The Family Men by Catherine Harris Read Free Book Online

might retch.
    Deep breaths, Harry . Deep breaths. Everyone always exhorting him to breathe. He shakes his head, tries to collect himself, to bring his mind back to the present, drawing himself in, a tug on the rope, hand over fist. “Focus on the here and now,” his father is always saying, ever since he started seriously at church and AA, one day at a time, one step at a time – the fish and chip shop, the car park, the car, etc. But Harry isn’t sure he can. He is too full of grog, too racked with regret.
    Dean doesn’t notice, busy as he is blathering on about work as usual, how this one client is such an idiot putting decking around the pool when it so obviously calls for tile, a fool’s errand, but that he doesn’t care how long the job takes because the guy’s wife is shit-hot, always running around half naked offering them drinks and stuff. “It’s his money. He can waste it however he likes,” he says, suggesting again that Harry think about going into business with him (“We’d make a killing”), then detailing the skimpy dimensions of the client’s wife’s bikini, the bottoms held together by flimsy loops on either side that are as good as asking to be ripped off. “Clearly the bastard’s got a huge cock or he won the lottery or something ’cause he’s punching way above his weight there,” Dean says. And then he tells jokes:
    How do you get a nun pregnant?
    Fuck her.
    By the time they go into the pub the band has already started. Everyone is yelling because there is so much noise, but it is so noisy you can’t tell that everyone is yelling.
    They push their way up to the bar. “Beer?” says Dean.
    Harry nods. “You’re a cunt,” he tells him, about the hundredth time that day.
    Six shots later and his judgement is right off. Rosie lets him in even though it is late and she has to work in the morning, her white chemist assistant’s uniform ironed and hanging on the back of her bedroom door. He reeks of alcohol but it isn’t the first time, smiling at her through the fly wire, the moths going crazy under the outside light. In the morning he’ll curse himself for not dragging his backside home, but for now her bed is warm, the sheets giving off the faintest scent of sweat. He falls into them fully clothed and allows himself to sleep, a dead man’s slumber, deep and dreamless.
    His mum isn’t exactly happy about it. “It’s just like the old days,” she says when he slips inside early the following morning, standing in the middle of the hallway with her arms crossed as he eases off his shoes at the front door, his useless concession to quiet. “I’d forgotten how much I enjoyed it, staying up all night waiting for someone to come home.” She looks at her watch. “Not bad, technically still before your alarm would go off. So you had a good evening? Should I expect a visit from the police?”
    â€œCome on, Mum. Give me a break. Don’t be like that.”
    â€œLike what? Where were you last night? I was worried sick.”
    â€œI had a few drinks with Dean. It’s no big deal. It’s nothing.”
    â€œNothing? After the way you’ve been behaving lately. I had no idea what you were up to, leaving without saying goodbye, your bloody phone switched off. What if something had happened? Would you have even called me, or would I have had to read about it in the papers like everybody else?”
    â€œNo. Fuck, no. Of course not.”
    â€œOf course not? That’s all you’ve got?”
    He doesn’t know what else to say. He would like to be able to explain himself to her. At times it is all he can do to stop from spilling his guts. About the Club and the girl and how he hasn’t been able to sleep properly since that night, the music like bile, rising up when he isn’t expecting it, so that he might find himself walking down the