13 Little Blue Envelopes(22)

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“Don’t,” Keith said, stabbing at David’s cell phone with his curry-stained fork.

David looked pained.

“Have to,” he said, snatching it up. “Be right back.”

“So,” Keith said when David had gone. “Let’s review. Last night you mysteriously give me one hundred and forty-two

pounds and then run out. And tonight you show up in front of my house as my flatmate suffers an emotional collapse. I was just wondering what it all means.”

Before she could answer, the waiter sprang at his chance to brush some crumbs from David’s chair. He had been hanging around their table like a vulture, waiting for them to eat the last papadam crumb so he could take away the basket. He eyed the last piece sadly, as if it was the barrier between him and eternal happiness. Ginny grabbed it and shoved it in her mouth. The man looked relieved and took the basket but immediately returned to stare mournfully at their water glasses. And then David came back in and dropped heavily into his chair. The waiter immediately pounced on him, offering another beer. He nodded tiredly. Keith turned his glance from Ginny to David.

“Well?”

“Just some stuff she wants back,” he said.

Nothing was said until the waiter came back a moment later with another enormous bottle of beer. David tipped it back and chugged in several large gulping motions, drinking a good third of it in one go.

The phone call and the beer loosened David. He was usually polite, but now he was morphing into someone else. He

launched into a list of all the things that he had long despised 98

about Fiona and that he had apparently noticed but kept inside.

And of course he would have another beer.

At first, this catharsis seemed good. David seemed to be coming back to reality. But then he began leering at a woman at another table who was clearly annoyed that he was talking too loudly. He chomped away at his curry and became louder and louder.

“He’s guttered,” Keith said. “Time to go.”

Keith asked the ever-available waiter for the bill and threw down some crumpled bills. They seemed to be the same ones she had just given him the night before. She could practically recognize her own grip marks.

“I’ll go get the car,” he said. “Stay here with him, all right?”

David looked around and, seeing that Keith was gone, got up and stumbled for the door. Ginny followed him. David was

waiting on the sidewalk, looking down the street as if lost.

Ginny hung nervously by the door.

“People don’t change,” he said. “You just sort of have to take them like they are. Know what I mean?”

“I guess,” Ginny said uncertainly.

“Could you go and get me an ice cream?” he asked, nodding at a shop next to them with a large ice cream display. “I want an ice cream.”

Getting up had caused David to lose a lot of steam. Besides, ice cream at a time like this was something she could understand.

She went into the shop and picked out a rich-looking chocolate-covered bar. When she came back outside, however, he was gone.

She was still standing there, holding the rapidly melting ice cream, when Keith pulled up.

“He did a runner?” he asked.

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Ginny nodded.

“I’ll drive this way,” he said. “You check the other way. Meet me back right here.”

There were an amazing number of people on Brick Lane that night, mostly groups of guys in suits. She spotted David a few stores up, staring at the menu for another restaurant. When he saw Ginny, he started running again, and Ginny had no choice but to go right after him. Excessive alcohol apparently brought out the evil imp in David. Whenever Ginny would fall behind, he would stop and stand there, grinning. When she was close enough to see his smile, he would start off again.

To her relief, Keith’s car turned the corner. Keith was almost on him when David turned and ran back the other way, toward Ginny. There was no way for Keith to turn around, so he had to keep going. It was up to Ginny to keep after him.

David led her all around the area, through residential streets, through streets with closed-up sari and cloth shops. They went deeper and deeper into less welcoming streets. She was breathing hard, and the curry was killing her stomach, but she stayed on him. After about ten minutes, she accepted the fact that David wasn’t going to give up the game. She was going to have to play dirty. She let out a scream, then collapsed to the sidewalk, clutching at her leg. David turned again, but this time, even in his haze, he knew something was wrong. He hesitated but, seeing that Ginny was going no farther, stayed where he was.

He didn’t even see Keith run up behind him and tackle him.

He pressed David to the sidewalk and sat on his back.

“Very nice with the leg,” Keith said, heaving for breath.

“Cor . . . who knew he could run?”

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Within a few moments of being held still, David slipped into a passive, near-unconscious state. Keith pulled him up and walked him to the car. Ginny scrambled into the backseat so that David could be carefully set in the front.

“He’s going to honk in my car,” Keith said sadly as they

pulled away. “And I just cleaned it.”

Ginny looked around at the collection of bags and garbage around her on the tiny backseat.

“You did?”