Don't Get Me Wrong (10 page)

“Helps what?”

“When he's angry. Centers his energy. Maybe you should go along and see what you think.”

At night, when I lie there full of rage, I have fantasies of hitting John White. Breaking his nose. Smashing the bone. Blood all over his fat, sneering face.

Eva said gently, “You've had a bad time, Harry. I'm not surprised you feel a bit lost sometimes.”

For a moment, he couldn't speak. It was all locked away in his mind. But he could feel the pressure of it, like a cupboard crammed full of old coats that someone has forced shut. Sometimes
the effort of keeping it closed exhausted him. “I wouldn't know anyone.”

“So? You'd get to know them.”

“Will you come with me?”

“You're such a baby,” she said, her eyes laughing at him.

He looked down at their hands on the table, the fingers intertwined. Outside, the first eerie calls of birdsong echoed, as if the world were a huge, empty space that could never be filled. It was a lonely sound. But when I'm with Eva, thought Harry, I know that everything's going to be OK. I know I'm in a much kinder place than I ever thought possible. “We'll always be together, won't we?”

“You've only just met me.”

“I don't care. I'm going to know you forever.”

“Forever's a long time.”

They sat, smiling at each other. He said, “I should go.”

“Come back later and meet my little sister.”

“What's her name?”

“Kim.”

“I could buy her an ice cream.”

“She's thirteen.”

“Roll her a joint?”

Eva laughed. “She's not like me. She has plans. She's going to change the world.”

“How?”

“I don't know. Take power. Go into politics. Start a revolution. You watch. One day she'll be famous.”

At the door, he turned back to look at her. The early morning
sun, glancing through the window, made her hair shine gold. He said, “See you later.”

She smiled at him in a way that made it hard to breathe.

•  •  •

Kim had spent hours working out what to wear for her first day in the new job. After three years as a student, most of her clothes had holes in them. For the interview, she'd borrowed a coat from Damaris and had kept it tightly buttoned, sweating, the whole way through. But that wasn't going to work on a regular basis.

“Borrow something of mine,” said Eva.

An Indian dress with tiny little mirrors sewn onto the bodice? A floor-length skirt in red velvet? Jeans with butterflies and daisies dancing up and down the flares?

In the end, Kim settled on a navy-blue velvet pinafore that Izzie had bought in the Mind shop in East Dulwich because she thought it might make a nice cushion.

“Does it make me look pregnant?” she said, standing in front of the full-length mirror.

“No,” said Eva, whose bump was now sticking out alarmingly. “This is what pregnant looks like.”

But on the way there, an elderly man on crutches tried to give her his seat on the bus.

The offices of the housing charity were in Vauxhall, just south of the Thames.

“Site of the old pleasure gardens,” said Jake. His hair was thick and fair, sticking out like straw on a thatched cottage. “Mentioned by Pepys and visited by thousands. For two hundred
years. Concerts, fireworks, tightrope walkers, hot-air balloons. They had a reenactment of the Battle of Waterloo in 1817. Finally closed in 1859.” He sat down in a large gray office chair that rolled backwards with a sigh. “But I expect you knew that.”

Kim, who had lived in London all her life but had never heard of the Vauxhall pleasure gardens, stared back, tongue-tied.

“You'll be shadowing me for a week. So that you can see what we do. Watching my every move.” Jake pulled his face into an expression of mock alarm, like someone who's just seen a putrefied corpse. “Stalking me.”

Kim swallowed. “I hope I won't be too much trouble.”

He looked at her. “You will be. Lots of trouble. But that's the only way to learn.”

He's weird, thought Kim. She suddenly wished she was in a normal open-plan office with lots of people and healthy potted plants and a water cooler. She wasn't sure being stuck in a cubbyhole with Jake was such a good idea.

“So where were you working before?”

“I wasn't,” said Kim. “I've just finished my degree.”

Jake leant back in his chair. He had chunky thighs, like a rugby player. Or maybe it was just the baggy jeans. “In what?”

“Social policy.”

“Interesting.” He picked up a sheaf of papers and banged them together to make a neat block. “Where?”

“Edinburgh.”

He raised his eyebrows, but she had no idea why. “So that's your desk, facing mine. I can set you up with a password and log you into the system.” He had a slightly nasal voice, as if he had a permanent cold. “Our priority in the next few weeks is the
London Homelessness Report. Cross-checking all the figures in advance of the media launch. But they probably told you that at the interview.”

She nodded.

“And you're on a six-month contract, apparently. A sort of paid internship. Although I wouldn't worry about that too much. You'll probably be renewed. We're currently in a state of chaos. New CEO. Got rid of the entire staff and brought in her own team. New faces. New IT system. No one has a clue what's going on. Apart from me.”

Jake was momentarily distracted by something on his screen, so she sat down at her new desk and busied herself opening the nearest drawer. It was empty apart from two pencils and what looked like the wizened remains of a mummified apple core. When she looked up, he was staring at her. “Why housing?”

“Sorry?”

“What made you want to work in housing?”

He had an intense gaze. His eyes were pale blue.

“Social injustice. You can't do anything unless you have somewhere to live.” Despite herself, she felt a lump in her throat. It kept happening these days. There were just two months before they had to move. She and Izzie had already paid the deposit on a smelly bedsit in New Cross with alarming stains on the carpet and black mold growing round the shower. The kitchen was two electric rings in the corner of the living room, so they wouldn't be eating anything more complicated than stew. The only consolation was that it was less than ten minutes on the bus from Eva's tiny new flat overlooking Peckham Rye. So I'll always be able to babysit, thought Kim. Whenever she needs me.

“That sounds heartfelt. Have you and your boyfriend just split up?”

This was totally inappropriate. So she ignored it. But something about his camp rudeness was making her start to relax. “How long have you worked here?”

“Five years this Christmas.”

“So you like it.”

“Well, I wouldn't stay if I didn't, would I?”

This annoyed her. “I don't know. You might need the money. Or be too lazy to look for something else.”

“You don't hold back, do you?” He smiled. His front teeth were crooked. It was endearing in a way she didn't quite understand. “So go on, then. If we're going to work together, tell me all about yourself.”

“You first.”

“Twenty-eight, born in Aylesbury, Bristol University, came to London, worked for Lambeth Council, got the job here, live in Stockwell, like cats, play the trombone, spend my weekends as a volunteer restoring windmills.”

Eva likes a 1960s song about windmills, thought Kim. Something to do with circles and your mind.

“Where are they?”

“What?”

“The windmills?”

“All over Britain. All three types—post, tower, smock. Your turn.”

Kim thought for a moment. “Twenty-one. Born in London. Graduated last summer. About to move to New Cross. I like
independent publishers, KT Tunstall, and Guinness. And my sister's having a baby.”

“Which explains the maternity dress. Unless you're having one, too.”

Kim opened her mouth to protest and shut it again.

“So where does she live, this sister?”

“Peckham Rye.”

“The nice bit?”

Kim nodded.

“With a nice husband?”

“No.”

He raised his eyebrows. “Do tell.”

“Her boyfriend's paying for the flat.”

“But not living in it?”

Kim shook her head.

“How very modern,” said Jake.

To her great astonishment—staring at this odd, awkward man with straw hair and thick thighs—Kim found herself awash with desire.

•  •  •

Harry came out of the gym and stood there for a moment, readjusting his eyes to the shadows. The city was now in the grip of a dull, gray winter. That's why Londoners act so completely out of character when the sun starts shining in March, thought Harry. They're so relieved that life has gone back into color that they forget about being aloof and aggressive and start bouncing about like spring lambs.

It took him a while to realize that there was someone else outside with him, leaning against the wall, huddled into a hoodie. Ethan was about seven or eight, but so small and skinny he could have been much younger. He'd been coming to the kids' class at the gym for about six months. He never looked you in the eyes if he could help it. Just a quick glance in your direction sometimes, checking you out.

“Waiting for someone?”

Ethan nodded. Or it might have been an involuntary shiver.

Harry put down his sports bag and leant back against the wall as if he, too, had all the time in the world. He took out his mobile and pretended to check his messages. He didn't want to leave until he knew Ethan was safe. There were no other kids around. They usually stayed inside until they were picked up. What was he doing out here on the street? You could tell just by the way he was standing that he was nervous.

Above them, a suburban train rattled to Victoria.

On the other side of the road, a gray car came to a stop. Ethan tensed so suddenly that his body seemed to bounce back against the wall. Harry made himself stay very still. He looked up. A young woman, laughing, got out of the car, waved, and turned off towards the station. The car ground off at speed.

Ethan slumped back against the brickwork.

It was getting darker. It was as if someone had turned down the dimmer switch. The gym door opened. A huge man, about six foot four, two hundred and thirty pounds, swung out, nodded at them both, and disappeared into the gloom.

Across the road, a car slowed down, then sped up again. Ethan cringed even more deeply into his hoodie.

An arc of lights swept round the corner, temporarily blinding them. A battered blue Toyota drove up on the wrong side of the road and stopped right in front of them. There was no one in the car but the driver. She reached back over the seat to the passenger door behind and pushed it open. Harry looked at Ethan. In the light from the car, Ethan's face was happy, flooded with relief.

What's going on? Why was he so frightened? Who did he think might be in the car?

Harry said, “See you next week.”

For a moment, their eyes met. Then Ethan ducked into the car, slamming the door, and Harry watched it speed off, veering out into the oncoming traffic.

It doesn't take much, Harry thought, to remember how it feels to be small and terrified.

He bent down and picked up his sports bag. But I'm grown up now, he thought with a surge of joy. And I know how to fight.

•  •  •

Alisha looked nervous. “Unfortunately, due to a sudden unforeseen emergency situation, our CEO can't be with us in person today.”

Jake frowned.

“So she's asked me to introduce you to Jake and”—Alisha studied her notes—“personally welcome you aboard as the newest members of the team at this exciting stage of the charity's future development going forward.”

They were five of them sitting in a tight circle of chairs by the fire escape. The offices were on the top floor of a concrete block
next to the main road. One of the double-glazed windows behind them had rivulets of condensation running down between the sheets of glass. The thin brown carpet beneath their feet was blackened with what looked like burn marks, and the leaves of the office palm were yellow brown, like old bananas. But this is a charity, thought Kim. You wouldn't want to waste money on inessentials.

“So, as a team-building exercise, Louisa would like us to go round and introduce ourselves, and say what made us want to work here.” Alisha looked up, her eyes anxious. “And then we have to come up with an interesting fact about ourselves.”

Kim felt hot and awkward. She wasn't sure that anything in her life counted as interesting. You're the only person I know, Izzie had said recently, who copes with stress in her life by working even harder.

“So I'll start, shall I? My name's Alisha, and I'm Louisa's executive personal assistant.”

“Why?” said Jake.

Alisha blinked. She had very smooth brown skin, gold-rimmed spectacles, and bright red lipstick.

“You're meant to say why you wanted to work here,” said Jake.

Alisha seemed to shrink back into her chair.

“Perhaps we should move on,” said Jake, “and come back to you in a minute.”

To Alisha's left was a thin man with bushy gray hair. His face was scored with deep lines, as if he'd spent most of his life in a desert. “I'm Brian. New IT support manager. Step up from the last job. My interesting fact is that I once had a cup of tea with Keira Knightley.”

Alisha burst back into life. “How come?”

“I was an extra on
Pride and Prejudice
.”

“No,” breathed Alisha.

Kim, aware that Jake was watching her, frowned as if she was unimpressed by name-dropping.

“You can see me in one of the crowd scenes. Breeches and a red waistcoat.”

“I loved her in
Pirates of the Caribbean
,” said Alisha. “I kept hoping she'd end up with Johnny Depp.”