Free The Love Song of Miss Queenie Hennessy by Rachel Joyce Page A

ticket.
    Napier lifted his fingers to his teeth and ripped the ends off three poor nails. ‘You have a good job. Good pay. What exactly is your problem here?’ His voice was getting higher and higher. ‘Just because you went to Oxford, you think we aren’t good enough?’
    This last sentence began as a statement but had an identity crisis halfway and became a question. I’d said nothing about him not being good enough. Clearly the person who feared he was not good enough was Napier. But it is easier to argue with another person, especially an employee, than it is to argue with the darker recesses of oneself.
    You see how complicated life gets. Even something as simple as a resignation.
    I didn’t want to make things worse with Napier, so I made an excuse. I said, ‘You need to get an accountant into the pubs if he’s going to catch the landlords fiddling the books. And I can’t do that. You were right. You do need a man. One with a driving licence.’
    ‘You want a driver?’ He pulled that face again, and I remembered it was his laugh.
    ‘I realize a driver’s out of the question,’ I said quietly. ‘Which is why I have to leave.’ At this point I believed I had the upper hand. In my head I was already on the bus. Goodbye, Kingsbridge. Goodbye, Harold Fry.
    Then Napier did the thing he did best. He came up with the one solution that would cause the most damage. It wasn’t even intentional. It was an instinct he had, just as some people have an instinct for the weather or the piano. You would be my driver, he said. All sorted. Bingo.
    I think I got as far as ‘But—’ and I ran out of words.
    ‘You’ll have no problem with Harold Fry,’ he said. ‘The man is married. Straight as a gate. Dull as fuck.’ He clenched his right fist and punched it into his left palm. I had no idea what he was trying tosuggest. It looked as if he were squashing you.
    You as my driver? You and me in a car several times a week? Me, already in love with you from a safe distance, and you married?
    ‘I can’t,’ I said. ‘I get carsick.’ I admit that wasn’t very clever, but I was beginning to feel cornered.
    ‘I’m about to fire him anyway,’ he said.
    It was like being hit. I went hot. My skin burned. And then I was so cold I needed a jumper. ‘You’re going to fire Mr Fry? What for?’
    ‘He’s a joke. He’s old-fashioned.’
    ‘But this is his job,’ I stammered. ‘He has a wife and son, doesn’t he?’
    ‘His son’s a screwball. Have you seen the way he struts round Kingsbridge? Like he owns the place?’ Napier shot out a puff of smoke. It went straight up my nose.
    ‘I don’t know about his son, but Mr Fry is a good man.’
    Napier did the laugh thing. Pointy gold teeth, et cetera. ‘Do you think I care?’
    No, I thought. Of course you don’t. It was time to try a new tactic. I took a deep breath.
    ‘So let me get this straight. If I stay, will Mr Fry keep his job?’
    ‘I’m not saying I like you, but it turns out you’re a good accountant. You stay. He stays too.’
    ‘It’s a deal.’ I held out my hand. ‘Now shake on it.’
    Napier seemed to get very busy with his smoking habit. Stubbing out his cigarette. Groping for a new one.
    ‘Let’s do this like men,’ I said. ‘Come along.’
    He slipped his palm inside mine. It was warm and slight and disconcertingly squishy. Like grabbing hold of a tongue.
    ‘Deal,’ I said.
    ‘Deal,’ he repeated.
    How many times I wanted to tell you all this, Harold. That I had saved your job, that I had stood up to Napier. Months later I sat beside you in your car and my head buzzed with all the things I wanted to share with you. But I had to be so careful not to give myself away and instead I said, ‘Another mint?’
    Don’t be fooled. Napier didn’t wish to keep me any more than he wished to keep you. But he wanted to fire me in his own time because otherwise I had control and it would be too frightening for Napier to find himself dependent on