‘Yes,’ Grant says. ‘That might be a correct assessment of the situation.’
‘So? I think an explanation is required. I did consider going to the police to report you all missing.’
I think I see Grant flinch. ‘Missing?’
‘I’ve been calling Leo for over a week now and nothing, nada. His flat was empty. None of you were in work. Where on earth did you get to?’
‘A week?’ I’ll swear that Grant blanches. He looks as if his knees have turned to jelly as he grabs hold of the nearest display case. ‘We’ve been gone for a week?’
‘Yes, you have. Are you going to tell me where you’ve been?’
He snorts as if he’s surprised and says, ‘A week?’ once more.
‘Well?’
‘We just took a few days off together.’ Grant tries – and fails – to look innocent.
‘So? Did you have fun?’ I ask.
‘Not in the traditional sense of the word.’
‘Where did you go?’
‘Er . . . away.’
‘Probably Ibiza or Las Vegas or Amsterdam.’ I narrow my eyes. ‘Anywhere that boys can behave badly would be my guess.’
Grant says nothing.
‘Didn’t you think to tell anyone where you were going?’
‘It was a spur of the moment decision. Very last minute. We only thought we’d been . . . er, we only thought we’d be away overnight.’
‘You are so irresponsible,’ I chide. ‘When normal people go on holiday, Grant, they tell friends and loved ones. They tell the people that they work with and work for. They don’t just disappear off the face of the earth for days on end.’
‘In Leo’s defence, he has a lot on his mind.’
‘And I don’t?’ I say. ‘I’ve been pacing anxiously for days while Leo has been gadding about and has been just too busy to be bothered to call?’ It’s so typical of him and I wonder why I’d ever considered that I might want a relationship with him again.
‘He’s been trying to call you since the minute we got back, Emma. You keep hanging up on him.’
‘I don’t want to hear his feeble explanations.’ What I actually want to do is hit him over the head with a frying pan.
‘We did have our reasons,’ Grant insists.
‘And they were?’
‘I can’t tell you about them,’ he says. ‘But one day you’ll understand.’
I sigh. ‘If I ever start to understand anything Leo does, please shoot me.’
Grant stands there looking pathetic, hands in pockets, down-turned mouth.
‘Caron has been worried about you,’ I tell him gruffly. ‘Fool that she is, she likes you. You had a date arranged and you never turned up.’
‘Oh shit.’ Grant looks crestfallen. ‘I didn’t do it on purpose, I swear.’
I put on my disbelieving face.
‘I’ll call her.’
I keep my face impassive.
‘I will,’ Grant promises me earnestly. ‘I will. She’s great. I hoped she might be here today. I’d love to take her out again.’
‘Get in the queue, then,’ I snap. ‘In fact, go to the back of the queue.’
Grant hangs his head.
I sigh again – a relenting sigh rather than an exasperated one. ‘You look like you need coffee.’
Grant nods and his smile reappears. He risks coming into the gallery fully and even sits on the chair at my desk. I go out to the kitchen, busy myself pouring some rather stewed coffee – if he thinks I’m making fresh coffee for him then he’d better think again – and take it out to Grant.
We sit for a moment sipping our bitter, too strong coffee quietly. ‘Okay,’ I say. ‘I give in. Where is he now?’
‘At home,’ Grant tells me. ‘He wanted to come down here, but I made him go to bed. He hasn’t slept in a few days.’
Now I’m alert. ‘He’s not been sleeping?’ Leo could sleep through an earthquake. ‘What’s wrong with him?’
‘He’s feeling pretty awful, Emma,’ Grant replies, not meeting my eyes. ‘You know that she . . . that Isobel’s gone.’
‘No.’ I don’t even try to hide my surprise. ‘I didn’t know. What happened?’
‘You need to talk to Leo about that.’
My eyes turn to slits again. ‘Is this all tied up with your disappearing act?’
‘Yes.’ Grant seems tired and there are dark shadows under his eyes. He looks terrible. A month’s sleep and a few vitamin injections wouldn’t go amiss here either. ‘We’re worried about Leo, Emma. He’s had a tough time. In the past few weeks he’s had a lot of growing up to do.’
‘That would be hard for him.’
‘Go easy on him when you speak to him.’
‘What makes you think I’m going to speak to him? My mother’s been ill, Grant. Seriously ill. Where was Leo when I needed him?’
‘He needs you, Emma. More than he realises. More than you realise.’
One of my father’s ‘pahs!’ comes out of my mouth before I can stop it. Sometimes I’m too much my father’s daughter. ‘Every time I go all soft and squishy on him again, he does something stupid. I can’t keep going on like this, Grant. My mind feels as if it’s being tossed about in a tumble dryer. I can’t think straight any more.’
‘He still loves you, Emma. I think you feel the same. Would you ever consider taking him back?’
‘Is hell ever likely to freeze over?’
Grant smiles sadly. ‘So you do still love him?’
‘What’s that got to do with anything?’ I say crossly. ‘I’m immune to Leo’s charms. I’ve moved on. I’ve met someone else.’ I don’t tell Grant that my particular someone else has just been reunited with his girlfriend. Instead, I flick back my hair and declare, ‘I am completely over him.’
And, perhaps if I say it enough, one day it will be true.
Chapter Eighty-Four
‘Here.’ Leo beckoned the schoolboy towards him. ‘Will you go into that shop and get me a bunch of flowers?’
The kid nodded. ‘It’ll cost you.’
‘A fiver,’ Leo said. ‘On delivery.’
‘Done,’ the kid said. And Leo knew that he had been.
He handed over the money, including the purchasing fee, and moments later the kid came out of the florist’s clutching a bouquet of pink-coloured flowers wrapped in cellophane. ‘Great,’ Leo said. ‘Nice choice.’
He put the flowers behind his back and walked the ten minutes to Emma’s parents’ home, hideously self-conscious of the blooms he was bearing. He rang the doorbell and waited. Emma’s father, Charles, opened the door. He was wearing an apron and rubber gloves.
Leo cleared his throat. ‘Mr Chambers,’ he said. ‘Hi. Hello. I understand that Emma’s mother has been unwell. I thought I’d pop in to give her my best wishes.’
Leo had never popped in to see Emma’s parents before. They were not ‘popping in’ sort of people. The expression on Emma’s father’s face said that nothing had changed on that front.
‘Come in, Leo,’ Charles Chambers said, finding his manners. ‘Come in.’
Leo followed Charles into the hall and then stood fidgeting uncomfortably.
‘We’ve just finished lunch. Come through to the kitchen. I’m washing the dishes and having a tidy up. You can join us for a cup of tea.’
Leo followed him. Emma’s mother, Catherine, sat at the table. She looked as if she had aged and was thinner and paler than when Leo had last seen her on the fateful night of her daughter’s thirtieth birthday party.
‘Leo,’ she said warmly. His only fan in the Chambers household was clearly pleased to see him. ‘To what do I owe this pleasure?’
‘I wanted to come and see how you were.’ Leo kissed her on the cheek. ‘I’m sorry I didn’t come sooner.’ He handed over the flowers, grateful to be rid of them.
‘Very nice,’ Catherine said. ‘My favourites. How thoughtful. Isn’t Leo thoughtful, Charles?’
Charles didn’t look entirely convinced.
‘You’re looking well.’ That wasn’t exactly true, but Catherine didn’t look as awful as he’d expected. Or perhaps after his recent experience with Isobel, he was marginally better at dealing with illness than he had been.
‘I’ll be back to my old self before too long,’ she assured him, patting his hand gently.
Leo realised that he’d taken his role in this family for granted too and he wanted to do anything he could to make amends. It was terrible to see Catherine looking a shadow of her former self and it made him think of his own mother and how little he’d seen of his parents in recent years. As soon as he left here, he’d call them and arrange to go to see them. But then, that alone could make them die of shock.
Charles switched on the kettle and then returned to his washing up. Leo joined him at the sink and picked up the tea towel. He dried the dishes as Charles washed.
‘I’ve also come here with an ulterior motive,’ Leo admitted to them. ‘Emma isn’t speaking to me. She won’t return my phone calls.’
‘And you want us to put in a good word for you?’ Catherine said.
‘Then you must be very desperate, Leo. When did my daughter ever listen to me? Or to anyone else for that matter.’ Charles Chambers stripped off his rubber gloves.
‘I’d like to become part of this family once again. If you’ll have me.’
Catherine slowly shook her head. ‘We’d love that, Leo. But there’s nothing we can do for you. You’re going to have to convince her all by yourself.’
‘I know that we haven’t always seen eye to eye, Mr Chambers, but I do love your daughter.’
‘I don’t doubt that, Leo,’ Charles said. ‘She loves you too. But do you make each other happy?’
‘I’d like to think that we could, given another chance.’
‘Well, there’s one thing for certain,’ Charles said with a heavy sigh. ‘She’s been damn miserable without you.’
Chapter Eighty-Five
The alarm clock went off yet again and Leo knocked it to the floor. Flipping onto his back, he stared at the ceiling. He kept hoping that, like Bobby Ewing on Dallas, he’d wake up in the shower and it would all have been a terrible nightmare and that none of it had really happened. But every morning he was in his bed facing harsh reality with no hope of a cop-out ending.
He’d been back in the real world now for over a week and it wasn’t all that it was cracked up to be. Getting up and struggling through the day wasn’t proving any easier. Leo wondered how long he could carry on with this feeling – or lack of it. He wasn’t sure that numb and sick were classed as emotions.
Forcing himself out of bed, he padded through to the kitchen. Leo was looking too scary to go near a mirror – even he fully appreciated that. His hair was a disaster zone and he hadn’t shaved at all over the weekend – somehow there didn’t seem to be any point. His time was spent entirely alone, watching as many Disney films as he could find in the local video shop featuring fairies, while partaking liberally of red wine. How he missed Isobel and her mischievous little ways. She would know how to sort this out for him. She’d have made Emma return his calls with a wave of that wicked wand of hers. Instead he’d lost two great women – and he wondered how he could have made such a mess of his life.
The sink was piled high with dirty dishes and Leo stood and surveyed the mess with disgust.
‘Not so keen to spruce yourselves up now, eh?’
His dishes remained silent.
Leo sighed. ‘Me neither.’
Going to the sink, he picked out the least dirty dish and then took a box of Kellogg’s Frosties from the cupboard. There was no milk in the fridge – he already knew that as he had run out yesterday and couldn’t be bothered to nip out to the shop. Leo quite liked black coffee anyway. Except that coffee was the other thing he’d run out of.
Sitting at the table with his dish, he went to tip out some cereal, but alas there was nothing in the box. Still, he hadn’t much of an appetite anyway. Leo put his head on the table and, mercifully, sleep overtook him once more.
When Leo finally got to the office, Grant and Lard were already at their desks. They exchanged one of their glances as he entered.
‘Leo!’ Grant said. ‘Where have you been?’ He glanced at the clock. It was nearly eleven o’clock.
‘I know. I know. Sorry. Sorry.’ Leo slid into his chair and tried to busy himself with turning on his computer and other stuff that he really didn’t care about.
Old Baldy came out of his office and glared at him. Their boss had been like a bear with a sore arse since Isobel had gone too. The fact that she’d been replaced by some pinch-faced temp with a tweed suit and librarian’s bun couldn’t be helping.
‘On the late shift again, Mr Harper?’
‘I know. I know. Sorry. Sorry. I’ll be here on time tomorrow.’
‘Nine o’clock, Mr Harper. Sharp. Or the number of your tomorrows will be severely curtailed.’ And Old Baldy flounced back into his office.
‘Bugger,’ Leo muttered under his breath.
Grant and Lard waited until Old Baldy was engrossed in something else and then sidled over to Leo’s desk. Lard put a Danish pastry down next to their friend.
‘Breakfast,’ Grant said. ‘Eat it.’
Leo shook his head. No glitter. ‘Cheers, mate,’ he said, ‘but I’ve already eaten.’ He patted his stomach just to prove how full he was.
‘You haven’t,’ Grant said.
‘No.’
‘Not for days.’
‘I’m on a diet.’
‘Yeah?’ Grant said. ‘And so is Lard.’
Grant and Leo looked up at Lard who was eating his customary Mars Bar with relish.
‘I’ve got work to do, boys.’ Leo tried to look interested in his computer while inside it felt as if his world was crashing.
Grant sat next to him and pulled his chair up close. ‘This can’t go on, Leo,’ he told him softly. ‘We are all in deep, deep doo-doo after our week’s little unauthorised holiday, even though we only thought we’d been gone for one night. I’m not sure how we’ve managed to keep our jobs, but we have. If you don’t buck up – and quick – Baldy will give you the bullet.’
Something inside Leo snapped. ‘Do you think I care? Do you really think I care about whether stocks go up or down or bloody sideways?’ He knew that he was shouting. People in the office were looking at him. ‘What does it matter? Why does any of it matter?’
Grant lowered his voice further, the voice of calm in his storm. ‘Leo. I’m your friend. Your best friend. I know what you’ve been through. I know what you’re going through. I know the things you’ve seen. But, mate, you’ve got to get your act together.’
Leo turned and faced his friend. ‘Why?’
Grant was clearly taken aback. ‘Why?’
‘Yes. Why?’
Grant looked at a loss for an answer. ‘It’s what we do,’ he said. ‘We carry on.’
‘Grant,’ Lard interjected, ‘you know what she was like. You of all people know. You must be able to understand why he’s so gutted.’
Leo raked his fingers through his hair.
‘This isn’t about Isobel though, is it?’ Grant asked candidly.
Leo sighed and it wavered sadly on the air. ‘Losing Isobel was bad enough, but I can rationalise that in some small part of my brain. She was a fairy, for goodness sake.’ He lowered his voice. ‘We were different beings from different places – it was never destined to last. I can cope with that. Sort of. But with Emma it’s not the same. She’s here. She’s flesh and blood. There’s no reason for us not to be together. We’re meant to be together. She’s the sensible one. I thought she’d see that. I thought she’d want us to carry on just as we were. I miss her so much that even my fingernails hurt from the pain of it.’
‘I wish I could wave a magic wand for you and make it all better.’
‘But you can’t,’ Leo said. ‘No one can. There’s suddenly a bit of a wand shortage round here. I lost Emma,
then I lost Isobel and now I’ve lost Emma again.’ He felt like wailing out loud. How careless could one man be? ‘I have to get through this on my own.’
‘You have us,’ Lard told Leo. ‘You have your friends. We’ll always be here for you.’ He put his hand on his heart.
Leo and Grant raised their eyebrows at this.
‘You said you were going to win Emma back, you prawn,’ Grant said with more than a hint of exasperation. ‘What have you done so far? Made a few whingey phone calls. Hung around outside the gallery and her flat when you know she’s not there.’
‘I went to see her parents.’
‘That’s it? The sum total of your effort?’
‘Emma has made it very clear that I’ve blown it.’
‘I know you’re in the depths of despair and I hate to see you like this, but now you know exactly how Emma feels, mate. She’s gone through all of this crap for you. Her fingernails have been hurting too. Why should she trust you again?’
‘I’ve changed.’
‘How does she know that?’
‘I don’t know. It’s rather difficult to show her how when she won’t see me or speak to me.’
‘So let’s get back to basics. Why did you break up in the first place?’
‘Because Emma felt we’d lost “the magic”.’
‘Then show her it, you idiot. For heaven’s sake, Leo, you should by now know more about magic than most. Think about that.’
Leo’s friend clapped him on the shoulder and he and Lard walked away. Leo sat and stared at his computer, utterly speechless. He stuffed the Danish pastry into his mouth and made himself chew even though he couldn’t taste anything at all and might as well be eating a beer mat or his own underpants.
Grant’s words reverberated round his brain. Leo had no idea that he could feel – or cause – this amount of pain. He was shocked to the core. Why was he never capable of showing Emma how much he loved her? Leo felt sick. Sick to his stomach. Sick to his heart. If it wasn’t for the fact that Old Baldy would sack him if he even moved from this desk before nightfall, Leo would have gone to the bathroom and would have spilled his guts.
Chapter Eighty-Six
It’s a Kind of Magic Page 32