Chapter Twelve Shout
Things were a bit tense in the shop for the first few hours of Julian’s shift.
He’d arrived late -- of course he had -- and had avoided eye contact with Rahul as he’d come around the counter and sat himself farther away than normal.
His jumper today was an eye-wateringly bright blue with a neon geometric pattern.
It stood in stark contrast to his dark hair and darker mood.
Two and a half customers came in. One, a regular, to pick up the Marc Johnson vinyl he’d ordered; the other, a girl who came in just to browse but ended up flirting with Julian for a solid twenty minutes and left without buying anything; and the half being a German tourist asking to use their toilet.
Rahul, against his better judgement, thawed with every passing moment.
Rahul had been so distressed last night that when he’d returned to his flat -- a full three hours before Kwambe -- he’d pulled on a jumper Julian had forgotten there the last time he’d come over, took a bottle of whiskey with him to bed, and drank until he’d fallen unconscious.
He’d awoken with a blinder and a slightly brighter outlook, though not by much.
He knew he’d done nothing wrong. When he faced his unkempt reflection in the mirror, he’d determined that he would not be the one to apologise first this time.
Let Julian be the one to own up to his mistakes for once in his bloody life.
Now, however, seeing Julian only barely muster the strength to flirt back with the pretty blonde who’d engaged him earlier, his convictions crumbled. He could never stay miffed at Julian for long.
“Look, Jules, I --” he began, only to be cut off by Julian himself.
“You know I didn’t mean it, right?”
Did he know that? In a way, yes. He knew Julian hadn’t meant to say those things to hurt him, that it had just come out in a momentary passion.
But he knew Julian believed what he said.
Because it was, in fact, true. Rahul had no life outside of Julian.
He was clingy and possessive, and when he wasn’t being boring, he was being actively unpleasant.
He couldn’t help those things. They were in his nature.
It was strange to say that Julian being the centre of his world was in his nature, but that was the God’s honest truth.
He didn’t know any other way to be than as a satellite orbiting the planet Julian.
Rahul had come to terms with that some time ago.
The one who had yet to accept it was Julian.
Did Julian need him? Maybe, maybe not. But dear, God did Rahul need him.
Rahul materialised a smile from out of thin air like a magician conjuring a rabbit.
“I know, small fry. Don’t you worry your empty little head over it.
All right? If I’m being honest, I was rather harsh myself.
” He did not, in fact, believe he’d been too harsh.
He did, however, believe this was what Julian wanted to hear.
Julian beamed and brought his stool closer, proving that Rahul had made the right call.
“It means the world to hear you say that. Honest. I was up half the night thinking about how we’d left things.
I think you and Michael are both top-notch.
You’re my mates. I mean, you’ll always be my best mate, right?
But I want to be able to meet new people and have you get on with them the same as me.
So we can be a group of friends, yeah? And Michael’s brilliant.
I mean it. You’ll love him if you get to spend time with him. I know you will.”
Ah, poor naive Julian. This is precisely what got Rahul so worked up about Michael.
That man -- older, wealthier, more privileged -- saw a sweet, ditzy kid and knew he could take advantage of him.
It wouldn’t take much doing to take advantage of Julian.
You wouldn’t even need a gingerbread house in the country.
All you’d need is an unlocked door and half a bag of Hula Hoops and he’d waltz willingly into whatever trap you’d set up for him.
This was what made Rahul feel he needed to protect him.
He had burdened himself all these years to keep Julian safe from the dangers of the world and those who would do him harm.
He’d be damned if he was about to let Michael do just that under his very nose.
“Yeah. I’m sure I would,” Rahul said through a wafer-thin smile. No. He would not. He was, in fact, going to redouble his efforts to expose this “Michael” for the fraud and menace that he was.
Julian was about to reply when the chime tolled above the door. He reflexively turned his charming grin client-side, but he and Rahul were greeted not by a customer but by a contrite and sultry-looking Aisling.
A strange and contradictory part of Rahul was grateful.
If she was here, it meant they were going to make up.
If they made up, Julian would have no time for Michael the Saviour.
As much as Rahul loathed Aisling, she was the devil that he knew, and he had experience enough to know that Aisling was only taking advantage of Julian as much as Julian was taking advantage of her.
A co-dependent relationship was still better than a predatory one.
So Rahul’s smile became a little more genuine as he levelled it at her, causing her to look back at him with confusion and mild alarm.
“Look who it is, Jules,” Rahul added in an unnaturally cheerful voice.
But instead of the barely contained excitement Rahul expected to see on Julian’s face, he was met with an expression that was uncharacteristically stony.
If Aisling was put off by this, she didn’t show it.
She bit her lip and sidled up to the counter, looking the very picture of coquettish contrition.
She folded her arms on the counter and leaned in, giving Julian and Rahul both a dizzying perspective of her cleavage.
Whilst Rahul had never been interested in mountain climbing, he could definitely see the appeal and beauty of Mount Everest.
“Hello, chicken,” she said in an infantile voice that made some of Rahul’s lunch come up into his throat.
“All right,” Julian replied, as flat and immovable as his expression.
Aisling blinked her long, dark lashes, notably nonplussed. She quickly recovered, however, and laid the act on extra thick. “Haven’t you forgiven me yet, darling? I’ve quite forgotten what it was we were even fighting about.”
“Really? ‘Cause I haven’t.”
Aisling attempted to laugh this off. “Come now, chicken. You can’t still be as cross with me as all that. You were the one who was carrying on with someone else, after all.”
“That’s funny, because I thought you just said you couldn’t remember what we were fighting about.”
Aisling was really starting to get nervous now. It was apparent in the way her gaze darted over to Rahul and a fuchsia flush was making its slow ascent up her alabaster neck. She hissed under her breath, “Can we talk -- in private, please?”
Julian shrugged a neon-patterned shoulder and slid off his stool, wandering as if by chance into Mel’s unoccupied office. Aisling followed and shut the door behind them with a sharp click.
Mel’s office door was inlaid with frosted glass, turning them into little more than shadowy, indistinguishable figures.
When the low susurrus of hushed voices began, Rahul did his best to sidle inconspicuously up to the door.
At first, he could make out nothing beyond the gentle rise and fall of voices in conversation.
But then there was a dramatic spike in volume from Aisling.
Julian was a naturally soft-spoken person, which always seemed at odds with his flamboyant nature.
His excitement or agitation tended to accelerate his pace or pitch but not his decibel level.
If anything, Rahul had learned, the more upset Julian became, the quieter his voice grew.
Aisling, like an ordinary person, became louder as her emotions became stronger.
“-- fucking liar!” Rahul heard her screech.
A beat, in which Rahul could just barely make out the rumble of Julian’s voice.
“I’m controlling?” Aisling shrieked. Something unintelligible and then “… self-centred, narcissistic, cheater!” Followed by a crash and a shatter. Rahul winced. Mel was going to be livid.
“You think I’ve gone beyond the pale?” Aisling’s voice was scathing. “That’s rich coming from…” (indistinguishable) “… sticking your cock into anything that comes your way and I’m bloody sick of it!”
A cascading and crashing sound, like a tumbling of books or records. The soft, tense tones of Julian’s voice. Then Aisling’s hollered, “Oh yeah? Well, fuck you!”
The office door banged open so suddenly Rahul barely had time to get out of the way before Aisling came storming out like a tropical hurricane.
“You’ve gone wrong, you have!” She was yelling, arms flailing and all pretence of a middle-class accent gone.
“And don’t think you can take me back after this, ‘cause we’re through! We’re well through, we are!”
Julian came as far as the doorway. His arms were wrapped tightly around himself and lips pursed so thin as to be invisible. “Don’t flatter yourself,” he said in a voice as tight as his lips. “I wouldn’t take you back for a million quid. I wouldn’t take you back if you were the last girl on Earth.”
“Good!” Aisling stopped at the shop door to scream her lungs out at him, purse thrashing violently in her hand. “Who’d want you anyway?”
“Fuck off,” Julian bit out.
“You fuck off, you bloody tosser!” She spat on the tiled floor and stalked out into the busy street.
She seemed to take most of the oxygen in the shop with her as she left. Rahul turned back to Julian and found him sagging against the office doorframe. He looked older than Rahul had ever seen him.
“Well,” Rahul began, just for something to say.
Julian’s shaky hands reached for the cigarettes in his back pocket. He brought one to his lips and lit it unsteadily.
By the time he’d exhaled a plume of smoke, Rahul had thought of something to say. “I hate to say I told you so, but I did always say that Aisling was --”
Julian pushed bodily past Rahul to grab his parka and made a beeline for the door and the frigid London streets.