Where the Rain Gets In Read Online Free PDF Page A

fuck is it?” asked
Carmel, and stopped by her desk.
    Katie looked up at Carmel.
    “Sorry, I . . . ”
    “Are you okay? You don’t look too good –
is it that Mike?”
    “No, no – it’s fine. I’m fine.”
    “I can get rid of him, if that’s what
you want.”
    “No, really, thanks, I’m fine. Put him
through when he calls. I’m sorry if I was being rude. It’s just . . . ”
    “A surprise to hear from him?”
    “Yes, you could say that.”
    “Well, as I said – he seems nice.”
    Katie smiled.
    “Oh yes,” she said. “He’s that alright.”
    Carmel’s phone rang. Katie looked up at
the time; it was exactly ten-thirty.
    “You’d best put him through,” she said
to Carmel. She walked into her office and closed the door.
    “Mike?”
    “Katie, how are you? Thanks for taking
my call.”
    “I had to – if only to get my assistant
to do some work today.”
    “I’m sorry about that. I thought if I
let her go I’d never get through to speak to you. Would you apologise to Carmel
on my behalf?”
    Katie could hear the nervousness in
Mike’s voice.
    “On your behalf? Yes, I’ll apologise to
Carmel on your behalf. Why are you calling, Mike?”
    “Well,” he said, “I’m here in Dublin
today, and I thought we might meet up – if you’d like to, that is.”
    “We agreed never to contact each other
again,” she said. “Under any circumstances – do you remember? So why are you
calling me?”
    “But that was such a long time ago,”
said Mike. “And I’m in Dublin so rarely these days. I saw your column in the
paper yesterday – it’s very good, you know – and I thought, well, why not?
You’re such a public figure now – what harm could it do to get in touch?”
    “Cut the crap, Mike! I want to know why
you called. We had an agreement and you just broke it – why?”
    Katie knew how easy it was to get sucked
into Mike’s pleasantries; she knew how overwhelming they could be.
    “But Katie,” he said, “does all that really
matter any more?”
    “I asked you a question,” said Katie.
“If you’re not going to be straight with me then I’m hanging up, and you won’t
be put through again. You have one minute to explain why you called before I
put down the phone.”
    “Katie – ”
    “One minute, Mike.”
    Katie watched the second hand tick
around the face of the clock on her wall. A minute wasn’t long enough to get a
grip on hearing Mike’s voice again; not long enough to come to terms with Mike
getting back in touch. The very mention of his name – Nice Guy Mike – upset
her, and Katie could feel her defences crumbling; defences she’d spent half a
lifetime creating. It was a shock rather than a surprise, because she feared
the past coming back into her present. She was scared of what that past might
drag along with it. If she let in the past, she let in worry and anxiety; she
let in guilt and regret, and, if she was honest with herself, she let in
loneliness. So she used the minute’s silence to reconstruct the barriers in her
mind. She breathed deeply and deliberately.
    “Katie.”
    Mike spoke exactly on the minute, if
only to stop Katie putting down the phone.
    “Why did you call?” she asked. More
silence. “Mike?”
    “I’m in trouble, Katie. I’m in trouble,
and I need your help.”
    “We agreed never to contact each other,”
repeated Katie.
    “I know, but – ”
    “We agreed for this very reason – that
if either of us were in trouble, we wouldn’t drag each other down. And now
you’re here, phoning me at my workplace; you’re setting up a connection, a
lead, from you to me. Where are you calling from?”
    “From a public phone box, in the lobby
of a hotel.”
    “Where people can hear you?”
    “No, it’s quiet.”
    “And you were using that same phone to
speak to Carmel? How did you pay for the call? You weren’t pumping coins into
the slot for an hour – your credit card?” Mike didn’t reply.
    “Are you fucking stupid, Mike?