Scabby Queen

by Kirstin Innes

  ‘They can’t do that to a pregnant woman!’

  ‘Yeah, but they don’t know I’m pregnant, do they? Wasn’t going to tell them for three weeks yet.’

  ‘Fucksake, man. Who the hell is doing this to us?’

  ‘Listen, Za. Bear with me here. What if – what if Clio did curse us? What if there’s something in that after all?’

  ‘Gem. Come on. What, she just leaves us alone for seven years then only comes after us once she’s dead?’

  ‘She maybe didn’t have the power till she became a spirit. I spoke to my grandma, Za. That’s what she reckons. Oh God, listen to me. I know, I know it’s stupid. I – just – everyone keeps dying, everything keeps going wrong, and I’m so, so scared for my baby.’

  This time he didn’t feel able to hush her, and comfort her, because he no longer knew which way the world worked. Could it be he’d angered Clio with his tribute, going public, taking away from her death? How would she know? She’s dead, man, he told himself. But there was something he just couldn’t let go, now.

  ‘Calvin, you believe in ghosts? Like, that they could haunt you?’

  Calvin shook his head, slowly, his stoned eyes stretching in his face.

  ‘Never used to, but I knew a gal who was convinced she was being chased by an evil spirit, mate. She said it needed to be appeased, like with sacrifices an stuff. Terrible things happening to her till she did. Not something you want to mess with, innit?’

  Appeasement. That’s why he’d spoken to that little Scottish journalist guy, when he came knocking. If his name could help an old friend of Clio’s get a book telling her true story published, that was a good thing, wasn’t it? In the interview he was only complimentary, allowed his own history to be rewritten, on the record, as he nodded along when the journalist suggested that it was Clio who’d made him political, had made him into a better musician. He bit his fingers and let it happen. Anything just to get her off their back.

  The baby was small. Had stopped growing. They needed to get her out early. Gemma had been a ball of tension for eight months, constantly knotting her fingers together, skinny and wrecked except for the fucking huge bump, swelling out of her like a parasite, sucking away at everything that had made her her. Locked in a toilet cubicle for two minutes while they readied her for theatre, Hamza pulled the seat down and curled himself up, knees tucked to his chin, his breath between his knees as he spoke.

  ‘Right. Listen, Clee. I can’t do this no more. I’m sorry. I’m sorry for everything. Yes, I used you. I strung you along. All that. I understand you would want to take your revenge. And you have. It’s worked. The last nine months has been hellish, man. Fucking worst. I was a cocky little shit and I needed to feel all that. But you’s dead now, man. You’ve got to let us be. Please. Let this baby be all right. Let Gemma just have the baby, and I will – I’ll write a song about you. I’ll never let them forget what you did. I’ll be singing your name always.’

  Someone else came into the toilets, coughing ostentatiously to warn of his presence. Hamza didn’t care.

  ‘Fuck, man. Know what? I could really do with you to talk to right now, like, I mean the real you. Not this witchy ghost thing I’m making up in my head. My proper Clio queen, right here, because you went through this shit all the time, dint you? You knew your brain when it was being paranoid. You’d be able to sort out my head for me. You’d be able to tell me straight, listen mate, here’s what you’re going through. Here’s how much of it is all in your head; ain’t no such thing as ghosts if you don’t want there to be.’

  The other guy finished pissing, fled the room without even washing his hands.

  ‘I miss you, Clee. I’ve been missing you for years and not realized it. Look, if you’re going to curse me, curse me. But don’t let it touch a baby. Don’t hurt anyone else. That ain’t you, to hurt people. That’s the opposite of what you was. Please. Begging you.’

  He stopped, breathed in. He needed to get back to Gemma. As he uncurled his legs, wincing a bit, there was a shift in the toilet block. A higher-pitched noise in the air. Something electrical, buzzing, but not bad. Probably just a light, or the air con. Probably. But Hamza blew her a kiss anyway.

  2019

  They started recording ‘Warrior Queen’ a year and a half after she’d died. To the day, Hamza realized, checking his calendar as he smoked outside the studio, wanting to greet all of the musicians himself as they arrived. There had already been some good buzz online, thanks to Gemma sprinkling a bit of magic from her still-hot contacts book.

  Za Flow going back into the studio after three years

  Will fatherhood have softened grime’s political firecracker?

  Za Flow’s new album rumoured to contain tribute to ex-girlfriend Clio Campbell

  Clio’s Uncle Donald wasn’t well enough to come down, but he’d hooked Hamza up with all the people he needed to know, and posted a fat parcel of scored notes, a rearrangement of a song by Robert Burns Hamza hadn’t heard before, called ‘Bonnie Jean’. Hamza used the first three verses, had a couple of the folk-musician guys from Scotland improvise around them, then worked out a bridge to take it to his own lyrics.

  Shiv West had come in on the third day, flown down at his own expense for maybe an hour’s recording. She’d not spoken much but fuck, man, she’d delivered on that song. Years of pain and smoke in her voice as she sang, almost like having Clio back there herself.

  There was a lass and she was fair,

  At kirk or market to be seen;

  When a’ our fairest maids were met,

  The fairest maid was bonnie Jean.

  And ay she wrought her Mammie’s wark,

  And ay she sang sae merrilie;

  The blythest bird upon the bush

  Had ne’er a lighter heart than she.

  But hawks will rob the tender joys

  That bless the little lintwhite’s nest;

  And frost will blight the fairest flowers,

  And love will break the soundest rest.

  RUTH

  Glasgow, 2020

  The film was one Alison had chosen. It was a documentary, about free-diving, about men who purposefully slowed down their heart rates and repressed the instinct to breathe in order to push themselves deeper and deeper into the ocean; the sort of thing Alison liked to experience voyeuristically but would never dream of doing in real life. Ruth was curled into her shoulder on their new sofa in their new house, picking at her nails, only half-watching at first.

  This man, the one they made a film about. He could have been James Bond, played by Alain Delon or a young Richard Burton. He had that reckless loner glamour that men loved in other men. He was committed to the ocean; it was his passion, his one true love. His friends, now old men, their ears full of hair, giggled that he had a girl in every port; the daughter he abandoned blinked back tears as she said she missed her papa growing up but understood that he had a higher calling.

  Alison’s body tensed obligingly as the tiny silhouetted body plunged down and down and down into the blue, as the strings on the soundtrack tightened.

  The man was filmed at Japanese temples, learning meditation in order to better slow his heartbeat, control his fleshliness. The girls came and went. His friends who lived near the ocean said he would come and stay with them for months at a time while planning a dive, that he never contributed to expenses but that was just his way. They seemed honoured to have assisted with his plan. In sexy honey-rust voiceover, the actor who played him in that big-budget movie in the Eighties read out the man’s writing. He wanted to be more like a dolphin. He believed human beings were capable of transcending their physical limitations; he also believed nature would have been better off without us.

  The man killed himself in his seventies, alone in the house he’d built, on a cliff, on an island. Loneliness, explained his friends, his daughter. Her voice broke. That great noble sacrifice he’d made to the ocean had come at a cost. But his legacy lived on – they had started a school to
teach other people his techniques. Young women who’d idolized him as children swam on underwater cameras, mermaid-free with their hair streaming out behind them.

  Alison and Ruth both had tears in their eyes at the end, for different reasons. Ruth excused herself to the kitchen, dug her nails into her palms. Because it’s different for men, she whispered, as the cat twisted at her feet. It’s always, always different for men.

  DONALD

  Isle of Skye, 2020

  ‘Well. This is the place. Here we are.’

  ‘That must be it up there on the dune, then? Looks new. Here, man, take my arm.’

  ‘Away, Andy, I’ll be fine. It’s not far. And I’d rather do this by myself. I’ll get you at the car – better you stay in there where it’s warm, anyway.’

  The wind was sharp on the beach today, bleakly crested waves snapping at the shore. In order to get up to the dune from the small car park, Donald needed to ford a rocky stream cutting down the wet sand. He stumbled, almost dropped his stick, turned back to wave to Morna’s anxious son to let him know everything was all right. The dune was footery to climb, although he got purchase on a couple of clumps of grass, managed to haul himself up. There it was, the bench, pale wood and its brass plaque. Just as the pictures he’d ordered from the Internet had promised.

  IN MEMORY OF

  CLIODHNA CAMPBELL,

  AND HER FATHER

  MALCOLM CAMPBELL.

  THEY WERE HAPPY TOGETHER

  ON THIS BEACH ONCE.

  He turned round to seat himself down on it, was seized by a momentary panic that he’d got the wrong place. Had it been here, after all? Could it have been two or three coves along? He stared out to the horizon point, strained his eyes for America just like they’d done as young men. No, here was the place. He remembered that rocky stream, of course he did. He looked all around him, tried to conjure up the two figures down by the shore, himself running towards them. The skinny naked man drawn to the sea, the slender toddler eating sand, their red hair blowing into the same sunstruck clouds. Yes, yes, here it had been.

  The ancient shrugging mountains watched the old man on the new bench, didn’t care.

  EILEEN

  Glendale Retirement Home, Ayr, 2018

  I was black affronted, honest I was, though. Naebody told me I’d hae a visitor. I had to leave her sitting while I went to get my hair on. I’d been in my housecoat. My housecoat! See these wans, these ither wans that sit around here the whole day in their housecoats, you know I’m not like them, hen. You know. Nice wummin, anyway. Big. Tall. Great big rosy cheeks like a butcher. Visitor. There was news she came with but I can’t mind it. She didnae mind waiting. Not like some of them’ll push you and pull you and say Eileen, Eileen and it’s Mrs McIvor, actually. Mrs Campbell-that-was before that bad bastard. Mrs Campbell-that-was. A long time ago now. Bad blood, the Campbells. Bad blood will out, that’s what they said. Of course ye don’t think of that when you’re a wee lassie, do you, when he’s all charming you. You don’t think he’s going to be drinking your wage packet and marching you around the islands and you with a baby. No, you sit down, lassie. You work hard. You sit down while I have my tea and don’t you mind some of them. Aye, hard workers, that’s whit makes it happen. That’s why when you find yourself with a man that drinks your wage packet, you get yourself out of there. I was laughing with oor Senga’s girl about it. No I’d not met her before, well I might have. Was she oor Senga’s lassie, maybe? The height. She could be. Some colour on her. Big rosy cheeks. Oor Senga wasny stocky, though, no like this wan. Whit was I saying, oh that’s right, that he was that lazy, her father, that he never, well, my daddy told me not to marry him, right enough. He just wisnae like the men in my family, though, and that was exciting, right enough. When you’re twenty-two and stupit.

  Here, you! That’s my biscuit. No, I’ve seen you. I’ve seen you take wan already. That wan’s mine. You can git tae is what you can do, ya cheeky besom.

  She’s all jealous because I had a visitor today. Did I tell you about my visitor, hen? I did. Oh right. Nice to have a visitor. Well, he was a musician so that was his excuse. Had a bonny voice on him. Her father. She was talking to me. That’s why I’ve got my hair on – it’s important to put your best face on. Even in this place. I always like to put my best face on. Not like that thing over there just sitting there. Wan of the nurses gets the panstick special for me and it all comes out of my savings. I saved well, I did. I’m not taking anything off the government except my pension and I paid for that. If you start taking things off them they start thinking of you as a drain, that’s what my daddy always said. Or he said before. Alec couldny help it when they closed the pits, though, him and my brother. My poor brother. My poor brother.

  No, no you sit here and we’ll get a nice chat, hen. I think there was something important, somewan told me today, and I think I need to remember it and maybe I’m supposed to tell somewan. That wee bad bitch, so she is. No, not you. That’s my girl. My girl. His girl, more and more. Always his girl. Could tell it in the hair. Not a bit of me about her, not really. I’d thought I’d given her principle. I thought I’d taken her away and given her principles and morals, but I took her too late. Took her away too late and he’d spoiled her. Maybe it was always going to be that way. Bad seed. Campbell rottenness. Islander blood. Lazy. You just always want the best for your children, don’t you? You always want the best and you work that hard and you can’t tell what’s going to come of them. But I’d really thought coming home would do it for her. I did think that, hen, I did.

  Aye aye, I’m fine. I am fine. Crying? Am I – I am crying! Well, would ye look at that. I don’t know why. I’m no a silly old wummin yet, I’m sure I’m no. Have you seen my legs, hen? Look at these legs. These are not the legs of a wummin of fifty-five! Aye, fifty-five. Are ye sure? Wait.

  No, I couldnae be fifty-five, you’re right. That was the year I was running the union even though they were trying tae get me to retire. No, I wisnae for retiring, me. I didnae retire until sixty-six. I worked all my days till sixty-six. And then it was that thing. What’s that thing that I’ve got? You know the wan.

  Oor Senga’s lassie was looking nice, though. I thought she’d maybe had trouble with her man, but she says she doesn’t have a man, so I don’t know where I got that from. She says she never had any weans but oor Senga was aye banging on about her grandkids so I don’t think she knew whit she was oan about there. She was visiting me, to tell me. Oh, to tell me something. It probably doesnae matter. The thing that matters is I had a visitor and nane of youse did. My daughter never visits me any more because she’s a worthless bitch. Oh she is. She just messed aboot. Oh, she did some singing, she lost that lovely husband – she had such a handsome man, so she did. Mind you, the handsome wans aren’t everything, that I know. What’s your man like, hen, is he handsome? I had two of them, two husbands, and the first wan was handsome but he couldn’t have been more useless. He left me with a bad bitch of a baby and when she got to grow tits she was a slut and a scab, and she brought shame on oor family name. And Alec, that was my second husband, he sent her oot and quite right too. If we’d no, the whole village would’ve rounded on us. They still wrote it on the hoose, SCAB HOOR, even though they apologized wance we’d got rid of her. And she would tell me in that café – we would meet in a café in Ayr every year for my birthday, because she couldnae come home, of course not. So I got the train into Ayr so Alec didnae know and she got the train in from Glasgow – Glasgow of all places. Whit was my lassie daein in a place like Glasgow. Have you been to Glasgow, hen? It’s noisy and it smells. Still, it was the men were her weakness, my girl. Always. Aye. Because she was that braw, don’t get me wrong. She took after her daddy. And I took efter mine, that’s how I’ve goat coal miner’s arms, eh no? Ha! It’s a joke, hen. It’s a joke.

  Whit was I talking aboot there? Was it oor Senga? Oor Senga never came to that café, so why would I be talking about oor Senga? It was wan of they fancy Italian c
afés with a coffee machine, and she’d aye buy me a wee frothy coffee, that was my birthday treat. Oh, she was bonny, my girl. She was a bonny lassie. I mean, when I think aboot it noo, she maybe couldnae help it. I mean, the men were always staring, right from when she got tits, that young, and I’d shout at them in the street tae get tae, I’d take her hand, my girl. But naw. She knew. She knew, that lassie. She knew there were lines you didnae cross, eh, and she went with him anyway. Out of whit? Just out of badness was it maybe? Oh she’s a bad bitch, right enough.

  And she left me all alone. She left me here and me no husband, no grandweans, no family eftir my poor, poor brother, eftir oor Senga. Just her and she left me here. Ah’ve never seen her. Just at Christmas, and I told her, I said you’re a bad bitch and you never visit me. Was that this Christmas, hen? I know there was a tree. I know that. Dae we have a tree in here? This lassie today, she was tall and I don’t remember seeing her before but she must be family, I was thinking. She said something aboot a funeral and I was trying to tell her it’s OK, we buried your mammy years ago. It was a nice service we had for oor Senga. Much nicer than the wan for Peter. Oh, poor poor Peter. Did you ever hear whit happened to oor Peter, did I tell you? He just threw himself into the pit. Afore they had time to put the concrete in. Well, he’d no work for years, neither he had, and the weans needed the money. But the church didnae want to give him a burial, so me and his Annie we ended up in this crematorium in Ayr where they wouldn’t let us bury him because you had to pay extra and the scandal was just clinging to us then, so Annie didnae know whit to do. She couldnae bury his ashes in the garden because the cooncil might move her on. Poor Annie. I’ve not seen Annie in a while. I wonder how she’s keepin. Oh now, wait. Did Annie not top herself too? No, who was it, then?