CHAPTER TEN
Hi peoples! Sorry about the late updates, but I'm gonna blame it on exams and the fact that no one is reviewing anymore, except to criticize the pairing. I mean, seriously guys, just click the review button and give the chapter, or even the whole story, a mark out of ten. OK? Just tell me which it is. You can give me a one, and you can review anonymously. Just review! Bartimeaus Trilogy is not dead. There is another book coming 2010! Keep it aliiiiive! I'm gonna shut up now before I say anything even more stupid. But read and review people!
NATHANIEL
"And the food really is exquisite," continued Jane. Jane had been talking non-stop for the past half hour, and Nathaniel was happy to leave it that way. Her words were meaningless to him anyway. He wouldn't be with her at all if he had any choice in the matter.
"How did you know that French cuisine was my favourite?" Then, without waiting for an answer, "And the décor is excellent too. Maybe we should come here again. What do you think, Nathaniel?"
This was the first time since they arrived that she had asked his opinion. She had even chosen his food for him without asking about it first. This was one of the reasons that he hadn't been listening to a single word she had said. The other was that he didn't care if she was telling him the world was going to end tomorrow. Nathaniel's was already crashing down around his ears.
"Huh?" he asked, not even caring about keeping up his appearance any more.
"Never mind," Jane said icily. "You must have had a busy day."
Yeah, right, thought Nathaniel. He hadn't had anything to do except sit around the house all day since the Glass Palace incident, as he still hadn't decided whether or not he was going back into politics. Jane started speaking again, but he remained immersed in his thoughts. Since the Glass Palace, Bartimeaus had been his entire life, and his rejection that afternoon had shattered the fragile bond between the two of them, leaving his very existence empty and worthless. Empty except for the girl across the table, blabbering on about some worthless subject…. She could never come close to replacing the djinni that had been by his side, a friend and enemy for almost as long as he could remember.
The minutes turned into hours, the hours into days as Nathaniel waited for the evening to be over. Jane seemed to eat in slow motion, his chauffeur drive much more slowly than the other cars as he dropped her home, their goodnight kiss a few more moments longer than necessary.
All because Nathaniel had realised that he wasn't alone. There was one more person he could turn to to put his life back together again. And he couldn't believe he hadn't thought of it before.
Nathaniel dissmissed his chauffeur as the long-suffering man pulled up outside Kitty's apartment block, mumbling a few hasty words of thanks as he scrambled out the door, slamming it hurriedly behind him. He barged his way through the door and raced up the stairs.
Two minutes and five floors later he was standing outside Kitty's apartment, panting but confident that she could help him. Later, he wondered how he had ever been able to think such positive thoughts after living his own life for the past seventeen years.
She opened the door and the first thing she gave him was not the warm smile he had been expecting but a solid punch in the face.
He stumbled and would have fell if he hadn't backed into the door of one of his assailant's neighbours. He realised, with a strange sense of dejavu, that he could barely hear what she was screeming at him over the blood pounding through his head and him own confused thoughts. "Why was Kitty so mad?" seemed particularily keen to make itself known in the miniature battlezone that was Nathaniel's mind. "She can sure punch hard" and "she looks really scary when she's angry" were also major players.
Even through all of that, Nathaniel still managed to pick up enough of what she yelling to add to his confusion. "You can break up with your own girlfriend" and "just when I was starting to think you weren't a complete idiot" featured prominently, as well as several other words and phrases that he wouldn't want repeated.
The emotion that hit him first was confusion then anger. Bartimeaus had been sharing his insane conspiracy theories with Kitty! He thought they were enemies! Now suddenly they were both terrifyingly and inexplicably angry with him, and he was left sore and completely clueless as to what exactly was going on. And he was sick of it.
Almost against his will, his mouth started shouting back, telling Kitty that he had no idea what she was taking about, that he couldn't care less what she thought, that she didn't have any right to so much as mention him and Jane.
He said all those things, but didn't believe a single one.
Nathaniel trudged dejectedly through the streets in the pouring rain. After paying for the meal with Jane in cash, he didn't have enough money to get a cab. Anyway, he thought, the rain rather reflects how I'm feeling at the moment.
He let a single, invisible tear join the raindrops on his face, sliding into one of the many puddles that turned the city pavement into a treacherous grey streak beside the road.
Nathaniel wondered if the sky was having as bad a day as he was, to shed so many tears. Nathaniel sighed. That would be pretty hard.
He felt like there was an icy hand around his heart, squeezing all the joy and life out of him. It clouded his vision, choking the colour out of everything. A girl ran past, squealing in laughter and trying to protect her expensive dress from the rain, followed a few metres behind by a man he supposed was her boyfriend, also laughing.
"How can they be so happy?" he asked himself. His mind came up blank, but his heart automatically supplied the answer. Because they have each other.
He pushed the thought from his mind, cursing himself for becoming so soft-hearted. Where had the cold, professional John Mandrake gone? He would not have been reduced to tears so easily. He would have put up his unfeeling shield around him and continued as if nothing had happened. Where had John Mandrake gone?
The strange thing was that John Mandrake had always wanted to be Nathaniel. To be able to feel, to love, to be free from the monotonous life that came with being a politician. But now Nathaniel wanted nothing more than to once again hide behind that emotionless mask.
But now that was impossible. Now he knew what it was to love, he would never be able to become John Mandrake again. Or could he?
He stopped still in the middle of the pavement, not noticing as the rain lashed his face and dripped from his hair. Maybe…
He could go out with Jane, court her, wear his old ridiculously tight suits instead of the more comfortable jeans and T-shirt ensembles he had recently taken to wearing. It wouldn't be easy. But both John Mandrake and Nathaniel both loved a challenge.
He started walking again, his stride lengthening and becoming more confident. Almost subconciously, he was already reverting to his old ways.
It would be easy, he thought as he shoved his way past a young woman, probably returning home from a late shift. All he needed to do was not feel, not think.
Anyway, it wasn't like Jane wasn't beautiful, wasn't wonderful. Maybe in time he could almost convince himself that he loved her. But she wasn't Bartimeaus, wasn't Kitty.
Nathaniel couldn't even decide who he was in love with. At least John Mandrake was sane. He smirked, 'sane' certainly wasn't a word he would use to describe how he had been acting the past few weeks. 'Crazy' or 'deluded' might better suited.
He walked up the steps to the front door, unlocking it and entering the hall. He almost called out to Bartimeaus when he remembered. He was John Mandrake now. And John Mandrake didn't giving a damn about his djinni. Especially idiotic, traitorous djinni. He made a mental note to dismiss said djinni as soon as possible.
Tossing his saturated coat on the hat stand, he decided that maybe he would wait until after Bartimeaus had dropped that off at the drycleaners to dismiss the djinni. He chuckled quietly to himself as he made his way up the stairs to his office. Taking the dry-cleaning had always been one of the djinni's least favourite chores.
Nathaniel – no, John Mandrake – sighed. When had he got to know his slave so well? Maybe this time he should dismiss him for good. He'd said that before though, and he still kept summoning the same sarcastic, un-obedient djinni as he had when he was only twelve.
Sighing again, he opened the door to his study and flopped exhausted into his swivel chair. All he wanted to do was sleep, to dream about something other than the living nightmare that his life had become.
He had drifted into a semiconscious state, too tired to leave the chair, when the phone rang. He considered ignoring it, but the ringing persisted and he decided that if answering would make it go away, then he might as well answer. Who would be calling at this time of night, anyway?
He had serious second thoughts when he saw the caller though – it was Jane, probably wondering what had been wrong with him at dinner. He smothered a groan, then remembered that he was John Mandrake now, and John Mandrake liked Jane Farrar. John Mandrake might even love her.
Plastering a fake smile on his face, even though she couldn't see him, and picked up the phone.
"Hi, Jane." He said brightly in a lousy attempt to feel, or at least sound, vaguely enthusiastic. "So sorry about tonight," he continued without giving her a chance to speak, "Don't know what came over me. Perhaps I can make it up to you? Maybe tomorrow at Reine de France?" He said all of this in one breath, determined not to be interrupted. But now Jane spoke, her voice slithering from the phone, reminding him of an exotic snake. Beautiful, but deadly.
"That would be lovely." At least this snake was easy to tame, "I'll see you there at nine o'clock, O.K? Wonderful." This time it was her that didn't allow him to speak. Nathaniel wondered if they would ever have a proper conversation.
He hung up the phone, leaning the back of his head against the chair. He was asleep in seconds.