The Break-Up Agency, page 28
Okay. That was a pointed comment. When Ellie spoke, her voice was high. Nervous. ‘I actually think he’s a bit more aware of things than some people give him credit for.’
‘Okay,’ said Mallory.
‘He’s calling Sadie.’
‘Alright,’ said Mallory.
‘And I’m going to tell him all about Softer Landings and, you know, everything.’
‘Oh?’
Okay, so maybe she wasn’t going to tell him, like, everything everything.
‘You do what you think is best, honey,’ said Mallory. ‘Just make sure you’re listening to this and to this.’ She pointed to Ellie’s heart and head.
Before she could think of anything to say, Ellie’s attention was snagged to the front of the room where Dan had turned into a human climbing frame. Three six-year-olds were clambering all over him, fighting to get hold of the book he was holding above them. She smiled, felt her heart soften, then heard herself commit to the dream she hadn’t let herself believe again until now.
‘Do you think I should start with telling him I’m going to get my masters in relationship counselling? You know . . . to make Softer Landings sound more legitimate?’
Mallory sounded out a neutral-ish mmhmmm and left it there.
‘I am,’ she whispered. Hotly.
‘Okay,’ said Mallory.
‘I am!’
A few parents turned to stare.
Ellie blustered, ‘I am . . . PROUD . . . of all of you.’ She swooped her arm around the room in a grand gesture, then started a round of applause for the children, slowly taken up by the confused-looking parents. ‘And how about some applause for the amazing Gus!’
Everyone complied. One of the children who had been getting very excited by the book-grabbing took advantage of the distraction and threw herself on to Dan’s knee. His foot slipped out from its position and cracked against the other foot. He gave a cry of pain. There was a strange hissing noise. When all of the kids withdrew, one of the parents gasped and two of the children began to cry while one went gape-mouthed and pointed.
Dan’s foot had fallen off. His recovery was faster than anyone else’s.
‘Oops,’ he said, his smile mischievous. Then, ‘Surprise! It’s International Prosthetic Day!’
The children fell about laughing. The parents, not so much, but Dan’s relaxed demeanour eased everyone back into the mood they had all just been in: positive and good-humoured.
Mallory was shaking her head back and forth.
‘What?’ Ellie asked, mortified her outburst had led to this.
‘That boy is something else.’ She fixed Ellie with a stern gaze. ‘You better do right by him.’
Ellie felt the words ricochet around her insides. She knew. He was an extraordinary man who deserved to be loved by someone unencumbered by secret professions that involved holding thousands of his girlfriend’s pounds in exchange for winning his heart. If she had to call the president of Nigeria himself to send out a search party and make Sadie turn on her damn phone, she would do it. This wasn’t a question of life or death. True love was at stake. And nothing trumped true love. Not on her watch.
Two hours later Dan still had the giggles. ‘Did you see their faces? It was like watching a swarm of Macaulay Culkins doing the Home Alone scream. Hilarious.’ He happy-sighed, then beckoned to Ellie to join him on the couch. ‘C’mere. Snuggle with me.’
She drew back. ‘I thought we agreed that was dangerous.’
‘We did, but . . . I have some grown-up talking to do with you, young lady.’
He did? Oh lord. ‘Sure. I can be grown-up.’ She silly-walked to the sofa. ‘What’s up?’
He waited until she had curled up on to the couch with him, his arm tucked around her shoulders, a soft kiss dropped on top of her head. He took her hand in his and played with it, his fingers slipping up and down each of hers as if he was confirming that she was a living, breathing being.
‘I wanted to thank you,’ he finally said.
‘For what?’ She twisted round so she was facing him. His hand slipped to her knee. His expression grew earnest, a picture postcard American Dan face. If he were a portrait it would be called The Sum of Things or Rumination.
He looked up at her, their eyes catching – as they so often did – with a physical reverberation. ‘Thank you for accepting me how I am. Faults and all.’
‘What? Don’t be daft.’
‘Well . . .’ He began picking at a tiny thread on the seam of his jeans. ‘You’ve seen me go through a few things. The leg’s the most obvious, of course. It will have knock-on effects to some things in my life, but . . . it’s more the emotional side of things I’ve been thinking about.’
‘How do you mean?’
He teased at the thread some more then left it so he could look her straight in the eye. ‘You’ve seen me date two people who were very unlike the type of person I’d actually like to end up with.’
Really?
‘Well . . . I’m not exactly in a place to cast aspersions in that department.’
He gave her a look that suggested he thought she was talking rubbish. If only he knew.
‘I just . . . I hope you know that I’m not exactly proud of what went down with Sadie.’
‘What do you mean?’
He heaved out a sad sigh. ‘She had a relationship back in Cape Town. One I knew she wanted to continue, but they were “on a break” after a disagreement about children.’
Her stomach clenched. He’d known all along. Dan continued, ‘She wanted a fling. I was at loose ends. We both figured why the hell not? They were on a break, right? No one would be any the wiser, so no one would get hurt. And then . . .’ He put his fingertips together, bounced them apart and mouthed kaboom.
Ellie felt the explosion in her gut.
He looked away, regained his interest in the thread on his jeans, teasing and teasing it until finally, with a yank, he tugged it free. ‘It’s just . . . Sadie was amazing. She stuck by me, did all the rehab stuff. Told her guy back home it was over, even though I knew in here it wasn’t.’ He poked himself in the chest.
Ellie voiced a hunch that bordered on questionable. ‘Do you think she’s really in Nigeria?’
‘Yeah,’ he said. ‘I do. I think she’s paying penance.’
‘How do you mean?’
‘I think she’s torturing herself because she doesn’t want to be with me but she wants to do the right thing by me.’
‘Which is . . . ?’
‘Show her gratitude for saving her life by staying with me. Which makes me feel like a proper asshole, you know? First, because I didn’t pull the plug before she left. I mean, Nigeria can be dangerous. And now, dumping her by phone to say thanks but no thanks I’ve found what I really want? It doesn’t really show much gratitude for what she’s sacrificed.’
‘Oh, I don’t think—’
‘Ellie,’ he cut her off. ‘She ended her relationship with a man I know she loved for me. But when I saw you again – I knew it wouldn’t work.’
As amazing as that was to hear, Ellie became very, very scared. Swallowing against a huge lump of I’m-not-entirely-sure-I-want-to-hear-the-answer, she asked ‘Why didn’t you tell her how you felt before she left?’
He doofed himself on the forehead. ‘I was all muddled up. It took me a while to realise what I was feeling for you was a lot stronger than what I was feeling for her. Loyalty and love are different beasts, and when we first got back I wasn’t able to separate the two. She saw it, though.’
‘You think?’ Oh god. She was definitely going to burn in hell for playing the fool.
‘It took me a few weeks, but . . . I think Sadie saw the writing on the wall straight away. Saw it, moved a few chess pieces around, put you right under my nose so I’d finally see what I was meant to. I bet you any amount of money that’s what she did. Organised this whole thing.’
A snip at five thousand pounds. If he wanted actual figures.
His features shadowed as he began to berate himself for not stopping her. For not insisting she go home to South Africa and her ex instead of doing the mission in Nigeria.
Tears floated in his eyes when he asked, ‘Do you think less of me? For what I did?’
‘No.’ She really didn’t. ‘They say it takes two to tango, so . . .’
Dan shook his head. ‘It takes one to stand up and call a spade a spade.’
Ellie’s stomach churned. This was a thousand times more awful than she’d imagined it would be. Like being filled with tar and acid. Maybe . . . as they were in confessional mode . . . maybe this would be the best time to explain . . .
Dan took both of her hands in his and gave the backs of each of them a kiss. ‘Anyway . . . the way things have been between us lately, since the race . . . It’s been a game changer. I’m not asking for promises or guarantees because I know life doesn’t work like that, but, knowing that you care about me, despite everything, the secrets I’ve kept, it’s . . . I like that being with you is making me a better man. And that I might be lucky enough to have a woman in my life who cares more about what happens in here’ – he pointed to his heart – ‘than down there.’ He pointed at his foot, which was, for the first time in their shared life, sitting apart from him, now that Gus had learnt that it wasn’t a chew toy.
‘Oh, well . . . I’m sure Sadie didn’t mind—’
‘She did,’ Dan quickly disabused her. ‘Not necessarily because of the actual physical loss, but all the memories that came with it. Look, I know there’s a long road ahead, but I feel I’ve come on actual emotional miles since you’ve become part of my life. Without knowing you, I wouldn’t have had the strength to deal with the kids the way I did today when my foot fell off. It was so rewarding, you know? Not the screaming part,’ he added with a snort, ‘but seeing them laugh and hold the prosthetic and look at it and then forget about it . . . It was cool. A reminder that what’s physically broken in me isn’t what’s important. This is.’ He pointed at his heart, then hers. He looked ear-to-ear happy. ‘I am strongly considering chopping off all of the right legs on my trousers as a public declaration of my gratitude to you, Ellie Shaw.’
Ellie laughed, privileged and awed to be part of this moment. To have played even the tiniest role in it. And equally horrified at how they’d arrived here. She swiftly rammed the feelings into a cupboard and kicked the door shut as Dan pulled her into a hug and, despite a vow not to, kissed her.
To avoid the increasing awkwardness of saying goodnight to one another without accidentally on purpose diving into bed together, when Dan succumbed to a yawn, she suggested he head to bed and she’d take Gus out for a final perambulation.
His smile softened. ‘Say perambulation again.’
She did.
‘Say caterpillar.’
She did.
He smiled, then let it fade. ‘Do you think this is right? What’s happening between us?’
‘I hope so.’
‘Me too, buttercup.’ He grabbed his crutches, they rose, and when neither of them moved, he ran his finger along her jawline. ‘Me too.’ He kissed the top of her head and pulled her in close. Mmnn. Crumpets and strawberries tonight. ‘I’ll keep on trying.’ He didn’t need to explain. They both knew he meant settling things with Sadie.
‘Maybe you should wait until she gets back,’ Ellie said into his chest.
‘Maybe,’ he said into her hair, then pulled back, his hands resting loosely on her hips. ‘It’s probably super-dickish to break up with someone on the phone. God. Could you imagine if I texted her. Who even does that?’
Ohhhh boy.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Ellie scanned the outdoor eating area at the Regent’s Park cafe one more time. They’d got the tables they wanted. The actor, Callum, was here. Thea was here. They’d already had a little run-through of the scene. Despite Ellie telling Callum this genuinely wasn’t an audition for something bigger (he’d been put forward by Flicka Bright, who was now enjoying a much higher profile after her character came out on a live episode), he insisted upon going method. He sat them down and ran them through a panoply of accents and character choices. Thea, already bored after the first one, said she didn’t give a flying fuck. Ellie said they all seemed pretty good to her but thought that the Reggie Kray accent was, possibly, a bit too full on. In the end they flipped a coin and got the Estuary English boyfriend whose simmering rage was inspired by the ‘inherent and near untameable but perpetually undermined masculinity of the classic TOWIE male’. Whatever that was. All they needed now was for Amy Starling (their client) and her sister, Alexandra (their unsuspecting client), to arrive.
After a final check that Callum’s earpiece was working, he excused himself for a short walk to ‘get in character’ before the Starling sisters arrived. Before turning her phone off for the duration of the set-up as they normally would, Thea wiggled her screen in front of Ellie. ‘Look.’
Ellie’s heart softened. ‘Awww. Hugging kittens. You never post kittens.’
‘I know, right?’ Thea scrunched her nose, like she was fighting off tears.
Ellie, who knew better than to acknowledge the unusual show of emotion, took the phone and scrutinised the post. ‘Hey!’ She beamed. ‘Simon liked it.’
‘He did?’ Thea grabbed the phone and stared at it as the tears she’d been trying to keep at bay trickled down her cheeks.
‘Have you thought about calling him?’ Ellie asked.
‘Nah.’ Thea swiped at her cheeks and, after thumbing through a few gifs turned the phone to Ellie. ‘I was thinking of sending this one later.’
It featured a kitten trying to catch some goldfish on an iPad screen. Ellie laughed. ‘I bet he’ll love it.’
Thea shrugged her doesn’t matter shrug again. It did, of course. It mattered a lot. Thea frowned and gave a distracted nod. ‘What about Dan?’ She was still thumbing through kitten gifs.
‘What about him?’
Thea gave her a look. ‘Has he dumped Sadie yet?’
‘Not strictly speaking.’
Before Ellie could explain, Thea said, ‘That’s so fucked up about his leg.’
‘I know. I don’t know how I would’ve coped in the same circumstances.’
‘Have you touched it? The stump?’
Ellie gave Thea her version of a look.
‘Gawd, just asking. I totally would’ve touched it right away.’ She gave her hair a scrub. ‘I have to admit, I was surprised Sadie told him about the other guy. I underestimated her.’
Ellie agreed, then gave herself a little wriggle and shook her hands out. ‘Okay. Right. Dan’s actually going to meet me here in an hour with Gus, so hopefully they’ll show—’ She suddenly pointed to the patio doorway, where the Starling sisters had just appeared. Amy, the one who’d got in touch with them, was looking round. ‘Heads up. Here we go.’ Thea scuttled off to her seat so that Amy would know which table to pick. They’d never done a scenario like this before. Alexandra was in a relationship her sister and family felt was toxic. Their pleas for her to end the relationship had fallen on deaf ears. ‘She can excuse every single thing he says, and some of the stuff is proper vile,’ Amy had said.
After a couple of Skype sessions, they’d decided having outsiders interfere would only make it worse. So instead, they were going to try to shine a light on her boyfriend’s behaviour by having Thea and Callum re-enact some of the interchanges Amy and her family had witnessed with Alexandra. Maybe then, they reasoned, she’d be able to see what was happening in her own relationship. Judging by their body language, Amy and Alexandra were very close. Thanks to Thea’s microphone, Ellie could hear them talking about their days at work, how their parents were, whether or not Alexandra had worn that top they’d bought down at Primark.
‘Nico wasn’t much of a fan.’ Alexandra fiddled with her teaspoon.
‘What? You looked well cute in it when we tried it on.’
‘Maybe I’ll wear it when he’s away. He’s got a business trip next week.’
‘Are you actually telling me—’ Amy stopped herself. ‘That’s cool. Weather’s meant to be better anyway.’
You could tell Amy wanted to protest, but they’d recommended she dial back her frustrations and let Thea and Callum’s role play do the work for her. Alexandra needed to know her family would be there for her because she was going to need them when and if they successfully ‘showed her the light’.
Callum entered in a much more grandiose style than they’d discussed. The patio area was surrounded by a waist-height wrought-iron fence. He hurdled it like a parkour guy and slid himself into the chair across from Thea. It made him look very, very cool. She leant in for a kiss. He half leant in then pulled back.
‘What are you even wearing?’ He flicked his hand at Thea. ‘Fuck’s sake. You could see that bloody cardigan of yours a mile off.’
She meekly looked up at him, said sorry, and began peeling off the brightly coloured cardigan.
They began to talk about his day. It had been alright, but it would’ve been better if she hadn’t kept interrupting his work with her endless stream of texts.
‘I only texted you once.’
‘Yeah, well, that was one too many times, wasn’t it?’ he said with a bang of his fist on the table. They had Amy and Alexandra’s attention now.
Thea and Callum sat back in their chairs as the server approached and slid a tray of baked goods on to the table.
He was kind and polite to the server, jokey even. When she’d gone, his voice got low and aggressive. ‘What the hell is this?’
‘It’s tea time,’ Thea said. ‘I thought you might like some.’
‘First of all, you better not be planning on eating any of it, because we discussed your weight situation already, yeah?’
Amy shot Alexandra a look. Alexandra, now openly watching, winced. ‘And second of all, is this your version of a joke? Because if it is, it ain’t funny.’
‘No. I seriously thought you’d want some cake.’
