Chapter 6
6
It’s 6 a.m. on Sunday and I never in my wildest nightmares thought I would be here.
Here, at the bottom of a members-only hiking trail no doubt owned by some private equity firm trying to look eco-friendly, waiting for Eric Bancroft. The warm morning air tracing my bare shoulders is comforting but not worth waking up at 5 a.m. and getting the same tube as the Saturday-nighters just coming home.
Fiddling with the fraying hem of my charity-shop bike shorts, I take in the pristine scene around me. There are kiosks dotted at the mouth of a winding trail selling freshly ground coffee, pressed juices and small glass pots of overnight oats. My mouth waters: maybe I could get into this part of hiking if it was at a reasonable time of day. The greenery bracketing the path is wild and full, but well landscaped, and frames the ticketed turnstiles that grant access to the hiking trail. This place is the Soho House of hiking trails. I watch as other early risers start their ascent. They look so at ease at this time of day that it’s as if they rise naturally with the sun, wearing matching Lululemon workout sets and carrying the latest expensive status-declaring aluminium water bottles. A few of them give me the side-eye as I drink out of a plastic bottle of Volvic I bought from the twenty-four-hour corner shop on the way here. The last time I exercised was over a month ago, running for a bus that I ended up missing anyway. I buy an overpriced oat milk latte and pain au chocolat from the trendy coffee cart and sit cross-legged on a decorative boulder, already worn out.
“Good morning, Hastings.” My body stiffens at his fake-chirpiness. I was almost enjoying myself in the brief chocolatey moment when I forgot the reason I’m here.
Bancroft sports an all-black outfit and Ray-Bans. Matching Nike shorts, fancy trainers and a quarter-zip hoodie all in pristine condition with perfectly tousled hair, looking alert and at ease, as though he’s been up for hours.
“You’re late,” I say, still chewing the last flaky bite of my pastry. It’s as though he loves to be the last one to enter a room, creating the illusion that everyone is waiting for him.
“I thought I’d give you enough time to take care of your sugar and caffeine addiction before we got started.” His gaze runs over me and lands on the empty grease-stained brown paper bag in my hand.
I glare at him. “It’s research,” I say, crumpling the bag into a ball and lightly throwing it at him. An old man dressed like a marathon runner tuts at my faux-littering in between pants for air.
I brush the pastry crumbs off my chest and he starts stretching his toned calves on a beautifully carved, moss-covered wooden bench.
“Look, I’ve already locked in discounted access for users, so all we need to do is check out the trail itself.” Bancroft picks up my bag and launches it at a bin several metres away. Of course, it lands perfectly in the center. I’m slightly impressed but feign disinterest as I slide off the boulder.
“Let’s just get this over with so I can go back to bed.” I place my worn baseball cap on my head for dramatic effect.
“That’s the spirit!” he says, patting me on the back as I stand up.
We hike in silence as the summer sun slowly begins to bake the ground below us. The trail fills with more versions of the 6 a.m. women, then the 6.30 a.m. fitness couples in matching skin-tight sportswear, followed by 7 a.m. friends with iced coffees and strollers.
We try to stay out of each other’s way: me walking a few meters behind him, huffing sarcastically every time someone checks him out; him keeping a steady pace just ahead of me, which I’m sure is some sort of dominance mind game he’s attempting. I try to regulate my breathing as my thighs burn their way toward what I hope is the end of the trail, but each breath makes my head grow heavier.
“You OK back there?” he asks over his shoulder after the first half mile uphill, the sun glistening off the sweat lightly coating his forehead.
“Never. Better. Thanks.” I strain between each word.
My legs, my chest and my forehead are all on fire. It would be fitting to die here, like this: she died how she lived, trying so hard to get somewhere but not quite reaching the peak.
He slows down to meet my pace. “We’re nearly at the top but we can stop if you need a break.”
“I’m fine,” I say, pushing against the incline to get ahead of him.
He stops completely, dust brushing his ankles. “I’d rather you didn’t drop dead at the top of the trail. I’ll just have to carry you back down.” His silver bottle glints in the sunlight as he holds it out toward me. “I know exercise has always been a foreign concept to you but can you at least stay hydrated?”
I clench my fists as I turn back around to him. “Why? If I die on the trail you won’t have to work for the promotion. Just glide into prosperity as always!”
He laughs, wiping the sweat from his forehead with the back of his hand. “If you die now there’d be no one to ruin later, and where’s the fun in that?” He tilts his head to me in question.
“This isn’t fun for me—this is my entire life.” I stomp further up the trail, legs burning.
He scoffs. “That’s pretty clear. Is that why you’ve sucked up to Susie for years despite never getting promoted?”
I stop and turn to him, my ponytail violently hitting me in the cheek as I whirl. I hate that we used to be friends, that he can now use truths I confided in him against me.
“You don’t even need that job! You just want it because I want it. And now you’re going to be fucking handed it.” I’m so furious black spots start to appear like flies in need of swatting.
“Are you serious?” he growls, closing the stony distance between us in three quick strides. His bright eyes blaze with frustration. “If you think I only want the job because you want it then you’re fucking deluded.”
His voice quiets as he comes in closer, glaring down at me so I feel three feet tall.
“As much as you’d love to believe it, not every move I make revolves around you. The reality is, Hastings, I don’t think about you as much as you think I do. In fact, I don’t think of you at all.”
My eyes travel up the towering human iceberg and blink furiously. A wave of sweaty embarrassment washes over me at the amount of mental energy I’ve expended thinking about him, always assuming that he was doing the same.
“Piss off, Wankcroft,” is the only thing my foggy brain can think to say as I start back down the rocky hill.
All I care about is trying to maintain an ounce of composure despite the blood pounding in my ears. The gentle morning sun has evolved into a humid beam of heat, making my lungs constrict. I need to get out of here. My feet tiptoe down the steep, rocky hill as I try to not let my frustration turn into teary defeat. I feel a sharp pain in my ankle and before I have a chance to grab on to a nearby branch, person, anything, my foot jerks unnaturally to the side.
My arms flail out to catch my fall as my knees buckle and I land on my side in the dust. A barrage of words too explicit for this early in the day echo from Bancroft behind me, followed by the pacing of designer-trainer-clad feet.
“Are you OK? Hastings?” he pants as he crouches next to me, a look of pure, unadulterated alarm in his eyes. “We should take you to the ER. Can you move?”
“No, it’s fine!” I say a little too loud, eyes scanning for the closest escape route. “I’ll be waiting hours and it doesn’t even hurt. I’m fine.”
Trying to stand and scrape back my lost dignity fails as I buckle under a sudden sharp, throbbing pain lancing through my ankle. I plummet toward the ground again—this time intercepted by strong, warm palms gripping my body and pulling me upright. He stands us face-to-face, so close I can feel his heaving chest as he assesses me. Instinctively, he rubs his hands up and down my arms, leaving a trail of goose bumps in his wake. The feeling pulls me away from the pain for a few moments. Our panicked eyes lock, then soften into nervousness as we both recognize the position we’re in. Until he breaks the charged silence.
“There’s a shorter trail on the way down. I’ll order an Uber to meet us at the bottom,” he declares resolutely.
I blink as his expression turns into gravely serious, tight-jawed control but, despite my embarrassment, I let out a breath of relief. “OK. My address is—”
“I don’t need it,” he interrupts, holding my arm with one hand and pulling his phone out of his pocket with the other.
I furrow my brow at the combination of pain and annoyance. “Are you a stalker or are you kidnapping me?” My functioning foot wobbles as I try and stand on one leg while on an incline, determined not to use him as a crutch.
He sighs, not looking up from the screen. “I don’t need your address because it’s already in my phone.”
He lets that fact sit between us for a moment; the whoosh of memory from the last time he had to wrangle me into a cab overrides my throbbing ankle. “But also because we’re going to my place.”
His eyes flick up and pin me with a defiant look, waiting for my protest.
“Kidnapping it is, then!” I say loud enough for us to receive weird looks from passersby.
He glances from my face to my airborne foot. “Your ankle is already swelling up. You need to rest it and I live ten minutes away.”
My gravel-scraped hand lifts up to intercept his explanation as I hop on one leg, giving him a pleading look to stop.
He steps in close; my heart pounds out a heady cocktail of anxiety, embarrassment and adrenaline as he loops my arm around his and grips my elbow with his free hand. Stabbing pain lances up my leg as we slowly descend the dusty path. We hobble in loaded silence for a few minutes until I finally let out a huff of a laugh when we pass a neon-green metal sign with the words “Beginner’s Trail” emblazoned in bold white letters.
“You didn’t think to start us out on this route on the way up?”
“In my defence, I didn’t think you’d be this terrible at walking. This is the route people take with strollers.”
I remember the women with their sporty buggies earlier and wonder if we could borrow one to get me to the bottom of this never-ending hill. A hiss escapes my lips as my foot scrapes the ground.
Bancroft squeezes my elbow more tightly and runs a rough thumb over a raised white scar on my forearm. “You need to distract yourself. Tell me how you got this.”
For a moment I’m amazed he’d noticed it during our dramatic morning, but he’s probably seen it before and just never asked.
“It was just some accident when I was a kid.” I breathe out, concentrating on the pins and needles tingling in my toes.
“What happened?”
“Ummm, I used to like climbing a really big tree at the bottom of our garden because my mum told me fairies lived up there. Even if it was pouring rain I’d be up this tree trying to talk to the fairies that lived there. Eventually, my dad built a little treehouse in the branches with a tire swing.” I feel weak at the memory. “I didn’t have many friends, so he thought a treehouse would be a good way to get other kids from the neighbourhood to come hang out with me.”
“So, one of those kids did this?” he asks.
My throat dries up as he locks eyes with me, light from the warm, glowing sky bouncing off his irises.
My pained grimace curls into a half-moon smile as I recall, “No. I don’t think my dad realized at the time that most kids my age had moved on from playing make-believe to playing video games. I had too by the time he had finished it, I just couldn’t work up the courage to tell him. So instead, he, my mum and I had a fairy-themed picnic in the treehouse and then decided to test if all three of us could fit on the tire swing. The rope snapped and I broke my arm from the fall.”
Bancroft’s grip on my elbow hardens. “Ouch.”
“Very ‘ouch,’” I confirm. “I still don’t think he’s forgiven himself. The funny thing was though, I was the first kid in my school year to have a broken bone. All of a sudden, everyone wanted to talk to me about it and sign my bright pink cast.”
Bancroft arches an eyebrow. “So, in a weird way, your dad’s plan worked.”
I laugh. “Yeah.”
I wait for him to reciprocate with a similar anecdote about the scarring on his right hand, usually half-hidden by his signet ring, but he says nothing.
Eventually, I give in and ask, “How did you get that?”
He examines the white vein running from his little finger wrapping down the side of his hand, jaw tensing for a second and then releasing. “Just... dumb teenage boy stuff.”
“Right,” I concede, instantly regretting my overshare.
My chest loosens as we reach a clearing and I see the boulder marking the start of the trail. “The car will be here in three minutes,” Bancroft says resolvedly under his breath, fingers gripping my arm just a little bit tighter.
Fifteen minutes later we arrive outside his apartment building and I stumble as I lift myself from the car. He watches me limp two steps toward the door before offering to carry me in. I protest weakly, but when I sway again he rolls his eyes and swoops me into his arms. The uniformed concierge gives us a confused look as we enter the immaculately styled mid-century lobby. He watches as we head to the elevator, taking in my scrapes and foot held at an awkward angle.
“Is your girlfriend OK, Mr. Bancroft?” the man asks as we round the corner toward a row of lifts. “Do you need—”
“I’m fine! And I’m not his girlfriend!” I shout back at the man. “You can put me down now,” I demand through gritted teeth as I hear the concierge’s chuckle echo, feeling the heat draining from my flaming cheeks as the metal doors slide open.
Bancroft places me down gently and I lean on one leg against the elevator rail, my grazed hands stinging against the cold metal bar. We wait in the thick silence, listening to the hum of the lift. The arrival of his floor is announced with a deafening ding , making us both jump.
He crouches down to wrap a supportive arm around my waist as the door slides open. My sore hand rests on his shoulder and I fight every instinct to explore the taut muscles under my palm. He tenses his arm around my middle and pushes up so he’s half carrying me down the sleek, carpeted corridor.
His keys jangle as they turn in the keyhole, filling the quietness still lingering from the elevator. Instantly the smell of wood and citrus hits my nostrils as he tugs me down a hallway with dark herringbone floorboards. This apartment is modern but soft. Hazy natural light framed by linen curtains, high white ceilings, walls adorned with vintage film posters and modern abstract paintings. It is so perfectly him. Masculine, but in all the best ways. Sophisticated but easy-going, blunt but charming. It’s inviting and unpretentious, not the seedy James Bond–style bachelor pad I had always imagined. As we enter the main living space I notice a pair of small gold hooped earrings in a bowl among small change and keys.
“Did you decorate this place yourself?” I ask nonchalantly.
He smirks, clearly aware of the negative space between my question. “I had some help.”
He places me gently on a gray corner sofa and walks over to the kitchen, where he grabs a medical-grade ice pack and wraps it in a kitchen towel. He lays it on the sofa next to my leg. The cool air from the A/C wraps around me as my heart rate finally begins to lower, but it’s immediately increased once again as Bancroft tenderly traces his warm fingers around my calf and lifts it to inspect the damage to my ankle. It’s definitely a coincidence that the air conditioning makes goose bumps form all over my body at the exact same moment.
“Is this how you usually get women back to your place?” I speculate, sounding more breathless than I meant to, steeling myself through the pain. “Wound them on remote trails and carry them in because they can’t object?”
He shoots me a glittering look with those sharp blue eyes. “And here’s me thinking this was more of a damsel-in-distress situation.”
I suck in a breath, avoiding the urge to find comfort in his too-familiar expression. “I don’t need your help.”
He cocks an eyebrow and squeezes his fingers lightly around my ankle. My leg jerks and I whimper in agony. “You’re a sadist!”
“You’re in more pain than you’re letting on and your ankle has doubled in size since the trail.” His eyes fix on me. “So, you’re going to sit here, accept my help and stop whining.” His stare returns to its annoyed-with-me neutral state, but with a flicker of concern so faint, I could blink and miss it.
Him looking up at me like that, his large hands steadying my ankle and calf, gives me a feeling low in my stomach that I really don’t want to deal with right now. I let out an annoyed exhale and fall back onto the sofa, arm up over my face to avoid his gaze.
“So you are able to do what I tell you? Good to know.”
Heat spreads over my chest and I wish I’d just died there in the dust. Sunk into the ground and became one with the dirt, never to be mortified again. Bancroft takes my ankle and begins unknotting the stained laces of my old ratty trainers, sucking his teeth.
“What now?” I sigh. He can’t help but be critical of my every breath. Is he like this with everyone or is this a personality trait he saves just for me?
“It’s like a child tied these—no wonder you ate it on the trail.” He holds up my loosely tied laces.
“Sorry I didn’t learn the Queen’s Knot in finishing school or whatever.” I feel him holding back a laugh. Even when I’m pissed off at him, it always gives me a small sense of satisfaction to break his controlled veneer. He stands and heads back to the marble kitchen.
“Why are you so eager to help me anyway? We’re mortal enemies.”
He bends down into the fridge, rummaging for something, and I feel my cheeks redden, his fitted hiking gear not leaving much to the imagination when he’s in this position.
“It would be boring to beat you while you’re down: not a very worthy opponent.” He flashes me a megawatt smile as he cracks the cap of a green juice and hands it to me in a way that feels like a brief peace offering.
Sniffing the thick, dark green liquid is like inhaling a boggy marsh.
He watches me crinkle my nose and lets out a long sigh. “Just... drink it. It’s good for you.”
“You don’t eat normal people food anymore?” A pang of regret hits me right in the chest as I remember all the food he used to order for our dinners at the office when we had to work late. How I used to take the piss out of his insistence on ordering stir-fries only to pick out half the ingredients and put them on my plate.
“I don’t really eat here. I’m either at the office or out with... friends.” He turns back toward the kitchen and returns with toasted brown bread and two pills on a beige-speckled plate, I raise an eyebrow in question.
“Don’t be weird. It’s just ibuprofen. For the inflammation. You’ll have to stay here for a bit to wait for the swelling to stop.” He hands me a highball glass of water and stands in front of me, watching me. I take the tablets and notice his eyes fixed on my throat as I gulp down the rest of the water. “I’m gonna wash off the hike. You rest. I’ll just be a few minutes.”
“Please do, I think you got some of your stink on me when you carried me down the hill.”
He throws a middle finger up over his shoulder as he leaves. I hear the creak of a door followed by the rainfall of a high-pressure shower.
The urge to snoop around his apartment while he is out of the room is almost unbearable. Every wall, counter and square foot tells a story of Bancroft, or at the very least tells the story of who decorated this place for him. It even smells like him, a soft woody scent with sweet citrus that sticks in your mind long after he’s gone. I lean to try and see more of the room, but the movement causes a sharp pain to jolt up my leg from my ankle. Inspecting the injury for the first time, I lift the ice pack and press a finger against the golf-ball-size swelling sticking out where my ankle bone would usually be. I decide to stay put. I can snoop without moving too much.
From where I’m sitting, I can see into his bedroom. I take in the cream sheets with brown piping on the edges making up what looks like a king-size bed.
I don’t know why I expected there to be a gorgeous woman waiting here on a Sunday morning to cook him brunch, the same person who helped him decorate. I take the opportunity to investigate the personal effects, mostly magazines and TV remotes, within arm’s reach to see if there is anything indicating another person’s presence.
After a few minutes, I hear the rapid stream of the water stop, replaced by the sounds of bare feet padding from his bathroom into his bedroom.
“You live alone?” My voice echoes across the open-plan expanse.
“It’s what I’m used to,” his voice projects back through the cracked bedroom door. “I like my own company.”
“I guess force-feeding people green sludge when they walk through the door tends to push them away?”
“Only if they’re caffeine and sugar addicts,” he calls back.
I crack a smile and sip at the earthy sludge juice.
I scan each surface of his apartment, and eventually land on the coffee table. Stacks of thick coffee table books are scattered in a way that makes me believe he might have actually read them: a giant book of David Hockney paintings, Slim Aarons photography, the NASA archives; Bancroft could start a Taschen exhibition from his living room. Using the tips of my fingers to drag a landscape photography book titled Remote Experiences: Extraordinary Travel from North to South from the top of the pile to the edge of the table, I grab it and flip through the pages, hoping an explanation of his inner workings is hidden within the text. The flashes of color and smooth stream of paper through my hands is abruptly stopped by the presence of a bookmark. Except, it’s not a bookmark. Placing the heavy book on my lap, I slide out the long rectangular card and my hand starts to tremble as the realization hits me.
It’s a strip of photos of me and him from the Catch Group Christmas party six months ago. A missing memory of pulling him into the cramped photo booth bursts through my mind as I run my finger down the images, homing in on the last one. Me, gleaming at the camera, glassy-eyed. Him, looking at me with a softness that makes my stomach do a backward flip off the side of the building.
I hastily shove the photo strip back into the book and slam it shut. “Listen, I have to go. I promised my flatmate I would help her with her dissertation today,” I lie. After a few seconds of silence, a freshly showered Bancroft appears, wearing a short-sleeved white cotton T-shirt and blue jeans. Ignoring his still-damp chest, I inspect my ankle for swelling, lowering it with a wince onto the oak floor.
“Let me check how the swelling is doing.” He leans down over me; his chest smells like soap. His usual sandy blond hair looks darker when it’s wet; the short curls fall over his forehead like little helter-skelters.
“It’s definitely feeling better.” I fake a smile. “So, we don’t need to do this whole Misery act anymore.”
A flash of something glints across his eyes and then disappears; he clears his throat and says, “At least let me help you to the door.”
I give him a light nod, trying not to make eye contact as my cheeks begin to burn, thinking about the photographs.
His arms wrap around me and I feel his hands hold me lightly but firmly. His scent envelops me like a warm duvet on a cold morning.
“Thanks...” I half whisper, as though being grateful to him must be kept quiet “... and thanks for the health sludge too—I feel like a new woman.”
He lets out an awkward, breathy laugh. “No problem.” He’s stepping away from me and running a hand through his wet hair. Before any stupid questions come tumbling out of my mouth, I grab my bag, and my pride, and hobble out of the door.