Chapter Sixteen

Duncan had driven up and down the road a couple of times before finally parking and going up to the front door. It was getting dark, all of the roads around about looked pretty much the same, and he’d only been there a couple of times before. This was going to be hard enough without buggering it up by hammering on the wrong house to start with.

It was a few minutes before Jake came to the door. Duncan could see him hesitate on the other side of the glass before finally opening up. What he hadn’t expected was the broad grin that he had on, or the really classy-looking collarless shirt. Ella was a moody cow at times, but Jake was at least as hard to figure out as she was, even though he was a bloke. And he knew that he’d best not start by asking where the shirt came from.

“Hi mate, mind if I come in for a bit?”

“Is your phone not working?”

Duncan instinctively pulled it out of his pocket and slid the screen up, just in case. Battery and reception levels were OK, and everything that was meant to seemed to light up.

“Phone’s fine, why?”

“Just wondered why you hadn’t tried calling first, rather than driving right the way across London when you didn’t know if I was here or not, that’s all.”

Duncan had been prepared for a number of different conversations, but he already had the feeling that this wasn’t one of them.

“You said this morning that you’d ditched your phone.”

“Called a joke, that is.” To his surprise, Jake was really, properly enjoying this, even if it wasn’t how he had planned to spend the evening. “I made especially sure that it was on this evening, and that I hadn’t put it onto silent or anything stupid. I even got Si to call me to check it, because I had a feeling that one or two of you might want to have a conversation. And then all three of you lot decide to just show up on my doorstep instead.”

“I just popped round because there was something I needed to have a chat about, that’s all mate. Only needs a couple of minutes.”

Jake showed Duncan down into the basement, which had been knocked through into a large open-plan living area. Jeff and Mouse were both sitting slightly uncomfortably at the dining table, and tried not to squirm in their seats as Jake lead Duncan down the stairs.

“Funny that. That’s what they said too.”

Duncan stood looking from Mouse to Jeff to Jake and back again, but couldn’t quite figure out what to say.

Mouse had been the first to pitch up, having gone there straight from the studio. Jake had been a bit surprised to see him, but Mouse did just turn up from time to time and he meant no harm. He had listened to most of The Piper at the Gates of Dawn, and spent a while nosing through a heap of old birthday cards and fan letters which hadn’t been properly cleared away, while Jake showered and changed. A couple of the fan letters had looked a bit off-beam, but Jake didn’t seem particularly bothered when Mouse had asked about them. And he’d listened intently when Mouse had told him of his trip to take Petey to see Marty’s mother, but hadn’t said much. They’d vaguely talked about going for a curry, although neither of them seemed particularly worried about actually doing anything about it.

Even just moving around the room, going to get a glass of water or dig out a different CD, Mouse thought that Jake seemed to be limping slightly; but then he knew he was probably looking too hard. He was wondering whether to mention it when the door went.

Jeff was more direct. Jackie had more or less kicked him out of the house, driven to distraction by his complete inability to sit still. He had been constantly checking his phone and blackberry, and pacing around throwing a stress ball at the walls. He might have got away with it if his aim had been better, but he had taken out a couple of photo frames in the sitting room, which had been when she had strongly suggested that he do something about whatever it was that was bugging him. He had showed up wearing what he hoped was his most sensitive management face, and had already been telling Jake that he thought that they needed to have a proper discussion about how the four of them were going to keep on working together when they started heading down the stairs, while Jake tried to apologise for having sworn at him in the studio. Jeff barely noticed Mouse was there, and certainly didn’t change what he intended to say for his benefit.

Jake, however, was resisting having any kind of discussion at all until he’d had time to sit down and think about it all properly. His plan had been to spend that evening doing the thinking, but when he had tried pointing out quite gently that if they were there he couldn’t really do that Jeff had missed the hint and ploughed straight on. They had been having an increasingly tetchy discussion about whether to have a discussion or not, when they had been saved by the doorbell.

Once he had recovered from Duncan’s sudden appearance, Jeff wasn’t entirely ready to let it go, and frustration was seeping through at the edges.

“Mr Woods, you’re exactly the man we needed. You’re just in time to join in this conversation which we’re not having, mate.”

“You’re what?”

Jake wasn’t about to let Jeff take control.

“Jeff was trying to get me to agree to having a conversation, in which I agreed to have another conversation, in which I agree not to leave the band. I’ve been telling him that I need more time to think about it.”

Duncan had no idea how Jake could possibly think any longer, given he’d had almost a whole day to think already, but thought it probably better not to say so. Jake was clearly finding the situation as a whole funny while still being deathly serious. It hard to figure out what was really going on in his head – especially as it had already been going on for hours.

“That’s got to be your decision, that has. You’re a silly prick at times, and it wouldn’t be the same without you, but if you don’t want to do it nobody’s going to make you.” Jeff went to say something, which seemed to Duncan like a very bad idea, “Not even him. We’ll lock him in a cupboard or something, if we have to.”

“Was that really what you came here to say?” Jeff was brusque, and worried. Duncan realised it wasn’t only the workings of Jake’s head which were off-key.

“What? Relax, right. There was just something I wanted to check with Jake.” The other three all looked at him, expecting him to carry on, which wasn’t what he meant at all, “Not now though, not with the rest of you lot listening in. I can ask him another time.”

Duncan stood there uselessly, wondering if he should just leave, only to be challenged by Jeff.

“Hang about. This isn’t a time for you to go sneaking off and doing other stuff with Jake. We need to figure out what the four of us are doing first, before any of us takes other stuff on.”

“What? This weren’t about other stuff – it was just a fucking question! What the hell’s got into you lot?”

“Well, why can’t you ask it here and now, if it’s just a fucking question?”

Duncan looked to Mouse for support, but he was staring intently at the pattern of the wood grain on the corner of the table.

“For fuck’s sake! You need to take a chill pill, the lot of you! OK, I’ll ask now – even though you two arseholes have got an interest in this.” Duncan turned to face Jake, which had the added advantage of blocking Jeff out of his line of sight. “Jake, look, I’m sorry about this and all, but.. well I need to know how much you had to pay that girl.”

Jake was sufficiently confused that he had no idea any more whether it was OK to be finding this funny.

“What girl?” Duncan inhaled sharply, which put Jake on the defensive “Look, I’m not trying to be funny Duncs, I just have no idea what you’re talking about.”

Duncan had no idea whether to believe him or not.

“That Sorcha girl, back at the hotel.”

“What?” Jake half wondered if this was a joke: Duncan’s track record made him wary. Mouse made a noise which might or might not have been a whispered “No”.

“Look, I know I shouldn’t of, but I ran a book on how much you would have to pay her off. I’ve been carrying ten grand in cash around with me for two months now. I’d kind of like to get the whole thing cleared up. So I need to know how much you paid her.”

Before Duncan had even finished speaking, Jeff made a spluttering noise which almost sounded like he was choking, before making a couple of wheezing, heaving motions which were his last attempt at keeping the evening on track. He curled up, almost in slow motion, before erupting into a full-hearted belly laugh. Mouse and Jake weren’t far behind him, with Jake ending up doubled over the end of the kitchen counter, trying to catch his breath.

First they had to convince Duncan that Jake had heard nothing at all from Sorcha, and had no intention of paying her a penny. Jake tried and failed to find the text message she’d sent which said something about Sainsbury’s, which lead to Jeff confiscating his phone and changing all of the settings but without actually managing to retrieve it. Then they had to persuade Duncan that it wasn’t a very good idea at all for Jake to ask Sorcha to confirm in writing that she had no intention of suing him, however much easier it would make it for him to break it to the crew that they didn’t stand to get a penny. And neither Jeff nor Mouse would own up to what they’d had their money on, however often Jake asked them.

“What about if I try to have that conversation you were wanting to have before Mr Sensitive here showed up? Would you tell me then?”

“No way, mate. I want this band to still be in one piece come the morning. If we don’t have the conversation, I reckon you’ll be there bright and early tomorrow. Fuck knows what you’ll say if we own up to what we reckoned about Ms Granny Knickers.”

That just about settled it.

Several hours, a fair amount of booze and a delivery curry later, a stone cold sober Jake was trying to say goodbye to a thoroughly pickled Jeff and Mouse, and pour them into a taxi. Duncan had tried to bag the sofa, to save having to come back for the car, and had been promised a futon instead. Jeff was in an expansive, benign, apologetic mood, and busy telling Jake that he loved him. He was briefly derailed by Mouse trying to give him a hug, but soon recovered himself.

“…’coz we’re all on your side, mate. You know that, don’t you? Know we’re all,” he staggered slightly, and had to stop talking for a moment or two to concentrate properly, ” … on your side?”

“Of course you are, when you can manage to stand up straight. My side, contra mundum.”

“What the fuck’s that?”

“That’s Latin.” Jake was met with a round of incoherent, disgruntled muttering “Means ‘against the world’. I read it in a book somewhere.”

Mouse looked at him earnestly, and put his arm around him to steady himself.

“Contermerfundus” He said it as if he wasn’t sure quite how it was meant to work, “I love you too, confundus Jake, but you’s better come to the studio tomorrow or I won’t love you any more. No, no, noooo more”

Jeff staggered over to the cab, muttering about books, only to be rudely interrupted by a fit of wildly erratic hiccoughs. Mouse followed behind, with a gentle, almost rhythmical sway to his step. Jake turned back into the house, with a smile on his face which went right through the middle of him like the writing on a stick of rock, still wishing he’d had a proper chance to think.