Bad Friends

In the end, my father came to fetch me. I sat numb in my hospital bed, racking my brain, over and over, and as soon as my father arrived I was out of that bed. God, I would have run down the corridor if I could have. The wheelchair the nice nurse wanted me to use loomed black and heavy by my bed, but I couldn’t bear it. Instead I clutched my father’s arm like I’d never let it go.

‘Please, Daddy, get me out of here,’ I whispered. I hadn’t called him Daddy since I was thirteen. And he understood my desperation, my fear of such institutions; he probably shared it with me, in fact, but he hid it well. He pulled me nearer to his red anorak that rustled so, that smelled of fresh air and bonfires. He stroked my hair, just once.

‘Chin up, hey, Mag,’ he said and his eyes were both sorry and kind. And then he put me in his car and took me back to his house – because though I just couldn’t remember, I apparently no longer had a home.

Chapter Eight (#u1b5226d4-3425-5d33-ae63-8df7ffd09c40)

On the Monday after Bel’s wedding I woke early and almost sick with nerves. For a moment I couldn’t think why – then I realised that today I was returning to work, to the nightmare of ReneeReveals. Pulling the duvet over my head didn’t make the fear dissipate. Eventually I clambered out of bed.

For once, the journey into town flashed by, when usually it seemed interminable. Surrounded by a floating sea of free newspapers, we rattled over the arches of Rotherhithe and Bermondsey, the sky a cobweb of intricate cloud above neat tower-blocks that flapped bright washing on plastic lines, and I realised with stomach-clenching clarity that I was actually frightened. Although I’d seen a few of the team while I recuperated at my dad’s, I had no idea how they were going to react to me in the office. I had no idea how much they knew, and that was what scared me most. I could still barely piece it all together myself. And, deeper down, I was frightened I’d lost my touch. Sitting at home alone for months hadn’t been exactly morale-boosting.

Of course, this morning the journey was so smooth that I ended up being early. I felt very tiny as I dawdled across Charing Cross footbridge in the freezing autumn air, the skyline hectic, huge cranes soaring above the spires of centuries past. I stopped at the corner café for coffee so strong it made my heart bump and they recognised me behind the counter, but I couldn’t manage conversation this morning. Finally I couldn’t drag it out any longer. I was so nervous that I almost couldn’t sign my own name at security.

But when I actually walked into the office, the initial reception I received was so nice, the girls so pleased to see me, the gossip to catch up with so comfortingly familiar, that I felt an enormous wash of relief; compounded by the fact that Charlie was apparently out all day. It’s not so bad, I told myself. Perhaps I can manage, after all.

I was just starting to relax a little, sorting things out in my tiny office, trying not to be overwhelmed by the thousands of emails and piles of paperwork that had accumulated since I’d last been here, when there was a tentative knock at my door.

‘Maggie?’

I looked up from the letter I’d been reading. It was the blond boy from the trauma show. Now that I looked at him again, it was funny – he reminded me of someone. Probably himself.

‘Oh, hi.’ I’d forgotten his bloody name again.

‘I thought you might like a coffee.’

He looked so eager I didn’t dare tell him I was already buzzing with caffeine. Very carefully, like it was a Faberge egg and not a chipped old mug declaring ‘You’re the best’ in hot-pink on one side, he placed it down beside the computer. Then he stood and looked at me.

‘So, how’s it going?’ I asked when I realised he wasn’t going to speak. ‘Are you settling in? Sometimes it can –’

‘Oh I love it,’ he interrupted airily. ‘The girls have made me really welcome.’ That’d be a first. They hated anyone who wasn’t their own. ‘They remember me from the summer, of course.’

I wished to God I did. ‘So, what are you working on?’

But he never got to answer because Charlie suddenly stuck his head round the door.

‘Miss Warren. Not before time, some less patient than myself might say.’

‘Hi, Charlie.’

‘Everything all right? Excited to be back?’ He sauntered in holding a folder I didn’t much like the look of.

‘Oh yes, very excited.’ My smile was as genuine as Charlie’s signet ring as the blond boy slunk out of the room, obviously irritated that Charlie had ignored him.

‘Strange boy, that one.’ My boss plonked himself on the edge of my desk, crumpling my ‘Welcome Back’ card in the process.

‘He does seem a bit odd, yes.’ I moved the card.

‘Anyway, darling, we need to discuss the show –’

The phone rang and I snatched it up, glad of the distraction. ‘Maggie Warren.’ No one spoke. ‘Hello? Hello?’ Eventually I hung up.

‘So, look, I’ve been talking to the team about the You’re Dumped show.’ Charlie admired his reflection in the glass partition and adjusted his collar minutely. ‘Everyone’s very excited.’

I seriously doubted that.

‘But we do need to book a celeb couple pronto, for the kudos. Get Donna on it.’

‘Oh Charlie, come on.’ I actually laughed. ‘No one in the public eye is gonna dump their partner live on air, are they. Not even the Z-list.’

‘Really? What about Jade Goody? Or that blond kid from East-Enders, the one that’s always fighting in the clubs –’

I fought the urge to sink my head onto the desk. ‘If you say so,’ I murmured.

‘Pull all the stops out, Maggie, yeah? You know you can do it.’

‘I’m not sure I’m quite there yet, Charlie.’ I held his gaze.

‘Well, you’d better be, my darling. Because Sally and Donna are chomping at the bit for your job.’ Charlie flung the folder onto my desk. A photo fell out of the side. ‘I can’t stave them off for much longer.’

The photo looked horribly like –

‘Is that …?’ I pulled the picture towards me.

‘What? Oh yes, your little friend. She’s dying to appear on any show, apparently. I do love the fame-hungry, don’t you?’

I turned the black and white headshot round to face me. Fay.

Somehow I got through that first day, though I practically willed the clock to strike six. I was hugely relieved to realise I hadn’t forgotten everything I knew, although my memory and my concentration were still tested.

Around five I’d taken a deep breath and made a phone call. She was horribly pleased to hear from me.

‘Don’t worry, Maggie. Charlie’s explained it all. It makes perfect sense – you know you love someone, but you also know you’re doing the right thing by finishing with them.’

How very ingenious of Charlie.

‘I need to talk to Troy first, obviously, sound him out. But Charlie said, well, he said he’d make it worth my while, you know.’

‘I bet he did,’ I muttered. ‘You know, Fay, you should really, really think about this before you do it.’

‘I have.’

‘I mean, how will Troy take it if you do something like that live on air, in front of an audience? There’ll be no going back once it’s done.’

I almost couldn’t believe my own ears. Me, who was usually trying desperately to persuade, to coax people into doing things on live telly that I’d never ever countenance myself.

Fay was absolutely blithe. ‘He knows it’s on the cards anyway. I’m sure he’d like to be on TV too, you know.’

‘Yeah, but Fay, this is real life. It’s not play-acting.’