The Other Side of the Story (13 page)

Suddenly Jojo stopped laughing and thought, I'm a woman in my prime. I shouldn't be spending Saturday night in bed alone, watching videos about meerkats falling out of trees.

She turned to her wallet, which was lying beside her on the pillow. 'This is not right,' she said. But she already knew that.

22

I should never have started this thing with him, Jojo thought. I could be in love with someone else right now, someone who wasn't married. Well, shoulda woulda coulda…

If only it was just about sex, she thought regretfully. If only it was about thrillingly dangerous bonks. Relationship gurus always said that an attraction based on friendship and mutual respect was far more likely to stay the course — and the bastards were right.

Even before Jojo had come to work at Lipman Haigh, she'd respected Mark; he was well known in the industry as a visionary. Five years previously, when he had come in as Managing Partner, Lipman Haigh had been a sleepy little agency and some of the partners were so old they made Jocelyn Forsyth look like a surly adolescent. Mark's first act had been to headhunt several young snappy agents and make three of them partners as soon as the three most doddery incumbents could be persuaded to retire. Then he'd added a foreign rights department and a vibrant media arm and within eighteen months Lipman Haigh had gone from being a bunch that no one bothered much with to being the hot 'new' London agency.

He was tough - he had to be — but he wore it with grace. In negotiations with publishers he could become as unmovable as cellulite, but he did it decently. Nothing personal, his manner said, but this just won't do. I won't be caving, so you'd better. Not stern, not slimy, just straight.

And he had a sense of humour. Not a laugh-a-minute like his chosen one, Jim Sweetman, who certainly knew how to win friends and influence people, but there was plenty of mirth just beneath the surface.

But what Jojo had admired most about Mark Avery was his incredible trouble-shooting abilities. His instincts were sure, nothing unnerved him and he was a man with all the answers: Don Corleone without the voice, the entourage and the paunch.

But she hadn't, like,
fancied
him. Then came the night outside the Hilton followed by the pupil-dilating stuff in the corridor and it all went weird. When Jojo did her Friday morning round-up, Mark listened to her while doing his thing of looking away and smiling — but without the smiling. He no longer flattened himself theatrically against the wall while she strode at high speed through the halls of Lipman Haigh. He addressed her only as 'Jojo' and there was no more cat's-pyjamas-style banter.

She didn't like it but she could wait it out. She was good at waiting — a lot of practice with publishers — and could tune out the voices of fear and doubt in her head.

But Mark hadn't become Managing Partner of a literary agency without also having nerves of steel, so the stand-off endured.

I can outwait anyone, Jojo thought, but with all that tension flying about, could she help it if she found herself wondering about him? Once she focused on him as a man rather than a boss, her imagination took flight and her resolve began to buckle. The meaningful look in the corridor was the start of a slide into a violent attraction to him and it really pissed her off. Eventually she admitted to Becky, 'I keep thinking about what it would be like to sleep with Mark Avery.'

'Crap. Bound to be. Old guy like him?'

'He's forty-six, not eighty-six.'

Becky was concerned — could any good come of this? 'It's only because you haven't had sex for nine months. Since Poor Craig. Maybe you should sleep with someone else.'

Who?'

'Now you're asking. Anyone.'

'But I don't want to go out looking for someone just to sleep with. That's not who I am. I want to sleep with Mark. And not anyone else.'

'Jojo, snap out of it.
Please
.'

'And considering I already like, admire and respect him, I'm doomed,' she continued disconsolately.

More prosaically, she had her career to consider. She hoped to be made partner some day soonish and how would that ever happen if her boss had decided to behave as if she didn't exist? After five weeks she caved in and made an appointment to see him. She came into his office, shut the door firmly behind her and sat before him.

'Jojo?'

'Mark. Ah… I don't know how to say this, but things have been, like,
tense
with us. Is it my work? Do you have a problem with it?'

She knew it wasn't that, but she wanted it clear.

'No, no problems with your work.'

'Riiight. So can we drop the weird stuff? Can we go back to the way we were?'

He considered it. 'No.'

'Why not?'

'Because… because… how can I put this?' he said. 'Because — please don't laugh — because I'm in love with you.'

'Please! How can you be?'

'I've worked with you for two years. If I don't know you by now…'

After a period of silence Jojo looked up from her lap and said, 'You're married. I would never be with a married man.'

'I know. It's one of the reasons I feel how I feel about you.'

'Well,' she sighed, 'ain't that a kick in the head.'

23

It was only meant to be a one-off— to get it out of their systems so they could get back to being colleagues at ease with each other. This was a total lie, of course; Jojo knew it and Mark knew it. Neither of them was interested in getting anything out of their systems, but dressing it up as A Good Thing made it a little less appalling.

After Mark had made the dramatic announcement that he was in love with Jojo, Jojo rang Becky and hissed the whole story down the phone.

'Don't worry,' Becky reassured. 'It's just a ploy to get you into bed.'

'You think?' Relieved and disappointed.

'I'm sure.'

TO:
Jojo.harvey@LIPMAN HAIGH.co

FROM:
Mark.avery@LIPMAN HAIGH.co

SUBJECT: I meant what I said

Not just a ploy to get you into bed.

M xx

'He used those exact words?' Becky said. 'My God, he's clever.'

'Yes. I keep telling you he is.'

Becky looked surprised at Jojo's evident irritation. 'Easy, girl.'

For the next nine days, Jojo and Mark tiptoed around each other, blushing and dropping things whenever they came into contact. Jojo reported every little encounter to Becky, who remained concerned but reluctantly fascinated. She'd never slept with a Managing Partner — a Head of Sales had been her most senior post.

On day ten Mark asked Jojo out for dinner; he wanted to 'have a talk'.

'A talk about getting into your knickers,' Becky sighed.

Good, Jojo thought.

'Here's how it is,' Mark said, between the starter and the main course. 'I'm not going to tell you that my wife doesn't understand me. I won't tell you that we never have sex because, very occasionally, we still do. And I love my two children, I don't want to do anything to hurt them.'

'Like leave?'

Yes. So now it's up to you. You deserve a hell of a lot more than I'm offering, but what I can say is that I've never felt about anyone else the way I feel about you.'

'And you don't make a habit of this sort of thing?'

He looked shocked. 'Absolutely not.'

As soon as Jojo got home she rang Becky and relayed the conversation.

'He's moving fast,' Becky observed. You don't want him to leave his kids. You just want to sleep with him.'

'Do I? That's OK then.'

At work the next morning an email was waiting.

TO:
Jojo.harvey@LIPMAN HAIGH.co

FROM:
Mark.avery@LIPMAN HAIGH.co

SUBJECT: Please

Please. (Interrogative form of) to beg, beseech, plead, implore, supplicate or entreat.

M xx

To her surprise, her eyes were suddenly swimming with tears. It was too much, all of it — his wife and children, his tender humility.
We have to do something
.

It was Becky who came up with the idea of them Getting it Out of Their Systems. 'He might be atrocious in bed,' she said hopefully. 'He might turn your stomach.'

Jojo doubted it but, in jokey embarrassment, ran it by Mark. 'And with a bit of luck you'll go right off me.'

The look he gave signalled how unlikely that was. 'Well, if you're sure…'

She nodded.

'So where shall we… ? I mean, I could…'

'Come to my place. I'll make dinner. No,' she amended. 'I won't. If I cook for you, I'll never get rid of you.'

He approached sex with her like he approached everything else: with determination, confidence, attention to detail, and he removed her clothes as if he was unwrapping a gift. Afterwards she asked, 'How was it for you?'

'Disastrous.' He stared at the ceiling. 'I haven't gone off you at all. You?'

'Even worse than I expected.'

Well? Was he fabulous?' Becky asked the following day. 'Or a bit crap? Sometimes those old guys can be terrible.' Becky had once slept with a drunken thirty-seven-year-old and regarded herself as an authority.

'It's not like that,' Jojo said irritably. 'It's much more than sex, Mark's my favourite person.'

'Sorry,' Becky said, shocked.

'No, I'm sorry.' Jojo was also shocked.

'So what happens now? Now that you've got it all out of your systems?'

'Only a fool would start a relationship with a married man.'

'And you, Jojo, are no fool.'

'No.'

'So when do you see him again?'

'Tonight.'

That night Mark asked Jojo about her first boyfriend and she laughed and said, 'I can't tell you, the jealousy will kill you.'

'I can handle it.'

'OK, he was a proby from my pop's firehouse.'

'Proby?'

'New guy. Rookie.'

'You mean he was a firefighter? Oh fuck, how sorry am I, I asked. But keep talking, I have to know now. Huge, was he?'

'Huge. Six four, arms like tree trunks, he worked out with weights. He had, like, this
chest
that he used to crush me against and I couldn't break free until he said so.'

'Aaaagh.'

Jojo laughed. 'You did ask. But you know what? Anyone can be a gorilla with a big chest. Takes more'n that to keep me interested.'

The funny thing was that after she'd fallen for Mark, she discovered that everyone else fancied him — Louisa, Pam etc.

She was surprised that she hadn't realized. 'I thought Jim was the man?' she asked Louisa. 'No?'

'Don't get me wrong, Jim is beautiful, but Mark… Mark is pure sex. I would give… let me see… OK! This is how bad it is — I would never buy shoes again if I could have just one hour in bed with Mark Avery.' She shivered dramatically. 'I bet he's an ABSOLUTE
animal
.'

Sunday morning

Jojo woke up and reached for a P.G. Wodehouse from the pile of comfort reads beside her bed. She loved him and Agatha Christie, all the stuff she used to read growing up in New York and fantasizing about the British part of her heritage. Even now she knew the books were nothing like the real world, she still derived great pleasure from them.

Then she got up and did her ironing while she waited for it to be late enough to ring her parents in Queens; she called them every Sunday and they had pretty much the same conversation every week.

 'Hey, Pops!'

'When're you coming home?'

'You just saw me! Remember Christmas? Like, a month ago?'

'Nah, when're you coming back for good? Your mother worries about you. You know the precinct would have you back in a heartbeat.' Noises in the background. 'Waidaminnit, I'm talking to her! She's my daughter too. Aw, here, your mother wants to talk to you.'

A staticy rustle as Charlie relinquished the phone. 'Hello, my darling girl, how are you?'

'Fine, Mom, great. Everyone OK?'

'Fine. Don't listen to that old fool. It's just that he worries about you. Is there any chance -'

'I'll try to come in the summer, yeah?'

When she hung up ten minutes later, she felt vaguely guilty but as she explained to her wallet, 'I live here now, see? This is home.' She loved her wallet. It was great company and much more convenient than having a dog.

Then she left to get the bus to Becky and Andy's cosy West Hampstead flat. The tube would have been faster but she preferred the bus because you got to see things; after living there for ten years, she still loved London, even though it had a lot of catching up on New York to do, especially in the area of nail-care.

'Oh good,' Andy said, when he opened the door to her. 'We're going to Salisbury's. You can help carry the bags.'

After the weekly shop was done, she traipsed after them to the garden centre.

'Do you mind me always playing third wheel?'

'No,' Andy said. 'livens things up a bit, gives me and Becks something to talk about.'

Andy and Becky had been together for eighteen months and they liked to make it sound as if they never had sex and were bored rigid with each other, a sure sign, Jojo knew, that they were crazy about each other. No one made those kinds of jokes unless they felt very secure. As a result Becky wanted everyone to be settled down and happy, especially Jojo.

'The Wyatt girls are having a party,' Becky announced, back at home, when they'd lugged the shopping bags into the kitchen.

The Wyatt sisters, Magda, Marina, and Mazie, were friends of Becky's since they'd shared a house for a six-month period before Becky moved in with Andy. They were blonde, posh, beautiful, rich and astonishingly kind and warm. They moved in more high-octane circles than Becky's but were so nice that they stayed in touch and always invited her and Jojo to their parties.

Becky had a crush on all three of them, all three had a crush on Jojo, and even Jojo had a slight pash for Magda, the eldest, the one with the best organizational skills. 'But NOT in a sexual way,' she kept telling Andy.

'Whatever,' he said. 'I'm terrified of them. They're so… fabulous.'

'It's Mazie's thirtieth. She's having a bash in the parents' Hampstead mansion. Not until June but they want to make sure you're available.'

'June?' Jojo exclaimed.

'Is that a posh thing?' Andy wondered. 'Giving several months' notice?'

'How would I know? Just one thing. It's fancy dress.'

'Fancy dress,' Jojo moaned softly. 'Why does it have to be fancy dress?'

She hated fancy dress — normal dress was difficult enough — and she always went as a red devil: neck-to-toe tight-fitting black with red horns in her hair and a red tail on her butt.

'But it'll be a great party and you might meet someone. Like -' Becky stopped, embarrassed - 'available.'

'Not everyone is as lucky as you,' Jojo said.

'No, there's only one of me to go round,' Andy said.

'No one else would have you,' Becky said.

'Yeah,' Jojo agreed, although she figured Andy was quite good-looking for a faithful man.

Work tomorrow,' Becky said sadly, looking up from a sea of newspaper. 'Last night I dreamt I gave the wrong figures to British Airways and over-refunded hundreds of people, and they're not even my client. Although they will be soon,' she added gloomily, 'the way things are going. Every bloody company in the whole bloody world will be my client. It was a nightmare, I woke up shaking.'

'This is turning into an obsession,' Andy said. 'You've got to confront Elise.'

'How?'

'Calmly. Just say what you say to me.'

'What if it turns nasty?'

'Nasty? It's just business, stop being so emotional about it. Be like Jojo. If someone was messing her about at work, she'd tell it to them straight.' Andy stopped. 'Mind you, she's sleeping with her boss, which could turn
extremely
nasty.'

'Enough already,' Jojo said.

'How
is
your adulterous liaison?' Andy asked. 'What's going to happen?'

Jojo squirmed. 'Ask Becky. She's director of emotional affairs.'

'Well?'

Becky considered. 'There are several possible outcomes. I'll make a list.' She scribbled for a few minutes on the 'Style' section of the
Sunday Times
then announced, 'OK. Possibilities.'

a) Mark leaves his wife

b) His wife is also having  an affair with, let's say, their son's teacher and she leaves Mark.

c) Jojo and Marf gradually go off each otherand end up being  friends

d) The wife dies tragicly from
—
what do people die of? scarlet fever
Jojo enters Mark's household as governess to his children and after a respectable time has elapsed, he can go public that he has fallen for her

'Which one do you like the most?'

'None. I don't want him and his wife to break up.'

'So you just want to carry on being a sidecar in the motorbike of his life?' Andy asked.

'No, but…' She didn't want to break up anyone's marriage. Part of the moral code she'd been brought up with was that family was paramount. If ever any of the firefighters in her father's firehouse was fooling around with a woman who wasn't his wife, the other guys on the rig got involved. They urged and counselled the renegade husband to return to the wife: he usually did. And on the rare occasions when he didn't, ranks closed around the wife and the man found himself out in the cold.

'And what about his kids? They'll hate me.'

'They'll live with their mother.'

'But they'll come to us and ruin our weekends. Sorry,' she said a mite defensively. 'I'm just being honest.'

'But you're so good with kids,' Becky said. 'Shayna's two love you.'

'I want kids but I want them to be babies first. Not a teenager who's already showing signs of delinquency and a goofy girl who falls off ponies. I'd spend all my down time at the Emergency Room.'

'Isn't George Clooney a hunk of a man?' This came from Andy.

'I prefer Mark.'

'Bloody hell. So what
do
you want?'

'I want him never to have been married and for there to be no children.'

Becky consulted her list. 'Sorry. That option isn't on it.'

'What a bummer,' Jojo sighed.

'How bad actually is it?' Becky asked. 'How strongly do you feel about him? On a scale of one to Dominic?'

'Who's Dominic?' Andy asked.

'Before your time,' Becky explained. 'The Big One.'

'See, when I first came to Britain ten years ago, I didn't realize that some of the guys I met were assholes,' Jojo said. 'I just thought they were being British. And even when I knew they were assholes, they were British assholes, so it didn't seem so bad. It took a little time before I became discriminating in my choices.'

'The idiots she went out with…'

'Then I met Dominic.'

'And he wasn't an idiot. He was a six-foot-three hunk, a journalist. He deserved her. She nearly married him, they got engaged, a ring and everything. But he got cold feet. Well, not exactly cold feet, he thought he
might
have cold feet…'

'He decided he "wasn't sure",' Jojo said. 'The week before we were supposed to move in together. I could keep the ring but we were no longer engaged. We weren't ruling out getting married but not at any definite time. Then he thought we should take a break from each other —'

'— but he kept showing up pissed, keen to play hide the sausage -'