CHAPTER 7

“It always takes an age to get served here.” Ed shook his head with resignation. “All the waiters seem to be bustling about, busy doing nothing.” He was sitting in the Groucho Club with Orla, and to prove him a liar a charming and efficient waiter came over straight away to take their order. “See what I mean?”

Orla laughed. It was a beautiful sound, made all the more startling because she did it so rarely. When she ordered a white wine spritzer, Ed confessed that he could never understand the joy of watering down wine. For himself, he ordered a beer, ignoring the desire of his taste buds for something infinitely stronger. Although the thought of diluted wine didn’t hold much appeal, the lure of neat whisky was becoming increasingly hard to resist at the end of a long working day.

The Groucho Club was overridingly black and scuffed. Very laid back in an overstated manner. The carpet was very night-clubby in a you-wouldn’t-want-to-see-it-during-the-day type of way. The club always had young, fashionable alternative comedians huddled into corners hoping no one would recognize or overhear them, and groups of brash, loud-talking, champagne-drinking nobodies hoping that someone would. It was the place where anyone who was anyone went to be ignored. Heaven knows why Wavelength held a membership, but it was only round the corner from their offices and it meant that the owner could stay in London in relatively cheap, convenient and trendy surroundings on his rare visits to the city. And you got a complimentary dish of peanuts with your media-type-priced drinks. What more could an exclusive club offer?

“You got finished on-time at Performing Power Tools?”

“Yes,” Ed said, stretching out and failing to add “just about.” Orla crossed her legs, but still sat bolt upright on the worn leather Chesterfield, despite it using all its guile to lull her down into its depths. She didn’t do relaxed well. Social chitchat seemed beyond her powers of comprehension, as if the whole thing was rather pointless, which it was but it certainly helped the day to go by. “The tape’s going into editing tomorrow. I’m sure they’ll be pleased with the results.”

“Good. Good.”

Their drinks arrived and Ed signed for them. He held his beer aloft. “Cheers,” he said.

“Cheers.” Orla sipped her wine. Ed wished she’d unbutton her jacket or do that “plain librarian” thing and loosen her hair and turn into a sexy vamp or do something to indicate that she wasn’t on duty now. But then, Orla always seemed to be in work mode. He sighed.

“Something wrong?” she asked.

“No.” He eased his neck against the sofa. “Just weary.” He wanted to curl up in a ball and go to sleep or be massaged with aromatic oils until his muscles let go of their seemingly permanent tension and softened to the point of helplessness.

“You look like you could do with a back rub,” Orla said, and Ed straightened up slightly, wondering if this frighteningly perceptive and astute woman could also read minds.

“I am due in Slough at some ungodly hour in the morning,” Ed supplied, “to film Digital Computers sales training.” And I really, really don’t want to go. “The thought of it is sending my spine into spasm already.”

“Did they decide on a presenter?”

“Jeremy Clarkson. Big budget,” he added with a trace of irony.

“Who?”

“Maybe he’s not made it on your side of the pond, but he’s very popular here. Except with car manufacturers. I think they would rather have Lucifer himself presenting their corporate videos.”

“Oh.”

“He’s good. Professional. We’ll get the job done quickly.” Unless the managing director decided to make a cameo appearance, as they so often did. Ed blamed Victor Kiam—he of “I liked the shaver so much I bought the company”—for an awful lot of tacky homegrown advertising videos. It could slow the whole thing down by a day if someone was particularly determined to make their screen debut. Still, the customer was always right. And, even if they weren’t, they paid the bill.

Orla leaned back and seductively unbuttoned her jacket, nearly causing Ed to spit his beer back in his glass. “Trevor was telling me that you started out in movies.”

“Yes.” Be casual, Edward. The words “Ford” and “Harrison” must not pass your lips or you will be the laughingstock of the postproduction suite.

“Ever miss it?”

Ed looked round. Was Trevor hiding behind the sofa ready to spring some Candid Camera–style joke on him? He turned back to Orla. “What?”

“The world of corporate videos is a little different from Hollywood.”

He was tempted to say “No? Really? I hadn’t noticed.” But then he remembered that Orla didn’t do irony either and said instead, “Yes, it is. A bit.”

Orla took a long, slow sip of her wine and fixed him with a stare, as she was prone to do. “I won’t be here for very much longer,” she said.

Ed chuckled. “It makes it sound like you’re dying.”

“I am,” she answered coolly, “in some ways. If not physically, then mentally. This just doesn’t get my juices flowing. I can feel them stagnating in my veins. This whole management thing desiccates the creative process. It’s not for me. I don’t know how you’ve managed to keep fresh for so long.”

“Er…” Ed said, realizing that Orla could have no idea of the size of his mortgage, which had been his prime motivating factor for an equally sizeable portion of his life.

“Don’t you feel the same way?”

“Er…” It was true to say that Ed’s juices had not recently been known for the quality of their flowing. But why did it matter to Orla? Had she suddenly found her small-talk button, or was this all being noted for a damning report about his future at Wave-length? He could see it now—“Edward Kingston, Managing Director. Creative juices all dried up. Desiccated. Recommend ‘izing’ in some way with large golden handshake.” But, no doubt, not large enough to allow him to retire in luxury to a deserted Caribbean island. Good night, Vienna, for poor old Ed, and back to scouring the job ads in Broadcast.

“You’re good, Ed,” she said flatly. “You’re good, but you could be better. You have some great ideas, which will never ever see the light of day as long as you stay at Wavelength.”

He wasn’t sure he liked the emphasis she placed on ever. “Er…”

“Can I be frank with you?”

When Orla was frank, it was usually quite painful. “Er…”

She leaned forward conspiratorially from her sofa toward the low occasional table that separated them. “When I go back to the States, I’m going to be heading up a small independent film company.”

“That’s nice,” he said for lack of anything more inspirational.

“It’s also confidential.” Orla put her glass and seemingly her cards on the table. “They’re young, funky, going places. We have some great British scripts that we have backing for.”

Ed nodded. “Good.”

“I want you to come with me.”

“Me?” He laughed.

“I mean it.”

He checked the back of the sofa for Trevor again. Any minute now he was going to jump out with a camera, going, “Ha, ha, got you!” He didn’t. Ed frowned. “I have no doubt, but why me?”

“You have a good, all-round knowledge of this business. I think I could put that to good use. British directors and producers are hot stuff in the States now. Look at Sam Mendes.”

“Look at Sam Mendes indeed!” Ed was tempted to say, “But I get women in itsy-bitsy teeny weeny bikinis to drill holes in wood,” and then he realized that false modesty was not a quality recognized by Hollywood either.

“You run a very eclectic but efficient organization with precious little in the way of assets or support from your management. You’re a great motivator.”

Only of other people, he added mentally.

For a moment he saw himself driving down Rodeo Drive in some racy, top-of-the-range convertible, sun shining, Beach Boys on the radio. “Ali would never go for it.” He shook his head. “She’s not a great fan of America. She’s the only person I know who doesn’t like Frasier.

“You’ve been married a long time?”

“A very long time.”

“Then what Ali thinks is important.”

“Yes.” Ed sighed heavily and wished he’d ordered the scotch. “This is no slur on your fellow countrymen, believe me. I love America. I would move there tomorrow. But Ali thinks Ronald McDonald is the Antichrist.”

Orla laughed.

“I think she would rather our children were brought up somewhere really, really awful than in Los Angeles.”

“Like where?”

“Like… Like… Budleigh Salterton.”

“I have no idea where Budleigh Salterton is,” she said with a smile.

“Neither have I,” Ed confessed.

“It sounds pretty.”

“It does, doesn’t it?”

“Maybe nicer than L.A.”

“Maybe.”

“We should go there one day. Together.”

The hairs on the back of Ed’s neck all stood to attention. “Maybe.” He finished his beer. “The District line calls,” Ed said ruefully.

“Think about this, Ed. I don’t need an answer right away,” Orla said as she stood up and smoothed a wayward curl from her forehead.

Think about it! It was going to occupy his every waking moment and probably most of his sleeping ones too. It was the opportunity he had longed for, dreamed of. A chance to get his foot jammed back in the door of real filmmaking. Get his career riding on the fast-track once again rather than shunted in some sleepy siding. No one else would give him a second look on his current CV, he knew that. It had taken someone inside, close to him, to realize that he could still make the grade.

Orla picked up her perpetually bulging briefcase. “But I won’t wait for you forever,” she warned.

“Of course not,” Ed agreed, and realized his tongue had gone dry and he was desperately in need of another drink.

“We can talk about this some more.” Orla headed to the door and he followed in her wake.

Oh, he could sit here all night and talk about this! He might even be persuaded to share his Harrison Ford stories, given the right moment. But the person he needed to talk about it with most was Ali.

“Maybe over dinner one night?” Orla suggested casually.

“Yes. Yes. Great idea,” Ed agreed readily. “Dinner. Dinner.”

Would Ali be prepared to pack up and go halfway round the world to satisfy his ambition? Would she realize how long he had waited to hear the sorts of things that Orla was saying? Would Ali, whose ambition stretched only as far as putting seven vaguely edible meals on the table each week, understand how much this ache had been suppressed in him? Until he’d heard that there might be a way out, he hadn’t even realized how much himself.

Ed glanced at his watch. They had closed the Venetian blinds and switched on the lights at the club, giving it a softer, more intimate feel. The inside of the much-vaunted Groucho might be disappointing, but there was a strange comfort in knowing that. At least there was one place where he didn’t feel he was on the outside looking in.

The alternative comedians were sinking deeper into the sofas, and even the brash boys were heading for home. It was late. He had said he’d be back ages ago. Ali would be worried. His dinner would be dried up or in the microwave or in the dog, if they’d had one. Perhaps he should have suggested supper to Orla tonight and phoned Ali to say he had an unexpected meeting. But then he ought to do the groundwork with his wife first. There was no point discussing the niceties when Ali might flatly refuse to consider it. They must sit down with a nice glass of wine and talk. He could rehearse his speech all the way home on the Tube to make sure he got it right.

He and Orla pushed out of the door and stood on the pavement. Before he had a chance to behave like a gentleman, Orla had hailed a cab. It pulled up next to her. “Good night, Ed.”

He held the door open. “Good night, Orla.” Ed stood there feeling ridiculously grateful. He wanted to hug her and kiss her and whoop enthusiastically and generally give some sort of emotional demonstration to show her how much her throwing a life-line to his drowning film career meant. Instead, he stood there like a statue, being tongue-tied and British and fiddling with his hands. In the end, all he managed was, “And thanks.”

She smiled out through the open window and waved her hand dismissively. The cab drove off, leaving him alone on Dean Street. There was a chill in the night air that felt more autumnal than springlike, more reminiscent of closing, ending, rather than of beginning. Ed shivered and wished he’d worn a thicker coat. At the same time he wondered what the temperature would be in Los Angeles.

Yes, he and Ali must talk. Tonight. But he wasn’t entirely sure that she would want to listen when she found out what he had to say.