Page 79 of House of Bass

“I thought you were meant to be the reasonable one in this relationship,” I whine. I don’t know what I expected her to say but it wasn’t that. Perhaps I am hoping she will stop me from burrowing myself deeper from the rabbit hole I have dug myself into. She rolls her eyes at me, as she often does, and just sighs.

“I don’t know the full story between the two of you but I’ve seen the way you look at each other when you think no one’s looking. Do I think you’re going about it the wrong way? Hurting someone? Maybe. But it’s always going to be there, you and him. You might as well figure out exactly what it is.”

“Ugh, you’re right.”

And she gives me a hint of a smile, “I always am.”

We say goodbye and I find Arden where I left him. On the living room couch, typing furiously against his phone, which can only mean one thing.

“Richard senior?” His head raises to reveal angry eyes that soften when he sees me. He nods in response.

“Nothing worth our time then,” I say breezily, to make him smile and he does. Or at least he tries to pretend he isn't, rubbing his hands across his mouth.

He kisses me on the cheek, “Not one bit.”

Arden locks his hands with mine and pulls me out the door, it takes us about an hour to get to Luton airport. We spend the car ride talking and it still shocks me how it is so easy to converse about the simple things like no time has passed.

An escort leads us from a different entrance, we figured it’d be simpler, the last thing we need is someone recognising us and it being splashed everywhere. I see the helicopter and my feet start to slow, “Where’s the plane?”

“We’re not taking it, we’re taking that.” He points to the empty helicopter that the escort is filling our luggage with.

“And who is flying it…?” I ask tentatively, worried where this is going.

He raises his hand and says, “I am.”

“There is no way I’m going in that rickety thing if you’re the one flying it.”

“We’ve been through this before, either you enter of your own accord or I carry you in. Your choice.”

“Those aren’t choices and when did you even have the time to get a bloody licence?”

“Last week.”

“LAST WEEK?” I shout, and I start walking back slowly. Hoping to the heavens I can find a cab to take me back home.

Arden yanks me towards him before I can move any further, “I’m taking the mick, I got it in the summer.”

He looks down at me, “Do you trust me?”

I shake my head and he just laughs because he knows I mean exactly the opposite. I pinch my eyes together and take deep breaths before I drag him towards the helicopter, “Let’s go before I change my mind.”

The flight wasn't too bad, it did help that I spent the entire hour we were on air with my eyes closed and my fingers crossed. We drove to his family home in the suburbs of Liverpool, in Allerton, as Arden’s mother was originally from here. There was a time when he was younger when he’d pronounce words a certain way due to her influence, I always thought it was the cutest thing. I tried mimicking him often but mother thought it unseemly to speak “like a commoner”. Anyways, all traces of the accent are gone from him today.

It surprises me that we are here because of how hard Arden took the death of Katherine. It has been a while since I have been here, the interior felt all too familiar. From the chandelier that hangs at the entrance to the scent of freshly gardened flowers. I assumed the place had been abandoned when the lady of the house died but that doesn’t seem to be the case.

“It feels the same,” I say softly, my hands gliding across the furniture.

“That’s because it is.” Arden responds leaning against the wall, “Up until four years ago no one had been in this house. Since she died.”

I stop in my tracks, taking in the fact that this is the first time he’s spoken to me about his mum in some time, and listen.

“Dad thought about selling it,” he scoffs. “He could never get himself to be near anything that had to do with her. So I told him I’d buy it.”

“My inheritance became accessible the day I turned eighteen, so I bought it from him.” He looks around the house as he sits down on the one-seater sofa, “I kept almost everything the same, brought back some of the staff who had worked here when she was still alive. It felt like a piece of her was still here with me.” A pause. Lost somewhere in his mind. It isn’t uncomfortable or uneasy, I understand what this means to him.

I bridge the gap between us, when my hand grazes his he looks up, “Thank you for bringing me here.”

Arden responds by pulling me onto his lap, he wraps both arms around my waist and brings me further into him.