We’re standing on the street, looking up at the sash windows of his office above our heads, splashed with the logos of his charity project cum labour of love.
“Are we going in then?” I ask, because he seems to be hanging back—maybe even dragging this out.
He rests his forearms on my shoulders and digs his hands into the back of my hair. He leans in, delivers a kiss that would make anyone’s knees knock, then pulls back with his eyes sparkling.
“Had to get that out before we head up,” he says, taking my hand. “Professionalism and all that. I’ll be okay for a wee while now.”
I scrub my hand through his wild hair as we take a side door, then climb some rickety stairs.
“You really must put a comb through your hair one of these days, Kitchener.”
“Really? Why?” he chuckles, eyes dancing.
I laugh and follow him, even though situations like these make me uncomfortable.
I guess I’d follow him just about anywhere.
He doesn’t give me time to prepare myself, bursting through the door to his rented office space without ceremony. There are long desks set out in square blocks. On some desks there are piles of promotional materials such as leaflets, flyers. There are fancy iMacs and flash printers, big TV screens and lush white leather desk chairs. I’m wondering where his people are when I spot them hiding just around a corner, gathered in an area semi-cordoned off from the office space. Instead of desks, this area has one huge sectional sofa, plus a monumental oak coffee table that appears to have been reclaimed from the land of the giants.
“Hi everyone, this is Freya, my girlfriend.”
He’s a huge presence in the room, everyone suddenly responding to his arrival. Some people sit up, others eye him warily—and me even more so.
“Hi Freya,” they greet me collectively.
Ruben begins the introductions, flying into Boss Mode. “So, we have Suresh, our digital expert.” I politely wave, not wanting to spend too long shaking everyone’s hands. Besides, Suresh looks happy to be left alone, his suspicious gaze and beady eyes so prominent I notice them first, despite a large paunch sitting beneath sizeable man breasts, I also discover.
Ruben points in the direction of two other men sat biting the ends of their pens. I realise, as I scrutinize them, they’re undoubtedly brothers. One has a big beard while the other is rather tanned, so aside from their similar physical traits, they appear to be like chalk and cheese.
“Drake and Maron, and yes, they’re twins, and also my financial experts… accountants… not sure we’ve decided their titles yet, their jobs are so intertwined…”
I get the sense this is all still rather in its infancy. Ruben moves swiftly on, addressing a trio who look nothing alike but are all seated together as though they belong to the same tribe.
“Katie, Eddie and Dan are our current in-house counsellors, but we’re looking to hire more very soon. And this is Georgie, who heads this whole thing up. I just provide the means.”
Unlike the others, Georgie steps forward and holds out her hand to me. I look at it for a second or two before realising I am actually expected to take it. Her hands are soft and warm, plus they’re dry, while mine must feel as sweaty as anything.
“Pleasure,” she says, giving me a look up and down that screams either lesbian or “I hate your fucking guts already”—I can’t tell which.
“I need to run those figures by you and then you can fuck off,” she tells Ruben, chucking him under the chin while winking in my direction.
Ruben looks at me and gestures over his shoulder. “Go help yourself in the kitchen, won’t you? This will only take a few minutes.”
I feel as though I’m being kept out of some secret, told to leave the room sort of thing, but maybe he really just needs to concentrate without me hanging around. I decide to happily bounce away, escaping to the kitchen where there’s hopefully coffee and some kind of snack.
Well, not only do I discover a state-of-the-art coffee machine in the kitchen, but there are fresh brownies too, already piled on a plate. Wondering if they’re the hippie kind, I sniff one just to be sure but decide they wouldn’t, anyway… would they?
I push a few buttons and before I know it, I have myself a frothy cappuccino, a deliciously fresh brownie and a quiet, non-passive-aggressive kitchen all to myself. Then it begins to sink in…
There’s something not quite right about this place.
I leave the kitchen and wander between the clustered desks in the office area. It’s not that Ruben’s so-called staff are all plain Johns and Janes with nothing to interest me whatsoever, nah. It’s more than that. It’s… Ruben. He doesn’t belong here. He sticks out like the proverbial sore thumb. He’s resigned himself… or something. Told himself he doesn’t deserve to play football anymore, not while his brother lies dead in the ground. Going by the paltry leaflets they’ve produced (I could do better on my iPad), he doesn’t have a clue that his workforce is most likely taking him for a ride—that they probably sit around like layabouts with their fingers up their arses whenever he’s not here. It’s not a well-known charity and addiction is a thankless cause unless you really have the skills to turn people’s lives around—so why is this group of misfits working for Ruben? I have so many questions, but maybe I should zip them. This is the manager in me coming out… so, maybe I should keep my thoughts to myself until I’ve learnt more, and then I can give him my opinion. Or maybe no shop talk whatsoever would be a good thing for our relationship. Couples who work together rarely stay together, right?
I continue pacing the room, unable to hear what’s being said around the corner. It’s quite a large space for just a handful of people doing donkey work. Maybe I’m jaded, but… I have instincts about things, sometimes. That’s all. Perhaps that’s why some of them looked at me with suspicion. Perhaps they fear I will shake things up… maybe I might even convince Ruben to spend his money on me, instead of dropping it into this money pit.
I keep my steps quiet as I near the edge of the corner, hanging back just enough so that they won’t see me. I hold my breath and overhear Georgie and Ruben chatting.
“Yeah, if we could just have a little more of an injection, I really think we could start raising much more cash on a daily basis and employ some more skilled staff. Broaden our horizons.”
I hear Ruben umming and ahhing.
My thought is that there are already so many big charities doing so much for addiction, how might a small concern like this make a difference unless they’ve got someone who knows how to run a charity, inside and out?
Her choice of words “I really think…” is interesting, because she didn’t say, “I’ve got these projections…” or “It’s been proven for these people, so why not us?”
And how do you raise more cash on a daily basis? Nobody does. It takes time to build up a business, even a not-for-profit.
“Just 50K more a month, until we pick up… and it will, I promise,” she says, and it’s then I can stand by no longer. The last of the brownie swallowed, I swan up to them, coffee cup in hand.
“Where do you keep the books, Georgie?” I ask curtly.
She looks at me as if I just asked the queen to produce her tax return—and she’s the queen. I get a very sharp gaze, plus I have a strange feeling other people are now also disgruntled by my intrusion.
“This is company business,” she says, but when she says it, she’s looking at Ruben as if I don’t exist.
“Umm, maybe she should take a look. Freya might spot something… an area we could redirect money from. She runs a 300-room hotel, so she knows a thing or two about management and deployment of resources.”
I lift my chin slightly, glad he can actually see things from my point of view—despite this crook having had him convinced for months, maybe years, that she’s actually trying her hardest—when in all honesty, I think she brought this ragtag bunch in off the street with her and they actually live it up in the pub down below when the boss i
sn’t looking.
Is my lover really this naïve? Or hasn’t he the heart?
One of the twins has his arm twisted and produces some of the accounts from an otherwise empty filing cabinet.
I scan them quickly while Ruben reads over my shoulder, seeing if he can spot anything too.
I divide the wages between the people here and realise they’re earning an eyewatering amount for so-called charity work. I point at the figure and shake my head. Ruben flushes and mumbles, “It’s London.”
“Yeah, but what the fuck are those fucking shitty flyers out there?” I motion with a thumb over my shoulder at the flyers my mother could have produced on her old PC in the early 90s. The room falls silent and I slowly lift my head, noticing every eye in the room on me. They’re more than suspicious, they’re actually downright seething. “What? Oh, grow up, the lot of you. They’re a load of turd and you know it. Seriously. How long did someone spend making that pile of wank rag?”
Nobody answers, but when I stare at Georgie, her shoulders jump up and she screws up her face like she’s been caught red-handed.
I hand Ruben back his sorry accounts and mutter, “This shower of shite needs a rocket up its collective ass. This is what people are like nowadays, Rube. Sorry, but it’s true. I’ll be down at the café on the corner when you’re ready.”
I sense Ruben’s anger without even looking at him. Maybe he had his suspicions, but me turning up like this and outing these people for what they really are has cemented it for him—the charity is bleeding money and his workers are taking home the bacon, all at Ruben’s expense. Laurent’s Legacy is truly a monumental failure. From what I saw scanning his account ledgers, the business has been losing money for months. Donation drives have been unsuccessful and Ruben’s counsellors are probably earning more than the average shrink, which is funny because going by the hive of activity around here—or lack thereof—they most probably answer a couple of calls a week. Any extra cash Ruben might provide would be swallowed up and deposited, most likely, directly into Georgie’s and her cohorts’ own personal bank accounts. Ruben really must have money to burn, but I also think he doesn’t know what else to do to honour his late brother—and these people have taken him for a ride.
As I stomp towards the café, I get a sinking feeling. I just hope it’s not put him off me. I can be blunt, I know that, but I’m just realistic and wise. I’m experienced.
If he’s a true gentleman anyway, he’ll appreciate a strong woman voicing her opinion, right?
The worst thing would be for him to feel belittled, but the truth is, it’s a hard world out there and I’m a hard woman. I spot crooks a mile off. It’s how I am.
Drinking my mint tea in a quiet corner, I’m about to give up hope… when I spot him enter the café, looking furious and confused. He sits down without a word, tearing at his hair, rubbing his beard and avoiding my eye.
“I’m so sorry, baby.”
He nods. “Can we just go home?”
“Yes. I’d love that.”
He gives me a small smile.
Relief washes through me because his fury doesn’t seem directed at me.
(Unless, he really does live in constant denial…)
Chapter Fourteen
It’s the Lies
On the walk home he was silent and now we’re back at his place, he’s still quiet. He plonks himself on the sofa and stares into space. For a moment the urge to run away overwhelms me. I could easily hop from one bed to another and do that for the foreseeable future, keep my belongings in the corner of my office and remain homeless rather than stay with Ruben and face the daily struggle that is life. Then I look at him and see what’s always been here, right under my nose: a devastating man who needs help. A beautiful man. The love of my life, I foresee. That’s what scares me the most—that he will seep so deep into my soul, I won’t ever be able to get him out. And what about when things go wrong and we’re parted? How will I survive that? I know I wouldn’t. Yet for every ten reasons I find for us not to stay together, I always find one reason why I can’t give him up…
I can’t turn my back on the way he makes me feel, and that supersedes every reason we shouldn’t be together.
“Ruben,” I call softly, standing by the picture on the fireplace, my body upright and ready to carry me out of here should the need arise.
He turns to look at me. “Yes?”
“What happened after I left?” I keep my voice soft and gentle.
He inhales and exhales dramatically before wringing his hands together. “They cleared out. I’d suspected for a long time, but… I was burying my head in the sand.”
He looks forlornly at the floor, ashamed of his ignorance… or lack of mistrust, maybe. A smidgen of mistrust can go a long way in this world. A dollop of it can take you even farther.
How terrible.
“They went quietly?” I find that hard to believe.
“They went, and that’s all you need to know,” he says.
I don’t know Ruben well enough yet to really be myself, but usually I would take that kind of response from someone and shove it up their arse. However, there’s time for that later. I’m not easily persuaded to forget the little details. I’ll just save that nugget for another time.
“I can’t help the way I am, Ruben. I see things. Hear things. You have no idea how many people I meet in my line of work. How many charity events we’ve put on. You wouldn’t believe the sinkholes I’ve seen come through.”
“I don’t blame you,” he tells me calmly, “it’s just, I feel such a fool. I was proud of what I was trying to do. I knew it wasn’t making money, but I thought if we just helped a few people out.”
“Still needs to be treated like a business, though. Ironically the only people benefiting from the charity were your staff—” I stop myself before I say anything more.
Ruben grinds his teeth and leans back against the cushions, hands in his hair. “I now have that rented space and all those Macs, but nothing going on.”
“Give up the lease… sell the hardware. Move on. Do something that actually benefits people. Become a football coach… get kids off the streets before they turn to drugs and knives. Target the kids who wouldn’t have a chance otherwise. Sometimes, you know, people determine their own path in life. It’s difficult to swallow. You can’t—”
“Can’t what?” he snaps, and I realise I’m opening old wounds, ones that’ve never been given a proper chance to heal.
“You can’t save everyone. Some people don’t do well in this world. It’s a tough world. It’s a rotten world.”
He stands and walks to the other side of the room, hands in his pockets, looking out of the French doors towards the patio. “You’re saying I’m naïve, but you don’t know everything about my brother, Freya. You don’t know it all.”
“I don’t need to know it all. I can guess. You knew when you met me how jaded I was… how much I’ve seen and done already in this life… you knew this about me. If you bring me up against bullshit, I will always call bullshit. That’s all that happened today. A hundred other alleged charities across London are doing exactly the same thing Georgie was and calling it good work, when really, they’re paying themselves money for old rope. If you want to help people out of addiction, you have to give them hope… a lifeline. A chance at something tangible.”
Ruben turns on me, eyes red. “He had everything. Promise. Potential. A future. He wasn’t hopeless… he was taken advantage of.”
“This is what happens when kids are brought up with everything available to them… they don’t see the ugly side of this world. They’re protected from it. They see only that there are things available to them but they don’t know the danger. My mum and dad didn’t always have that house… Mum couldn’t always work. She had psychosis after I was born. That’s why there’s such a big gap between me and Adam. I remember being so hungry I’d cry myself to sleep. My father had debts from his single days they just couldn’t pay off. He
could only get shitty jobs because he didn’t have the right qualifications. I’ve known real struggle, Ruben. Real, terrifying struggle. Tell me you have. Tell me! I mean, aside from Laurent’s death, tell me you’ve known hardship or have had health issues or you’ve been beaten black and blue because you were judged responsible for your mother’s crippling mental health issues.”
A deathly silence descends on the room as Ruben tries to process what he just heard.
Does he now understand why I can’t stand this world sometimes? Its hideousness, and all.
The ugliness of some people often worms inside me and makes me want to scratch out my own eyes. Ruben is naïve to think his brother was taken advantage of. I know there was probably a lot more to it than that. Laurent’s drug use was likely linked to depression, maybe stress and anxiety. Not everyone takes drugs who’s suffering stress and anxiety, but if Laurent already had a taste for it and knew he could get it easily, then during hard times drugs would have been the first thing he reached for. There’s guiding your children to academic success, but more importantly there’s tooling them up for what life has in store. Laurent’s overdose was unlucky, I’m betting. He took more than he could handle. Has it haunted Ruben that it was a potential suicide? That he should have been there for his brother more? Likely, that’s why he allowed that charade of a charity to continue for so long, because his guilt outweighs his logic on a daily basis.
“Who beat you black and blue?” Ruben spits, and I lift my head to see his eyes blazing with fury.
I lift my chin, my stomach turning to stone. “You know who.”
“Right, there’s no way—”
I rush towards him in a panic, my hands around his upper arms. “Ruben, no. No.”
His eyes are bloodshot and full of hatred, despair and wrath.
“Baby, he’s not worth it. Besides, I’m not in harm’s way anymore. I’ve got you. I won’t go back, I promise. Just stay with me. That’s all the protection I need. Stay with me.” I wrap my arms around his shoulders and fall into him, needing the comfort and warmth of his body.
Kismet Page 12