Breathe

by Cari Hunter

“Me too, but I’m too cosy to move, so I’ll wait till I need a wee.”

  “Sounds like a plan. Is your date still on for tomorrow?”

  “Yes. Thanks for reminding me.” Jem tried not to look at the clothes she’d set out in readiness, but they crept into her peripheral vision regardless.

  “Text me all the gruesome details. And shout if you need rescuing.”

  Jem stopped in the middle of turning over and frowned. “Rescuing?”

  “Yeah, you know, ‘Goodness, my friend’s just phoned me. My cat’s stuck up a tree. I really have to go!’”

  “Ah, right, gotcha. If I need you to fake a cat emergency, I will be sure to text you.”

  “Just don’t tell her you haven’t got a cat, or it won’t work.”

  “Okay, enough.” Jem aimed for stern but spoiled the effect by giggling. “Go to bloody sleep.”

  The rustle of bedding and a pillow being thumped suggested Rosie was settling down.

  “Night, Jem. Sweet dreams.”

  “You too,” Jem said, and ended the call.

  Chapter Eight

  The headlights of the Audi A3 convertible flashed once to acknowledge Jem’s wave, and its driver performed a neat parallel park to place its passenger door within touching distance. Jem had taken a wary step forward, unsure whether to let herself in, when the driver’s door opened and a woman jogged around to greet her.

  “Jem? Hiya, I’m Sylvie.” She pumped Jem’s hand in both of hers, her enthusiasm overcompensating for the initial flit of disappointment in her expression.

  “Hiya,” Jem said, determined not to write the date off in the first twenty seconds. “You made good time.”

  Sylvie patted the car’s soft top. “This doesn’t half shift when you put your foot down. What do you drive?”

  Jem thumbed toward her Skoda Fabia. It was a good car: reliable, economical, and snot green, which meant she’d got it for a steal.

  “Okay.” Sylvie dragged the word out, her polite smile now more of a rictus. “Shall we go in mine? Here, let me put that in the boot for you.” She took Jem’s rucksack, as if afraid Jem might offer resistance if she didn’t keep things ticking along. Jem stayed on the pavement, taking stock as Sylvie whirled around her. Though Sylvie matched her in height, the similarities ended there. Dressed head to toe in figure-hugging designer sportswear, she was lithe and tanned, and her sandy hair was secured in an intricate French plait. She moved with a self-assurance that made Jem’s teeth hurt.

  “Christ, what’ve you got in here?” Sylvie asked, hoisting the rucksack into the boot.

  “Oh, y’know, bit of everything.” Jem had packed and unpacked it three times, preparing for every eventuality—swimming, cycling, Nordic walking, maybe sky diving at a push—and squeezing in a novel at the last minute. It made the bag weigh a ton, but she always felt better if she had a book with her. At Sylvie’s urging, she got into the car and was almost folded in half as the bucket seat sucked her arse toward the road. Thrown off balance, she knocked a large protein shake askew as she fastened her seat belt. Three wholesale boxes of whey powder on the back seat suggested Sylvie either had a serious addiction or sold the stuff on eBay.

  “Terrific for building muscle mass,” Sylvie said, catching her in the act of gawping. “I have one for breakfast, one for lunch, and a proper tea.”

  “That sounds…” Jem floundered. It sounded revolting, but politeness was an issue. “Committed?” she ventured.

  Sylvie lifted her T-shirt and bounced a palm off her washboard abs. “It certainly requires discipline, but the results speak for themselves. Remind me to give you an information pack.” She sped through a light that was more red than amber and accelerated past a lorry. “I’d love to do your job, zipping around on blues all day. It must be exciting.”

  “It has its moments,” Jem said, clasping her armrest. She was used to being thrown about the cab by giddy new starters, but they had a siren to alert other road users, and a legal exemption to exceed the speed limit.

  “I’ll bet.” Sylvie chugged her shake at another traffic light, slapping its cap back on as the taxi in front set off again. “What’s the worst thing you’ve ever seen?”

  Jem rubbed her forehead with the heel of her hand. If someone had given her a quid every time she’d been asked that, she’d have her own house by now. No one wanted an honest answer, though. They didn’t want to hear about the heroin addict who’d fallen asleep on her newborn and smothered him, or the lad who’d just been told the bursitis in his hip was actually a metastatic tumour that would kill him within weeks, or the kids torn apart by a suicide vest full of metal shards. They wanted gore without the horror behind it, consequence-free splatter they could widen their eyes at and tell their mates about.

  Pushing away the memory of Kyle Parker’s battered corpse, she fell back on her tried and tested response. “We see all sorts. I had this lad once who’d been knocked off his bike, snapped his femur right here”—she patted the middle of her thigh—“and his leg was so twisted he could’ve turned his head and nibbled his own toenails.”

  As usual, it did the trick. Sylvie pulled the requisite face of awed disgust and rocked against the steering wheel. “Holy shit! What did you do?”

  “Filled him full of morphine and straightened the bugger. We couldn’t take him in with it wrapped around his ear hole.”

  Indicating right, Sylvie slowed to wait for a gap in the oncoming traffic. She revved the engine, nudging the car back and forth. Even when stationary, she was moving. “You should write a book.”

  Jem had heard that one before as well. “It’s tempting, but people would think I was making it up.” She delivered the standard line by rote, her attention fixed on a sign at the junction that read Manchester Climbing Centre. “Bollocks,” she mouthed, hoping she was wrong but sure she was right.

  Sylvie had also spotted the sign. “Damn, busted. I didn’t know that was there. I usually come in the other way. Are you surprised? I was hoping you’d be surprised.”

  “I am. Very.” Jem couldn’t have been more surprised had Sylvie announced they were going cage diving with great whites.

  Apparently fed up of waiting, Sylvie sped across the junction, earning a blare of horn from an oncoming petrol tanker. Jem saw the whites of the driver’s eyes, but Sylvie didn’t even blink, chattering on without pause. “Have you been here before? I bet you have. Ferg told Mandy you loved climbing in the mountains.”

  “Ah, well. Sort of.” Jem wondered how much of that conversation had been lost in translation. Most of it, she guessed, given her current predicament. “I, uh, I think the message has got a bit mixed there. I’m more of an armchair mountaineer, really. My dad used to tell me loads of stories—the history of the Great Walls, first ascents, that sort of thing. I go to the Alps every summer if I can, but only to hike.”

  “Right. Shit. I must’ve got my wires crossed.” Sylvie pulled into the climbing centre car park and drummed her fingers on the wheel, clearly considering her options. “I’ve booked us a session each.”

  Jem shook her head in apology. “I can pay you back. It’s not a prob—” She broke off as Sylvie dismissed the offer with a wave of her hand.

  “Don’t worry, I know all the staff here. I’m sure they’ll switch you to the beginners’ wall, and we can meet up for lunch afterward. There’s a cafe in Hulme that does a fantastic vegan omelette.”

  The latter concept left Jem so flummoxed that she was rousted from the car and standing at the climbing centre’s reception desk before she could mount a protest.

  “That’s great. Thanks, Kel,” Sylvie was saying to the receptionist. “Can we get her a pair of shoes as well? I don’t think her trainers will cut it.”

  Jem scuffed her feet on the hardwood floor, her chest tight with apprehension and embarrassment. She felt like the kid who’d forgotten her PE kit and got stuck with the class hand-me-downs. “Sorry,” she said to no one in particular. “I don’t have any…” Her explanation withered
to nothing as she watched Sylvie stride toward the changing room. Kel put a hand on Jem’s arm, keeping her at the desk.

  “Here, hon, these are brand new out of the wrapper.” Kel placed a spotless pair of climbing shoes on the signing-in book. “I’ll give Rob a shout. He’s brill with newbies, and you can take things at your own speed, so don’t look so scared, okay?”

  “Okay,” Jem said, easing her grip on the inhaler in her pocket. “Thank you.”

  Shoes in hand, she entered the changing room, where Sylvie was pacing the floor, decked out in all the right clobber.

  “There you are,” Sylvie said. “I’m going to make a start on the Beast. It’s the advanced wall at the far end, if you fancy watching when you’ve had enough. It’s got some awesome overhangs on it.” She flexed her fingers, cracking most of her knuckles. “Have fun, and I’ll see you in a couple of hours.”

  And then she was gone, the door swinging in her wake, and the changing room silent aside from the occasional squeak of Jem’s breathing. Jem sat on the central bench and opened her rucksack. Her book was balanced on top of her towel and toiletries like a siren on a rock, its cover bright and alluring, promising two hours of entertainment that wouldn’t involve falling from a great height and snapping something vital. It would be easy for her to hide in one of the cubicles, while away some time, and then see how Sylvie was faring with the Beast. She pulled the novel out and set it in her lap, toying with the frayed edge of its bookmark. She’d read it more times than she could count, but there was comfort in its familiarity, like spending time with good friends who arrived with no expectations and never outstayed their welcome. The thought brought Rosie to mind, and Jem’s eyes strayed to the climbing shoes. Rosie would tell her to go for it, to put the damn book away, put the damn shoes on, and haul her arse up the damn wall. It was only a beginner’s wall, after all. How high could it be?

  The shoes were a perfect fit, removing her final excuse to procrastinate. She slinked out of the changing room, immediately overwhelmed by a hubbub of shouted instructions, cries of encouragement, and the occasional yelp of failure. A tall bald chap spotted her within seconds, dodging around a line of teenagers bedecked with ropes and carabiners to greet Jem by name.

  “Kel asked me to look out for you. I’m Rob, and you have me all to yourself for”—he checked his mobile—“the next hour and fifty. Shall we make a start?”

  “Okay,” Jem said, mesmerised by the sheer scale of the walls surrounding her. The climbing centre had been built inside a converted Victorian church, and a beautiful stained-glass window rained multi-coloured light onto the climbers. She pointed toward a young girl suspended in an acrobatic pose beneath a gnarly overhang. “We won’t be doing that, will we?”

  “Not today,” Rob said. “Maybe save it for next time, eh?”

  The corner he escorted her around deadened the worst of the noise, and he stopped in front of a bright orange slab, its rumpled surface stretching to about fifteen feet, liberally dotted with plastic holds and fixed metal loops. Jem felt queasy just looking at its summit ledge. Although she loved the mountains, she had no head for heights.

  “I don’t think I can do this, either,” she whispered. “I’m not very strong.”

  Rob sat her on a bench at the base of the wall. “I think you can. A lot of people have the wrong idea about climbing. They assume it’s all about arm strength and dangling off ledges by your fingertips, but your legs are the key to making progress. You need your quads not your biceps for this, which means women instinctively climb better than blokes, because they’re less inclined to act like knobs and try to pose.”

  Jem laughed in spite of herself. “I doubt you’ll ever have a student less inclined to pose.”

  He gave her his hand and pulled her up. “Smashing. Right, let’s crack on.”

  His introduction to the basics was thorough and punctuated by practical examples. “Use your feet, put your weight over your feet, put your waist over your feet,” he told her, hopping on and off the wall with enviable poise. “Okay, come and have a go.”

  Snug in a harness far more orthodox than the one she’d hashed together on Barton Bridge, and belayed by Rob’s colleague, she took her first tentative step on the wall. Rob joined her on a parallel hold.

  “Don’t look up, look down,” he said. “Plan where you’re putting your feet, not your hands.”

  It was sound advice, and she plotted her next couple of moves with relative ease, advancing halfway up before she made the mistake of glancing beyond her shoes to the crash mat below.

  “Jesus,” she hissed. Perspiration slicked her palm, and her right hand slipped from its hold, flailing in midair until she found an alternative grip. Her knuckles blanched, and she thought she might be sick.

  “Take a minute, Jem,” Rob commanded, pulling her attention away from the floor. She nodded in fitful jerks, reminding herself that even if she fell, the top rope would catch her. But what if it didn’t?

  “Sorry,” she said. “Me and heights, we don’t really get along.”

  He barked a laugh. “Now you bloody tell me.” He moved across to her, close enough that he could speak without his colleague overhearing. “Do you want to stop?”

  “No.” She didn’t want to give in. She wanted to get to the sodding top.

  He considered her carefully for a moment and then waved her onward. “Okay, good. Where are you going next?”

  “There, I think.” She sidestepped onto a conveniently placed hold and gained another foot.

  “You’re a natural,” he said, ignoring his mobile phone as it chirped.

  She stared at him and dried her forehead on her sleeve. Her shirt was soaked and clinging to her, and her legs felt like wet spaghetti. “Bugger off,” she said, forcing the words out between mild bouts of wheezing. “And shift your arse off that spot. I need it.”

  He hopped obligingly to one side, slowing his own progress to let her reach the summit alone. Her fingers clawed for purchase, and one final push allowed her to collapse her top half over the ledge. She stayed there for a few seconds, panting and smiling like an idiot, and then allowed her belaying buddy to gently guide her descent. Back on the crash mat, bouncing foot to foot, she pulled Rob into a hug and kissed his cheek when he offered her his hand.

  “Thank you,” she said, feeling simultaneously lighter than air and fit to burst.

  “My pleasure.” He sounded like he meant it, and his face was flushed with pride. “I’m very glad my one o’clock cancelled.”

  She stopped untying the knot at her waist, the alarm he’d muted suddenly making sense. “What time is it?” She’d been scheduled to meet Sylvie at one.

  “Twenty to two.”

  “Really? Are you sure? Shit, I have to run.” She handed him her gear. “Thanks again for everything. I’ll pay the extra at the desk.”

  “Don’t worry about that. My cancellation will have covered it.”

  “I’ll leave you a big tip, then,” she called over her shoulder, already halfway to the changing room.

  She showered in five minutes and applied generous amounts of deodorant, throwing on fresh clothes before chucking a couple of clips into her hair and hoping for the best. A gang of kids directed her to the Beast, but Sylvie wasn’t on the wall, and a chap swinging nine feet above Jem told her that Sylvie had soloed her chosen route in less than an hour.

  At a loss, Jem returned to the front desk, where Kel met her with a round of applause.

  “Congratulations,” Kel said, giving her a drumstick lolly. “To commemorate your first ascent.”

  “I’ll treasure it.” Jem pocketed her prize. “I don’t suppose you’ve seen Sylvie?”

  Kel’s nose crinkled in discomfiture, and she fished a slip of paper from a pile of messages. “I have, actually. She left this for you.”

  The message was short and succinct. Met a couple of friends here, and we’ve gone to the Butterbean Cafe. Get a taxi and join us if you want. S.

  “They do the
most revolting omelette,” Kel said. “You’d be better off eating that piece of paper.”

  Jem was too thrilled with her afternoon’s adventure to feel slighted. “I don’t think she was really my type,” she said.

  Kel took the message back, screwed it up, and tossed it over her shoulder. “Naw, Sylvie’s a strutter. She brings women here all the time, but she’s happier if you just stand on the mat and admire her. You had fun anyway, didn’t you?”

  “Very much so.” Jem gave her thirty quid. “Can you pass that on to Rob?”

  “Will do, but he won’t want it. His cancellation paid for your extra time.”

  “Tell him to pay it forward for someone else, then.”

  Jem paused at the exit to shoulder her rucksack and zip her coat. She’d have to phone for a taxi, but she preferred to wait outside, where the air was cooler and didn’t smell of body odour and soggy chips. Perched on the car park wall, she fished out her mobile as it vibrated with a text. Before she’d even read the message, her excuses were piling up on each other: I twisted my ankle and I think it needs an X-ray, chickpeas make me sneeze, my cat’s stuck up a tree…

  The last one set her off laughing, and she opened WhatsApp fully prepared to deal with Sylvie having a strop. Instead, she found a message from Rosie. In Manchester, but I can still fabricate feline shenanigans if you need me to.

  Jem hovered over the reply pane, her heels thrumming against the bricks. The main bus route into Manchester was only a five-minute walk away, she had a few quid left in change, and she really didn’t want to waste her good mood by going home with her tail between her legs.

  My date ditched me for a vegan omelette, she typed. Fancy meeting for a brew in town?

  The gap that ensued seemed to stretch for hours. A flock of seagulls cackled their disdain overhead, and she was busy googling local taxi firms when a message flashed up. How the fuck do you make a vegan omelette?

  She snorted, scaring one of the gulls. I don’t think I ever want to find out.

  Rosie didn’t leave her hanging again. How’s about Northern Soul for a fry up?