‘Hey you guys, how’s it going? Is everything—?’
Blinking through the driving snow pinning us all to the ground, I saw a tall, curly haired woman I vaguely recognized from Angela Clark’s office wall walking into the studio.
‘Holy shit!’ she yelled, stopping dead in her tracks. ‘What the hell is going on?’
It was a fair question from where I was standing. Or rather, lying.
‘Stop screaming!’ Cici yelled over the roar of the powerful snow machine. ‘Everyone stop screaming.’
There was actually only one person screaming but Sadie was doing such a good job of it no one could have been blamed for thinking we’d brought a bus full of toddlers into the room and introduced them to a knife-wielding circus clown.
‘Turn it off!’ I shouted as loud as I could, cradling my blinking camera as James tried to scramble to his feet, grabbing a handful of boob as he went. ‘Please just turn it off!’
‘I’m trying!’ Cici wailed back. ‘The button is stuck.’
‘Help! Sadie screeched. She was pinned to the green wall behind us, the wind machine hurling relentless gobs of semi-frozen snow at her beautiful face. ‘I can’t move.’
Dropping her handbag by the door, the woman pulled off her suede high-heeled boots in the doorway and ran across the studio.
‘Get out of my damn way!’ She gave Cici a shove as she took over the controls of the snow machine, bashing every button with the flat of her hand.
‘Make it stop!’ Sadie wailed, ineffectually flapping her hands at the oncoming blizzard. ‘I can’t see!’
‘Cici, get her out of there!’ the woman shouted. Whoever she was, Cici knew not to mess with her. Without so much as an eye roll, she nodded and crawled into her homemade snowstorm on her hands and knees, spitting out snow as she went. I was impressed. I couldn’t even get her to stand up to pass me a pencil earlier in the day.
‘Oof,’ I grunted as a boot hit me in the back of the head as I tried to wriggle towards dry land.
‘Sorry,’ James called as he scurried out of the danger zone and joined Kekipi underneath the table. ‘Didn’t mean to.’
‘No problem, gents,’ I shouted back, spitting out a mouthful of snow and shoving my camera down the front of my jumper. ‘I’m fine.’
‘She’s fine,’ Kekipi insisted, grabbing hold of James’s hand. ‘She’s a feminist.’
‘I have a T-shirt with that on,’ James replied cheerfully, brushing the snow out of his hair. ‘Good for her.’
‘I can’t turn it off,’ my curly-haired hero yelled, hitting the snow machine with the heel of her boot before turning her attention to the power cable. I watched as she followed it to the wall and gave the plug a short, sharp tug. ‘But there’s always a way.’
I opened my eyes as the swirling snowstorm petered out into a delicate dusting of soft flakes and took a deep breath.
‘Are you OK?’ a loud American voice asked. Looking up, I saw a hand reach out towards me and pull me up to my feet. ‘I’m Jenny.’
Glancing across the studio, I watched while Sadie kicked off her insanely expensive and utterly destroyed shoes and turned them into weapons, bashing Cici in the head as she attempted to slither away from the scene of her disgrace.
‘Tess,’ I said, snapping my wet jumper away from the cold skin on my belly. ‘Should we stop them?’
‘Eh?’ Jenny slipped her boots back on, holding onto my arm for support. ‘If we help Cici now, she’ll never learn, and between you and me, I think there are a few lessons she could stand to learn the hard way. Is your camera OK?’
‘I don’t know,’ I said, taking it out and pressing the on and off button. Nothing happened. ‘Is the laptop all right?’
Kekipi reluctantly emerged from his James Jacobs occupied den and picked it up from the floor.
‘I’m sure we can fix it,’ he said, holding the screen in one hand and the keyboard, mostly parted from it, in the other. My stomach dropped to my feet and I felt the sudden urge to sit down and never get back up.
‘Come on.’ Jenny pulled me out of my trance and back into the safety zone behind the snow machine. ‘You need a drink.’
I nodded and watched a supermodel chase a Park Avenue princess around our accidental winter wonderland, cracking her across the arse with a shoe.
Now, there was a photo. If only I had a bloody camera so I could take it.
CHAPTER TEN
‘I’ve got to tell you, it was the most amazing thing I’ve ever seen.’ Jenny Lopez, snow-machine maestro, and my new personal hero, shoved her phone under Angela’s nose and swiped back and forth through this afternoon’s chaos. ‘You know I love Sadie, but man, I wish I’d thought of getting a snow machine for the apartment when she first moved in.’
Angela took the phone and zoomed in on the catfight.
‘Dear God,’ she whispered. ‘I wish I had been there to see this.’
‘I am so sorry,’ I said, wishing Jenny would put the phone away. ‘We definitely got the shot, though. And nothing was damaged, well, nothing much was damaged.’
Apart from my camera and my laptop, I added silently. They were both drying out inside bags of rice, stashed in the boot of the town car Al had loaned us for the day, a dark secret between me and Tony the driver; as far as everyone else was concerned, I had salvaged my equipment with nothing more than a little scratch. Even Kekipi seemed to believe that a laptop that had been virtually severed in two could be clipped back together.
According to the internet, there was nothing I could do for at least the next twelve hours while they dried out and I didn’t want to worry Angela unnecessarily. She had given me this amazing chance and I couldn’t even process the idea that it might be completely ballsed up. I was fairly certain the pictures already on the memory card would be OK, but I couldn’t be certain about anything on the laptop.
‘I got an email from Cici telling me she was very concerned about her shirt,’ Angela said, still swiping through the photos as though it were Tinder. ‘It was dry clean only.’
She skipped back to the picture of Cici, spreadeagled in the snow, with Sadie holding a stiletto above her head.
‘I wish I’d had this before we sent out the company Christmas cards,’ she said, enlarging and enlarging until she could properly see the look of terror in Cici’s eyes. ‘This is priceless.’
I had emailed Agent Veronica to tell her about the job but all I’d received in response was a curse-littered note about working below her set rate and bleeping me and her up our bleeps, so it was safe to say she was annoyed with me. The last thing I needed was bad feedback from the one job I’d managed to book. If I lost my agent and gained a reputation for almost killing people on set, I’d be utterly buggered. Two steps forward, three steps back was no use to anyone.
‘I don’t think it was as bad as it looks in those pictures,’ I lied. ‘Really, it was all over in a matter of seconds.’
Which was just long enough to destroy all my equipment.
‘It was carnage,’ Kekipi qualified. Always so helpful. He leaned across me to take a better look at Jenny’s photo of him and James, clutching each other underneath the folding food table. ‘Could someone forward me that?’ he asked.
‘You’re not helping,’ I hissed, kicking him in the shin as Jenny and Angela went over the pictures one more time.
‘Tess, love …’ Kekipi pierced a fat-looking olive with a cocktail stick and patted me on the back, ‘it was a disaster. We’re lucky no one died. But you got the photos you needed, so why worry about it?’
Why worry indeed? I thought, swilling my wine around in the glass. I still felt sick to my stomach and it really wasn’t going down well.
‘Yeah, Tess, no one is blaming you for this,’ Jenny said, still unable to take her eyes off her phone. ‘Shit like this happens to everyone.’
‘Really?’ I said, peering down at a photo of Cici crawling in front of the camera while Sadie lay on the floor, locked forever in an open-mouthed sc
ream in the background.
‘Well, OK, no, it doesn’t,’ she replied. ‘But shit like this happens to us. Don’t sweat it. You’ve been shooting all day, you coped with Cici all day, you took a bad spill from the top of a stepladder – if anyone deserves to unwind with a drink, it’s you.’
I looked hopefully at Angela who had already turned her attention to the dinner menu.
‘Oh, yeah,’ she agreed. ‘Remind me to tell you about the time we fell in the fountains in Las Vegas. Classic Clark. As long as you got the shots and no one died, I’d chalk this one up as a win.’
‘And there was the time I was living with a hooker in LA,’ Jenny added. ‘And remember when James wanted you to be his beard? And when Cici had your luggage blown up in Paris?’
‘I already told her about that,’ Angela nodded. ‘Good times, happy memories, everyone’s a winner.’
‘I feel so bad,’ I said. Of course they thought everything would be OK; they didn’t know we might have lost 90 per cent of the photos I’d taken. ‘I should have told her we didn’t need the snow machine. I knew we’d already got the shots we needed but I didn’t know how to explain it to her without pissing her off.’
‘Firstly, you can’t tell Cici Spencer shit without pissing her off,’ Jenny said, topping up her glass. ‘Secondly, you need to learn how to use your voice and thirdly, drink up. I want to order another bottle. How long are you going to nurse that glass?’
‘Jenny is very wise,’ Angela said, grabbing an olive before Kekipi ate them all, proving Jenny wasn’t the only wise one. ‘She’s read more self-help books than anyone else I’ve ever met. Also, I would like more wine, please.’
Jenny nodded. ‘I’m basically Oprah only not a sellout.’
‘Translation, “without the billions of dollars”,’ Angela added, giving her a sly look.
‘I don’t whore out my powers,’ she countered, nipping the olive right out of Angela’s fingers. Best friend food thievery, I noted; it was familiar. ‘I can’t be bought.’
Angela almost choked on her sauvignon blanc. ‘That’s a lie and we both know it.’
‘Whatever,’ Jenny said, smiling as she swatted her with a menu. ‘But seriously, if you knew you were done, why didn’t you tell her? You’re the photographer, you’re in charge.’
‘But she was the client! Wasn’t I supposed to do what she asked?’ I said, looking to Kekipi for help and not getting it.
‘You were in charge,’ she said, pointing a perfectly painted gold nail in my face. ‘You should have told her you had the shot.’
‘You’ll pick it up with experience,’ Angela offered, playing good cop to Jenny’s downright terrifying one. ‘Next time you’ll know.’
‘If there is a next time.’ I raked my hands through my hair and fought back my frustration.
‘We can sit here all night and kiss your ass,’ Jenny added, taking hold of my ponytail and flicking through the ends. ‘But if you just want to wallow, there’s nothing anyone can do to help you.’
I sniffed and sipped my wine. ‘I guess …’
‘I know,’ she countered. ‘Also, you need to drop by the office tomorrow, I have some conditioner you need.’
‘Oh, I have conditioner,’ I said, examining my own dry ends. ‘Thanks, though.’
‘It wasn’t a suggestion,’ she told me, a severe clip to her words as she dug a business card out of her handbag. ‘Here’s the address, come by any time. I’ll be there all day.’
‘She’s right, though,’ Angela said. ‘Not about the hair stuff, although she’s usually right about that too. So much of getting ahead nowadays is believing in yourself and you seemed pretty bloody convinced of yourself in my office yesterday or I wouldn’t have given you the job. You can’t let someone like Cici bring you down. There are an awful lot of those in this world.’
‘Agreed,’ Jenny said. ‘And for the record, I’m always right about hair stuff.’
‘There are going to be a lot of people telling you you’re shit,’ Angela carried on. ‘Either because they’re jealous of you or because they really think it. You have to be able to go out there with your photos and say, “oi you, look at my photos, they’re amazing,” no matter what anyone else says, not only when people are nice to you.’
Jenny turned to look at her friend. ‘Were you drinking before you got here?’ she asked.
Angela pinched her shoulders together in a shrug. And then nodded.
‘Yeah, I figured,’ Jenny sighed. ‘Your delivery is off but you’re right. You’ve gotta believe in you or no one else will.’
‘You think she’s a mess at work, you should ask her about her love life,’ Kekipi said, clucking his tongue. ‘Now there’s a story.’
Both of the other women picked up their glasses and downed the contents in tandem.
‘Spill,’ Jenny ordered.
‘Please,’ Angela added.
‘I’d rather not,’ I replied.
‘I’ll start,’ Kekipi interrupted. ‘So, we met in Hawaii and there was this man called Nick Miller there as well …’
Refreshing my texts one more time, I saw a sad face emoji from Amy. She couldn’t make drinks because she was still working. Whatever topsy-turvy bizarro world I’d walked into, I didn’t want anything more to do with it.
‘And now we’re waiting for him to text back,’ Kekipi concluded, giving me a nudge as I tapped out a reply to Amy. ‘We are still waiting, aren’t we?’
‘We are,’ I confirmed. ‘But it’s been twenty-four hours, I think it’s time to give up.’
‘Doesn’t sound like a bad idea,’ Angela said, waving to the waitress for another bottle of wine as I got to work on my full glass. ‘He loves you, he doesn’t love you, he loves you, he doesn’t love you. Trust me, I dated one of those wankers before I met my husband, Alex. The only person they love is themselves. All this “I’m so damaged and hurt” stuff is just an excuse to treat you like shit and then say “I told you so” with a smile on their face on their way out the door.’
‘Fair,’ Jenny agreed. ‘He does also sound like something of an asshat. I want to hear more about this Charlie dude.’ She turned to Kekipi with a very serious expression on her face. ‘Which one is hotter?’
‘Oh, please don’t,’ I muttered. ‘Charlie is off the table. They’re both off the table. There’s nothing on the table but wine, really.’
He cocked his head to one side and considered the options. ‘Charlie is taller,’ he said, contemplating. ‘But Nick is definitely sexier. That said, Charlie definitely has a “hot boy next door in a Reese Witherspoon movie” thing going on. I feel as though he is heavily involved in sports. Great thighs.’
‘So, Charlie is cute and Nick is hot, am I right?’ Jenny asked. ‘And they’re both assholes. This is a tough one.’
‘It really doesn’t matter which one is which,’ I said, watching the waitress bringing our wine over from the bar. ‘I’m not interested in Charlie and Nick isn’t interested in me. End of story.’
No one at the table looked convinced.
‘But, hypothetically, if they both came running through the door and begged you to forgive them,’ Angela said, her face a picture of innocence. ‘Which one would you go home with? Hypothetically.’
‘If you had to,’ Jenny added. ‘If you had to or you’d die.’
Sloping back against the booth I fingered the ends of my hair. She was right, they were very dry.
‘She’d choose Nick,’ Kekipi said, picking up his glass and taking a long sip. ‘Definitely.’
‘I don’t know,’ Jenny said, regarding me carefully with dark eyes. ‘She’s taking her time. And everyone knows the Nicks of this world are not reliable. You can’t reform an asshole. Once a douchecanoe, always a douchecanoe.’
‘Didn’t you say that about my husband once upon a time?’ Angela asked. ‘God knows he’d been round the block more than once before we met.’
‘I don’t remember calling him a douchecanoe,’ Jenny frowned. ‘
But yeah, he and the block were super-familiar. Although I’m pretty certain Alex is the exception, not the rule. You caught him on a good day: with dudes it’s all about timing.’
‘And what if the timing is right with Nick?’ Kekipi argued. ‘What if he has spent the last couple of months thinking about how badly he screwed everything up and if only he had a chance to change things, he would?’
With newfound resolve, I finished my first glass of wine with two big gulps while the waitress waited and held it out for her to fill it to the brim.
‘Have you eaten today?’ Kekipi asked as I chugged my second glass.
I shook my head and the room shook with it. ‘I’m fine,’ I assured him. ‘I’ll be fine.’
‘It was a long day and you deserve a drink,’ he relented. ‘But you can’t vomit in a taxi, there’s an extortionate cleaning fee here.’
Stopping mid-sip, I put my glass down on the table but kept my hand clenched around the stem. ‘There is?’
‘Ask your best friend,’ he said, raising his eyebrows.
‘I don’t know. Life is short,’ Jenny said, still debating my romantic situation, or lack thereof. ‘What happens if she walks away from the Nick situation and spends the rest of her life asking herself what if?’
‘I’m not going to,’ I said, interrupting. ‘I’ve texted him and he hasn’t replied – that’s a fairly clear indication of where his head is at, isn’t it?’
‘Perhaps we’re overlooking something,’ Angela said, turning to face me head on. ‘Tess, do you love Nick?’
‘Ahhdunno,’ I replied with a shrug. ‘Maybe, sort of?’
They all stared at me.
‘Yes?’ I said, miserable. ‘I totally do.’
‘Oh, you poor girl,’ Jenny said, her big brown eyes full of pity. ‘You’re in so deep you don’t even know it.’
‘Oh God!’ I covered my face with my hands. ‘When does it stop? It doesn’t make sense.’
‘Hate to be the one to break it to you,’ she replied as the rest of the table went silent. ‘But love doesn’t make sense. Can’t rationalize this one, honey, you’ve got to go with your gut.’