Silas Nash Book One: Hush Hush Honeysuckle: Chapter 7 (a)

Max was tied up for the rest of the afternoon and made the phone call the next morning. He hoped he wasn’t too late. ‘Hi, mate. I’m calling about the campervan. Is it still available?’

‘Somebody came out to have a look at it yesterday. They took it for a test drive and said they wanted it. They were supposed to come back last night, but there’s been no word. So, yes, the first one to come up with the money can take her away.’

‘Cheers, mate. Text me your address, and I’ll set off now.’

Max had considered a brand new hundred and fifty grand mobile home with beds that came down from the ceiling at the touch of a button and other switches that did incredible things. But those models weren’t for speeding down the motorway on a whim and having fun. They were so long and heavy that they’d be lucky to make the speed limit. Max didn’t want luxury. He wanted freedom and the hippie dream.

An hour after his enquiry, he drove home in his brand new, five-year-old VWT5 camper van. It was fully equipped with everything he needed for weeks on the road and was big enough for him and the occasional conquest along the way. In some places, it was tatty and needed some loving, but he got it for a song—no time like the present. On the way home, he called at Barrow Market. The bloke on the carpet stall was a wide boy and tried to sell him a carpet of quality, ‘Qual-i-ty, man. A hundred and twenty quid, and it’s yours to take away today.’

‘Look, mate. I don’t need Axminster shag or whatever the hell that is. I just want something to shag on. It’s for the back of my van. got it?’

‘Got it.’ He winked at Max. ‘Little bit of sunshine right here should fit in your van, me old son, with a bit left over to put down by your feet in the front. How does fifty quid grab you?’

‘It doesn’t. Twenty, or I’m walking away.’

‘Thirty-five, and you’ve got a deal.’

‘Twenty, and I won’t shag your missus in my campervan. Final offer.’

‘Steady on, old son. She’s a diamond in the rough my old lady is. Okay. Twenty, and you’re starving my poor children.’

Mel was waiting for him in the drive when he got home. God, that woman could nag. She’d got it into her head that with Max dying, their mother needed help with her finances and investments. Mel had persuaded their mum to let her take out Power of Attorney in case anything happened to her. Mel always had a nose for the crisp aroma of money. ‘I know it’s a delicate subject, Max, but Laurence and I have been talking.’

‘Of course, you have.’

‘Now, don’t start. There’s no need. I want to have an adult conversation. Mum’s getting older.’

‘She’s sixty-three.’

‘Yes, and I’ve got osteoporosis, so she must have it too.’

Mel, you’ve got a brittle mind. There’s sod all wrong with your bones.’

‘One day, somebody is going to give you everything you deserve, Max. You nasty little man. What’s this thing anyway, and what are you doing?’

‘This, my dear sister, is a campervan. It looks like a van, see, and you camp in it. And this is a piece of carpet. Yours are all bigger and more expensive. Bloody awful patterns, too, come to think of it—but you’ve seen carpet before. It’s the stuff your cleaner vacuums to get rid of all the crap. And talking about useless fluff, how is dear Sebastian? Has he moved further than the sofa this week? Do record it for me if he does.’

‘Frig off, Max. Will you sign over your share of Mother’s assets or not?’

‘Jesus, talk about going straight for the jugular. Will I what?’

‘Will you sign over your share of the inheritance? You don’t need it, Max. You don’t need any of it? I’m also hoping that you will look generously on your nephew and me when your time comes.’

Max had been in the van fitting the piece of carpet throughout the exchange. He sprayed the last edge down with glue before he backed out of the van and answered.’

‘Melissa darling?’

‘Yes?’

‘Go pleasure yourself.’

He packed a rucksack that hadn’t been used since his college days. The musty smell gave it provenance. There was no time like the present for a drive. Maybe he’d spend his first night in the van with the roof open, looking at the stars. He had the image of a girl in his head with two-tone hair, half blonde, half brown. She’d made an impression last week, and maybe he could take her for a drink when she finished work.

He told Jonathan he’d keep an eye out for those two missing boys as well. The search the night before hadn’t given the police any new leads. They were still treating it as a missing person case, but in the press conference, their faces were grim, and the mothers were behind the table sobbing and saying all the usual things about them not being in trouble if they just came home. It ended with a personal note to any individual that might have taken them, to keep them safe and bring them home to the families who loved them. It was poignant stuff, but two thirteen-year-old boys? Max told the police at the search the night before that it was probably a couple of young lads on their first big adventure. They’d be home by the weekend in time for Mum’s Sunday roast.

When he got to Morecambe in his van, there was a line of seventeen campervans parked along the road just up from The Midland Hotel. There wasn’t one worth less than a hundred grand. What was this? Some rich camping swingers club? He didn’t want to park at the end of the row and be conspicuous. He’d much rather have got himself into the middle of the gang—been one of the boys—but you couldn’t get a Rizla paper between them. He slid into the last place and made his first cup of hippy green tea in his new home-from-home. It was disgusting. The previous owner had left everything in the van, and he even had a little tin kettle. It whistled like the olden days.

Soon, it rang out like a siren, and the campervan next to his opened its door.

‘You can’t park here,’ a man in khaki shorts said. He seemed unnecessarily angry.

‘Why not? You have.’

‘We’re organised.’

‘What like organised crime?’

‘We are the north county sect of the Lakeland Camp.’

‘Are all your awnings pink then?’

‘Look, just move your van, or we’ll have you removed.’

Lesson one in the Campers’ Guide to Hippy Living. The natives aren’t always hippies, and they aren’t always friendly.

‘You know what, you old glamper-faced moron. Keep your Northern Sector Camp Lakeland thing. My van and I have certain standards when it comes to the vehicles we associate with. I won’t be offering you a green tea any time soon.’ He slammed the door shut, leaving the older man with his mouth agape in protest.

Feeling like the Ulgy Duckling being chased away by the beautiful swans, he drove off and was sure his camper’s headlights were facing towards the ground. The van needed a name, and as he drove around looking for a layby to park up, he contemplated a name befitting of his queen. Even the name Barista Paige was considered and discounted. He laughed at himself for sounding like a lovesick teenager. The girl was a decade younger than him and had served him coffee once.

He settled on Diana as the van’s name and the sound of his laughter rattled around in the stillness of the late afternoon calm. It was that time of day when the families had gone to the hotels to roost, the dealers, beggars and buskers had shut up shop, and the night owls were just waking from the evening before. There was the hint of an early sunset, and he determined that he would have the bloody brew that he never got to drink. He’d lost his sea view and only had a sign to look at saying No Fly Tipping, but he drank his tea in the campervan, The Good Lady Diana, and today life was great. He contemplated what kind of person would want to tip flies, and wouldn’t a can of fly spray do the job? The café where Paige worked was just around the corner. They’d be closing after the tea-time crowd, and he might get to take her for a drink. He hoped it wasn’t her day off. Max got out of his van, locked up and went to the café.

The bell jangled. Damn, that was annoying. Every customer’s head in the café turned to look at him—there were only five. With nothing-to-see-here vibes, they turned back to their fish and chips. Max stamped on his urge to launch into a chorus of All that Jazz with fluttering jazz hands—Paige worked here, and while he wanted to stand out and woo her with his boyish charm, he didn’t want to come across as the town idiot.

Max was disappointed when she wasn’t behind the counter. A young lad, who looked to be about seven feet tall, smiled and Max was greeted with a set of braces that reminded him of a railway track. ‘Joe’ had a name badge, and he didn’t look like the type to be leading the revolution.

‘Cappuccino, please. No Paige today?’

It was a simple question, but the kid clattered the mug he’d picked up against the counter.

‘No, not today.’

Something had rattled him. He looked around as if he expected a manager to appear at his shoulder and fire him on the spot. ‘We’re not allowed to talk about it.’

‘Talk about what?’ Come on. He’d set it up like a red ball over a pocket. What else was Max going to say?

‘Can’t say. She just doesn’t work here anymore.’

‘I see.’

He didn’t see. The best guess was that she’d been caught creaming the till. He chuckled at that, creaming in a café. After her first greeting last time, she’d barely made eye contact with him under his intense appraisal, and yet she’d disappointed him. He didn’t like to think of her as a thief.

Joe turned to the coffee machine, and Max glanced at the tabard uniforms on a stand behind the counter, some with nametags attached and some without. It made him sad. On the counter was a silver plate with a couple of name badges on it. The one on the top said, Paige. He kept his eye on joe, who was elbows deep in steam and reached over the counter to grab it. He wanted to get out quickly in case Joe noticed the tag was missing. He turned to leave the café and almost bumped into a pensioner with a face like a disgruntled Shih Tzu. She had something that he assumed was mayonnaise at the corner of her mouth. Either that or she’d had a nice time with Old Jim in the men’s toilets. She didn’t say a word but raised one eyebrow. It was a clever thing on two counts. Max had never been able to raise just one eyebrow. Nope, couldn’t do it. And, the old bat made one expression, both a question and a reprimand.

He put his finger to his lips in the universal sign for shush and winked at her. The bell jangled again as he left the café. He could live without coffee anyway.

Walking back to the van, he considered his actions. He had no idea why he’d stolen the girl’s name badge. Because he could? Because the tumour in his head was making him do irrational things? He almost threw it into the hedge at the side of the road, but it felt warm in his pocket as though it was an invisible thread from her to him. He was getting sentimental. There were a million girls with two-tone hair and green eyes. He needed to get laid. He could find a girl with shocking pink hair and accommodating thighs if he wanted.

He thought about making a bacon sandwich on his new stove in his new van. But that was taking this camping gig way too far. Besides, there was a burger van in the next layby and Morrisons just across the road. He opted for a dirty cheeseburger and took it back to The Good Lady Diana.

This was his first time on the road, and he ate his dinner sitting on the bench seat, with coffee in a tin mug made on his gas stove with his tiny little kettle. It was a fun romantic novelty.

It would have been so much better if Paige was sitting opposite him. He thought about all the questions he wanted to ask her and wondered where she saw her life taking her. He even had a crazy notion about offering her a job in the company, something in sales, maybe, with training that would lead to a decent career. His disappointment was profound. She was like a gift he’d had for a fleeting second and then lost. The prettiest shell on the beach that would be there until the turn of the tide, and then she’d be washed away on the ebb. Like his life being drawn in the sand so briefly that it too would be washed away. He would look out for her in the pubs that night. If luck was with him, she’d be there without a boyfriend, and they could talk.

But other than giving her a life that he could never share, to what end would that be? Even if she liked him, it would be wrong to start a relationship with her or anybody else for that matter. He wondered if this was what love at first sight felt like and decided it would be best for them both if he never saw her again. She would be a good memory when the time came for him to need them.

The image he had of himself as the wayward traveller soon came to a crashing head. It wasn’t so good when he wanted to get cleaned up for a night out on the pull. He hadn’t considered for one second that he didn’t have a shower. He poured some cold water from his white plastic drum into a sink made for Tom Thumb and added a splash of hot water from the kettle. He bumped his head on the cupboard as he bent over to wash his bits with a handful of Fairy Liquid that had been left in the van when he bought it. Anticipating taking Paige for a drink, he’d thrown cologne, a clean shirt, a toothbrush and toothpaste into his musty bag but had forgotten everything else.

His body was covered in washing-up liquid, and he didn’t have enough water to rinse it properly. He had no razor for a shave and no towel to dry himself. He used the t-shirt he’d just taken off and was probably going to put on again in the morning. He hadn’t been able to wash his hair, and how the hell was he going to pull a bird if his shoulder-length crowning glory wasn’t shining like a halo? Camping was losing its appeal.

It was too early to go out. Barely seven o’clock. Time moved slowly when you were camping. He had no idea what people do without television. He was off-grid and, therefore, not hooked up to an electricity supply. He had his three-way leisure battery and even solar panels on the roof, but he’d never used them before. He didn’t understand them and wanted to make sure he’d have electricity for the morning. He had his phone but didn’t want to be out of touch if that died. But Jesus, he was stuck in a tin can with nobody to talk to. If he went out this early, he’d be hammered by ten o’clock.

Max scrolled through social media and liked a few meaningless posts. His thumb moved through the single-second snapshots of life, and his brain went into chewing gum mode as he passed talking parrots, clever dogs, and a poll on whether he’d prefer to eat frogs’ legs or kiss a toad. Neither, at this moment, thank you very much. Ask me again when I’m pissed. Though he’d eaten the Cuisses de Grenouille many times.

He almost scrolled past Henry Watson’s photo. The first one was just his picture, and he only hesitated because it was so out of place seeing Henry Watson on Facebook. The post below it had the inscription RIP Henry above the same picture. He’d only spoken to him four hours earlier.

Thirty-four messages of condolence said he was dead.

He rang Henry’s number, hoping that his wife would answer. He had to grope in his mind for the mousey woman’s name. Despite being his partner, Henry had rarely mentioned her. Maureen. He’d need to remember that for the funeral.

Their phone went to voicemail. Max scrolled, looking for Linda’s number and realised he didn’t have Henry’s PA in his phone. He should go home. But if Henry was dead, what good could he do? His partner’s death was going to be a massive upheaval. Max definitely needed to get laid.