by Paul Magrs
Andy asked, ‘Is there any chance of staying at yours?’
‘Sure,’ she said. She led the way up the path, feeling in her bag for the key.
Andy felt awful about this. Penny didn’t know him from Adam.
Penny was saying, ‘About these creatures you said you saw coming out of the tree…’
There were no lights on. Strange.
He sounded defensive. ‘What about them?’
Penny stepped inside. ‘Mam?’ The kitchen was dark and bleak, full of scraps and used crockery from the night before.
‘I see those animals, too,’ Penny told him absently. It was something they had in common, so she thought she would tell him. She put the lights on.
‘It’s a lovely house,’ said Andy politely. ‘You and your mam have got it lovely.’
‘It’s all right.’ Penny smiled, shrugging her coat off. ‘Do you want coffee?’
‘I want a proper drink.’
‘I wish Vince had passed his booze around out there. He was really hogging it.’ She went to the dresser and fetched the brandy.
‘He can be a piss-head when he likes.’ Andy snorted. ‘I can’t believe he just stomped off like that.’
‘Was he really pissed off?’
‘Oh, he gets these black moods. Acts like a bastard. When he can’t see the good of anything. It’s when he thinks he’s losing out on something.’
Penny was pouring out the brandy. It was only when she saw Andy’s eyes had gone wide she realised she’d poured it by magic. ‘No hands!’ she said, with an embarrassed laugh, and passed him his glass. ‘What does he think he’s losing?’
‘Me… probably. I dunno. He shouldn’t. I’m here when he wants me. I always was.’
‘So tell me!’
‘But he doesn’t want me, Penny. Not really. He’s just tried to convince himself of that.’
She showed him somewhere comfortable to sit. ‘I think he’s in a bad way,’ she said thoughtfully.
Andy tutted. ‘That makes me feel a whole lot better!’
‘Ring him!’
‘Nah.’
‘Maybe you should.’
‘I’ll see him tomorrow. He’ll still be arsey tonight. There’s no talking to him.’
Penny fingered the stem of her glass, frowning. Her fingernails tingled and buzzed like crazy.
So the sky was a very deep blue. A light night. Light enough for us to see. We ventured out about midnight. Ventured. That’s not my word. Can’t you tell? Ventured is the Dog Man’s word. We ventured outside, dressed up. The only thing missing was my locket. Elsie and Meg, give me strength — wherever you are.
I’m cold now. But that will pass. Disguises are not for warmth, they’re for show. No one has seen us yet. We walk proud, waiting for attention. He rubs his body against me as we walk. He is friendly. Happy. I’m giving happiness to him, just walking like this.
Across the road a woman comes out with her empty milk bottles. Big Sue. I can sense her straining her eyes to see us. We pass by the bus shelter. She slams her kitchen door and the light goes out.
We go for quite a long walk. There’s a full moon. I’m on the top of the world, the world moves beneath me. I’m in a film and music plays about me, my smile on the screen. This is how I live now. And for ever.
I will go out walking, the Dog Man by my side.
Life is wonderful.
Frank put the kids to bed. Fran was drinking herself drunk. Past midnight he came down to see her and she was staring at the gerbils. ‘Are you OK?’ he asked, wary of her lashing out. When he saw her like this he wanted to take her up to bed. He wanted her gripping him the way she did, fierce and almost cruel. She burned, deep down. Whenever he reached to touch her cunt it was the hottest he’d ever known. It surprised him every time.
‘I’ve remembered something,’ she said, and Frank realised that she wasn’t of a mind for going up to bed.
‘I thought you were going to say that you’ve killed Nesta yourself, the way you’re going at that bottle. What have you remembered?’
‘I’ve given the police wrong information.’
‘On purpose?’
‘I’d forgotten the last time that I really saw Nesta. It wasn’t when I chucked her out of the house. It was later on. When we went on our night out. When me and Jane and Liz got on the bus.’
Frank took hold of her shoulders, not sure why. ‘Where?’
‘She was in the bus shelter. Just after nine o’clock.’
‘Catching a bus?’
‘No. She was talking to your mate. The army man. Gary.’ Frank’s grip slipped. ‘He’s not my mate.’
‘Whatever he is, Frank, it’s him. It’s got to be him.’
‘It’s got to be him who did what? You’re not making sense, Fran.’
Now she was on her feet, none too steady in her slippers, her face grey suddenly. ‘He’s taken her away. He’s taken her away.’
‘Fran, Gary couldn’t hurt anyone. He’s pathetic, you’ve seen!’ Frank was almost pleading with her now.
‘He said he was going to punch you in that time!’
‘That was bullshit!’
‘His wife left him. Took the bairn.’ Fran looked stricken. ‘He was violent with her.’
‘They gave as good as they got. The pair of them.’
‘Frank,’ she took a deep breath. ‘We never saw his wife and bairn leave. What if he —’
‘Stop this, Fran! Just stop.’
‘I won’t stop. What if he’s killed them? What if they’re dead?’
‘Don’t be stupid —’
She squeezed her eyes shut and shouted, ‘I’m not being fucking stupid! Don’t tell me that!’ She glared at him.
Very quietly he said, ‘You can’t stand me any more, can you?’
‘Sometimes,’ she said through gritted teeth, ‘no, I can’t.’
‘Right.’
‘Right now, I want to get this sorted out. Gary’s got her, Frank. He’s got Nesta. God knows what he’s playing at.’
‘You saw her talking to him. What does that mean? Maybe he’s shagging her.’
‘I hate that. I hate that phrase.’
‘Aye, well. Probably you can’t remember what it means.’
‘You’re a selfish little git, Frank.’ She headed for the door. ‘I’m phoning the coppers.’
He said, in a tone that sounded almost warning, ‘Give it a rest, Fran. Come to bed. You’re shattered.’
‘Are you covering up for him?’
‘What?’
‘Are you covering something up for Gary? You men are always doing that.’
‘No! I can’t stick him!’
She looked at him long and hard. ‘I’m phoning that policewoman. Then I’ll come to bed.’
‘She’ll just say you’re daft.’
‘Maybe. Go and put the leccy blanket on.’
Penny and Andy sat up late talking. They left the TV off and rearranged the lamps so it was more atmospheric.
‘It can’t be easy, knowing that you’re second best,’ Penny said, glancing at her watch. She winced at herself. God, that was tactful, Pen. ‘I mean, knowing that Vince is pretending he wants to be with you —’
Luckily Andy laughed. ‘God, you make it sound terrible!’
‘I don’t mean to. You know what I mean.’
‘Yeah. I’m not what he wants. I’m too fickle. And I’m not clever enough.’
‘Does that matter?’
‘Sometimes it does. Vince needs someone to talk to. I’m not as good at that.’
‘We’re managing to talk.’
‘Yeah. Well.’
‘So what are you after, Andy?’
He smiled. ‘Just something else. Something I haven’t considered yet. Some new circumstances to live in. Maybe a new city. I don’t know.’
‘Sounds good.’
‘What about Scotland? Edinburgh?’ He smiled. ‘A different country. A short train ride. Big queer scene.’
‘Sma
rt.’
‘Perhaps. I need to get away. Vince has been and done that. And come back again. I don’t feel. .. stretched yet.’
The phone rang. Penny was straight on it, as if she’d been waiting.
‘Mam?’
‘Ehm, yes, dear. It’s me. I’m —’
‘Where are you?’
‘I’m staying away for a little while. It’s an impulse thing.’
‘Right.’
‘You can look after yourself, can’t you?’
‘Yes, but where are you?’
‘I’m in Kendal at the moment, with Cliff. We’re staying here tonight and then we’re off to the Lakes for a while. We’ve got some things to sort out. Don’t worry, he’s got plenty of money. My cards are in the dresser drawer. Use what you need, dear. You understand, don’t you?’
Penny wasn’t sure. ‘Of course I do. Just come back with a tan.’
Liz laughed. ‘It’s piddling down in Kendal.’
‘Give Cliff my love.’
‘I will. I’ll see you . .. soon. I’m not sure when, exactly.’
‘Thanks for phoning.’
‘Bye.’
He slung the empty bottle of tequila across the damp school field as he crossed. Where was the worm in the bottom? Before he threw it he looked down the neck as if it was a kaleidoscope and there was no worm. Neither were there glowing tiny animals romping about in the dregs. There were only dregs.
His dad was in front of the gas fire in his chair. It hissed and he hissed and, even smashed out of his mind, Vince thought about his dad expiring in carbon monoxide. He switched the heater off and left him there.
In his room he jammed the door shut behind him and left the light off. Moonlight washed in from above the field and the low, flat school buildings where he was meant to be working. He remembered the gin in his cupboard.
As he started to drink again he peeled off his clothes. He sat on the mattress, naked, shivering, and felt dirty from going all over the Burn. He was scratched and bruised. His shoulders shook.
Disney songs were going through his head. Songs he had on a record when he was little. He could only remember bits of them, all mixed up, and they went round and round.
I’ve got no strings…
You can fly you can fly
To hold me down…
it’s mother nature’s recipe
you can fly
you can fly
as lucky as can be
can fly can be
can strings
I’ve got no strings to hold me down…
In through his window came the gold and blue figure he had waited for. She was kindly and a bit smug-looking.
‘Are you the Blue Fairy?’ he asked.
‘Aye, pet.’ She smiled, reaching forward to take the gin off him.
He frowned and tried to focus on her face. At first she looked like Penny’s mam. He was holding her close and they were dancing on his mattress, slowly as they had in the nightclub. And then she didn’t look like Penny’s mam at all. It was his dad. He was dancing with his own dad. But only for a split second. They recoiled from each other.
Lastly the Blue Fairy was Andy’s Nanna Jean. Burly and competent.
‘I always wanted you to be my nanna,’ he said.
‘I know, pet.’ She went to his cupboard and fetched down the bottle he had nicked from the taxidermist’s. ‘Here, get this down you.’
‘What is it?’
‘Do you want to be a real boy or not?’
‘Yes! More than anything!’
She held out the bottle.
FIFTEEN
Sometimes I get the impression that I’ve missed something. Something has passed me by. For a while I was right on the edge, with the world at my feet. I was on a motorbike, the breeze in my Brylcreem, speeding on the wild side. Some mornings I wake up and I can’t believe it isn’t 1959 any more.
Vince’s dad was spending his morning off in the garage, applying Turtle Wax to his already gleaming Triumph Herald and thinking out his life.
But I’ve missed something. Something in particular that happened yesterday. Vince came in late last night. He thought I was asleep, but he woke me. I watched him looking at me, turning off the fire. Where was his friend, that Andy bloke? The night before last he was happy enough to see him. Oh, he tried to hide it, but I could tell. I’m not his dad for nowt.
Cliff Richard on the wireless, the tang of wax in the air. It was brilliantly sunny outside, drying everything out. He was in a cheerful mood. Cheerful enough to ponder.
Will I ask him what’s up? He’ll bite my head off. He can be snappy when he likes. But I should show willing. I saw he had that poster up. I was right after all. But I’m glad.
I wonder what they were up to yesterday. His shoes were left kicked across the kitchen floor, and they were thick with mud. Like he’d been down the Burn. He’ll have pneumonia. I will ask.
Gone were the days of not asking questions. That was the sure-fire way of letting things pass you by. That was how his wife had gone. When he thought back, it was to very few memories of her. Apart from those in the late fifties, early sixties, when she dressed as a ted to be with him. Once she stopped being with him and stayed at home instead, he had taken less notice.
One memory: she smashed all his records before leaving, in 1977. He was left to throw the pieces out. Thick records, heavy as smashed china. He pinned the empty sleeves to the walls. He felt allowed to do that, with the house suddenly his and his alone.
I’ll ask Vince what the matter is. Openness and all that. I’ve missed too much, I think.
Rose stepped out into the sunshine, dolled up and ready for the cameras. It was like the postcard business all over again. She was ready for her public. ‘This appalling affair… such a nice girl… my daughter knew her very well…’ Ethan was waiting at the corner of the street.
‘Hello,’ he said, tottering towards her. ‘Am I allowed to speak to you?’
Rose was a vision in pink, her personal space scented with Poison. Ethan was damp and filthy. He had spent much of the night hobbling the streets. He sneezed.
‘You stupid old bastard!’ she cried, seizing his arm. ‘Where did you go last night?’ She wheeled him around, marching him firmly back to her house. The news people would just have to wait.
‘I slept on the bench by the boating lake. Our favourite spot, Rose.’
‘It might well be. But I don’t want you pegging out on it.’ She bundled him indoors and started to strip him off in the kitchen. ‘I’ll run a nice hot bath.’
‘Will you still marry me?’
With a fastidious expression, she picked at his cardigan buttons. ‘We’ll just have to see about that.’
Ethan nodded glumly.
Fran was waiting anxiously for dinnertime. Jane came round and surprised her with a Battenburg. But her appetite was gone. Phoning the police with her new information had knocked Fran sick. She could just imagine that Detective Inspector Collins’s face; her nasty puckered expression as she was told.
At ten past twelve Frank came back on his lunch break.
‘Well?’ asked Fran. Jane looked up, mouth full of cake.
‘He never came in for work this morning,’ Frank said. ‘There’s no sign.’
‘Right.’ Fran went to the phone.
‘What’s going on?’ Jane asked. The kids were complaining. They weren’t allowed to play out today.
‘Vince?’
No reply. Vince’s dad knocked on the door again.
Well, if his little friend hadn’t come back, there couldn’t be an embarrassing scene to walk into, could there? He gritted his teeth against what that last thought meant and what his next action might bring.
He pushed the door open and saw Vince sprawled naked on the mattress, fast asleep. He was lying on his back with his mouth open. The room was brilliant with light.
How can he still be sleeping on a day like this?
With a kind of morbid fascination hi
s father stared at the prone body. Finding out what Vince was had made him different. He wasn’t just a son any more. He was, in a sense, the enemy; they were no longer on the same side. For a second or two, a part of the older man’s mind was weighing up the enemy.
His body is like his mother’s, was the thought that emerged. Long-limbed, pale-skinned; a light dusting of auburn hair. His penis was large, nestling against one leg, different to his dad’s. He doesn’t take after me at all. He’s bigger than me, even there. I’d never noticed. How could I? So private. So different.
‘Vince,’ he said. ‘Vince!’ He became irritated, went to shake him.
The flesh was cool. Pale and cool, too much like marble. His dad froze, noticing the bottle by the mattress. Not pills, that would be too corny for Vince. But it happens. Vince’s dad remembered Marilyn; where he was and what he was doing when the news came through. He looked at the bottle’s label, scared to read. It was handwritten.
‘Ethan Nesbit’s Special Embalming Fluid.’
Pulling his son into a sitting position, he tried to force his fingers into his mouth. The body remained still, but a sickly groan, a belch, fought past his fingers. The heart was still beating. ‘Vince, what was that stuff? Is it fatal? What?’
The eyes opened and looked at him coldly. ‘Hospital?’ Vince asked and passed out again.
His dad picked him up in an expert fireman’s lift and struggled with the suddenly massively heavy body. Vince’s soft hair brushed into his face, starting his tears off. He became a man and I never noticed. Who cares what he does with that big cock of his. So long as he’s still here.
Vince’s dad shouldered him downstairs, outside, towards the garage. The sun struck white flesh, making him gleam.
Andy woke up in Liz’s room and, as he dressed, surveyed the contents of her wardrobe in respectful awe. He was trying on a sequinned frock when Penny walked in. Her mouth dropped.
