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Mr Buchanan started inspecting some of the peeling paintwork on the front door frame, picking at it with a fingernail to see how easily it came away.
‘Yes, about your finances Miss Cooper,’ he said, flaring his huge hairy nostrils at her. ‘I see you’re behind on your utility bills again.’
‘Yes, I know, cash flow, but I’m on it, don’t worry,’ said Minnie, making two firm hand gestures with her fists to hammer home how on it she was.
‘They tell me when a tenant falls into bad credit you know,’ he said, turning back to face her with a squint. ‘And we spoke about this before, I believe?’
‘Oh yes, I know, but … ’
Minnie looked up and saw Lucky pawing the glass at her. She gave him a little wave.
‘What are you waving at?’ Mr Buchanan asked.
‘My cat … my catalogue.’ Minnie suddenly remembered she wasn’t allowed pets under the terms of her lease. ‘My catalogue will have arrived. I’m just excited – do you ever get like that about catalogues? January sales, whoop-whoop … ’
Mr Buchanan turned and looked up at the window. She didn’t know if he’d seen the swish of grey tail before Lucky ducked out of view.
‘I see,’ said Mr Buchanan, cutting her off. ‘It doesn’t sound like you are in a position to be shopping, Miss Cooper.’ He blinked his small eyes at her. ‘You’re due to renew your lease on the first, that’s today.’ He paused, ‘I don’t feel—’
Minnie could see where this was going and held up a finger to stop him.
‘Wait!Mr Buchanan, please wait, whatever you might be about to say, please can we not have this conversation now? I know this sounds crazy, but bad things happen to me on the first of January, so if there are any major decisions to be made about me continuing to live here, I wonder if I could call you tomorrow when it’s not the first and, um, well, just don’t makeyour mind up today. I know I’ve been a bit of a crap tenant, but just give me one more day.’
Mr Buchanan’s head was making very small movements from side to side. His lips were moving as though Minnie were a book he was trying to read and she was scrolling through the pages too fast for him.
‘You want me to ask you to move out tomorrow?’ he asked, peering at her in bemusement.
‘No, no, I don’t want you to ask me to move out at all. Just sleep on it, Mr Buchanan, decide tomorrow. I might not look like such a bad tenant tomorrow.’ Minnie gave him the most charming smile she could muster.
‘You have a month’s notice, Miss Cooper,’ he said, handing her the spare key. ‘But since you asked nicely, I’ll wait until tomorrow to formalise it in writing.’
Minnie got inside, dropped her bag on the floor and pulled Lucky into her arms.
‘Oh Lucky, it’s so cold in here.’
Lucky kicked out of her arms and sprang through to the kitchen. ‘OK, fine, I’ll get you food.’
Minnie pulled out half a tin of cat food from the fridge door and decanted it into a saucer. Lucky devoured most of it, then he jumped up onto the counter and up again to the top of the fridge. ‘Oh, you found the only warm patch in the place, hey? You won’t come keep me warm next door?’ Lucky tucked his head into his body – a definitive ‘no’.
Minnie walked into the next room and lay down on her bed. The only noise was the ‘plip-plip’ of the dripping tap in the bathroom and the gentle hum of traffic from the adjoiningroad. She shivered, jumped up from the bed, pulled off Leila’s stupid dress and riffled through her chest of drawers for something warmer to wear. She pulled on tracksuit bottoms, two thermal tops, her thickest jumper and some bed socks, then she climbed back into bed.
She looked at her phone; she should try Greg again. She should call Leila too and cancel their lunch – she couldn’t face going out again today. A wave of exhaustion crashed over her. Now she was lying down, the adrenaline that had been fuelling the last twenty-four hours finally stopped pumping. As well as being shattered, she was also fearful of interacting with anyone else today. Knowing her luck, if she spoke to Greg they would argue. If she went out with Leila, who knows – they were close, but no friendship was impregnable.
She sent Greg, Leila and both her parents a text to say she was fine, not to worry about her, but she had a terrible migraine and needed to take to her bed for the rest of the day. Then she turned off her phone. Minnie didn’t get migraines, she never had, but no one questioned a migraine, no one expected you to soldier through; people just accepted it and left you alone to recover. She didn’t get these migraines often, only a couple of times a year, but they did tend to come on with remarkable regularity around her birthday.
Minnie reached into her bedside drawer for a small brown bottle. It was almost empty, only three little white pills left. They were powerful sleeping tablets she’d been prescribed during a bout of insomnia last year. She had been saving them. She generally slept better now, but it was reassuring to know they were there. Otherwise she would get anxiousabout the 3 a.m. wake-up, her mind churning and no access to an off switch. She popped one of the remaining pills in her mouth and swallowed it dry. It was only 11 a.m., but if there was ever a day she wanted to sleep through, it was her thirtieth birthday.
New Year’s Eve 2015
Minnie’s hammock was almost perfect. It was exactly the right angle, hung between two palm trees with the head end raised slightly higher than her feet. She could lie back and look out to sea while sipping her coconut through a straw. Her curly brown hair was damp and crunchy from her morning sea swim; her face lightly tanned and freckled from two weeks in the sun – the picture of contentment. And yet, there was something about the rough cotton fabric against her skin that irritated her and stopped her from truly enjoying this last moment in paradise.
‘I don’t want to fly this afternoon,’ she said wistfully to Leila, who was lying in the hammock next to her.
‘It’s the only flight that gets us back to Delhi in time to make our connection home. Plus it was cheap because, guess what, you’re not the only one who doesn’t like to travel on New Year’s Eve,’ said Leila.
Minnie let out a weary sigh. ‘Can’t we just stay here, live in hammocks and drink coconuts for ever?’
‘I don’t think Islington Council would let me work remotely. I doubt the vulnerable members of the community I look after would appreciate chatting to their case worker over Skype, from a beach. It doesn’t send the right message.’
