Cathy Kelly - Always and Forever

‘Hey, great to see you,’ said Tony, kissing her. ‘You look terrible.’

Bonnie, hugging Adrian, gave her husband an exasperated look.

‘Left my make-up at home in the rush to get out the door,’ Mel shrugged.

‘I don’t have much with me,’ Bonnie said, holding up a tiny evening bag, ‘but you’re welcome to use mine.’

Leaving the two men to talk, Mel and Bonnie made their way in the direction of the loos, but as they turned into the corridor, they almost literally bumped into Hilary and the chief executive, Edmund Moriarty – the very last people Mel wanted to see in her current state.

‘Gosh, Mel, are you ill? A virus?’ asked Hilary, moving a step away because whatever it was, she didn’t want to catch it.

‘No, it’s being a working mum and always having to do everything at a rush,’ laughed Bonnie brightly, the effects of her two glasses of pink champagne loosening her tongue. ‘Honestly, Hilary, I don’t know how she manages it. Our Mel is a regular heroine. I always say to Tony that he’s lucky I’m there at home for him all day so he doesn’t have to come home to the washing, like Mel. It’s great that Lorimar are such supporters of working mums.’ Bonnie’s sweet round face shone with pride at her friend, thinking she’d said the right thing because Mel was incredible , really. Bonnie didn’t know how she ’d manage if she had to work as hard as Tony and Mel, and still be a mum.

There was silence.

Mel felt the smile straining on her face. She knew that it was absolutely the wrong thing for Bonnie to say. Edmund did not want to be reminded that Mel was a mother with any other responsibilities. He and Hilary wanted Lorimar to be her first priority and they genuinely didn’t care what sort of hoops she had to jump through in order to do her job. A childless man, the only capricious, demanding and easily bored person Edmund wanted his employees interested in was himself.

Casting her mind about for some explanation that would satisfy everyone and keep her Super Career Woman image intact, Mel suddenly came up trumps. ‘Actually, I was at the gym training and I had to rush home. You know how time flies when you’re working out.’

Bonnie blinked.

‘The mini marathon,’ Mel went on. ‘Lorimar have a group running and, obviously, I want to be there.’

The vision of a gang of his female workers wearing head-to-toe Lorimar merchandise as they ran past waiting photographers clearly appealed to Edmund Moriarty. Health, charity and good publicity – the perfect combination.

‘Excellent,’ he said. ‘Didn’t know we were sponsoring a team but excellent idea. Health is our aim and we are healthy. I like it.’

Hilary, who obviously didn’t believe a word of it, gave Mel a bland stare. ‘Great,’ she said. ‘We can talk about it on Monday.’ And she led Edmund off to schmooze some more.

Mel managed to keep a stiff upper lip for the rest of the night and it was only when they were safely on their way home that she let her guard down.

‘It looked so bad,’ she groaned as they drove out of the hotel’s underground car park. ‘And for damage limitation, I said I was training for the mini marathon, which means I’ll actually have to do it.’

‘You’re kidding, right?’ Adrian was bemused by all of this. So what if Mel had looked tired? She hadn’t been hired to look like a supermodel all the time; she was a normal person.

‘No,’ she snapped, angry at the world and, since the world wasn’t there, Adrian would have to do.

‘You can’t have to run a mini marathon just because you looked tired at a party?’ he went on.

‘Yes I do because I said it in front of the boss and the boss’s boss, so I have to, and it’s all my bloody fault for looking a wreck. I can see why people have eyeliner tattooed on. At least you always look as if you’ve tried.’

Adrian laughed. ‘Come on, love, it’s not that important, really. You’re great at your job, they know that. The rest is rubbish. Who cares about how you look?’

‘It shouldn’t matter but it does,’ hissed Mel furiously. ‘How I look does count because I’m a woman and I’ve got kids and I’m on borrowed time. You don’t understand that. You’re a man and nobody’s watching you like a hawk for signs that your family are coming before your job, and that goes for your appearance too. Everything matters! You’re not suspected of being the one who takes a sickie when Carrie has a temperature of a hundred and three. If you make the school Christmas play, everyone thinks you’re in line for Dad of the Year. If I make it, I’m clearly shirking at work and if I don’t make it, I’m clearly shirking as a mother. So yes, how I look does matter.’

‘I’ve stayed home with the girls when they’re sick,’ Adrian pointed out.

‘But with men it’s seen as a one-off,’ Mel said in exasperation. ‘It never stops with women. It’s like a bloody marathon. And not the mini marathon, either.’

‘It can’t be sexism in Lorimar, Mel, because Hilary’s a woman too,’ Adrian said doubtfully.

‘Not so you’d notice,’ Mel sighed. ‘She’s married to the job and you’d never think she has kids. In other words, the perfect female executive. Have your tubes tied or have someone else bring up your kids so you never see them and we’ll give you a job at the very top.’

‘But you love it,’ Adrian insisted. ‘You’re a powerhouse, Mel. Everyone thinks you’re great for all you do. I think you’re great. The way you manage work and the kids, juggling it all…’

‘I hate when they call it “juggling”,’ Mel said quietly. ‘Juggling can’t be that hard but this…this is like…’ she searched blindly for the right words, ‘this is juggling with hand grenades.’

‘Is it that bad?’

Mel closed her eyes. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘It’s a bloody nightmare, like a hamster wheel in a horror movie, and I can’t get off.’

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