‘I’m sorry. Twice now.’
‘I don’t offend easy.’
‘So I can switch hats from defence to prosecution?’
Loris leans against the back worktop underneath the neon lights, which array his highlighted brown hair in golden shades. ‘Hit me.’
‘You played along. You led me on.’
‘And you offend easy.’
‘No, I…’ Charles laces his fingers around his glass. ‘I don’t believe I do. But it was important to me to talk about my passion, so to realise you were just waiting to mock it was offensive, yes.’
‘I couldn’t miss this opportunity to outwit you. I’m a bit of a smartarse.’
‘You don’t say.’
Loris laughs, massaging his arm again. ‘I apologise in return, for mocking you, but I’d never mock how important Olwinski is to you. I hid my knowledge at first because I was super intrigued. Findingyour collector pen was a bombshell. And I saw your reaction when you got it back, but I wasn’t sure if it was a pen thing, aLandsthing, or a bit of both. I wanted to check what Olwinski means to you before turning into the biggest fanboy. You would have mocked me.’
‘I’m not a smartarse, I don’t mock, and you fanboy over Olwinski?’
‘I want a tattoo of his coat of arms, but I’m scared of needles.’
‘Alright… Colour me shocked.’
Charles assumed the worst when he labelled Loris as an Olwinski detractor. He needs to process and assimilate this shift in the situation – as well as the discovery that the placid smartarse is squeamish about something, which is reassuring.
‘In that case, why did you…’
Charles trails off and turns around when the door creaks open. A woman with white bobbed hair plods in and puts empty glasses collected outside onto the first table.
‘Hey, boss. How was your date?’
‘Dull as fuck. Did Richie bring back the van keys?’
‘Yep!’
‘Nice, gonna save me a trip tomo— Jesus, boy, I’d aim better after ten brandies.’
Loris completely missed his throw, so the keys landed in the middle of the room. Charles slips from his stool with a chuckle and picks them up as the woman steps closer, revealing her grumpy face.
Charles gives her the keys, her sunken eyes bore into him, and his brain splits in half.
The pub looks the same, but the bob of hair around the woman’s grumpy face is grey. Half as tall, Charles is hopping and crying in fake pain. He begs her to call someone, hiccupping that his ankle hurts, but every time she asks for a name, he cries louder. Next to him, George is transfixed, unable to answer her questions. He’s not acting, he’s trulypetrified, because she’s terrifying. They’ve heard rumours of children being cooked in the basement of this pub, so why did they let Liv and Fred talk them into this? No video game is worth the risk of ending up in a stew pot.
The woman is losing patience when George’s sister storms in. ‘There you are, boys! I’m sorry for the trouble, Madam. I’ve got them now!’ Charles is so relieved he forgets about his fake injury, but George elbows him, so he hobbles to the door. Liv supports him until they turn at the corner, then she instructs them to run, and Charles’ heart starts racing. He won’t be chopped into a stew. And he did it. He actually did it.
Liv drags them to the left, to the right, and finally into a cul-de-sac. Fred is waiting there, sitting on the cases of Peroni bottles they stole from the pub van – to smuggle in at Liv’s sixteenth birthday party.
Charles speeds up, and Fred jumps to his feet, arms open. Cracking up, he catches Charles, who feels so proud he could burst. Proud, invincible and ready for any mission Fred may give him.
‘You were fantastic, Charlie!’
‘Charles?’
‘Thank you!’
‘Charles!’
