Quinn had kissed girls before but not like this. The kisses before had been wet and mechanical, pleasurable, but consciously so, and somehow a bit ridiculous. Like the girl from the hockey club who just stuck her tongue out and moved it back and forth into his mouth like a lizard. This was something entirely new; every part of his body was investedin this, her mouth entirely in sync with his own. He felt an instant firm reaction beneath his jeans and pulled away, embarrassed that she might notice.
‘Wow,’ she said softly, her face flushed. ‘Um, Happy New Year.’
‘H … ’
Quinn couldn’t even repeat the sentence back to her, his mind was so full of questions; was this what kissing was supposed to be like? What was her name? Could he see her again? Could he kiss her again now without pressing his offensively hard jeans against her?
Before he could answer any of these questions, his phone started to ring, then his other phone started ringing too. The girl glanced down, perplexed.
‘Sorry.’ Quinn took a step back, pulling both phones out of his pocket. His mother was calling on one, the taxi company on the other. It was one minute past midnight. Quinn turned his back on the girl, not wanting her to look down at his jeans. ‘I’m … I need to take this, but wait here, please. I’ll be one minute.’ He gave her an apologetic, pleading look and backed out of the side door into the courtyard beyond.
‘Yes,’ he said, answering the phone to his mother. ‘Mum I’m kind of bu—’
‘Quinn.’ She was crying, ‘I need you to come home right now.’
‘Mum I’ll be back in half an hour, I said—’
‘You need to come back now, Quinn, I think there’s someone in the garden, trying to get into the house.’ She sounded breathless, panicked.
Quinn sighed a slow, resigned sigh. He called back the cab; he’d be five minutes, just long enough to get the girl’s name and number. But when he went back inside to the corridor, she had gone.
1 February 2020
Minnie woke up in a panic. She couldn’t breathe. Something was suffocating her. She sat bolt upright, gulping for air, her arms flailing frantically. A grey ball of fur flew across her bed with a screeeeoooow sound. Since moving home last week, Lucky had taken to sleeping on her face. Whether he had separation anxiety, or he simply missed having a warm spot to sleep on at the top of the fridge, Minnie didn’t know, but it was turning into a life-threatening situation.
Looking around the room, Minnie had that momentary feeling of not knowing where she was. The ceiling was too close, the windows weren’t where they should be and there was the ominous sound of ticking, like a hundred bombs about to go off. Then she remembered she was at her parents’ house on a mattress on the floor in her old attic bedroom. There were no bombs, just the combined sound of a hundred clocks.
The small, eight-by-ten-foot space was packed with boxes and old suitcases. Her father’s workbench was set up in the middle of the room, covered with the remaining tools and magnifying lenses he hadn’t got around to moving. The wooden frame of her deconstructed bed leant against one wall, stacked away to make more room for boxes.
The last few weeks felt like an unravelling to Minnie, wool being pulled from her body, stripping her of comfort andleaving her naked. All the ways in which she defined her current life had been removed. Minnie was a chef, she ran a pie company, she lived off the Essex Road, and she dated Greg. Breaking up with Greg felt like stripping off that last piece of identifying clothing.
Handing back the key to her flat had been painful.
‘It’s only temporary,’ Leila had reassured her as she helped move boxes into the hall. ‘You won’t be at your parents’ for ever.’
But Minnie couldn’t see how she was ever going to manage to rent a place on her own again. What with moving house, breaking up with Greg, and the flurry of orders to fill at work, she hadn’t had a chance to plan what she was going to say to Leila about the business. She’d been waiting for inspiration to strike, but it hadn’t struck.
She glanced up at one of the clocks on the wall to see what time it was, but each clock showed a different time. She checked her phone, 11 a.m. She’d been awake half the night, her brain too full; she must have finally dozed off around six. The jostle of thoughts now began again in earnest and she knew she would have no peace until she plucked them out one by one and confined them to a list. She typed a note on her phone.
TO DO:
1)Apologise to Quinn Hamilton for being horrible cow.
2)Tell Leila I want to close the business.
3)Think of excuse – why do I want to close the business?
4)Help Bev, Alan and Fleur find new jobs.
5)Secretly plan Leila’s perfect engagement.
6)Get new job for self.
7)Find somewhere to live.
8)Stop being so shit at life.
9)Buy cat food.