Air Kisses (7 page)

As I neared the kitchen, Dec grabbed my hand gently. ‘I hope this isn’t going to hurt through the night. It should be okay, but you might want some painkillers in the morning.’ He stopped and looked squarely into my eyes. ‘Hannah, I’m so sorry, I don’t know what got into me. I’m so sorry…’ His eyes were wide with concern. ‘Are you okay?’

‘Totally.’ I smiled, feigning absolute control and calm. ‘It’s so fine. Our little secret.’

His look didn’t change; I had expected relief.

‘Okay, yeah, probably a good idea.’ He nodded, but was still frowning.

‘Well, it’s late and I can already feel my hangover creeping in – I think I’ll go.’

‘You need a cab?’

‘Yes, please.’

‘I’ll call one now.’

But I didn’t want a cab, and I didn’t want to go home. I wanted to lay down on the sofa with Dec, wrapped up in his arms, and let him kiss me like that again and again…

He turned and walked into the lounge room, allowing me a small precious moment to reflect on what had just happened before Iz bowled into the hallway.

‘Oh! There you are!’ Her eyes went to my hand. ‘You’re all bandaged up. Good. He’s a good boy that Declan.’

I blushed but she didn’t see it. Now would be the time to tell her. The
only
time. After this, she would feel like I’d kept something from her, and she’d get the shits.

‘Do you need a cab?’

‘Dec’s calling me one now.’

‘Ever the gentleman. I’m telling you, girl, you should make your move.’

I cleared my throat. That’s what liars did, Mum always said, they cleared their throats in a subconscious effort to release the lie. ‘You’re crazy, my little Iz. Hey, thanks for dinner, it was just what I needed. The cut, too – I was dying to try out the sliced-skin look.’

She laughed. ‘You’re always welcome here. Now, let’s get your bag and I’ll walk you out the front.’

As we walked to the front door, I considered telling her that I had to say goodbye to Dec, but that would’ve been way too obvious.

Our little secret it was, then.

Chapter Seven

‘But we need to make it look as though it’s editorial. Do you know what I mean?’

‘Yes, Marley, we did it for Crunch gym-wear, remember?’

‘Good, cool, nice one. Hey, is Hannah around?’

‘Not sure, she might be in the goo room.’

‘What do you think of her?’

‘I love her. Why?’

‘But isn’t she like, boring?’

‘You’re such a bitch. She’s gorgeous and cute and has become a very good friend while you’ve been away. Be nice.’

‘I’m always nice.’

‘No you’re not; you’re a bitch. A rotten advertising bitch, single-handedly proving why stereotypes exist.’

‘I resent that.’

‘You know it’s true.’

‘All right, but does she have to come tonight? You’ll have to babysit her all night and you’ll be boring.’

‘I will not. It’s
you
who’ll be hard work.’

‘All right, shit, I’ll be nice! Be ready at six. And can you wear your hair up? I love it up.’

‘Jesus, anything else? Should I buy a new top at lunch? Pop into Prada, maybe?’

Still facing my computer, I turned my head a very surreptitious nineteen degrees to watch Marley leave. She was wearing possibly the best-fitting jeans I’d ever seen, lush brown boots that went past her knees to romantically cuddle her child-like thighs, layers of white and grey singlets, and a cool cropped black jacket that radiated a price in the high three digits or low four. Her hair was a shade of rich-woman caramel. Her arse was a video-clip arse. It was perfectly round and high and smugly suggested that she worked out with a handsome young personal trainer to maintain it.

I knew she was close to Jay, but
why
mystified me. Jay was so warm and affectionate, while Marley strutted around the joint as though her last name were Beckert. She was on the
Gloss
advertising team. She was a demonic saleswoman, and earned triple the salary of us editorial kids, a fact her wardrobe reflected: she was always extraordinarily well-dressed.

She was an account manager now, but there was talk she was soon going to be made advertising director of
Gloss
, aka ‘top dog’.

Which meant I would have to deal with her. A lot. I was constantly being pulled into meetings to discuss events and sponsorships with Karen and Laura, the current ad director. Thing was, Laura was pregnant, and her pregnancy brain was becoming a major issue. She had recently presented us with a proposal for
doing a sponsorship deal with a lawnmower company.

Despite the fact I found Marley to be a complete bitch, I desperately wanted her to like me. I tried to figure out why, and it took about three seconds: she’s pretty and dresses immaculately. Obviously, she appealed to my inner caveman. Or magpie. Whichever it was that liked shiny, pretty things.

As Jacinta tapped away nonchalantly on her keyboard, I wondered if she knew I’d heard her exchange with Gnarly Marley. I was too lame to ask her in person so I sent an email – yes, to someone sitting five metres away – and asked if she was sure it would be cool if I came tonight, because I could easily not, it’d be no problem at all.

‘Don’t be silly, Atkins,’ she yelled out. ‘We’ll have fun; Carter Communications know how to throw a good party. Too much money, that lot.’

‘Okay, cool,’ I said,
dying
to ask if it was okay with Marley, because from what I could ascertain, my simple jeans, top and heels combo was going to make the whole crew look unfashionable and repulsive.

Then with a ding, a name dropped into my inbox: a group email from Marley.

I was stunned.
She included me
. This was monumental. I decided to swallow my insecurities and accept her Fendi coat-hanger
of kindness tonight at the party. After all, it’s easy to be confident and friendly when you’re drunk.

And I’d know. It’s no fiction that when you’re single you go out drinking more. Around 400 per cent more. In fact, if I was honest, part of the reason I’d been okay about the whole Jesse thing was because I was drinking four nights out of seven.

Tonight’s party was the perfect example. It was on a Wednesday night and it was for a cable TV show none of us had to write about. Regardless, a group of mag fillies were off to consume exotic cocktails and deep-fried canapés like we hadn’t just done it on Monday night and wouldn’t follow it up with a similar imprint on Friday night.

The thing about working in magazines – well, in beauty or fashion magazines – is that there are
way
too many functions. We weren’t celebrities, but as we made the party look good with our bright colours and shiny hair, we got invited to most things.

And because with invites comes pressure to look good, my wardrobe was taking an absolute hiding. I no longer had a line between ‘work clothes’ and ‘going out’ clothes.

My shopping expeditions had become not dissimilar to working out long division:

‘All right, so, if I buy this dress, I can wear it to afternoon tea or breakfasty beauty launches, but I won’t be able to wear it to that posh fragrance cocktail party because I’ll look like I’m off to a baby shower. No good. Put it back. Oooh, but this
Stepford
Wives
blouse will make the crossover beautifully. Sextastic with a pencil skirt.
Reeowr
– you clever little minx. Oops, hang on! Get a load of those puppies! Toooo much cleavage. Terrible if I suddenly get pulled in to make a presentation with the advertising team. Okay. Ooh,
this
dress looks good.
Pretty
… What a delicious Salma Hayek-esque shade of red. Innocuous
enough in the breast department to see me through a fine-dining lunch, but still slinky enough for Friday-night drinks without making me look like I went home and got all tarted up. Perfect.
Excellent
work, Hannah. Take five…’

And this was only when I was
buying
the threads. Once I had them safely home, I was expected to:

a) coordinate them with shoes, non-visible undie-lines, the right bra, belt, necklace and earrings

b) consider all of the functions they must cater to on that particular day

c) take into account the weather (exclude all suede materials, or add a jacket or cardigan, which will inevitably not match and thus render the rest of the outfit unfit)

d) factor in any long periods of standing around, and question if five-inch heels would be appropriate (hint: no)

e) think of all of these things at 7.12 a.m. on a weekday morning, while feeling dusty from the previous evening’s champagne-soaked function.

It was utterly exhausting.

My alarm screamed into my skull the morning after the Carter function, and it took thirty-five minutes of snooze-buttoning for me to finally shift from my cotton cocoon. I saw roughly fifteen packets of chewing gum on the floor, and remembered that they’d had bowls of them at the party last night, and that I’d thought it would be hilarious and entertaining to thieve them really obviously for what I’m sure was a fascinated audience.

Idiot.

When I finally got to work, wearing an outfit even Stevie Wonder would’ve rejected, Jay caught me as I walked into the
office, echoing similar requests for hospitalisation, or at least greasy food. Immediately, if not sooner.

‘Oh Han. What went wrong?’

‘No idea. Maybe it was dinner?’ I was pretty sure it was. That and the cheap wine.

‘Shall we go to that diner on Thomas Street and get breakfast?’

‘Oh, that’d be
perfect
.’

I turned around with Jay and went straight back downstairs. I had no meetings or launches that morning, so what did it matter?

We waited silently in the diner for our egg-and-bacon rolls, both deeply entrenched in self-sympathy mode. Jay had her sunglasses on inside, which spoke volumes.

Once I got to my desk, filled with grease and caffeine and feeling vaguely more human, it dawned on me that I had a function in the afternoon that I would not be able to get out of, even though the idea of making small talk was on a par with a large angry horse kicking me in the stomach.

Jesus, what was that
fricken
smell?

It was unbearable. It wasn’t one of my regular beauty-office smells; they’re usually quite lovely and reminiscent of clean hair. This was more like…like…off food, or a bunch of rotting flowers. I had to find the scent, which meant attacking all the bags, boxes and parcels that surrounded my chair like a cosmetic moat. This was a good move, I decided. Being physically busy would, hopefully, use enough brain power to stop me from thinking about how revolting I felt.

I started with the pretty bags first, and the brands I liked best. The ugly boxes that required scissors and caused cuticle damage could wait until last. Served them right for ignoring the power of pink tissue-paper.

A new colour collection for NARS. A new variant of Bumble and Bumble hair powder. Bo’s new first-signs-of-ageing face cream. A new M.A.C lipstick range. A new self-tanner from Clinique. A skin-brightening range from Show Off. A fruit-infused Decleor body oil. Revlon’s latest lip-gloss assembly. Maybelline’s new crème bronzer/blush hybrid. A fresh, flirty new fragrance from Marc Jacobs.

I tried to imagine how this could become routine for
anyone
. Jay said she no longer got excited by the things that hit her desk, but I didn’t believe her. How could you not be thrilled when every day was Christmas? Plus, sometimes we got gifts with the product – as if the luxury of trying the product months before everyone else wasn’t enough of a treat. In my stash I had already scored an underwear set, a key-ring, a desk mirror, some chocolates, and a voucher for a session with a personal trainer.

Last week I had even been sent a
list of possible gifts
from Sheen, a haircare company that had recently sent us Tom Ford sunglasses to go with their new ‘solar protect’ range. One of the questions was: