I fix Teddy with what I can only hope is a mildly intimidating stare. I must not be dimming the switch quite enough, because he literally flinches away from the look on my face. He takes a step back, looking suitably regretful.
Rather than bothering to threaten Teddy like the more shadowy corners of my mind hiss at me to do, I move past him and go after my partner.
Thanks to it being a townhouse, the staircase is narrow and steep. It makes me feel like a hippo traversing a dollhouse.
The second floor is a lot tidier than downstairs was. There are four doors, and I find Leo standing outside one of them. He’s got his bicep pressed up against the door, the opposite hand gripping the door handle. He’s speaking in a low, coaxing voice to the thin crease between the door and doorway. I go over to him, keeping some distance between us as Leo attempts to convince his mum to come out of the bathroom
“Come on, mum,” Leo says, jiggling the door handle. “It’s me. We need to go home.”
“Fuck off!” a high female voice shouts from the other side of the door. “I’m not leaving!”
Leo releases a weary sigh, already so done with all of this, and it seems he’s barely started.
“Party’s over,” he calls out to her. “Time to collect a plastic bag with a slice of supermarket birthday cake in it and piss off.”
“Fun police,” Leo’s mum accuses, her voice echoing strangely. “Go away. Tell Teddy he’s a bastard, and I hate him.”
Leo takes his hand off the handle and smacks the door, hard.
“Mum, I’m not your fucking messenger pigeon.” He huffs irately. “Besides, Teddy already knows he’s a bastard. That’s his entire aesthetic.”
There’s a short pause where Leo looks over at me, an apologetic grimace on his face.
After a few tense seconds, his mum replies with a definite, “I’mnotleaving, Leo.”
“Why not?” He smacks the door again. “Did Teddy break up with you again or something?” He sounds slightly mocking about it, which I doubt will help, but hey. Maybe his mother will respond better to acerbic prodding.
Banging noises come from inside the bathroom, the unmistakable racket of someone trying to stand up inside a bath. If she was lying down in the bath before, that would explain the echoing of her voice.
Then there’s the sound of someone definitely failing to stand up in a bath and falling back down into it again. Pained yelping accompanies it, followed by equally pained complaining.
“Go away!” Leo’s mum shouts angrily, his goading about Teddy having apparently had some effect if not the desired one. “I don’t want to see you.” Her voice turns unnervingly spiteful. “I’m sick of you bulldozing your way into my life and ruining things for me, Leo.”
Leo doesn’t react to this like I expect him to. Instead of becoming angry or defensive, he releases a shallow sigh and lightly bangs his temple against the door.
“You’re killing me, Mum,” he calls to her, his tone decidedly sardonic. “You’re actually killing me.”
“Fucking hell, you sound just like her,” his mum snarls back at him. “All I can hear when you talk is Anabelle. I hate it. I hateher.”
“I hate you” goes unsaid. But it certainly doesn’t go unheard if the way Leo sucks in a sharp, pained breath is anything to go by.
“Mum, please,” Leo says, his voice sounding almost wet, like he’s trying not to show how hurt he is by his mother’s words but can only just stem the tide. He presses his temple to the door again and repeats his request. “Please.”
Right, that’s it. Cajole-the-drunk-woman time is officially over. Let’s try some good old-fashioned force.
“Okay, so I’m done with this,” I say, grabbing hold of Leo’s shoulder and yanking him out of the way.
Leo allows himself to be moved but frowns at me in confusion when I place myself in front of the door. “What are you doing?”
I look sideways at him and give the obvious answer.
“Getting into a very one-sided fight with this door.”
Leo’s eyes widen, and he opens his mouth, maybe to protest this course of action. I don’t give him the chance.
All it takes is one solid kick for me to break the bathroom door’s shoddy lock. Wood splinters, and the door crashes open theatrically, revealing a moderately large bathroom with a claw-foot tub containing a bedraggled-looking woman who can only be Leo’s mum.
I was partially right about them looking the same. They share the ice-blue eyes and black hair as well as the same refined facial features, though Leo’s mum’s are softer and more feminine. What I was wrong about, however, was the smile. Leo’s mum doesn’t look like she’s capable of smiling, let alone giving me her son’s fully watted smile of joyful, bloody abandon.
