‘He’s just been diagnosed with prostate cancer.’
‘Not really my point. So what date is the nearest weekend?’ he improvised.
‘Daddy’s birthday falls on a Friday,’ she said, tired now. ‘It’s December twenty-first, Lou. The same as it was last year and every year before that.’
‘December twenty-first, right.’ He looked at Alison accusingly, who wilted for not getting there first. ‘That’s next weekend, Marcia, why have you left it so late?’
‘I haven’t, I told you, everything’s arranged. Both venues are ready to go.’
Lou stopped listening to her response once again, grabbed the diary from Alison and started flicking through it. ‘Ah, no can do, would you believe. That’s the date of the office party, and I really have to be here. We’re having some important clients over. Dad’s party can be on the Saturday, I’ll have to move some things around,’ he thought aloud, ‘but the Saturday could work.’
‘It’s your father’s seventieth, you can’t change the date because of an office party,’ she said disbelievingly. ‘Besides, the music, the food, everything has already been decided on for that date. All we need is to decide which one of the two venues –’
‘Well, cancel all that,’ Lou said, hopping off the corner of the desk and getting ready to hang up. ‘The venue I have in mind does its own catering and music, you won’t have to lift a finger, okay? So that’s all sorted. Great. I’ll put you back on to Alison so she can take all the details.’ He put the phone down on the desk and grabbed his briefcase.
Despite feeling Gabe’s presence behind him, he didn’t turn around. ‘Everything okay, Gabe?’ he asked, lifting files from Alison’s desk and arranging them into his open briefcase.
‘Yep, great. I just thought I’d ride down in the elevator with you, seeing as we’re going the same way.’
‘Oh.’ Lou snapped the case closed, turned and didn’t slow in his walk to the elevator, suddenly afraid that he’d made a big mistake and that he’d now have to show Gabe that his intentions behind getting him a job were not to find a playdate. He pressed the elevator button and, while waiting for the floor numbers to climb up, busied himself with his phone.
‘So you have a sister?’ Gabe asked softly.
‘Yep,’ Lou replied, still texting, feeling like he was back at school and trying to shake off the nerd he’d once been nice to. Of all the times his phone decided not to ring.
‘That’s great.’
‘Mmm.’
‘What was that?’
Gabe had responded so curtly that Lou’s head snapped up.
‘I didn’t hear you,’ Gabe said, like a schoolteacher.
Then, for some unknown reason, guilt overcame Lou and he placed his phone into his pocket. ‘Sorry, Gabe,’ he wiped his brow, ‘it’s been a funny day. I’m not myself today.’
‘Who are you then?’
Lou looked at him with confusion but Gabe just smiled.
‘You were saying about your sister.’
‘I was? Well, she’s just being the usual Marcia.’ Lou sighed. ‘She’s driving me crazy about organising my dad’s seventieth party. Unfortunately it’s on the same day as the office party, which causes some problems, you know. Always a good night here.’ He looked at Gabe and winked. ‘You’ll see what I mean. But I’m taking the whole organisation off her hands now, to give her a break,’ he said.
‘You don’t think she’s enjoying organising it?’ Gabe asked.
Lou looked away. Marcia loved organising the party, she’d been planning it for the past year. In taking it out of her hands he was in fact making it easier on himself. He couldn’t stand the twenty calls a day about cake-tasting and whether or not he’d allow three of their decrepit aunts to stay overnight in his house or if he’d lend a few of his serving spoons for the buffet. Ever since her marriage had ended she’d focused on this party. If she’d given her marriage as much attention as she did the bloody party, she wouldn’t find herself crying to her friends at Curves every day, he thought. Taking this off her hands was a favour for her and a favour for him. Two things accomplished at once. Just what he liked.
‘You will go to your dad’s party, though, won’t you?’ Gabe asked. ‘Your dad turning seventy,’ he whistled. ‘That’s not one you want to miss.’
Irritation and uneasiness settled in on Lou again. Unsure if Gabe was preaching or was just trying to be friendly, he quickly stole a glance at him to judge, but Gabe was just looking through the envelopes on his trolley, figuring out which floor to go to next.
‘Oh, of course I’ll go.’ Lou plastered a fake smile on his face. ‘I’ll drop in for a while, at some stage. That was always the plan.’ Lou’s voice sounded forced. Why the hell was he explaining himself?
Gabe didn’t respond and, after a few loaded seconds of silence, Lou punched the elevator call button a few times in a row.
‘These things are so bloody slow,’ he grumbled.
Finally, the doors opened and the crammed lift revealed room for only one person.
Gabe and Lou looked at one another.
‘Well, one of you get in,’ a crank barked from the lift.
‘Go ahead,’ Gabe said. ‘I’ve got to bring this down.’ He nodded at the cart. ‘I’ll get the next one.’
‘You sure?’
‘Just kiss already,’ one man called, and the rest laughed.
Lou rushed in and couldn’t take his eyes away from Gabe’s cool stare as the doors closed and the lift slowly lowered.
After only two stoppages, they reached ground level and, finding himself crammed at the back, Lou waited for everybody to unload. He watched the workers rush to the doors of the lobby for lunch, bundled up and ready for the elements.
The crowd cleared and his heart skipped a beat as he caught sight of Gabe standing by the security desk with the trolley beside him, searching the crowds for Lou.
Lou slowly disembarked and made his way towards him.
‘I forgot to leave this on your desk.’ Gabe handed him a thin envelope. ‘It was hidden beneath someone else’s stack.’
Lou took the envelope and didn’t even look at it before crushing it into his coat pocket.
‘Is something wrong?’ Gabe asked, but there was no concern detectable in his voice.
‘No. Nothing’s wrong.’ Lou didn’t move his eyes away from Gabe’s face once. ‘How did you get down here so quickly?’
‘Here?’ Gabe pointed at the floor.
‘Yeah, here,’ Lou said sarcastically. ‘The ground level. You were going to wait for the next elevator. From the fourteenth floor. Just less than thirty seconds ago.’
‘Oh yeah,’ Gabe agreed, and he smiled. ‘I wouldn’t say it was quite thirty seconds ago, though.’
‘And?’
‘And …’ he stalled. ‘I guess I got here quicker than you.’ He shrugged, then unlatched the brake at the wheel of the trolley with his foot, and prepared to move. At the same time, Lou’s phone started ringing and his BlackBerry signalled a new email.
‘You’d better run,’ Gabe said, moving away. ‘Things to see, people to do,’ he echoed Lou’s words. Then he flashed a porcelain smile that had the opposite effect