Marshmallows for Breakfast (9 page)

I was fresh out of college for the second time and wanted temp work to tide me over while I looked for a job. I'd decided to try an office on Oxford Street in central London that I'd walked past a few times. It was behind a glass door and under a square purple sign that read Office Wonders. I pushed open the door, climbed the narrow staircase and opened the door at the top of the stairs.

It was a large, open-plan room with desks and computers and filing cabinets at the end where the window looked out onto Oxford Street. At the other end of the room was the waiting area with comfy purple chairs for temps and other employment candidates pushed back against three of the pale purple walls. Almost all the chairs were taken up by smartly dressed young women. Each of them in a dark skirt suit with a white blouse or shirt underneath. And each of them carried some variation on a bag that looked like a shiny black briefcase. I was the only one in a burgundy trouser suit and I had my scuffed black slouch bag slung across my body. When I saw them, my confidence in getting a job wavered. Is this how temps are dressing nowadays? I asked myself as I unhooked my bag and stood up straight, wishing I'd thought to wear makeup.

At the business end of the office only one woman was running things. She had a young woman sitting in front of her, whom she'd probably been in the process of interviewing but she was on the phone with someone, trying to be professional and polite, while a look of harassment tugged at her eyes.

Her blue-black hair was cut into a sharp side bob that ended at her chin. She was statuesque, her frame curvy, dressed in a navy-blue suit. As soon as she put down the phone, it rang again and irritation flickered across her face before she picked it up. Another phone on another desk started to ring. And then a third. Instead of joining the row of women who'd obviously come for an interview, something in me knew that if I didn't answer the phone I'd snap. It'd been a long day, even though it was only noon and I knew there'd be a “Temp Murders Seven over Unanswered Phone” type headline splashed across the papers in the morning if I didn't answer it. Without really thinking I went to the desk, picked up the phone, answered the call, took a message. I'd worked a similar phone system before, so once I'd taken the message, I hit **8 and picked up another call. And another one. And another until I'd answered about seven calls and the harassed woman had finished her phone conversation.

Ignoring the woman in front of her, she came striding over to me. She was tall, quite imposing.

“You must be my new trainee recruitment consultant,” she said.

“Erm, no, I'm just here about getting some long-term temping work,” I replied, suddenly aware that the other people in the office were all staring daggers into my back.

“You misunderstand me, you MUST be my new trainee recruitment consultant,” she said. I noticed how smooth and glowy, creamy white her skin was, on her face, on her neck, across her chest. Up close she was beautiful; the kind of woman you would always look at twice. Striking.

“I just want to temp,” I repeated. I didn't want a full-time job with commitment and responsibility and having to think about it after I left work. I wanted to walk out at the end of the day and not worry about it until I walked into the office the next morning.

“Fine,” the woman said. “Do it for six months, If something better comes along I'll let you leave with a week's notice, no questions asked.” Erm…

“The pay is better than temping, plus you get benefits. And bonuses if you get us more clients.” She was talking in a language and using words that didn't interest me. I wanted less commitment, not more of it. I wanted to be free, not shackle myself.

The black phone on the desk beside us started ringing and automatically my hand reached for it. “Don't touch that phone unless you mean it,” the woman warned.
Don't tell me I can have something if you're going to snatch it away,
her look said.
I can't handle it.

It was the look on her face. The desperation. The desolation. Years later, I realized it was something else as well. It was the quiet torment buried in her clear blue eyes—I'd seen it several times before when I'd looked more than fleetingly in the mirror.

She raised her eyebrows questioningly at me and I picked up the receiver, effectively sealing my fate. Without even telling the woman my name, or finding out what her name was, I'd got myself a job. While I was on the phone I heard the woman tell the others the position had recently been filled—the candidate in question demonstrated an impressive amount of initiative.

Something better hadn't come along. Not in six and a bit years. Not until I decided I needed to move to Australia.

Gabrielle was always the first in.

In all the years I'd worked with her, no matter how hard I tried, nor how early I arrived at the other office we'd worked in, every morning she'd be there, behind her desk, cup of coffee half drunk, croissant crumbs on a grease-soaked paper bag, typing away. I was yet to disprove the theory that she actually slept in the office.

She'd once told me that she was a compulsive early starter. In the way some people are always late, she couldn't help herself being early. I must have just caught her arriving because she was in the process of uncapping her cup of coffee.

“Blimey,” she said, her hands paused on the top of the white plastic lid, while her eyes went to the clock on the wall above the candidate waiting area. “Thought it was just me who couldn't stay in bed in the mornings.”

“I'm trying to catch you out,” I joked. “And I wanted to make up for yesterday.”

“Emergency all sorted?” she asked as she watched me shed my coat and unwrap my multicolored scarf.

“As far as it can be,” I said. I didn't want to tell her everything, but I had to talk to someone, had to share my concerns. “My landlord's two kids were worried because they couldn't wake up their dad. And they were so scared that I couldn't leave them on their own. Not even when we knew he was OK.”

“Where's the mother?”

“America, apparently. Although she might be back, I don't know. Not at home, basically, which is why the kids came to get me.”

“Is he hot?”

“Who?”

“The flaky father.”

I shrugged. “I don't know, I guess. Haven't really thought
about it. So much has happened since I met him and we aren't exactly on the best of terms. That taints how you see someone.”

“I'll take that as a yes.”

“Take it how you want, sweetheart. I'm more worried about his children.”

“What, he's abusing them?” Gabrielle asked, concerned.

“No. No.” The two crescent shapes carved out in the bottles of alcohol flashed through my mind. “Nothing like that. He's being, like you said, flaky. They're going through a divorce, he's struggling. I'm just being a bit dramatic. It's fine.”

The words sounded hollow in my ears. It wasn't fine. It was far from fine. But if I said it enough times, I might just start to believe it.

Knowing when to leave well enough alone, Gabrielle listened to my too-many reassurances and then smartly changed the subject. “So, how about you get a cuppa and we'll have a catch-up.”

Throwing myself into work was the way forward. That was the way to temporarily set aside the sallow, hollow faces of Summer and Jaxon that were scored into my mind.

They were sitting on the lip of my doorstep when I arrived back that evening.

I'd stayed late at the office to catch up on work, so it was dark and cold by the time I'd wandered down the pathway from the front of the house to my flat. In the pool of orange-yellow light thrown out from their kitchen, they sat. Around their shoulders were tartan blankets, across their laps was a duvet.

Jeez, you'd think he'd wait a few days to neglect them again,
I thought as I approached them.

Both their faces lit up, although Jaxon quickly hid his delight by looking down. “We've been waiting for you,” Summer said, still grinning. She fizzed when she smiled; her smiles came from the joy deep inside her heart and she had no worries about showing it.

“I can see that,” I said, crouching down in front of them. “Is something wrong?”

“No,” Summer replied. Jaxon shook his head.

“Oh, right. So you're sat here because … ?”

“We've been waiting for you,” Summer repeated, as though I was somehow slow.

I nodded, and rubbed the bridge of my nose. My eyes were burning, my head was throbbing and my neck was a knot of tension from too much time in front of the computer and too little time asleep last night.

Jaxon nudged Summer as if to remind her why they were there. “Dad said we had to come and say thank you,” she explained.

“He did, huh?”

“He said we had to say thank you for you looking after us on Saturday and yesterday. He said we had to draw you a picture.” From the space between them under the duvet Jaxon pulled out a slightly rumpled sheet of A4 paper. It was stiff from where the paint he'd used had dried. He'd painted me a steam engine. A lime-green body and funnel with navy-blue swirls for wheels. In the corner he'd written “Ken.”

“Thank you.” I smiled in surprise as I took it.

“And this is my picture.” Summer brandished her picture, again taken from under the duvet. She'd drawn a picture of a lady in a purple skirt and orange top. The woman had a blond ponytail and big brown eyes with long black lashes, red lips, dainty nose. She carried a pink handbag on her
arm. Summer had used pencils to color it in and had pressed hard so each color lay thick and shiny on the surface of the paper. “Thank you” she'd printed in her uneven handwriting across the top of the page.

“Thank you to you as well.”

“Do you like them?” Summer asked.

“I love them,” I admitted. I loved them particularly because it meant Kyle had spent time with his children doing this. He'd gotten himself together and had put them before himself. That made these pictures all the more beautiful. “I'll put them on my fridge so I can see them every day. Is that OK?”

They both nodded.

“Dad said we had to buy you a present as well,” Summer said. Jaxon pulled out a bag of marshmallows.

“Jaxon told Dad we have to get you marshmallows because you eat them for your breakfast,” Summer explained.

“You don't like chocolate,” Jaxon mumbled into his chest.

I did, actually. But clearly my talk of marshmallows had negated all other sweet things in his mind.

“Dad said every woman in the whole country kingdom universe likes chocolate, but he still bought it. Do you like it?”

Taking them from Jaxon, I held them in my hands. The pack had been warmed by its time beside their bodies under the duvet. Its cellophane packaging crackled in my hands, the pink and white cylinders of sugar giving easily under my fingers.

“I like them very much. I love them, in fact. Thank you for being so thoughtful.”

“It's OK. You're our friend,” Summer replied.

Jaxon nodded in agreement. I'd made great leaps with him without even trying. I wasn't simply someone whose
hand he wanted to hold in the street, I was his friend. He liked me, even though he tried to hide it.

“Right, so you're off to bed now, aren't you?” I said, standing up to the tune of cracking knee joints.

Jaxon's shoulders fell; Summer rolled her eyes. “Can't we watch television in your house?” she asked. “Only for a little bit.”

“Five minutes,” Jaxon echoed.

I knew when I was being hustled. Their dad had probably told them they could stay up until they said thank you. Now they were trying to outstay their bedtime. “Much as I'd love to, I have to say no. You've got school tomorrow.”

“Five minutes,” Summer begged.

“Why don't you ask your dad if you can watch television for five minutes in your house?” I said. “Come on.” I picked up their duvet, folded it over in my arms.

Reluctantly, they got up, clinging onto the blankets around their shoulders. As I turned I saw their dad standing in front of the window. He'd clearly been keeping an eye on them all the time they were outside. Well good. He was capable of behaving responsibly. The weekend was probably just a hitch. Of course it was. They didn't look abused. He was just struggling.

He moved to the door, opened it fully, ready to receive his children back.

“She loved it, Dad,” Summer said, stepping around him into the house. “Kendie said we can watch television for five minutes.” She led the way across the kitchen with Jaxon following.

“I never said that exactly,” I said to Kyle. Didn't want him to think I was trying to be a parent to his children, was disrespecting his role.

“I didn't think you had,” he said.

“I said they could ask you if they could watch TV for five minutes,” I added. In the background the sound of the television went up a few notches.

“I know you did.”

“Oh, here,” I said, handing over the duvet.

He took it and folded it over in his arms, using it as a shield almost.

We stood in silence for a few moments. So much had happened between us in these past four days and both of us wanted to say something to acknowledge it and then lay it to rest. He was going to do better next time, I was sure of it.