Just In Case Page 2

  Her mother’s gift of a new wheelie-bag could not have come at a better time for Rosie, especially as there was no chance she would have been able to buy a new case herself. Rosie’s bank manager had called just two days earlier to say she was going to lower Rosie’s overdraft limit and that she should think about consolidating her various credit card balances into a single loan. The cost of the flights to Italy had been the final straw.

  The bank manager, Judy Renshaw, was kindly. She said she understood the temptations. ‘But you must stop living as though there’s no tomorrow,’ she sighed.

  ‘I’ll do my best,’ Rosie assured her.

  But Rosie couldn’t not go to Keira’s wedding. Keira was one of her oldest friends. They’d been close as two peas in a pod all through college. Certainly closer than Rosie had felt to her actual twin in a long while. So she had put the flights on her credit card and promised Judy Renshaw that she would make a proper concerted effort to end the next month in slightly less debt. Thus this suitcase was a Godsend. She was only too pleased to be able to put her old Samsonite out by the dustbin. Not without thanking it for its sterling service first, however. Clare caught Rosie praying over the broken case as she had once prayed over the small carcasses of various ill-fated pet hamsters and guinea pigs during their youth.

  ‘Are you actually giving your suitcase a funeral?’ Clare asked.

  ‘Me and that case had some serious adventures together,’ Rosie said.

  ‘I see,’ said Clare. ‘Though not really.’ Adventure was not a word she liked to hear in conjunction with travel plans at all.

  Chapter Four

  The following morning, the sisters decided it made sense for them to travel to the airport together. More to the point, it made sense for Rosie to catch a lift with Clare, whose transport to Heathrow had been arranged by her office. If she hadn’t been able to get a free ride with Clare, Rosie would have had to take three buses. After borrowing the money for the fare. What a fortunate coincidence that Clare was leaving for the States from the same airport. Even if it did mean Rosie had to get up rather earlier than she would have liked in order to share the cab.

  ‘You’re going to make me late!’ Clare yelled when the taxi arrived while Rosie was still tonging her hair into elaborate ringlets.

  Though of course, there was little chance of that. Clare had built in an hour and a half of extra time in case they encountered traffic, or an accident, or the driver’s satnav didn’t work and he’d forgotten to pack a paper road atlas. ‘Prior planning prevents poor performance’ was one of Clare’s favourite maxims. It meant she spent quite a bit of time in waiting rooms and airport lounges, but she had never, ever missed an appointment, a train or a flight.

  While the twins said ‘goodbye’ to their mother, the driver loaded both blue cases into the back of the car. Clare’s went in first, on the left (she made a mental note). Rosie’s went on the right. And of course Clare had filled in the neat luggage tag that came with her case. It was one of those very smart little tags that you have to open to see the name to prevent nosy-parkering in the check-in queue. Rosie hadn’t bothered. She would fill in her tag at the airport. Perhaps.

  While they were en route to Heathrow, Rosie called her friend Ed, with whom she would be travelling, to confirm that their flight to Florence would be leaving from terminal one at three o’clock. Ed confirmed that it would be leaving from terminal three at one thirty.

  ‘It’s a good job one of us is organized,’ said Clare. ‘If you’d been left to your own devices there’s no way you would have got to the airport on time. Are you absolutely sure it’s Heathrow you’re flying from and not Gatwick?’

  ‘Yeah, yeah,’ said Rosie, settling back into the seat for a snooze. She was never at her best before midday. Plus, taking the opportunity to nap meant that Rosie wouldn’t have to listen to any of Clare’s well-meant advice. Not that Rosie having shut her eyes prevented Clare from giving it.

  ‘We’re twenty-eight years old, Rosie, and you still act as though you’re eleven. You can’t even get the time of a flight right. As for having to share my cab because you’ve run out of cash? Well, that’s just typical. You’re lucky I don’t mind. But you can’t keep expecting me and Mum to bail you out. You’ve got to get your finances in order. If you want to make it as an actress, you’ve still got to find a little bit of time every single day to think about the business aspect of your work as well as the creative parts. And you’ve got to control your spending. No more going crazy on ASOS.com. I can help you with a spreadsheet…’

  Clare was a big fan of spreadsheets. She had created one devoted to tracking her everyday expenditure, which she filled in every evening without fail. Nothing would prevent her from keeping a grip on her cash. Not even love…

  Realising that Rosie just wasn’t listening to her – in fact, she was snoring - Clare glanced out of the window and caught sight of a hoarding advertising holidays in the South Of France. As she did so, she had a sharp and slightly painful memory of sitting in a hotel room, filling out her expenditure spreadsheet, while Ryan lounged on the bed behind her, begging her to break her routine just this once and join him on the soft white pillows.

  ‘We’re on holiday!’ Ryan had pleaded.

  But Clare needed to go online to check the details of her latest credit card statement, and then she saw a transaction she didn’t recognize, and by the time she had sorted that out, Ryan had fallen asleep. The following morning, Ryan got out of bed before Clare even woke and went down to the swimming pool without her. The rest of the trip was a disaster and they broke up soon after they got home.

  Clare shook the memory from her head. There was no point dwelling on how her relationship with Ryan had turned out. They just weren’t quite right for one another. Simple as that.

  ‘Anyway,’ she wound up her lecture to Rosie, though Rosie was deep in the land of Nod. ‘If you don’t want to end up a little old lady without even enough money to keep a cat, it’s time you started taking things more seriously.’

  Rosie – who was not quite so fast asleep as she appeared - shuddered at the thought of being a little old lady who could afford to keep a hundred cats but had nothing or nobody else upon which to lavish her affection. That was the fate she suspected awaited Clare. She opened one eye and looked at her sister.

  ‘Clare,’ she said. ‘I know you mean well but there’s no need for you to baby me. I’m a grown-up and I live the way I want.’

  ‘I’m not babying you. I’m trying to have an adult discussion.’

  ‘You’re giving me a lecture. Seriously, Clare, I appreciate your concern for me but I do wish you would give up. Otherwise, I might be forced to point out some of your faults.’

  Clare bristled. ‘Such as?’

  ‘Such as your total inability to let go. You’re so controlling.’

  ‘I…’

  ‘I know,’ said Rosie. ‘You’re going to tell me you’re not controlling at all. So prove it by letting go of the need to control my life.’

  After that, Rosie changed the subject onto the Tuscan holiday ahead of her. Clare suggested she should visit some museums. Rosie said she’d rather visit a few vineyards, which prompted Clare to remind her about the recommended daily limits for alcohol consumption and the dangers of drink-driving. Which prompted Rosie to remind Clare that she’d promised not five minutes earlier that she would treat Rosie like an adult from now on.

  When they got to the airport, Clare had the driver go to Terminal Three first and kissed her sister ‘goodbye’ in the back of the car.

  ‘Remember your case is the one on the right,’ she told Rosie. ‘The right. Make sure you’ve got your own case.’

  ‘Message received,’ said Rosie. ‘I’m not a total idiot. I’ll pick up the case on the right.’

  If only Rosie had ever known her left from right in the first place. If only Clare hadn’t decided that for once, just this once, against her better judgment, she would not get out of the car and make sure that
Rosie had the correct case before she drove on to Terminal Five. After Rosie’s response to her lecture, Clare had decided she would try to believe her sister could be an adult and choose the suitcase that belonged to her. Rosie needed to feel that people trusted her before she could start looking after herself. And if only Clare hadn’t held on to that thought on her way to the check-in Terminal Five, so that she didn’t bother to open the luggage tag on the case Rosie left behind to see that it didn’t contain her beautiful handwriting. Clare simply put the remaining case onto the conveyor belt and congratulated herself for having nagged just a little less than usual. She continued to feel good about her restraint as she boarded the flight and settled down to watch half a film before she absolutely had to open her laptop and create a handy budget spreadsheet that she would forward to Rosie. Though only if she asked.

  Controlling? That definitely wasn’t an adjective that could be applied to Clare Marwood. Oh no.

  Clare was in her hotel in New Jersey when she finally opened the suitcase she’d brought all the way from England and discovered it was stuffed with four maxi-dresses, a pair of neon pink rubber wedges and a tutu.

  Chapter Five

  Utterly dumbfounded by what she saw, Clare shut the case and reopened it, as though the hideous contents were a hallucination. But no, the bubble-gum coloured tutu did not disappear, despite looking like the kind of thing a magician’s assistant would wear.

  ‘No. Please, no.’

  Clare sank down on the edge of her bed.

  ‘Just… no.’

  Clare knew at once what had happened. Bloody Rosie. She’d never been able to tell her left from right. Not even after their mother knitted her a pair of mittens that had ‘L’ and ‘R’ stitched onto their backs. Somehow, even then, Rosie managed to get the mittens on the wrong hands, with the letters on her palms. Clare should never have trusted her to pick the right case out of the back of the taxi. She knuckled her own forehead in frustration.

  Of course, had Clare been in Manhattan, it wouldn’t have been such a problem. She could have gone straight to Saks Fifth Avenue with her credit card. But Cyber Intel Solutions were not holding their conference in Manhattan, which was deemed too expensive for such a big gathering. Instead, they were in some enormous hotel about forty miles out of the city, in the backwaters of New Jersey, built specifically for the conference trade. The hotel was designed so that the delegates would not need to leave the premises. It was also clearly designed with the old-fashioned notion that most of the delegates would be men.

  The first thing Clare did when she realized that she was at a conference with a suitcase full of dressing-up clothes was rush down to the boutique in the hotel lobby. They might have something sensible there. Unfortunately, the hotel boutique didn’t carry much in the way of clothing: just T-shirts, golf caps and a selection of bikinis even a Victoria’s Secret model would have had trouble carrying off. There was definitely nothing that resembled the ideal emergency capsule wardrobe for a businesswoman on a mission to impress. It was too late to go to the nearest mall.

  Having failed to find anything even remotely suitable to replace her missing luggage, Clare dragged herself back upstairs. She lay down on the bed in her featureless hotel room and cursed her careless twin sister all the way to Montepulciano.

  Rosie didn’t find out that her case didn’t contain the clothes she had chosen until much much later than Clare. She and her old friend Ed had gone straight from Florence airport to the first of many parties to celebrate the bride and groom: a dinner at a casual restaurant in a pretty village square, which segued into a long, long night in a bar. When they finally arrived at their hotel, where they were sharing a room (with twin beds), Rosie and Ed were both thoroughly sozzled.

  Rosie clicked open what she assumed was her case and stared at its contents in confusion. She must have drunk even more than she thought.

  ‘Crikey,’ said Ed, when he glanced at Rosie’s luggage. ‘There’s an awful lot of black in there. We’re in Italy for a wedding, my dear, not a funeral.’

  ‘Oh no.’ Rosie sat down heavily. She saw now that her phone was full of texts from Clare. Rosie felt herself go hot and cold with dread as she read each one.

  ‘You may well have ended my career,’ was the gist. Rosie lay down and closed her eyes. There was no way she wanted to deal with Clare now.

  Despite the fact that New York was six hours behind Tuscany, Clare called Rosie the moment it was daylight in Italy.

  ‘What?’ Rosie answered groggily.

  Though it was the middle of night where she was, Clare was completely wide awake and furious.

  ‘I’ve got your case,’ she said.

  ‘I know,’ said Rosie. ‘And I’ve got yours.’

  ‘How the hell did that happen?’

  ‘You told me to take the one on the right.’

  ‘And you must have taken the one on the left. You’re such a donut. Why didn’t you check the label?’

  ‘You didn’t give me time. Anyway, why didn’t you look at the label on the other case when you were checking in to your flight?’

  Clare didn’t like being reminded of that. It was so rare for her to make such a cock-up. Why indeed hadn’t she checked her luggage label? She hated that such a simple thing might have saved so much trouble.

  ‘It doesn’t matter,’ said Rosie. ‘At least we’re the same size. You can use my stuff and I’ll have to use yours. Simple.’

  ‘Simple? Have you gone mad? In seven hours’ time I have to make a presentation to three hundred senior managers from all over the world and you’re expecting me to make it in a tutu?’

  ‘Oh. My tutu!’ Rosie sighed. ‘I was going to wear that to the big party on Wednesday night. It would have looked awesome. I can’t believe you’ve got it with you in New York.’

  ‘Neither can I,’ said Clare flatly. ‘Because you know what, it definitely isn’t the ‘awesome’ choice for delivering a presentation on Cyber Intel Solutions’ plans for expansion in international banking.’

  ‘It will certainly get you remembered,’ said Rosie in an attempt at levity.

  ‘Nnnngh,’ said Clare. ‘You really don’t understand.’

  ‘I was joking,’ said Rosie. ‘I know you can’t wear a tutu. But what about the clothes you travelled in? They looked all right to me. You can do a day in those then you can go out and buy something suitable. Problem solved.’

  ‘The clothes I travelled in are creased and dirty,’ said Clare. ‘And I will have no time to go and buy something suitable. I am going to be in business sessions from dawn until dusk starting at nine am today until I fly back home on Thursday. I can’t believe you would do this to me.’

  ‘I didn’t do it deliberately. And you’re not the only one who should be upset,’ said Rosie. ‘I’m at a wedding in Tuscany, miles from nowhere, and all I’ve got to wear is a pile of black suits. There isn’t a decent shop within an hour of this place. I’m going to look like I work at the hotel. Except that everyone at this hotel is super-fashionable. I’m going to look like I work at a Travelodge in Luton in the sort of stuff you wear.’

  ‘What! My suits are by Jil Sander.’

  ‘Whoever they’re by, they’re bloody horrible.’

  ‘They cost hundreds of pounds.’

  ‘You were ripped off.’

  ‘And you weren’t? What is all this crap you were taking to Italy anyway? How can you wear so much polyester? I don’t think there’s a single natural fibre in the whole bloody lot. That blue dress. Ugh. It’s hideous and it’s a fire hazard.’

  ‘It’s pure silk,’ said Rosie.

  ‘Ha! Is that what the sales assistant told you? Do you ever read the care labels? It’s a good job you haven’t got this dress with you in Tuscany. Weddings. Candles. You’d have gone up like Guy Fawkes on the fifth of November.’

  As she was talking, Clare pulled a few more things from Rosie’s bag. ‘And how you can wear any of these shoes without your feet being shredded to pieces… J
ust looking at your shoes is making my feet squeal in pain.’

  ‘Looking at your shoes is making me think of a dental nurse.’

  ‘At least I won’t have bunions when I get old.’

  ‘But you might as well have, for all the sex appeal you’ll get from these clod-hoppers. No-one’s ever going to try to kiss your toes.’

  Clare shuddered at the thought.

  ‘Look there’s no point us arguing about this,’ said Rosie. ‘You’re in New York and I’m in Tuscany. I’ve got a wedding to attend and you’ve got to go straight to a huge presentation right after breakfast. Neither one of us has time to shop. We can’t courier the bags transatlantic in time to make a difference. So we’re both stuffed. We’ll have to make the most of it and wear each other’s clothes. That’s the end of it.’

  Clare groaned. The idea of carefree, careless Rosie going to a wedding, where there would definitely be alcohol and lots of it, in one of her expensively altered designer suits was almost worse than the idea of having to wear one of Rosie’s dresses to her presentation. It was a disaster. A total, unmitigated disaster and there was nothing Clare could do about it now. Not even Net-A-Porter would be able to get a decent suit to Clare’s hotel before she had to take the stage in front of all those important senior staff.

  ‘Just so you know,’ Clare told her sister. ‘You have potentially ruined my chances of promotion.’

  ‘Just so you know,’ said Rosie. ‘You have definitely ruined my chances of getting a snog.’

  Chapter Six

  Ed, Rosie’s gay best friend, found Rosie’s dilemma hilarious. For as long as he had known her, he had thought of Rosie as a bird of paradise in human form. On the night they first met, she was on her way to a fancy dress party dressed as Carmen Miranda. The second time he met her, at a Sunday lunch in a pub a week later, she didn’t look terribly different. Rosie was known for her incredible outfits. Ed was sure that half the wedding guests were waiting with baited breath to see what she would wear to the ceremony, suspecting there was a strong chance that she might upstage the bride. None of the guests, not one, would guess that Rosie might turn up in a navy blue suit by Jil Sander, with a knee-length A-line skirt and a jacket that buttoned all the way up to the chin.