by JL Merrow
Robin thought back to the photo shoot and tried to imagine himself lasting six hours sleeping rough. He failed. “But what did you do for money?”
“Oh, you get by.”
It was annoyingly vague, and could have encompassed anything from begging for change to dealing in crack cocaine. Still, it didn’t seem polite to push it, pun not intended.
And it wouldn’t be polite to outstay his welcome, either. Robin could have kicked himself. They’d been having a great time, and then he’d had to go and ruin it by turning the conversation from fun and games onto all these heavy topics like homelessness, protest rallies, and naked mothers.
“I probably ought to be going,” he said, the words dragged out of him like drawn teeth, although thankfully with less bloodshed. The pain was about the same, though.
Archie started. “What? Uh, tell you what, how about another cup of tea for the road? No duelling involved, I promise.”
“Um . . .”
“Come on. You hardly got to drink any of the last cup. I’ll go put the kettle on.” Archie leapt up and headed for the kitchen without waiting for an answer.
Robin’s heart flipped. And then it flopped. Archie was just being hospitable.
Wasn’t he?
Archie filled the kettle feeling like he had that time he’d been working on his outfits all night before the first day of Asylum, adding finishing touches to gadgets and the last coat of Rub ’n Buff to his Nerf gun, and downing Red Bull by the bucketload to stay awake. Hyperaware, but light-headed all the same. As though he’d been chugging gin and taken a dare to try walking a tightrope.
Robin was here, in his house. And he was adorable. Archie could totally see why he’d thought him so much younger than he really was—there was an air of innocence, of naivety about him. But underneath it there was a deeply caring heart, and a sly sense of humour that only dared to poke its head over the parapet every now and again, as if worried it’d get shot down if it got too obtrusive.
He’d forgotten to bring their used mugs out with him, so Archie grabbed a couple of clean ones from the cupboard. Had it been those parents of his that’d made Robin so wary of showing his true self? There hadn’t been a lot of smiles over at their table in the Ploughman, had there? Robin’s mum had had a sour look on her face every time he’d seen her, while his dad had mostly seemed to ignore the rest of them altogether. It made Archie wonder why they’d even bothered to go out for a family meal. Maybe they had different ways of showing they cared?
Or maybe they didn’t, given how Robin had blossomed under Archie’s attention this afternoon.
He still couldn’t work Robin out. He’d seemed really into the tea duelling, and it’d been beyond awesome to find he was willing to give the steampunk stuff a go. Archie hoped he hadn’t overdone it. Robin had backed right off when he’d suggested a second game, so did that mean he’d just played along for politeness, earlier?
The kettle boiled, and he hastily grabbed a couple of teabags and slung them into the mugs. Hopefully Robin would be okay with blackcurrant again. Of course, he probably wouldn’t say even if he wasn’t. Archie could see that mum of his being a stickler for manners. She was that generation.
He gave the teabags a good stir and a squeeze in the hot water. Robin had heard what Archie hadn’t said about his and Lyddie’s past, he was pretty sure. Funny—it’d been ages since Archie had talked about that stuff. He wasn’t ashamed of any of it, but other people always seemed to get embarrassed if it ever came up, so he’d mostly kept quiet.
Robin hadn’t been embarrassed. He’d been interested—had seemed to really care about what Archie had gone through. Enough that Archie had found himself glossing over the details, because that part of his life was over and he’d survived it, so there was no sense anyone else getting worked up about it now.
Biscuits. Robin might fancy another biscuit—one that hadn’t gone all soggy, and that he actually got to eat. Or more cake, maybe? That was still in the living room with Robin—if he hadn’t got fed up waiting and snuck out already. Time to get a move on. Archie carried the mugs back into the living room.
Robin—still there—looked up from his phone and smiled.
His heart doing weird things inside his chest, Archie opened his mouth to offer him some cake, but was interrupted by a knock at the door.
Damn it, was it that late already? Archie glanced out of the window at the pitch-dark. Yes, it probably was. Where had the time gone? “That’ll be Bridge, with Jerrick,” he said with an apologetic grimace in Robin’s direction.
Was she going to react badly to seeing Robin here? Even though it was all totally innocent? Yeah, you just keep telling yourself that.
He told himself not to look guilty as he opened the door. “Hey, Bridge. How’s my little lad today?”
“Pukey.” Bridge’s tone was flat.
Archie gave her a closer inspection as he took the car seat from her. Jerrick was sleeping and didn’t stir. “Bad night last night?”
“Yeah. Gave him the world’s smallest bit of cabbage yesterday, cos we were having bubble and squeak. Won’t be trying that again till he’s old enough to wipe his own bum. And you wouldn’t believe the farts.” She snorted. “Course, some of them were Dad.”
“Something to look forward to tonight, then? From Jerrick, that is. Unless you’re so sick of it you’ll be sending your dad over as well?”
“Should be okay tonight. Little man had carrots for his tea, so it’s just the orange puke to watch out for. The rest of us are supposed to be having toad in the hole when I get back.” She rolled her eyes at Archie’s grimace. “Mum thought it’d be fun to try out all these old-fashioned British meals. She says since I’m into retro fashion, I ought to be into retro food. All I can say is, if women in the forties and fifties were scoffing down sausages in batter every other night, there’s no way they’d have fitted into those dresses. Is your mum in? I thought I’d say hi.”
“Er, yeah. Think so. Come in.” Archie led the way with Jerrick into the living room, where Robin was examining the campaign stuff. He seemed to be really interested in it. Archie hoped he wouldn’t want to join in, though. For Lyddie’s sake, he reckoned it’d be better if it stayed fairly low-key, maybe even fizzled out before the Black Friday demo got a chance to take place.
“Oh,” came from behind him. This time, Bridge’s tone could have been used as a spirit level. In more ways than one. “I didn’t realise you had company.”
“Er, yeah. Robin just popped round for a friendly visit. Robin, you remember Bridge, Jerrick’s mum, right?” Archie put Jerrick’s car seat carefully down on the floor, so as not to wake him.
Robin had jumped up when they’d entered. He wiped his hands on his trousers, and Archie could see him climbing back into his polite-yet-reserved shell. “Oh—hi. Nice to, um, see you again.” He gave an awkward wave.
“Nice to see you too, Robin,” Bridge said with a saccharine smile, and then turned to Archie. “Better give you this, hadn’t I?”
Archie winced as she thrust Jerrick’s rucksack into his stomach.
“You, er, like working at the chip shop, Bridge?” Robin persevered, and Archie kind of loved him a bit for it.
“It’s a job. Don’t recall seeing you in there much. Until recently.”
“I was trying to eat a bit more healthily,” Robin said with a nervous laugh. “Um, not that chips are bad. I mean, I love them, really.”
She gave him a very obvious once-over. “Yeah? You don’t look like it. There’s nothing of you.”
“I’m, um, I’m on my feet a lot at work.” An odd expression crossed Robin’s face. “That is, we’re, er, we’re trialling standing desks.”
“Robin’s an accountant,” Archie explained.
“Someone worked hard at school, then.” Was Bridge making a subtle dig at Archie’s lack of qualifications there, or was he just imagining it? “Bet you’ve got a degree and all.”
Robin had the wide-eyed stare of a rabbit
facing down a tank regiment, which seemed a bit over the top seeing as she was being perfectly nice to him. “Er, yes. Music. From Reading. You?” His voice cracked on the last word.
“Never was all that academic. One thing me and Archie have in common.” She sent Archie a mulish glare.
No, he hadn’t been imagining things. “I’ll give Lyddie a shout, okay?” he said, fed up with this.
“Actually, I really should be going.” Robin made a beeline for the door. “It’s been great. Tell your mum thanks for inviting me in, please? I’ll see you. Bye.”
He was gone so quickly, Archie had only just opened his mouth to say goodbye when the front door closed.
Their untouched cups of tea sat forlornly on the floor by the sofa where Archie had left them.
“You didn’t say it was your mum who invited him.” Bridge still looked mulish, but like a mule that was starting to realise it might not actually have its hooves on the moral high ground here.
“Yeah. I think they got talking or something. I wasn’t even in at the time.”
“Oh.”
“Yeah, oh. So no, I haven’t been lying to you about going out with the bloke, okay? Because I could tell that was what you were thinking.” Archie folded his arms just as she unfolded hers, as though they were doing some kind of improv comedy skit.
Bridge sat down heavily on the sofa. “Well, what was I supposed to think? I walk in here, and there he is, looking ten times fitter than he did last Sunday.”
Archie’s heart skipped. “You think he’s fit?”
“Er. I said fitter.” She gave a weak smile. “At least he wasn’t looking like his mum dressed him today. But he seems a bit . . .”
“Too intelligent for me? You made that pretty clear, thanks.”
“Oi, it’s not like I’ve got more than a couple of GCSEs to rub together, either. That’s not intelligence, though, getting degrees and stuff. That’s book learning.”
“I read books.”
“Yeah. You do, don’t you?” She gave an unhappy little laugh. “S’pose you’d never have been with me at all if your life had gone different. Do you really like him?”
Yes. “I hardly know him,” Archie said instead, because it was more tactful and also, as he needed to remind himself, true. “And don’t do yourself down, okay?” He gave her a hug.
“Lyddie obviously likes him,” Bridge persisted.
“Yeah, but you know what Lyddie’s like.”
“What am I like?” Lyddie asked, padding into the room on bare feet.
Archie smiled. “Friendly.” He wondered how long she’d been standing out in the hall.
“Oh, yeah, can’t argue with that. You’ve gotta get on with people, haven’t you? Live and let live. Unless they’re a bastard. Oh, hello, Bridge, love. You all right?”
Bridge jumped up to give her a hug. “I’m fine. Knackered, though. Don’t know how I’m going to manage this exercise class tonight. Which, speaking of, it’s high time I buggered off. We’ll have a chat when I get back, yeah?”
“Love us and leave us,” Lyddie said vaguely, looking around.
“I’ll see you in a couple of hours, maybe a bit less, okay?”
“Have fun,” Archie told her.
“Like that’s gonna happen.”
Archie grinned at her sour expression. “You never know, you might enjoy it.”
She made a rude gesture, glanced over at Jerrick, who was luckily still sleeping soundly, and left.
“She’s a lovely girl, bless her,” Lyddie said. “Where’s Robin got to? I was going to ask him to stay to dinner.”
“He had to leave,” Archie said. “Look, be careful what you say about him to Bridge.”
“Why?”
“She’s got the idea I want to go out with him.”
“But you do.” Lyddie said it as if it was a simple, incontrovertible fact. Archie’s gut twisted. He did . . . Oh, God, he did.
Then she frowned, and her tone sharpened. “What’s it got to do with her who you go out with now, anyway? Archie, love, is there something you’re not telling me? Are you and Bridge—”
“No! That’s not it. She’s not jealous. She’s just feeling a bit down right now. Vulnerable. And protective of Jerrick. Don’t be hard on her.” The last thing they needed was Lyddie turning against Bridge. He hesitated. “When you had me, did you start feeling different about your life?”
“Oh, everything. Makes you grow up, doesn’t it? Having kids. There’s this tiny person and you’re their whole world, and they’re yours.” Lyddie was smiling. “I fell in love with you the first time I saw you, did I ever tell you that? You with your wrinkled-up face and your little starfish hands. I couldn’t believe you’d come out of me. You changed my life.”
“You’re the best mum ever, you know that?” Archie gave her a fierce hug. “So how long was it before you started thinking about blokes again after I was born?”
“I don’t know. Months. Years? Course, just cos I wasn’t thinking about them didn’t mean they weren’t thinking about me. That’s blokes for you.”
“So how old was I when you started going out with them again?”
“You were the most gorgeous baby. Always smiling, you were. Everyone loved you. They all said it was like you’d got everything from me and nothing from your father. Shouldn’t we be getting some dinner on? It must be dinnertime by now.”
Archie fought down the familiar sharp ache in his chest he always got when Lyddie was evasive about her past, and smiled at her. “Yeah, let’s see what’s in the fridge. Did you have something for lunch while I was out?”
“Oh, I ’spect so. I think I’d be hungrier now if I hadn’t. Oh—I never asked you how it went. Your thing today.”
“It wasn’t a thing. I was just covering for Steve. He had a family wedding to go to. Yeah, I know, a bit late in the year.”
“I always wanted a winter wedding. Lots of lush velvet in the snow.”
“Snow, in Hertfordshire? You could be waiting years for that. And I thought you didn’t want to get married.”
“Doesn’t have to be my wedding, does it? Could be yours.” She giggled. “You and little Robin Redbreast. Getting hitched in Hitchworth in the snow. I could wear one of Charlie’s old fur coats.”
Archie laughed. “You would too, wouldn’t you? Looking like you’d been eaten by a bear, and smelling like a taxidermist’s dustbin. Sorry to break it to you, but I’m not marrying Robin. We’re not even going out together.”
“Course not, love. So when are you seeing him again?”
“I’m not. I . . .” Realisation made his heart sink. “Christ, I never got his number.”
“Archie, love.” Lyddie’s tone was reproachful. “What were you doing all that time, then?”
“Tea duelling.” Archie knew he was flushing. “He’d never done it before.”
“Hm. Not going to get a lot of chance to do it again, either, is he? If you’re not seeing him again. Which you said you weren’t.”
No. No, he wasn’t, and the thought made Archie sadder than he could have imagined. “Maybe I’ll bump into him sometime,” he said, mostly to comfort himself. “He only lives over in Wells Street.”
Lyddie seemed to perk up at that. “Oh, in those flats? Poor love. Still, he’s young. You can live anywhere when you’re young.”
Archie huffed under his breath, feeling a weird mix of amusement and remembered pain. Yeah, you really could.
Robin wasn’t sure what to think. He racked his brain to work it out as he walked home from Archie’s house, but all that happened was that he nearly got run over twice when crossing the road without due care and attention.
They’d been getting on so well. And then she’d turned up, like the ex from Hell. Exactly like, because she was the ex from Hell. Robin hadn’t missed those barbs she’d kept sending in Archie’s direction. She probably kept a forked tail under all those poofy skirts. And a trident in Jerrick’s nappy bag. Or was it Neptune who had one of those?
Hitchworth Comprehensive, he couldn’t help thinking, had let him down badly on this sort of stuff.
Except . . . did anyone actually enjoy bumping into their ex with the new boyfriend? Robin was pretty sure he’d find it hard to be nice to Ethan and whoever he was currently banging, should he ever have the misfortune to encounter them. Having a baby together . . . Well, Robin didn’t have any relevant experience to draw on, but he had a fair idea it was unlikely to make things better. It couldn’t be easy, the prospect of someone you didn’t know from Adam spending time around your little baby just because he and your ex fancied each other, could it? If he was rubbish with kids, you’d worry about the baby hating him. And if he was fantastic with kids, you’d worry about the baby loving him too much and getting hurt if that relationship broke up too.
And if Robin dug deep down inside himself, he’d have to admit he was . . . not jealous, exactly, but possibly a little bit threatened by Bridge. She was good-looking, confident, and the mother of Archie’s son. What did Robin have to offer in comparison to that?
Not, of course, that he was in a position to be offering Archie anything right now. Archie had made that pretty clear with his friendly visit.
There were obviously some complicated emotions going on in Archie and Bridge’s relationship, even if it was a platonic one these days. Baggage. Most likely all kinds of subtle—or not so subtle—pressure from family or friends for them to get back together. Well, perhaps not from Lyddie, but from everyone else, probably.
He was better off out of that. In any case, Archie was a man with a baby, and what did Robin know about kids? He’d end up giving the poor boy a neurosis. After all, he had so many of his own to choose from.
Robin sighed, and climbed the weary stairs to his flat.
Probably the last thing Robin expected to see Sunday morning when heading down to the corner shop was Lyddie, sitting on a wall. She was bundled up in an old man’s overcoat that was comically too big for her, but at least she had shoes on today. Well, boots. They’d quite possibly had the same original owner as the coat, and she’d teamed them with thick woolly socks that looked like they’d been made from an actual sheep. The whole sheep.