Picture Imperfect - By Nicola Yeager Page 0,20

late to cancel any part of it.’

‘Well that still isn’t Mark’s problem, is it? Did Mark push the other guy off a cliff or whatever happened to him? No. I’ll tell you, if you did something like this to Mark, he’d be sitting at home, stewing in his own paranoid juice for a week, imagining you getting up to all sorts of shenanigans in every combination possible with two guys and another girl and that’d be just on the first day. Actually, this is beginning to sound pretty erotic. Sorry.’

‘But the girls aren’t that great looking. I wouldn’t describe them as hot. I don’t think…’

‘But that’s even worse. These plain-Jane girls go off on their own looking for a couple of virile Greek fishermen with no taste, huge libidos and two words of English, Mark and whatshisname are left drinking by the pool, ogling every bit of suntanned foreign tail that goes by – it’s a disaster waiting to happen! God, if I had a boyfriend who did this to me, I’d kick him in the balls so hard they’d come out the top of his head. How could he? How could he do this to you? Bottom line – you’re a couple. You should share stuff. If one of you can’t afford expensive foreign holidays, then you don’t go on expensive foreign holidays. Unless, of course, he’s a generous, non-materialistic type who pays for both of you. Simple as that. I mean – what the hell?’

‘I don’t know if I’m just being intolerant by…’

‘Stop defending him all the time. Are you mad? This is unacceptable, full stop. This is him, not you. He could have said no, couldn’t he? He could have said that he had this beautiful girlfriend and if he was going to spend x amount of money going on holiday with anyone, it would be with her. But he didn’t.’

I flop back in my seat. I’m getting exhausted with all of this. It’s like having a hurricane-level blast of righteous indignation that you can’t turn off.

Kristin picks up a pen, scribbles with it on a piece of paper to make sure it’s working and sits up, staring at me, pen poised in mid-air.

‘Right. Let’s work out how much this flatworm has spent on this so-called cheap holiday shall we?’

‘I really don’t want to get into all this. I don’t want to think about it.’

I can tell she’s going to do this with or without my cooperation.

‘You said the holiday was a little over three hundred pounds, yeah? Let’s call it three hundred and fifty. Did he tell you how much the return flight was?’

‘I don’t remember.’

She narrows her eyes, knowing I’m lying.

‘Alright, it was two hundred and seven.’

She scribbles this down.

‘How much spending money?’

‘I really don’t know. We didn’t discuss it.’

‘Fair enough. Conservative estimate, then, let’s say two hundred, make it three hundred. This is only going to be a ball park figure, after all. How much do you think he spent on your shopping spree?’

‘Well, he did buy quite an expensive bag and some hundred quid sunglasses.’

‘How much did he spend on stuff altogether?’

‘Something like five or six hundred pounds, maybe? Possibly more?’

‘Well call it five hundred. Let’s be conservative on that one. Add on things like snacks and magazines at the airport, taxi the other end and other sundries. Let’s make that, say fifty pounds.’

I watch her moving her lips as she makes the calculation.

‘Crap. That comes to close on fifteen hundred! Now I’m not a lesbian, even though I experimented at school for a while, well – more than a while, but if I had a beautiful girlfriend like you and was going to spend that sort of money on a holiday, I’d spend it on you and take you away to some luxury spa hotel in the Cotswolds for a few day’s pampering and frequent sexual intercourse with scented candles and exotic massage oils.’

‘Thank you. I’m flattered.’

‘You’re welcome.’

Mrs Goddard suddenly appears. I realise that her office door has been open while Kristin and I were having our little chat and I’m worried that she’s steeling herself to tell us both to shut up and get on with some work. I don’t like to upset her as she’s obviously upset enough already. I don’t know if I mentioned it, but it was down to her that I got the job here in the first place. I came here as a so-called graduate girl, but explained that I only wanted a job for a