Lovers Leap

by JL Merrow

  “Mum, it’s not like an addiction.”

  “Then how do you explain all these politicians who get caught consorting with rentboys and the like? They try to do the right thing, but they’re not strong enough to resist their . . . urges.” Mum shook her head, tight-lipped. Michael tried not to show how uncomfortable she was making him feel. Best to let her get it out of her system.

  Until next time.

  “I’m just glad you’ve been spared all of that, for all you seemed so keen on her,” Mum carried on and then, thank God, changed the subject. “Now, that’s quite enough talking about those sorts of things. What did you do on the island, then? Did you go to see the dinosaurs?”

  Michael rolled his eyes. “Mum, I’m not five. And they weren’t open anyway.”

  “Oh, that’s a shame. I remember the first time we took your sisters to Blackgang Chine, your dad and I. Way before you were born, of course—Charity had only just started playgroup.” Mum stared out of the window with that weird half smile she always got when she talked about his dad. “They had such a lovely time, all of them, climbing up to ride the dinosaurs. And the girls loved the nursery rhymes garden. It just wasn’t the same, taking you all there after he’d . . .” She blinked a bit, then shook her head. “Still, all this isn’t getting the tea brewed.”

  “Mum, sit down, yeah? I’ll make the tea.”

  She laughed. “Don’t be silly.”

  “All right, but I’ll go to the shops to get stuff for tonight, okay?”

  “Michael O’Grady, you’ll do no such thing. I am quite capable of doing my own shopping.”

  Michael gave up. “Can you get some rice, then?”

  “Rice? I think we might have some in the cupboard, but it’s probably out of date. I haven’t made rice pudding for ages.”

  “That’d be perfect, then. It’s for my phone. It got wet.”

  “Oh, Michael. How many times do I have to tell you to be careful with your things?”

  “Hey, it wasn’t me, all right? Trix, uh, borrowed it and dropped it in the sea.” If he told Mum Trix had dropped it in the loo, she’d only want to bleach it or boil it or something.

  “She should buy you a new one, then.”

  “Mum, I’m not gonna go over to my ex-girlfriend’s house and demand a new phone, all right? She’d laugh in my face.” Or punch it.

  “Hmph. In my day people took responsibility for their actions.”

  “It’s only a phone, Mum.” Still, it was gonna be a right bugger if it died. Michael hadn’t backed up his photos and contacts and stuff for about six months. He still had his work phone up in his bedroom, but all that had on it was work stuff. Obviously. And he never gave out that number, so none of his mates would be able to ring him.

  He wondered if Rufus would try to ring him. Maybe he already had?

  Shit. There was an ache inside him, a fucking great big empty hole where Rufus had been. He missed the lying little bastard.

  Still, maybe Mum was right, and it was all for the best.

  Even if she had been talking about Trix, not Rufus.

  Shit. It’d stop hurting soon.

  Wouldn’t it?

  Being alone, Rufus decided after a quick but intensive wallow in misery under his duvet, really wasn’t all it was cracked up to be. What had Garbo been thinking?

  He reached for his phone and hit Call.

  “Whatdjer want, pickle sniffer?”

  A cuddle, please. “Liz, where are you?”

  “Down at the swings with Kieran. You know, the ones down by the crazy golf. Wanna come push him?”

  “See you in ten minutes, yeah?” Rufus scrambled out from under the duvet, jammed his feet in his trainers, and headed off.

  There had always been swings down by the crazy golf course, even when Rufus was little—even when his mum and dad had been little, come to think of it—but now there was a proper little playground with bouncy rubber flooring and brightly painted climbing frames meant to look like ships and castles and stuff. Little Kieran was digging away in the sandpit like he was hoping to reach Australia before nap time, bundled up to twice normal size in thick trousers, anorak, and woolly hat. Rufus vaguely remembered his own mum, when he was little, telling him she’d found him under a gooseberry bush. Kieran looked like Liz had found him in the dictionary under the definition of “totes adorbs.”

  She was sitting on a bench nearby, watching like a hawk ready to swoop with razor-like claws in case any of the other toddlers showed violent intentions towards her pride and joy.

  “God, what’s happened?” Liz’s eyes narrowed as Rufus approached. “I thought something was wrong when you called me ‘Liz.’ Do I need to sharpen my cleaver?”

  Rufus sighed, sitting down next to her. There was plenty of room, although all the other benches had several people sitting on them. Liz tended to have that effect on people, although they’d been working on it for months, and she was showing definite signs of progress. Sometimes she even smiled at the other mums. “No. Maybe. Michael’s gone.”

  “Gone where? Gone home? Gone back to his girlfriend? Gone for a long walk off a short pier—again?”

  Rufus looked at her sharply. “Did I tell you about that?”

  “No, but I got talking to Amy, Kieran’s little mate Jayden’s mum, who’s mates with Judy at the Selsey—”

  “Oh, bloody hell. Why doesn’t she just ring up the County Post and get them to run the story?”

  “What makes you think she hasn’t? Anyway, so you dumped him, right? Good for you. I thought he was a bastard.”

  “I didn’t dump him. He just left,” Rufus said sadly. “We had a row when he found out about my ferry thing.”

  “So? Good riddance, if you ask me.”

  “No! Not good riddance. Bad riddance.” Rufus gestured wildly and impotently. “I like him, all right? What am I going to do?”

  Liz looked at him for a long moment. “You’re saying you want him back? He’s a prick. What sort of bloke treats his girlfriend like that?”

  “I don’t know! I just don’t think it can have been as bad as Judy’s been saying. I mean, he told me some of it. Like, he split up with this Trix girl and she got upset and pushed him off the pier.”

  “And then went straight round to yours and shagged the pants off you. He’s a shit.”

  Well, yeah, but— “No one’s listening to his side of the story!”

  “They can’t, can they? Cos he’s buggered off.” She was silent for a mo. “So what did you tell him about your ferry thing, anyhow?”

  “I didn’t. Shelley told him.”

  “That’s not good.”

  “I know. I know, all right? And I never got a chance to say anything. I mean, without Shelley or Dad there.”

  “I told you that one was gonna come back to bite you on the bum. I told you.”

  “Yeah, well, it was already too late then, wasn’t it? I’d been, like, living it for years before we even met.”

  “So what are you gonna do?”

  “Don’t know.”

  “Have you tried ringing him?”

  “His phone’s off. Probably permanently. His ex did a number on it. Pun not intended.”

  She frowned at him. “What?”

  “Forget it. So I’ve got, like, no way of getting in touch.”

  “Hmm . . .” Liz pursed her lips. “What about Judy? She might have his address. You take an address when people book at the B&B, right? As opposed to just turning up on your doorstep saying ‘Oi, gizza room?’”

  Rufus’s heart leaped. “Yes! Liz, you’re brilliant. I’ll go round right now and ask her.”

  “No, you won’t. I’ll go, and you can mind Kieran for me.”

  “Why?”

  “Roo, think it through. She’s so worried about you hanging around with this bloke, she shopped him to your dad. You really think she’s gonna help you get back together?”

  “So why’ll she tell you?”

  “Easy. I’ll say I wanna send him ha
te mail for hurting my mate. It won’t even be a lie, cos if he does turn out to be as big of a shit as everyone except you thinks he is, I’ll be emptying Kieran’s potty into a padded envelope and sending it to him first class.” She paused, looking thoughtful. “Or maybe second class. Give the smell a chance to really develop. Anyway, you stay here and do not take your eyes of Kieran for a second, yeah?”

  “Got it.” Rufus gave her a jaunty salute that was at total odds with the way he actually felt.

  By the time Liz came back, Rufus was covered in sand, his arms were aching from pushing Kieran on the swings, and he had a grazed knee from jumping off the roundabout without due care and attention. But at least he was feeling a bit better about life.

  Liz eyed his sweaty, dishevelled state with approval. “You want the good news or the bad news?”

  Rufus sat down on the bench, panting, while Kieran slurped on a carton of juice. Some kids got all the luck. “Good. I want good news.” He was determined to clutch at every single straw that floated his way.

  “Well, I got an address.”

  “Yay!” Rufus punched the air.

  “But it’s not Michael’s address.”

  “Poop.”

  “It’s his girlfriend’s address.”

  “Explosive diarrhoea-type poop.”

  “Poop! Poop! Poop!” a passing tot yelled. Her mum glared at Rufus.

  Liz glared back on his behalf. The mum picked up her daughter and hurried away.

  “Still, look on the bright side,” Liz said, smiling smugly. “At least you and her have got something in common. You’ve both been dumped by that shithead.”

  “Let me guess—Judy had a few things to say about Michael when you went round?”

  “And some suggestions as to what to send him in the mail. She’s really quite creative when you get to know her.”

  “So what am I supposed to do with the ex’s address? Write her a letter and say I’d like to send Michael some hate mail?”

  Liz shook her head. “She’d just ignore it. I mean, I would. You could be any sleazeball nutjob. Like him. No, you gotta have the personal touch. I had this idea while I was walking back. We could kill two birds with one stone.”

  “You’re not still talking about things to do to Michael, are you?” Rufus asked nervously.

  “Sort of. But not like that. Look, you and I both know your ferry thing isn’t really a thing, right? Don’t you think it’s time you told your dad the truth?”

  “Hmm, let me see . . . How about no? Liz, I can’t leave the island. What’d Dad do without me?”

  “I dunno—employ someone he’d actually have to pay?”

  “You know the B&B doesn’t make enough money. I mean, it’s fine for us all to live on, but not enough to pay someone’s rent and stuff. It’s like you not being able to work cos you can’t afford childcare.”

  “Yeah, I know, I know. But I’m not asking you to move off, am I? I’m only asking you to go on a flippin’ day trip. Look, Michael found out about your ferry thing, right? And that’s why he got in a huff and flounced out.”

  “Michael would never, ever be seen flouncing. But yeah.”

  “So if you go over there and get his address from the ex, then turn up on his doorstep, that’ll prove your thing isn’t a thing, won’t it? Go on. It’s a leap year, innit? You told me leap years are for trying something different. So try it.”

  “It’s not . . .” Rufus screwed up his face. “It’s difficult, all right? If Dad finds out I’m not really scared of boats, he’s gonna start up again with all the don’t waste your life here, I’ll be fine stuff.”

  “He’d have a point. That catering course we did, you were streets ahead of everyone else at cooking. The rest of us just took the course cos it seemed like a good bet in a place with so many hotels. If I had your talent, I wouldn’t be sitting around wasting it, kid or no kid.”

  “Yeah, but if I go off to London or Southampton or even just Ventnor to train as a chef—”

  “Which you could easily do, right, cos it’s not like the island hasn’t got any decent restaurants, even if you would get stuck with doing seafood, which is totally gross, jeez, who decided just cos you live near the sea, you have to eat every slimy thing that slithers out of it—”

  “—Dad won’t be fine,” Rufus interrupted right back. “It’ll be just him and Shelley running the B&B. How long do you reckon that’s going to last before they go bankrupt or she leaves him or both? That’s why he’s got to think I can’t leave the island. I mean, if I’m going to be stuck here anyway, I might as well work at the B&B, so he doesn’t have to feel guilty about it. But if he knows I can go anywhere . . .”

  Liz drew in a deep breath, opened her mouth—then shut it again. She paused for a moment, then finally spoke. “Fine. So don’t tell him.”

  “What?”

  “Don’t tell him. You just say you and me are going over to the other side of the island to, I dunno, walk across Tennyson Down or something—I mean, it’s not like you’re gonna be needed at the B&B, is it? Your only guest just left—and then we get on the ferry and go over to Southampton. It’s not that complicated.”

  “What about Kieran?”

  “I’ll sort something out.”

  “When?”

  “Soon as I can. I’ll let you know, yeah?”

  Dreams were bastards. See, in Michael’s dreams, yeah, he’d been back on the island. Waking up with Rufus in his arms. Rufus was making that cute little snuffly sound and clinging on to him like a sex-starved limpet.

  Then he awoke for real, and he was in his old bed in the house he’d grown up in. Alone. Unless you counted the stiffy he’d woken up with, but fuck it, even wanking wasn’t much fun today.

  After the most pathetic orgasm in the history of self-abuse, Michael cleaned himself off, chucked on some clothes, and trudged down to the kitchen. Mum was in there doing something at the sink.

  If Judy hadn’t shot her mouth off, Michael could’ve been doing Rufus at the sink back on the island right now. Well, if he’d managed to persuade Rufus’s stepmum and dad to leave ’em alone for five minutes. Or even if not, they could be cuddled up somewhere, or Michael could be watching him cook another gourmet breakfast and teasing him about how nipping out to a café for a sausage sarnie would take half the time.

  Christ, he missed the little twat. Michael pulled out a chair with an ear-splitting scrape of leg on floor.

  Mum turned. “Oh, Michael, you’re up. Let me get you some breakfast. Bacon and eggs?”

  “Yeah. S’pose.” Then he felt guilty. “Oi, why don’t you let me do it?”

  Mum actually laughed. “That’s a kind thought, but I like my pans without the bottoms burned out. You just sit down, and I’ll have it ready for you in a jiffy.”

  “I can do it,” he protested. “How hard can it be?”

  Mum just laughed again, shook her head, and cracked some eggs into the frying pan. Michael sighed, resigned, and picked up the Daily Mail. His calendar’s word for the day had been “schadenfreude,” and he reckoned the papers would be good for a bit of that.

  He still hadn’t found anything to make himself feel better about life by the time Mum served up, though, and he set to, but found his appetite waning (yesterday’s word; he’d caught up on his reading for the days he’d been away) as he ate. There was nothing wrong with Mum’s bacon and eggs—well, the yolks were a bit overdone, and the bacon rind had some soggy bits, instead of being uniformly crisp and golden, but that was how she always did them. But somehow it just tasted flat after Rufus’s eggs from happy hens and, for all Michael knew, bacon from pigs on ecstasy.

  And how come Rufus knew how to cook, and Michael had never learned the first thing? He swallowed his mouthful and put his fork down. “Mum, why did you never get me to help in the kitchen when I was a kid?”

  “You were always so much happier kicking a ball around.”

  “Yeah, but so were the girls, and you always made them do their bit.�
��

  “That’s different.”

  “Why? Why is it different?”

  “It just is, Michael.” She sighed. “Your father, God rest him, wouldn’t have wanted you stuck in the kitchen when you could be outside in the fresh air, now would he?”

  “I dunno. Maybe he’d have liked me not to starve if I had to fend for myself?”

  “And why would you have to do that? I know I’m not going to be here forever, but you’ll find a nice girl some day and settle down.”

  “Mum, I don’t think nice girls these days stay nice if you expect them to do all the cooking.” He hesitated. “And anyway, what if I . . . don’t meet a nice girl?”

  “Don’t be daft. A handsome young man like you, with a good job? And you’ve never had any trouble in the past.” Mum heaved herself down into the chair next to his and patted his arm. “Don’t be discouraged by what happened with Trix. She wasn’t the girl for you.”

  “Maybe . . . maybe there isn’t a girl for me?” Shit, this was hard. He wasn’t even sure why he was doing it, ’cept . . . it’d hurt, what she’d been saying about bisexuals yesterday. He couldn’t help thinking about Rufus, and his dad’s easy acceptance of him being gay.

  Must be good, knowing your folks loved you for who you were, not who they wanted you to be.

  Mum tutted. “What did I just tell you? You’ll find her. Now, you finish up your breakfast before it gets cold.”

  Michael gave up.

  Michael went for a drive after breakfast. Being around Mum was making him feel uncomfortable and guilty. He needed to get out. And in any case, the Saab had been sitting outside the house for days, not being driven. He didn’t wanna end up with a flat battery, did he?

  The day was cold but sunny, so Michael thought Sod it and put the top down. He didn’t have a hat with him, but it never got cold enough for frostbite in Britain, and who needed ears, anyway?

  It was fucking exhilarating, bombing along back lanes and through the New Forest. Even if he did have to keep slowing down so as not to splat the ponies. Somehow, he ended up driving through Lymington to the coast, parking the car, and getting out to gaze across the Solent to the Isle of Wight. It looked almost close enough to touch from here, the chalk stacks of the Needles clearly visible—and the ferry was only a couple of miles away from where he’d parked. He could get a ticket, go across, and . . .