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‘Oh, just fancied a change,’ I lied. I didn’t want to deceive her again, really I didn’t, but for her sake it was the right thing to do just then. ‘You know musicians. Always doing something nutty with their hair.’
‘Well, it’s good to see you. Come here.’ She held out her arms to me. I put my bags down and walked over, accepting the embrace and holding on to her perhaps a little longer than was proper. She still smelled of rose oil, an ingredient in whatever fragrance she wore. I took in a deep breath of it and then pulled back to look at her, the mist of rising tears fuzzing up my vision.
‘I’m so glad you’re back in New York, I really… I really needed to see you,’ I said. Her head tilted to the side and she frowned at me. She always was sharp, and it was clear that she knew then: this wasn’t just a social visit.
‘Why don’t you come sit up at the counter and we’ll catch up,’ Esther said, gesturing at Jack. He shuffled down into the next seat along so Esther and me could sit next to each other. I picked up my luggage, dragged it over to the stool next to hers and sat up as she suggested.
‘You’ve met Mona, I believe.’
I nodded at the waitress who was standing behind the counter, just as she had been last night, and smiled.
‘And this is Angela.’ Esther pointed to the catalogue model, who pushed a section of her crimped brown hair out of her eyes with one hand and waved to me with the other.
‘This is Ryan.’ She waved at the athletic fella who, reaching a long arm across the ladies and Jack, gave my hand a firm shake.
‘Didn’t know Esther had any other friends,’ he said, and I was surprised to hear he also had a British accent. I chuckled at Ryan’s comment while Esther shot him the patented withering look I’d seen her use on a customer or two back at the casino buffet. The managers there generally insisted on service with a smile but, when they weren’t looking, Esther wasn’t afraid to let a customer know if they were testing her patience.
‘And this is Jack.’ Esther waved a hand at the actor. I smiled at him and did what I could to keep my expression relaxed. I’m not really one to be impressed by celebrity but it was weird, and even a little bit exciting, being up close to a movie star. ‘Jack’s my, er…’ Esther looked at him, thinking hard about her next words, then looked back at me. ‘Well, he’s my…’
‘Boyfriend,’ Jack finished. ‘I’m her boyfriend. But she seems to have a bit of difficulty with the word.’ He smiled, running a hand through Esther’s hair. She raised an eyebrow at him but it was obvious to anyone she was trying not to smile.
Like Ryan and Esther, Jack also had a British accent. I’m not sure I’d ever been in the same room as this many people from merry old England before, but their accents were so cute, I could listen to them all day.
‘You’re pushing forty,’ Esther said to Jack. ‘I’m not sure the term “boyfriend” is all that appropriate. Are you?’
‘Life partner?’ Jack tried.
Esther’s face crinkled up in disgust.
‘Significant other? Sweetie pie?’
The rest of us laughed as Esther’s expression became more disgruntled with each suggestion.
‘Life partner? You’re getting far too ahead of yourself, Faber.’ Esther gave his nearest cheek a tap with the flat of her hand.
‘Oh, don’t mind me, I just own the place,’ a voice called down from the end of the counter, interrupting the fun. I swivelled on my stool to see a dumpy-looking fella in a pink polo shirt and a loose-fitting pair of jeans. Though he hadn’t yet greyed, judging by how little hair he had left I guessed the guy must be at least forty. He had a plate of mac and cheese in front of him and was about halfway through eating it.
‘That’s Bernie,’ said Esther. ‘You’ve caught him in one of his better moods.’
‘I just love your diner, Bernie,’ I called down the counter to him, hoping the compliment might raise a smile. He looked like he hadn’t smiled in a long time, and his face was fixed in a chronic state of disappointment. ‘Never seen another one quite like it.’
‘Oh.’ Bernie’s grimace loosened. ‘Well, nice of you to say so.’
‘Can I get you somethin’ to eat or drink, honey?’ Mona asked.
‘Yeah, I’ve been outside all day, busking. Could use a grilled cheese and a coffee.’
‘Sure thing, honey,’ she said grabbing a cup from next to the coffee machine and pouring out my drink. ‘You start warming up with that and your food’ll be out in a snap.’
Smiling at her, I poured some cream into my coffee and emptied a sugar packet into it too. When I looked up, Angela, Ryan, Jack and Esther were all staring at me, watching. Waiting. Esther was the first to speak.
‘So, what brings you to New York?’
OK. Straight down to business. I can do that. I’ve rehearsed my little speech. It’ll sound natural enough, it’s pretty much the truth. Like ninety-eight per cent of it, so I’m not telling any out-and-out lies.
I just need to breathe, and talk.
‘Thing is, something happened back in Atlantic City, and I’m in over my head. Way over my head.’ I looked towards the kitchen doors. Mona was still on the other side of them, which was perfect. She may not be in on anything, but her husband was a cop, so I couldn’t trust him or what she might accidentally relay to him through innocent pillow talk.
‘What happened?’ Esther asked.
Going into detail was too dangerous, but she wasn’t one to be shrugged off. I had to give her something.
‘It’s… it’s really difficult to talk about right now. But I had to get outta town pretty quick and I can’t go back to my parents. You know what they think of me and my career. So, I really need a place to stay for a few days and wondered if you’d mind me, maybe, crashing on your sofa? I know it’s a lot to ask…’
‘Yes, it is.’ There was a sting to Esther’s voice. Both Jack and Ryan noticed it and looked at her face for a clue but she was giving nothing away. I was grateful to her for not blurting out to the whole crowd exactly why I wasn’t in a position to ask her for a favour, but still felt the blush skulking its way up the back of my neck anyway.
‘It’s just until I can busk and get some money together and figure out how I’m gonna – I mean, what to do next.’ I tried to explain.
‘Why’d you leave the casino?’ asked Esther, as the other three watched on, quiet.
‘You know how you always said trouble had a tendency of finding me?’
Esther glanced down at the lino. ‘Yes.’
‘Well, some pretty big trouble found me this time. You’re really better off not knowing the whys and wherefores but I promise I won’t stay a second longer than I need to. It’s just so I can regroup, you know?’ I opened my eyes as wide as I could in the hopes of looking persuasive.
Esther pressed her lips together and gazed into my eyes.
God damn it.
So this was my comeuppance for what I’d done to her. If I’d been on the level the whole time we were in Atlantic City, she wouldn’t think twice about taking me in. But I hadn’t been. I’d broken her trust early on and though I’d tried really hard, I was never sure if I’d rebuilt it before she left for New York.
‘Esther?’ Jack nudged the side of her face with his nose and murmured, only just loud enough for me to hear, ‘You OK? It’s fine if your friend wants to stay at the flat. It may be technically mine but I think of it as ours, if that’s what you’re worried about.’
‘No,’ she said.
‘No?’ I repeated, my insides hollowing out.
‘Esther?’ said Jack. ‘What’s going on here?’
‘Nothing, I just…’ She looked at me out the corner of her eye. It was the same uncertain look she’d given me that rotten night back at the casino when she’d caught me red-handed. Going through her things. Without her permission. ‘I’m sorry, Bonnie, you can’t stay with us.’
‘Esther, please.’ I put a hand on her arm. ‘I’m begging you, I’ve got nowhere else to go, everyone else I know is in Atlantic City and I really just need somewhere to put my head down for a few days and figure out what I’m going to do. Some place safe. You think I’d ask you for a favour unless I was desperate? Haven’t you ever been desperate in your life?’
Esther took in a deep breath. Her eyes filled with tears and she closed them, battling with something in her mind. Probably the easiest way of telling me she couldn’t take me in, no matter how desperate I was. She opened her eyes again, she was about to speak, but a second later her stare moved past me. Her jaw dropped wide and her eyes narrowed. Jack looked in the same direction, and his expression also changed. His brow weighed heavy with a frown.
‘No way,’ said Angela, shaking her head.
‘What, what is it?’ I asked, turning. Jimmy stood just inside the doorway in his sheepskin jacket and a pair of jeans. His right cheek was still a little puffy from where I’d socked him a good one outside the subway station last night and his hair was damp from the snow that had been drifting down for the best part of the day. He unwound a scarf striped green and black from around his neck and began walking towards the counter. I could tell by the look on his face he’d noticed the others gawping at him but he fixed his eyes on me until he reached where I was sitting.
‘Now then, honey, here’s your grilled chee— Uh-oh.’ Mona had reappeared from the kitchen. The air in the room thinned out, making it hard to breathe all of a sudden. Jimmy Boyle wasn’t popular in these parts – I’d known that, but I hadn’t quite expected this reaction. I looked at him, wondering what he’d done to these people and why the hell he’d come back here when Mona had made it pretty clear just yesterday he wasn’t all that welcome.
‘What’s he doing here?’ Jack growled out the question I’d been pondering. I jumped in surprise at the shift in his voice. When he had spoken before, his register had been nothing short of mellow.
‘Long as I’m standing right here you can address any questions to me direct,’ said Jimmy, his voice of equal roughness to Jack’s. ‘I won’t be here long, just came to return this.’ Jimmy held up my brown leather notebook, which I used for writing down my song lyrics.
‘Oh,’ I said, frowning. ‘I’m sorry, I was in such a rush this morning because I overslept. Probably through sheer exhaustion. I must not have picked it up or maybe I dropped it, I don’t know, but thank you so much for bringing it back to me. It…’ I trailed off. Jimmy had a smug look on his face and on seeing it I snatched the book out of his hands. ‘You didn’t… read this, did you?’
The self-satisfied leer on Jimmy’s face melted away and he clenched his jaw.
‘Don’t flatter yourself,’ he said. ‘If that’s the thanks I get for coming out of my way after a long day at the office, next time I won’t bother.’
‘I’m sorry, I didn’t mean… It’s just, it’s very private.’ I’d written one or two half-baked lines down this morning about the kiss I’d shared with Jimmy and the thought that he might have read them was mortifying.
‘Hold on a minute, you two know each other?’ Esther asked, looking between me and Jimmy.
That felt like a bit of a complicated question to answer after what’d happened the night before. Just for an instant, I once more felt Jimmy’s arms tight around mine and the force of our lips pressed together.
Pull it together, Bonnie, this is not the time.
‘We met here,’ I said, and then did what I always did when I got nervous. I started to jabber on like a total lamebrain. ‘Late last night I was lookin’ for you but you weren’t here and I had nowhere else to go because I spent my money on the Greyhound from Philly and somehow Jimmy knew I didn’t have no place to go and he let me stay at his for the night so I wouldn’t be shut out in the cold.’
‘Weren’t you on shift last night?’ Esther turned on Mona. Esther’s skin was usually ghostly white but it had reddened and I could see she was working herself up by the way she was breathing, all deep and huffy.
‘Now, honey, come on. You know it’s our job to serve customers, even him.’ Mona put a hand on her hip.
‘Why’d you even come here in the first place Boyle? You know you’re not wanted,’ Esther said, turning back to Jimmy.
‘Well,’ Jimmy said, scratching his left temple. ‘I’d read in Jessie Marble’s showbiz column a week back that Jack Faber and his new girlfriend were spending the holidays in England, so I reckoned it wouldn’t do no harm.’
‘Fact is, buddy, you caused my waitresses a whole lotta grief last summer,’ Bernie chipped in. ‘And when the waitresses suffer, I suffer. It’s inevitable. And I don’t like sufferin’. I’ve never had to outright bar a customer from the Starlight Diner, but if you’re here to make more trouble you can beat it.’
‘Come on,’ said Jimmy. ‘You ain’t trying to say I’m to blame for everything that happened last summer?’ He looked from Esther to Jack, to Angela, to Ryan and rested his eyes on Mona.
‘You didn’t help. Like when you physically assaulted me on our first meeting and then wrote several poisonous articles about me,’ said Esther.
‘Or reunited me with my murderous ex live on TV,’ said Jack.
‘Or phoned me saying you were Esther’s shrink to manipulate me into divulging things I otherwise wouldn’t have divulged,’ Ryan said.
‘You didn’t do anything to me outright. But hurting three of the people I care about is reason enough for me to take against you,’ Angela finished.
I turned to Jimmy and stared at him, shaking my head. He looked from Angela to me and started at the look on my face. Don’t get me wrong, I wasn’t in a position to judge anybody, but I didn’t walk around like I was either. Jimmy, however, had been nothing short of snide about Jack and Esther. If everything Esther and her friends said was true, why did he feel entitled to be cruel about them?
‘You didn’t really do all those things, did you, Jimmy?’ I asked, feeling real hot all of a sudden. He opened his mouth to say something, before closing it again. There was an ache in his eyes I couldn’t make sense of, and bit by bit his stare lowered to the floor. I looked over to Esther; she’d crossed her arms and her face was cemented in a frown that matched her lover’s.
‘You know what, that’s just fine,’ Jimmy said. I turned to see him with his arms part raised in surrender. ‘Believe what you want to believe about me, everyone else does.’ He started winding his scarf back around his neck and as I watched him my heart started beating faster. The thought of him leaving on these terms after all he’d done for me the night before was nothing short of sickening. He’d not only taken me in from the cold, he’d soothed me after my nightmare and had even offered to help me, even though he had no idea what he could be getting into. I had to find some way of showing him that, whatever he’d done before we met, I was still grateful for the kindness he’d shown me.
‘I want to believe you’re a good person,’ I said, in the gentlest voice I could, trying to draw out some of the tenderness I’d seen in him the night before. Whatever he’d done to Esther, this guy had a heart. I’d seen it, and was willing him to remember it.
‘Well it looks like you’re the only one,’ he said, looking back up at me. ‘Good luck, Blue.’ Without another word he turned and strode towards the doorway.
‘Jimmy!’ I called after him, but he didn’t even glance back. He pushed out into the snow, while I watched on, helpless to stop him. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Bernie looking at me, his forehead puckered, like he was trying to figure something out. I was trying to figure something out too: why the hell I felt so empty over Jimmy leaving like that. So I’d never see the guy again, so what? I’d kissed him once and had known him for less than twenty-four hours. I needed to get a grip. To say I had bigger problems was putting it mildly.
‘Well,’ said Esther from somewhere behind me. ‘If you resorted to sleeping on Boyle’s sofa last night you must really be desperate.’
I turned back to face her, teary-eyed in spite of myself.
‘I wouldn’t be asking if I didn’t need your help,’ I managed to say.
‘Alright. You can stay with us. Until New Year,’ Esther said, her features softening again now that Jimmy was out of the mix.
‘Until New Year,’ I said, a smile flickering at the corners of my mouth as relief flooded through my veins.
Chapter Five (#ulink_12286ef0-934c-5052-8622-4ab4e6a69158)
About a half hour later, we bundled through the door of Jack and Esther’s apartment. It was on Ludlow Street, just a few blocks down from the diner, and was a lot more swish than Jimmy’s place, that much I noticed right away. Jack said he’d moved in over the summer but six months later there wasn’t much sign it’d been lived in. The place had laminate floors, a faux fireplace in the centre of the sitting room, and bookshelves, heaving with paperbacks, lined the surrounding walls, which had been painted a shade of off-white. It was bright without feeling too much like a showroom, and the whole place had a warmth to it.
‘There we are.’ Jack laid my guitar and suitcase down on the sheepskin rug, which stretched out just in front of the fireplace. ‘I’ve never used it myself, but I think this settee actually doubles up as a bed.’ He started yanking cushions off the sofa, pulled at the base and unfolded a mattress. ‘Not sure how comfortable it’ll be.’
‘Oh, trust me, it’s a big step up from where I’ve been sleeping the last few nights,’ I said, and smiled. He did a sort of awkward half-smile that told me he understood. He couldn’t, of course. He had no idea what I’d been through. But I got the impression that he was the kind of guy who wanted to understand, even if that was beyond him. Esther was lucky, having a fella like that to take care of her. Not that she showed any outward sign of appreciation in front of other people, though I got the feeling things might be different when the two of them were alone.
‘Jack,’ she called, a touchy note in her voice. She’d scurried straight into the kitchen to make me something to eat, even though I’d just had a grilled cheese at the diner and had told her there was no need. Jack sauntered towards the kitchen and leaned on the inside of the doorway. ‘Why are the cupboards bare?’
‘Because we were going away over Christmas and you said we had to empty the cupboards. Don’t you remember that unforgettable dessert you made the night before the flight? The one that masterfully blended what was left of the breakfast cereal with those satsumas that were about to go off?’
‘Don’t get funny, Faber,’ came Esther’s sharp response. Sitting down on the edge of the sofa bed, I put my hand over my mouth, giggling at their little routine. ‘We’re not at all in a fit state to receive guests. You’ll have to go to the shop,’ Esther added.
‘Alright.’ Though I couldn’t see his expression I could hear a rich amusement flooding through Jack’s voice over the fuss Esther was kicking up. ‘I’ll go to the shop, but I don’t think you’re ever allowed to get at your mother again for her overzealous hospitality.’
‘Jack!’ Esther almost shrieked but her next words were muffled.
He’d moved towards her.
He was kissing her.
From my vantage point in the living room, on account of the fact the kitchen didn’t have a door to it, I saw him stooping over her. Her hands, clenched into fists at first, relaxed and ran up and down the length of his arms. I lowered my eyes and turned away. Peeling off my leather jacket, I pulled my suitcase up onto the bed and rifled through it for the notebook Jimmy had returned to me. Opening it up to the last page I’d written on, I read:
There’s no other thought or sight or sound.
The moment you kiss and you’re lost and you’re found.
I re-read the words and sighed down at them.
Jimmy.
Why couldn’t I get him out of my head? He’d done all those things to Esther and Jack and Ryan. But he’d also helped me even though he didn’t know me at all. Even though he knew I was a friend of Esther’s and she had no time for him.
