Sanditon Melodies

Chapter 9: The contract

Sidney caught his train back to London which was mercifully on time – plus he got to have his forward facing seat this time which he was pleased about (although, if he was honest with himself, he would have quite enjoyed having Charlotte for company on his way home). The journey was a lot more tedious this time round and he found his mind kept wandering back to episodes from the weekend, which made him smile. Sidney was glad he would be returning in a couple of weeks and he wondered if Charlotte would have started to write any songs by then. He'd like to hear them and he hoped her song writing capabilities were as good as he expected.

Charlotte... God, she had no idea how good a musician she was! Whilst he had said to her that anyone could sing a cover, he hadn't known anyone sing a cover as well as her. He really wrestled with his conscience as to what to do to help her, because in his head, it was only a question of when Charlotte would work out that a career in music was for her, and not if. On the one hand, he didn't want to push her into making that decision, but equally on the other, he didn't see there was any harm in offering her a gentle nudge along the way to discovering that. For he considered it was an injustice that such a talent should go to waste and he couldn't sit idly by during her period of indecision. The encouragement to write songs was of course one way of helping her embrace her talent, but the job at the bar was his idea too. Tom would never have considered paying for someone to perform, but when Sidney had explained the advantages along with the potential for revenue generation, Tom had been only too eager to go along with it.

However, his next idea for helping point Charlotte in the right direction was a bit more of a gamble, and he wondered whether his meddling would be too obvious. The fact was that if times were different, he would want to offer Charlotte a record deal there and then (not that he was convinced she'd accept it at this moment in time), but she needed to establish herself first – and write her own material. The label would not be interested until she had. This was going to be a long game plan, and Sidney had to be patient. More importantly, Charlotte had to reach the realisation for herself that this is what she wanted to be doing.

Sidney got out his headphones from his bag, plugged them in his phone and stuck on his music to pass the next couple of hours before he got to London.

*****************

Tom and Charlotte made their way to the bar on Monday afternoon so that he could introduce Charlotte properly to some of the staff and start her induction. When they got there, they met Esther who was setting up for the day. There was also another girl helping out.

"Esther, Clara, you remember Charlotte from Saturday night?" Tom said as they made their way towards them.

"Yes, how can we not? You have the most stunning voice." Clara replied.

"Thank you." Charlotte replied.

"Well, I have some good news. Charlotte is joining the team. Her main role will be performing a couple of times a week, but she's also going to do a few shifts in the bar." Tom turned to Charlotte. "Esther is our bar manager. She works out all the rotas, orders the stock and the like. Clara is one of our bartenders. There's also Julian and Steve who you'll get to meet another time. Let me show you round and then we can talk more about how this is going to work."

Tom did a short tour of the bar, explaining how things worked and also discussing his plans for various theme nights over the summer. They then grabbed a drink and sat down to talk about Charlotte's role and details such as pay, as well as the equipment she would need, the possibility of finding extra musicians to accompany her for larger events and what sort of shifts she'd like to do in the bar. After an hour or so they had come to an agreement between them and Tom said he'd knock up an employment contract for her by the end of the week. It was agreed that she would come in the next day so Esther could show her the ropes.