‘Metalcore?’ he supplied. ‘No, apparently not.’
‘Is that why you moved here?’ I asked. ‘You were run out of your previous place by neighbours wielding pitchforks and earmuffs?’
‘Something like that.’
His reply was flat, indicating a disinclination to provide more details, and I heeded it, wincing as I applied the ice to the rapidly swelling egg on my forehead. A second later the cold bundle began its numbing work and I sagged in relief.
‘Better?’ he asked and I offered him a watery smile.
‘Much, thanks.’
Unfortunately, as the pain faded, I became more aware of just how stupid I must look in my floral PJ pants and bulky knitted creation, my curls forming a knotted halo around my head. It was one thing for the twenty-four-hour newsagency cashier to see me looking so dishevelled, he must be used to all sorts, but my pristine neighbour who looked as fresh and clean as ever even at so late an hour? I mean, it was bad enough that I’d got his attention by literally head-butting his door, but on top of what had happened the previous evening and – oh, god, I’d almost forgotten – this morning?
My cheeks flamed just that little bit redder and I pushed myself straight again, readying myself to slink away.
‘Well, I better leave you to it.’ I took a couple of steps towards the door.
‘Is there someone with you in your flat?’
What did that mean? Was he asking if Dec slept over? ‘No,’ I said slowly. ‘Why?’
‘You clearly hit your head pretty hard.’ He gestured to the tea towel-covered area in question. ‘You might want to just wait a couple of minutes in case you’re concussed.’
And, okay, I melted a little bit. He was standing there all good looking and kind and it made my bruised little heart give a feeble lurch.
‘You’re nice,’ I said, before realising that my tone was pure sap and hurrying to add, ‘I mean, that’s nice of you. I mean, you are nice, I’m not saying you’re not . . . Oh, for god’s sake.’ I put my free hand over my eyes in embarrassment. ‘I’d hoped you’d be able to chalk up last night to the cocktails,’ I muttered, ‘but I have no excuse for this.’
There was a pause and then I heard him say mildly, ‘You have had a blow to the head.’
I tentatively pulled my hand away to look at him. ‘There is that,’ I agreed, and was rewarded with one of those half-smiles of his.
‘What I meant,’ I went on, ‘is that it’s nice of you to offer to keep an eye on me, but I don’t want to interrupt you. More than I already have.’
He pulled two glasses out of a cabinet above his head and filled them with water from the tap. Passing one across to me, he murmured, ‘You’re not interrupting.’
And that was that.
I took a few awkward sips of water as we hovered in the kitchen and then, apparently back on the hunt for distraction, asked, ‘Can I have a look at your books?’
He nodded, and gestured towards his shelf. ‘I’d say “knock yourself out”, but given the circumstances . . .’
We shared a quick smirk and then he moved past me and sat at his desk, turning his attention to his laptop while I put aside my water and went to indulge my natural nosiness.
Trailing my fingers along the spines of his books, I saw that Theo’s collection was predominately non-fiction: biographies, war stories, several books on the inner workings of planes. There was a small cluster of fiction in one corner, but it was all crime and thrillers, nothing of any interest to me.
If I was honest, I was looking for a cookbook, my absolute obsession, but there were none to be found. Did that mean he was the sort to eat out or order in a lot? Or did he have a few stock-standard meals that he cooked from memory? Maybe he got recipes from the internet; I always forgot that option because I was so leery of having my laptop or phone anywhere near the mess I routinely made of my kitchen. Judging by the ‘everything has a place and everything in its place’ vibe of his flat, however, Theo probably didn’t have that problem.
Although there did seem to be one thing that looked out of place. Tucked into the corner of one of the shelves, half hidden, co-opted into service as a bookend, was an ornate silver trophy with a dent on one side. The plaque on the front read: The Aver Award 2015 and then, underneath, Theodore McKillop.
The year before last, putting Theo at twenty-five-ish. Who won a trophy at twenty-five? Surely they were purely the dominion of childhood sporting achievements? And what was the Aver Award?
I turned to ask him about it and saw that he was frowning at his screen, the very model of concentration. Newly determined not to impose my presence on him more than I already had, I hastily grabbed a book at random and sank down into a corner of his massive couch.
With the pain from my head receding and the flat quiet beyond the occasional tap of Theo’s keyboard, however, I found myself focusing not on the book, but returning like an exasperated homing pigeon to Dec’s email. I really needed to get on with figuring out how long I could deprive myself of Dec without going mad. Considering my current sleep-deprived, knock-to-the-head, awkwardly-crashing-my-neighbour’s-evening state, I was afraid the answer was ‘not long’. I twisted it back and forth in my mind, worrying at the problem like a dog with a chew toy.
I hadn’t realised I’d started nervously drumming my fingers against the cover of the book I held until Theo shifted round to look at me and I snatched my hand back.
I grimaced. ‘Sorry.’
‘No worries.’ He looked at me more closely and asked, ‘You feeling okay?’
‘Yes,’ I said quickly. ‘But can I ask you a question?’ Sick of being stymied and aware I probably couldn’t appear any more barking than I already did that night, I decided to throw Dec’s questions out to the studio audience.
Theo’d looked back at his laptop as I’d told him I felt fine, but he didn’t sound like he minded about the further distraction as he replied, ‘Course.’
‘How long do you think it takes to get over someone?’
His typing stopped abruptly and he looked back at me, although his expression was carefully blank in the blueish light from his computer screen. ‘I guess it varies,’ he said slowly.
‘Yeah.’ I repositioned the ice against my forehead and then made a snap decision. ‘I think I’m going to give myself a month.’
The faintest shadow of surprise crossed his features. ‘A month?’ he repeated.
‘Thirty days.’ I nodded firmly, already starting to tap away at my phone. ‘I don’t want it to drag out, you know?’
He didn’t ask what ‘it’ was as he returned to his work. But he’d been witness to an embarrassing amount of my personal life in the past twenty-four hours, so could no doubt guess.
Give me a month, yeah? I typed to Dec before I lost my nerve. Thirty days to clear you out of my system as something we’re not going to be. See you on the 27th.
I hit send . . . and instantly regretted it. Thirty days? I don’t think I’d gone thirty hours without being in touch with Dec in seventeen years, how was I going to get through a month without seeing his hazel eyes crinkle when he smiled at me? Without the little jump in my stomach whenever he texted? Without feeling his arm across my shoulders whenever he gave me one of those chummy half-hugs of his?
My phone jittered in my hand and I looked down to see that it had taken Dec all of a minute to reply.
I’m not going to pretend I like it, but I get that you’re the one calling the shots on this. I guess I’ll see you on the 27th.
p.s. It’s past the witching hour. Bit late for you, isn’t it?
He knew me so well.
I felt a sad, swooping sensation reminiscent of homesickness in the pit of my belly and had started tapping at the book again before catching myself.
Rather than using the hardcover as percussion, I decided to try giving it a read and, for the first time, I had a look at what I’d picked. Inside the Pratt & Whitney J58 Axial-flow Turbo-jet Engines of the SR-71 Blackbird. Wow, look
ed like a real page turner.
As I opened to the title page, however, I instantly reappraised how interesting it was as I saw a personal inscription in a flowing feminine script.
Happy birthday, baby. Who would’ve thought I’d be so keen to marry someone so boring? Thank god the sex is so good! Love you xxxxxxx
Whoops! Embarrassed, I shut the book with a snap, happy to snoop through Theo’s shelves and draw my own conclusions about his life, not so comfortable actually stumbling across something so personal.
Unfortunately, the noise I made closing the book had made Theo look up again and he noticed what I was holding.
‘Sorry,’ I muttered again, wondering if I was ever going to get through five minutes with him where I didn’t say sorry. ‘I didn’t mean to pry, I just–’
‘Wanted to learn the intricacies of the engines of the SR-71 Blackbird?’ he suggested and I nodded, clasping and unclasping my hands over the cover.
‘You don’t have to look so guilty,’ he said gently after a moment, ‘it’s just a book.’
Sure, just a book. Except for the flirty message from his . . . what? Wife? Fiancée?
I looked around the flat again, trying to find any suggestion that such a person was in his life, but there was nothing. There were no photos, no girly bits and pieces, no sign that he didn’t live alone, practically no sign that he lived there. Oh no! Had she . . . died?
Look, I blame the lateness of the hour and my not-so-rock-solid emotional state for that almighty jump to the worst conclusion. To my exhausted mind, though, it explained everything: why he seemed so closed off; why his smiles were so muted; why he’d looked so tragic and alone out on the balcony of the High-Rise and had clearly not had a date at the party even though his looks alone should’ve had women lining up. He was heartbroken.
Forgetting my exasperation with my continued use of the ‘s’ word around him, I raised suddenly watery eyes to Theo’s and said, ‘I’m so sorry.’
‘What for?’ There was an unspoken now at the end of his words, but I chose to ignore it in the face of his heartrending backstory.
‘Your fiancée.’
To my great surprise he let out a noise that could almost, if he wasn’t so genteel, have been a snort.
‘Me too,’ he said, although it looked like he was sort of . . . amused? Well, people dealt with grief in different ways, I suppose.
‘Was she sick?’ I asked carefully, trying to walk a fine line between satisfying my own curiosity and being respectful of his privacy.
He actually let out a puff of laughter at this. ‘My assistant certainly seems to think so.’
I wasn’t quite sure what to make of that and, my inquisitiveness increasing with each non-answer, I pressed, ‘Was it sudden?’
His brow creased, clearly surprised by the continued questioning even as he was too polite to not reply. ‘No,’ he said in the end, ‘it was a long time coming.’
‘I guess either way is awful,’ I said gently, hating myself for spending so much time flopped on my bed crying when my heartbreak was nothing, nothing, compared to what Theo’s must’ve been. ‘But at least that way you got to say goodbye.’
He looked at me strangely. ‘Yeah, I guess . . .’ He glanced at his computer, then immediately whipped his head back around, his face a picture of dawning comprehension. ‘Giovanna, she’s not . . . she’s not dead, if that’s what you’re thinking. We just broke up.’
‘Oh.’ If I’d thought I’d been blushing before, it literally paled in comparison to the all-consuming lava flow of embarrassment that broke over me in that moment. I dipped my chin into the bulky collar of my poncho, kind of wanting to pull it up over my head as I realised what a ridiculous leap of non-logic I’d made. ‘Well, that’s good.’
‘She’d definitely think so.’ His face was lit with as close to an actual grin as I’d seen from him. It was just a shame it was at my expense.
Right, well, that was quite enough humiliation for one night, I decided. Time to go.
Putting the troublemaking book on the couch next to me, I uncurled my legs and got unsteadily to my feet.
‘I’ll leave you to it.’
He rose as well, valiantly putting his amusement aside to look at me solicitously. ‘How do you feel?’
‘Mortified,’ I replied honestly.
He chuckled, an honest-to-God chuckle and shook his head. ‘I meant any dizziness? Headache? Nausea?’
‘Nope, just mortification,’ I said, heading towards the door.
‘Okay, but if you start to feel off, please let me know.’
I bobbed my head obediently, although he’d be the absolute last person I’d bother with any ‘off’ feelings. With the tea towel still clamped to my forehead, I reached out behind me for the door handle. ‘Will do. Thanks again, and sorry again.’ I grimaced. ‘Basically just imagine I’ve said thanks and sorry another twenty or so times.’
My hand found the doorknob and I hurried backwards out into the hall feeling a strong surge of déjà vu as I said, ‘Night, neighbour.’
‘Night, Giovanna.’
*
As the door closed behind her, Theo collapsed into his desk chair and let out a brief laugh. So much for not having anything more to do with his neighbour.
No matter what Ari said, Theo wasn’t a hermit: he spent all day, and what he considered an excessive number of evenings, surrounded by his colleagues. AHC was a big firm. And then there were his clients, their lawyers and any number of lackeys, sycophants and hangers on. Combined with the few friends from uni he’d kept up with and his incredibly high-maintenance family, his life was full of people and, mostly, they exhausted him. Giovanna should have been just as, if not more, draining, but somehow she wasn’t.
That half an hour in her company had put him in a better mood than he’d been in for what felt like weeks, maybe even months. He was sorry she’d have such an impressive shiner on her forehead come the morning, but the image of her sitting, rumpled and flushed, on his couch, his tea towel clasped to her head, the curves she’d showed off at the High-Rise hidden by that awful knitted something, was still making his lips twitch.
How the hell had O’Connor come across her? She seemed about as far removed from the sort of people he usually courted for his acquaintance as it was possible to be. Still, if Giovanna’s ‘thirty days to get over someone’ was in relation to his colleague, as he presumed it was, it wasn’t as if Theo had to worry about O’Connor screwing yet another person over in his presence. And he was more relieved by that than he had any right to be.
He plucked up the book she’d left on the leather couch. Flicking to the page that had led to such embarrassment on her part, he ran his eyes over the familiar handwriting. God, had it only been his last birthday that things had been so good? So simple? Only eight months ago? It seemed a hell of a lot longer than that.
Yawning, he put the book down and snapped his laptop shut. It was late, he’d finish off tomorrow.
As he rose, a faint, sweet scent hit his nostrils and he realised it must’ve been from her, from Giovanna. She’d made his flat smell like sugar.
6
There was a sculpture near Pickle, Peach and Plum called The Brother. Part of The Family, a series of polished steel designs by Helena Leventis, daughter of the infamous Philomena Leventis, it consisted of a large, perfectly round, perfectly smooth ball perched, seemingly precariously, atop a tall column of books. The books were stylised and colourful, but the ball was a dull grey, vaguely reflective; as inscrutable as an inanimate object could be.
I was by no means a fine art critic but I loved it and on fine days, I spent my lunch hour sitting on a bench before it, eating my sandwich and admiring the way the various hues of the surrounding trees bounced off the sphere.
That was where I sat the Wednesday after the disastrous AHC party, staring fixedly at the sculpture so as not to see people’s reactions to my still swollen head. I’d come out of my confrontation with Theo’s doorframe as a
lumpy, bruised spectacle and the past four days had made it clear that the general public had no qualms about gawping like I, too, was some kind of art installation.
Thankfully, my work at PP&P was conducted out the back with the bakers and other pastry chefs who, after I’d promised, sworn, crossed my heart and hoped to die that the bump was due to a fall, not anything more ominous, had left me alone. My fellow passengers on the bus to work and those I passed on my walk to The Brother each lunchtime, however, had not been so blasé. Coupled with the dark circles under my eyes from night after night of interrupted sleep, I truly must’ve been a sight to behold.
Still, it was the last day of winter, the sun was shining, and, despite the patches of insomnia that had been chipping away at my resolve, I’d yet to cave and text Dec to see how he was doing. I was determined to see the positives.
‘Mummy, what’s happened to that lady’s head?’
Yes, I was scaring young children, but there were still lots of positives: I was healthy and so were my family and friends, and I don’t think Zoë had ever been so proud of me for sticking to my Dec ban.
‘Gio? Is that you?’
Oh, look, it was Vanessa, the most beautiful woman in the world, walking towards me when I was at my sleep-deprived, emotionally fraught, bruised worst. Fabulous. What were those positives again?
Of course, it wasn’t only the discrepancy in looks between me and Dec’s beautiful workmate that was making my heart sink at the sight of her; I also felt guilty in the way you do every time you open your inbox and see an email that’s been sitting there for weeks that you just haven’t got round to replying to yet.
Yep, I hadn’t got back to Vanessa after seeing her texts on that horrible Saturday morning, I just wasn’t sure what I was supposed to say. It wasn’t like we had a great deal in common. She’d surely just been being nice and hadn’t actually wanted to catch up? Besides, I was sure Dec wouldn’t want me striking up a friendship with someone from his work, considering the current circumstances.
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