The Wake-Up Call(14)

When the phone call comes, I am talking through a new lunch menu with Arjun, who now has a very limited number of people with whom to discuss these things (Ollie suggested we should serve Doritos with Arjun’s forty-eight-hour chilli and has been banned from having opinions).

“The bitterness needs offsetting,” Arjun is saying.

“Right, totally,” I say, bubble-wrapping a vintage snow globe that just sold to someone in Northumberland for a satisfying ?85. It’s a great price, but I hate selling this stuff—especially the festive decorations. I want the hotel to look like it did on my first Christmas here: glowing, gorgeous, its mantelpieces laden with thick fir branches and golden lights.

“I’m thinking salt-crusted parsnip?”

“Salt-crusted,” I say, tearing the Sellotape with my teeth. “Perfect.”

“Are you humouring me?” Arjun asks, eyes appearing from behind the menu, which is held about two inches from his face. He’s so overdue a visit to the optician that I have considered booking one for him and luring him there by pretending I’ve found a fantastic new deli.

“I’m giving you what you need,” I say, “which is a sounding board and some validation.”

The menu drops further. “Will you swap jobs with Ollie?” Arjun asks. “Please?”

“Ollie’s great. He’s just new, and you never like new things. You thought I was annoying for at least a year.”

“You have always been my favourite!” Arjun says, outraged at the very suggestion. He has a selective memory for his own bad-temperedness.

“Give Ollie a chance.”

“Puh,” Arjun says as he nabs my pen to scribble down a note about parsnips. “You give Lucas a chance, then.”

He looks up and laughs at my expression. Arjun is usually the last person to suggest going easy on anyone. I remember the first time Drew popped in to see me while I was at work—she’d been hoping for a free lunch. Arjun eyed her through the kitchen door and said, That’s the flatmate you’re always bending over backwards for? I say cut her loose. She’s ordered three sides, Izzy. That is a woman who takes what she can get.

The phone rings before I can respond to Arjun.

“Forest Manor Hotel and Spa, this is Izzy speaking! How can I help you?”

“Hello,” says a gravelly male voice. “Full name, please?”

“Umm. Izzy Jenkins? Isabelle Jenkins?”

“And can I ask you to confirm the address of your place of work?”

I blink. “Am I, like, going through security for something here?”

There is a slight pause. “I got an email,” the man says. “And I need to confirm that I’m speaking to the correct person.”

“Was the email about a wedding or engagement ring?” I say hopefully.

“Affirmative,” the man says.

Ooh, I love that. I am going to start saying affirmative. When Jem next messages me asking if I’m all caught up on Strictly, that is exactly what I’m going to say back.

“I responded to say I would be in touch when I returned to the UK. I’m back now, and I’d like to request a follow-up email with an image of the engagement ring in question,” he says.

“I can do that for you, no problem!”

“I’ll be in touch once that has been safely received,” he says. “Goodbye.”

“The Ring Thing?” Arjun asks as I click the phone back into the receiver, slightly dazed.

“Yeah. Crap. That was all so weird I didn’t even take his name. Though I’m pretty sure I know who it was.” I look up at Arjun. “Am I being ridiculous about these rings, like Lucas says?”

Arjun tilts his head, tapping the pen on the menu. “You’re being an optimist,” he says eventually. “And a romantic.”

“So . . . ridiculous?”

“No.” He gives me his full attention—a rare thing from Arjun. “You’re being Izzy, and it’s excellent,” he says, as though it’s as simple as that. “Now, excuse me. I have some parsnips to salt.”

I watch him go with a lump in my throat. I have seen Arjun almost every day for eight years. At first we didn’t click, but slowly, week by week, we’ve become more than colleagues, more even than friends. I’ve cried on him several times, and he cried on me after his awful, toxic divorce. We might never have been mates outside of this place, but now we rely on each other—he’s part of my life. For Lucas, losing this job would probably be an inconvenience. For me, it would be like losing a family all over again.

And I just can’t.



* * *



? ? ? ? ?

On the last Monday of November, when I am two days away from having to sell that curious Tupperware of rings, a straight-backed man in a razor-sharp suit comes marching into the lobby. Poor Mandy is setting up, gamely creating herself a space amongst all the lost-property boxes, and I’m already on my way out the door—I’ve got drinks with a couple of temps I used to work with when I first started at Forest Manor.

“Eric Matterson,” the man announces when he reaches the desk. “I’m here about a ring.”

Mandy’s eyes find mine. I dash over.

Eric looks about sixty—he is greying at the temples and has a deep frown-line between his eyebrows. This is exactly how I imagined the guy on the phone. He has the carefully pressed look of a military type, and an intimidating air of steeliness.