The Love Shack (12 page)

I pick her up at 3 p.m. from her friend’s house and pile the bin bag full of clothes and pictures – her only belongings – into the boot of the Fanny Magnet. She follows me out and does a double-take.

‘Is this your company car, lad?’ she asks, clearly amused.

‘You could say that.’

‘If the fella sitting next to you got a BMW, I suggest you go and hand your notice in,’ she cackles.

Sheila spends the journey in the back complaining about the lack of passenger seat and telling me about her new granddaughter. Because, despite the fact that most of Sheila’s life history is a dysfunctional mess, featuring an abusive father, neglectful mother, care homes, pimps and a litany of other predictably nasty characters, she
has
managed to raise two sons. They’re eighteen and twenty, never went into care like Sheila and, as far as I can tell, are fully functioning members of society. Baby Rose belongs to the twenty year old; her mother is a girl he’s been with since school.

‘Do you see a lot of them?’ I ask.

‘Every few months. They live down south these days. I’ve only met Rose once.’ She looks at her hands. ‘They despair of me, my boys. Not surprising, eh?’

The flat I’ve found her is in a tattier-than-I’d-like house in an area that’s only leafy insomuch as nobody weeds their paths. But it’s safe-ish, dry-ish and it’s a home – something Sheila hasn’t had in a long time.

It’s obvious she’s over the moon about it. Which is just one of the reasons I’m so annoyed when I discover that the landlord has inadvertently given me the wrong key. And after learning on the phone that he’s two hours away in Blackpool, my only option is for Sheila and me to reconvene in a café down the road until he can get it to us.

It’s a busy place serving strong tea and heavily carbohydrated fare with prices scrawled on fluorescent cardboard stars. I buy Sheila a drink and a cake, which she proceeds not to touch.

The immediate priority when I take on a case like this is getting a roof over the client’s head. But that’s just the beginning: over the next few months, I’m going to help her become self-sufficient; set up her bills and a bank account, then show her how to look after them all herself.

She’s eager and accommodating until I try to book a GP appointment, when she fixes her gaze on me and protests: ‘I already know I’ve got
everything
!’

Then I raise the issue of her substance abuse and how we’re going to tackle it. This is usually the thorniest of subjects and it’s not hard to see why: the life of the average crack user tends to be more violent and unpleasant than most of us are used to. And nothing matches the ability of Class A drugs to neutralise that unpleasantness. It’s little wonder most of them would rather
not
have someone like me banging on about giving it up.

This isn’t just about a physical addiction though: most users are friends with other users. So those who do succeed are usually the ones prepared to turn their back on their social circle. And can you imagine saying goodbye to
all
of your friends?

Yet Sheila insists that’s what she wants to do. She’s hoping to check into the Kevin White Unit, a detoxification centre that she knows has helped several people she used to hang around with.

‘We can’t get you in there straight away, Sheila. To be considered for a referral, you’ll need to demonstrate that you’re committed by going to the weekly clinics and the GP when you’re due.’

She takes a deep breath. ‘I don’t have to sit in a circle and say “My name’s Sheila and I’m an addict”, do I?’

I laugh. ‘You’ll have to go along to find out.’

It’s gone seven by the time we finally get into the flat, and that’s before I’ve shown her how everything works and settled her in. She steps into the living room silently as she takes in the fraying carpet and dodgy-looking patch in the corner. She swallows and looks at me, suddenly small.

‘Lad.’ I can tell she’s about to get emotional. ‘This is just . . . just brilliant.’

I get back to Buddington at gone nine o’clock. I enter the kitchen guiltily, clutching the only flowers I could find en route – from a Shell garage, which I am fairly sure negates all my theories about the power of floral gestures, and strays dangerously close to
Men Behaving Badly
territory. Gemma’s obviously given up on me and gone to bed, and I wince when I find an unopened bottle of Prosecco and some M&S profiteroles in the fridge. ‘That you, Dan?’ Mum calls through from the living room. ‘Come and have a little drink! I’ve just put
Glee
on – and made those caramelised nuts on the front of
BBC Good Food.
They’re lovely once you’ve got them out of your teeth.’

I put my head through the door. ‘I’ll pass, Mum, if you don’t mind. Tough day.’

‘Gemma said the same. Do you know she’d got a nice dinner in? If it had been me I’d be
very
unhappy about you turning up at this time. So where’ve you been? And who’ve you been with?’

My mother’s capacity for making me feel sixteen years old again is apparently infinite.

‘I spent the evening with a prostitute,’ I tell her.

‘Don’t be facetious, Daniel.’

‘I’ve been
working
,’ I clarify.

‘Until this hour?’

‘Yes, I’m afraid so. It’s all part and parcel of the job sometimes, Mum.’ I wonder why I thought, even for a second, she’d try and be understanding.

Instead, she lets out a short, high-pitched
hm
sound. ‘I suggest you start asking them to pay you a bit more.’

‘I’m due a pay rise at the next review,’ I reply, not telling her that the last time I had one, it wouldn’t have covered the cost of a modest night out.

‘Hm,’ she says again. ‘So this is the norm, is it? Working this late?’

My blood suddenly feels several degrees hotter. ‘Mum, what does it matter to you?’

She frowns. ‘This is my roof you’re sleeping under, young man. Of course it matters to me.’

At which point I make my excuses and leave this odd
Freaky Friday
-style vortex.

Upstairs, I push open the door to our bedroom to find Gemma lying on her side, her back to me. I tiptoe closer and see that she’s reading.

‘Hi,’ I whisper, kissing her on her head.

‘Hi,’ she says, without moving.

I walk round the bed and produce the flowers. She examines the five wilting, psychedelically-coloured horticultural aberrations and looks underwhelmed.

‘They’re . . . gorgeous,’ she forces herself to say.

‘You’re a terrible liar.’ She laughs. ‘Sorry I missed dinner – and the house update,’ I continue. ‘And I’m sorry the best flowers I could get hold of look like they’ve been in a hit and run.’

‘It’s the thought that counts. I think.’ She rolls onto her back and smiles. ‘What was it this time? Squatters in your client’s flat or an alcoholic who’d fallen off the wagon?’

‘Neither. Just something I had to do. Budge up,’ I say, sitting on the edge of the bed as she shifts over and I run my fingers through her hair. I feel dramatically better.

‘It was only an M&S meal anyway,’ she sighs. ‘I probably made it sound fancier than it was. Although I did get Prosecco.’

‘What about the budget?’

‘It was half-price. Anyway, I found a solicitor.’

‘Oh, brilliant.’

‘And phoned the mortgage company to tell them we want to proceed.’

‘Sorry it’s all landed on you.’

‘It’s probably easier if one of us takes charge,’ she says tiredly. ‘We’ll know where we are then.’

I pull off my shoes, socks and jeans, then slide into bed as the scent of bubble bath on Gemma’s skin fills my head with primal thoughts. My eyes drop to her lip-balmed mouth and I have an urgent desire to kiss her. Her eyes dilate as I edge forward . . . and am rewarded with a loud, uncompromising SQUEAK.

She lets out a long breath and gestures to the living room below. ‘Has your mum gone to bed yet?’

A blast of camp-tastic music sears through the ceiling.

‘No, she’s watching her
Glee
box set. Hopefully she won’t be long. We could, you know . . . resume matters when she’s asleep.’

Gemma smiles and snuggles into my arms, where I hold her. And hold her. For two long, tortured hours, I hold her.

When my mother finally turns
Glee
off and plods upstairs, Gemma is fast asleep, her mouth slightly open. And it’s looking very likely that she wouldn’t stir if Jamie Dornan bounced in here on a space-hopper and suggested a game of Spin the Bottle.

Chapter 15

Gemma

Dan and I visit Pebble Cottage again on Sunday, despite my failure to work out where we’re getting the extra £4k – and the fact that we don’t have an appointment. Rich has threatened to take out a restraining order if I don’t stop phoning to check that no other interested parties have been allowed to view it since our offer was accepted.

We pull up in my car and step out silently. Even before I peek through the window, I notice features I hadn’t spotted earlier: the little shelf below each windowframe perfect for a lavender box; the original tiles on the front step, patterned like a silk scarf. Even though there’s no furniture now, everything about the place feels like home, from the location to the size, to the old-fashioned fireplace in the living room.

Dan squeezes my hand and I experience a wave of unease about his enthusiasm for this whole thing. Particularly now the mutual tolerance between him and his mum is wearing thinner than her Threshers’ loyalty card.

And, although I’d never say it, I’m starting to find her fairly difficult to live with myself. It’s not just the fact that she has absolutely NO filter, or that she is
always
right about everything, or that she can be so overbearing that we never get a moment to ourselves.

Being alone with her is akin to locking yourself into an interrogation room: I’m bombarded with questions about Dan, his job, his financial situation, his health – all the usual stuff mums are interested in, but which Dan prefers to keep on a need-to-know basis. Which leaves me with the uncomfortable feeling that in answering her, even vaguely, I’m somehow betraying him.

‘I can’t wait to be in there, can you?’ I ask Dan.

He glances down at me. ‘I can’t wait to be in anywhere but my mum’s.’

I frown. ‘You don’t mean that, do you? Not after we’ve had an offer accepted and it’s all happening. This is the only house for us as far as I’m concerned, and—’

‘Gemma,’ he interrupts, ‘we’re going to do everything in our power to get this house, okay?
I
will do everything in my power to get it. But don’t ever forget that you and I would live happily ever after, whether it was here or somewhere else.’

I nod as he kisses me. ‘I agree completely. But it won’t be somewhere else. It’ll be here. Just so you know.’

He laughs. ‘Yes, I think I’ve got that message, loud and clear.’

A few days later, I’m daydreaming about our Happily Ever After – in Pebble Cottage and nowhere else – as I’m on my way to the filming of an advert I was involved in scripting. I pull up in an overpriced car park in Manchester and head towards the Northern Quarter.

Its bars and cafés are as bustling as ever on a sunny Friday afternoon, with outdoor seats at a premium and the weekend crying out to start early.

As I walk through a cloud of coffee-shop aromas, I picture my future with the man I love. My head is filled with visions of nights in front of our beautiful fireplace and Sunday mornings in our tastefully furnished bedroom.

But as my eyes drift to a small round table in one of a dozen pavement cafés, all those thoughts – and any others – vanish from my head.

I stand and stare, feeling winded, unable to believe what – or rather
whom
– I’m seeing, for the first time in twelve years.

Alex Monroe. The one-time love of my life.

It’s difficult to describe my physical state as I attempt to look unfazed, holding my breath and hardly able to feel my legs, even if they’re still technically walking. I slow down to make certain it’s him, the confirmation of which makes my heart pound harder and faster than can possibly be good for anyone’s health.

Eventually, as I’m about twenty feet away, my legs refuse to go any further and I stand watching as he reads a newspaper, like he always did, even when we were seventeen. He doesn’t look twelve years older, at least not in a bad way. The soft features of his younger face have become more mature, more angular, altogether more impressive.

I take a small step without knowing whether I’m going to politely cough and ask if he remembers me, or throw myself into his arms with tears in my eyes.

However, when I’ve caught my breath long enough to start to approach, a woman – slim, blonde, intelligent-looking – appears at his side and places two drinks on the table, before sitting down next to him.

He is immediately deep in conversation. And in that split second I find myself desperate to know whether they’re
together
, even though there are a dozen more pertinent questions, not least what the hell is he doing in the UK? He smiles and runs his hand through his thick blond hair, a gesture so painfully familiar to me, yet one I’d entirely forgotten about until this moment.

And it’s that, accompanied by my cascades of adrenalin, that makes me realise I don’t want to be here. The thought of seeing him after all this time and being introduced to a girlfriend, fiancée,
wife . . .
I instinctively feel repulsed by the thought.

He glances in my direction. And suddenly, only drastic measures are open to me. Namely, I have to hide.

Unfortunately, I am not in the dense jungle of the Amazon Basin with as much vegetation and camouflage that a girl could hope for. I am in central Manchester in strappy sandals, and the only thing I can find in the way of cover is a large specials board.

I dive behind it and crouch, panting, as if on the run from an armed gunman whose house I’ve burned down, dog I’ve run over, and whose grammar I corrected on Facebook.

‘You okay?’ A waitress with short spiky hair and a friendly, if mildly condescending smile bends down to talk to me.