‘Alone at last,’ Dean says, making me jump as he comes closer, well and truly crossing the line into my personal space.
‘Not really,’ I snap, stepping back. ‘If you count the room full of people we’re in. Dean, I’m not sure this is your kind of thing.’
‘Nonsense, I’m enjoying it and I met a nice girl, Louisa over there, very friendly she is, not quite as lovely as you of course. Anyway, I need to talk to you, a very strange thing’s been happening. I’ve been trying to phone your mobile and this old woman keeps answering.’ Dean appears quite puzzled.
‘Really? How odd,’ I reply innocently.
‘Yes. She was quite pleasant but seemed rather deaf. Do you know who she is?’
‘Can’t imagine,’ I reply, trying not to laugh, and walk off under the excuse of needing to talk to Emma.
I sign up for the Silver Membership with the promise of strawberry champagne picnics and a trip to Bath. I also ask her surreptitiously if she can prevent Dean from joining the agency. She’s a bit taken aback but when I explain the situation, she agrees to turn him down immediately. I feel kind of bad about it until she suggests a taxidermy group she knows, which her eccentric old uncle runs out in the country somewhere. Dean will be thrilled with that and hopefully it’ll get rid of him once and for all. He certainly won’t be able to get hold of me because he’s on a hotline straight to Great Aunt Flo.
I’m quite pleased with my dancing, I’ve mastered some of the steps and figure that with practice, I might even cut a reasonably convincing impression on the dance floor if I do ever make it to a Regency Ball.
All in all, the evening has been fun and we eventually leave. Mel’s exhausted, Chloe flushed and radiant. I think she may have had a few glasses of champagne too many. But I’m happy, what with me finally ditching Dean and making some great new friends, it looks as though The Jane Austen Dating Agency might be a winner after all.
Chapter 9
I sprint into the Modiste offices at a couple of minutes to nine the next morning. The tube had been late as usual so I’m compelled to run the last few metres in spite of my heels. Rushing through the huge entrance doors to the art deco building, I push past the elegant reception desk and leg it up the stairs.
Amanda has already started the usual Monday morning sales pep talk, which is supposed to motivate us to sell more advertising space. This always includes the carrot Amanda feels it’s necessary to dangle in front of us to reward the person who sells the most advertising space that week. I really hate this system but I guess it’s the way most sales people operate and that’s why I don’t really fit in.
I’ve always worked as hard as possible, whatever the position, because I like to do my best. Throughout my student days, I worked several jobs: serving in a café, cashiering in a bank (I loved counting out huge sums of money, pretending it was my own) and in an event company selling balloons and tacky room decorations, on the minimum wage of course. It didn’t matter how much I was paid, I worked hard, so the idea of being bribed to sell is a bit like being a performing dog. I don’t really like the competition and haven’t been very good at winning much business since my initial flukey beginner’s luck.
I hate being late. Amanda raises an eyebrow at me as I stutter my apologies and rush to my desk.
‘I shall start again,’ she announces, ‘for the sake of those who are a little tardy.’
The rest of the sales team, who have probably been there since at least 8.30, all appear smug and self-righteous. I pretend to be very busy, starting my computer and making sure my stationery is all in place.
Amanda continues her motivational speech. ‘This week we will be doubly hard working as it is the end of the financial year and I want our MD, the honourable Angelica Sassay, to be totally blown away. So I need you to sell, sell, sell. I want to feel those phone lines buzzing. Of course,’ Amanda surveys us all as though she is about to do us a huge favour, ‘as it is such an especially important week, the employee with the largest number of sales will win a very special prize indeed.’ She pauses dramatically. ‘They will win tickets to Victoria Beckham’s Spring Summer Collection.’
There’s an audible gasp amongst the team. We would all do pretty much anything to go to Victoria Beckham’s show, her collections are incredible so this is a BIG deal. I sit up straight in my chair, as though this will somehow help me be more professional, and comb the leads I’d been given the week before.
By the end of the morning, after making endless phone calls and leaving messages for shop managers who I know will never phone me back – who I’ll just have to re-phone and take any ‘get lost’s, polite or otherwise, on the chin – I feel less motivated.
It’s nearly time for the obligatory smoked salmon blinis and I’m considering wandering off to grab a coffee to try to help me make more pointless phone calls when a tall sloaney-looking girl dressed in Burberry mooches up to my desk. I can immediately recognise she is a member of the editorial team, who I occasionally see with her own little ‘it crowd’ in the lobby.
‘Are you Sophie Johnson?’ she drawls in a frightfully well-spoken voice.
‘Erm, yes?’ I answer, sounding as though I even doubt my own identity. In fact, I’m worrying that somehow someone’s discovered that I’m not very good at sales after all, and that sometimes I put the phone down before anyone picks up because I just can’t face being told to ‘f’ off one more time that day.
‘Oh jolly good!’ she spouts, extending a bony hand. ‘Miffy Pemberton-Smythe, Editorial. You know, we’re the chaps who sit upstairs and write stuff.’
‘Of course. I love your stuff. I mean I read every edition, great writing. I especially love the section on “Essential garments for every girl’s walk-in wardrobe”.’
‘Oh, that piece,’ Miffy smirks. ‘Total trollop really, ran out of ideas that week, shoved a few bits together and Bob’s your uncle. In fact, I think it was my PA who gave me the idea for the feature because she suggested I put my clothes in feng shui order.’
‘Great,’ I enthuse, ‘such a fab idea.’ I’m trying not to visualise my own wardrobe back in the flat where New Look stuff is shoved in with Primani and everything is so precarious that anyone opening the door risks serious personal injury. Not quite like Miffy’s article, which I presume displays her own walk-in wardrobe back in her luxury mansion, with every designer item colour co-ordinated and placed in outfit order. Heaven!
‘Right, yes, anyway, a very good friend of mine, Emma Woodtree, mentioned you work here and I couldn’t believe it, any friend of Emma’s, you know… Emma and I go way back, went to school together. Have you been here long, darling? Don’t seem to have seen you round the place.’
‘I started in February.’
‘Oh well, you must have been hiding away down here in sales, darling. Fancy coming out for a snifter at lunchtime? The girls in Editorial are all going to Epicure for a working lunch.’
‘Erm, I wasn’t really going to take lunch today – huge pile of leads to get through and, you know,’ I stutter lamely, trying not to look at the iconic image of Victoria Beckham’s designer viewing, which I’ve pinned on my noticeboard in a sad attempt at self-motivation.