All at once she didn’t care if he didn’t do the column. What did it matter? It was only for a stupid women’s magazine. Apart from a few perfunctory remarks about liking spicy food, she let the conversation fall into gloomy abeyance.

Ironically, the more subdued she became the more Marcus was forthcoming, and about halfway through her main course she finally twigged. Then she started to milk her reticence for all it was worth.

‘So what kind of article did you have in mind for me to do?’ Marcus asked.

She shook her head and waved her fork. ‘Enjoy your food.’

‘OK.’ But he came back to the subject moments later. ‘How many words were you thinking of?’

‘About a thousand, but forget it.’

‘And did you find out about syndication?’

‘One of our Australian publications would love to run it, as would Bloke, our men’s magazine in Britain.’ Then she went for the kill. ‘But Marcus, if you don’t want to do a column, then you don’t want to do it.’ She smiled regretfully at him. ‘We’ll get someone else. They won’t be as good, but…’

‘Tell me how fantastic I am,’ he grinned. ‘And I’ll do it.’

Without missing a beat, Lisa said, ‘You’re the funniest person I’ve seen in the last three years. Your comedy is a unique melding of innocence and awareness. Your bond with your audience is rock-solid and your sense of timing is impeccable. Sign here.’ She pulled a contract from her bag and thrust it across the table at him.

‘A bit more,’ he twinkled.

‘Despite your act having echoes of Tony Hancock and…’ Damn! She couldn’t think of anyone else.

‘Woody Allen?’ he prompted. ‘Peter Cook?’

‘Woody Allen, Peter Cook and Groucho Marx,’ – she smiled conspiratorially at him. She bet he knew every single one of his reviews off by heart – ‘your style is undeniably cutting-edge and modernist.’

She hoped that was adequate. Because if he asked for one further explanation for his funniness, all she’d be able to come up with would be, ‘Your face is goofy.’

On her return she ran over to Ashling’s desk and said with vicious glee, ‘Guess what? Marcus Valentine has said yes to a monthly column.’

‘Really?’ Ashling stuttered. He’d seemed so against it on Monday night. Hadn’t he… ?

‘Yeah,’ Lisa gloated. ‘He did.’

Forty minutes later a seething Ashling finally realized what her response to Lisa should have been. She should have said coolly, ‘Marcus doing the column? That must have been because of the great blow-job I gave him last night.’

Why couldn’t she ever think of these things at the time? Why did it always have to be ages later?

37

To Ashling’s overjoyed relief, Marcus rang on Thursday and opened the conversation by asking, ‘Are you busy on Saturday night?’

She knew she should tease, torment, string him along for ages, play hard to get, make him sweat.

‘No,’ she said.

‘Right then, I’m taking you out for dinner.’

Dinner. On a Saturday night – what a meaningful combination. It meant that he wasn’t pissed off with her for not sleeping with him. It also meant, of course, that she’d really better sleep with him this time. Anticipation flared. So did a little anxiety, but she’d knock that on the head good and fast.

Cautiously Ashling admitted that this was going well. Marcus was treating her nicely, and even though she’d been riddled with obligatory angst, it wasn’t really because of anything he’d done. Since she’d first seen Marcus on stage a regeneration had begun to creep across Ashling’s internal landscape. After Phelim’s scorched-earth policy she’d been off romance, more interested in recovering from than replacing him.

But she’d always intended to get back in the game just as soon as she was fit. And Marcus’s phone call had nudged through little buds of hope which told her that perhaps that time had come. She was finally out of hibernation.

The funny thing was, there was a lot to be said for hibernation. Once awake she was suddenly seized with an urgency about her age, the ticking of her biological clock and all the usual thirty-something, single-woman angst. The fuck!-I’m-thirty-one-and-not-married! syndrome.

When Joy asked her what she was doing on Saturday night, Ashling decided to try out her new life for size.

‘My boyfriend is taking me out for dinner.’

‘Your boyfriend? Oh, you mean Marcus Valentine? And he’s taking you out for dinner?’ Joy sounded jealous. ‘All men want to do is get drunk with me. They never feed me.’ She paused and Ashling knew she was going to say something gross. She wasn’t disappointed. ‘The only thing my fella feeds me,’ Joy said gloomily, ‘is his mickey. You realize that if Marcus is taking you out for dinner on a Saturday night, he means business?… Business,’ she repeated with emphasis. ‘No more stunts like the last time, saying you have to get up for work in the morning.’

‘I know. And the hairs have already started to grow back on my legs.’

Ashling knew exactly what she was going to wear on Saturday night. Everything, right down to her nice underwear. It was all entirely under control. Then suddenly she took violently against her lipstick. She’d worn the same colour for what felt like years, buying the same again when one ran out. And all because it suited her! What tosh!

Mag-hags got through lipsticks like they got through men – speedily. She needed a new lipstick to redefine her. It was imperative that she track down the right one, and until she did everything felt wrong.

Saturday morning was spent obsessively foraging, but nothing suited. They were either too pink, too orange, too frosted, too shiny, too dark, too pale or too shimmering. Experimenting with being someone else, she tried on a vampy dark-red colour and viewed herself in the mirror. No. She looked as though she’d been on a fourteen-hour spree, drinking red wine which had congealed and solidified on her mouth. Attempting a smile, she looked like Dracula. The sales girl came running. ‘That’s fabulous on you.’

Ashling managed to escape and the hunt continued. The back of her hand, criss-crossed with red stripes, looked like an open wound. And then, just when hope was fading, she found it. The perfect one. It was love at first sight and Ashling knew with a deep warm conviction that everything was going to be all right now.