Silas Nash book 1: Hush Hush Honeysuckle: chapter 6 (a)

Max had been in her company for less than five minutes, and she was nagging him already. ‘Have you been to see Mum?’

Max’s sister, Melissa Jones-Whitehouse, was two years older and behaved as though she had the birthright to nag him at every opportunity.

‘No, Melissa, I haven’t seen her.’

‘Don’t you think you should?’

‘No.’

‘Are you going to keep being this childish? I didn’t have to come, you know.’

‘First, your question. Hell, yes, I’m loving the childish. Your statement, so go back to where you came from. I don’t care. And lastly, the guilt trip. Mother has probably forgotten my name by now. She’ll be on a yacht with that rich bastard of hers. Which is this husband, number three? Four? Twenty-seven?’

‘Maxwell Jones, you’re impossible.’

‘And you, my dear sister, could do with getting laid by somebody other than Laurence. Get a toyboy, and you might just be in time to save yourself. But it’s not my business to run your life, so what the hell makes you think you can run mine?’

‘I wanted to tell you how sorry I am about your illness. Why do you have to be so negative?’

‘Because it’s fun. Why do you have to be so self-righteous?’

‘Because it’s fun.’

Melissa gathered her things and picked up her calfskin gloves and keys.

Max wasn’t done. ‘Oh, yeah, because you ran the PTA and sit on the school’s board of directors. Aren’t you just something? But some of us remember that you got yourself knocked up at thirteen. And now the world’s lumbered with the teen messiah Sebastian, the incredible static knob job. And that makes you the font of all knowledge and, for some reason, puts you way above us mere mortals. Old Laurence’s willy must be the only part of him that isn’t limp.’

‘Have you finished?’

‘No, don’t slam the door on your way out.’

On a roll, he dressed down for the meeting with his partner, Henry Watson.

He was late and didn’t care. It was the first time since he’d formed the company that he attended a business meeting in Sliders and trackie bottoms. Even if this had been the norm, his choice of t-shirt certainly wasn’t. He debated slogans at length and discovered that he couldn’t cope with making choices very well. In the end, he went for Can’t Adult Today, over I Won’t Quit, But I Will Swear a Fricking Lot. His choice fit the way he felt, but by the end of the meeting with Henry, he wished he’d gone with the other one.

Max founded, owned and had run MJ Properties for two years when it got too big for him as the only director. MJP took Henry on six years ago to manage the groundwork and civil engineering side of the business. The company had grown to employ forty people.

Henry excelled as his Ground Manager, and after proving himself, Max brought him onto the board as a partner. They were fifty-one to forty-nine per cent split partners, with Max being the majority shareholder.

Being twenty years Max’s senior, they’d never been friends or socialised outside work and fought over company issues every time they got together. Henry was old and rundown like the renovation contracts they took on, and he made no secret of the fact that he thought Max skimmed too many of the profits and made rash decisions. Max flew by the seat of his pants, and Henry was still an old fart.

The meeting was scheduled, which meant it was going to be a bore with Henry laying bare all Max’s failings. Henry’s PA, Linda, would be taking minutes because Henry always made sure to cover his arse. If ever litigation was involved or things got heated, the transcript could be used as evidence in court, and it was every man for himself.

Henry was a twat.

Max picked a stem of honeysuckle from the creeper growing outside the main entrance. When he designed the building, he’d insisted on honeysuckle around the door because it was a scent from his childhood and Nanny Clare’s favourite. As he swept passed Linda’s desk, he presented her with it along with his sweetest smile. It was a ploy to allay the telling off she was going to give him for being late, but it didn’t come. He’d have preferred it to the dripping sympathy.

‘Oh, Max. I’m so sorry to hear your terrible news.’

It travelled fast. Thanks for that, Gob Almighty Melissa.

‘I know, Linda. Isn’t it awful? I couldn’t believe it myself. It was supposed to be a non-stick frying pan too. The yolk broke on both of my eggs this morning. Tragic.’

‘You know what I’m talking about—your thing. You know? Your Diagnosis.’

‘Oh, that thing. That’s nothing—just an irritating bout of death. I’ll be over it soon. Let’s say no more about it. Is his lordship seething?’

She nodded and dabbed her eyes with a tissue.

Max tapped on the boardroom window and used his finger to motion Henry to follow him. That was one motion of many he could have chosen for the digit. He would’ve preferred another one.

The meeting was for Max and Henry, with Linda taking notes. It didn’t warrant the twenty-four-seat boardroom. He went into his office, curled his nose and swept last night’s McDonald’s boxes off the desk. He sat on the leather sofa that was an integral part of the burgundy-grey interior décor. He’d designed it himself, right down to the last staple. Eat that shit, Henry weasel-face. The office was a confusing mix of contemporary designer space to show the company in a good light and a thirteen-year-old boy’s bedroom. His desk had a Newton’s cradle and an assortment of electronic games. A broken drone was in the corner, and a dartboard on the wall with a picture of Henry’s face pinned to it. Max slumped onto the sofa and put his feet on the lacquered coffee table.

‘Really, Max?’ Henry came in, made a show of choking on the smell and sat on a chair, moving a stuffed monkey with a name tag that said, Henry. Linda opened the window a crack and sat on the edge of another chair with her notepad perched on her knee.

‘Henry, you old goose. To what do I owe the pleasure of this impromptu meeting? Would you like a gumdrop? Personally, I find them a bit tasteless. Put it in the minutes, Linda. We should debate it.’ He offered Henry a crumpled bag of sweets, and he stared at it as if Max was offering a warm turd on a serviette.

‘We need to talk about the way things are going, Max.’

‘I figured you didn’t want to take me to the movies when you called the meeting—which, I hope you notice, I remembered to attend, aided by the three texts from the delightful Linda, of course.’

‘Do you want to tell me what happened with Owen Richards the other day?’

‘Not really.’

‘Max?’

‘I might have told him I’d shagged his ugly mother and to go screw himself.’

‘That was a six-apartment build. Have you any idea how much that would have brought in?’

‘Haven’t a clue, mate. That’s why I have you, but I’m guessing it’s somewhere near the same as the other builds we’ve done. He’s no loss. We’ve got people biting our hands off for new builds. There’s more of the damned things in the pipeline than we’ve got time or men to build. And what about the land? Do you remember what this town was like twenty years ago? Green fields for miles, I grew up with places to play. Now, all we’ve got is housing estates. And not good old council housing that can help people that need it. I’d be all for that. No, the boxes we build all look the same. Where’s the architecture? It’s clone housing for moronic middle-class robots. Another one’s gone up at Pennington, and the environmental insult is that they’ve had to build a huge roundabout to accommodate the anticipated traffic. Another country road that’s been raped and scarred. He made conducting motions with his hands and sang, Little boxes, I pointed this out to that Richards fella and called him a fake fascist fanny, but only because it was alliterative and sounded good. I asked him what his stance was on capitalism, and he didn’t like it. Did he?’

‘Are you trying to ruin us?’ Henry screamed. ‘Is it some kind of ploy to get me out? Have you gone mad?’

Max grinned and embellished his derision. ‘Apparently so, old boy. That’s exactly what I’ve done. I’ve gone stark raving mad. If you want, I can get a sick note to say I’m not pulling a sickie. You know how many times I’ve skived off work to go to a bar and get away from your incessant nagging? And now I don’t need to. Kind of takes the fun out of it, but isn’t it delicious? And you can’t hold anything I say against me. Because I’m dying, and that’s discrimination. I can even call you a crispy crap-face, and you can’t do anything about it.’

‘It’s like talking to a belligerent child. In your own interests and the good of the company, I’ve taken power of attorney, and I’m having you removed from the business. You’ll still get your dividends and an additional financial incentive to step aside, but the papers will be drawn up for you to sign immediately.’

‘Blah, blah, blah. Is that it? Can I go now? Guess what? Pompey pompous arse? I was leaving today anyway. And you’ve just paid me a fortune to do it. I think that rests the joke squarely on your shoulders, old boy. I have a boat to charter to Croatia, and from there, I’m going to Asia for some Chinese pussy. Write this down, Linda. Bollocks to you and the horse you rode in on.’

Max felt his mood drop as he left the glass and chrome building designed by himself to resemble a Rubik’s Cube. Arguing with people had been fun at first, but it was boring now. His condition had made him more outspoken, and he’d taken liberties with his manners. He wondered if this meant that everything would only have a short shelf life before he tired of it. He didn’t want to be a bad person.

Croatia and China had fled his mind by the time he got to the corner. He was onto his next big thing. He was going to grow his hair, buy a camper van and be a hippy.

But first, he had to see Jonathan. He tried telling himself that he was going to be kind and sweet and wouldn’t offend Jon or his fit wife, Emily, but that was ridiculous. He always insulted him. That’s why his friend was put on earth.