“You treated me like I was something you’d trodden in, so I thought I’d act that way so you weren’t disappointed. And that wasn’t even a hard punch.” It was, but it wouldn’t hurt him to think I could hit harder.
“I’m sorry.” He starts to blubber.
I walk away and head towards one of the doors, opening it to find a bedroom that’s bigger than the first floor in our home back in Cornwall, but nowhere near as comfortable. I can still hear William crying but now he’s on his feet and coming into the room that I’m not sure I’ll chose.
His fists are up and he looks like he’s going to fight, but it’s such a bad stance I start laughing.
“Why are you laughing at me?”
“Have you ever actually fought anyone before?”
“Yes.”
“Liar.”
He doesn’t argue.
“I don’t want you here.”
“I don’t want to be here.” He may as well know the truth.
“Dad says you got the brains. He thinks you can help me.” His hands drop to his sides.
“I’ll bet.” Because it makes sense now. I’m the bastard son of a politician with a legacy to leave, only his heir isn’t all that.
“Will you help me?”
I tip my head to one side. “It depends.”
“On what?”
“What I get in return.”
Chapter Four
When I was a boy growing up in Cornwall, January was the darkest month. The tourists who rose in numbers slightly over Christmas had all gone, the cafes and restaurants and gift shops all closed for the month or even longer. It was a ghost town.
But it was the month when Ivy and I were the freest. We could run around the coastal paths and the streets with our friends and those we weren’t friends with without fear of getting into trouble for being too loud or giddy. The town was ours.
The beach wasn’t.
It was this month that the surfers arrived, January making the tides wilder and the sea harder to tame. It was January when Ivy first had her heart broken and I broke her lover’s nose and was arrested for the first time. The first month.
The sky today is just as grey and colourless as those Januaries in Cornwall, and the tides are again unpredictable and wild, although these are different tides.
The loch is still grey. Any blue it had in summer has been erased by the winter and it’s shrouded in a mist that I don’t think will ever lift, not until Ben’s returned.
So maybe never.
I arrived just an hour ago, a long and laborious drive from London to the Loch, using motorways drenched in rain, the spray hazardous and the trip consuming too much time. It’s a visit I didn’t want to make, the aftermath of William’s attack lingering across the media, because as usual someone had told and we’d had to apply so much spin the words were dizzy.
Micky knew the name of one of William’s attackers. He would’ve told Blair. I didn’t need to be here as these were conversations that could be had via a phone call, but I needed to see her, to talk about Ben while no one was there and it was just the two of us, remembering him, trying to conjure him up from the mist.
The loch is tumultuous. Its waves are wild, as if some beast from deep within it is restless and mad. I stand on its banks, the water reaching my shoes and the low cloud prevents me from seeing any further than a few metres in front. The mountains aren’t visible and the birds don’t fly.
Not today.
Stones crunch behind me, two sets of feet, but there are no words. I turn around and see Blair and Micky, their breath visible in the cold air.
