by Alex Bell
I frowned, irritated by his sarcasm. ‘You don’t understand. I’m going to save Casey. That’s what God wants me to do. That’s why I’m here.’
Stephomi nodded wisely. ‘So . . . how do you know the big guy so well?’
‘Big guy?’ I said, trying to remember any fat men with whom I might be acquainted.
‘The big man upstairs,’ Stephomi clarified. ‘God, Allah, Ganesh, Buddha . . . whatever you want to call him.’
‘Buddhists don’t believe that Buddha is a god,’ I said impatiently. ‘And those other so-called “Gods” you mentioned are false ones.’
‘Christ, why do you have to turn every question into a theological debate? I’ll rephrase it for you, Gabriel: how can you be so sure about what it is God wants you to do?’
‘I just know, that’s all. Don’t you understand? It’s like one of those comic books. I’m like one of those superheroes. I don’t care about myself, I just want to help other people.’
‘Superhero, eh?’ Stephomi said, looking me up and down. ‘Yes, I can certainly see the similarities. I’d stay clear of the spandex costumes, though, if I were you. I don’t think any man has ever looked good in spandex.’
‘Oh, shut up about the fucking spandex!’ I snapped, losing my temper. ‘The spandex is irrelevant. The costume is irrelevant. Why do you have to turn everything into a fucking joke?’
‘Sorry, Gabriel, it’s a bad habit, I know. I just don’t want you to forget while you’re making these plans that you’re not the only player in the game. The angels and demons might have plans of their own for the baby.’
‘What the hell is that supposed to mean, Stephomi?’
Stephomi glanced at me, eyebrow raised. ‘Don’t worry. Budapest isn’t about to be overrun by choirs of angels and hordes of demons. God and Lucifer frown on it.’
‘Frown on it?’ I repeated incredulously.
‘Yes. Earth is a playing board for humans. Angels and demons can involve themselves in the game to a point. But the major moves must all be made by human players. Of course,’ he added with a shrug, ‘that doesn’t mean that angels and their fallen brothers can’t employ human agents. But there are so few people of the In Between in existence today anyway, and I believe you and I are the only ones here in Budapest.’
I glanced sharply at him and he returned my look with a slightly bitter smile. ‘Don’t look at me like that, Gabriel. I have no intention of taking the child from its mother. Children were never really my thing, you know. All that screaming.’
‘They don’t scream that often,’ I said.
‘No, I meant me. If I’m around them too long.’
I sighed and ran a hand through my hair. ‘Am I the only one who feels like they’re caught in a giant, invisible spider’s web?’
‘You mean God’s web, don’t you?’ Stephomi said.
‘It’s a devil’s web,’ I said sharply.
‘Well, it’s a web that reaches down from the lowest layer of Heaven to the uppermost level of Hell, with Earth trapped in the middle. If God finds the situation so distasteful, one might wonder why He does not trouble to brush the web from Heaven’s edge so that it might sink harmlessly down upon itself. Perhaps the Good Lord rather enjoys watching the insects that get caught in it, thrashing about, unable to free themselves. Entertainment is scarce when you’re in Heaven, you know.’
‘You must not doubt God,’ I said, just about managing to control myself at his blasphemous words. ‘You must have faith.’
‘Where does your faith come from anyway?’ Stephomi asked, glancing at me, a strange curiosity in his eyes. ‘How can you believe in Heaven? I don’t think I could take fat, naked cherubs plucking harps at me for any great length of time.’
I hesitated, trying to think of some way to explain, but I had no answer for him. You can’t rationalise faith.
‘Well, I’d better be getting back,’ Stephomi said, glancing at his watch. ‘You’d do well to keep an eye on this girl of yours, Gabriel. If nothing more, at least we’ve got a few more years than we thought while this kid is growing up before God comes down and starts dishing out justice like there’s no tomorrow.’
It had become dark while we’d been standing there. The Chain Link Bridge was now lit up and I could see the outlines of the floodlit Basilica and Parliament buildings across the dark Danube. The old-fashioned lanterns had come on, lighting the sprawling fairytale white spires of the Fisherman’s Bastion with a soft golden glow. It was so magical that I half expected to see a unicorn walking through the frosted arches, or snow faeries fluttering about the tall, glowing streetlamps as I made my way back towards the glittering Chain Link Bridge.
When I got back to my building late that night, I took the elevator up to my floor and walked along the corridor to my apartment, where I froze in sudden fear. The walls of the building were thin and poorly soundproofed, and I could clearly hear sobbing coming from Casey’s apartment. Dread flooded through me as I thought of all Stephomi had said that afternoon as we overlooked the frostbitten Danube - things of an unborn child and the intense interest that angels and demons alike had in it . . . Don’t forget you are not the only player in the game . . .
I knocked sharply on the door. When there was no answer, I called Casey’s name. To my relief, she opened the door then, looking at me with red-rimmed eyes, clutching a grotty bit of tissue and sniffing pathetically.
‘What is it?’ I asked anxiously. ‘What happened?’
‘When I . . . when I got back in today . . . the social services and the police were waiting. They found me when I tried to use my credit cards . . . They’ve taken Toby back to my parents.’
And then she burst into tears. I felt for her, even as relief swept through me. It had been bound to happen sooner or later. Casey herself had admitted that she couldn’t look after her brother. I held on to her tightly while she sobbed against me, feeling painfully sorry for her as well as exasperated by my own helplessness to fix this for her.
‘I was going to t-take him back anyway,’ she gulped between sobs. ‘But I was going to wait until . . . wait until after Ch-Christmas. I’ve never been on my own at Christmas before. I just w-wanted someone from my fam-family . . .’
I hated Casey’s parents in that moment. Hated them. If I had been lucky enough to keep my family, I know I would never intentionally have hurt them or lied to them or betrayed their trust or made them feel worthless and unwanted. I think husbands who cheat on their wives are disgusting. And I think parents who throw out their children over pregnancies or sexuality or any other pathetic reason are a disgrace. They don’t know how lucky they are to have each other to begin with.
‘You won’t be alone for Christmas,’ I said softly. ‘I know I’m no substitute for your family, but at least you won’t be on your own. And soon you’ll have a tiny perfect baby that belongs only to you that no one will be able to take away.’
30th November
Last night I dreamed I was back home with Nicky and Luke. I was in the bathroom of this beautiful old Victorian house, giving my son a bath before bed. He was splashing around with toy submarines, getting soapy water everywhere, and I knew Nicky would tell us off for making such a mess when she got upstairs.
Luke’s pyjamas were on the side by the sink but I couldn’t find his towel anywhere. I stuck my head out of the door and shouted down the darkened corridor, ‘Nick, where’s Luke’s towel?’
But there was no answer - the large old house was silent. I turned back into the bathroom, frowning, and glanced at the white, fluffy ‘His and Hers’ towels warming on the towel rail. I grabbed my own and dried my son off with it, made rather a mess with talcum powder, and then managed to get him into his pyjamas.
I picked him up and walked down the corridor with him to his bedroom. There were soft toys on the shelves lining the room and trains on the wallpaper. I tucked Luke up in bed, brushed back strands of his dark blond hair, said goodnight to him, then turned the nightlight on and crept out of his
room . . . But no sooner had I shut the door than I froze at the sound of glass breaking downstairs somewhere. It was probably just Nicky dropping a wine glass while cleaning up our dinner, but . . . something made the hairs on my arms stand up with this awful apprehension that prevented me from calling out to my wife and made me fetch the baseball bat from our bedroom before creeping down the stairs.
The house was dimly lit with only a couple of lamps still on, but I knew the house - it seemed very familiar even in my dream - and I had no trouble navigating the stairs in the half light. When I got to the bottom of the stairs I froze, cold dread making my heart beat painfully fast as I clearly saw the dark silhouette of a man standing in the next room. It was the living room and there was no light save for the moonlight shining through the French doors.
‘Who are you?’ I demanded, straining my eyes towards him, gripping my baseball bat harder. ‘How did you get in here?’
Still he didn’t speak, didn’t even move. I approached slowly, aware that he was probably dangerous, that he might even be armed. I got to the doorway of the living room and then reached in and flicked on one of the spot lamps. The light shone directly onto Nicky’s priceless baby grand piano in the corner, only softly illuminating the rest of the room - the bookcases, the beige suite, the box of Luke’s toys neatly packed away. And the man stood in the centre of the room, staring at me.
He was tall, with dark hair combed back, black boots, navy trousers and jacket, white cravat and pale, waxy skin. But what alarmed me the most was that he held a long, thin sword awkwardly in his hand. And there was blood on its blade.
‘Where is my wife?’ I asked, my voice shaking slightly already.
The intruder looked at me and I saw that there were dark bags of fatigue beneath his eyes. ‘Don’t you recognise me?’ he asked hoarsely.
‘No,’ I said, staring at him. ‘Who are you?’
‘I’m Valentine.’
‘Valentine?’
‘Gretchen’s brother.’
‘Gretchen? You mean the woman who was Faust’s lover?’
‘Mephistopheles is killing us,’ he groaned, dropping the sword so it clattered loudly on the parquet wooden flooring. ‘Once we’re dead, he’ll turn on you.’
‘Where is my wife?’ I demanded once again.
‘She’s upstairs. In the bathroom.’
‘Look, why the hell are you in my house?’ I said. There was something about his motionless posture, about his sunken eyes, that was making me feel increasingly alarmed. ‘What’s the matter with you?’
‘I’m bleeding to death,’ Valentine replied softly. ‘That’s what’s the matter with me.’
And as I stared in horror, Valentine moved his jacket aside with one hand so that I could see the dagger buried in his chest and the blood soaking into his white shirt, running down the side of his leg to stain the parquet floor beneath his feet. With a yell, I dropped the baseball bat and raced upstairs to find Nicky, quite sure, even before I found her, that something really awful had already happened. When I burst into the bathroom, Nicky was already dead and our ‘His and Hers’ towels were dripping with blood. I couldn’t scream, I couldn’t even move - I just stood there, staring at the bloody towels, and when someone started to play the piano downstairs I somehow knew that it was Mephistopheles on my wife’s piano, waiting for me to go down and face him.
It’s lucky I know that my family died in a car crash or else this dream would really have upset me. As it was, it did, of course, scare me. But nightmares are only nightmares and I’m not going to make my usual mistake of attaching far too much importance to things that have no meaning.
15th December
Christmas is here now. Shops, restaurants and streets are decorated in all their festive finery and the snow has come to the city, making it sparkle and glisten in the fresh, clear light from the winter sun. Large Christmas trees and strings of lights have been put up around the squares and in the streets, and the artists’ Christmas crafts markets have been set up outside.
For the first few days after Toby was taken away, Casey had been very down and, in an effort to cheer her up, I had taken her out to the three-storey Luxus Department Store in Mihàly Vörösmarty Square. The traditional huge bedecked Christmas tree had already been erected in the square, and the department store itself was lavishly laced and ribboned with festive decorations and displays.
In an effort to draw Casey’s thoughts from her parents and brother celebrating Christmas without her, I had tried to focus her mind on the fact that soon she would be starting a family of her own. A few years from now, she would be celebrating Christmas with her own little son or daughter, making the season magical for them and enjoying everything anew through their eyes. To my relief, this seemed to cheer her up.
When we got to the large department store, I said I wanted to buy baby things for her as an early Christmas present. At first she protested, saying that I was already doing more than enough for her. But I insisted. I said frankly that there was nothing I needed or wanted for myself, that I had no one else to buy presents for and that, for the moment, we were both as alone as each other. I wanted to love the baby as much as she did. If she agreed to let me be part of her life, she would be giving me far more than I could ever give her.
So for a while she had walked around tentatively picking up the cheapest baby things she could see. But I continued to take these off her and put them back, picking up better quality items, until she finally gave in and started choosing nice things. We had everything a child could possibly want by the end of it. We had a cot, little feeding bottles, plastic bowls with matching spoons, a musical mobile to hang above the cot, soft toys to put in the cot, baby bubble bath with the unmistakable powdery soft scent of tiny, perfect newborn babies, and a set of yellow rubber ducks and other bath toys. We also bought a baby monitor and a highchair, an array of toys and books, and, last of all, we must have spent a small fortune in the clothes department.
Casey didn’t know what sex the baby was going to be so we tried to stick to neutral colours and patterns on the baby-grows we picked out. We also purchased tiny, tiny socks and bibs and little knitted hats. I had never seen Casey so elated as she rushed round like an excited child, looking at the baby clothes on their tiny hangers, exclaiming in delight over some item or other. Perhaps it was just the first time that she had viewed her own pregnancy as anything other than an unmitigated disaster. She really was quite huge now, emphasised all the more by the fact that she had a small figure to begin with. It couldn’t be much longer now. I even wondered whether she was carrying twins, she seemed to be so big.
There was far too much to carry by the time we were done so I paid extra to have it sent back to the apartment the next day. Casey voiced concerns again about the cost of everything, but I waved them away. To my utter astonishment, I heard a slight tremor in her voice as she said quietly, ‘I’ll find some way to repay your kindness one day, Gabriel, I promise. I can’t tell you how much it’s meant to me.’
Kindness? How could this be kindness when I was simply making myself happy? She made me happy just by being near me. Already I loved her so much that it hurt. But perhaps I was kind. After all, I was doing kind deeds - that must surely make me a kind person? I am a good person, aren’t I? Look at all the good things I’ve done.
After the Luxus Department Store, we went to Gerbeaud’s, the famous patisserie on the northern side of the Mihály Vörösmarty Square, and enjoyed coffee and pastries in the sumptuously rich interior made all the more splendid for the many Christmas angels and golden ribbons with which the patisserie was decorated for the holiday season.
It was the best day of my life. My time spent with Stephomi seemed to pale in comparison. Truly those days had been nothing to this one. To know that I had been responsible for the smile on Casey’s face; to know that I was the one responsible for lifting some of the sadness from her eyes . . . was utterly priceless to me. She would have been so miserable without me. She needed
me. And I trusted her in a way I knew I would never be able to trust my more scholarly, evasive friend.
As we sat there in the warm, bright patisserie with golden chandeliers hanging from elaborate cream and gold ceilings, and alternating green and red velvet drapes sweeping to the floor from archways, I felt that even if my future was filled with one disaster after another, this day, this moment here with Casey, would provide me with enough happiness to last me until I died.
We were in the middle of a conversation and I had glanced down at my coffee cup for only a moment, but when I looked back up, the aura around her that had been soft with golden beauty only a second before had once again changed to thick, swirling clouds of black - the smell of burning flesh horribly pungent once again. Just the sight of it chafed horribly at my senses, instinctively warning of danger and the terrible potential for hissing evil . . .
‘What is it?’ Casey asked, gazing at me, clearly quite unaware of the malevolence that clung about her.
