The Harder They Fall (29 page)

George perched on the furthest end of the sofa and glanced at the papers on the cushion next to him, having initially concluded that this was more of the same mass clear-out operation, but now he recognised the blue photo album.

“Are you going to eat your breakfast? I won’t be offended if you don’t.”

“No. I am going to eat it. I’m starving and it looks delicious. You hate cooking.”

“Yes, I do, but I sort of enjoyed it this morning. I didn’t even know if you were going to come, but I had to take the chance.”

“You think I’m going to ignore a text like that?”

“I hoped you wouldn’t, which was why I sent it. I’m sorry.”

“There’s no need to be sorry, unless you only said it to get me to come back.”

“I didn’t.”

George picked up his fork and knife and sliced through one of the yolks, the yellow liquid cascading onto the slab of toasted wholemeal below. He cut a chunk off the bread and put it in his mouth, feeling terribly self-conscious, even though Josh had left the room, knowing that his presence while George ate would have this effect. The food could have been warmer, but otherwise it tasted wonderful. He loaded another large hunk of toast with egg, the yolk dripping onto his chin on the way to his mouth.

Josh waited in the kitchen, listening for the clatter of cutlery that would signal George had finished. He was on his second jug of coffee and felt jittery. The caffeine wasn’t helping that feeling, but it was keeping his mind focused. All those years of complete self control were taking their toll and the desire to crawl back inside his shell was almost irrepressible. Even this momentary lapse in concentration meant he missed his cutlery cue, and George had brought the empty plate. It was a welcome sight, because to ask if he had enjoyed his breakfast would have made it about the cook’s performance, not George’s pleasure.

“Thank you,” he said, putting the plate in the sink and turning on the hot tap.

“I’ll do that.”

“That’s not how it works,” George protested. Josh leaned over and turned off the tap.

“You’ve got egg on your chin.”

George reached past him to grab a paper towel. They were standing so close that it was unbearable and he could feel his legs wobbling. “Has it gone?” he asked, his breath catching in his throat.

“Almost.”

Josh took the towel from him and dabbed at the offending spot, but he was no longer paying attention to what he was doing. Their eyes were deadlocked and neither wanted to break away. Eventually it was George who did, and Josh took the opportunity to pour two cups of coffee. He had never felt so nervous, his hands shaking so much that he was struggling to hold the jug. George watched and waited, then picked up both mugs and carried them through to the lounge, the trail of splashes a good indication that he was fairing just as poorly. Now they were seated either end of the sofa, with Josh’s personal treasures an insurmountable obstacle separating them, both sipping at their coffee, so painfully aware of their own and each other’s every movement. George had found a tiny scrap of lining paper still attached to the wall and was using this to distract himself from the pressure of the photo album against his thigh; it was like waiting to be shot with your own gun. Josh was employing a similar strategy with the power button on the games console, and when the silence broke, they both spoke at once.

“You played
Crash Team Racing
with Sophie.”

“And you had the nerve to call Zak a freaky stalker.”

George was first to respond, just as soon as he recovered from the shock. So that’s what he’d meant. Who’d have guessed that a quick game to pass the time could do so much damage?

“I’m sorry. I’m not sure why it upset you, but it wasn’t intentional.” They still weren’t prepared to look at each other.

“It’s OK. I knocked the button with my knee and your scores came up on-screen. She gave you a bit of a thrashing, didn’t she?”

“Yeah, you could say that. But why does it bother you?”

“I don’t know, really. I think it’s because it’s always been something we do together, just the two of us, and you did it with someone else.”

“I cheated on you, in other words?”

“I guess that’s it, yes. It was like it wasn’t exclusive anymore.”

“That’s crazy. I mean, I kind of understand why you feel that way, but it’s still crazy.”

“But not quite so crazy as what I’ve done to the house, or you going to talk to Sean.”

“Ah. He told you. I thought he might.”

“Which was why you came back last night.”

“No. I came back because I was worried what might happen, with him being drunk, and you being…”

“Crazy? Well nothing much did happen. We talked, or should I say he did; he left—eventually—and I spent the night on my laptop.”

“Reading my email.”

“Yes.”

By now, each knew that the other had been through their personal things, and were both working on the assumption that the intrusion was absolute, but that was not the case. George had got no further than the photo album, and Josh had likewise seen little more than the pictorial biography of their life apart, from George’s point of view, and thirty or so email messages. It was only now, with Josh’s next words that this became apparent.

“I didn’t read all of your emails, but the ones that I did—you never say how you really feel about us, do you? And that’s what bothered me, you know? I thought you were just keeping it from me, but all those messages to Ellie and not once do you say outright how you feel. The photos you’ve kept tell the same story as mine, but the words…”

“Hold it right there, Joshua.” George put down his coffee and went upstairs, returning a short while later with the big suitcase and using it to push the table out of the way. Josh watched on in puzzlement, as he left the room again, this time bringing back with him the rug from his bedroom floor.

“See all of this?” he said, nodding at the suitcase and Josh’s pile of documents, whilst spreading the rug on top of the underlay. “This has come between us for long enough.” He smoothed the rug and sat on it, his back resting against the sofa, then patted the space beside him. Josh raised an eyebrow, a smile creeping onto his face as he slid to the floor.

“No more lies, OK?” he said.

“OK,” George agreed reluctantly, because this felt a lot like entrapment.

“Do you remember when we cycled along the canal bank and you swerved to avoid those ducklings and fell off your bike?”

“How could I possibly forget?”

“And we were going to camp out in my back garden.”

“Ha ha. We were, weren’t we?”

“And you were going to tell me a secret.”

“Yeah. But I had to go to hospital.”

“What was it?”

“I, err, I can’t remember.”

Josh twisted around, carefully extracting from the pile an aged and fragile piece of purple sugar paper, on which was stuck the most dreadfully out of perspective drawing of a tower block, and below it a short, handwritten poem:

This is where my friend lives,

High up there, on the ninth floor.

I’d like to go and play, but he

Won’t open his front door.

He says he doesn’t live here,

But I followed him one day.

He counted out two hundred stairs

And gave the game away.

When people ask him where he lives

He’s frightened as a mouse.

He even tells the teachers

That he lives in a big house.

But I know where my friend lives:

It’s a big house in the sky.

I’d like to go and play some day

Then he won’t have to lie.

She wasn’t sure how she didn’t hear it ring, but there was the missed call to prove it. Adele dialled her voicemail and held the phone to her ear with one hand whilst using the other to organise cleansers and moisturisers for her next client: one Ms. Eleanor Davenport. She hung up and clapped her hands in delight.

Not so delighted was the recipient of a similar message, sitting at a desk loaded with a week’s worth of unfiled paperwork due to life’s other far from little distractions, not to mention a PA on sick leave with flu. No voicemail, though; just a terse text message stating that Andy and Dan had secured a cancellation and would be back by late Saturday afternoon.

When George finally pulled himself together, having fled the room in tears some twenty minutes previously, he and Josh agreed that however painful, shocking or embarrassing their confessions, they would stay where they were until they’d worked through everything. Even now, as he unlocked the case, he was again overwhelmed by the poem. All right, it wasn’t going to see Josh being named Poet Laureate any time soon, but it wasn’t bad for a second year high school English assignment. To think he’d known all this time and kept it to himself. George sniffed and blinked away the tears.

“I don’t know where to start,” he said emotionally. “And there was I, thinking I’d be mortified if anyone ever set eyes on these…things. Yet, you shared that with me. I…I…” He was off again. Josh rolled his eyes.

“Man up, Morley. It’s going to get far worse than that, believe me.”

“I’m going to get a toilet roll,” George suggested and waited for approval before he left the room. His phone was on the table and it started to vibrate across the surface. Josh peered at the screen.

“Sophie’s ringing you,” he called. George returned with the roll of tissue.

“Ah, hell. That’ll be to remind me about lunch.” He reached his phone just as it stopped and called her back straight away. “Sorry, Soph. I can’t make it today.”

“Now why did I have a feeling you were going to say that?”

“I’m a big disappointment, I know.”

“Have you been crying?”

“Err, yeah. But I’m OK.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah, thanks. I’ve got to sort something out. Are you free tomorrow?”

“Ohh. I suppose so. It best be important.”

“It’s more important than you’d ever imagine.”

“All right. Same time tomorrow?”

“I’ll be there, I promise.”

“Hmm. I’ll believe it when I see it. Bye.”

“Bye.” George hung up. “Right. Where was I? Ah yes.” He lifted the photos out of the way and pulled out a dog-eared sketchbook, the first two-thirds of which was filled with his A Level art project. He passed it across to Josh, who ran his hand over the cover.

“Equinenergy?” he read.

“I thought it was really clever at the time.”

Josh slowly turned the pages, stopping to examine each one in turn. “It wasn’t just clever at the time. These are incredible.” The sketches portrayed horses in motion, with their profiles blurring into the background to indicate direction, and even though they were in chalk and charcoal, they were so vivid, so lifelike. “I think the only drawing I’ve seen of yours is that doodle you did when you psycho-analysed me. Now I know why you were forever hiding in the art classroom.”

“Yeah, it didn’t really go with the macho image.”

“Like I ever cared. I honestly didn’t know you were this good.” Josh’s admiration was evident.

“They’re not that great.”

“They’re tons better than my poem.” He’d passed the centre of the book now and could feel George getting fidgety. “Here.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out a tiny, black velvet bag. “This might distract you for a while.” George took it and cautiously pulled apart the draw-string top, tipping the contents onto his hand.

“No way! You kept this?” He turned the Lovehearts sweet over and ran his finger across the worn and faded letters.

“Well it does say ‘FOR KEEPS’. Oh, and I also kept this.” Again, Josh delved into his pocket, extracted the small object and dropped it into George’s hand. It was a bulb from a set of fairy lights.

“What’s this?”

“You don’t remember.” Josh had continued through the sketchbook and had now reached a page that stunned him to silence.

“Don’t remember what?” George asked, trying to hide his shame.

“When we…err…” Josh tailed off, so taken aback that he’d lost track of what he’d been about to say, because this sketch was of him and it was such a true likeness that he immediately started searching his memory for the time it related to.

“I did that when I was in Aberdeen,” George explained. “It was how I imagined you to be at the time.”

“You weren’t wrong,” Josh laughed. The drawing saw him sitting at a desk with his chin resting on his hand, deep in thought and staring into space above the piles of books that surrounded him, although it wasn’t a space really, as it contained a very smudged, rough self portrait of the artist. He turned over a couple more pages to confirm that he had reached the end. “So, anyway,” he said. He could sense George’s continued discomfort and closed the sketchbook without further comment. “That first Christmas after we started uni?”

“Hmm?” George said vaguely.

“You helped me decorate the tree.”

“I did?”

“At my grandma’s?”

“Oh. Yeah. That was when we couldn’t get the lights to work.”

“And we went and bought some spare bulbs,” Josh prompted. George nodded and smiled. He remembered now, but he wanted to hear the rest of the story. “And all the way home you kept singing ‘You Light Up My Life’, until I threatened to plug you into the mains instead. Well that, my dear friend,” Josh pointed at the tiny glass lamp, “is the only bulb left over.”

“‘You Light Up My Life’. Man, that was so cheesy,” George laughed.

“No.” Josh’s expression remained sincere. “Because maybe I’m finally going to get my chance.” George’s heartbeat quickened, although he couldn’t help himself and started to laugh again. Josh tried to look affronted, but failed.

“Yes, you’re right,” he agreed. “It is cheesy.” He took the bulb and the sweet and put them back in his pocket. “What’s next?”

George returned the sketchbook and picked up a handful of letters. “A whole lot more cheese, I’m afraid. I wrote these when I first moved to America, with no intention of you ever reading them. I nicked the idea off you, actually. I think it was Dan, or someone—whoever it was, you told them to write letters to the person who was making them feel bad, to get it out of their system.”