‘But in the evenings?’ Gibby begins to feel anxious.
‘Communal activities,’ nods Admin. ‘They’ll be fun.’
‘Not — not charades?’ He glances despairingly out the window at the bright, unreachable Lace, then sinks down onto Amenity Number 1: Cracked Cushionless Chair.
‘Nothing compulsory,’ Admin assures him, ‘but all manner of things to fill in the time between dinner and bed. Most of our guests love them!’ She stares at her notebook again. ‘One radio-alarm clock. One lace doily. End of amenity count.’ She closes her notebook and, with that, her assertiveness fades. ‘Speaking of dinner… I’m afraid the catering staff don’t arrive until this afternoon. There are crisps and biscuits, of course. But that’s not enough for a growing boy.’
‘We can find our way to the village, if it’s not too far.’
‘Not far, no…’ Admin frowns distractedly. ‘Though if you’re leaving the grounds, perhaps I should chaperone you… Then again, I’m needed over in the New Building.’
‘We’re not really here, remember?’ says Gibby encouragingly. ‘We don’t arrive until this afternoon.’
Admin nods. ‘All right, then. Take Grace and find a cafe. But don’t be too long.’
‘Actually her name’s Lace,’ says Gibby almost apologetically.
‘Is it?’ Admin scrabbles once more in the green woollen depths of her cardigan. With a list in front of her, she becomes assertive once more. ‘No. Grace McDonald. That’s how she enrolled herself.’
‘Her uncle enrolled her. I really wouldn’t recommend addressing her by that name.’ Gibby sighs, foreseeing the days ahead: blue pen, red tape, sharp exchanges, and battles of will. His stomach gives a loud rumble, which is immediately echoed by an even louder rumbling in the corridor.
‘Ah, good, the cleaners have arrived.’ Admin adjusts her glasses in a business-like way. ‘We were assured that this was a functioning hotel until very recently. But considering the state of things I highly doubt it.’
‘It does seem rather spartan,’ agrees Gibby, looking at the bare walls and the doorless wardrobe.
‘There’s nothing much we can do about that at such short notice. We can, however, get it clean. From top to toe!’ There’s the hint of a bugle call in her voice, and her head lifts at the sound of multiple vacuum cleaners. ‘I prefer to check out locations in person,’ she adds, ‘but I was waylaid in Beirut until two days ago.’
‘Beirut, in… Lebanon?’ Gibby has a sudden vision of Admin cross-legged in her baggy cardigan, smoking apple-flavoured tobacco from a hookah.
‘That’s right. Until last week, we were considering moving the whole shebang there. A very good potential building — running water, plenty of space, everything one could wish for. But the owner was a crook.’ Admin whips off her glasses to reveal eyes as fierce as a hawk’s.
Gibby steps in quickly. ‘I’m sure it will be much more peaceful here. But why is it all so last-minute?’
‘To avoid the paparazzi, of course.’ Admin turns her X-ray vision away from Beirut and replaces her glasses. ‘We delay the release of our location as long as possible. Occasionally, if it’s leaked to the press, we make changes up to the very day before we start.’
‘Paparazzi?’ Gibby stares. ‘Who on earth would they be interested in?’
‘In celebrities!’ says Admin, as if this is obvious. ‘Booked under false names, of course. I did wonder when I first saw your registration… The name Gibby Lux didn’t sound…’
Gibby flushes. ‘It’s real, I’m afraid.’
Admin looks a trifle disappointed. ‘Strange. When I saw you last night, lumbering about in the lobby, I thought you had something about you.’ She peers over her glasses at him. ‘Are you sure you’re not famous?’
He wipes his hands on his sweatpants. ‘I’m just your average, ordinary, run-of-the-mill kid!’
‘So you say.’ Admin steps closer — so close he can smell the milky tea on her breath. ‘But my first impressions are rarely wrong.’
‘Joe Bloggs, that’s me,’ babbles Gibby. ‘Joe Public, Joe Soap, common man, everyman. Man in the street your average punter commonplace middle-of-the-road —’ As he pauses for breath, his inconvenient need for precision kicks in. ‘Though I’m not what you might call the golden mean, of course. Let’s face it, I wouldn’t be here if I were Normal.’
‘I’m not talking about degrees of normality.’ Admin clicks her tongue reprovingly. ‘There’s no such thing when it comes to the absurd human race. I’m talking about fame.’ Her spectacles are off again, and her pebble eyes are drilling holes into Gibby’s future. ‘Not the red carpet, but magazine articles, lecture halls. I’m seeing round-table meetings in Stockholm —’
Suddenly her vision is interrupted by a loud hammering. She turns sharply towards the door. ‘Tsk, I specifically told them no alterations without my approval! Are they unable to understand the Queen’s English? Goodbye, dear.’ Snapping her notebook closed, she sweeps out and shuts the door firmly behind her, briefly reopening it to free the trailing sleeve of her cardigan.
The radiators are stone cold but Gibby is sweating. He grabs his dressing gown and wipes his forehead, then returns cautiously to the window. No cameramen, no crowds, only Lace, still there on the wall swinging her legs. Now that the sun has moved away towards the house, she looks less shiny, less glowing — and very alone. The longer Gibby looks at her, the smaller she becomes. ‘Lace!’ he cries, banging on the window several times, but her back remains turned as she resolutely faces the mountains.
He needs a quiet minute before venturing downstairs through the roar of Hoovers and the flying dust. He lies on the bed, arms by his side, feet stretched corner to corner. The mattress sways, the frame creaks. It’s a raft, a rocket; it will carry him to Antarctica or Mars. Apart from in the long-ago hospital, it’s the first bed he’s ever slept in away from home. He knows he’ll do a lot of thinking here. He feels surprisingly all right.
THE MEMORY LAPSE
LACE’S MEMORY HAS BECOME leaky. Leaky boats, leaky roofs, leaky pens, leaky shoes: all are troublesome, but none so troublesome as a leaky mind. ‘I’d like —’ she begins. ‘I think I want —’ Leaking oil, leaking water, leaking information, leaking the truth; letting it all pour through and spill out onto a squeaky clean linoleum floor.
She’s standing in a Bavarian bakery, staring at neat rows of bread rolls, and her memory is letting her down.
‘One. Eins.’ She points to a dark-brown seeded square with a fringe of pink and green. ‘Gibby, do you want a ham and lettuce thingy?’
He’s hovering by the door, as if uncertain whether to take part in the scene. ‘Ham? Lettuce?’ He throws the words over his shoulder like the ends of a scarf. ‘Okay. Why not.’
‘Eins,’ says Lace, holding up her left forefinger, ‘and —’ But it’s gone completely. ‘Gibby,’ she says, shuffling back a step, ‘what’s German for two?’
Gibby is turning pink. He’s never much good with shop girls, especially tough ones with challenging black-rimmed eyes. Lace sighs and returns to the fray. She doesn’t see any point in feeling embarrassed in front of strangers, even when there’s a silent scrutinising row of them, staring at her white poncho embroidered with crimson horses, her silver trousers, and her biker boots with the jingling buckles. She moves along the gleaming glass, pointing randomly. ‘Eins und eins. Eins und eins, bitte.’ She’s starving! If Gibby doesn’t care for the round pastries with thick white icing, she’ll eat both.
The girl snaps transparent gloves over her plump baby-wrists. ‘Two is zwei,’ she says, chewing her gum in a slightly derisive way. ‘But I speak English. Only losers can’t speak English.’
‘Thank you. Zwei! And zwei of those as well!’ Lace feels like leaping the counter, grabbing up the baked goods and ripping into them like a lion into meat. She’s been awake since four that morning, resisting sleeping pills until five, realising that sleeping pills don’t work at six, and roaming the ragged lawn s
ince seven. Then, sitting on the wall, cracking her knuckles and watching the river mist rise, cursing her mind.
The shop girl is both young and ancient. Her face is stretched with tiredness, alcohol, and the effort of being constantly truculent. ‘Is that all?’
‘I suppose so.’ Lace assesses the brown paper bags. They’re bulging, but still they don’t look enough to fill the void inside her. ‘We might come back.’
Now Gibby is lumbering into action, pushing forward in pink-and-white haste through the silently watching customers. ‘I forgot,’ he hisses, pressing a hot coin into Lace’s hand. ‘Admin asked me to get her a croissant.’
‘A croissant? Where does she think we are, Paris?’ Lace surveys the cakes behind glass: solid slabs of strudel, heavy respectable buns.
Gibby looks flustered. ‘You’re right, there’s nothing.’
‘What’s your favourite thing here?’ Lace turns to the shop girl, whose mouth is hanging slightly open, revealing foxy little teeth. ‘What would you recommend?’
The girl’s mascara-laden eyelashes flicker. No one’s ever asked for her opinion before! Her dark eyes turn a bright blue. ‘Those are really good.’ She points to a tray of triangular pastries studded with chocolate. ‘They’re delicious!’
And suddenly the air in the bakery comes alive. Buttery crumbs float through the sunlight; the girl’s cheeks become dusted with pastry freckles, and flakes flutter lightly around Lace’s and Gibby’s heads. ‘Delicious!’ chorus the onlookers, and for a second their stolid feet rise right off the floor before landing again with multiple thumps.
‘Frau Admin will love them!’ promises the Bakery Girl, her words whirling in the sweet air. And when the atmosphere settles she’s fresh-faced and new; now it’s obvious that she’s only fifteen, and she’ll spend the rest of the day dreaming of a future far from here.
‘Zwei of the chocolate triangles,’ says Lace, handing over money.
The Bakery Girl looks admiringly at her clinking wrists. ‘Where did you get your bracelets? London?’
Lace stares at the silver links. Her memory falters. Comes up short. The bracelets look expensive, and also old: were they a gift?
The girl’s eyes are dark with longing.
‘You can have them,’ says Lace.
The girl starts. ‘Really? But I’m not allowed to wear jewellery at work.’ She shoves her hands in her pockets.
‘Lace, are you sure?’ For some reason, Gibby has taken hold of her elbow.
‘Wear them after work. Wear them to school.’ Lace places the bracelets on the counter, on a pile of paper serviettes.
‘Oh, thanks.’ The Bakery Girl’s voice is almost too gruff to be heard. ‘Thanks a lot.’
Outside the air is so sharp that it catches in Lace’s throat. She coughs, crouches down and has to spit on the grass.
‘Are you okay?’ Gibby bends down beside her, sounding alarmed. ‘Did you mean to do that?’
Lace straightens up, pushes her hair out of her smarting eyes. ‘Sorry. Yes, I’m fine.’
‘But the bracelets. The bracelets. Such a part of your past.’ Gibby clutches the bags to his chest, rustling with concern.
‘Give me a sandwich, would you?’ She crams her mouth so full of rye bread that she can hardly breathe. ‘God,’ she says in a snuffly voice, ‘I’m so hungry.’
There’s a bench in the middle of the cobbled square, but the day is too chilly for sitting down. The sun slants between lamp posts like a razorblade, cutting out sharp-edged shadows. ‘Shall we walk and eat?’ suggests Gibby, leading the way past a tall beak-nosed statue, a closed Birkenstock shop, a closed pottery shop and a closed religious bookshop, into a street lined with small square houses.
Lace trails her free hand along the top of walls, trying to keep track of where she’s going and where she’s been. ‘When I was ten, I taught myself to count to ten in ten different languages. And I’ve never forgotten any of it, until this morning.’
‘Stress,’ Gibby reassures her. ‘All those townspeople staring. I found it hard to remember even English words.’
The bad news is, it’s more than this. The bad news is that Lace’s memory is losing useful information, while retaining stuff she’d rather forget, like vivid patches of yesterday, for example. Chummie’s anxious face as he said goodbye, the lurch of the plane lifting off familiar ground, the thump of the wheels on a Munich runway, the churning of carousels bearing suitcases like coffins, the revolving doors spitting bodies onto unknown soil.
Her brain’s an unreliable mess. Yes, this is bad news. She can remember pieces of yesterday, but not the building she’s staying in now, nor the room in which she just spent a sleepless night. Both are a ten-minute walk from here — but both have vanished. Is the bed parallel to the window? Are there any pictures on the wall? The recent past has faded with the early morning mist.
But the good news is that, out of the flickering white noise, a complete and unwavering picture is emerging. God! She’s never seen it so clearly; it usually arrives the moment after waking and vanishes before she can grasp it.
Gibby is unwitting of all this. He’s leaning on the side of the bridge, pointing to a bronze sculpture striding through the shallow water — while Lace is blinded by the face of her younger sister. White-gold hair like a winter sun. Cornflower-blue eyes, a tiny nose, the smallest of teeth in the widest smile. ‘A mouth big enough to tell stories to the entire world.’ This is Lace’s father, predicting the brightest of possible futures for his offspring. But Lace’s little sister isn’t listening to him nor is she looking at Lace; her eyes are fixed on something in the distance, an absorbing secret visible only to those aged three.
Ooof. The breath is knocked out of Lace’s body by the reappearance of her tiny starry sister. Ooooffff. She doubles over, clutching her stomach, then straightens up again. And now she sees only a deserted street, yellowing leaves and the onion dome of a whitewashed church.
‘It’s a one-horse town, all right.’ Gibby’s surveying their surroundings. ‘Or is it more of a village? Whichever, I guess the grapevine has already spread the news we’re here.’
‘We’ll be — marked out — by nightfall.’ Lace is finding it hard to breathe. She turns to face the wind and opens her mouth, letting the cold air pour in.
‘Yep, marked out,’ agrees Gibby. ‘Though that’s nothing new for us, is it.’
Can one suffocate from too much air as well as a lack of it? It’s rushing down Lace’s throat and into her lungs and chest. ‘We should be used to it,’ she manages to say.
‘I must ask Admin who the sculpture’s of.’ Once again Gibby is staring at the giant figure stepping high-legged through the water. ‘She looks like someone who’d know that sort of thing.’
‘She looks like —’ begins Lace. But her words are lost in the gusts of wind. Her ribs expand and pop from the increased pressure.
‘Like a librarian?’ suggests Gibby. ‘It’s the cardigan. And the shoes.’
Lace is now full to the brim with alien air. Her lungs are like balloons, lifting her off the bridge and onto the river path. ‘I think I’ll run a bit!’
If Chummie were here, he’d suggest she waits a while to avoid indigestion — but Gibby doesn’t know about such things. Lace jogs on the spot, on restless legs. ‘Want to come?’
Gamely, Gibby starts down the steps. ‘Can you run in those boots?’
She’s already taken off along the path, possessed by the wind. The world is a blur of green and brown; she flies past trees, over patches of gravel and mud. The red embroidered horses on her white knitted chest gallop apace.
Where’s Gibby? He does as well as any loyal friend can, but even bouncy new trainers are no match for the wind. For a while Lace can hear him panting behind her, then she can’t. She’s lost him.
‘Gibby?’ Blisters spring up on her heels; soon there’s blood inside her socks, seeping through her soles and into the damp autumn soil and on into the blazing core of the earth. Life is
one long process of losing things. This is what she thinks, running faster and faster against her will. She’d cry if she had any spare breath — or perhaps she’s already crying, the tears whipping from her eyes before anyone can see?
Life is a long losing process. (She runs, cries, runs.) Losing keys, losing wallets, losing coats slung over radiators in cafes while the snow drops in thick flaky pieces from the sky. Losing your virginity, losing your idealism, losing belief that there’s someone out there who is looking for you. Losing your parents, sister, home. Losing faith, losing heart. Losing your mind.
‘La-ace!’ Is it a shout from behind her? Her pulse is hammering loudly in her ears, blocking out other sounds.
The hills flash rapidly between the willow trees and disappear again. Twigs whip her face. She throws down crumbs and then whole chunks of bread like the children in the Russian fairytale, longing for forests and rivers to spring up behind her. To provide a protective wall, an impregnable barrier between her and her past.
ARRIVAL, TWO
DOZING AND HALF-WAKING. FALLING back into cloud. The thud of a car door. Petrol pumping into a tank, behind or below him. Fumes. Cold air. The drone of a radio interview, the whine of a jazz trumpet, the clearing of a throat.
Bright sits bolt upright. ‘What the hell —?’
In front of him are a white collar and a thick, creased neck.
‘Is that you, Reverend?’ He coughs. The air in the car is heavy with miles and unseen hours. ‘Reverend, Father — sir?’
‘You’re awake at last!’ It’s Lewis, of course. The name returns slowly, along with France, the pension, motorways, the journey. ‘Feeling better?’
He shuffles along the back seat, meets Lewis’ eyes in the rear-vision mirror. ‘I feel groggy. How are you?’
‘Can’t complain. Traffic’s getting heavy though.’
It’s late afternoon already. Outside the window are shifting hordes of cars, sliding up, overtaking, falling away. All are black, moving fast; the BMW is a shark in the middle of other powerful, nosing, purposeful sharks. Bright screws up his face at the low sun. ‘Too bright.’ He shifts to the shadowy side of the car.
Suicide Club, The Page 18
