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Chapter 7 | Fairytales

A fortnight before the wedding

"Is it still okay for me to– you know, have the day off for my wedding?" Rachel asked, leaning on her elbows and looking towards her boss, who was perched on the front desk, "And everyone else."

"Of course," Gill said, not raising her eyes from the case file she was flicking through, "Why wouldn't it be?"

"I just thought I'd check."

Things had been frosty between Gill and Rachel for a while after Gill had rejected Rachel's offer to be a bridesmaid, but in the past few months things had thawed between them. Maybe they'd just realised they needed to grow up a little bit, that it was making the rest of their colleagues miserable when they bickered constantly.

Now, they talked more or less normally; Gill would tease Rachel, Rachel would slam Gill's coffee down on her desk. As long as neither of them mentioned the wedding, nobody would've really known there'd been a problem.

"I've drafted in a cover team. If there's something bad we might have to steal a couple of the boys away early, but other than that..."

The side of Rachel's mouth turned up in an attempt at a smile.

"Have you sorted out a honeymoon yet?"

"No," Rachel said, "Neither of us really have a lot of spare money at the moment. There's Haydn to think about."

Gill felt certain that the final sentence had been said with a certain type of malice, like Rachel was suggesting that her boss hadn't ever thought about Sammy's needs. Was she just being paranoid? She was always really paranoid when something involved Rachel.

Jesus, she really needed to grow up. DC Bailey was getting married in a few days, and she would become DC McCartney. Nothing Gill said or thought could change that.

"We want to save up so we can afford to go somewhere really special," Rachel continued, "We were thinking Paris; the capital of romance, all that."

"Sounds nice."

"We've looked at little cottages you can rent on the internet; there's a lovely one with rose bushes and shutters on the windows, and they give you complimentary croissants when you arrive."

Gill looked up for the first time since Rachel had spoken to her. Rachel's chocolate eyes pierced hers, without a trace of sarcasm. She suddenly felt like she needed to run to the toilets and throw up the contents of her stomach.

What, she was repulsed by Rachel's beauty and youth and kindness and warmth? No, she knew the truth; she was repulsed by the fact that she couldn't have it all for herself.

"Just tell me when you've got a date."

"Will do. Jan?"

"What now, Sherlock?" Janet called back across the office from where she was crouched in front of the fridge.

"Bring me a KitKat, will you? Pretty please?"

"Why do you put your KitKats in the fridge, Rach?" Kevin asked, glad of an excuse to take a break from the mountain of paperwork he had to do.

Godzilla was so moody sometimes; she always had it in for him. He'd moaned to Janet about it last week in the pub, told her she was the sergeant and she should do something about it. Having three letters in front of your name instead of two didn't give you the right to take out all of your miserable old woman problems on your officers.

Janet had just shaken her head and taken a long sip of red wine, "She's not an old woman, Kev. And if she's miserable, we should do something to help her, not talk about her behind her back."

"I took her a coffee the other day, and she shouted at me."

Rachel had laughed, "You do make the most horrendous coffee, Kev."

It felt weird to be admitting it, even to himself, but he actually felt a little bit sorry for Gill today. She'd put make up on, more than usual, perhaps in an attempt to look younger, but it only highlighted the crinkles around her eyes. She looked exhausted, the parts of her face not smothered in blusher and concealer a sort of creamy colour.

He didn't dare ask her if she was okay. Instead he nudged Janet when she came back to the desk having given Rachel her KitKat.

"What, Kev? Are you confused by all the different letters? This is an A, and this is a B, and this–"

"Shut up, Janet."

"Sorry, I'm just kidding," she said, crouching down beside him, concerned by the sharpness in his tone. Normally he took mocking better than any of them put together. "What's wrong?"

"Is Godzilla okay?"

"What, the miserable old woman?"

"I'm serious. She looks like she's about to pass out or something."

"It's just the time of year. Everyone feels a bit peaky in the winter," Janet said, but she snapped a little bit of her own KitKat off and gave it to him, like she was rewarding him for being nice.

It was funny that everyone assumed he didn't give a damn about them. He might hide it behind bullshit and bravado, but he genuinely cared.

"Y'alright, Kev?" Rachel asked, when she came back to her desk, and Gill had disappeared into her office again.

"Is Godzilla alright?"

"As alright as she ever is," she shrugged, "You've got a bit of chocolate round your mouth. Have you been eating my Aero yogurts again?"

"Nope."

He waited until she'd settled down at her desk. She was texting under the table, glancing every now and then towards Gill; she looked like a school girl trying to avoid being caught by the teacher. Bless her.

Kevin signed a couple more forms, chewed his pen lid for a while, then sidled across the room and knocked. She'd said to him once, on one of her rare nice days: my office door is always open, so why was it closed today then? He leant against it slightly.

Gill was sitting at her desk fiddling with something in the palm of one of her hands. She hid it quickly between her hands when she saw him, but a chain hung down between her fingers. What was it? A necklace?

"Are you okay, Ma'am?"

Ma'am. Since when had he called her Ma'am and meant it as a sign of respect, rather than something to get him out of trouble?

"Not really, Kevin."

Since when had she called him Kevin? And since when had she actually admitted she was having a shit day, rather than denying it and taking it out on the rest of them, like it was their fault she didn't want to talk about the complicated issues with her husband and son.

"Why? Should I get Janet?"

"No," she said softly, "I'll be fine."

"Do you– do you want a drink or something?"

"No. Thank you."

He went a little bit closer. His first thought, when he'd seen her sitting there, was that she was crying, but now he saw that she wasn't. She just looked sad and empty and, whatever Janet said, she looked old.

"Should I go?"

She shook her head, "Was there something you wanted to talk about?"

"No, I was just saying to Janet that you looked ill," he said, tapping his foot against the leg of her desk, like he was facing the headmistress for his crimes. It should be Rachel standing here, getting shouted at for texting her boyfriend in work hours. "But Rach said you were fine."

"Rachel–" her eyes flickered, "Rachel isn't always right."

"No. I know. I mean, she's normally wrong. She says I make crap coffee."

Gill didn't even smile.

Kevin didn't understand, he didn't pretend to understand, but he saw that she was upset about something Rachel-related, and he had to be honest and say he knew the feeling. He didn't want her to be upset, he really didn't. The miserable old bitch was a good person, somewhere deep down. Very deep down.

He sat down at the desk in front of her and offered her the stick of KitKat he'd stolen from Rachel's desk on his way past, like it was some sort of consolation prize for whatever Rachel had done.

She took it. A tear dribbled down her cheek and fell onto the chocolate, and she unclasped her hand and showed him the pendant of the necklace, a beautiful golden rose which seemed suddenly to tell Kevin everything.

XxXxX