9
“Hello, may I speak with Julia please?”
“Who may I tell her is calling?” Bella adopts her most formal British tone.
“This is Jack Roth.”
“And will she know what it's in connection with?”
“Yes.”
“Just one minute.” Bella covers the mouthpiece and looks over to Julia sitting on the sofa. “It's someone called Jack Roth,” she mouths. “Who he?”
Julia shrugs and holds her hand out for the phone. “Hello?”
“Is this Julia?”
“Yes.”
“This is Jack. Jack Roth.”
“Yes?”
“Jack whom you met the other night at the Hudson? In the bar? You gave me your number and said to call you as soon as I got back from Argentina.”
“How very presumptuous of me. And have you just got back from Argentina?” Julia hasn't a clue who he is, but is nonetheless rather enjoying this conversation.
“I've just stepped off the plane at JFK and I'm about to jump in a cab.”
“What? No limo picking you up? I'm not impressed.”
“Neither am I,” he laughs. “Someone somewhere's going to lose their job over this.”
“I hope you're joking.”
“I know all the British think the Americans have had a sense of humor failure, but yes, I was joking. So have you worn the Armani jacket yet?”
Julia's floored. God. Who is this man and, more to the point, what else did she tell him? “Um. No, actually.” Her enjoyment is starting to disappear, the memory loss rendering her somewhat out of control.
“The Prada coat?”
“Yes, actually. I wore that one today.”
“Shame I couldn't see it on you. Maybe you'll wear it when you have dinner with me.”
Julia pauses. She wouldn't have made a date for dinner with this man, not when the situation is still so unresolved with Mark. Would she?
“Am I having dinner with you?”
“Oh yes. Absolutely. You swore on your dog's life you'd have dinner with me when I got back from my trip.”
“I don't have a dog.”
“Maybe it was your brother's. I don't remember the details.”
“I don't have a brother, which is rather lucky because I imagine his life would be in some danger by now.” Julia laughs, as Bella jiggles next to her on the sofa, desperate to find out what's going on.
“So are you free tomorrow night?”
“I don't know. Hang on, I'll ask my social secretary.” Julia covers the mouthpiece as Bella reaches over and bangs the hold button down. “Am I free tomorrow night?” she asks Bella innocently.
“Never mind that. Who's Jack Roth and why are you flirting with him?”
“I'm not really flirting, am I?” Julia tries to look horrified but fails miserably. “Bella, I have absolutely no idea who he is,” she says impatiently. “If you remember correctly, I was completely shitfaced at that party, and I know I gave my number out, but God knows to whom. However, he sounds nice and he wants to take me out for dinner, and you were the one who said I needed to date.”
“You're right. You're right. But find out a bit about him, for God's sake.”
“Bella, I'll meet him at the restaurant. It'll be a public place. I won't go back to his apartment or do anything stupid. Relax. I'm not going to start asking him a billion questions on the phone.”
“I told you, when in New York—”
“But I'm not a pushy New Yorker looking for a husband. That's the last thing on my mind. I quite like the idea of having a Magical Mystery Evening.”
“Okay, okay. But can I come too and lurk invisibly at the bar just so I can check you're not with a madman?”
“Maybe. But only if you swear not to come over or make it obvious.”
“I swear.” Bella presses the hold button again and Julia puts the phone to her ear.
“Hello?”
“Hello? Did you go on vacation?”
“I'm so sorry, my social secretary had lots of questions.”
“Ah. Tell her I work for Goldman's, I'm in Emerging Markets, hence my traveling to Latin America, I'm six-three with dark hair and brown eyes, which of course you'll remember, and I live on the Upper West Side. Will that satisfy her?”
Julia laughs and mouths to Bella, “Goldman Sachs.” Bella nods approvingly.
“So how about tomorrow night?” he continues.
“Bugger. I forgot to ask her. Hang on.” Julia confers briefly with Bella, rules out tomorrow night due to dinner with some of Bella's friends, and goes back to Jack to agree on next Thursday night.
Julia tells him she'll meet him at the restaurant and takes down the address for Orsay. She's about to ask how will she recognize him when she remembers this isn't a blind date, not as far as he's concerned, and she decides to turn up slightly late to make sure he's sitting at the table.
“Well?” Bella says urgently as soon as Julia puts down the phone. “Orsay indeed? Goldman Sachs indeed? I'd say your bait must have been pretty tempting.”
“Yeah. I actually offered him a lifetime's blow jobs with a free subscription to Esquire. What man could refuse?”
“Evidently not this one.”
“Bella, I haven't a bloody clue who he is. Is this completely mad?”
“Nope. Probably the sanest thing you've ever done. Getting out and having some fun.”
The great thing about staying with someone who lives in New York rather than in a hotel, Julia muses a couple of days later, is that you have a chance to feel what it's really like to live in the city, rather than be a tourist.
Even her gait is different in New York. In London she takes her time, looks around her as she walks, whereas here she strides briskly, eyes fixed on the middle distance, looking as if she knows exactly where she's going and what she wants. A native New Yorker in the making.
She was completely delighted yesterday when two different sets of tourists stopped her in midtown and asked her the way to, first, Rockefeller Center and, second, F.A.O. Schwartz. Delighted and embarrassed, for the minute she opened her mouth she proved herself as alien as they.
Already she has developed something of a routine. Every morning she joins Bella for her workout, before walking her to the office. On the way back she goes a few blocks up to the Pick-a-Bagel on 77th and Lexington, grabbing a cinnamon raisin bagel and a large hazelnut coffee, taking it back to the apartment to eat while flicking between the final parts of the morning shows on CBS and NBC. Later she watches Bella's show on BCA, and late morning she'll leave the apartment for the rest of the day.
Sometimes she walks through Central Park. Sometimes she'll hit the museums. She's revisited her old haunts in SoHo, and found a few new ones. She's ogled her way down Madison Avenue, and bought, in stages, all the stock she can lay her hands on in the Gap.
She has no qualms about eating on her own, and if she isn't meeting Bella for lunch she'll have scrambled eggs and crispy bacon at EJ's, fresh sushi at the Atlantic Grill, a giant burger at Hamburger Heaven.
She has already understood why New Yorkers are always out. So much to see, so much to do, it's always a disappointment to go back home to the apartment late afternoon.
So far she and Bella have spent only one night at home. Julia insisted on Chinese takeaway. She had a vague memory of Cliff in Dallas always eating Chinese food out of a small cardboard carton, and remembers salivating at the time, and thinking how much more delicious Chinese food must be when eaten that way.
The food duly arrived in said cartons, and wasn't even a quarter as delicious as it had looked. Nevertheless she and Bella finished everything while watching reruns of Seinfeld.
Thursday afternoon Julia walks in after spending a few hours trying to spot the polar bears in Central Park Zoo, and runs to get the phone that's ringing as soon as she walks through the door.
She picks up, unwinding her scarf and pulling off her woollen hat, relieved to finally be in the warmth.
“Hi, darling, it's me. How was your day?”
Julia smiles at Bella sounding like the dutiful wife. “Cold. I went to the zoo.”
“Great.” Julia can hear Bella isn't in the mood for a chat. “Listen, I've got a proposition for you. How would you like to have a job?”
“What do you mean, a job?”
“I mean we're running a new item on the show called ‘Baby Showers,' which will take a week to film. The bloody thing starts filming on Monday and Lisa, the producer, is in hospital with suspected malaria.”
“God. Poor girl. So what's ‘Baby Showers'?” Julia puts on a deep, and rather sardonic, American accent.
“For the last few months we've been doing stuff on parties. Every week we change it so we've had bachelorette parties, sweet sixteens, bar mitzvahs, pre-prom nights, that kind of thing. Think cheesy and American. And now it's baby showers, which is basically when everyone you know comes to your house when you're pregnant bearing gifts for the baby.
“We look at clever things to make as party favors, oops, I mean going-home presents, recipe ideas, themes, that kind of thing. We'll film it next week to air in two weeks' time, so we're now completely stuffed unless you say yes.”
“So you want me to produce it?”
“Julia, I badly want you to produce it, but I was so frightened to ask you because I didn't want to remind you about the baby stuff, but we're totally up shit creek and if you could handle it you'd be doing me the most massive favor. It's all set up, we just need someone to oversee the whole thing.”
“Don't I need an interview or anything? Doesn't anyone senior want to meet me? And won't I need a green card or something to work here?”
“You don't need an interview because it's a freelance position, and the responsibility comes down to me. All you'll have to do is send in a CV as a formality, but frankly they're all running round in a panic like headless bloody chickens, and they'll be delighted for someone as experienced as you to do it. As for a green card, normally of course you would, but BCA's a global company, so I'm pretty sure I can persuade the British office to pay you. Given this is such short notice, I don't think anyone's going to question us taking on a British producer. The fact is you're here and you're available. Look, if you want it, bash out a CV on my computer at home, e-mail it to me and I'll run it under their noses, but basically it's yours. If you want it.”
“Okay.”
“Okay what? Okay you want it?”
Julia takes a deep breath. It's only one week, she tells herself. The whole thing for next week is already set up, and all she has to do is go along and smooth ruffled feathers and make sure everything goes according to plan. All the hard stuff has been done, and God knows she's hardly an amateur. How different can America be, anyway?
“I'll do it,” she says finally.
“Yessss!” hisses Bella. “My laptop's under the bed. Do the CV now and send it over by the end of the day. You'll need to come in with me tomorrow, is that okay?”
“Oh, I don't know,” Julia says, the calmness in her voice hiding the excitement just starting to bubble up from her stomach. “I'll have to check my diary.”
“Oh ha, bloody ha. I'll see you later. Hang on. Tonight's the night, isn't it?”
“Night for what?”
“Jack Roth.”
“Oh yes. God, thanks for reminding me. I'd almost forgotten.”
“Is that why you went out and bought a shimmery pink dress from Scoop! yesterday?”
“Bugger. I can't get anything past you.”
“Damn right. I've got the most gorgeous Manolos that would look fantastic with it. They're in the wardrobe in my bedroom on the far left. Keep digging and you'll find them eventually.”
“Bella, you're wonderful.”
“Aren't I? I'll see you later, my darling, and I promise to remain incognito at Orsay.”
“Are you at least going to meet someone there?”
“Of course. I'm meeting Russell Crowe for a date. I wish. Which reminds me, just as added bait, next Thursday you're going to be filming the celeb vox pops.”
“Let me guess, I'm going out to film the Carol Vorderman and Anthea Turner of America?”
“You could say that. Although in this case you'll be filming Elle Macpherson and Uma Thurman.”
“Elle Macpherson! Wow!” Julia's awestruck. “Uma Thurman!”
“I know! Elle and Uma! Maybe you and Elle will hit it off and she'll be our new best friend. Or Uma. I'm not particularly fussy.”
“Elle Macpherson. Uma Thurman. Wow.”
“Okay. I can see I'm not going to get any sense out of you now. I should have told you tomorrow. Forget Elle and Uma and think of Jack. I want you to start getting ready now. Understood?”
“Have you met my new best friends Elle and Uma?”
Bella laughs. “You're incorrigible. See you later.”
Julia is so excited about meeting Elle Macpherson and Uma Thurman she barely thinks about her impending date with Jack. She moons around the apartment like a teenager with a serious crush, all professionalism having long since hot-footed it out the door.
Imagine, Julia thinks, hitting it off with Elle and Uma. Elle liking Julia so much she'd invite her over for dinner with a few friends. Just the usual gang, Cindy and Rande, Brad and Jennifer, maybe Ben Affleck for her. Julia envisages walking into restaurants with Uma at her side, everyone stopping to stare as Julia pretends to feel pissed off at the attention.
Oh, for God's sake, Julia, get a grip. She shakes her head but still can't resist tapping out a merry little dance on her way to retrieve Bella's laptop from under the bed. This was the last thing she expected, after all. A few days' break in New York has turned into nearly two weeks, and now she even has work. Will she ever go home?
Because of course there is Mark to consider, and with a start Julia realizes she hasn't thought about him for days. She's been far too busy, she tells herself, checking her watch and ringing the machine at home, knowing he'll be at work on a Thursday, but not wanting to talk to him.
“Hi. It's me. Just checking in to say everything's fine. I'm having a great time and guess what? I've been offered some work so I'm off to film with Elle Macpherson and Uma Thurman next Thursday.” She tries to sound blasé but fails. “Still not sure when I'll be home,” she continues, “but I'll probably be here at least another few weeks. Hope everything's fine, and I'll talk to you soon. Bye.” She puts the phone down and sits staring at it for a while, thinking about Mark, their house in London, the life she flew away from, and she knows she's not missing it.
She has barely thought about it.
Until now. Now she sits thinking about her struggle to get pregnant. About the countless nights she lay with her legs in the air, or filled Mark's pockets with juniper berries, or—and she starts to laugh at the memory of this—performed some ridiculous fertility ritual.
What would happen, she wonders, if she thought of a baby now, because she hasn't thought of babies, or pregnancy, since she's been here. She conjures up a picture in her mind of a gurgling baby, the picture that used to reduce her to furious tears, and she finds that she doesn't feel much at all.
No anger. No pain. No fear. Somehow she knows that having to film babies and baby parties for a week is a final sign from God. He's proving to her that she's okay now. That there are more important things in life than getting pregnant, and that in any case pregnancy wouldn't have been enough to cement her relationship with Mark. Even as she accepts this she knows that there are bigger questions she'll have to answer soon.
Questions about Mark. Her relationship. Her things. Questions about roots. London. Work. But she can't think about that right now.
After all, she has a date to attend to.
At twenty past eight Julia and Bella make their approach to Orsay.
“So the plan is you go in first, then five minutes later I'll come in and go straight to the bar,” Bella gabbles as they wait round the corner. “After twenty minutes I'll meet you in the loo, and take my mobile so if he's horrible I can call you up and tell you it's an emergency and you have to leave.”
“Okay, okay. I'm going in.”
Bella turns Julia until they're face to face, grasps her shoulders and looks at her with the most serious expression she can muster. “You're going to be fine,” she says in a crappy American accent. “Just relax,” she adds somberly. “And good luck.”
Julia laughs. Leans over and kisses her cheek. “Thanks. See you in the loo.”
Bella gives her a thumbs-up and Julia goes in.
The restaurant is packed. Every table full, all the women immaculately groomed and glamorous, the men wealthy and powerful. A crowd of people wait just inside the door for their tables, and the bar is already three deep in beautiful people.
Julia pushes her way through the people at the door and finds a ma?tre d'.
“Excuse me? I'm meeting Jack Roth?”
He checks the book, then nods. “Certainly. If you'd like to follow me.” He leads the way through the restaurant as Julia tries not to feel self-conscious, even though every woman in there looks her up and down. Thank God for this dress, she thinks, so perfect for a restaurant such as this.
Her heart beats a little faster as she sees a lone man sitting at a table. He is facing away from the restaurant, the chair opposite him empty, and the ma?tre d' leads her over, then leaves her to hover awkwardly.
The man turns to see her and his face breaks into a big smile. Julia smiles in return, partly out of relief, for he certainly doesn't look like the madman Bella suspected, and partly because she is astounded she could have forgotten someone like him.
“Julia.” He stands and takes her hand, leading her to her chair, and she is delighted he isn't so presumptuous as to kiss her on their first date.
“Jack.” She sits down, smiling. “How lovely to see you again.”
“You had absolutely no idea who I was, did you?” He smiles and shakes his head at her while talking, and for a second she is embarrassed. She thinks of protesting and then she laughs.
“You're right. I had absolutely no idea.”
“I knew you were drunk. I kept telling you that you wouldn't remember me when I called and you kept swearing that you were stone-cold sober and would never forget someone like me.”
“I always say I'm stone-cold sober when I'm rip-roaring drunk. But I have to concede I'm rather surprised I did forget someone like you after all. Are you really six-foot-three?”
“Do I look short sitting down?”
“Not short, just not too tall.”
Jack pushes back his chair and stands up slowly as their fellow diners turn to stare. Julia makes a point of looking him up and down with slow approval, and he sits down with a grin.
“I take it I have your approval?”
“Oh yes. I'd say your workouts are definitely doing you good.”
“So you do remember something of our chat that night?”
“Er, no. It was a lucky guess. Something about your washboard stomach tells me you take your gym seriously.”
“If that was a compliment, thank you. And seeing as we're exchanging compliments . . .”
“Are we?” Julia's trying very hard to wipe the grin off her face, but she can't quite manage it. She's not helped by the fact that she's just glimpsed Bella, who's walked all the way round the restaurant to see his face, and who is now, unbeknown to Jack, clutching her heart and mock-swooning to the amusement of the people at the table she's swooning next to.
“We were. I have to say that you look beautiful.”
Julia blushes. “Thank you. Different to how you remember me, then?”
“Fishing for compliments won't necessarily guarantee you more,” he says, raising an eyebrow. “Oh, all right, then. I remembered you as being pretty and fun and sparkly. I didn't remember you as being quite so beautiful or elegant as you look tonight.”
Julia frowns at him, then reaches over and taps him on the forehead.
“If this isn't too personal a question, what the hell are you doing?” he says it with a smile.
“Just checking to see if you're real.”
“The only part of me that's wooden is the pencil in my diary.”
“I bet you say that to all the girls.”
Thirty-four minutes later Julia tears her gaze away from Jack's to see Bella gesticulating furiously.
“Oh shit,” she mutters.
“You don't like my amusing anecdotes?” Jack's tone is wry.
“I'm sorry. Will you excuse me?”
“As long as you come back.”
“I'm just going to the loo.”
“The what?”
“The ladies' room. Restroom. Bathroom. Whatever you call it.”
“Powder room,” he says as she stands up. “Happy powdering.”
“He's gorgeous,” Bella erupts as soon as Julia walks in. “I've been waiting for you for bloody ages. How's it going?”
Julia's still smiling. She glances in the mirror and is pleasantly surprised to see how she's glowing, how she hasn't glowed in years. “He's lovely,” she says, smiling, turning back to Bella. “He's clever, funny, interesting, and interested in me.”
“What more could a girl ask for?”
“I know,” Julia sighs, reality starting to hit. “Can you believe I already have a boyfriend?”
“Julia, now's not the time to think about Mark. Mark's your past, and who knows,” Bella says, affecting a dreamy tone, “Jack could be your future.”
“Oh, don't be ridiculous,” Julia snorts, turning to Bella with hope in her eyes. “You think?”
“I love this weather,” Julia says, clutching her coat tightly around her as she and Jack walk up Third Avenue. “Cold and crisp.”
“Unlike rainy old London.”
“Tell me about it.”
“Tell me about it.”
Julia turns to face him. “About what?”
He shrugs. “Whatever you like. Oh, I don't know. You could tell me where you see yourself in five years' time. You could tell me why you don't seem to be in any hurry to go back to London. You could tell me whether or not I could kiss you.”
Julia doesn't even notice his face moving closer and closer. She thinks she may have misheard him, but before she has a chance to ask him to repeat the question, because of course if she did hear him correctly then she'd have to say No because she does, after all, have a boyfriend, before she has a chance to say anything, his lips are on hers.
And when he finally lets her go the only thing she can do is sigh contentedly and smile.