Page 84 of Alice Carver Manifests Her Perfect Life
‘Well, we could use this as an opportunity to expand, refine, include some new titles. Like, Discover Mindfulness? Or—’
‘Horrible idea, Alison. What about Discover My Cock. Come on. This isn’t some leaflet series for the doctor’s surgery.’
Gentle Jadan from Design visibly shook his head and Harry asked him what the problem was. Gentle Jadan said he wasn’t comfortable with aggressive sexualised language in the workplace. There was a moment of silence and then Harry told everyone he’d been asked to fill in 360s by the end of the month and so it was time for our best work.
I was going to say thank you to Gentle Jadan afterwards, but he disappeared quite quickly, so I asked Drunk Stephen to pass it on. I pointed out that Harry Piles was so dense he didn’t seem to understand the concept of a 360 and he had better hope no one from this outside company coming in to ‘quality assure’ decided to conduct an interview with Gentle Jadan. But Drunk Stephen didn’t seem as convinced. ‘They all know each other, these people,’ he said. ‘What’s the bet Harry Piles somehow makes the grade, despite everything?’
I am grateful for:
Gentle Jadan from Design
Sex with GC on Tuesday – and he didn’t call me a car for a full half an hour afterwards this time so that’s progress.
Date: Monday 6 FebruaryTime: 11.15pm
My thoughts and reflections:
Saw Guy again after work – that’s the third time, so I’ve already beaten Charlotte. He sent me an email telling me to come straight to the serviced apartment and that the concierge staff would let me through. I could happily live in a serviced apartment. (I stupidly mentioned this to Astrid last night and she said in effect I always have lived in serviced accommodation, and that if I didn’t start replacing the loo rolls when they ran out, she’d tell Arrie I would babysit the weekend after next. Arrie’s been trying to rope one of us into childcare whilst she and Roger go to some farming convention: apparently Mum and Dad can’t help – and both Astrid and I have covered each other’s excuses because neither of us want to be saddled with our nephews.You wouldn’t, I said.Try me, she said.)
Anyway, the serviced apartment is quality, if box-like. If you want a glass of wine, or ice, or crisps, you just ring concierge, and someone in a fawn uniform brings it to the door. And they’ll do laundry. (I’m thinking of getting them to do my sequinned trousers but may wait until week three of relationship – tactics and all that.) So, whilst I was waiting for my Diet Coke to arrive, Guy spoke to me about work a bit (another success story for my manifesting). He didn’t say much,mainly that he’d had to start handing over loads of paperwork to these third-party business consultants that Alistair had bloody invited in, and that whilst he was absolutely confident Carsons couldn’t operate without him, he’d be under real pressure during his divorce if anything were to happen.
‘You’re not really worried, are you?’ I checked.
‘Worry gets you killed,’ said Guy. ‘I don’t worry.’
His army background is quite hot. ‘What’s the timeline?’ I asked.
Apparently the top people had meetings off-site the next couple of weeks and then the consultants would begin to meet staff.
‘None of this is to be repeated, Alice,’ said Guy.
He’s particularly sexy when he orders me about.
‘Of course not,’ I agreed, thinking how I’d probably only tell Drunk Stephen.
‘I don’t trust them,’ said Guy. ‘It’s one of these new, woke companies. They’re looking to catch people out.’
That didn’t bode well. There was a lot I could be caught out on. ‘So they’re not coming in to the building yet?’
‘End of the month soonest,’ said Guy. ‘No one’s coming in yet.’
Then he gave me a lascivious look and started grazing his knuckles up my thigh which I do find as erotic in reality as I did in my fantasies – the hair makes it simultaneously tickly and a smidgen disturbing – and told me that it was high time he was coming. In me. ‘Or, better still, on you, Alice.’
I tried not to imagine Arrie’s reaction if she heard this. What she doesn’t acknowledge is that I’m not Tess of the d’Urbervilles. Personally, I like a bit of jism. We don’t all haveOCD, frigid tendencies, like Mum and Arrie. Besides, Arrie objectifies Roger all the time. She calls him a ‘fun vacuum’. And when you think about it, she’s pretty much his boss too, so equally troubling.
I am letting go of:
Sisterly ideals of feminism
Date: Tuesday 7 FebruaryTime: 10.10pm
My thoughts and reflections:
This Easter Discover book is making my job bloody hard. I’d been putting it off and getting on with the other projects, but Cara just emailed, chasing, so I couldn’t delay any longer. I spent a couple of hours this morning looking through the back issues of the Discover series – standout titles includedDiscover Needlework for GirlsandDiscover Maths for Boys– and then made the mistake of looking up JJ on the internet. Honestly, I still feel slightly nauseated and sullied from the combination. Add Easter into the mix and it was enough to make me consider voluntary redundancy.
However, that may well involve moving back into Mum and Dad’s which would in turn involve being closer (location-wise) to Arrie. I’ve just received another text from her saying how the twins are desperate to see their Aunty Alice soon (bullshit) and suggesting I come and see the puppies whilst they’re tiny. If those puppies are anything like their mother, then I don’t like them. But they do look pretty cute in all the photos she sent.
So I steeled myself and got on with thinking creatively, and finally sent the following to Cara:
