Page 52 of The Monday Night Heartbreak Club
‘Fraser!’
‘Sorry, Margot, but I does. I was practically a hero, and it’s the nearest I’m ever going to get to being a hero.’ Fraser looked a little crestfallen. ‘But Minnie was right impressed when I told her. I had to have clips put in,’ he added to me. ‘Look,’ and he lifted his hair to show a line of tiny clips that kept his scalp together. ‘It’s like hair extensions, only skin.’
‘Fraser, you are revolting,’ Margot said firmly. ‘But it would be nice to see the film, Flynn. Have you watched it?’
‘Endlessly.’ Flynn was scrolling on hisphone. ‘I’ve even shown it to Dad, but we don’t recognise the goons. He’s in the middle of some takeover in the Middle East somewhere, we thought this might be rivals wanting to put him off. Ah, here it is.’
The film was from a camera above the bar, with a wide-angled lens. I watched our group arrive, saw Margot and Flynn put the peanuts out, everyone moving jerkily like in a ridiculous 1920s silent film.
‘I’m playing it back at twice normal speed,’ Flynn explained. ‘To get to the good bits.’
‘I look good,’ Fraser said wonderingly. ‘Wow.’
He’d arrived pantingly through the door and thrown himself upon the peanuts.
‘You look like an industrial digger,’ Margot observed.
‘Margot!’
‘Sorry, Wren.’ Margot gave Wren a small, secret smile. They were still hand in hand and nobody was commenting, so I decided to keep quiet too. ‘Sorry, Fraser.’
‘Nah. I were hungry. And Minnie says nuts are good.’
We all crowded in close around Flynn’s phone screen to watch. At least, everyone else crowded and he was holding the phone almost under my nose, so we were all bundled together. Nobody, apart from Fraser, had remarked on how bad I looked, or my injuries, and I guessed that the group chat had been kept fully up to date with my progress. Maybe they’d already visited when I’d been out of things? The thought of Fraser looming by my bed when I wasn’t conscious made me pull a small face.
‘Here.’ Flynn tapped the screen. ‘This is where they come in.’
We watched the door open, and Flynn changed the timer to show everything happening at normal speed. Two men came in and stood by the bar, putting the bag between them.
‘I should have noticed the bag,’ Flynn said sadly. ‘But it’s so ordinary.’
The pair moved, talking to Flynn on the screen, and I jerked.
‘Fee?’ Wren looked sideways at me around Margot. ‘Are you all right?’
‘I know them.’ My voice sounded as cracked as it had when I had first woken up.
‘Youknowthem?’ Margot peered more closely at the screen now.
‘Yes. Well, I sort of do. I recognise them, anyway. I didn’t really look at them that night, they had their backs to me and I was too busy…’ No. I couldn’t tell everyone that I was too busy being smug about my new future. ‘That one, the tall one, he’s called Axe, although I very much doubt it’s his real name, and the other one is always in the background. He deals drugs, he lives in Leeds…’ I moved my head on the pillow. ‘His name is… No, I can’t remember. But I’ve met them both. With Dexter.’
Flynn let the phone drop. ‘Dexter? You mean, your ex did this?’ He gestured at the screen.
‘Looks like it.’ My voice was small. ‘Sorry.’
‘Not your fault,’ Flynn said sternly. ‘At all. But I need to call the police and tell them.’
He went out and left the remaining four of us looking sheepishly at each other. ‘I’m sorry,’ I said again. ‘I didn’t realise he’d go that far.’
‘Look.’ Wren sat down beside Fraser, poking him until he moved towards the end of the bed and she could sit next to me. ‘You can’t take responsibility for your ex’s actions. You didn’t force him to be a jealous, possessive, thuggish bastard, did you?’
I moved my head on the pillow again. It wouldn’t quite shake, I couldn’t get it far enough over to the left, so it was more of a one-sided flop. ‘I honestly thought he’d just forget about me. I should have remembered that Dexter is…’
‘A sad, pathetic excusefor a psycho?’
‘Yes, thank you, Fraser. I should have remembered that Dexter doesn’t like being shown up and Flynn showed him up good and proper. He wouldn’t have come round, he’d been well warned off, so he sent his mates. I wonder if they knew what was in the bag?’
‘If they didn’t, they got out of there pretty sharpish,’ Fraser said, finding the bowl of fruit that someone – Flynn, most likely – had placed beside my bed, and peeling a banana.
