Chapter 2.07 #2
Why did nothing nice ever happen?
Why couldn’t she just . . .
Hang on a minute: been forgetting something.
‘The sauna! I can have a wee sweaty sit in the sauna!’
And just like that, all was right with the world again.
Ten minutes later, she was hobbling across the back garden, making for the outbuildings lined up along one wall.
Ho, ho, ho.
She’d slipped out of her PJs and into a furry dressing gown and bunny slippers, towel under one arm, bottle of chilled water clutched in her free hand.
Should’ve thought of this sooner.
Nice long roast in some lovely hot heat. Get a bit of steam going. Sweat the yuck right out of her.
A little wooden sign was screwed to the sauna door: ‘THE POLICE SCOTLAND MEMORIAL RETIREMENT SAUNA’ with an extra message dangling beneath it, inscribed in Naomi’s unmistakable scrawl: ‘NO BOYZ ALLOWED!!!’ with a skull-and-crossbones.
Quite right too.
Roberta opened the door . . . onto an abandoned building site.
They’d bricked up the window – presumably so no pervert could cop an ogle at Susan and Roberta in the nip – making the space gloomy and grim.
The walls were stripped back to the dusty stone, with a bare concrete floor, and a naked lightbulb dangling from the rafters.
Oh for God’s sake.
She flicked the switch and a cold light picked out the thick grey snakes of electrical cabling that poked up through the concrete – one of which had a socket wobbling about on the end of it – a drain hole that was clearly going to need tiles and things to make it workable, and a blue plastic pipe with a tap attached.
It looked more like a serial killer’s torture pit than a sauna: no beautiful lining of Scandinavian pine, no wooden benches, no duckboards, and nothing to make it baking sweaty hot in here. Just a big . . . nothing.
Wasn’t easy pulling your trousers on, single-handed, when your balance wasn’t up to much and you had to sit on the edge of the bed. Two hands would’ve been better, but Roberta needed the other one for the phone.
‘Why didn’t you tell me? I looked a right wazzock standing there in my dressing gown.’
Susan sighed. ‘I didn’t want to upset you.’
‘Useless lazy bastarding builders!’ Working up a head of steam. ‘I’m gonna call a taxi, head round there, and rip a strip off their arses a mile wide! They’ll finish that sodding sauna if it’s the last thing they—’
‘It was me.’
Hang on.
‘What?’
‘I cancelled the sauna.’ This time the sigh had that resigned tone to it. ‘You’ve got a metal plate holding your skull together, Robbie. Do you think it’s a good idea to get that sizzling hot?’
‘But . . .’ She stopped struggling with her trousers. ‘I was looking forward to—’
‘So was I. But it’s not worth roasting your brain for.’
Roberta opened her mouth.
Then closed it again.
Frowned at the rumpled reflection in the mirrored wardrobe doors: so much older and pastier and droopier than she’d been seven weeks ago.
Buggering hell.
Susan was right, wasn’t she.
Nothing was ever going to be the same.
Stupid bloody explosion . . .
OK, so it was only five to three on a Monday afternoon, but sod it: today was officially a cocking disaster that could only be ameliorated by the application of a restorative whisky.
Balvenie, Caribbean Cask, fourteen-year-old.
Glass of water on the side. Wearing jammies in the garden again.
Scowling at the flowering honeysuckle as if it had just crapped in her slippers. Replying to Logan’s text:
Of course I’m fine.
Why wouldn’t I be fine?
I’m a lady of leisure now.
No more rat race for me.
SEND.
She took a sip, rolling the sweet spicy burn around her mouth, holding it there till her gums went numb.
Butterflies chased each other between the spiky purple flowers – no idea what they were called, gardening was Susan’s domain; weenie birds fought over peanuts in the feeder; somewhere, off in the distance, someone sang a sad sweet song.
And Roberta slumped in her recliner. Sipping whisky and glowering at the glowing blue sky.
Supposed to rain later in the week.
Maybe she should put a wash on?
. . .
Was this what the rest of her life would be: weather and washing?
How sodding depressing was—
Ding-buzz.
She scrabbled for her phone, unlocking it like a druggie, desperate for a fix.
LOGAN:
Didn’t they give you a therapist to talk to?
Getting blown-up isn’t your everyday experience.
You should TALK to someone!
Another sip.
Couldn’t reply right away: it’d look needy. Desperate.
So, she counted to ten first.
Then thumbed out:
You caught your killer yet?
SEND.
Roberta turned her gums numb again. Waiting.
Waiting, waiting, waiting, waiting . . .
Still no reply.
Gah . . .
Being a lady of leisure sucked.
She poked at the screen, coming out of her texts with Logan, and clicked on Tufty’s name instead. But her last message was still at the bottom of the chain, so he hadn’t replied either.
His last one sat at the top.
TUFTY:
Just a reminder ~ we still need a wizard!
You could get a character rolled up and start adventuring next Wednesday!
Then her reply:
Roll your wizard sideways and jam him up your crumph-hole.
And her follow-up:
Where’s my post-mortem report, you wee snudge?
I might be off on the sick, but I’m still your DI!
DO NOT INVOKE THE SPANKING HAND’S TERRIBLE WRATH!
Yeah . . .
That might’ve been a little harsh.
But once you’d invoked the Terrible Wrath of The Spanking Hand you couldn’t really take it back . . .
And he genuinely could ram his wizarding idea.
Detective Inspector Roberta Alexander Steel, playing Dungeons and Dragons? Like some spotty teenaged boy? No sodding chance in hell.
Didn’t matter how bored she got, she wasn’t doing that.
She drained the last of her dram.
Puffed out her cheeks.
Looked around the garden again . . .
Maybe it was time for another whisky?