Love on the Rocks Read Free

call his wife? Give her my condolences?’
    ‘George. You know the score. Lawsuit. Litigation. Liability. It’s the world we live in, I’m afraid. Anyway, you’re going to have enough to deal with. We’ll have the insurance guys swarming all over us before we know it. And Health and Safety. Questions will be asked and it’s your head on the chopping block.’
    ‘But he wasn’t wearing his safety harness.’
    ‘That’s not the point. The balcony gave way. Our fault. Or to be more specific, your fault. I’m sorry.’
    Richard hung up. George put his head on his desk in despair. He felt sick. What a perfectly hideous situation.
    It was George who was responsible for the maintenance of all the commercial buildings his company managed. Colin, currently lying in hospital with severe head injuries, held the contract to clean all their windows. Flouting all the safety guidelines and regulations, he had failed to wear a safety harness while cleaning the windows of a fourth-floor office. He had slipped, fallen and grabbed on to the balcony which, being merely ornamental, had given way. Colin had plunged four storeys on to the concrete below. And George, it seemed, was liable. He should, it turned out, have ensured that every ornamental balcony they owned could take the weight of a falling man.
    When he thought about Colin, he wanted to retch. He had three kids, George knew. The stupid man. Why hadn’t he worn his harness? He’d be here now, instead of a bloody mound of broken bones and teeth waiting for a brain scan. Meanwhile, George couldn’t even go down and comfort Colin’s wife in the hospital corridor while she waited for the results, in case he inadvertently admitted liability. It was a mad world.
    George rubbed his hands wearily over his face. Then he picked up his jacket from the back of his chair, scooped up his car keys and walked out of the office. It was only half past two, and he had an important meeting scheduled for three, but he didn’t care.
    ‘Cancel my three o’clock,’ he said to his secretary, with an uncharacteristic lack of warmth. ‘I’m going home.’
    ‘Don’t you feel well?’ she asked, concerned.
    ‘No,’ he said. ‘I feel sick. Sick to bloody death of it all.’
    Traffic in Bath on a Friday afternoon was notoriously horrendous. Whether people were trying to get in or out of the city, George couldn’t be sure. He only needed to cross from one side to the other, but he had sat in a jam for fifteen minutes now, rather detracting from his dramatic exit as it gave him too much time to reflect on whether he had been wise to flee the office like that. He realized that it was the first time in his life that he had skived. Well, adult life. At university skiving had practically been part of the curriculum. Now, he wasn’t sure how he felt, knowing he’d left chaos in his wake. His absence at this afternoon’s meeting would be a major irritant. Richard would be livid.
    But did he care?
    On balance, he thought probably not. Over the past few months he had become increasingly overwhelmed by boredom. Disillusionment. Stagnation. After four years in the job, a pattern had set in. He was doing the same things over and over again, following the same old routine. The names and the places might change, but the motivation never differed. The only alteration was the rules and regulations, which became more and more complicated, petty and impossible to work to. Which was why a situation like today had evolved. To George, Colin’s accident and its repercussions summed up his frustration with where he was in life.
    The future had once been exciting; the world his oyster. At eighteen, he was brimming with promise, and getting into the school of architecture was widely regarded as a ticket to success. He’d be able to do whatever he wanted. Visions of glittering skylines peppered with the curves of his masterpieces filled his dreams. He imagined iconic museums, headquarters that were the jewels in