by Sam Hayes
‘Does anyone ever come back and tell you that you got it wrong?’ Robert didn’t know where he was taking it now.
‘Complain?’ Cheryl laughed. ‘It’s a bit hard to moan about fate. Not like you can take it back and ask for a refund, demand another life.’
‘But what if you were so wide of the mark, you know, with your information that they asked for their money back?’
‘If they were that unhappy then, no, I suppose I wouldn’t charge my fee.’
‘What if something should have been glaringly obvious but you overlooked it? Would you charge then?’
‘I can only tell my clients what I see. I access this information in a number of ways.’ Cheryl gestured to the crystal ball, touched the cards. ‘If you’re that much of a sceptic, Mr Knight, I suggest you don’t make appointments with clairvoyants. ’ Apparently recovered from the sudden glimpse of her past, Cheryl defended her occupation.
‘How did you first get into it? The psychic stuff.’
‘I went to see one myself. She told me I had a gift.’
‘Why did you go and see a clairvoyant?’ Robert didn’t realise he had incised and touched a nerve.
In an instant it was all over. Cheryl stood up. ‘Mr Knight, I will not charge you for this consultation because you obviously have no desire to learn anything about yourself. If you wouldn’t mind,’ she levered her arm at the door, ‘I have other genuine clients to see. Goodnight.’
Unperturbed by the outburst, in fact relieved that it had reached this point, otherwise how else would he know how to say the words, Robert also stood and leaned his hands on the small table. It wobbled.
‘I know,’ he began in a controlled tone, not too loud. Years of experience in court, impossible clients, even his recent struggle with Erin levelled his words. ‘I know what happened.’
Cheryl cocked her head. The space between her eyebrows tightened.
‘I know about your baby.’
Cheryl staggered and leaned on the chair, gripping it for support. Her knuckle bones turned yellow, nearly erupting through the skin.
‘I’ve found your baby, Cheryl. It’s all over.’
TWENTY-SIX
I soon learnt how hostels worked. Don’t ask for much and neither will they. Two nights here, another couple there. If I stayed too long in one place, they began to ask questions that I was no good at answering. I managed to track down several old clients and earned a few hundred so that one night I was able to treat Ruby to a night in a posh hotel. We ate ice cream out of the tub and watched weepy movies until we fell asleep in the king-sized bed.
Then I saw the advertisement. I might have missed it if Ruby hadn’t stopped to tie her trainer lace. Assistant wanted. I left Ruby standing in the street and impressed the flower shop owner with my extensive floral knowledge. I began work the next day and by the end of the week we’d rented a room in a house full of students. They didn’t care who we were because I paid two weeks up front with an advance on my wages. In some ways it was good to be back in London.
I enrolled Ruby at the local comprehensive school two weeks after the start of term. It should have been a new beginning; her first year at secondary school. She was eleven. It was a whole month before I realised she’d been truanting. Her bed was soaked from tears and I found her sobbing with the sheet stuffed in her mouth to silence her misery. When I pulled it out, she screamed. When I walked in on her in the bathroom, I saw the bruises on her back.
I made an appointment with the headmaster but he had little time for my complaints.
‘We have other itinerant children in the school. Why doesn’t she play with them?’ He thought we were gypsies.
I allowed Ruby to come to the flower shop where I worked. It was situated on a respectable high street and mid-morning she would run to the bakery and fetch doughnuts and hot chocolate. But she soon got bored and tried school again. I had to re-enrol her because the school secretary thought we had moved on.
With several months’ salary behind me, I rented a small bedsit that was all our own. No more sharing bathrooms or labelling food in the fridge. When the school asked for a copy of Ruby’s birth certificate, I kept promising I’d send it in. I never did and in the end they gave up asking. To them, we were trouble.
The florist was next to a music store. At three forty-five Ruby would step off the school bus right outside the shop. I’d see her trying not to smile as she spied me through the foliage of the window display and instead of coming to greet me, she’d go next door and run her fingers across the keys of the Bluthners and Steinways.
At first the owner was cautious of a pre-teen girl trailing sticky fingers over his expensive instruments but one day, when Ruby plucked up the courage to allow the fingers of her right hand to strike a complicated tune, he pulled out the stool for her and adjusted the height.
‘Do you play?’ he asked and Ruby nodded, too terrified to speak. Through the partition wall of the shop units, I heard my daughter lose herself in Debussy, Chopin and Mozart, everything Baxter had taught her over the years. From then on, whenever she wanted, she was allowed to go into the music shop and play the piano. The owner said it helped his business.
Months later, I was able to afford a second-hand piano for Ruby and I’ll never know how the removals men squeezed it into the living space of our tiny bedsit.
I’m rearranging Fresh As A Daisy. I’ve learned over the years that customers expect a completely new look every couple of weeks. It lures them back. Baxter taught me the importance of window arrangement. ‘Your invitation to the world,’ he said.
I’m aiming for the bleached driftwood New England kind of look today – lots of twisted, weathered branches, beach pebbles with whitewashed pallets to support galvanised pots of stunning grasses. I managed to get hold of a fishing net and I’m trying to hang it up at the back of the display but it keeps dropping down. The number of people who walk by and stop to stare, you’d think one of them would lend a hand. I pause to make a coffee, leaning against the counter to study my work while the kettle boils.
Eventually, the window is looking pretty much how I want it. It seems to be attracting attention and I get a nice comment from one of my regulars. She comes twice a week to buy an arrangement for the firm of accountants where she works. Some of my other displays are looking a little limp. I fetch my spray canister and a stepladder and barely before I have misted anything, Robert strides into the shop. My heart skips and I smile. I like it when he drops by unexpected.
‘Darling, what a surprise!’ I jump backwards off the ladder, still holding the sprayer. ‘You said you’d be away all day.’ He’d left me a brief message yesterday saying Den had sent him to a legal conference. ‘Den’s just terrible, making you go away at such short notice. I missed you last night.’ I think of kissing him but stop short. ‘You need a shower, Mr Knight.’ I squirt him playfully and grin. He doesn’t respond. He looks flat. ‘Remind me to give you a good scrubbing later.’
Robert still doesn’t say anything. He strides across my shop as if he’s looking for something and skittles a bucket of gerberas. He leans against the counter, his fists balled and white. He’s breathing as if he’s been running. Finally he turns to me and says, quite calmly, ‘A shower is just what I need. I feel wrecked.’
I’ve got him. I grin again. ‘Just let me bring the buckets in from the pavement then and I’ll shut up shop early.’ I wink at him and begin to drag the buckets in from the street. If he’d help, we’d be home quicker. But he doesn’t. For some reason he just stares at me like I’m a stranger. We drive home in separate cars and as I look in my rear-view mirror, the sun glints off Robert’s Mercedes as if it’s on fire.
Nine months after the squashed-in bedsit, I moved us to a two-bedroom flat. I was earning just enough to pay for it and, tempting though it was, I didn’t go back to selling my body. I wanted none of it. And, remarkably, Becco appeared to have lost my trail.
When we first moved in, the flat was grotty and smelled of cat
s but we soon had it our way and filled with the scent of lavender and home-cooked food. For the first time in my life I had my own kitchen.
Ruby seemed to be getting on well at school, despite being taunted by several kids. I prayed it wouldn’t turn into anything worse. She enjoyed French and music lessons and made a friend called Alice who came back for tea. I worked hard for the owner of the flower business, using the skills I had learned in Brighton to transform his rather dull shop into one of the most popular florists in the area.
I wrote and told Baxter about our life in London and at first he didn’t reply. I was worried that he had cut me off, holding me responsible for Patrick’s death, which in a way I was. But I persevered and eventually his letters filtered back, short at first but then he revealed more about his life and how he had hired two assistants to help him in the shop. Baxter was strong. He’d saved my life even though I’d shattered his.
We arrive home and my skin prickles with evaporating sweat. The house is so much cooler than the inside of my car. Robert’s obviously in a bad mood about something and I’m going to snap him out of it. I blow him a kiss but he doesn’t see so I run upstairs, leaving a trail of my clothes across the bedroom floor. I step into the shower and let the water flow between my breasts. I feel wicked.
When Robert doesn’t take the bait I know I’m going to have to be devious. It must be a very bad mood. ‘Robert, help! Come quickly!’ I scream as if there’s a burglar in the house and before I know it, Robert’s outside the shower cubicle panting like a beast.
‘What is it?’
‘In here. Open the door.’ He does and instantly he’s doused with water. I’m all lathered up and I can see he can’t believe his eyes. ‘Take your clothes off and get in. You’re disgusting. I have to wash you.’ I blow him another kiss. I know he wants me.
When he just stands there gawping, I reach out and pull him in. He wasn’t ready for that and staggers into the cubicle fully clothed. I’m laughing my head off, not sure if the water on my face is from the shower or tears. Robert looks hilarious. ‘Told you I’d get you clean.’ I giggle. I push my soapy body against him. I don’t care if his clothes are a mess. ‘Take your shirt off and let me wash your back.’ He does as he’s told but reluctantly. ‘Now, now. Don’t get stroppy. If you’re going to be a dirty boy then you have to face the consequences.’ His eyes, creased to slits, dance all over me. I know he wants it.
‘There’s something we need to talk about,’ he says, leaning on the tiles. I’m pinned between his arms. ‘It’s serious.’
For the first time ever, I wonder if he knows.
Ruby was in the shop next door playing the piano. She banged out an angry melody, something she’d composed herself, and from that I knew she’d had a bad day at school. The shop had been quiet all day, the rain not having let up since first thing. I hadn’t bothered with the outside displays that morning because the petals would have been washed away.
Apart from the ‘Open’ sign on the door, I might as well have been closed. The owner of the shop rarely stopped by these days. He trusted me completely to manage the stock and the accounts, somehow knowing I wasn’t going to rip him off, knowing I needed to keep my job.
The autonomy gave me confidence and I began to dress differently and had my hair highlighted and cropped into a flattering, jaw-length cut. I even hoped that one day I might meet a man. I didn’t know what it was like to have someone to love me, not pay me. The thought of allowing a touch of my body without first agreeing a price confused my understanding of intimacy.
I was adding up the week’s takings. The bell jangled and I looked up, pushing my reading glasses onto the top of my head. I didn’t really need glasses and had bought a weak pair from the chemist. I liked the tortoiseshell frames. They made me look purposeful, as if I had a life. The man stopped in the doorway, politely wiping his feet over and over again. It didn’t matter. I mopped the floor every night. He folded up his umbrella and stood it against the wall. I thought: you’ll forget that.
‘Hello,’ he said and smiled. He walked around the shop and I went back to my calculator. Once or twice I looked up, a habit I have when customers are in the shop. He didn’t notice.
‘Can I help?’ My question seemed to fluster him and, after staring blankly at me for a couple of seconds, he plucked a bunch of roses from a container and put them on the counter.
‘Thanks,’ he said while I wrapped them. He leaned on the counter with his left hand and I noticed there was no ring. He had nice hands.
‘Eight ninety-nine then, please.’ When I studied his face, I could see he was tired. His dark hair was mussed from the wind and rain and his eyes looked as if the soul had been sucked from them. He smiled and handed me his credit card. I swiped it through the machine and after a quick look at the signature strip I handed it back.
‘Thank you, Mr Knight. Check and sign, please.’ He held the pen and paused.
‘I can hear music.’ He tilted his head towards the partition wall.
‘My daughter. She plays the piano in the shop next door until it’s time to go home.’
‘She’s very good,’ he commented. ‘You must be proud parents.’
‘Parent,’ I corrected. ‘Just me.’ I wanted him to know, in case.
‘Well, thanks.’ And he walked out of the shop into the rain.
What can I do but carry on? He has me pinned to the wall, hot water raining down on us and he wants to talk about something serious. I don’t. ‘Talk dirty,’ I order and smother him with shower gel. ‘And don’t even think of being boring right now. Anything serious will have to wait.’ I rinse him with the shower rose and run my tongue up his chest.
Strangely, Robert flinches and thwacks his elbow against the glass. I take the opportunity to kiss it better. I will kiss anything for him. I loosen the belt on his trousers and drop to my knees, sliding the wet cloth to his ankles. ‘While I’m down here . . .’ and finally Robert’s body responds to me.
Suddenly, he has his hands under my armpits and roughly pulls me upright. Our faces are close. ‘How many times do you think we’ve made love?’ he asks. I have no idea why.
‘Let me see . . .’ I hold up my fingers one by one and then take hold of Robert’s and do the same. I crouch in the small space again and continue counting on his toes. ‘Two or three hundred?’ I drag my mouth over his wet legs but before I know it, he has me standing again. ‘Hey . . .’ He’s hurt my shoulder.
‘So what do you reckon I owe you then, considering it’s all been on account?’ He turns off the shower and hoists up his wet trousers. Robert stares at me and I don’t move. There’s heaviness in the cubicle and it’s more than the steam. ‘Time to settle my bill, I think.’ He shoves into me, jamming me against the tiles and the shower control pokes into my back. He grabs my wrists and pulls them above my head roughly.
I’m scared and want to get dry. I block it all out. All of it. Nothing happened. I’m OK. I’m all right.
‘How much do I owe you for all the sex? Tell me what you charge.’
I screw up my eyes and turn my head away from him.
‘Tell me!’
‘I don’t know what you mean, Rob. Stop this. You’re scaring me.’ I open my eyes to slits and see the veins on his neck. ‘Let me get a towel. I’m freezing.’
Like a sigh held in for too long, Robert releases me and I slide past him into the bathroom. I grab my robe and wrap it around me. I’m not going to hear what he said. I’m not going to hear.
‘How much?’ He’s blocking the doorway to the bedroom.
‘Robert, what happened last night? You’re acting so strange.’ My voice quivers. It’s too high. Don’t panic. He doesn’t know. He doesn’t know.
‘I didn’t go to a conference. I went to Brighton.’
‘Brighton?’ I barely say the word. He doesn’t know. He can’t know. The sun is on my back, streaming through the frosted window. It doesn’t feel warm.
‘I went to see Baxter King.’
‘Is he a lawyer? A client?’ My voice drops back to its normal level. I walk up to Robert, trying my best to appear unfazed, and slip under his arm into the bedroom. ‘I’ve not heard you mention him before.’ Quick as a fox, I grab some clothes. I pull on shorts and a top and wrap my hair in a towel. I don’t care if it’s wet. I just need to get out. I smear cream over my face and a kiss of mascara. It will do. I haven’t time to bother with foundation or put concealer on the annoying mole on my cheek. I smile at Robert’s reflection. Best to appear casual.
‘So you’re telling me that you’ve never heard of anyone called Baxter King?’
‘Correct.’ I add a bit of lipgloss. He knows I always wear it.
‘And am I right in thinking then that you’ve never lived in Brighton?’
‘Absolutely. Never even been there.’ I put on my watch and curse the awkward strap. I ignore my thumping heart.
‘So if I said to you that I’ve heard otherwise, that you do know Baxter King and you did live in Brighton for eight years, what would you say?’
He’s right behind me now, glowering at my image. ‘I’d say you’d heard wrong.’ I don’t blink, breathe or move. I stare back at him, knowing I’ve faced worse.
‘And if I asked you another question, one that could change everything between us forever, do you swear that you’ll answer me truthfully?’
‘Of course but—’
‘Did you once earn a living by having sex for money?’
Even though my entire world has come crashing down, even though I can see Ruby and me fleeing and running away and starting all over again, I know I can’t afford to hesitate. I stand up and face Robert. He can’t do this to us. Why couldn’t he have left everything alone? Tears collect in my eyes and I don’t have to feign the shock that rushes through me. Suddenly there’s a loud noise. Someone is in the house. There are voices. It’s Ruby. She’s playing the piano.
