Chapter Eleven
“Jamie, you made it!” Rose’s familiar voice instantly soothed Landon’s heart, which had been beating erratically since he’d re-met her twenty-eight hours ago. “And you brought a friend.”
“Told you I would.” Landon clapped Dave on the back.
“Brought some snacks,” Dave said, holding a Tesco bag. “Just a few things to nibble on. Have you tried Cadbury Creme Eggs before? I’ve already put on five pounds from the stuff—wife’s gonna kill me.” Landon did not interject to mention that Dave had only been in the country for three days.
Rose giggled. “I have indulged in a Cadbury Egg here and there.”
“Got to watch your figure, I s’pose,” Dave said. “What with your occupation.”
“Already telling your friends about me, I see.” Rose batted Landon playfully, and he tried very hard not to let the gesture visibly excite him.
“Oh, you know,” Landon said, aware he was blushing and unable to do anything about it, “just the basics.”
Nothing could be further from the truth.
Last night, when Landon had made it back to the hostel after a long walk in which he refused to admit he was lost, he’d found Dave and told him every excruciating detail of his day, running the gamut from Rose’s keen artistic eye to Graham’s alarmingly large arms. It hadn’t taken any convincing to get Dave to agree to come with him to the meeting.
It seemed Rose was right: Most people who’d taken the pill were fascinated by it, eager for any chance to discuss.
It had, however, taken three practice sessions to get Dave to reliably refer to him as Jamie.
Landon was still not convinced that Dave wouldn’t slip up when the beer inevitably started flowing.
“Whew,” Dave blew out through his teeth. “This place is something.” They were only in the entryway, and the word that came to Landon’s mind first was palatial. Even if Landon stretched his arms as high as they could go, they still wouldn’t touch the ceiling.
“Isn’t it so gaudy?” Rose asked. Landon peeked his head around the corner and found he did not agree with Rose’s word choice.
A leather sofa rested against a wall lined with built-in bookshelves and sat atop a neutral-toned knotted rug.
The dark hardwood floors shone, and tall sash windows framed views of rooftops and chimneys that could have been lifted from the pages of a travel magazine.
Landon wished he didn’t find it as aesthetically pleasant as he did.
“Graham hasn’t changed anything since he took the pill, which I find fascinating,” Rose said. “The decor is just so one-note. Does Graham strike you as the kind of person who should live in a house without a single primary color?”
“I don’t really know Graham,” Landon said, though it was clearly a rhetorical question.
“I don’t like primary colors,” Dave muttered.
“Come, then,” Rose said. “Get to know him, and the others.” She waved them into the living room.
“We’re just getting started.” She grabbed Dave’s contribution to set out with the other hors d’oeuvres.
“Something to drink? We have sparkling water, wine, beer, and Graham makes an incredible gin fizz.”
“Water for me,” Landon said. “Plain, if you have it.” He’d need to keep his wits about him to stay in character.
Rose laughed. “Plain water coming right up.”
“I’ll take that gin fizz, made by the incredible Graham,” Dave said. Landon fought the urge to elbow him in the gut. He didn’t need reminders of how great Graham was, no matter how cheeky.
“You won’t regret it.” Rose smiled and tossed her hair over her shoulder—a move Landon had seen her pull a hundred times before.
Four people were already there, sipping drinks on the couch and lounging on large floor pillows in various shades of gray.
One of the couch sitters turned politely toward them, then stood and waved an arm in salute.
“Rose said we’d have fresh blood today,” he said, with the heaviest Scottish accent Landon had heard yet.
The man reached an arm thick with bracelets out for Landon to shake.
He had a scruffy, sinewy build, and unruly sandy-blond hair that gave the impression that he didn’t care much how he came across.
“Theodore Lachlan,” he said. “Though everybody calls me Fox.” A faded scar ran from the man’s left eyebrow straight down his cheek.
It was subtle, almost invisible—though not to someone like Landon, who tended to linger in the details.
“Fox,” Landon repeated. “I like it.”
“Theo’s my other.” Fox’s hazel eyes crinkled at the corners. “I have a lot of love for the guy, but ye ken how it is. Name just didn’t sit right with me, after.”
“I get it.” Landon was beginning to, at least.
The woman next to him waved. “Maria,” she said, with an accent Landon would have bet the ten pounds in his pocket was from the Great Lakes region of the US. Maria’s dark brown hair was piled high on her head, her curves filling out her tweed blazer and spilling out the neckline. “Pleasure.”
“Jamie,” Landon said, placing a hand on his chest as though pressing the button that would make it so. “And this is Dave. I met him on the flight over. The pill makes fast friends of us all, I guess.” Dave clapped him on the back.
“I see you’re skipping ahead to the introductions.” Rose placed a sturdy tumbler in Landon’s hand and a tall, narrow glass in Dave’s. Landon marveled over the frothy head and the perfect pale yellow Graham had achieved in such short order.
Dave took a sip and let out what Landon could only describe as a moan. “Fucking incredible,” he said. “Best I’ve ever had. What is Graham, some sort of wizard?”
Invoked, Graham popped his head out of the kitchen.
“Thanks, mate!” he called. “More where that came from.” Landon was struck again by the calming symmetry of Graham’s face and the doll-like perfection of his dark beard.
Even his voice was beautiful, the vowels soft and stretched. It made Landon want to punch something.
“Dinner should be ready in twenty minutes, give or take. Graham’s been marinating a roast since last night, and the vegetables are almost tender.”
“Are you a chef or something?” Landon tried to keep his tone light and almost succeeded.
“Training to be.” Graham smiled. “My other left me a pile of money to play around with. For the life of me, I’ll never understand why he worked himself to the bone in finance when he was sitting on such a large trust, but that’s neither here nor there.”
Landon thought it was both here and there.
Rose slipped an arm around Graham’s muscled torso.
“Let’s get started, huh? We’ll do some light introductions before diving in?
” She posed the question to Graham in a way Landon was sure meant nothing to the other guests but punctured his heart like a rusted nail. They were a team, the two of them.
“Sure,” he said, then turned to Landon and Dave. “Feel free to pull in a cushion from the dining room or grab some space on the floor.”
“Floor’s great,” Landon said. He had no interest in seeing Graham’s perfect dining room. He was sure it was stocked with fine china atop muted place mats. Graham probably had furniture made of real wood, not the toxic composite Landon had filled his own house with.
Rose settled into the love seat, and Graham took what must have been his usual place on the floor beside her, close enough she could reach out and rub his shoulders if the mood struck her.
“This is mostly just an excuse to get together and eat Graham’s food, but we do try to pick a topic each week and stick to it,” she said, for Landon and Dave’s sake.
“As we all know, taking the pill bonds us in a way people who haven’t can’t begin to understand.
They can read about it, and think about it, but they can’t ever know the joy and hope that only a clean slate provides.
” Landon took a large gulp of water from the tumbler and managed to choke on it loudly enough that all eyes swiveled toward him.
“Fine, I’m fine,” he said. “Went down the wrong way.”
“I’m so grateful to you all for being here, and for being a part of this community with me.
With us,” she amended, placing the smoking hand on Graham’s shoulder.
At Rose’s prompting, they swung around the circle and introduced themselves, a pattern quickly emerging: name, occupation, information their other had left them, and information their other hadn’t.
There was Isolde, the florist, whose other had written her a six-page letter describing her previous lonely, unsuccessful life as a chemical engineer and every regret she’d ever had; Idris, the tattoo artist, whose other left him a two-minute video pleading with him to run in the other direction if he so much as heard that a woman named Janice Cooper was in the vicinity; and Maria, a PhD student in philosophy, whose other had been such a rock star in the same field that she’d felt the only way to make any real progress was to erase her knowledge and begin again from square one.
Fox pulled up the rear. “Fox Lachlan, yoga teacher. My other was an intelligence officer, and ye ken what that means. He didn’t tell me squat.
” A Scottish spy? His other had clearly told him something, or he wouldn’t have been able to supply the detail.
Landon fought every impulse to interject with questions.
Jamie was not Landon, and Jamie did not say everything he was thinking without filter.
“It’s Fox’s day to bring a topic,” Rose said, her gray eyes finding Landon’s.
“Feels like it’s always Fox’s day,” Maria said with an affectionate eye roll.
“Aye, as it should be.” Fox puffed his chest. Were Maria and Fox together? “I’ve been thinking ’bout my other,” he said. “More than usual, the sneaky bastard. I was down in the Christmas market on Sunday, minding my own business. Can’t get enough of that German wine, don’t ken the name.”
“Glühwein,” Maria supplied, laying a hand on Fox’s bouncing leg. At least sleeping together, Landon figured.