Bricking It (22 page)

On much firmer ground here . . .

‘I do!’ I blurt out.

Mischa leans in and kisses me lightly on the lips.

You know how I’ve just been saying how boring I found Mischa to be in conversation? How I couldn’t wait to get away from her as quickly as possible, before I had to listen to her talk any longer?

Yeah . . . Fuck all that. Libido trumps common sense
every single time
.

I return the kiss and almost gasp in surprise when I feel her hand rub my crotch.

I think this evening is about to take a massive upswing!

Mischa kisses me harder, pushing me back against the marble kitchen top. ‘I want you to take me on the island, Danny. I want to feel the cool Bianco Carrara under my body as you fuck me.’

‘Come again?’

‘The Bianco Carrara, Danny! It’s beautiful, isn’t it?’ Mischa uses the hand that isn’t massaging my penis to once again feel the surface of the countertop.

Great. Mischa doesn’t so much want to have sex with me, as she does my bloody farmhouse kitchen. If I really want to impress her I should glue some taps to my nipples and install a dishwasher in my arsehole.

‘This house used to be place for sex, yes?’ Mischa says huskily. ‘That’s what your sister says.’

‘Um, maybe, yeah,’ I reply.

‘Then have me here, Danny! Take me as the moonlight filters in through the central-pivoting VELUX!’

‘You fucking what?’

‘The skylight, Danny! Don’t you think it’s wonderful? I chose it from the broad selection on offer, because it best complimented the rake of the new extension.’

This is actually making her horny. Talking about extension rakes is a sexual thrill for this woman. From the one-sided conversation we’ve just had I understand how obsessed she is with house design, but this is another thing entirely.

I have no frame of reference here
whatsoever
.

I need a distraction – anything to get me away from Mischa, before she tries to wrap me in wallpaper and take me up the waste-disposal chute.

Luckily, I suddenly hear music wafting down from upstairs.

It’s Marvin Gaye’s ‘Let’s Get It On’.

Bloody hellfire! Has Mischa set this whole thing up? Does she intend to use Marvin Gaye’s seminal hit as the background music to her seduction? If so, couldn’t she think of something more appropriate, given her apparent sexual peccadillos? ‘This Ole House’ by Shakin’ Stevens, for instance?

‘What is that music?’ Mischa remarks, breaking away from me.

Hmmmm.
Looks like she’s as clueless as I am.

‘I don’t know. It’s coming from upstairs,’ I mutter and walk back out of the kitchen, towards the sounds coming from above.

At the bottom of the stairs, we can both hear the music clearly, along with being able to see a crack of light coming from underneath the nearest bedroom door.

Squatters!

We’ve got bloody squatters!

‘Who is it?’ Mischa wonders, looking slightly nervous.

‘I don’t know,’ I reply manfully, ‘but they’ve picked the wrong house to set up shop in!’

I mount the staircase, and start to make my way up to the first floor with Mischa in tow, slightly hiding behind me. I’m pleased to have her along, as if the miscreants turn out to be dangerous, I can just have her bore them to death with the reasons why we chose cedar wood for the bedroom floorboards.

I grasp the master bedroom’s door handle, a breath caught in my throat. Best to just fling it open and surprise the bastards. With any luck they’ll just bolt as quickly as possible, and I can call the police while I watch them run up the garden path.

‘You shouldn’t be in my house!’ I cry as I push the door open wide. ‘This is private prop—’

I am stunned into sudden and complete silence.

On the floor of the bedroom is a large duvet. Beside the duvet are two portable lights casting the room with a soft yellow glow. An iPhone connected to a speaker blasts out the Marvin Gaye, and a small heater sits in the corner of the bedroom, warming the place up nicely.

This is just as well, as on the duvet are two naked people. Both of whom I recognise very easily.

As does Mischa. ‘My God!’ she exclaims, hand going to her mouth.

I can think of nothing to say myself.

The sight of Baz and Spider completely naked and locked in each other’s arms is something guaranteed to steal away any coherent thought.

‘Oh fuck!’ they both exclaim in unison.

‘I’m sorry!’ I wail loudly, realising that I’ve just interrupted what is clearly a very intimate moment. I back away as fast as possible, nearly sending Mischa flying. The sound of the bedroom door slamming can probably be heard in the next county.

‘I think we should get out of here!’ I spit at Mischa, my face flaming.

The thought that keeps running through my head is that it must have hurt Spider a great deal to get that pirate skull tattooed on his left buttock.

That
glistening
pirate skull.

Oh good God.

I virtually push Mischa back down the stairs as I hear the bedroom door being flung open. Spider and Baz, both mercifully now dressed in boxer shorts, come hurrying down towards us, combined looks of horror and embarrassment on their faces.

‘Danny! Hang on!’ Spider calls.

No chance, mate. I’ve just seen you locked
in flagrante delicto
with Baz, and given that both of you could snap me like a fucking twig, I feel it’s probably best for my continued health that I leg it away from here as fast as possible. I throw open the front door with a squeal, turning back to see how close our half-naked pursuers are to getting their hands around my throat.

‘It ain’t what you think!’ Baz shouts, seeing my horrified expression. ‘We’re in love!’ he bellows.

This brings me up short. ‘Pardon?’ I say, turning back from my hasty exit.

Baz looks totally dejected. ‘We’re in love, Dan. Me and Spider.’

‘Are you going to beat me up?’ I ask him. This elicits a look of horror from them both.

‘Why would we want to do that, Dan?’ Spider asks me, a hurt look on his heavily tattooed face. ‘You’re our mate.’

‘Because, because I just saw you . . . saw you . . .’ I can’t say it. I just
can’t
.

Now it’s Baz’s turn to look hurt. ‘And you think we’d beat you up for that?’

I shrug. ‘Well, you are both big and strong, and . . .’

Glistening?

‘You’re probably angry that we burst in on you,’ I finish in a small voice.

This seems to remind Baz and Spider that I’ve just seen them in the early stages of having sex with one another. Baz flushes red in the face. Spider does the same, making his various tattoos look all the more terrifying.

‘Are you going to tell anyone?’ Baz asks me, looking less like a six-foot muscle-bound builder who’s about to pummel me, and more like a small boy who’s been caught with his hands in the cookie jar.

‘Not . . . Not if you don’t want me to, Baz,’ I stumble.

‘No, please don’t,’ Spider adds, sounding equally as distressed. ‘The boys would hate us.’

I shake my head. ‘No, they wouldn’t! This is the twenty-first century, lads . . .’

‘Doesn’t matter, Dan,’ Baz says glumly. ‘They wouldn’t have it, trust me.’

‘Nah. Being gay and a builder? Hiding to nothing, that is,’ Spider agrees.

I feel this is a good time to assure my two closeted friends that they have nothing to be ashamed of. ‘Well, I think it’s great,’ I say in a strong tone. ‘Good for you!’

‘Danny, I’m going outside,’ Mischa says in a much flatter, colder voice. I notice the way she’s looking at Baz and Spider. It’s not a look I approve of
at all
.

Mischa strides out of the doorway and marches off up the garden path. Poor Baz and Spider watch her go, looking miserable.

‘You see, Dan?’ Baz says. ‘That’s what we’d get from everyone if they knew.’

I open my mouth to argue, but I could see the look on Mischa’s face just as well as they could. Slovenia is quite a religious country I believe, so maybe I shouldn’t be too surprised by Mischa’s reaction to finding out that Baz and Spider are gay.

Instead, I have to ask another question, one that’s only just occurred to me now I’m over the shock a bit. ‘Er, why are you both here, exactly? You’ve both got your own places, haven’t you?’

‘Well, it’s romantic here, isn’t it?’ Spider tells me.

‘Is it?’

‘Yeah! The place looks beautiful.’

I’m stunned by Spider’s choice of language. It seems there’s a side to the heavily tattooed builder that only comes out once his deepest, darkest secret is revealed.

‘Besides, people might notice if we saw each other where we live,’ Baz adds. ‘People would
talk
.’

The look of fear on his face actually breaks my heart.

‘You’re sure you’re not going to say anything, aren’t you?’ Spider mumbles.

I shake my head hard. ‘No, of course not. Not if you don’t want me to.’ I’m acutely aware that we’re still standing in the now draughty hallway, with Spider and Baz wearing nothing other than their boxer shorts. ‘Look, I’m going to leave, and make sure Mischa gets home. Why don’t you guys go back upstairs? By all means stay as long as you want to. I will keep your secret safe.’

The combined looks of gratitude make me a bit uncomfortable. Neither of them should need to be grateful to me for keeping their homosexuality a secret. It shouldn’t need to be a secret
at all
.

‘Thanks, Dan,’ Baz says. ‘It is getting a bit cold down here.’

‘Alright then, get yourselves back upstairs,’ I repeat. ‘I’ll see you in the morning.’

I go out of the front door and close it carefully behind me, leaving my two friends to hopefully go back to their fun in the bedroom.

The kind of fun I shall resolutely
not
be getting now this evening.

For one thing, I don’t think I could get Mischa’s engine revving again unless I rubbed a couple of Ikea cabinets up and down against her, and for another, I really didn’t like the way she looked at Baz and Spider just a minute ago. I guess she’s entitled to her prejudices, but it doesn’t mean I have to share them.

I join her at the front gate. We don’t exchange many words. It doesn’t really feel appropriate.

The both of us stand in uncomfortable silence until the taxi arrives, and I barely summon up enough enthusiasm to give her a peck on the cheek before watching the cab driver take her away.

What a very, very strange day this has been. And what lessons have I learned from it?

Whether it’s Mitchell Hollingsbrooke and Fred Babidge scheming to get me and Mischa on a date, the girl in question turning out to be a pub bore, or stumbling on the most unlikely gay partnership in history, people always have the capacity to surprise and shock you.

I turn and look at Daley Farmhouse with a wry grin, thinking about Grandma and her secrets.

My sister and I thought all the shocks and surprises would come from the house itself during the renovation. That’s what all the TV shows and websites tell you.

But in reality? A house is just bricks and mortar, and bricks and mortar are pretty predictable when you get right down to it.

It’s the people inside you have to watch out for.

HAYLEY

December

£157,819.12 spent

D
ear Grandma,

The last time I wrote you a letter like this I was ten, and you were still alive. I can’t remember what I wrote, but it probably involved me asking you for sweets. Many, many sweets.

Given how much I’ve discovered about you in the past few weeks, I felt it best to sit down and put pen to paper once again, even though you are dead, and I stopped eating sweets about a decade ago because of the damage they were doing to my waistline.

If nothing else, I need to get all this down on paper so it’s straight in my head. Also, at some point, I’m going to have to explain everything to Dad. Rather than stand there with a flaming-red face as I recount your colourful past to him, I’ll just hand him this letter and run for the bloody hills as fast as my legs will carry me.

Oh my, Grandma, what a very colourful past you had!

I can see why you tried your hardest to cover it up. Especially when you married Granddad – a vicar, and man of quite high standing in the local community. Did he know about your previous life? I guess that’s a question I can never have answered. At least I managed to uncover the truth about what went on here at Daley Farmhouse all those years ago, thanks to a bit of legwork, sifting through piles of old public documents, the Internet and the willingness of the local pensioners to talk once you’ve bought them a nice hot cup of tea.

We’ll start with your first husband, shall we? He sounds like he was a nice man, by all accounts. James Antony Hayle. A man of means, it appears, given that he owned several properties in the local area, including the very farmhouse you left Danny and I in your will.

You married him in 1950 – and who can blame you? He was a man with a bright future, wasn’t he?

Until he invested his money in that hat company, of course. Whatever possessed him to bury so much of his hard-earned cash into a venture like that? Did he have a thing for hats? I guess he must have done, given that most of his liquid assets went into the company he co-owned with Baron Leland Hanson, a man who turned out to be an unscrupulous cad.

Did you try to stop James, Grandma? I bet you did. You always came across as a very level-headed woman to me. I can’t see you supporting your husband as he ploughed his money into such a strange venture.

I also know that you wouldn’t have said ‘I told you so’ once when Hanson disappeared two years later with what was left of James’s cash. No, I’m sure you would have continued to be supportive, even when James started to drink heavily.

His death must have come as such a massive blow, Grandma. I am so so sorry for everything you must have gone through.

There you were, a widow at the tender age of twenty-five, left with a mountain of debt and no support from anyone. What must that have been like? No money, no husband, no family to help you in your time of need.

The local community didn’t seem to care either, did they? They just saw the widow of that madman who owned the silly hat company.

All you were left with was the farmhouse. The only thing to have survived James’s folly.

I’d love to know how and why you decided to turn the place into a house of ill repute. Was it your
first
choice? Or was it your
last
? Did you try anything else beforehand? Why didn’t you just sell the place and move on with your life?

Again, these are questions I will never have answers to. All I do know is that by 1957 the farmhouse was up and running as an establishment for discerning gentlemen’s entertainment. A very successful one, by all accounts. I’ve spoken to men whose eyes light up when I talk about the farmhouse, and others who run a mile when I mention it.

Did you get on well with PC Chapman? He certainly remembers you and the farmhouse very well. A great source of information he was. All I had to do was keep supplying the garibaldis and smile sweetly at him.

It turns out that while your bordello was indeed illegal, the local constabulary turned a blind eye most of the time, providing you and your clients were very discreet. It came as no surprise when I found out that the area’s chief inspector was a regular – sometimes coming over on a weekly basis. I wonder how many times you tied him to that bed and whipped him with that riding crop. It’s a mental image I may never get out of my head, no matter how hard I might try.

Where did you find all the girls, Grandma? Did you advertise for them? If so, where? I can’t see you sticking an ad in the local newsagents! My best guess as to how many you had working for you at one time is seven. I couldn’t find any of them to talk to – which came as no surprise at all. In fact, I only managed to track one of them down at all, and she slammed her front door in my face as soon as I mentioned your name. Genevieve Hayle is a name that conjures up all sorts of reactions when you mention it. Some of them good, some of them definitely
not
so good.

But there you have it. For a good three years, you kept your head above water running a brothel in the very same farmhouse I’ve just ploughed a hundred grand into.

I should be ashamed. I really should.

But you know what? I’m not. Not in the
slightest
.

I don’t see a seedy woman of ill repute and no morals when I think of you as the madam of the local knocking shop. I may have done before I really started to look into your past, but once I uncovered more information, my impression of you changed for the better.

By all accounts you were a fair, even-handed woman, who treated the girls who worked for you with grace and dignity. You paid them well and gave them a roof over their heads. You seem to handle your clients with strength of character I don’t think I could ever have. PC Chapman tells me that you neatly and comprehensively manipulated and controlled every single man with power in the local community to make sure that your business was allowed to thrive, and that your girls were well protected from harm.

You were, in short, something of a local legend. A woman to be respected. One who could make all your fantasies come true if you were nice, and make all your worst nightmares come true if you weren’t.

I couldn’t be more proud!

So, what happened, Grandma? What would make Genevieve Hayle – madam, businesswoman and local entrepreneur – give it all up for a kind, gracious man in a dog collar?

Again, this is one area of your past I have been unable to find out more about, so I’m just going to have to take a wild stab in the dark and guess that it all came down to
love
.

What else could make you shut the brothel down and leave the life that you had built for yourself so abruptly?

Was it
just
that you fell in love?

Or did things start to go wrong? Did some of those relationships you’d worked so long and hard to maintain begin to break down?

I notice that your favourite chief inspector retired in 1961, and was replaced by a much younger man from London. I’m willing to bet that he wasn’t a weekly client of yours, like his predecessor. Without the tacit support of the local police, I can imagine life got very difficult for you and the girls pretty damn quickly.

This is all conjecture on my part, of course. But I’m the type of person who can make an educated guess if I have enough facts at hand – and I think I might just be right about all of this. The same way I was right about renovating the farmhouse. Sometimes you just have to go with your gut.

Any mention of Genevieve Hayle and her brothel cease in 1961. From then on it was Genevieve Daley, through and through – vicar’s wife and pillar of the community.

You reinvented yourself – again. And you buried any mention of your past as thoroughly as you did that trunk in the back garden.

Except you couldn’t get rid of the farmhouse, could you? Couldn’t let that last reminder of James go.

Maybe you couldn’t let go of your exciting life as a madam either! Not completely.

Whatever the reason, you didn’t sell the farmhouse. Nor did you try to rent it out to anybody, for reasons best known to yourself. You just left it behind. Left it to slowly rot into the ground, rather than hand it over to somebody else.

I can see you visiting the place over the years, once every so often. A lonely pilgrimage to your long-forgotten exploits in the late fifties. In my mind’s eye I see you wandering around the deserted rooms that once held so many secrets, a tear forming at the corner of one eye as you think about your girls and your oldest, dearest clients.

The visits probably stopped as you grew older though, didn’t they, Grandma? Time can be a harsh mistress – even if you weren’t a harsh one yourself.

Okay, I’m probably being extremely fanciful about most of this, but without firm evidence I’m just going to fill in the blanks with what I
think
happened, no matter how whimsical it might sound.

And so, you fell into a life of domestic bliss with Granddad. Pregnant with my father a year after the marriage, it must have seemed such a lurch for you. Were you bored, at all? I bet you were! Maybe just a little bit? After all, I doubt caring for a baby and attending church every Sunday would compete with all that behind-closed-doors debauchery!

Whatever. I guess none of that is really important any more. What
is
important is that you are the kind of woman who can build not one, not two, but
three
lives for yourself – picking yourself up and ‘getting on with it’ each and every time. I hope and pray that I have some of that in me too.

Which leads me to my final unanswerable question: is that why you left Danny and me the farmhouse? Did you see your two grandchildren lost and directionless, and decide that dropping a derelict ex-brothel on their heads would be the best way to shake them out of their respective ruts?

Because if it was, your plan has worked
spectacularly
well.

Before this project Danny was drifting through life, and was a lazy, stumbling mess. This house has given him purpose, a reason to get out of bed in the morning and go do some proper work.

Do you know what he said to me yesterday?

‘Fred’s offered me a job, sis. He wants me to come work for him on a build he’s starting in the New Year. I’m going to pack it in at the museum and go for it!’

I’ve never seen him look so happy or so fulfilled. It’s not like he’s doing it for the money, either. Not if the house sells for what we hope it’s going to. No, Danny is going to work for Fred because
it makes him happy
. I never thought I’d see the day!

And as for me?

Those last few months of your life must have been a
real
joy whenever my miserable little face turned up on your doorstep. Did you have to bite your tongue when I moaned and groaned about how Simon had treated me? How he went from the best man in the world to the worst in the space of five short years? I imagine you did, given that you appear to be the kind of woman who would never have taken that kind of rubbish from a man for more than a minute. Little did I know I was pouring my poor, pitiful heart out to a woman who was built of far stronger stuff than I was!

You left me this place to end all that self-pity, didn’t you? To give me something constructive to think about, rather than wallowing in misery about the divorce.

I’ve always had an obsessive personality. You just turned that obsession away from a useless, pathetic little man, and towards a dilapidated house with no roof.

You crafty, clever old woman!

No wonder you ran a money-spinning brothel, and controlled the local police for three years!

(Oh God, I’ve just had a thought. What the hell is Dad going to say when I tell him that his eight-month cruise around the world was funded by his mother stuffing her knickers into the mouth of a senior police officer? I must remember to ask Gerard along, so he can set up a video camera to capture the look on my parents’ faces when I tell them.)

And as for Gerard O’Keefe, you couldn’t have seen
that
one coming, could you?

Maybe you hoped that the renovation would pull me up by my bootstraps, and that maybe I’d earn back enough self-confidence to one day meet another man and start a new relationship. I very much doubt you could have predicted a man like Gerard O’Keefe entering my life, though.

But
oh dear, Grandma
, I’m not sure I’m ready for that yet.

Stronger I may be, thanks to Daley Farmhouse, but I’m afraid that moping, sad little girl who visited you to complain about Simon is still there underneath it all and just waiting to rear her ugly head again.

I’m trying – really,
really
trying – to be as strong as you were, Grandma. To be as fearless as you. But it’s hard. A little
too
hard, I think. I look at Gerard and see a kind, thoughtful man. But then Simon was the same when we first met, wasn’t he?

It scares me.

Scares me as much as finding yourself alone in a rambling old farmhouse must have scared you.

Can I follow in your footsteps, though? Can I take the plunge and do something that scares me?

I’m deathly afraid that starting my own brothel would be a piece of cake compared to trusting my heart to another man again.

But anyway, the farmhouse is finished now, Grandma.

I did it!

Sorry –
we
did it.

From a ruined bunch of bricks sat in an overgrown field, we have restored Daley Farmhouse to its Victorian glory.

Actually, I’ll go a step further than that – I think we’ve made it
better
. A grander, larger, prettier house than it ever was before. You would be proud if you could see it, I have no doubt.

You’d also want to immediately light some candles and jump in the bath. I know I do every time I walk past it.

It’s kind of strange to see everything finished.

I have mixed feelings about it. On the one hand, I feel a tremendous sense of accomplishment, but on the other, I feel a strange sadness that the job is now done.