The Plumber's Apprentice
The pipe under the sink was pissing water all over my face, and I'd forgotten to turn off the mains.
“Fuck’s sake,” I spluttered, scrambling out from the cupboard with my hair plastered to my forehead. My toolbag was soaked. My shirt was soaked. The kitchen floor was doing a decent impression of Lake Windermere.
“Everything alright down there, Danny?”
That was the client. Roxanne. She’d booked me through the app for an emergency callout — leaking U-bend, simple job, hour tops. Except the fitting was corroded to buggery and I’d snapped the bloody thing clean off.
“Bit of a situation,” I called up the stairs. “Mind if I kill the stopcock?”
“Under the stairs, love. Help yourself.”
I squelched across the tiles, yanked open the cupboard, and twisted the valve until the hissing stopped. My jeans were clinging to me like a second skin. I peeled my shirt off and wrung it out over the sink, muttering every swear word I knew in alphabetical order.
Footsteps on the stairs.
“Oh my.”
I turned, topless, dripping, and got my first proper look at Roxanne. She’d been in a dressing gown when she let me in — hair wet, no makeup, coffee in hand. Now she was in black leather leggings, a cropped white vest with no bra, and heels that could double as weapons. Lipstick red as a postbox. Cheekbones you could cut glass on.
Six foot without the heels, easy. Shoulders a little broader than mine. A bulge at the front of those leggings that my eyes flicked to and then very quickly flicked away from.
“Sorry,” she said, not sounding sorry at all. “Didn’t realise there’d be a floor show.”
“Pipe’s knackered,” I said, trying to keep my voice level. “I’ll need to nip to the merchants. Hour, maybe.”
“Or,” she said, leaning against the doorframe, “you could use my shower while I dry your clothes. I’m not watching a man drip all over my floorboards for an hour.”
