Chapter 16
sixteen
One Month Later
My phone rings, and I fumble for it, nerves squirming in my stomach like a bed of snakes.
“Cath?”
“He’s okay, Wes.”
I slump against the counter, letting my breath out in a loud sigh. The man perusing the skin mags on the other side of the counter shoots me a suspicious look and then goes back to gazing at this month’s centrefold. I ignore him.
“Are you sure?”
“ Positive .” Her voice carries a hint of hope, and I don’t know whether to encourage it and let myself feel the same or whether we’re both just heading for more disappointment. “I think this is going to work. He looked determined.”
“He couldn’t look much worse than when I saw him.”
Over the last few weeks, my worry for Tyler has compounded the misery of life without Mac.
Tyler kept his promise and has texted every night, but neither Cath nor I have seen him.
It’s been hard not to feel terrified that he’s been gambling, racking up more debts, or if he’s been taken by the men who’ve been terrorizing him for money he owes.
Now, this news from Cath feels like a lifeline. I tap my fingers on the counter, distantly noticing the ding of a car entering the petrol station forecourt.
“What did he say?” I ask.
“Not much. It’s difficult to talk in those places. We can’t seem to remember how to talk to each other lately, anyway. There’s only one thing we can talk about. Plus, there were lots of people around. It was like a nice prison.”
“Well, hopefully, we’ve staved off the particular delight of real prison.” For now , is my unspoken comment but I know she hears it.
“They seem to know what they’re talking about, and I should think so. It’s seriously posh, Wes.”
Tyler’s gone into rehab at a place that specialises in addiction. He rang me yesterday afternoon to tell me he’d got a place there, but I’d been working and I couldn’t take him. So Cath had agreed to go with him.
“So, he’s settled in, then?”
“Yeah.”
“I wish I could have gone with you.”
“Maybe it’s better that you didn’t, Wes.”
“What do you mean?”
“He tries to be better for you. He’s not so bothered about showing me his weaker side. If you’d been there, he wouldn’t have focused on what he needed to do.”
“What’s the place like?”
“I’ll send you a picture.”
My phone beeps a second later, and I fumble to open the picture.
It shows a big building in what looks like the middle of nowhere, which actually turns out to be near Brighton.
It’s a tall, white-painted mansion in front of a lonely stretch of windswept beach.
She’s right. It’s seriously posh. Maybe too posh. Alarm bells ring.
“How is it that he’s there, Cath?”
“What do you mean?”
“Places like this…” I run my tongue over my teeth as I gaze at the picture. “I don’t know. Something feels hinky. People like us don’t get chances at places like that.”
“Tyler said they have to take on a quota of free cases, and he just struck it lucky.”
But my brother and I don’t ever get lucky. That’s my worry.
“Stop worrying,” Cath chides me.
“I’ll try. So, how long is he in there?”
“Three months.”
“Jesus. And we’re not getting a bill for this?”
“Apparently not.”
“Because I’ve got money, but I’m not sure how much a place like this costs.” My voice is threaded with panic, because my life is, once again, teetering on the precipice of disaster.
“Wes, relax . Take a breath. You’re winding yourself up again.”
I do as she says, feeling a little calmer. “So, when can we visit?”
“Not for a bit. The bloke in charge says patients are not allowed access to mobiles. They’ll contact us when we can visit, but at first, they want to focus on Tyler. It seems to be a mixture of therapy and reconditioning.”
“Sounds like a shampoo and set.” I sigh. “Well, at least he’s safe for now.”
“He seemed different, Wes. Determined.”
“Let’s hope that carries on. He’s going to need it. Keep in touch, babe.”
“I will. Love you.”
“Love you too.”
I click to end the call and lower my head to the counter, banging it gently on the Formica.
“Relationships, eh?”
I look up at the comment and find Andy watching me.
My first week of working here at the station, I called him Porno Pete, such was his fascination with the skin mags.
He comes in every night to have some sort of mystic communion with them.
I’m actually flattered that he’s pulled himself away from the relationship he appears to be having with Miss August.
“Pardon?” I say.
He nods at my phone. “They’re more trouble than they’re worth.”
“True. They’d be much less trouble with a glossy finish and a staple in the middle.”
He laughs and nods kindly at me before walking out. I shake my head. I would never have the nerve to come into a shop and casually read the porno mags page to page and then go home. And I mean page to page. I’m pretty sure he’s even reading the articles and the classifieds at the back.
I look around me. The petrol station is small, but its proximity to an Amazon hub makes it very busy.
It’s midnight, and I can feel the tiredness tugging at my bones.
My exhaustion isn’t solely caused by the night shift—after a month, I’m starting to get used to those.
It’s being away from Mac. It’s a grinding pain inside me and a sense of loss.
I keep expecting to hear his key in the lock or the ping of a caustic reply to one of my text messages.
I pick up my phone again and find our text history. For the thousandth time, I read the long message he sent me the morning after I’d left.
I’m sending you the name of someone who specialises in possible trauma after an assault.
If you don’t get on with him we can find another option.
I’ve paid for ten sessions, and if you need more, I will continue to pay.
You are not obligated to visit him, but I hope you do.
There’s also no limit on how many times you go, Wes. I just want you to feel better.
I smile. That’s so him. No push to get me back, no attempt to see me, but still that kind streak he tries so hard to keep hidden. I wonder why he’s so determined not to reveal his true self. It’s a certainty I’ll never know.
I’d given in and gone to see the therapist he’d recommended. I’d been experiencing nightmares for a week, and I was grateful to seek help. I found the whole situation a bit surreal, but the therapist is nice, and at least the bad dreams have tapered off.
I trace my fingers over Mac’s latest message and my reply.
Are you safe, Wes?
Yes
And that had been it. Those two lines marked the end of our arrangement. My reply shows as read , but he hasn’t attempted to contact me since.
Maybe he agrees with me that nothing good could come of us together.
Myself, I’ve grown less confident about being apart as the month has progressed.
So much happened the night of the party.
The evening started off feeling wrong and then it progressed into feeling like I’d been dropped into a nightmare.
Between meeting Brandon, being attacked by that fucker Ian Harris, and then being so tenderly cared for by Mac…
Well, it’s no wonder my emotions veered off a cliff and I made a knee-jerk decision.
I think I did need some time away to process, but now I’m overcome by how much I miss him. Maybe I was too hasty deciding to permanently cut things off. Perhaps I should have stayed and fought for him.
I huff. Fought for what? He paid me for sex.
He was kind. He scolded me for wanting to spend more time with him.
That was the extent of our great love affair.
I roll my eyes as I look down at the messages again.
Maybe he doesn’t even miss me. He’s probably got another man already.
Maybe he’s gone back to Brandon. Whether it’s Brandon or another man, they’re probably living in the same flat and sleeping on the same sheets as I did.
I consider that and then shake my head. Mac would definitely insist on new bed linen.
I try to smile, but I just can’t. The thought of him with someone else makes me want to crawl into a dark space and never come out.
I rub my neck and glance out the window.
A few times in the past week I’ve felt like someone was out there observing me.
The forecourt looks the same as usual. Two people are pumping petrol, and a car is parked neatly in one of the parking spaces.
A man is sitting in it, but I can’t see his features.
I shrug. He probably stopped in to make a phone call or check his sat nav. It happens all the time around here.
The door rings as one of the men who was pumping his petrol strolls in, making straight for the chocolate. I don’t blame him.
I open my book. I’m reading something from one of the shelves in Julian’s flat, but not much keeps my attention lately, and certainly not this mystery. It’s hard to be interested in the whodunnit when you actually can’t remember the murder in the first place.
My phone rings, and I brighten. Julian. “Hey,” I say. “Missing me already?”
“That would imply that I might miss you at a later point, if not now. How disturbing.”
I smile. He’d insisted that I move back in with him after that night at the club. I’m grateful for the place and his friendship. Yet, I feel stuck there—caught and unable to move forward or back. I’m in a holding pattern, but for what? I don’t know.
“What’s up? You can’t be calling about the washing-up because I did the pots before I left.”
“That would only be impressive if you contributed to making them dirty. You hardly eat.”
“I know. Sorry. Haven’t been hungry lately.”
“Hmm.” There’s a pause. “I need to tell you something.”
“What is it? Hang on.”
A customer approaches the counter. Julian continues to call my name urgently on the phone, but I ignore him. I ring up the man’s petrol and purchases, cradling the phone on my shoulder, and watch as he runs his card through. After giving him his receipt, I go back to my call.