New Lease of Life (3 page)

“Why are you getting rid of them, then?” Colby braced himself to be told to mind his own business.

“I’m a cripple.” Phillip punctuated the venom behind the word by slamming the rubber tip of his crutch against the wooden floor. “Where am I going to wear them? Out dancing?”

Colby didn’t bother pointing out that the majority of the items were hardly suitable to go clubbing in. Unless Phillip planned on dancing at the Ritz. A vision of him twirling Phillip around the
Strictly
dance floor popped into his head and refused to leave. Unlikely as it was that the dance show would call, what with Phillip’s attitude, Colby’s two left feet, and their complete lack of celebraty status—although Colby could probably invoke Z-lister rank if he felt so inclined—the thought still made him smile.

Inappropriately, as it turned out.

“You think it’s funny, do you? Me relying on this piece of crap.” The crutch slammed onto the floor again. Hard enough that Colby winced and scanned the parquet for a dent. “Stuck in here all the time.”

“What? No! I wasn’t—” Did Phillip never leave the house?

“Sure.” Phillip’s scathing tone heralded his disbelief as loudly as a corps of bugles. “We can’t all be rugged perfection.”

“What?” Rugged perfection? “Me?”

“Whatever.” Phillip rode roughshod over Colby’s protest. “I should have known better than to invite someone into my home. Are you going to be much longer? I’ve got a grocery delivery scheduled in an hour.”

That answered Colby’s question about Phillip’s excursions, at least as far as food shopping went, and would account for the sallow complexion and overall impression of lethargy. He’d bet Phillip had barely glanced inside the dressing room since whatever had happened to leave him in his current predicament, let alone tried the clothes on.

“I don’t know. It’s all a bit old-fashioned.” Colby sighed in an as put-upon manner as he could manage. He pulled a tweed jacket in ocher and green from the rail, the Harris Tweed label declaring the quality of the item, and held it up to his chest. He forced himself to be cruel, although it went against his very nature. “Don’t think this sort of stuff would appeal to my customers. Twenty—” Barely a heartbeat as he considered how old Phillip might be. “—and thirtysomethings with money to spare and style by the bucketload.”

“You don’t think this is style? It takes flair to pull off a look like this. Sounds like your customers are dfofs. With their—”

“Doffs?”

“D-F-O-F. Dedicated Followers of Fashion. Heads up their arses while they blindly follow the next trend. I thought you specialized in vintage. I thought you’d understand how exceptional these clothes are.” Phillip snorted his derision. “I thought I saw appreciation on your face when I walked in. Guess I was wrong.”

“Show me.” Colby spoke as though he hadn’t heard any of Phillip’s rant, even while he absorbed every word.

“What?”

“Show me how good they can look.” About to slip the jacket back onto the rail, Colby noticed a purple waistcoat almost the color of Scottish heather, still tweed but more lightweight. Purple and yellow, not a combination most people would be brave enough to try , but…. Colby tucked the waistcoat inside the jacket just to see what the overall effect might be. Something in the two color schemes drew them together—maybe that touch of green that ran through both fabrics. He glanced over at Phillip; with his light coloring and his slim build, he might just pull it off. And with flair too.

“I can’t.” But the longing in Phillip’s gaze told another story, lingering on the items for a fraction too long before he abruptly turned away. “They don’t fit anymore.”

Liar.
Although it was possible he’d lost some musculature due to lack of movement, the clothes still looked as if they would fit. Having spent years dealing with overly skinny models and actors fighting the march of time, Colby had seen his fair share of people with poor body image. He’d battled against the reflection other people saw in their mirrors every day to find the person within. Diet and exercise might have been what people had paid him for, but without a positive self-image, neither would give his clients the spark they searched for. Sometimes he could afford to be kind, but with others he found he had to push them into a corner.

Phillip wasn’t a client in a job Colby had left far behind, and his negative body image was of no concern to Colby. In fact, it worked to his advantage, providing a huge haul of exquisite pieces for his shop. Yet the urge to help Phillip find that missing spark and coax until it shone brightly tugged at Colby.

Even though Phillip had turned his back on Colby—and the clothes—Colby schooled his features into the best imitation of a sneer he could muster. “Didn’t think you could pull it off.”

“Pull it off!” The rubber on the bottom of his crutch squeaked on the parquet flooring as Phillip rounded on Colby. A fire in his eyes matched the rancor in his words as he took a step into the dressing room for the first time. “I’ll show you.”

For a moment Colby thought Phillip intended to snatch the clothes from his grasp, and he had already turned his attention to the hangers for a suitable pair of trousers when Phillip shouldered past him. The rubber of his crutch impacted hard on the wooden flooring, echoing in the small room as Phillip shuffled down to the far end where floor-to-ceiling shelves appeared to house sweaters and, as far as Colby could make out, some seriously vintage knitted waistcoats from the late thirties, early forties.

Vintage wool work so often succumbed to the rigors of time and moths, that the best Colby could normally hope for were reproductions taken from original knitting patterns. But even from this distance, the colors looked right for the period, and he had to remind himself that, for some unfathomable reason, he wanted Phillip to change his mind about donating.

“Bollocks!”

Phillip’s curse dragged Colby from his thoughts, which had been veering between hoping to find a stash of knitted ties and doing something to finally make his host smile.

Using his crutch to take most of his weight, Phillip attempted to reach for something on the very top shelf, but even at full stretch, the task appeared beyond him, and he slumped back down.

“You’ll have to get it,” Phillip snapped.

Get what? Even with his height advantage, Colby couldn’t see what Phillip had been so determined to find. There certainly didn’t appear to be any items of clothing on the top shelf.

Phillip mistakenly took Colby’s confusion for reticence, and he huffed, dropped his gaze, and muttered, “Please,” like the effort to force the word from his lips physically hurt.

“What am I looking for?” Colby asked as he moved to the end of the dressing room, bringing him closer than ever to Phillip. Crowded together as they were at the far end of the small room gave Phillip no opportunity to get away, and Colby took advantage of the proximity to inhale the spicy scent of him.

“A box. It appears I pushed them farther back than I realized.”

“Them?” Colby asked, looking down on his host.

“Photo albums. I should have warned you. It might be heavy.” Phillip glanced at Colby’s upper arms, following the movement as Colby reached above his head. “Not that you should have any trouble.”

“Hmm.” Colby flexed the muscles of his biceps, just to observe Phillip’s reaction, and was rewarded with a soft gasp. “How far back would the box be?”

“I don’t know. I guess I had a fit of pique when I stored them away.”

Colby leaned in farther, his torso brushing Phillip’s arm. He groped blindly on the shelf above his head until his fingers knocked against something solid, and he grasped the edge of the box. But pressed between the shelves and Colby’s chest, Phillip had made no effort to pull away, and Colby wanted to revel in the sensation, letting Phillip’s body seep the warmth from his own for a moment longer.

Of course then he had to open his mouth and ruin everything. “You were angry enough to try to hide your past. Slightly more than a fit of pique, I’d say.”

The shove to his chest took Colby by surprise. He staggered backward a couple of steps, losing his grip on the box.

“Don’t bother,” Phillip said, each word panted as he eased out from the press of Colby’s body and limped from the dressing room. “I have nothing to prove to you. If you don’t want the clothes, I’ll find someone else who does.”

“No!” Colby reached up and pulled the box from the shelf.

Turning toward his host, Colby ignored the derisive expression Phillip sent Colby’s way from over his shoulder. Of course Phillip thought it was all about the clothes. The top of the box was sufficiently dusty to obscure the label on the lid. Not excessively so, though, leading Colby to guess that the truths it held hadn’t been hidden away for too long.

Without thinking Colby brushed at the dust and dirt, determined to reveal the legend written there.

“Don’t!” Phillip’s cry sounded almost panicked.

Mortified, Colby stopped instantly. What possessed him to pry in such a manner? But it was too late. He’d already exposed hidden words.

“The knitwear, you blithering idiot. Dust. Oh, sweet Jesus. Bring the box out here.”

“Shit!” Colby glanced back over his shoulder, almost expecting to see a swarm of dust mites chomping great holes in the precious hoard. The sweaters looked exactly as he’d last seen them, but that didn’t mean microscopic creatures weren’t doing irreparable damage at that very moment. “Sorry. Do you want me to shake them off?”

“Just bring the box through to the bedroom.” The concern Phillip had shown toward the knitwear had vanished, and grumpy bastard was back.

Following his host, Colby couldn’t resist glancing down at the label.

Pip’s photos.

“WHO’S PIP?”
Colby asked before he could censor himself.

The side table under the window held nothing but a smattering of books and magazines, and a vase—chunky and colorful, Whitefriars Glass if Colby’s assessment was correct—devoid of flowers. Phillip indicated that Colby should place the box there and frowned. No doubt pondering whether he should answer the question or tell Colby to mind his own business.

“
I
am. My friends called me Pip.”

Called?
Colby daren’t ask about the use of the past tense. Instead he rolled the nickname around in his head for a moment, wishing he could try out the simple syllable on his tongue.

“So.” Colby traced a finger over the edge of the box, snatching it away when Phillip—Pip—glared at him. “The box is down now. Are you going to show me?”

“Show you?” With the permanent frown Phillip wore, it was hard to tell, but Colby thought he sounded confused.

“That your unwanted collection is suitable for my shop,” Colby reminded him, as offhand as he could muster.

It gave Colby little satisfaction to watch Phillip wince and bristle as the dual barbed comment hit home. An impressive feat that made Phillip’s slender frame appear as if he were vibrating.

“Oh,
I’ll
show you.”

Carefully, Phillip eased the lid from the box and removed the top album. Colby read the date over his shoulder.
January—September 2014.
Just seven months ago.

Resting all his weight on the crutch and all but cradling the album to his chest, Phillip flicked through several pages before turning it to show Colby the image he had chosen to illustrate his point.

For a moment Colby took his time to appreciate the quality of the album; the thick vellum pages, photographs held in place with corner mounts rather than glue, and a thin page of translucent tissue-like paper to protect the image. Everything about Phillip and these clothes screamed loved and cared for, and yet again, Colby wondered why anyone who had invested that much care and attention would want to get rid of them.

A younger-looking Phillip—although from the dates Colby knew this could be no more than fifteen months ago—smiled out of the photo at him. His blond hair was neatly trimmed in a short back and sides, more reminiscent of the style of yesteryear than the recent bastardization of the cut by footballers and celebrities alike. His blue eyes shone with laughter, happiness directed at the photographer rather than for the camera, and Colby knew he had now met the man who friends called Pip. Penciled in beneath the photo, perfect penmanship recorded the occasion.
Pip. Emily’s wedding. February 2014.
Just over a year ago, then.

Belatedly Colby remembered he was supposed to be looking at the clothes. Pip had combined what appeared to be a vintage, single-breasted tux with a cream and pale green silk brocade waistcoat.

“Waistcoat and tux combo,” he said with a shrug. “Impressive, but everyone dresses up for weddings.”

“That
combo
is a late 1930s Hart Schaffner Marx two-piece tuxedo with shawl lapels and a vintage Chinese silk brocade waistcoat from the fifties. It took me weeks of trawling to find that piece.”

And yet you are giving it away. What happened to you?

“Still, it’s a wedding photo.” Colby snorted, fabricating the disdain for effect. He had to admit Pip looked bloody amazing, although he couldn’t decide how much of that had to do with the clothes. That smile would brighten up even the crap he was hiding away in now. “Even I can look good at a wedding.”

Colby grabbed his phone from his back pocket and started to flick through his photo album.

“You look great as you are,” Pip said with more sincerity than Colby would have expected. “Very presentable. Stylish.”

Surprised, Colby glanced up from the search of his photo gallery to find Pip—because he couldn’t be anything else now that Colby had seen the man smile, if only secondhand—studying him.

“What? You’ve got that whole ‘lumberjack in the city’ look going on. I couldn’t pull it off, but you….” Pip paused and raked his gaze over Colby’s body. “You look very manly.”

Colby ignored the disappointment he felt knowing that Pip’s interest was in the wrapping and not the contents.

“Thanks.” He returned his attention to the phone, finding the photo he was looking for almost immediately. Then he held his phone out to Pip, the screen on display. “Look.”