It's an ugly sort of Saturday morning. The kind where Friday night was too long but I can't roll over and sleep again so I have to get up anyway. I was working, see. Had to go to this exhibition opening at the British Museum. Not because I'm interested in the Treasures of the bloody Inca or anything. No, one of my clients has picked a target, but he was scared she might be a spook, so I went along to approve her. She's not a spook. I spoke to her for thirty seconds and I knew she wasn't a spook. She's a trumped-up accountant with privileged access at the Treasury. She's smart and a relative innocent. I wouldn't have picked her. It's not up to me, though. All I had to do was prove she wasn't from Intelligence and he wasn't getting stung. The rest is up to him. It just annoyed me, that's all. It put me off.
I was home before Cinderella last night. But I still feel like shite this morning. I make my way downstairs and the hallway mirror stops me, swearing, mid-step. I just look so… tired. You could shop for the fecking Brady Bunch with the bags under my eyes. Jesus Christ, when did this happen?
But I don't have time to question it; as I stand there, there's a tiny little noise, a little scraping, like a mouse trying to get through the letterbox. Then, beyond that, a low giggling. I cross the hall and open the door. It's Danielle, apparently trying to post me her key. While she's still outside, I tap the keyplate. Her drifting, drunken eyes widen very slightly and she mumbles, "Oh…" Then goes back to giggling.
I should turn her away. I don't know what brought her here rather than her own place, but I should shut the door and send her packing. But in the end I let her in. It's more of the pleasure of seeing her walk than anything else. I've always had a weakness for things that seem to be against all laws of nature, and on four-inch stilettos, in skin-tight silk, and looking like she's spent the night on an intravenous martini drip, this is definitely against nature.
She just about manages to point past me, up the stairs. From this sign language I interpret, "Please, dear friend, I am terribly sorry to impose, but would it be much trouble for me to pass out in the doorway of your spare room?"
Not just yet. "Are you seriously just getting in at half-seven in the morning?"
She nods, big and slow like a cow.
"Where have you been?" Stretching takes her into even further conflict with physics, but she manages it, arching back, arms stretched, and saying something beyond a yawn. "Beg pardon?"
"Policeman's Ball."
"Oh. Good girl. Yes, certainly, go and sleep. Full report this afternoon, alright?" That's if she remembers anything… But she nods again, and there's a little tremor on that first step towards the stairs, but other than that, she is making it.
How did she make it, actually? Seriously. I didn't even make it to midnight and that was two glasses of champagne and an hour's small talk. She's been working and learning and prying information all night, and apparently keeping up with the way cops drink, and it's half-seven in the morning. I swear to God, when she comes back down those stairs she better look like something Satan just shat out, or I'll murder her. She just better have the good graces not to upstage me.
But just thinking about that, I begin to suffer some sort of contact hangover. Before it has time to really take hold, I make my way through to the kitchen and start the coffee maker. Then turn around, because I can see myself in the chrome and nothing has improved since the mirror. And then I turn back again. I think I need a haircut too. Maybe that would help. I'll get Moran to book me in with his Turkish mate down Camden way. I was wary of him at first, since all he does for Moran is wax his head like a car bonnet on a fortnightly basis, but he turned out to be very good with a blade. That'll sort things out. Yeah, that's all I need. That's all it's going to take.
Moran copped off last night. I brought him along for a bodyguard, in case our friend from the Treasury really did turn out to have a Vauxhall heart. But as soon as we knew we were safe, he did his usual party trick of finding the only openly gay City boy in the room. They do exist, by the way, but only on nights out; as soon as they go back into the City, it stops. And I don't mean they become straight as soon as they step past Moorgate, I mean it all just stops. But anyway, last I saw dear Sebastian, it looked like a sure thing.
I don't really understand it, if I'm honest, this whole one-night culture. With Moran it's only when he's in between relationships, but with Dani it's constant. I don't understand it. Maybe that's what I'm doing wrong. Maybe if I was having it off and no strings attached every other night, I wouldn't look so… tired.
That's all it is, is just tired. I need a lazy day and a lie-in and then I'll be fine. I'm panicking over absolutely nothing here. Honestly, last week, one of Milverton's disgruntled victims was waving a gun in my face and threatening to bring everything down in grand and very public style, and I didn't feel a thing. The man was dead ten minutes later, so obviously I didn't feel a thing. But this is no different. A couple of coffees and a long shower and it'll probably all be over, nothing to worry about.
But those are just temporary fixes, aren't they? In the top of black coffee I can see myself and the corners of my eyes aren't going to be fixed by anything so simple. They're all… ruched. I swear to God that wasn't there yesterday. Threats like the one from Milverton's mate, they happen all the time, but this doesn't happen all the time.
The first person to even mutter the words 'crows' feet' gets stabbed with the roasting fork. And there's another word, and it starts with A, and I promise you sincerely, everyone you've ever so much as smiled at in the street will die before I get to you if you so much as dare to think it.
That's it. I'm not standing for this. I'm going to torment Danielle. Comfort to the wretched and all that…
But I'm too late. She's gone to the safety of barely-consciousness already, laughing to herself with a duvet half-dragged over her silk. You can see she tried to wriggle out of the dress, even got the zipper down, but the little button at the top is still keeping her from completely relaxing. I try calling her a couple of times, but she's hearing nothing. But look at that face. Obviously the drink has had its way with her this morning, but there are no lines. None. Granted, she's a bit y… Was born a couple of years after me, but she's in a high stress occupation same as me, so why are there no bloody lines?
"Oi." With my cuff tugged down over my hand, I try gently patting her awake. Much as I'd love to slap her I don't slap her. "What's the frigging secret?"
"Max Factor," she grins out of her stupor. Oh my God, it must be noticeable, if she's noticed in her state, if she knows what I'm talking about. "And Harry Factor," she giggles, "and George Factor. And the occasional Alice Factor." By which point I realize I'm holding her up by the front of her dress and let her drop back into the pillows. Before I leave her to the darkness I reach behind her and undo that button. Just as a courtesy. Just in case there's something else she might be bribed into telling me.
Not that I'm looking or anything, but as I leave I have to turn around to close the door. I just happen to catch sight of her as she writhes out of the dress. And I can't tell you what blessed relief it is to see the amount of support and strapping and tucking in that had to be worn beneath it. It really helps. It's getting me through the rest of this day, I'll tell you that for nothing.
But still, I do find my way back to the hallway mirror again. Not deliberately, I was just passing it and it's still just stopping me. Y'know I think the coffee and shower and the joy of knowing Dani is suffering similar troubles have made things worse. I'm all… puffy, oh, God, there, I've said it.
And the worst of it is, Moran's not drunk, so there's no real warning, and he just walks on in before I can turn away from the mirror. He looks at me with pity, and with a laugh. Well, it's alright for him, isn't it? Him and his perfectly smooth head and his hours in the gym because he hasn't got the army telling him what to do anymore. Some of us have work to do. Some of us don't have time for endless reps and would have pale, lumpy heads (that are probably all wrinkled at the back, for all I know)… "What? What are you laughing at?"
"It's tomorrow, isn't it?" is his reply. "I forgot it was so close."
"Forgot what was so close? What are you talking about?"
"Charlie called last week, asked what to send you."
"Nothing. I don't want anything. Why would he send me anything? Nothing's happening."
"Don't worry. That's what I told him. I told him we'd all just ignore it, let you get on with it." What? The hell's the point if I'm not even getting presents? Milverton has good taste. Why is Moran going out of his way to ruin my rapidly-shortening life? Are they all ignoring it? Am I not getting presents from anybody? But all this must show on my time-ravaged face, because Moran starts laughing. He stifles it at first, but then he can't anymore. "Sorry, mate, but I had to wind you up while you're weak."
"Don't. Seriously. You're not even funny."
"Look," he says, still with laughing pity in his evil eyes, but sounding like he wants to make peace. He points over my shoulder to the stairs, where Dani hung her tiny little bag on the banister post. "She won't mind if I give you one of your present early."
He goes fishing, and from amongst perfume and cash and mobile and lipstick and a roll of miniature lock picks (none of which on its own looks like it should fit in there), he fishes out a small black memory stick. "All the coppers, alright? Well, all the sociable coppers anyway, and their plus-ones. She downloaded the guest-list during a snog with the doorman." He hands it over, and with just a flash of some genuine emotion out of his hard, wicked heart, he starts to say, "Happy-"
"Don't dare," I cut in. "Not out loud."
"Happy anniversary of your survival for a further three-hundred-and-sixty-five days after turning twenty-nine. How's that?"
Well, from Moran, that's fine. Man-to-man, and considering he went through this a couple of months back, that'll do. But if that other one comes down from upstairs, the Unlined One, who would appear to have danced in the blue flame or bartered her soul in a Satanic rite, if she comes down and says anything stronger than Merry Diwali, we're going to have issues.