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      CHAPTER TWO

       So long, farewell …

      Processing the news was a surreal experience. I felt as if I was floating just above a room filled with rotating knives, knowing my descent was inevitable. How dare Aidan drop this on me? How could he think this was a better option than learning about it with the rest of the team? At least if I’d heard it at the same time as them we could have reacted as a team, united by a common experience. Now I was in limbo – not in with Aidan and the lucky few who would walk out of the office today knowing they had a job to come back to, and not with my workmates who were about to learn their fate. I hated it; and I hated Aidan more for once again demonstrating how little he really knew me. I wanted to tell Vicky but she had disappeared to the canteen to grab a bacon sandwich. Feeling completely helpless, I wished the seconds away until the inevitable meeting.

      Thirty minutes later, we filed into the meeting room like sheep into an abattoir, my colleagues completely unprepared for the lightning bolt about to fire at them. Aidan and two of his superiors calmly handed out letters to all of us, detailing the consequences of the Council’s ‘programme of restructuring’. Vicky and two of my other female colleagues began to sob quietly, while my male friends stared in gut-wrenched silence, eyes not blinking as the awful reality set in. Some idiot from HR who nobody knew then stood up and explained how committed the Council was to ensuring our personal development – a ridiculous stance to take considering it was happily sacking fifteen people. When he asked for any questions he was met by uniform, wordless hatred.

      I could feel Aidan’s eyes on me, but I refused to look back, focusing instead on the impersonal general letter in my hand:

      We regret to inform you … This is not a personal reflection on your considerable contribution to the Department, rather a necessary measure to protect the financial integrity of the Council …

      No longer required.

      Out of a job.

      Unemployed …

      However I looked at the words I couldn’t help but take them personally. This couldn’t be happening to me! Only that morning I’d wished for something to change …

      And then, it hit me.

      Something had changed. Admittedly not in a good way, but my secret wish had been granted. From this moment on, my life would never be the same again. Nell Sullivan, Assistant Planning Officer, was no more. That chapter of my life had been brought to a sudden end and now …

      Well, now what?

      The prat from HR was handing out tissues and wittering on about a hastily arranged consultation with a local recruitment agency to follow the end of the meeting. But it was as if I had become cocooned in a bubble, separated from the devastated expressions of my colleagues by a million new thoughts that sparkled and spun around my eyes. I hadn’t planned for this, hadn’t even considered its possibility in my carefully ordered life. And yet, here it was, together with the promise of three months’ wages in one go …

      At the end of the meeting, I followed my colleagues out, my heart inexplicably light despite the devastation that surrounded me. Vicky grabbed my arm and pulled me from the line of zombie-like shufflers heading down the corridor to the room set aside for ‘career repositioning advice’.

      ‘Can you believe they’ve just done that?’ she demanded, trails of blue-black mascara running down her cheeks. ‘Bastards! I’ve just taken out a new mortgage on the house – how on earth am I going to pay for it now?’

      ‘I don’t know, hun.’

      ‘And Greg’s had his hours cut at the factory, too … This is such a mess.’

      ‘You’re telling me,’ the bulky, middle-aged hulk of our colleague Terry appeared beside us. ‘Can’t believe I chose this bloody week to give up smoking. Either of you have any fags?’

      We shook our heads and watched him lumber away.

      ‘I think I might take up smoking,’ Vicky said, staring blankly after Terry. ‘Look at me: I’m shaking, Nell.’ She held out her hand and I could see the light from the strip-lights overhead undulating gently over her newly manicured nails. ‘I’m going to have to phone Greg and tell him. So much for our wedding plans next year.’

      ‘The agency might have something for you, Vix,’ I suggested, immediately hating myself for sounding like Aidan’s henchwoman. As I considered it, the thought that had begun in the meeting room grew. I didn’t want to be a victim of this. I wanted to do something else …

      ‘… Of course the Disney World trip Greg wanted to take me and Ruby on is out of the window. I might have to ask Mum to look after Ruby for an extra day because there’ll be no way I can justify paying nursery fees five days a week now. And then I’ll have to endure her endless diatribes on how reckless Greg and I were to have Ruby before we were fully settled. I swear if we have to move back to his parents’ house in Brentwood I will go insane …’

      Vicky was listing all the things she now couldn’t afford and I had to force myself away from the burgeoning idea to give her my full attention. ‘Vix, hun, try not to think the worst. I know you’re still in shock – we all are – but we don’t know what the situation is yet. You and Greg have been through worse and look at how happy you guys are. Ruby’s gorgeous and loves you both to bits and you know Greg is a great dad and partner. You’ll work through this.’

      She sniffed. ‘You think so?’

      ‘If anyone can get through this, you guys can.’

      ‘Thanks, babe. And you will, too. At least you and Aidan patched things up and worst-case scenario you could always move into that big house of his …’

      I averted my eyes and she stopped.

      ‘You did get back together, didn’t you?’

      I let out a long sigh. She wasn’t going to like it, but I couldn’t lie to her. ‘No, we didn’t.’

      ‘I don’t understand. Why call you into his office if he wasn’t going to …?’ Her eyes widened as the truth dawned. ‘Oh my life. You knew …’

      ‘He asked me not to say anything …’

      Her expression darkened. ‘You knew, Nell! You came out of his office and you sat at your desk like nothing had changed, and all the time you knew?’

      ‘What was I supposed to do? I wasn’t going to be the one who broke everyone’s hearts!’