by Monica Ali
‘You could definitely do that?’ said Gabe.
The general manager levelled him with his demolition stare. ‘Are you in? Can I welcome you into the fold?’
For a moment Gabe was back in Blantwistle, ten years old, poking shepherd’s pie round his plate while his mother started the washing-up and his father pushed back from the table and cracked his fingers as he always did before the sermon began. Never pick on a lad smaller than yerself. He would stroke the table firmly, as though to smooth out the cloth. He was built like a whippet but his hands were large and strong. Nimble too. At the mill the legend was that Ted Lightfoot could knot on faster than any machine. Never pick on a lass neither. There must have been a time, not that Gabe could remember it, when he was six or seven, maybe, when he had looked up to his dad. It was stupid the way he sat there after dinner like he was Moses, bringing down the law. Never, ever, shake hands with a man and then go back on your word.
Gabriel got up and shook hands with his new employer. It was an empty gesture and they both knew it. It was how the game was played.
* * *
At the Penguin Club Charlie was singing ‘’Taint Nobody’s Bizness If I Do’. She wore her silver sequin dress and jade choker. Her heels were sharper than boning knives. The pianist kept his nose close to the keyboard, collapsing under the weight of the blues.
Charlie put her hand on her hip and rolled her shoulder; her way of waving at Gabe.
Gabe bought a beer and sat at the bar, watching the punters watching his girl. The room was dark with fake wood panelling and padded booths along one wall. The round tables in the middle had crushed velvet tablecloths and little art deco lamps that lit up the punters’ chins. Some had their girlfriends or mistresses with them, fingering necklaces and earrings; some sat in twos or threes, clinking glasses and sometimes words; most just sat with their cigarettes, inhaling and exhaling and thickening the air.
Charlie and the pianist shared a small stage, elevated a mere six inches above the floor. The song did not suit Charlie’s voice, which was too light for it, too teasing. She lowered her eyelids and pressed her lips to the microphone as though it were the object of her every desire. A bald man at a table close to the stage rose to his feet and saluted her with his tumbler. He swayed for a moment and then sat down.
‘You like her, then, do you?’ The punter at the bar had a heavy gold watch and heavy, hairy wrists.
‘Yes,’ said Gabe. ‘She looks good to me.’
The stranger drained his glass. He slid closer to Gabe. He wore a good suit, silk tie. ‘Listen,’ he said, ‘I can judge a character. In my business, if you can’t do that, might as well cut your own throat. If you’re interested …’ He cocked two fingers in Charlie’s direction and fired them like a gun. ‘I could tell you the SP.’
Gabe laughed. ‘Go on,’ he said. ‘Get me off the blocks. Give me the starting price on her.’
The man leaned against the bar. He squinted and burped and Gabe suddenly saw how drunk he was. ‘Three Campari and sodas or one dry martini. Tha’sall you gotta do. She’ll suck the tongue from your head, fuck like a rabbit and if you’re lucky only steal the cash from your wallet, leave the bloody cards.’
If he had laughed Gabe would have punched him but the man was quiet now and looked sad. They both looked at Charlie. She was singing a love song, a Burt Bacharach number, loading every word with heavy irony; that was the way it sounded to Gabe.
For a moment he wondered if she had slept with this man.
‘Well,’ said the punter, ‘best of British.’ He tried to drain his glass but discovered he had already done that. ‘I’d have a go myself but – got to be honest – she’s out of my league, she is.’
Charlie’s hair fell to her shoulders in thick waves. It was strong red, like an Irish setter, and her skin was creamy white. ‘How was it today?’ she said. ‘How was work?’ She laid her arm along the bar and took Gabe’s hand in hers.
‘Fine,’ said Gabe. ‘What do you want – red or white?’
She perched on the bar stool and crossed her legs. The dress was tight. It made her sit up straight. ‘You’re kidding me,’ she said. ‘Fine?’
He thought about the girl, Lena, darkness hollowing her cheeks. He raised his beer and drank slowly, as if to hide the picture in his mind.
Charlie twisted her hair over one shoulder. She sought him out with her cool green eyes and smiled in her lopsided way. ‘Just another normal day. Nothing to report.’
‘I don’t know,’ he said. ‘Yesterday was … well, I told you. I’m half expecting the shit to hit the fan but nothing happened today, really. Maybe it’s not going to.’
Charlie asked the barman for a large glass of Chablis. ‘Accidents will happen, right?’ She pressed a stiletto heel against Gabe’s shin. ‘I might break my neck in these.’
When Lena came in again he would talk to her, privately, about what she was doing there this afternoon. Her hair was blonde, almost colourless. He had never liked blondes much.
‘Calling Planet Gabriel. No. No sign of intelligent life.’
‘Sorry,’ said Gabe. But Lena would not come again. She had been fired.
‘My day was terrific, thanks for asking.’
‘Was it?’ He nodded. ‘Good.’ Though if she hadn’t seen Oona, she wouldn’t know that she had lost her job. So what made her run away?
Charlie swirled the wine round her glass. She wore a large amber ring that she had bought in a souk in Marrakech on a long weekend with Gabe. ‘I spent the morning in a so-called studio – a tape deck in a bedroom, that’s a studio – recording a song that may or may not be released as part of a compilation CD in Japan. And this afternoon I auditioned for a regular slot at some private members’ club in Mayfair. The guy had sleaze coming out of every orifice and he thought I was too old, I could just tell, and I really feel like I’m getting somewhere now, you know, my life’s just taking off.’
If she seemed to be inviting sympathy it was not a good time to offer it. Gabe had discovered this through a process of trial and error. ‘Try out for one of those TV talent shows,’ he said. ‘It’s the only thing left to do.’ The police wanted to interview Lena. She would have to be found again.
‘Thanks,’ said Charlie. ‘I’ll do that when you have your own cooking show. How come you don’t have your own cooking show? Nana Higson wants to know.’
Nana was Gabriel’s maternal grandmother. She lived with his father now. Phyllis Henrietta Josephine Higson. Gabe called her Nana. Dad called her Phyllis or, in the old days, ‘the shapeshifter’, but only behind her back. The neighbours still called her Mrs Higson, even after twenty years. Only Charlie referred to her as Nana Higson, and she hadn’t met her yet.
‘I’m not telling you anything any more,’ said Gabe. He put his hand on her collar bone, just below the choker. He thought, as he had thought so many times before, everyone here can see that I’m the one with her.
‘Can’t stay for the second set, sweetheart.’ The man was a loser in a patterned jumper. He had a paunch and was going bald in the worst way, a forlorn ridge of hair between two receding tracks. He leaned between Gabe and Charlie to deposit some glasses on the bar. ‘If I stay it’ll be three more rounds at least and I get an acid stomach, you know. So I’m off now, sweetheart.’ He winked. ‘Don’t take it personal. You’re a cracker, you really are.’
Charlie kept a straight face. ‘It’s the fans that make it all worthwhile.’
Gabe looked round the club, at the smoked glass on the pillars, the slippery banquette seats, the penguin-shaped ashtrays and the waitress who was emptying them, old Maggie, who was reasonably penguin-shaped herself. Everything seemed unreal. This phoney life that he lived when normal people were in bed.
‘Hey,’ said Charlie, ‘when are you going to take me Up North, anyway?’
He thought of Nana in her nightdress, the last time he visited, scuttling across the lounge with the drinks trolley that she used as support in preference to sticks or the
walking frame. ‘Now,’ she said when she had kissed him and caught her breath. ‘I was watching this chef on the telly, he was rubbish. Eee, I said to your father, our Gabe wants to look sharp. There’s younger fellas now, not as good as him, who’s jumping ahead and getting on the telly before he’s had a go himself.’ Her cheek against his felt powdery, as if she might crumble away to a heap of dust. ‘Nana,’ he said, ‘you don’t just get to “have a go”. It’s not about taking turns.’ She settled into the wingback chair and put her furry bootees up on the footstool. ‘I’ve got an irregular heartbeat, Gabriel. Did your father tell you? No. They suspect a touch of gout too. But I’ve got all my faculties, sunshine. I’ll thank you to remember that next time you open your mouth.’ She closed her eyes and grunted and it was a while before Gabe realized that she had nodded off.
‘Nana’d like you,’ Gabe told Charlie. ‘She’d think you should be on the telly as well.’
‘That doesn’t actually sound like a plan. That sounds, in fact, like you think she would like me if only she met me but she’s not going to so she won’t.’
‘What?’
Charlie sighed. ‘What’s wrong with me, Gabriel, huh?’
‘Nothing,’ said Gabe automatically. ‘You’re great.’
‘I’m a cracker, I really am.’ She slid off the stool and adjusted her dress. A sequin came away in her hand and she flicked it at his chest. He put a hand on her hip and she wriggled away. ‘Can’t keep the fans waiting.’
The pianist had taken up residence but was finishing his cigarette.
‘My place or yours tonight?’ said Gabe. He yawned and checked his watch.
‘I’m tired as well, lover boy. I want my own bed tonight and I want to sleep alone.’
In the fridge there were three tomatoes, a slab of chocolate (80 per cent cocoa solids), an out-of-date bio yoghurt and a piece of Brie. Gabe ate a couple of the tomatoes and then took a piece of chocolate through to the sitting room.
The flat was at the top of a converted school building on Kennington Road, not far from the Imperial War Museum. It had long, casement windows and a view over the buses and chimneypots. It was one of only ten flats and when Gabe first moved in he sometimes wondered how many schoolchildren had fitted into this space, which now was his alone.
The sitting room had new oak floorboards and recessed lighting. The estate agent who showed him round described it as being ‘part-furnished’ but it was furnished enough for Gabe and he rented it on the spot. There was a long, low sofa, ultra-modern and ultra-uncomfortable, upholstered in green with matching scatter cushions that were precisely as hard as they looked. The coffee table was an oversized sugar cube. A black leather and chrome Le Corbusier chaise longue stretched out next to the windows. Black shelving ran the length of one wall. Gabe had added books and a rug to the furnishings. The pictures that he had meant to hang were stacked against the shelves.
He sat on the sofa looking at the chaise longue, which was the only comfortable place to sit. The couple who lived across the hallway arrived home. They always stood outside their front door making a song and dance about keys. They were young and often stayed out late. She left early in the mornings, shouting goodbyes and last-minute instructions. He listened to Coldplay and Radiohead at top volume, and slammed the door when he went out and took the stairs at a run. They said ‘hi’ to Gabe whenever they saw him. They hadn’t got as far as names.
Gabe ate some chocolate just to give himself the energy to get up and brush his teeth and go to bed.
It was all right that Charlie wanted to be alone. He wanted to be alone as well. That girl, the porter, Lena, kept inserting herself into his brain. Whatever he had felt, some kind of sickness, when she showed her ghoulish self in the catacombs had quickly passed but she had become a headache now. The police had questioned everyone else. She was a loose end to tidy up.
He wondered what colour her eyes were. He had spoken to her once, he thought, about polishing the wine glasses before they were racked up again. Her hair trailed out from beneath the green plastic porter’s cap and caught in the side of her mouth. Yes, he remembered. He remembered now. How she looked. How she had looked at him. She was nodding and staring down at a spill of soapy water and then she raised her eyes. They were dark, dark blue, wide and deep, and she parted her lips and he reached for her and kissed her. He kissed her hard and then harder still because that was what she wanted, he was sure of it, and the harder he kissed her the more she wanted, he knew it, and then she pulled away and he saw what he had done: there was blood all over her face.
* * *
The chocolate that was still in his mouth when he dozed off had melted and dribbled down his chin. Gabe went back to the kitchen for some paper towels and rinsed his mouth and spat. He noticed the answerphone blinking and pressed the button.
‘Gabe, it’s Jenny. I know you’re busy – aren’t we all – but I spoke to Dad today and I can’t believe you haven’t even called him back. Call him, Gabe, all right?’ There was a pause and Gabe could hear her breathing. ‘Right,’ she said without much conviction. ‘Cheerio.’
When had his little sister turned into the kind of woman who said ‘cheerio’?
Dad had left a message a few days ago. ‘Hello, Gabriel. This is your father calling you on Sunday afternoon, approximate time of three o’clock.’ Messages from him were rare, invariably laborious and gloomy, as though the Angel of Death had called to make arrangements. ‘I would like to speak to you. Would you call me please on the Blantwistle number. Thank you.’ His telephone voice was both clearer and more strained than his normal speaking voice. If you were over a certain age, it seemed, it was impossible to speak normally into an answering machine. Call on the Blantwistle number – as if there were other numbers on which he might be reached.
Gabe had meant to call but it had been a bit of a week. It was too late to call anyone now.
He was about to switch off the light when the shrill of the phone sent a charge through his body.
‘Gabe,’ said Jenny. ‘Is that you?’
‘Jen, are you all right?’
‘I’m fine, yes, fine, it’s two o’clock in the blessed morning and I’m roaming around the house picking up socks and checking for dust on top of the picture frames and I’ve just unloaded the dishwasher but, you know, when you can’t sleep the last thing you want to do is be in bed. I mean, that’s not the last thing you want to do, it’s the first thing you want to do but you shouldn’t because it’s not good sleep – oh, what’s the word – hygiene is what my doctor says and we’re trying to steer clear of the pills, though I wouldn’t mind, sometimes I think, well, why don’t I just give them a little try? Then I say to myself, Jenny, that’s not a road you want to go down, not if there are other roads you can take, and there are. And, anyway, I wanted to call you and I know you’re a night owl and so I picked up the phone and … I didn’t wake you, did I? I mean, I called earlier and you weren’t in so I guessed if I left it a while but not too much of a while—’
‘Jenny,’ Gabriel cut in. ‘I was still up. I’m glad you called. How are the kids?’
He heard her sucking in and blowing out. She could have been lighting a cigarette or taking a puff on her inhaler.
‘Harley’s got a girlfriend, she’s called Violet and she works over at Rileys on the Crazy Glazes stand and she’s got her nose pierced and her belly and some other bits and pieces too that I wouldn’t like to think about, and she doesn’t look it but she is what I would call a good influence. Is on our Harley, anyway, because you know he’s had his share of troubles and only the other day I was saying to him, Harley, I think Violet’s got you under the thumb, I only mean in a good way because, well, when he was younger … and Violet is quite an old-fashioned name, don’t you think? She’s nineteen, year older than Harley, and …’
Gabe held the phone away from his ear. Two years ago – was it three? – he had been affronted when Jenny walked into the kitchen in Plodder Lane and he saw how old she h
ad become, how middle age had enveloped her like the layers of fat on her arms, her legs, her neck. Jenny, who used to wear torn denim miniskirts and a fuck-off glare. Who used to drop one laconic word in the pub and send everyone scurrying to pick it up, frame it and hand it around. She used so many words now and all of them passed you by.
He pressed the phone to his ear again.
‘… pleased about that but you can’t help but worry. Worry about every little thing when you’re a parent, you know, suppose you don’t, not yet, but you know Bailey, always headstrong, and I said to her, Bailey, I know I’m your mum and you don’t want to listen …’
‘Jenny,’ said Gabe. ‘It’s a bit late, even for me. I’ll call you …’
‘Tomorrow,’ said Jenny. ‘I’ll call you tomorrow. You always say that.’
‘Do I?’
‘Yes,’ said Jenny, lighting another fag or taking another puff on the inhaler. ‘But you never do.’
‘Don’t I? I mean, I do. I’m sure I do, when I say it.’
‘No,’ said his sister firmly. ‘You don’t.’
There was a pause.
‘Well,’ said Gabriel.
‘I need to talk to you, Gabe.’
Gabe went to stand by the sink under the kitchen window. The kebab shop opposite was closing. One man humped bags of rubbish to the kerb, another pulled down the metal shutter. Yellow light seeped from under it. A plastic bag flew across the road. ‘I want to talk to you as well,’ said Gabriel, finding, to his surprise, that he meant it.
‘I’m sorry,’ said Jenny, ‘I haven’t asked about you. How are you? Tell me how you really are.’
‘Fine.’ The word just popped out when he opened his mouth. He tried to think of something else to say.
There was only static down the line.
He tried again. ‘Busy at work. Thinking about opening up …’
‘… your own place …’
‘… my own place … And me and Charlie are thinking …’
‘… about moving in together …’
