Christmas at Claridge's (12 page)

‘My favourite, too,’ Clem said, popping it into the machine and hoisting herself up onto the worktop. ‘So, have you had far to come?’

‘No. I live in the Hallfield Estate, Paddington, fifteen minutes from here.’

‘Cool. Good commute.’

Mercy nodded, her eyes still roaming the flat. ‘So, I’m guessing you’ve never had a cleaner before?’

‘What gave it away?’ Clem grinned, reaching up and hooking a cobweb with her finger.

‘D’you live here on your own?’

‘Officially, I share it with my brother, Tom, although he hasn’t been around much lately.’ She wrinkled her nose as Mercy’s met hers curiously. ‘Pushy
girlfriend.’

Mercy nodded. ‘I met some of those in my time. Lived here long?’

‘In this area all my life. My parents live on Elgin Crescent. We got this flat seven years ago.’

‘Nice.’

‘Thanks.’

‘So there’s two bedrooms, one bathroom and this room?’

‘That’s right. Nice and compact. We don’t need anything major doing – just hoovering, cleaning the bathroom . . . uh, stuff like that.’ Clem waved her hands in the
air in a vague manner, unsure what else counted.

‘Dusting, cleaning the windows,’ Mercy opened the oven door and peered in. ‘Scouring the oven, lifting the rugs. You want me to strip the beds and launder them, too?’

Clem’s eyes widened as though she was a fairy godmother, here out of benevolence alone. ‘Would you?’

‘If you pay me to I will,’ Mercy chuckled, a deep, heaving sound more akin to dredging. ‘The ironing, too?’

‘Oh God, please!’ Clem said, hopping off the counter and pouring the coffees. Her life was changing before her very eyes. Outsourcing! Why had she never done it before? Wait till Tom
saw how she’d streamlined everything for them. Now when they came home after work, they wouldn’t have to fight over who did the ironing and who made dinner (him and him, usually). And
Tom wouldn’t complain about there being no room on the sofa, or of the towels smelling musty. And their Mother would be silenced – finally – when she did one of her impromptu
drop-ins and spent the whole time looking disappointedly at Clem for not being better at ‘keeping house’.

‘Do take a seat,’ Clem said, motioning to the sofa as she came over with the coffees.

‘I like this sofa,’ Mercy said, stroking it as if it was a pet.

‘Thanks, it’s a prototype. My brother’s company made it. Alderton Hide, have you heard of them?’

Mercy shook her head, her fingers gently winding around the curly tufts of sheepskin.

‘No, most people haven’t. They’re a bespoke business-to-business company, supplying all different types of leathers and suedes – shearling, reindeer, crocodile, ponyskin
– to clients, mainly hotel groups and city banks.’

‘Sounds expensive.’

‘Yes,’ Clem sighed. ‘It is.’ She sat down next to Mercy and looked at her properly. It was hard to get a handle on her age: Thirty? A bit older maybe? Her face was round
and deep, like a pillow, with cheeks you wanted to pinch and a mouth that seemed to triple in size when she smiled. Her skin was two shades from ebony and her big black doe-eyes radiated constant
mirth.

‘How old are you?’ Clem asked, curiosity getting the better of her.

‘Forty-six.’

‘Forty-six!’ Clem spluttered. ‘But I thought you were the same age as me! And I’m twenty-nine!’

Mercy winked. ‘Ah, plump skin. The fat girl’s revenge,’ she chuckled, making Clem splutter even more.

‘Have you got kids?’

‘Five. All between twenty-five and eight.’

Clem shook her head. ‘Five kids? And I can’t even look after myself.’

‘I can see.’ Mercy chuckled again, looking down into her coffee. ‘But that’s why you called me. My past boss used to call me “Angel”.’ She shrugged.
‘Angel of Mercy.’

‘Did you work for them long?’

‘Three years. I was nanny to them kids, too, not just the cleaner.’

‘Why did you leave?’

‘The baby was starting at school and they didn’t need me for so many hours.’

Clem nodded just as a door slammed downstairs. Footsteps travelled up the stairs and stopped outside in the hallway; there was a jangling of keys and then a perky laugh – a laugh Clem knew
only too well.

The door opened and Clover practically skipped through. ‘So this is
it
,’ she purred over her shoulder, arms opened wide and half-raised in a happy shrug – until she
turned and saw Clem and Mercy sitting on the sofa. Then her arms dropped as if they were broken. ‘Oh! What are
you
doing here?’

A young guy in a shiny too-blue suit followed after her and, for a split second, Clem thought she was cheating on Tom. But then she saw the digital tape measure in his hand and understood
exactly what was happening.

‘It’s
my
flat,’ Clem retorted indignantly. ‘Why wouldn’t I be here?’

Clover tried to regroup, looking embarrassed and awkward. ‘I meant . . . I thought you’d be at work.’

‘Hoped, more like.’

Clover looked away. ‘If it’s not a good time . . .’

‘No. It’s not. I’m having a meeting,’ Clem spat, stretching herself taller at the words, to give them added importance, and clearly totally oblivious to the fact that she
was wearing an owl onesie. With
ears.

Mercy sipped her coffee, one hand still twirling the sheepskin, her eyes swivelling right to left between the two women as if it was a posh version of
The Jeremy Kyle Show.

The estate agent, whilst keeping one ear trained on their spat, was more concerned with doing a visual recce of the flat, taking in which direction it faced, the imposing ceiling heights, the
original feature cornicing and fireplace, working sash windows, the wide planked maple floor . . .

Clem felt her blood begin to boil as she watched him. How
dare
Clover sell Clem’s flat! ‘Like what you see, do you?’ Clem sneered at him, making the poor man –
boy – jump. ‘Well, think again, mate. It’s not for sale.’

‘We discussed this the other day,’ Clover said in a tone that implied she was being reasonable (and therefore Clem was not).

Clem stood up, willowy and proud like the white queen (albeit dressed as an owl), a move that made both Clover and the estate agent take a step back. ‘I don’t suppose Tom’s
told
you
that he agreed to wait for a while?’ The surprise on Clover’s face was confirmation enough. ‘No, I thought not . . . You know, I almost feel sorry for you,
Clover, not losing a second on this. I mean, you just can’t wait to get him out of here, so that you can hook your claws into him. You’re so desperate it’s
embarrassing.’

Her words hit their mark and this time it was Clover who advanced, the black queen drawn into battle, her face pinched with anger. ‘You want to know who’s embarrassing, Clem?’
she half whispered, half hissed. ‘It’s you. Poor lost you who can’t hold on to a job, a man or any semblance of adult life. You need Tom to do everything for you, and you
can’t bear it that he wants to be with me. He’s only still here with you out of some sort of misplaced loyalty or pity. When are you going to get it? Whether he does it this month or
next Christmas, he
will
choose me over you.’

‘You’re wrong. If he was sure about his feelings for you, he’d be with you in a shot. There’d be nothing I could – or would – do. He stays with me because
I’m his best friend, not because I’m his sister.’

Clover gave a short, joyless laugh. ‘If it makes you feel better to think that . . .’ she sneered. ‘Come on, Joe. We’ll come back another time.’ Clover turned and
headed for the door.

‘No you won’t!’ Clem shouted after them. ‘I already told you, this flat’s not for sale!’

Clover stopped at the door and gave a half-smile, her own set of door keys laid out like a taunt in the palm of her hand. ‘We’ll see about that.’

The cushion hit the back of the closed door, but without any power and certainly lacking in the fierce ‘smashing’ sound a cup would have achieved. Clem sank back into the sofa,
shaking as the adrenaline subsided.

Mercy was silent for a moment. ‘I see what you mean . . . Pushy.’

Clem slid her eyes over to her, a smile breaking the tension in her face. ‘When can you start?’

‘D’you think we can smoke in here?’ Stella whispered as the congregation sat back down again.

‘No!’ Clem retorted, her fingers stroking the capacious suede pouch she had slung across her body. It was ivory with a ruby-red silk cord drawstring, and she’d already clocked
several women checking it out; she’d put money on them coming up to her after the service and asking where she’d got it.

She’d be ready for them when they did: flyers with details of the Twitter account to follow to get the time, place and date for the pop-up shop were in the bag. She and Stella had been
working tirelessly for seven weeks now, forsaking pubs and pretty boys for evenings in, eating bowls of noodles as they sorted the irregular cuts of leather, suede, sheepskin and shearling into
bundles of similar sized patches and worked out what to do with them. So far, they’d done the shearling deerstalkers and wrist warmers (Clem had almost sprinted down the road with the
prototype to give to Katy), some Toscana shearling beanbags that were as long-haired as Afghan hounds, some croc-embossed buckled leather phone covers that looked especially lovely in saturated
jewel colours, and furry tags that had been dyed in a range of colours and attached to rings to accessorize handbags. But it was this suede bag that was the hot pick, thanks to the model Laura
Bailey – a regular at Katy’s stall – agreeing to carry it to a film premiere, where a frenzy of flashbulbs popped as usual. The fashion pack had been on the phone to her stylist
within hours, and bloggers and trend spotters had been trying to identify it, but all anyone could get hold of was the Twitter account and hashtag to follow, building a growing buzz for the
as-yet-unidentified label, while Clem and Stella frantically worked through the nights.

The church filled with cries as the vicar poured cold water over the baby’s head at the font, and Clem felt her phone buzz in the bag. She took it out and checked.

Josh. Again.

He hadn’t taken the break-up well, looking stunned as Clem launched into her usual patter, even though she’d been so busy with her new evangelical mission that she’d forgotten
to call him for three weeks beforehand. She couldn’t understand how he hadn’t seen the writing on the wall when they’d failed to move past booty-calls to dates.

Unmoved, she let Josh’s plea go to messages and looked around the congregation instead as the baby’s cries grew louder. Everyone was young, in couples and hats. Quite a few of them
had babies, too. Christenings, she grimaced, were the new marriages, heralding the fact that life was grinding relentlessly forward, whether she chose to keep up or not.

Towards the front, Tom was sitting with Clover. She was wearing a hat that looked more like roadkill and a smile that suggested the next time she stepped inside this church, she’d be in
white and wearing a tiara. Things hadn’t improved between the two of them since their argument in the flat, although if Tom knew about it, he didn’t admit to it, and Clem was determined
not to be the one seen to be breaking the peace. She had explicitly promised Tom she would try harder with Clover, in return for Tom delaying any drastic decisions, but Clover was playing the same
game and the two of them were embroiled in a stand-of – an agony off polite, sisterly consideration, which only just concealed the visceral antipathy that existed between them.

Today was part of that game. The baby being wetted and now attempting to shake the church from its foundations, was Clover’s sister’s child, and it was for Tom’s sake only that
she was here in the name of bonding with Clover’s family. It was bad enough for him that the sister, Peony, was several years younger than Clover and already living her big sister’s
dream; Tom didn’t need any extra hassle on that score.

The service drew to an abrupt close as the baby’s cries gathered in volume and speed, and Stella and Clem stayed in their seats at the back as the guests shuffled slowly up the aisle.

‘Guess we should go out and show
this
baby off,’ Stella murmured, stroking the sheepskin bag. ‘It’s certainly a lot prettier.’

‘Just make sure Tom doesn’t see you handing out the flyers, OK? That’d be the last thing we need.’

‘Right, boss.’

They slunk outside, leaning like stroppy teenagers against the pillars by the church door and watching the photographer group the guests together for the official photos. Clem checked her watch
impatiently, desperate to escape and work on some more ideas. Now that she had started thinking in a creative vein, she couldn’t stop, and ideas were coming to her in the middle of the night,
during her shower, her runs – she had to keep a notebook on her at all times to jot them down. She reckoned an hour back at the house for drinks, tops, and then they could reasonably
leave.

‘Miss?’ She looked up. The photographer and the eyes of the crowd were upon her. ‘Could you come and stand here?’ He was gesturing to a space in the heart of the family
circle.

‘Oh . . . no, I’m not family,’ she demurred as an assistant took her by the elbow and wheeled her into position.

‘Nonsense,’ Clover beamed insincerely at her. ‘You soon will be.’

‘But . . .’

A hand behind her settled on her waist and gently pulled her back a little, the fingers spreading and applying a gentle pressure that was almost ticklish, almost . . .

‘That’s better,’ murmured a quiet voice. Foreign, male, gorgeous as hell. She went to turn to see who the voice belonged to but—

‘Everyone smile!’

The flash popped, the baby cried and everyone dispersed again, eager to get away from the ear-splitting bawls. Clem looked around as strangers swarmed, all looking for their partners, children
and cars.

‘What’s wrong?’ Stella asked, looking up from her phone with pink, excited cheeks. Oscar – the rogue from the Electric – was resolutely ignoring all her
protestations that theirs had been just a one-night thing and kept belligerently calling her or turning up at her stall with food and flowers and cruelly making her laugh. The fact that neither she
nor Clem had been seen in their usual haunts for the past couple of months had made his job a lot harder, but he hadn’t given up, and Clem wasn’t sure whether to admire or worry about
his persistence.