by Suki Fleet
Cai snorted and shook his head. This guy was unreal.
“If you leave now, you could be gone before they arrive,” Cyril carried on.
Cai prided himself on his calm even temper—it took a fuck ton of shit to make him angry. He couldn’t even remember the last time it had happened. But Cyril’s outrageous behaviour was beginning to piss him off. And when he got pissed off he had a tendency to act a little recklessly.
Pulling his ancient, crappy phone out of his pocket, Cai dialled and held it to his ear. His phone didn’t have a touchscreen, every key beeped as you pressed it, and the plastic was cracked. Cyril’s disdain could have melted the crystal screen.
Which service do you require?
“Police….” Cai waited as his call was transferred.
What is the nature of your emergency?
“I have someone with me who wants to report a trespasser.”
He held out the phone to Cyril, certain enough of Cyril’s response to call his bluff. If Cyril had wanted to call the fucking police he’d have done it the first time. Tensing his jaw again, Cyril shoved the phone away.
Cai raised his eyebrows and mouthed, “Are you sure?”
“Put the fucking phone down, you fucking imbecile!”
Cyril’s well of patience was very shallow, his temper like a flare. But as to whether he was all bark and no bite, Cai wasn’t sure yet.
Apologising to the operator, Cai ended the call.
“You shouldn’t have done that,” Cyril hissed.
“No? Listen, mate, you don’t scare me. And I’ve got a shitload of work to do, so just fuck off, all right. Get in your shiny car and go back to where ever the fuck you came from.”
Cai turned away and reached down to picked up the hedge trimmer, realising with a sinking stomach that it had been sitting in a puddle of water. That couldn’t be good for it.
Bony fingers fastened to Cai’s wet shoulder. With a violent jerk Cai shoved the hand away and stepped out of reach. Turning, he swung the hedge trimmer around in front of him.
Cyril leapt back, eyes wide. Cai had no intention of letting him know it was out of petrol and was no more dangerous than a big stick.
He thrust the hedge trimmer forwards, causing Cyril to take another step back. “Do not touch me. I don’t give a fuck who you are. Go. Now.”
Eyes flashing, but managing to keep a lid on his temper, Cyril turned and hurried quickly away through the bush and mud.
Relief made Cai’s clenched fingers tingle. He wanted to slump down in the mud for a moment.
Who the fuck pretended to call the police to get someone who was just doing their job to leave?
The weird air of unreality about Cyril was unnerving. It was as if he didn’t inhabit the world everyone else inhabited—as if his world really was one of panelled rooms and plush fabrics, where everyone you met kissed your fucking arse.
Not wanting to follow the stuck-up prick, but needing to make sure Cyril did indeed get back in his car and fuck off, Cai headed after him to the front of the house.
Cyril must have legged it because he was already in his car, engine running, when Cai emerged from the overgrowth. And there was someone in the car with him. A big guy in a red baseball cap was in the passenger seat. They stared at Cai, both of them, and Cai knew without a doubt they wanted to hurt him. He’d seen that look cast around at the YOI many times. Still, he wasn’t prepared for Cyril to put his foot down and for the car to rocket across the gravel towards him.
Adrenaline took over. Without thinking, Cai dropped the trimmer and dived to the side, just as Cyril spun the wheel and the car swung wide. It skidded across the gravel in a fat arc, tiny stones flying up and pinging against the shiny paintwork. Then with a roar the car accelerated again, and in cloud of toxic black smoke, Cyril was gone.
Fists clenched, Cai stared after him. If he never saw Cyril Du Vey again it would be too fucking soon.
If he was shivering hard, Cai told himself it was just because he was no longer exerting himself, but that wasn’t the entire truth. Leaning against his van, he ran a hand through his dripping hair. Yes, he was tired and cold and he wanted a break and needed to warm up. But if he sat in his van he wasn’t going to want to get out of it again, and the heater was still broken so it wouldn’t be much warmer anyway. Keeping moving would probably be best. Being cold and wet like this was likely to make him sick.
Retrieving the can of petrol from the back, he filled up the trimmer. He really hoped dropping it hadn’t broken it.
As he passed the front door, he noticed a tatty-looking plastic bag sitting on the step. He eyed it warily before stepping closer. If Cyril had left it, it was unlikely to contain anything good.
A familiar little square of yellow paper was stuck to the front with Sellotape.
Cyril was being a dick. Thank you for getting rid of him.
Cautiously Cai opened the bag and found a very worn-looking wax jacket folded inside. Originally the material could have been either green or brown but now it was somewhere in between. Its musty smell wasn’t pleasant, but it was heavy and looked pretty waterproof. And, even if it was a bit motheaten, the chequered lining was quilted and would be warm.
He shook I out, then slipped his arms in the sleeves. It was a good fit for him, even if he really hoped it didn’t suit him.
With a grin, he scrunched up the plastic bag and tucked it carefully into his pocket so as not to screw up the little note. All at once, he felt a whole lot warmer.
Nicky’s map of stars
After Cyril’s surprise visit, Nicky was exhausted. He leaned against the closed front door, not even bothering to pull all the bolts across. The entrance hall’s hushy whispers didn’t register—the darkness couldn’t touch him right now. Nothing couldn’t reach any deeper.
Tiredly, he trailed his fingers through the dust and dirt coating the floor. Lance had told him Cyril lived with the rest of the family, somewhere in central London. Apart from Cyril, and the mysterious Claudette, Nicky knew nothing about any of them, not even their names. It had been months since he’d last actually seen Cyril.
Before Lance had died, Cyril used to turn up at the house once a week, usually the weekend, to bother him. Lance rarely admitted him inside; instead, they’d have heated discussions out in the driveway or they’d sit in Cyril’s ridiculously shiny car for an hour or two not talking to one another at all.
The envelopes of dead spiders, the maggots and the bee had been Cyril’s handiwork, without a doubt. Lance had spoken of Cyril’s tenuous grip on reality many times, and Nicky had thought he’d understood—life could be confusing and painful. Most of the time Nicky hadn’t felt strong enough to navigate the stairs, never mind the outside world.
The first few times it happened, Lance had laughed when Cyril stared hungrily at Nicky. On one of the rare occasions Lance had invited Cyril into the house, Cyril had reached out to touch Nicky’s hair. Lance’s face had turned purple and he’d swung at Cyril. From then on Lance referred to him as Poor Obsessed Cyril, who must look and not touch, and kept him away from Nicky.
Lance had told Nicky that Cyril had threatened many times to cut off Nicky’s hair and strangle him with it. But Lance had promised that would never happen.
Tipping his head back, Nicky closed his eyes.
He was so tired. If Cyril came back, he was tired enough to lie down and take it. Tired enough to not get back up.
Fuck. He grimaced. He wasn’t that low. Yet.
This was what sitting in the gloomy entrance hall did to him. Depressing lightless space that it was.
Nicky got to his feet. That godawful whirring noise had started up again. It was as though someone was swinging a can of angry bees around. For a large part of the morning Nicky had prayed Cai’s damn hedge trimmery thing would die or explode, or that Cai would chop his hand off and be unable to use the fucking thing. But then he’d stood near one of the newly cleared windows watching Cai brandishing it about like a sword when Cyril had tr
ied to intimidate him. It had been an enjoyable display, satisfying in an intense and painful way to see Cyril threatened after the things he’d been shouting, and it had made Nicky want to stroke the fucking noisy thing and possibly cut himself on it at the same time.
Following the direction of the noise, Nicky ended up in the doorway of a small bare cloakroom next to the study and watched Cai attacking the trees with a random wildness. Cai hadn’t got a clue what he was doing, that much was obvious. But his ineptitude was strangely hard to look away from. As was the determined clench of his jaw and the amusing frowny faces he pulled as he concentrated.
Minutes passed, and Nicky kept watching. It was ridiculous. And it certainly wasn’t because Nicky found the incompetent gardener attractive… or anything.
He really didn’t.
It was just…. Fuck, he didn’t know what it was.
Cai honestly looked like a straggly drowned rat with Lance’s ancient and ugly jacket on. It fit him far better than Nicky thought it would, though. Which meant he must have been even broader than he looked at first glance, tall and spare but strong. Cai tipped his head back and rolled his shoulders, as though trying to relieve some ache. He slipped the jacket off his shoulders and dug his thick fingers into his right bicep, rubbing and pressing. Nicky stopped blinking. His breathing quickened. Like yesterday, Cai’s lean muscles had stood out in stark relief beneath that thin T-shirt he was wearing. Sweat and rain soaked the fabric, making it cling across his chest, down his stomach….
Nicky tried to stop the thoughts, but it was useless. His dick swelled rapidly in the tight confines of his leggings. Frustrated, he threw his head back against the wall so hard his ears rang. But even the pain didn’t stop the unwanted arousal from sweeping through his body like a forest fire.
This was not helpful. Not in any way.
He forced himself out into the corridor, far away from the sight of the bloody gardener.
He was in need of a cold shower and a fucking wank. That was all. Apart from Lance and Cyril, Cai was the first guy he’d really looked at—or even seen—in two years. It was just a reaction. One he really didn’t need or want to be having.
What he needed was to think about last night’s package.
Those fucking goggles perplexed him. Lance had been so humourless in life that Nicky couldn’t imagine them being a joke. And if they weren’t a joke that meant they must have some practical value. Had Lance meant him to use them? To swim? The thought turned him cold. Nothing was more successful at wilting an erection than feeling sick with dread.
Outside, the world fell silent. Cai had finally turned off the noisy trimmer. Refusing to look and see what Cai was doing instead, Nicky stepped quietly back along the corridor towards the study.
There were two places he could swim. One of them he could hardly think about. The other was the dead pool in the copse. Lance had talked about how he’d swum in it on sticky summer days when he was a kid. How he’d loved the quiet peace of the place, an escape from a domineering father.
What if Lance was trying to tell him something? What if he was asking something of Nicky? What if it was a clue? What if there was something about the pool that would help him work out what the other notes meant?
What if working out the meaning of these notes was Lance’s final wish?
Didn’t he owe him that much, after everything Lance had done for him, after keeping him safe these past two years? Nicky didn’t know. His head was a mess and he didn’t know what he felt.
Back in the study with the door locked, Nicky took the goggles out of the box and put them on. Thinking about going into the copse alone, then diving into that dark, still pool made every muscle in his body tense. He plucked at the adjustable plastic strap around his head as he read the solicitor’s letter again.
With every re-read he became more and more convinced Lance wanted him to do this. Lance was asking him to dive in and swim in the copse pool. But he couldn’t. He just couldn’t.
Nicky sank down into an armchair and curled around his knees. He kicked off his dirty trainers and began counting his breaths.
A minute passed, then another. Finally, his heartbeat slowed.
Okay, okay, okay.
The shelter king/Fireworks
Even after their conversation yesterday, seeing Soph holding hands with Loz at the bus stop was one of the last things Cai expected.
The van bumped up the pavement and Cai winced at the not particularly healthy-sounding crunch as he came to a halt. Exhaustion and hunger were making his head spin a little. He needed to be a bit more careful.
Soph hurried over, her hand clutched tight with Loz’s. Opening the passenger door, she leaned in. The sky had darkened to the colour of wet clay, and big fat drops of rain hit the windscreen and began to drum against the van’s dented roof.
“You know what we talked about yesterday, about dinner…?” Soph said tentatively, brushing away the soft curls that fell in front of her face.
Still soaked to the skin, and giving off a pretty unpleasant aroma of both mud and sweat, Cai wasn’t feeling exactly sparkly and welcoming, but he forced the most enthusiastic smile he could manage on his face and tilted his head so he could see out of the van. “Hi, I’m Cai. Loz, right? Want to hop in before you both get as drenched as I am?”
Loz nodded, fixing him with a brief but assessing gaze, and then smiled widely as Soph tugged their hand and they both clambered in.
There was a small seat with a seat belt folded away in the back of the van, behind the passenger seat. When he’d bought the van, Cai had considered ripping it out, assuming, with just the two of them, he would never need to use it.
Soph and Loz both scrabbled into the back and after a few minutes of quiet laughter, they seemed to figure out how to unfold the seat and find the seat belt. With Loz strapped in, Soph climbed over the seat into the front.
“Cai the Spy… it’s got a nice ring to it, you know,” Loz said.
Raising an eyebrow, Cai turned in his seat to look at Loz.
Full of the sort of smiling confidence in their own skin that Cai, with a small twinge of envy knew he’d never had at fourteen, Loz shrugged a skinny shoulder. “Soph told me about your new job. Big old falling-down house, owner you’ve never seen and who communicates by way of Post-it notes—it’s like one of those murder mystery stories waiting to happen. I’d definitely be spying.” Loz paused long enough to flick their long feathered fringe out of their eyes and Cai glimpsed a tiny self-conscious blip beneath their bright confident aura. “I’ve got a big mouth. Soph probably told you that.”
“Well, Soph said lots of—ow.” Cai rubbed his arm. Soph’s elbows were like bloody arrows points. As if he was going to embarrass her. He was only teasing. But Soph kept frowning even when he winked.
“So, you live over the other side of town?” Cai asked, pulling out into the traffic.
“Yeah. For now anyways,” Loz replied in a far more subdued voice. “Hey, so it’s really nice to meet you at last. I mean, I see you at the bus stop every day.”
Wow, okay, that sideways subject change reminded Cai of how much he used to hate talking about his home life as a kid. “Likewise.”
“You were inside, right? Like prison?” Loz carried on earnestly, obviously a pro at keeping on the attack with the questions. It saved having to answer any, after all.
“Yeah, well, not quite prison—young offenders. I was eighteen when I went in. Arson.”
Despite the fact that Loz was probably after details, that was as far as Cai was willing to go with this conversation right now. It wasn’t because he was ashamed—well, not really. He’d made a few bad choices, lots of people did, and he didn’t think his choices were necessarily any worse than anyone else’s, but being in the wrong place wrong time and having a bit of random bad luck that was just life sometimes, had made his small mistake into a big one, and he was tired of thinking about it.
“You started a fire somewhere?”
Quick
as lightening, Soph twisted in her seat. Cai couldn’t see if she was pulling faces or mouthing something but a few seconds later, Loz said, “Sorry. I guess I’m not making the best impression right now, which sucks.”
Cai shook his head and smiled. “You’re doing fine. But I’m guessing I’m not the one you want to impress.”
Beside him Soph blushed.
“Ah, um, you’re right and you’re wrong there. Obviously, I want to impress Soph more than anything, but it’s also kind of important you like me. You’re a really important person in Soph’s life, so yeah, I’m trying to unsuck here….”
Cai grinned. Loz had no filter—no wonder they got crap at school.
Placing her chin on the back of the seat, Soph said, “You don’t suck, you noodle. You just say everything that comes into your head.”
“Well, yeah. It’s more honest that way, right? And honest is the best way to be.”
Showered and clean, Cai stared longingly at his mattress. All he wanted to do was face-plant down on it and sleep. Instead he took a twenty out of the money envelope in his sock drawer and splashed out buying a takeaway from the Chinese next door to the bookies. They ate in the living room, sitting on the floor around the wonky coffee table and laughing when half the meal took a slow slide down the table and had to be caught before it ended up on the floor.
Every time Cai glanced over at Soph and Loz, they were either whispering or grinning at one another, their hands touching beneath the table. He could almost feel Loz’s thrumming excitement and could definitely see Loz adored Soph. How obvious and open they were about it gave Cai good feelings, but it also awoke the longing in his chest that he wished he could forget about.
Close to ten o’ clock, Cai decided it was late enough and drove Loz home across town. Loz directed him to an area of terraced streets. The roads weren’t treelined and the brick built houses were small and run-down.
Loz pleaded with Cai not to be dropped off right outside, even though both front windows were dark, so if anyone was home, it didn’t look as though they were waiting up. Cai waited down the street until Loz was safely inside their house.