Out!

by JL Merrow

  Patrick wasn’t sure how many beers Heather had had by that point, but he was getting drunk just on her breath. “What I said. Not mine, and I don’t want him to be either.”

  “Uh-oh. What’s he done?” She looked like she was ready to march up to Mark and demand they take it outside.

  “Tell you another time, all right? No Con tonight?” he added to change the subject.

  “Nah. Tristan’s taking him up the West End.” She cackled, then burped, loudly, just as Chris came to join them.

  He slung an arm over her shoulder. “See, that’s what I love about you. Such a lady.”

  “Eff off. I can be a lay-dee.” She put on a ridiculously posh voice. “In Hertford, Hereford and Hampshire, hurricanes hardly ever happen. See? Trouble is, what’s the point when there’s no bloody gentlemen around?”

  Chris laughed. “Well, she’s got us there, ain’t she? You all right, mate? You’ve been looking like someone pissed in your pint. This new bloke stealing your thunder?”

  Patrick huffed out an exasperated breath. “Has nobody round here got anything to talk about apart from Mark bloody Nugent?”

  Chris shrugged. “Man of the hour, in’t he? Don’t worry, mate, we still think you’re the prettiest princess—oi, what was that for?” Heather had thumped him on the shoulder.

  Patrick put down his half-full glass. “Think I’m gonna call it a night. Don’t enjoy yourselves too much, all right?”

  He left them still bickering like a couple of kids, and headed off home. Time to quit before he said something he’d regret.

  Course, it hadn’t helped his mood any that he’d been on the Diet Coke all night, ’cos no way was he gonna drink when he was pissed off. Angry drunk was his dad’s thing, not Patrick’s. So he didn’t slam the door when he got home, and he didn’t kick his boots halfway down the hall when he got them off.

  Well. Maybe one of them.

  “Everything all right, love?” his mum asked, poking her head out of the living room right at the wrong moment.

  “Fine.” Patrick stomped to the kitchen in his socks, got out a mug and put the kettle on.

  She followed him. “Are you sure? ’Cos you’re looking at that teabag like boiling water’s too good for it.”

  Patrick leaned on the counter and huffed out a breath. “Sod it. I’m going to bed.”

  “Love? What happened?”

  He whirled. “Nothing. Nothing happened. Nothing’s gonna happen, all right? You were right. I waited too long and I missed the boat. ’Cept it turns out he’s a lying piece of shit, so that’s all right.”

  Mum made a face. “Well, that’s men for you, love. So who was he, anyway, this bastard? Anyone I know? Just so’s if I see him in Tesco, I can run over his toes with my trolley.”

  Patrick had to smile. “Nah, no one you know. You wouldn’t have liked him anyway. The older bloke, remember?”

  “Ooh, not that new one—you know, the one who moved into the Claridges’ house, after she ran off with that vicar from Bishops Langley? The one with the daughter with the hair?” Mum frowned at Patrick’s frankly incredulous look. “What? I got talking to Sally in the chemist the other day.”

  “Mum, you scare me sometimes. Yeah, the one with the daughter with the hair. His name’s Mark.”

  “I never liked that name.”

  “It was your dad’s name,” Patrick pointed out.

  “Yeah, but he deserved better. So what did he do? What’s he lying about?”

  “So you can tell Sally in the chemist?”

  “Matter of public interest, innit? Well, I mean, I won’t tell her anything private. So go on.”

  “Nah. Don’t wanna talk about it.” The kettle boiled, and Patrick poured the water into the mug. “You want a hot drink, Mum?”

  “Don’t be daft,” she said, holding up her wineglass. “Coming to watch telly with me?”

  Patrick shook his head. “Gonna take this up with me and get an early night.”

  She made a sad face. “All right, love. You sleep well. And just remember, he’s not worth it.”

  Right. Sleep well.

  That was pretty much guaranteed to be a no go.

  * * * * *

  Lex rang late the next morning. Patrick had already been up for a while—he’d done a load of washing and got started on the ironing mountain. Mum hated ironing, so he usually did hers as well. These days he didn’t even make her pay him in chocolate buttons.

  Lex sounded a bit breathless on the phone. “I just wanted to ask if anyfing happened last night? ’Cos I’m seeing Fen this afternoon, so—”

  Great. Patrick’s new favourite subject. “Nothing happened. Not with me, anyway.”

  There was a silence, probably because that had come out a bit sharp.

  “What d’you mean?” Lex asked finally.

  “I mean, it wasn’t me, all right? That younger bloke Mark’s into. I met him, last night at Mark’s house.” The humiliation still stung.

  “Oh, shit. Oh fucking shitting crap, I’m sorry. Shit. I’d never of—I thought she meant you, right? Shitshitshit.”

  Patrick’s anger melted away. This wasn’t Lex’s fault. Mark was the one to blame here, the lying prick. “I know you didn’t know, all right? It’s okay. You were only trying to help.”

  “Yeah, but… God, was it awful? Was they, like, all over each other? Shit, did he go to the Spartans thing? Did you have to watch ’em at it all night?”

  “I don’t think they’d have been at it in the Three Lions, but no, he didn’t go. S’pose he must have stayed with Fen.” And Christ, that was twisting the knife. Just how long had Mark been with this bloke, to trust him with his daughter? “Look, don’t worry about it, okay? How did your evening go?”

  “It was great. Really great. You know that restored 1920s cinema they’ve got over in Berko? With all the gold and the pretty bits round the walls and stuff?”

  “Art deco, yeah.”

  “Whatev’s. He took me over there on the bike. It was dead romantic.”

  “Yeah? What did you see?”

  “Night of the Living Dead. You know, the original, not the remake.”

  “Glad to hear it. ’Cos the remake wouldn’t have been romantic at all.”

  “Shut up. You’re well jell.”

  “Yeah, right. So what’s this with you and Fen, anyway? Since when are you two BFFs?”

  “I dunno. I always wanted a little sister. And she’s got, like, literally no one to talk to round here. It’s really sad. I mean, her dad keeps telling her it’s all for her, them moving out here and that, but he never asked her or nothing.”

  “Yeah… You probably shouldn’t be telling me stuff she says about her dad.” Not that Patrick was actually talking to Mark at the moment, but it still felt wrong.

  “Shit. Sorry. I sort of forgot he was your Mark. Sorry. Not your Mark. Um. I’d better go, yeah? I’ll see you Monday.”

  “Yeah. Take care, all right?”

  “Yeah, you too.”

  Patrick put his phone back in his jeans pocket and stared out of the window at the plum tree in the front garden, which was showing its usual pitiful crop of pale pink blossom that never seemed to bear any proportion to the avalanche of plums they got every summer. By this time tomorrow Lex would know all about David the ex-PA. Maybe even have met him too—probably, even. After turning up on Friday night, he’d most likely be staying the weekend, wouldn’t he?

  Playing happy families with Mark and Fen. Sod it.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Fen didn’t roll out of bed until around noon on Saturday. Mark’s attempts to speak to her the previous evening had been greeted by increasingly shrill cries of “GO AWAY,” so he’d gone back downstairs to help David with the carpet and to tell him to not be an idiot and stay the night. Then he’d gone to bed.

&n
bsp; David had been gone by the time Mark woke up in the morning, leaving his bed neatly made.

  It was probably just as well. Fen still seemed upset; she’d crept down to eat breakfast in the kitchen, then sloped off back to her room, her dirty cereal bowl and the dregs of orange juice in the bottom of her favourite mug the only evidence she’d emerged at all.

  Mark gave her an hour or so, then went to knock on her door.

  There was no reply.

  “Darling? I want to talk to you.”

  Silence.

  “I’m coming in,” Mark said, and opened the door.

  Fen was sitting on her bed, propped up in a nest of pillows, heart-shaped cushions and cuddly toys, tapping angrily at her phone. Her eyes were red and swollen.

  Mark’s heart melted. “Sweetheart… I’m sorry, but you can’t force these things. David and I are never going to be together.”

  “But you like him. I know you do.”

  “I still like your mother, you know. It just didn’t work out, us being married, and it wouldn’t with David either.”

  “How do you know if you haven’t tried it? You’re always telling me that.”

  Mark hoped he wasn’t going red at the memory of David’s kiss. He certainly wasn’t planning to tell her he had tried it. “That’s when you won’t eat your vegetables. Love’s not like brussels sprouts.”

  “But why can’t it be? It’s not fair. Why can’t we be a family again?”

  “There’s all kinds of families, you know. Lots of people grow up with only one parent. You’ve still got two, even if they don’t live together anymore. And your mum and I both love you very much.”

  “But it’s not the same.”

  “I know. But that doesn’t mean it can’t be just as good.”

  “Yeah, but… What about when I go to uni? You’re just going to be all on your own.”

  “Well, we could get that cat you were talking about to keep me company,” Mark suggested, trying to lighten the mood.

  “Daa-aad. That’s worse.” Then she seemed to realise exactly what he’d said. “But we ought to get a cat. Totally. Can we go to the shelter this weekend?”

  “We’ll see.”

  “That just means no, doesn’t it? Please?”

  “It doesn’t mean no. It means I’ll have to think about it. There might be things we’ll need to sort out in the house—and besides, I don’t even know where the shelter is.”

  “I know where it is.” Fen sat up and grabbed her phone. “They’ve got all these pictures of the cats there, with stuff about them and where they come from and everything.”

  Mark watched in mildly horrified fascination as she scrolled down columns of cats, each with a winsome picture, a name and a cutesy biography.

  It was like a feline version of Grindr.

  “So what do you do if you see one you like?” he asked. “Send it a message?” Hi, I read your profile and I too enjoy eating fish, licking myself and taking long naps in the sunshine. U wanna?

  “Dad, don’t be stupid. Cats don’t go online. You have to send the shelter an email. Or ring them up. Or we could just go there.”

  “Okay. I’ll think about it.”

  “Please?”

  Mark thought about it. “Actually, I suppose there’s no reason we couldn’t go this afternoon.”

  Fen didn’t look as happy as he’d expected. “Um. We can’t. Lex is coming over.”

  “Oh—your friend from drama class?”

  “Theatre group. Yeah.”

  “Oh. Good.” Mark was pleased to hear the friendship was flourishing. “What time?”

  “Dunno. We just said after lunch.”

  That could mean anytime up to around five o’clock. Possibly even later, these days. “You know, if you ever want to ask anyone around for a meal, you only have to say.”

  “Daaa-aaad. Like anyone wants to have lunch with my dad.”

  Mark winced at the waves of scorn.

  Everyone warned you when you had kids, you’d find yourself with no sleep, no money and no social life.

  Mark wondered why nobody bothered to mention you’d have no respect either.

  * * * * *

  In fact, the ring on the doorbell came shortly after two o’clock. Mark went to open the door, eager to meet Fen’s first friend in Shamwell.

  He just about managed not to do a visible double-take when he saw who was on his doorstep, facial piercings and all.

  This was Lex? The theatre group assistant?

  At first glance, the clothing didn’t appear to have changed, but on closer inspection Mark thought he could spot a marked increase in the skull motif. And the boots… Ye gods, were those spikes? Yes; yes, they were. Around two inches long and subtly curved, interspersed with smaller studs that looked almost dainty in comparison, leaving barely any room for the inevitable silver zips and buckles. These were the sort of boots Boudicca, legendary Queen of the Iceni, might have donned before trotting off to sack London and slaughter the Roman invaders. Was footwear like this even legal?

  “’Ullo, Mr. Nugent,” their owner said.

  Mark wrested his gaze back up to eye level. “Oh. Sorry. Just admiring your shoes. Um. You’re Lex? Fen’s expecting you.” And, judging by the sounds of a herd of adolescent elephants rampaging down the stairs, she’d noticed Lex’s arrival. “Oh, and please, call me Mark,” he added just as Fen appeared, pink-cheeked and beaming.

  “Lex! You made it.”

  “’Course I did. Told you, din’t I?” Lex pulled off his/her boots and left them standing neatly to one side in the hall, like a post-modern conversation piece. (Oh, the boots? I picked those up at a metal festival in Derbyshire. Very self-referential, wouldn’t you agree?)

  “Those are just sick,” Mark heard Fen say. “Where’d you get them?”

  He had a sinking feeling she wasn’t going to be asking for a pony for Christmas.

  “Come on, I’ll show you my room,” Fen said, pulling Lex by the arm.

  Mark opened his mouth to object, then closed it again. He had a strong feeling he shouldn’t be letting his teenage daughter take boys up to her room—but was Lex a boy? And how on earth could he ask without giving offence?

  And what if one or both of them was gay, anyway? Mark was all for progress, obviously, especially when it came to queer issues, but he couldn’t help feeling parenting rules had seemed a bit more clear-cut in the Dark Ages. Perhaps he should just avoid the question entirely by encouraging them to stay downstairs with the promise of snacks?

  Unfortunately, by the time he’d thought this through, they’d disappeared.

  Mark didn’t, of course, hang around outside his daughter’s bedroom in the hopes of finding out just what was going on in there. It just so happened there were a lot of things that needed doing upstairs. There was the spare bed to strip, of course, and the bathroom sink to clean. That hadn’t been done in days. And the airing cupboard could really do with being reorganised. What on earth had he been thinking, putting the towels in by size and not by colour?

  Unfortunately, Fen’s door might as well have been soundproof for all the good it did him. Mark caught the odd burst of excited conversation: Fen saying, Oh my God, so you thought I meant… Lex’s voice: No, but see, he’s really… And giggles. There were a lot of giggles.

  After they’d been in there about an hour, he knocked on the door.

  “What?” Fen called.

  Mark opened the door. He was relieved to see Fen and Lex sitting at opposite ends of Fen’s bed, showing no signs of having hastily sprung apart or thrown back on articles of clothing. “I wondered if you wanted any drinks or snacks or anything?”

  “’S all right, Dad. We’ll get stuff if we want it,” Fen said.

  “Cheers, though,” Lex added.

  “Yeah, thanks, Dad.” Fen gave
him a piercing look. “You can go now.”

  “Right. I’ll just be…around.” Mark closed the door behind him and winced at the fresh outbreak of giggles that filtered through.

  He spent the next couple of hours writing. Technically speaking. He’d certainly sat at the computer for the entire time, and he was sixty-three percent certain he’d decided on a radical rethink of the whole concept.

  And he’d come up with three clear favourites from Fen’s cat dating website: Honey, a shy ginger seven-year-old who claimed to like a quiet life; Greebo, an enormous neutered tom who was far too fat to do anything but enjoy a quiet life; and Mochi, a skinny half-grown Siamese who had no opinions on quiet lives but did have beautiful blue eyes the exact colour of Patrick’s.

  He got so caught up in the subject, in fact, he didn’t even notice when Fen and Lex came down to forage in the kitchen. Much like earlier, if it hadn’t been that they’d left the countertops looking like a smaller-than-average dustbin had just been raided by a messier-than-average fox, he wouldn’t have known they’d been there at all.

  Mark didn’t see Fen again until the slam of the front door heralded Lex’s departure. He jumped up from his desk and strolled casually into the kitchen, where rustling sounds had indicated Fen was in search of yet more food.

  Either that or they had an extremely large rodent problem. Maybe he’d been right about that fox.

  Luckily, his first guess turned out to be correct. Fen jumped as he walked in, a violently pink packet in her hand. “Oh. Dad. It’s all right if I have some crisps, isn’t it?”

  “You mean some more crisps.”

  She looked shifty. “You said we could have snacks while Lex was here.”

  “Oh, go on, then. But for God’s sake, eat an apple or something next time.”

  “Whatever.” She opened the crisps, and the room filled with the cloying aroma of prawn cocktail flavour. It intensified as Fen waved the packet at Mark. “Want one?”

  He shuddered. “Not if they were the last crisps on earth.”

  “Dad, you’re so boring,” she said, although at least it sounded fond.

  “I do what I can. Lex seems nice,” he added casually.