Yes Chef, No Chef - By Susan Willis Page 0,45

morning and scurried out the door behind him.

Unbelievable, she thought, within the space of ten days she’d lost her boyfriend, her lovely apartment, and now had been turned down from what she’d been almost certain was going to be her new job. Casting her eyes upwards towards the ceiling she muttered, ‘what next, eh? What else are you going to throw at me?’

Suddenly the door opened and she looked up to see Frances standing there with watery eyes.

“Oh sweetheart,” she soothed, “I’ve just seen Susan in the corridor and she’s told me. Are you OK?”

“Christ, somebody up there doesn’t like me at the moment,” she said with a huge choking sob threatening to escape from her throat. “I just can’t believe it?”

Frances actually knelt down in front of her and put her arms around her. “I know, honey, you must feel like shit. But I do know Susan didn’t know anything until she came into work this morning and I know she’d have given me a tip-off earlier if she had.”

Katie nodded glumly. “Oh, I know none of it’s her doing and none of David’s either. They’re just the two poor sods that had to tell me.”

Frances hugged her tightly. “And of course, who the hell wants to argue with the chief exec, nobody, eh? Well, not if they want to keep their jobs.”

Katie still felt speechless. She couldn’t think of anything else to say but got up thanking Frances while they walked slowly to the staff restaurant together arm in arm for a coffee break.

By the time they’d made their way back up to the office everyone was abuzz with the news. What date was he starting? Which company had he come from and what was he like? But, reassuringly to Katie, they had all come to her desk to commiserate with her.

Slowly she was coming to terms with the disappointment that the job wouldn’t be hers and she wouldn’t be moving up to the manager’s floor. Harry and Alice both told her they were sorry but were also glad in another way because they didn’t want to lose her as their boss and Frances was being funny trying to cheer her up by stating they were all a bunch of boring farts upstairs and she’d be much happier down here with her friends.

But try as she might, she just couldn’t seem to concentrate on any of her paperwork and looked around the room at the same faces she’d been working with for eight years. She was stagnant and bored and the thought of carrying on with the same old job made her feel weary - there was nothing new for her to learn and no new challenges lying ahead, and worse than all of that was the fact that she’d have to report into someone else all over again. Sending texts to Sarah and Lisa she told them briefly what had happened and hoped they’d come to hers tonight to share some wine and supper. The thought of being alone tonight was awful and she decided she was going to get very drunk indeed.

Chapter Eleven

While Tim drove back down south that morning he suddenly wondered where Kate was staying, and felt his cheeks flush with shame because it had taken him a week to think about it. Defensively though, he decided this was because he’d been convinced she would have come back after a couple of days but when she hadn’t, and had moved out completely, well, he shook his head in amazement and whistled through his teeth - he still couldn’t quite believe she’d done it. She could, he supposed be at her mums house or at Lisa’s or Sarah’s. Or, if she was going to find somewhere on her own would she have enough money to finance it?

With his foot down hard on the gas and flying down the outside lane of the motorway he supposed that living his life through a haze of alcohol over the last few weeks hadn’t helped, and then it suddenly dawned upon him that his salary alone wouldn’t be enough to cover the rent on the apartment. Kate had always done their books and he made a mental note to look through the bank statements as soon as he got home and inevitably he’d have to talk to his dad.

A sudden flashing motorway signal up ahead made him slow down and remember the speeding ticket he’d got last month; after his first driving lesson with his dad he’d always loved