Chapter 12 #3
‘Brilliant. And I won’t name you.’
‘You won’t mention it at all because my ex listens to Prunella. I also cut the buttons off all of his shirts.’
‘Classic. Did you put the shrimp in the curtain pole?’
‘No, I considered fish but thought the mice would be better.’
‘They won’t suspect you. They’ll think they have an infestation.’
‘That was the idea.’
‘Do you think that when the mice defrost they’ll come back alive?’
‘I don’t think that’s how it works,’ he says amused, dimples forming. She likes making him smile.
‘They must know the other stuff was you.’
‘They do, at least Walter does, but he hasn’t said anything about it. He just comes into work looking worse and worse every day.’
She studies him. He doesn’t look proud, which she likes about him.
‘Wait, you work with him?’
‘I got him the job. He’s our ecologist. And now all he does is go on about saving rare freshwater pearl mussels every time we want to repair a bridge. So yeah, I have to see him at work every day.’
‘Who is he, single white female?’
He lifts his face to the sky, opening his mouth to catch the snowflakes, and laughs loudly. He has good teeth, no sign of fillings, not the old mercury ones anyway. Melody’s mother has more in her body than a tuna fish. Pedestrians flow around him like he’s a rock in the stream.
‘Have you seen the movie?’ she asks.
‘Every time I see a stiletto heel I think of it.’
‘Yeah, me too,’ she says enthusiastically. ‘Right in the eye.’ She makes a squelching sound and he studies her in a way that makes her stomach swirl and heart pound. Something’s happening.
They’re still walking and she has no idea where they are or where they’re going and she doesn’t care.
She doesn’t want this conversation to end.
She trusts him and she has all the time in the world.
Time is flying by but it’s a very long way from five a.m. And all of a sudden she just says it easily, the thing she finds it hard to say.
‘I live in an apartment with a flatmate. She’s a barrister. Criminal law. She wears one of those black gowns and white wig things.’
‘Handy to know.’
‘Especially when your revenge act, breaking and entering case goes to trial. She’s away tonight. She’s staying with someone, somewhere, I assume a man. We don’t go into personal details but she tells me when she won’t be home so that I can make arrangements.’
‘What kind of arrangements?’ He gives her side-eye and she laughs.
‘I don’t like being home alone at night.’
As she says it aloud, a lump forms in her throat.
‘It’s not that I just don’t like it, it’s a phobia. I’m fine with being alone alone, in life, but I just don’t like to be alone at night.’
‘Is it the sounds?’ His expression and voice are soft.
‘So many sounds,’ she agrees. ‘Cracks and pops and you never hear them in the day. Creaks and banging. Breathing, I’m sure I hear breathing, as if someone’s in the room with me.’ She shudders.
‘Are you afraid someone will hurt you?’
‘Hurt me, kill me, abduct me, the world will end. Or a combination.’
‘Being abducted on the night the world ends is just sheer bad luck.’
‘Exactly. I’ve played it all out in my head. Never ends well.’
He nods, understanding. ‘So what arrangements do you make?’
‘My mum comes and stays with me, or I stay with her. But she can’t tonight because she broke up with her husband – who’s not my dad – and she’s packing up his stuff and needs time alone.
’ She looks at Al to explain. ‘They had a love lock on the Grace Plunkett Bridge. Or I babysit for Sam’s baby Faith, which I know is probably odd that we’re still friends but … ’ she sighs.
‘The crippling guilt.’
‘Yes,’ she says, relieved that he gets it. ‘But I can’t talk to him because I said something on last week’s podcast that upset his wife.’
‘The sell-the-ring thing. I listened to that one too. I had one of your baked potatoes at the Ploughing Festival.’
‘What flavour?’
‘Baked beans and cheese.’
‘Classic.’
‘It made me wonder if my ex will sell her ring and what she’ll do.’
‘You could ask for it back, was it a family heirloom?’
‘Nah. I don’t want it. It was for her. A symbol of us.’
‘That’s why I think you still have the love locks,’ she says gently, studying him again. Someone like him wouldn’t destroy love.
He looks at her, irritated. ‘Asked and answered. So what arrangements have you made for tonight?’
‘None. There’s nobody available to stay with me tonight, or who can take me in, apart from a guy, but nah.’
‘Who’s the guy?’
‘A not serious guy.’
‘Stairs not lift.’
‘Yes!’
‘So you have no plans.’
‘No.’ Her smile fades, and she feels that sick feeling in her stomach again, the fear starting to close in on her.
‘Then let’s keep walking.’
Suddenly he takes her hand. She’s wearing gloves. As is he. But she feels the warmth of him through his glove. He doesn’t say anything, holds her hand as if it’s completely normal.
He keeps walking, casually, not seeming to feel any pressure about filling the silence.
She relaxes after a while, settles into holding his hand.
His hand is so large it wraps entirely around hers.
He doesn’t squeeze too tight, but it’s firm.
Such a simple gesture and yet so impactful.
She feels like he’s got her. She moves in closer to him.
She feels safe.
They walk and talk around and around the city, laughing and chatting.
She doesn’t feel the cold, or the time passing.
They barely come up for air, the conversation is flowing.
The ebb and flow of jokes and confession, of talking and listening, from concealing to revealing.
Their direction seems aimless, until suddenly he stops walking.
‘I live here.’
She looks up at the glass monstrosity which resembles her apartment.
‘It’s an Airbnb, I only have it until the owners come back from Australia in March. Melody,’ he says seriously. ‘I don’t really like you.’
She recognises the playful tone in his voice and goes with it. Reverse psychology.
‘And I very much don’t think I could spend more than one night with you. Ever.’
Her entire body buzzes. ‘Probably not even a full night. I like to be home by five a.m. Usually bad things don’t happen after five a.m.’
‘Definitely not a whole night. In fact if you could leave before five that would be ideal.’
She laughs.
‘I can barely stand the sight of you.’
‘Easy,’ she says, warning.
‘No, I like the sight of you,’ he says gently. ‘Would you like to come to my place and kill a few meaningless hours that will mean absolutely nothing to me?’
‘When you kiss me, will you think of your ex?’
He laughs, a machine-gun burst of a laugh. ‘Absolutely, I’ll be comparing you the entire time.’
‘Excellent,’ she grins, stomach swirling with butterflies and her heart pounding with desire. He knows just how to treat a girl with commitment issues. ‘How could a girl say no to all of that sweet-talk?’
He holds the door open for her. He hits the call button on the lift and he lets go of her hand for the first time since he took it, and steps inside. She’s assuming he has forgotten her fear of confined spaces, and she remains firmly outside the lift.
Then he turns around to face her. He hits the button. ‘See you on sixteen.’
He winks as the doors close and she laughs, her voice echoing through the empty marble reception.
When she was with him she didn’t realise how alone she was, his sudden absence causes her to feel the cold, and plummets her into quiet.
Her hand throbs for his. She doesn’t like still and quiet.
She puts a foot on the first step, then pauses.
Her heart is pounding. She really wants him, which terrifies her.
Only till five a.m.
Then she smiles and takes the next steps forward.
On the tenth floor she gets in her own head and stops walking.