by Jodi Taylor
I wiped my eyes. ‘Tell you later. Did you want me?’
‘Yes. Have you got a minute?’
I got up to go and paused. It would have taken a better woman than me to resist the temptation.
‘Leon, how tall are you?’
‘Five foot ten inches.’
What can you say?
We sat outside at one of the tables overlooking the gardens. The sun shone. Birds sang. In a few minutes, they’d start the institutionally approved violence known as football, when the Technical and Security sections relieved the week’s tensions by kicking the living shit out of each other in the name of sport. But just at the moment, all was peace and tranquillity.
We sat in the warm sunshine for a while and then he said, ‘I think the time has come to talk.’
I nodded. It had. I looked at him. He was wearing the old jeans and sweater from when the Time Police had first turned up and disrupted our lives. I was in historian blues. I wondered if that meant anything.
‘I think we need to talk about what we want to do. If you like, I’ll go first.’
I nodded again.
He reached over and took my hand. Right in front of anyone who cared to look. He turned to look at me and his blue eyes were very bright.
‘If there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that this is too important to mess about with. We’re too important. So no more of this, Max. I’m going to say what I want. Then you can do the same. Then we’ll talk about how to achieve it. We’ll talk honestly and say the things we really feel. All right?’
I nodded again.
‘Here goes, then. I don’t care. I don’t care whether we live here at St Mary’s, or whether we go back to Rushford. I really don’t care. So long as I’m with you, I’ll live in a box in Tesco’s car park, if that’s what you want. I’ve learned that happiness is too fragile and fleeting to be messed around with. You have to grab it while you can. So, you say what you want to do and I’ll happily go along with it. Just so long as you want to do it with me.’
I looked at his battered hand holding mine. I thought about life here at St Mary’s. A unit to put back together again. I thought about Peterson and Markham and Guthrie. I thought about the noise, the arguments, the solid feeling of good friends. I thought about how I felt every time the pod door opened and I stepped out into the unknown.
Then I thought about his little flat. I thought about sitting at the kitchen table, watching him cook while I sipped wine and just enjoyed being with him. I thought about the paintings I could produce. I thought about all the pictures in my head that might never see the light of day if I stayed here. I thought about staying in bed with him on Sunday mornings, reading the papers and getting toast crumbs everywhere. I thought about waking up every morning and he would be there, beside me, smiling.
I looked across at the football pitch and the battle lines being drawn up there. ‘I don’t mind, either. I just want to be with you. But happiness is like grains of sand. The more tightly you clench your fist, the more it just slips through your fingers. I think that if we just come to rest somewhere and wait quietly, then one day we’ll look up and it’ll be there. So, like you, I don’t care. Whatever you want to do, I’ll do it with you.’
‘Well, we’re a hopeless pair, aren’t we? It looks as if I’m going to have to deploy the decision-making apparatus again.’
He delved in his pocket, pulling out half a crown.
‘Heads we stay. Tails we go.’
‘Fine with me.’
He tossed the coin. I watched it fly up into the air, catching the light as it spun. He caught it neatly, slapped it down on the table. We both leaned forwards to look. And then we both leaned back.
‘Well,’ he said, reaching for his coffee. ‘That’s that sorted.’
THE END
Published by Accent Press Ltd 2014
ISBN: 9781783752836
Copyright © Jodi Taylor 2014
The right of Jodi Taylor to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
The story contained within this book is a work of fiction. Names and characters are the product of the author’s imagination and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, electrostatic, magnetic tape, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the written permission of the publishers: Accent Press Ltd, Ty Cynon House, Navigation Park, Abercynon, CF45 4SN
The Chronicles of St Mary’s Series
by Jodi Taylor
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