“You left the oven on, remember,” Max said. Then he smiled at Emily. “She left the oven on. The lasagna’s probably burned.”
“Probably,” Emily agreed.
“Well, I can always make another one,” I said quickly, forcing a bright smile. “So, look, darling, is there anything I can do?”
“Actually,” Emily said, “it’s quite late, and visiting hours are over. It’s best if you come back tomorrow.”
“Best,” Max echoed.
“Oh,” I said uncertainly. “Oh, right. Well, if you’re sure, Max?”
Max looked at me vaguely, then smiled again. “Remember to turn the oven off. Don’t want the apartment burning down on top of everything else.”
“No,” I said, wondering how our perfect evening had ended up so crappily. “No, we wouldn’t want that.”
Chapter 8
VISITING HOURS, I LEARNED BEFORE leaving the hospital, started at 10:00 A.M., after the doctors had done their rounds. The following day, at 10:01 A.M., I stepped through the door to Max’s room, clutching a large bouquet of flowers courtesy of Giles, a newspaper, a latte with one sugar, and a croissant. Breaking Max’s leg had not exactly been part of the whole being-perfect plan, but it was, I told myself, just a minor setback, an opportunity to demonstrate my ability to not bother him with anything, to listen to him, to be supportive. I was going to be a pillar of strength, I’d decided. I was going to ensure that Max didn’t have to worry about a thing while he was in the hospital. It would be the holiday he kept promising he’d take and never did—we didn’t even take a honeymoon. Who knows, he might get a taste for leisure, I found myself thinking. Maybe I’d get him away for a proper holiday when he was better.
Max took the coffee gratefully and watched as I arranged the flowers on the little cabinet to the side of his bed.
“They’re saying a week,” he said grimly.
“Yeah,” I said, turning to give him a kiss. “The doctor said that last night.”
“A week. I can’t be here for a week. I can’t.”
“Max,” I chided, “don’t worry. It’ll be okay. I’m going to look after everything for you.”
“Jess, do you know what looking after everything entails?” Max asked.
“Yes,” I said quickly. “I mean, no, not really. But I’ll check with you before making any decisions. Come on, chief execs go on holiday and companies don’t all grind to a halt. I don’t expect Jarvis Private Banking is falling apart because Chester’s gone to the States.”
“Chester’s business isn’t in the fragile state we’re in,” Max said flatly.
“Fragile? We’re not that fragile, are we?” I asked, frowning.
Max looked away. “We’re okay,” he said. “I just can’t be away. Not for a week. Salaries go out this week. The audit’s starting. We’ve got two important pitches. I simply cannot be laid up in the hospital. It isn’t an option.”
“It is an option,” I said impatiently, then checked myself because the ideal wife would be understanding, not impatient. “Look, I do know why you’re worrying, but let it go. You don’t have a choice, so enjoy it.”
“Enjoy it,” Max said tersely. “Enjoy being in agony? Enjoy being stuck here, unable to work?” He looked at me, then let out a long breath. “This is just a really bad time.”
“I know,” I said quietly. “And I know it’s my fault.”
Max shook his head. “I didn’t mean that. I don’t blame you. I wish it hadn’t happened, that’s all. I appreciate your help, but I need to be there. We’ve got some big invoices to pay next week, and I need to keep on top of cash flow, make sure we’ve got the funds to pay. We’re still chasing payment from Anix for the campaign we did last month, and without it we could be in trouble for a week or two until Jarvis’s monthly payment lands.”
“So I’ll loan the company some money in the short term,” I said exasperatedly.
“No,” Max said immediately. He looked at me irritably. “Sometimes I wonder if that money has made you forget what the real world is like. I don’t want a short-term loan; I want to manage my business.”
“I’m sorry.” I stared at him, bewildered. “I know exactly what the real world is like. I only meant that—”
“I know what you meant,” Max interjected. “And I’m sorry. I didn’t mean that. My leg hurts and … I didn’t mean it. Forget I said it. Just …”
“Just what?” I asked uncomfortably.
Max sighed. “Look, Jess, we’re really leveraged up at the moment. We took on more staff to service Chester’s Internet bank account, which is fine but only if we keep on top of everything. Only if nothing goes wrong.”
“Nothing’s going to go wrong,” I said.
“The audit,” Max replied. “Chester’s little ethical audit. That can’t go wrong. I know Chester is virtually family now, but he’s still a client and a crucial one. We can’t afford to make any mistakes, okay?”
I nodded firmly. “Okay,” I said. “I’ll make sure it goes perfectly. I promise.”
“Thanks, Jess,” Max said, managing a half smile.
I smiled back. “So, look, here’s a newspaper. And a croissant.”
“You’re a star,” Max said, as I placed them on the small table in front of him. “Have you heard from Chester?”
“Since last night?” I raised an eyebrow. “No, Max. It’s the weekend, remember?”
“Right. Of course. I feel like I’ve been here longer than one night. Right. Good.” He looked at me quizzically. “You’re really going to run things for me while I’m here?”
“Absolutely,” I said with confidence. “You tell me what to do and I’ll do it. I don’t want you worrying about a thing. Now, can I fluff up your pillows? Adjust the volume on your television?”
Max smiled wryly. “I haven’t watched it, to be honest. They don’t have the news channel.”
“There are other channels,” I pointed out.
“Other channels worth watching?” Max asked. His jaw was clenched, and I noticed him gripping the newspaper rather too tightly.
“Max,” I said, concerned. “Max, are you—”
“Ah, here we are. Sorry I’m a bit late. Got delayed by the last patient having a bit of a hissy fit. Oh, hello!”
It was Emily. I smiled brightly. “Hi! How are you?”
She didn’t reply; instead, she went straight to Max with a syringe. “Roll over. That’s right. Just a little scratch and … there we are.”
Max let out a huge sigh, and Emily smiled at me. “Pain relief,” she said. “Poor Maxy should have had that half an hour ago.”
“Maxy?” I asked, a rather frozen smile on my face.
“He’s lovely, isn’t he? Such a poppet.”
I cleared my throat. I could think of many words to describe Max: energetic, dynamic, serious, substantial, honorable, generous, funny, intense. But a poppet? Was she kidding?
“So, look,” I said, turning back to Max. “Is your schedule for next week emailable? Anything you want to talk me through?”
“Talk you through?” Max said goofily. “I can talk you through it. Talk you through it all. Lots of meetings. Yes, meetings and other things.”
“Other things?” I asked.
“Other things,” Max confirmed, grinning at Emily. “My wife doesn’t want me to worry about a thing,” he said.
“Very sensible,” Emily said.
“I’m guessing the pain relief has kicked in?” I asked her.
She smiled. “It’s pretty quick when it’s injected.” Then she turned back to Max. “Maxy, shall we put the television on?”
“I tried that.” I rolled my eyes. “He only wants the news channel, and you don’t have it here.”
“Television?” Max’s eyes lit up. “Yes. I think television is a good idea. Don’t you, Jess? You don’t want me to worry about a thing, do you?”
“No, darling,” I said, watching disconcertedly as Emily flicked on his bedside TV and received a rapturous smile fro
m Max for doing so. “Not a single thing.”
The city soup kitchen was about a twenty-minute walk away from the offices of Milton Advertising. It was an uninspiring gray building that had been built as a municipal center in the 1970s and had apparently been neglected since then.
“Although, of course, we don’t call ourselves a soup kitchen,” intoned Christina, the woman who ran the place, as she showed me around.
“You don’t?” I asked curiously.
“No,” she said, smiling and shaking her head. “We prefer to call ourselves a resource center. The people who come here call us RES.”
“RES?”
“Rest and Eat in Safety,” she explained. “They’re all equally important. Soup is just a small part of what we offer. And most days it isn’t even soup. Do you cook?”
I smiled weakly. “Um, sort of. I mean, I’ve taken a class, but I’m not really—”
“You’ve taken a class? Oh well, you’re streets ahead of the rest of us. So, this is the kitchen.”
She led me into a tiny dark back room and switched on the lights; immediately I was hit by the glare of stainless steel and aluminum. It smelled like a school canteen, but there was barely room to swing a cat, let alone cook for large numbers. “We try to be inventive with the food. Stretch the budget, you know. It’s vegetables that cost the most, but sometimes the local supermarkets give us the stuff they’re about to chuck out. It’s a terrible waste, you know, and we can make good use of it.”
“Absolutely,” I agreed.
“This is the living area. A lot of people come here during the day for some peace and quiet or to get out of the cold in the winter.” I looked around the room she’d led me to—this one had a different smell, one I vaguely recognized as the musty scent of the unwashed. It was laid out a bit like a doctor’s waiting room, with chairs along the wall and a few sofas in the middle, and there were about fifteen men and women crammed into it—reading, playing cards, or sitting silently on their own. One woman stared at me, her eyes hostile. She was wearing several layers of clothing, and her feet were bulbous, squeezed into a pair of sandals. As I walked toward her, she bristled visibly, then stood up and held out her arms as though to fend me off.
“That’s Greta,” Christina said with a smile. “She likes to be left alone. Hello, Greta!”
Greta muttered something under her breath and sat down again.
“And this”—Christina opened another door—“is the resting room. If you can just look through the door, we won’t disturb anyone.”
I squeezed past her to peek inside—the room had mattresses on the floor, on which people were curled up to sleep; a loud snore could be heard from the far corner. “If you sleep on the street,” Christina said, “there’s always a chance someone will steal from you. You’re very vulnerable. Here, people can sleep in peace. Apart from Alan’s snoring, of course.”
She smiled again. “Now, why don’t we go to my office?”
I followed her back through the living room to a door past the kitchen. Inside, there was barely enough room to sit down; Christina’s desk was piled high with paperwork, and every other surface was covered in stacks of paper and books.
“Do excuse the mess,” she said with a little shrug. “I keep meaning to tidy up, but the problem is that there’s nowhere to put anything. I need a bigger office, really, but we’re so tight for space as it is.”
“You couldn’t move somewhere bigger?” I asked.
Christina laughed. “Oh, we could. If we could raise a ridiculously large sum of money. Do you know how much property costs around here? No, I’m afraid it’s impossible.”
I persisted. “What about if you got some of the big banks around here to help out?”
“Funnily enough, we did,” she said with a sigh. “Two years ago we came close to securing a large sum of money from one of the big banks. Enough to buy somewhere twice the size of this place. But then the credit crunch happened and, well, you know the rest. Still, this place is fine for our purposes. We’re very lucky to have it. You know it was going to be demolished? Fortunately it’s in a conservation area and no property developer could get permission to build anything else. So it hung around empty for a few years, and then we came along and the council sold it to us for virtually nothing on the proviso that we maintain the building. But I digress. Now, let me just find your email. Here we are. So, Jessica Wild Wainwright. You want to help us?”
I nodded firmly. “Yes, that’s right.”
“Well, that’s great,” Christina said happily. “We can always use more hands on deck. You cook, you say?”
I bit my lip. “Not really.”
“But you’ve done a class?”
“I did a class because I wanted to cook my husband a meal. You know, one that didn’t involve opening a packet and putting it in the microwave. Only …”
I looked down.
“Only?” Christina prompted me.
“I wasn’t very good. The instructor ended up cooking most of the meal for me.”
“Ah,” Christina said sagely. “Still, I’m sure your husband appreciated the sentiment.”
“He broke his leg, actually,” I said, pulling a face.
“The food was that bad?” Her eyebrows shot up. “I’ve never heard of food attacking limbs like that.”
I giggled. “He didn’t even get to eat the food. He broke his leg before we got round to that. I was … well …” I went red, mentally kicking myself for bringing up the episode at all.
“You were treating your husband, were you?” Christina evidently understood exactly what we’d been doing. “Was it his birthday?”
I shook my head. “No. I just, you know, wanted to be a better wife, to be a better person generally. That’s kind of why I’m here.”
“I see,” Christina said seriously. “Well, let’s see what you can offer. I’ll say no to cooking, shall I? What about DIY? Putting up shelves, changing plugs, that sort of thing?”
I grimaced. Helen and I had once tried to put some shelves up in the kitchen; we’d managed to fix them to the wall, put all our cooking equipment on them, and two minutes later they’d fallen down again. “I’m probably not the most handy person around,” I confessed. “I’m willing to try, but …”
“But you may not be able to meet the stringent health and safety measures?” Christina asked. “Okay, then. What can you do?”
I took a deep breath. I’d already had an idea of what I could do, how I could really help. “Well, actually,” I said, leaning in toward her, “I work in advertising. I help to leverage brands to build awareness in the marketplace and embed them in the public consciousness.”
“Gosh,” Christina said. “Well, I’m not sure we have any brand to leverage, but—”
“You do,” I cut in. “And I was thinking that maybe I could help you build that brand to raise funds. For the new premises you need.”
Christina frowned. “I’m sorry?”
“Strategic partnerships,” I said seriously. “Your brand offers a warm, fuzzy good feeling. Financial institutions love that stuff. One of our clients, for instance, is Jarvis Private Banking. A partnership would give you money and make them look good for helping out.”
Christina looked at me uncertainly. “That’s very nice, but I think we prefer not to have strategic … partnerships, was it? The thing is, we’re a small charity and we like to do things our own way.”
“But you could!” I enthused. “I mean, there might be a photo shoot or something to publicize the partnership, maybe a press conference, but that would be great for you, as well. Publicity’s great for raising funds, right?”
“It can be,” Christina said tentatively, “but—”
“But what?” I asked excitedly. “Look, I could really make a difference here. We leverage the great stuff you’re doing and turn it into an irresistible offering.”
Christina took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. “Jessica,” she said, looking at me warmly. “I can see that
you’re brimming with ideas. And I’m sure that you’re a wonderful advertising professional. But what we’re about here is providing a place of refuge for the homeless, somewhere they can come without fear, without any questions, and without any demands on them. We feed them, we let them rest. We don’t leverage them. We don’t package them up as an offering, irresistible or otherwise. I know you mean well, but it’s not what we’re about. We leave that to the bigger charities. Us? We just provide soup and shelter.”
“And not always soup,” I said quietly. “I get that. But—”
“No buts,” Christina said gently. “So let’s think of something else that you can do, shall we?”
“Sure,” I said, trying not to feel too disappointed. “Whatever I can do to help. Really.”
Christina leaned forward. “You know, with the skills that you have, I think the best job for you is that of companion.”
“Companion?” I frowned.
“Talking. Listening.” Christina shrugged. “Many of the people who come here barely speak to anyone for weeks at a time. Except to ask for money, of course. Some of them ramble constantly, but most of them hardly recognize their own voices anymore. They like being read to, which I’m sure you can do very well, and sometimes they like to talk. Your job is then to listen. What do you think?”
“Listen? That’s it?” I asked.
“It’s harder than you think,” Christina said seriously. “But it’s worth it. You’ll hear all sorts of interesting stories. Some true, some absolute fiction, but fascinating all the same.”
“Okay.” I tried not to sound disappointed. I’d wanted to do something significant, to really make a difference; instead, I’d proved myself to be completely useless and was obviously being given a non-job because Christina felt sorry for me. “Sounds great. When do I start?”
“You can start now if you like,” she said warmly.
“So, what, I just go in and … and what?” I asked uncertainly.
“Just go in. Sit down. See if anyone wants to talk to you,” Christina said. “And when you want to go home, you leave. It’s as simple as that.”
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