Christmas Daddies

by Jade West

  I guess you could say I like to lead rather than follow. You could also say I like to be in control of my personal situation at all times, hence why this infatuation of Michael’s perplexes me somewhat.

  Why do people go so fucking insane over random members of the opposite sex?

  Are we really still slaves to base level hormonal instincts? Really? Are we?

  I like to think not, which is probably the reason I’ve dated over a hundred women and only popped the question to one of them. Diana didn’t even live with me, it was long distance. It would probably never have made it to the proposal stage if she’d lived anywhere near my doorstep.

  I don’t regret not tying the knot. I don’t regret never having that one special person that I’ve opted to label my own above all others, even if my mother still whines on about grandchildren over Sunday dinner. I watched Michael and Molly live in a state of romantic mediocrity for years and it didn’t nothing whatsoever to raise the green-eyed monster in me. I think I’d have been bored to death if I’d been in his shoes.

  Carrie Wells – the little minx that pushed my poor sensible friend off his sensible rocker.

  I’m still shaking my head at the insanity of it all as the other delegates filter in.

  Carrie

  Michael didn’t come back last night. I thought maybe he’d call or text, but he didn’t. I sat by the landline with his business card in my hand, flipping it over and over and wishing my stupid dumb mouth would open up enough to tell him I’m sorry. But it wouldn’t.

  I hate TV, so the minute Michael left I turned it right back off again. I don’t get why people like the stupid thing so much. Almost every house I’ve ever set foot in has a stupid screen blaring somewhere. I’ve spent loads of time watching people stare at moving pictures on a box like big dumb shits, and I just don’t get it.

  When you’ve been in foster care as much as I have, you come to know it’s an easy option to palm off every kid that ever wants attention. Why don’t you just behave and watch some TV? Why don’t you sit down in front of the TV and be quiet? Why don’t you just watch the kids channel like every other kid we’ve ever taken care of?

  Because TV is a fucking life-stealer, you dumbfucks. TV is a fucking sedative for your fucking brain.

  Know what burns more calories, watching TV or staring at a blank wall? Staring at a blank wall, because at least then your brain has to make moving pictures for its fucking self.

  I want to put my boot through posh guy’s big fucking screen, because even looking at it reminds me how I pushed Michael away last night. But I don’t. Because I like it here, even though I know I won’t be able to stay.

  I’m never allowed to stay anywhere, not for long. But for now I’m gonna make the most of it, because posh guy’s house is amazing – the best house I’ve ever been in. If you look through the back windows, especially from upstairs, you can see for miles, a patchwork of fields and trees and sheep. I wonder if posh guy has any animals here. There’s no dog, which is sad because this place would be the best place ever to have a couple of Labradors. I can’t see a cat, either, and there’s no cans of petfood in the cupboards. The guy must be an idiot for not having pets here. If I lived here I’d have a whole zoo in my backyard.

  It looks like it’s gonna be a nice day today, even if the ground is still bound to be boggy from the rain last night. I got up early because that springy bed makes stupid squeaks every time I roll over, but that’s alright. I like getting up early. It makes sense that travelling is in my genetics, because there’s nothing I like more than exploring as the sun comes up outside. I hate being cooped up while there’s a big open world out there.

  I’m so desperate to get out into it that I don’t even grab any breakfast. I lace up my boots and head through the back door, wondering just how many of the fields I counted from the window belong to this house. I bet it’s all of them. Most of them at least.

  I have to climb over some fences, but my ankle holds up just fine. I scrabble through a couple of broken hedgerows and find a little stream that’s just perfect for hopping over.

  Being in the middle of nowhere excites me. Being just me amongst the magic of nature is the thing that makes my soul happy. The hours disappear so easily out here. I find I’m smiling, even though I still feel like shit about Michael. I find I’m twirling, laughing, calling to the birds in the trees. They probably think I’m as crazy as I feel, but my blood is pumping and my hair is flying all around me and I love it. I really love it.

  And then I see something. A bedraggled something flapping around on the ground by the hedge at the far side. I head over to get a closer look, and it’s a crow, a big black one with beady eyes that glint as it stares at me. My heart drops as I see he’s got his leg caught in some wire, and I hate posh guy for having such an amazing place and not taking care of the maintenance. The fence is crap down here, all broken and battered, and nature’s suffering, yet again, for humanity’s dumbfuck ignorance.

  Even in boots I can move quietly when I need to. I’m slow and steady, making sure I talk to the bird real softly as I make my way over. He flaps hard but he can’t go anywhere. His eyes don’t leave mine at all, and when I get there he caws at me but doesn’t freak out like I thought he might.

  His feathers are muddy and trashed. His leg looks sore where the wire’s cut him, but it seems like he can still move it.

  I don’t know where posh guy keeps a tool kit and I wouldn’t want to head all the way back to the house even if I did. This crow needs freeing right away, so I crouch down, crawling along the last bit, right through the mud, until I can get a proper look at things. I sigh in relief to find I can do this. I really can do this by hand.

  I’m careful. Really careful.

  I put my hand on the crow’s wings and hold him to the ground, just enough to steady him. My fingers free up some slack on the wire and gently, really gently, I twist it free of the bird’s leg.

  I’m quick when I’ve done it, bundling the bird into my arms before he can attempt to fly away. I’ll need to look at him, maybe wash him down with something and try to straighten up his mangled feathers.

  I feel like I’m carrying the most amazing treasure on the planet as I head back to the house. The crow doesn’t fight me, not when he’s held safe under my arm. It’s like he knows I saved him, and it figures, because they’re super smart birds. Smarter than some people, I’m sure, because so many people are fucking idiots.

  I don’t really have a plan for once I’m inside, so I just shut the back door behind me and hope the crow stays calm when I put him on the kitchen island.

  He doesn’t.

  The moment I let him go he flaps about and takes off right through to the dining room.

  Fuck.

  I haven’t got time to take my boots off, be fucked with posh guy’s carpets. I haven’t got time to do anything but chase after the bird and hope he doesn’t wreck everything before I’ve even had the chance to help his foot.

  He settles on the top of some big display cabinet, so I grab a dining chair and climb up after him. He’s gone before I reach him, and as he takes off he dislodges one of the ornaments on the top shelf. The big garish glass thing tumbles before I can catch it, smashes on the floor into a billion pieces of gaudy coloured glass.

  Fuck. It’s not even lunchtime and I’m already trashing the fucking place.

  The sound of smashing glass freaks the poor crow out worse, and he shits himself, dumping big globs of crap over the dining table before he heads through the door back into the hallway.

  Fuck. I should’ve fucking closed that.

  My boots crunch over the broken glass and trample a load of it with me. I see the sparkles in the carpet as I chase the bird around the house, finally cornering him in the living room where he settles on a big framed-mirror behind the sofa.

  He stops. Stares at me.

  And I know he’s thinking, watching, working me out. It’s like he can see right into me.

  “I
’m sorry I scared you,” I whisper. “I’m just trying to help your foot, that’s all.”

  He blinks and his eyes are so black.

  “I just want to help,” I tell him. “I’m not gonna hurt you.”

  I’m so pleased when he doesn’t fly off again. It’s pure instinct to step up onto the sofa and balance myself on the back cushions.

  I can almost reach him here. He shuffles along the frame but he doesn’t fly away.

  “I’m a friend,” I say. I’m so gentle as I stretch out and reach for him, I really am.

  I’m close. So close. Moving so slowly I daren’t even breathe in case I startle him.

  My heart is beating fast, a big smile on my face as I realise he’s really going to let me catch him.

  And then there’s a bang.

  The loud fucking bang of the front door being barged open.

  The crow freaks out and takes off, and he craps again on his way. He’s flapping around the room, knocking fucking ornaments from the mantelpiece in his frantic flight, causing a real fucking commotion because some dumbfuck thumped the fucking door wide open.

  I hear footsteps in the hall, and I’m raging. I’m fucking raging.

  I know it must be Michael, because who fucking else would it be?

  I know it’s his heavy fucking footsteps clumping through the hall, oblivious to the fact he’s just fucked my perfect fucking crow-bonding effort.

  “You’re a noisy sonofabitch,” I hiss as I try to head the bird into the corner. “Next time, try to swing the front fucking door right off its hinges, why don’t you?!”

  My stomach tips right over itself when it’s not Michael’s voice that answers me.

  Chapter Nine

  Jack

  Carrie Wells is in my fucking living room. Large as fucking life.

  Her piercing eyes are as wide as fucking saucers, her pretty mouth flapping harder than the bird flapping around the ceiling.

  My eyes don’t know where to look first, at her, at the crow in my fucking house, or at the state of the place around her. My white carpet is filthy with muddy boot prints. The cushions on my perfect white sofa have been trampled, and they’re covered in mud too. There’s bird shit splattered over the front of my TV, my mantelpiece is in fucking disarray with several of my picture frames smashed on the top.

  And her, covered in shit, mud and feathers, a picture of horror as she stares right back at me.

  “The door!” she yells, but I’m too fucking dumbstruck to move. The crow flaps straight over my head and out. She races after it, and I hear her angry wail before I find her in the open front doorway. Her eyes are wild as she glares at me. “You let him out! He needed his foot taking care of and you let him out!”

  When my voice comes back it comes back hard.

  “What the holy living fuck is going on here?! What the fuck are you doing in my fucking house?!”

  I know as soon as I’ve said it. Of course I fucking know.

  I dig my mobile from my pocket and thumb straight through to Mike’s number.

  The girl takes one last look at the sky and groans as she accepts defeat. She closes the door behind her and heads back in like she owns the fucking place.

  “If he dies, it’s your fault,” she snaps.

  I’ve got the call connecting tone in my ear even as she says it. “My fucking fault?!”

  “He was tangled in your crappy fucking fence!”

  I hold up a hand to signal her to shut the fuck up, and she folds her arms as she waits. Her muddy boot taps on the floor, and it really shouldn’t be a pleasure to watch her red mist fade away, but it is. There’s a beautiful trepidation in her eyes as she soaks in the mess. I watch her gaze travel over the trail of boot prints to end with a long hard look at her boots. She lifts up the soles as if the mud needs explanation, and when her eyes meet mine again they are full of nerves at odds with her cocky stance.

  Mike’s phone rings to voicemail. I take a breath before I unleash my fury down the line.

  “You’d better get here. Now. I’m in my fucking living room with your missing fucking person. Get here, Mike, before I call the fucking police.”

  Carrie Wells is a sight to behold as the colour drains from her cheeks. “You gonna call the cops?” she asks, and her whole body tenses, as though she’s about to make a dash for it.

  I hang up the call. “I should. It looks like the place has been fucking ransacked.”

  She shakes her head. “I haven’t taken anything.”

  I gesture around me. “My house is fucking destroyed. Why the fuck are you even in here?”

  She takes a step forward. “Michael tried to help me. I had nowhere to go.” She pauses. “It’s not his fault. He doesn’t know about the crow, I was just trying to save it.”

  I’m rarely lost for words, but she has me stumped. I don’t know whether to march her off my property or laugh insanely at this whole fucking spectacle.

  “I’ll clean up,” she says, and I cover my face with my hands in disbelief.

  “You’ll clean up?!”

  “Yeah,” she tells me. “I will.”

  I point to the smashed frames on the mantelpiece. “And what about the damage? What about the fact I’ve got a total fucking stranger on my property? In my house?”

  She’s quiet while she thinks, chewing on her bottom lip like she wants to draw blood. “I’ll pay for it.”

  “Do you have any money?” I look her up and down. It’s a marvel that her beauty shines through the state of her tattered, filthy clothes. Her boots are grubby and old, and I can see a flash of pink sock through a hole in the toe.

  She shakes her head. “Not yet, but I can earn it. When I get a job I’ll pay you back.”

  I can’t stand to look at the living room anymore so I step out and close the door behind me. The hall is also covered in boot prints and so is the kitchen. I dare to peek into the dining room and groan in disbelief to see the rainbow shards of what used to be my prized glass sculpture.

  I hear her footsteps behind me. “I’ll pay for that, too.”

  I swear under my breath. That sculpture was almost ten grand, a stupidly extravagant purchase at an auction house down in London.

  I should order her to fuck off out of my house and never fucking come back. I can’t believe she’s even still here, following me around while I uncover more and more of her fucking catastrophe.

  But Michael.

  Even now, knowing that the stupid sonofabitch invited a whirlwind of trouble into my empty house without my knowledge, I can’t bring myself to send her running. He’d only fucking follow.

  “How long have you been here?” I ask her.

  “Two nights.”

  My shoes crunch on broken glass. “Two nights?” The shock is numbing me to the anger. “Just as well I didn’t stay away another fucking week.”

  “He was trying to help,” she says again. “Michael, I mean. He found me on the road.” She holds up her foot. “I sprained my ankle, couldn’t walk.”

  “So he brought you here?”

  She shrugs. “Someone called Pam lives in his block. He said he couldn’t take me there.”

  “Pam Clowes,” I say absentmindedly. “Yes. She’d have his job for it.”

  “It was only for a few days, he said. Just until we sort something else.”

  I can’t help but register her word choice. We sort something else. I wonder what the fuck’s really been going on here. Are they physical? Has this midlife crisis become more than a crazy pissing pipe dream?

  I want to ask her but I don’t. I’ll ask him instead, just as soon as he fucking gets here.

  “I’m sure he’ll be here as soon as he can,” she says, as though she’s a mind reader. I wonder if the gypsy rumours are true. Maybe she’s got some weird psychic gift in that pretty head of hers. I feel uncharacteristically self-conscious, because despite all this – despite the shit-storm of chaos around me, and the cold, hard horror of finding an intruder in my house – I’m t
hinking how much prettier she is sober and in the daylight. I’m thinking how glossy her hair is and how it ripples as she moves. I’m thinking that her eyes are more fey than human, and her freckles look surprisingly cute when she’s angry.

  I’m thinking that I can see why a girl like Carrie Wells has sent a man like Michael Warren fucking crazy.

  “Can I wait for him?” she asks, as though she suddenly needs my permission for shit.

  “You better had,” I say. “You both owe me one fuck of an explanation.”

  She shrugs. “I told you what happened. I didn’t have anywhere to go, Michael brought me here. I went out for a walk and found a crow in your busted fence, tried to help it and you let it go.”

  I sigh. “And you trashed my whole fucking house in the process, yes?”

  She shrugs again. “Not the upstairs. It didn’t go up there.”

  But she did.

  I wonder if she’s been sleeping in my fucking bed, too. Like bastard Goldilocks.

  I wonder if they’ve both been in there.

  The thought of her splayed out in my bed makes my mouth water, and I don’t get it. I really don’t fucking get it.

  “I didn’t mean to trash anything,” she tells me. “You should take better care of your fences.”

  “And who I leave a fucking key with it seems.”

  She drops to one knee to unlace her boot, kicks it off and does the other. Too little, too fucking late.

  I watch as she places them neatly on the mat by the kitchen door, then rummages under my sink for some cleaning products. She’s a vision on all fours, her jeans riding low on her ass, loose enough at the waist that they show the top of her pale blue knickers. Her hair hangs free from her shoulders and gathers on the floor tiles, and her feet are tiny in silly pink spotty socks at odds with the rest of her grubby attire.

  She glances up at me over her shoulder, and the involuntary image of me pounding her from behind jars my senses.