Chapter 124: Wednesday II

Her sleeves were shoved up past the elbow and the little pale marks went all the way down the inside of both forearms, a dozen on each side, steam wand and hot milk over 9 years.

"I’ve had 2 go under me. First one I found out on a Tuesday with the shutter down and a letter taped to it and I was owed 3 weeks. Second was better. He cried and everything, and I was still owed 9 days."

Her jaw went tight and let go. "So I’ll have the 15. But I want a line in it that says if it shuts, I get my notice paid. In writing. Not a handshake off a nice bloke, because the nice bloke was the one who cried."

"How much notice?"

"A month’d do me."

"You’re getting a year."

Keisha’s head came round.

"What?"

"Twelve months of your wages and 12 months of his go into an arrangement at a bank tomorrow afternoon with a second signature on it that isn’t mine," Danny said. "It pays out on the last working day whatever happens. If we shut. If I go under a bus. If I turn out to be an idiot and you’ve all got to go and work somewhere else. It runs 12 months and then it stops."

A bus went past between them and the shop.

Keisha’s lips moved once.

"That’s 58 grand," she said.

"It’s about 58 with the tax and the pension."

"You’ve got 58 grand you can put in a box and walk away from."

"Yeah."

"In November. On a shop that’s not opened." She said it slowly, the way you read a docket. "I’ve been doing this 9 years and I’ve been interviewed by 4 men this year in good coats, and not one of them could have put a month in writing, never mind 12."

"I know what it looks like."

"You don’t, because I’ve not said it." Her hand came up. "You bought a lease for cash in October. You paid 46 grand to a designer. You took the 3,200 ceiling on Monday when the 900 was sat there. And on Thursday you couldn’t pull a shot."

"All true."

"So either you’ve come into something or you’re in something." Keisha kept her hand up. "And I’ve had a fortnight to pick which one I think it is, and I’ve decided I’m not asking you, and I want you to hear that properly, because it isn’t me being nice."

"What is it?"

"It’s me keeping myself out of it." The hand went down. "If you tell me, I’ve got it. And then one day somebody’s stood at that door with a question and I’ve either got to lie to them or hand you over, and I’ll not do either for £15 an hour."

The queue inside had gone down to 4 and the lad on the till was looking out at her through the glass.

"So here’s mine. My name goes on nothing that isn’t coffee. Not a company, not a bank mandate, not a lease, not a licence, and I’m not a director of anything, and I don’t sign for deliveries."

"You can’t do the last one."

Keisha stopped.

"Say that again."

"You can’t not be a keyholder." Danny had both hands in his coat pockets. "I got told yesterday what happens if somebody gets hurt in that room and there’s nobody named on the policy. You’re opening at 5 in the morning on your own with a machine on. If you’re not on it as a keyholder and you go over on a wet floor, the insurer’s got a reason to say no, and it’s me paying you out of my own pocket and you waiting on me to do it."

"That’s what you want, is it. Me on a form."

"I want you on one form." He did not move. "Keyholder and named on the liability, and that’s it, and I’ll show you both of them before they go and you can read them stood there."

Keisha looked at him for a bit.

"Put it on the contract, then," she said. "Written out. Keyholder and employers’ liability and nothing else, ever, without asking her. If I see my name on anything past that I’ll have it off the same day."

"Done."

"Last one." She had one hand back in the puffer. "The day I find out it’s dirty I’m gone that hour. I’ll not shout and I’ll not tell anybody why. I’ll just not be there at 5."

Danny had the envelope in his coat pocket with his thumb on the corner of it.

"All right," he said.

"You’re not going to tell me it’s not dirty?"

"I’d have to say a sentence I can’t finish."

Keisha took her foot off the wall and stood up straight.

"You shouldn’t have said that."

"You asked me."

"I asked you so you’d say no." Her voice had come up for the first time all morning and a man going past with a crate looked over. "That’s what the question’s for. You say no, I’ve got a no, and if it ever goes wrong I can stand there and say he told me no. And you’ve just took that off me."

Danny stood on the pavement.

"I’m not going to lie to you on the first morning."

"I’d rather you had."

"No, you wouldn’t."

"Don’t tell me what I’d rather, you’ve known me a fortnight." She had both hands out of the puffer now. "I have got a boy of 14 and a mum in Lewisham who thinks I’m the one who’s done all right, and I’ve just stood on this pavement and had a man tell me he can’t say his money’s clean, and I’ve still got to go in there in 4 minutes and do 40 covers."

The queue inside had gone and the lad on the till was wiping the same bit of counter.

"Then say no to me," Danny said.

"I’m not saying no to you." She said it like it annoyed her. "That’s the whole trouble."

"Why not?"

"Because I’ve wanted my own bar since I was 22 and I’m not going to get another one." Keisha had her eyes on the road. "Nobody’s going to hand me a room and say the coffee’s yours. Marcus won’t. Them 4 men in coats won’t, they want a face behind a machine that matches the website. And you’ve got a corner on the sunny side with a 3 group in it and you’ve just offered me the lot, and I’ve been stood here for 15 minutes trying to find the thing that lets me say yes to it."

"And?"

"And there isn’t one." She got her hands back in her pockets. "So I’m going to do it anyway, with my eyes open, and that’s mine, and I’ll not be coming to you about it in 2 years."

"Keisha."

"New rule." She held a finger up. "You never say anything like that to me again. Not when it’s going well. Not when you’re pissed. Not when it’s going wrong at 2 in the morning and you want somebody to know. I heard it once on a pavement and I’ve decided I didn’t."

"All right."

"Say all right again like you’ve understood it."

"All right."

"Right." She pushed off. "Four weeks here. I’m not leaving Marcus short at Christmas, he’s useless but he’s never had me over."

"Four weeks is the 17th."

"It is."

"Keisha."

She stopped in the doorway with the heat coming out over her.

"Ring Tobi," Danny said. "Now. Put me on speaker."

"Why now?"

"Because he’s been waiting since Saturday and I’m not doing Wednesday to anybody today."

So she got her phone out on the pavement and rang him, and Tobi picked up with a tumble dryer going behind him.

"Keish."

"Danny Flynn’s stood next to me. You’re on speaker."

"Right." There was a chair, and the dryer got further away. "All right, Danny."

"Fourteen while you’re learning, 15 when Keisha says you’re not. Contract, hours on it, paid the last working day."

"Yeah." A pause. "Yeah, you said all that at the bus stop."

"I did. Now it’s a bit of paper tomorrow afternoon."

"Right." Another pause, longer. "Can I say a thing and not have it be a problem?"

"Say it."

"Nursery shuts at half 5 and it’s 2 buses." Tobi said it fast, the way you say a thing you have decided to say. "Monday, Wednesday, Thursday I’ve got to be off that floor at quarter to 5 or I’m not getting there, and every place I’ve worked has said yeah course mate and then put me on till 6 and been funny about it."

Keisha had the phone flat on her palm.

"Quarter to 5, 3 days," Danny said. "Put it in the contract."

"You what?"

"I’m putting it in the contract. Written down, so it’s not me being nice on a Wednesday. It’s a term, and if some idiot’s running that floor in 3 years he can’t move it."

Keisha turned the phone away from her mouth.

"You know what that is on a Thursday," she said, quietly, to Danny. "Thursday’s your school run and your builders in the same 90 minutes, and at quarter to 5 I’m on my own with a queue and nobody on the till."

"I know."

"So that’s a third person by March. That’s another 14 grand."

"Then it’s 14 grand."

"You’ve not even opened."

"I know."

She looked at him for a second and turned the phone back.

"Then yeah," Tobi said. "Yeah, go on."

"Tobi." Keisha had the phone up now. "Half 5 tomorrow, come to the shop. I want you on that machine before you sign anything, because if you’re rubbish I’m telling him."

"I’m not rubbish."

"You’re all right. You’re not good." Click. She put the phone away. "He’s good. Don’t tell him."

"Why’d you say it, then?"

"Because he’s been told he’s all right by 4 chains in a row and he believes it," Keisha said, "and I want him wanting it when he walks in tomorrow. Right, I’ve got 40 people coming at 12."