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11.30 a.m. Film Company Reception Area.
Oh, God. What was I thinking having sex all night? The whole make-up/break-up thing somehow whipped Roxster and me up into a sexual frenzy and neither of us could stay asleep. Was just actually hanging upside down from the side of the bed with Roxster holding both my legs in the air whilst thrusting in between them when suddenly—
‘Mummeeee!’ The door handle started rattling.
Oh God, it was so difficult to stop.
‘Mummeee!’
Roxster pulled back in alarm so that I crashed down backwards onto the floor . . .
‘Mummy! What was that bang?’
‘Nothing, darling!’ I trilled, upside down, ‘Comeeeeing!’ at which Roxster whispered, ‘And I’m certainly about to.’
I tried to turn myself round unladylikely, with my bum in the air, and Roxster started giggling as he hoisted me back up onto the bed, whispering, ‘Please don’t fart.’
‘Mummee, where are you? Why is the door locked?’
I dived over the bed, trying to straighten my slip while Roxster hid over the other side. I undid the hook, opened the door a crack, and hurriedly stepped out, shutting it behind me.
‘It’s all right, Billy, Mummy’s here, and everything’s fine. What’s the matter?’
‘Mummy,’ said Billy, looking at me strangely, ‘why are your boobies hanging out?’
Once I’d taken them to school, the morning was complete nightmare trying to sort out complex matrix of pickups and nits and play-date dilemmas with Chloe, blow-drying hair (presumably spraying bathroom with early-cycle nit eggs), and eventually locating navy silk dress in bottom of wardrobe requiring ironing and wiping off of chocolate stain, and now I am here waiting for the film meeting and have not done any mental preparation at all.
Offices are incredibly scary. Reception area is like an art gallery. Reception desk is like an enormous concrete, free-standing bath, and there is a man lying face-down on the floor – perhaps another aspiring screenwriter whose ‘exploratory option meeting’ had failed?
12.05 p.m. Oh. Is a sculpture, or perhaps more of an installation.
12.07 p.m. Calm and poised. Calm and poised. Everything is fine. Just need to remind self of what is actually in script.
12.10 p.m. Maybe will win BAFTA award for Best Adapted Screenplay. ‘I would like to thank Talitha, Sergei, Billy, Mabel, Roxster . . . anyway, enough about them! I was born thirty-five years ago and . . .’
12.12 p.m. Look, stoppit. Must marshal thoughts. The important thing is that this updating is a feminist tragedy. The key narrative thread is that Hedda, instead of just being independent like Jude, settles for a dull, unattractive academic, who stretches his budget to buy them a house in Queen’s Park. Then, disappointed by the intellectual honeymoon in Florence, because she really wants to go to Ibiza, and disappointed by the rubbish sex, because she really wanted to marry her hot alcoholic lover, she comes back to find self also disappointed by the dingy, rainy house in Queen’s Park and eventually ends up shooting herself and . . . Gaah!
5 p.m. Was startled from reverie by a tall girl with dark hair, dressed entirely in black. A shorter youth stood behind her, with hair cut short at one side and long at the other. They smiled over-brightly as if I’d already done something wrong and they were trying to smooth me over before they killed me, and left me like the man on the floor.
‘Hi, I’m Imogen and this is Damian.’
There was a moment of awkward silence as we squashed into the stainless-steel lift looking at each other, through maniacal grins, wondering what to say.
‘It’s a very nice lift,’ I burst out, at which Imogen said, ‘Yes, isn’t it?’ and the doors opened directly into a spectacular boardroom looking out over the rooftops of London.
‘Something to drink?’ said Imogen, pointing to a low sideboard sporting an array of designer waters, Diet Cokes, coffee, chocolate biscuits, Nutribars, oatmeal biscuits, a bowl of fruit and chocolate Celebrations, and, oddly for that time of day, croissants.
Just as I was helping myself to coffee and a croissant, to create a pleasing air of a Power Breakfast, the door burst open and a tall, imposing man in large black glasses and immaculately ironed shirt swept in, looking very busy and important.
‘Sorry,’ he said in a deep voice without looking at anyone. ‘Conference call. OK. Where are we?’
‘Bridget, this is George, the head of Greenlight Productions,’ said Imogen, just as my handbag started making a loud quacking noise. Oh God. Billy had obviously done something with the text alert.
‘Sorry,’ I laughed gaily, ‘I’ll turn that off,’ and started grappling amongst the bits of cheese in my bag to try and find the phone. The thing is, though, the quacking wasn’t a text alert, it was some sort of alarm so it kept on going and my bag was so full of rubbish I couldn’t find the phone. Everyone stared.
‘So . . .’ said George, gesturing at the chair beside him, as I managed to pull out the phone, wipe off a bit of squashed banana and turn it off. ‘So . . . we like your script.’
‘Oh, that’s great,’ I said, furtively placing the phone on ‘vibrate’ and on my knee in case Roxster, I mean Chloe or the school, texted.
