was three years ago?’
‘It’s pretty much the worst club in the city,’ she says, and then starts defending herself. ‘He told me I had a problem. He wouldn’t leave me alone.’
I can’t exactly judge her. I held a grudge against Henry for three years. But Pavement? She couldn’t have just told him she’d been at Laundry and then not showed?
‘Henry was with Martin tonight,’ I say. ‘They went for dumplings.’
‘Okay,’ she says, but clearly she’s edgy as she directs me through the centre of town, past the main City Train Station, and towards the docks.
We’re on a long stretch of dark blue road when George finally tells me to slow down. ‘He’s somewhere around here.’
We really start to worry when we get to the blinking dot on the map and he’s not here. I pull over and George looks at the map, pinches it between her fingers and makes it bigger. I take it from her, and turn it around. ‘It’s a double highway,’ I say. ‘He’s on the other side.’
I make a U-turn and see Henry before she does. He’s shining in the darkness; arms pulled back like a suburban Caravaggio.
‘Shit,’ George says, spotting Martin.
I pull up near them, and we get out. Henry Jones naked is quite a sight and I try not to look like I’m enjoying it as much as I am.
‘Hello,’ he says.
‘Hello,’ I say. ‘You seem to have gotten yourself in some trouble.’
‘You’re naked,’ George says.
‘Really?’ Henry says. ‘We hadn’t noticed.’
‘Why are you naked?’ George asks.
‘Why are you in pyjamas?’ Martin asks, as she walks around to his side of the pole.
‘I had to leave in a hurry, to save you.’
‘Maybe I wouldn’t need saving if someone hadn’t told me she’d be at Pavement tonight.’
‘I said I might be there.’
I decide it’s the best thing for everyone if we get Henry and Martin down as soon as possible. There’s nothing to cut with in the back seat, so I open the boot, and there, next to Cal’s box, are scissors and, for some reason, a steak knife.
I pick them up, and stare at the box. My hands touch the cardboard instinctively. I trace my finger around the question mark, but don’t open it.
George walks over and I close the boot. ‘You take the scissors and Martin,’ I tell her. ‘I’ll take Henry and the steak knife.’
‘Do you have a steady hand?’ Henry asks me while I’m cutting.
‘Fairly steady,’ I say. ‘I’ll go carefully around the sensitive parts.’
‘It’s skin. It’s all sensitive, really.’
I nod, cutting slowly.
‘How do I look naked?’ he asks after a while.
‘Not half bad,’ I say.
‘Can I take that to mean I look half good?’
‘Close your eyes,’ Martin says to George. ‘Stop looking at me.’
‘I’m cutting some fairly sensitive areas. Do you really want me to close my eyes?’
‘I’m glad you find this so funny. If you and Rachel were naked and Henry and I were making jokes, it’d be a whole different story.’
‘Relax,’ George says.
‘Relax?’ he says. ‘If you didn’t want to be friends you could have just said no. Do I need to beg every single day? You haven’t even bothered to say sorry.’
He yells the last bit, and George doesn’t answer for what seems like a long time. Eventually she says, very quietly, ‘Sorry.’
‘What?’ Martin asks. ‘You’ll have to speak up.’
‘I’m sorry,’ George says loudly.
‘I accept,’ Martin says.
‘Careful of my penis please,’ Henry says, and I suddenly find the whole situation hilarious. I haven’t found anything funny in ten months. Usually I pretend to laugh. I try to make jokes.
‘Don’t laugh while you’re cutting,’ he says, making me laugh even more.
‘You’re shaking,’ he says, and George is laughing now and Martin too and Henry’s saying, ‘I’m glad my naked nuts are so hilarious to you all,’ but he’s laughing as well and he’s happy that everyone else is happy, because that’s the kind of guy Henry is.
We pile in the car, and Henry and I listen to Martin retelling the story of tonight to George, who interrupts every five seconds or so to say she’s sorry. He gets to the part about Henry talking to Amy, and then Greg arriving, and I look quickly across to the passenger seat.
Henry’s staring out the window, with an old jumper I keep in the car over his lap. ‘You can say it.’
I’m dying to say it. What kind of a girl doesn’t call the police when her idiot boyfriend throws two guys into a car and drives away? What kind of person