‘Well, I suppose so. If you want it that is. I gather your sister is my dad’s neighbour and she spoke so highly of you, it convinced me that with you as my PA I might just be able to do this job after all.’ He gave a weak laugh. His teeth were perfect: straight, brilliant white and with that slight overbite I can hardly resist in man. I liked his smile, I’d warmed to him instantly and now I had a job. And in 365 days I’d be a quarter of a million pounds better off. Where did I sign?
I reached over and sealed the deal with a handshake before he could change his mind. We rose to our feet, still holding hands across the desk.
‘You won’t regret this, Anthony. I’ll be the best PA there is.’
‘Can you start right away?’ he asked.
‘Well straight away on Monday, if that’s all right?’ I said with a winning smile. I needed a few days to psych myself up. Employment was a major step after all.
‘Monday is great. I’ll see you at nine,’ said Anthony. We finally released each other’s hands and for some reason I gave him a thumbs up. Anthony Shearman had me all of a fluster. I questioned whether I could survive the 365 days without falling for him; but by the time he saw me to the door of the building, it was too late. I already had.
A celebration was in order. I called my BFF, Anya Stankovic, and arranged to meet her at a fashionable restaurant and bar in town. Anya was back in London after a shoot in Milan and she was my girl when it came to getting slaughtered in the middle of the day. Anya and I had been friends since art school. I had gone to study fashion and Anya was a fine art painter. We’d met in the canteen one afternoon and, after discovering that we were both skiving from our respective lectures, became instant friends.
It was when my department put on a fashion show and I asked Anya to be my model, that a fashion industry executive told her she should take modelling seriously. Anya jumped at the chance of having a photo shoot and meeting an agent. Her career as a fine artist would never have worked out anyway. She spent most of her days in the Student Union Bar and very few hours with her easel and brushes.
Anya’s popularity as a model came at a time when the Eastern European look was all the rage. Her fine features, determined green eyes and slender body got her to the front page of Vogue in just two years of starting as a model. She’d arrived from Serbia as a skinny fifteen-year-old with a strong accent and perfect English. She still pronounced the W at the front of words as a V, which men found irresistible.
We looked like polar opposites of each other: Anya with her pale skin and mine sandy brown, she with the bone-straight, dark hair and mine wild and wavy. She was tall and fragile-looking. I was tall, too, but full in the bust and butt region. Anya rarely smiled and I could never stop grinning or laughing about something or other. But we’d clicked the first time we met and while Anya had gone on to be a raging success in her career, I, quite obviously, had failed. I didn’t finish my art degree and I didn’t understand the meaning of the word career as each of my sisters had pointed out to me in turn. Yes, Anya and I were complete opposites.
‘Vot is this job you have?’ Anya asked as she breezed into the restaurant, causing every head to turn as she approached the table. She kissed me on each cheek, rather systematically, and I pulled her in for a squeeze. I held out the drink I’d ordered for her and she held the stem between long, slim fingers as she sat opposite me.
‘I’m the PA for Anthony Shearman of A Shearman Leather Designs.’ I lifted my drink and we both took a sip.
‘Congratulations,’ said Anya. ‘I hope he isn’t some boob-grabbing boss like the last time.’
‘I don’t think so,’ I said. ‘Anthony is a sweetie. He’s Clark Kent in these super sexy glasses.’
‘Oh and I guess you’re dying to rip off his shirt and reveal the S on his chest.’
‘You could say that. But I can’t get involved. I need to keep my job for a year, not fall in love.’
Of course Anya had no idea about the conditions of the will so, after ordering a second cocktail, I told her everything. She barely raised an eyebrow during my tale of hardship and hard work.
‘So, you think you can do this, Madge?’ she asked. This was only going to be the greatest challenge of my life.
‘Look, I’m twenty-eight,’ I said. ‘I can’t go on living off my parents and eating out on your credit card for the rest of my life.’
‘Vye not?’ she asked. ‘I have a lot of money and I get so many gifts: dresses, bags, shoes, hotel rooms. I can share vith you.’
‘I haven’t done anything to earn it, Anya. You’ve worked hard since you were eighteen. You look after your body. You eat weird food and you lived like a pauper for a year in Paris. You made sacrifices and you made it to the top. I’ve got nothing to show for myself.’
‘Rubbish. You have your flat, your car.’
‘I could never have had those without my parents’ money. Besides, I had to give the car back – failure to pay the loan, remember? And I’m in rent arrears. Any second now I could be served with an eviction notice. I don’t actually own a thing. You’ve got three places to live. If I get flung out for non-payment of rent I have to move in with my mother – or worse, my father. You know he’ll never stop lecturing me. He’ll have me working for him and he’ll drive me completely nuts.’
‘You know you can alvays move in vith me if you needed to. Besides …’
‘What is it?’ I said.
‘Vorking for a year isn’t so bad if it means you can practically retire at tventy-nine ven you come into your inheritance.’
I stopped with my cocktail glass halfway to my lips.
‘But you know what, Anya?’ I’d had an epiphany. ‘That inheritance could be the making of me. I wouldn’t carry on as I have been. If I get hold of that money before I’m forty-five, I swear I’ll make something of myself. I’d use the money for something – something worthwhile.’
Anya smiled a thin smile.
‘Don’t you believe me?’ I asked her.
‘It’s not that I don’t believe you, darling. It’s just that you’ve had lots of schemes in the past that didn’t really take off. I mean, there vos the time you vonted to be a stylist. I introduced you to a number of celebrities. You turned up late for everything and you made Matt Damon look like Coco the Clown.’
‘Silk trousers were in that year.’
‘Not for a man vith his physique. And vot about the time you tried to be a singer?’
‘Oh, that. Look I know I’m no Beyoncé but you’d be amazed at what they can do in the studio. They can touch up your vocals and make you sound really good.’
‘But, Madge, no amount of touching up could save you. It vos awful.’
‘Okay, don’t go on about it.’ I sighed.
The catalogue of disasters that was my life wasn’t entirely my fault. Practically everything that happened to me since my brief but tempestuous relationship with Hugo seemed doomed to fail. Nothing had really gone right since him. I don’t suppose my family and friends accepted that Hugo was to blame for all the catastrophes that went to make up the Magenta Bright existence. And anyway, as it had been ten years since he left, they must all have assumed I’d moved on. In many ways I had, but memories of Hugo were never far from my mind.
I was eighteen when I met him. He was ten years older than me. I was about to start art college and had gone out for a drink with friends. Hugo was on the opposite side of a wide bar in a loud pub where live music was blaring from the stage. The bar itself was being propped