Armani Angels (20 page)

‘What's she doing here?' Mercedes said in a whiny voice.

‘You know she's on the committee,' Gemma said.

‘Yes, but I thought we were having a social dinner first, before the meeting.'

Gemma glared at Mercedes. ‘We are,' she said.

Gemma stood to call Laura over. She heard Mercedes hiss to Chantelle, ‘What in the hell is she wearing?'

‘I dunno, I think it's kind of a cool look,' Chantelle whispered back.

Laura was in wide-leg beige linen palazzo pants topped with denim jacket and tie-dyed tee and accessorised with a cotton Union Jack bag and lime Converse sneakers.

‘Yeah, cool . . . for Nimbin.'

‘Hey, girls. Sorry I'm late. How's tricks?'

‘Super.' Mercedes's smile didn't reveal her teeth. Gemma could almost smell the sarcasm emanating from her pores. Maybe it wasn't such a good idea having her on the committee, but it would have been disloyal not to have asked her.

Laura sat down. ‘So, have you been following Priscilla's column? Great publicity.'

‘Yes, I guess so,' Gemma said. ‘I feel bad for the Dame, though. Priscilla isn't very kind to her in her articles.'

‘You know why though, don't you?' Laura asked. ‘Prissy got uninvited to the Fashion Luncheon at the Robertson mansion.'

‘Nooo!' the three other women exclaimed.

‘Yep,' Laura chuckled, ‘and Prissy never gets uninvited to anything and takes it lying down. I was in at the paper on the day she got the letter informing her of the committee's decision. Oh, man, was she livid.'

‘How stupid,' Gemma said, shaking her head at such a PR stuff-up. ‘Why on earth would the Dame cross such an important member of the media?'

‘Well, apparently she was pissed off with an article that Priscilla wrote. Which, by the way, was nowhere near as bad as what she's written lately.'

‘Gawd, I wonder what the Dame's saying about all this?' Chantelle said. ‘Priscilla's being pretty hurtful but she's really ramped up your brilliant work, Gemma.'

After the women had enjoyed a light meal of bruschetta, antipasto and chatter the other members of the committee arrived. They were Gemma's young office staff who had offered to volunteer their time.

They were a great team. Patty, IQPR's voluptuous receptionist, had a Facebook friend base of 1500. Bethany, a tiny elfin-looking thing with a penchant for ponchos, was the social network manager at the office and, thanks to her rigorous tweeting, had managed to secure 32,400 Twitter followers in the past few years. Each of her tweets was retweeted around the world in seconds, and many times she'd actually been responsible for starting a Twitter trend. Gemma was thrilled this had happened with her event.

Then there was Romy. She was a socialite with contacts in every community in Melbourne, could text at one hundred words a minute and had an address book with almost 2000 names in it. One SMS from her and most of social Melbourne would respond. These kinds of networks were crucial to the success of the event.

Finally, and most importantly, Ruth Browning arrived. Ruth was the acting client services manager. She was shouldering the main part of Gemma's old job while Gemma was temporary CEO of the firm.

‘So, it's eight pm, we begin; thank you all for being so punctual. The invitations, Romy?'

‘All done. Here's the final jpeg we sent out.' Romy flipped open her laptop and passed it over to Gemma. It was an animated invitation with links to the YouTube, Twitter, MySpace and Facebook pages. It was humorous, sensual, delightful. The web designer had done an immaculate job.

‘Excellent. Bethany, is everything fine with the venue?'

‘Certainly is, Gemma. I spoke to the conference manager at The Shed down at Docklands just an hour ago.'

‘The Shed? That's massive,' Mercedes interjected. ‘How many people are coming?'

‘Three thousand,' Gemma, Romy and Bethany said in unison.

‘Three thousand? Good God, that's ambitious,' Mercedes said. She was leaning her chair back against the wall, the only one not taking notes.

‘Yes, it is,' Gemma said. ‘We have a competition to win. The Dame is only going for 500. But on the other hand her tickets are five times more expensive.'

‘Prizes? Romy?' Gemma swiftly moved back to the agenda.

‘I'm still working on it but I've been able to secure first prize from Mars.'

‘Ooh, yum,' Chantelle said, ‘what is it?'

‘A lifetime supply of chocolate,' Romy said, not even a little smug that she'd pulled off such a coup.

‘Brilliant, Romy, just brilliant,' Gemma said. ‘In fact, you know what would be great? Let's get it in, let's get a mountain of chocolate as the centrepiece of the room. How good would that look? Piles and piles of chocolate towering up in the middle of the space, it's sure to tempt people to buy a raffle ticket or ten.'

‘Sounds gross,' Mercedes said.

‘I've got a sculptor that could really make a wild piece of artwork using chocolate. How about statues instead?' Romy suggested.

‘Yes! Even better,' Gemma agreed. ‘You're right, Mercedes – it might be a bit Jamie Oliver to pile transfats right in front of our body-conscious guests. Chocolate statues of naked people dotted around the room. It would look incredible. Could he do that?'

‘I can ask,' Romy said, typing away.

‘Thank you, Romy. You're wonderful. Now, goody bags, Patty?'

Patty consulted her notes. ‘I've got 3000 boxes of Maltesers from Mars, edible undies, chocolate body paint and MAC eye shadow pots.'

‘What colour is the shadow?' Gemma asked.

‘Why mocha, of course,' Patty said.

‘You legend,' Gemma said. ‘We need jewellery. Can we get some kind of piece in the goody bags too? Just to beef them up a bit?'

‘I have a client that might be able to help there,' Patty said. ‘They import cheap junk from China. One of the pieces is a silver love heart on a leather thong.'

‘Perfect, that's just perfect. Well done. Do it,' Gemma said. She beamed. Now this was a meeting. Quick, efficient and productive. Her team was solid.

‘Have we finalised sponsorship dollars to fund this thing, Ruth?' This was Ruth Browning's area of expertise. She had all the clients in the palm of her hand.

‘It's all been done, Gemma. I simply contacted each client and asked if they could divert their annual charity budget to UP-Kids this year. We've got a hundred grand. It was basic, considering all the press you've been getting about the event. Everyone was keen to get on board.'

‘That's the best news I've had all day. Basically that covers all the costs which means that the sale of each one-hundred-dollar ticket goes straight to the charity.'

‘One hundred dollars a ticket?' Mercedes said. ‘That works out to be $300,000.'

‘That's right,' Gemma said.

‘If you sell all the tickets, that is,' Mercedes said.

‘How are you going with your jobs, Mercedes?' Gemma asked. ‘Are all your clients on board?'

‘Sure, every single one of them has asked for tickets. When do I get them?'

Romy answered. ‘Just tell them to go to the website, Mercedes. They buy the tickets online, pay through PayPal and then their name goes on the door. There's no actual paper needed. We're trying to keep this event as green as possible.'

Gemma reflected that Mercedes would know all of this if she'd ever bothered to attend meetings. This was only the second one she'd deigned to be present at. She really shouldn't have asked her on the committee. What worth was she bringing anyway? Then Gemma had an idea.

‘We need the dancers to be really tricked up. Mercedes, do you think you and your team could do the hair and make-up? We've got fifty girls and guys doing a mixture of pole dancing and onstage performances. I can see big, teased bed-hair and glittery gold make-up. What do you think?'

Mercedes rolled her eyes. ‘That's going to cost me a fortune,' she whined.

‘Maybe they'll donate their time,' Patty said. ‘It's incredible how generous people have been.'

‘Maybe,' Mercedes grumbled. ‘I thought I had enough to do organising the disco ball.'

‘Sign me up for the job of snaparazzi,' Laura said. ‘I'll take pics of everyone then have them ready to collect by the end of the night. Do you want to charge?'

‘Absolutely, we can make several grand out of that,' Gemma said. ‘That's fabulous, Laura, thank you so much.'

‘Alcohol?' Gemma moved on. Her ninety-minute meeting deadline was looming and she didn't want to keep the women as she knew they all had busy lives.

‘Foster's is donating everything in exchange for signage and media mentions,' Bethany said.

‘That's easily done,' Gemma said, ‘I love scratching the back of Foster's. Can we come up with a sexy shooter or cocktail on entry?'

‘Slow Comfortable Screw Against the Wall?' Chantelle piped up.

‘Hmmm, not bad, but too long.'

‘Sex on the Beach?' Patty offered.

‘Good,' Gemma said, ‘but the Docklands isn't really a beach, is it?'

‘Orgasm?' Romy suggested.

Gemma clapped her hands and beamed. ‘Yes, perfect,' she said. ‘It's chocolatey, and we can say we're giving out Multiple Orgasms.' The group of women burst out laughing. Mercedes rolled her eyes.

‘Or, “See Gemma for an Orgasm”,' Chantelle suggested.

Patty laughed so hard she snorted then offered, ‘And . . . and . . . and the guys will drink theirs down before the ladies even take their first sip,' she said. Romy and Bethany exploded, while Gemma and Laura held their stomachs as tears of mirth poured down their cheeks.

Gemma wiped her eyes and managed to quip, ‘Yes! Classic – and we'll also serve them without alcohol and call them Virgin Orgasms!' which kept the group's giggles bubbling along until the straitlaced Ruth Browning interjected with, ‘Otherwise known as a Masturbation,' which sent the women into more peals of hysterical laughter.

Out in the restaurant, patrons leaned back in their chairs to see what was going on in the dining room.

When the women saw the interest their hilarity had created, they laughed even harder.

The waiter came in and removed the empty bottle of pinot and, with raised eyebrows, neglected to offer another.

Eventually the laughter subsided and the members of the committee fixed their eye make-up and wiped their faces. ‘Right, so Orgasms are the drink du jour,' Gemma said, still grinning from ear to ear.

‘I don't know,' Mercedes said. ‘I don't even like Orgasms. They bloat me.'

The meeting finished at a respectable nine-thirty and by ten pm they'd all said their goodbyes. Laura and Gemma were the last to leave. The streetlights reflected off the wet streets as they walked to their cars, thankful the heavy spring rain had stopped. ‘Great meeting, Gemma,' Laura said. ‘The women are all so positive, except that Mercedes. What in the hell is she doing on the committee anyway? She undermined you every step of the way tonight.'

‘I know, she's just become so bitter and dreadful lately. I guess she's always been like that. In the beginning she was great fun but thinking back now, she's always been quite nasty. I thought it was funny the way she'd make snide comments about every other woman in the room, a bit Joan Rivers, you know? But it just started to get negative and nasty. And she's become really needy too. She rings me all the time; she wants to know what I'm wearing when we go out then she turns up in the same outfit – it's getting a bit stalky.'

The women reached Gemma's Audi and the car's lights flickered as Gemma pushed the unlock button on her key. She opened the passenger door and flung her Armani bag onto the front seat.

‘Yeah, she's dangerous, Gemma, really insecure. I'd watch her. I can't believe she was so hesitant about helping with the hair and make-up, for God's sake. Look at how much work everybody else is putting into it.'

Gemma sighed. ‘You're right; she's selfish. It's a give-an-inch-and-take-a-mile situation. When we started hanging out, she was so thankful to be included and couldn't do enough for me, but now that she's well entrenched in this lifestyle she's sort of taking me for granted and gets cross when she's not invited somewhere as opposed to being grateful when she is. It's ridiculous.'

‘Yeah, give her the flick. She's a cow.' Laura looked up at Gemma. ‘How's Tyler?'

Gemma sighed again. ‘No change. What am I going to do? How do I find out what's going on inside his head? What about you? How's Mathew?'

‘I've had a massive breakthrough. He's back, I'm so happy; his schoolwork's improving, he's talking to me – in monosyllables, of course, I'm not expecting miracles, but at least he sometimes makes eye contact.' Laura beamed.

‘Laura, that's just wonderful, I'm so happy for you.' Gemma smiled, thrilled for her friend. ‘What's the secret, how did you do it?'

‘Well, I thought a lot about our last conversation and realised there's no amount of books or lectures that will really help until you look at yourself. So I've been working on changing my attitude. I've tried to stop being the bitter grumpy old cow who stormed around the house complaining about him, about money problems, about men.'

‘Really?' Gemma leaned against the door of her car and folded her arms. ‘Have you genuinely had an attitude change? Or are you just putting it on for his benefit?'

Laura buttoned up her jacket against the cool night air. ‘It has to be genuine; they're kids, they're intuitive. They can totally tell when you're trying to fake it. I've tried to face the fact that my bitterness about past relationships and my loneliness and disappointment in Louis for going off and dying on us, selfish prick, was a cold, dank, gloomy rock right in the middle of our house. How could I expect Mathew to embrace me as a person when I criticised everything constantly? He's not a friend I can vent at; he's my son and he needs me to be the adult. So I decided to focus on good stuff. After being so negative for so long, it's not easy. It's still a work in progress.' She shot Gemma a rueful grin.