Wake Up Happy Every Day (42 page)

‘Is this a proposal?’ she says, but she’s smiling and I think the whole Scarlett being kidnapped hysteria has been safely buried under this avalanche of new information. I have no doubt it’ll work itself to the surface again in time. She’s a smart cookie, Sarah, she doesn’t really forget anything.

‘No, it’s an order,’ I say.

And I’m about to show her the amazing thing I found on Russell’s computer, when Catherine comes back and drives it out of my head.

‘I reckon you got an hour,’ she says.

Forty-six

LORNA

‘We could never be a proper couple.’

It’s deep into the afternoon and they are drinking tea and eating toast in Lorna’s bed. Lorna feels that she is in better shape than Megan, and she’s meant to be the finest female white-collar boxer in Alameda County or whatever. She doesn’t look like such an athlete now. At least Lorna can sit up, at least she can talk – Megan just groans, puts a pillow over her head and pulls the duvet tighter around her.

‘No, you’re pretty fine and everything when we’re out, but get you home and into bed and you fall straight asleep, start snoring, farting, and stealing all the covers. It would never work. Frankly, you’re too like a man.’

Well, that gets her going. Megan groans again and coughs like an expiring heroine in one of Lorna’s novels, the ones she reads for her course where conspicuous consumption means something very different from what it does now. And then, ever so slowly, ever so carefully, Megs sits up, scratches her head. Gets ready to fight back.

‘And you, missy, you drop crumbs in the bed. And you reek of marmite. And I do not snore. Or fart.’

‘You did last night. And this morning.’

It has to be said though, they did have a right laugh. They’d been in the Bison first for noodles and honey-basil ale, and they would have stayed but there was a band on and everyone knows that a bar band kills the buzz pretty effectively, so then it was on to the Albatross where they’d played skinny-hipster boys at pool and darts and drunk good Guinness. And Lorna had been reminded just how much fun Megan was.

It was Megan who’d suggested Brennan’s. And done it at a perfect moment, when they were both pretty wasted, but still had just enough sense left to know that they needed to get out of the pub before something embarrassing happened with a couple of the skinny-hipster boys.

Megs had found a cab and got them to 4th and Uni where they had sat over cold ones with the beer-bellied truckers and talked about guns. At least that’s what Lorna had thought they’d talked about, though it seemed unlikely. She did remember that a big bearded biker-type had asked Megan for a kiss and she’d told him to ‘swivel, asshole’, and the whole pub had choked on its cheap suds because big biker guy was meant to be such a hotshot hood, but he had just blushed and left. And they hadn’t had to pay for any more beers. Or the Jägerbombs. Lorna had been shocked to find that they didn’t really do Jägerbombs in the States so she taught J-bombing to the blue-collar barflies in Brennan’s. They were enthusiastic students.

And then they were somehow back at home, and they’d just crawled into Lorna’s bed. And it didn’t need talking about, they’d just stripped to knickers and T-shirts, cleaned their teeth and got into bed. Though she did remember Megan insisting they each drank a pint of water first. Good old Megan, always sensible even when wankered. And then she thought they’d laughed about nothing for quite a while, before she’d noticed that Megan was noisily asleep. Lorna had been genuinely put out by the racket, but before she’d had time to get properly cross, she’d obviously dropped off too.

And then it was daylight but there had been a long, long period of really quite effective denial about that. They’d both got up for a piss but got back into bed and dozed and moaned and sipped at new pints of water until just a few minutes ago when Lorna had made them toast. Marmite for her, peanut butter for Megan, only Megs hasn’t touched hers yet, said there’s fire behind her eyeballs.

‘And you kept fiddling with me,’ says Lorna.

‘I so did not,’ says Megan.

‘So did. Rubbing up against me and everything.’

‘In your dreams, honey.’

‘It’s OK, I quite liked it.’

‘You’re such a liar.’

‘You don’t think I liked it?’

‘I know I didn’t do it. If I’d done it, you’d have liked it a lot.’

‘Ooh, such confidence. Well, I suppose it could have been Armitage Shanks. Come here, boy, come have your belly rubbed.’

‘It was probably him snoring and farting too,’ says Megs.

And they watch as the fat cat stirs himself from his position on Lorna’s feet and tries to sashay up to her waiting, waggling fingers. Only it is hard to sashay across bobbly knees, and bony shins, so it’s probably not the big lion strut old Armitage has intended. Lorna laughs. ‘You silly sausage,’ she says. She tickles him. ‘Were you touching me up in the night? Were you? You big old randy thing, you.’

And Lorna can tell that it’s probably going to be a good day. Maybe they’ll watch an old movie, something romantic but with a strong female lead. Maybe they’ll have a hair of the dog around six.

And then they finally start the glacially incremental process of getting up and getting dressed. There are interruptions like American
Come Dine With Me
, and lots more tea to be drunk and quite a lot of sitting down holding their heads, and problems with finding clean clothes, and texts to be answered including some shyly pleading ones from numbers she doesn’t recognise. She guesses these are from the skinny-hipster boys they’d met in the Albatross. She won’t go there. It could be fun, but she’s probably still too young to start getting all Cougaresque just yet. They’d been mostly Jezes in the making anyway. Baby Fuckweasels. She wonders briefly what he’s up to. I wonder how jolly old Jez is doing, she thinks, but she has no urge to call him or text him or anything.

And then she checks her emails.

She goes into the kitchenette, where Megan is making a smoothie.

‘Russian Hill then.’

‘What?’

‘That’s where we’re going today.’

‘Oh, babes. Does it have to be today? We both look like crap.’

‘Cheers, mate. Thanks for that. As if I wasn’t paranoid enough already.’

‘It’s true.’

‘Well, anyway,
babes,
we do have to go today, because there is the small matter of a coupla million bucks that has appeared in my account, courtesy of Daddy dearest’s factotum.’

‘His what?’

‘His factotum. Anyway, apparently I’m a millionaire which is a bit of a brainfuck actually.’

A long pause while Megan looks at her with eyes the colour of cigarette ash. Ash sunsplashed with blood.

‘And you want to go and say thank you?’

‘I want to go and say something. I’m not sure what exactly.’

‘I’d sure start with thank you.’

‘So you’ll come with me?’

‘Of course I’ll come with you. Old buddy. Old pal.’

‘Oh, all nice to me now I’m loaded.’ At which point Armitage Shanks comes into the kitchenette and begins rubbing himself against her legs.

‘Oh, not you as well,’ Lorna says, as she picks him up. ‘I can’t believe it. I’m surrounded by whores.’

Forty-seven

CATHERINE

Chunking up, that’s all she’s doing really. Preparing herself for life as a freelancer, where everyone is your boss and you have to say yes to every job you’re offered. That’s what Catherine tells herself as she gets what she needs from the boot of the Camry. It’s just a tiny bit of extra pro-bono work. And the least she can do, considering. As she slips the aerosols into the pockets of her jogging bottoms she thinks again about the advances in technology that make her job so much easier these days.

Minutes earlier she’d come out and jogged sedately around the block and concluded that the couple in the car were the only people watching the Knox house. This is not really much of a stake-out. Sortable.

And now, as she trots towards their Subaru, she can see that the man looks like a classic grade C government worker. Cheap suit, limp hair boringly cut. He could be one of the more slovenly missionaries for the Mormons. The old lady is more interesting. She is kitted out as an ordinary pensioner in her grubby pink jogging suit and the rigid steel-grey helmet of hair. Either she’s pretty senior in the organisation, or she just didn’t save enough for her pension and can’t afford to retire. Maybe she didn’t ever expect to get to retirement age. Interesting that she’s in the driver’s seat.

Catherine knocks on the passenger-side window. Resting on the dashboard of the car there are large Starbucks styrofoam mugs. Old newspapers are coming apart on the back seat. Sweet wrappers. It’s sloppy and self-indulgent. Not as Group 4 as the kidnapper’s’ operation but getting that way. The demoralising effects of cuts to public services no doubt.

As the window slowly eases its way down she can see the bloke has been reading
The Economist
, which he now chucks into the footwell of the car. She draws the can from her pocket. Gives it a gentle shake.

‘Can I help you?’ he says, and she lets him have it – a long squirt that envelops him in brackish-smelling vapour. He coughs once and goes quiet.

The woman is slow to react. Reflexes are gone. Dead wood. They should have retired her anyway, pension or no. She just about manages to reach across the slumped body of her partner. She is clearly going for the glovebox and some kind of weapon she has in there, but she’s nowhere near sharp enough. Catherine leans into the car, and then she gives the old lady the second can full in the face. She can see the woman holding her breath, but there is forty-five seconds’ worth of gas in the can and the woman looks like she won’t last out for half that time.

Sure enough, twenty-five seconds later the woman’s fingers stop scrabbling at the glovebox and she is quiet too, lying across the lap of her partner in a way that might be mildly embarrassing for them when they come round. Catherine gives her the final seconds of the can anyway, just in case the woman is faking.

Then she uses the phone she’d nicked from Russell Knox to take photos of them both. She has to admit this kit is impressive on lots of levels, but to carry something like this around is to have a tracker device round your neck. Send even one text from a piece of hardware like this and almost anyone could find you, almost instantly.

She’ll show Russell the pictures of who is watching the house, then she’ll make sure this gadget is destroyed in the approved manner.

She goes to the boot of the Subaru and flicks it up. Nothing. That’s annoying. She thought it was standard equipment these days. So it’s back to her own car for the rope and gaffer tape. It is Catherine’s opinion that everyone should have rope and gaffer tape in the car, like they should have a spare tyre, a flashlight and some barley sugars. Basic common sense.

She ties the feet and hands of the operatives. Tight enough, but not too tight, she isn’t wanting to properly hurt anyone. She isn’t doing real work on these nobodies. Not taking any major action. She’s just napping them. Giving them their own little daytime slumber party.

She does all she needs to and then she has a quick look for some ID. She finds it in the glovebox and she guesses it was actually these plastic oblongs that the woman had been fighting for. Certainly there are no angel-makers in there, no armoury. A notepad, some pens – and these ID cards on their tangled lanyards. She makes a quick mental note of the names and numbers on the cards and then puts them back in the compartment and jogs back to the Knox house.

She has a brief moment of concern when she sees the front door is open, but it’s OK. She walks into the nearest reception room and she can see it’s all happy families. Russell Knox, his partner and his little girl, all smiling, all laughing.

She tells them she thinks they have an hour. Really, she thinks they probably have two but if you want people to do things by a deadline it’s always best if they think they have less time than they do.

And Sarah raises an eyebrow and Russell just says that he’ll explain later. And then Catherine shows them the pictures of the people watching the house and sees them both switch on frowns of wonder and concern.

‘Hey, it’s the honorary consultant, Mr Jones. The computers and fruit guy.’

‘And Dorito woman.’

And they both look a bit lost. Like they paid to come into some kind of hall of mirrors and it stopped being fun a while back. Now they just keep banging their heads as they try and find the exit.

And then Russell says, ‘Hey, is that my phone?’

And Catherine says no, it’s hers and he looks doubtful but he doesn’t challenge her.

And Sarah asks her who she is again exactly, and Catherine looks at Russell and he tells her that she is the woman who found Scarlett, and brought her back to the house, and Sarah hugs her and thanks her and then says, ‘You’re a neighbour?’

And Catherine says, ‘That’s what the man said.’

Which, after all, is not yes and so is not a lie. Catherine hopes she has maybe told her last ever lie.

And there is a silence. Time for her to go. Time for them all to go.