Raven, Zoe was none the wiser and she sat next to me every day at work! Thank. God.
Of course, our client hadn’t been mentioned, which Diane was not going to be happy about. But it was a helluva lot better than any kind of ‘Raven Goes Wild Again’ story, which would have dragged the name of our client’s underwear range through the mud. And then some.
Anya spotted my celebration dance on the balcony and could tell there was more going on than just a retweet of one of my clients’ products. She wandered over to see. I simply held my phone out for her to read the article.
‘Gah! There’s not a single mention of Vixenary in that piece! Why are you smiling? Are you on crack?’
I danced some more. ‘Can you tell it’s not Raven in that article but just a good lookalike?’ I asked.
‘Nooo,’ Anya said incredulously. ‘Who is it?’
I stabbed my finger into my chest then held it up to my lips to indicate she should keep that quiet.
‘Holy shit!’ she whispered. ‘That’s you?’
I nodded proudly.
‘I can’t believe you passed for a celeb, babe!’
Typical Anya. She was more impressed by my brush with stardom than my brush with unemployment. I started smiling again but caught a glimpse of myself in one of the full-length mirrors that adorned the walls of the living room and realised I was still in a bad way. Raven, the skank, was cutting the shoot in half and Diane still hadn’t called. Usually I couldn’t escape her. I frowned and the creases on my skin looked ten times worse underneath the heavy foundation I had lacquered on earlier. However, like the strange gratification one gets from seeing Oxford Street revellers of a morning, once Raven actually arrived, I felt instantly better.
She looked like total shit. Even in sunglasses.
It was as if she hadn’t bothered to shower and had decided to hang on to the tow bar of the limo and be dragged through the city. The crown of her hair was stuck to her scalp, and was that cigarette ash I could see in there? Even Anya struggled to look impressed.
Caz, the stylist, mouthed the magic word, ‘Airbrushing,’ before smiling and looking at Raven, who walked straight to the cans of Red Bull arrayed on of the catering table, her head down, her manager following, still on the phone.
With the Look team standing around awkwardly, and Anya frozen like a deer in the headlights of fame, I decided to approach.
‘Morning, Raven. How are we feeling today? And how great is this location?’ I tried, smiling ferociously and waiting for the recognition to kick in.
She stared at me blankly, her bottom lip so dry that it looked like it was about to snap off. ‘Who are you?’ she groaned.
‘I’m Jasmine, the publicist who has been looking after you all week,’ I said sweetly. ‘I saw you last night?’ I added, tilting my head meaningfully at her.
‘Riiiiiiiight. So I guess you’re the one who can explain why the fuck there are photos circling the fucking USA of me in dirty piece-of-shit sunglasses,’ she said.
‘Sorry?’ I replied, still smiling sweetly, when I remembered the knock-off D&Gs I had paid stupid money for. And I believe she meant ‘circulating’ rather than ‘circling’.
‘Are you deaf? There are fucking pictures of me from last night in these fucking fake Dolces and all my friends have texted me saying how fucking cheap I look. I mean . . . what the farrrk,’ she said. ‘As if I would ever wear those. What the farrrk?’
I stood by silently, not quite believing what was happening. Sure, I didn’t expect her to name her firstborn in my honour, but a little gratitude would have been nice.
‘Raven, let’s get on with this,’ said Marlita, finally off the phone.
‘ Fine . But I’m leaving in, like, two hours, no later, and there better be some good food. Faark this shit,’ she said, no doubt still under the influence.
I glanced at the Look staffers. They just looked petrified.
‘Okay then.’ I clapped.
Marteeka Karland and Shelby Morgen