A Thousand Small Explosions Page 9

  ‘Do you mind if we take a seat?’ Kevin smiled and she nodded, too lost for words to reply. She followed him into a spacious, brightly lit reception room with huge windows that overlooked miles and miles of fields stretching as far as the eye could see. Kevin steadied himself against the arm of a chair and slowly lowered himself into it.

  ‘I’m sorry I asked you to leave when you called, but you kind of took me by surprise,’ he began; the youthfulness of his voice belittling his ageing appearance. ‘The last thing I expected was for you to fly over here to see me.’

  ‘I only decided a few days ago,’ whispered Bethany. ‘I... I’m… sorry.’

  ‘You shouldn’t be the one who’s apologising, it should be me. I haven’t been honest with you about everything, well, I guess that’s pretty obvious. There’s no easy way to say this Bethany but I have lymphoma. It’s now at stage four which means… well, it ain’t good.’

  Bethany found it difficult to maintain eye contact with Kevin, unable to make the connection between the man she had fallen in love with by telephone and text message and the sliver of a man standing before her.

  ‘I was diagnosed a year ago, before you and I were Matched,’ he continued. ‘I wanted to know if my perfect girl was out there somewhere and a few months later it turned out to be you. And I did consider leaving it at that and not giving out my contact details because it wouldn’t be fair on the other person, but it’s human nature to be curious and when you spend so many hours of the day stuck in this house like I do, it’s all you can think about. So I really couldn’t stop myself from wanting to find out more about you. It was selfish and I’m sorry.’

  Bethany nodded and conceded that if their roles were reversed, she too would want to know everything about the person with whom she’d been Matched.

  ‘How much…’ her voice trailed off, deciding what she about to ask was insensitive.

  ‘How much longer do I have left?’ Kevin continued for her. ‘Probably not much longer than a month or two.’

  ‘What about the photos you sent me?’

  ‘They were taken last summer.’

  ‘And this is why you didn’t want to Skype or FaceTime me? A few minutes ago I was going to tear strips off you convinced you were married with kids.’

  ‘Ha!’ he laughed, ‘I don’t reckon I’ve got a Buckley’s chance at marriage.’

  Bethany suddenly felt very, very alone when she realised it meant the same for her. She might eventually go on to fall in love with someone but it wouldn’t be with the one. It wouldn’t be with Kevin.

  She offered him a sympathetic smile but no hollow words; there was little she could say that would make the slightest bit of difference to either of their circumstances.

  ‘Listen,’ Kevin continued, ‘I understand if you want to leave right now, I honestly do. Because if I were in your shoes, I’m ashamed to say I’d probably seriously consider it. You didn’t sign up for this.’

  Bethany gritted her teeth and curled her toes up inside her trainers. She wouldn’t permit herself to become upset in front of him.

  ‘Neither did you, Kevin,’ she replied. ‘So if you don’t mind, I’ll hang around a little longer so we can get to know each other in person. How does that sound?’

  Kevin gave her a nod and could barely suppress the grin that was spreading across his face.

  CHAPTER 29

  NICK

  ‘I thought you’d quit the smokes?’

  ‘I have. Well, I had. It’s just been a bit of a …peculiar … few days.’

  ‘What’s wrong, is it the S&D account?’

  Nick paused to take in the Birmingham City Centre landscape around him from the fire escape of his office building. He could hear the warning bells of the trams making their way up New Street while below him, rush hour commuters bustled along Corporation Street’s pavements towards the train station.

  Rhian was leaning against the railings puffing on her vaporiser when Nick appeared. He too had an e-cigarette in his desk drawer but today wasn’t a day to be a fake smoker. It was a day to slip into old habits, walk to the local newsagent to buy a pack of ten Marlboro Lights, a box of matches and packet of Extra Strong Mints.

  Then he’d enjoy a ten-minute nicotine high, give himself a squirt of the Hugo Boss aftershave he kept in his office for emergency spruce-ups, suck on his mints and head home to Sally, who’d be none the wiser that he’d broken his new year’s resolution yet again.

  It would be another lie to add to the rapidly growing list that’d tripped off his tongue since he’d met his DNA Match Alex; like that he was still one hundred per cent sure Sally was the only one for him, that they could live happily ever after and that he hadn’t given Alex a second thought when really he was all Nick had thought about.

  ‘Yes, it’s the S&D account,’ Nick told Rhian. ‘The MD is getting confused about the message he’s trying to get across. It’s giving me ball-ache.’

  ‘Well, start channeling your inner Don Draper because you always pull something out of the bag.’

  In his three years at the agency as a junior copywriter, Nick had yet to be beaten by an account he’d been assigned to manage, even though many were obscure products he either hadn’t previously heard of or even dreamed had existed. His work in making market leaders of a new yeast infection cream and a herbal remedy for erectile dysfunction had given him the nickname the Genital Giant, which quietly amused him. He prided himself on being able to sell anything to anyone with a smart tag line, but this week he’d been too pre-occupied to make a pubic lice lotion palatable.

  He’d tried his hardest not to allow his mind to wander towards Alex and came close to convincing himself that the emotions his DNA Match had stirred were imaginary. But while Nick made a living persuading consumers to buy into something they hadn’t realised they needed, he couldn’t fool himself. He had truly felt something and it wasn’t like anything he had ever experienced before. And he was convinced Alex had shared in it too.

  Nick slept very little over the next few days and his constant fatigue made him impatient and ratty with Sally. He heard himself sniping at everything she said or did, from her innocuous requests to pick up more kale from the little Waitrose on the way home to what new box-set they should begin on Netflix that evening.

  Something in Nick’s heart had deviated from the path it was following, and it was making him nauseous. Or maybe at that moment it was the cigarette smoke going deep into his lungs that made him want to vomit, he couldn’t be sure.

  As Rhian headed back inside the building, he took a long, last drag right down to the filter and stubbed it out on a metal step. He sniffed his fingers and turned his nose up at the smell. Stinking clothes and skin - he hadn’t missed these bi-products of being a slave to nicotine.

  His mobile phone rang. He looked at the screen and saw the number was withheld but answered it anyway.

  ‘Hello, Nick Wallsworth speaking,’ he began.

  There was a pause that Nick assumed meant an automated message was about to begin, inviting him to talk to someone about claiming a PPI refund, until a voice appeared that he recognised immediately.

  ‘Hi,’ began Alex. Nick’s heart went from zero to sixty in a second. He felt part terrified, part thrilled. ‘It was you, wasn’t it?’ continued Alex, ‘who came to see me?’

  ‘Yes,’ Nick whispered, his mouth suddenly dry. Neither voice spoke for a moment before Alex broke the silence.

  ‘Why didn’t you tell me who you were?’

  ‘In case you thought I was mad. And because I don’t believe in the whole Match Your DNA thing.’

  ‘Neither do I. Well, neither did I until…’

  ‘…until I was leaving…’

  ‘…and you felt something too, didn’t you? It wasn’t my imagination, was it?’

  ‘No, mate, it wasn’t.’

  Nick felt his body shiver even though he wasn’t cold. ‘I’m sorry I lied about my name. How did you find me?’

  ‘Match Your D
NA emailed to tell me I had someone. I did my test a year and a half ago and there were no Matches. Then as you were leaving I just knew it was you. I paid to access your details and guessed you had used a different name.’

  ‘Sorry.’

  ‘It’s okay, I’d probably have done the same myself.’

  There was another break in the conversation as both men fell silent. Nick steadied the hand he used to clasp the phone to his ear to stop it from trembling.

  ‘This is awkward isn’t it?’ said Alex.

  ‘You’re not kidding.’

  ‘It’s bullshit though, right? The test results, bullshit.’

  ‘Yeah, of course. Total bullshit.’

  ‘How has it happened?’

  ‘Some glitch or ghost in the machine or something.’

  ‘That sounds about right.’

  ‘Do you think we should get together and talk about it over a couple of beers some time? You know, if you think that’s a good idea?’

  ‘How about now?’ Nick caught himself saying.

  ‘Okay, say in half an hour in the Bacchus Bar?’

  ‘Yeah. See you there.’

  Alex was the first to hang up and Nick froze, waiting for his head to stop spinning before hurrying back to his office to grab his coat.

  CHAPTER 30

  ELLIE

  ‘Sorry, they look really pathetic, don’t they?’

  Tim looked sheepish as he presented Ellie with the flowers lying on the bar in front of him. ‘I didn’t pinch them from a cemetery, honest.’

  ‘No, they’re lovely,’ Ellie replied, glancing at the poor selection of wilting white carnations and red roses, their stalks wrapped in brown paper. She appreciated the gesture though. Tim raised his eyebrows like he didn’t believe her.

  ‘Okay, they’re a tiny bit pathetic but it was a very sweet thought,’ she smiled.

  ‘I’ve been carrying them around all day which is why they’re battered. I bought them this morning in case I couldn’t find another florist.’

  Ellie smiled, touched by his naivety in thinking there might only be one flower seller in London.

  Tim was already waiting at the restaurant when Ellie arrived a few minutes late. She’d gone against her security chief Andrei’s wishes and had set off alone by taxi for their second date, this time in a quiet street near London’s Notting Hill. Tim had chosen the venue, a family run French brasserie that looked like its décor hadn’t seen a lick of paint since the Thatcher government.

  He sat on a bar stool, peeling the label from his bottle of imported beer waiting for her to arrive. From the pavement outside, she spotted him in a dark suit. His hair was slicked down into a side parting and he was nibbling at his fingernails. He appeared to have made more of an effort with his appearance the second time around and looked much more nervous. His apparent anxiety made her body tense and she wondered if he had discovered who she was and, as a result, had felt under pressure to make a better impression. It wasn’t what she wanted from him - time and time again she’d witnessed first-hand the lengths some men went to in their quest to compete with her, or others who had assumed that by showering her with expensive gifts they would win her heart. As much as she loved a strong female role model like Madonna, Ellie was not a Material Girl.

  ‘Can I get a Hendrick’s gin and tonic please?’ Tim asked the barman as Ellie took a seat by his side. She liked that he’d remembered her favourite brand.

  ‘You look really nice,’ he said, taking in her black top, knee length skirt and black, leather boots.

  ‘So do you,’ she replied. ‘Is that a new suit?’

  ‘Yes, how did you know?’

  ‘You’ve left this on the pocket,’ she grinned and tore off a price tag. However, in doing so, she ripped away part of his pocket from the seam too. ‘Oh no, I’m so sorry,’ she apologised, and covered her mouth with her hand.

  ‘That’s okay,’ he replied, and tried to pat the pocket back into place.

  ‘I feel awful – you’ve gone to all this effort…’

  ‘Oh really, I haven’t.’

  ‘Flowers, a new suit, aftershave… but you don’t look as relaxed as when we met last time at the pub. Is everything all right?’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Tim sighed. ‘But I have a confession to make.’

  “Damn it,” Ellie thought, and felt her stomach sink. “He’s done his research and now he thinks I’m out of his league.”

  ‘I told my mate Michael about our first date and he had a right pop at me.’

  ‘I’m not sure I understand?’ Ellie replied, puzzled.

  ‘He said that even though we’d been Matched, I should have brought you flowers and taken you somewhere nice, not to my local pub, and then I should’ve dressed up a bit, hence the new clobber. It’s been a while since I’ve been on a date, Ellie. The last few were off Tinder and Plenty Of Fish and I was the only one who seemed to bother making an effort. So I went the other way with you, then you came in looking amazing and I realised I’d got it wrong. And with the others, on the rare occasion I did meet someone I was really attracted to, it was never mutual and I always ended up being friend-zoned pretty much straight away. But when we met, I definitely felt something more than just a bloke fancying a bird on a date - and something told me you and I weren’t going to end up just as mates. And now I’m a bit nervous about that because I don’t know what’s supposed to happen next. I don’t want to scare you off, I don’t even know if it’s possible to scare your Match off…. by the way, feel free to interrupt me at any point before I sound like a total bell end.’

  ‘Honestly Tim, I liked that you were yourself,’ said Ellie, unsure of when she had last met someone who wore his heart on his sleeve so openly.

  ‘But when you get all those London City types in their Hugo Boss suits and Rolex watches trying it on with you, then you find you’re Matched with some provincial pleb…’

  ‘Believe me,’ Ellie interrupted, ‘I had a far better time with you in your local that I would have with one of those types in The Ivy.’

  A look of relief passed across Tim’s face. ‘Can we start tonight again?’ he asked.

  ‘No, I’m secretly enjoying the awkwardness of it.’

  ‘Then let’s go and see if our table’s ready. That way I can drip some soup down my shirt or spill wine over my crotch and we can really make a night of it.’

  ‘Well at least you’re not having another of your love at first fart moments.’

  ‘You don’t want to know what happens on my love at second fart moments.’

  There were many things about Tim that Ellie found endearing like the way his lips curled up at the sides a second before he’d break into laughter, the small grey strands of hair peeking out from his beard, the way his left ear stuck out a little further than the right and how his entire face turned a deep shade of crimson when he became embarrassed.

  ‘So was I worth taking a gamble for and hoping for the best?’ Tim asked.

  While it was neither love at first nor second sight for Ellie, she was sure of one thing. There was something about him she was rapidly falling for.

  ‘Now that would be telling.’

  CHAPTER 31

  AMANDA

  Amanda listened intently as her Match Richard’s mother Jenny recalled anecdote after anecdote about her son, filling in the many gaps of Amanda’s imagination with mental snapshots.

  It was the second time they’d met in a week, this time in a garden centre coffee shop in a village half way between their respective towns.

  ‘The women he trained at the gym loved him,’ chuckled Jenny. ‘He was a handsome lad but there was something about his personality that they adored too. I think it’s because he gave them attention and listened to them and they might not have got that from their partners at home. And of course some of them took this to mean he was more interested than he actually was.’

  Amanda was beginning to understand what it was about Richard they were drawn to, because the more s
he heard about him from the people who knew him best, the deeper she was falling for him, even if it was against her better judgement.

  She clung on to Jenny’s every word as she described his childhood days in the boy scouts, how his sense of adventure had been inherited from his father and how no matter where in the world he’d been, Richard had always stayed in regular touch with his family by email or by phone. She spoke of how, when Richard was just nine years old, he had lost his father to a sudden heart attack but immediately stepped up to the plate as the man of the house.

  ‘I think Emma told you about his cancer scare, didn’t she? The one that made him want to go travelling in the first place?’

  ‘She mentioned it but she didn’t go into detail.’

  ‘Well, he was seventeen when he found a lump in his testicle and at first he didn’t say anything … the last thing a teenage boy wants is his mum to know he has anything wrong down there. But when he finally did tell me, I whisked him to the doctors and within a couple of days he was in hospital having the lump removed. It was cancerous, and he had to undergo a few sessions of chemotherapy, but within six months he was back to normal.’

  ‘That must have been horrible for you all.’

  ‘It wasn’t a great time, no. And it sparked a huge change in Richard. I think something inside him knew his time on earth might be limited and he wanted to make the most of it. And who can blame him? He was right, after all, and he managed to cram more into his years that many other people manage in a lifetime.’