Steve wolf-whistles when I walk into the reception area. He puts his head into the back room.
‘Guys,’ he shouts, ‘you gotta see this. Danny boy’s all dressed up!’
I ignore them and check the time. Good – 8.45. Another fifteen minutes until we open. I take my notebook and red pen from my rucksack. I sit on the high-stool beneath the counter, then stand up, wincing. My legs are covered in little scabs and bruises where the pin penetrated: a small round of blood encircled in a wider sphere of grey. Sitting down is to be avoided.
I start writing Luke’s working day in the City and then become conscious that I am being observed. I try to ignore the feeling but it is too intense, so I turn.
Steve, Chris and Prakesh are standing looking at me, grinning.
‘Oh, he’s writing in his diary now!’ says Chris.
‘It’s not a diary, it’s a novel,’ I say. They should know by now. I tell them often enough.
‘Are you writing down who you fancy, Danny boy?’ asks Steve. ‘In your diary?’
There’s enough of that in books two and three, I feel like telling them. But that would only lead to more questions.
‘Ooh, let it be me, let it be me,’ cries Prakesh, his hands clasped beneath his beard.
I continue writing.
Luke surveyed the other men on the trading floor, their sweaty ape-like faces. Their time had come – the trading bell tolled for all men. He rolled up the sleeves of his Thomas Pink shirt, cufflinks popping. Without warning, his fist connects with one of their jaws. The crack sounds like …
What does a crack sound like? I must find out. I take off my jacket and drape it over the counter.
‘Oh, a strip show! Excellent!’ says Steve.
I roll up the sleeves of my shirt, buttons popping.
‘Da, da, da-da-da,’ sings Steve. ‘You’ll have to be quick, mate, we open in five.’
I take one of my arms right back until my fist is level with my shoulder. I propel my fist forward and hit – nothing.
‘What, you practising your front crawl, mate? Need some armbands,’ laughs Steve, amused by his own wit.
A bell rings.
‘Customer!’ shouts Steve. ‘Right, Danny boy, sort yourself out, get into the back room, stick a polo shirt on and come back when you’re decent.’
I glance over my shoulder, hoping for Adam. No. He used to come here a lot more, before The Accident. Not so much, after that. Then, it was just the police.
So without Adam, I go into the back room and change.
Transformed, I return.
The crack sounds like …
I smile politely at the customer Steve is dealing with. Steve is doing the paperwork. Jimmy Price used to do it for us. He was the ace at paperwork. Always used to help Adam, too. But then he left, suddenly. Dropped in once, afterwards, driving a Maserati. Said he’d won the lottery, told us a whole long story about when he’d won, how much, and what the numbers were. Like we needed to know all the details.
The crack sounds like …
I practise squeezing my fist under the counter. Steve escorts the customer out into the car park and shows him the car. Steve has handed over the keys and is coming back.
The crack sounds like …
I advance towards him. He looks up briefly and stares at me blankly, the look of a co-worker who doesn’t care.
Ready, this time, I take my clenched fist and I swing.
Oh, I see.
The crack sounds like the breaking of a lobster’s claws.
Apparently it is unacceptable workplace conduct to give your co-worker a bloody nose, so on suspension I run over to Adam’s. I know he will be in. It is his first wedding anniversary – or rather the anniversary of his first wedding – and he always takes the day off work. He knows I generally find myself coming over there to keep him company. He never objects.
I find him sitting in the dark drinking Veuve Clicquot, the same champagne they had at their reception. He is watching the wedding video, smiling softly to himself. Adam is a real romantic, although you wouldn’t know it unless you are close to him.
‘Dan! What are you doing here? How did you …?’
I remind him about the spare key, for use in emergencies.
‘Oh,’ he says. ‘Right. I thought I’d changed the locks after, you know?’
I shrug and sit down next to him, wincing as the scars of last night’s research make themselves felt. After that initial first shock, though, the pain can be endured.
He sips some champagne and presses pause on the video. The best man is in the act of handing over the rings. I understood when Adam didn’t ask me to be best man. After all, if I’d been there at the altar with him and Helen, his loyalties would have been divided.
‘I’m sorry I wasn’t there to comfort you, that night,’ I say.
‘It’s okay, mate,’ he says, punching me lightly on the arm. ‘Your aunt was sick.’ He presses play again on the television.
We sit there, listening to each other’s breathing. Or at least, I listen to his. It is regular but deep, and every so often, he sighs. The grief is still there, it seems. It reminds me of old times, when I was fourteen and the grief was mine, and he sat next to me in church. I held hands with his mother, on the other side of me. She squeezed my hand. I took Adam’s hand and squeezed it. He didn’t squeeze back. At first. I wonder now whether I should take his hand and squeeze it? But no. He understands without that, now, having read my earlier work.
On screen, with the best man out of the way, the bridal couple are revealed again. Helen has mistakenly worn a strapless dress. It is either to show off her cleavage or the family wedding jewellery. Both are too showy.
‘She looked beautiful,’ comes a voice from behind us.
I jump and turn. Nicole is here! She is wrapped in a silk dressing gown – at 11a.m. The luxury of not having to earn your keep. It doesn’t look like there’s much on under her dressing gown. That doesn’t interest me. But it would interest Luke. It interests Adam, too, unfortunately, despite this being his and Helen’s day – he strokes her silken arm.
Nicole is not in the market for his seduction, though.
‘I just wish Helen had been more careful,’ says Nicole, ‘on her ride.’
‘But then you couldn’t have married Adam,’ I say, which is true.
Nicole stares at me as though I have missed the point. Apparently it is rude to state the obvious.
‘Dan just means we have to be thankful, Nic. That’s all,’ says Adam, playing peace-maker.
‘Yes, that’s all,’ I say. ‘Don’t misunderstand me.’
‘Helen would be happy for us,’ says Adam. ‘Believe me. She was a very generous person.’
I’m sure Nicole