Finding Jessica Lambert, page 16
Anna had risen in the night to remove her dress and hide her body again under a generous T-shirt and returned to bed apologising for her reticence. Jess had told her she shouldn’t fret and reassured her in more ways than one and Jess smiled again enjoying her own nakedness wrapped around the partially dressed Anna.
She reluctantly rolled away from her slumbering lover and checked her phone. Six-thirty and she had a message from her agent, Celia. It must have been the notification that had woken her. Did the woman never sleep? Actually she knew Celia didn’t. “Bloody thyroid,” she heard Celia croak in her mind.
Jess sat up and opened the message. “Call me as soon as you wake up. And I mean, as soon as you wake.”
Jess dressed quickly, throwing her coat around her shoulders, and padded out to the balcony, sliding the door shut behind her. She shivered in the near freezing air and swiped to Celia’s number.
“Good god, darling. I didn’t expect you to be up at the crack of dawn,” Celia answered.
“Good morning, Celia.” Jess sniggered at her agent’s insistence of punctuality then berating her for complying.
“What’s stopping you sleeping dear?” Celia asked.
“Your message.”
“Oh. I was rather hoping for something more interesting than that. We live in hope.” Celia chuckled. “Right, to business.”
“OK,” Jess readied herself. Celia sounded serious.
“So this is a bit of curve ball, but I have my reasons. Theatre.”
“What about theatre?”
“How do you feel about it?”
“As in, watching it?”
“Oh, don’t be dense. You really are slow for someone who is very clever in so many other respects.”
This was the story of Jess's life. Thinking on her feet wasn’t her forte, but submerging herself in the depths of a subject and emerging with something novel definitely was.
“I meant,” Celia tutted, “performing.”
“Oh,” Jess frowned. “I haven’t done any stage work for, well, since school, just amateur dramatics.”
“That’s what I thought.”
Jess could hear Celia’s sharp nails drumming on her desk.
“How do you feel about an four-week run in the West End?”
“London?”
“Yes, dear. That would be the West End I would be referring to.”
“When?”
“Starting in a month’s time after intensive rehearsals.”
“But–”
“Femi’s sorting your publicity schedule, but he’s wrangled some remote interviews along with personal appearances and social media events with the studio and that’s keeping them, if not sweet, from suing at the moment.”
“Oh.”
The phone was silent.
“I know it’s unexpected,” Celia said, “but let’s just say, if you did this, Matt and many others would be relieved.”
Jess didn’t know if it was early morning brain fog or her inability to process Celia fast enough, but she didn’t have a bloody clue what she was getting at.
“I can’t really say much yet,” Celia continued, “but a theatre board member would be very grateful if you, with your high profile, could save the day and in return they might save yours.”
“Right.”
Clear as mud.
“You see, one of the cast has toppled off a bus and broken a leg and the understudy really isn’t cutting it, and frankly the play is dying on its arse anyway. So some injection of star quality around Christmas, to bring in curious punters who’d like to see you in the flesh, should revive its fortune and get it back on its feet to continue its run. Actually I’m tasked with signing up several guest appearances. And Femi and I were listening when you said you needed to stay in one place for more than a day. So–”
“Yes.”
“Yes? Yes what?”
“I’ll do it.”
“I haven’t even told you about the play and the rest of the cast.”
Oh. “I don’t care.”
“Don’t you want to think about it?”
“I have.”
“But are you up to it?”
Jess blinked and shook her head. Was Celia trying to sell this to her or not?
“I mean,” Celia continued. “You’ll have to audition with the director, but she’d be a fool not to take you.”
“Celia,” Jess smiled. “I haven’t had coffee. It’s six-thirty in the morning and I don’t do talking on the phone.”
“Bloody millennials,” Celia chortled.
Jess ignored that. “Please tell me what I need to know. Clearly. Succinctly.”
Jess heard another chuckle at the other end of the line. “OK. The play’s The Return. An ensemble piece. Are you familiar with it?”
“No.”
“Fine.” Celia didn’t seem surprised. “I didn’t have you down as a theatre buff. It’s a fairly new play and has already been on tour and is in London for what should have been a long run but it’s hit a few problems. There’s a high calibre stage cast, so you will have to expect some superior attitude, but none of them have your audience pulling power so dismiss their snooty little noses if they get priggish about it.”
Jess could imagine what Celia meant. That Jess had been catapulted to stardom from an unknown school girl didn’t always go down well with seasoned actors who’d been to drama school and put in years of auditions and work. Actually it hardly ever went down well.
“It’ll be hard work,” Celia continued. “If you get the heebie jeebies on stage or don’t put in the rehearsal hours it could all backfire spectacularly of course.”
“Are you still trying to encourage me to do it?” Jess asked, wrinkling her nose in confusion. Her humour belied her nerves. Her heart beat with hope in her chest. The sense of relief was huge at the possibility of staying in the same place for weeks at a time. And Anna. She could see Anna again. Jess peeked through the windows. Anna remained in bed, a sleeping beauty.
“I’m surprised that you’re so eager to take it,” Celia came to an end.
“Honestly?” said Jess. “I’m desperate. I’m at the point where I want to quit acting and bury myself at home, wherever that is.”
Celia was silent.
“I know I’d regret it in many ways, but right now I’m ready to throw in the towel.”
“OK.” Celia said. “I do understand. I hadn’t appreciated how far you’d been pushed. I’ll send you the audition details and the script. Let me know what you think.”
“I—”
“Don’t worry, I’ll send a provisional yes, but mull it over while you’re away. And call me any time. Seriously anytime. I’m always awake.”
“Thank you,” Jess said.
“Oh my dear, you’re welcome,” Celia said, amused. “You really are by far the most straightforward and polite of all my clients.”
Jess laughed.
“While at the same time bringing in the most money. So thank you.”
“OK,” Jess said, trying not to apologise or thank her again.
And they rung off.
So.
Theatre.
That’s not what Jess had been expecting. She gazed across London with her heart in her mouth. The prospect of theatre, with a real live audience, no retakes, nothing, was terrifying. But, and her heart cantered at the thought, it opened up the possibility of seeing Anna again.
She peered inside the window. Should she tell Anna now? Jess was desperate to tell her everything, but this wasn’t a quick conversation after a night like that. Femi had indeed emailed with the week’s hellish schedule, then who knew where she would be after that. But if she could stay in London, well, there would be months to talk and spend together.
The sky was getting lighter by the time Jess returned inside. She warmed her hands on a mug of coffee before waking Anna. She gently squeezed her shoulder. Anna’s eyes opened slowly, taking a little while to settle on Jess’s, then she smiled the most beatific of smiles.
“Good morning,” she murmured.
Jess beamed. “It’s a bloody amazing morning. Here, I made you a coffee,” she said and she carefully handed it to Anna, who dutifully sat up to take a sip and set the mug down on the low bookcase beside the bed.
Was it the hot coffee that brought colour to Anna’s face, the slight flush, those large eyes, or was it something else? Jess grinned, sure of the answer.
Anna reached up to her face “Last night.” She smiled. “That was…” Anna was unusually lost for words, her lips parted, and that gorgeous full mouth captivated Jess.
“Wonderful”, Jess whispered and she leaned down to kiss her.
Despite staying awake well into the early hours, appreciating those lips and much more, she couldn’t tire of them.
“It’s been a long time,” Anna started. “I’d forgotten how close you feel to someone.”
“Someone you’re mad about,” Jess finished in her head. When you’ve fallen for a person. When it’s not just sex but opening up your whole being to share and be able to enjoy another’s.
Jess kissed her again.
“Are you leaving?” Anna said, looking down at Jess's coat.
“I have to. My manager has scheduled several meetings but,” she braced herself, metaphorically crossing everything, “if I get a chance to stay in London for a while, would you, you know, like to spend some more time together?”
“Is that possible?” Anna blinked and sat up higher.
The air seemed to flutter with excitement.
“I don’t know yet but there’s a possibility and I would really like to spend more time with you. Proper time, without having to rush off or fear never seeing you again. There’s so much I want to tell you and I love every minute we’ve had, so if you–”
“Of course.” Anna reached up, an unbridled look of happiness on her face, and drew Jess closer. “I would love that.”
Jess blinked and let herself be drawn in and fell victim to another of Anna’s delicious, infatuating kisses.
Chapter 26.
Anna smiled, a lot, and she knew exactly why and that made her grin more.
She caught herself before stepping inside Zehra’s coffee house to meet Pen for breakfast. She pursed her lips, attempting to appear serious, but her mouth twitched and she couldn’t stop her whole face lifting with rapture. Was she imagining it or were her cheeks glowing? She checked her face with the back of her fingers. Yes, she radiated heat.
She fanned her face with her hands, let them rest, felt the cool air on less obviously euphoric cheeks, which then slowly filled with a rosy glee. Damn it. Afterglow was written all over her face and Penny would know exactly what the glow was after.
But Penny was flapping when Anna entered the café. She heard her first and found her best friend and daughter at their favourite booth by the window. Bibs was sitting in a wooden highchair pulled up to the end of the table, a ring of Turkish simit bread brandished in one hand and something squelchy in the other.
“Stop squeezing that egg, Bibs,” Penny snapped.
Oh, that was it. Vaguely yellow mush was emerging from in between Bibs’s fingers. The girl seemed unperturbed by her mother’s fussing and looked up to say “Banna”.
“Hello, lovely girl,” Anna said and she stroked the toddler’s wispy hair and kissed her on the forehead. She risked egg all over her clothes, but she wasn’t missing out on a cuddle from her favourite kiddo. Besides, Anna was leading a more informal class today, open to everyone who needed voice coaching, and she was dressed in jeans and a long jumper in which a bit of egg could conceivably blend.
“Sorry,” Penny blustered. “We started without you. Bibs was wailing and we couldn’t wait.”
Penny was behaving as if she had the most cantankerous, demanding child on the planet while Bibs sat quietly getting on with the business of being a toddler.
“Banna want some?” Bibs said and she spread out her yellow fingers accompanied by another little squelch.
Anna smiled. “No, thank you, Bibs. I will order mine in a minute.”
Penny was tugging a bib that resembled a mini raincoat onto the child, seemingly a little after the fact, but Anna didn’t want to point that out.
“Oh god,” Penny groaned. “We’ve been up since four. And it’s not like we spent much of before that sleeping.”
That would explain Pen’s grouchiness.
“What’s up?” Anna said, sliding into the booth seat.
“Bibs is snotty again.” That would account for the nasal “Banna” greeting. “And she’s been having night terrors.” Penny fussed and tugged at the bib. “I’m trying to pass off these dark rings under my eyes as smudged makeup after a good night out, rather than a terrible night in sharing a bed with a toddler.”
“Any idea what’s causing the nightmares?”
“No,” Pen replied, relaxing as a popper button finally snapped into place. “Poor pumpkin,” she said with genuine sympathy. “I wish I could see what was going on in that little head.” And she kissed Bibs on the forehead while the toddler obliviously licked food off her hands.
“Right,” Penny sighed and she plopped down onto the booth seat opposite and at last focussed her attention on Anna. Penny’s mouth dropped and continued to widen until it peaked at maximum stretch. It was accompanied with an excited and indignant inhalation.
“You got laid!”
Shit.
“It’s written all over your face.”
It was written all over her face and now that it was heightened with a blush it was written in bold.
“Who got laid?”
It was Zehra who sidled up with an order pad. She abandoned the pad on the table and shuffled her bottom next to Anna.
“You got laid?”
Oh god. Was nothing secret in this world for long?
“Stop!” Anna cried. “Just….stop.” She put her hands up.
“So?” Pen said, eyes as wide as her mouth.
“Yes, I saw her again last night.”
“And?”
“Well, let’s just say she was still here this morning.” Anna sat back, relieved that she’d managed a tasteful answer.
“And?”
Oh come on.
Pen tutted. “She managed to stay two other nights and show a disgusting amount of platonic behaviour. So?”
Did she really have to do this?
“I…”
“You are definitely glowing,” Penny said.
Apparently she did.
“That grin of yours stretches from ear to ear.”
“True,” Zehra added.
“And,” Penny said with finality, “you walked in here with your titties thrust out like weapons of mass seduction.” Penny shook her own bosom for good measure.
“I did not.” Why did Penny do this to her – maul her experience over with such crudity she wanted to die?
“Did too.” Penny strung it out to make it the last and final word. “Oh come on. I get to spend the night with a tiny snot monster. I want to live vicariously at least.”
“OK.” Anna smiled. She couldn’t bring herself to use Penny’s diction and answered succinctly with, “Yes.”
“I knew it!” Penny punched the air. “Anna Mayhew had sex!”
“Jesus, Pen!”
Zehra chuckled beside her. “Oh, I’ve missed your morning-after conversations.” And she put her arm around Anna’s shoulders. “You two have entertained me over the years.”
It had usually been the other way round though, Anna and Zehra the listening ears and shoulder to cry on after Penny’s exploits. It had been a quiet spell over the last five years, with Pen settled with Lana and Anna quiet at home.
“My money,” Zehra tugged Anna towards her affectionately, “is on that beautiful girl from the other night.”
“You’ve seen her?” Pen gasped, aggrieved.
“Am I right?” Zehra asked.
“How…?” How did Zehra know?
“The one sprawled on your bed when I came to check on you?”
There was that.
Anna pinched her lips together. “Yes.”
“Aaaaaah.” Zehra enjoyed the satisfaction of being right. “I thought so.”
“How though?” Anna said.
“The way she looked at you.”
Again, “How?”
“Yes, she was worried and in a state, but those little looks in unguarded moments, taking you in, those are always such a giveaway.”
“But she was only getting to know me. People regard others when they meet.”
“Do they?” Zehra cried with high-pitched disbelief. “A few seconds is all they take to categorise a new person, put them in little boxes then move on. But this girl, always peeking up, those big brown eyes, admiring, searching.”
“I can’t believe you’ve already met her,” Pen huffed.
“I didn’t speak to her, but I saw enough.”
“What was she like?” Pen leant forward, with the eagerness of a hound.
“Gorgeous,” Zehra said, like she was sampling a new dish. “Tall, brown skin, beautiful eyes with long lashes. Natural too I think. Lovely lips. Not covered in makeup. She was kind of, how would you say, soft butch maybe?”
Pen nodded with the speed of a drill.
“You know,” Zehra had her hands cupped in front of her as if weighing large fruit. “Fit, with short hair, and great big–”
“I am still here,” Anna said. “You are talking about someone whom I respect and have a high regard for.”
“Yeah, yeah,” Pen dismissed. “You were always far too considerate with your lovers and hardly ever dished the dirt, so I need to sniff around elsewhere for details.”
Anna crossed her arms and rolled her eyes and let Zehra and Pen carry on their discussion and conjecture.
She gazed through the window and wondered where Jess was now. She’d left soon after waking but not before they’d kissed once more. And Jess's kisses had trailed down Anna’s neck, and eager hands had teased her nipples beneath her T shirt. Jess had eased on top of her, Anna wrapping her legs around her back while Jess slipped her fingers inside and sensationally circled her thumb around Anna’s centre.
