Resolved, he left the station behind and ventured out onto the streets of Paddington. The set of keys he’d shoved in his bag felt suddenly heavier, and it wasn’t long before the building that had once housed Black Star Ink loomed into view. As Calum got closer, it appeared the shop was being converted into a café. His heart sank. He’d known from the client who’d appeared in Porthkennack that the shop had been stripped, and with builders already at work, there was little chance that anything left inside had survived the renovations.
Calum approached the studio he’d briefly been proud of. With its new hot-pink colour scheme, he hardly recognised the place—even the girls in the nail bar next door were different.
“All right there, mate?”
Calum turned to the builder who’d called out. “Yeah, I used to work here. Just looking for some stuff. Seen any tattoo equipment lying around?”
“Tattoo equipment? You mean needles and shit?”
“Nah. It’s an old tattoo machine, a heap of crap, really, but it has sentimental value, so I’m hoping it got left behind.”
The workman jumped down from his stepladder and hollered into the back of the shop. “Oi! Curly! Get out here, dick-splash.”
A younger man—Curly, presumably—appeared, covered in paint and dust. “What’s all the shouting?”
“Him over there used to work here. Says he’s looking for some tattoo shit. What happened to that box we found in the office a few days ago?”
“It’s in the skip, innit.”
“Where’s the skip?” Calum asked. He hadn’t seen one outside.
“It’s at our other site down the road,” the first man said. “The barber’s next to the Abbey National.”
Calum frowned. Where the fuck was the Abbey National? He’d never heard—
“He means Santander,” Curly said. “Stev’s stuck in the nineties. We’ve had the bloody Charlatans on repeat all fucking day.”
Calum thanked the builders and left them to their bickering. Santander was in sight of the studio, and it didn’t take long to spot the skip outside.
He approached it with wary hope. Dottie was a vintage machine, worth more than three of the sleek new ones Brix had at Blood Rush, but—and it was a big but—as far as Calum knew, Rob had no idea of her value, so there was a chance that he hadn’t flogged her on eBay.
The skip was full, piled high with rubble and junk. Calum peered over the side, then caught the eye of a workman. “Stev and Curly sent me to look for something.”
“Have at it, mate.” The workman nodded disinterestedly. “It’s being collected tonight.”
Calum climbed over the side of the skip and rummaged around, seizing any scrap of cardboard he came across in case it was the elusive box. He’d about given up hope by the time his hands scraped the side of the battered Amazon box he’d once kept flash posters in.
Stomach in his mouth, he eased the box out from beneath a pile of broken bricks. At the top, he found mostly parts to the sterilising machine Rob must’ve taken, and then damaged packs of gloves and antiseptic. The hope in his chest faded, but then, right at the bottom, was the scuffed tattoo gun he’d carried since his apprentice days. Dottie. Calum’s heart leapt. She was in many bits, but he’d found her, and now that she was safe in his arms, there was no reason for him to stay in London a moment longer.
He wrapped Dottie in his coat and scrambled out of the skip, ignoring the curious gaze of a nearby plumber. His phone buzzed as his feet hit the ground: a message . . . from Brix.
Calum activated the phone. With all the trepidation of returning to London, he’d forgotten to call Brix back. Though it wasn’t Brix’s way, he half expected to see a barrage of abuse on the screen, but as he touched the message to open it, perspective prevailed. Despite how complicated their friendship had become, this was Brix, not Rob, and always would be. Calum read the message and the metaphorical door on London closed a little bit more, even as he turned towards the station, and Brix’s text message set off a chain reaction in his overstimulated mind.
Pls come home. So much to tell u
Calum didn’t doubt it, and as he replayed every moment he’d spent with Brix in Porthkennack, pushing the magic of the sea aside, tiny pieces of a puzzle he’d never thought to look for slotted into place.
Oh, Brix.
Brix sat in the idling van, tracking the trickle of commuters who periodically emerged from Truro train station, and ignoring the strongest urge he’d had to smoke in months. An urge that kept his fingers busy tapping the dashboard, his knee, and anything else he touched.
“Take a minute. Calm yourself, lad. You’re like a cat in heat.”
“You shouldn’t have gone out, Dad. Not at your age.”
“Oh aye? Well, if you’d bought me a few ales like you’d said you would, I’d have been too bloody drunk, eh?”
John Lusmoore’s logic had made a sick kind of sense, though Brix had found himself unable to heed the snark-hidden pearl of wisdom.
