A Groom With a View (23 page)

“Come in and have a seat.” Guido closed the door behind us. I caught a last glimpse of Eloise’s fascinated face. “So, how are things?”

I twisted the cap off a bottle of water from the tray Guido always kept on the boardroom table and took a sip. It didn’t help – my voice still came out a husky whisper.

“Not good,” I said. “Nick and I. . . the wedding’s not going ahead. I’m not sure what I’m going to do. I stayed at Eloise and Dean’s place last night but obviously I can’t forever. I’m going to have to sort myself out and get a flat.”

Guido shook his head. “Pippa, I’m so sorry to hear that. Do you need to take some more time off?”

“No! I don’t want to make a fuss. I need to be working, I think. It’ll help.”

Guido looked unconvinced. “That’s what I wanted to discuss, of course. But I wonder if now is the best time.”

I stared at the bubbles in my water and said, “If I’m not going to have a job any more, I may as well know. And whatever decision I need to make about work might help with all the other ones. So it’s probably best if you break it to me now. Try and be gentle though.” I managed a feeble smile.

Guido said, “First of all, I want to reassure you that I value you enormously, and appreciate all the work you’ve done for me and the group over the years. I don’t want you to be in any doubt about that. If you’d prefer to discuss your future here another time, that’s fine. Or we can carry on?”

“Carry on.”

“Pippa, what happened in South Africa was obviously deeply embarrassing for me on a personal level. But that’s my problem. However, unfortunately the way it impacts on the business affects all of us. The loss of the Thatchell’s partnership is going to mean restructuring, and rethinking what we do here.”

I nodded again. It was the sack – I could feel it hovering over me, like a London pigeon about to dump a load of shit on my head.

“But the publicity – and almost all of it has been terrible – has had an effect I frankly didn’t expect.”

“What’s that?” I croaked.

“Across the group, bookings have gone sky high. January and February are normally our worst months in the restaurants, as you know – it’s winter, people are on diets and not drinking, money is tight, businesses’ financial year-end celebrations haven’t yet begun. But we’ve had an outstanding month so far, and it looks like continuing. Over the past year or so, I’ve been giving some serious consideration to expanding the restaurant part of the group internationally. When this. . . this news broke, I thought that would be the end of that idea. But it isn’t. One of the investors I’ve been in discussions with confirmed yesterday that he is still very keen to go ahead with the launch of the first Osteria Falconi outside the UK.”

“Great!” I said, thinking, but what does this mean for me? You won’t need a glorified microwave-operator in New York, or wherever it’s going to be.

“Pippa, when we were in Franschhoek last year, I got the impression that you were very keen to move back into the restaurant kitchen. I didn’t mention this at the time, because the opportunity was still very vague at that stage. And besides, you had other things on your mind. But now your personal circumstances have changed, and I thought perhaps this is something you’d consider.”

“What, exactly?” I asked.

“Head chef of Osteria Falconi in Dubai,” Guido said. “We’re looking at an autumn launch, so we have eight months to get it off the ground. That will mean you relocating in the next couple of months, initially with a lot of international travel between the UAE and the UK, then being based there full-time. The restaurant will have two hundred covers, focussing on high-end cuisine with an international theme. It will be very, very hard work, but also very rewarding, professionally and financially.”

He named a salary that seemed unimaginably high.

“Do I have to decide now?” I said, with a lurch of fear.

Guido laughed. “Of course not! I wanted you to be the first to know that the opportunity is there, that’s all. I’ll email you a PDF with the detailed proposal, and you can think about it, chat to Helen about the HR side of things, come to me with any questions. I don’t need a decision immediately. It’s a huge change and a big commitment, and I want you to be sure you’re making the right decision. So maybe you could let me know two weeks from today?”

The Monday after what would have been my wedding day. It felt as if there was some weird planetary alignment going on, with events leading up to this fateful day, randomly selected by the fact that a couple from Essex had decided to get married abroad instead of in Hampshire, and now their choice had linked my fate inextricably with the first Saturday in February.

I said, “I’ll think about it, of course. And I’ll talk to Helen. And Guido, thank you. It means so much that you think I could do this.”

“Think? I know you can, sweetheart. You’ve proved your talent and your work ethic over and over again. We wouldn’t even be having this conversation if I didn’t believe you were absolutely capable of making a success of it.”

“Thank you,” I said again. “But. . . Guido, I don’t know how to say this without it sounding like I don’t love the idea. I do love it. But I need to know what my options are. If I say no, what happens then?”

He said, “I don’t want to lose you, Pippa, you know that. But after this series I doubt Platinum will commission another. And that will mean winding down the operation here and focussing on the restaurants. We’ll always need good people. There will be a place for you in the group if you don’t want to move abroad, in London or perhaps in Manchester. Don’t worry, your position is secure. This is win-win for you.”

I thanked him again and left the boardroom. Win-win, he’d said. But heading up a shiny, exciting new restaurant in Dubai on a mega-salary versus going and being a chef de partie in Manchester sounded more like hitting the Euromillions jackpot versus winning a fiver on a scratchcard to me.

It was only when I sat back down at my desk that I realised I’d completely forgotten about Gabriel’s email. Depending on what he had to tell me, I might have no decision to make at all.

I opened the email again and started reading where I’d left off.

I don’t know how to say this in a way that doesn’t embarrass us both. If we were face to face I’d buy you a drink and it would be easier. But maybe that wouldn’t be the best plan, given that you passed out cold the last time I saw you!

Pippa, here goes. I just wanted to tell you, in case you don’t know already, that nothing happened that night after you fell asleep. I wouldn’t want you to think – God, I’m so sorry to have to say this – that I was the kind of guy who takes advantage of a woman who’s had too much to drink. I didn’t. I took your swimming costume off because you might catch cold. Your hair was really wet too but there was nothing I could do about that.

But that’s not what I told the other guys. It was totally shit of me to lie but I guess I wanted to look like some kind of big man. I don’t feel like one though, I just feel like a dick. I’m so very sorry.

I hope you’re okay, and things are not too bad with your boyfriend. It sounds like you really love each other. I would hate to be the one to screw up your relationship and I feel really bad that things even went as far they did (not that anyone would ever regret kissing you. You’re hot. And I’m digging myself deeper into a hole here, aren’t I?).

Sibo gave me your email address, when I told her what really happened. Only after she’d finished shouting at me, though. She sends her love.

Gabriel

I put my face down on the keyboard and waited for the full-body blush that had swept over me to subside. God, I was a fool. A drunken, stupid fool. But mixed with my mortification was a huge sense of relief.

“Are you okay, Pippa?” asked Eloise.

“Fine,” I said. “Just think I might be coming down with something. I feel a bit faint.”

It was true, I did. I opened Gabriel’s email and read it again. Then I sent a very brief reply.

Hey. Thanks for getting in touch, I appreciate it. I’m glad I know what really happened now.

Take care,

Pippa

I pressed send, then checked that the message had left my outbox and truly gone on its way. Then I deleted Gabriel’s message and my reply. He was a sweet boy, even if he was selfish. I hoped he’d have a good life and be happy. But I never, ever wanted to hear from him or think about him again. I was double-checking that Gabriel’s email had definitely been deleted and would never be seen again (unless at some point Guido gets done for phone-hacking, which seems unlikely), when another message landed in my inbox.

From: [email protected]

To: [email protected]

Subject: Meeting

Dear Pippa

I hope you’re well. Once again, thanks for all your hard work on Guido’s African Safari – it was a pleasure filming with you.

Mel and I are currently working on a pitch for a new cookery show. It’s around the theme of cooking with kids – how healthy eating habits and a lifelong love of food can be engendered in children and young people. We’d be going into schools and colleges, and ultimately helping a group of teenagers to set up their own pop-up food cart. Think Jamie’s School Dinners meets The Apprentice, but younger and fresher in its approach.

We’re keen to find someone to front the show who is relatively unknown, who can really relate to our young participants and audience, and has a warm, bubbly screen presence. Of course this is still early days and we’re considering a number of potential presenters. However, the team and I were extremely impressed with your work on Safari, and would like to meet with you to discuss this opportunity, and others going forward.

Please let me know if this might be of interest, and what your availability is like in the next couple of weeks.

Regards

Zack

For the first time in what felt like ages, I had something to look forward to. Feeling considerably happier than I had done when I got out of bed that morning, I went to meet Katharine for lunch.

CHAPTER NINETEEN

From: [email protected]

To: [email protected]

Subject: Zweep pitch

Right, I’m attaching the Keynote presentation again with the amends you mentioned. I think it looks shit-hot. Let me know how it goes tomorrow – I bet they’ll be blown away. Mostly because if you get it, I’ll be sending you an invoice for fuckloads, haha.

And, mate? Congratulations :D

N

“I got here early,” Katharine said. “This place is so popular at the moment, you have to queue for a table if you turn up after about half twelve.” I could see why – the banh mi bar, with its stripped floorboards and stainless steel counter, was hipster heaven. Katharine herself looked the part, in a tartan pinafore with the kind of woolly white tights only those of gazelle-like proportions can get away with, and glasses with heavy black frames.

“Coffee?” I said, when I’d kissed her hello and asked how she was.

“Jasmine tea, please,” she said. “And I’ll have a five-spice chicken banh mi and a steamed pork bun if you’re ordering food. I’m starving.”

“So, how are things with Iain?” I asked, when I’d returned to our table carrying a tray piled with our lunch.

“He’s on best behaviour at the moment,” she said. “Because. . . well, I’d more or less decided it was over. But then I found out. . .” she glanced down at her tiny waist, “we’re having a baby.”

I gawped at her. “Wow. Congratulations. That’s amazing news. When did you realise?”

“A week or so after your hen night,” she said. “God, I feel so guilty, I got so pissed that night. But my midwife says as it was just the once, I shouldn’t worry, and it happens to lots of people. But still. It was such a shock, because as I told you, things with Iain weren’t great, nookie-wise. But there was one time when we were on honeymoon, and I guess it only takes one.”

“And what about the other girl?” I asked.

“Ludmilla?” she wrinkled her nose. “She’s still working there. But he says it’s over. Pippa, I’ve been doing a lot of thinking. I’m not stupid. I don’t know if Iain’s going to be faithful to me, ever. Forsaking all others – it’s just not his cup of tea. But the alternative seemed a lot worse. I’m not cut out to be a single mother, bringing up my kid in some poky two-bedroom flat in Stoke Newington. I want to be with Iain.”

It was typical of Katharine, I reflected, to regard trendy Stoke Newington as some kind of social Siberia.

“So I decided to forgive him,” she continued calmly. “I’ll get a lot of practice at that in the future, I expect. I imagine it gets easier with time. And I love him, I still do, in spite of everything. He’ll be a great dad, I’ll get to have the lifestyle I want for myself and our kids. If there’s the occasional fling with some random work experience girl, I’ll deal with it. He’ll always come back to me.”

“Katharine, I’m so pleased you’re making a go of things. I really am. But are you sure? It must have been such a shock to find out you’re pregnant so soon after the whole thing with Ludmilla. Maybe you need a bit more time to think about it? To make sure you’re doing what will really make you happy?”

She laughed. “Pippa, you’re such a romantic. I used to be, too, but not anymore. I’ve decided you need to be pragmatic about relationships. I’ll never love anyone as much as I love Iain, and he loves me too, in his way. If that changes, I’ll think again.

“But anyway.” She put her warm hand over mine, leaving a smear of soy sauce. “Sorry. Here, I’ll wipe that off. I haven’t been feeling a bit sick, you know, just fucking starving all the time. You and Nick. What’s going on? One minute you were all loved up – and you really were, you’re the happiest couple I know. Then the next thing, it’s all off. What gives?”

I put the remains of my sandwich back on the minimalist square plate and sipped my Diet Coke. “God, Katharine, it’s such a mess. You’re right, everything was fine until we started planning our wedding, and then it all went horribly wrong. His mother’s a nightmare, and she was living with us and I hated it. And he got totally obsessed with the wedding, to the point where I couldn’t imagine going through with it all. And then we had a couple of massive rows, and there was the thing on his stag do, and then in South Africa I got pissed and snogged someone else, and that was just kind of the last straw. It felt like if I didn’t end it and we got married, I’d be making this massive mistake. But now I think I’ve made an even bigger one, and I don’t know what to do.”

“Hold on,” Katharine said. “One thing at a time. What thing on his stag do?”

“He spent the whole day instant-messaging his ex-girlfriend,” I said. “And then met up with her somewhere. And I. . . I’ve always been jealous of her. It felt like such a betrayal.”

Katharine burst out laughing. “That? Oh my God, Pippa, you didn’t take that seriously, did you? It was really awkward, Iain says. Nick was pretty wasted, obviously, they all were. But then this woman turned up and she was more pissed than any of them and she was, like, all over him, and Nick was going, ‘No, no, you’ve got it all wrong, I love Pippa!’ And then Iain put her in a taxi and Nick came back to ours and crashed on our sofa. It was only the second night Iain had been home and I wasn’t too pleased about it, but Nick didn’t hang about the next day because he said he needed to get home and feed the cat.”

I looked down at my plate, then up again at Katharine. I felt weirdly dislocated – as if reality had shifted. Bethany the cool girl, the irresistible woman who could take Nick from me with one snap of her fingers, had suddenly been transformed, diminished in my mind to a figure of fun and pity, a woman who turned up drunk at a stag night and had to be packed off home.

“But what did you do?” Katharine asked.

“Ugh. I was so stupid. I got pissed at a party on our last night there. And there was this guy I was working with. He was sweet, and we flirted a bit, and I didn’t think anything would come of it. It seemed so safe. And then I read that thing about the stag night, and Nick and I had been arguing, and it seemed like I could either carry on with the wedding, feeling like I really didn’t want to, or do something crazy to stop it, to make our whole relationship implode. So I decided to sleep with him. But in the end nothing happened – it was just a snog really.”

“Nothing happened? Well, that’s your get out of jail free card, right there.”

I shook my head. “No, Katharine. The thing is, I meant for it to happen. Well, I didn’t really, but it could have happened, and I didn’t do anything to stop it. It was just luck. And the wedding’s all off now, anyway. We’ve made other plans.”

“But you can have a different wedding!” Katharine was sounding like her old self again, the woman whose wedding was planned down to the last placecard, months in advance. “You could go abroad. You could have a small registry office wedding and lunch somewhere fabulous. It doesn’t have to be huge.”

I had the feeling she was about to whip out her database of alternative wedding venues. “No, Katharine. Honestly. Maybe Nick and I can be friends again, but I can’t see us getting past this. It’s all too shitty and horrible.”

“Pippa, my husband had an affair, and I’ve forgiven him. Well, I haven’t, totally. It’s going to take a lot more time and a lot more diamonds for that to happen. But we’re moving past it, because we have a future together and we love each other. You and Nick could do that too. All you’ve had is a disagreement over the guest list, at the end of the day. Look at my friends Neil and Adam. They argued so much before their civil partnership you won’t believe. Neil wanted their labradoodle to be the ring bearer and Adam thought it was stupid – the idea, not the dog – and they had a screaming row in Selfridges and got thrown out by security. And they’ve been married for three years now and there’s never a cross word between them. Planning a wedding is stressful.”

“I wish I’d known just how stressful it would get,” I said miserably. “I’d never, ever have gone ahead with it. We could have just stayed as we were.”

“But you can’t stay as you are forever,” Katharine said. “Relationships change and grow. When I met Iain I thought he was a good catch, nothing more. It took him being unfaithful to remind me how much I care about him. Did he tell you what happened on Christmas day?”

I nodded, remembering Iain’s account of how Katharine had flown at Ludmilla’s boyfriend and stopped him from beating Iain to a pulp, in the manner of a vixen protecting her cubs.

“I love him so much I want to eat him,” she said. “But then I want to eat everything at the moment, so that’s not exactly news. Think about it, Pippa. Talk to Nick. I must get back to the office.”

Katharine, I reflected as I watched her swish away down the street in her vintage lime trenchcoat, was a force to be reckoned with. I wished it was her who was going to talk to Nick about our relationship, not me. She could make a happy ending out of cod cheeks and bashed-up salt and vinegar crisps.

I may have been grateful for Katharine’s advice, but following it was another matter. Over the next few days, I composed countless drafts of emails to Nick and deleted them unsent. I began text after text, but I couldn’t find words to say that weren’t, “I’ve been shit. Forgive me.” Which, whilst true, didn’t strike me as the best way to win back the man I loved. And the one time I plucked up the courage to call him, after too many beers in the pub with Eloise and Dean one night, his phone went straight to voicemail and I wimped out and ended the call without leaving a message, then took the sim card out of my phone and made Eloise promise not to give it back to me until the next day.

If it wasn’t for work, I’m sure I would have been reduced to a gibbering obsessive-compulsive wreck, spending the rest of my days composing emails to Nick until eventually neighbours alerted police to a foul smell and my decomposing body was discovered, a mobile phone clutched in my cold, dead hand. But I was saved from this fate by Guido, who announced that to help me make a decision about the move to Dubai, I should spend some time in as many of the restaurants in the Falconi empire as I could, working in the kitchens and getting a sense of the culinary direction the group’s chefs were taking.

I went to Falconi Familia, one of the five informal restaurants ‘where good food and good friends meet’, and ate braised shortrib on buttered noodles, followed by cassata sundae. I tried the nine-course menu degustation at Osteria Falconi, which had changed completely since I worked there, and was now all Noma-ed up with wild herbs foraged on Hampstead Heath and scatterings of truffle soil in the plates. I troughed pizza by the slice at Guido to Go in the Bullring in Birmingham, and heard about the new branches that were planned for Leeds and Newcastle. And by the time my odyssey ended, at Guido’s Grill in Richmond, all I could face was bit of seared tuna and a small green salad – I could feel the weight I’d lost on the poached-egg-and-heartbreak diet at Mum’s creeping back on. Perhaps I should write a book, I reflected, outlining a swift and effective weight loss regimen involving cancelling your wedding at the eleventh hour and eating burnt toast while lying in a single bed.

I was half-heartedly pushing lettuce leaves around my plate and wondering whether I still possessed even a fraction of the skill of the seasoned chefs whose food I’d enjoyed and admired over the past few days, and whether Guido had entirely taken leave of his senses to even consider me for the job in Dubai, when a text message came through on my phone. It was from Erica.

Dear Pippa, it’s Erica here. I am sorry to bother you.

I imagined her sitting at our kitchen table with Spanx on her lap, the message written out in longhand next to her, painstakingly transcribing it on to her phone, using one finger to tap it out with agonising slowness. I rolled my eyes in annoyance, but, to my surprise, my exasperation was mixed with fondness.

It’s about Spanx. He went out this morning and I haven’t seen him for a couple of hours. Nick is at a meeting. He (cat not Nick) is not usually allowed out, is he? I am a bit concerned. Am going out to look for him, but think you should know. Very best, Erica.

The fondness evaporated as quickly as alcohol from flambéed brandy. What the hell was she thinking? She’d lived with us for weeks, she knew Spanx wasn’t allowed further than the balcony. And despite his good looks and charm, Spanx has always been a bit of a non-starter in the feline intelligence stakes. He once tried to get to some fillet steaks I’d left on the worktop by walking across the lit stove, and I’d only just rescued him before his tail caught fire. I always had to bath with the door closed, because he’d try and drink the water and fall in. He had all the instinct for self-preservation of a hard-boiled egg. And Erica had waited – what, an hour? Maybe even two or three, before letting me know he was missing. He’d get flattened by a 188 bus on Jamaica Road for sure, if he hadn’t already been.

I rushed into the kitchen and thanked Serge, the chef, for my lunch, and said I was sorry, but I wouldn’t have time to try the lemon granita after all, because I was needed urgently back at the office. Then I legged it to the station and jumped on board a train just as it was about to leave, but forgot to check which one it was, and discovered too late that it was the slow one that was going to take me on a scenic tour of south-west London lasting almost an hour before arriving at Waterloo.

I tried Erica’s number, but her phone just rang. I remembered that answering it generally involved hours of fumbling in her handbag and much muttering of, “Now, is it the green button or the red one? Where do I. . . Oh dear, it’s stopped. How do I see who was ringing? Nicky, could you possibly. . .?” and so on. In a crisis, she’d lose what little technological nous she had altogether. I sent a text anyway, telling her I’d be there as soon as I possibly could.

Then I rang Nick. It was easy, I didn’t hesitate at all, and when his voicemail picked up straight away, I found the words spilling out of me as if they’d been waiting there all along.

“It’s me. I’ve just had a text from your Mum, Spanx has gone AWOL. I’m on my way home. Hopefully it will all be okay. I really, really hope you’re okay too. If you can get away, maybe I’ll see you there. If you’re not, I’ll let you know what happens. I’m really sorry about everything, Nick. I hope we can talk later. I can’t imagine life without Spanx.”