The Sweet Second Life of Darrell Kincaid

by Catherine Robertson

  Suddenly, I realised Dr Flynn had left us, and that I was staring along the length of the ward at his retreating back. Then I realised what that meant. I was alone with Big Man. I braced myself, and looked down at the bed.

  He was looking right back at me, and I had to steel myself not to whimper. Instead, I moved over to the visitor’s chair and sank down into it. His eyes followed me. I felt like a small mammal caught out in the open with a raptor circling above. There was no escape.

  It was clear that if anyone was going to speak, it would have to be me. At least a hundred opening lines entered my head and were all discarded as insincere, trite or grovellingly pathetic. But I had to say something …

  ‘I’m sorry.’ My voice caught and I had to clear my throat. ‘I’m sorry I slapped you.’

  There was an excruciatingly long pause, during which all he did was stare. Then – finally – he spoke. His voice was gruff and deep and distinctly north London.

  ‘It hurt.’

  I sank my head in my hands. ‘Oh God,’ I said, my voice muffled.

  Then I sucked in a huge breath and sat up again.

  ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘Course,’ he added slowly, ‘after having my chest hacked open and sewn back up, and then having all these fucking tubes stuck in me, the pain was sort of relative–’

  I was so mortified, I could no longer look at him. I wanted to crawl under his hospital bed and curl up in a foetal position.

  Because the blood was pounding in my head so loudly, I didn’t immediately identify the sound coming from the bed beside me. It was sort of a hoarse wheeze, and my first thought was some medical emergency – Big Man couldn’t breathe. I stood up, startled, ready to call for help.

  He didn’t need help. He was laughing.

  He paused as I shot out of my chair. Then he caught the look on my face and started again.

  I couldn’t think what to say. Frankly, I wanted to slap him a second time.

  He controlled himself. ‘Gawd almighty,’ he chuckled. ‘You’ve got a mouth like a cat’s arse.’

  I sat down again with a thump. ‘It’s not funny! I thought you were serious!’

  ‘I was serious! That smack fucking stung!’

  ‘I’ve been wound up like a top about this!’ I protested. ‘That was the worst thing I’ve done! Ever!’

  He stopped smiling. ‘I didn’t mean it the way you think,’ he said quietly.

  ‘You didn’t mean – what?’

  ‘What I said. That made you slap me.’

  ‘Oh–’ I felt my face flame again. Then I frowned, puzzled. ‘What did you mean by it then?’

  ‘Why are you here?’

  His expression was bordering on hostile again. I wasn’t sure now where this conversation was headed.

  ‘I came to apologise,’ I replied. ‘And – to see how you were.’

  ‘Why? You don’t know me from Adam.’

  I began to bridle at his tone. ‘You’re not a complete stranger! And you had a heart attack right in front of me! Wouldn’t it be weirder if I wasn’t concerned?’

  He settled back against the pillows. ‘Well, you’ve done your duty now. I’m all right. I accept your apology. So why don’t you piss off ?’

  I did the goldfish gape again, but almost instantly forgot my shock as I was swamped by another rush of fury. How dare he be so unbelievably rude? What had I done to warrant it? Nothing! He was a prick! A pig-headed, big-headed prick!

  My hands were shaking, so I took hold of my bag strap and clutched it tight to stop them. I took a deep, slow breath, and I rose from my chair in the most dignified manner I could muster.

  ‘Why don’t I?’ I snapped. ‘I wouldn’t want to tire you, what with your constant stream of other visitors. Friends and family, all queuing up to see you.’

  My God, the look he shot me! It was one of such pure, unadulterated venom that I took a step backwards.

  But all he did next was turn his head away, settle further onto the pillows, and close his eyes.

  I stood there, the last bursts of anger swiftly being overcome by a growing remorse. I was appalled at my behaviour. At how quickly I’d become furious with him – for the second time. He may well be a rude pig, but he had also just had a large brush with mortality. I should be making allowances, not leaping down his throat.

  I hovered on the spot for a moment, but his eyes remained firmly closed. As far as he was concerned, I’d already gone for good.

  I thought about whispering, ‘I’m sorry.’

  But I turned and walked away without a word.

  It was only one o’clock when I returned home; I knew that the builders would be there. I opened the door quietly and glanced down the hallway, ready to offer a – with luck – casual-sounding hello. But although I could hear the bustle of activity down in the courtyard, no one’s head popped out to see who’d come in. I might as well not have bothered.

  I went upstairs and checked my computer. There was nothing, not even a message from Michelle updating me on the potty progress. I would have liked an update. I would even, in my current mood, have liked to see photos.

  I considered emailing my publisher, but decided against it. I did not want to sound desperate – the whiff of neediness is unattractive in any circumstance, not only a romantic one. Besides, I’d had no regular contact with anyone at the firm except Hippolyte, and a little gremlin in my head had me worried that no one else would actually know who I was. I had not produced any startlingly good sellers that might have got me on someone senior’s radar. I had not actively promoted myself. Some romance writers not only had their own websites, but also newsletters, and even their own merchandise – bookmarks and calendars and suchlike. I had nothing like that. I didn’t even talk about my writing much on Facebook. That was probably why I was in this situation. I had not made enough noise to not be ignored.

  I sat on the bed and tried to work out my best strategy for survival. I did not want to go home. But if my publisher reneged, or did not get around to finding me a replacement editor any time soon, what should I do? What might I be forced to do?

  Normally by this time, I would be most of the way through my next book. But the limbo I was in with my publisher had sapped my confidence, and all I had were a few tentative plot outlines, a couple of character sketches and one line of dialogue that I didn’t think was all that good. It had been ages since I’d heard my ‘imaginary bastards’ talk in my head, and I was having trouble remembering what sexy conversations between men and women were like. I was having trouble remembering how to write full stop. I just couldn’t focus. Which was ironic because, let’s be honest, I had very few other demands on my time. Perhaps that was it? I had too much time?

  It occurred to me that this was a truly pathetic excuse. If I had all this time, I told myself, I should be finding more productive ways to fill it than fiddling around with scraps of not-very-good writing and fantasising about getting it on with a duke.

  Of course, I could use the opportunity to finally, once and for all, embark on writing a ‘proper’ novel. But oh, the thought of it! A proper novel would have to be at least a hundred thousand words. My little books were half that size and, up until now, I could dash them off with relative ease in a matter of weeks. A proper book would need much more application. To come up with the theme, the plots and sub-plots, to make the dialogue fresh and contemporary, to make each character believable and likeable, and then to put it all on paper – how long would that realistically take me? A year? How could I support myself financially for that long? And what if, after all that effort, it was a failure? What if I simply did not have what it takes? I fingered the raised surface of the white damask bedspread – or counterpane, as Mr Perfect’s family probably called it. I had not until now thought about this being landlady Clare’s old bed. I wondered for a fleeting second whether she and Patrick had …

  And then I banished such a thought from my mind. Not only did it make me sad, it was also icky.

 
The whine of a circular saw came up through the floorboards. Someone was busy at least. Someone knew what he needed to do …

  I decided to go downstairs and make a cup of tea. It would also, now that I thought about it, be a good moment to have some buttered digestives and cheese.

  Anselo was bent over one of those horse things, cutting wood with the saw. He had earmuffs on, so was oblivious to me. Tyso was facing away, measuring something. I slipped into the kitchen unobserved and flicked on the kettle.

  I was reaching into the dishwasher for a clean mug when a voice in my ear made me jump.

  ‘Milk and two, thanks.’

  Tyso was grinning at me.

  ‘You’ll be lucky if it’s not two spoons of cyanide,’ I warned him.

  ‘Foxglove,’ he said. ‘That’s the thing. Drops you dead and everyone thinks it’s a heart attack.’

  I raised an eyebrow. ‘Gypsy lore?’

  ‘Nah, I saw it on Midsomer Murders.’

  ‘Right–’

  I looked past him, into the courtyard. His boss had stopped cutting wood, and was now stacking it. There was an efficient certainty about the way he worked. He had a goal. He had a plan to get there. He did not faff about. I admired that, but at the same time, I found I resented it a little. Why did someone like him have it nailed (if you’ll pardon the pun)? Why was it so impossibly bloody hard for me?

  Tyso followed my line of sight. Fortunately, he wasn’t able to follow my line of thought. ‘He’ll have it black, no sugar,’ he said. ‘And leave the teabag in.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Yeah, he’s not keen on sweet things.’

  I would never have guessed.

  Tyso handed his boss the mug, and nodded towards the kitchen to indicate that I was there. To my surprise, Anselo slung the earmuffs around his neck, left his assistant and came to stand in the kitchen doorway. He was possibly about to say something when a burst of rock music made him glance back over his shoulder.

  ‘If that’s My fucking Chemical Romance again,’ he said, ‘I will shove this mug up your backside.’

  ‘Well, where’s your bloody CDs then?’ Tyso whinged.

  ‘In the van. Where they always are.’

  Muttering, Tyso dragged his feet down to the front door.

  I met Anselo’s eye. ‘And who says the youth of today have no motivation?’

  He offered me a brief smile. ‘An occasional swift kick in the slats does wonders for their attitude, I’ve found.’

  I started to butter the digestives, and caught him staring. ‘Want some?’ I asked. ‘They’re really good with cheese.’

  He shook his head, as mutely appalled as if I’d offered him a love potion made with menstrual blood. I wondered idly if Anselo knew any Gypsy love spells? Perhaps I could use one on Claude …

  Digestive in hand, I gestured to the courtyard. ‘How’s it going?’

  He glanced behind him, as if he’d temporarily forgotten it existed. ‘All right.’

  ‘On schedule?’

  ‘Yeah. Well. Her nibs changing her mind every five seconds hasn’t helped.’

  ‘She’s pregnant. It makes you a bit – nuts.’

  The front door slammed. Tyso stomped back and thrust three CDs at Anselo.

  ‘Pick one. Any one. They’ll all be rubbish.’

  Anselo pointed. ‘This is a classic. One of the albums to hear before you die. Or so they say.’

  Tyso held up the one Anselo had picked and hung his head mock-dramatically. ‘Yeah, because it makes you want to kill yourself.’

  But he put it on. The lonesome guitar intro of Dire Straits’ ‘Down to the Waterline’ sounded out. As its main rock beat kicked in Mark Knopfler began to sing. Tyso’s face was a picture.

  ‘It could be worse,’ I told him. ‘I could force you to listen to my albums.’

  He eyed me warily. ‘Can’t be worse than this, can it?’

  ‘Kate Bush?’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘I inherited a poster of her from my older brother,’ said Anselo, slightly wistful. ‘She was wearing a pink singlet.’

  ‘I’ve got a pink singlet with her face on it,’ I confessed. ‘I’m a bit of a Kate nut. I saw the video for “Wuthering Heights” on a best-of-the-seventies TV show. It rocked my world. I bought up every album and never looked back.’

  ‘I’ve never heard of her!’ Tyso clearly found this disturbing. In his world, it was the old people who hadn’t heard of stuff. ‘I’m gonna look her up on YouTube,’ he muttered into his tea.

  ‘I can’t imagine you liking Kate Bush,’ I said to Anselo. ‘She’s not exactly a guitar hero.’

  He eyed me evenly over the rim of his mug. ‘I didn’t. I just liked the pink singlet.’

  I laughed. And this time, he gave me a proper grin, a sparkler like the other day.

  Then Tyso said, ‘Is that someone at the door?’

  We all stopped to listen. He was right. There was a knock.

  We all stood there. The two men stared at me until I said, ‘Oh. Right–’ and went to open the door of what was now, if only temporarily, my house.

  There was a man outside. In a sweaty courier’s uniform. He had a bunch of flowers in his hand. Yellow roses.

  ‘Darrell?’ he said.

  ‘That’s me.’

  He gave me a sceptical look. ‘Yeah?’

  I smiled. ‘My mother wanted a boy. She also thought she was Joan of Arc.’

  He’d lost interest. ‘Right, yeah.’

  He shoved the flowers at me. Once I’d taken them, he hightailed it for his double-parked van, leapt in the cab, did a screeching u-turn and disappeared up the street.

  I closed the front door and carried the roses to the kitchen. Tyso whistled when he saw them.

  ‘Oo-er,’ he said. ‘Who’s got an admirer, then?’

  ‘It’s probably a mistake,’ I said. I mean, who did I have in my life who would send me flowers?

  Tyso peered at the layers of paper wrapping. ‘There’s a card!’

  He made a grab for it, but I held the bunch up out of his reach. ‘Bugger off!’

  ‘Tyso.’

  The boss was back in the courtyard, and the tone of his voice was unambiguous. Tyso made a quick face at me, and headed back to work as ordered.

  I ripped the card from its staples, and opened it. It said ‘Thank you’. There was no name, only an initial, which appeared to be a C.

  Claude. Oh my God. How amazing.

  I hunted in the kitchen cupboards for a vase, but had to settle for a measuring jug. I was about to take jug and flowers out to the table in the front room when I caught Anselo watching me. I smiled, but he dipped his head quickly and started up the circular saw again. Work to do. Deadlines to meet.

  I set the jug of flowers on the table. They were so pretty – the yellow glowed like sunshine against Clare’s greeny-blue walls. She had good taste, my landlady, and for the first time, I felt genuinely glad to be in her house. Even the whine of the saw didn’t bother me. Even the thought of Big Man didn’t bother me as much. I’d made my apology; he’d told me to piss off. That, I supposed, was that.

  I was so buoyed up, I spent the next few hours jotting furiously in a notebook, working out ideas for a new novel. I knew it might not come to anything, but if I didn’t start, I’d guarantee it got nowhere.

  And, for the first time in months, I slept right through the night.

  I slept so well, I slept through the alarm. I was woken by the bang of the front door. Curses. Builders were back in the house. And I wasn’t ready for them.

  I snuck into the bathroom and had a quick shower. Normally, I’d wrap myself in a towel for the return journey to the bedroom, but this morning I decided to take no chances. My legs weren’t fat exactly, but I did hate my knees. They were like two sacks of small spuds. The knobbly kind. Not the smooth kind you use for salads.

  Tom used to roll his eyes whenever I moaned about my knees. ‘They’re knees, for Christ’s sake,’ he’d say. ‘They�
��re meant to be functional, not decorative. Has a poet ever written an ode to knees? I don’t think so.’

  ‘That means you think they’re ugly,’ I’d pout.

  ‘No-o,’ he’d reply slowly. ‘It means I think you’re a dickhead.’

  Then he’d fend me off while I tried to thump him.

  One day, about three years into our marriage, I found a card on my pillow. On the front was a cartoon pair of large, naked boobs. Inside, Tom had written:

  This is what poets really think about when they write. But since you insist …

  Ode to Knees:

  I love your knees

  They are the bees

  My eyes they please

  And they’re fun to squeeze (but not because they’re fat or anything … )

  Love, Tom XXXXX

  Even so … I’d exposed my knees once to the builders, and I wasn’t keen for them to get a second chance to look more closely. I took my clothes into the bathroom and changed there. Being still slightly damp, I struggled to pull up my jeans, and when I passed the mirror at the bottom of the stairs, I wasn’t pleased to see that my face was flushed and my hair frizzy. Oh well. It was only Anselo.

  As it turned out, it was only Tyso.

  ‘Where’s your boss?’

  He made a sour face and hooked his thumb towards the front door. ‘On the phone.’

  ‘Trouble at mill?’

  ‘Trouble with his stuck-up girlfriend.’

  I felt a jolt of surprise. For some reason, I had never thought about Anselo having a girlfriend. But why not? He was good looking, and in regular employment. He was hardly a sparkling conversationalist, but then again, some girls prefer the strong, stunned type.

  I dropped two slices of bread into the toaster and tried to picture what kind of girl would fancy Anselo. I failed. I would have to get the low-down from Tyso.