For someone who had flat out refused to go to Brooklyn for one evening only one week ago, I returned to the apartment on Friday morning to find a note from Jenny saying she was staying at Jeff’s for the weekend. As far as I could tell, she hadn’t been in our apartment since we’d had dinner at Scottie’s on Monday, but it was weird how the place already felt like home to me, whether she was there or not. Jenny had been quick to add some photos of us from Gina’s leaving party to her clip-frame montages, and since we had terrifyingly similar taste in films and TV (read hot actors), heaps of my favourite DVDs were lying around the place. I’d even picked up some copies of books by my favourite authors at The Strand second-hand bookshop. I couldn’t think of a single thing I needed from the flat in London. Not one single thing.
Necking what was left of my iced coffee, I logged on to check my email. I had precisely two hours before my meeting with Mary and in that time I needed to shower, choose an outfit that said ‘please don’t fire me’, and come up with my very first ‘it’s not you, it’s me’ speech for dinner with Tyler that night. Flicking through the acres of spam in my Gmail account, I played the scenario over and over in my head. I was sure he would be fine, we could just be friends, it would be great. Absolutely fine. And I definitely wasn’t going to be terribly terribly English if he wasn’t OK with it, and accidentally sleep with him. Nope. Wasn’t going to happen. I was just reassuring myself that one single polite goodbye kiss would probably be OK, when I spotted an email from The Look. But it wasn’t from Mary or Cissy, it was from someone called Sara Stevens.
Dear Angela,
I hope you don’t mind me emailing, this was the only contact information on The Look server.
Firstly, I just want to say I absolutely love your blog–so much fun! I really feel like Im in New York with you.
So here comes the exciting bit. We’re currently setting up the UK version of The Look, launching in January and I would absolutely love to talk to you about you working with us as senior staff writer. Everyone here thinks your style is perfect for our magazine, and we’ve been tracking the popularity of the blog here in the UK as well as in the US, you’re a hit!
Obviously I’m not sure how long you’re planning to be in New York, but we’d need you back in the UK by the end of August to prepare for the launch issue.
Give me a call, my numbers are at the bottom of the email and we can talk over any questions you might have, salary, benefits, etc.
It was almost one-thirty here, so six-thirty in London. Only one way to find out if she was a late worker.
Yes, yes, she was.
‘Hi, Sara? It’s Angela Clark here.’ This was officially the last time I was going to dial a phone number without having a blind clue what I was going to say if someone answered. ‘I just got your email.’
‘Angela, I’m so excited that you called me! We absolutely love you here in the UK office. Are you excited? It’s exciting isn’t it?’
So far, so different from Mary.
‘Erm, yes? It is?’ I plopped down on the back of the sofa.
‘Oh my God, it SO is!’
I wasn’t sure I was OK with Sara showing such an early propensity for screeching.
‘So, when are you back, hun? I love that you nicked off to New York for a jolly instead of sitting around being a lil miss victim. Very fun. But we need you back here! When’s your flight booked?’ she yelled.
‘I haven’t actually booked a flight back.’ Sara might only need to stop for breath every seven minutes, I was struggling. ‘I don’t know if I’m actually coming back.’
‘What? You haven’t married that Wall Street banker have you? Not that I would blame you! No, really, it’s better. We will absolutely pay for your flight back, Virgin Upper Class all the way, baby! So the senior writer position is really exciting. You’d be writing about just about anything you think would be interesting to The Look readers, so there’s lots of scope for getting around. I was reading your blog and it just hit, pow! This girl can write fashion, dating, travel, food, sex—’
‘What did Mary say?’ I interrupted. Yes I know it’s rude, but she wasn’t going to shut up if I didn’t.
‘Mary?’
‘Oh,’ Sara actually paused, ‘I haven’t exactly spoken to her. It’s not really poaching is it? You’re British, you’re coming back to London, we need a writer. Really, we’re just keeping it in the family. I’m sure she’ll be pleased as. And I don’t want to be vulgar, but Angela, the money on this position is going to shit all over whatever pennies the web team are paying you.’
‘But you will speak to her?’
‘Oh yeah, right now, I’ll call her right now. I just need you to say you’re coming to work for me, you ridiculously talented woman!’
‘OK, well, this is really interesting,’ I just wanted to get off the phone as soon as humanly possible, ‘but I actually have to dash off to a meeting, and—’
‘I need to know by the end of the day, your time, on Monday,’ Sara said bluntly. All the giggles and enthusiasm gone out of her voice. ‘Unfortunately I don’t have time for you to think too long and hard about this–I didn’t think you’d need to actually–I have a writer to recruit in a very short space of time. I’ll email the job spec and salary and you can reply. Right?’
I suddenly realized she couldn’t see me nodding down the phone. ‘Yes.’
‘Right. I’ll speak to you Monday. Bye hun, have a great weekend in the Big Apple!’
‘Bye. You too. In London, I mean.’ But she had already hung up. I looked around the apartment, still holding the phone to my ear and softly bit my lip. ‘Bugger me.’
As if Sara’s phone call wasn’t enough to mess with my tiny mind, the tourists on their way to Times Square really didn’t want me to get to my meeting with Mary on time. I’d spent far too long scrubbing at my hair in the shower and troughing Goldfish crackers, watching The View instead of doing any of the things I was supposed to do, and now I was late. I could understand why Alex loved Williamsburg, it was so chilled out, but I was still in love with Manhattan, despite the maddening crowds. The noise, the people, the feeling that anything could happen at any given second. That was what inflated my blood pressure, that was what sent adrenaline surging through me as the streets got narrower, more congested. I loved the neon billboards, the giant Target ads, the garish Hershey store, Bubba Gump’s Shrimp Co, Virgin, Sephora, Toysrus. They were just adverts, stores, restaurants, but it was the clicking cameras and the pushing people with the happiest faces you’d ever seen that made the place what it was. And it was amazing to me.
Also amazing, was the hit of the air conditioning when I walked into the Spencer Media building. Bliss. I was late, but sent straight up to Mary’s office and without a lecture and shockingly, given coffee and iced water and, Jesus, a smile, by Cissy, as soon as I stepped over the threshold.
‘Angela Clark, get in here!’ Mary yelled from behind her desk.
‘I’m in,’ I said nervously, balancing the drinks, trying not to spill anything on my bag. ‘Hi, Mary.’
‘So yesterday’s post? Oh my God?’ She was actually grinning. Not a wry smile, not a disappointed frown. A big fat grin. ‘Great writing, Angela, I can’t wait to post it.’
‘So the blog is still going?’ I sighed with relief.
‘Of course it’s still fucking going!’ Mary stood up and gave me a hug that was much bigger than she was. ‘You’re my little success story. Do you know how many emails we’ve had about your column? More than about anything else on the website. Hell, more than most things in the magazine. Everyone at The Look loves your column.’
‘Everyone,’ I said cautiously. I couldn’t tell whether Sara had called yet. ‘I mean, that’s good. Isn’t it?’
‘It’s really fucking good. People love you, Angela, and they love to live vicariously through someone else. They don’t want to run away to another continent and leave everything they’ve ever known, but they love that you’re doing it for them,’ Mary nodded, perching on the edge of her huge desk and pushing me backwards into a seat. I managed to keep the coffee in the cup, but the water went everywhere. Except on my bag. Phew. ‘It’s good for me and it’s really good for you. So I need to put you on a contract.’
‘What?’
‘A. Contract,’ Mary said slowly. ‘We want to keep the blog going long-term, Angela. I won’t make you sign it in blood, but I will make you sign it.’
Shitshitshitshitshitshitshitshitshitshitshit.
‘A Sara Stevens hasn’t called you from the UK office has she?’ I asked, gulping down the coffee in case Mary felt like taking it away shortly.
‘The UK Look? How do you know about that?’ Mary asked, hopping back behind her desk at lightning speed. ‘That hasn’t even been announced internally yet.’
Fuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuck.
‘Well, they called me today and asked if I would go and work for them. As senior staff writer.’
‘Are you shitting me?’ Mary’s face went from red to white to purple in what seemed like a heartbeat. ‘They tried to poach my fucking writer?’
‘She said it wouldn’t be like poaching …’
‘What else is it exactly? When was this? Why didn’t you tell me?’ Angry Mary was very, very scary.
‘It was just now, literally, like an hour ago,’ I explained hurriedly. ‘Right before this meeting. I didn’t think I should call to talk about it when we were meeting now.’
‘Right. I suppose I should appreciate your coming to tell me face to face, even if those sly London bitches couldn’t be respectful enough to tell me,’ she shook her head. ‘Congratulations Angela, it’s a great opportunity for you and I think you’ll be very good at it. I’m just fucking furious to have found you and then to lose you.’
‘But I haven’t accepted yet, I have until Monday,’ I bleated, jumping up off the leather chair and leaving half my thighs behind. Ouch. ‘I’m not sure I really want to go back to London, or work for Sara.’
Especially work for Sara, I added silently, she’s clearly nuts.
Mary stared over her desk, not speaking. I didn’t know whether or not that was a good thing.
‘Are you serious?’ she said eventually.
‘About?’
‘About not going home and taking up this huge opportunity to risk it all to write a blog in a city that you’ve lived in for three weeks?’
‘Well, when you put it like that, I know it sounds a bit silly.’ I sat back down, trying to pull my Velvet T-shirt dress underneath me.
‘Don’t you want to go back home to London?’ Mary asked.
‘Does it matter what I want?’ I bit my lip hard. ‘I’ve got to go, haven’t I? Everyone keeps telling me.’ Everyone but Alex, I reminded myself unhelpfully.
‘Well, you’re not a US national, so it wouldn’t necessarily be easy,’ Mary stood up and walked back around her desk. She bent down in front of me, forcing me to look at her. I was so embarrassed. ‘But if you wanted to stay, you would always have a job with me.’
‘Really?’ I blinked back a tiny tear before it could make a real break for it.
‘Angela, I’ve been reading your diary for three weeks now, and it’s quite clear that you really don’t know what you want,’ Mary knelt on the floor, one hand on my knee. ‘That’s why people are relating to your blog, they want to be there when you work it out. I don’t know if that’s going to be here in New York, or back in London, but I do know you don’t have for ever to work it out any more.’
‘I know,’ I said, taking a deep breath and wiping my eyes. I really had to pull myself together.
‘You know I’m pissed about the UK team,’ she said, ‘but if you’re planning on going home, you should go now. This really is an amazing opportunity. If you stay here, who knows? The blog isn’t going to pay as much as a staff job, but it will pay. We can help you apply for a visa, but I can’t tell you what will happen after that.’
I stared at the pavement all the way back to the apartment, only just aware of people and cars and any other potential obstructions. Fumbling my keys into the lock, I rolled straight over the back of the sofa and stared at the ceiling. I had just worked out I was happy, I had just worked out it was definitely Alex, not Tyler, and now this. Jenny would say it was life testing my decisions. My mum would tell me it was fate bringing me home. I would say, enough, have we got any more Ring Dings. And since I was the only person in the room, I went with my option.
Tyler arrived on the dot of seven to find me on my doorstep, juggling brown paper grocery bags, my handbag and my keys. I’d completely forgotten he was coming over in my wallowing, and by the time it hit me, during the Thanksgiving episode of Friends, I had just enough time to run to the food halls in Grand Central station and pick up pasta, sauce and an enormous chocolate cheesecake. I had been planning to pass it all off as my own work, but I’d spent so long internally debating the merits of cheesecake over tarte tartin, I had run out of time.
‘So this is my romantic dinner?’ he smiled, taking the bags from me.
‘I’m so sorry,’ I grimaced, tussling with the door. ‘I had that meeting with my editor, and it was all a bit, eurgh, just a bit much. I was going to cook properly, honest.’
‘Another meeting?’ Tyler followed me through the door and up the stairs. ‘You must have almost as many meetings as me.’
‘Yeah, it’s a long story,’ I said, turning up the next staircase. ‘I dare say you’ll get the pleasure of it over dinner.’
Walking into the apartment together made me realize what a state it was compared to Tyler’s luxury pad. I desperately tried to kick some of the piles of crap under the settee and distract Tyler with the wine he had brought, but I couldn’t find a bottle opener in the kitchen. Naturally, in the apartment of two singlish girls, it was in the living room. I was relieved that Tyler was in a much better mood than when I had bailed on him earlier in the week, but I couldn’t help but feel that wouldn’t last long once I broached the ‘dumping him’ portion of the evening.
We cooked together (I boiled the pasta, he microwaved the sauce) then we sat down at the coffee table, cross-legged on the floor. For a while, we chatted about nothing, Tyler wolfing down his dinner, me pushing it around my plate. I wasn’t really in the mood for the pasta or the conversation, but I was hoping he would leave before we hit the cheesecake. It had me, Jenny and a weepy bottle of wine written all over it.
‘So what was so bad about this meeting today?’ Tyler asked, topping up my drink.
‘I can’t hand on heart say it was bad,’ I said, grinding more black pepper on my uneaten pasta. ‘I’ve been offered a full-time job.’
‘Really?’ he asked, emptying his plate and starting work on mine.
‘Really,’ I nodded. ‘Staff writer on the magazine. On The Look. Only thing is, it’s in London.’
‘But that’s fantastic,’ he said, leaning over for a quick one-armed hug. ‘It’s a real writing job like you wanted. I told you this blog thing would be your big break.’
‘But it’s in London,’ I repeated, watching him pick up his fork and start eating again. ‘I’d have to leave almost right away.’
‘You were always going to have to leave, weren’t you?’ Tyler helped himself to my untouched food. ‘Isn’t it amazing that you have this to go back to?’
‘Well, the web editor said if I stayed then she would always have work for me.’ I couldn’t stop staring at him. He hadn’t even flinched at the idea of me leaving. ‘So I could stay.’
‘But surely you’re not going to,’ he looked up, mid-mouthful. ‘I mean, the webby thing is one thing, but staff writer on a magazine, that’s a real job isn’t it? It’s being a journalist, not just playing at it.’
‘You think the blog is just “playing at” writing?’ I asked. He was making my worries about breaking things off easier every time he opened his mouth.
‘Angela, honey, why are you getting all stressed?’ Tyler asked. Having finished my food and his, he crawled around to my side of the table and held my face in his hands. ‘I think you’re a very talented writer and I think this job is a fantastic opportunity for you. Now, why don’t we go and celebrate?’
For the want of an answer, I let him kiss me, but it was strange. I didn’t feel anything.
‘Tyler, would you still want to see me if I stayed in New York?’ I asked, breaking away.
‘Of course,’ he murmured into my hair, nuzzling my ear.
‘What if I went back to London?’ I asked, pulling away. ‘What if I went back to London but I wanted to keep seeing you. Do the long distance thing. Would you do that?’
‘I don’t know where all this is coming from,’ Tyler said, tensing slightly. ‘We’re having fun, aren’t we?’
‘Apparently you are,’ I said, pushing up off the floor and grabbing the plates off the table. I placed them on the kitchen counter. Maybe it was slightly more of a slam than a place. ‘So if I went back to England this would be over?’
‘Angela,’ Tyler stood up, ‘I don’t know what’s going on here. Aren’t we just supposed to be having a nice dinner?’
‘Yes, supposed to be. I suppose I just didn’t realize this wasn’t important to you at all.’
‘What the …’ he threw his hands in the air. ‘Like you’re serious about me? For fuck’s sake, you’ve been screwing some guy in Brooklyn while you’ve been screwing me, so don’t come over all “is this going anywhere?” with me.’
‘I’ve been …’ I trailed off. He’d been reading the blog. ‘Why didn’t you say anything if it was a problem?’
‘Because it wasn’t a problem.’ Tyler shook his head. ‘You’ve been seeing other people, so what? So have I. I see lots of other girls. Isn’t this what you were looking for when you ran away in the first place?’
‘I don’t know.’ He wasn’t actually wrong. ‘But it’s not what I’m looking for now.’
‘I don’t think you know what you’re looking for,’ he laughed, making for the door. ‘This is why I don’t do relationships, especially psycho rebound girls.’
‘Psycho rebound …’ I repeated. My God I was not going to miss him after all. Such a charmer.
‘You totally got what you were looking for out of this, Angela. You just wanted to fuck some hot guy to make you feel better about getting cheated on. It’s not my fault that you’re too scared to go back to Britain. I do not have time for this emotional “will I won’t I” bullshit.’
‘Emotional bullshit? You think this is emotional bullshit?’ I asked. Before he could escape, I positioned myself squarely between him and the door. ‘All right then, you may as well have all of it. You know what? Yes, I’ve been seeing someone else, but do you know why I kept seeing you?’
He looked away. The ceiling was apparently very interesting.
‘I kept seeing you because I thought you were nice. No, really! How stupid was I? And just so you know, it certainly wasn’t because you’re so good in bed that I couldn’t help myself, because it turns out there are a few things you could learn there.’
That got his attention.
‘Yeah, cause you were faking that,’ he sniffed.
‘One of the benefits of being a “psycho rebound girl”,’ I smirked right back. He didn’t need to know I was lying my arse off. ‘When you’ve been faking it for ten years, you get really fucking good at it.’
He shook his head, his lips set in a thin line. The last time all my frustrations had built up inside me like this, I’d practically ripped his clothes off in the street. Tonight I would settle for just ripping into him.
‘I thought you were charming, a bit cheesy, but basically a nice guy. God, I even felt bad about seeing you and Alex at the same time. Obviously, I didn’t realize you were seeing so very many “other people”. And even though I was going to dump you tonight, yes, I was, I was hoping you would want to be friends. But if my emotional bullshit is too much, you’d better just leave.’
He looked at me, shaking his head. ‘I don’t have to put up with this just to get laid,’ he said, pushing past me, out of the door.
‘And neither do I!’ I yelled after him, slamming the door right behind him.
For a long time after Tyler had gone, I stood completely still, absolutely furious. But I didn’t know who I was more angry at, Tyler or myself. He was right, I had been using him, so why was I so pissed off that he had been doing the same? If I did go back to London, it wouldn’t be Tyler I’d be lying awake at night thinking about. Finally freeing my feet, I picked up my mobile and dialled Alex. I just needed to talk to him.
But he wasn’t there. I couldn’t call Jenny, she was having her big romantic evening with Jeff. I thought about ringing Erin or Vanessa, but I didn’t really feel close enough to them. Instead I did what any confused, angry girl would do when the shops were closed. I opened another bottle of wine, I took the entire chocolate cheesecake out of the fridge, and I sat down in front of the TV. Sod the diet and pray that this season will favour the smock, I thought as I chowed down. By the time I couldn’t force another thing into my mouth, I’d eaten more than half of the cheesecake and drunk the entire bottle of wine. It wasn’t going to feel good in the morning, but the sugar-wine coma I was slipping into felt great at that moment.