You Belong With Me

chapter012

Edie was letting herself into the new office on the first floor of a converted lace factory. Its huge industrial metal pillars were painted a jaunty matte lilac, and the cavernous space was dotted with leggy, air-purifying plants left behind by the last inhabitants.

Two desks and a neon Ad Hoc wall logo had arrived, and some sweet-talking of the delivery men saw the latter hung on the far wall.

Edie had firmly instructed herself to learn from the dramatic turnaround in her circumstances.

Not so long ago, every aspect of her existence had, not to overstate matters, sucked golf balls through a hosepipe.

Wrecked social life, knackered reputation, professional life in turmoil, tossed aside by a worthless man, reviled by many, loved by few, and exiled to the one place she didn’t want to be, with a family she didn’t know how to relate to.

Now look. Just look. She wasn’t smug – it wasn’t in her nature, and she was, as Elliot said, too much of a catastrophist.

But Edie knew to properly value this remarkable recovery, to back pocket the lesson for the future. Even when everything seems several hundred shades of shat-upon, you can come back from it. You might even benefit.

If Jack hadn’t kissed her at that wedding, Richard might not have given her the project with Elliot, and they’d never have met. Unthinkable.

She daydreamed constantly since she last saw him.They’d not been able to put each other down when her cab arrived, and she’d shed a few tears at parting. Seeing her distress, Elliot had said: ‘Sod it, I’ll come with you and leave from yours at half five instead.’ En route, Meg had texted that she was going to kip at their dad’s. Inevitably, when Elliot’s airport ride pulled up, tailgate lights cutting through the fog like evil red eyes at that horrific hour, they’d not been to sleep.

Memories of shared confidences and intimacies by the glow of the chilli fairy lights kept making Edie smile, feel shy, or shiver.

Once he’d left, she went back to bed and slept until midday, waking up to find a WhatsApp that she’d since reread seventy-eight times.

I’ve got a pint of black coffee with two sugars in the BA lounge, and I look like I’ve been exhumed by detectives who want to run toxicology tests to prove foul play. In a hailstorm. I wouldn’t change a thing. Be mine forever? x

There weren’t many commuters grinning like a lovesick clot in the first grey week back in January.

On the Friday morning that her sole team member, Declan, was due to start, Edie made sure she was in her seat, laptop open, for a frankly magnificent twenty past eight. She was a victim of her own excellence, as it was too early to get coffees and pastries without them going cold. Edie reckoned she’d trot out once she had settled Declan in.

They’d exchanged cordial messages confirming the location, in which it was impossible to gauge much about each other.

Edie had intended to use the extra time to check emails and be hyper efficient, but she ended up browsing gastropub menus in the Dales for tomorrow’s trip with Nick and Hannah. The break hadn’t fallen at an ideal time, leaving Declan on his own at the start of next week, but at least they had a day to get acquainted.

The clock ticked to nine, then ten past, then half past. No sign of Declan. Edie segued from surprise to judgement.

Not the greatest indicator,she thought. If you can’t be arsed to be punctual on day one, what else will you be sloppy about? Pardon her for sounding like Margaret Thatcher, but it was an issue of respect to not roll up forty-five minutes after the fact.

He’s never been here before. Maybe he’s got lost,she chided herself. Then remembered, if so, he could call her. Mobile phones had ruined the middling excuse: nowadays, this sort of thing meant either huge crisis or flagrant etiquette misdemeanour.

Or, she could contact him?

Hi Declan, checking you’re OK and can find the place? Let me know if I should come down and collect you!

Two blue ticks, read instantly, yet minutes passed by and nothing back. Wow, OK.

Had Richard sent her a Gen Z problem? Richard wouldn’t have knowingly sent her a problem, so it’d have to be more sinister than that: someone who’d fooled Richard. Edie didn’t think such an employee existed.

Oh God, unless this was the nefarious plan from day one? Jessica running interference? Disrupt the operation, tell a different story to Richard, besmirch Edie’s capabilities. Choose someone he liked in Declan, who was what counterterrorism called a cleanskin, someone with no convictions who didn’t fit the profile.

Admittedly, perhaps leaping straight to this sort of MI5 chat was paranoia.

Edie had always hated snitching, even before she became a prime snitch target. Yet by ten a.m., she wondered if she should just call Richard. Bet you’d reply to contact made by him, huh. If this was going to be warfare, keeping secrets for the other side wouldn’t help her.

At five past ten, the door of the office banged open dramatically. A tall, lean, disarranged man of about thirty, holding a bike helmet, stepped unsteadily, glassy-eyed, over the threshold.

‘Good morning, is it Edie? Hello! I’m so sorry I’m late – I’ve had a bit of a scrape,’ Declan said, in a strong Irish accent, which immediately made this information sound as if it was a charming gambit in a bucolic romantic comedy. ‘I think I was unconscious for a wee while. At least, I lost quarter to nine until about half past.’

‘Oh fuck! What happened?’

‘A car knocked me off my bike. I woke up on a roundabout. I was zooming along like I’ve got this Nottingham thing cracked. Then crack.’

‘You’re bleeding!’ Edie said, pointing at the red mark that was flowering through his white shirt at waist height.

Declan looked down, swiping a luxuriant amount of his brown hair out of his eyes. ‘Aw, shit. So I am.’

‘You’re really pale?’

He had that distinct quality of grey-green, about-to-boak clammy that couldn’t be confused with his Celtic fairness.

‘I am?’ Declan put a hand to his glossily sweaty face.

‘Declan, you shouldn’t be here – you need to go to hospital! Why did you come in?’

‘I didn’t want to make a bad impression.’

There was a beat of silence, and they both laughed.

‘Let me help you.’ Edie ran over to guide him to a chair, bearing his weight with some difficulty as he staggered. He was surely six foot two at least; if he fell onto her, it’d be like a skyscraper demolition.

She’d seen a first aid box in the corner and soon found gauze bandages inside.

‘Uhm, do you want to … Or shall I …?’ she muttered, realising Declan was semi out of it and she was going to have to play nurse.

‘Maybe if you pull your shirt up?’ she said timidly, as he stood, unbuttoned it, and yanked it over his shoulders. Ah, OK. Edie did the obligatory teeth-sucking at the sight of blood:‘That’s quite a nasty graze.’

Declan looked down and grimaced. The fact he was woozy made partial unclothedness and their physical contact less peculiar for him, Edie thought. Or certainly the lesser of his problems.

Meanwhile, Edie was fully sentient that she was winding a roll of cloth round a man’s bare abdomen when she’d been expecting to ask him his Starbucks muffin order.

She kept up inane chatter to defuse any Indiana Jones and Marion energy flying around the room, but Declan swayed dangerously and caught hold of her to steady himself, so they were momentarily clasping each other. It jolted Edie. There was a definite jolt.

‘Sorry, sorry, this is a bit much …’ Declan said, and Edie said: ‘It’s fine!’ in her most chipper and very normal voice.

She got Declan some water and made some phone calls in the stairwell. They confirmed: 1. His being conscious and able-bodied enough to push his bike half a mile meant it was a taxi to AE, not blue lights, and 2. Richard wanted her to lock up the office for as long as it took and keep him company.

When she came back in, Declan was looking angst-ridden, holding his phone.

‘Now, I know the WebMD doomscroll is for suckers, but I’ve been researching head injuries and found out about this thing called the Talk and Die Syndrome.’

He read from his handset: ‘The person may appear fine initially and be quite talkative. They insist they’re well because there isn’t too much pressure on the brain yet. At some point, they worsen, lapse into a coma and brain death gradually occurs.’

‘Sounds exactly like any office job – you’ll be fine,’ Edie said.

Declan burst out laughing, before wincing at the pressure on his wound.

‘If this is my final lucid interval before the darkness takes me,’ Declan said, ‘I can already tell you’re the right person to spend it with.’