Lindsey Kelk - A Girl’s Best Friend

He rifled around behind the dinner plates for a moment before producing a bright blue package. ‘Milk chocolate Hobnobs at that,’ he said, tapping me on the head with the packet. ‘Best Sunday night ever.’

‘Best Sunday ever,’ I replied, happy, sad, and with a Hobnob craving like you wouldn’t believe.

‘Morning.’

‘Nnueeughh,’ I groaned, my face buried deep into a pillow that I immediately knew was not my own.

‘You’ve always been such a delight first thing in the morning,’ Charlie said as he opened the living room curtains. I rubbed my eyes with tight, tired fists. ‘Nice pants.’

‘Thanks,’ I said, rolling myself up in his quilt and promptly falling off the settee. ‘God, I feel rubbish, I should have gone home.’

‘I’m not sure sleeping on my settee is why you feel rubbish,’ he said, tapping an empty bottle of white wine with his foot. ‘But you were in no fit state to go home, madam.’

‘And apparently you were in no fit state to give up your bed for a lady,’ I replied, clambering back up onto the settee, curling my legs up underneath myself and pressing my head back into the pillow. ‘What a gent.’

‘You refused,’ he reminded me. ‘You said you didn’t need to be patronized, you were perfectly fine on the settee and you wanted to be closer to the toilet in case you threw up.’

‘Oh yeah.’ I looked across into the bathroom and saw the toilet seat up. ‘It’s coming back to me now.’

‘And you said I’d have to carry you and, honestly, I couldn’t be arsed,’ he said, stretching upwards and tapping his fingertips on the ceiling. His T-shirt pulled up around his flat belly, showing off a trail of brown hair that disappeared under the waistband of his shorts as well as some abs I definitely didn’t remember seeing before. His no-biscuit regime was clearly paying off.

‘I should get to work,’ I said, sitting up and trying not to cry. Charlie’s settee was not the place to get a good night’s sleep. ‘If you’re late, Ess makes you wear the Hat of Shame.’

‘Hat of shame?’ Charlie asked, flicking at his phone, a look of concern on his face.

‘It’s a bright pink baseball cap with the word “cock” embroidered on the front.’ I tried to run my fingers through my curls but last night’s rain, sleeping in a plait and a night on the settee had worked together to create one giant dreadlock. Wearing the hat might actually be preferable.

‘I can’t believe you’re working as an assistant to an arsehole.’ He leaned over the back of the armchair to give me a sad look. ‘I know you’re a complete martyr when it comes to work but at least at Donovan & Dunning you were getting somewhere.’

‘I worked eighty hours a week and I was the first person they made redundant when the shit hit the fan,’ I replied. ‘Yes, totally getting somewhere.’

‘But this is better?’ he asked. ‘Fetching and carrying for a wanker?’

‘This is how it is,’ I told him. ‘You know how people say, “you’ve made your bed, now lie in it?” This is my bed. This is me lying in it. You have to start at the bottom, Charlie.’

He made a humming noise and tucked his phone away in his back pocket. ‘You say it like you don’t have any options, but you do. You could get another job in advertising tomorrow.’

‘Firstly, who would want me with a six-month gap in my CV? And secondly, I don’t want to go back into advertising,’ I said, almost surprising myself with my certainty. ‘I love photography. I’m a photographer.’

‘You’re also a brilliant creative director,’ he replied simply. ‘And I’d have you.’

I pressed my lips into a tight, silent line.

‘I mean, I’d hire you,’ he clarified. ‘I’m serious, I was thinking about it when I woke up. I interviewed someone for creative director last week but it’s not too late. You could still take photos on the side and you wouldn’t have to do all this assisting shit. You’re better than this, Tess.’

I methodically worked my fingers through my hair and pretended he hadn’t just made me the most spectacular offer.

‘That sounds really amazing,’ I said, overwhelmed by the sudden vision of myself striding into a meeting with nice clean hair and a lovely pair of shoes on my feet instead of balancing on a chair, covered in sweat, wearing a pair of dirty trainers. ‘But like I said, I’m a photographer now.’

‘I’m serious, Tess,’ he repeated, squatting down on his uncomfortable armchair, elbows on his knees. ‘I’m not saying you don’t love photography and I’m not saying you’re not good at it but I’m offering you something else. You’ve had six months out and maybe you needed a break. There’s no shame in saying the photography thing didn’t work out as a career and keeping it as a hobby. You could be a director. If you wanted, you could be a partner, we’d be a team. The business is really starting to take off.’

It was something I’d wanted for so long. I’d worn my corporate blinkers for years with partnership the only goal in sight and here it was, being dangled in front of my face. And it was tempting. Going back to the beginning, a month before I turned twenty-eight, starting back at the bottom? Less appealing.

‘Think about it,’ Charlie said. ‘I told the bloke I interviewed I’d let him know after Christmas so he can sort everything out with his old job in the new year. That gives you time.’

‘I will,’ I promised. ‘I’ll think about it.’

‘Yeah, well,’ he said, clearly a little bit offended. ‘Don’t think you’ve got to stick this out because you don’t want to admit you made a mistake. Tea?’

I nodded and waited until he had disappeared into the kitchen before I gave him the finger. Did he really think I’d made a mistake? Did everyone?

I knew that going back to advertising would be easy and working with Charlie would be fun, but what I didn’t know was whether or not it would make me happy. Nick always said I was too worried about the things I thought I should do, rather than the things I wanted to do. This definitely felt like a ‘should’. But since when was I taking Nick Miller’s advice?

Pulling the blankets up around my chin, I grabbed my phone to check my messages. There was a late night text from Paige, asking if I wanted to get a drink. A message from Kekipi attached to a photo of him and Domenico singing karaoke in some dimly lit dive bar and seventeen texts from Amy, half written exclusively in Emojis, the other half more or less unintelligible swearing but the general gist of them was that I should get my arse on a plane to New York ASAP.

‘Maybe I should be Amy’s assistant,’ I called through a yawn. ‘She’ll be queen of the world in six months at this rate.’

‘Maybe this Al dude is her Mr Miyagi,’ Charlie shouted back. ‘She’s going to be the fashion equivalent of The Karate Kid .’

‘Karaoke kid, more like,’ I muttered, flicking through her Facebook posts. Kekipi and Domenico were not alone in that bar. ‘I don’t really see Al as the wax on, wax off type.’

‘I don’t know.’ Charlie stuck his head out of the kitchen. ‘He made a big impression on you.’

‘He did,’ I admitted. ‘He’s a really great man, you’d like him.’

Growing up, it hadn’t really occurred to me to miss my dad. My mum remarried a couple of years after they got divorced and he was never more than an occasional visitor after that. Brian, my stepdad, was a total champ, but the fact of the matter was always there: he wasn’t my real dad. Whether I knew it or not, I’d missed out on something. Al, or Bertie Bennett as most of the world knew him, was the kind of granddad everyone wished for. A kind, generous, gentle man armed with all the wisdom of old age combined with the same curiosity and preference for neon T-shirts as your average six-year-old. Al was the kind of person you needed in your corner, only you didn’t know it until you met him.