Breaking Joseph (39 page)

“This is true.”
He glanced up and down the empty street. “Race you?”

“I’ll only
embarrass mys–”

The bastard. He
took off, leaping down the road and whooping like a teenager. His
footprints carved the way into a brave new world.

“You cheat!” I
shrieked. “Come back here!”

“Last one there
is a very good lawyer,” he shouted, laughing.

You’ll be
wondering, sooner or later, what happened to Charlotte.

Did she get a
happy ending? It wasn’t the shape she expected it to be. I don’t
think she ever expected one at all. Perhaps she was afraid she
would melt in the daylight, but the brighter the sun, the fatter
the swell of the shadows. And Charlotte still likes shadows very
much.

Leila still
lives in London. I still live sex and money beneath a thin slick of
law. I am composed of memories, sour and sharp and bloody, and I am
particularly defined, I think, by the moment where a tall blond man
embraced me on this very street. Where a whisper saved me. Was I
ashamed to need him? I was only one girl, and yet I needed to put
two back together. What do
you
think?

With him, no
longer was I unfinished. Charlotte melted like a snowflake and I
sank back into my own skin with a sigh. Now she waits behind closed
doors for the wolf who takes her hunting, and there is nothing
quite as sweet as the moment when he tugs her back through my
flesh.

There's only
one thing better than the thrill of two, and that's the man who can
match me.

Fuck for
fuck.

Matt’s “Alternative”
Ending

(told from his
perspective)

“God. I’d
forgotten how gorgeous your bed is.”

Leila gazed up
at the carved four-poster that dominated my beamed room, her eyes
like petrol puddles reverberating with traffic. Her hands sat on
her hips as she paced around.

“I’m sure
you’ll make it even more gorgeous.” I gestured to the bin liners
full of expensive linen that we’d piled up beside her boxes.
Sequins winked at me in the sunlight pouring through the window;
a girl lives here now
, they said.

Weird.

“I seem to
remember making a mess of it, last time,” she murmured, throwing me
a coy, knowing little smile.

Oh, fucking
hell. I wish she wouldn’t do that to me.

Only when I let
myself look at her--really look at her--did I realize she was
crying.

“Hey.” I strode
over, wrapping her against my chest. She leaned in willingly, all
warm and smelling like marzipan and flowers. “What’s wrong?”

She shrugged as
she sobbed on to my rugby shirt, her tears soaking into the
creases.

She knew why,
really. So did I. But we were off on the yellow brick road to our
shiny new jobs; maybe even a shiny new us. It didn’t feel right to
belittle that. I stroked her back with flat palms, trying to ignore
the way her breasts melted against my ribs.

Then I bit my
lip hard and edged away before she could feel my hard-on.

“Just…just
stuff,” she managed eventually. “It’s all still sinking in, you
know?”

“I know,
babe.”

Leila wasn’t
supposed to be here. She should still be in London, getting ready
for her posh-arsed City career and buying overpriced sandwiches
from Pret. She should be exhausted in Joseph Merchant’s bed.

Until recently,
she should also be fucking men for money.

She didn’t
realize that none of that would make her happy. I knew--we'd
trained together for the past two years. London‘s cool and
everything, don’t get me wrong (Shepherd’s Bush Empire is the best
gig venue ever) but when you strip away all the things that money
brings…it’s empty. Hollow. A bit like how Leila was going to turn
out if she kept up with that horrible night job. As System of a
Down once said:
somewhere between the sacred silence and
sleep…disorder, disorder.
If you stay there too long, London
will fuck you over.

Just like it
fucked the pair of us.

“Shall we
unpack some stuff, make you feel at home a bit?” I suggested.

She wiped her
eyes with the back of her hand. “Actually…would you mind if I went
to bed?”

“No, course
not.” I smoothed the curls from her face; it felt natural to do it.
Made me ache that she let me.

“I haven’t been
sleeping very well lately,” she admitted. “Weird dreams.”

“You’ve had a
shitty time of it. But it’s all sorted now, okay? Onwards and
upwards and all that crap.”

“Happy ending,
huh?” She gave me a tear-stained smile.

Lyrics echoed
in my head:
let’s pretend, happy end…

“Yeah.” I
nodded, my forehead just brushing hers. “Let’s put you to bed
then.”

I tucked her
beneath the throw my mum had stitched when I was in primary school;
quilted squares in the colours of my favourite football team (back
when I thought football was cool). She seemed to belong there, in
my bed.

“I’ll knock
later, okay?” I said.

She wriggled
beneath the covers and made a sleepy little sigh.

Downstairs, her
father was having tea with Dad and Amy in the kitchen.

“You didn’t
tell me that Leon makes wine,” Dad said, beckoning me.

“Never thought
to. Sorry.” I nodded at Amy as she pushed a mug into my hand and
spooned in three sugars. I watched muddy liquid coil as I
stirred.

“Is Leila
unpacking?” said Leon.

“She’s having a
nap. Said I’d wake her up for dinner.”

“Poor mite.
She’s knackered.” He laughed. “You’ll give her a hand later, Matt,
won’t you?”

I had to lower
my eyes--he was her dad, and if he saw the look in them, he’d know
exactly what I wanted to give her.

“Right. I’m
going to give Leon a tour, show him the orchard,” Dad announced,
clapping a heavy hand on my back. “He’s going to give us a hand
with the raspberries. See you out there in a bit?”

“In a bit.” I
gulped lukewarm tea as they strode out of the stable doors,
silently ticking off another box on my morbid game of bingo. Our
parents get on. I bet they wouldn’t get on with Joseph’s--they’d be
flashy, pretentious cunts. As for her clients’ parents…yeah, there
was a place I never wanted to go. Like Primark.

“Penny for
them.” Amy, nudged my shoulder. She slid a plate of biscuits in
front of me, and I reached for one, shaking away the crumbs.

“Just thinking
about…starting the job.”

“Ah, right. Of
course.” She leaned back on the counter with her arms folded. She
read me like a book—gah, so annoying.

“It’s going to
be nice, being somewhere small and…” Not soulless?

“It’s nice to
have you home.” She smiled. “I’ve got a pie on for dinner. Will
that be alright for your Leila?”

My Leila.

She wasn’t
mine.

“Yeah, she
loves stuff like that.” I dunked half a biscuit into my tea.
“Cheers.”

I walked out
through the garden as I chewed, wondering whether to phone Charlie
and let him know that everything was going well. He was my
stepfather. He was also Leila’s old lover. Between the two of us,
we'd rescued her career and sorted everything out (also, I may have
punched him when I learned about the lover part. I tried to pretend
I felt guilty but seriously--it was the best rush of my life. Take
that, adulterous porkshit! Funny how landing a swift upper cut can
lend you a sense of inner peace for a good…ten minutes).

I felt like a
prize cunt when two girls from our office stole Leila’s escorting
photos from my laptop. They used them to bribe her out of a
boyfriend and a job. For a while, it looked like her life was
beyond fixing.

Seemed to me,
though, that Leila and I could solve each other’s problems. She
needed a job. I needed…her. With a bit of help, I convinced the
partners at my new firm to take her on, and now she'd moved into my
room until she could sort a place of her own.

I didn’t intend
for her to move out, but it wasn’t the right time to say that. Not
yet.

I joined Dad
and Leon in the orchards, rolling up my sleeves and hauling buckets
of fruit as they picked. It was the beginning of the berry harvest,
this time of year --I used to love it. I remembered Mom making
reams of jams and pies, decorating the jars with checkered fabric
and ribbons. She always asked me to write the labels because my
handwriting was the neatest.

Amy's probably
a better cook than Mom, but it can't be the same.

The afternoon
squelched by in red-stained hands and tart berries on my tongue.
Dinner time loomed, and I excused myself for a hot shower, scraping
the last of London away. When I peeked in on Leila, she was still
asleep.

“Hey.” I shook
her gently. “You’ll never sleep tonight, at this rate.

She yawned, her
back arched in a stretch that pushed her nipples right through her
t-shirt. “That time already? Crap.”

“Dinner’s in
ten, okay?” I lingered by the door. “I’ll see you down there.”

She nodded, her
smile lazy and framed with dishevelled ringlets.

Leila’s dad
joined us at the table, and it turned into something of an event,
dragged out with coffees and Amy’s home-made petit fours. I swapped
glances with Leila across the table. We weren’t really part of the
conversation, but we had our own going on regardless, made of
cocked heads, knowing grins and nudging knees.

At the end, I
gave her space to say goodbye to her dad in the hall, and then
followed her upstairs.

She tugged the
clip from her hair, and it fell down her back in a sweep of
flashing russet. “Would it be okay if I had a bath?”

“Yeah, course.”
I glanced at my old chest of drawers, now heaving with girlie
potions and jars. “I’ll sort it for you. What shall I put in…?”

She passed me a
little vial of oil. “Thanks.”

The old
farmhouse plumbing made the bath water chug out in lumps. I
drizzled in the oil, and the scent of spiced apricots rose with the
steam, blurring the mirror. As it got warmer, I tugged my collar
loose.

“Oh wow. Smells
like autumn in here, doesn’t it?” Leila slid in from behind the
door, dropping towels and bottles on the padded old chair. Her
features had mellowed; she seemed relaxed, and the tension in my
limbs eased at the sight.

“Autumn smells
like mud and rain to me,” I said wistfully.

“And sweaty
rugby changing rooms?”

“Those
too.”

She bent to
test the water, dashing the foam lightly with her fingertips. Then
she twisted the old tap off and looked up at me expectantly.

I stayed
perched on the side of the bath

“Are you
watching…?”

She asked me
that once, when we were dating. She was getting changed in my
bedroom and I drank in her little body as she peeled away her
clothes.

I hadn’t
expected her to ask me tonight, not when she mourned the loss of
another relationship. Maybe not as much as I thought…?

“I can do
better than that.” I stood over her, reaching for the hem of her
t-shirt. “Arms up, babe.”

While I
undressed her, she gazed up at me with glassy, stoned eyes. Leila’s
response to me was one of the best--and worst--things about her:
she wanted me. Our bodies played the same tunes, and like the Pied
Piper, I teased her with them for weeks as if it excused the
uncomfortable origin of us (I paid, she obeyed). In the end,
though, just wanting me wasn't enough for her.
I
wasn’t
enough and that was hard to understand; we were good friends,
doomed to desire each other. What is love, if it isn’t that? Can
you tell me?

As she stood
there in the steam, I wondered who took advantage of who. In the
end, I didn’t care--if she'd have me tonight then it was pointless
trying to resist it.
I'd
do the having, would fucking own
her.

“Are you coming
in?” She cocked her head towards the water.

I drew a
fingertip down between her breasts. “If there was room, I would,” I
said, my voice full of longing. There really wasn’t space for the
bulk of me. “Don’t be long, okay?”

“Okay.” She bit
her lip as she sank into the bubbles. They swarmed around her
shoulders and began to feast at the line of her collarbone.

Then I closed
the door and fell against it, dragging my breath from the air.

I could've
spent hours analysing this. I was ever the scientist, in love; it
was how I’d known with Niamey, my ex, and how I knew with Leila.
Only last weekend, she had admitted how much she missed Joseph. She
told me that we’d never get back together, but had she changed her
mind now we were alone?

Or did she just
want a good, brisk fuck?

I had to pull
myself together. I could stand there and brood like a glittery,
homo vampire or I could be a good boy scout and get prepared. (I
was a brilliant Scout, by the way. Probably why I tie myself in so
many knots).

I marched into
Toby’s room, currently mine. I ransacked the underwear drawer and
then my hand hovered over the strip of condoms. I fantasized
briefly about taking Leila back to London for a visit, watching
Joseph’s eyes bulge as he noticed her swollen belly: mine, mine,
MINE!

I wasn’t that
brand of dickhead though. Was I?

I took the
condoms. It’d be dark in the bedroom and if she didn’t ask me,
didn’t notice…I could always say I forgot. Feeling her like that,
nothing between my cock and the sticky mess of her--it’d be another
thing all those clients never had.

No, no. I
really wasn’t that bloke. They lived on chat shows and I lived
in…well. Salisbury.

I put the
condoms under one of the pillows in Leila’s room. The whole place
smelt like her now, and her spicy bath oil wafted down the
corridor. It was still strange, thinking that we lived together,
but in an exciting, dizzy way.