Page 14 of Christmas Romance Galore!
Today I came into work early, fired up and ready to take on the week — but my first port of call was a cup of coffee.
Sal walked in just as I’d finished grinding beans and gave me a grin. “Morning, No. 1 Lesbian — good weekend?”
I nodded. “It was okay.”
She put a hand on her hip. “And how was Serena?”
“Sienna,” I corrected, slotting the ground coffee into the machine and pressing the button.
Sal clicked her fingers together. “Right, Sienna.” She paused and cocked her head. “But I’m guessing from the look on your face, it didn’t go as well as you might have hoped.”
I laughed. “It didn’t — but that’s not Sienna’s fault. It’s mine. I fell asleep halfway through the date. On the loo.” I held Sal’s gaze as the words sunk in.
She took a moment to reply. “How do you fall asleep on the loo?” she finally asked, grabbing a cup from the cupboard and starting on her own coffee as mine came to an end.
I waved my hand to bat the comment away. “It’s a long story, and one I have consigned to the part of my brain marked ‘Dumb things I have done in my time on Earth, folder two’.”
Sal smirked. “Folder two? You’re planning on a collection?”
“Judging from the first 27 years, I’d say it was highly likely.”
I grabbed some bread from the communal bag and slotted them into the toaster, just as I heard my phone go in the office. My eyes widened. “Gotta grab this, expecting a call,” I told Sal, picking up my coffee and brushing past her at speed.
“That’s what I like to see, eager staff!” Sal called after me.
I got to my desk and banged down my coffee, just getting to the call before it rang off. I needn’t have run, though — it wasn’t the client I was expecting, it was Holly.
“Hey,” I said into my phone. “You missing me already? We only saw each other an hour ago.”
“Ha ha,” she replied. “Just calling to remind you about those tickets.”
“Tickets?” I searched my mind for what she might be referring to.
“For the Dixie Chicks gig? You said you were going to get them, remember? Anyway, they go on sale today at 10am, and I’m not going to be anywhere near a computer, so don’t forget. This is your one-hour warning call.”
I nodded. “Dixie Chicks, goddit.”
And that’s when I noticed the burning smell, right before the building’s fire alarm started screeching in my ear.
“What’s that noise?” Holly asked.
“Who left this toast unattended?” asked Maureen, our office manager. She folded her arms in the kitchen doorway and scoured the office looking for the culprit.
Bugger. “I gotta go,” I told Holly. “I think I just set the office on fire.”
I hit the red button on my phone and made my way sheepishly to the kitchen to fess up to Maureen. She already had the offending, blackened toast on the kitchen counter and was just putting on her high-vis fire warden jacket as I arrived. No matter what Maureen claimed, I think she secretly took pleasure in such episodes — any excuse to don the high-vis and have her authority ratcheted to the next level. If Maureen hadn’t been a prefect at school, they’d missed a trick.
“Sorry — it was me. I got a phone call and rushed to take it.” I bit my lip and gave Maureen my best ‘sorry’ face.
In return, she gave me a withering look — Maureen and I tolerated each other, rather than took pleasure in each other’s existence. Her look told me this was no more than she expected.
“Tell that to the fire team when they turn up on a wild goose chase,” she said, tutting. She rolled her eyes for good measure, then pushed past me and began shouting at the office to pack up and get out.
I made my way back into the scrum, grabbed my coffee, bag and coat, then joined the throng now exiting the office via the stairs. It wasn’t just our office either — it was the whole building. A slight pang of guilt zapped through me, but then I was standing on the cold winter pavement outside our building, chatting to our finance team about their weekend. Fire alarms weren’t unusual in our building, so most people took them in their stride. If there ever was an actual fire, it would be a shock to the system.
Ten minutes later, the giant red fire engines skidded round the corner, bringing the central London traffic to a halt. There were two of them, which seemed overkill for two pieces of toast. However, as our purchase ledger whizz Simon pointed out, they didn’t know that — they just thought a building was on fire.
I winced as he said it.
