mother to let her stay at home. Sean put his finger under her chin, and she turned her face up towards him.
‘Hey,’ he said gently, looking into her eyes. He smiled, his tanned, kind face crinkling into lines. ‘It’ll be easy for you, Katy. You’re wonderful. We all know it, you just need to know it.’
She clutched at his wrist, taken aback. ‘Oh, Sean.’ She was embarrassed, she didn’t know why, and she smiled back at him, shyly. ‘You’re just saying that.’
You’re just saying that. She sounded about five; Kate cringed, inside, then asked herself why it mattered, as awkwardness fell upon them. She tightened her hold on his wrist, reached up and kissed him on the cheek.
‘Thanks,’ she said, and she smiled at him, feeling happy, all of a sudden. ‘You’re right, Sean. Thanks a lot.’
‘I know I am,’ he said, and he was still watching her. ‘Now, you’re gonna be late. Have a great day. I’ll be there when you come back, after a long day slaving over some JavaScript. OK?’
‘OK. Bye. Thanks.’
His mouth curled a little. ‘No, thank you.’
He was a flirt, such a flirt, she told herself, as Sean walked away. Kate watched him shaking his head at her over the ticket barrier, as the sea of commuters bustled past them, off with lives of their own, full of promise and exertion and interaction and … Oh, all the bloody things she was no good at. It was so sweet of him to try, she told herself. She stared after him. He would be there tonight when she got home, watching TV, and they’d sit on the sofa together and chat about their day and yet another day would have passed with her being shunned, like the Amish. So she’d cook him something and he’d teach her how to mend her bike, or how to rewire a plug, or something, and they’d spend the evening together, like they always did. She’d be fine, if she could come home to that life. It was a nice life. Who said you had to love your job?
But Sean was right. Because that very day, Charly decided to notice Kate.
They went to Anita’s, a traditional Italian around the corner from the office. It was free of Broadgate employees, by dint of the fact it served food, in particular food that wasn’t just leaves. Charly seemed to know them all, the waiters practically clapped as she slunk in, her long legs sliding into a table by the window.
‘God, Sue’s a bitch, man,’ she said as they were seated. She pushed her small frameless sunglasses up on her head and nodded at a waiter. Her honey-coloured hair tumbled around her, she smiled at Kate, the freckles on the end of her nose wrinkling. ‘Yeah, we’re ready,’ she said to the waiter, hovering nearby, a look of adoration on his face. ‘What you having? Salad nicoise for me. No dressing. With extra olives. And a coke. Thanks.’
She flung the menu back at him without acknowledging his presence. Kate said,
‘Er … me too.’
‘The same?’ the waiter said, raising his eyebrows.
‘Yes,’ said Kate, not wanting to be conspicuous. She handed him the menu back.
‘You don’t want dressing neither? The same?’
‘Yes!’ said Kate, trying to affect an incredulous laugh.
‘You want extra olives too?’
‘Oh, go away,’ Charly said, batting the waiter away. ‘Just bring her a normal one. Leave us alone. So. D’you like Catherine? What do you think of Sue?’ she demanded, leaning in, her long, slender fingers plucking a stale roll from the basket in front of them.
Kate was taken aback by the directness of the question, and a little terrified. She hadn’t imagined she’d have to speak, more that she could just sit there and listen to Charly, whom she’d noticed striding around the office, effortlessly glamorous. She never seemed to hang around with the Georginas and the Jos, the Pippas and the Sophies, she was her own separate entity. More beautiful than them, cooler than them (she had been wearing cropped trousers and heels for ages – long before Madonna in the Beautiful Stranger video, as she informed anyone who wanted to listen) – less posh than them, less fake than them. She knew it, and she didn’t seem to care.
‘Come on,’ said Charly impatiently, and Kate was shaken from her reverie. ‘Is Sue a good boss? She really annoyed me today, you know, telling me to recheck that piece on gloves for autumn.’
‘Er … Aah,’ Kate said, hating the impaired speech she seemed to have developed since her arrival at Woman’s World. What would Sean say if he could see her? She thought about it, and smiled. ‘I like her. She’s nice. Bit uncommunicative – I mean I wish she’d tell me what’s going on a bit more.’
‘Yeah,’ said Charly, nodding. ‘She seems to think you’ll just guess. She’s OK, but I know what you mean. I used to work for her.’
‘Did you?’ said Kate. ‘How long – how long have you been here?’
‘Not long,’ said Charly. ‘Too long, you might say. A year. I was her assistant, now I work with Catherine and Georgina –’ Kate nodded, she knew this ‘– and I sometimes write the editor’s letter when no-one else can be fucked to do it, and I do a couple of featurettes.’
‘You do the Letters Page, don’t you?’
A frown passed over Charly’s beautiful face. ‘Yeah, and I fucking hate it. Load of weirdos writing in to tell you how to make stuffed animals out of the lint from the washing machine, or wanting you to print a picture of their grandson just cos he’s done a shit that’s shaped like Alma Cogan.’
‘Really?’ Kate was fascinated.
‘Not the last one, no.’ Charly shook her head. ‘Barbara Windsor, actually.’
Luckily the salads arrived, saving Kate from further comment. Charly ate like a demon, shovelling food in her mouth, throwing out odd comments, inviting responses from Kate, making jokes about the office, filling her in on what she hadn’t known – Barbara in Sales had slept with Fry Donovan, the new Broadgate publisher, a couple of years ago, and he’d given her a job to keep her quiet, so the rumours went, which is why Barbara giggled helplessly whenever Fry walked into the room. Claire Cobain on the subs desk threw up into Phil’s yucca plant the day after the Christmas party; she’d forgotten and he hadn’t realized for three days, except they all kept gagging on the smell. And Jo and Sophie weren’t speaking to each other after Sophie heard Jo saying to Georgina in the loos that she looked rank in her new black patent platform boots.
All Kate had to do was throw in the occasional question, raise her eyebrows at the required moment, but Charly was a great companion, and soon Kate found herself opening up, telling her about her flatmate Sean, about her best friend Zoe, about how she’d started to dread coming into work, how she’d eaten her lunch on a park bench for the past two weeks –
‘By yourself?’ Charly demanded. ‘Sitting in Lincoln’s Inn eating a sandwich from Prêt à Manger by yourself? God that’s sad. What did you do if someone you recognized came past?’
‘I’d look down at my book, or else I’d turn my head so they couldn’t see me,’ said Kate, and as she said it, she realized how silly it sounded. Charly laughed, her eyes wide open with surprise, and Kate joined her.
‘That’s the
