by Luke Brown
‘You are fucking her, aren’t you?’
‘All the time. It turns us on, slagging you off. We fuck in your dad’s bed when he’s out at work.’
‘You’re not really angry with me, are you?’
‘I don’t really understand why you want to be in here with me.’
‘Tell me more about what’s wrong with me.’
‘I’m running out of things that are wrong with you. There’s so much I like about you.’
‘I can show you plenty more that’s wrong about me if you want me to.’
The taxi driver turned round again to look at us.
‘What shall we argue about?’ I said.
‘I don’t know. How about education?’
‘Great,’ I said.
And we began.
*
Emily sat on a seat in front of mine when we caught the tram north, and we went quiet, shunting past the hundreds of B&Bs, looking west at the Irish Sea rippling around the coast until we were heading inland and past my old school. The tram dropped us off on the edge of the high street in town. Emily trundled her case beside me down the terraced streets, the wind in our faces. The gulls had taken exception to us; they wheeled in tight circles around us until one bird, cackling like a pervert entertainer, came down so slow and low that Emily had to duck and grab my arm.
‘What’s its fucking problem?’ she asked.
‘It can tell we’ve come from London. Or it’s nesting. They’ve always been twats. Don’t worry. We’re just down here.’
The house was just as Mum had left it, as clean and free from dust as it always was. It wasn’t a big place for the town, but big for London – a long, thin terrace with a living room and a dining room and a kitchen at the back with a small garden, three bedrooms above. All cleanly decorated, painted walls covered in prints, the floors wooden except for the thick carpet that was the touch of comfort over style in the room where she watched TV. Her boyfriend Alan came round once a week to dust surfaces and run a Hoover round. I had let him know Emily was staying and arranged to visit him for a coffee on Sunday.
I gave Emily the room I usually slept in, the only bedroom with a desk in it. I made her a cup of green tea with one of the bags – they may have been Amy’s – that I found in the cupboard.
‘It must be strange for you, being here,’ said Emily, looking at me.
‘It’s, er, yeah,’ I said. I had my hands on the wall of the kitchen, as though it might be about to fall in. I took them off and turned around.
‘Shall we go for a walk?’ Emily said. ‘I’d like to see the sea.’
*
And on the beach, with the tide in, it was still possible to feel optimistic about the town. The skies were the bright blue dye of the school shirts we had worn on the first day back in September. The clean air filled our lungs and made us buoyant. We walked towards the site of our burned-down pier, listening to the waves arrive so diligently, so faithfully. I told her the story of the bawdy comedian who some people suspected had set it alight. On the bay’s horizon I pointed out to Emily the mountains, the power station, the wide space where you could still see the cargo ships heading somewhere else to land. Though it was a clear, warm day we only met a handful of dog-walkers. We headed on and rounded the edge of the peninsula on the prom, past a statue of a woman and girl waving out towards Ireland. Bye-bye! Bye-bye! There was bunting strung up outside the amusement arcade, from the Queen’s ninetieth, I presumed, unless it had been put up that morning in celebration of the Leave vote. I pointed through the fencing to show Emily where the ships had docked and we walked on into the town, where we passed three men in stationary mobility buggies, smoking and talking. A smoking man in a jogging suit pushed a little boy wearing Fonzie shades. Seagulls the size of microwave ovens swooped from the sky and scrapped for chips. There was life on the high street, people queuing for cash machines, at the Iceland checkout. Schoolgirls with white legs, smoking. Smaller boys buzzed round them in blazers. A giant Asda cast its shadow over the smaller shops.
‘Pub?’ I said.
‘OK,’ she said. ‘I think today we can allow ourselves a few drinks.’
*
There was a party going on in the busiest pub in town. Beer mats objecting to Christine Lagarde winged through the air. The bar was packed deep. An incongruous hipster with full Edwardian beard and an arm full of sailor’s tattoos – a mermaid, an anchor, a leaping shark – dispensed pints as quickly as he could pour them. Plates full of the remains of fish and chips were being gathered by a waiter while another brought fresh ones out of the kitchen doors. Everyone smiled at us. ‘All right, pal, all right, bud!’
A TV without the sound on replayed the arrival of Farage in another pub very like the one we were in.
‘Do you want to get out of here?’ I asked.
‘No, no. Let’s soak up the atmosphere,’ she said.
‘Paul,’ said John from primary school, whom I hadn’t spoken to for twenty years. He shook my hand. ‘We did it,’ he said. His head was shaved and there was a scar running from ear to ear.
‘Yep,’ I said.
‘Are you back living here?’ he asked.
‘Nah, just visiting.’
‘Where from?’
‘London.’
His eyes went wide. ‘Rather you than me, mate.’
We found a table on the outskirts of the room and I bought us drinks. I saw people I’d worked with as a street-sweeper at the council during my university summers. More people shook my hand, beaming.
‘Is that your lass, Paul? She’s a corker.’
‘London! How much is a beer there?’
‘You were a bright lad, Paul. I bet you’re earning down there, yeah?’
I didn’t like to disappoint them. I just nodded and fought my way back to Emily.
*
We stayed for a few hours in the end. Emily was at the bar talking to a group of men. One of them was Wozza, the man who had doubted the accidentalness of Carl’s death on Facebook, the man who had made a contested but plausible claim to being ‘cock of the town’ in the mid-1990s. My phone rang.
‘Jesus, where are you?’ asked Sophie.
‘I’m in a Wetherspoons,’ I told her.
‘Obvs.’
‘Obvs. It’s banging in here. Where are you?’
‘I’m at home, working. God, are people happy there?’
‘Absolutely. They’re having a whale of a time.’
‘Fuck.’
‘It’s the best atmosphere in here I’ve experienced for years.’
‘Oh, God, let’s not go there. How is she?’
‘She’s at the bar, making friends with the locals and buying me a drink.’
‘So you weren’t missing me, then?’
‘No, not at all.’
‘What!’
‘I was distracted. I’m missing you now I can hear your voice.’
‘Liar.’
‘Look, she’s on her way back now. Can I call you later?’
‘I see. Choosing her over me.’
‘She is bringing me a beer.’
Emily put the drinks down and grinned, looking back towards Wozza.
‘Don’t you even want to know what I’m wearing?’ Sophie asked.
‘Don’t tell me. I couldn’t cope. I’ll call you back later.’
‘I’ll send you a photo.’
‘Looking forward to talking later.’
‘You do sound flustered.’
‘Obvs. Talk to you later.’
I cut the call and smiled at Emily, raised my glass. ‘Cheers.’
‘Who was that?’ she said.
‘My sister.’
‘You have quite a flirty tone with her.’
‘Brotherly.’
My phone buzzed on the table. I snatched it up and put it in my jeans pocket.
Emily looked at me. ‘I have some news,’ she said. ‘I was chatted up at the bar.’
‘I saw you were popular. Which one was doing
the chatting up?’
‘The wide one. The rectangle in an orange tablecloth with a head on the top.’
‘Human head or bulldog’s head?’
‘In the middle.’
‘Yeah, that’s Wozza.’
‘Wotsit?’
‘Wozza.’
I told her about a time he had held me upside down to remove and confiscate the money from the pockets of my school trousers.
‘How long ago was this?’
‘Oh, last Christmas. No: I would have been about fourteen or thereabouts. He once made me dance like Jarvis Cocker for him. After that he sort of liked me. As a mascot. I kept well away from him. What did he say to you?’
‘Celebrating, are you?’
‘What did you say?’
‘I said, No. He asked me why not and I said I didn’t think Brexit was a very good idea. Why not? he said, and I said I didn’t think it would solve anything, just trash the economy, increase intolerance, stop me from living in France if I wanted to.’
‘What would you want to live in France for?’
‘He didn’t actually ask that. He asked where I lived and nodded knowingly when I said London. Fair enough, love, he said, but it’s different round here. Then he told me to let him know if anyone gives me any hassle and he’d have a word with them for me.’
‘That’s a useful offer.’
‘Then I asked him why he was celebrating.’
‘What did he say?’
‘Because we won! We won! There’s more of us than there is of them.’
‘Who’s them?’
‘Us,’ she said.
*
We went the long way back so Emily could see the sea again. It would be dark in London by now but the sun was only just setting here, pink sky and glints of flame in the puddles the tide had left behind. We walked down towards it, where the sand was wet and firm. Seagulls glided overhead and patrolled the tideline, mocking us in Liverpudlian accents, impersonating laser guns like kids with ADHD. In the distance the sea sloshed. A light shone on the horizon. Everything stank of sex.
Emily took a deep breath and said, ‘This is peaceful. Thanks, Paul.’
She keeled over and lay on the ground.
‘That was a stupid thing to do,’ I said. ‘You’ll be all sandy now.’
I wondered if she wanted me to lie down next to her. I wondered too long.
She got back up and I laughed at her, brushed the sand off her back.
‘You city types,’ I said. ‘You go silly at the sight of the seashore.’
I spent more time rubbing the sand from the small of her back than I suppose I really needed to.
When we got in we sat down on the sofa in the back room and started yawning.
‘I’m tired,’ she said. ‘Which train are we getting tomorrow?’
‘We’ll get a taxi at nine for the half nine train.’
‘I haven’t got sand on your mum’s sofa, have I?’ She brushed at her knees and looked around her. When she looked back up at me she saw that I was looking at her knees and she pressed them closer together.
‘You’re fine,’ I said, looking away. ‘Would you like a cup of tea?’
‘No, I should go to bed,’ she said. She yawned again, and stood up.
‘You have everything you need?’ I asked.
‘Everything,’ she said.
You couldn’t kiss someone goodbye who was staying in your house, but it felt cold just to let her leave, so I stood up and gave her a hug.
‘Goodnight,’ I said.
She went up and I followed up soon after. I left my bedroom door open and got into bed where I lay thinking about how the night had gone and imagining what might have happened if I had lain down next to her on the sand. They had installed a new street light just outside the window to illuminate the activities of youths hanging out in the alley. It was very bright, and I kept thinking that it was still daylight outside, long after it had gone dark. I lay awake for a while, listening out in case she made a noise, in case she called out for me.
Fourteen
The leaves on the tree outside your window have gone bright yellow. I tell you again about the wedding and what I did afterwards.
‘I wonder if you can explain to me what it was that was so attractive to you about Emily,’ you say. ‘She doesn’t sound like she was particularly nice to you.’
‘No, no, that’s a drab interpretation. She was wonderful to me.’
‘In what way?’
‘She spoke to me. She was interested in me.’
‘But you should expect that, shouldn’t you, from everyone?’
‘In what utopia? We were on the same side. We had the same enemies. She was funny. She was perceptive. I think you and I might disagree about what friendship is. For me it has to be more than an exchange of kindnesses. That’s just barter, just commerce. I liked her because she was scathing, because she was brilliant. And beautiful. God, she was beautiful, in such a… Hardly anyone is beautiful now.’
I take a tissue from the box and wipe my glasses clean. You watch me for a while and then ask, ‘So you don’t consider her to have betrayed you?’
‘Not in the way you mean. Not like that.’
‘So why were you so angry with her?’
‘I don’t know. Why don’t you have any books in here?’
‘Because I don’t read in this room. Why were you so angry with her?’
*
The Lancashire countryside alternated with neat redbrick workers’ terraces as we moved through the towns of nineteenth-century industry, Burnley, Accrington and Todmorden, the landscape getting wilder as we headed into the Moors and over into Yorkshire.
We were both still sleepy. There is always something wholesomely exhausting in the change of air; I had slept through the hysterical yearning of the seagulls better than Emily, who knocked on my door at eight and asked if I wanted a cup of tea.
It had been sunny for most of the trip but we disappeared into a cloud at Todmorden and got out in Hebden Bridge to a drizzle. Emily had dressed practically for the occasion, wearing jeans, jumper and a pair of athletic trainers I had not imagined her to possess. Now she pulled out a pac-a-mac, unfolded it and carefully put it on over her jumper. I zipped up my own cagoule and we set off like a married couple into town, crossing a bridge over the river, talking about how nice it would be to live here, where they had scenery, fresh air and an art-house cinema.
While we waited at the bus stop we looked in the window of an estate agent and cooed. Our dreams, really, were very conventional.
*
The bus reached the top of the moors and shook the hills out below us. The sun only shone through some of the clouds, lighting up bright-green planes tinged with orange and purple, casting great moving shadows upon the hillscape, squirming clots of darkness shifting shape like my worst envies. Small, crooked farmhouses passed in and out of the light, and we tried to guess which one was Wuthering Heights. A man turned round and asked if we were from round there. ‘You’re looking for Top Withens,’ he said, ‘a way over that peak.’ He pointed out the Haworth old road branching left from the road we were on, going down into the valley while we climbed higher and higher.
‘How long would it take to walk that way?’ asked Emily. ‘Maybe we should get off?’
‘About three hours, love. If you’re fit, that is, and you’ve got the right shoes on.’
I looked out at the paths and imagined us alone together there, on the grass that blazed green and darkened again.
‘It’ll be quicker from the parsonage, if you’re going that way,’ he said.
So we stayed on the bus and climbed up to Haworth.
It was raining again when the bus dropped us off. We trudged up the street, past souvenir shops, past galleries selling hobbyists’ landscapes, until we reached the Black Bull, Branwell’s local. A Chinese woman asked if I would take a picture of her and her husband under its sign, and I did so happily, asking
her if she’d return the favour using my phone.
‘This is so cheesy,’ said Emily, as I put my hand on her shoulder and grinned.
‘Shall we have one for Branwell?’ I asked.
‘We should have one for his sisters, stuck at home or earning money as governesses,’ she said. ‘Let’s go to the museum before we have a drink. I might need to take notes.’
*
The first room we came to was the famous parlour where the sisters had written their novels, where Charlotte and Branwell had elaborated their childhood fantasies about their kingdom of Angria.
‘Angrier,’ I said. ‘Do you think they knew about Brexit?’
We stood in front of the table where Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights were written, behind a rope that kept us just inside the doorway. Three housedresses stood awkwardly on their own.
‘Who sat where then?’ asked Emily.
‘We could do with those little place cards you get at weddings. I’m not getting much of an aura, are you?’
‘No,’ said Emily. ‘Let’s try. Imagine you’re here a hundred and seventy years ago.’
‘OK. I’m Emily, you’re Charlotte. Which dress is yours and which is mine?’
‘Don’t you want to be Branwell?’
‘Stop negging me. Let’s split up. I’ll see you upstairs. We’re interfering with each other’s receptors for ghostly vibes.’
I wandered round the kitchen and Patrick Brontë’s study, then headed upstairs. There was some kind of art installation in one room – no, it was a recreation of Branwell’s bedroom studio, excellent at the expense of accuracy, which some small print acknowledged: Branwell had shared a room with his father for a lot of his life; and this gloomy chamber was more like my bedroom in the château on a Sunday morning after I’d invited friends back, a disordered piling of books and newspapers and empties, scrawled poems and empty laudanum bottles – at least I assumed that’s what they were, since you couldn’t fit enough gin in them to get an alcoholic drunk, or certainly not this one. I wouldn’t have been surprised to have found NOS canisters on the floor; or empty baggies with Bob Marley’s face printed on them.
