“Uh, dude, where’s your car?” Mal asked as they emerged from the fields.
“Up the road. Sorry. Didn’t think it through. Just wanted to get to you as quickly as possible.”
Their feet splashed in a river of rainwater as they hobbled up the narrow lane. Fortunately, Jory consoled himself, he was soaked through to the bone already so he couldn’t get any wetter. They probably looked like contestants in some bizarrely overpopulated version of a three-legged race, had there been anyone around to see, which, thank God, there was not. Especially since if a car should come along, it was doubtful they’d be coordinated enough to get out of the way in time.
He’d thought he’d been keeping in shape since coming back to live here. The pounding of his heart and the straining of his lungs as he half carried Mal up the hill told him he’d better work harder on his fitness.
Reaching the Qubo, Jory felt like a fisherman who’d weathered the mother of all storms and had at last spotted the harbour lights of home. Fumbling in his pocket for his keys, he had a moment’s panic that he’d dropped them somewhere in the fields, before realising he’d left them in the ignition in his hurry to get to Mal.
Thank God the local car thieves were a fair-weather lot.
Tasha was panting hard as they eased Mal into the Qubo’s passenger seat. “Fuck me, Mal, you gotta go on a diet.”
“Oi, I’m all muscle. Weighs more than fat.” Despite his cheery words, Mal’s face was pale under its smears of grime.
Jory squinted at him in the sudden brightness of the car’s interior light. “How’s your leg?”
“Still there. Fuck. Feel a bit sick.”
“We need to get you warm and dry.” Jory hesitated. “Roscarrock House is closest.”
“Nah. Just wanna go home.” Mal looked around. Jory wasn’t entirely sure he was seeing what was actually there. “Back to the pub. With Tasha.”
“You’ll be all right going that far?”
“’M what?”
Never mind, then. Jory slipped into the driver’s seat and was startled to realise he still had his rucksack on his back. He wrestled it off, Tasha helping from the back seat.
“Oh my God, babe, your hands are a mess,” Tasha said, sounding horrified.
Jory was faintly shocked to realise she was talking to him, not to Mal. Since when did he merit a babe? “It’s okay. I can drive.” Although for the first time in his life, he was half wishing he’d bought an automatic. He gritted his teeth and put the car in gear.
It must have been past closing time when they got to the Sea Bell, but you wouldn’t have known it from the number of no-longer-young men still propping up the bar. It worked to their advantage in that one of them was Dr. Prowse, a semiretired GP who was able to check Mal over and pronounce him probably able to survive the night without visiting a hospital.
Jago Andrewartha hadn’t exactly looked approvingly at Jory when they’d walked in supporting Mal, Tasha’s T-shirt plastered to her chest and all of them streaked with mud and dripping on the floor, but at least he’d allowed Jory to take Mal upstairs and help Tasha get him changed into dry clothes and settled into bed.
“I was really fucking careful, you know?” Now coherent, thank God, Mal resembled a teenager, his towel-dried hair fluffing up against his pillow.
Jory knelt by the side of the bed. His clothes had started to dry on him, surprising him with the revelation that yes, they could get even more uncomfortable than they had been soaking wet. “You were? I must have missed that bit.”
“Watched me step, you know, so’s not to fall down the hole. Didn’t know I was gonna make a new one.”
Tasha snorted. She was in a big fluffy dressing gown with her hair in a towel, as if she’d just stepped out of a bubble bath, the sort that involved scented candles and a glass of wine. “Yeah, and we’ll rip you a new one if you ever do anything like that again.”
Jory was absurdly touched by the we in her threat. “What was so funny, earlier?” he asked Mal. “Remember? You were laughing after we pulled you out of the hole?”
“Fun— Oh. Me. Sorry. Your mum ever read you that fairy story about the enormous turnip? You know, where the whole bloody town and all the animals help pull it out of the ground and end up on top of each other?”
It struck Jory as far more hilarious than it should have. He snickered as silently as he could, probably sounding like some kind of cartoon dog.
“You’re an enormous turnip all right,” Tasha muttered darkly. “You ever go trying to bury yourself alive again, I’ll put you in a fucking pasty.”
“Oi, but then it wouldn’t be an authentic Cornish pasty. No turnips in one of them. Only swedes allowed.”
“You can fuck authentic. You can fuck it right up the arse.”
“Couldn’t do that. Me bloke here would get jealous.” Mal smiled at Jory—but then the smile faltered. “Uh . . .”
“I should go,” Jory said abruptly, getting to his feet. “You need to rest. And if you still can’t put weight on that foot in the morning, go to emergency and get an X-ray. Despite what Dr. Prowse said.”
“You should stay,” Tasha blurted out. “I’ll make you a cuppa.”
“No. Thanks. I need to . . .” Jory gestured vaguely at his clothes.
Mal made a half-hearted offer to lend him something dry to
