by Kevin Brooks
“I don’t…dunno…I don’t…”
“You don’t know what?” I asked gently.
“It’s like…It’s like…I dunno…I c-can’t remember…” She shook her head, then took a deep breath and straightened her back, trying hard to calm herself down. “God,” she said, wiping her eyes, “this is so bloody hard.” She looked at me. Her lips were quivering and her face was streaked with makeup. When she spoke, her voice was still frail, but not so breathless as before. “It’s not just giving up heroin that scares me,” she explained. “It’s everything else. It’s like…I’ve been stuck in this place for so long, this place where everything’s numbed and dead and you don’t have to think about anything or care about anything…and I can’t remember what it feels like to be outside this place. I don’t know what it’s like to be normal anymore…having to deal with things, having feelings about things, being myself again…” She sighed heavily and looked down at the floor. “It’s a different world, Joe,” she said quietly, “and it scares me to death.”
After that we just sat there for a while, holding each other in the candlelit silence. The fire began to burn down, the exhausted logs crackling and hissing in the dying embers, and as the cold night air started creeping into our bones we held each other closer, sharing the warmth of our bodies. Candy was resting her head on my shoulder, and I could feel her breath whispering faintly on my neck. It was hypnotizing—the steady rhythm, the heat, the touch—like a wordless lullaby. Gradually, she began to drift away, and as her breathing became faint with sleep, I closed my eyes and let myself sink down into the darkness.
Sometime later, in the small hours of the morning, I woke up to find Candy in the throes of a nightmare. Groaning and whimpering, her body twitching, her eyes and fists closed tightly in pain…
I nudged her softly. “Candy…Candy…wake up.”
Her head shook from side to side, and she let out a tiny little yelp.
“Wake up,” I repeated, this time taking hold of her hand.
Her eyes jerked open and she stared at me, blinking in confusion at the remains of her dream.
“Whu…?” she mumbled.
“It’s me,” I said, “Joe…you were having a nightmare.”
“Joe?” she said.
“Yeah…are you all right?”
She rubbed her eyes, shook her head, yawned widely, then started rubbing her arms. “Christ…it’s cold.” Her voice was sleepy. “What time is it?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “It’s still early…”
“Too cold,” she mumbled. “Let’s go to bed.”
“Bed?” I said stupidly.
She ignored me and started to get up, wobbling slightly on her legs. I reached out to steady her, then got to my feet.
“I’ll take the back bedroom,” I muttered, avoiding her eyes. “You can have the main one.”
“I don’t want to sleep on my own,” she said.
I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t know what to do…what I ought to do…what I wanted to do…I didn’t know anything. All I could do was look at her.
“Just come to bed, Joe,” she said simply.
I still didn’t know anything as I blew out the dying candles and followed her into the bedroom. I stood and watched as she got into bed without undressing, and then I clambered in beside her.
You don’t have to know, I thought to myself. You don’t have to know anything.
The sheets were cold, the dark of the night ever-silent, and as we lay down together and closed our eyes, everything drained away into nowhere.
We didn’t do anything.
We didn’t even kiss.
We just fell asleep, fully clothed, holding each other in the darkness.
chapter eighteen
When I opened my eyes, the room was bathed in daylight and Candy was sleeping quietly on my arm. I didn’t know what time it was, but it felt quite late. Birds were singing outside the window, the air was cold and fresh, and away in the distance I could hear the faint chunk-chunk of someone chopping wood.
I couldn’t move my arm.
I looked down at Candy. She was still fast asleep, sucking dreamily on her finger, and her head was still resting heavily on my arm. I lay still for a while, studying her face, her discolored eye, wondering what she was dreaming about…and then I set about retrieving my paralyzed arm. I didn’t want to wake her, so I tried just giving it a gentle tug…but nothing happened. My arm was completely numb. I tried flexing my fingers…but still nothing happened. I didn’t have any fingers. All I had was a lump of dead meat sticking out of my shoulder with some pointy bits stuck on the end.
I lay still again, thinking about it. Maybe you ought to just wait, I told myself, wait for Candy to wake up…
But I didn’t want to do that.
It might be awkward…
So I tried again. This time, instead of trying to use my dead arm to move itself, I leaned to one side and used the weight of my body to start dragging the arm from beneath Candy’s head. It felt really strange at first, as if I was moving something that didn’t belong to me, but gradually, as the arm began to move and the blood had begun to flow, I started getting some feeling back—a pleasant tingle in my fingertips, a prickling sensation in my arm—and then something else happened, something not so pleasant. As the blood rushed into my arm, a thousand red-hot needles started jabbing into my skin, electrifying my flesh, and I froze in an instant, gritting my teeth against the pain, trying not to scream.
Candy, meanwhile, was still sleeping.
She’d taken her finger out of her mouth now and was lying there with her lips drawn back against her teeth and her tongue lolling loosely against her gums. It wasn’t the most beautiful pose in the world, but there was something strangely appealing about it, and as I waited for my arm to stop zapping, I found myself staring at her face again. I wondered what it was that made it so beautiful—the proportions, the shapes, the textures, the bones beneath the skin…? Or was it just me? My eyes, my vision, my expectation…
My thoughts.
After a while, her eyelids began to flicker. I thought she was about to wake up, and I suddenly realized how embarrassing it would be if she opened her eyes and caught me staring at her…but before I could do anything about it, she breathed out a breath of stale air, chomped her lips, and rolled away from me to lie on her side.
I lifted my senseless arm from the pillow, rubbed some life into it, then slipped out of bed, grabbed some clothes, and padded off to the bathroom for a long hot shower.
About an hour later, I was in the kitchen making some coffee when Candy appeared in the bedroom doorway. She looked terrible. Her eyes were bloodshot, the bandage on her wrist had come loose, and the flimsy T-shirt she was wearing did little to hide the lurid bruising around her midriff. As she shuffled sleepily across the room, all bleary-eyed and bedraggled, I couldn’t help thinking of a punch-drunk boxer, struggling to live with the morning after the fight before.
“Morning,” I said breezily. “Do you want some coffee?”
She ran her hands through her tangled hair and muttered something under her breath.
“Sorry?” I said.
She yawned. “What time is it?”
“Just past twelve. Do you want some coffee?”
“What?”
“Coffee,” I said, waggling a cup at her.
“Yeah…in a minute.”
She stood there for a moment, frowning and mumbling at the floor, then she turned around and shuffled back into the bedroom. I stared after her, wondering what she was doing—Getting dressed? Getting her makeup? Getting back into bed?—but then she came out again, and I knew immediately what she was doing. She was heading straight for the bathroom, not shuffling anymore but walking with a purpose, and she was hiding something behind her back…
Getting what she needed.
I didn’t know what to do about it.
I didn’t know what I was supposed to do.
Get angry?
<
br /> Stay calm?
Say something?
Do nothing?
I suppose what I really wanted to do was scream at her, tell her to stop, tell her to think about what she was doing…
But I didn’t.
I didn’t do anything. I just stood back and watched as she went into the bathroom, closed the door, and locked it. The snap of the lock left me cold. It killed me. Emptied me. That simple little sound said it all—that I was nothing, that she didn’t want me, that she didn’t need me.
All she needed was heroin.
And I hated it.
I hated its power, its attraction, its control.
I hated the way it took her away…
From herself.
From me.
From everything.
I hated it.
It took some time for the rest of the day to get going. While Candy was busy in the bathroom, I made some toast and drank some coffee…washed up the cups and plates…sat around for a while…made some more coffee…and then I got up and spent some time just wandering around the cottage.
I don’t know if it was because of my mood, but as I looked around the empty rooms, nothing seemed to feel right. There was something missing, but I couldn’t work out what it was. It wasn’t a physical absence, as far as I could tell—there was nothing actually missing from the rooms. It was more of a sensuous thing. Something to do with memories…memories of me and Gina…Mum and Dad…family holidays…different times…
That was it, I think.
The memories weren’t that old, but for some reason they seemed hard to find. They weren’t missing—they were definitely there—they just weren’t here anymore. Even when I came across things that should have meant something—a dried-up daisy chain at the back of a drawer, some of Dad’s books left on a shelf, forgotten shoes and abandoned clothes—I couldn’t seem to place them. I recognized them, I knew what they were, but that was all.
I had no sense of attachment to anything.
It was kind of sad, really.
I tried not to think about it as I went into the bedroom and unpacked the bag that Gina had prepared for us. I sorted the clothes from the food, put the clothes in the wardrobe and the food in the fridge…and when that was done, I decided to check the electricity. It turned out that the mains switch was turned on after all. The only problem was a dead lightbulb in the front room. I should have known, really. I’d just had a hot shower—I’d been standing there staring at the glowing red light of the power switch for about ten minutes…Of course the electricity was on. I just hadn’t realized, that’s all. My mind had been focused on other things.
Anyway, I changed the lightbulb in the front room, and then I checked all the other bulbs…and put all the candles away…and I was just trying to think what else I could do to pass the time, when my cell phone rang.
It was Gina.
“Hello?” I said.
“Joe? Is that you?”
“Yeah—”
“I can’t hear you…”
“Hold on…the reception’s no good.” I went outside and sat down in a battered old chair on the veranda. “Is that better?” I said into the phone. “Can you hear me now?”
“Yeah, fine,” Gina said. “So, how’s it going? Is everything all right?”
“Yeah, not bad…”
“How’s Candy?”
“She’s OK…we talked about things last night. You know—giving up heroin and stuff. I think she’s going to give it a go.”
“I thought you’d already talked about that?”
“Yeah, I know…I just meant she hasn’t changed her mind or anything. She still really wants to do it…”
“Really?”
“Yeah…”
“That’s great.”
“I know…It’s a bit scary, though.”
“Well, it’s bound to be. I mean, it’s a really big thing—physically, mentally, emotionally…everything—it’s going to be hell for a while. For both of you, probably. That’s why I said to ring us if you need any help. If you can’t get hold of me, give Mike a call. He’ll be happy to help. Any time, night or day, it doesn’t matter…just pick up the phone—OK?”
“Yeah, thanks.”
“Oh, and by the way, before I forget, Jason called again this morning. He wants you to ring him—says it’s urgent.”
“Right…Has Dad been in touch?”
“No, not yet. What do you want me to do if Jason rings again?”
“He won’t. Don’t worry about it—”
“I’m not. How’s the cottage?”
“It’s OK. I’m out on the veranda at the moment…It’s really nice.” I was looking around at the woods as I spoke, taking it all in—the winter trees, the brambles, the wide-open skies…
And it was really nice: cold and empty and miles from anywhere.
“Did you sleep all right?” asked Gina.
“What?”
“Did you both sleep all right?”
“Uh…yeah…”
“I’m not being nosy…”
“Yeah, you are.”
She laughed.
“Nothing happened,” I said. “We’re just friends, OK?”
“Yeah? I’ve heard that one before.”
I didn’t reply. I didn’t know how to. It wasn’t simply that I didn’t want to talk about Candy and me—although, admittedly, I didn’t—but the main thing was, I just didn’t know what to say. I didn’t know what we were. We weren’t boyfriend and girlfriend, we weren’t lovers…but then we weren’t just good friends, either. We were something else. We had something else. I just didn’t know quite what it was.
“Joe?” said Gina. “Are you still there?”
“Yeah…”
“Are you pissed off with me?”
“No…”
“I didn’t mean anything…I wasn’t trying to be funny. I was just being your sister, that’s all.”
“I know—it’s all right.”
“I like Candy. She’s a nice girl. And I know you really like her…I just want you to be careful—OK?”
“Yeah, I will…I am. It’s OK—honestly. It’s not a problem—”
Just then, the cottage door opened and Candy came out onto the veranda. She was dressed in a thick green sweater and her little black hat, and as she stood there in the morning light, sipping black coffee and smiling at me, nothing else seemed to matter anymore. Confusion, sadness, anger, hate…it all just drifted away in the wind. Everything was all right again. I was all right. Candy was all right. We were all right. Nothing could have been better—the weather, the world, the way that I felt…my body, my heart, my presence of mind…
In the skip of a heartbeat, it was all just right…
The way it’s supposed to be.
“I have to go,” I told Gina. “I’ll ring you tomorrow, OK?”
“Oh…OK,” she said, a little surprised by my abruptness. “Is everything all right?”
“Yeah,” I assured her, glancing at Candy, “everything’s perfect.”
And it was, for a while.
After we’d hung around doing nothing for an hour or so, we put on our coats and locked up the cottage and headed off toward the estuary. As we strolled through the woods, arm in arm, ambling slowly along the pathways, the skies took on a dim gray light that chilled the air with the promise of dusk. It was still only midafternoon, but I could already sense the coming night. It was there in the shadows, in the heart of the woods, creeping ever closer, like an unseen beast, stalking the frailty of the day…
I knew it was coming.
I could feel its dark breath.
But it wasn’t here yet.
The cottage isn’t far from the estuary, and it wasn’t long before the woods began thinning out and the path started winding down through low-lying cliffs toward the narrow shores of sand and mud that run along the waterside. Everything was quiet. The tide was still, the wind had dropped, and the waters of the estuary were high and silver-gray.
We sat on a bench at the edge of the woods and looked out over the estuary. I watched a kingfisher skimming by, its metallic blue sheen mirrored in the silver surface, and then it was gone, like a flashing star, and the estuary was still and quiet again.
“What’s on the other side?” Candy asked me.
“I don’t know,” I admitted, gazing across the water at the barren fields and tumbledown barns in the distance. “Farms, I suppose…”
“Where’s Orwold?”
“Back there,” I said, pointing over my shoulder.
“Is it far?”
“Not really…a couple of miles.” I looked at her. “Why do you want to know?”
She squeezed my arm. “Don’t worry, I’m not going to run away. I just need to get a few things, that’s all. Is there a shop in the village?”
“Yeah, I think so. We can walk back that way, if you want.”
“OK.”
We were silent again for a while. Candy lit a cigarette and smoked it quietly, and I just sat there, staring at the emptiness. The sun was going down, rimming the horizon with its paling light, and the first faint colors of dusk were beginning to paint the sky. The atmosphere reminded me of our day at the zoo, when it was late afternoon and the schoolkids and tourists were heading back home and the animals were slumbering and Candy and me were wandering quietly around the far side of the zoo…
And I wondered if we were on the far side now. Away from all the people, away from all the chaos…
Was this our place where secrets could be shared?
I looked at Candy, thinking, Secrets, truths…or nothing?
She looked back at me, her eyes adrift in a haunted mist. “I’ll do it today,” she said quietly. “When we get back…I’ll take a last hit, and then that’s it. No more.”
“Are you sure?” I asked her.
“Yeah,” she whispered, wiping away a tear. “I’ve had enough, Joe. I don’t want to be like this anymore.”
By the time we’d made our way up through the woods and along a little road into Orwold, the daylight was dying and the village shops were all closed. Candy was starting to get increasingly grouchy.
“What’s this?” she sneered. “A ghost town? Why’s everything shut?”
