By the time I’d left the room Hattie had rung off. Settling into the office on the first floor, I fired up my laptop, wishing I’d thought to make myself a cup of tea. Skim-reading my emails, I pulled out a drawer, looking for some paper for Dan’s letter.
Another agent was asking if I was OK, if I’d seen Twitter. I immediately abandoned the drawer and logged in, searching for the agency handle. A stream of angry responses, many retweeting the incredibly damaging Guardian piece. I had to sort this, Arthur was Linda’s client but this was our agency and we were, rightly, getting dragged for our lack of response.
A door banged somewhere below as I waited for Linda to answer her phone. No response.
I drafted an email, attaching information on the writers’ scheme. This wasn’t my job but I needed Linda to understand the seriousness of it all. Partway through I heard voices and lost my thread, huffing as I deleted the sentence. Then I frowned. Because Miles was the one I could hear. And Miles was never the one I could hear.
Opening my office door, I realized they were coming from his room next door, the wood decorated with remnants of some rocket stickers he removed last year as being “too babyish” (I cried). I stepped forward, craning to listen. My eyebrows shot up—Miles was actually yelling.
It was Poppy who normally yelled; she was like me, could fly in, explode quickly. We clashed often, Dan reminding me to give her space, let her come to me. I couldn’t help rushing in, never wanting a child to be ignored.
“OKAY . . . (mumble mumble) WILL TALK . . . SAYS HE’LL . . . (something indistinguishable) . . .”
Why did we install fire doors? They made it so much harder to hear things.
“SCHOOL NOW . . . (mumble something) HATE YOU . . .”
“Just don’t tell, OK?” said Poppy.
Don’t tell?
My whole face was now pressed up against the wood. Miles didn’t get angry; he was the most placid child I’d ever known. Even as a baby he just couldn’t be arsed to get worked up. His tantrums had always lasted less than thirty seconds before he picked up something else or wandered off distracted by something shiny.
They didn’t hear my knock, and by the time I’d stepped inside Miles was standing in the middle of the room, his chest moving fiercely up and down. Poppy stood opposite, feet planted wide.
“Why are you shouting?”
There was a thick silence as they both glared at each other. Miles opened his mouth to speak first.
“Don’t,” Poppy said.
It snapped shut, his body tense, arms by his side, fists clenched as if he was going to explode upward at any moment.
“Don’t what?” I said, feeling the stirrings of a headache. “And why aren’t you at Dance, Poppy?” I remembered. “We’ve paid for the term.”
“I quit,” she mumbled, not meeting my eye. “And Miles was just angry with me for borrowing his pen. But I’ve put it back now,” Poppy said, her eyes narrowing at him.
“That’s SO NOT FAIR I DON’T CARE ABOUT A CRAPPY PEN . . .”
“Miles,” I shouted, shocked into being loud myself.
“She’s lying,” he said, twisting to me.
Poppy rounded on him. “OH MY GOD, SHUT UP.” Then she twisted to me. “And I’m not.”
“SHE IS.”
“I’M NOT.”
I put both hands to my head. This didn’t seem like a quick-fix situation and I desperately needed to get back to work, and I still had that letter to Dan to write too. “STOP IT, BOTH OF YOU.”
“I haven’t done anything WRONG,” Miles said, turning and kicking at the frame of his bed.
“Don’t kick things, Miles, you’re not four!” I yelled.
Poppy was backing away, sliding past me to the door. “And don’t think I won’t find out what’s happening,” I called after her as she raced up the second flight of stairs to her room.
I heard her mutter something. Miles was refusing to look at me. My phone started ringing and when I glanced at it, it was Hayley from Charter Publishing.
“Look, Miles, I’ve got to take this but I want to know what’s happened,” I said, my voice conciliatory. “Miles?”
He grunted as I pressed Accept, then started gushing apologies on behalf of my agency. Hayley interrupted me.
“What’s happening? We need Arthur to issue a statement, Emma, apologize and commit to that scheme.”
I put her on speaker as I walked through to my bedroom. I could change for the committee meeting. Save time. And I should check my makeup before my video call with our US agent. I wanted to pitch her Scarlet’s novel to sell in the States.
“I know, I know,” I murmured, my head stuck in a turtleneck sweater, voice muffled.
“You really need to, or this could be the end,” she warned as I stepped into the en suite.
My reply bounced off the tiles, “I understand. I’ll try my best . . .”
The pause was unbearable as I stared at the phone, then back at my face in the mirror.
“Thanks, Emma. I know this isn’t your client, but it’s your agency.” This final sentence before she hung up triggered another pain in my chest. She was right. I had to try Linda again.
My makeup had faded and I pulled off a piece of loo roll—Dan had obviously bought more—wiping the marks from under my eyes. Then I reapplied my concealer and dashed on an extra line of eyeliner to disguise my tiredness, unable to find my mascara in my makeup bag. What the hell had I done with it?
God, Poppy needed to turn down her music, I thought, as I moved back to the office for my call with our US agent. I texted her with one hand as I adjusted my laptop with the other. I didn’t have time to go up there and argue with her.
“Emma, hi . . .”
More than an hour later I was exhausted but tentatively hopeful; the agent had liked the sound of Scarlet’s book so would be pitching it in America. I called Linda, repeatedly, and got no reply. Then I answered six of the twenty-nine emails I’d received since lunchtime. At one point, Dan had called me down for the kids’ tea.
“Be a sec,” I’d called back. I knew I should go; it was about the only time of day we were ever all together. I needed to check on Miles, it wasn’t like him to get so upset. And I was on thin ice with Dan too. I made a typo just as Linda returned my call.
“Arthur did not appreciate being blind-sided in that manner. And he will not bend to this wokery.”
“But this has really exploded, Linda. It’s all over the internet, it’s not going away.”
“Melissa is being extraordinarily silly over this whole thing. And she needs us more than we need them.”
“Well, that’s not really true. We’re at a vulnerable stage with the recontracting, and if they drop Arthur—”
“Drop him? They wouldn’t dare,” Linda’s laugh turned into a cough. “And we will discuss your disappointing response to all of this in our meeting on Friday.”
“But Linda . . .”
She had gone and as I hung up, depressed, I realized I’d missed the kids’ tea. Brilliant.
I went looking for my youngest and found Miles lying on his bed looking up at the ceiling.
“Hey,” I said softly, sitting down. “What happened earlier?”
“Nothing,” he said, swiping angrily at his face.
“It’s clearly not nothing.”
I waited for him to speak.
“OK. Well . . .” I said, aware of the time I simply hadn’t got, the committee meeting any minute, Dan who I needed to talk to too, “we can talk about it at breakfast, OK? We’ll sort it.”
He didn’t reply.
“I’ve got to go out now, otherwise . . .” I said helplessly.
He rolled onto his side and I felt a lurch in my stomach. Maybe I should stay? See if this was really serious? “I’ll come and say good night later, I won’t be long,” I said, making promises to his back. His digital alarm clock told me I was running late. Shit.
Rushing to my bedroom I tried to shrug off my unease, my instinct whispering in my ear that something was really wrong as I rummaged for a Band-Aid to stick over the rub on my heel. Pulling on jeans, socks, boots, I wished they were pajamas and slippers and I wasn’t going back out. Oh God, I still needed to write the letter to Dan.
And I should tell Dan about the kids yelling. Maybe he’d already found out why over their tea?
My phone rang as I was racing down the stairs. “Prompt Emma. Six thirty p.m. sharp,” Catrin barked jokingly. “Denise will string you up.”
It was only two streets away. “I’ll be five minutes, literally. Distract her with talk of the need for speed bumps in Grosvenor Road. She’ll lap it up.”
Catrin was laughing as I hung up and appeared, puffing, in the doorway of the kitchen. Straightening my shoulders I stepped, attempted to sashay in fact, across the room toward Dan, his back to me at the sink, washing up the kids’ plates. Gus lifted his head in greeting as I approached. Give me strength, boy, tell your master I love him.
“Didn’t you hear me call you?” he said, not turning around.
The kitchen clock, a large gilt sunflower, ticked loudly above me. The committee meeting had started.
“I’m sorry, I meant to come down but it all kicked off and . . .” I swallowed down the excuses, “I won’t be long, OK, and we can have a lovely evening, together . . . alone.” I dropped my voice for that last word, trying to inject as much sex appeal as I could into the two syllables. I moved behind him. “I can’t wait to celebrate our anniversary properly,” I murmured, moving my arms around him.
Gratifyingly the tops of his ears turned pink and his shoulders relaxed. “I thought I’d make us chicken tarragon.”
A pang in my chest, one of my favorite meals and Dan knew it. Even cross he was making an effort. For a flash I really did just want to stay there, leaning into him, his familiar smell, his solid body beneath his shirt. We would sit at the table, catch up, the air smelling of warm batter. I’d magically produce my letter to him with a coy smile and a light laugh, “Did you think I’d forgotten . . . ? Not likely . . .” and we’d share a bottle of wine and chat and laugh. Afterward I’d take his hand and lead him to the stairs, moving toward our bedroom, my eyes on him, his dark with desire . . .
Ping, ping, ping. Email, WhatsApp, text. Email, WhatsApp, text. Ping, buzz, ping. It wasn’t just the guilt making me tense. I tried to block it out, my grip on Dan firmer, but the mobile was vibrating against his back.
I could feel his muscles tighten, his hand gentle on mine. “I’ll see you after your meeting.”
Conciliatory—and definitely all I was getting.