Amber Stephens - Confessions - A Secret Diary

AMBER STEPHENS

With special thanks to Tom Easton.

Title Page AMBER STEPHENS Dedication With special thanks to Tom Easton. Chapter One Chapter Two Chapter Three Chapter Four Chapter Five Chapter Six Chapter Seven Chapter Eight Chapter Nine Chapter Ten Chapter Eleven Chapter Twelve Chapter Thirteen Chapter Fourteen Chapter Fifteen Chapter Sixteen Chapter Seventeen Chapter Eighteen Chapter Nineteen Chapter Twenty Chapter Twenty-One Chapter Twenty-Two Chapter Twenty-Three Chapter Twenty-Four Chapter Twenty-Five Chapter Twenty-Six Chapter Twenty-SevenMore about Mischief Copyright About the Publisher

Chapter One

‘Every now and then you should sleep with someone considerably less attractive than you.’

Shelley looked up at Briony across their cluttered, back-to-back desks. ‘Er … what?’ She hadn’t really been properly listening to her friend twittering on, but sometimes Briony said stuff you just couldn’t let by. ‘Why?’

‘You’ve got to give a little bit back,’ Briony said, flicking over the pages of a magazine. ‘Haven’t you heard about that Random Acts of Kindness movement?’

‘Yes, but that means buying someone a cup of coffee, or helping an old lady across the road,’ Shelley pointed out. ‘Not yanking your pants down at a Star Trek Convention and shouting “Get it here, Scotty!”’

Briony was about to say something else but Shelley held up a hand.

‘What’s up with you?’

‘I’m totally bricking it.’

‘About the announcement?’

‘Of course. How come you’re so chilled?’

Briony shrugged. ‘Que sera, sera.’

Shelley bit her lip. The office was wired tighter than Joan Rivers’ face. A general e-mail had been waiting for all the staff that morning from the Chief Operating Officer of West End Magazines, their parent company, requesting their punctual presence at eleven o’clock for an important announcement about the future of Female Intuition, the magazine Shelley had been working on for nearly four years.

Shelley tucked her unruly brown hair behind her ears and picked up a Styrofoam coffee cup, clutching it in two hands as though she feared it might escape. ‘Do you think Kate’s sick or something? She’s been so quiet lately,’ she said.

‘Don’t be a div, Shell,’ Briony said, rolling her eyes. ‘She ain’t coming back.’

‘Isn’t coming back,’ Shelley corrected. She could never let a grammatical slip go by. She knew it was sad, and was convinced she’d end up alone, with a dozen cats, writing letters to the Guardian admonishing them for typos and punctuation clangers.

‘She’s been given her P45,’ Briony said.

‘You don’t know that,’ Shelley replied.

‘So why is there a padlock on her office door?’

Shelley looked over at the glass office Kate had been in for two and a half decades. The office must have had cutting-edge décor back then, glass and steel everywhere, midnight-blue carpets, pastel vertical blinds, open-brick walls. Female Intuition had been the first London magazine to give computers to all the editors.

Now the décor looked shabby, many of the vertical blinds were lying horizontally amongst the mouse droppings on the faded carpet, and Shelley sometimes wondered if her computer were one of the original ones handed out – it was practically steam-driven.

Shelley sort of knew it must be over, but didn’t want it to be true. Kate Hurley had given Shelley her first job in journalism, straight out of university, or at least her first job writing for magazines, which is not necessarily the same thing. She’d been editor here at Female Intuition for as long as anyone could remember and was legendary in the business.

‘I need a drink, fancy anything from the kitchen?’ Shelley asked.

‘I have a splitting headache,’ Briony replied. ‘Get me a strong coffee would you?’

‘Coffee’s not good for headaches,’ Shelley replied.

‘Who says?’

‘Everyone says. It’s a diuretic, isn’t it?’

‘Don’t give me any of that Scientology crap; get me a double-strength aspirin and a triple espresso.’

Shelley wandered off to the manky little kitchen to get the drinks. She passed Freya Wormwood’s desk on the way back and the Fashion and Lifestyle Editor looked up, catching her eye. Though pretty, and with a figure to die for, Freya made the mistake of going with whatever hairstyle was currently in vogue, regardless of its suitability for her. Freya currently sported an enormous fringe that made her look a little like the Dulux dog.

‘Not nervous are you, Shelley?’ Freya asked in that sly, sardonic voice she used with people she felt threatened by. Other women, to be specific. Shelley glanced at the myriad photos of her perfect boyfriend, Harry, on her desk, so many it looked like a shrine.

‘No,’ she replied, trying not to sound defensive and failing. ‘What would I have to be nervous about?’

Freya looked away, but not before Shelley caught the beginnings of a smirk on her face. Freya was one of those women who claim moral superiority simply because they have a boyfriend when you don’t. Not that anyone in the office had ever been allowed to meet the saintly Harry. Briony suspected he didn’t exist and the photos in the frames had already been there when she bought them. Harry bought me a divine new coat the other day – far too good for work, though. Harry’s whipping me off to Bruges on the weekend, first class on the Eurostar. Harry’s such a sensitive lover, unless I ask him to treat me roughly, that is!

‘Have you heard something?’ Shelley asked, immediately regretting it. If there was something Freya loved even more than Harry, it was knowing something that other people didn’t.

‘I’ve heard a few things, Shelley,’ she said. ‘But I’ve been asked not to share them with anyone else for now.’

Shelley didn’t believe a word of it, and slumped down back at her desk. Briony arched an eyebrow.

‘I wonder who’s going to take over?’ Shelley said. ‘They might close us down altogether.’

‘Oh don’t worry about that,’ Briony said, putting down her magazine, which Shelley couldn’t help but notice was a rival publication with considerably higher circulation. ‘They’ll just get a new editor in who’ll make a big fuss about New Beginnings and a Radical New Focus before changing the logo slightly, adjusting the font size and putting the handbags section on page 240 instead of page 170.’

‘Really?’ Shelley asked hopefully. ‘No redundancies?’

‘Nooooo,’ Briony said, shaking her head vigorously. ‘Apart from firing a couple of columnists, maybe.’

‘Briony!’

‘What?’

‘I’m a columnist!’

Briony paused. ‘Oh, yes. So you are. Oh don’t worry; I think there’s at least two columnists more likely to go than you.’

‘Who?’ Shelley asked, coolly.

‘Oh erm, Robin and, um … um …’ Briony cast her eyes around the open plan office desperately. ‘Erm, and Toni.’

‘Toni left three months ago.’

‘Really? Oh …’

‘Never mind,’ Shelley said, saving her from further embarrassment. ‘Maybe redundancy is exactly what I need. Sometimes one needs a kick up the bum to make one sort one’s life out.’