Chapter 43 Bess
Chapter forty-three
Bess
Iraise the binoculars and spy Mr Kavanagh mowing his lawn, very much alive and energetic enough to push motorised blades through grass.
To be honest, I never really entertained the thought his wife had chopped him into small parts and fertilised her roses with him, but two months is a long time not to have a presence at the end of my binoculars.
Taking a large sip of gin and tonic, I feel Ed's absence keenly and a sense of relief he's not here.
I want him to roll his eyes and tell me just because I haven't seen Mr Kavanagh doesn't mean he hasn't been doing things out in the world when I'm not sitting up on the roof.
And I want him to give me space to work out why I had not only a confusing reaction to him telling me he wrote the letters, but an extreme one at that.
I think I need a lot of space. As in fully capitalised and the size of a modest solar system A LOT of space.
Something big is unravelling inside me. I can feel it unspooling, the layers of haziness and murk ever so slowly thinning and receding. Underneath will be the raw truth and I'm absolutely terrified of what it will look like.
I'm sure it's why I got so angry. Ed's revelation he wrote the letters scared the shit out of me, because...
I think, maybe, I kind of...
Want him to have meant them?
I don't like it. I don't like the weight of what's forthcoming. It feels like a bomb's about to drop. And I don't like that I'm looking at Ed differently now when I have no idea how he looks at me.
No wonder I'm angry.
Footsteps sound behind me and I close my eyes against them. I'm going to have to tell Ed to disappear from my life for however long it takes for me to come to terms with what's happening.
"Chica!"
And although I should be relieved it's not Ed, I can't help but feel disappointed. I don't bother to hide the groan that escapes. "Fuck off, Theo."
"Hey now. That's no way to greet your investment partner."
"It's perfectly appropriate if they're an arsehole."
He comes into view and leans against a chimney pot. "I'm just a two-bit hustler playing the bank jam."
Pointing my finger at him, I say, "If you talk to me in that ridiculous patois of yours, I will throw you off this roof. Don't think I don't have it in me. Talk straight or go away. I'm in no mood to humour your affectations."
"Aight."
I push myself up out of my lounger.
He throws his hands up in surrender. "Okay, okay! Average-white-boy-from-the-Mayfair-ghetto speak only. Calm down, Bess."
I point my finger at him. "Don't you start with that patronising shit either."
Crossing his arms, he says, "If you're going to be angry at anyone it should be at yourself. The only person here who took to two million pounds with meths and a lighter was you. If you hadn't completely lost your mind, I wouldn't be here and you'd be the sole owner of this building."
"I wouldn't have been put in that situation if you hadn't been an absolute meatstick with your money in the first place.”
The Odour flicks his hair off his forehead. "You know, maybe it's time for you to pull up your big girl panties and face the realities of the real world, where things cost what the market decides they cost, and those that aren't fit enough to survive go out and find a real job."
I laugh. "Can you hear what you just said?
You've never had to face the realities of the real world in your life, Theo, because you've been cushioned from them by generations of wealth and entitlement.
And you've never been in any kind of position where you might have to 'go out and find a real job', so spare me the hypocritical sanctimony. "
The Odour is quiet for several seconds. "I might have to, actually."
"What? Even with the exorbitant rent coming in in two days?"
His, "Yes," is on the verge of a whisper.
And as much as my heart in no way bleeds for him, I am very curious as to the circumstances in which he finds himself on the precipice of having to find honest work. "Is it that bad?"
"It's pretty bad."
I take a sip from my glass and note the furrows in his brow, the glaze of his eyes as he worries about just how bad it is, the slight tremor of his hand as he sweeps his hair away from his forehead. I shouldn't enjoy it as much as I do.
He looks out over the town and squints so that little creases gather in the corner of his eyes. Then he takes a deep breath and exhales through pursed lips.
It's pretty goddam glorious.
He looks across at me, then down at my glass. "Do you think I can have a drink?"
I consider it, then nod my consent.
The Odour moves to lie in Ed's lounger and I tip gin and tonic into the thermos cap for him.
He takes a large gulp and smacks his lips. "This whole thing's a complete fucking disaster."
I wait, hoping he'll expand on what 'disaster' for him actually looks like. When he doesn't, I say, "So what happened with your money?"
The Odour's eyes slide to mine and away again. He looks down at his cup and swirls the liquid. Eventually he says, "I got phished."
"Phished? As in scammed by a Nigerian prince about to receive a financial windfall?"
"Something like that." He drains his glass and I empty the last of the mix into it.
"How did you let that happen?"
He shrugs. "It doesn't even have to be particularly sophisticated anymore. All you need is an AI video generator and an AI voice cloning app and to find a willing target and you're a lounge chair fraudster."
"Is it really that easy?"
The Odour doesn't reply.
"Who did they pretend to be?"
"Sam Mathers. An investment specialist who's a very big social media influencer on making your money work for you. I've followed him for years." He laughs. "I've even met him at some fundraiser or other. Nice guy. An exceptionally wealthy nice guy."
"What was the scam?"
"He messaged me on Instagram, or so I thought. He was sharing a once in a lifetime investment tip to a select few of his followers. Guaranteed thirty to forty percent return within a couple of years."
"Right. So far too good to be true."
"Apparently so."
"And how much did you 'invest'?"
"Not quite all of it, but very near."
"You daft bugger." It's an understatement. What The Odour has done is catastrophic. No wonder he's turned into an unreasonable, greedy sociopath.
"Indeed." He pinches the bridge of his nose and looks delightfully pathetic in his Amani shirt and trousers and very shiny gold watch.
"How did you know you'd been scammed?"
"I bumped into him again, thanked him for the tip and he had no clue what I was talking about. I tried to show him the message, but it'd been deleted. Worst bloody moment of my life."
"Well, Theo. Ordinarily I might have some sympathy for you, but given it's led to the worst bloody moment of my life and a whole lot of financial hurt for everyone else, I don't. So, say what you've come here to say and then go home to cry into your empty bank account."
He takes a deep breath and looks mournfully down at his empty cup. "Alright. I've come to check you were still intending to occupy the building."
"For now, yes."
"Good." He places the cup on the little table between the loungers and pushes himself up to standing. "I'll get my lawyer to send over the paperwork in the morning."
I don't bother with any response and he doesn't bother with a goodbye.
The rhythm of his departing footsteps is slower than his arriving one, but I don't waste any energy beyond noticing the change of pace. My thoughts immediately return to Ed and the emotions churning through me, threatening to settle.
A sense of dread sweeps over me.
When they do settle, I might understand them and I have no idea if I'll like what I see.
I pick up my binoculars and look at his house.
It's a standard semi. Small and fairly characterless.
I wonder what he's up to. Whether he's struggling with stuff inside him, too, or just getting on with his evening.
I wonder at how he could write such incredibly beautiful love letters and did he have someone in mind as he penned them?
I wonder if there's anything of me in them, or were they really just for a woman somewhere in 1940s England.
And I hate that he's done this to me. Made me into a jumbled-up person when I knew my mind and my heart so well until a few days ago.
I want him to be similarly scrambled and all at sea and...
Thinking about me.
Not anybody else.
Then I do something I've never done before. I break the one, big important rule with my Port Derrum voyeuring and raise the binoculars to see into his back yard in case he's playing mini golf, or petting hedgehogs, or something equally wholesome.
I don't see him in the garden, but I do spot a shed against his back fence. Its entire front wall is constructed of glass bi-folding doors.
It's what I see on the other side of that glass that makes me gasp.
Hanging on the back wall is a corner of a painting. I don't have to see much of it to know what it is.
The painting I did of the single pink poppy Jeanette gave me when my parents moved away.
I've never been into Ed's backyard. He's never invited an opportunity to. And I've never thought that might be a little strange until now.
He's wanted to keep it from me. For whatever reason, he hasn't wanted me to know that he was the anonymous buyer of my flower painting. The first painting I'd ever sold to someone who wasn't my mum.
I throw the binoculars onto Ed's lounger and hurry towards the door to the stairs.