A familiar thought—it was a bedtime mantra, a grace note on which to end her days. No sober day is wasted, meaning that whatever else she’d done or failed to do on any given day, there was always this achievement to reflect on in the violet hour. Every sober day was one more to her total, and though she did not keep a tally in the manner of many recovering alcoholics, she did not need to: each individual day was the only one worth counting, because the present was where she lived.
It occurred to her now, though, that her mantra had another aspect. If no sober day was wasted, then nobody could take one from her. Even if today brought a slip, the total would stay the same. All that would happen was that she would not be adding to it. It was like money in the bank. If you missed making a deposit, that didn’t mean the sum grew smaller.
She returned to the bathroom to splash water on her face. Perhaps she should eat the apple, drink the water. The wine would remain camouflaged by the sandwich and whatever it was, the flapjack. What kind of kidnappers brought flapjacks? It was beyond absurd. She could mix the wine with the water; it would barely be noticeable. Like taking medicine. And then it would be gone, and she need think of it no more.
There was no mirror in which to talk herself down. Look herself in the eye, and ask what she thought she was doing.
And really, she was past this stage. No alcoholic, she knew, was ever past this stage, but in the comfort of her own head she allowed herself to believe she was, in the same way that her colleagues allowed themselves to believe that their careers might yet revive. Because belief was not about actually believing; belief was simply somewhere to shelve hope. But in her own defence, she had passed every test she had set herself, or been set. For some time, Jackson Lamb had been in the habit of pouring her a glass of whisky when they sat in his office at night. She had never yet succumbed, but often wondered what his reaction would be if she did. She thought he would snatch the glass away. Perhaps all that meant was, she hoped he would. But she suspected that he enjoyed testing the limits of other people’s survival instincts, probably because his own had been subjected to rigorous examination over the years. The forms this had taken, she’d never heard him speak about—a thought she’d once had about Lamb was that when they’d pulled the Wall down he’d built himself another, and had been living behind it ever since. Hard to understand another human once they’d bricked themselves up like that. So she might be right, might be wrong: it was possible that when Lamb tempted her, it was because he wanted her to fall. The important thing to remember was that she’d not yet done so.
Besides, one night—the odds were in her favour—he’d run out of booze, and be forced to reclaim the glass he’d poured her. That was going to be sweet. And once he’d drunk that, she’d fetch the bottle she kept in her desk drawer, provided he hadn’t found and drunk it before the opportunity presented itself. That, too, would be a kind of victory. Though of course, to aim for victory would be to admit she was playing the game.
Back in the bedroom the bottle of wine sat waiting for her, obdurate on its untouched tray, and shimmering in the heat.
Caviar had been on the menu at Anna Livia Plurabelle’s, and while Judd had refrained from indulging, now, as he brushed a vacant bench with a rolled-up copy of the
The article had been intended to inspire shock, but Judd had barely managed surprise. That a delicacy for the pampered was acquired through brutality was hardly news. By any civilised standard, it was how luxury ought to be measured—wealth meant nothing if it didn’t create suffering. Because the standard liberal whine that the rich were cushioned from life’s harsh realities was laughable ignorance: the rich created those realities, and made sure they kept on happening. That was what kitchens were for, along with prisons, factories and public transport.
