“I used to know, didn’t I?” Jodi said when Rupert didn’t answer. “And now you know everything about me and I know nothing about you.”
The sadness in Jodi’s tone made Rupert look up. “What do you want to know?”
Jodi shrugged. “Dunno. I like talking to you, though. Did we used to talk a lot before?”
Rupert smiled in spite of the weight dragging his heart through the mud. “Yeah, we talked. You were the best friend I ever had.”
If that meant anything to Jodi, it didn’t show. His only response was another absent shrug before he rose from the couch and left the room.
* * *
“Where are you going?”
Rupert glanced over his shoulder as he stamped into his scruffy trainers. “Sainsbury’s. Why? Do you need me for something?”
“No.”
Jodi leaned on the living room doorframe, hands in his pockets, looking for all the world like he didn’t give a shit, but his dark, brooding gaze compelled Rupert to close the distance between them. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.”
“Sure? I can stay if you want? Wait until Sophie gets here tomorrow? We’ll have to order Domino’s for breakfast, but—”
“I want to come with you.”
It was the last thing Rupert had expected Jodi to say. Aside from his many medical appointments, Jodi rarely left the flat at all. “You want to come to the supermarket?”
“I want to go with you.”
“With me?”
Jodi started to roll his eyes but seemed to change his mind. “I think I feel better when I’m with you. I know that doesn’t make sense, but everything is more ... logical, maybe.”
Rupert had been lost for words many times since the moment he’d met Jodi, but this felt like the first time all over again. Like it had been that long since Jodi had truly wanted to be in his presence. “I guess you’d better write us a list, then.”
Half an hour later found them in the frozen section of the closest supermarket, trying to decipher Jodi’s scrawled list.
“It could be sausages,” Jodi remarked sagely. “Or maybe salami?”
“It definitely isn’t salami.” Rupert squinted at the list. “And you don’t like frozen sausages. You never let me buy them before. Said they were full of trotters and ball sacks.”
“They probably are. What was my handwriting like before the accident? Was it legible?
“Just. To be honest, it wasn’t much better than this.”
“That’s what Sophie said.”
Jodi seemed relieved, though it left them no clearer as to what they were looking for. Rupert was beginning to regret challenging him to open the fridge-freezer and write down what he thought was missing.
“Maybe it’s aBnot anS?” Jodi’s frown deepened.
“Fuck it.” Rupert crumpled the list into a ball and tossed it into the empty trolley. “Just get whatever you fancy.”
Jodi coughed and turned away, grabbing a package from the nearest fridge.
“Potato waffles?” Rupert raised an eyebrow.
Defiance flashed in Jodi’s eyes. “Yeah.”
