Page 39 of Don't You Forget About Me

I take that to mean wrestling his brother into submission. I’m hugely grateful. And also utterly terrified. Congratulations: your prize is, being a subordinate to a hostile Lucas McCarthy.

I’m delighted he didn’t object sufficiently to stop this though. Tiny victories.

‘Feel free to say no at this notice, but would you be free to pop in later tonight? Say six-thirty p.m.? I’ll show you around the tills and you can get your bearings so it’s not brand new to you if you get a rush on the first day.’

I look at my watch. An hour and a half’s time. Best make myself halfway presentable.

‘No problem.’

‘You’re a gem. Sorry, you know how it is. My diary’s suddenly gone fuckin’ attention deficit disorder crazy and there’s a million things to do.’

‘Honestly, I wasn’t busy. See you then.’

‘If no one answers when you knock we might be out the back, let yourself in, the door’s unlocked.’

We.This is happening. He is back in my life.

As I’m about to leave the house, I pause: should I wear my pink fur? My hackles rise: why not? Because Lucas McCarthy suggested I was a bimbo? My coat, my choice. My bravado is a veneer. I’m as much a combination of outward bolshieness and inward terror of inadequacy as I was when I was an adolescent.

As I skip home, my phone starts buzzing again in my bag and I flip the flap on it and fumble around, pulling out a mascara in the process, which means it peals for ages. I’m frantic by the time I finally unearth it: what if it’s Dev calling back to rescind his offer?

I see onscreen: Rav.

‘Hi!’

‘Ey up. You busy?’

‘Not as such.’

‘Just wondering, did you contact the paper about the Italian place you worked? The TripAdvisor flamings thing? You said you were going to but you were pished at the time.’

I’d told them that? I didn’t know I’d told myself that. My memory blackouts from grog are getting worse. It’s like there’s a whole deleted scenes reel these days.

‘Yeah I did …?’

‘Well, they used it.’

‘They did? Great!’

‘Well, there’s good news and there’s bad news. Alright, more honestly: it’s bad from here on in.’

‘They didn’t mention me?’

‘No? Why would they do that, did you name yourself to them?’

‘Oh. No,’ I say, feeling daft. ‘Only as I sent the tip.’

Someone – not Mr Keith, but Ant Something – at theStarreplied to my email about That’s Amore! with a dashed off, ‘typed with one hand while the other was clamped round half a Pret egg and cress baguette’ effort:thanks will look into it.

I thought it was curt not to address me by my name and then remembered I was only Gogpool. I didn’t imagine anything would come of it as there was no further question about who I was, why I was Another Unsatisfied Customer. Ah, well, I’d thought. Worth a punt.

‘… You know they say that revenge is a dish best served cold?The Starhas served it like That’s Amore! Nothing like what you ordered,’ Rav says.

‘What do you mean?’

‘Where are you now?’

‘At the … nearly home.’ I turn into my road.

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