‘I have a horror of those women who do fuck all with their time, unless they buy my products, of course. I thought you were different, that you were devoted to this company, body and soul. I was mistaken. Perhaps you should have spent a little less time mothering and a little more time on this presentation. This meeting is over, Thelma, dear.’

He gets up. I feel a blind anger rumbling inside me.

Mothering. I picture myself at Louis’s bedside, the previous day. Mothering my damaged teenager. Trying desperately to make myself useful to him. Trying to hide my grief, then abandoning that hopeless pretence. I see myself with Louis on his first day at school. Mothering my little boy. Slipping a bar of his favourite chocolate into his school bag, with a little drawing of a red heart to comfort him and tell him that I’m there, at his side, always. I see myself cradling Louis in the maternity ward. Mothering my baby. Alone. Feeling like a bad mother because I can’t breastfeed him properly. My breasts are painful, but I can’t do it. Louis loses weight, I’m advised to bottle-feed him, but I persevere. I don’t give up. Two days later, Louis begins to feed and I start to cry. Mothering – don’t talk to me about mothering.

This bastard has no idea what he’s saying. I walk over to him and I do what I should have done a long time ago. What all the women in the company should have done a long time ago. I plant myself in front of the dictator, blocking his path, and I slap him as hard as I can.

A Slap with a capital S.

The ultimate slap.

The super-slap.

The mother of all slaps.

It’ll cost me dearly. I’ll be fired, I know. But what a buzz! What an amazing feeling. The chief tosser stares at me, speechless. He raises his hand to his cheek, then smiles at me and says, to no one in particular:

‘Fire her now!’

I reply, quite simply:

‘It’ll be a pleasure, sir.’

I leave the room in a state I’ve never experienced before. I think I’m about to burst into tears. Instead, I burst out laughing.

5

Let My Heart Give Up