Masters & Lovers Box Set Three

Chapter 41

Klempner - Twenty-Six Years Ago

I call the number of the new apartment…

The apartment I bought her…

No reply.

Did she stay?

I try her old apartment instead.

Still no answer, but the ansa-machine clicks in. “Hi, Mitch. It’s Larry. Just to let you know that I’ll be back tomorrow. I’m hoping we can meet up. I thought you might be able to meet me at the airport. I’m coming in on the three forty-five from Amsterdam. But if you can’t make it, I’ll drop round to the new place around six. I’m… I’m looking forward to seeing you.”

Disappointment pinches at my stomach.

Will she meet me?

*****

In Arrivals, I scan. The crowd mills and jostles. Kids, shrieking with excitement, run up to adults crouched down with outstretched arms and big smiles. Businessmen with briefcases march up to cabbies holding up cardboard signs scrawled in felt-tip capitals. A girl pushes past me to pelt across the floor and fling herself into the arms of a waiting boyfriend. The pair laugh and babble as he lifts her from her feet, spinning her.

But there’s no Mitch.

She’ll be waiting in the apartment…

Bound to be…

I hail a cab, staring out at billboards and neon, gaudy in the already failing February light. They advertise rings and chocolates, flowers and eternal promises, flashing up ‘Forever’ and I *heart* you’.

Wonder if she’ll like the painting?

At the harbour, I exit the taxi. Over the waters, lights bob as yachts and pleasure cruisers ride rippling waters. Multi-coloured lights drape from trees and buildings and masts, giving the area a jolly, gala-like feel and brightening the streets. But Mitch’s apartment windows are dark.

I pay the cabbie, but, “Wait for me would you,”

“Of course, sir.”

for the keys in my pocket but on the

Her apartment…

No strings…

press the

no movement. The darkness remains,

with brown and a tea-pot. stone-cold. When

Her own work…

on the carpet, leaning against

in the chill and the air has

check the

unslept-in. And save for a few shadings between

even stay

I slept in is as I left it, the blankets rumpled,

Let-down gnaws at me.

I offend

With a gift?

head back out where the taxi driver stands leaning against his vehicle blowing smoke rings into the evening

the back again. “Where to,

address; that dingy apartment which, apparently, she prefers to

Gave her…

taxi pulls away, the garish harbour

do I say

just flushed my gift down the

seeking her window. Again, it’s in darkness. I

Headed out…?

Working again?

cabbie twists in his seat. “Want me to wait

“Please, yes.”

Instead, climbing the stone steps to the door, I fumble a little in the dark on the panel

Now what?

the bottom step, she spins, reverses and tries

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