39. JACK
JACK
Minnie doesn’t want to come to mine so I’m trekking up the back stairs of some basic hotel on the outskirts of nowhere. Do they really put press up in this shit?
She’s been cryptic on WhatsApp but even I can read between the lines that her day was a steaming pile of wank.
I want to do something nice for her but my options are limited since she’s refusing to leave her room.
No bother, I can problem solve. My knuckles have barely touched her door when I’m dragged inside.
She lets go of my shirt like I’m piping hot and I force myself not to be offended.
The sight of her puffy red eyes splits me open.
Tonight I’ll do everything in my power to take away her pain.
She pulls the hotel robe tighter around her and rubs her nose with her sleeve. ‘Hi.’ It’s not ‘I’m so pleased to see you’ or ‘thank god you’re here’. It’s flat. We’ve come too far for a flat greeting.
‘Get over here,’ I say, dumping my rucksack and putting my box on the side.
When she doesn’t immediately move towards me, I wrap her in a tight embrace.
She doesn’t relax. It’s fine, we have all night to work on it.
‘How was your day?’ I say it casually like I haven’t spent every waking second wondering.
‘I don’t want to talk about it.’ Her voice is muffled by my jumper.
‘No problem.’ Well isn’t that the biggest fib in the world.
I need to hear how bad it was. What did Greg say?
Is her job safe? Was Brian a twat? Has she checked social media, because Channel 3 F1’s Instagram comments are wild.
She shouldn’t read below the clip of our interview in Melbourne. People online are fucktards.
An apology sits on the tip of my tongue – for belittling her, for making the wrong call, for not putting her first, for not keeping her safe, for being so drunk on her that I flaunted our rules in the first place – but now’s not the right time.
She doesn’t look like she wants to be reminded about anything to do with the last sixteen hours.
‘What’s in the box?’ she asks wearily, pulling away and crossing her arms. Her body language couldn’t be any more closed if we were in Antarctica in our underwear.
‘Take a look.’
She opens it up like a jack-in-the-box could pop out at any second. ‘A cake?’
‘A carrot cake with butter icing and no walnuts. Your favourite.’
She peers closer. ‘Did you bake it?’
‘What makes you say that?’
‘It looks… homemade.’
I seize my poor, fragile heart. ‘Ouch! But yes, I did bake it – in Pagari’s hospitality kitchen, alongside Michelin-starred chefs.
They were so appalled by my lack of technique they refused to help.
Of course,’ I stop behind her, close enough for her to feel me but not close enough to touch, ‘I only care about what you think.’
‘I’m not hungry right—’
‘It’s not for now. First, you’re going to have a bubble bath…
’ I root around in my rucksack, ‘…with these bath salts and this candle. You’re going to read your minotaur porn and use this face mask, which the packet says has brightening qualities, and I feel a little sunshine couldn’t hurt today.
’ Her expression’s unreadable so I keep going.
‘Then when you get out, we’re going to inhale your favourite takeaway – bhuna for me, tikka masala for you, with extra garlic naan—’
‘What about your diet?’ she interjects. ‘You’re being weighed the day after tomorrow.’
‘It’s chicken and vegetables. Just what the doctor ordered.’
‘And carbohydrates and sugar,’ she mutters.
I ignore her. ‘I’ll order it while you’re splashing about. And then we’re going to watch Bridesmaids – your favourite romcom – with cake.’ Am I imagining it or did her eyebrows just rise and drop?
‘There’s no crystal meth in it,’ she says, and a small part of me releases. There’s my girl. I knew she was in there somewhere.
I tilt my head. ‘In the cake?’
She lifts her eyes to the ceiling. ‘In the movie.’
‘No? Deal’s off then. That’s a shame.’ I give her a cheeky grin to show I’m joking – I don’t think it’d take much for her to back out.
She worries her lip. I so badly want to take her hands and smooth her back and knead her shoulders and make her believe this will turn out ok. The distance is unnerving. A blank space we filled this time yesterday.
‘I can’t believe you remembered all my favourite things,’ Minnie says.
That’s a punch to the gut. Why wouldn’t I? These are so basic. I know her hair’s more high maintenance than I am. She’s incapable of being anywhere on time. She says she doesn’t have a favourite dog, but it’s Maple. She got a B in A Level art and kicks herself about it to this day.
I also know all this lying to her mum’s eating away at her. She never feels enough because of her dad, and I’ll always hate him for that. She misses baking but the words will never leave her lips. And, most heartbreakingly to watch, she clams up when she’s sad.
‘I remember everything about you, Min,’ I murmur.
Her smile’s tiny and I’m so sure she’s going to kiss me, but she turns to run the bath.
Winning her trust has been an uphill climb and for a few perfect weeks, I was her safe place.
It stirred caveman instincts I didn’t know I had.
When we saw each other, she’d melt into me.
When something was wrong, she’d tell me first.
Now she’s blocking me out and it feels like a nail’s being driven through my chest. I know it’s mostly my fault and I did fuck up, but she has to forgive me at some point, right? She can’t stay mad at me forever. The idea of losing this... I need to make things right.
When she emerges from the bathroom, her hair’s wet, her glasses are steamed up and her skin smells of roses. She’s almost too beautiful to be real even when she’s upset.
‘How was your minotaur?’ I ask.
‘I didn’t read.’
A knock on the door saps all the colour from her face. She looks like Ted Bundy’s calling.
‘Hide,’ she mouths.
‘It’s only the takeaw—’
‘Shhh! Hide.’
This is insanity. I duck behind the bathroom door while she receives our food. When he’s gone, she slumps on the bed, trapped by her thoughts. I’ve never felt so helpless. She’s tense as hell. I tell myself food will sort everything and unpack the containers.
‘Can you go please?’ she says, and I stop.
When I turn, she’s staring into nothing. ‘What?’ It’s barely above a whisper.
‘I want to be left alone.’
Terror grips me. ‘Minnie, I’m so sorry, I never meant—’
‘Stop. Please just go.’
I study her eyes on the verge of tears, her skin scarily pale. ‘Tell me how to make it better,’ I say so softly I don’t know if it carries over the air-con. ‘I can’t stand seeing you like this.’
Without looking at me, she wipes a tear and gets up to hand me my dinner. I don’t know what to say so I take it and walk to the door, knowing leaving’s a mistake but not seeing any other option.
This isn’t how it was supposed to go. I was supposed to win her over, make her smile, be her sounding board. Now I feel like… I don’t know what I’m leaving.
‘You forgot your cake,’ she says behind me.
‘I made it for you. Keep it.’ I meet her eyes. ‘This will be better tomorrow, you’ll see.’
I almost don’t recognise the woman looking back at me. ‘No it won’t.’