“Thank you.”
“Don’t thank me, Trick. Just come home. I know you think I let you down, not supporting you, but I thought you’d come around. I thought you’d go off and sulk when you didn’t get your way, spend money, live it up, and eventually you’d forgive me, get bored and come back. I didn’t know, I didn’t know about how, well, how hard you took it. I’d have tried to find you soo
ner. If it wasn’t for the newspaper report I … I’m just so glad you’re back.”
Drum ended the call with a promise to be in touch then spent a few weeks walking around in his new skin, part Trick the kid who collected strays, part Patrick, the successful businessman, part Drum, the man who’d been frightened of hurting people and managed to hurt the person he loved the most.
He didn’t know how to reconcile that last part, whether it was healthier to cut the hesitant, suspicious hermit squatter out of his new life and not look back, or to take what he’d learned from living rough and let it warm his future.
He walked a lot. He watched people, listened to them. Heard hunger and worry, laughter and friendship in their talk. He would never have done that in his pre-Drum days. He’d never have noticed how tired the woman with the twins was, how pin-eyed the schoolgirl was, wired on something she was too young to be using, or how proud the pavement chalk artist was, and how in need of the coins in his hat. He saw those things through Drum’s eyes and it helped him understand he needed to be Drum as much as he needed to be Patrick and Trick to be whole again.
He could put himself together again, be a functioning person, but he needed one more thing to be happy. Foley. And he had to be worthy of her. He had to hope she’d give him a chance to show he could change, had changed, that he’d been worth her commitment. That if she wanted it, they could be friends again. He couldn’t hope for anything more.
But he was prepared to fight for it.
He moved from the cheap hotel to a serviced apartment. He could cook his own plain meals that way and it was cheaper. He was a very different man settling his hotel bill than the one who’d arrived.
He worked on his idea, had dinner with his father. A restaurant for that first time. The menu was a puzzle, ingredients he’d never heard of, styles that hadn’t been around last time he’d spent a small fortune on food. He got the permission he wanted and a queasy stomach ache from the richness of the meal.
He bought Foley’s falling down house. The one she wanted to save. He wanted to save it too, and it was something he could do for her. It stood on a cliff not too far along the coast from his cave and it faced the sea. He had a builder draw up restoration plans and submit them to council for approval.
Six weeks later, on the morning of the afternoon he was to present his idea to the board, he got up early. He was nervous. He was about to meet his new cliff edge, one he’d designed and felt passionate about, but to win he had to be prepared to jump.
Last time he’d stood in front of the board he’d tried to convince them to shut down production of Circa, to turn the company’s efforts to making a different drug, any other drug. He’d gone into that sparkling glass-walled room with its sweeping harbour views, its long table and the smell of fresh rich brewed coffee and he’d tanked.
He lost the argument. He lost control of his emotions. Shouting at them, thumping the table. Melting down in front of people whose trust he needed to lead the company. He lost faith in them, he lost their respect, and by the end of the day he’d lost his job and begun the process of unwinding his life. A month later he’d found the cave and stood for the first time on its edge, seeking absolution and answers.
He needed a very different outcome today.
He caught a taxi to the beach. The lure of that cliff edge was a tangible thing. As real as the clothing he dragged on. He stood on the shore for a long time looking up at the rock face. From this distance, he could only see the two ledges, not the cave itself. The man who’d needed that place was hurt and confused, angry, and determined to punish himself for failing. He didn’t feel the same way now. Those emotions were still there, he could call up the sense of apprehension that led him to believe his ambition had hurt so many people and he’d needed to stay away from the world so as not to do it again, but they didn’t cripple him anymore. They gave him strength.
He ran as the sun came up. Every slap of his feet on the sand he imagined Foley beside him, but if she was still running it’d be at the other end of the day. Still he thought of her chasing him, and then he went in search of friends.
He found them, waking, rolling out of blankets and scratching their heads in annoyance at the man disturbing them.
“Fuck off,” said Blue. “We’re not a side show.” He pulled his blanket up under his chin and scowled.
“We are if you want to donate,” said Noddy. He sat and put a hand on Clint lying close, checking him. “Go away, he’s still asleep.”
“How about breakfast,” Drum said.
“Fuckin’ hell,” said Blue, recognition in his watery eyes. “We have to get Scully.”
Noddy woke Clint and Blue went in search of Scully while Drum bought the kind of breakfast that would keep these men going all day. Lashings of everything. He paid the closest cafe to serve the men at their usual table at the pavilion, more comfortable for them than the attention they’d attract if they sat at the cafe. If they wanted it, he’d do it every morning.
Scully fed bacon to Mulder and the dog was a frenzy of tail wags. “Knew you were a fuckin’ fake. Told that chicky you were.”
“She came looking for you. That dolly bird. Not the one you got in trouble over, the one you were hanging with,” said Noddy.
He’d known Foley wouldn’t give up easily, but hearing she tried to hunt him down hit him hard. “I need to make it up to her too.” If she’d let him.
“That what this is, apologising to us for being lying scum?” said Scully. “I read that you’re a rich guy. Peddle legal drugs.”
That’s what it was. He could’ve helped these men in the small ways they’d accept. They were strays he’d failed to collect, but like Melissa, he’d collect them now. While they ate he asked them dozens of questions. He learned about Noddy’s failed business, his bankruptcy, and the head injury Blue never quite recovered from. Clint had outlived anyone who’d ever cared about him. Scully was too angry for anyone to care about.
Noddy wanted a new coat and boots. Blue wanted an old van. Clint wanted to stay with Blue and he’d like roast pork with crackling and apple sauce once in a while. Scully didn’t want anything except for a vet to look at Mully’s teeth. They were small things. They were the least Drum could do.
When he left the beach he felt ready to do bigger things. He was on a new edge and ready to jump.