A Prison in the Sun

by Isobel Blackthorn

  Finally on my feet, I fished out from the wardrobe's top shelf a clean shirt and some shorts, stoically ignoring the rucksack. I had no idea what I was going to do with that cash, but at least the paranoia that was wont to rise up in me periodically had begun to wane since I convinced myself the likelihood of the stash belonging to the deceased swimmer was high, coupled with the fact that, if anyone I had approached at the beach had had any inkling of the contents, they would have hammered on my door by now.

  No one had arrived on my doorstep other than Paco and Claire, and that had been pure chance. The only issue I had on the moral front was whether I really had the right to keep the money, or if I should hand it in, but since I continued to adhere to my supposition that the owner was now dead, I decided I might as well choose the former option. A small voice within cautioned me to wait before I took out a bundle and started spending, at least until I found out who that poor soul was and if there had been any foul play at work in his demise, and for once I took heed.

  Besides, I had other matters to deal with. My shoulder nagged at me both physically and mentally. I was determined to loosen the tension and, after downing two anti-inflammatory pain killers, I began with a hot shower. That experiment lasted all of half a minute before my skin started complaining, the sunburn still not healed.

  I adjusted the taps to a temperature a touch above lukewarm and after rinsing the rest of me, I patted myself dry and went through my moisturiser ritual.

  Ravenous after yesterday's effort at the gym, I treated myself to a full English breakfast, not skimping on the fat, not caring if all those calories deposited yet more blubber around my midriff. After sinking an orange juice and a large mug of brewed coffee, I felt fit enough for the day, my limbs all the better after movement, other than my shoulder which resisted every motion. Maybe I needed to call in at a pharmacist and purchase some sort of ointment for that muscle, but whatever I chose would have to be sunburn safe, which added some complexity to the situation.

  I could of course put up with the pain, something I chose to do after exploring the other options online. Only then did I recall the pills that guy had sold me the evening before. I rummaged in my gym bag and found them at the bottom. Clenbuterol. A fat burner, he'd said. I swallowed one as I opened my laptop and before I had a chance to look up the effects, I saw an email had entered my inbox. It was from Angela, letting me know in a single pointed sentence she had inside knowledge Sandra Flint was tipped to win the literary prize.

  Win!

  Outrage spun through me at the injustice. She was set to win fifty thousand pounds. Stuck up old trout! It was an enormous sum, and I felt like emailing her expressing my chagrin and suggesting she should at least consider splitting the prize money with me if Angela was proved right. Then again, it wasn't worth my trouble. I knew she wouldn't part with her winnings. I needed to forget about it and get on with my day. Above all, I needed inspiration for my own novel and so far, I had none.

  I took stock. Angela was right, plenty had happened to me in the short time I had been here. I chanced to find myself situated in an area haunted by terror and horror, but I had already decided those tragedies were better left as memorials, at least by me. More, those were topics meant for some local author to pick up on. If literary types were in short supply on the island, then a Spaniard. There were plenty of Spanish authors of a high calibre, too. Any one of them would do a much finer job of handling the tragedy of the parachutists or the heinous cruelty of the so-called hostel than I could with my paucity of local or regional knowledge.

  As for the rucksack, basing a novel around that was a silly idea. Not least, I would be implicating myself, one way or another. Besides, whatever I wrote would need to be stunning, and you couldn't get stunning out of a rucksack full of cash. In the land of crime fiction, it was trite. Frustration gnawed at me. I was capable of being shortlisted, for heaven's sake! I had it in me to win the Booker. Surely I could find a good story? If I couldn't, then I should write nothing. I would not be a hack author or even a mid-list author. I needed to be of a certain calibre, or I would remain who I was, a ghost.

  I got up and wandered around. The farmhouse was starting to get to me with its warren of small rooms. I felt penned in, despite the ample space overall. I grew more irritable by the minute. The wandering became pacing and the pacing stomping until I could not stand to be indoors a moment longer. I felt like hurling something, anything at a wall, just for the hell of it, just to hear the sound of things breaking, shattering.

  This new pent-up me came as a shock. Was I having some sort of breakdown? No, I was just overwrought. That was all. I had been through far too much, and I needed to relax, unwind, go for long walks, find somewhere nice to read, meditate. Or use the hire car, go for a drive, explore. Anything other than stay in the house on this traumatised plain, a location which seemed to magnify my frustrations.

  I opened a map of the island and chose a place to visit. I fancied checking out the old villages in the island's interior, and my eyes landed on Casillas del Ángel, which was the closest to Tefía and seemed as good a place as any to make a start. I was out the door and on my way with fresh eagerness, sensing as I buckled my seat belt, that the best way to find inspiration was to go looking for it, and maybe, just maybe, this day would be the day I found what I was searching for.

  I reached my destination in five minutes, instantly disappointed. I really had no idea what I was expecting, but the charm of the place was lost on me. As I looked around the main square, it was the mountains in the distance that grabbed my attention. Always the barren mountains, wherever you looked.

  There was nothing much to the village itself. As far as I could see, the main feature was the church in its centre. Casting my eye around, I decided there was little else to do but examine the building.

  I trudged past a couple of weather-beaten old men in shabby clothes and hats having a yarn in the shade of a tree, and then I stopped in my tracks, caught up in a curious thought. Should I, could I write a travel fiction novel based around a broken character on a spiritual quest of some kind? I let the idea percolate in the further reaches of my mind and directed my gaze to the object of interest.

  The church was notably small compared to the churches I had known back home and didn't look like much from the outside. Other than the contrast between the white side walls and the dark basalt of the façade, there was little to commend it.

  I began to go off my latest literary impulse. I have never been one for visiting churches, having grown up with and rejected my family's Catholic faith. Aunty Iris and my sisters, having failed to keep all that Biblical nonsense rammed down my throat, chose to disown me from then on. Yet I was curious now. The old men were strolling away. There was no one else about. Finding the door unlocked, I slipped inside.

  There was no denying the splendour that greeted my gaze or the ethereal atmosphere that infused the nave. I couldn't help but be impressed by the intricate wooden ceiling high above or the ornate altarpiece rendered in red and gold.

  I went and sat at the end of the rear pew, and as I felt the polished wood beneath my fingertips and inhaled the cool air that smelled faintly of incense, memories filtered into my mind, memories of other times I had sat in a pew, listening to the priest, waiting to take communion. Before long, I felt consumed by a choking claustrophobia. My heart raced and I started to pant as memories of confession tumbled into my mind, blown in by a cruel and vicious gust, and I was forced to relive the shame I felt as I awaited my turn, the shame over my escapades with Vince, the shame I held close and never revealed to anyone, not even the priest.

  That lack of honesty in confession I saw in hindsight as the true cause of my moral crisis, a moral crisis that had remained deeply buried and unexamined all my adult life. Shame was the root cause of me rejecting the faith and not, as I had always supposed, my choice of a Protestant for a wife. After all, if I had held an unwavering faith, Jackie would have been required to rear the children as Catho
lics. Instead, I was perfectly content to let our marriage cause a schism between me and my weird and dysfunctional family of origin.

  That shame now had me in its grip. I struggled to slow my breathing as panic started to take hold, and I couldn't remain seated in that pew a moment longer. All but gasping for air, I rushed out of the church, colliding with a stray fly on its way in. The sudden bump of insect on man sent a jolt through me. Annoyed at myself for jumping at the slightest thing, I waved the fly away, and as my hand swished across my face. I glanced in the direction I had seen the two old men. Thankfully they had disappeared. I made straight for my car, vowing never to set foot in Casillas del Ángel again.

  There was only one way to fill my days on the island. I drove back to the farmhouse, headed straight to the kitchen and, despite my lack of hunger and thinking I would need the energy boost, wolfed down some leftover lasagne cold from the fridge. Then I donned my gym gear and set off for the city.

  Gazing at Pecs

  Two kilometres of pedalling and the sting in the sore shoulder muscle eclipsed the searing agony in my quads. But I was not about to change the bike's setting, which I had increased a notch from yesterday as indicated on my fitness plan, even though my calves burned and the towel around my neck, there to catch the drips of sweat, was making me hot and uncomfortable. The mirror in front of me reflected back a gasping wretch, flush-faced beneath his tan. Everything about my body, my pedalling, my efforts altogether shouted “weak”.

  So much for the steroids.

  As for my weight, the only thing lighter about my person was my wallet. I pulled in my gut, set my jaw and concentrated on pedalling.

  I couldn't help noticing that the guy next to me, who seemed to be doing the Tour de France, had perfect form. He didn't wobble about like a flaccid lettuce leaf. His movements were angular, rhythmic. I tried to copy his posture for the last kilometre, but my efforts did not compare well. When I slid from the seat, my legs had set themselves in pedal position and it was an effort getting clear of the bike.

  I had noticed a guy the other day doing a quad stretch and, recalling what he had done, I bent my knee, reached for the ankle and pulled. I could feel the stretch immediately and I couldn't pull far. I held on for as long as I could, but I started to lose my balance. I swapped legs and bent the other knee and reached down. As I gripped my ankle and pulled, my shoulder yelled out in pain and I had to stop.

  My corporeal transformation had hit a new low. Every muscle in me resisted more exertion. The lasagne I had stuffed myself with earlier sat heavy in my belly, not to mention the full English I had had for breakfast. I had the beginnings of a stitch. I had to suppress the urge to emit a belch as the trapped gas sent darts of pain through my stomach, and there was every chance I would be doubled over in the throes of acute indigestion at any moment.

  At least it was leg day, and my circuit didn't appear to interfere with anyone else's in the gym. Most were on the upper body machines. The mix of clientele was different, too. There were even two women – one doing sit ups, the other on a fitness ball – and the atmosphere seemed a touch friendlier.

  After reading through the day's fitness plan, I began with the leg press. Luis had told me to try as heavy a weight load as my legs would take. I was to do three sets of eight reps, then halve the weight and do three sets of twenty. Thinking about those instructions, I decided the critical factor was that initial weight. Luis thought I could manage twice my body weight, so I set the machine at two hundred kilos.

  The first few reps were easy, but as I had been finding with each of my other designated days, each rep got that little bit harder and each set harder still. Halving the weight and doing twenty reps started off fine, but by the end, I was gritting my teeth and pushing with all my might, not because I lacked the strength to push that weight, but my quads were way too tight. They wouldn't stop protesting they had had enough and it was time to pack up and go home. My glutes were feeling it too.

  I sat for a few moments, recovering. Luis was assisting one of the women. The music blared. Guys wandered in, and others went home. There was little conversation. As usual, I appeared to be the only tourist, the athletic cyclist having left after his marathon cycle, the two women undoubtedly Spanish, and all the others swarthy local types. Some of the men I began to recognise as regulars. I couldn't help wondering what they all did for a living, since mid-week mornings were normally a time normal people went to their normal jobs. Clearly, these men did not work in offices or in retail or in any other regular sort of job I could think of. Other than factory shift work and hospitality, I couldn't think what they might do for income.

  I watched the guy on the bench press. I hadn't come across him before. He was dressed in tight black Lycra, and the definition of his upper arms and shoulders captured my gaze, the way each muscle tensed and flexed, the bulging, the rippling beneath shiny tanned skin.

  Realising I was staring for an inappropriate length of time, I ripped away my gaze and stared at the floor, already knowing when it came to muscle definition, I never had any. Nature had bestowed me with a slender frame, narrow and a touch barrel-chested. I would be lanky but for the paunch. My knees were knobbly. Fat hid poor muscle tone. When I squeezed my pecs, curved bands of sinew did not protrude beneath my skin.

  The guy ended his set and worked on the other arm. Now the mirror captured the bulge of his manhood, and my gaze was drawn in astonished fascination. Did he have a whole salami down there? I blinked and averted my gaze, taking in the other areas of the gym, anywhere but that particular appendage which thrust me back into Vince's bedroom.

  What was the sudden preoccupation with men's bodies, their cocks? Idle curiosity? Pent-up sexual frustration after having had no sex with anyone since I moved out of the marital home? Or was Angela right about me? Was I gay? But that didn't make sense because I felt no love towards other men, and I had no desire to take any of them to bed. Truth was, the thought of sex with a man repelled me, real sex or even the sort of sex I had engaged in with Vince. Or maybe I was repelled because I hadn't met the right man yet, a man I could desire, even fall in love with.

  Did other men think like this? Or was it only me? Was I alone in taking more than a passing interest in my own gender? Did other men admire each other's bodies? Perhaps it was normal, after all. I stole glances around the room, judged the directions of various pairs of eyes and decided on balance that yes, they did. But not in overtly covetous ways. More like envy or competitiveness. The sorts of masculine traits as old as time. The gym akin to a gladiator's pit, a place where raw masculine power was the order of the day, and you couldn't help but observe it, be intrigued by it, obsessed even. Yes, all in all, I was normal.

  The association had me back to pondering the various shades of sexuality and that it was as perfectly natural to be attracted to the same sex as it was to the opposite sex. To want to be the opposite sex. To not want sex at all. To be in one way or another queer. I had no problem with any of it. Angela, an out-and-out lesbian, had decided long ago that my sexuality was ambiguous. Jackie had acted on her lesbian leanings. It occurred to me, I owed her some respect for her decisiveness, her courage, even though the betrayal still twisted my guts.

  Yet when I weighed everything up – the memories of Vince, the wet dream, my fickle gaze, the existential guilt injected into my veins by the Catholic church, even my choice to come to a gym to get fit and not partake in some other, less sensual, open-air activity – it all amounted to a whopping question mark as large and hard as Mr Salami over there on the bench press.

  Luis walked past me with a brief hello, and I was shaken out of my speculations. Besides, I had rested long enough. Before my legs locked, I eased myself off the leg press. Next, I tackled the leg extension machine, applying the same number of sets and reps. As heavy as I could manage, Luis had written down. I set the weight at fifty kilos, half what the guy before me had used. Even that weight proved too much after the first set, but I was determined not to fail and
squeezed the last two reps out of each of the following sets.

  By now my quads were on fire, and various other leg muscles were making themselves known to me as though for the first time. It was an awakening and not entirely unpleasant, but I knew I would pay for the workout later. I was not looking forward to yet another stiff and sore afternoon.

  The hip thrust and leg curl machines were also free. Luis had demonstrated the moves I had to make. Leaning my shoulders on the backrest with my feet and rear on the mat, I held a five-kilo dumbbell at the top of each thigh and proceeded to do the required reps of upward thrusts of my pelvis, excruciatingly aware as I did that I was no Mr Salami.

  Between each set, I had to jump over to the other machine, lie on my front and do twenty prone leg curls. It was a punishing workout. As I staggered over for the penultimate exercise, I was inwardly cursing Luis. Four sets of ten on the hack squat machine and I could barely stand. Two sets of forty reps of standing calf raises and, when I extricated my shoulders from the machine's pads and tried to walk away, it took every cell of me not to wobble. I wasn't sure my legs were capable of getting me home in my car.

  All that, and Luis wanted to finish me off with another five kilometres on the exercise bike. He had to be joking. Yet a plan was a plan, and I had to stick to it. If I didn't, I would be racked with guilt the whole afternoon. I would be five kilometres short. That thought would rattle around in my brain and take a whole bottle of red to eradicate. I knew it would. Even now the thought made me queasy.

  I was heading over to the bike where I had left my bag when that drug-dealing behemoth rushed in. I started pedalling, groaning quietly as I observed the goings-on behind me in the mirror. The guy approached the front counter and whispered something to Luis who then stood back in shock.

  I looked away and kept pedalling.

  Then the music was turned down and everyone looked over to find out what was going on. The guy, a hundred and fifty kilos of solid muscle with a neck like a tree trunk, announced to the gym in a loud voice, 'Juan está muerto.'