Any Way You Want Me (6 page)

I touched my face. Even now, I could still remember his teenage fingers on my skin. I could see his soft brown eyes, his longish hair that curled so cutely at the back of his neck.

Danny Cooper
. What the hell would he be doing these days?

A loud crash from downstairs shoved Danny to one side in an instant. There was an ear-splitting wail from Molly seconds later, followed by sobs. Oh Christ. I got out of the bath and leaned out of the door, dripping and naked. ‘What’s happened?’

‘She fell off the table,’ Alex called up. ‘All right, love, come here.’

She fell off the
table
? What the fuck was she doing on the table?

‘I want bump cream!’ I heard Molly crying. ‘BUMP CREAM, DADDY!’

‘She means the arnica cream,’ I yelled. ‘Drawer next to the sink.’ I dried myself hurriedly. What was Alex thinking, letting her go up on the table anyway? For God’s sake, I couldn’t leave him for five minutes without something happening. I just knew he must have been checking the teams for today’s football match on teletext, or something. Something completely un-child-related anyway. Why couldn’t he just entertain them for a bit so that I could have a break? Was it really too much to ask?

‘Let’s see if this homeopathic nonsense can work its placebo magic on you, eh?’ I heard him saying to Molly. He always spoke to her as if she was fifteen, rather than two and a half.

‘Yeah,’ Molly gulped, her sobs slowing down and finally stopping.

Crisis over. I looked at my bubbly sanctuary regretfully. The moment was gone, punctured with a single cry. I untied my hair from its tight hairband, and a handful of shining dead strands fell out through my fingers, as usual. This had to be what it was like to go bald for a man, this post-natal hair loss thing. Like traitorous lovers stealing away in the night, my hair was deserting me too, slipping out silently to rest on my pillowcase, clog up the plugholes or sprawl across the carpets. At this rate, I’d have less of the stuff than my baldy five-month-old boy, whose first blond wisps were just tufting out of his scalp.

I looked in the mirror and sighed. The cruelty of the female body is relentless: after the heroic exertion of pregnancy and childbirth, you might expect some relief, but no. Forget it, sweetie! The reward for continuing the human race was nothing more than a roadmap of purple stretchmarks charting the expansion of a formerly bikini-worthy belly, and aching, hot breasts pumped up to bursting point with milk. And then, just as you thought you could rightfully reclaim your body, the hair thing. Mother Nature sure knew how to kick a gal when she was down.

I slapped on some moisturizer, trying not to look too closely at the disturbing wrinkle thing that was going on under each eye, and brushed my teeth hurriedly. I put on underwear – matching, for once – pulled on some old jeans and grabbed a jumper. I wondered what Danny Cooper would say about me now, if he saw me at a school reunion. Would I have been relegated to middle-aged minger status, like the luckless Gary Taylor, or would he still be able to see some last traces of the seventeen-year-old Sadie in my face? My green eyes and dark lashes and snub nose were all still the same. My lips looked a bit thinner and paler than they had once been, admittedly. Teeth weren’t bad. All still there, at any rate. It was my tired, aged, sleep-deprived skin that really let the side down . . .

‘WAAAAAHHHH!’

And there was Nathan, bellowing for his next feed. Time to return to the front line.

Danny Cooper was forgotten about for a few hours while both children were fed and put down for naps, and then Alex and I sat down with sandwiches and coffees and crackling newspapers in a rare oasis of calm.

Silence. I loved it. It was one of my favourite sounds in the world, after the children’s laughter and ‘I love you’ and the
Coronation Street
music.

‘Mind if I have a look at your laptop?’ I asked. I still had ‘Going Underground’ running through my head.
Some people might say my life is in a rut but I’m quite happy with what I got
. . .

‘Help yourself.’

I booted it up and searched for the website Becca had mentioned.

Some people might say that I should strive for more but I’m so happy I can’t see the point . . .

‘What are you looking at?’ Alex peered around the ‘Sport’ section while I typed in the name of my school.

‘Hang on,’ I said, watching the blue boxes build along the bottom line of the screen as the page whirred itself open. Then a list of names appeared. ‘Oh my God!’ I cried excitedly. ‘Amanda Benson! I’d forgotten all about her!’

‘Amanda . . .? Oh, right, Friends Reunited. Is that the first time you’ve seen it?’ He sounded incredulous.

I would have shot him a look, but was too busy staring at the names, all throwing memories at me – Anna Stevenson’s amazing ginger freckles, Anthony Woodsley and his reputedly huge willy, Rachael Albright of the pink hair and studded dog collars. ‘We don’t
all
sit around in offices arsing around on the Internet every day, you know,’ I said tartly, and then stopped short. Danny Cooper. There he was.

‘All right, all right. I was only saying.’

I ignored him and clicked on Danny’s link.

Living and working in Manchester – managing my own record shop. Two dogs, no kids, GSOH.

Yeah, and? I wanted to ask. What else? Wife? Ex-wife? Partner? No one gives a shite about your dogs, Dan – what’s the beef on your love-life?

‘What’s Amanda Benjamin doing with herself, then?’ Alex leaned over, trying to look at the screen, and I closed Dan’s message at once.

‘Amanda Benson,’ I corrected him. ‘The usual boring stuff.’

‘What, married, two kids, six hamsters and a drink problem?’

‘Something like that,’ I muttered.

Add Your Details
, a link was inviting me. I clicked on it and started typing my own message.

Went to university in Brighton, then travelled for a year. Came back to good old south London and worked in sales before I met my partner Alex and we had our two sprogs – Molly (2) and Nathan (five months) . . .

I stopped. God, it sounded dull. No,
I
sounded dull. What the hell would Danny think when he read that? He’d probably thank his lucky stars he’d got away up the motorway to Manchester when he’d had the chance.

I deleted all of it. Maybe I should just add my name, forget the details. Then I thought back to my conversation with Anna. Maybe I could just . . . embellish a little . . .

Lived in Brighton for a few years, doing my degree. Then I travelled around the world, stopping in Vietnam to work in an orphanage for two years.

I giggled out loud at the enormity of my lie. The travelling bit was true enough but the only work I’d done had been a few crappy fruit-picking jobs in Australia and New Zealand to raise some extra dollars. Voluntary work in South-East Asia . . . forget it. I’d been too busy bronzing myself, climbing mountains, haggling over sarongs and smoking the mind-bending grass. I sighed nostalgically. It had been such a great time.

‘Who have you found now?’

‘Nobody. You didn’t know her,’ I said, typing away again.

Came back and did an MBA before getting a job in finance . . .

No. Too dull – and far too unrealistic.

Came back and retrained at King’s. Am now a leading brain surgeon . . .

Even worse. Everyone would know that was a lie. It had to be something at least on the right
side
of credible.

Came back and did three months’ work experience on Newsnight, before being offered a permanent place as a researcher.

Yes, good.

Made the jump to Channel 4 two years ago as . . .

I racked my brains. What would everyone have heard of ?

. . . a producer of Countdown . . .

Absolutely no way. Terrible idea!

. . . a producer on Big Brother.

Yes! Definitely yes. Then, as a nudge to Danny, I added:

No dogs, but own teeth and GSOH.

There. I sent my details away to the database and a message flashed up, telling me my name and message had been added to our school board. For some weird reason, my hands were trembling.

Four

I put the laptop away and finished my coffee, trying to imagine Danny’s face if he logged on to the site again and saw my name. He’d be impressed, I was sure. Fancy Sadie Morrison working for Channel 4! he’d think. Mind you, she was always creative at school. The paintings she did for her Art A level portfolio – brilliant, they were, especially the portrait of me. Good at English, too. Should have known she’d end up doing something in the media.

I picked up the pile of weekend newspapers that I hadn’t so much as glanced at yet, and suddenly felt as if I’d been caught cheating in an exam. First Jack, now Danny. What was I like with my fantasy jobs?

The last job I’d had before I went on maternity leave with Molly had been as a sales manager for a small publishing company. It was fun, sure, and there were lots of perks, and some people – my mum, for example – seemed to think it was terribly glamorous. Which it wasn’t. Not as glamorous as being a TV producer by any means. Still, it was something. A job. I had been an independent working woman, with my Next trouser suits and company car. Needless to say, it all seemed a very long time ago now.

The ‘Jobs and Money’ section of the paper was on top of the pile, and, on impulse, I grabbed it and started flicking through the ads. Just to see what I could do, you know. Just to remind myself that I could still get an interesting job if I wanted to.

ITN Senior News Correspondent . . .

Cool or what? I couldn’t resist imagining myself in sexy little Moschino suits, with horn-rimmed spectacles and a stern interviewing technique. I would frighten those MPs into squealing out their secrets in live interviews or, alternatively, I’d ply them with booze and let them give themselves away. I’d be a TV legend!

I glanced through the details. Nice pay, flexible working hours (good) . . . oh. Keen interest in current affairs. Well, duh. You don’t say. I thought back to my outstanding contribution to the political discussion last night and regretfully moved on to the next ad.

Sales Manager for a new publishing company . . .

Now, then. I could definitely get that one, if I wanted to. I was brilliant at sales, wasn’t I? I had always met my targets, and was sure that the old magic would still be there. A,B,C my first boss had instructed fervently. Always Be Closing. In my heyday, I could have closed five deals before breakfast! Well, lunch anyway. It all depended on how hung over I was, really, and how susceptible the booksellers were to my sweet-talking. And, to be quite honest, how short my skirt was.

I read the ad again. Religious books. Oh. That would be a no, then. Even I couldn’t be convincing about religious books. I scanned down to the next ad.

That was when I saw it. Talk about coincidence!

Producer required for new chat show. Do you have creative flair, an ability to work on a tight budget, and the organizational skills to juggle a hectic workload?

Yes! I did. I bloody did!

We are an independent television production company in the heart of Soho.

Lovely. All those lunches, and all that shopping . . .

You are an experienced producer with great ideas and a full contacts book.

Well, not quite, but . . .

Interested? Send your details to Emma Tomlinson at . . .

Interested? I was, actually. Apart from the last sentence, the experience bit, it sounded great. A TV producer, just like I’d put on the Friends Reunited website. It really was a coincidence.

My hand hovered over the paper, not quite wanting to turn the page on the ad. I tore it out instead. Maybe it would be fun to apply – not seriously, obviously – but just . . . as a way of proving something to myself. Anyway, it was all good practice. I would have to apply for jobs again in the future, when the kids were older. I had to keep my hand in, didn’t I?

I thought back to the lies I’d told to Jack earlier in the week, to Chloe the night before, and now, via a website, to Danny, and everyone else I’d been at school with. I was obviously a good liar, that was without doubt. I could bullshit with the best of them. Was I good enough for the Firestarter TV Company, though?

I switched on the laptop again and started typing.

Dear Ms Tomlinson,

I am writing in application to your advertisement in the
Guardian
for the producer’s position.

As you will see from the enclosed CV, I have had many years of experience working on a variety of television programmes, and, in particular, daytime chat shows. After finishing my Media Studies degree, I undertook a voluntary placement on
This Morning
where . . .

I paused for thought. God, I was enjoying this. I was going to flog it for all it was worth, load this letter with bullshit until it reeked of the stuff.

. . . where I learned many aspects of programme-making, both on the studio floor and in the offices. For me, impeccable organization is the key to a successful live programme like
This Morning,
and as a TV producer, good team-working skills are essential.

Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. On and on I wrote, turning my CV into a two-page work of art, and my letter into a modest reflection of some of my greater triumphs. Hey, even
I
would have given me the job, I sounded so good. I giggled as I read it back again. Well, even if it wasn’t all true, nobody could fault my creative writing skills.

There was a cry from upstairs, and I emailed the thing off without a second thought. Gone. See? Motherhood wasn’t the only thing I could do. Lying came as easily as breathing.