‘I wasn’t thinking about her!’
‘But you said you were wanking out of resentment.’
‘I was pissed off with them for having such loud sex, that’s all.’
‘Because you’re not getting any?’ She gazed at me, unblinking.
‘Look, I’m not repressed, all right? I’d have sex if anyone wanted to have sex with me, but no one has for ages.’
‘So you’re just waiting for someone to offer it to you on a plate.’
‘Well, no—’
‘That’s what it sounds like to me. It’s just like your career. You’ve just decided to sit back and stay in this dead-end temp job—’
‘I’m a contractor, actually, not a temp. And I might apply for the Fast Stream this year,’ I said.
‘Why didn’t you apply last year?’
I hadn’t applied because that would mean saying ‘I’m a civil servant’ when people at parties asked, ‘What do you do?’ and then having to answer a lot of questions about NHS funding and whether I approve of the government. I hate it when people ask, ‘What do you do?’ I assume everyone does, even if the answer is ‘I’m a novelist,’ or ‘I’m a surgeon specialising in babies’ hands,’ because even then you know someone will say, ‘Will you show my book to your agent?’ or ‘Can you look at this lump on my finger?’ I missed being able to say, ‘I’m a dancer.’
I looked at the floor. There was some sort of stain on the carpet – ketchup, possibly.
‘You need to make an effort with your career,’ Nicky said. ‘It’s the same as your love life. You’re not prepared to put yourself out there.’
‘I’m not going to go looking for a relationship. I don’t need one to make me complete. I’m independent.’
She put down her notebook. ‘Are you independent?’ she asked. ‘Or are you really, really sad?’
I maintained a dignified silence.
‘It’s OK to cry,’ she said.
‘I’m not that sad,’ I said.
‘Just let it out.’
‘I’m not crying,’ I said, which wasn’t strictly true.
She handed me the tissue box triumphantly.
I called Cat on my way home from Nicky’s. I didn’t want to be alone with my thoughts, and I could always rely on Cat to tell me an anecdote about her terrible career to put my problems in perspective.
‘Do you fancy a drink?’ I asked, when she picked up the phone.
‘I wish,’ she said. ‘I’m in Birmingham. Doing the life cycle of the frog again.’ She sounded a little out of breath. She’d probably been having energetic sex too.
‘When are you back?’ I asked, sidestepping a puddle.
‘Not for ages,’ she said. ‘It’s a UK tour.’
‘Ooh!’
‘Of primary schools.’
‘Oh.’
‘I’m probably going to get nits again. Or impetigo.’
Cat couldn’t get work as a dancer after school – every company she auditioned for said, ‘You have the wrong body type,’ which is the legal way of saying ‘You’re black.’ But instead of doing what I did when my dance career ended – moving back in with my parents and swearing never to perform again, except to sing my signature version of ‘I Wanna Dance with Somebody’ at karaoke nights – she retrained as an actor. Now she earned most of her money performing in Theatre in Education shows, playing roles like ‘frog’ and ‘plastic bottle that won’t disintegrate’ and ‘uncomfortably warm polar bear’. I think we probably stayed close over the years because neither of us could stand our other friends from dance school, with their OMG I just got cast in Birmingham Royal Ballet’s Swan Lake! #Blessed Instagram posts. I did feel envious of Cat sometimes, though. She still got to experience the thrill of applause, even though the people applauding sometimes pulled each other’s hair and had to be sent to the naughty corner.
‘Lacey’s playing the frogspawn,’ Cat continued, ‘and she won’t stop going on about the musical she’s writing about periods.’
‘I bet that’s actually going to be really successful,’ I said.
‘It is, isn’t it? Oh God …’
I heard a muffled sort of stretching sound on the other end of the line.
‘Are you taking your tadpole costume off?’ I asked her. ‘Go on, sing me the tadpole song again.’
‘I’m the frog this time. Fucking green leotard is a size too small.’
‘You’ve been promoted!’
‘Very funny,’ said Cat. ‘One of the kids came up to me today and said, “You’re not a real frog. You’re too big.” I swear six-year-olds are getting stupider.’ More stretching and shuffling, and then a grunt of effort. ‘Got it off.’
‘So now you’re naked.’
‘Yep. This is basically phone sex,’ she said.
‘This is the closest I’ve come to a shag in three years.’ I gave myself a mental pat on the back. At least I could joke about it.
‘I thought I had it bad,’ Cat said. ‘Lacey’s been shagging Steve, the new tadpole, all tour, and I’ve been feeling like a total third wheel.’
‘You’re best off out of that,’ I said. ‘Tadpoles shagging frogspawn is all wrong. Sort of like incest.’ I tucked my phone under my chin and unlocked the front door.
‘How are you anyway? How’s work?’ asked Cat.
‘Too boring to talk about.’
‘You need a creative outlet outside work.’
‘No thanks,’ I said. All I wanted to do was watch TV without listening to people have sex. I sat on the sofa, coat still on, and felt around between the cushions for the remote. Come Dine with Me was on, and Alice and Dave were out. This was shaping up to be a good evening.
I was a little late to work the next day, so my usual desk was taken. I waved at Owen, who I usually sit with, across the grey no-man’s-land of desks and chairs. I could feel other people looking up at me from the trenches, so I ducked down into the nearest seat, next to Stan, one of the press officers. I usually try to avoid Stan, because he breathes loudly and eats crisps all day. An unsociable combination. This morning he’d gone for salt and vinegar rather than cheese and onion, which was a blessing.
I couldn’t concentrate on logging the new emails and letters – my session with Nicky was still playing on my mind – so I pulled out the latest letter from Eric, the Bomber Command vet, written on thin, yellowing lined paper in shaky blue biro, and started drafting my reply.
You’re not supposed to draft a stock response to government correspondence – you’re supposed to treat each letter writer as an individual. There are guidelines that tell you how to address a Baroness (‘Baroness Jones, not Lady Jones; it’s important to distinguish Baronesses from women who become Ladies when their husbands become Sirs’) and how to refuse an invitation to a Minister (‘Unfortunately, pressures on her diary are so great that she must regretfully decline’). Sometimes you take letters to the Minister for their signature. Sometimes, if the letter isn’t