I Heart Paris

The Adventures of Angela: Ooh la la

Today has been one of those days when everything happened at once. My boyfriend asked me to go to Paris with him next week, I had a really important work meeting which has led to a really really exciting new project, I arranged to meet up with my best friend from London, oh, and I got my hair cut. It’s been a big day.

But aside from the massively dramatic event that was taking half an inch off the ends of my bob, how exciting is Paris? I know I’m a bit rubbish for not having gone before, especially when I lived in London for five years, but yay, I’m going now! And sigh, with my boy. And that’s the only way to do Paris isn’t it? It’ll be all romantic walks down the Left Bank, holding hands outside Notre-Dame, watching the sunset from the top of the Eiffel Tower. I am a little bit concerned about the wardrobe though – my experience of Paris is more or less limited to Funny Face, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes and the last third of The Devil Wears Prada. So it’s either black turtlenecks and pedalpushers or haute couture. Hmm. And bugger.

So, while I try to resolve my sartorial crisis, please let me know if you have any Parisian advice – I want to know exactly where to sip my chocolat chaud and bag the best baguettes. And obviously, any shopping suggestions are more than welcome. My heart says Chanel, but my head and credit limit says flea market. Why don’t you send both and I’ll work it out once I get there…

Before I could really start thinking about actually getting to Paris, I had to get through my meeting at Belle. Maybe it would be a good idea to write out a proposal for this Insider’s Guide. Maybe it would be a good idea to find some Parisian insiders. Maybe it would be a good idea to spend three hours hunched over my laptop, scouring the internet. I checked in at all the usual places, Time Out Paris, Gridskipper, Citysearch, and started to pull together my synopsis. Several hours later, I had, well, something. For want of further inspiration, I swapped my crumpled sundress for a stripy Splendid vest and Hello Kitty knickers. It was just too hot to wear anything else. I took an icy can of Diet Coke from the fridge and draped myself across the sofa, rummaging around for the remote. Maybe just fifteen minutes of E! and then I’d do some more research. Or half an hour. And then an episode of America’s Next Top Model. Two hours later, looking back guiltily at the sleeping screen of my laptop, I tried to convince myself that there was in fact such a thing as too much preparation. And turned back to the TV. It really is amazing what I can talk myself into.

The next morning, it wasn’t quite as easy to believe that being over prepared was a mistake. Determined not to fall into my regular trap of waking up late and scrawling at my face with a kohl pencil, I woke up bright and early, washed my hair, did proper grown-up girl make-up and selected my most Belle appropriate ensemble, a simple vintage sky blue shift Jenny had guided me towards at a vintage store in Williamsburg. I figured that even the biggest fashion bitches would struggle to find fault with it. It couldn’t be the wrong designer because it wasn’t designer in the first place. Anyway I wasn’t worried about what these girls thought of my dress sense. It didn’t matter. I wasn’t going to pitch an article on the hottest trends coming from the catwalks of Milan, was I? Besides, I thought, slipping my synopsis into my bestest swankiest bright blue Marc Jacobs handbag (OK, so I was a little bit worried), I’d seen Ugly Betty, I’d seen and read The Devil Wears Prada, there was no way these girls would actually be like that. Yes, Mary had been fairly snippy about them, but then I’d never seen Mary out of jeans and Converse. She probably just didn’t like the fashiony types. It would be absolutely fine. And I had Bob’s backing. My good friend Bob. Bobbity bob bob. Oh shit, I’d gone mad.

With one last look in the mirror, I smoothed down my hair and wiped away the tiniest smudge of mascara. I could do this. I’d been writing for The Look for a year. I had my column in the UK magazine. I’d interviewed a movie star for God’s sake. All they wanted was a tourist guide to Paris. A city that hardly anyone who was going to read this magazine would ever visit. This was going to be brilliant. Easy even.

‘What this isn’t going to be is easy,’ Donna Gregory barked at me, my synopsis crumpled up in her hand. ‘Belle readers have no interest in some tragically obvious tourist piece about visiting the Eiffel Tower and taking a boat down the Seine. Our readers want to know the most exclusive, most stylish, secret sides of Paris. Not where to get the best crêpes according to Gridskipper or Time Out’s top ten scenic parks.’

I flinched in my chair. As far as I could tell, during the ten minutes I’d been in the office, Donna hadn’t even looked at my synopsis and yet she was still managing, quite adequately, to pull it apart, word by word.

‘Why do you think you should be writing for Belle, Angela?’ she asked.

‘Well, I—’

‘I mean, seriously, what makes you think that you –’ she paused to hold her hand out towards me and then wave the hand up and down to make sure I understood her critique encompassed every last little thing about me. ‘– that you should be allowed to write for Belle?’

Silence. Allowed? Why should I be allowed?

‘I’m waiting for an answer,’ Donna said.

I was stumped.

Donna wasn’t very nice.

‘Well, I might not have written a specific travel piece before, but I write about a lot of different things in my blog and I interviewed James Jacobs for Icon earlier this year so I think that I could do this,’ I said. Very quickly. All of my confidence had vamoosed and all I wanted to do was get out of the office, bury my face in a pan of chocolate brownies and cry, like the porky talentless excuse for a human being Donna so clearly thought I was.

It was fair to say that Donna Gregory wasn’t the glamazon dragon lady you might expect to find sitting behind the features editor desk of a fashion monthly. She wasn’t that tall for a start, her glossy (OK, very glossy) brown hair was pulled back in a ponytail and she was actually wearing jeans. Very skinny and presumably expensive jeans, but jeans nonetheless. But while she might not be wearing Prada, she was certainly proving herself to be the devil. From the second I’d walked through her door, she’d more or less done nothing, but insult me.

First, I wasn’t allowed coffee because I looked like I needed a good night’s sleep and the caffeine wouldn’t help, then I was refused water in case I needed to use the bathroom, which was for staff only. The implication being that I was not now and would never be staff. But she did suggest I try drinking at least two litres a day outside of her office because I really did look a lot older than thirty. When I mentioned that I was only twenty-seven she actually made a little gasping noise and held her hand to her mouth.

Bitch.

‘Hmm, I heard about the Icon piece,’ she said, flicking through some printed out emails. ‘You’re the girl that turned James Jacobs gay, yes?’

‘For fu—I mean, no, not exactly.’ I wasn’t quite sure why I was still sitting in the office. There was no way I was going to get this job. ‘I’m pretty sure he was gay before I walked in on him and his boyfriend going at it in a public toilet. But I suppose you never know. It’s possible that my extreme level of dehydration turned him.’

Donna paused for a split second and looked at me again.

‘That dress, I don’t recognize the designer. Where’s it from?’ she asked.

‘I got it from Beacon’s Closet, it’s vintage,’ I said with a modicum of pride. Vintage was cool, wasn’t it?

‘Right.’ She sighed and leaned back in her chair, stretching up to let her tiny cropped Alexander Wang T-shirt reveal a couple of inches of taut, gym-toned stomach. And I knew it was Alexander Wang because she had gone out of her way to tell me almost as soon as I walked in the door. ‘Of course it’s vintage. And your boyfriend’s in some band?’

‘Alex? Yes?’ I was confused. Which, to be fair to the witch, was pretty easily done. I didn’t want her taking any sort of pleasure in that achievement. ‘But I don’t really see what that has to do with a travel piece?’

‘It has everything to do with it, Angela,’ Donna said, leaning towards me across her desk. ‘I’m going to try and be as kind as I can when I explain this to you, but whatever, there’s no point trying to sugarcoat it. You’re really not the sort of person I would have write for Belle.’

‘Really?’

This was just getting embarrassing now. How badly did I want this again? Oh yeah, really badly.

‘Really.’ Donna nodded, missing my sarcasm. ‘But Mr Spencer is very keen for us to use you for something. And don’t get me wrong, it’s not that people who wear vintage don’t have a place at Belle, it’s just…it wouldn’t usually be writing for me. One girl in the art team once wore this amazing Diane von Furstenburg original. To a fancy dress party. That’s a beautiful bag though.’

‘Thank you, it was a gift.’ I lovingly stroked the soft blue leather on instinct, momentarily forgetting the torrent of insults that were coming my way.

‘Of course it was.’ Donna sounded almost relieved. As if the idea of my buying my own Marc Jacobs bag might cause the end of the world. ‘Basically, the only way I can see this working is if we position this as a two part piece. I’ll have someone else put together a high end Paris piece, a feature on the haute couture, the salons, the five-star hotels, and you, the quirky “vintage” girl with the boyfriend in a band, can provide the other side of things. The, oh, I don’t know, the cool, hipster side of Paris?’

‘Oh God, honestly, I’m not cool,’ I said altogether too quickly. ‘I don’t have any tattoos. I don’t even live in Brooklyn. I’m just very, very English.’

‘Oh. Well that could be a problem then.’ Donna leaned back in her chair. ‘Because either you give me Paris’s best flea markets, vintage stores, late-night cafés and dance clubs, or you don’t give me anything.’

Meep.

After sitting through another hour of Donna’s directions on exactly how she wanted the piece to come out – quirky, but not too quirky, edgy, but not too edgy, underground, but not grimy. Just very, very Belle – I was finally released from the office, none the wiser, but actually relatively chipper. I might not have received any compliments, but I had got the job. That was good, wasn’t it?

There was only one person I could talk to about this. And that person better not be screening her calls.

‘Pick up the phone, Jenny,’ I said quietly, dashing into the shade of the nearest skyscraper and following it along 42nd street.

‘Angie, baby, it’s seven-thirty a.m.,’ Jenny crackled all the way from LA. ‘Are you dying?’

‘No, listen, I just had this meeting at Belle—’ I started.

‘You’re not dying, I only got in two hours ago, I’ll call you back later,’ Jenny interrupted.

‘No! Jenny, listen, I have the most amazing news. Did you hear what I said? I’ve got a job writing for Belle magazine.’ I hoped that dropping the name of one of her style bibles might keep her on the phone for five minutes more. ‘Belle. Your favourite magazine. B-E-L-L-E.’

‘No offense, Angie,’ Jenny yawned into life, ‘but what are you going to write for Belle?’

‘None taken.’ I pouted. What about me was so fundamentally un-Belle-like? I had sorted myself out massively in the last year. Well, Jenny had sorted me out massively, but I could do my own eyeliner and everything now. I could do an entire evening out in proper heels if I had my roll-up ballet pumps in my bag. ‘They want me to write an insider’s guide to Paris. They’re going to get some other girl to write the swanky high-end stuff, she’s going to do, who did Donna say, uh, Balmain? Is that right? And you know, Chanel and whatever, and I’m supposed to write about the cool, underground stuff. But I could really use your help, I want this to be good. Do you know any stylists in Paris? Anyone who might know some cool second-hand shops or flea markets?’

‘Balmain? Oh…’ she breathed.

‘Jenny, listen to me,’ I said slowly. I should have known better than to start talking designer at her. ‘Do you know anyone who can help me in Paris?’

‘Oh honey, you know I think you’ve come a real long way,’ Jenny snapped back, ‘but you are so not ready to write a fashion piece, a fashion piece about Paris for Belle magazine.’

At least I had her attention.

‘Firstly, thanks for your confidence and secondly, it’s not a fashion piece, it’s a travel piece,’ I said. ‘I’ve just got to write about a few vintage stores, a couple of cafés and then cover Alex’s gig. It’s going to be fine. I thought you’d be excited for me?’

‘But it’s Belle, Angie. And I don’t want you to look stupid,’ Jenny insisted. ‘’Cause, you know honey, some people know you know me.’

‘Really, your belief in me is incredibly reassuring and I promise not to show you up in any way. Especially if you answer my bloody questions and tell me if you know any stylists in Paris.’

‘Is Belle going to style you? Have they given you a list of places to go?’ She carried on ignoring me. ‘Are there going to be photos of you in the feature?’

‘No they’re not styling me, no they haven’t given me a list of places to go – that’s my job – and no of course they’re not going to let me be in the bloody photos.’

‘I guess that’s a good thing at least.’ Jenny sighed, audibly relieved. Cow. ‘OK, I have an idea. I’m gonna pull some pieces together for you, OK? When are you leaving?’

This was the first part of the phone call I did not hate. Jenny being a million miles away in LA was completely shitty. Jenny being a stylist with access to lots and lots of beautiful free clothes was not shitty in the slightest. ‘Monday, but really, don’t go to too much trouble, you don’t have to do this.’ Yes she bloody well did.

‘Honey, I got you covered. Skinny jeans, slept-in eyeliner, beret, I’m all over it. I’ll just take it up a notch. You’ll be like, a Belle-hipster. A Bipster.’ Her laugh turned into a yawn. ‘Seriously, I’m freaking dying here. Email me the details, what you’re doing when you get there and I’ll send some stuff over. And I’m sure I must know someone in Paris. I’m on it.’

‘Really?’

‘Really. Angie, it’s like, totally what I do. Now let me go back to sleep.’

‘Like, totally go back to sleep.’ I laughed. ‘You’ve gone totally LA on me, Lopez.’

‘Like, rilly. Screw you, Clark.’ She yawned again. ‘Go buy Belle, let the intimidation build a little more. Love you.’

‘Love you too.’

Or at least, I’d thought that I loved Jenny until the three giant DHL packages arrived the next morning. It turned out, I really hadn’t known what love was. Love was one box labelled ‘evening’, one box labelled ‘day’ and one box labelled ‘I don’t know when the fuck you’ll wear these, but they’re awesome’. I hacked into them desperately, using my keys to slit the package tape and carefully pull out one beautiful outfit after another. In each box was a manila envelope with handwritten (well, scribbled) notes along with gorgeous sketches of how each ensemble was supposed to go together. The Joe Jeans with the Tory Burch flats and Elizabeth and James blazer. The DVF royal blue silk romper with the YSL wedges. The beaded Balenciaga flapper dress with the Giuseppe Zanotti platforms. The Miu Miu purse with everything. After an hour and a half of playing dress up, I perched on the edge of the sofa in a pale blue silk Lanvin number, flustered, redfaced and grinning maniacally. At the very bottom of the ‘Fuck Knows’ box, under the Kenneth Jay Lane pendants and bangles, was a note from Jenny.

I know you said not to go to too much trouble, but you’re going to Paris. For Belle. And people know you know me so there’s no way I’m letting you head over to the fashion capital of the world, head-to-toe in American Apparel – don’t tell me you weren’t wearing it when you opened the box, even if you’re in the Narciso Rodriguez jumpsuit by now—

I paused to look at all the outfits on the sofa, there was a jumpsuit? Had I missed it?

—because it’s awesome. You’re going to be amazing at this, Angie, I’m so proud of you. Just take the clothes, wear them, rock them, take photos and BRING THEM BACK, preferably in one piece and without ketchup all over them.

Love you, JLo xxx

It was only eight in LA, four hours before I was legally permitted to call Jenny without it going on her ‘you’re dead to me’ list. Three strikes and you were out and I already had one from the time she caught me ironing the collar of a Thomas Pink shirt I had borrowed from her with my hair straighteners. Apparently, she had never done it. I did not believe her. What I did believe was that the collection of clothes, currently acting as a very expensive throw on my sofa, was a) amazing b) worth more than my apartment and c) going to make me the best dressed bargain hunter in all of Paris.

I tapped out a text to let her know that the package had arrived and that I would love and cherish the clothes as though they were my firstborn child. Which I would be more than happy to trade to keep this stuff for ever. Clutching a pair of pale blue Stella McCartney widelegged trousers to my heart, I stared at the assembled selection of swag. Truly, it was one of the most beautiful sights I had ever had the honour to behold. How was Paris supposed to compare?

CHAPTER FOUR

While the actual being-on-an-aeroplane part of flying had never been a problem for me, I really, really hated airports. The thrill of Duty Free wore off in approximately fourteen minutes when I remembered I was broke and the fact that I was left alone, slumped in an uncomfortable metal chair scarfing a soggy McDonalds while Alex was already up, up and away, didn’t make me feel any better. Cici swore she had tried to book us on to the same flight, but his was already full. Even though his manager booked his flights on the exact same day she tried to book mine.

So instead of joining the mile high club with my boyfriend, I had a nine-hour flight sandwiched in between complete strangers to look forward to. Ramming a fistful of chips down my throat, I checked my (newly reinstated) Spencer Media-sponsored BlackBerry again only to see another message from Esme. Joy. I’d managed to avoid any further face time with the delightful people at Belle magazine, but there was nowhere to hide from Donna and Esme’s terse, borderline bullying emails. And brilliant, here was another.

Angela.

French Belle magazine are sending an assistant to keep you on brief. Be in your hotel lobby to meet Virginie at ten-thirty.

Esme.

Oh dear God, no. They were ‘sending me’ a super cool, super hot French fashionista to make me feel inadequate. Mary had been right, the girls at Belle were really not happy at all with my being foisted on them by Bob, but I was determined to prove myself. I was a real journo girl with a real talent and I deserved this opportunity. My boyfriend said so.

And it wasn’t as if everyone at Spencer Media was against me. Since everything about my assignment was a little bit last-minute, Cici had magnanimously stepped in and offered to help sort out my travel details. Even when she couldn’t get me on Alex’s flight, she did say she would ask a friend that worked for my airline to try and get me upgraded and she had couriered over a package with my BlackBerry, a corporate credit card, a map of Paris and even a DVD of Funny Face. And if that weren’t scary enough, she had signed off the accompanying note ‘xoxo Cici’. Either she had undergone some sort of complete personality transplant or Grandpa Bob had some serious influence on that girl.

Obviously, Grandpa Bob had some serious influence everywhere at Spencer. I’d had email after email from Donna Gregory checking on my research progress, reminding me time and time again what it was that she did not want from this piece. But next to no detail on what she did want. Not so helpful. I’d spent all week researching, but really, I couldn’t wait to get to Paris, to really get stuck in. I couldn’t help, but feel that this was my big break. I mean, I’d thought the blog was my big break and I suppose it kind of was, it had got me the James Jacobs interview. And then I’d thought that the James Jacobs interview would be my big break, but that turned out to be a traumatic, potentially liferuining pain in my arse instead. Although it had sort of lead to this. A piece for Belle. And a new Marc Jacobs handbag, so I suppose it hadn’t been all bad. But this was definitely it. I could feel it in my waters. Whatever that meant. Actually, that was a bit gross, wasn’t it? Hmm.

I waited impatiently to be called to board, flicking through the pages of the newest issue of Icon for the millionth time, wishing I’d left my Paris guidebooks and notes in my hand luggage so I could work on them on the plane. There was no way I’d be able to sleep on the flight, I was full of butterflies. Nervous about the article, nervous about not being able to speak French, nervous about getting to the hotel on my own and, for some reason, nervous about spending almost a straight week in another country with Alex. Good nervous, I was pretty sure, but still definitely nervous. Not as nervous as Alex however, who had spent the previous three days becoming increasingly uncommunicative and turning an attractive shade of pale green. He had explained that he didn’t like flying at least twenty times and no matter how many times Graham and Craig, the bassist and drummer in his band, Stills, slapped him on the back and offered to get him shitfaced before they boarded, he never seemed to look any better.

I looked around for any telltale patches of puke at the boarding gate to show he’d been there, but it was clean as a whistle. But then, JFK airport probably sorted that kind of thing out fairly quickly. The Americans were pretty up on cleanliness.

It was really quite cute. Even when I was climbing the walls about something, Alex was always so laidback, and to see him panicking about the flight was sort of reassuring. So he was human after all. Even when I’d tried to reassure him with my ‘more people die in hippo attacks than in plane crashes each year’ favourite factoid of all time (not that I actually knew it was definitely a fact), he had just kissed the top of my head and gone back to pretending he wasn’t flying anyway.

Eventually, the flight was called and I hauled myself and my wildly overpacked and battered MJ handbag over to the gate. I’d packed my beautiful blue number and decided to carry on my trusty old (well, I’d had it almost a year) satchel for fear of the new bag being scratched or stained or touched by human hands other than my own. And besides, I’d more or less convinced myself that the knackered satchel actually looked better for being worn in. Kind of. Shuttling down the windy tunnel on to the plane, a reassuringly boredlooking flight attendant took my tickets, checked my passport and then pointed down the right-hand side of the plane with a Joker-sized smile. I returned a tight grimace and shuffled down the aisle, trying not to wedge my bottom in the faces of all the club class passengers already boarded. One day they’d tell me to turn left, one day.

Predictably, I’d been blessed with a teeny, tiny economy seat in the middle of a row of four and all three surrounding seats were taken. According to an overly sincere Cici, it was Spencer Media travel policy to fly economy on all flights under twelve hours, but for some reason, I just didn’t believe her. And besides, there was economy and there was the nine hours of living hell I was about to endure. Wedging my handbag under the seat in front of me, I glanced to my left to take in the extraordinarily large man currently crossing himself with closed eyes, a very large Bible in his lap. To my right, love’s young dream sat giggling and holding hands. Catching my eye, a (not actually so young) blonde woman thrust her left hand under my nose.