Alik shook his head. “Come on, Billy, it's their wedding day, do you really think Nate and Poppy need this shit?”
“I didn't think anything could spoil their party,” said Billy. He nodded to the lines on the cistern. “It came from a reliable source.”
“I'm sure it did.”
“You've become so fucking straight since you hooked up with her,” said Billy. “You don't know how to have fun any more.”
“Mate, I know how to have fun.”
Billy stared him straight in the eye. “Then prove it.” He offered him the rolled up note.
Alik hesitated for a moment before accepting. It had been a long time since he'd last indulged. Once wouldn't hurt. He bent down over the cistern and swiftly inhaled one of the lines that Billy had cut, feeling the hit almost immediately. Then, with a sly wink, he leaned over again.
* * *
Alik and Billy walked out of the Gents together, laughing, the animosity between them seemingly forgotten, masked by the effects of the cocaine. Nate signalled to them and they made their way to the small platform that was doubling as a stage. Their gear was crammed into the tiny space and Dev was squeezed into one corner behind his drum kit.
“You two seem as thick as thieves,” said Nate, as he tuned up his guitar. “Made friends or something?”
“Definitely something.” Billy threw his bass strap over his head and joined Nate in the tune up.
After a few minutes, they were ready. Poppy had taken it upon herself to be the MC and encouraged as many of the guests as possible into the room.
“Ladies and gentlemen,” she said. “My wonderful husband and his equally wonderful bandmates would like to play a few songs in honour of our nuptials. They have promised to keep it clean. Or at least as clean as they can. Please give it up for Blood Stone Riot!”
Alik had decided that they would stick to covers, mostly to keep the peace. Running through a swift, pacy ten song set they played some Aerosmith, Extreme, Skid Row, old nineties favourites that many of the audience recognised.
When they got to ‘I Remember You,’ Billy tried to ad lib his piece and ended up bumping into Nate, sending the guitarist tumbling to the ground. There was an almighty screech of feedback, which caused several members of the audience to shriek.
“What the fuck are you playing at?” Alik said, as they got to their feet and tried to pick up from where they left off.
“This idiot trying to get centre stage as per usual.” Nate pushed Billy in the chest.
“I thought that was more your style,” said Billy, ducking out of the way.
Poppy jumped in and took the microphone from Alik. “Thanks guys, great set!” She turned to the crowd of guests. “If you want to shake your thing on the dance floor, the DJ will be back in five.”
The guests melted away and Poppy turned to Billy. “Thank you so much for making a scene, that's exactly how I want people to remember my wedding day.” She shoved the microphone back to Alik. “If you need me, I'll be dancing with the other children.”
Alik went to confront Billy.
“What?” Billy shrugged. “These things happen.”
“Not if you weren't trying to over play your part.”
“Oh, because I'm just the rhythm section and don't figure in the important plans for this band.” He stripped off his instrument and thrust it at Alik. “Maybe you can learn to play this as well if I'm not wanted.”
Alik and Nate exchanged a glance and watched Billy head off towards the gardens, swiping another beer from the bar as he went.
Chapter Fifty-Two
Much later, Alik and Caro were sitting outside, taking advantage of the still-warm evening and taking a breather from the general chaos inside Montgomery Hall after Blood Stone Riot's short set. There had been a mixed reaction, unsurprisingly, from the assembled guests.
Not least because of the onstage row.
“I could kill him,” Alik said. “Of all the times to fuck up like that and he has to do it on his bandmate's wedding day.”
“Yeah, but I think I know why,” Caro said. “You scored, didn't you? I can tell by your eyes. And I'll bet Billy had something to do with it.”
Alik couldn't look at her.
“Caro, I...”
He didn't have chance to say anything else. Nate came running across the lawn towards them, urgently calling Alik's name.
“Nate, what's the matter?”
“It's Billy. There's been an accident.”
Alik searched his face to see if he was joking. “What kind of accident? Is it serious?”
“We don't know. We need to get to the hospital.”
The three of them made their way to the porch, where Poppy and Lucia were waiting. Lucia had arranged for someone to pick them up, but had persuaded Poppy and Caro that they should stay at the reception. Reluctantly they agreed, on the proviso that someone kept them informed of what was happening.
Upon arrival at the hospital, Alik and Nate were directed to one of the relatives' rooms just off the main A&E waiting room and told that they would get news when there was anything to tell. The two of them sat there for what seemed like eons. There was the occasional sound of a doctor calling out for assistance or a telephone ringing, but otherwise it was horribly quiet. Neither of them spoke.
Alik flicked through one of the old magazines on the table, barely registering what was on the pages until he came to a photograph of Billy and Edie at an event. A sickening thought came into his head.
“Hey, do we know if Edie was with him?”
Abruptly, the door opened and a doctor came in, holding a clipboard. The two of them stood.
“You're the friends of Billy Walker and Edie Spencer-Newman, yes?” the doctor asked, her eyes darting between them.
They nodded mutely.
“Ms Spencer-Newman will be okay; she has a few bumps and bruises. She was, at least, wearing a seatbelt and the airbag was deployed. But mostly we are concerned about the baby, so we'll be keeping her in for a few days to monitor her condition.”
Alik and Nate stared at each other. A baby. Alik shook his head.
“Seatbelt?” he said, quietly. “You mean he drove? But he wasn't, I mean we had been...we were...” He trailed off.
“What about Billy?” Nate asked.
“I am so sorry,” said the doctor. “We did all we could for him.”
“What?” Alik's voice cracked. “What do you mean you did all you could?”
Nate moved towards him, placing a steadying hand on his arm. “Alik, Billy didn't make it through,” he said softly. “He's...”
Alik looked between Nate and the doctor. And then back again.
“I'm sorry, I can't do this.” He turned and ran from the room.
* * *
By the time Alik and Nate got back to Montgomery Hall, there were barely any guests left. Lucia was still there, manning the bar. She looked quizically at the pair as they walked in. Alik shook his head.
“Poppy and Caro are in the drawing room,” she said, pointing to the room across the hallway. “I’m sorry about your friend. Do let me know if you need anything.”
“Are you going to tell the girls or shall I?” asked Nate.
“I'll do it." Alik's stomach churned at the thought. "We need to tell Dev as well.”
“I'll call him after we've spoken to Poppy and Caro.”
They found the bride and her maid of honour curled up on the sofa, talking quietly. There was an almost empty bottle of champagne on the coffee table in front of them.
“What happened?” asked Caro.
Alik sat down on the arm of the sofa next to her. All he wanted to do was gather her in his arms and tell her that everything was fine, it would all be okay. He put a hand on her shoulder, as much to steady himself. Nate gathered Poppy in an embrace, pulling her close to him.
“Billy...” His voice cracked. He took a deep breath as he closed his eyes and tried again. “He didn't make it,” he choked.
He f
elt Caro reach for his hand, squeezing it tightly. When he looked at her, there were silent tears falling down her face.
“What about Edie? Was she with him?”
“Yes.”
“Is she...?”
Nate took over. “A few cuts and bruises. She was wearing a seat belt and the airbag deployed, which helped her.” He glanced over at Alik. “Although we did find out something else.”
“Edie's pregnant.”
Chapter Fifty-Three
Edie opened her eyes, slowly, wondering where on Earth she was. Her entire body ached. It hurt to even breathe. The sterile scent of disinfectant assaulted her nostrils, and it was all she could do not to throw up. As things began to come into focus, she realised that she was in hospital.
Then her memory returned with a vengeance. They had been at Nate and Poppy's wedding, arguing, then driving, then... The crunch of metal, the stench of petrol, everything twisted in the wrong way, Billy screaming, making sounds that Edie didn't think could be human.
She sat up suddenly, yelping as the pain coursed through her. Where was he? She had to get to him. She tried to stand up, but her legs wouldn't hold her and gave way, leaving her in a crumpled heap on the floor.
The sound of her landing was enough to send two nurses scurrying over.
“What are you doing out of bed?” one of them said. “You should call for one of us if you want something.”
“I need to see Billy,” Edie said.
The two nurses exchanged a glance, before one of them answered. “Let's get you more comfortable, shall we?” she said, helping Edie her up and getting her back into bed before tucking the blankets back around her legs. “We'll get the doctor to come and talk to you.”
“I need to see him now!”
Edie strained to listen to what the nurses were discussing as they walked away from her, but they were talking so quietly that it was impossible to hear. One of them disappeared out into the corridor. The other one stayed with Edie. As she waited, she looked around the small ward, pristine and white. All four beds were occupied; the other three by elderly women who stared vacantly into the distance, either drugged up on medication or sleeping.
A handsome dark-haired man in his early fifties, clad in a smart suit, waltzed into the ward, the nurse who had gone to fetch him trailing in his wake. He stood at the end of Edie's bed and removed the notes from the holder, scanning them briefly. He nodded at the nurse, who pulled the curtains around the bed, cordoning them off from the others.
“I'm Dr Glover,” he said, with the soft burr of a Scottish accent. “I understand that you've just woken up.”
“Yes,” said Edie. “I want to see Billy.”
“Do you know what happened to you?” he asked.
“I, I think so. We had an accident?” Little bits were coming back to her, what was on the radio as they drove, the silly things they had said to each other.
He nodded. “That's right. You were very lucky, wearing a seatbelt probably saved your life. And the baby too.”
“Baby? What baby?”
“You did know you were pregnant, didn't you? Even though it’s only a few weeks?”
She shook her head. She touched her stomach, running her hands over the gentle swell of it. She had dismissed her recent slight weight gain and recent bloating as water retention. She had no cravings, her periods had always been irregular anyway, although she hadn't been so careful about taking her pill lately. “Does Billy know about the baby?”
Dr Glover sighed gently.
“Edie, I'm so sorry to have to tell you this, but Billy didn't survive the crash. His injuries were just too severe and he'd lost a lot of blood. We tried to revive him, but I'm afraid we couldn't.”
Edie was silent, until tears fell down her cheeks and she began to sob.
* * *
“Visitor for you, a lovely young gentleman.” One of the more cheerful nurses, a round, middle-aged lady with apple pink cheeks, breezed in with yet another jug of fresh water and set it down on the pedestal beside Edie's bed. She cleared away the untouched afternoon tea tray and bustled away without passing comment on this occasion - she was always going on at Edie to eat. Especially for the baby's sake.
Three days in hospital and Edie was slowly going out of her mind. Initially devastated at losing Billy, her grief had turned to anger, and she pushed away anyone that came to see her. Not that many people had. She found that being stuck in a four-bed ward with three elderly women alternately coughing and snoring was driving her mad. She kept begging to be moved to a private room, but she had been told there wasn’t one available. She had already read all of the magazines in the hospital shop. She broke down every time she saw a picture of her and Billy, and she didn't have a phone or an iPad to entertain her because Olivia hadn’t yet come in with some of her own things to make her stay more bearable. The nurses were encouraging her to get out of bed and move around or take walks around the unit, but it either hurt too much or, realistically, she couldn't actually be bothered. She spent a lot of time curled up in the foetal position, turned away from everyone, staring at the wall, clutching her stomach, protecting her baby and wondering how everything had all got so messed up.
With an effort, she turned around and opened her eyes, and was stunned to see Alik.
“I guess you were the last person I expected to see,” she said. “What are you doing here?”
“I...we wanted to see how you were.” Alik hovered between the doorway and the bed, his eyes darting to the other women in the room.
“It's okay, they usually take a nap around this time, they're not dead,” Edie said, as she propped herself up against the pillows. “Otherwise they'd be rather excited to see a nice young man.”
Alik looked Edie directly in the eye as he sat down on the chair beside her bed. “We need to talk about something,” he said. “The baby.”
Edie felt sick. “How do you know?”
“The doctor told us the night you were brought in. Did Billy know? Is that why you were arguing?”
Edie didn’t reply straight away, remembering what the doctor had told her about how far along she might be. “Alik, the baby's yours,” she said.
The words hung in the air.
“What are we going to do?”
“I don't know.”
They sat in silence for a few moments, each lost in their own thoughts.
* * *
Caro waited for the break in conversation and forced a smile as she waltzed into the room in. She dropped a perfunctory kiss on Edie's cheek and placed the bag she was carrying on the bed.
“We thought you could do with some of your home comforts,” she said. It was a strange enough situation being nice to Edie in any case, let alone after hearing that she was carrying Alik’s child. “I asked Olivia to go over to your flat and pick out some decent clothes, as well as get your iPad and a couple of good, trashy novels, as you've probably run out of things to read. She said she'd come in later, but was going over to The Magpie first to check that everything was okay.”
“I take back what I said earlier,” said Edie. “Caro is definitely the last person I expected to come and visit me. Thanks for bringing my stuff in, but I think I'd prefer it if you left now.” She turned her back on the couple.
Alik shrugged. “If that's what you want.”
“You said Olivia was coming in later, that's fine, but I'd like to be left alone now.”
Alik reached for Caro's hand as they left the ward, but she pulled away.
“What are you going to do about the baby?” she asked, without looking at him.
“You heard us? I'm sorry, Caro.”
“Being a new parent will be tough if you’re trying to juggle gigs and tours,” she said.
“There won't be much of that anyway as the best bassist I've ever known has just been killed in a fucking car crash,” he said. “There might not even be a band anymore. I have no fucking idea what’s going to happen now.”
Caro stopped
and turned to look at him. He’d had a haunted look about him since the accident. Her heart contracted as she realised what he meant to her, and how much she loved him.
“I have to go,” she said. “I need some space.”
“You can't, we have to talk about this.”
“What is there to talk about? Until you know what you're going to do, there's no point.”
“Caro, please...”
She was already walking away from him, hurrying down the hospital corridor, her eyes glittering with unshed tears. “I can't do this, Alik, not now.” She ran. “I'm sorry.”
The nausea that had been held at bay by her anger took hold as she burst through the exit and out into the fresh air. She leaned against the wall and tried to breathe steadily. She inhaled deeply and bent over as she retched.
Chapter Fifty-Four
Alik fell into a routine over the next few days. He would spend the morning playing guitar or writing lyrics and would then go and see Edie in the afternoon. The creativity helped him to stop dwelling on the loss of Billy, and the thought of the baby gave him some sense of purpose. Caro was spending more and more time at the club, citing staff issues, but he was convinced that she was avoiding him. Or at least avoiding the situation. He still didn't really know how she felt about the baby and the tie that he now had to Edie. They hadn't discussed it at any length. And he wasn't brave enough just yet to address it.
He scribbled down some words that seemed appropriate for the song he was working on about Billy and their friendship. It was tentatively titled ‘The Lost Boy’. He stopped for a moment, remembering the last time he'd seen Billy. He gave a deep sigh as he looked at the words again, knowing he also had to write something for the funeral. Billy's parents had asked if he would do a eulogy. He started to scrawl a suitable tribute on a clean sheet of paper.
Needing a distraction, he texted Edie to see if she wanted anything and she immediately responded with a list of magazines. He smiled to himself. While still being her usual high-maintenance, demanding self, she was actually being quite nice. Glancing up, he saw it was time to head over to the hospital.
Cocktails, Rock Tales & Betrayals Page 22