Stella Newman - The Happiness Recipe

I wander down to the mail room to see if Sam’s around. I fancy a coffee and a gossip but he’s nowhere to be found. He’s probably in the pub with Jinesh from IT, swotting up on some dodgy new computer software that can read your emails from outer space.

Finally (and this should have been first, but I’ve put it off because it’s the least fun) I take the lift up to the creative floor to visit Robbie Doggett’s secretary, Alexis. It’s impossible for me not to associate anyone called Alexis with Alexis Colby Carrington from Dynasty . So even if this Alexis wasn’t already a cold, manipulative bitch, I’d probably project that onto her anyway. She’s lying on the leather sofa outside Robbie’s office, wearing sequinned hot pants and her favourite Patti Smith t-shirt. Sam’s the only man in the building who doesn’t think she’s the most beautiful woman in W1. As a consequence she hates him. She hates him even more since last year’s Christmas party when he asked her – in front of her new pop star boyfriend – to name a single Patti Smith song.

She’s deep in concentration, studying Grazia .

‘Alexis. Have you got a sec?’

She puts her magazine down on the floor and checks out my outfit. Her gaze lingers briefly on my belt, then moves swiftly back to the mag. ‘Hi babe,’ she says wearily.

‘Can you please ask Robbie to allocate me a team for the Fletchers brief asap?’

‘Babe, he’s shooting in New York, not back for a week.’

‘Yes. I know.’ And as far as I’m aware they do have telephones and the internet in America. It might just be a rumour but I’m pretty sure it’s true. ‘He knows the brief’s urgent.’

‘He didn’t mention it to me,’ she says, flicking over the page. She pulls her head back as if she’s seen a burns victim. ‘Look at this cellulite!’ she says, her fingers tracing the thighs of some poor A-lister as if the paper were her own skin.

‘And tell him Devron wants scripts three weeks on Friday.’

‘You’ll never get that,’ she says.

‘I’ll call him myself and explain?’

‘Babe, you know that I’m The Gatekeeper. Leave it with me.’ End of conversation.

It’s pitch black outside by the time I finish, and a particularly cold March evening with no sign of spring in sight. All I want to do is head home and have a large glass of wine and a curry, but I’m trying not to drink every night. Plus I can’t justify splashing out on a mid-week take-away when I’m meant to be saving for my eventual escape.

Theoretically I should go home via Sainsbury’s. Try to be good, buy something healthy and full of beta-carotenes and Omega 3s. Is it Omega 3s or Omega 6s? Can’t I just eat double the 3s? A piece of salmon, some leafy green veg. I could make some form of cleansing broth. If I slipped in some udon noodles, it’d be almost like pasta … I should also pop in to see my neighbour, Grumpy Marjorie. I try to see her once a month and I haven’t been round for a while. The guilt is building up.

Then again, The Apprentice is on tonight. If I go straight home I could be in bed with Sir Alan on iPlayer by 9pm. Not in bed with Sir Alan, that wouldn’t work at all.

Decision made, I walk quickly to the tube station. I promise myself I’ll go round to Marjorie’s this weekend. Or maybe next weekend. And I’ll eat green leafy veg another day.

Right. Let’s start over. Stressful day, happy pasta shape needed. Farfalle! Butterflies are happy! And there’s the other half of that pack of bacon from Monday. I was planning a vegetarian dinner after watching Devron demolish a piece of bone marrow with his fingers earlier. Still bacon’s not really meat-meat. Pigs are more like chickens than cows, when you think about it.

And I’ll chuck in some frozen peas, they’re definitely vegetables … and there’s that carbonara recipe that doesn’t need cream – just one egg and an extra yolk – but it still tastes mega creamy: easy, peasy carbonara! Perfect. Crispy bits of bacon, little bursts of fresh, sweet peas, topped with lovely salty parmesan.

My stomach is rumbling on the tube and the minute I walk through my door I start the pasta and pour myself a little glass of wine. It’s just one glass. An hour later I’m in bed and I’m content. This is the best way that this day could end. I have three things that I really wanted. Good food. Good wine. Good TV.

I am thankful for these nights, when I am so exhausted, I can almost forget that I’ve ever been in love. I can almost forget the whole concept of having another person to share my life with. The good stuff, the bad stuff, a photo of ballerinas, the story of Devron and his wine. I’ve almost forgotten what it feels like to fall asleep next to someone and wake up the next morning feeling happy and calm. I’ve almost forgotten all of these things. Except in these moments in the dark before sleep comes. And who ever really does forget, really?

Jake, my ex, used to have this thing about foreign catchphrases and quirks in other languages. For example, he thought it was hilarious that the English call condoms ‘French letters’, but the French call them English hats, ‘ capotes Anglaises ’. He’d often try to amuse my male friends with this fact, to the point where I’d have to leave the room from sheer repetition.

Another phrase he loved was ‘ Metro, boulot, dodo ’. Metro = subway. Boulot = French slang for ‘the grind’, i.e. the day job. And dodo = sweet slang for ‘dormir’ = to sleep; like you’d use to a child, i.e. sleepy time. The line is taken from a poem by a French writer, Pierre Béarn, about the tedium of monotonous work: tube, the grind, sleep. Welcome to my world.

Some mornings when I’d be struggling out of bed at 5.30 a.m. for a pre-meeting with Berenice where my sole purpose was to lay pencils for her in Boardroom Two at perfect right angles to the pads, Jake would grab my hand and try to pull me back into the warmth.

‘Why do you do that bullshit job? It’s Metro Bullshit Dodo, Susie, I don’t get it.’

‘I’m thirty-three, it’s the only job I’ve ever done. I’m not qualified for anything else.’

‘Your skills are totally adaptable, there’s loads of other jobs you could do.’

And then a year later, ‘Jake: I am thirty-four. That’s too old to change careers. I couldn’t afford to go back to college now, even if I wanted to.’

‘Stop being so negative. People older than you re-train to be doctors or even architects.’

‘I can’t stand the sight of blood, and I’m not smart enough to be a doctor or an architect.’

‘I didn’t literally mean those two jobs. I meant you could do anything – even if it takes a few years to get there.’

And then last year, ‘It’s easy for you, Jake! You’re naturally talented, you love your job and you’re paid loads to do it. I am average at everything. I have no hidden talents. What am I good at?’

‘Food. You just need to figure out a way to make it into a career.’

‘Yeah right, chip shop assistant number three, minimum wage and the boss gets to grope me behind the deep fat fryer …’

‘I don’t know. You could run your own café, do a mix of English and Italian classics, just simple, beautiful stuff. You’re such a good cook, and you love all that.’

‘Do you know how expensive it is to set something like that up? And do you know how many catering businesses fail in their first year? And if you think I’m busy and do horrendous hours now, what do you think that would be like?’

‘You could write a cookbook! Or do a recipe blog, or a blog all about pasta! That girl at work I was telling you about, she’s started doing a blog about make-up …’