Page 3 of Just Do It
‘Son of a—’
‘Bella?’ Peter, our intern, knocked lightly on my open door. I would close it but there was too much stuff in front of the door so I pretended I liked it that way. Although right now I just wanted to be left alone.
‘There’s someone on the phone for you from Denmark.’
She jumped up. ‘I have to take this but we’ll talk, OK?’
‘I’m fine. Really. There will be other opportunities.’
We both knew this was a big fat lie but the sentence sufficed to let my colleague know that while I appreciated her concern, I was done talking about it. At least for now. Bella and Peter walked away and I pulled out my phone.
Drinks. Tonight. A lot of them xx
Colette’s reply came back quickly.
Time to celebrate, oui? Xx
Commiserate
The next moment my phone rang.
‘Quoi?’ Colette was French, spoke five languages fluently, worked as an in-demand translator all over the world and often dropped back into her native tongue in times of high emotion or extreme tiredness.
‘They gave it to someone else.’
‘That is out of the question! You are the only possible candidate.’
‘So everyone keeps saying. But in the end they decided to go with Friedrich.’
Colette’s intake of breath was so loud and, naturally dramatic, that it almost made me laugh. Except I was beyond laughing.
‘Tonight. What time?’
‘What time can you leave?’ I asked.
‘I’ve just finished a job so I’m already in town. I’ll meet you here.’
‘I’m going to try and leave as soon as possible. I’m sure Inis will be fine. She’s as pissed off as me.’ I dropped my voice to a whisper. ‘She even swore.’
‘She did not!’
‘Uh huh. But I can’t tell you what she said because I promised.’
‘They are idiots, the whole lot of them. Get out as soon as you can.’
A quick trip home, a shower and a change of clothes later, I was on the Tube back into town to meet Colette. I didn’t usually mind the ride. It gave me time to think. But right now I didn’t want to think. I wanted to numb every single neuron I had. It was a short-term solution, admittedly. But it was still a solution.
‘Cheers!’ I clashed my glass a little too forcefully against Colette’s and the barman swapped it for one that didn’t have a fissure in it. ‘Thanks,’ I said as he handed it back.
‘No problem. Happens all the time.’
‘And on top of everything,’ I said, my voice raised to be heard over the ebullient Friday evening crowd. ‘I got an email just before I left. Apparently the project manager for the extension to the museum is going to be sharing my office.’
‘Why?’
I shrugged and sloshed my drink over the rim. ‘I dunno,’ I said, then swiped my finger up the glass to catch the blood-red wine before sucking the excess off. Waste not want not. As I did, I locked eyes with a man from the large group near us who were clearly in a more celebratory mood than we were. He turned away but there was no mistaking the smile on his face.
‘I think you have an admirer,’ Colette said, her accent thicker now we were several hours into our commiseration.
