What became of us

remark cheered her up even though she knew she ought to be offended.
    She looked down at her dripping dress — eight hundred pounds-worth of couture clinging to her curves like a bathing costume — then looked up and smiled at him, trying to look disapproving and indulgent at the same time.
    He smiled back, then suddenly she was aware of his eyes doing that focusing thing that happened when people recognized her.
    ‘Hang on a minute, you’re Annie McClintock, aren’t you?’ he said.
    A fan, she thought, or worse, one of the barmy misogynists who rang the duty log to complain every time her character said something mildly true about men. She took a quick look at his grinning face. Prematurely greying hair, a touch of the Desmond Lynams. He looked harmless enough, if a little eager. They were often the worst.
    ‘No,’ she said.
    ‘Oh!’
    ‘But we’re often mistaken,’ she conceded.
    ‘I’m sorry...’
    He looked so embarrassed, she almost felt inclined to tell him the truth. He was wearing a tweed sports jacket, white polo shirt and jeans, and he had the build of someone who played too much golf and not enough tennis. He was the sort of person, she thought, that you might strike up conversation with in the cosy bar just inside the hotel lobby, then go on to tea, or a drink, even a pleasant dinner with. He would be charming enough at making small talk, as long as you kept well away from politics, but he was definitely married. If you went to bed with him it would be a grown-up thing. Ships that pass in the night. He looked as if he would be competent with a condom, but not much more than that.
    ‘Bye then,’ she said, walking over to the reception desk.
    ‘Cheers!’ he said.
    He was the sort of man who said Cheers.

    * * *

    When she was a student, Annie had often wondered what it must be like to stay at the Randolph. It was the place where famous people stayed when they came up to see productions at the Playhouse. Richard Burton, Elizabeth Taylor, people like that. She remembered the time when Ian McKellen, long before he was a Sir and everyone knew he was gay, had come up to see a production of Dr Faustus. OUDS had put on a little backstage party for him. When she finally pushed her way into Mr McKellen’s orbit, he was so handsome and slight and looked at her so superciliously, she forgot all the intelligent questions she had prepared about his own recent interpretation of the role at a RSC season at the Aldwych, and ended up saying ‘I think you’re gorgeous’ before stumbling backwards and wishing that she could instantly disappear like one of the visions in the play.
    The memory of her embarrassment was still so acute that her heart rate quickened at the thought of it. How come memories of shame remained so much longer than memories of praise? she wondered, as she walked up the grand staircase and along the carpeted corridor to her room.
    It was decorated rather over-abundantly with heavy curtains and pelmets in the same slightly too dark velvet. The bathroom was equally luxurious. There was a basket containing little bottles of shampoo, conditioner, body lotion and an individually wrapped soap as well as a sewing kit, vanity kit and shoe polisher. Annie had only recently trained herself not to empty these instantly into her sponge-bag. As a poorly paid actress she had never been able to resist a freebie in case it might come in useful later, even if it was only a showercap that looked like a plastic bag.
    ‘Nice touch,’ she said out loud, fingering the complimentary bottle of mineral water standing beside the basket.
    In the bedroom she discovered the sachets of instant hot chocolate beside the tea- and coffee-making facilities (or kettle, as Annie preferred to call it). She was disappointed to find no little tartan package of shortbread. The only time she ever ate shortbread was when she was staying in this type of over-fussy hotel room, lying on the bed, watching satellite television, and spooning out globs she had dunked too long in her cup of complimentary hot chocolate. Then, with delight, her eyes fell on the Heritage Hamper which contained four whole packets of organic biscuits, and three full-size pots of conserve. This was really living, she thought, and was weighing up whether to open the lemon curd or the strawberry jam first when she caught sight of a little price card. She put the jars back. There was nothing in the least exciting about the prospect of munching biscuits and