Shop Girl Blowing in the Wind

It’s summer in the shop.

The sun above me is a 300 watt halogen up-lighter.

“Don’t you get hot in ‘ere with all these lights?” a customer asks.

“Yes.”

It wouldn’t be so bad if they gave me a tan. But they don’t, they’re just hot.

I decide to give up jeans.

From now on I’m only going to wear pretty, light-weight skirts.

I skip over to the Dress Shop and buy two short, flowery ones.

On my first day of wearing one a delivery man comes with a 1.2m² box which doesn’t fit through the shop door.

“Don’t you have a back entrance?” he asks.

“No.”

So he leaves me and the box outside the shop and drives away.

It’s a windy day and my skirt swells like a plastic bag then flies up.

I hold it down at the front but then to my horror, the back shoot ups.

There’s a wolf whistle from a passing van and I hurry inside.

I ring Mum to tell her about the box.

“Keep an eye on it,” she says.

But I want to do more than that so I go back outside with a Stanley knife.

The wind plays at the hem of my skirt and I feel nervous.

I stand between my shop window and the box and lean over it to cut through the sellotape. As I lift open one of the flaps, a gust of wind whips the polystyrene pellets out of the box and sends a flurry of them down the street.

“Aaah!” I cry, and press down on the box before another artificial snow storm can escape.

While I’m trying to stick down the sellotape a whoosh of air swoops under my skirt and reveals my knickers to a second passing van.

Hoots.

Red-cheeked, I go back inside and ring Mum again.

“15 minutes,” she says.

When she arrives, we cut a hole in the side of the box. We tilt the box so the pellets fall through the hole into a bag.

It’s slow work but finally we empty it enough to get the huge light out and leave the remains of the freak snowstorm to blow away down the street.

We cut the box down so it’s small enough to fit through the door. After that I get inside the box and shovel the rest of the polystyrene pellets into bags.

Skirts aren’t ideal for the shop but they’re still a lot cooler than trousers so I persevere.

I wear one on my day off. It’s a date and we’re going somewhere posh to celebrate a year together.

The wind starts as I’m walking towards the tube station.

It’s sudden and so strong. My skirt begins to flap and I grab onto one side and hurry on through the gates.

On that single journey I notice the tube cultivates its own wind.

It’s at the top of escalators and outside the lifts.

It teases you when you change platforms and chases you down the emergency stairs.

The worst thing is, in my local station, the wind is most powerful by the ticket machines.

When I come back from my indulgent date I go straight over to top up my oyster card. It’s forward thinking because I know I’ll have to catch a bus later.

The wind tears around me like a tornado. My skirt beats about my ears.

I try to hold it between my legs but it flies up at the back. I try to hold it over my bottom but then it blows up at the front.

I battle to keep it down as I push a two pound coin into the slot. But it’s hopeless.

I feel like the whole world is watching me squeaking in panic and failing to cover myself up.

I give up trying to feed more money into the machine and hurry to finish the transaction. I need to press my pass against the machine to register the £2. I let go of my skirt to flick my pass at the sensor, then without checking the screen I rush out of the station towards calmer streets.

When I get on the bus, my pass makes a negative bleep.

“You have no money on it,” the driver says.

I’m dismayed. Wearing a skirt has lost me two whole pounds.

“Blow that, I would’ve let everyone see my knickers,” Mum says, when I tell her.

It dawns on me how right she is.

“Next time I will.”

Shop Girl: Take 1, Camera, Action!

“How much do you want this?” my brother had asked me, back in September.
“More than anything.”
And he’d rolled up his sleeves and launched into a speech on how to promote my blog.
I took his advice and one quiet day from behind the counter, I started leaving my link on internet sites, including SE1, a local forum.
Chloe Thomas, a TV director and producer, mailed me a few days later.
My blog had got her thinking.
She asked me if I fancied a cup of tea.
I did.
We had two beers and Chloe set out her vision and asked me to turn the blog into a screenplay.
And so began the Shop Girl Blog film project.
I’d never written a script before.
The date earned gold stars by giving me a master class. He gave me the screenplay of The Usual Suspects to follow as we watched it on the telly. He explained what should be included and what could be left out. He also gave me a script-writing template. If he hadn’t done that I’d still be back-spacing or trying to centre the dialogue for the first few lines.
Draft 1 followed.
Then 2, 3, 4, 5, 6....
7, 8, 9, 10
11, 12
And lucky 13.
Chloe roped in all her contacts and Cassandra King organised the casting.
I’d never been to a casting. It was a bit like being in the shop; lots of random people coming in and talking to you without buying anything.
But I was touched so many people turned up to the audition.
After the first day of casting I went to see the date feeling emotional.
It didn’t help that I hadn’t eaten lunch.
“Some of them came from such a long way,” I sobbed.
“That’s what actors do darr-ling."
“They ju-uh, ju-uh, ju-uh...”
“Are you okay?”
“They ju-uh came to read Shop Girl.”
“That’s a good thing darr-ling.”
On the second day of casting I made sure I’d eaten before.
This time I left the studio happy and excited. We’d found our cast.
Meetings followed; the shop was blitzed.
On Friday, we opened up at 6.30 am, which was quite something for our shop.
Four hours earlier Petra, who’d undertaken to be the entire Art Department, had been ironing costumes while Mum and I had cleared up.
And so it began.
The camera crew arrived with all their equipment.
The date arrived to do sound with the boom operator.
“Have you said hello to yourself yet?” he asked.
I looked over at Shop Girl and suddenly felt shy.
It wasn’t weird having someone play me as everyone thought it might be. It was only weird when I had to show her how to pin crystal.
“I could get into this,” she said, “come on Emily, I can help, give me stuff to do.”
Her pinning wasn’t bad but she wasn’t fussy about what she pinned to what. That said, a bit more training and I’d happily leave her in the shop while I go on holiday.
I never realised how intense filming is, how many takes are taken and angles covered. I sympathised with Natalie, in charge of continuity, since we were moving lights all the time to accommodate the camera and boom.
In spite of the notice that had been on the door for days, a few regulars did turn up. Veronica came in hoping to sell some more second hand jewellery.
“Sorry, we’re closed for filming,” I told her.
She looked irritated, “Well how long are you going to be? I’ve got this bracelet here...”
“Two days.”
Later she caught Mum and pushed a denim jacket into her hands.
“You can pay me next week if you like it,” she said.
Connie called in too.
“What are they filming for?”
“I’m not sure.”
“What do you mean you’re not sure?”
“Some advert, I think.”
It’d been ambitious to film the script in two days but the crew and cast managed to pull it off, stepping over the anticipated filming time by only 1 hour.
For those two intense days of filming it felt like my shop was its own universe and everything in it mattered.
It was an amazing feeling to be part of the crew and I can’t wait to share it with all you Shop Girl readers.
Thanks from the heart to all those who made it happen and for all those that are reading:

And now for the credits:

Executive Producers – Damon Beesley and Iain Morris
Head of Production and Catering – Leo Martin
Director / Producer – Chloe Thomas
Producer – John Kennedy
Writer – Emily Benet
Editor – Mick Johnson
Production Designer – Piera Lizzeri
1st Assistant Director – Christine Luby
2nd Assistant Director – Rhianna Andrews
Driver/ Runner – Colin Phillips
Director of Photography – Justin Evans
1st Camera Assistant – Dan West
2nd Camera Assistant – Tom Williams
Sound Recordist (day 1) – Juan Diego Sánchez
Boom Operator – Laura Fairbanks
Sound Recordist (day 2) – Richard Munns
Boom Operator – Raul Dias
Casting Director – Cassandra King
Script Supervisor – Natalie Scicluna
Costume Designer – Piera Lizzeri
Costume Assistant – Claire Wardoper
Make-up & Hair Designer - Emma Maris
Make-up & Hair Designer – Jennifer Nash

And thanks to all the actors –

Shop Girl – Katy Wix
Mum – Annette Badland
Ali – Davood Ghadami
Rose – Leila Hoffman
Mr Roberts – Rhod Culbertson
Danny – Blake Harrison
Guardian Seller - Kourush Mavaei
Belle – Lou Conran
Raf – Paul Sharma
Lucus – Jeff Leach
Postman - Dave Shelley

And a massive thanks to my wonderful family for all their love and support -

Mum – Jill Benet
Papa – Antonio Benet
My Brother – Oriol Benet
My Auntie – Keri Hacker

Grumpy Shop Girl

Some customers bring out the best in me and some bring out my dark side.
I’m not like the sales assistants I saw in Canada. They were so unfaltering in their happiness I wondered if they were on prozac.
My customers wouldn’t take me seriously if I told them to ‘have a nice day’ all the time.
“How much?” Mr Francis says, pointing at a state of the art lamp.
Mr Francis, the haggler, is one of those who stir my inner monster.
“195,” I say.
“What about my discount?”
“Look, I could’ve said 250, then you’d have said 200, then I’d have said 240 and so on, for half an hour, but I didn’t, I’m too busy.”
He looks at me and smiles.
“150?”
“No,” I say and I turn back to pinning crystal at the counter.
Mr Francis as ever, promises to return next week with money to pay off for the last bargain I shouldn’t have given him.
Another man comes in and points up at a sparkling chandelier near the door. It’s an ornate fitting, loaded with dazzling crystal balls.
“This says 1000 pounds reduced to 700 pounds,” he says.
“Yes?”
“I bought the same one for 700 dollars.”
“It probably isn’t the same.”
“It is.”
“Crystal and plating often vary in quality,” I start to explain.
“It’s the same. And I got it for 700 dollars.”
What does he want me to say?
“Lucky you.”
He looks at me and frowns.
“Excuse me?”
“You got a good price,” I say, “so you’re lucky.”
He leaves after that, with no intention of coming back.
The thing is, on the sixth day of being in the shop, a part of you fades.

A part of you loses all interest.
A woman comes in and pouts at me.
“Why are you closing?”
“We don’t want to sell to the public,” I say.
“Oh,” she says, taken aback. “That’s not very nice.”
“I didn’t mean it like that...”
She waits for me to tell her how much fun the public really are.
“We’ll still be doing wholesale,” I say.
“Oh,” she brightens. “So you’ll be on the internet?”
“No.”
She frowns.
“Well, yes, we will be on the internet...”
“Right.”
“But not to you.”
“Oh.”
The local salsa addict comes to see me near closing time.
He’d predicted I’d be ‘bored and lonely’ by this point. He brings music and jaffa cakes and I start to cheer up.
I take my flip flops off and dance barefoot.
“Aren’t you worried about bits of glass on the floor?” he asks.
“Nope.”
Mr Salsa attends 8 dance classes a week so I’m not worried about him treading on my toes either.
“This is just what I needed,” I say, as I click into a cha cha.
Afterwards I clean the soles of my feet with window cleaner and we have a home-made piña colada with coconut juice from the newsagent.
I suppose I’d started taking it all a bit too seriously. But it's nothing music and dancing can’t cure.

Perhaps this is what the shop girls do in Canada.

Shop Girl Dum Di Dum

Without realising it, I missed the 80’s.
In fact, I also missed the 90’s.
Sitting in the park, Rosie and my date tried to include me in a film quiz.
They hummed theme tunes, quoted legendary lines.
“Come on, it’s a classic!” my date cried in disbelief, every time I shrugged.
I picked at the grass; nothing remotely near the tip of my tongue.
“Okay, easy one,” the date said, and breathed into his hand, “Luke, I am your father.”“Star wars?” I said.
They clapped and I felt relieved.
It’s not just films; it’s music too.
Two decades of culture lost to me.
I used to listen to the radio in the shop but stopped when I grew tired of the same old five songs.
Problem is we don’t have many CDs in the shop either.
It’s lucky we don’t mind repetition; it goes well with the crystal pinning.
Last year we played the sound track of the Motor Cycle Diaries over and over, until one morning I found a customer had posted three CD’s through our letter box.
“Thought you needed a change,” he said, when I saw him.
Mum’s didgeridoo music wasn’t much of a hit either .
“What the hell is this?” a customer complained. “It’s like having your head drilled out.”
My taste in music is equally suspect.
I love cheesy Latin stuff; the kind of music where the main singer is always dying of love but always lives to write the next song.
When customers come in, I often lower the volume, embarrassed by the lyrics even though they probably wouldn’t be able to understand them.
Recently, my date introduced me to spotify.
It’s a program that lets you find any music you like at a click of the mouse. No downloading, no complications.
The only downside is a few advert breaks.
Usually it’s just a certain ‘Jonathan’ saying, ‘Hi from spotify’, but sometimes it’s a bit more.
A fellow twenty-something came into my shop last week and as usual, I discreetly turned the music down.
But then it was really quiet.
Too quiet.
So I thought, sod it, better cheesy music than this awkward silence.
I turned the volume back up just as a spotify advert came on.
‘We all love music, especially in the bedroom...’
I panicked, not sure what was coming next, and went to switch it off but instead switched it on full blast.
‘Say YES to SAFE SEX!’Great message but not the one I’d planned to give to this young man who was already looking a little nervous.
The silence that followed was even more uncomfortable.
“Oh spotify,” my friend Velvet, said casually, “I’ve known about it for ages.”
Typical, another thing I’d missed.
But it was new to Rosie.
“Are you ready?” I said, when I rang her. “I’m going to give you a gift.”
Now she says it’s changed her life.
We’re forever texting names of songs back and forward.
Perhaps this is how I’m finally going get some music education.
And perhaps not.
I wonder why I care so much anyway.
Only yesterday a customer came in who I hadn’t seen in a long time.
“You closing?” he said.
“Eventually.”
“Oh that’s a shame. I enjoy the music in here.”
I grinned and not so discreetly, turned the volume up.

Shop Girl in Sequins

I go upstairs and make two cups of tea.
I don’t know why I make two; I’m on my own today.
I chuck the milk carton in the bin outside and notice the man from the wig shop, looking cool in sunglasses.
I’ve never asked him to put my shutter up before. He seems the type who’d think it was beneath him. But when I do he’s very obliging.
“You need a strong man around,” he says, “ask me whenever you need help.”
What a find, I think, and go back to my teas.
The first is weak.
The second is cold.
Veronica comes in and I realise I’ve started something off. She now knows I’m capable of buying her jewellery.
“Mummy not here?”
“Not today.”
She looks slightly disappointed.
“What size are you?”
“What do you mean?”
“I’ve got a dress here.”
I’m blinded as she pulls out this glittering blue number, covered top to bottom in sequins.
“Oh, wow,” I say, struggling for words. “I don’t think it’s Mum’s thing.”
“You try it.”
“I don’t think I’d wear it.”
“Just try it.”
“But really, I wouldn’t...”
“Let’s just see how it looks.”
It’ll only be a moment, I tell myself. Veronica won’t give up unless I do.
The dress is really heavy.
I step into it and pull it up over my jeans. It’s so tight I can hardly move my legs.
It’s like being stuck inside a tube of toothpaste.
“Oh yes, it looks gorgeous on you,” Veronica says.
A tube of toothpaste covered in sequins.
The phone rings and I suddenly realise I’m in my shop dressed up like a drag queen.
What was I thinking?
I pull down the straps as I pick up the phone.
“Is that accounts?” a woman asks.
“Uh ...accounts is... away.”
Veronica comes around the counter, right up to me.
“You need to try it on without your top,” she says, and then tries to lift my top off.
The dress is stuck around my hips.
“I see,” the woman says.
I wriggle and the dress slides down, pushing my knees together. I fall forward and catch myself on the counter still hanging onto the phone.
The dress drops around my ankles.
“Do we owe you something?”
“You could wear it to a nice party,” Veronica says.
I pull my top back down.
“Or a dinner.”
“Yes, I’m afraid so,” the woman says, and gives me the amount.
“Right, I’ll sort it out tomorrow.”
“Thank you.”
I hang up and hand the dress back.
“It’s not really my style.”
“It’s only 20 pounds, it was 150...” Veronica pushes.
I catch myself thinking about my friend’s hen party.
“No, really,” I say, gathering my wits. “It’s not me.”
“I know it’s a bit over the top,” she says, “but I think you and your Mum should be a bit a bit more over the top...”
“Well...”
“I have to say it,” she says. “I think you’re both too conservative.”
This is news.
Is that the impression I give?
She starts getting her bags of jewellery out.
And I don’t know how she does it.
But after she’s gone, I look at my reflection in the mirror and run my finger over the new necklace. It’s a blue heart pendent with a big bling diamante inside it. On a gold chain.
And I think, maybe if I look at it long enough, I’ll start to like it.

Shop Girl and the Local Economy

It’s been a difficult week for independent businesses.
The pub across the road has been boarded up.
“We’ve been hearing all sorts of reasons why,” confides the owner of the cafe, lowering his voice. “Infestation of bats, apparently.”
“Bats? I hope we don’t get them!”
“No, not bats! Rats!”
And that’s just one of the possibilities.
An inside source tells me they’re refurbishing. But either they’ve boarded it all up with the builders within or they haven’t started yet.
I go to the ‘all and everything’ African shop to get some disposable table cloths and find a bailiffs notice stuck on the door. Where am I going to find a disposable table cloth now?
It’s sad. The owner could never find anything you wanted but he was a nice guy.
Back at the shop we have our own problems.
A lanky white-haired man strides in with a bottle of white spirit under his arm.
“Now, am I right in thinking you sell hoover bags?”
“Nope, try a few doors up.”
An Indian man holds up a memory card from a camera.
“Photo?”
“Nope, try a few doors up.”
A black man comes in carrying a folder.
“Do you do shipping?”
“Nope, but you could try a few doors down.”
Veronica creeps up on me on Friday with her endless bags of second hand jewellery.
A more mysterious regular customer had come in only moments before.
He’s a Nigerian lawyer and journalist who appears every few years to, in his words, ‘monitor’ my progress.
“That sounds creepy,” I say. “I’m going to blog about you now just in case you turn out to be a psycho.”
Lately I’ve forgotten how I’m supposed to talk to customers.
Veronica ignores the lawyer sitting on the stool by the counter and proceeds to shows me her wares.
“I haven’t got any money,” I say.
But she passes me the silver earrings anyway. I’m surprised to find I really quite like them.
“You won’t see another pair like it,” she says.
A couple come in and are looking at a chandelier. I’ve seen them before and sense they're probably quite serious about buying. We need a sale and I want to help but between the lawyer in front of me and Veronica at the side, I’m locked in.
“Okay, I’ll have them,” I say.
I think by buying the earrings Veronica will go and I’ll have a bit more space to sell something of my own.
No such luck.
“Have a look at this necklace,” she says.
“Hang on.”
I squeeze passed her to answer a few of the couple’s questions before leaving them to deliberate.
The thing is, the necklace is lovely too.
“Vintage,” she declares.
And cheap.
So I buy the necklace and off she goes.
The lawyer stays where he is.
“Do you want anything?” I ask him
“No.
“Bulbs?”
“No.”
So I leave him be and attend fully to the couple.
Then Veronica marches back in.
“Can I use your phone?” she says. “It’s a free number.”
I hand her the phone because it’s quicker than not giving it to her.
“There’s no dialling tone. Can you have a go?”
“I need to help these customers.”
“Let me try,” the lawyer says.
“No, she’ll do it for me,” Veronica says.
The couple glance at each other; confused or worried, I don’t know which.
I expect they’ll escape now, while they still can.
My counter is under siege, I can’t get in front of it or behind it.
“It’s free,” Veronica keeps saying. “I wouldn’t ask if it wasn’t.”
It’s one of those moments when I wonder if my life will ever make any sense.
“We’ll take it,” the couple say.
“Great!”
But maybe it doesn’t have to.

Shop Girl On Call

I’m in the Ladies toilets of a local pub.
I’ve come to replace the missing crystal on their chandelier.
It’s a metre long and hangs across the two cubicles.
My ladder is ready but I'm waiting for Miss Tinkle to finish in the loo. I don’t want to alarm her by reaching out across her head.
She sounds like she’s drunk a fair amount.tinkle tinkle tinkle tinkle...A pint of beer?tinkle tinkle..Two?tinkleSilence.
I tap my pliers against the rung of my ladder and wait for the flush.
Instead it starts again.
tinkle tinkle tinkle tinkle tinkle...
The main door opens and another girl comes in.
I hadn’t anticipated these interruptions and am beginning to worry that this job will take a long time.
The girl eyes my ladder.
“I’m not a pervert. I’ve just come to put some crystals on the light.”
“If you say so,” she says.
The toilet flushes and Miss Tinkle comes out. The second girl goes into the cubicle.
“Do you mind if I put them on while you’re in there?” I call out. “I can’t see you.”
“Yeah, go on,” she calls back, “as long as you’re not a boy.”
So I go up my ladder and awkwardly manoeuvre myself so I can reach the gaps in the chandelier. I can’t see her but she can see my hands fiddling about above her.
“That looks weird,” she says.
It doesn’t take long after that and I’m glad to get outside into the fresh air.
We do this sort of thing for local customers; turn up to do the fiddly bits.
One local woman still asks after my brother when her halogen bulbs blow.
“Where is the boy?” she’ll ask.
And I have to tell her he turned into a man a long time ago and doesn’t live in England anymore.
Other jobs are a little grander.
Like the 2 metre tall spiral chandelier we dressed at 8am this morning in a stairwell at South East London’s most famous Funeral Directors.

It was like entering a country estate; beautifully maintained with its gardens and clock tower. There was a buzz of activity as everyone got on with their jobs for the day; each person appropriately dressed for the task at hand.
Their spacious car park was full of gleaming black vehicles.
They were all so smart and shiny that Mum hesitated before going in.
“What are you doing?” I asked her, as she reversed.
“I can’t go in there with this car,” she said. “It’s covered in bird’s poo.”
“But this is like, our van,” I said.
“It still doesn’t need to be covered in bird’s poo.”
To reach the chandelier we needed two ladders locked together down the stair case and two Polish builders to hold each side.
I climbed to the top and Mum handed me up a string of crystal, one at a time.
There were hundreds of strings, each one a different length; it was going to take a while.
The builders didn’t speak much English and watched in silence.
At one point I felt an urge to chat to them.
I’d done four classes of Polish while studying TEFL* (teaching English as a foreign language).
I knew how to say ‘bread’ and ‘one sausage’.
But half an hour later I was still wondering how I could put my knowledge to use.

In the end I kept quiet and let the chandelier do all the talking.