No Way to Say Goodbye - Anna McPartlin [29]
He didn’t hear the door open and his neighbour didn’t see the man stooped over her step so she walked straight into him – his face embedded itself in her crotch – unbalancing him. Her initial shock gave way to horror when he clutched at her arse. Beating him about the head with her handbag was her only option and she did so with gusto. A strange man’s face in her crotch will provoke that kind of reaction in a woman.
In Sam’s defence, he hadn’t planned the assault and her handbag had buckles.
“Get off, you frigging perv!” she roared.
“Your bowl!” He pointed with one hand, while protecting his face with the other.
She gave him one last clout and the onslaught ended. Unfortunately that one drew blood.
“Aaaah!” he yelled.
Mary took a moment to survey the damage she’d inflicted. “Oh!” Frigging buckle.
“What?” Sam said urgently – as with most men, any minor injury was tantamount to the end of the world.
“Your eye is bleeding. It must have caught on the buckle.”
Sam took his hand off his face. It was red, the blood pooling in his palm. He heard her sigh – a frustrated sigh. She really did have a nerve.
Mary was embarrassed at having gone one step too far, yet his reaction to a tiny cut was amusing, even endearing. “I have a first-aid kit,” she said.
He would have told her to shove it but he had always been squeamish around blood, which had proved a handicap when he was a heroin addict. Of course, the promise of liquid Nirvana had enabled him to get over it, but now he was clean, his weak stomach and wobbling legs had made a surprising return.
Unsteadily he followed her inside and she indicated that he should sit at the kitchen table. He closed his eyes, his hand tight against the cut just over his eye. He could hear her shoving pots and pans about and then she was standing over him. “You have to move your hand,” she advised.
Eyes closed, he was almost sure he could hear a grin in her voice. He was slow to comply.
“It’s a tiny cut. You’re not going to lose an eye here.”
Easy for you to say, you bag-wielding lunatic! He lowered his hand and his good eye opened in time to see her approach him with a cotton-wool bud.
She held his head, arching it back. “This will sting a little,” she warned, and he braced himself.
It wasn’t that bad. She was surprisingly gentle. Using another bud she applied antiseptic cream and then a small plaster covered the even smaller cut. “There, all done!” she said.
“I guess I should thank you,” Sam said, still a little shocked at sustaining a head injury so soon into his trip. It wasn’t hard to detect a hint of sarcasm in his voice.
“Don’t bother,” she said, brushing herself down.
He got up, sensing she wanted him gone – he was only too happy to oblige.
“Sorry,” he heard himself mumble, as he walked quickly to the door.
She followed and once outside she attempted to reciprocate his apology, conceding that it had all been a misunderstanding and that, in all probability, he wasn’t a pervert. Still, it was clear to him she was not entirely convinced.
(In fact, he was so desperate to prove his innocence she almost felt sorry for him but she wasn’t about to let him know that. She’d had way too many foreign neighbours – the best of friends one day and the next gone for ever – and didn’t need the hassle, so she allowed him to think she wasn’t convinced of his virtue. That should keep him at bay.)
She was getting into her car when he realized she would know where he could get a decent lunch. She rolled down the window. “Everywhere is good,” she said, and drove off.
“Everywhere is good,” he repeated.