Better Than Easy Read Free

do you get that?”
    â€œPaid direct into my account,” I tell him. “Seventy percent of my salary.”
    Tom gasps. “Seventy percent? Jesus! I wish
I
could get that.”
    â€œFor eighteen months…” I add.
    â€œEighteen months! I don’t suppose anyone really looks for a job for eighteen months then do they?”
    I wink at him. “Not me anyway,” I say.
    â€œSo you’re on holiday,” Tom says. “Officially.” He proffers the joint.
    I wrinkle my nose. “It makes me feel a bit guilty, but then I just think how much tax I have paid over the years…”
    â€œOh go on!” he says, still waving the joint. “You’re free. It’s the end of one thing, the beginning of another. Have a smoke!”
    I shrug and take the joint. “I guess so,” I say. “I wasn’t planning doing anything else today.”
    â€œThere’s nothing else
to
do is there? Not until we get the keys to the gîte.”
    â€œActually, I think there’s plenty to do,” I tell him. “We need to get some kind of marketing plan sorted, a website and stuff…”
    Tom nods. “Yeah, I already started actually. Only, I need some decent photos of the place. Hers are all crap.”
    â€œAnd budgets,” I say. “I want to work out how we’re gonna make a living at it. But I need some figures from Chantal – profit margins and stuff. I think we need to go up there, have lunch, maybe even stay a weekend – pump her for as much information as we can. Because once it’s ours I get the feeling she’ll be out of there and never want to look back.”
    â€œI can’t wait to get started on the place though,” Tom says. “I was wondering – do you think we cangrow rhubarb up there?”
    I frown at Tom and snort in amusement.
    â€œWhat?” he asks.
    I half-shrug. “I just don’t think growing rhubarb is gonna be very high on the urgent list of things to do,” I say.
    Tom scowls like a child. “So what’s going to be on the
Fuehrer’s
list of things to do?”
    I unplug the lead from the Dyson, hand it to him and then stroke his back. “Hey,” I say. “You can grow rhubarb, of course you can. I just mean, what with all the redecorating and marketing we need to be doing… Well, that’s the stuff
I’m
worried about. We need to make sure the place makes money.”
    Tom scratches his chin and slumps on the sofa. “Yeah, we
so
need to redecorate,” he says. “I was thinking it would be nice to do something quirky,” he says. “Like themed rooms, you know bright colours and stuff.”
    I nod. “Yeah, I thought so too, pick up some bits of funky second-hand furniture…”
    â€œI love rhubarb though,” Tom says, instinctively reaching for his smoking box and taking out the ingredients for his next joint. “I’ve got this craving for rhubarb crumble. Maybe I’m pregnant.”
    I slip beside him on the sofa and contain a sigh. His brain works differently to mine, drifting laterally from one subject to another. Mine is much more linear, logical. If I’m talking about decorating I’m not going to drift onto rhubarb. “And a dog,” Tom says. “Can we have a dog?”
    â€œA
dog?!”
I exclaim. “Where did
that
come from?”
    Tom shrugs. “It’s just a sort of recurring dream,” he says. “A daydream more I suppose. I always imagined one day I’d have a husband and a vegetable plot and rhubarb growing and a big country dog.”
    I nod at Paloma on the chair opposite; she’s cutely cleaning her forehead by licking her paw. “I’m not sure what madam will have to say about it,” I say,thinking about Tom’s use of the word husband. It’s not a word he uses generally – I like it.
    â€œIt’s a
country
dog,” Tom says.