Page 66 of The Bargain

It doesn’t matter how hard I try to concentrate on classes, on work, on extra physics assignments for Mazzati. On Brotherhood parties, or avoiding Desdemona.

The only satisfaction I have, in those two weeks of pure unadulterated dread leading up to the gala, is ignoring the endless texts from Mr and Mrs Pearson’s legal and PR people—all of them begging me for the same thing.

Written confirmation that I, worthless sob story poster boy Elias Lennox, will be bringing Desdemona Sutton-Knight, golden goddess with the KGM father and famous prosecutor mother, as my date to the gala.

I give them nothing apart from a text here and there confirming I’ll be bringing a date without ever mentioning Desdemona’s name. Then I stop texting altogether.

In the end, Mrs Pearson herself is forced to stoop. She sends me a text all in sugar-sweet tones asking me if I know what Desdemona will be wearing, so that she can match the colour of my pocket square—for the tuxedo she’s having tailor-made specifically for me at Henry Poole & Co—to her gown.

I ignore her, too.

It doesn’t quite feel as good as it would feel to tell her that Desdemona isn’t going, that I’m not going, that no gala could ever convince the country that she and her husband are anything other than selfish, self-serving, shameless leeches on the flank of society, and fuck them and fuck their gala.

But it does soothe the anxiety enough that I can get a few hours of sleep every night, although, what’s the point?

I still wake up every day feeling like puking my guts up.

Is there anything in the laws of physics that explains how time can stretch forever and still snap faster than a lightning flash? Maybe. Maybe I’ll learn about it at Harvard, in Mazzati’s dreamworld. Until then, all I’ve got is the torturous wait for the gala—a balloon swelling with dread until it bursts in a heart-stopping bang.

Now, I’m standing in a hotel room at the Savoy, getting fitted into a tuxedo that costs more than every piece of clothing I’ve ever worn since birth. Assistants flit around me, making sure the garment is entirely perfect, peppering me with questions I’m not even sure how to answer.

My neck is itchy with invisible basting stitches. Outside, the sun is falling, and the city fights the encroaching darkness with bright lights. The version of London I see stretched at our feet is a version of London that feels so foreign to the one I know that it might as well exist in a parallel universe.

Grand boulevards and smooth glass façades, a city scrubbed clean of dirt and injustice and hunger. A far cry from the London I grew up in, the grey, angry, grinding city that smelled of smog and fried chicken and piss-soaked stairwells.

The nausea that’s been haunting me for weeks doesn’t abate—it heightens, rests heavy in the pit of my belly. At the care homes, I always felt trapped. Now that the walls are Chinese silk instead of peeling wallpaper, I realise the cage never mattered.

All that matters is that I’m still inside one—biding my time.

At the foot of the hotel, there are flashes of light, a red carpet, a stream of town cars and limos depositing all the shiny people who are going to come feast on my misfortunes and soothe their egos with the sweet balm of showy generosity. They’ll make large donations in the name of social housing and the underprivileged youth, and they’ll rest easy in their Egyptian cotton sheets and Chelsea townhouses tonight. It’s not going to matter that eighty percent of their donations will go to the Pearsons, lining their war chests.

“Ah—Elias!” I didn’t hear the door open, but Mrs Pearson’s voice is instantly recognisable. “You look so very handsome tonight.”

The anxiety she’s been feeling is carefully contained beneath a cheery sheen, like trying to disguise sweat underneath powder, and ending up covered in both sweat and powder.

She doesn’t wait for me to answer, despite seeing me open my mouth to do so.

“I hoped that the silver pocket square would match your date’s outfit,” she says, crossing the expanse of blue carpet towards me. She’s wearing a wrap dress and a necklace made entirely of discreetly small diamonds. “Has she arrived yet?”

“Thanks, Mrs Pearson,” I answer mildly, looking down at the pocket square even though I couldn’t give less of a shit about it. “I’m sure she’ll like it.”

“Have you spoken to Desdemona?” Mrs Pearson asks. She’s now close enough that I can smell her perfume: a subtle bergamot blend that’s inoffensive and classically feminine, just like her appearance. “I can’t remember whether you confirmed her attendance or not.”

Yes, you can. Everyone remembers an unanswered text—the absence of what you need is always louder than the presence of what you assume is yours. I know that better than anyone.

I smile, letting myself soak for one small, petty moment in the lukewarm fizz of her anxiety.

She answers my smile with hers and clears the room without a word.

A single look is enough to scatter every employee and send them filtering silently out of the room. One assistant drops a notebook and bends to pick it up, cheeks flushing and eyes wide as she turns back to glance at Mrs Pearson.

But Mrs Pearson’s not looking at her. Her full attention is on me now. She smoothens the collar of my jacket. She’s taller than you notice when she’s beside her husband—his stature offsets hers, makes her seem smaller, less threatening. But alone, facing me, she’s nearly my height, and her eyes are two glacial shards, clear and merciless.

“Is Desdemona on her way?” she says, quietly and conversationally. “Yes or no?”

“Don’t worry, Mrs P,” I answer just as softly and casually. “You asked me to bring a date, so I will.”

“Elias.” She lets out a sigh in the manner of a long-suffering parent, all rueful annoyance and affectionate frustration. “I should think I wouldn’t need to remind you of how important this event is for all of us.”