Page 89 of Mercury Rising

This time she wasn’t going to hinder his exit. Mercury grabbed his bag and stalked out of the house. If being with Nick had taught him one thing, it was that it was time to get his own place.

As he walked out onto Queens Crescent, his first reaction was to tell Nick. He still wanted to impress him.

The Nickleby was only a few streets away. Mercifully, he made it there without bursting into tears. Lotty had already checked in.

He got up to the room intact. When he closed the door, he burst into tears again. Lotty guided him over to a chair in the window. She held his hand until the tears subsided.

“It went well then?” she said.

Mercury shook his head. “Not so much.”

“How did it go with your probation officer?”

“Better. She returned my call and has a place for me at a community garden in Hackney. And don’t say nice area.”

Lotty sat on the bed. “It could be a lot worse.”

“I don’t see how. My almost boyfriend has gone. I can’t bear to be in the same room as my mother. What’s the positive?”

“You’re handsome. You’re rich. You could be litter picking in Leicester Square. Stop whining now.”

Mercury winced. “Are we in the tough love phase, already?”

“We bloody are,” Lotty said. “I’ve brought my laptop. We are about to order a sinful amount of room service and spend the evening getting your channel sorted out. I want my friend back now.”

The certainty with which she said those words lit a fire in Mercury.

“You know what, let’s do this. Can we get cocktails?”

He tried to raise a smile. Lotty took hold of his hand.

“I get that this hurts. I don’t know if there’s anything you can do about it though.”

Anxiety was coursing through him. “It’s not just Nick,” he said. “It’s everything. What if the campaign fucks up because I’m not there? Eddie and the others will think I just abandoned them. Oh, I hate this so much.”

Lotty squeezed his hand. “One thing at a time, eh? I read a book once that said we should only worry about what we can change. If we get you back on top professionally, time might sort the rest. If it doesn’t, then this was the biggest fucking learning curve of your life.”

Mercury nodded and watched Lotty pore over the room service.

What had he actually done wrong though? Confided in his mother? Tried to change himself? Would going back into his old life be as easy as Lotty seemed to think?

So many questions were invading his thoughts Mercury was quite breathless.

Yet, the one question he wanted answering was way up in the air.

Will I ever see Nick again?

CHAPTER TWENTY

It was drizzling as Mercury got out of the cab. The allotments were huge. Neatly planted vegetable patches stretched far ahead of him. Little sheds dotted around.

The backs of Edwardian houses lined the whole perimeter like the teeth of a beast that threatened to engulf this little oasis.

“Another worthy cause,” Mercury said to himself.

He had tried to convince himself and Lotty that he could find just as much fulfilment at the Haka Allotments. Yet, he wasn’t convincing either of them.

Nick hadn’t been in touch. Mercury had given up even checking his phone now. It was the harsh truth that Nick had simply cut him off.