Page 5 of Hard Tail
He was more bewildered than angry. That’s Jay all over. He’s so bloody laid-back he can’t understand anyone ever having a negative opinion on anything anyone else does. “I haven’t got a problem with it, all right?”
“Just as long as Matt doesn’t find out. I’m not having you pissing off my staff while you’re playing at being a shopkeeper, all right?
How did this happen? How does thisalwayshappen?
Is there anyone else in the world so good at asking for a favour, and at the same time making it sound like he’sdoingyou a favour?
I hope not.
“Anyway, you can stay at my house. Kate won’t mind you being away for a few weeks, will she? It’ll probably do you both good—absence makes the tart grow blonder, and all that. Not that I’m implying Kate’s a tart, obviously.” He grinned. “Except when you want her to be.”
“She—” My voice caught unexpectedly. I cleared my throat. “Actually, she’s left me. Yesterday.”
“What? No way! Shit, really?” Jay’s face was suddenly so miserable it made me feel bad to look at it. “Tim, listen, I’m really sorry. Do you think she’ll come back?”
I shook my head. “No. She’s met someone else.” I shrugged. “He’s a decent bloke. I’m sure she’ll be better off with him.”
Jay clutched my arm, his big, rough-skinned hand a solid comfort. “She’s an idiot, mate. Didn’t know when she was well off. Look, if there’s anything I can do, anything at all, you tell me, right?”
And that’s why I agreed to look after the shop for him.
Because even though he’s an arrogant, self-centred layabout and has always taken me—and the rest of the world—for granted, he’s my big brother.
And he never lets me forget it.
***
Jay’s house was on the outskirts of Eling. I’d never actually seen it before—I mean, I’d been down to see Jay since he’d moved in, obviously, but we’d always done pub lunches. Just like when he’d been up to see me and Kate, we’d gone out to restaurants. Although, come to think of it, we’d insisted on giving Jay the Grand Tour of the house first. Well, just as soon as we’d got it looking nice. And avoiding the fourth bedroom, about which Kate and the decorators had had a bit of a disagreement and which consequently got left half done.
Outskirts, by the way, are pretty much all there is to Eling, as far as I’d been able to tell on such limited acquaintance with the place. That and the Tide Mill, advertised on brown tourist information signs all over town. I’d always assumed it was some kind of watermill except with tides rather than a stream. Now I came to think of it, it seemed unlikely there was an enormous waterwheel sitting there, waiting to be turned twice a day. Maybe I should take a look sometime. It wasn’t like I’d be that busy after work. I didn’t know a soul down here apart from Jay, and even if any of his friends popped round, I doubted we’d have much in common. Apart, of course, from a difficulty in believing Jay and I were actually related.
Jay bought the house with the money our grandmother left him. Apparently, everyone (by which I mean Mum and Gran) had agreed I didn’t need the money, what with the high-flying city career and more letters after my name than were in it. As long as you didn’t spell “Timothy” out fully, that was. I inherited the dog-eared complete works of Agatha Christie and the collection of pottery dragons, which Kate had taken one look at and banished to a series of cardboard boxes in the garage.
At least I’d be able to get them out now, I thought, brightening a little.
The hope had been that Jay would use his inheritance to get a more settled lifestyle, and amazingly, it’d actually worked. He’d set up the business, and had money left over for a two-bed ex-council house with a scrubby garden and van-owning neighbours.
I wondered if the neighbours would expect me to be friendly. Like Jay.
Jay had also, while he was at it, embraced a more holistic lifestyle. Which meant misshapen, organic veg and recycling everything. Actually, Jay had started on the path towards all things Green when he was twenty and dropped out of University. He’d gone on the hippy trail to Goa; never mind that he was thirty years too late. He’d come back six months later with a suitcase full of shell jewellery and drug-taking paraphernalia, an all-over tan and an STD. Mum had greeted him like he’d spent the time starving on a pig farm, not lazing around on a beach out of his skull, and not a word was said about the unfinished degree.
My 2:1 from Durham, meanwhile, was treated with about the same amount of enthusiasm as if I’d just come home with an ASBO and a caution for shoplifting.
After I left the hospital, I drove straight back up the M3. The gorse bushes that lined its southern half were in full bloom, a mass of warm yellow amid dark green. Feeling a bit more relaxed now I knew Jay wasn’t actually at death’s door, I eased off the accelerator to appreciate the view. Kate and I had never really been into the joys of the countryside. Our holidays together had been spent in cities, perusing museums and art galleries by day and enjoying fine dining and classical concerts by night. Looking at those bushes glowing golden in the late afternoon sun, I started to wonder if maybe there had been something missing. Something simpler.
When I got back to my big, lonely house, I found myself wandering from room to room, just on the off chance Kate might have come back. She had, as it happened—but she’d also gone again, taking the contents of her wardrobe and most of our CDs. Probably a few other things too, which I’d no doubt discover just when I needed them.
Well, two could play at that game. I packed a bag and loaded it into the BMW. Then, on a whim, I went into the garage and picked up one cardboard box marked “Evil Under the Sun” and another marked “Here Be Dragons”. I shoved them both into the boot of the BMW and set off back down to Jay’s. He’d been keen to have me in the shop the next day. Matt-minding.
The gorse bushes along the M3 were no longer burning bright, and the sky was a rich salmon pink that deepened to inky blue the nearer I got to Southampton. It was only June, but the warm air coming in through the open window tickled my nose with the fecund smells of summer. I sneezed a couple of times, then seemed to grow accustomed to the pollen. I breathed in deeply, while a dozen reckless bugs met a messy end against my windscreen.
As I pulled onto Jay’s road, it occurred to me that if the spare key wasn’t where he’d said it was, I’d be pretty much stuffed. I knew only one hotel in Southampton, the de Vere one down by the waterfront. The lounge at the front was an imposing pyramid of glass, and though I’d never stayed there, I doubted it’d be cheap. I really ought to start watching the pennies, seeing as Jay’s bike shop would put paid to me applying for a proper job for a while. And I’d still have to pay the hefty mortgage on the house in Mill Hill.
Which reminded me, I should probably get in touch with Kate so we could put it on the market. Depression settled on me like a worn-out duvet, lumpy and uneven. Maybe I hadn’t been in love with Kate, but we’d been comfortable together. I’d liked the house and enjoyed the experience of setting up a home with someone. Bickering over furniture and experimenting with DIY. (It’d been a short experiment. The guy we’d called in to fix the mess we’d made had visibly struggled not to laugh at our efforts.) And there was just something about a failed marriage that made me feel, well,failed.
What with all the pessimistic thoughts, I was mildly astonished to find the key where Jay told me to look, under the third mini-flagstone of the path across the postage-stamp front lawn. It was being guarded lovingly by a large family of woodlice, and I shivered a little as I wrested it from their leggy grasp.
Then I opened up the front door, hauled my bag inside and took a tour around my new, temporary home.
