Chapter 8
Excerpt from an article in Forbes UK
Kate
When you live on the streets and pick pockets, every day is a surprise.
No day is the same as the last, and no one week is like another.
Something unexpected could always happen.
But when I’d gone out that morning to find the money for Randell, I couldn’t have imagined I’d end up at a McDonald’s with Henry Darlington.
I knew there were better places to eat in London, but I loved McDonald’s.
My mum and I had hardly ever been able to afford to eat out, but whenever we’d had a little cash to spare, it was where we would end up.
The food was mediocre, but the memories I associated with the place made it a five-star restaurant in my eyes.
I approached the digital order kiosk. “Do you want anything?”
“No, thanks,” Henry replied, looking around. In his tailored three-piece suit and tie, he looked completely out of place among the cheap decor.
Henry paid for my order with a credit card he pulled from the inside pocket of his jacket. The kiosk churned out the receipt with an order number, and we joined the other diners waiting for their food. The smell of fried meat made my stomach rumble in anticipation.
I looked up at Henry to see if he’d heard, but he wasn’t looking at me.
He was tensely watching the order numbers on the digital display and looked like he couldn’t wait to leave.
Perhaps it would have been wiser to take his money and run.
He had promised not to call the police, but what if he changed his mind?
I wasn’t keen to get arrested, but my desire for company was greater than my fear of going to jail.
Living alone on the streets could be pretty lonely, even though there were people everywhere. And I was curious too. I’d never met anyone like Henry. Someone who was so rich that money didn’t matter. I couldn’t imagine it.
“Do you really have a private jet?”
When he turned from the orders board to look at me, I saw that he had the bluest eyes of anyone I’d ever met. They’d often looked out at me from screens and magazines in the last few months, but the pixels disguised how bright and colourful they really were.
“Yes. It belongs to my family.”
“And you can fly in it whenever you want?”
He nodded.
“Wow,” I murmured. “It must be so freeing to go wherever you want, whenever you want.”
“Yes.” His mouth twisted into a smile, but it seemed forced, as if the corners of his lips had been weighed down.
I couldn’t tell if his sombre mood was because of my presence or the glances of other diners who had, unsurprisingly, recognised him.
At a table just a few steps away, a woman was pointing him out to her companion.
“Do you fly a lot?” I asked to distract him.
“No, not anymore. I used to go on holiday with my friends a lot, but I don’t have time for that anymore.”
“What kinds of places did you jet off to?”
The number on the display changed, and a man standing behind me jostled me as he rushed to collect his food. I stumbled forward into Henry.
“Sorry.”
“It’s OK,” he said.
He didn’t let on if I smelled bad. It had been a few days since my last shower, which I now regretted.
For not only was Henry nice to me—nicer than he should have been—but he was also incredibly good-looking.
He had outrageously long eyelashes, black hair that curled around his ears, and neatly trimmed stubble that seemed at odds with his otherwise polished appearance.
I, on the other hand, probably looked like a scruffy stray dog.
Henry cleared his throat. “Everywhere. Monaco. New York. Sardinia. Paris.”
“Wow,” I murmured again. “I’ve never been outside of England. Or London, even. Although . . . that’s not exactly true. I went to Watford once, but only because I fell asleep on the train. It was late, and super annoying to get back.”
“You’ve never left London?” Henry asked with surprise. I shook my head, and he shrugged. “You haven’t missed anything. I’ve been to a lot of cities, and honestly? None of them holds a candle to London.”
“You’re just saying that so I don’t feel like an uncultured loser.”
“No, I’m saying it because it’s the truth. London is the best city.”
“Prove it.”
“How?”
I pursed my lips. “Tell me what you like about it.”
He hesitated. “Everything won’t cut it with you, will it?”
“No. I want details.”
It was a strange question, but Henry seemed to give it serious thought.
“I love the parks, and that the Thames is right on my doorstep. I like all the restaurants where I can eat food from around the world even when I’m stuck here.
But the best thing about the city is how many different kinds of people and possibilities there are.
There’s nothing here that you can’t do.”
I smiled. His answer was so heartfelt, even if it wasn’t true. There was a lot you couldn’t do in this city if you didn’t have the money for it. But that was my problem, not his.
Before I could answer, my order number showed up on the display. I’d bought so much food that Henry had to help me carry it to a free table by the window. As soon as we were sitting, I hastily unwrapped the first of five burgers and took a big bite.
“Oh my god,” I groaned appreciatively. It was by far the best thing I’d eaten in a long time, even if it was just because I was famished. I took a second bite before I’d even swallowed the first and gave another rapturous sigh.
“It sounds like you’re really enjoying that.”
I froze. I was so fixated on my food that I’d managed to forget Henry for a brief moment. He watched me, bemused, and my cheeks flushed. Where he came from, people probably ate burgers with knives and forks and didn’t hoover them down.
“Sorry,” I mumbled, cheeks bulging.
“You don’t have to apologise.”
I dabbed at my mouth with a napkin and told myself to eat a little slower. I’d also be doing my stomach a favour. “Sure you don’t want any?”
Henry leaned back in his chair and opened the top button of his jacket in one fluid motion. “Thank you, but I don’t eat meat.”
“I can’t afford to not eat something. Apart from peanuts. I’m allergic to them.” I tore open several ketchup sachets and squeezed their contents into the lid of my burger box. “Are you allergic to anything?”
“Wasps.”
“Have you been stung before?”
Henry looked at me appraisingly. “You’re pretty nosy.”
“I’m just making small talk,” I answered with a shrug.
“Yes, I was stung once when I was a kid.”
“Was it bad?”
“Pretty bad. Shelley had to take me to hospital.”
“Is Shelley your mum?” I asked. If his dad’s contact was saved in his phone with his full name, it was possible he called his mum by her first name.
“No, she was my nanny.”
I drowned a chip in a lake of ketchup. “Was?”
Henry’s mouth twitched. “Yes. I’d say being twenty-six makes me a little too old for a babysitter, don’t you think?”
“Oh. Of course. I just thought . . .” I fell silent and felt myself blush for the second time in several minutes. “Never mind. Forget what I said.”
“Don’t worry, I already have. Shelley now lives with her husband near Bristol, and .
. .” Henry broke off when a group of women sat down at the table next to us—all of them looking at us.
Strictly speaking, they were looking at Henry.
I slid down lower in my chair, but Henry didn’t move.
If anything, he straightened his shoulders and raised his chin a little, as though projecting strength was his way of facing uncertainty.
“Doesn’t it bother you when people stare at you like that?” I asked quietly.
“No. What bothers me is the reason why they stare.”
“You mean your dad?”
He grimaced slightly. “So you know about that.”
“Of course. I live on the streets, not on the moon.” I unwrapped my second burger and lifted the top bun to put several chips on it. “In fact, I ended up at the protest outside your hotel earlier in the week. Unintentionally, though.”
Henry looked suspicious. “How do you end up at a protest unintentionally?”
I hesitated, weighing up whether or not to tell him the truth.
I decided that he’d sussed me out by now anyway.
Besides, we’d probably never see each other again after today.
Who cared what he thought about me. “I stole a wallet, and the guy noticed. I ended up caught in the protest when I was running away from him, so I just joined it until the coast was clear.”
“How long have you been doing that?” Henry asked, ignoring the women at the next table and fixing his attention fully on me.
“I don’t really know. It snowballed over the years. It started with shoplifting just every once in a while. Sanitary products my mum and I couldn’t afford. But after getting caught two or three times, I switched to pickpocketing. I don’t like doing it, but I don’t have any other choice.”
“Why don’t you find a job?”
“Oh my god! Of course! What an excellent idea. Why didn’t I think of it sooner?
” I replied with exaggerated enthusiasm, something in my chest tightening.
Henry had no way of knowing that I constantly got asked things like that.
People acted as though being homeless was a fate I’d chosen freely, one I could change with enough motivation and determination.
Henry grimaced apologetically. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to . . .”