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It was so dark, it felt like the middle of the night and when Harriet slammed the taxi door, it sounded like a gunshot in the deserted village street. There would be curtains twitching in a minute. The only place with lights on was the bakery where Sue would be at work on her bread already. Sanctimonious cow. Sue had caught Harriet doing the walk of shame at 4 in the morning many a time and would always make some comment. Imagine what she’d have to say about her going out midweek.
Harriet stepped with exaggerated care up to the door at the side of ‘her’ corner shop, two doors along the street from the bakery. Her feet were already numb in these stupid shoes and it wouldn’t do to twist her ankle as well. Angling her body away from the street light, so that she could see the keyhole, she had a couple of stabs before she got the key in the lock and stumbled in.
After the darkness outside, the light in the narrow hallway was blinding. She covered her eyes and peered through her fingers. The stairs seemed to pulse ahead of her. Urgh. Not good. The hangover was going to be brutal tomorrow ... well, later today, technically. She had to open the shop in five hours.
She went up the stairs on her hands and knees, pausing at the top to take off her heels. There was another door at the top. Harriet unlocked that door too, took a deep breath and pushed it open.
The flat was exactly as she’d left it. Fairly neat. Fairly tidy. Totally empty, apart from her. She chucked her shoes into the basket in the corner and padded to the kitchen where she got herself a glass of water. Of course it was empty. What had she expected? That he would miraculously be there waiting for her? And what if he had? What would he have said to find her staggering home smelling of booze and smoke and some random guy she’d pulled in a nightclub?
Harriet gulped down another mouthful of cold water. He’d be horrified and upset, that’s what. There would be tears and remorse and she’d feel awful. But she’d happily live through that ... just to see him again for five minutes.
Oh balls. This was what she’d gone out to avoid. This ... yearning. She didn’t have any more booze in the house. There was wine downstairs, in the shop, but she had enough sanity left to know that was out of bounds. Tears leaked down her cold cheeks. Harriet wove her way to the bedroom and, still dressed, curled up under the duvet and gave into the sadness until she fell asleep.
***
When the alarm went off four hours later, Harriet smacked it to snooze and uncurled, slowly, so that she didn’t shatter herself into pieces. Ow. Ow. There was a band of pain around her head. She hauled herself up until she was vaguely sitting up, found the water and ibuprofen she’d put out on the bedside cabinet before she went out and gulped it down. She reset the alarm and sank back under the duvet. One snooze and she’d go downstairs. All she had to do was sort the papers.
****
Sitting at his computer Tim stared at his inbox. 212 messages. How was that even possible? He’d wrestled it down to less than 20 before going home the night before. He rubbed his eyes and briefly considered deleting the whole lot, just to see what happened. But no. That would be irresponsible. One of his graduate students might have emailed him something that was actually important. At least he could get rid of all the university administrative emails telling him about when scheduled computer system updates or road closures. He sighed and started to work through them, trying to prioritise the onslaught so that he didn’t get buried in it.
His mobile phone rang. He pulled it out and looked at the caller ID. Mel. Crap. He looked at his inbox and considered ignoring the call. She would only call back. He’d already had three missed calls from her that morning. She was nothing if not persistent, his twin sister.
He sank into his chair before he answered it. This was not going to be easy. Discussions with Mel never were.
“There you are,” she said, by way of greeting. “I’ve been trying to get hold of you for days. Don’t you ever answer your phone?”
“Hi, Mel. I’m fine, thanks. You?”
She clicked her tongue. “I know you’re fine, Tim. I friended you on Facebook, remember?”
Had she? Oh bugger. He’d forgotten about that. He’d only friended her so that he could keep up with what his niece Niamh was doing. Of course it meant that Mel could see what he was up to too.
“Anyway,” said Mel. “I’m calling because I need a huge favour.”
There it was. Straight to the point. Although, on reflection, it saved a lot of time not beating about the bush. “I dunno, Mel, I’m really busy at the moment.”
“I know you are, Tim. I wouldn’t have called you if it wasn’t urgent.”
Tim sighed. Fair enough. She was pretty self-sufficient. She had a husband and friends to lean on, anyway. “What do you want, Mel?”
There was a tiny pause. “You know how Alex and I are going away on a retreat in Scotland in a week’s time.”
“Yes ...”
“And Niamh was going to her godmother’s place while we were away.”
Tim closed his eyes and rubbed at the headache that was gathering on his forehead. He had a feeling he knew what was coming. “Mel, I can’t look after Niamh. I’m completely snowed under with work. I have deadlines coming out of my ears and there’s a new cohort of students arriving in two weeks. I—”
“Oh, Tim, please? Niamh’s godmother has broken her leg and she can’t manage Niamh on top of that.”
“What is there to manage with Niamh? She’s fourteen. She only needs an adult to be around. She doesn’t need spoon-feeding.”
“Exactly! You could keep an eye on her in the evenings and make sure she gets something to eat. She’s ever such a nice girl, she’ll be no bother. She’ll be spending the day at holiday club anyway, so you don’t need to worry about her during the day.”
“Mel ...” he said. But his heart wasn’t in it. Mel would keep trying to persuade him and he didn’t have the energy to argue with her. She always won. Besides, he liked Niamh. Scratch that, he loved Niamh. He had spent a lot of time with her when Mel split up with her first husband. For a time, he had lived in his sister’s house, acting as in-house babysitter while Mel sorted out mortgages and lawyers and got shot of Niamh’s father Richard. Tim and Niamh had become very close as a result. Later, he’d been there to keep Mel calm while Richard took Niamh away on his access days. He and Mel argued and bickered, but if she ever needed him, he would be there. He would never to say no to her. And they both knew it.
“Please, please, please. You’ll get to hang out with Niamh without me around. I’ve asked everyone else I can think of. You’re my last hope.”
“Oh thanks.” He leaned back in his chair. “Can’t you cancel your trip?”
“You know I can’t. It’s taken me so long to arrange this. You know how hard it would be to get Alex to take time off again.” There was a tell-tale wobble in her voice. He recognised the latent panic in it. He knew what it meant. Mel’s second marriage had been slowly deteriorating – according to Mel. Alex worked too hard and his initial adoration had faded to something more mundane. Mel was feeling ignored ... and Mel hated being ignored. Tim had initially wondered if Mel was just being a drama queen, but he now knew that she was genuinely worried.
“Okay,” he said. “I’ll do it. I’ll come and stay at yours, but I’ll have to work in the evenings. Niamh will pretty much have to entertain herself.”
Mel gave a little laugh. “She’ll be fine with that. All she ever wants to do is sit on Skype to her friends or watch Netflix.”
Tim smiled. Teenagers. Then he remembered all that had happened in Niamh’s life in the past few months. “How is she?” he asked. “Is she okay?”
Mel sighed. “Yeah. She seems to be ... getting on with things. She still bursts into tears from time to time, but not so often now. Mostly, she worries about friends and hairstyles and the usual stuff now.”
“Oh good. And how about you?”
“Well, I’m not exactly upset about Richard dying,” she said, too quickly. “I’ve got enough to worry about keeping my marriage to Alex alive.”
Tim frowned. Despite her brusque manner, he could feel the worry that bubbled underneath. “How’s that going?”
Mel sighed. “In all honesty, I don’t know. A fortnight in a retreat, with no computers or mobiles, might get Alex away from his computer long enough to sort things out ... or it might just prove that we can’t be fixed. I don’t know.”
For a few seconds there was silence. The years fell away and they were six again. Tim, with scrubbed clean hands and paper face mask, was sitting on Mel’s hospital bed, playing Scrabble with the hospital’s special set that smelled of disinfectant. He’d had a brilliant six letter word all lined up, but one look at his sister sitting there with tubes coming out of her nose and wrist, and he’d ignored it in favour of a lousy three letter one. He’d let her win then and had been letting her win ever since.
There was no point fighting it. It was just a waste of precious time. “You go to your retreat,” Tim said, quietly. “I’ll keep an eye on Niamh.”
“Thanks Tim. You’re ... well, thank you.”
Tim laughed. “The words you’re looking for are ‘you’re awesome’.”
She clicked her tongue. “Oh don’t you start. You hardly inspire awe.” Her voice softened, as though she was about to laugh too. “But yes, thank you.” A beat passed. “Can you come round at about four on Friday? I’ll run you through everything before I head off.” And just like that, they were back to business.
“Sure. I’ll see you Friday.”
He was smiling when he hung up. He could take a bit of time off to hang out with his niece at the weekend. It had been weeks since he’d last seen her. With a jolt, he realised it had actually been months. Time flies. He opened his email and looked at the 5 messages that had come in while he was on the phone. This mountain of work would still be there, whether he took the weekend off or not. Maybe some of it would even go away. Maybe doing something different wasn’t such a bad idea.