Rhona. pt 1

Millie Garrens, former British spy, Vape Enthusiast. A short story.

Millie’s phone died before the two vacant ticks could appear under her message to Arif. Locked out of the house with no money, wearing her Hilton Marriott sliders and the outfit she used for sleeping and the milk run, she decided against seeking refuge in the pub or cafe. She was barely able to face her neighbours when properly dressed.

She resigned herself to the stoop of number twenty-three Creshire Mews in Putney where she could smoke her nicotineless vape. As the London sun began to fade and the light breeze began to chill, Millie double checked she had definitely left her keys inside when she stepped out to chase the Amazon driver.

After Arif skewed the car into the parking space he jogged to the front door apologising as he fished his keys out.

‘Don’t worry just don’t be mad, I left the central heating on’ Millie said.

‘So it’s been on all day?’

‘Well for however long your game of tennis was. So how long was that Arif?’

Inside Millie warmed up by burning the back of her thighs on a radiator as Arif explained that he had not seen her messages long after his game as the group became engrossed by one of them admitting to having voted Reform. This lasted an hour before they changed topics to cycling lubricants for another forty five minutes.

‘Did you hear me?’ Arif asked, ‘Reform!’ Millie ignored him as she spun round to warm her kneecaps.

Arif complained that he could still smell the vape’s artificial cherry on her breath as he settled into bed. Millie agreed to give brushing her teeth another try. Arif reminded her to brush them lightly, and not ‘like you’re scrubbing the pavement, do it like the tik tok I showed you.’

Millie took the opportunity to check her messages as her phone had just come back to life. She ultimately regretted this due to a sobering lack of activity. The sole notification from her fitness app reminded her to close her wheel for the day. She tapped Arif’s message to clear the only unread chats, her finger slipped along with a misguiding smear of tap water on the screen, confusing the phone to reveal the time stamp of Arif’s reply to Miliie’s SOS message. She noted that the delivery and read receipt were both within 11:32, which did not track with Arif’s comment about reading the message much later. Rinsing her mouth out, she asked if he had been at the Tennis club all day. Her only response, the first snore of Arif’s famous nightly symphony.

The next day was exceptionally terse as any conversation which could be spared, ultimately was. The package remained unopened on the dusty record player which Arif had insisted on pulling out of storage, on which he was yet to play any of his thirteen records. She considered taking the package to him as a peacekeeping exercise. However, she was distracted by a heavy buzzing above her. It sounded like a drill pushing through the floorboards. Both Millie and Arif’s phones were next to one another, Arif had left his there almost purposefully, as it rarely left his side usually. Millie realised that it was her phone causing the noise, just not the one in front of her.

Millie popped her head round the door after knocking to see Benji transfixed on the Nokia 3210 in his hand hovering over the open draw he had found it in.

‘What is this?’ He asked Millie as the relic continued to buzz in his hand.

‘It’s my phone Benji.’

‘Oh… aren’t you Android? Should I put it back in the drawer?’ Millie sat herself down by his side, wrapping an arm around him as she took the phone with the other. She hugged him as softly as possible and asked permission to answer the call in his room, which he appreciated. Millie invariably went out of her way to ensure he never felt like an imposition, not easy considering he was an ex boyfriend of Jen’s, living there rent free on account of not handling the break up with Millie’s daughter very well. Benji qualified as the ultimate imposition - especially when the only day he had decided to leave the house in weeks was the day Millie locked herself out.

‘Feral cats are running wild in Palermo’ the husky voice said on the end of the line. Millie immediately recognised the prompt and person speaking. She eventually mustered a response.

‘The council has a person to deal with that, let me fetch you the number,’ Millie said, before pulling a scrap of paper from the open drawer, ‘51.510814. Let me know if that number still works.’ Millie listened as the voice read back to her another string of numbers that completed a set of co-ordinates. The line went dead and to Millie’s utter desolation, she would now have to leave the house after 9pm on a Saturday night as a result of taking the call.

Millie dug her hands deep into her pockets and wrapped her coat tightly as the swell of the Thames lapped against the permanently docked HMS Wellington. A vetted London rendezvous for Millie back in the nineties on account of the steps leading to the river offering perilous shelter on the slippery steps between the pavement and boat. This created cover from directional microphones and tele photo lenses. Unfortunately since the heady days of New Labour, the HMS Wellington had been turned into a Wedding Venue. The sloshing of water against the embankment was drowned out by Abba’s Dancing Queen.

‘Alright my old mucker?’ Millie heard from behind. She took one last heavy huff on her vape.

‘Good to see you Rhona, I didn’t realise you were still paying for that line truth be told.’ She said, as Rhona approached in a fur coat hiding a red ball gown.

‘Still kept the phone charged though. So either you were hoping I would call...’

‘Or knew what would happen if I hadn’t.’

‘What would have happened?’

‘Well. This, but at my house.’

‘Am I that insufferable,’ Rhona said, ‘regardless, it does not make sense to get rid of solutions before exhausting them Millie.’

‘I guess the solution would say that depends on the problem Rhona.’

‘Solutions have no say. The problem does the talking for them both. So would you mind if we got away from this… barge?’ Rhona headed back up the steps pretending not to understand a drunk wedding guest asking for a light. Rhona mentioned they should scratch this rendezvous from the list in future as Millie focused on keeping her balance up the steps.

They ambled towards Westminster. At Cleopatra’s Needle Rhona ran her hand over the pocks and scars from World War II shrapnel. Giving a history lesson on the monument which Millie had not asked for. Rhona then began to explain the current crisis.

‘I heard you’ve carved out somewhat of a niche in our field. Which is impressive considering the field.’

‘I find stuff Spooks lose. Yeah.’

‘Right. And how proficient can you be at losing things people want found, I wonder?’ Rhona asked, taking in the New Scotland Yard, shaking her head in disapproval at the glass rotunda, ‘Not sure if you will see this as saddening news, Lord Agnew passed in the night. I called you from his house in Norfolk in fact.’

‘Oh.’

‘Indeed, very tragic.’

‘Yes - tragic Rhona.’

‘I can tell you want to smile. However the Deputy Director General still needs us to do something for him unfortunately. Typical, even from the grave.’

‘He needs something lost, you said?’

‘His grandson. And I did not say anything’

‘You inferred. Grandson?’

‘Illegitimate.’

‘Well… this all sounds terrible, like Oxford Street on a Saturday. Or any day.. What on earth would anyone want with his illegitimate grandchild?’ Millie decided that she would have her fun, and continued, ‘unless he knew things Lord Agnew told him, and no one else. Making the grandson a living record of some of the country’s greatest secrets.’

‘Not some, all of the country’s greatest secrets, I can have him outside your house in a car by the time you get back.’

‘You can’t be serious Rhona. Just expect me to turn my house into a B&B for the country’s most high profile asset.’

‘Calm down, it will not be for long and I have to say it is the smartest solution considering any number of Foreign agencies could have become aware of this grandson by now. No one will think to look for him in Putney.’

‘Rhona you’re the Assistant Director General of Operations, did you not think you could give this to someone who I dunno, still works for MI5?’

‘They wouldn’t be as grateful Millie.’

‘Babysitting costs double Rhona, if you’re going to get coy about it.’

‘Christ, don’t talk about money on the street, this is not a fruit stall.’

The front door was already open, with Arif waiting to meet Millie.

‘There was a car idling for an hour before I gathered up the courage to ask what they were waiting for. Once your name was mentioned I invited them all in. But one guy was just a driver I guess and said it was late. He left at two after occupying the loo for twenty minutes.’

Millie looked over Arif’s shoulder to see a pimple faced grown man with fuzz above his top lip, in a dull navy Londsdale tracksuit sat at her kitchen table, staring vacantly at the floor.

‘He’s someone’s Grandson Arif.’

‘He’s entirely non verbal by the way. So thank you for the heads up. I’m off to bed, I assume you’ll know how safe that is to do.’ Arif then trudged up the stairs.

‘Did you make up the couch for him?’ Obviously Arif did not answer. She stepped into the kitchen and looked the Grandson up and down. He was dressed like a child in foster care but Millie could not escape the fact he was easily in his 30s. She took the packet of Benji’s ham from the fridge and placed it between him and her on the table, and they both began to feed themselves.

‘I’m Millie by the way. Rhona said you’re to stay here for a bit.’ She then walked out to show him where he would be sleeping before realising he was still sat down, ‘not here in this room. Stay here in this house.’ He finally got to his feet and followed her out.

End of Part 1.

Outsourcing is the first instalment of the Millie Garrens series and establishes Millie’s niche in the world of Spycraft and her mission to recover a dossier of senstive documents the absent minded Jeremy left on the 5:15 from London Bridge to St.John’s train station.