After he’d waved Kyle and Tasha off for their meal, Dev had walked in his front door and stopped dead on the doormat.
Mal was sitting on the sofa with a mug of tea in one hand and the TV remote in the other.
They stared at each other. “What are you doing here?” Mal asked literally moments before Dev could ask him the exact same thing.
“Tasha had a bit of bother. What are you doing here?”
“Came home, didn’t I? I was gonna go down to Cornwall to join you tomorrow. Wanted to surprise you.”
“You did that all right,” Dev said feelingly. “But . . . why? Why didn’t you stay in Portugal with the lads?”
Mal looked sheepish as he put his mug down on the floor. “I felt bad, didn’t I, mate? Blowing you off like that. And then I got your text, so.”
Dev was touched. And guilt-stricken, seeing as he couldn’t even remember sending a text, let alone what he’d said in it. “You didn’t have to cut your holiday short though. What about all that sun, sea, and sex?”
“Nah, it weren’t all that great there anyhow. Nav’s girlfriend caught him snogging some Scottish bird on the beach and went off with one of the local lads to piss him off, so they ain’t been speaking to each other ’cept for the screaming matches over the pool. And on the beach. And in the bar. And you know Josh? Turns out he can’t pull to save his life, so he’s just been getting shit-faced all the time. I was up till five one night with him crying on me, then the next morning he accuses me of trying to turn him gay, like I’d wanna get off with a snot-nosed miserable git like that. And Pete ain’t speaking to anyone ’cos he got the hump when Nav and Josh locked him out the first night for a laugh. I just thought, two weeks of this shite and I’ll end up going postal on the whole bloody lot of ’em. So I got ’em to change me flight and came here.” He stood up and beamed at Dev. “So, did you really miss me or were you pissed when you texted?”
Dev had to laugh. “You tosser. Ah, come here, mate. It’s good to see you.” He folded Mal into a hug and even kissed the top of his head. Christ, he was going soft in his old age.
But, yeah, it was good to see Mal again. Dev knew where he stood with Mal.
“So go on, have you met your mum yet?”
“She ain’t my mum.” Dev’s good mood evaporated like spilled petrol, and he sat down heavily on the sofa. “Don’t want nothing to do with me, and the feeling’s fucking mutual.”
“Ah, mate, no. Seriously?”
“Yeah.” Dev’s voice didn’t crack. He was proud of that.
“Shit, mate. I’m so fucking sorry. I should’ve been there for you. Christ, I’m a fucking twat. I thought it’d be all, you know, like on the telly and stuff, and I’d be a spare part hanging around getting in the way. She really don’t want to know you?”
“Yeah. Can we leave it now?” Please? Dev added it in his head, but Christ knew, he’d say it out loud if he had to.
Mal sat down next to him and hugged him again. “You don’t need her. Got me now, ain’t you?” He paused. “Wanna shag?”
God, Dev had missed him. “Cheers, mate, but no.”
“Sure? It’ll make you feel better.”
“Seriously. No.” Dev hesitated, but why the hell not? “Sort of met someone, didn’t I?”
“What, local, is he? Is he all ‘Oo-arr, moi loverrrr, oi’ll ’ave ’ee in’t ’aystack wiv moi mangel-wurrrzel’?”
Dev found himself laughing again. “What accent was that supposed to be? Mate, leave off the impressions. And never enter Britain’s Got Talent. Trust me, it wouldn’t end well. No, he ain’t, all right? He’s from Surrey.”
“Yeah? Posh twat, is he?”
Dev grimaced. “Yeah, bit. Used to be a barrister.” Course, as of today there hadn’t seemed to be so much used to about it, had there?
“Used to be? What, is he retired or something? Check him out of the local old folks’ home, did you?”
“Oi, he’s young. In his thirties. He had to give it up. Or, well, take a break.”
“Took a bung, did he?”
“Jesus, bruv, where did you get your shining faith in human nature? No. He got ill. Narcolepsy.” Should he have kept it a secret? But at least Kyle wasn’t here to be embarrassed to his face.
“Narco what now? That some drugs thing?”
“No. Narcolepsy. He keeps falling asleep. And oi, no jokes. It ain’t funny. And no saying nothing to him about it.”
“I ain’t said a word, mate.” Mal was wide-eyed and serious. Then he grinned. “Be a bit awkward if he fell asleep mid-shag, yeah?”
Dev groaned.
“What, he never? Really?”
Great. Now he was going to have to spend half the night explaining what narcolepsy was actually like to his mate and trying not to deck him if—no, when—he laughed.
Funny, though. Dev couldn’t really bring himself to mind too much. Then again, there was other stuff that needed doing. “Tell you about it all later. We got stuff to do . . . Ah, shit. Tasha was gonna have your bed tonight.”
“Oh yeah? So what’s this bother she’s in? She’s okay, right? You sorted it?”
“Kind of. Maybe.” Dev gave Mal a quick rundown of it all.
Mal’s eyes got wider and wider. “And he’s here, your bloke? He came all the way over from Cornwall to help out?”
Dev couldn’t help smiling, but there was an uneasy feeling in his chest. “Yeah. But it’s what he does, innit? So we gotta get this place sorted before they get back from dinner. I ain’t having him thinking I live in a bloody pigsty.”
“He sprung for flights, didn’t he? Get him to shell out for a posh hotel.”
“What? No fucking way. This ain’t Pretty Woman.”
“Yeah, you sure as shit ain’t Julia Roberts, bruv.” Mal grinned. “She’s lovely, she is. What I couldn’t do with a mouth like that.”
“You realise she’s the same age as your mum, right?”
“Nah, she’ll always be twenty-three to me. So what’s the plan after tonight, anyhow?”
“Taking Tasha down to Cornwall— Ah, shit.”
“Lemme guess, she was gonna have my bed there and all? You know, a bloke could start thinking you were wishing he’d stayed in Portugal.”
“No, course not, mate.” Dev hugged him to be on the safe side. “I just got to think it all out again, that’s all.”
“Nah, you don’t wanna strain nothing. I got it all sorted. Your old mate Mal to the rescue.” He gave Dev that smug look that was all Mal. “You and posh bloke go back on the plane tonight, or if there ain’t no flights you get a hotel at the airport and have a shagfest, you lucky bastard, and Tasha stays here. In your bed. Then me and her drive down and join you tomoz. It’s perfect, innit? Everyone’s happy, and no need to get the industrial hoovers out.”
Dev ignored the bit about the shagfest. Mostly because he wasn’t sure that was ever going to happen, and the thought left a pain in his chest he didn’t want to think about. “Oi, hang on a mo, where’s Tasha gonna sleep when you get there? We’ve only got a two-bed room at the B&B. This you volunteering to take the floor?” And Christ knew what Mrs. Quick would say about that anyhow.
“Nah, you’re gonna be off shagging the rich bloke, ain’tcha? So me and Tasha’ll have the B&B to ourselves.”
“I can’t just invite myself to stay at his house.”
“Maybe he’ll offer? You know, if you tell him I’ve turned up to bollocks up your cunning plans? Tell you what—worst comes to worst, I’ll sleep in the car till I can get a room somewhere. Done it before, ain’t I?”
“You’re a mate, Mal.”
“I know I am. And seeing as it’s only Tasha who’s gonna be staying here, and she don’t give a shit, we don’t have to tidy up. Like I said, mate. Perfect.”
Yeah. Yeah, it was. Because no amount of tidying up was going to shift the patches of damp on the ceiling, or change the fact that it wasn’t so much a flat as a shoebox with two rooms just big enough to bung a bed in, or stop the screaming rows from the couple next door coming right through the thin walls. Or the noisy makeup sex that always happened afterwards, come to that.
“Why do we live here?” Dev asked.
Mal frowned. “Where else we gonna live? Chelsea?”
“I don’t mean Balham.” Although maybe he did, a bit. “I mean . . . this flat. I mean, it’s shit, innit?”
“So? It was all we could afford, wasn’t it?”
“Yeah, but that was years ago, before you got your job driving on the Tube. You’re earning good money now, and I’m doing okay, so . . . Why do we still live here?”
“Well, it’s home, innit?” Mal looked around. “See that sofa? Perfectly shaped to fit our arses through years of slobbing about on it. That mould round the window, that’s practically a pet, that is. And there’s that patch on the carpet where Hermione got out of her cage and had her babies. It’s, like, our lives. In furniture and stuff.”
Dev had to laugh. “Yeah, but it’s shit stuff. We could afford something better, you know we could. So why ain’t we ever moved?”
Mal stared at him like he’d grown an extra head, and it didn’t look any brighter than his normal one. “Seriously? It’s obvious, innit? We’re lazy sods.”
God, Dev had missed him. The tightness in his chest eased, just a bit. Yeah, spending some time with Tasha, with Mal nearby, that was what he needed.
Maybe Kyle would offer Dev house room, at that. But with the way he’d been before they heard about Tasha, and shit, the way meeting Tom fucking Saltash, flying solicitor, had rubbed in how bloody little they really had in common, especially looking at where they came from . . .
Dev wasn’t going to be laying any bets on this thing between them working out.
By the time Kyle and Tasha got back from dinner, Dev had it all sorted. He’d booked him and Kyle onto the last flight back to Newquay, called Tasha so they wouldn’t hang about at the restaurant, and even looked into getting a cab to take them direct to the airport. That idea got thrown out sharpish when he realised it’d take twice as long as the train. He’d also finally managed to grab something to eat, thanks to Mal nipping down the road to get some fresh bread and milk in.
Then he stood outside the flat and leaned on the wall trying to relax until they turned up. “Change of plan,” he greeted them, trying to ignore the way Kyle was looking at him warily. “Mal’s home, so he’s gonna explain it to you,” he told Tasha, then turned back to Kyle. “Me and you got a plane to catch.”
“Mal!” Tasha squealed in the general direction of the flat, then flung her arms around Dev. “I’m gonna see you soon, right?”
“Tomorrow,” he promised. “Gotta run now, though.”
There was only one thing Dev hadn’t thought of, which was that when they got out of Newquay airport, having made the last flight by the skin of their teeth, it was getting on for eleven o’clock and Kyle looked anything but in a fit state to drive them back to Porthkennack. He’d napped a couple of times, on the train and the plane, but it didn’t seem to have done him a right lot of good.
Dev wondered how to tactfully bring up the subject, but it was Kyle who mentioned it first. “Do you mind driving back? I’m not sure I’m safe to do it.”
“No problem,” Dev said, relieved. He was even more relieved when the ancient Fiesta started first try and made the half-hour drive with hardly a grumble. No wonder Kyle was so keen on the old girl. Dev was starting to feel fond of her himself.
Not that he’d better get too attached. It wasn’t like this was going to be a long-term thing, was it? Dev’s heart ached, remembering Kyle’s words.
He had to wake Kyle up again when they got back to his cottage. Kyle didn’t exactly invite Dev in—he didn’t say much at all, in fact—and Dev felt a bit awkward about assuming he’d be welcome. Especially seeing as he’d practically forced the bloke onto a plane without stopping to think if it was what Kyle really wanted.
Dev had told him about Mal and Tasha driving down tomorrow, but hadn’t said anything about where everyone was supposed to sleep, and Kyle hadn’t asked.
So Dev just said good night and headed back to the B&B, hoping Mrs. Quick wouldn’t have locked up and gone to bed already, seeing as she wasn’t expecting him back tonight.
That’d be the icing on the fucking cake, that would.