Dead in Time

Chapter Eighteen

Toby had booked us a hotel not far from the airport, all pseudo-Spanish arches and bright geometric print furnishings, which reminded me a little of the trendy Dulwich restaurant in which I’d first met his father. He apologised to me for not being able to offer his own place, but it was apparently nothing more than a rat-hole and, in any case, currently stacked to the ceiling with flight cases full of equipment from a party he’d run at the weekend.

“Oh, yeah.” Leon beamed. “I remembered you said you were doin’ that. How’d it go? Hey… wait a minute, this is the place in Meadowview? You’re not still living there, are you?”

Toby rolled his eyes. “It’s safe, Dad. Honestly. It’s not even really Meadowview, and—”

“You said you were going to look for somewhere else! Hell, your mother’ll kill me if she finds out….”

I excused myself and went to freshen up. We segued from the hotel to dinner at a nearby seafood place where they piped Californian indie pop through paper-thin wall speakers linked to LCD displays perpetually morphing in patterns of hot pink and acid green. Possibly because of the jet lag, barely having time to have a pee and dump my flight bag, or simply due to the fact I’d never been an enthusiastic traveller, I couldn’t help but think it looked like someone’s lava lamp had exploded in an IKEA store.

Toby asked pertinent questions about my apocryphal book, gently ribbed his father over days lost in lurex and sequins, and turned a little more respectful at the full mention of Damon’s name. I wondered how much the shadow of Day’s life—and death—had touched Toby’s early years; whether he knew his dad hadn’t been around that much because he’d been busy falling to pieces, or falling in and out of different retreats and shrinks’ offices. They seemed close, nonetheless. Toby looked genuinely worried when, talking about the trip to see Cris tomorrow, he prodded Leon with a gentle caveat.

“Yeah, so it’s, um… assisted living. Nursing care.”

Leon’s thick brows arched. I’d stuck with sea bream and a salad; he was addressing a mixed platter that contained hints of tentacle. I wanted very little more than to go to bed. Around us, well-heeled patrons chatted and laughed, and the melodiously bland indie pop tinkled on.

“I didn’t know he was sick.”

The corner of Toby’s mouth furled around a dubious smile. “Mm. I don’t know what it is, but the place is… well, it looks good, on the website. I just thought I oughta say. I mean, I know you guys haven’t seen each other in a long time, and if you’re going to—”

“Only if Ellis doesn’t mind me tagging along. I don’t know how much, uh, company she’s planning on having,” Leon added with a glance at me.

He meant Damon. He’d tried to word around it on the plane and, ever since we’d landed, I’d seen him taking nervous peeks into dark corners. To tell the truth, I didn’t know when or where Day would pop up. Before we left, I asked him how he wanted to play it. Teased him about running water and whether or not he could cross it. He’d pouted at me and asked precisely what I thought sewers and water supply pipes were. I judged his current absence to be more to do with making it easy on Leon—maybe avoiding meeting Toby—but I doubted he’d keep away for too long. I had the tacky red brooch in my luggage, anyway.

“You’re more than welcome,” I said. “Both of you, of course, if you….”

They both smiled at me, and it seemed settled. In stereo.

The home wasn’t terribly far away, considering the size of the state. The English find it deceptively easy to think of Americans as insular, defined and corralled by their localities—but what we neglect to realise is how much more landmass there is over there. Where, just a few weeks ago, I’d been spending hours swapping trains and sodding about on the Tube just to get to Bristol, it seemed that, here, a longer journey would actually take less time. Toby and Leon chatted away about it, in any case, and I decided—perhaps uncharitably—that my comment about a road trip in the Mystery Machine hadn’t been that far wrong.