Chapter 28
Morrie
I’m collecting what remains of my handsome, ruined body from the bloody battlefield that is the village-green-turned-torture-field, when out of the corner of my eye, I see Mina flee from the alley behind the bakery.
Tears stream down her cheeks. She swipes at them angrily as she jerks to a stop, looking this way and that with the frantic jerk of someone who needs a safe place to hide but doesn’t have any place left.
Heathcliff’s confession went well, then.
I scramble to my feet to go to her, heedless of the blood on my torn clothes, knowing only that I can fix this.
Unfortunately, I momentarily forgot about the recent torture Lancelot inflicted upon my body.
My jelly legs and the screaming agonies that were formerly my muscles refuse to hold me upright. I collapse back into the dirt.
By the time I lift my head, Mina’s talking to Darren.
I don’t know why she’d give anyone wearing such an absurd combination of striped sweater and brown trousers the time of day, but I guess any friend will do in a storm. Mina wipes at her eyes and stands a little straighter. I drag my ruined body a little closer so I can hear what they’re saying.
“—I can’t believe she’s gone.” Darren shakes his head sadly.
Ah, we’re talking about Ashley.
“Yes, it’s awful.” Fresh tears roll down Mina’s cheeks, but I don’t think they’re for her ex-friend. “Please, Darren, I need to get home—”
“Listen, I’m not doing so well. I think it would help if I just… if I could talk about her with someone who knew her. Do you have a minute to grab a drink with me?”
Mina shakes her head.
“I never told you, but I’m in love with Ashley.
Was in love, I guess I have to say now.” His voice cracks.
“I never got up the courage to tell her in secondary school, and I was hoping now that she was back in the village, I’d get the chance to take her out and tell her how I felt.
Now I’ll never have that opportunity, and I just… ”
“I don’t really want to talk about Ashley, Darren.”
“I’m sorry, Mina. Of course not! You were the closest friend she had. I just… I need to feel connected to her, you know?”
Mina sighs, wiping her eyes with the back of her hand one final time. She squares her shoulders and arrives at a decision. “Yeah, sure, we can grab a drink, as long as you’re buying.”
I consider following them to the pub, but one, Lancelot clanked off in that direction and I can’t face him making me do more burpees and two, Mina will be perfectly safe with that drip Darren for the moment. I have more important conversations on my agenda.
“What did you do?” I whip a book from Heathcliff’s hands and loom over him with as much villainous menace as I can muster while my legs are still two jellyfish having a jelly-wrestling competition.
“I was reading that.” He swipes for the book, but I hold it out of reach.
“You were supposed to tell Mina that all three of us want to share her. It was supposed to be hot. Instead, Mina ran out of here crying, and now she’s at the pub with that Darren fellow while you sulk with Christina Rossetti. So I repeat, what did you do?”
“I didn’t do anything!” he yells, swiping a pile of books from his desk and sinking his head into his hands.
I sink into the velvet chair, grateful to rest my legs, and wait.
“Ikifffferrr.” His voice is muffled through his huge hands. I try to focus on the situation and not think about what those hands might feel like fisting my shirt or wrapped around my—
“Pardon? I can’t quite hear you.”
He takes his hands away, and his features twist with misery. “I kissed her.”
“And she ran away in terror? I’m disappointed.” I lick my lips. “But that’s okay. It’s salvageable. Consider this a teachable moment. Come here, and I’ll show you how to kiss a girl so she doesn’t run away in horror—”
“She didn’t run away because of my kiss. It was an incredible kiss.”
I steeple my fingers, saying nothing. Heathcliff’s face twists again.
“I broke it off.”
“Interesting.” I lean forward. “You mean to tell me that you could have her bent over this desk right now, wrapping that gorgeous hair of hers around your fist, but instead you pushed her away and made her cry? I’m unfamiliar with the Heathcliff Earnshaw school of seduction, but that doesn’t seem like the best method to me—”
“You’re in my head!” He tosses a book at me. And another book. And a mug. And a pen. When he runs out of stationery within reaching distance, he slumps back into his hands. “You’re in my bloody head.”
“I don’t follow.”
“You! You and that bloody bird! When I was kissing her, all I could think was that I was taking her away from both of you, and messing everything up, and that I’d end up doing to her what I did to Cathy and Isabella and Hinton and…
and all of them! I’d end up destroying you all with my love, and it’s better if I don’t get involved at all, so I stopped kissing her, and I told her to stay away from me. ”
“Ah, that old ‘get out of my face’ seduction. Works every time.”
“And she told me to stay away from her. So I guess that’s it. Game over. She hates me, which means she’ll probably never come back again. But at least…” he swallows. “At least I didn’t destroy her.”
“The game isn’t over, big guy. The game is never over.
Mina was crying. She may hate you in this present moment, but that’s only because she cares enough about you that your words hurt.
She’ll be back. But when she does, you need to get over this ‘woe is me, I’m big bad Heathcliff and I destroy everything’ nonsense because one, it’s not attractive, two, it’s not true.
You are not the Heathcliff of the books.
You’ve proven that by co-existing with me for several years without killing me, and I’ve never seen you dig up a skeleton, and three, because Mina wants you.
And that is worth crawling to her on your hands and knees. ”
“You think so?”
“I know so.” I pick one of the books off the floor. “But when she does come back, I suggest you let me handle it. I am, after all, a man of great wit and subtlety. I know exactly how to seduce Ms Mina Wilde back into your arms.”
Heathcliff refuses to get out of bed the next day, and Quoth flies away in the early hours to keep an eye on Lancelot (I think it’s just him trying to escape the wrath of a Heathcliff who knows he’s messed up), so I have the shop to myself.
I settle into my favourite velvet chair to read a little poetry, one eye to the window, watching for Mina.
She’ll come back. I know she will.
Just as I’m starting to doubt myself, there she is, heading down the street with her usual bakery order of coffee and croissants. My heart soars. But just as she reaches the door, a hand comes out of the bushes and grabs at the bag of croissants.
Mina screams and steps back. My hand flies to the dagger I conceal in my boot, and I race to the door, but by the time I get there, I see Mina has left the coffee by the door and taken off after him.
I give chase. When I reach the village green, I scan the shops, but I can’t see them anywhere.
How did they get away so quickly? But then I see Earl exiting the market, and Mina leaps in front of him.
She grabs him, her face twisting with fury.
She really does think he killed Ashley. I’m halfway across the green, dagger in my hand, when Earl opens his coat to reveal a tiny kitten, and Mina absolutely melts.
Okay, so he’s not the killer; he’s just a guy who needs money for his friend.
As I see Mina petting the cat, I head back to the shop and jump in the shower.
Cat cuddles give me enough time to make myself even more alluring.
I’m drying myself off when I see her walking determinately down Butcher Street.
Heathcliff’s snores echo through his closed bedroom door.
I head downstairs as the front door swings open.
“Heathcliff!” Mina yells. The floorboards creak as she makes her way down the front hallway.
“I’ve come to talk about yesterday. I think you know how highly inappropriate it is to make an advance like that on an employee.
I know things have been stressful for you lately, but just because I know your secret and you know mine doesn’t mean you get to treat me that way—”
“What’d he do to you?”
She stops, one foot dangling in thin air, as she sees me.
Her eyes glaze over as, even with her low vision, she takes in the fact that I am wearing nothing but a wicked grin.
I keep my tone light. I already know what he did, but I need to hear it from her.
I need to know that she’s upset because she cares about him and actually wants him back before I make my move.
Her breath catches in her throat.
“I… er…”
“He’s not here,” I say. Which isn’t strictly true, but when Heathcliff is asleep, not even Mina’s screams would wake him. “Judging by the flames coming out of your ears, I think he wanted to get out of the line of fire. I repeat, what did he do?”
“I really need to talk to Heathcliff.”
“Don’t look so glum. I’m here instead, and we’re going to have the best day.
Yesterday was terrible for me, as well. I spent three hours infiltrating the department store only to discover those rings are so popular there’s no way to find out what store it came from or who purchased it.
” And then I was tortured by a Knight of the Round Table, but I’m not mentioning that.
“But today will be better! Let’s start by rearranging all the books so they’re alphabetised by the third letter of the author’s first name.
Oh, or… we could glue all the furniture to the ceiling. ”
Mina snorts. “Don’t, Morrie, please. I—”