How to Get Ahead in Television (9 page)

STEP 18 – IT'S IMPORTANT TO GET OUT OF THE OFFICE

FROM
: NATALIE

TO
: POPPY

Pen, R U seriously going out tonight? Why? New
30 Rock
is on. What could be more exciting than me, Alec Baldwin + those Quality Street I found from last Xmas…? YOU'VE CHANGED, MY FRIEND.

PS Mum hinting she might have to start charging u rent… Would be mates' rates – that OK? Sorry she is being money nazi at mo. Is even charging £2 to do my laundry!

I
SENT
A text to Ian telling him to meet me outside a trendy noodle bar on Dean Street called El Noodle. I'd overheard Mel talking about it on the phone, and though I'd be loath to admit it to her, she was probably far more knowledgable about the cool places to eat in Soho than I was. I'd heard her say the service was quite quick, so this way I got brownie points from Mum for having dinner with Ian, but could probably still be home in time to watch an episode of something with Nat.

I vaguely remembered Ian. We had been quite good friends as children. I think he must have been about nine and I'd been seven when we used to build dens together behind his mum's garage. We were pretty inventive when it came to building
materials, using twigs, moss and whichever bits of my sister's bedclothes I could sneak out of the house. Then Ian had been sent off to boarding school and I hadn't seen much of him after that. I'd last encountered him a couple of years ago at my parents' annual mulled wine and mince pies party, when we both happened to be in Dorset before Christmas. He'd meta-morphosed from a rather plump, permanently muddy little boy into a tall, skinny man, with the pallid complexion of someone who didn't see a lot of sun. I had an ominous suspicion that my mother thought he might be my ‘Mr Darcy next door', though I think this idea had come not from any compatibility-based observation, but from a practical conversation with Lorraine about ‘how easy it would be to pull down the fence between their two gardens to put up a marquee'.

After work I had swapped my flats for high-heeled suede boots and changed from a T-shirt and jumper into my favourite black silk blouse. I didn't often go out on the town, so thought I might as well dress up. However, the evening air was beginning to feel close, as though it might rain, so I was already questioning my outfit choice.

As I arrived at El Noodle, I scoured the queue to see if Ian was already there. At the back, behind a gaggle of girls, I saw someone waving at me. It was Ian, looking as skinny and gaunt as ever – but sitting in a wheelchair. As I walked towards him, I racked my brain to see if Mum had told me about some horrific accident he'd been in that I wasn't to mention, or whether in fact I'd misremembered all the den building and the ‘really tall' bit, and perhaps he'd always been in a wheelchair.

‘Hi, Ian?'

‘Hi, Poppy.'

‘Sorry, I didn't know you were… how long have you… I've heard you have to queue for this place, is that okay? It looks like it's moving quite quickly, but we can go somewhere else if you like? If you're not fine?' I blathered.

‘No, it's fine, I like the look of this place. I don't mind waiting,' said Ian. ‘This is only a temporary addition to my
look,' he said, indicating the chair. ‘I've had a back operation so I can't walk for a month.'

‘Oh god, how awful. Poor you. The last thing you probably feel like doing is meeting your neighbour's daughter to dole out career advice. You should be all tucked up at home with a good DVD and a tin of Quality Street.'

I suddenly felt sorry for Ian, and incredibly guilty that I had taken so long to get back to him. The guy obviously had enough on his plate without me messing him around too.

‘No, it's fine, honestly. I have been housebound for so long, I thought it time I took this puppy out on the road – NHS's finest piece of kit. It comes fully equipped with terrible handling and some rather dubious brakes.'

I laughed, suddenly feeling a lot more optimistic about the evening ahead.

‘Fancy seeing you here,' came a voice from behind us, and I turned to see Rhidian and Mel joining the queue.

Shit.

‘Small world,' said Mel, looking at me as though she wanted to squash me with her shoe.

‘Hi, I'm Rhidian,' Rhidian said cheerfully, putting out a hand to introduce himself to Ian. ‘This is Mel. We both work with Poppy.'

‘I'm Ian.'

My face must have revealed some indication of what my brain was thinking, namely: SHITSHITSHITSHIT WHY DID I LIE AND SAY I WAS GOING ON A DATE TONIGHT?? GAHHHH! AND OF ALL THE FLIPPING RESTAURANTS IN ALL OF COCKING LONDON!

Mel, like a shark sensing blood in the water, could tell I wasn't thrilled by this chance encounter, so instantly started to take an interest in it.

‘Hi, I'm Mel,' she said, bending down to talk to Ian as though he were a child. ‘I work with Poppy too. It's nice to meet you.'

She looked up at me with a menacing smile.

‘Wow, this queue is slow, hey?' I said to Ian. ‘We can definitely try somewhere else if you like?'

‘I don't mind,' said Ian, unhelpfully.

‘It's usually really quick,' said Rhidian, equally unhelpfully.

‘So are you guys on a date?' said Mel, as the penny dropped and she worked out why I might be looking so awkward.

‘Well…' Ian started to speak.

In blind panic I quickly interrupted him. ‘YOU say dating, I say darrrting, let's call the whole thing off, da da da,' I started to sing, then laughed awkwardly and did a little skip to illustrate that this was a spontaneous musical number of my own devising. It actually worked quite well in terms of avoiding the question – my heel caught on the kerb, I lunged forward to try and save myself, grabbing the only thing within range: Ian's chair. The chair launched backwards under my weight and Ian gave a yelp of pain as he was momentarily lifted into the air on two wheels.

‘Smooth,' said Mel.

‘Oh god, sorry, are you okay?' I quickly righted the wheelchair on all four wheels and looked carefully at Ian for signs of damage. The guy had just had a back operation and here I was, yanking his wheelchair around as part of some deranged distraction dance.

‘I'm okay, it's fine,' Ian exhaled, squeezing my hand in reassurance.

‘Awww,' said Mel, with a patronizing little cock of the head.

‘So how did you guys meet?' Rhidian asked Ian.

‘Our parents live next to each other down in Dorset. Poppy and I used to play together as kids,' said Ian.

‘So Poppy was the girl-next-door,' said Rhidian, eyeing me curiously.

‘Something like that,' said Ian, sounding slightly confused. ‘We used to build dens behind my mum's garage.'

Rhidian's eyes lit up at this detail.

‘I wouldn't have had you down as a den-builder, Poppy,'
he smiled, arching an eyebrow at me. ‘So, what was your den design of choice?'

‘Well, I…' I started to say something but trailed off as Ian started to speak.

‘Poppy always insisted our muddy dens be fully equipped with scatter cushions and soft furnishings. Something my mother's drawing room was not best pleased about.'

‘Oh, I can imagine that,' Rhidian laughed.

Mel tapped her foot impatiently. ‘God, this is taking forever,' she moaned.

‘How many? Four?' The maître d' asked from behind us. We'd somehow reached the front of the queue. ‘You might have to wait longer for a wheelchair spot.'

‘No, NO, NOT FOUR. TWO,' I said, a little too much panic audible in my voice.

‘Well, I can seat you two,' the maître d' said to Rhidian and Mel.

‘That seems a bit unfair,' Rhidian replied. ‘They were here first.'

‘Come on, Rhidian, I'm cold,' whined Mel.

‘Honestly, go, don't wait on our account,' I said, nudging him into the restaurant.

Once they had disappeared inside, I turned back to Ian.

‘Are you sure you are okay? I'm so sorry I jolted you like that. Is your back okay?'

‘Honestly, it's fine, Poppy. Your work colleagues seem nice.'

‘He's okay, but I'm not sure about her.'

‘So are you enjoying this TV placement? My mum said it was just a temporary thing and you wanted to get into finance, find something more long-term?'

‘Not exactly…'

‘I wish I'd done something more creative. I'm just not sure I would have been very good at it. My brain is more numbers than ideas.' Ian smiled.

The maître d' was pulling people from behind us into the restaurant now, and I shivered involuntarily.

‘I'm sorry about this,' said Ian. ‘I have to say, being in this chair has given me a whole new insight into how bad it can be for disabled people in London. It's not just being in a chair, it's all the stuff that goes with it – like this.'

‘It's fine, don't worry, I'm sure we'll get in any second.'

Sure enough, the maître d' was soon back for us.

‘Sorry about the wait. We have an end table free so we can fit the chair in now.'

He guided us into the restaurant, which had long trestle tables in rows down each side. Arty pictures of noodles from around the world lined the walls and a delicious smell of spicy teriyaki and warm noodle soup filled the room. I walked behind Ian as he rolled along after the maître d'. It was then that I saw where we were being lead to: a space at the end of a trestle table, right next to Mel and Rhidian.

‘No, no. We've changed our minds, sorry.' I scurried past Ian to stop the maître d' in his tracks.

‘What?' Ian asked.

‘We don't want to eat here any more… This… this… this restaurant's policy on disabled diners is absolutely disgraceful!' I said, a little too loudly.

‘Poppy, it's fine.'

‘No, no, it's not fine.'

My outburst was beginning to attract attention as diners turned to see what was going on.

‘Making disabled people wait in the cold is not on, and I refuse to condone it by eating here. Come on, Ian!'

And with that, we made our exit.

Half an hour later, having failed to get a table anywhere else in Soho, and my prediction about rain being on the cards turning out to be accurate, we found ourselves dripping wet in a grotty pizza place next to Tottenham Court Road. Ian had been a saint throughout the whole ordeal.

‘You know, if you were embarrassed to be seen with me in
front of your friends, you could have just said,' Ian said with a smile as our pizzas finally arrived. ‘I'm probably considered a bit of a geek in the eyes of your “cool media crowd”.'

‘Oh god, no! Is that what you thought?'

I paused for a moment. I'd made this poor man wheel halfway around Soho just so I could escape embarrassing myself in front of Rhidian and Mel. I think the least I owed him at this point was the truth. I took a deep breath.

‘The thing is – and this is going to make me sound like a real weirdo – I was being teased at work today for never going on any dates, or being particularly social, and, well, on the spur of the moment I lied and said I was going on a date with you, which I know this isn't, by the way, I'm not getting all bunny boilerish on you… Anyway, it was a stupid lie just to make me look like I might be a bit interesting, rather than the kind of person who'd generally rather go home, eat Caramacs and watch a boxset.'

‘Oh, I love Caramacs. Do they still make those?' said Ian, looking surprisingly unfazed by the information I'd just relayed.

‘I know, right? Caramel chocolate is hugely underrated. Anyway, obviously I didn't think we'd run into my work colleagues while we were out, and I didn't want you to know I'd said it was a date, or you'd think I was a total psycho… Which I probably am.'

Ian laughed. ‘So, basically, you were trying to make that guy jealous.'

‘Which guy? Rhidian? No! No, I don't care what he thinks.'

‘Really?' said Ian, raising a sceptical eyebrow. ‘I felt like there was something going on there. He was very interested in you and your den-building.'

‘No, he's not interested in me, we just have this weird competitive thing going on at work. But listen, I'm really sorry I made you wheel all around Soho to escape them. Please let me buy dinner to make it up to you?'

‘I wouldn't hear of it.'

‘Well, anyway, enough about me, tell me about banking. You do know I don't really want a career in finance, right? My parents aren't too happy about the TV plan and want me to scope out better prospects.'

I really was going for the ‘honesty is the best policy' tack tonight. Ian just felt like the kind of person you could be honest with – like Oprah, but in man form.

‘Well, I'm not sure banking holds much safer prospects these days. Since the crash, it's not as lucrative as people think.'

‘Excellent.'

‘What?'