by Matt Whyman
‘Sweetheart, it’s nearly suppertime,’ said Kiril. With the envelope filled with the day’s takings, he rejoined his business partner, who looked set to leave.
‘There’s a good rib restaurant further up the boulevard,’ Lev told her. ‘We got a table booked in half an hour.’
‘You can join us if you like,’ Kiril added, only to wince when Lev jabbed an elbow into his arm.
‘Amanda isn’t like us, dumbass. If the food on her plate had a mother or a face then it’s off the menu.’
Unless it’s food that’s had a birth certificate, passport or a driving licence, she thought, but opted to bite her tongue. Since the café opened, Amanda hadn’t been on a single dinner date, nor did she have any desire to do so. Waiting the tables here, she’d met plenty of nice guys who shared her views, but somehow that wasn’t a challenge. In time, she knew that someone would walk into her life in desperate need of seeing the error of their eating ways. For now, however, The Lentil Rebel took up all her energies.
‘They do salad where we’re going,’ said Kiril hopefully.
‘Thanks, but no.’ Amanda smiled sweetly and gestured at the door as if to remind them it was there. Outside, the sun had settled under blankets of orange, peach and turquoise. A stiff breeze caused the palm trees to shiver and sway, while lights from the villas across the inlet were beginning to twinkle. ‘Bon appétit, fellas. Hope it chokes you.’
Lev shared her grin before turning to leave, while Kiril hung back for a moment, his tall frame and narrow shoulders in silhouette to her.
‘Well, when you come to your senses,’ he said, ‘supper is on me.’
‘Good night, Kiril.’ Amanda crossed the floor to hold the door open for him.
The two men had arrived in Lev’s sports car, which chirruped as he disabled the alarm. Amanda watched him squeeze into the driver’s seat, while Kiril had to practically fold himself up to fit in beside him.
‘I always think those two would taste a little too sour for my liking.’
Amanda turned on hearing the voice behind her. Ivan was standing at the kitchen door with his school bag slung over one shoulder, watching them leave.
‘You should’ve come out to say hi,’ she told him. ‘It’s only polite.’
Ivan turned his attention to her for a moment, but it was clear by the look on his face that he hadn’t registered the advice.
‘I was busy working,’ he told her.
Amanda returned to the counter to clear up the crumbs.
‘I admire your dedication to the job,’ she told him. ‘It’s good to know that someone’s on top of the kitchen hygiene.’
This time, Ivan heard her clearly. He looked quietly surprised, as if she’d just reminded him of something.
‘I’ll be right back,’ he said, and disappeared through the door.
He left Amanda looking puzzled. Just what was the kid up to in there if he wasn’t disinfecting the equipment? She set down the cloth to follow him, only for headlights to sweep across the opposite wall of the café.
‘You’ll have to hurry!’ she called out to Ivan. ‘Your parents are here.’
As agreed, now that the building was refurbished, Titus had stepped back from day-to-day involvement with The Lentil Rebel. He offered advice and guidance to Amanda, and had done a great job fixing the extractor fan, but seemed content to keep a low profile.
‘How was business today?’ he asked on stepping inside.
‘The best ever,’ said Amanda. ‘You just missed Lev and Kiril. I think they’d like us to expand.’
With a guffaw, Titus slapped his sides.
‘I’m already fighting one expansion,’ he told her.
Angelica joined them just then. She had spent the day at home baking biscuits and cakes for the counter. Katya clasped her hand. The little girl was wearing a pair of mesh fairy wings that hung at an angle from her shoulders. Angelica let her go to run around, before looking up and around in admiration.
‘This is such a welcoming place,’ she said, noting the recent addition of a community corkboard. It already featured a cluster of business cards and flyers that added a note of green against the cream walls. ‘You should be proud of your achievements, Amanda.’
‘It’s a team effort,’ she insisted, as Ivan returned from what was evidently a hasty clean-up operation.
‘It seems everyone has made a contribution.’ Angelica smiled proudly at her son.
Ivan stopped by a table, resting his bag on the floor.
‘Do you know what this calls for?’ he said, looking hopefully at his father. ‘A feast.’
All eyes turned to Titus. Given the success of the café, Amanda expected him to agree straight away. Instead, it seemed as if some invisible weight that had been hanging over him just settled on his shoulders.
‘I’ve been meaning to discuss this with you,’ he said, and gestured for them to join him at a table. Amanda took a seat across from Titus, who waited for Angelica to deal with Katya’s request to straighten her wings. Ivan remained standing, however, right beside his school bag.
‘Is this about the ginger and garlic marinade again?’ asked Angelica. ‘I like the flavour it brings as much as everyone else, but it takes hours to soak into the meat and we don’t have that kind of room in the fridge.’
‘It’s Grandpa,’ he said, leaning in. ‘Oleg has asked to bring a guest.’
‘To eat?’ asked Ivan. ‘If it’s his friend from the home, she looks too old for the table. There’s no meat on her bones.’
‘To eat with us,’ said Titus, to clarify. ‘He believes it could save her.’
Angelica closed her eyes, sighing at the same time.
‘We Savages have always stuck together. Amanda is the only exception.’
‘And she didn’t let us down,’ Titus pointed out. ‘Under any other circumstances, I would’ve refused, but this means everything to my father.’
‘I bet it does,’ Ivan muttered under his breath. ‘The old fox.’
‘Then it comes down to trust,’ said Amanda.
‘He knows that.’ Titus sat with his hands clasped. ‘Oleg is aware of the consequences should Priscilla break that trust.’
‘It also means a lot of mouths to feed,’ complained Angelica. ‘I know people tend to be a little more fleshy around here, but that’s still less of the best bits for each of us.’
‘I know someone suitable,’ Ivan piped up. ‘Actually, I know three. They’re all in my class!’
Amanda tutted and shook her head.
‘Then they’re only fifteen years old,’ she pointed out. ‘That makes them minors, which is sick, Ivan. No way that’s going to happen.’
‘Amanda is right,’ said Angelica. ‘We have principles.’
‘Then who?’ asked Titus. ‘I have some lovely tenants at the moment. None cause me any trouble. I’d hate to lose them in a hurry.’
It was Angelica who rose first from the table.
‘I have someone in mind.’ She began to button her coat once more, deliberately keeping her gaze from her husband.
‘Who?’ asked Titus, as she waited for him to join her at the door.
‘We can discuss this over dinner,’ she told him, and fluttered her hands to summon Ivan and Katya.
Amanda fetched her coat, well aware that if Angelica had made up her mind about what meat they would be eating, Titus would simply be required to bring it home.
25
Water aerobics was always popular among the more mobile residents of the Fallen Pine Nursing Home. It was gentle on the joints and offered a chance to exercise communally. The session took place in the home’s outdoor pool, which had been purpose built without a deep end. The participants faced the instructor at the side – an overweight lady in unflattering Lycra called Dionne – and performed star jumps with differing degrees of success.
‘This is killing me,’ muttered Oleg, waist-deep in water, as his fellow residents splashed about around him.
‘Well, I think it
would be a fine way to go.’ Priscilla was positioned beside him in her bathing suit and cap with the plastic flower detail. She had made a good recovery since her hospital visit. Even so, the staff had frowned upon her insistence on joining Oleg in the pool. With her arms spread crookedly, she looked as if she hoped to flap into the air. ‘Might as well bow out having a good time!’
Just then, the cell phone in Dionne’s fanny pack began to bleat. She sighed wearily, as if she knew the call would be from her divorce lawyer, and then waved at her class to stop.
‘Well done, everybody,’ she called out. ‘You’ve earned yourselves a rest.’
Slowly, the elderly folk in the pool began to gravitate towards the steps. Oleg waited for Priscilla to move alongside him, holding her hand to keep her steady.
‘You’re not leaving this world,’ he told her. ‘Not yet.’
‘Oleg, how many times?’ Priscilla smiled and rolled her eyes. ‘You’re very sweet, but there’s nothing anybody can do. It’s OK, though.’ Oleg felt her squeeze his hand. ‘These are happy days for me.’
By now, a line had formed as two nurses helped each resident up the steps. Oleg and Priscilla joined the queue, the sun drying their shoulders.
‘The meal I mentioned … ’ Oleg addressed her quietly, keeping his eyes on the nurses. ‘I’ve spoken to Titus, and my family would love you to join us.’
‘Well, that’s sweet of them,’ Priscilla replied. ‘So, when are you going to tell me what’s on the menu? I’m partial to a bit of pork.’
Oleg gasped on feeling her pinch his bottom. He wheeled around in the water and found her grinning at him. Through his eyes, the moment was both startling and sad. He hadn’t felt like this since his teenage years before the war. He also knew that without a feast he wouldn’t be feeling this way for much longer. Now Titus had confirmed that Priscilla would be welcome at the table, under strict conditions, the old man knew she had to be told. It was a gamble, of course. What Oleg had to share went against nature, after all. He also knew that she wasn’t the sort of lady who liked to make a scene. And so, to be on the safe side, he decided there and then to strike in public with what she could expect on her plate.
‘A human.’ Calmly, Oleg clasped her hands under the water. ‘Listen to me, Priscilla. We’re not fiends. I swear it. This is dining undertaken in the best possible taste, and with health benefits that mean you and I can spend a lot longer together than your doctors believe. Think of this meat as a medicine,’ he told her, keeping it as casual as he could. ‘I guarantee you’ll finish your final mouthful in a state of rapture, as if you could live forever. Now, can I trust you to process what I’ve just shared without screaming?’ Oleg held her gaze, waiting for her to close her mouth. ‘Whatever you’re thinking right now, just give yourself some time to digest it.’
A moment passed before Priscilla appeared to pull focus on him. Then, with a blink, her mouth eased into a smile, followed by a chuckle.
‘You’re such a kidder!’ she said. ‘Some time to digest it, indeed! You almost had me there, you wicked man!’
‘Priscilla –’ Oleg drew breath to stress that he was being deadly serious, only to falter as her amusement gathered ground. Aware that a number of residents at the poolside were turning to see what the old lady in the water found so funny, he forced a little smile for her benefit. ‘Well, I tried,’ he said, mostly to himself.
Cackling now, Priscilla took her turn on the steps, where the two nurses helped her up and into her towel.
‘Oleg, you make me laugh, but you really shouldn’t joke like that. What if someone took you seriously?’
Oleg glanced nervously at the nurses, but they were used to the residents’ babble and generally tuned out. It was only when they had finished with Priscilla that the two men paid him any attention.
‘I can manage this myself,’ Oleg grumbled, thinking that he now had a serious challenge on his hands. Not just with leaving the pool, but with persuading an elderly lady to explore an extreme form of eating for the sake of their future together.
On several occasions, usually when things got too much at school, Ivan Savage headed for the sand dunes overlooking the boardwalk and the ice-cream stall. The boy always chose to sit amid the long grass where he couldn’t be seen, cross-legged with the gerbil in his lap. There, he watched the vendor serving up treats that nobody questioned or even knew they wanted until it was too late to resist.
It was with this in mind that Ivan had volunteered to help some of the moms provide post-match refreshments whenever the football team played an inter-high-school league match. Given that Ivan only ever spent his time on the bench, as he had explained to the coach, serving snacks would allow him to make a contribution in the closing minutes.
‘That’s a wise move, buddy,’ the coach had told him, as the rest of the squad goofed about during warm-up by performing body slams on one another. ‘A safe option.’
And so, with nothing more sinister in mind than watching how the team filed into the changing rooms to devour the drinks and snacks laid out for them, Ivan had made himself useful by buttering the bread.
By his third game in the role, he had worked out exactly what sandwiches Bryce, Ryan and Chad favoured. All three ate the ham and gherkin, deriding anyone who took the tuna or the egg as ‘snack faggots’.
‘Leave those for new girl, although he’ll probably want to cut off the crusts first!’
Ryan was the ringleader on this occasion. He was sweating profusely, having just come off the pitch from another physically intense game. Ivan watched him drain a cup of orange squash before crushing it in his fist.
‘Can I get you a refill?’ he asked.
Ryan dropped the cup at his feet, his eyes narrowing.
‘Sure,’ he said cautiously.
Ivan filled another cup without word, just as Ryan swapped glances with Bryce and Chad.
‘It’s important to keep your fluids up,’ said Ivan, and handed him the drink.
Ryan took the cup and gulped it back. Then, with his cheeks bulging and his two friends grinning, he blasted it back at the boy.
‘Whoops!’ he crowed, as Ivan took the full force in the face. ‘Careless!’
‘You’re all wet,’ said Bryce.
‘Same goes for his panties,’ added Ryan, and burst out laughing.
Ivan didn’t respond. Even when the trio peeled away from the refreshment table, he just stood there with his eyes closed and juice dripping from his lashes like amber tears. Despite the indignity, however, Ivan held onto the fact that he knew just what to prepare in time for the next fixture. Having thrown themselves into the match, Ryan, Bryce and Chad would come to him in a state of exhaustion, hunger and dehydration. That meant their immune system would be less effective than normal, which was ideal for what Ivan had in mind. No doubt he would face more ridicule and torment in serving them refreshments, and all three would walk away as they had done just then. The only difference would be what they had unwittingly taken with them in the pit of their guts.
It would be just like the kiddiewinks buying ice cream on the boardwalk, Ivan thought. He might’ve been wrong about the seller’s intentions – no doubt the tarpaulin in the back of his car was for the stall, not an incumbent body in the boot – but just supposing he was there to incapacitate his victims? If so, it was the perfect set-up. So long as the treat was presented to them as just what they needed, nobody would question what was in it. That was the thing about food, he decided. It could seduce the senses with devastating efficiency.
‘Next time,’ he muttered to himself, and wondered what it might be like to be a pathogen working slowly through the bloodstream from the stomach to the brain stem.
Ivan reached for a paper towel to dry his face. His mother wouldn’t be happy that the juice had stained his school shirt. He just hoped she’d be distracted by the planning currently underway for the family’s next feast.
26
Since he had begun working out under Joaquín’s gui
dance, Titus found that he could now tighten his belt strap by an extra notch. He felt fit and looked trimmer, which was down to a ruthless running regime alternated with weight-training sessions. He knew he still had a long way to go, of course, but the recent improvements meant by rights he should’ve arrived outside the gym in good spirits. Instead, on seeing his trainer stretching in the sunshine outside the entrance, Titus just felt his heart grow heavy.
‘All set?’ asked Joaquín Mendez, who stopped reaching for his ankles and began skipping on the spot.
‘As ready as I’ll ever be,’ said Titus. ‘How about the forest road circuit?’
Joaquín seemed surprised, but not in a bad way. The route Titus had just suggested would take them several miles further than he had run before, including an isolated track through the pines where it was easy to twist an ankle.
‘You’re feeling brave,’ he said, falling still for a moment. ‘Reckon you’re up for it?’
‘I’m ready for anything,’ said Titus, well aware that only one of them would be coming back again.
‘Well, that’s good to hear.’ Joaquín began jabbing his arms back and forth at the elbows. ‘It sounds like my work is almost done with you.’
Titus was dressed in his shorts and, unusually, a long-sleeved sweatshirt. The sleeves served to hide the garrotte, which he had carefully wound around his left wrist for safekeeping. While the pine trail carried some risk of turning a foot, it also presented the perfect opportunity for Titus to dispatch Joaquín in private. With the job done, Titus planned to remove the cell phone from the pouch strapped around the young man’s forearm, access his diary for the day and delete his digital footprints. With the body hidden in the undergrowth, he’d jog back to collect the pickup, which was parked as a precaution several blocks from the gym, and then bring the body home. Technically, it was a straightforward operation. Where Titus struggled, for the first time, was with his feelings about it all.
‘Let’s not push too hard,’ he asked, and gestured at the sky. ‘On a beautiful day like this, it’s important to enjoy the moment.’
