Diary of an Unsmug Married by Polly James Read Free Book Online Page B

and wearing an incontinence pad.
    It’s quite nice to have an International Director of a Global Oil Company flirting with me in the meantime, though. It makes a change – though I do wish I could recall what the hell we did behind the Science block.
    FRIDAY, 4 JUNE
    Oh God, I hate Fridays. I bet other people love them, but then they don’t work for an MP, do they? Whoever thought it would be a good idea to designate Friday as ‘spending time in your constituency day’ ought to be shot. Several times, if possible.
    I’m on the phone to DEFRA fn3 this morning when The Boss arrives, dumps his briefcase on my desk and opens it. A crumpled shirt and five pairs of obviously dirty Y-fronts fall out. He fishes around for a folder, and then buggers off to do an interview, leaving me staring at skid marks. I have a degree, for God’s sake!
    It takes me the rest of the morning to get over the shock, and I still can’t face eating my lunch, though Andrew kindly saves me the bother upon his return. He finishes my sandwich just in time for today’s surgery – which is attended by the usual collection of total nutters, interspersed with the odd sane person with a really serious problem.
    I’m disturbed by yet another case where a middle-aged woman has apparently died unnecessarily while a patient at the local hospital. From dehydration. That’s the fifth or sixth case in the last three months, so I’m getting a bit worried about what’s going on now. I know that nurses have degrees these days (like me, not that mine does me any good), but lots of people don’t, and most of them can manage to remember to give their children (or pets) enough to drink. It’s not exactly rocket science, after all.
    Anyway, talking of pets, The Boss doesn’t seem half as exercised by people dying of thirst as he does about the ban on docking the tails of some pedigree dogs. This probably has less to do with a fondness for canine mutilation than with the fact that the constituent in favour of it turns out to be a reasonably attractive woman in her late forties.
    She flirts outrageously with The Boss, who flirts outrageously back, and – before I can get a word in edgeways – he’s agreed to consider bringing a Private Member’s Bill to reinstate docking, and she leaves in a presumably hormonal tizz. If she had a tail, I’m sure she’d be wagging it, and Andrew’s looking pretty perky, too.
    In fact, he’s still flushed with success when I show the next constituent in: Mr Beales, yet again – though Andrew greets him as if he were a long-lost friend. Why the hell does The Boss insist on doing that? The usual suspects need no encouragement.
    Grinning like an idiot, Mr Beales pulls a piece of paper out of his pocket, then passes it to The Boss, completely ignoring my outstretched hand. ‘If you could just sign that, Andrew, then I’ll be on my way,’ he says.
    Since when does Mr Beales call The Boss Andrew ? Not that it seems to bother anyone but me. Andrew just smiles, and flourishes his pen.
    ‘At least read it first!’ I say – sotto voce – or at least that’s my intention, but Big Ears Beales hears me anyway. He pushes his double-barred paedophile glasses to the end of his nose, and peers at me over the top. His eyes are unnervingly cold.
    ‘It’s just my shotgun licence application,’ he says. ‘Your Boss knows me, after all.’
    ‘Indeed he does,’ I say. ‘That was rather my point. Andrew, are you sure you don’t want to wait and think about this first?’
    The Boss notices my expression – which Greg says is the one that makes me look like a member of the Infected in the film 28 Days Later – and finally reacts.
    ‘Ah, Edmund,’ he says. ‘Molly’s right, you know—’
    ‘Thank God for that,’ I say, under my breath, but then Andrew carries on where he left off:
    ‘She’s forgotten to type up that reference for the court. Tell you what, she can go and do that now, and I’ll sign this while you