Cake at Midnight

by Jessie L. Star

  ‘For Christ’s sake!’ O’Connor snapped. ‘Could you just be a fucking human being for two seconds and listen to what I’m telling you?’

  Theo suddenly saw that O’Connor’s eyes were bloodshot and his skin was grey beneath the blotchy red anger on his cheeks. He was unravelling. This wasn’t just about Giovanna, it couldn’t be, and the understanding that all this rage was symptomatic of something else made Theo let out a deep breath and step back.

  ‘My relationship with Giovanna,’ he repeated, ‘is between the two of us. I’m not going to discuss it with you. What I will say,’ he continued as he saw O’Connor yet again about to protest, ‘is that I have no intention of taking advantage of her or disrespecting her, or whatever it is you’re accusing me of. I like her. And if that’s enough for her, it has to be enough for you.’

  He was astonished to see O’Connor’s eyes go glassy, as if they’d filled with tears. He was saved from having to acknowledge this in any way, however, as O’Connor abruptly pushed past him and out of the office. Theo stared after him for a moment and then slowly reached out to close the door.

  Sitting down at his computer, he tried to return to the financial reports he’d been looking at earlier, but he couldn’t focus. There’d been so much emotion in O’Connor’s expression, all the sly charm and cockiness he was used to from him nowhere to be seen.

  Theo knew he wasn’t in the grand, romantic drama that his colleagues had cast him in, but he couldn’t ignore that he was in something, and that that something should’ve made the decision Anderson was pushing him on easier. But it didn’t, it really didn’t.

  16

  Theo’s bedroom was like the rest of his flat – bland, beige, bare of personality – and yet it was fast becoming one of my favourite rooms in the whole world. Most likely because of all the sex I was having in it. Amazing sex. After years of only understanding to a certain extent what all the fuss was about when it came to romping around between the sheets, I was now fully on board.

  I grinned with the sheer enjoyment of it and Theo, holding himself above me in the aftermath of a bout of said amazing sex, smiled back and bent his head to kiss me, something so familiar now and yet still so thrilling.

  He drew back and then rolled to the side, emitting something between a satisfied sigh and a chuckle. For a few seconds we both just lay there, catching our breath.

  ‘I think this is working well,’ I said, turning onto my stomach and propping myself on my elbows to look down at him. His head was flat to the mattress, the pillows having been thrown from the bed in our enthusiasm, and his eyes were closed. ‘Working well’ didn’t really cover it. This was without a doubt the best romantic relationship I’d ever been in . . . and I wasn’t even technically in one!

  Theo made a murmured noise of agreement and I snorted.

  ‘If only you weren’t so chatty.’

  The corners of his mouth tipped up, even as his eyes remained closed.

  ‘I got an incredible gorgonzola at the deli on Hopkins Street today,’ I continued. After over three weeks of being in a ‘modern’ relationship with him, I was well used to being the one to lead the conversation. ‘What d’you reckon to a prosciutto, fig and gorgonzola pizza for tea?’

  He let out another breathy laugh. ‘It’s all about sex and food with you, isn’t it?’

  ‘I’m a simple creature.’

  ‘Pizza sounds great, but I’ve got a Skype call in–’ he opened his eyes and reached over to check his watch, ‘–twenty minutes. I’ll jump in the shower and then I can help you with whatever you need in the kitchen until the call comes through.’

  There was some pizza dough I’d made in the freezer and the rest of the ingredients only needed to be arranged on top, but I didn’t tell him he wasn’t really needed. Over the past few weeks, I’d come to realise that Theo liked to be doing something, to be helping. It felt a bit unfair that I never had to stack the dishwasher or wipe down the bench, but he seemed to prefer to be able to offer when I cooked, so who was I to argue?

  Having announced his agenda, I expected Theo to immediately head to the en suite, but he hesitated. As I looked at him, he reached out and gently traced a line from my temple to my jaw with the pad of his thumb. I froze, trying not to lean into his hand like some sort of needy pet. But maybe he misread my stillness as unease as he suddenly pulled away, rolling off the bed and padding naked to the bathroom.

  I watched him go, all my nerve endings in tumult. How could he have literally been inside me mere minutes before, but one touch of my cheek was making my heart pound so fast I felt dizzy?

  Honestly, moments like that made me wish we’d put more parameters around this arrangement of ours. I liked our sex and I liked our banter. Theo was fast becoming the highlight of my day but – oh my god – we needed parameters! Unfortunately, just bringing that up seemed like something outside the non-existent parameters. And I’m sorry, but we had practically been staring lovingly into each other’s eyes just then – surely that was off-limits? You know what else? He’d looked sad. It took me a second to put my finger on it, but that was it: sad. It really wasn’t the emotion I’d hoped my bedroom skills would evoke. It certainly hadn’t been what I’d been feeling. I’d been closer to elation.

  Over the past week since Theo had told me about the scandal that had brought him and Vanessa together and then broken them up, well, things had been different. I understood his stoicism and self-protectiveness so much better now. He’d been betrayed or used or manipulated by everyone closest to him in the past few years, so was it any wonder he’d been reluctant to take it further that first night we’d kissed? He didn’t want me to have any expectations because his only expectation of relationships must be that, before long, they went horribly wrong. But, knowing that, and knowing where his unwillingness for anything more serious came from, made me more, not less, comfortable around him. I mean, after all the nonsense he’d had pulled on him and how much he kept everyone at arm’s length because of it, it was basically an honour to be let in as far has he’d allowed me.

  I thought all this as I lay in the cloud of his high-thread-count sheets, running my hand across their soft whiteness. I longed to put some colour in the room, some bright photos (landscapes or fully clothed people only), some books on the sidetables, a rug, anything that would make the space warmer and feel a bit more permanent. At this point, Theo could simply pick up his watch off the table by the bed and walk out, never to return, and it made me much too uncomfortable.

  Speaking of uncomfortable, I’d spent all day at work desperately trying to avoid thinking about the date, but, now, left to my own devices, with no Céleste cracking the whip or Theo to distract me, there was no dodging it. It was the evening of the twenty-sixth of September, which meant tomorrow was the twenty-seventh, the day that Dec’s and my thirty-day break was up. And I had no idea what to do about it.

  I hadn’t seen or heard from Dec since his warning, or whatever he’d meant it to be, about Theo had gone so wrong. Zoë had also refused to talk to me about how her and Dec’s hunt for his dad was going, telling me nothing whenever I tried to wheedle some information out of her, except that they’d yet to find him. Neither of us mentioned that this was by the far the longest Dec’s dad had been missing, we didn’t need to.

  I realised I felt a bit cheated by my thirty days. I’d thought that, at the end of them, everything would seem clear, that my emotions would’ve had time to neatly reorder themselves. Instead, it seemed more like all my feelings had been put into a snowglobe that had then been handed to a particularly enthusiastic child.

  I didn’t feel the same way I’d felt about Dec before the Allsopp party, I knew that. The unrequited crush I’d had on him hadn’t been able to withstand the turmoil of that evening, or the high-emotion conversations I’d had with him since. Which wasn’t to say that I didn’t still know, down to my very marrow, that I loved him and that I missed him in a way that felt like a constantly prodded bruise. Maybe it was easier
to put it this way: if love was friendship set on fire, then the two of us were more like faintly warm ashes at this point.

  None of which helped me understand what I was supposed to do tomorrow. Did I seek him out? Wait for him to seek me out? Or did I just let it lie?

  A sound other than the faint noise of the running shower caught my attention, and I realised it was my phone buzzing beside the bed. More than happy for the distraction, I flopped my way to the edge of the mattress, yanked my bag towards me by the strap and fumbled around inside for my mobile. Of course, it stopped ringing as soon as my hand clasped it. In the next moment, however, I saw that Murphy’s Law had worked in my favour in this instance, as I had a notification of a missed call from Vanessa freaking Allsopp.

  As soon as I saw the name I dropped the phone onto the duvet with a weird sort of hiss. I’d assumed I’d fallen off her radar and, after everything Theo had told me, was more than happy for that to be the case – I wanted nothing to do with such a snake in the grass.

  As another little buzz told me Vanessa had left a voicemail, I cast an almost furtive look towards the en suite. I carefully picked up my phone, frowning at the notifications. It felt wrong even looking at her name, as if she were my ex-fiancée and I was trying to hide her call from Theo. Stupid, of course, because if anyone was still in touch with her, it was Theo. They worked together, after all. At least for now.

  I should’ve just deleted the notifications and got started on the pizza, but I couldn’t. The reminder that Theo was still in Vanessa’s sphere, and that Dec was as well, made me realise that I’d never be able to stop wondering if her message was about either of them if I just deleted it.

  Unlocking the screen and accessing the voicemail seemed to take forever in the way that things always did when you were hyper aware that you were doing them. Still, it could only have been seconds before I lifted my phone to my ear.

  ‘Hi Gio, it’s been a while,’ her message began, her voice smooth as butter, ‘we should meet up again soon.’

  I almost snorted. Fat chance!

  ‘I’m calling now, though, because someone’s just told me that a couple of police officers turned up at work this afternoon looking for O’Connor.’

  Any amusement at her greeting vanished in an instant and I gripped the phone tighter.

  ‘Theo and I were in a meeting all day so I just wanted to check with you before I give the company florist a ring. Is it true his dad’s died? Please pass on AHC’s condolences if he has and let O’Connor know that–’

  But I didn’t hear any more.

  While my brain froze, struggling to comprehend the enormity of the information I’d just received, my body leapt instinctively to action, hanging up on Vanessa’s silky platitudes so I could dial Dec’s number. A buzzing sort of panic rippled through me as I waited for him to answer and then, just when I was sure his voicemail was about to kick in, I heard a sudden burst of tinny music, the kind that pokies played, in my ears.

  ‘Dec?’ I asked, speaking loudly to be heard over the background noise.

  ‘Baker!’ His voice sounded thick and strange, like his tongue was too large for his mouth, or he was talking through cotton wool balls. I’d heard people talking like that before, of course, many times. But not Dec. Dec would never sound like that because that’s what drunk people sounded like.

  ‘Where are you?’ I asked and he let out an odd sort of laugh.

  ‘Dunno. Where are you?’

  ‘At home,’ I half-lied, clutching Theo’s expensive sheets against my chest. ‘Dec, are you . . . are you in a bar?’

  ‘Reckon I am.’ There was a guilty sort of bravado in his voice and it made me sick to my stomach, although not as much as when he added, ‘My dad’s dead.’

  ‘Oh, honey,’ I breathed.

  ‘No, is fine,’ he slurred. ‘Everything’s fine. He’s dead. So what? I don’ care.’

  He didn’t sound like he didn’t care, he sounded confused and blurry.

  ‘Dec, listen to me, where are you? Is there a sign or the bar name written on a coaster or something?’

  ‘You’re not talking to me.’ His child-like defiance made my nose start to prickle, warning of impending tears, but I ignored it, trying not to flinch as he added, ‘I’m a bad person so you’re not talking to me until tomorrow.’

  ‘You’re not . . . Look, are you near the counter?’ I persevered. ‘Can you hand the phone over to one of the staff?’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because they’ll be able to tell me where you are.’

  ‘I-don-wan-you-t-come,’ he said, the words running together.

  It hurt to hear him say it and I tried not to draw a parallel with how he must’ve felt when I told him I didn’t want to see him for thirty days.

  ‘Please, I just want to see that you’re okay.’

  There was a pause and then a snuffling noise and Dec sounded further away as he said, ‘Here, she wans talk to you.’

  A moment later, a suspicious voice grunted, ‘Yeah?’

  ‘Hi,’ I said, my voice high, ‘what pub is my friend in, please?’

  ‘The Duchess.’

  ‘On Landsdown?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  It was one of the grossest, grottiest pubs the city had to offer, and I’d know, as I’d been in just about every one of them over the years, looking for Dec’s dad. For a moment, the realisation that those days were over threatened to overwhelm me, but I couldn’t afford to be overwhelmed just then.

  ‘I’m going to come and get my mate,’ I said quickly, already scrambling off the bed and reaching for my clothes. ‘Could you make sure he stays put until I get there?’

  ‘I’m not a bloody babysitter.’

  And then there was a dial tone. I tried calling back, but it went straight to voicemail.

  Don’t panic, I told myself furiously and, fumbling to do up my trousers with one hand, I dialled another number with the other.

  ‘I heard,’ Zoë said, answering on the first ring. ‘I was just about to call you. D’you know where he is?’

  ‘The Duchess,’ I said. ‘Zo . . . he was drunk.’

  She swore and, amidst the horror of the situation, I felt the smallest lift of relief that the three of us were at least in this together, that we had an in-built back-up system for when one of us faltered.

  ‘Are you at home? Because I’m on the other side of the city from you,’ she said and, as she spoke, I could hear her grabbing her things like I was.

  ‘Head straight to him,’ I told her, holding back another wave of dread as I realised she wouldn’t be able to give me a lift. ‘I’ll be there as soon as I can.’

  As I hung up and pulled my work shirt over my head, I heard the sound of running water from the other room die away, but didn’t stop. Running into Theo’s lounge room, I gathered up my shoes, hopping as I pulled first one then the other on, then slung my bag over my shoulder and skidded out of the flat and down the corridor towards the stairs.

  I could feel guilt using its elbows to work its way up the line of emotions jostling to take precedence. How could I have been lounging in Theo’s bed when Dec was out there on his own? How could I have been satisfied to just leave Zoë to help him find his dad when that’d been my job? How could I have put my selfish crush on Dec before our friendship? If I hadn’t, I could’ve helped him find his dad before it was too late.

  As I reached the stairwell, however, I told myself to get a grip. I’d memorised the local bus timetable back when Aggie still lived at Veronica Way and knew that a bus was due, but that it would only take me about halfway to The Duchess. I needed to concentrate to figure out what connection I’d need to get the rest of the way.

  ‘Giovanna!’

  I’d barely clattered down to the second floor when I heard Theo call out. If I hadn’t already been going as fast as I could, I would’ve sped up. I just didn’t have room in a brain already writhing with self-recriminations, what ifs, disaster scenarios and bus timetables to fit Theo
in as well.

  I was neither as fast nor as confident as he was on the stairs, though, and, within seconds, he’d reached me, catching me at the elbow and pulling me to a stop.

  ‘Hey,’ he said, barely out of breath as I gasped beside him. ‘What’s happened? Where’re you going?’

  ‘Let go.’ I yanked my arm, trying to move past him. ‘I’ll miss the bus.’

  His forehead creased. ‘Never mind the bus, I’ll drive you wherever you’re going, but–’

  ‘I’ve got to go!’ I felt suddenly claustrophobic and couldn’t see the sense in what he was saying, I just knew I had to keep going, that I had to get to Dec.

  ‘Sweetheart. Sweetheart, look at me.’ I felt his hands, warm and gentle, cupping my face and turning me towards him. ‘Tell me where we’re going,’ he said softly.

  With his voice acting as a life-preserver I could cling to, I finally calmed enough to mutter, ‘The Duchess, Landsdown Street. It’s Dec. His dad’s dead and I . . . I just need to . . .’

  ‘C’mon.’ In the next moment, his hands had moved down to mine and he was guiding me, sure and steady, down the remaining stairs.

  He didn’t ask any further questions as we reached his car and peeled out onto the road, and I was incredibly thankful for his restraint.

  Snatches of memory caught at me as we drove, reminding me of all the times I’d raced from one of Dec’s dad’s old haunts to another, sure it was the last time, sure this time, I’d find him collapsed or dead. Now that it’d finally happened, I was struggling to get my head around it. I clenched and unclenched my fists, trying to make myself take slow breaths – in through my nose and out through my mouth – but struggling to maintain even that simple rhythm.

  ‘He’s an alcoholic,’ I said after we’d been driving for a few minutes, the words bursting out of me even though moments before I wouldn’t have thought I’d be capable of doing anything other than whimpering. ‘Dec’s dad, I mean. He had an accident at work not long after Dec was born and he drank because his back hurt, and then he couldn’t stop.’