Murfey's Law (3 page)

A rusty metal guard rail led Lori steeply over the edge of the garden. Years of use had created a sort of staircase that she followed carefully down to the rock platform below. Feeling it safer to take in the view sitting down, Lori sat as close to the edge as she dared. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath in before slowly exhaling, keeping her eyes shut tight. The salt spray hitting her face was almost painful but she didn't care. No wonder he loved it here, she thought sadly.

It wasn't the fact that he had died that upset her so much, more the fact that whilst he was alive, and had the chance, he had displayed no desire to know who she was, what kind of woman she had grown up to become. The last time Lori had seen her father she was only
 eleven years old. She didn't have the clearest of memories from this era of her childhood, but what she could remember was the desperate sadness she felt inside knowing that he didn't want to see her. Now older, she recognised that moving to England with her mother had made it difficult for him to visit her, but that needn't have prevented him from phoning, or writing. Anything would have been nice. Anything would have been an affirmation that he loved her.

One of the most vivid memories Lori had of that time was of her mother, sitting in the communal hallway of the rented apartment they first moved into not long after arriving in London, feeding stacks of fifty-pence pieces into the pay telephone one after the other. She would repeat their new address to him several times over, and ask him to promise he would make contact for Lori's sake. Every couple of weeks a new little stack of silver coins would be built, and the call would be made again, a fresh emotion would rise up each time, from polite request, to begging and then on to anger. By the fourth or fifth stack Lori could hear resignation in her mother's voice and soon after this, the fifty-pence pieces became her pocket money, little compensation for what she'd lost.

Lori pinched herself and opened her eyes. A little way off from where she sat she spotted something dark in the frothy white bubbles of the breaking waves. She held her gaze and stayed fixed to the spot so as not to lose its position. It had dipped down below the water just as another messy wave crashed overhead. A few seconds later it popped back up. A seal? No, a surfer! Lori was spellbound.

Living in London, and never taking holidays meant she very rarely saw the sea, let alone got to swim in it. Seeing him in the waves reminded her just how much she missed the incredible feeling of cold, clear, salty water enveloping her body. In the years prior to her parents break up Lori and Jack spent many mornings, weekends and school holidays at the beach either swimming, fishing or rock-pooling. The desire to strip off and jump in was strong but Lori resisted. She would go this evening she decided, it would help her stave off the evils of jet lag and hopefully prevent her from giving in to sleep too early.

She settled instead for watching the surfer paddle out past where the waves were breaking, wait for the perfect wave, then paddle powerfully back towards the shore, just in front of the rising swell. As it peaked, he jumped up in one smooth leap onto his feet and rode the wave zigzagging his board this way and that. His movements were so fluid, just like his surroundings. He made it look so simple.

Something rustling in the bushes above where Lori sat startled her and she whipped her head around just in time to see a dog come crashing out of the undergrowth between the garden and the steps. Bluey grey with black splodges it leapt down the steps two or three at a time and hurtled past her. She squealed in fright as it threw itself off the rock platform straight into the waves several feet below.

‘Shit!’ Lori cried out, thinking it had just committed doggy hara-kiri. She scrambled quickly to her feet and peered over the edge into the water below. Looking back up at her the dog was just fine and treading water. It seemed to study her face for a few seconds before powering off through the waves towards the beach. Once on the sand it lay down just beyond the reach of the water and in a direct line to where the surfer was.

Lori sat back down too, her pulse returning to normal,
 and carried on watching the surfer catch wave after wave until he tired and rode into shore, disappearing up the beach towards the road, his dog in tow. She took this as her cue to get on with her day. There would be plenty of time to watch the world go by later on. This morning she needed to investigate some local real estate agents and see if there was anything she could do to make the place as marketable as possible, she was fairly certain that in its current state it wouldn't be worth much at all. Bulldozing it was perhaps the only hope, she thought as she got up from where she'd been sitting.

Back in the garden and puffing from the return climb Lori paused to catch her breath. She took a seat in the chair she'd admired earlier and although wooden, it was surprisingly comfortable. It took a while for her breathing to return to normal, during which time Lori swore to herself she would get on and do something about how unfit she had become in the last decade. She wasn't athletic and had never set foot in a gym, the thought of physical pain and sweating from places a girl shouldn't sweat from made Lori shudder, so she would need to come up with some sort of exercise regime that didn't involve wearing Lycra, and avoided any chance of feeling intimidated by perky women with boobs and butts like pieces of fruit.

Someone entered the shop.

Hearing the screen door bang, Lori turned around and squinted through one of the uncovered windows at the back of the house. Against the reflected glare of the morning sun, she could just make out a male figure helping himself to an ice lolly from the freezer before moving to the counter. Pulling open the back door, she stepped into the shade and went to go and serve him.

It was the surfer she had just been watching. He was even more mesmerizing close up, though had nothing of the classic blonde 'dude look' normally associated with a beach boy. His hair was cropped close to his head, every little ridge and dip was visible under a layer of short brown fuzz. A huge tattoo, Lori couldn't quite depict what of, stretched across the top of his back from one shoulder to the other. His tan was so deep it was difficult to tell, in the dim light of the shop, where the ink ended and his skin begun. Long wet board shorts clung to clearly muscular thighs, and thin rivulets of water snaked down his legs, leaving little pools on the old wooden floor around his feet. His presence was ridiculously masculine, he even smelt like the sea - a salty scent filled the room making Lori's nerve endings fizzle and pop.

Not hearing her come in behind him he was about to head out the front door.

‘Excuse me! You can't just take things without paying for them. That's stealing.’ She may not have been enamoured with her surprise inheritance but that didn't mean she had lost her sense of right and wrong. Lori tried, with difficulty, to appear indignant as he turned to look at her.

‘Maybe you should call the police?’ He raised an amused eyebrow, creating little crinkles in the corners of his face.

He had the darkest eyes Lori had ever seen, almost black. There was something of an air of menace about him she decided, but that didn't stop her staring. She could feel herself blushing as she briefly glanced over his beautiful face, across his chest and down to the waistband of his shorts. Her insides tripped and tumbled as her eyes fell on the tops of a strong V line disappearing into the wet fabric. Woah! Lori mentally gave herself a good shake and snapped back to the now.

‘Maybe I will.’ She stepped forward then hesitated.

‘Good, you go ahead and do that,’ he added childishly with a smirk. He leant confidently back against the counter where he'd been fiddling with a pen when she'd walked in, and gestured with the ice-lolly for her to walk past. Stalemate. He wasn't going to move, and she wasn't going to call the police as that would involve having to squeeze through the tiny gap between him and the newspaper rack to get around the back of the counter to where she could see the phone on the wall. She strongly doubted her nerve endings would hold up. Besides, he might set his dog on her if she went for the phone, even if it did look harmless.

Through the screen door she could see it sat faithfully waiting in the little piece of shade provided by his surfboard. He had left it stood upright against the side fence that separated Jenny's manicured front garden and the part dead grass part sandy area to the front of the shop.

For what felt like an era he stared at her face, his gaze flickering between her eyes and mouth, causing Lori to break out in goosebumps. She dug her fingernails painfully into her palms.

‘Look...’ he broke the silence first before she interrupted.

‘Listen let's forget about it, just take it,’ she looked at the icy pack in his hand, ‘I'll pretend I didn't see a thing.’

Not from the pain in her hands Lori felt tears begin to prick the back of her eyelids. She didn't want the stupid ice lolly, she didn't even want to be here. The whole situation was beyond ridiculous. In the space of a weekend she had been drugged by her best friend, stuck her tongue down the throat of a gay man, flown to the other side of the world and unwittingly become the owner of a run down and most likely non too lucrative village shop.

Tears begun flowing down her cheeks and she hiccupped and snorted like a mad woman. Great. Just to top it off, she was stood in front of an incredibly beautiful semi-naked man, albeit for a completely benign reason, for the first time in forever, and all she managed to do was blow snot bubbles. Nice.

She turned and ran back out the door she'd just come through.

It didn't take too long to find a safer way to climb down off the rock platform and onto the beach than the route the dog had opted for. There, Lori sat in the wet sand at the water's edge and waited for him to leave. Her eyes stung from washing away her tears with salty water, yet she was fairly certain she could see the silhouette of his surfboard moving slowly up the hill away from the shop.

Lori surveyed the contents of her suitcase which was now strewn across both the bed and the floor, she had unpacked as moodily as she’d packed, irritated at letting her emotions get the better of her so many times in recent days. Four pairs of knickers just weren’t going to cut it in this heat, even if they were black she reckoned, adding locate washing machine and shop for pants to her mental to-do list.

Hidden underneath a pile of mismatched bikini bottoms and tops, all two sizes too small, Lori found the travel adapter she’d paid far too much for at Heathrow Airport and headed down to the kitchen with her laptop to do some research.

While she waited for the screen to come to life Lori flicked the kettle on and poked around in the cupboards. Everything in the kitchen seemed much as it did in the rest of the house, unfinished. At one end of the bench top, a jumble of handles sat waiting to be screwed on to the cabinet doors. Three different sized screwdrivers sat beside the pile. Typical, thought Lori. The only job Jack appeared to have ever completed in his life was living.

It struck her at that moment that she didn’t know exactly how he’d died. To most people it would have been their first question, but not to Lori, this was the first time it’d come to mind. She figured he’d probably just followed in the footsteps of her mother. When he’d had enough, he’d had enough.

In a cupboard set aside for crockery and large cobwebs Lori cautiously retrieved a mug and poured herself a cup of tea. She ducked into the shop to grab a bag of sugar.

Beside the cash register, on a pile of paper bags reserved for the Jurassic sweets, Jenny had left a note. Emergency at the school, will catch up with you later this afternoon. Don’t forget to go see your father’s solicitor – Robert Matthison at 1pm to sign paperwork. Lori tore it off and stuffed it into the back pocket of her shorts. Untangling a pen tied to the bottom of the till she wrote on the clean bag underneath, I. O. ME – One bag of sugar.

Perched on a stool beside the counter Lori keyed her password into the laptop hoping someone in the street would have an unsecured wireless signal that she could tap into. Bingo! Apparently FoxyNonna lived somewhere nearby and didn’t mind a bit of unprotected wireless routing.

According to Google, Lori discovered that Robert Matthison LLB, the Bob that Jenny must have been referring to last night, had his office in Green Bay, the next village along from Murfey’s Beach. From the little map on their website, it looked to be about a twenty minute walk. She could do with the exercise she told herself, and besides, it wasn’t like there was actually a choice, she had no other mode of transport and judging by the taxi driver’s mumblings last night outside the train station, not many cabs came this far down the coast.

In the corner of the screen a little chat window popped up with a PING! It was Sara. She’d obviously seen Lori’s instant message status flick to Online when she’d logged in to check her emails.

Lori hovered the mouse pointer over Sign Out.

On the one hand, she desperately wanted to ignore it, make Sara suffer, but on the other, she missed her best friend terribly. She needed to share her news, get Sara’s opinion and advice on how to get rid of the shop as quickly and as painlessly as possible. She would know exactly what Lori should do.

Their friendship had been built on mutual understanding and admiration.

Robin James, and Catherine Sands had been admitted to the Maudsley Psychiatric Hospital on the same day. It was Lori's twenty-third birthday. She and Sara had been sat beside each other on the bolted down plastic visitors seating, signing committal papers for their respective mothers, when a stark naked patient had tried to make his break for freedom through the doors separating the waiting room from the hospital itself. Thankfully the half inch thick glass had held, and his morbidly obese body had merely splattered against the frosting. Out of nervous anxiety or perhaps as a release of years of worry the girls had burst into fits of inappropriate giggles. They’d spent the next three days locked inside Lori’s apartment, laughing, drinking and eventually crying. Max had been on call for them, ferrying vodka and takeaway meals back and forth. He didn’t speak apart from to tell Sara that he loved her as he handed over the deliveries. It was the first time Lori had realised true love actually existed. She hadn’t cried once since then.

Until her run in with the sexy lolly thieving surfer that is.

Lori clicked the box and typed. I just need to know why? Sara. Then we can move on and forget the whole thing even happened.

Sara’s reply came slowly. PING! I didn’t do it Birdy. It was Max.

Lori shook her head incredulously. Don’t blame it on poor Max Sara! He’d never do that, and besides, YOU gave me the drink remember.

PING! Max gave me the drinks. He texted me earlier that night to say he had something new and exciting for me to try, I thought it was something kinky for god’s sake, not drugs! When he gave me the drink he just told me yours was the one with the monkey, or at least that’s what I thought he said. I thought he was just being sweet to you, but I was wrong, and more than a little drunk. Your glass was meant to be mine. I had no idea what he’d done…what I had done, until I saw your reaction. I promise.

Lori stared at the screen.

PING! Birdy? Are you there? Please answer me. I tried your phone a thousand times. Did you get my messages?

PING! Can we video chat?

PING! Please Birdy.

PING! PING! PING!

Lori glanced at the time on the screen. She needed to get going if she was going the make it to the solicitor’s by one o'clock.

She waited for the next PING! and then replied. Later.

Sweat ran down Lori’s stomach as she alternately wafted her top in and out and swatted mosquitos away from her face. The twenty minute walk had been closer to forty on account of her taking the wrong turn several times. Wiping the little beads of perspiration from her top lip Lori pushed open the door of Matthison, Walker & Young and was greeted with an icy blast of air conditioning. The sudden drop in temperature made her light headed. A water bottle would have been a good idea.

‘Can I help you?’ The receptionist enquired, taking off her headset.

‘Ah, yes, I’m here to see Bob Matthison. My name is Lori James.’ She wiped her top lip again and patted down her hair which she could feel had frizzed up in the humidity. In the mirror behind the reception desk Lori caught her reflection, her face was beetroot red.

The young, sleek receptionist saw it too. ‘Take a seat Miss James, and I’ll get you a glass of water.’

What was it with receptionists, Lori wondered. Did they all come from the same plastic Barbie doll mould? She took a seat on the squishy leather sofa beside the fish tank and watched a little scuba diver blowing bubbles as it bobbed up and down. She couldn’t wait for her swim this evening.

‘Miss James, how lovely to meet you at last!’ A tall silver haired man appeared from the corridor behind the reception counter.

Lori stood up, leaving a thin layer of thigh skin on the couch. She winced and shook his hand. ‘Nice to meet you too, Bob.’

‘Please, call me Robert,’ he frowned.

‘Umm, ok. Robert.’ Lori took the glass of water the receptionist handed her and followed him into his office.

‘Take a seat.’

Lori sat cautiously on the edge of the chair. She guzzled down half of her water and wiped the condensation from her hands on to the backs of her now stinging thighs.

Robert continued, ‘Firstly, I’m very sorry for your loss. Your father was a much loved and very important part of the local community around here…’

It sounded more like he was very sorry for his loss, Lori thought cynically. Jack and his shop had probably gone broke paying Matthison, Walker & Young’s fees. This place wouldn’t come cheap she reckoned, looking at the floor to ceiling mahogany bookcase lining the entire circumference of the office. She’d been on enough site visits with Max to abandoned businesses to know that any furniture requiring a crane to lift it in and out through the window fetched enormous amounts of money, even at liquidation auctions.

‘…and secondly, I hope that the long standing relationship your father and I had can continue between ourselves.’

Ah hah! Lori smiled inwardly. ‘I’m afraid any relationship we have, will be short lived. As soon as you have what you need from me in terms of signatures and whatever, I’ll be putting the shop up for sale.’

Despite his age, Lori guessed him to be in his late fifties, Robert Matthison was a very good looking man. And oh how he knew it. He nodded slowly, stroking his closely trimmed beard.

‘Well, Miss James, or can I call you Lorikeet?’

‘Miss James is perfect thank you,’ Lori retorted.

‘Ok, Miss James. That notion is very sweet, and probably quite a good one, however, there’s a little problem with it. Actually, I stand corrected, quite a big problem. You see your father, Jack, really didn’t want to see the store being sold to just anyone. Certainly not someone from outside the area. And he knew that you were most likely going to want to simply land in Murfey’s Beach, sell off any possessions he had, and take off again without even getting to know the place. Without getting to know the people. His people.’

‘For crying out loud Mr Matthison! You make him sound like some sort of messiah. I can assure you though, he was as far from great as you can possibly imagine. And then some.’ Lori’s face felt as if it would burst into flames any at any minute. Everyone in the community, as he’d put it, must have been under one hell of a delusion.

Oh! Maybe that was it. Her father had become a cult leader and the good people of Murfey’s Beach and beyond were under his spell. No wait, Lori finished her glass of water and took several deep calming breaths, didn’t most cult leaders make their followers kill themselves first, not the other way around?

‘Listen, Lorikeet,’ he hissed, ‘Jack James was a very good man. I’m not in a position to vouch for his abilities, or lack thereof, as a father. He was my client, and a dear friend, and he asked that I try and guide you in the right direction with regards to your time here.’

‘Listen, Bob,’ Lori mimicked, ‘just give me the bloody papers I need to sign and I’ll be out of your way. You won’t need to steer me in any direction and I’ll be out of the way in no time. I don’t care what my father wanted, in the same way he never cared about me.’

Lori stood up knocking the empty glass flying to the floor where it smashed. The receptionist rushed in and she and Bob set about picking up the pieces. Wanting to leave, Lori grabbed the file with her father’s name on from the desk and opened it. At the top of the pile were three sheets of paper covered in little sticky tabs. Using a fountain pen that sat in its own velvety cushioned box Lori ran her finger over each of the tabs, signing wherever she saw her name. Just as she reached the last of the tabs the pair finished and stood up.

‘Lorikeet, I…’

Lori interrupted, ‘Bob, pleasure doing business with you.’

She turned on her heels and marched straight out of the office.

The receptionist’s voice was all Lori heard as she opened the front door and stepped back out into the heat. ‘Wow! She took that pretty well didn’t she Robert? I’d have done a lot more than smash a glass if it was me.’

Unsurprisingly, the walk home was a lot quicker.

Jenny, already back from her emergency, had re-opened the shop. Sensing Lori needed to be alone she silently made her a cup of tea and went back across the driveway to number twenty-one.

A little afternoon rush of kids in school uniform, all after ice lollies and sweets which they ate under the shade of the shop verandah, kept Lori pre-occupied for a while. Their chatter and laughter, gossiping about who fancied who and which teachers were presumed to be having secret trysts in the stationary cupboard, was light relief from her world of grown up troubles.

‘I heard Mrs Schroff tell Miss Jeffries that Mr Turner made her eggs ache,’ one of the girls, a pretty red head with freckles, spoke through a mouthful of sherbet, ‘I mean, like, what does that even mean?’

Her little friends all sniggered, one of them remarking, ‘Mr Harrison said that Mr Turner couldn’t come to careers day anymore because none of the female teachers had done any teaching when he was there.’

Mr Turner must be quite something thought Lori.