Page 33 of Love in Tune

‘I didn’t know what else to do with them. The cleaning lady comes on Tuesdays! What if she found our new things? She might polish them or something, and think of the skin irritation you could get from that. Or worse, she might resign.’

‘So … you have other things in your bag beside the handcuffs?’

Wide eyed, Nell opened her bag and gestured for Honey to look inside. Beside Nell’s phone and sunglasses lay a vibrator, a long feather and a string of pearls.

‘I don’t think they’re meant to go around my neck, are they?’ Nell squeaked. ‘Simon left them for me this morning! Honey, I don’t even know what to do with them. Help me!’

‘Uh-uh. You’re asking the wrong person. You need Tash.’ Honey laughed at the askance expression on her friend’s face. The last few weeks must have been a real period of revelation for Nell, and in all that she’d still given enough thought to the piano man mission to arrange Friday’s date with Robin. She really was the best kind of friend, and probably a good person to talk to about Hal, if Honey ever felt it was time to share. Now was definitely not the time though, not with Christopher waiting over in the home, itching to deliver more bad news.

CHAPTER TWELVE

Sitting down to listen to Christopher an hour or so later, Honey found herself distracted by worrying thoughts of Mimi and Lucille. What were they up to? Or rather; what was Mimi orchestrating and Lucille being accomplice to? Whatever it was, she was certain of two things: Billy would involve himself as much as he could, and Christopher was likely to go ballistic. Beyond that she was in the dark, aside from the fact that Nell’s pink handcuffs were likely to feature too. She’d managed to grab a quick word with Old Don’s son, and he was heading down in his lunch hour with a photographer riding shotgun. Pressing her fingertips against her temples, Honey prayed that whatever they did wasn’t drastic enough to get her fired – at least not before they saved the home, anyway.

At the front of the room Christopher stood and clapped his hands for everyone’s attention, and a hush fell over the disparate gathering. Three care workers representing the care staff as a whole; two cleaners; Patrick the huge Glaswegian chef and his fresh out of school trainee; Cheryl and her mother from the office, and Honey. The fact that the gathering was so disparate did nothing to diminish Christopher’s apparent sense of self-importance as he tapped an experimental finger on the huge green felt microphone he’d just plugged in. It looked like something from a 1980s TV outside broadcasting. They’d all watched him set it up in the centre of the room, discover the lead wouldn’t reach the plug, and end up standing at the far end of the room as if he’d been sent to stand in the naughty corner.

‘One-two, one-two,’ he said like a cheesy wedding DJ, and the screech of feedback had the whole room clapping their hands over their ears as one. Christopher said something that really shouldn’t be uttered into a microphone, turned it up to full volume and kicked the stand.

‘Unless you want the whole town to hear what you’re gonnae say, I’d turn that thing off, Sonny Jim,’ Patrick said, clearly enjoying the chance to add to Christopher’s discomfort.

Christopher shot him daggers, yanked the plug out of the wall and dragged the microphone stand into the centre again.

‘Right then, to business,’ he said, both hands on the stand as if he were about to break out into karaoke.

Patrick raised his hand. ‘You probably don’t need to speak into the microphone, seeing as it’s unplugged.’

Christopher stepped in front of the mike stand, muttering, ‘I knew that,’ under his breath then cleared his throat, looking slowly around at each of them.

‘If we’requiteready, I’ll make a start,’ he said, as if the delays had been everyone else’s fault rather than his own.

‘As you’re all aware, the home is scheduled to close in a few months’ time,’ he looked pointedly at Honey, ‘the shop too. Well, the powers that be at head office have updated me personally this morning,’ his chest puffed out, ‘that they’re looking at bringing that date forward by five weeks owing to the fact that I’ve already secured places for more than fifty per cent of the younger residents, and, taking natural wastage into account, they feel that they can reasonably expect to rehome the remaining residents within the shorter timeframe. Are you all still with me so far?’

Honey stared at him. Five less weeks to work with.

‘Are you saying that we’re going to lose five weeks’ pay?’ one of the cleaners piped up.

Honey shared their worries, but something else in Christopher’s speech had outraged her even more. She found herself raising her hand, and all eyes turned towards her.

‘“Natural wastage”?’ she repeated his phrase, getting to her feet. ‘Natural wastage? Are you saying that you’re counting on some of our older residents dying before the time comes for them to be “rehomed”, as you put it?’

Christopher had the good sense to look contrite. ‘Well, I wouldn’t put it exactly like that, Ms Jones, but owing to the advancing years of many of our residents, it’s not unreasonable to think …’ his voice trailed off as a commotion kicked off outside the open window. He cocked his head like a police dog and narrowed his eyes.

‘What is that racket?’ he muttered, backing into the microphone stand and sending it flying, then climbing over it to get to the window.

‘Oooh no,’ he said, wagging his finger. ‘No, no, no. Not happening. No. Excuse me, ladies and gentlemen.’ He said all of this through an almost-maniacally unpleasant smile as he took off towards the door at a Basil Fawlty half run, and everyone else in the room bolted to the windows to see what was going on out front.

Honey clapped her hand over her mouth, holding in her quiet ‘Oh my God!’ as her gaze moved along the line of residents who’d fastened themselves to the home’s railings using anything they could find. Mimi stood at one end, handcuffed to the bars with Nell’s pink fluffy cuffs, with Billy Bobbysocks on the other end of the line, lashed to the railings by various bras Honey recognised as stock from the lingerie bin in the charity shop. At least eight other residents were strung out along the footpath in-between Mimi and Bill, including Lucille, who’d chosen women’s support tights for her restraints, and Old Don, who’d fastened his wheelchair to the railings with his prized collection of men’s neckties and sat eating a cheese and onion sandwich out of tinfoil with a blanket over his knees.

There was nothing for it. She needed to go outside, this was likely to get nasty. Turning quickly, Honey made for the door, followed hotly by Patrick and the rest of the staff from the meeting.

Christopher emerged onto the pavement as Old Don’s son from the newspaper pulled up with his photographer buddy in tow.

‘No press!’ he shouted, waving his arms frantically at the car.

‘There’s nothing to see here, gentlemen. Kindly move along.’ Christopher adopted the tone of a community police support officer and tried to push the photographer’s door closed even though the guy already had one leg out of the car.

‘Out of my way, lanky,’ the photographer grinned, pushing the door wide and sending Christopher barrelling backwards onto his backside, much to the amusement of the quickly assembling crowd. He snapped off a quick shot before holding out a hand to help the other man up.

‘No hard feelings,’ he said jovially as Christopher ignored the proffered hand, brushed himself down and glared at him.

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