500 Miles from You by Jenny Colgan

Author:Jenny Colgan
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2020-03-28T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 38

Both Cormac and Lissa were rather surprised when they fell out, particularly over someone Lissa had barely met. But Cormac was distracted anyway; he had what Jake would have called his savior face on.

He’d been wandering home late—he would have found it hard to deny that he rather liked the shiny London streets at night: the neon and lights everywhere, the sense of a lot of people with a lot to do. There was always a palpable prickle of excitement in the air; it was never dull. Cormac saw a chap he’d seen before, sitting near the entrance to the nurses’ home, over the vent of a posh office building that, judging by the smell, had a swimming pool in the basement. The vent air coming up was warm, and the man lolling there looked about the age of Cormac himself. He felt in his pocket for his wallet. This wasn’t right. It was a warm, slightly sticky evening, but even so, everyone needed a place to lay his head.

He put the money down quietly, trying not to disturb the figure, who was very still but had his eyes half open.

“Aye, thanks, man,” came a low voice, almost a growl, unmistakably Scottish, and he stretched out a hand. To Cormac’s great surprise there was a badly drawn, but nonetheless recognizable, pinpricked tattoo on the bottom of the grubby pale arm: the clear insignia of his own unit.

“Are you Black Watch?” he asked in amazement.

The dull, lifeless eyes lifted up to him, and Cormac caught a strong waft of unwashed body.

“No anymore,” said the figure.

“Where did you serve?” said Cormac worriedly, looking at him carefully in case he knew him.

“Fucking . . . fucking Fallujah,” said the man, and Cormac smiled painfully.

“Aye,” said Cormac. “I was there too. 2014.”

“Fucking . . . fucking shithole,” said the man.

Checking which way was upwind, Cormac sat down carefully beside the man. “What happened?”

The man shrugged. He had to be Cormac’s age, but he looked far, far older.

“Aye, got stuck in a bit of trouble with the bevvy, aye?”

He looked at Cormac. “Were you really there, man? Or are you after something?”

Cormac didn’t even want to think about what something might mean.

“No, I was there,” he said grimly. “Did you know that regiment colonel, Spears?”

“Fuck yeah,” said the man, almost breaking into a grin. His mouth was covered in sores. “That bawbag.”

“I know.”

“Fuck it all,” said the man. “I lost three mates out there.”

Cormac nodded. He had probably worked on at least one of them. “What’s your name?”

“Robbie.”

“Cormac.”

Robbie offered him a bottle, but Cormac declined, instead offering him the last of the money in his wallet.

“I cannae take your cash,” said the man.

“Always going to help a comrade,” said Cormac. “Have you got a phone?”

The man laughed. “Naw.”

“Look, I stay in that building just there. Come find me if you need anything.”

Robbie waved him away. “Aye, fine, man.”

CORMAC COULDN’T SHAKE the memory, couldn’t shake thinking about what had gone on out there on the battlefield that had left Robbie on the pavement, left him treading water in his own life.

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