Fifty Is Not a Four-Letter Word Read online

  “Of course times are changing, and so am I, and the magazine is—”

  “If you could let me finish, Hope.”

  “Of course.”

  “For three years now, sales have been slowly sliding. Very slowly, I admit, but the advertisers are beginning to lose faith. It’s not so much the bottom-line sales figures that are worrying me as the fact that the magazine has begun to look fusty and old-fashioned. Always banging on about working mothers and their rights and child-care problems and all those lurid stories about the sex lives of married women. Women want to escape all that. Women are returning to more traditional values; they’re fed up with feminism. Think Nigella Lawson: a shining beacon of modern womanhood. That’s who women want to be. Domestic goddesses, not workplace warriors. Stains, my dear Hope, are the new sex.”

  I laugh so hard I involuntarily snort. I’m sitting in the boss’s office, oinking like a pig. I’m wishing today could be canceled.

  “Stains are wh-wh-what?” I stutter helplessly.

  “Stains are the new sex. Mark and I have been discussing it and a lot more besides.”

  “Stains?” I ask again. My laughter hasn’t yet fully run its course. I really don’t have the faintest idea what he’s talking about. And what do stains have to do with Mark? I’m unstoppable now. “Stains? As in wet patch? As in who sleeps on the wet patch? That kind of thing?” I’m still laughing, even though it’s not funny. Another snort escapes.

  “Hope, is this really necessary? Why does everything have to come back to smutty sexual innuendo? That’s your problem. Sex, sex, sex. It’s so very last-century.”

  So very last-century. That’s not a Simon phrase. It has a distinctly Mark flavor to it. Something nasty is about to happen.

  “But I’m still not getting it, Simon. Stains are the new sex. What the fuck does that mean?” Olly is right about me and swearing. I may have Tourette’s. Why can’t I keep myself in check?

  “It’s a metaphor, Hope, a metaphor for the new domesticity. The new domesticity that is going to be at the core of a revamped Jasmine. A Jasmine that celebrates women’s unrecognized desire to demonstrate their domestic skills in traditional pursuits such as baking and needlecraft. A twenty-first-century take on traditional values. And stains are part of it. In a recent survey conducted by Disappear, stain removal—be it grease from cooking or flower pollen on a silk shirt—is a burning issue in households up and down the country.”

  My mouth is opening and closing like a fish’s. First I was a pig, and now I’m a fish. I catch some words, like a fish snapping at a fly. “No, we’re not having this conversation. Not seriously having this conversation. Of course a survey for Disappear would say that. You’re kidding me, aren’t you? Please tell me this is some kind of early April Fool’s joke.” My laughter has dissolved. I’m feeling another tidal wave surging up. This one is neither pre-, peri-, nor postmenopausal. This one has the three Furies riding on its crest.

  “Has it not occurred to you, Simon, that it’s Disappear’s job to be obsessed with what the nation thinks about stains? If there were no stains to deal with, Disappear wouldn’t have a business. It would simply disappear. Even I, who have about as much desire to become a domestic goddess as I do to become Saddam Hussein’s personal handmaiden, want to know how to get rid of stains. But a whole magazine dedicated to the subject of stain removal and tapestry cushions because the manufacturer of a stain-removal stick has done a survey … You can’t honestly expect me to take this seriously. You don’t really want me to turn Jasmine, which has become nothing short of a bible for working mothers, into a … a … journal for domestic drudgery.”

  Simon edges back in. “No, Hope, I wouldn’t expect that from you. Not from our resident unreconstructed dyed-in-the-wool feminist. Which is why I know you will understand when I tell you that Mark will be taking over as editor of a new-look Jasmine. I’ve made the decision that, rather than allow the valuable brand that is Jasmine to simply fade away over time, we will take Mark’s marvelous idea and superimpose it on Jasmine. After all, the core audience for the new magazine—women aged thirty to fifty—is exactly the same age group as Jasmine’s dwindling readership. Our new strategy will save Jasmine and—”

  “—lose me my job and my career and probably result in half my staff being fired as well. This isn’t really happening. We’ve not once even discussed it. And sales have only fallen by about two percent. By July they could be up again—we’ve got some great issues coming up. Please tell me that you are not replacing me with a man who, just because he likes to potter around his apartment in a pinny while icing fairy cakes for his fairy friends—”

  I come to a halt. This may be the most surreal thing that has ever happened to me, but nevertheless, it is happening. And then this image of Tanya pops into my head: She is seated at her kitchen table poring over a copy of the newly domesticated Jasmine, emitting teeny yelps of delight as she snips out all the useful little tips to store in a box file marked S for Stains. Tanya, who never reads a single word of Jasmine—Jasmine being too, well, strident, I suppose. And then something else occurs to me. All this creeping uncertainty I’ve been feeling—maybe it was some kind of premonition, only I didn’t recognize it as such.

  “Hope, we need to sort out terms. This is not personal, it’s business. I admire you as an editor, and I appreciate what you’ve done for the company. But I have to make the business decisions that will keep our shareholders satisfied and our customers happy.”

  “But what about my staff? Are you going to fire them all? All twenty-five of them? You can’t just get rid of all those hardworking, talented people; it beggars belief.”

  Simon visibly stiffens. I notice his flaky face is even flakier than usual. And so it should be.

  “Mark must be the one to decide. He needs to have a core team of people who can turn his vision into reality. All those who aren’t on-message will either be made redundant or, if there are suitable vacancies at other magazines within the group, get transferred. It’s going to be a painful transition for everyone. You will get a year’s pay and a wonderful reference, and everyone else will get the redundancy to which they are entitled.”

  On and on he drones. I look up. There’s a dark brown mark in the corner of the ceiling next to the window. It seems to be growing as I stare at it. I wonder whether it’s coming from the flat roof. What extraordinary synchronicity. A stain.

  He’s still talking. “We have to run three more issues of the old Jasmine, much of which I’m sure is already planned, before relaunching with a big promotional splash in May. I would be delighted if you would stay to see the last issues through, but I’ll understand if you find your position untenable.”

  I could swear the stain is spreading right before my eyes. I bet the new Jasmine would know just how to deal with such an emergency.

  “I won’t hold you to your notice period. In which case, Megan, as your deputy, can keep things running until Mark and his team take over.”

  He’s still going at full throttle, but I’m not keeping up. The words come at me in spasms, with bits missing in between. Must mention the wet patch on the ceiling when he’s finished. Inexplicably, I remember we’ve run out of detergent for the dishwasher.

  “… announcement … staff … three-thirty … not … speak … advance. Can … word … this.”

  He’s finished. I say nothing for a long while. At least a minute. And when I do speak, I’m not sure whether the words are coming from me or if I’m just a ventriloquist’s dummy and someone else is talking for me.

  I say, “I really do have to go now. I’m late for a meeting. And by the way, there’s something very nasty happening to your ceiling.”

  Simon says, “I don’t think you were listening, Hope. I said I am going to come and make an announcement to your staff at three-thirty, and I am instructing you not to say anything to them beforehand.”

  “I shall give that some serious consideration.” No, I damn well won’t. “And now I am goi
ng to stand up calmly and leave the room.”

  Calmly? Calmly? Why even contemplate calmly? The Furies have shifted position. They’re lined up behind Simon, giving me the thumbs-up, egging me on. I stand up to my full five feet nine in kitten heels, put both hands firmly on his glass desk, and lean forward to face him straight on. So close am I to his face that I could easily flick off a flake of skin that is trying to part with his nose. “Fuck you, you stupid bastard,” I shriek. “You stupid, stupid, stupid bastard.” The Furies are smiling now. “You dumbed-down advertising salesman in a Savile Row suit.” The Furies are jumping up and down in excitement. “You pathetic philistine who has read only two books in his entire life—and both of them by Jeffrey Archer.” The Furies are swaying in an ecstatic trance. I swing round and clackety-stomp out of the room. Holding the door wide open and in full view of Genevieve, I deliver my final insult over my shoulder, demonstrating my incontrovertible superior intelligence and sangfroid. “You, you, you complete and total fuckwit …” The Furies sigh in unison. Not a memorable exit line after all. I’ve disappointed them. They dissolve into the ether.

  Over toward the fire exit, stumbling. Clunk, clunk, clunking down all eight flights of stairs to avoid bumping into anyone. I wrench down the metal door handle at ground-floor level and turn sideways to heave the door open. Can’t catch my breath. Think I’m hyperventilating. How badly did I blow that? Telling the boss he’s a fuckwit and reminding him that he left school with one O level will not have helped my case. Not that it matters, I suppose; it’s all over anyway, bar the black bin liner.

  I’m standing in a grim alley around the back of Global’s glitzy offices, among the rubbish bins and broken glass. Cats are eyeing me suspiciously. Coatless, jobless, and too numb to feel the cold. But not quite so numb as to forget the effect the sleety drizzle will have on my eight a.m. pre-office blow-dry. I race back around to the revolving doors at the front of the building and try to compose myself.

  “Hi, Stan,” I say to Stan on reception. “Bit chilly out there, but I needed some fresh air.”

  I head for the lift and press the up button. It grinds its way up from the garage in the basement, where editors and publishers and the top-floor boys are allowed to park their cars. The lift shudders slightly as it comes to a halt, and the doors part dramatically like the Red Sea. Standing there in an immaculate lemon-cord Paul Smith suit with a pink shirt and a burgundy kipper tie with garish ruby lips printed all over it is my nemesis.

  Mark smirks. “Happy New Year, Hope.” Stepping to one side to make way for me is this boy—not yet thirty, prettier than I ever was in my heyday, and, loath as I am to admit it, talented, too. “Hope you had a good one. Little birdie told me you’ve just been celebrating a rather important birthday.”

  I want to say something clever and cutting and deeply homophobic. I want him to be struck down by AIDS and suffer a long, lingering death. I want to ask him what right he thinks he has to snatch away my beloved magazine and set about destroying it. I want him to explain how he can possibly believe himself qualified to know what women want. I want him to justify how he’s going to be able to live with himself when perhaps fifteen or even twenty of my staff get fired because of him. If this had been a month ago, I probably would have wanted to ask him where he gets his tinted moisturizer. Now I’d like to squirt a tube of it straight into his aquamarine eyes fringed by those unbearably silky black lashes.

  The lift is almost at the sixth floor, where I’m due to exit. Exquisite Interiors is on the seventh. In a few seconds I will escape, and Mark will continue his journey, unable to help admiring me for reining in all emotion. For a split second I am Katherine of Aragon, proud and indomitable at the court of Henry VIII, even after being dumped in favor of Anne Boleyn. So how come tears are suddenly gushing out of me like a geyser? How come my sobs are reverberating off the walls? Mark is no longer smirking. As the doors open, I shove my fist into my mouth to stifle the sound of my weeping. I head for the sanctuary of the toilets, lock myself into a cubicle, sit on the closed seat, and bury my face in my hands.

  • • •

  Time passes. I’m still sitting in the cubicle. Twentysomethings come and go, exchanging stories of all-night benders, one-night stands, and the hell of going home for Christmas. Animated talk of New Year’s diets and sales bargains in the stores. Little cries of “God, I’m humongous” and “I’m so fat I’m disgusting.” One girl is engaged, her temporary squirty ring—presented on a beach in Mauritius—soon to be swapped for a little something from Stephen Webster, Madonna’s favorite jeweler. The girl she’s sharing this with has just discovered her boyfriend is screwing someone else. The reassuring sound of lipsticks and mascaras and eye shadows being jiggled in makeup bags. Thirtysomethings with their altogether different agendas: hassles with babysitters and child minders and even “Do you think Hope would let me go part-time? I’m so tired I can hardly stand up.” “Well, she can hardly say no when that’s exactly what Jasmine campaigns for every single issue.” Fortysomethings? All the fortysomethings are on the top floor. Fiftysomethings? You’ve got to be joking.

  And then Tanya, lovely, ever discreet Tanya. “Where’s Hope?” I can hear the fashion editor ask her. “Oh, she just popped up to see Simon. Be back soon.” In fact, I’ve been gone for fifty minutes, which is highly unusual, as Simon has a twenty-minutes-only policy for all but board meetings. Tanya has been asking herself, “Where’s Hope?” for at least half an hour and is beginning to worry in the manner of a mother whose child is late from school.

  I can’t stay here all day. I’ve got to get to my girls before he does. My girls. Even the two boys among my staff are my girls.

  • • •

  All is quiet. I peek round the door of the cubicle, step outside, and grab a paper towel. After dousing it with liquid soap, I remove the mascara smudges from underneath my eyes. My handbag is in my office, and I can’t do full repairs without my kit. I look awful. I run the cold water and sloosh my face, then dab it gently with another paper towel, trying to avoid removing the last vestiges of makeup. Okay, this should be enough to get me into my office. This time, as I stride purposefully back across the open-plan floor, I fling neither casual hi’s nor smiles, keeping my eyes straight ahead.

  “Just give me five minutes, Tanya, no interruptions, then come in and see me.”

  Tanya looks at me, her face a question mark, then merely nods.

  I close the door and get out my armor. Eye-whitening drops, lip-and eyeliner, YSL Touche Éclat to deflect light from the shadows under my eyes. A comb. Looking the part helps. This time I really do have to be strong. Not for me but for them.

  Five minutes later, Tanya knocks quietly and enters before I can answer.

  “Close the door, please,” I say.

  She sits down with me at the small round conference table, hub of the magazine, home—over the past eight years—to hundreds of discussions, debates, heated arguments, and heart-to-hearts.

  “Something awful’s happened.” My right hand is resting on the table, and Tanya instinctively reaches out to cover it with hers. “Jasmine is to be relaunched with Mark as editor. I’ve no idea how many of the staff will lose their jobs, but there is one thing I am absolutely determined to make happen. Mark will need an assistant. We both know he’s using a temp at the moment. And you’re the girl for the job. He’ll let you fuss over him to your heart’s content, but more important, I really think that the new Jasmine will be right up your street. Promise me, Tanya, promise me you’ll give it a go.”

  Tanya’s lower lip is trembling; her eyes are welling up. “But Hope, this is too terrible. I couldn’t even begin to think of working for Mark. Not after working for you. Why are they doing this? What’s going to happen to you?”

  I gently remove her hand from on top of mine and place it between both my hands, taking control of the situation.

  “Tanya, it’s just the way of the world. It’s unfair, it’s unjust, but it’s business. Although bad b
usiness, I can guarantee. I’ll fight all I can to save as many jobs as possible. Me? God, I could do with a break. I’ve been doing this for nearly thirty years. Who knows, I may decide to become a geologist. The world will hardly be a poorer place if Hope Lyndhurst gives up being an editor.”

  I’m fully in charge again. This is what I do best. “Look, we’ll have plenty of time to talk this over later, but now I have to brief Megan. At midday I want everyone to gather round, and I’ll make the announcement. Make sure everyone who’s in today stays here—all appointments, however important, are to be canceled. Simon’s coming at three-thirty. Ring that bar in St. James’s, and if it’s available, book the private room in the basement for six o’clock. Tonight we’re going to get hammered. Drinks on me. Or rather, drinks on Global. Let’s see if I can give my company Amex a heart attack.”

  My tears are all dried up, but everyone else’s have only just begun. When I tell Megan, she cries. The fashion editor, the beauty editor, the art director, and—probably because these things are catching—the intern who started this morning all cry. The junior features assistant, my current candidate for penning a secret best seller about the bitchy world of women’s magazines, doesn’t cry. She has started taking frantic notes and is grinning. I had her sussed right from the start. My features editor, Ally, and my two boys—Saul and Cosmo, picture editor and style assistant, respectively—are looking shifty, which suggests to me that Mark has already had “words” and that all three are moving camp. In Cosmo’s case, extremely camp. Saul, on the other hand, is a father of three and as straight as Fifth Avenue. He can’t afford not to have a job, not even for a fortnight. Their early absconding suits me fine; that’s three fewer to worry about.

  The rest are genuinely shocked and deeply upset, for me, for the magazine, for themselves. I tell them to be ready to fire questions at Simon about their future, but to be prepared for him to prevaricate. “Dig out your contracts when you get home tonight,” I say, “so you get a clearer idea of where you stand.” I promise to talk first to HR and if I don’t get any answers, to an employment lawyer who is a family friend. I promise to do everything I can on their behalf: write references, recommend them to other editors, give them time off for interviews—whatever they need to get themselves sorted. “And remember, tonight we’re going to get hammered. Until then try and make it business as usual.”