Breakdown (13 page)

“I don’t remember much. I guess I tried to deflect the first blow. They broke my arm. They got me good in the head, too. I had a hell of a concussion.”

“How did you get away?” Pauline managed.

“Some lorries drove up, just in time. A team from the monastery. They chased off the gang. They had medics with them. They did what they could, but it was too late for Stew. They took me with them. They said I was lucky.”

Chris shook his head and paused.

“So, I woke up in their infirmary. Brother Luke took care of me. He had some training in counseling. He tried to help. He pushed religion, though, and that made me resistant. I was pretty angry at God.”

“Were you religious, before?”

“No, not really. Mum took us to church when we were kids. It was always in the back of my mind, but not a big part of my life.”

“Are you still angry at God?”

Chris thought, chewing on his lip, then looked up. “When I think about it, yes.”

Pauline nodded. “Do you think talking with Brother Luke helped at all?”

“I suppose, a bit. He taught me one thing that helps with staying calm.”

“What’s that?”

“Counting backwards.”

Pauline raised her eyebrows.

“It’s more than that, but that’s the main thing. Focusing on that, instead of what’s got me angry, or—” He put his head down.

“Hurting?”

“Yes.”

“You did that the night we were mending.”

Chris nodded.

“I thought you might break something. You were awfully wound up.”

He looked up at her.

“You used to, didn’t you?” Pauline said. “Break things? Get violent?”

“How did you know?”

“It’s not so uncommon.”

“Huh.”

“Not a good thing, though.”

“No.”

“How often do you do that? Count backwards?”

Chris shrugged. “Just that once, here. A fair bit before, in other places.”

“Like Portsmouth?”

“I was just—well, numb, in Portsmouth.”

“Because of what happened in London?”

“Yes. Let’s not talk about that yet.”

“Okay, back to the monastery. How long did you stay?”

“Year and a half, about. No, maybe more like two years.”

“Doing what?”

“Cows, mostly. I tried all sorts of jobs, but I liked the cows. Not sure why.”

Pauline smiled. “That’s where you learned to milk.”

“Yes.”

“You must have made some friends there, besides Brother Luke.”

Chris scrunched up his face and shifted on the crate. “At the beginning, yes.”

“Tell me.”

“Evan. He was driving the lorry that found me, was in charge of the team. He decided to stay on at the monastery when they took me there. He was in quarantine while I was in the infirmary. We talked. He’d lost his wife.” Chris flexed his shoulders and kept his head down. “He stayed a few months, then got restless. He decided to rejoin the outside teams.”

“Outside teams?”

“The groups that spent a lot of time on the road, foraging. They called it collecting. Anything useful, including people.”

“So you didn’t see him much after that?”

“I never saw him again. His team never came back. We never knew what happened to them.”

Pauline took a deep breath. “I’m sorry, Chris.”

Chris shrugged.

“So you don’t get close to people anymore.”

“I try not to.”

“Who else did you get close to?”

Chris shot her a wary look. “Can I stand up? Move around?”

“Of course. Whatever you want.”

He stood up with clenched fists and paced in a small area.

“Did you get close to someone else at the monastery?”

“No, not really.”

“Did you get close to Beryl in London?”

He jerked, drew in a breath.

“Not a huge deduction, Chris.”

He turned his back and crossed his arms. “Can we be done, now?”

“We’ve hardly started.”

“I wouldn’t say that.”

“We won’t get anywhere at this rate.”

“Tomorrow, then. I’m feeling the need to count.”

“Okay, just one more thing,” Pauline said. “Tell me something about Sophie.”

A shudder ran through Chris. He said nothing.

“How did you meet?”

“On an island.”

“Tell me a little more.”

“It was early spring, March. An island off the coast of Maine. Cold, windy. Usually people only go there in the summer. We’d both gone to get away and be alone. Neither of us knew the other would be there. I was staying at a friend’s cottage, she was staying at her sister’s. Every evening we watched the sunset together.” He wiped at his eyes.

Pauline waited a moment. “I think that went well. Do you?”

“Oh, yeah, it was great. I’m looking forward to next time.”

Not My Juliet
(excerpt)
(Wolcott/Price, 1993)

This bud of love did not become a flow’r
Love’s wings took flight, this is the ending hour.
No wish to be a glove against your cheek,
Our stony limits make the prospects bleak.

I’m not your Romeo, you’re not my Juliet.
The fire we felt, it seemed complete, and yet,
As we move forward, time exacts a toll.
Must heed the signs, sidestep the bayonet.

CHAPTER 11

“S
omeone’s been busy,” Chris said, eyeing the new seating in the garage.

“I moved a few things around to make it a little more comfortable. It’ll be too cold out here soon, though. I’ve been cleaning up Dad’s study.” Pauline took a seat in a padded desk chair.

“I like the decor.” Chris settled himself onto a stuffed chair covered in an old sheet with orange and yellow flowers.

“It’s cheerful, don’t you think?”

“Was your office cheerful?”

“Hmm, neutral actually.”

Chris nodded and shifted, not looking at her.

“Is there anything you want to talk about today?”

“I told you, I’m no good at this.”

“Do you want me to ask you questions?”

He chewed on the end of one finger. “I don’t know.”

“Okay. Tell me about your family in Bath then.”

“They’re probably dead, you know.”

“Stop that. Do you have more brothers, besides the one in London?”

“One more. Jon. The youngest. He was always reckless, always got in more trouble than Kevin and me. He was the most outgoing. People liked him.”

“Are you close?”

“We were, as much as possible, living on different sides of the ocean.”

“What about your parents?”

“My mum. But she wasn’t well, back—when it all started. She was frail, needed a lot of help. So I don’t think her chances were very good.”

“You’re so sure there’s nothing for you in Bath?”

“If I was sure everyone was fine, I wouldn’t be here, would I?”

“Who else?”

“Friends. Brian and Fiona, and their two boys. Brian was my partner, in the band.”

“Oh, right. Just him? I thought there were more.”

“Yes, Stan was bass, Erik the drummer. The record company always minimized their roles, and that was fine with them. Erik moved to France, I think, a few years after the band broke up. Stan went off to Manchester, searching for new talent with his brother.”

“Tell me more about Brian.”

Chris gave a sigh and sat looking off into the distance before he answered.

“We’d been mates since we were eleven. We had a lot in common, but were different in other ways. But we clicked, y’know?”

“How did you meet?”

“I had to transfer schools,” Chris said. “We had some classes together. He always told everyone that he ran off some bullies who were about to beat me up, but I don’t remember that.”

“Did you get bullied?”

“Doesn’t everyone, a bit? Sure, I got my fair share. They had reason enough.”

“What reason?”

“I was the new kid. I had been a rich kid, but not anymore.”

“What do you mean?”

“My dad was an executive with a big company. He traveled a lot. He had a heart attack and died when I was ten. We’d been quite well-off, but he’d not been careful with the money and left a lot of debt. By the time it all settled out, we hadn’t much left. We had to sell our house, move to a flat. Mum had to get a job, of course. No more fancy schools. We were tossed into the pond with the rest of the little fish. That’s what Dad used to say, that we didn’t have to swim with the little fish, we could swim with the big fish. He was a hell of a snob, I suppose, but I didn’t see it that way then. We were happy, until he died.”

“I’m sorry,” Pauline said.

Chris didn’t take any notice. “So suddenly I’m one of the little fish and missing my dad. Brian was a good kid; we got on well, got to be mates, and stayed that way as we got older.

“Brian was the real musician. He’d been taking piano lessons for years when I met him. He convinced his teacher to let me sit in. He loved piano, but he wanted to learn to play guitar so we could have a band. What kid didn’t? His older brother was taking guitar lessons already. I wanted to learn because Brian did. Mum didn’t have the money for it, but Brian arranged it. I used his brother’s guitar. I nearly gave up at first, my fingers hurt so much, but Brian didn’t give up, so neither did I. Once I got some calluses and figured out chords, it was easier. I liked it, and I had a knack for it. Brian was better, of course. When we got older and my voice changed, I started singing, too. We had all sorts of bands as teenagers, but none of them ever really worked out. But it was always the other blokes who quit or got sacked. The two of us, we were mates. We liked the same movies, the same books. We did garden work on Saturdays to earn money so I could get my own guitar. Some people thought—well, we had a hard time getting dates. It took us a while to figure it out.” He shook his head, thinking about it. “I suppose we were a bit naive. Brian’s brother finally sat us down and explained it. God, I remember that. We made it our mission to get girls, after that.” He made a little noise; anyone else might have chuckled. He twisted his mouth in a way that didn’t look quite like a smile.

“And did you? Get the girls?”

“Yeah, you could say we did. It only took once, and then word got around.” He shrugged, looked embarrassed. “Teenaged boys. But that didn’t last too long. Eventually I met Laura.”

“First love?”

“I thought it was love, anyway. For a time.”

“How old were you?” she asked.

“Um, nineteen, I guess.”

“That’s not so young, for a first love.”

“I told you: we had a hard time getting dates. Anyway, it was my twentieth birthday party where we met Stan and Erik. Stan’s older brother was in the music business, had a recording studio. Brian got us all together, we played together a bit, and it seemed to work. We recorded a few demos and got lucky. By the time I turned twenty-one, we had a number one single and another moving up the charts. We moved in together to celebrate—Laura and me—and because Brian had married his girl, Fiona.” Chris scowled at the floor, grunted softly, shook it off. “But we weren’t ready. We set a date, then kept pushing it back.” He leaned his head against the back of the chair and stared into the rafters. “In a few years, I was rich again, and didn’t make the same mistakes my father had. I hired a good accountant, made good investments...” He trailed off.

“Did you get married, then?”

“No.” He looked at her, then away. “It wasn’t really love. We found that out. Went our separate ways.”

“Well, it’s good to find that out before you marry.”

“Fewer legal issues, anyway. I think she’d already met someone else, but she was nice enough to be discreet about it for a few months. The last I heard, she and her husband still lived in Bath. I don’t plan to look her up.”

Pauline waited while Chris stared at the door handle of the Polo.

“So...at some point your band broke up. What was that about?” she asked after a time.

Chris turned his stare to her, his face a mask.

“We had a falling out,” he said. “I quit the band and moved to New York. I never spoke to him again.”

Pauline stared back in surprise. “Oh,” she managed. First his father, then Brian, then Sophie, and the rest of them over the years.
No wonder.

Chris turned his face from her, but she could see that his jaw was set.

“What did you fight about?”

“Money, of course. Isn’t it always money? We were in danger of losing our contract, and he was dicking around and wouldn’t let them have anything. I told him we had to give them an album quick or they’d dump us, but he didn’t give a damn. He’d always studied music theory and composition, and didn’t want to write pop songs anymore. He’d started composing on a different level. We argued about it every time we tried to get together in the studio. He said I only cared about the money, not the music. He said I’d only got that far because of him. He said I wouldn’t be anything if it weren’t for him.”

Chris stopped and inhaled, stared at the ground. His mask had dropped away while he was talking, and Pauline saw again the pain she had seen the night they were mending. Then he shook it off. “Yeah, well, maybe it was more than just money. We weren’t the same kids anymore. He’d grown into a serious musician, while for me, it was a job. I was good enough to get by in a band. It
was
about the money. I wanted what I could get, so I wouldn’t end up poor again. I didn’t have a backup plan. We fell into it so young. I knew bands like ours didn’t last. Hot, then cold. So, yes, I pushed Brian to be less than what he could have been, for the money. We managed to make a second album to suit the label, but the whole process did us in. We just couldn’t deal with each other anymore. And as soon as the first round of publicity ended, I quit the band. I thought—”

“What did you think?”

“I don’t know. I thought if I quit the band, if we didn’t have that to fight over, then maybe we could still have some sort of friendship. But Brian took it as a personal attack, I suppose. Stan and Erik took off too, of course, and that was the end of that. The label gave us hell, but we’d fulfilled our contract, so there was nothing they could do.” He shook his head. “It was like a divorce. From Brian. There was a lot of joint stuff, you know, with the band. We had a studio, rights, all that stuff. We had to split it all. Brian made it hard.” He shook his head again, looked up at her. “We’d been mates for so long. And for Brian to be like that, well.”