Rupert caught it before it shut in his face. “Can we sort out January’s dates while I’m here? I’ve got my shifts.”
“Really? Now?” Jen’s sneer morphed into the irritated frown she saved for Rupert. “You’d better come in, then.”
Rupert followed Jen and Indie into the plush townhouse they shared with Jen’s latest squeeze—a mild-mannered banker with more money than sense, who was rarely around when Rupert brought Indie home.
Indie disappeared upstairs while Jen led Rupert to the kitchen and retrieved a diary from a drawer. “You can have her the second and fourth weekends. What week days do you want?”
Rupert breathed a silent sigh of relief. Not having Indie overnight until the second weekend of the New Year gave him some breathing space. He handed Jen a list of possible afternoons he could take Indie out for tea.
Jen studied them, keeping him waiting long enough to remind him that she called the shots. “These look fine, but I’ll have to check with Roger. I’ll email you.”
“Fine. I put January’s maintenance in your account this morning.”
Jen raised an eyebrow. Rupert had never missed a payment, but he’d been a few days late more times than he cared to admit, and never ever early. “What’s the occasion?”
Rupert shrugged. “Just getting things in order. I’ve got a lot going on.”
“Your boy toy out of hospital yet?”
“What do you care?” Rupert glanced around, looking for Indie, but she was still upstairs. “And don’t call him that. It’s not fair on Indie.”
Jen rolled her eyes. “Whatever. I just want to know if I’ve got to put up with another six months of Indie asking me about him every ten seconds. If you’ve split up, you should tell her.”
“We haven’t split up. You know why I haven’t let her see him.” Rupert ground the words out through clenched teeth, knowing Jen would interpret his anger as the usual irritation that simmered between them. An interpretation that suited him because, in reality, Jen didn’t have a clue. She’d assumed that children hadn’t been allowed on the neurological ward, and Rupert had never corrected her. She had no idea of the ongoing extent of Jodi’s injuries, and Rupert wanted to keep it that way. It wasn’t beyond Jen to fill Indie’s head with all kinds of horrors, and the less ammunition she had, the better. “Anyway, I’d better be off. Can I call Indie down to say goodbye?”
“Okay, but don’t take too long. It’s past her bedtime.”
It wasn’t, but Rupert didn’t care to argue. It never got him anywhere. He called Indie down and gathered her to him in the bear hug she loved so much. “See you soon, kiddo, yeah? Have a nice time at Grandma’s.”
Indie squeezed him back with her tiny arms. “See you soon, Daddy, over the moon. Will you show Jodi my trains for me? And give him the pictures I drew him?”
Rupert closed his eyes and thought of the stacks of crayon drawings he’d hidden on top of the fridge at home. “Course I will. I love you, sweetie.”
“Love you, Daddy.”
Rupert showed himself out and caught another bus to take him to Camberwell. It was a long route, taking nearly an hour, and he was half-asleep by the time it stopped across the road from the hospital. Yawning, he hauled himself off the bus and drifted to the hospital’s main entrance. He hadn’t owned a car in years, but for some reason the parking payment machines caught his eye. The screens were lit up in bright blue on black, one of Jodi’s favourite colour combinations, but it wasn’t the graphics that stopped him short; it was the date: December 26, 2014, five years to the day since he and Jodi had met, a day—or night, really—that was etched on Rupert’s heart in indelible ink. A night that had turned his sorry world upside down and made it beautiful.
A night that seemed so far out of reach now; the neon-blue digital numbers glowed belligerently and a wave of rage swept through him, heating his bones and burning his chest. The sudden need to smash something was overwhelming.
He turned away before he could punch the screen, and pushed through the hospital’s revolving entrance. Autopilot led him upstairs to Jodi’s ward. It was after nine, the time of night Jodi usually fell asleep, and for once Rupert found himself looking forward to the still quiet of his bedside, craving the familiar discomfort of the plastic chair. He was worn out, tired to the bone, and with a six a.m. start the following morning, a few hours uncomfortable kip couldn’t come soon enough.
A nurse buzzed him into the ward. He recognised her voice, but the station was empty when he tiptoed past. Jodi’s bed was in the corner with the curtains pulled around it. Rupert slipped through them. Jodi was curled on his side, eyes closed, breathing deep and even. Rupert searched out the chair, his gaze cast downward. He drew it close to the bed and sat down, retrieving his phone from his pocket. The screen was blank. Fuck it. He’d forgotten to charge it. Not that it mattered. There was no one he wanted to speak to.
He settled into his chair and finally focussed on Jodi. Gleaming dark eyes stared back at him, alive, alert, and very much awake. Rupert blinked. “Jodi?”
Jodi sat up slowly, like a predatory cat, ready to pounce. “Who the fuck are you?”
“What?”
“Isaid, who the fuck are you?” Jodi pulled his lips into a scowl that stilled Rupert’s heart, glancing erratically around him, staring at the drip in his arm and the ID bracelet on his wrist, before returning to Rupert, the hostility in his gaze increasing with every second. “Where’s Sophie?”
Rupert grabbed Jodi’s hand as Jodi struggled to sit up. Jodi jumped and smacked his hand away.
“Don’t touch me!”
Rupert let go and tried to calm himself with gasps of air that stuck in his chest. He counted to ten and tried again. “Jodi, look at me. Do you really not know who I am?”
“What?” Jodi blinked, then glared at Rupert for a moment that seemed to go on forever. “Nope. Sorry. I don’t know who the fuck you are. Now where the hell is Sophie?”
