Up on the Roof

by A. L. Brooks

  “Callum, I—”

  He raised a hand before she could get any further. “No need. You’re family, and family always comes first.”

  Except Lena wasn’t family, and Callum had done it anyway, simply because it affected someone Megan knew in the place where she lived.

  She closed the distance across the kitchen to her brother and pulled him into a rough hug. He patted her awkwardly on the back. “S’all right, Megs. No worries.”

  “Thank you,” she said, pulling back to gaze at him. “You’re the best.”

  Callum blushed. Actually blushed, which Megan didn’t think she’d ever seen happen in her whole life. Not knowing quite what to say to him in that moment, she turned away and made a pretence of clearing up the tea things.

  Callum cleared his throat. “How’s she doing?” he asked quietly.

  Megan turned back to him, sighing. “She’s a mess.”

  They both looked towards the sofa, where Lena was wrapped up in a bundle of blankets, sleeping. It hadn’t taken Megan nearly as much persuasion as she thought to get Lena to stay the night. Lena was in shock, of that there was no doubt, and her resistance was minimal. It was tomorrow Megan wasn’t looking forward to—Lena was going to wake up in a strange place with none of her things and all hell would probably break loose.

  But still, that was tomorrow. Tonight, now, Megan needed to get to bed. Her own adrenalin rush had worn off long ago, and she ached for the comfort of her duvet.

  “Right.” Callum drained the last of his tea. “I’d better get off. Karen’ll be wondering where I am.”

  “Sure. Say hi to her and the kids for me.”

  Callum grinned and nodded, and Megan walked him to the front door. After closing it quietly behind him so as not to disturb Lena, she walked over to gaze down at the sleeping woman. She hadn’t meant for Lena to fall asleep on the sofa—she had a perfectly serviceable spare bedroom after all. But Lena had suddenly collapsed there, a while after Callum’s team had finished the main work. Megan had walked into the room to find Lena snoring gently, her head twisted at an odd angle, with a line of drool slowly inching its way down her chin. Laughing softly to herself, Megan had gently pushed and pulled Lena into a horizontal position. She’d removed her shoes, found some blankets from the spare room, and tucked her in.

  Megan sighed. She and Lena had had their differences, for sure. But no one deserved this shit to happen to them. She just hoped Lena could get herself sorted out with somewhere else to live soon.

  Lena was conflicted. While it did feel comforting, in a way, to have Megan right behind her as she made her way up the stairs in her wrecked flat, at the same time she’d rather Megan didn’t witness the tears that kept falling. She’d rather keep her despair to herself, thank you very much. But Megan had insisted, citing concerns over how stable everything was—or wasn’t—and Lena had been too tired to argue. She had also been amazed that Megan had excused herself from work for the day, citing an “emergency” so that she could be here for Lena, who had also taken a day out from her own job to deal with this…nightmare.

  She’d slept fitfully. Not because Megan’s sofa was uncomfortable—far from it, in fact. But she wasn’t in her own place, her own bed, with her own neat space surrounding her. Instead she was wrapped up in blankets that might or might not have been clean, in a flat that was distinctly less than tidy compared to her own. She’d shuddered at the piles of pizza boxes left strewn around the living room after the builders had left, even though she’d simultaneously been grateful for all they’d done. She’d flinched when she’d had to use the bathroom and seen pale blonde hairs everywhere—on the floor, on the counter top, in the sink. Deep down she knew Megan wasn’t that messy, not really. But all of it, the strangeness of being in someone else’s place, the things not left where Lena would have left them, it all conspired to leave her unsettled and deeply uncomfortable.

  And now she had to face the reality of what Megan had briefly described to her yesterday, and the sight of her carpet covered in dirt all the way up the stairs was already causing her breathing to quicken and her pulse to race. She could tell from what little Megan had said that Callum’s team had cleared away a lot of the debris—no tiles lay scattered across the stairs, for example. But the dirt was there, and possibly even worse after being trampled into the carpet by those many pairs of booted feet last night.

  She heaved in a huge breath as she reached the top of the stairs and saw the carnage that awaited her. Fighting back more tears, she made herself walk into the room, across the squishy damp carpet, as far as was safe to do so. She could see where Callum’s team had erected supports and steered clear of those, placing herself near the kitchen area, which seemed to have avoided the worst of the damage. Except for the enormous crack down the middle of the worktop, of course. The broken rafter that had caused that had been cleared away, but the scar told its story.

  “You okay?” Megan’s voice was quiet behind her. Lena looked around and noted Megan had stayed at the top of the stairs, giving Lena some space.

  Lena shrugged. “Not really.” She looked back into the room, and a sob caught in her throat. Piled up on a square piece of tarpaulin were the remains of her books. Her beloved books, now a mash of wet and damaged paper with barely a single one left unscathed. She trembled as she stepped closer to the pile. Was anything retrievable? She knelt on the edge of the tarp before the stack, and all hope left her. For some, the titles could still be read on the spines, but the pages were crinkled and glued together. For others, even the spines couldn’t be read, the water damage was so great.

  “Given what Dorothy said, once she’d calmed down, we think it happened around three o’clock. Which means they sat in the rain for four hours, nearly five, before Callum could cover them up. I’m so sorry.” Megan did sound genuinely sad for Lena, and it helped. A little.

  Shaking her head, Lena turned away, trying to get the image of that sodden pile out of her head. Her gaze fell on her floppy-eared bunny slippers, wrecked almost beyond recognition. She wanted to cry. “What…what about the bedroom?” she asked, even though she was scared to hear the answer.

  “It’s not so bad in there. Your bed has a little damage, like on the duvet, but I think your wardrobe and chest of drawers are intact, so your clothes should be okay.”

  It was something, at least. Deciding the living area was too depressing to look at, Lena walked to the bedroom. A quick glance round told her Megan was right: the damage here was nowhere near as bad as the main room. Avoiding looking directly at the bed, where out of the corner of her eye she could see a swathe of dirt across the duvet, she opened the wardrobe and found clean, undamaged clothes. Her stress level dissipated a notch.

  “Do you want some help packing?” Megan was in the doorway, pointing to the open wardrobe.

  There was no way a stranger was touching her clothes. Lena bit back a snippy retort, acknowledging Megan was only trying to be friendly, and shook her head.

  “It’s okay. I can do it.” Lena reached up to the top of the wardrobe, then realised with a sigh of irritation that she couldn’t reach the suitcases she’d stored up there, and her short ladder steps were buried somewhere in the mess that was her kitchen. She closed her eyes for a moment, then said, “Please could you get these down for me.”

  Megan, to her credit, said nothing and simply walked into the room, pulled down both suitcases, then left the room just as quietly.

  “Thank you,” Lena belatedly said after her.

  “I’ll be just out here,” Megan called. “Let me know if you need anything. And take your time.”

  “Oh, no!” Madhu’s voice in Lena’s ear was a balm. After the stress of everything she’d had to deal with today, being able to spill it all out to the one person who got her was an enormous relief. “Oh, Lena, I am so sorry to hear that. What are you going to do? Are you okay? Were you hurt?”

&nbs
p; Lena smiled at the barrage of questions and realised it was probably the first smile she’d managed since Sunday, two days ago. “I’m okay. I wasn’t home when it happened.” She shuddered as she pondered the implications of that. Imagine if she’d been sitting on her sofa reading when that destruction rained down? Would she still even be alive?

  “Well, at least there’s that,” Madhu said. “But…what now?”

  Lena sighed and shifted position on the sofa. It was still only the day after the storm, but it felt like she’d been at Megan’s for days. Megan had retreated to the spare room to catch up on e-mails—and to give Lena some privacy for her phone call—but Lena was very much aware that she was invading Megan’s space.

  “I have no idea,” Lena said, her voice small. “We called the landlord last night, to report the damage. Now we have to wait for his insurance assessor to come round and see what they say. I can’t live there, that much is obvious. I assume his insurance will pay for me to live somewhere until it’s done. But that’s going to take some time to sort out. And…”

  “And?”

  Lena closed her eyes, and her voice dropped to a whisper. “It will probably be somewhere awful, Madhu, and you know I don’t like change anyway.”

  “I know.” Madhu’s voice was equally quiet. “But I don’t know what else you can do. I mean, I’d offer you our spare room but—”

  “Oh, Madhu, of course not. I mean, how would that work? I can’t commute from Bolton every day, and anyway, you really don’t have the room, especially not with the baby on the way.”

  “I know. I just don’t like to think of you with nowhere to go.”

  Lena swallowed. “I know. And it could be months, Megan’s brother said, before my place is fit to live in again.”

  “Months?” Madhu squeaked.

  “I know.” Lena passed a hand tiredly over her forehead. “I don’t know what to do.”

  “Could you get a hotel for a few nights? Just something really cheap? Or ask someone at work if they can put you up for a while?”

  “I-I guess I could ask around, see if anyone has a spare room.” The thought nauseated her. It was unsettling enough not having her own space, but to share with someone she barely knew, and learn a whole new routine, a new commute? The shivers that ran down her spine chilled her.

  “Hey.” Madhu’s exclamation broke into Lena’s maudlin thoughts. “What about those cousins, remember? The ones Mum doesn’t really talk to anymore.” Madhu giggled. “Probably means you’d like them.”

  Lena snorted, then laughed, and it felt good. “I can’t remember where they live, can you?”

  “I’ve got this idea it was way out east London somewhere. I’ll try to find out. Maybe Dad will tell me. There’s no way I’m asking her.”

  They talked for a few minutes longer before Madhu had to hang up. “I’m sorry, Lena. It’s my stupid bladder. I’ve got to go.”

  Lena laughed. “I understand.”

  “Call me later. I’m sure Megan won’t mind you staying with her a couple of days until we can get you sorted out, so I’ll get that info about the cousins as soon as I can, okay?”

  After she ended the call, Lena tapped the phone against her chin. She supposed it would be okay to stay here for a couple of days, but if Madhu couldn’t come through with the info on the cousins, or if they didn’t have room, or didn’t even live in London anymore—

  She closed her eyes in exasperation. This was…impossible. For the tenth time that day, tears threatened, but she didn’t have the energy to let them fall. She was so tired of crying and feeling sorry for herself, but she had no idea how to change that.

  Chapter 9

  “What did the assessor say?” Megan asked as she shrugged out of her coat. She’d had to go back to work today, but Lena had taken one more day off work to meet the assessor. She’d felt odd being alone in Megan’s home and in fact had gone out for a long walk during the morning to try to ease her discomfort. It didn’t help much at all—her whole life felt completely disjointed. She’d spent last night in Megan’s spare room, her suitcases and few other belongings rescued from the nightmare above them placed as neatly as she could in the small room. Sleep had been difficult; there were new noises to get used to, a bed that wasn’t as comfortable as her own, a different detergent smell on the bed clothes. All of it sent her anxiety levels rocketing and left her looking quite the worse for wear come morning.

  Megan had tip-toed around her over breakfast, and although Lena was grateful, she couldn’t bring herself to say so, or engage in any kind of conversation. She was unravelling at the seams. Madhu had texted her a couple of times, however, and that had helped a little.

  Now, the simple question from Megan set Lena’s heart pounding again, and her hands fidgeted with the mini iPad she held in her lap. Megan sat down beside her on the sofa.

  “It… He told me what happens now, and how long it’s all likely to take.” The anger bubbled up, and the next words spat out of her mouth. “And he also told me that our landlord only paid for the basic policy they offer. So although they have declared the flat uninhabitable, which relieves me of paying rent, the policy doesn’t pay an allowance for me to be re-housed while the repairs are going on. So I have to find somewhere else, and unless I want to pay significantly more than I was paying upstairs, I can only afford to get something like this at short notice.” She thrust the iPad in Megan’s direction.

  Megan leaned over to look at what was displayed on the screen.

  “Ew,” she said immediately.

  “Yes,” Lena snapped. “Exactly.”

  Megan sat back, her eyes wide. “Wh-what are you going to do?”

  Lena sighed and sunk back into the sofa alongside Megan. Snarling at Megan didn’t help anybody. She breathed in and out a couple of times to get her heart rate down.

  “I’m sorry for being short with you,” she said quietly. “This whole scenario is very stressful for me.”

  Megan waved her apology off. “Of course,” she said. “Anyone would react the same way.”

  Lena offered a weak smile. “I don’t actually know what I’m going to do. To start with, I need to call my sister back. There are some distant cousins somewhere in east London who could possibly put me up. If that doesn’t work out, I’ll ask around at work tomorrow. I’ll be out of your way soon. And I am very grateful for what you’ve done for me.”

  Megan’s smile was warm. “Hey, you’re welcome. I was happy to help. It was awful what happened to your flat. I’d hate to go through something like that. I think you’re doing pretty well, actually.”

  “Thank you.” Lena straightened her shoulders. She really did need to stop wallowing now and get on with sorting this out. The quicker she did it, the quicker she could get some kind of routine back. “Okay, I am going to call my sister.” She stood and walked off to the spare room.

  Megan sipped her beer and looked at the door to the spare room for about the tenth time in as many minutes. Lena had been in there a long time considering she only had one call to make. Maybe she just needed some space. Some quiet time. Although she’d been on her own all day, so surely she’d had enough quiet time already?

  Stop worrying. She’s a grown-up. If she wants to talk, she will.

  But…when Megan had first come home, Lena had looked completely distraught, sitting rigidly on the sofa, her cheeks slightly flushed. Megan couldn’t help worrying about her. She’d figured out pretty quickly in the last forty-eight hours that Lena was an anxious person, to say the least. Megan thought that was probably her normal behaviour, so having to deal with the roof disaster could only have been making it a hundred times worse. She hoped Lena’s sister could come through for her. Funny, she’d never mentioned her parents in all of this…

  Megan chugged some more of her beer, then began chopping ingredients for a quick stir-fry. She’d make enough for two, in ca
se Lena was hungry, and—

  The sound of a throat clearing behind her had her turning quickly.

  Lena’s expression was downcast, but at the same time her mouth was set in a firm line.

  “No luck?” Megan asked, pretty sure she already knew the answer.

  Lena shook her head, her gaze darting away. She motioned towards the pile of vegetables on the counter. “Can I help?”

  Megan stared at Lena for a few moments. If Lena didn’t want to talk about it, she had to respect that. But she was dying to know what her sister had said.

  Lena frowned, and Megan snapped out of her thoughts.

  “Sure,” she said, pulling another chopping knife from the block. “I’m making a stir-fry if you’d like to join me?”

  “Thank you,” Lena said quietly, and Megan knew she wasn’t only talking about dinner.

  “You’re welcome.”

  They ate quickly and silently, the TV news on in the background. When they’d finished, Lena insisted on clearing up. She clearly wanted to keep busy, and Megan was happy to let her—clearing up was one of her least favourite tasks. From the happy humming sounds Lena made as she worked, Megan guessed it was the complete opposite for her guest. She surreptitiously watched Lena as she methodically wiped down every countertop, even the ones they hadn’t gone anywhere near during the preparation of the meal. Monica from Friends sprang to mind, and Megan only just held back a snort of laughter.

  “Having fun?” she asked.

  Lena whirled round, the cloth clutched tightly in her hand. “What?” Her eyes had narrowed in a look that frightened Megan a little bit. Well, okay, more than a little.

  “I-I wondered if you were enjoying yourself. You were humming and—”

  “Look, I like cleaning, okay? It’s no big deal.” Lena’s face had scrunched into a frown so deep Megan feared it would leave permanent marks. “Just…leave me alone.” Lena turned back, folded up the cloth, and placed it neatly on the draining board, and before Megan could think to respond, Lena marched off to the bathroom.