Chapter 20
William
The village pub, the Hooray Henry, was standing room only for the big England v Scotland match, but I’d managed to nab a table with a first-rate view of the big screen.
I sat on my own, watching the pre-game with three pints of real Leicestershire ale in front of me, looking both like Nobby No-Mates and a certified alcoholic.
Petey Boy was outside, making the most of the phone reception to call his gran.
The other beer was for Bramley, who had never heard of the term third wheel, and had also never taken less than forty minutes to pee.
When the pub door opened and Petey’s face appeared, I threw my hand in the air, perhaps a little too eagerly, to get his attention over the hubbub.
He was walking gingerly, like he still had a horse under him.
“That’s why I gave you the yoga pants,” I said as he slid in beside me. “Wear anything with an inner seam and you’ll be red raw.”
I pushed his beer towards him. He winced. “Last time I found myself walking like this, I was staggering back to my hotel from the Folsom Street Fair.”
“Is that like a village fair? You know the Newton Bardon fair is coming up soon?”
Petey Boy stared at me. I couldn’t read the expression.
“How’s your gran?”
“Fuming. She reckons one of the other inmates swapped their dentures while she was asleep, because her teeth don’t fit right anymore and someone called Doris now has an eerily familiar smile.”
“Did you say inmates?”
“She’s in a home. She’s not a fan. Still, it ain’t all bad news. Chatsworth House cancelled a visit from my father’s car club, and he’s furious. So that’s delicious.”
This took me aback.
“I had the impression your father was probably serving twenty-five years to life for the Hatton Garden robbery.”
“Sir Edward Topham, KC?”
“A King’s Counsel?” I was rapidly reassessing everything I thought I knew about Petey Boy. “So, he’s not even a barrow boy, then, let alone a notorious East End gangster?”
“Afraid not.”
I let this information settle for a moment. Pennies were starting to drop. All this “bruv” talk didn’t sit right because, well, it wasn’t really who Petey Boy was. But why the facade?
“Do I get the impression you don’t get on with your old man?”
“My parents… disapprove.”
“Of?”
Petey Boy waved a hand up and down the length of himself. “All of it.”
The family’s black sheep, Jonty had said.
I took a cautious stab. “Rebelling against your class?”
Petey Boy pursed his lips. “That’s part of it.”
“Being gay?”
“To be fair, no, not that. But they have a very set idea of how I should live my life. I never wanted the life they offered, and they’ve never really forgiven me for it.
But then, I’ve never forgiven my father for defending a lot of the #MeToo accused, so I guess disappointment is my family’s love language. ”
“I’m sorry,” I said. My father had been chaotic and irresponsible and frustrating, but I knew he’d have supported me, no matter what I chose to do with my life.
Of course, if he’d been less chaotic and more responsible, I might still be doing what I chose to do with my life, rather than what he was supposed to be doing with his.
“Dub-Dub!” Horatio Blunt’s voice boomed across the pub, and I flinched. I sensed him moving towards me like an oil slick. Petey Boy’s hand went to my knee under the table.
“Are you OK?”
I spoke quickly, through gritted teeth. “It’s someone I’d rather not—” A hand landed on my shoulder. “Horatio!” I turned to face him.
“Lovely to see you, Dub-Dub. I was hoping I’d bump into you.”
“Were you?” Of course he was. Not only had I threatened him with the undertaker if he turned up at home again, but the TV company had security on the gates, and they weren’t letting anyone through—especially twats—so stalking me in the village was his best hope of getting to me.
“I thought you might come in for the big game. Mind if I join you?”
“Actually, we’re waiting for—”
But he had already slithered into Bramley’s seat.
“I won’t take up much of your time.”
I mouthed an apology to Petey Boy. He squeezed my knee. Horatio extended a greasy hand towards him.
“Horatio Blunt. Old school chum of William’s.”
“Peter Topham,” Petey Boy said, shaking the offered mitt.
“I say, no relation to the KC, are you?” Horatio looked him up and down, taking in the hair, the ear stud, the boiler suit, and answered his own question.
“No, I suppose not. Still, thoroughly sound chap. Helped my poor father out of a spot of bother a few years ago. What’s gotten into all these secretaries, hey? ”
It was my turn to squeeze Petey Boy’s knee under the table. His hand held mine. It was deeply comforting.
“My clients have upped their offer,” Horatio murmured into my ear. He slipped a piece of paper onto the table.
“My answer is the same.”
“Come on, Dub-Dub. Take a look.”
“I don’t need to look at it.”
Petey Boy leant into my ear. “Are you OK? Do you want me to get him chucked out?”
I was grateful but said I could handle it.
“Fair enough, Dub-Dub,” Horatio said. “If you need a little longer to come round, that’s absolutely fine.
” He leant in closer, the heat of his breath on my ear.
“It won’t be long now. In my experience, once someone sells their family’s dignity, it’s not long before they’re willing to sell their family’s heritage too.
You’ve got my number. Call me any time, old chum. ”
Outrage boiled up inside me. “Who the bloody hell do you think you are?”
Horatio frowned, pretending to be innocent. “I’m not the bad guy, Dub-Dub. I’m the man who holds in his hands the obvious answer to all your problems. I’m here to help.”
Petey Boy’s hand pressed into my shoulder, and I realised I’d been rising out of my chair, my fists clenched. I’m not a violent person. I’ve never thumped anyone in my life. But Horatio Blunt could well have been the first.
“Time to piss off, mate,” Petey Boy said, standing up—all six and a half feet of him unfolding to tower over my old school bully—and looking ready to start a pub brawl.
Horatio laughed like this was the most ridiculous thing he’d ever seen. “And who the bloody hell are you? His nanny?”
“How dare you, sir!” Bramley’s voice boomed through the pub. I hadn’t seen him look so incensed since that time I suggested we save on polish by only doing the silverware once a month. “I’ll have you know, you’re addressing His Lordship’s fiancé!”
“No, Bramley, that’s only for—” But my protest arrived too late.
“Fiancé?” Horatio repeated, his voice thundering across the whole pub. “Dub-Dub, you dark horse! Congratulations!” He stuck his hand in mine and shook it, then pulled me towards him, slapping my back. “Everybody, His Lordship is engaged to be married!”
A roar of applause went up around the pub.
Horatio shouted the entire bar a round of drinks.
By the time the congratulations had died down, the match was starting and Horatio had slunk off.
At half-time, I stood on a chair and bought everyone another drink on the condition they swore to keep the news about my “engagement” under their hats.
“The last thing we want is for this to make the papers,” I said. “We all remember what it was like last time our village was crawling with reporters.”
“Gutter scum!” Birdie Craddoch cried out.
“What’s the world coming to when you can’t even finger a girl in the street without some arsehole taking a photograph?” Noah, the village electrician, added.
“Shame!” someone boomed.
“We saw them off for you, though, William,” Gurpreet, the local chemist, said.
Which was all jolly encouraging, but it didn’t alter the fact that the lie Petey Boy and I were engaged was never meant to go beyond the walls of Buckford Hall.
Now it had escaped, and I feared it might be difficult to contain.
I was relying on my community’s love and respect for my family to keep it quiet.
Because if it hit the papers, we wouldn’t be left alone—and I wanted very much for us to be left alone.
Almost as much as I was starting to want to add us to my list of pronouns.
I sat down. Petey Boy leant into my ear.
“Why didn’t you just tell them the truth?”
“We couldn’t risk the cast finding out.”
Petey Boy looked at me like I was an idiot. “The cast that is locked away at Buckford Hall and has no contact with the outside world? Who these villagers are therefore never going to meet?”
“Ah.” He had me there. “Yes. That cast.”
No wonder he thought I was a himbo.
Back at the folly, I made my way upstairs with a couple of nightcaps to find Petey Boy sitting at my father’s desk, his fingers tracing the ornate carvings.
The moon was shining in through the porthole window behind him, giving his white-blond hair an ethereal glow that reminded me of Prince Henry in the Knights-Errant trilogy.
I presented him with the tumbler, and he took it.
“What is it?”
“Sloe gin. It’s about the only thing this estate still produces. Sorry, there’s no ice.”
We cheersed and he sipped at it, his eyebrows leaping off his head.
“This is really good.”
I parked my arse against the edge of the desk, pretending to look out the window at the moon but mostly enjoying the closeness of Petey Boy’s body.
“Was it a good day off, then?”
He smiled. “The best.”
I clinked my glass against his. “I’m glad. I’m sorry we couldn’t fit in the otters.”
He spluttered into his drink. “I missed out on otters?”
“Didn’t I mention?” I knew I hadn’t. “Well, it was otters or the rugby, so I made an executive decision.”
“I feel like if I’d been consulted, our day would have ended very differently.”
As it turned out, that would have been for the best.
“They’re very young. Their mother is still teaching them how to swim. There’s plenty of time.”
Petey Boy looked like he was having a stroke. “Baby otters? You withheld baby otters? Fuck. I know people who would shiv you for less.”
I laughed. “You’ll have to hang around a bit longer, then.” And with every fibre of my body, I wanted him to. “When’s your next day off?”
“In eight days. At which time I demand otters.”
“It’s a date.” I rocked my shoulder gently into his, hoping to placate him.
Petey Boy pretended to be properly sulking, tracing his fingers over the carved woodwork of the desk, right by my thigh. His hand brushed my leg. I rocked into him again.
“This desk is really cool,” he said.
A wave of sadness crashed through my body as a thousand memories of my father flashed in my head. I knocked back my gin. It sucked the air out of my lungs and gave cover to the tears in my eyes.
“You want to know what’s really cool?” I turned, put my glass down, and crouched low.
“Come stand behind me. Watch this.” I gently pushed the small drawer inwards while my other hand fished around under the desktop.
Then I gave the drawer a sharp shove, and a hidden panel thrust out from the desk where Petey Boy had been sitting. He shrieked with delight.
“A secret drawer! That’s the coolest thing ever.” There was a look of genuine childlike delight on his face. Sadly, there wasn’t any treasure rattling around. A deck of cards. A dead spider. I wished there’d been something more interesting so Petey Boy could really understand the magic of it.
“When I was a kid, my father and I used to use it to send secret messages to each other. Stupid things, really. I’d pop in a drawing of a horse or something. You know, kid stuff. He’d leave me sweets or five pounds or, when I was much older, maybe a spliff or a mushroom.”
Petey Boy shook his head. “You have got to be kidding me.”
I laughed, wiping away a silly tear with my forearm.
“My parents aren’t—weren’t—like normal parents.
” I felt the familiar weight in my chest I always felt talking about my father and tried to swallow it down.
“I don’t think I’ve opened the drawer since he died.
Sometimes there’d be letters from him telling me how proud he was or how much he loved me. I’ve kept them all somewhere.”
Petey Boy’s face twitched, and too late, I remembered his terrible relationship with his parents.
“Let me show you how the mechanism works,” I said, hoping to distract him—and me too.
I pushed the secret drawer back in until it clicked.
Then I grabbed Petey Boy’s hand and fed it under the table, feeling for the button, enjoying the feel of his fingertips weaving through mine.
When I found it, I slid his hand onto it.
His eyes met mine, and electricity sparked through my chest. I shifted in behind him, grabbing his other hand and placing it on the drawer knob.
“Like this,” I said. “Now press here.” My head rested against his, and Petey Boy leant into it. “Then shove.” The drawer popped open, and we both looked in total surprise as a joint rolled slowly through the dust towards us.
Petey Boy stared at the spliff, then up at me. “I think your old man wants us to have a smoke.” He picked up the joint. “How long has it been since, um…?”
“Three years.” I shook my head. “There’s no way that’s any good.”
“Still, your old man sounds like the kind of guy who’d want us to give it the old college try, right?”