This morning was Kim’s.
I got up and quickly tidied the living space of the trailer, and then I threw on some clothes and ventured outside. The chickens—larger in number now—were our responsibility this week. I let them out and collected the eggs, and I was drinking dandelion tea and cooking breakfast on the outside stove when Kim slid his arms around me from behind.
“Make a hippie of you yet, eh?”
It was a joke that never got old for Kim,andmy brothers, who found it hilarious that I was living the very life I’d resisted all these years. “Piss off and get the plates.”
Kim obeyed, and I loaded us up with veggie omelettes and fresh tomato relish, spiked with Kim’s home-grown chillies. It was probably the nicest thing I’d cooked him so far, and the thought spawned a heat in my belly that warmed my bones. Was this how it felt to be truly happy? God, I hoped so. “Do you know how many are coming this morning?”
“Not a clue. Reckon no one does until they walk up that path.”
I swallowed the last of my breakfast and considered the theory. Weather allowing, Kim had been hosting a weekly AA meeting at the commune for three months now, and though I kept out of the way during the meeting itself, at the end, when I served up Laura’s best cakes and bakes, I couldn’t help studying the changing faces of the attendees, and speculating what had brought them to Blackbeard’s Junkyard.
My theories often proved beyond fanciful when compared to the mundane reality of addiction—a retired vicar who couldn’t stay off the sherry, a teacher who’d driven her car into the wall of the town’s library after one too many lunchtime ciders. And there were young people too, younger than Kim, who’d never have considered a community meeting had it not been sponsored by the coolest business in Porthkennack.
After breakfast, I set out the Blood Rush mugs and filled the tea urns, and then I made myself scarce, leaving Kim to his tribe. I shut myself away in the trailer and worked for an hour, completing far more in my snatched time on Kim’s patchy internet connection than I ever did at my place where I had all day to get shit done.
The irony of my newfound focus wasn’t lost on me, but I didn’t dwell on it. Instead, when my hour was up, I closed my laptop and ventured outside. The meeting was just breaking up, so I drifted to the tea station and set out the cakes Laura had sent over with my dad for the occasion. Kim joined me, and I took a moment to squeeze his hand over the jam tarts. “All right?”
“Aye. It was a good one today. Some folk have made real progress.”
I smiled, because though I knew little of what went on in the meetings, the positive effect they had on Kim was undeniable. Addiction was a lonely illness, even for Kim, who had a wider support network than most, and the camaraderie this band of misfit addicts shared made every morning I spent pouring tea worth a thousand that I’d spent alone.
The meeting drew to a natural end around midday. Kim drove a few elderly attendees back into town while I cleared up with the help of a couple of church volunteers. We were finishing up when a car pulled onto the muddy track that led to the commune. It was too soon to be Kim, unless he’d forgotten something, and the rest of the commune’s residents rarely had visitors, so I tucked the tea urn safely away in the shed and set off through the orchard to meet whoever it was.
I was half expecting the postman and the box of acrylic paints Kim had ordered the day before, but my dad hopping out of the red and yellow van, less so. “What on earth are you doing?”
My dad grinned at me from beneath his multicoloured flat cap. “I was on my way to ask Kim if he wanted to come to the seed fair with me. Fred gave me a lift.”
Of course he had. Where else but Porthkennack did the friendly postman pick up hitchhikers? “The seed fair in Port Isaac?”
“That’s the one. I thought he might like to get some ideas for the raspberry crop.”
“He doesn’t have a raspberry crop here, Dad. There’s no room.” It was a sad fact, but a true one. The commune was at capacity, and there was no space for new crops without sacrificing existing ones.
“Aye, well,” my dad said. “I’ve got some ideas about that too, if you’ll come for your dinner tonight.”
I raised a questioning eyebrow, but my dad just shrugged and smiled a smile I’d come to recognise as a sign that he was up to something. “We can’t come until late,” I said. “Kim’s got ink appointments until seven.”
“I thought he wasn’t tattooing anymore?”
“He finishes today.”
“Oh well, that’s fine, son. Laura’s at her bridge club until the evening.”
The conspiratorial grin remained, but he was saved from further questioning by Kim coming home, and it turned out that he’d planned on visiting the seed fair anyway.
“You don’t want to come?” he said to me.
I shook my head. I’d embraced every aspect of life with Kim except his obsession with tramping about in the mud, nursing seedlings into adulthood. Fuck that. My father could have him, even if it meant sacrificing an afternoon I’d kind of counted on spending in bed.
My dad retreated to Kim’s car. When he was out of sight, I grabbed Kim and pushed him against the most solid part of the fence. I kissed him fiercely, shoving my hands into his silky hair, twisting my fingers to give him the tiny shot of pain that riled him up so much.
His reaction didn’t disappoint. He spun us around and took control, and it wasn’t long before I forgot all about my father waiting by Red’s hot-pink Fiat 500. That was right—Kim still had the most ridiculous car in the world.
Kim broke away, his heart hammering against my chest, his dick digging into my thigh. “I can stay, if you want? I’m sure your dad won’t mind.”
“I think he would, actually. Gaz reckons he likes you far better than the rest of us.”