The Fantastic Book of Everybody's Secrets by Sophie Hannah Read Free Book Online Page B

working at all. I bet you were in the pub playing darts, or having mud and seaweed rubbed into your back as part of a spa day, cheating the company, you lazy bastard. And, look, I’m telling on you. I’m telling the even bigger boss.’
    The inclusion of ‘cc Gillian Bate’ was the proof. If Nora trusted him, was genuinely concerned for his wellbeing and had no doubt he’d spent last Thursday working, she wouldn’t have felt the need to send a copy of the letter to Gillian. Nor would she have done something so formal as send a letter; she’d simply have emailed him. What did ‘cc’ mean, anyway? Complete cunt, thought Tom. The company email template offered one the option of ‘bcc’ as well. Both complete cunts: Nora and Gillian.
    The phone on his desk rang. He picked it up, said ‘Tom Foyers,’ hoping, as he always did, that Jonathan Ross would be on the other end. Jonathan would be phoning from Barry Norman’s house. ‘Look, Tom, if I don’t have a few months off I’m going to go crazy. Barry and I have been having a chat, and we’ve decided you’d be ideal to present Film 2005 . Youwouldn’t, by any chance, fancy it, would you? All you need is a reassuring smile and a stylish yet comfortable jumper to wear.’
    It was not Jonathan Ross. It was Selena, Tom’s wife. Still, he was reasonably happy to hear from her. Selena was the only person with whom Tom shared some (though by no means all) of his real thoughts. He didn’t quite know how this had come about, but he knew that Selena had arranged it. She had constructed a supervised area in which Tom could safely say anything. So could their two children, Joseph and Lucy. Lucy, who was two, had taken to saying, ‘For fuck’s sake!’ every time she encountered a practical difficulty. She said it when she couldn’t slot the Piglet piece into her Winnie the Pooh jigsaw, and when her Baby Annabel doll rolled off the changing mat. She’d learned the phrase from Selena, who laughed every time Lucy parroted it. ‘That’ll give the girls at nursery a shock,’ she said. Joseph, who was four, screamed, ‘I hate you, Mummy! I hate you, Daddy!’ every time he was told that he couldn’t have chocolate mousse for dinner and then again for pudding.
    â€˜How are you?’ Tom asked his wife.
    â€˜Extremely pissed off,’ said Selena. ‘Furious, in fact. Can you come and meet me, now?’
    â€˜Not really.’ What Tom meant was, ‘Not at all.’ Selena’s current job was to sell eighteen townhouses for Beddford Homes. She worked alone in the sales office, which was the double garage of the show home. This was at least ten times the size of Tom’s office, and her bosses, Andrew Beddington and Brian Ford, had installed a fully equipped little kitchen for her at the back. They’d also judged Selena worthy of a carpet, three armchairs, a fan to cool the stifling summer air, and a television. She had already sold four of the houses for them, and they liked and trusted her. They knew she could and would sell the lot. Selena was an extremely persuasive woman. Andrew and Brian didn’t even mind that on quiet days she closed the office and went shopping or to get a manicure.
    Selena sometimes had trouble understanding the constraints of Tom’s working life. ‘Why not?’ she said crossly.
    â€˜Because it’s not up to me when I come and go from the office,’ said Tom, running amok in this rare opportunity for honesty like a toddler in a Wacky Warehouse ball pit. ‘It’s up to a fat, snide, glorified tealady called Nora Connaughton.’ Last Thursday, Tom had worked at home from seven in the morning until eight in the evening. He had asked Ruth, one of the secretaries, to send the Burns Gimblett files to his house because he hadn’t wanted to lose an hour and a half of work time. ‘Why, has