Dolphin-san: Hey there! I'm really sorry to all of you who may possibly be getting bored of this since there is not much mention of Kai, but it's just the way I've planned it. Sorry. But you have to remember that he's a journalist so he has a lot of other work to do, tedious stuff that I don't really know about so can't write. I'll try to put him in the fic more but I can't make promises! And don't worry, this is definitely still a Kai/Ray fic, just others get in the way.

Chapter 18

For Max, the next two weeks were a nightmare. Every day, during his lunch hour and after work, he trudged from hideous flat to even more hideous flat, desperately searching for anything remotely habitable.

Every evening, when his mother phoned from Manchester, Max lied brightly to her, insisting he was fine and giving the impression that the only reason he hadn't found somewhere to live yet was because there were so many gorgeous properties to choose from.

And ten there was work itself, more a minefield nowadays than a shop, with Bruce feigning concern for his well-being when all the time – Max just knew – he was desperately plotting how he was going to sack him. Bruce's mood hadn't been improved, either, by the news that his mother had taken up with some unscrupulous toyboy and was evidently planning to squander all her money on him instead of giving it to her son.

'She's gone barmy, completely barmy. I could get her sectioned for this,' he raged. 'As for business,' he muttered ominously, 'I don't know how I'm going to keep it together, I really don't.'

The atmosphere in the shop wasn't a happy one. And, sod's law, the harder Max tried to be the perfect employee, the more things went wrong. Having never been late back from lunch before, he promptly earned himself two black marks in a week.

'I'm so sorry, the bus broke down and I had to run the last half a mile,' he gabbled, bursting into the shop at ten past two. The flat he had rushed out to view had gone before he'd got there; another one pound forty wasted on bus fares.

'I need you to be here on time,' Bruce told him, even though the shop was empty. As he noted Max's lateness in his diary with secret satisfaction he announced ominously, 'This isn't good enough.'

As he was leaving that evening, Mac saw a car he recognised parked on the double yellows outside the shop.

Hiro's friend, Adrian, beckoned him over.

'Max, it's about our mother. These phone calls, they've got to stop.'

'I've told her that already.'

Max reddened; every evening his mother delighted in recounting the details of her latest torrent of abuse. It was so humiliating. Not to mention pointless.

'We have to keep the answering machine on all the time now,' said Adrian. 'It's a real pain.'

'I'm sorry. I don't want her doing it any more than you do.' Max fiddled with the newspaper in his hands. He had three more flats to see and was desperate not to be late.

'Anyway, Hiro's moving out next week, so after that she'll be wasting her breath.' Adrian took a last drag of his cigarette and flicked it into the gutter. 'Maybe you could pass the message on.'

Max's hands were clammy.

'Hiro's moving out? Where?'

Adrian gave him a measured look.

'Since your mother's the reason he's going, I don't think he'd be too happy if I gave you the address.'

Be brave, be brave.

'Is he . . . um, moving in with his girlfriend?'

'I really can't say. Max, don't ask me anymore questions, okay? I'm just the go-between here.'

At least he had had the grace to look embarrassed. Max thought of all the meals he had cooked for Adrian during the first weeks after his own husband had left him. Then, he had been shocked to the core, frequently drunk and desperate for company. Max had listened to his endless self-pitying ramblings, fed and watered him, even ironed his shirts when Adrian told him Jack had ran off with their only iron.

How many times during those weeks had Adrian shaken his head and told him how grateful he was? 'True friends, that's what you and Hiro are,' he had burbled in a maudlin fashion after his ninth or tenth can of Stella. 'I mean it, I don't know what I'd do without the two of you.'

That had been then, of course, and this was now.

A whole year later.

Adrian was over Jack. And he was sober.

'I'm looking for a flat as well,' said Max. 'Actually, I'm late for an appointment. I don't suppose you could give me a lift to Finsbury Park?'

'I would,' Adrian lied, 'but I'm in a bit of a hurry myself.'

'I've seen forty-three flats in the last fortnight. They've all been terrible.' Max gave it one last try. 'Please?'

But it was no good. Adrian wasn't his friend anymore, he was Hiro's.

'Sorry, Max, I just can't. You'd be better off taking the tube anyway.'

Better off jumping in front of it at this rate, thought Max as he watched the car pull away.

Two of the flats were awful but the third – in Clerkenwell – was okay. Max told the landlord he was very, very interested.

By the time he got home, there was a message on the machine from the landlord telling him that he had let the flat go to someone else.

Max reheated the remains of last night's pasta and drank a pint of his latest craving, strawberry milkshake. Then he ate two Chelsea buns and a tin of rice pudding, before running himself a bath.

While he could still afford hot water.

Afterwards, he surveyed himself in the bedroom mirror, peeling of his dressing gown as cautiously as a plastic surgery patient having the last bandages removed.

No wonder no one wants to rent me a flat, Max thought, I'm so fat and hideous-looking I don't deserve one.

Covering himself back up – well, it wasn't fair on the mirror – he made his way through to the kitchen and unwrapped a packet of custard creams.

It was either eat or cry, and he was running short of tissues.

Not to mention time, Max realised with a stab of anxiety. In just over a fortnight he had to be out of here. If he didn't find himself somewhere else to live – and fast – he would be homeless.

Or, worse still, back in Manchester with his mother.

A bit of Dutch courage would have come in handy. Since he wasn't allowed to down a bottle of wine, Max psyched himself up with another biscuit instead.

Swallowing his pride along with his custard cream, he punched out Adrian's number.

Predictably, the answering machine picked up the call.

'Hiro, it's me. Max. I need to speak to you urgently.' His voice began to quaver. 'Please ring me back.'

Dropping the receiver back on to the hook, he gazed at the phone.

Less than two minutes later, it rang.

'What's happened?' Hiro spoke without preamble. 'Is something wrong?'

Was something wrong?

Oh no, everything's fine, thought Max, I'm pregnant and my husband's walked out on me and I'm probably about to loose my job and I don't have anywhere to live and if I don't stop eating I'm going to end up the size of the Millennium Dome –

'Max? Are you there?'

It was weird, hearing his voice again. Max gripped the receiver in both hands.

'I've spoken to my mother. There won't be any more phone calls.'

'Well, good. Not that it makes any difference to me,' said Hiro. 'As Ade told you, I'll be out of here by next week.'

Right, here goes, thought Max. He took a deep steadying breath.

'Hiro, I can't cope. Financially, I mean. I'm looking for a cheaper flat, but it's still going to be almost impossible to manage on my wages.'

Long pause.

'You should have thought of that before you got pregnant,' Hiro replied coldly. 'So? What does this have to do with me?'

How had it come to this? We were so happy once, thought Max. Nobody could have been more charming than Hiro when they'd first met.

But he thought he knew, now, what it was. The thrill, for Hiro, was all in the chase. Once the novelty had worn off, he had begun to loose interest.

Basically, he had a short affection-span, Max reminded himself. Oh yes, and when it came to money, he'd always been a bit mean.

'I thought . . . I thought maybe you could help me out.' The empty custard cream wrapper crackled as he curled his fingers helplessly around it.

'Impossible, I'm afraid. I'm moving too, aren't I? This new flat's costing me a bomb.'

This new love-nest, you mean, thought Max.

'The thing is, I was talking to Bruce about it. He told me I was legally entitled to maintenance. If I go to a solicitor, he'd be able to serve you with –'

'No chance, Max. I'd fight it all the way. You chose to have this baby, I didn't. God,' he sounded disgusted, 'you're a bastard, aren't you? First you wreck our marriage and now you have the nerve to expect me to support you. If you're in a mess, that's your fault, not mine. I'm the innocent party here and I'm damned if you're going to bleed me dry.'

'I don't want to bleed you dry.' Max was instantly consumed with guilt; Hiro had always been able to argue a case with terrifying efficiency. 'But I'm desperate, Hiro. I have no money, and as the law stands, you have to –'

'Don't threaten me with the law! I'm changing my address, I can change jobs too. So the law's going to have its work cut out, making me do anything.' He spoke with an air of finality. 'Because they'll have to catch me first.'

Max was alone in the shop the next morning, disentangling bubble-wrap from a box of alarmingly delicate porcelain figurines.

When the phone rang, his shattered nerves reacted as if a bomb had gone off. Max's fingers jerked and an especially fragile porcelain daffodil, clutched to the bosom of a pallid faced young country girl, caught on the corner of bubble-wrap and snapped off in his hand.

The figurines weren't wildly expensive, but that was beside the point. This miniature daffodil, Max thought, was in effect his P45.

He pictured himself, bags packed, climbing on the coach about to head up the M1.

Home to mother.

Truly a fate worse than death.

'Hello,' he sighed into the phone.

'Oh my word, that won't do at all. No no no,' a familiar voice scolded him good-naturedly. 'You're supposed to say "Good morning, Special Occasions, how may I help you?" in a sickeningly cheerful manner. I'm sorry Max, you don't sound nearly enough like a lobotomised air hostess. Instant dismissal for you.'

Against all the odds, Max felt his spirits lift a little.

Just a notch.

'Too late. I think I've just instantly dismissed myself. Hello, Mrs Curtis. How are you?'

'In a very good mood. Is Bruce glaring at you?' Florence chuckled. 'Don't worry. Put him on, I'll tell him not to sack you.'

'Bruce isn't here, I'm afraid.' (This is a lie; he wasn't afraid, he was glad.) 'He's at a trade fair in Birmingham. Shall I ask him to phone you when he gets back?'

'Don't worry, it's not important. I'll give him a ring this evening. So,' said Florence, 'how are you?'

'Oh, fine.' Another lie.

'Any customers in the shop?'

Puzzled, Max said, 'No.'

'Good. In that case, stop being polite and tell me how you are really.'

A lump sprang into Max's throat. These were the first words of genuine kindness he had heard in weeks. And they were coming from Bruce's mother, a woman about whom he may have heard a great deal – not all of it good – but whom he had never even met.

'How am I really?' He felt hot tears prickling at the back of his eyes. 'Not great.'

'I shouldn't imagine you are. Bruce told me the situation,' Florence said in her brisk, kindly way. 'Tricky to say the least. For other people too,' she went on. 'I mean, they must wonder which they're supposed to do when they see you, congratulate or commiserate.'

'I know.' Max sighed. 'I've got myself into a bit of a muddle.'

'So what's all this about instantly dismissing yourself?'

Florence didn't miss a trick, thought Max.

'I've just broken a china ornament.'

'Was it hideous?'

The pallid-faced country girl, minus her daffodil, gazed balefully up at him.

'Pretty hideous.'

'Probably a blessing then. Tell Bruce one of the customers did it.'

The lump in Max's throat threatened to expand.

'I don't think he'd believe me.'

'Is he trying to sack you?'

'I think so.' Max's voice began to wobble. 'Well, I can't really b-blame him.'

'How about that flat-hunting. Any joy yet?'

Joy, thought Max. When did I last have any joy?

His nose began to run with the effort of holding back a torrent of tears. Scrabbling in his pockets for a tissue, he mumbled, 'No . . . sorry, I've got a bit of a cold . . .'

Clamping his hand over the receiver just in time, Max let out a sob – an inelegant great honking sound like a grief-stricken goose. Tears slid down his face and dripped onto the bubble wrap on the counter.

'Max, are you still there?'

'A customer's just come in, I'll have to g-go.' Max stumbled over the words and hung up.

Twenty minutes later the phone rang again.

'Find yourself a pen, write this down,' Florence instructed him. 'Twenty-four Tredegar Gardings, Notting Hill.'

Max wondered what it was. The address of the Samaritans, probably.

'Got that?' Florence said briskly. 'Good. Come and see me after work.'

Max began to understand why Bruce called his mother a domineering old witch and a law unto herself.

'Um . . . actually, I've made appointments to view a couple of flats . . .'

'Come and see me after work,' Florence repeated. 'I'll expect you at six o'clock.'

Dolphin-san: Yay! Max's just so adorable isn't he? Hope you enjoyed the little update on what Max is up to.

Next chapter: Max goes to see Florence, and someone unexpected turns up.