Leo was sitting alone in the dark, which he appreciated was a sad sack thing to do. Even worse, he was listening to Whitney Houston, but he did have a can of beer in his hand, which to Leo’s mind sort of evened things out. He had got stuff to do, but he wasn’t sure what, and he didn’t know if he could be bothered with it anyway. He should probably iron a shirt for work tomorrow, but if he kept his jacket on then no one would see the creases.
The doorbell rang and he considered ignoring it, but it was ringing in a particularly persistent manner and whoever it was didn’t seem to be in a rush to go away. Leo padded out to the hall.
When he opened the door, Grant and Lard were standing there grinning inanely.
‘We have curry,’ Grant announced cheerily. ‘We have beer. We have a DVD of Manchester United’s golden moments. We have all that is required for a good time.’
‘Nearly all,’ Leo said miserably.
‘The lap dancer said she’d be along later,’ Lard told him with a wink.
‘Oh good.’ Leo smiled at them tiredly. ‘Come on in.’
In the lounge, Grant threw him a worried look. ‘Whitney Houston?’
‘It’s a temporary phase.’
‘I’m glad to hear it, mate.’ Grant cut Whitney off in mid-warble and replaced her with the White Stripes.
‘How are you feeling?’ Lard asked sincerely. ‘Really feeling?’
‘Fantastic,’ Leo replied. ‘I’m really feeling really fantastic.’
‘You will,’ Grant said, clapping him so heartily on the back that he nearly fell over.
They went through to the kitchen and Leo stood there being as useless as a chocolate teapot while Grant and Lard washed some plates and dished out heaps of biriani and onion bhajis and piles of poppadoms. Neither of them mentioned what a state his kitchen or, indeed his life, was in. Grant sang while he ladled out the vegetable curry and, call Leo slow on the uptake, but he then twigged that this forced bonhomie was all for his benefit. Part of the Rehabilitate Leo Plan. Even though he was still a miserable old git and he was absolutely sure that it wouldn’t work, he was touched that they had gone to so much trouble on his behalf.
Succulent pieces of chicken tikka steamed gently in a silver-foil tray. No refined Indian gentleman popping up to serve it this time though. But for the first time in weeks, the smell of the spices pricked at Leo’s appetite. He wasn’t sure whether he’d eaten at all today, but suddenly he realised that he was starving.
‘Can’t you do something to help, you lazy bastard?’ his dear friend Grant said over his shoulder.
‘I’ll get us some more beers,’ Leo said, and turned his attention to the fridge to hide the fact that he felt like crying again.
Two hours later. Curry gone. And beer. All merry. Happy times. Happy times. Drink. Drink. Lots of drink. Sat in row on sofa. Watched football. With mates. Leo loved Grant. Loved Lard too. Great mates. The best. David Beckham. Also best. Loved Dave too. Loved Emma most of all. Manchester United Golden Moments. Top DVD. Much scoring. Naff off, Whitney Houston. Sloppy, sloppy, terrible music. All bollocks. Sorry, Emma.
‘Goal! Goal! Goal!’
Mexican wave on sofa. Leo stood up. Wobble. Cheering. Cheering. Hoorah!
Leo. ‘Boys. Boys. Sing-song. Sing-song.’
Grant and Lard stood up. Wobble. Wobble.
Leo. ‘There’s only one David Beckham!’
All. ‘There’s only one David Beckham! One David Beckham! There’s only one David Beckham!’
Not so pissed. Saw Grant and Lard exchange relieved glance. Top mates. Ha! Old Leo was back. David Beckham saviour of all mankind. Emma sexiest bird on planet. Hurrah! Fell over. Ouff!
Seventeen cups of coffee and a little doze later and they were all a bit more sober and righteous. And who knew what it was, maybe the curry, the booze or the fact that Manchester United were the top team in the universe, but something had shifted inside of Leo and he knew that from now on, things could only get better.
Grant and Lard were at the kitchen sink and they were washing Leo’s dishes. They were also wearing aprons which they had found who knows where. They must surely have been something to do with Isobel. Leo’s heart squeezed at the thought of her and the fact that he was never likely to see her again – no bumping into her down at the shops or the pub, no catching a glimpse of her on a passing bus – but he didn’t feel quite the amount of hopelessness that he previously had. Isobel had been an important part of his life and he’d never forget her, but he saw that it would be possible to let go. He’d learned a lot from her and he should put all this new knowledge to good use and not squander it as he’d squandered everything else in his life.
Before he was berated for his lack of domesticity, he started to cram the empty foil cartons and remnants of the curry into a black bin bag.
‘You need a dishwasher,’ Grant said.
‘I do not.’
‘You do.’
‘You need to get out more,’ Lard said.
‘I do not.’
‘You do.’
Now they were all sober and they realised that Leo wasn’t about to top himself, they clearly thought they were safe to nag him again. He thought Grant and Lard would make a wonderful couple.
‘You need a woman to look after you,’ Grant said.
‘I definitely do not!’
‘You do!’ Grant and Lard insisted in unison.
‘Yeah?’ Leo sat down at the table, resisting the temptation to open another beer. ‘Look at the state of me. Miserable. Morose.’
‘Manky,’ Grant added. ‘You might be crap at relationships, Leo, but you don’t do great single either.’
‘I’m not ready for another relationship.’ He shook his head. ‘I wouldn’t want me. Who else would?’
Grant and Lard exchanged a demonic grin. ‘Emma,’ they said.
‘No. No. No. Many times no.’ Leo held up his hands. ‘I have hurt that woman enough.’
‘True,’ they agreed.
‘Anyway. What about you?’ Leo frowned at Grant. ‘I thought you and Emma were getting . . .’ He rubbed his arms up and down himself in a seductive manner.
‘Oh, Leo.’ Grant sighed at him. ‘When are you going to learn? If you could ever get your two brain cells to collide it would be a cataclysmic event.’
‘Perhaps I should stand aside and let you get on with it.’
‘She happens to be in love with someone else.’
Leo was horrified. ‘Who?’
Grant turned to Lard. ‘You hold him down while I knock some sense into that stupid thick skull of his.’
Leo gazed at them incredulously. ‘She’s still in love with me?’
They both rolled their eyes.
‘She can’t be,’ he said. ‘I’m such a pain in the arse. She has told me many times and in many different ways. She won’t even take my calls.’
Grant and Lard gave him one of their special looks.
‘I’m not saying it would be easy,’ Grant said. ‘You’d need a very cunning plan.’
‘Emma wouldn’t want me back with a bow tied round me.’ A rush of warmth flooded into his body. Suddenly there was hope in his wounded heart. ‘Would she?’
Chapter Eighty-Seven
I’m meeting Jo and Caron for lunch at their favourite haunt down by the River Thames, but I’ve got some time to kill and am stocking up on a few bits and pieces to see me through the weekend at my other favourite haunt – the Hay’s Galleria. I’ve bought my friends a few little trinkets too, for being so fabulous over the last few weeks. I don’t know how I would have managed without them.
The weekdays aren’t too bad – when I’m busy at work and I often stay late researching and planning new exhibitions just to avoid going home – but the weekends loom large ahead of me and they’re sheer torture. Friends are great, but they’re not the same as having a partner waiting for you to slob around with.
I’m going to see Caron again tonight, but we aren’t going out on the town. There’s only
so much enforced partying that I can stand and I’ve pretty much reached my limit. Instead, I’m planning to regroup and conserve my energies. Which essentially means that Caron and I are going to sit in and watch yet another DVD featuring an unattainable man. Jo, despite her disgust at men who want only casual sex, doesn’t seem to be able to manage without it for any longer than a week or two either – so she’s hitting the clubs with the intention of getting soundly laid. No doubt we’ll hear about her tawdry escapades during the week.
This morning, I’ve been to see my mother who is now, thankfully, back at home, ensconced in her downstairs makeshift bedroom. I think that she still looks frail, but there’s no doubt she’s making a good recovery. My father is running round, catering to Mummy’s every whim, like a teenager in love. It’s both wonderful and heartbreaking to see. My mother has never been incapacitated in her entire life and it’s strange to see her so dependent on other people. It’s even stranger to see my father coping so well. If ever there’s a silver lining on a cloud it’s the fact that Daddy has somehow broken down his own emotional barriers and is now openly affectionate to his wife – and, even more bizarrely – to everyone else around him. He even smiled at the spotty teenager who delivered his newspaper today. There’s no doubting that my parents are still deeply in love despite all that life has thrown at them. They have magic in their lives and there aren’t many people who can count themselves so lucky. It gives me hope for the future. Even a future without Leo.
Leo has been home for weeks now and has given up calling me. And even though I kept hanging up on him when he did, I do really want to talk to him now. I could call him, but I haven’t managed to summon up the courage to do that yet. Perhaps we’re both too stubborn for our own good. It could also be that Leo has moved on, has found someone new, and this really is the end for us. I shift the weight of my carrier bags in my hands. We had such great potential and I still find it hard to believe that we managed to fritter it away so easily. We have both been stupid in taking each other for granted. But, when all is said and done, Leo is still probably more stupid than me.
Leo came out of the novelty gifts store, clutching at his bulging carrier bags. This was a complete trial for him as he wasn’t a natural shopper. He was a man for a start and men just didn’t have the right genes for it. This, however, was important shopping. So important that Leo had even scribbled down a list for himself. And he hadn’t lost it. He wanted to get everything perfect, so nothing would be left to chance – or to his two cohorts. He must accomplish this feat alone. The amount he’d spent was making him feel dizzy and he decided he must consume some strong alcohol before he’d be capable of moving on to attempt phase two.
Leo headed towards the nearest bar in search of some medicinal Budweiser and as he did, he saw Emma coming out of one of the other shops. His heart nearly stopped beating. She was swinging down the middle of the arcade, smiling. He thought she’d lost some weight – which she’d like. But he had to say, she looked great. Happy and perky. Without him. And Leo wondered whether Lard and Grant had read this whole situation wrong. They were convinced that Emma still held a torch for him, but Leo didn’t know if that was the case. She didn’t exactly look miserable. He had to conclude that she’d usually looked an awful lot more miserable when he was with her. Was it insane to place his trust in two men who were just as clueless as he was when it came to reading what women want? Leo thought it might well be so. But they had helped him to get Isobel home and he supposed he could do worse than rely on their instincts again.
Emma was heading straight towards him. He felt like a rabbit trapped in the headlights, standing there with his arms chock-full of carrier bags. This was dastardly timing, indeed. He didn’t want to bump into her now when he wasn’t prepared. It reminded him of the day they saw each other here when he was shopping with Isobel and how it felt to see Emma with another man – a man he’d thought she was planning to marry. That left him more than breathless. He could never let that happen again. Leo felt panicky. Was this plan madness? Should he just shout out to Emma now and take his chances? They could maybe have lunch, a coffee – break the ice that had developed between them that way. Leo looked down at his carrier bags; he felt he’d come too far to veer from his chosen route now, although his courage nearly deserted him. She was a few metres away from him. Any second now they’d be face to face. A group of American students pushed their way past him, laughing and giggling, chattering in high-pitched East Coast accents. Leo lost sight of her in the tide of people, even though he stood on tiptoe and looked over their heads. By the time they’d passed by, he looked up and saw that Emma was walking away from him. And he thought that, for the moment, it was probably a good thing.
Chapter Eighty-Eight
Leo could do this. He could do this. He was pacing up and down outside the very smart florist’s shop in the Galleria. It was true that he’d had a drink, but he was trying to curb his dependence on all things alcoholic. It had brought him nothing but trouble and was, obviously, along with money, the root of all evil. This situation, however, counted as exceptional circumstances and had required a few swift glasses of beer for courage. Leo made no excuses for his weakness.
There was a very lovely lady standing inside behind the counter in the florist’s and she was looking at Leo as if he was a stalker. This was primarily because this wasn’t his first time of pacing up and down outside. For half an hour now he’d been hoping that a suitably bribable child would pop up – but he was out of luck. This particular mission, it seemed, was going to be down to himself entirely. He chewed at his fingernails and he could feel sweat peppering his brow. Now he was making her look nervous. Leo knew what it felt like to suffer agonies of indecision.
With a deep breath he dived inside the shop. The woman looked suitably terrified and he was sure he could see her hand hovering over a panic button. This was possibly worse than buying underwear. ‘I . . . I . . . I . . .’ My goodness, he’d developed a stammer! ‘I . . . I . . .’
‘Yes?’ She tried to give him an encouraging look.
‘I . . . I . . .’ Leo’s hands had gone clammy and he was feeling faint. He wished he hadn’t had a drink now. Leo was sure she could smell it on his breath. ‘I . . . I . . .’
‘You’d like to buy some flowers?’
‘Yes.’ A sigh of relief rushed out of his mouth. ‘I’d like to buy some flowers.’
‘Roses?’
Leo wiped his damp palms on his trousers. ‘Roses would be lovely.’
She smiled at him and went over to a stand that had a display of a dozen different colours of roses in stainless steel vases. ‘Is it for a romantic occasion?’ she asked.
‘Yes,’ he said, with an over-enthusiastic nod. ‘A romantic occasion.’
‘Then I think red roses, don’t you?’
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Red. Red is good.’
The florist smiled at him again. ‘There,’ she said. ‘That wasn’t so bad, was it?’
‘No,’ Leo said. ‘That wasn’t so bad.’
‘And how many would you like?’
‘About two hundred, I think.’
The florist went pale. ‘Two hundred?’
‘Yes. More if you have them.’
‘Do you have any idea how much that’s going to cost?’
‘No,’ he said. ‘Whatever it is, it will be worth it. But I need them today.’
‘I . . . I . . . I’ll have to ring round our other shops,’ she said. Now she’d developed a stammer. ‘But I’m sure we can do that.’
‘I’ll take what you have now,’ Leo told her. ‘Can you have the rest of them delivered as soon as possible? I have things to do.’
‘Yes,’ she answered in a vaguely stunned way. ‘I’m sure we can do that.’
Now she was looking terrified whereas Leo was gaining confidence by the minute. He handed over his address and an awful lot of plastic money. Then he took his leave of this lovely lady and strode outside the shop with a carrier bag fille
d with roses, heads peeping out. Leo had no idea why he had avoided this flower-buying lark for so long. It felt great.
Half an hour later and he was nearing home. Leo shifted his shopping against his chest. He was sure his arms were considerably longer than they were when he had set out, but he didn’t care. Leo had worked his way through the greatest hits of Queen on his way home and was now on to ‘It’s a Kind of Magic’ at the top of his voice. He even tried a few dance steps. It had worked for Gene Kelly, it could work for Leo. The sun was out. The birds were singing. Strangers smiled at his one-man concert rather than avoiding him. Old and faithful Ethel was parked patiently outside awaiting his return. Leo went over to her and kissed her roof. ‘You and I are going to look irresistible,’ he said. ‘You just wait and see.’
Leo sprinted up the stairs – even though he was weighed down with a dozen different carrier bags – and just as he went to open the door, his lovely neighbour Dominic came out. ‘Hello, lovely neighbour,’ Leo said brightly. ‘How the hell are you?’
‘Fine,’ Dominic said, looking decidedly shifty. ‘I’m fine.’
‘Good. Bloody hell, you look miserable, mate.’
‘I’m fine,’ he repeated. Then he shrugged. ‘Lydia and I have had a bit of a tiff.’
‘Bugger,’ Leo said. ‘Women. Thought she’d left you?’
‘She’s back,’ Dominic said tightly.
Leo grimaced apologetically. ‘Behind with the news. Haven’t seen you in ages.’
‘No,’ Dominic said. ‘But I understand you’ve been away.’
‘And now I’m back,’ Leo told him. ‘Da! Da!’
‘Good.’
Leo pulled a beautiful red rose out of his carrier bag with a flourish. ‘Give this to Lydia,’ he said. ‘Tell her you love her.’ And, just to show what a nice guy he was, Leo gave Dominic a big kiss on the cheek. He was sure he saw his neighbour flinch.
‘How’s Emma?’ he asked croakily.
‘Wonderful,’ Leo said. ‘Very wonderful. And very soon she’s going to think I am too!’
‘Give Emma my love,’ Dominic said quietly. He clutched the rose to him. ‘Tell her I send my love.’