Chapter 4
I need my girl
By the time Malcolm arrives at Number 10, half the UK's press is lining the laneway out front, a dozen quaffed reporters standing in front of the iconic black doors and solemnly reporting that "Prime Minister Nicola Murray remains unaccounted for."
Malcolm wants to deck one of them, the one who is making the biggest song and dance about how 'Deeply concerned the people of Britain are' and how 'so many people are deeply attached to the Prime Minister. Everyone is hoping for her safe return.'
Malcolm has to actually restrain himself. If he went out there (which thankfully he has enough self-control to refrain from doing) he would rail against the ridiculous presumption that anyone genuinely gives a shit, because even if they think they care, no one, no one, in the whole of the United fucking Kingdom cares as much as he and the children do.
The longer he watches them through the window the more he worries he's going smash one of the priceless artefacts in Number 10. Just as he is peeling back from the window to seek out Ollie, however, his phone chimes in his pocket. He whips it out so fast he fears he may have torn the fabric in the process, but he doesn't care. His thought is only that Nicola is calling him, and he wants nothing more in the world to be true.
"Hello?" He barks into the device urgently, not even taking the extra second to read the name on the screen.
"Malc, I've been trying to get hold of you."
"Katie, darlin'. Sorry. I thought yeh might be - "
"Mum. I know. Have you heard anything?"
"Less than Helen shitting Keller. Nothin' more than what's on the news. I'm being driven out of my fucking mind." Malcolm takes a moment to appreciate that while he may love Nicola, it's Katie whose mother is missing. "How about you, hen? How're you doing?"
"Well, it's eight thirty in the morning here so we've not really had enough time to process it. I mean," Malcolm can hear his step-daughter's composure cracking, and he wishes she were here so they could hug, or drink, or something. "Jesus fucking Christ, it's... You know, you don't expect your mum to be the fucking Prime Minister and you don't really ever expect her to get into a hostage situation in one of the world's most secure buildings. So I have no idea. Ella's making lots of tea and the boys aren't up yet. Dad's... I dunno. I can't really read him right now."
Malcolm bites back any cutting remark he may have in his utility belt to make about James Murray. It's not what Katie needs right now, and the last thing he needs is to try wedging her.
"The news said you've just gotten back to Number 10?"
"Yeah, that's righ'. I was at the cottage. We were - she was..." Malcolm gives up on trying to tell her that he expected her mother to arrive and spend a weekend alone with him. He gives up trying to manage the mental images associated with this, and the broken compact with the universe it implies. Instead he settles for "Christ this is a mess, KitKat."
"Fucking tell me about it."
"Can I have a quick word with Ella?"
"Yep. Can I have you back before you go, though?" At this moment, nearly twenty-eight year old unshakeably snarky Katie Murray sounds like the insecure teenager she once was. Once again, Malcolm wishes he could hug her.
"Course, pet."
If Katie sounds insecure, Ella sounds borderline catatonic. Malcolm has a good relationship with Nicola's children. Hey enjoys their company. He does not allow himself to wonder whether he will get to see them if Nicola doesn't come home to him today.
"Hiya." Is Ella's greeting, but it is stiff and lacking her normal warmth.
"Are you doin' alrigh', Ells?"
She doesn't respond to his question, and now that he listens properly he can hear rolling American coverage of the incident playing in the background. Her voice hitches, and he knows her well enough to know that one of her hands is tugging on her brown hair anxiously. "Is Mum dead, Malcolm?"
The Scot rakes his hand over his face, considering idly that he will be lucky to have any skin left by the end of the day. Malcolm has not had the benefit of raising Ella. He will not recover from promising things he can't deliver. He cannot magic Nicola Murray safe and sound no matter how much he wishes he could. Once, many years ago, he had a conversation with Ollie about the nature of power, about their inability to help people when they weren't in government. Now Malcolm realises he has never truly understood what it means to be powerless before. Powerlessness isn't having the shit offices and having to go through wankstain Tories when they need something from a Department. Powerlessness is this. Powerlessness is being totally incapable of changing his circumstances; being totally unable to find any information about whether or not the woman he loves is dead or alive. Malcolm feels like going back in time and educating himself on the many ways his understanding of power has been misguided, but right now it is perhaps the least of his issues.
Unable to answer her question better he offers an apologetic "I'm not sure, darlin'."
"We're not allowed to call her." Ella says numbly, and he's not quite sure if she's taken in his response or if she's too much in shock to process it.
"No. They said something about tracking it? I'm not sure. The thing has a fucking GPS so yeh'd think that would be more than enough to -"
"When will we know something?"
"I'm honestly not sure, Ella." He answers. Two months ago they celebrate her twenty-third Birthday, but he is beginning to long for the days she was a Harry Potter obsessed tween who never asked him anything more complicated than "Is the Prime Minister taller than Dumbledore, d'you think?"
"Look, darlin', I know it's a fucking ludicrous thing to say, but you need to try not t'worry about yer mum. She's got the best security guards in the world, and she's with the President of the United States. Nuclear wars would be launched if anythin' happened to that woman. An' that's before we even get to what I'd do if something happened to yer mum."
Ella half laughs at this comment, and he takes this as a sign of progress.
"Listen pet, maybe put me back onto Katie. If you need me just phone me, alright?"
"'Kay. Love you, Malc." Malcolm is a little surprised by the level of her endearment. It is not that he doesn't have a good relationship with her children, or that it's never said between them, but Ella's tone is one of numb insecurity, as if even from all these thousands of miles away, he is her lifebuoy. Malcolm isn't sure how well equipped he is to fill this position if he's brutally honest, but he's willing to try.
"Love you too, pet."
"Hello." It's Katie's voice on the phone now, and while Malcolm knows this, absolutely knows it, for a minute she sounds just like her mother, and the irrational part of his brain fires with relief at the sound of it.
"Just wanted to say goodbye, really, darlin'. Are you holdin' up?"
"Yep. Yeah, I'll be fine. I mean, like, not fine but - "
"I know, Kat. You're the coper."
"I wish I didn't fucking have to be sometimes."
"I wish neither of us had to be today, pet."
Katie's tone shifts as she utters "Ells, can you check if Dad's told Josh yet? If the boys aren't up don't wake them." She turns back to the phone as Ella mutely pads out of the room. "Malc, thank you for looking out for her. I know you're stressed off your head."
"Yeah, well. Yeh're my family and this is shit for ev'ryone. We do what we can."
"Have you ever had something like this happen before?"
"Lost yer mother? 'Course I have. Yeh know what she's like. Attention span of a fucking gnat. Nine times ou' of ten she's wandered off somewhere."
"You know what I mean."
He lets out a sigh. Of course Katie wouldn't let him escape with his weak attempt at humour, his dull platitude. On the measure of Never Putting Up With His Shit, she's just like her mother. "Not like this. Honestly Kat, I've never been quite so fucking terrified in my life."
Katie lets out a humourless breath of laughter. "Listen, Malcolm, I know, in the beginning things were like, y'know, not great between us all the time, but - "
"Kat, it's fine. You were looking out fer yer mum."
"I know. And I know we've talked about all this properly but I just... I like having you around is all. I wanted to say thanks."
"You lot come as a package deal, pet. Wouldn't trade you."
"Oh, good to know." She retorts sarcastically, and for the briefest moment he thinks they might all be able to get out of this in one piece. "Can we have like a serious metric fuckton of alcohol when I get back from Florida?"
"Fuck that, darlin', let's make it an imperial fuckton."
Katie laughs a little more genuinely now, and Malcolm feels like he's achieved something for managing to diffuse the situation, in however minor a way.
"Call me if you hear anything, yeah?"
"I will, pet. Call me whenever yeh want."
"Okay. Thanks, Malc."
Malcolm rings off, his head throbbing with family politics and the stress of the entire situation. He needs to find Ollie and bollock the younger man until he is sure he knows every scrap of information. This, of course, will not happen now he is the husband of the Prime Minister rather than the Director of Communications. It's not in anyone's best interest to give him all the facts, including, if he's brutally honest, his wife's best interest.
Nevertheless, he sets off from the residential wing towards the office where all the various security forces have set up.
"Malcolm." Ollie says, catching sight of him as he enters the room. He still finds it disconcerting to see the once perpetually perfectly suited Scot in weekend clothes. He finds it especially disconcerting because Malcolm still has the ability to absolutely eviscerate people even when he's disappearing beneath a bulky knitted jumper.
"Please tell me one of you lot isn't an incompetent twat."
"Mister Tucker, I'm not sure this is the right room for you to be in." Says an unnamed agent who Malcolm thinks must be MI5. He has that superior-because-I-could-kill-you-with-my-thumb-and-forefinger vibe that seems to accompany so many of them.
"And I'm not sure you have the right genital configuration, mate." Malcolm's tone is deadly. The security personnel in the room are irritatingly unperturbed. Malcolm is more than willing to kill someone with his bare hands to get the message across.
"Alrigh' I'm fucking done with this game. What do we know?"
"So, uh, the explosion was here..." Ollie says, pushing his glasses higher up his nose as he points to a mark on a sprawling blueprint of Novo- Ogaryovo.
"Do you have the run-sheet?" Malcolm asks numbly. He's sure it's been sent to his phone, but the idea of looking for it amongst his many thousands of emails makes his head throb.
"Here." Answers Nicola's EA, who looks totally stricken. Malcolm accepts the document from her and dons his own glasses, scrutinising the page.
"Where was this meeting? Which room?" Ollie hesitates. Malcolm reads the anxiety in his pause and knows the answer before Ollie musters the strength to give it.
"Oliver."
"This room. This is the room."
"Fuck." Malcolm exclaims, willing his legs not to give out on him.
"Who've we sent over?"
"They're still in transit. Russian special ops are there, three fire trucks en route to the scene. It's a bit difficult because the Russians like to keep things a bit... y'know, low-key. They've got media over there and they're trying to keep a lid on as much information as possible."
"D'you honestly think I give a shit about what the Russians want to keep a lid on, Ollie? I care less than I fucking care about Ben shitting Swain's pubic hair. Send the whole fucking military if yeh need! Fuck, wage a few wars while yeh're at it! Just get my fucking wife home."
"Malc, look, I'm really sorry, but you're actually not making the decisions here." Ollie can see every one of Malcolm's muscles whip with tension. He has the very real sense that Malcolm is going to hit him, and honestly he wouldn't blame the Scot if he did.
Of its own accord, Malcolm's fist is balling at his side, and just as he is about to grab Oliver Reeder by the shirtfront and break his fucking jaw, he recalls standing in Ollie's exact position in this very room. Tom had gone offline in Bali for five hours during Malcolm's tenure as Director of Communication. His wife Tessa had been alternating between crying softly and screaming at people, and while Malcolm had initially been gentle with her, by the end he was all clinical terms and an objective "Look, Tessa, darlin', I'm sorry, but there's just nothin' I can tell you righ' now. It's not been that long, I'm sure he'll fucking turn up like the bad penny he is."
Tessa had, quite rightly, hit him across the face and then proceeded to punch him in the abdomen. Malcolm sees it now, how his apathy must have infuriated her further. Malcolm refrains from decking Ollie based on this knowledge. He saves the option for later in case he needs it.
"I'm going for a fucking walk." Malcolm bites the words out viciously before turning on his heel and stalking out. When one of the nice, highly trained killers from MI5 calls after him "We'll have to ask you to not leave the building, Mr Tucker," Malcolm flicks him the 'V's over his shoulder.
Malcolm finds himself in their bedroom without particularly meaning to end up there. He is accosted with the lack of chaos, and for a moment he utterly despises having cleaners. He longs for the days in their old home when he would walk into the bedroom and find an explosion of Nicola. Dresses across the bed, shoes kicked off across the floor, bras hanging from the end of the bed and pants dumped unceremoniously on top of the laundry hamper. Malcolm wants to be surrounded by her chaos, her mess. He wants to trace the garments with his eyes and consider her trajectory, piece together where she was going and what she had been doing. Malcolm wants to be somewhere where he feels less like she is an idea, a memory, and more like she is a fact and a reality. He opens her wardrobe and runs his hands over her clothes, trying to focus his mind on the differences in each of the fabrics under his fingers. There are silks and cottons and wools and crepes. The feeling of each is familiar to him, but the way they yield beneath is hands, do not fall against the familiar shapes of his wife's body prevents the material from alleviating his tension. Malcolm upends the laundry hamper in an attempt to make the room feel occupied, but he finds it empty. The laundry has been taken and done since the two of them left Number 10, and Malcolm finds he cannot even muster the energy to rant about this fact. The building is full of rooms that he could pace through, but this is the one that is most lived in, the one that probably smells most like theirs. It is not the famous sitting room in which she occasionally takes tea with the Queen, nor is it the garish yellow hallway littered with pictures of past PMs, against which seemingly every world leader has been photographed. This is their space. It bears pictures of the children, and their trinkets from various overseas junkets and adventures. Katie's oldest stuffed toy - a worn Paddington Bear - has permanent residence on the window seat with the impeccably coordinated striped cushion. Malcolm chooses here to settle, beside Paddy, head resting against the window and eyes trained aimlessly into the grounds. He turns his BlackBerry in his hands for close to an hour, until he looks down and sees that the heel of his left hand is bright red with the force of his little device hitting it. At someone else's request, a cup of tea and an egg and cress sandwich is brought, tentatively, into the bedroom on a tray. That Malcolm doesn't shout their housekeeper senseless for interrupting him says everything that needs to be said about the whole encounter. Malcolm lasts half a cup of tea before breaking SO1's edict about keeping her phone free for the third time.
Malcolm holds his breath while his absent wife natters on. "Hi, this is Nicola's phone. Obviously I'm not answering so leave me a message. Or don't. But probably do. Especially if you have a private number. Now I'll stop wittering, but hey, at least you've had enough time to work out what you want to say. Bye!"
"Well, yeh've caused quite a stir down here at Number 10, m'dear. Got half of the intelligence agencies here. I'm hopin' you're in some safe room, tryin' not to get felt up by fuckin' Mattarella. But, look, if yeh have t'stick yer tongue down POTUS' throat to get yer flight cleared faster I'd be okay with tha'. I'd better get off yer phone before MI5 assassinates me. Don't do anything stupid. You know, nothing stupider than usual. Love you. You know that."
Malcolm rings off and throws his head back against the window harder than he'd intended, making a solid smacking noise alongside a solid set of swear words. With little else to do, Malcolm wanders down back into the newest, hottest destination in Number 10 - the room with half the country's security services in it.