The Cinderella Reflex (10 page)

“Cut you?” Tess was appalled. The woman should be visiting the police, not ringing a radio station. She looked out at Helene for direction but her boss looked as bewildered as she did.

“So what did
you
say?” Tess decided to play for time, giving Helene an opportunity to decide how to cut the woman off. Maybe she could get Ollie to cue a break or something ...

“I didn’t get a chance to say anything!” Cindy continued. “She kept going on at me! Said I wasn’t the first girlfriend he’d had and that I wouldn’t be the last. She said,” Cindy dipped her voice as if she were in the movies, ‘“Remember this,
bitch
– he always comes back to me. Always!’” Cindy sniffed. “She became very emotional.”

“Well, she would do,” Tess said reasonably. “In the circumstances.”

“Whatever,” Cindy said offhandedly, “The point is – what should I do?”

“What should you do?” Tess cast around in her mind for an answer. Ollie was leaning back in his chair, his mouth curved in a wide smile, hugely enjoying her discomfort.

“Well, if you ask me it all sounds very clichéd,” Tess said finally.

“
If
I ask you?” Cindy sounded mystified. “Of course I’m asking you. Isn’t that why I rang up the show? And what do you mean it all sounds very clichéd? Are you saying I’m making it up?” Her voice rose. “Or that I’m some sort of fantasist?”

“Well, it’s an old story, isn’t it?” Tess pointed out patiently. “The married man. The girl who thinks he’s going to marry her. The wife who finds out. It sounds like something you’d read in a magazine, if you ask me.” In fact, now that she thought of it, Tess was sure she
had
read something very similar in that pile of magazines she’d been swotting up on all last week.

“Would you read in a magazine that the wife said she’d come and cut me?” Cindy challenged.

“Well, maybe not that part,” Tess confessed.

“Well, anyway.” Cindy took a deep breath. “It’s even more complicated than that.”

Jesus, Tess thought. She looked out at Helene again, making a throat-cutting gesture to indicate she should cut the caller off. Now!

“Em ... so how is it more complicated?” Tess asked.

“Well, I gave up my job for him, for one thing.”

“What did you do that for?” Tess couldn’t keep the astonishment out of her voice.

“We worked in the same firm and he said it would look bad if it got out about us. Anyway, being a trophy girlfriend was a job in itself, I can tell you,” Cindy said with feeling. “All those manicures and pedicures and waxes and shopping. He said that me looking good made
him
look good. Hah!” Cindy laughed shortly. “We’ll see how good he looks when his wife gets around to him. I wonder will she threaten to cut him?” Her voice rose hopefully.

This was insane. Tess was going to have to end it. “How old are you, Cindy?” she asked briskly.

“Twenty-five.”

“And your boyfriend is?”

“Forty-five. Ish.”

“And before his wife rang you to say she’d cut you if you didn’t leave him alone did you never suspect that he might be married already? At forty-five years of age?”

“He said he was separated,” Cindy said sulkily.

“So what did you work at before you became a ... er ... trophy girlfriend?”

“I was a secretary. His secretary. He’s a partner in a law firm.”

“And how much did you earn?”

Ollie leaned forward on his desk again, interested now, despite himself.

“Thirty thousand euro.”

“And so was he going to pay you thirty thousand euro a year for being his girlfriend?”

“
No!
” Cindy was horrified. “What do you think I am? A prostitute?”

“I just wondered how you thought you could afford to give up your job, that’s all,” Tess said mildly.

“I didn’t think of it like that. We were having fun. We went to restaurants, weekends away ...” Cindy sounded wistful now.

“But now you’re left with no job and no boyfriend and a wife threatening you,” Tess pointed out.

“You’re not very sympathetic!” Cindy burst out. “You’re supposed to be an agony aunt. Aren’t you supposed to be giving me advice?”

“Yes, well ... I’m getting to that,” Tess countered. “I think you should dump him,” she offered finally.

“That’s it?” Cindy was incredulous. “That’s your advice?”

“Yes it is. You’re involved in a situation that is making you unhappy. And unsafe, if you don’t mind me saying so. Who wants to be in a situation where someone is threatening to come around and cut them? So, yes, Cindy – I say dump him. Go out with your friends. Research new career options. Read a good book. Get a life!” Oh dear. She hadn’t meant to sound so harsh. Still, she had asked. “So anyway, that’s my advice,” she said in a softer tone. “And er ... thank you for calling.” Tess looked to Ollie to resume control of the programme. Her whole body was bathed in a film of sweat and she needed to get some air. And maybe a vodka and tonic.

“And now,” she took a deep breath and looked down to finally read her script.

“Tess! You have another caller!” Helene sounded surprised herself this time. “Er ... the same drill as before, I suppose. Ask them for their name and their problem.”

Tess had to swallow hard before she could speak. “Okay so ... and I believe we have another caller. Hello caller, may I ask your name? Caller?” I’m babbling, Tess thought wildly. I need to stop babbling
.

“Certainly, dearie. My name is Rosa. But most people call me Grandma Rosa.”

Tess felt the blood drain from her face. The
fortune teller
was calling her?

“So you have a problem, Grandma Rosa?” Tess asked in a strained voice.

“Yes!” Rosa’s voice was filled with suppressed excitement. “I was listening in and I heard you’re called the Agony Aunt of the Airwaves. So I thought, well, I have plenty of agony going on in my life at the moment. Do you think you can help me?”

“Well, that depends on what the problem is,” Tess’s words felt like cotton wool in her mouth.

“In a nutshell? That’s easy – my business is going down the drain.”

Tess opened her mouth to reply but again, no sound came out. She could hear the silence roaring in her ears. But what was she supposed to say here? She wasn’t a business guru! And she knew by now there was no point in looking to Helene or Ollie for help.

“So aren’t you going to ask me what my business is, dearie?” Rosa said uncertainly.

“Right. Good idea.” Even to her own ears, Tess sounded slightly dazed. “So what is your business, Grandma Rosa?”

“I’m a fortune teller. But,” Rosa’s voice dipped to a confidential tone, “things have been pretty slow of late. I think one of the reasons is because I had a little heart scare? Maybe my clients think I’m out of action, but I am most certainly not. I’m fully recovered and if I could just give out my number ...”

“Oh, we’re not a free advertising service!” Tess cut in quickly.

“Oh!” Rosa sounded disappointed.

“The problems we’re interested in hearing about are the kind that other listeners might identify with. Maybe more of an emotional nature? For a business venture, perhaps you might be better off contacting your local enterprise board?”

“Well, I’m sure I’m not the only listener with business problems,” Rosa replied. “Not in this day and age. I mean, if Michael O’Leary ... or Richard Branson, for instance, rang to say they were having a slump in their business would you tell them to contact their local enterprise board?”

Tess massaged a vein pulsing in her temple. If Michael O’Leary or Richard Branson were to ring an agony aunt on a flop local radio station looking for business advice, proverbial pigs would be flying around the studio.

“I don’t think that scenario is very likely, do you?” she managed to mutter.

“Hmmm ... I suppose it isn’t, now that you say it,” Rosa agreed. “Look, I’ll be honest with you. What I really want to know is how can I get on to the radio like you? Telling fortunes? People would be very interested I think. And it would give my business a nice little boost.”

Tess put her head in her hands and, at the same time, Helene finally came back to life.

“I’m cutting off this old bat!” she hissed in Tess’s ear. “Just say goodbye to her and that you hope she has better ‘fortune’ coming to her. Geddit?” she laughed mirthlessly at her own joke before adding ominously, “And Tess? You have another caller!”

Tess looked out at her in alarm. Where were they all coming from? Tess had no sooner said goodbye to Rosa than Helene had plugged the next caller through.

“Hello, caller, can I ask you your name and problem?” Tess asked tonelessly.

“Yes. So, like your last caller, my problem is a business orientated one.”

“Well, you must have also heard me say that we’re just dealing with emotional problems this morning,” Tess said flatly.

“But there’s an emotional side to it as well,” the caller cut in quickly. Tess thought she caught a funny, familiar lilt to his voice.

“So. Are you going to tell me what it is? The problem?” Tess asked impatiently. She was aware of Helene giving her dagger looks through the glass screen but all Tess cared about at this stage was getting rid of this caller and getting herself out of the studio.

“Well,” he said slowly, “I’m considering investing in a business. But it’s mainly because someone very close to me has asked me to. And I’m not convinced it’s a good idea.”

“And?”

“So should I heed what my head is telling me to do and give the business a wide berth – which is what any self-respecting businessman would do? Or should I indulge the person who wants me to invest, and for once in my life, do something that isn’t motivated by the bottom line?”

“Isn’t the standard advice for business folk that you don’t mix business with pleasure?” Tess asked uninterestedly.

“Yes it is. But isn’t there more to life than business?” the caller countered.

Ollie chose that moment – finally – to speak.

“I think you seem to be going around in circles here, Tess!” he sniggered.

“Yes, I think we are,” Tess quickly agreed. She had told everyone this was going to be a disaster, but it gave her no pleasure to be proven right. She leaned into the mike. “In fact, I don’t think I’m the best person to consult on this problem. So from Tess Morgan on the This Morning show ... it’s goodbye.” Tess heard her voice shake on the last word.

“No. Wait!” the caller was still on the line, but Tess had already thrown her headphones onto the desk. She stood up to leave. She could vaguely hear Ollie talking to the caller in soothing tones, apologising on her behalf.

“I’m so sorry about this, caller. But it seems that’s all for today, folks, from our new Agony Aunt of the Airwaves, Tess Morgan. Not exactly what I was expecting mind you, and probably not what you were expecting at home either, folks. But these things take time to settle and no doubt Tess will be back soon with another batch of your problems. Can’t wait. Meanwhile, it’s time for another disc.”

And the sound of another heavy metal number blasted over the airwaves.

Tess’s face was flushed scarlet as she stumbled out of the studio. She was dimly aware of Helene waving her arms at her, exclaiming how she had just abandoned a caller on-air, and Sara saying she hadn’t given any details for where listeners should send their problems.

Tess rushed past them, close to tears. She hurried to her desk, intent on grabbing her bag and getting out of the building. She glanced at Andrea, who was staring at the radio with a bewildered expression. She jumped up when she saw Tess, her eyebrows almost disappearing under her fringe.

“
What
just happened?”

Not trusting herself to speak, Tess gestured for Andrea to follow her. Outside on the main street, while she waited for Andrea to catch up, she gulped in deep breaths of fresh, cold air. Passers-by were going about their business, shopping and sipping coffee in Zelda’s cafe across the street, unaware and uncaring that Tess had just made a monumental fool of herself. That thought calmed Tess down somehow and by the time Andrea exited the building, she was already beginning to rationalise everything.

The sky hadn’t fallen in, she told herself, as Andrea linked her arm and steered her across the road. People were continuing with their lives, oblivious to Tess Morgan’s woes. They by-passed Zelda’s, the smell of greasy fish and chips making Tess feel nauseous, and headed automatically for Ryan’s bar. The dark cool interior of the pub felt safe after the experience in the studio. Tess picked a seat at the back while Andrea went to get the drinks.

“Bit early for vodka, but in the circumstances,” Andrea said wryly a few minutes later, plonking two glasses and miniature bottles of tonic water on the table between them. She took a sip of her own drink, looked at Tess gravely and deadpanned, “Well, the slot didn’t go too badly in the end, did it?”

Despite herself, Tess felt her mouth twitching.

“It’s launched my new career in style, that’s for sure,” she joked, but her hand still shook a little as she took up her glass. “Cheers!”

“Did you know the fortune teller was going to ring?” Andrea was perplexed.

“Of course I didn’t know! I thought I would be doing a straightforward read-through of the script, like we prepared.” Tess closed her eyes against the memory.

“And what about Cindy? Where did she come from? And the guy saying he wanted to know if he should allow his head to rule his heart. I was dying to hear more from him. I’m surprised you got so many calls without having anything set up.”

“I met that guy when I went to the fortune teller’s. I’m almost sure of it. I recognised his voice. It is so weird that they both rang in today! I wonder if they planned it?”

Andrea shrugged. “Maybe he’ll call back next week and you can find out.”

“Or you can find out. Helene will be hunting for a new Agony Aunt of the Airways so you’d better start preparing now.”

“She’s not going to drop you the first time out. Look, Tess, today was a baptism of fire, but you’ll know what to expect next time. You’ll be better prepared
and
you’ll soon learn to think on your feet.”