DARRELL: Chad is a good lad.
LADY MO: Chad is the best. Erase from memory my earlier bitching. I am the luckiest woman in the whole god’darn US of A!
When I went down to the kitchen in the morning, Anselo made a point of ignoring me. He stared coolly for a moment, and then put his earmuffs on and proceeded to apply a drill to a large piece of wood. Clearly, when it came to grudges, here was a man who could hold one so long it would have to be prised from his cold, dead fingers.
I found it infuriating. For Christ’s sake! It wasn’t as if I’d insulted him! I had, in point of fact, apologised! But no! That wasn’t enough, was it? I would have to be given the cold shoulder from now until sodding eternity!
I didn’t realise that I was slamming stuff in time to my thoughts. The cupboards. Bang! The kettle lid. Smack! The fridge door. Bash!
I wasn’t aware until Tyso’s voice came from behind me. ‘Um–’ he said. ‘Is this a bad time to get some water?’
I wheeled around and he took a step backwards. ‘I’ll – er, I’ll come back later.’
‘No, it’s fine!’ I snapped. ‘What’s wrong with you?’
‘Not me that’s demolishing the kitchen. Well, not yet, anyway–’
I sagged against the bench. ‘I’m irritated, that’s all.’
Tyso sidled around me to the sink. ‘Yeah? Never have picked that.’
‘With your boss,’ I said, with a glower in said boss’s direction.
Then I noticed Tyso was drinking out of the tap. ‘What is it with men and glassware?’ I demanded. ‘Why do you refuse to use one?’
Tyso wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. ‘Easier not to.’
Fair enough.
Tyso checked to see that Anselo wasn’t watching and whispered, ‘What’d he do?’
‘Oh, nothing,’ I said. ‘He’s just sulking.’
‘Yeah, he’s good at that. My dad always said he could sulk for England. Olympic level, Dad felt.’
That made me laugh out loud. And that made Anselo look up, and catch Tyso and I together. He flipped off his earmuffs and glared at us.
‘Oops,’ murmured Tyso. ‘I’ll be in the shit now. Oh, well. Same old, same old–’
He strolled back, took up his hammer and stuck some nails in his mouth. As he turned to the wall, he sent me a swift wink. I felt a stab of envy. How nice to be so secure in your own happiness that you could shrug off problems that blithely.
I took a cup of tea back up to my bedroom and revisited what had kept me awake most of last night. Marcus hadn’t called, so to prevent myself getting in a complete demented lather over it, I forced myself to think about Big Man. Which wasn’t, as you might expect, the greatest alternative. But it was better, because at least I could do something about it.
Trouble is, I still couldn’t decide what. Should I knock on his door again? Should I send him a letter? Should I do what Gabriel Flynn had originally suggested, and call social services?
None of those had huge appeal. In the unlikely event that he answered his door, I imagined he’d slam it again instantly. A letter, he would rip up. And if social services appeared, he might hunt me down and kill me.
I sighed, and checked my inbox, even though I knew it would be empty. On top of everything, I’d had no word from the publishers, and it was at the point where it was becoming harder to tell myself that they needed time to get organised. There was no shortage of editors in romance publishing, so someone must have given both my book and my contract at least a cursory once-over. Unfortunately, there was also no shortage of writers. So if the new editor didn’t like what they read, perhaps they were currently putting their name to a letter of rejection?
I could find out. I could call and ask someone. To be honest, I’d had that option open to me all along. But I was so dreading what the answer might be that I simply could not summon the courage to do it. If bad news was a-comin’, I wanted it to take the very, very long way round.
It was time to go to the café. I hadn’t thought my heart could sink any further, but by golly, it seemed it could. I had no idea now where I stood with Claude. I wasn’t sure how he felt about me, and I wasn’t at all sure how I felt about him. I was embarrassed that I’d pursued him, and embarrassed that he’d rejected me. I was embarrassed about Marcus – I was embarrassed full stop. I found the whole situation utterly humiliating.
I wondered if I should do us both a favour and tell him that he didn’t have to be table buddies with me anymore. But as soon as I thought it, I realised I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t bear to think of there being one less person in my new life. I did not trust that nature would fill a vacuum. I could only see the hole, and to me, it looked too much like despair.
Despair or humiliation. Had my life really come to the point where those were my only choices?
Downstairs again, I checked my mobile before I put it in my bag. No missed calls. No messages. I grabbed my coat and opened the front door to a crisp but sunny spring day.
‘Bye, Darrell!’
Tyso’s voice sailed down the hallway. I glanced back. He was standing in the kitchen, where his boss could not fail to see him. He gave me a cheery salute that was clearly meant as more of a wind-up for Anselo than a farewell for me. I waved back. It was nice to know that I had one supporter. Even if he were a child.
Outside the café, I had to gird myself before I stepped inside. As it turned out, Claude was sitting with Alastair the doctor. Miss Flaky was also there – not at her usual table, but at the one right next door to the two men. For a second, I wondered why, as her usual table was free. But mostly, I was focused on the fact that Claude had company. What an enormous relief! The perfect excuse to keep a polite distance – for today, at least.
But as soon as Claude saw me, he smiled and beckoned me over. He stood as I approached, prompting his companion to throw him a look of rather pained disbelief. The doctor obviously had no time for anachronistic courtesies, and intended to stay right where he was.
‘Alastair, you remember Darrell?’ said Claude, when he and I were both seated.
Alastair nodded curtly. ‘The alarm raiser.’ He made it sound lumped in the same category as every other irritating time-waster, like Jehovah’s Witnesses and telemarketers. But then he added, ‘I rang the hospital to check on our Mr Hogan. He’s been discharged, so I assume he’s still with us. For now, anyway. I can’t say as I expect him to be a role model for heart-disease management.’
‘That’s because the system sucks.’ Miss Flaky had put down her book. I caught the words Raw Food on the spine. It seemed not inappropriate.
Despite a palpable lack of encouragement on our part, she went on. ‘Health systems worldwide have a financial interest in keeping the people ignorant and dependent. More disease means more drugs, which mean obscene profits. And the crime of it all is that the drugs being pushed as cures are in fact the reason disease levels are at near epidemic levels. That, and the toxic processed crap that the food “authorities” are bribed into passing as fit for human consumption.’
There was a pointed pause. Alastair the doctor spoke first.
‘Mr Hogan’s disinclination to take physical exercise and stop smoking,’ he said, ‘seems to me more of a personal choice than one imposed on him by a … system.’
‘Cigarettes should have been banned decades ago,’ replied Miss Flaky. ‘But again, there’s too much money in it – for the death merchants who peddle them, the governments who get their cut, and the drug corporation vultures who feed off the ill and dying.’
‘I see–’ The doctor shifted around in his seat, so he had a clearer line of sight. ‘So what you’re saying is that the current system should be replaced by another system that permits us to have only what it decides is good for us?’
Miss Flaky’s eyes narrowed fractionally. ‘There are proven alternatives,’ she replied. ‘We would all be better off if they were more widely available.’
The doctor nodded. ‘And if we could force peop
le to make better choices, things would be damn near perfect.’
‘People don’t make those choices because they don’t know they have them.’
‘I can’t imagine there’s one person in the first world that doesn’t know smoking is bad for you. Yet around ten million Britons still smoke.’ He hooked a thumb towards an empty plate on our table. ‘I am five pounds over an ideal weight, and my cholesterol is marginal, but I still chose to consume two custard tarts. And by Christ, you know what–’ He leaned forward. ‘I relished – every – bite.’
Abruptly, he shoved back his chair and stood up. ‘You come and tell my seventeen-year-old with the weeping sores that if she chose not to inject methamphetamine she wouldn’t feel the need to scratch her arms until they bled. You come and tell the woman whose teenage son killed himself that she should have rejected the opportunity to have her first good sleep in months because it helped fill the coffers of drug companies. You come and tell my fifty-two-year-old father of three that he would never have been afflicted by leukaemia if he’d chosen to eat organic mung beans and wheatgrass. I’m in the surgery from eight in the morning till eight at night most days. Drop in when you find a free moment.’
And without a further word to any of us, he walked out.
Claude rose, as if to go after him. But then he sighed, and resumed his seat. ‘I’ll see him later,’ he said to me, with a small, rueful smile. ‘And I think with a bottle of single malt in hand.’
‘He’s a typical apologist for the system. No surprises there.’
Miss Flaky was cool and entirely unruffled. Again, part of me admired her composure. But my God – the nerve! I truly believe she’d sat at the next-door table purely for the opportunity to have a go at Alastair: to take her revenge for the other day.
‘He is my friend,’ Claude said to her, ‘and by far the best man I know.’
Miss Flaky’s mouth once again did the twisty-smirk thing. ‘Yeah, well, having seen the calibre of man you hang out with, that’s hardly an earth-shaker.’
Claude flushed. ‘I find that extremely insulting.’
‘You’d find gum on the sidewalk insulting,’ she said. ‘A speck of lint on your trousers. Your whole life must be an endless stream of insults. What’s one more?’
‘How dare you?’ Claude was ramrod straight in his chair.
‘Give it a rest, champ.’ Miss Flaky sounded bored. ‘Only thing all that pent up moral outrage will give you is a bad case of haemorrhoids.’
I’d had enough. ‘What is your problem?’
Miss Flaky raised her eyebrows. The corner of her mouth twitched. It dimly occurred to me that she loved this sort of thing, which meant she’d be far better at it than I would. But it was too late now.
‘Seems to me you’re the one who’s upset.’
‘Oh, so you can be a complete bitch to everyone, and we’re just supposed to take it?’
She reached for her book and calmly opened it back up. ‘Take it or leave it. Whatever floats your little boat.’
Aware I was on a fast trip to nowhere via humiliation-ville, I took a last random stab.
‘You don’t like people much, do you?’ I said. ‘Do you hate everyone in general? Or do you just hate men?’
If you hadn’t been watching, you wouldn’t have seen it. The flash of rage came and went in an instant.
But I had been watching, and she knew it. And because she hesitated just a bit too long, now Claude knew it, too.
‘Ah,’ he murmured. ‘That would explain a great deal.’
‘Don’t patronise me!’ She lunged forward and hissed at him. ‘You spineless, jumped-up English fuck!’
From cool and composed only minutes before, Miss Flaky was now incandescent with fury. And like before, it was all aimed at Claude. I may as well have vanished into thin air.
To my amazement, Claude laughed out loud.
‘I may once have aspired to a more laudable epitaph,’ he chuckled, ‘but sadly, that one will probably have to do.’
Miss Flaky took the only course left open to her. She stood, tucked her book under her arm, and became the second person that morning to walk out on us.
‘Well, well …’ Claude was staring at the now empty doorway. ‘I wonder what happened to her?’
‘With luck, something viciously horrible,’ I muttered.
‘I don’t know,’ he said, still staring. ‘Sometimes I think – if there were more people like her in the world …’
He turned and caught my eye. Across his face, I saw a flash of what looked like embarrassed defiance. But it smoothed again so fast I couldn’t tell.
He leaned forward, all trace of a smile now gone. For some reason, I felt a need to mentally brace myself.
‘I owe you an apology,’ he said. ‘I should never have judged you. You seem a level-headed person and, for all I know, you may have no expectations of Marcus, and simply be content to enjoy his company if and when he makes himself available.’
Ouch. Sucker punch. Straight to the heart.
And all the worse because I knew he was right. Marcus would make himself available if and when he wanted to. He had never promised me more, and it would be unrealistic for me to expect more. It didn’t stop me wanting more. But that would just be something I’d have to put up with.
Still, Claude needn’t have been quite so brutal about it.
‘You don’t like him much, do you?’
His whole face completely blanked, and he managed to reply without, as far as I could tell, moving his lips. ‘I really don’t care to discuss it.’
‘No,’ I said. ‘You really don’t, do you?’
I felt that the nature-versus-nurture crowd would have watched these proceedings with interest. When it came to personal stuff, Marcus spilled everything whether you wanted him to or not, whereas Claude kept the lid on tighter than an old marmalade jar. Their genes were too different for any shared upbringing to have created a closer connection. I thought about my brother. Even though we were nineteen years and half a set of DNA apart, I was very fond of him. For an emotional second, I really hoped nothing would stop him coming over; I wanted to see him very much.
Claude was looking at me a tad askance. I suspected my rush of sentiment had shown on my face.
‘If that bothers you–’ he said.
‘What?’ I wound the conversation back. ‘Oh! No, it doesn’t bother me.’ I sighed. ‘To be honest, I’d much prefer to talk about something else.’
His relief was palpable, even through all the layers of manners. ‘Right! Well! Let us indeed talk about something else.’
I waited.
‘Would you like me to start?’ I asked him.
‘Why don’t you?’ he said. ‘No doubt I’ll pick it up as we go.’
I grinned. ‘You are quite funny, you know that?’
He gave me a look. ‘Perhaps I could have that as my epitaph instead? So nice to have a choice.’
It was the word ‘epitaph’ that did it. If Marcus had been there, he would have said I was doing it again. The glum cartoon mouth thing. And then he probably would have tried to kiss me better.
All Claude did was raise an eyebrow.
I blew out a breath. ‘I need help. Well, no, I don’t,’ I added hastily, seeing his flash of alarm, ‘someone else does. I just need help figuring out how to help them.’
‘Do they wish to be helped?’
‘Good question. As it happens, no.’
‘Pride?’ he asked. ‘Or circumstance?’
‘A bit of both, I think.’
Claude hesitated. ‘Is the person to whom we are obliquely referring our heart-attack victim? Mr … what was his name again? Hogan?’
‘Yes! How did you guess?’
‘When Alastair mentioned his name earlier, you did a rather good impression of a startled faun.’
‘Oh.’ I screwed up my face. ‘That’s partly guilt, and partly because he scares the bejesus out of me.’
‘Mr Hogan?’
‘Him, too.’
Claude laughed. ‘My dear friend Alastair does not tolerate fools, that is very true. However, in his opinion, less than one per cent of the human race falls outside that category. Which can lead to difficulties. As we have just witnessed.’
‘He tolerates you.’
‘That’s because I make no demands of him.’
‘How do you know him?’ I asked.
‘He married a friend of our family.’
Then he gave me a slightly challenging look, and said, ‘Let’s get back to our Mr Hogan. Why don’t you tell me what you had in mind, and we’ll see what we can do?’
‘Is that the royal we?’ I asked hesitantly. ‘Or are you actually offering to help?’
‘In the absence of any other pressing obligation, I may as well.’
A vision flashed into my head of Big Man opening the door to Claude. I wasn’t sure if I saw it as hilarious, or as an event that would have the same effect on the universe as dividing by zero.
But Claude had done more than offer to help. He had reconnected himself to my life when I was convinced he’d been this close to leaving. I was so grateful, I could have run up to Big Man’s door right then and there and knocked until he was forced to let me in.
Then again, why rush it?
‘I have two ideas about what to do next,’ I told Claude. ‘Please tell me which one seems the least crap.’
Good things that happened this week:
Marcus called! He was in Paris, for a series of meetings with the author of the sexy little French book. He told me he’d woken the morning after he’d arrived in the hotel with – his words – an erection so substantial it made him sorry he couldn’t remember what he’d been dreaming about. He assumed it had been me, because every time he’d thought of me since – his words again – he’d had to go beat himself down with a stick. I asked if any of those moments had been inappropriately public and he said yes, but he’d been concealed both times by a meeting table, so the worst consequence was being forced to sit with the kind of posture that would in earlier years have earned him a swift, exquisitely painful ear-tweak from his schoolmasters. Because I couldn’t help myself, I asked about the author of the sexy French book. Turns out, she was a nineteen-year-old girl who, at age sixteen, had actually asked her prostitute mother’s pimp if she, too, could work for him. She took to it, let’s say, like a duck to water, and had described her encounters in her book with lyrical proficiency and a level of detail that compelled even Marcus to go outside and get some fresh air. It was the perfect combination, Marcus said, of literary mastery and utter filth. As a film, it would blow box-office earnings records sky high, and the French teen’s level of fame would shift into the stratosphere. I asked if she were ready for stratospheric fame. Marcus said he felt a girl who was prepared to undertake the activities described in Chapter 5: The Circus Comes was ready for anything. There was a pause and I assumed he’d now ask me what I’d been up to. I prepared myself to give the accurate answer, which was ‘sod all’. But he didn’t ask. He said: ‘Oh, and by the way, the garden party is themed. Nineteen thirties. We’ll be expected to dress up. That won’t be a problem, will it?’
The Sweet Second Life of Darrell Kincaid Page 18