Chapter Four
When Louis walked through the doors on his second day, he was feeling a little bit apprehensive – but the first greeting he got was another friendly wave from Niall, and then a couple of people he recognised – but whose names, he guiltily realized, had slipped his mind – walked past and gave him a pat on the back, presumably in gratitude for him deciding to stick around, and things only got better from there. He mooched around for a while, saying hi to people, and stopped for a bit and had a pretty good conversation with Zayn Malik about hair wax, which the other boy admitted was a bit of a sore point.
“They won’t let me have any gel or anything – I can’t cope,” he announced, grabbing a strand of hair off his forehead in aggravation. “Look! It’s so limp. I can’t get it to stand up at all. It’s…it’s just unacceptable. My hair’s just flat. Ugh.”
“I think it looks okay,” Louis assured him.
“You would say that,” Zayn said gloomily, “your hair looks great.”
Louis started attempting to reassure him that his hair looked fine when he spotted a flicker of movement in his peripheral vision. Turning to look, he saw Liam gesturing impatiently at him and realized with a twinge of embarrassment that he had been doing it for a while, and it looked like Louis had been deliberately ignoring him. Shrugging apologetically at Zayn, he hurried over to where Liam stood and gazed sheepishly at the floor.
“Sorry. Got distracted.”
“Yeah, I bet,” Liam said with a grin. “Talking to Zayn, huh?”
“Yeah,” Louis said almost defensively. “Problem?”
“No. It’s just weird, that’s all.” Liam shook his head in amusement. “Zayn doesn’t usually say much – even when he’s got visitors he keeps his head down. He values his privacy, I guess. What on earth did you find to talk to him about? If it were me, I would just have stood staring at him; I didn’t think he was capable of having a full conversation. You’ve really brought him out of his shell. One-word answers are usually his limit.”
“Really?”
“Well. He’s quite close to his cell-mate, I guess, but who isn’t? We make sure that people get along in this place, or else we move them around. Don’t want anyone getting aggressive. I get the impression Zayn can be quite chatty when he feels like it, but the point is that he doesn’t feel like it very often.”
“He was moaning about his hair,” Louis admitted.
Liam laughed. “Oh, now that doesn’t surprise me. I do remember we had a few arguments with him when he first came in about that kind of thing. High quality haircare products were something he was adamant about. Not that he got his way, of course.”
“Vain, is he?”
“Not…not exactly. I wouldn’t say vain; he’s not totally self-centred or anything. But he does take pride in his appearance, yes.”
“Liam,” one of the guards said warningly as he walked past, “we’ve got a job to do.”
“Right. Sorry!” Liam apologized with a meek smile. He rolled his eyes as the other guy walked past, then made a face behind his back.
Louis smiled sympathetically.
“I was meant to be showing you to your office,” Liam admitted, gesturing for Louis to follow him.
Excitement lit up Louis’ face as they started heading down the corridor. Doors opened, and Liam’s keys clinked as they navigated their way down endless twisting corridors, constantly stopping to unlock doors and then carefully lock them again once they’d gone through.
“I get an office?” Louis asked eagerly.
“You sure do. Now that you’ve decided to stick around, they’ve set aside a little room for you, so you can have a little privacy with the guys. Confidentiality and so on.”
“But…an actual office? My own office?”
“The only thing you’ll be sharing that office with is the photocopier,” Liam promised.
A photocopier was a weird thing to have in a prison, but Louis didn’t comment. Already he was planning how to make the office his own; he’d always wanted an office, although he wasn’t entirely sure why. He liked decorating. One of his favourite things about getting his own flat had been customizing it, arranging all the little homely touches that made a house into a home. He was thrilled – his very own office! Not that it would be a very large one. Perhaps the size of a box room, he expected; very modest, very simple. Would he have a desk? He really wanted a desk. And he was determined to invest in a little plaque with his name on, a gold one that he could place in front of him to make him look important. Louis grinned.
“Here we are,” Liam announced, reaching for the first door they had encountered that wasn’t locked. He twisted the handle and threw it open, and Louis instantly poked his head inside.
It wasn’t exactly a large room, but it wasn’t tiny; it was somewhere between small and average. There were no windows; all the light came from a small and dusty lamp in one corner, which flickered occasionally. He did, to his delight, have a desk, and there was a huge, high-backed, dark red chair sat behind it, the kind of spinning office chair that evil villains with cats occupied in clichéd spy movies. It was quite threadbare, with a few rips, patches and clumsily mended tears, but it was a chair nonetheless. Opposite it, on the other side of the desk closest to the door, was a limp faded green armchair with the stuffing leaking out of it, looking very sorry for itself. There was a filing cabinet in one corner, and the photocopier sat in the other, by far the cleanest thing in the room. Even the desk was wobbly, one leg half missing so that one side of it was propped up with old telephone directories, and it creaked uneasily every few seconds, as if it might collapse if someone put so much as a piece of paper on it. The hinges of the door squeaked, there were cobwebs strategically placed in high corners that would be almost impossible to clean, and several ominous stains on the carpet stared accusingly at him, as if daring him to attempt to remove them. A balding doormat that was turning grey lounged in the doorway, not doing very much apart from masquerading as a rug. Oh, and the only thing on the unstable-looking desk was some kind of potted plant. It was limp and practically dead, brown leaves drooping, but it was a plant of some kind, no matter how lifeless.
“Oh my God!” Louis cried. “I’ve got a plant!”
“You’ve got somewhere to hide your briefcase,” Liam smirked.
“Yeah, but…I’ve got a plant!”
“You, my friend, are easily excited,” Liam told him pityingly, patting him on the back. “But come here for a second.” He led Louis over to the desk and the two of them stood behind it.
“I can’t believe I have my own office – and it comes with a free plant,” Louis said dreamily.
“Just remember something, and this is important. Here, give me your hand.” Taking Louis’ hand, he slipped it under the desk and slid it across the wood. “I know it’s here somewhere…aha! There! Feel that?”
“Yes…” Louis said cautiously. “It feels like a bump.”
“It’s a button. Don’t press it!”
Louis almost snatched his hand away, but Liam held him in place.
“Relax! It’s not dangerous. But don’t press it. This is your panic button. It’s your contingency plan, if you like. We’re legally obligated to let the prisoners have their privacy and not listen in to anything they tell you. It’s all because of closure, or something. Don’t ask me about the legal stuff; I haven’t a clue. But you keep quiet about this button, because if anyone starts getting nasty with you, all you have to do is press it. There’ll be someone outside at all times; if you press the button, we’ll be in here before you know it. As long as nobody knows about that little button, you’re safe.”
Wide-eyed, Louis nodded. “Keep quiet about the little button. Got it.” He paused interestedly. “Is it a redbutton?”
Liam snorted. “No. It’s yellow. Why, did you have your heart set on a red one?”
“No. It’s just the emergency buttons are always red, aren’t they? I just expected it to be red.”
“We’re full of surprises around here,” Liam teased. “Want me to leave you, give you a chance to get you and your briefcase settled in?”
“Please,” Louis said.
Liam headed for the door – but just before he left, he turned and said warmly, “I’m glad you decided to stick around, mate. Things are going to be a lot more fun around here with you knocking about the place.” Then he left.
Instantly, Louis had snatched his phone out of his pocket and was dialling. It rang out twice before Jay picked up.
“Louis?”
“Hey, mum!” he exclaimed. “You’ll never guess what! I’ve got a plant!”
* * * * * *
It took a while for Louis to finish tweaking with the room, and he had to admit defeat after the first two hours of tidying; it would have been impossible to perfect the appearance of it, even if he’d had a whole army of professional cleaning staff at his disposal. Still, by the time he gave up, the walls were faded white rather than dingy grey, many of the cobwebs were gone, and he had borrowed several extra lamps from other people to better illuminate the room; with white light bathing the area, it looked far more inviting. He had thrown his jacket across his own chair to disguise its battered state, and the ugly colour of the chair that his patients would occupy had been masked by a blanket that someone had kindly donated to him. Along with the neatened stack of telephone directories that he was planning to replace with actual books, the doormat that he had thrown away, the new rug that he had strategically covered the stains with and a neat pile of books and papers resting on top of the filing cabinet, the room was now presentable and almost inviting. Obsessively watering the plant for the third time in the last half hour – it was now in danger of drowning rather than dying of thirst – he stowed his briefcase underneath the desk and smoothed his shirt, realizing that the office was now pretty clean, but he was most definitely not.
Unfortunately, before he had time to do more than fluff up his hair at the back and twitch his collar, there was a timid knock on the door, and he automatically called “Come in!” without thinking about how much of a mess he was in. He couldn’t exactly take it back – so as a blond head poked nervously round the door, Louis smiled nonchalantly and acted like being rumpled and covered in dirt was completely intentional and he was setting a new fashion trend.
“Hey,” he greeted.
“Um…hi?” Niall offered. He blinked at Louis’ appearance.
Throwing him a reassuring smile, Louis said lightly, “Don’t worry; I know I’m a mess. I was so busy cleaning the room that cleaning me kind of slipped my mind.” He rolled his eyes.
“Oh. Okay.” Cautiously sliding the rest of his body into the room, Niall looked anxiously around as if someone was going to jump out at him, then advanced forwards a few tentative steps.
“I won’t bite,” Louis promised.
“I know,” Niall said. He smiled.
“Excellent.” Sitting down in his high-backed chair, Louis looked around happily at his office, feeling pretty professional for once instead of like a kid playing at being a psychologist. “Do me a favour, Niall, and test out that chair for me? No one’s ever sat in it before. Well, I’ll assume they have, but not while I’ve owned it.”
“Right. Okay.” Licking his lips, Niall carefully perched on the very edge of the seat and stared across the desk. His mouth moved into a polite smile, but it didn’t reach his eyes. He still looked anxious.
“If it collapses, don’t sue me.” Louis grinned.
“Is that…likely?” Niall stared in alarm at the chair below him.
“Just a little joke!” Louis reassured him. “I really shouldn’t try to be funny; I’m appalling at it. Don’t look so scared. I’m not going to do anything awful. We don’t even have to talk if you don’t want to. Don’t get me wrong; sitting here in silence for twenty minutes could get a little awkward, but it’s all your decision.”
“What do we have to talk about?”
“Anything. I’m really not fussy.”
“Are you going to force me to write essays about my youth and draw pictures that express my inner child?” Niall asked cautiously.
Louis laughed delightedly. “Oh my God! People actually think we do that? That’s great! No, trust me, all I want to do is talk, and I can probably get a pretty accurate idea of your mental state from that. If you really want to do all those essays and stuff, it’s up to you, but honestly, it sounds pretty boring.”
“Nah,” Niall said quickly, relieved, “just talking sounds good to me.”
“Good. How about we start from the beginning, then?”
“That’s usually a good place to start.” Niall chanced another smile.
“You don’t mind if I take notes, do you?” Louis flipped past a few pages in his notebook and then clicked the pen in a businesslike manner.
“Um…no?”
“I really ought to invest in a tape recorder,” Louis said conversationally.
“You can’t get tape recorders any more,” Niall pointed out.
“True. Sorry, that was just me being a nineties’ kid. The good old days of cassettes.” With a nostalgic sigh, Louis touched his pen to the paper. “So, down to business. The beginning?”
“Of my life?”
“No, of your…your criminal activity. Your big mistake, if you like.”
Nodding, Niall said, “I like the sound of ‘my big mistake’ a lot better.”
“Right, then. ‘Your big mistake’ it is. Tell me what happened. In your own words.”
“Will you be able to keep up?” Niall eyed the notebook.
“I know shorthand.” Louis looked pleasantly up from his paper. “Let’s make a start, shall we? See how much we can cram into twenty minutes.”
“Yeah, okay.”
Niall took a deep breath and looked into Louis’ kind, sympathetic eyes. Then, he opened his mouth and started talking.