Page 86 of Strays
Whatever. Nero watched as Lenny tore the envelope open and whooped at what he found inside.
“Glastonbury tickets? Oh, wow . . . they’re vendor tickets, for the bus. Access all areas. Oh, man.” Lenny laid his head on the steering wheel. “What did I do to deserve all this?”
“The impossible,” Nero said. “Cass told me just yesterday that you’ve made me a much nicer person.”
“Bollocks. You’re the nicest person I’ve ever met underneath that grumpy façade . . . Ooh, hang on, there’s more.” Lenny withdrew yet another envelope from inside the first. “It’s got your name on it.”
“What?”
Lenny handed it over. “It’s not for me. It’s for you.”
Frowning, Nero opened the envelope and revealed a stapled legal document with the Urban Soul logo on the front. “What the fuck?”
“Read it,” Lenny said, his voice muffled as he bent double to peer at who knew what under his seat. “Maybe it’s a new contract or something. You’re due a pay rise.”
Nero hardly heard him as the first page of the document began to sink in. He flipped quickly through the pages, scanning for any sign that he’d misunderstood, but there was none. Cass had done the unthinkable, and Nero could barely believe it.
“What is it?”
“Cass signed TST over to me . . . I think.”
“What?”
Nero shook his head and read the document again. “I don’t understand.”
Lenny pried the paperwork from Nero’s hands. “The brand name remains with Urban Soul, but the business—the bakery and the restaurant—belong to you. It’s yours. He’s giving it to you.”
“Fucking bastard.” Nero started to get out of the bus.
Lenny grabbed him. “Don’t you dare.”
“Dare what?”
“Go in there and throw it back in his face. He’s giving it to you because you’ve earned it, and because who he is, who they are. Don’t hustle in there and disrespect what they stand for, what you stand for.”
“I don’t stand for getting shit for nothing.”
“It’s not for nothing, Nero. It’s for you . . . for eight years of hard work and loyalty. Did you honestly think they were going to let you set up a dozen businesses for them and not give you anything in return?”
“They pay me, don’t they?” But the fight in Nero faded as he realised that this was a fight he’d never win. A fight that Jake had lost too. “Fucking bastards.”
“Uh-huh. Same bastards who gave me a bus for my birthday, eh?”
“Fuck off.”
Lenny laughed and laughed and laughed, until Nero pounced on him and kissed the hell out of him to shut him up.
They parted, eventually, flushed and breathless, but the mirth in Lenny’s eyes remained, and Nero couldn’t contain his own grin. “I’m going to take the summer off.”
Lenny blinked. “Am I dreaming?”
“Maybe, are your dreams good or bad?”
“If you’re implying that we can take this van around the world this summer, Nero, then my dreams are everything I’ve ever wanted. How about you?”
Nero smiled. “You are my dreams. I just never knew it.”
