by Neil Cross
'People used to think it was that. But we're pretty convinced it's some kind of geothermic reaction - like an intense, very localized electrical field. It sort of charges things up - and yeah, throws stuff around.'
'No shit?'
'No shit. A professor I know in Copenhagen, he built a poltergeist machine. Honest to God. He built a room inside a kind of electromagnetic chamber. He filled it with everyday stuff-chairs, furniture, newspapers, mugs. Then he runs a charge through it, a really powerful charge. And guess what? He reproduces poltergeist phenomena, right there in the lab: things levitate, fly across the room.
All that.'
'You've seen it?'
'Seen it.'
'What's it like?"
'Creepy as shit.'
Nathan was enthusiastic. 'So you think that's what it is, the supernatural?
Just natural phenomena.'
'Pretty much, yeah. Ninety-nine per cent of it.'
'And the other per cent?'
'It's the other per cent that really interests me. Probably a good ninety-nine per cent of that last one per cent is explicable. We just don't know how yet. But the remaining one per cent of the one per cent?'
He pinched his nostrils and closed his eyes.
'Jesus. Do you have a cigarette?'
Nathan could feel each cell of his body vibrating.
After hoovering the last of the cocaine, then wetting their fingertips with spit and rubbing the bitter residue into their gums, Nathan refilled the wine glasses with ice and Bombay Sapphire.
Bob sat rigid on the bed, holding his glass by the stem.
'Fucking hell,' he said.
Nathan told him, 'I stopped taking this stuff two years ago. Can you imagine?'
Bob said he couldn't imagine.
They went quiet.
The quality of the light seemed to change.
Bob said, 'What's wrong?'
'Nothing.'
'Something's wrong. You've got something on your mind.'
Nathan thought about it.
Eventually, he said, 'So, yeah. I've got this problem.'
'What problem?'
'I was going to finish it with Sara.'
'Like, dump her?'
'That's a very strong word for it. We've kind of, y'know. Drifted apart and whatever. Somebody has to say something. One of us.'
'Won't it cause a scene?'
'Not tonight. I'm too wired. Are you wired?'
'Yes.'
"Me too.'
'So, if not tonight - when?'
'Tomorrow. Over lunch, a late breakfast.'
'Why?'
'She's having an affair.'
'With?'
'Her boss.'
'Okay. So where's the problem?'
'Second thoughts. Am I doing the right thing? Should I be, like, fighting for her?'
'If you loved her, you would.'
'Would I?'
'Yeah. Nathan, mate. The decision's already made. This is just anxiety talking.'
'And booze.'
'And booze.'
'And coke.'
'And that.' Bob leaned over and, with an index finger, he tapped Nathan's head. 'But in here, you know what to do. You've already decided.'
'You reckon?'
'I reckon.'
'I'm not sure I do.'
Bob seemed to be thinking very hard. He said, 'Do you love her?'
'I don't think so. But when I think of us not being together any more, it makes me a bit sad.'
'That's natural. But that's not love, it's regret. It's the end of love.'
'The end of love,' said Nathan, awed by the concept. 'Blimey. The end of love.'
Bob slapped his thigh and stood. He wavered a bit. His knees clicked.
He said, 'Let's consult the oracle!'
Nathan blinked up at him.
Bob said, 'Go to the bathroom. Bring back a plastic lid, like from a can of deodorant or something. Air freshener. Whatever.'
Excited - and too wired to question what he'd been asked -- Nathan hurried down the corridor to the bathroom, which had long since passed its best days. The shower and bath and sink were limescaled. The sinks wanted plugs. The taps dripped. Nathan rooted in the cupboards and found a can of shaving foam, from which he removed the plastic lid.
Back in the guest room, Bob was writing letters of the alphabet on sequential pages of a pocket notebook. Finally, he ripped the pages from the notebook, one by one, and lay them on the back of the mirror -- forming a rough circle. He placed the word YES at twelve o'clock, followed by the letters A through to M. At six o'clock, he placed the word NO, followed by the letters N through Z.
Nathan looked at the makeshift Ouija board and laughed.
'Come on. Look at the state of it. There's not even a pointer.'
'Planchette,' said Bob, and nodded at the plastic lid in Nathan's hand.
'You're joking.'
'Give it a try.'
Nathan giggled as they sat cross-legged before the board. Bob placed the planchette in the centre of it.
Nathan said, 'What do I do?'
'You rest your index finger -- very lightly, lightly as you can -- on the planchette. Then wait.'
'How does it work?'
'Something called the ideomotor effect: tiny involuntary muscle movements. It'll help you find out what you're really thinking.'
'I'm not sure I want to know what I'm really thinking.'
But Nathan did as instructed. They waited, in the loaded silence.
And then the planchette seemed slowly to rotate beneath their fingertips.
Bob
closed his eyes and licked his lips. 'Okay. Have we got anyone?'
They waited again. Until, with a dry creak on the mirror's surface, the planchette slid to the word YES.
Nathan took his finger from it.
'Fuck off. You're moving it. I can feel you.'
'Afraid not. Now, come on. You don't want to piss them off.'
'Piss who off?'
Bob looked at the ceiling. 'Them.'
Nathan said, 'Christ. You're giving me the horrors.'
Bob implored him with impatient eyes. So Nathan touched the planchette again.
Bob asked the air: 'Do you have a name?'
The planchette slid to the letter D. Then the letter A.
David
'Do you know us, David?'
no
'Then why have you come through?'
can you hear
'Yes. Do you have a message?'
die cunt
'Is that your message?'
die cunt die cu --
'Then goodbye.'
Bob took his finger from the planchette, saying, 'Mate. You're shaking.'
'Fuck me. Tell me you were doing that on purpose.'
'Were you ?'
'No.'
"Me neither. Shall we try again?'
Nathan shook his head; no way.
Bob told him, 'Look. It's nothing. It's coming from inside your head.'
'Or yours.'
'Or mine, yes. Possibly. Now come on.'
Once again -- Nathan much more tentatively -- they placed their fingers on the planchette.
'Now,' said Bob. 'Do we have someone?'
yes
'Who do we have?'
sunny
'Have we met, Sunny?'
"Not here
Nathan removed his finger.
'Fuck that.'
Bob's face had darkened. 'Put your finger back.'
Nathan did.
Then Bob relaxed himself and once again spoke to the air, 'Why are you here, Sunny?' fuks him
'Who fucks who?'
fuks him
fuks him
fuks him
Nathan stood up.
'Really,' he said. 'Fuck that. I mean really. Fuck it.'
He looked down at the mirror. Then he hit the main light switch.
He was dazzled by the sudden, whiter glare. With his foot, he scattered the letters
of the Ouija board across the carpet.
Bob was standing up, too. 'What are you doing'
'And fuck you, too.'
'Do you know how dangerous that is?'
'You're cracked in the head, mate.'
Nathan picked up his cigarettes and left the guest bedroom.
Outside, in the dim hallway, he looked at his watch. His eyes wouldn't focus. He leaned against the wall.
Then he strode downstairs, where it was hotter than ever. The bodies and the noise pressed down upon him. He squeezed into the ballroom.
He looked at his watch. An impossible amount of time had passed. Sara was on the dance floor. 'Crocodile Rock' was ending. It was followed by 'He's the Greatest Dancer (That I've Ever Seen)'.
Sara was dancing with Mark Derbyshire. Mark had discarded his jacket. Nathan watched them; Mark was grinding his hips, all but dry-humping her, and Sara was laughing. Mark's shirt was soaked under the armpits and between the shoulder blades.
The dance floor was packed and the music was fast and everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves.
Nathan snatched a bottle of Chardonnay from the trestle table, then went to collect his coat and walked out the front door.
The cold and quiet hit him, the skin contracting like cling film across his skull. He clenched his teeth and sat in the spilled light on the stone doorstep, the muffled sounds of the party behind him, and wondered what to do. The big house mocked him. So he went for a walk in the darkness, clasping the bottle by the neck.
Beyond the east wing was a small copse of leafless trees. On the other side was a tennis court. Around the tennis court were arranged some benches. On one of these benches huddled a dark mass. As Nathan approached, the dark mass seemed to bloom, sprouting a white head. It resolved into a girl. Her short hair was glossy black in the starlight. She was bundled up beneath a man's overcoat.
She said, 'Hello.'
'Hello,' said Nathan. 'So what are you doing out here?'
'Getting some air. Y'know.'
He laughed, once. Too loud: a bird erupted from the dark trees behind them. She looked over his shoulder and up, tracking its progress.
'What's that? An owl?'
He squinted into the darkness. The Milky Way spread like a distended contrail across the sky.
'I don't know. I think it was maybe a crow.'
'Whatever. You didn't impress it much.'
'So, how do you know Mark?'
'I don't. Not really. He's a friend of my dad's. Which is lucky, if you think about it.'
'Please explain.'
'Because Mark respects my dad, he technically can't make a pass at me.'
'That is lucky.'
'I did say "technically".'
'Oh my God. He didn't.'
'No, but he was working up to it. Mum, Dad and my sister had already gone home. So I sneaked out, to get away from him. Let him find someone else to lech over.'
Nathan sat down next to her and, in unconscious imitation, drew his knees up to his chest and hugged them.
He passed her the wine. She took it.
He said, 'I think you're safe. Right now he's dancing with my soon-to-be ex-girlfriend.'
'Ugh.'
'You should see him.'
'I'd rather not. I've seen it. I've felt it. He shoves his hard-on into you, kind of grinds it around. Like you won't notice.'
He shuddered.
The girl said, 'So what makes her your soon-to-be ex? The dancing thing?'
'Nah. It's a long story.'
'Who's in a rush?'
'Long story short, she's seeing someone else.'
'Behind your back?'
'Pretty much.'
She ruffled his hair.
'Poor puppy.'
Something passed between them. The night had magic in it.
They sat for a few minutes, watching the slowly circling sky --until Nathan said, 'I'm freezing.'
"Me too.'
'Would you like to sneak inside and maybe have some drugs?'
'What would your girlfriend say?'
'I don't think she's my girlfriend any more.'
'Just checking.'
'Ha.'
'What've you got?'
'A little bit of coke. There's a room. Up the main stairs, take the dark corridor, the little offshoot.'
'To the guest bedrooms?'
'You've been here before.'
'Every Christmas since I was nine.'
'Cool. Third door on the right. I'll meet you in there.'
'I'll go first. See you in five minutes?'
'Five minutes.'
He consulted his watch. Not yet midnight.
The girl scurried off, lost in the big black overcoat.
He waited on the bench, watching the sky. It was so clear. He saw a satellite, a quick-winking light passing too high and too fast to be an aircraft.
Then he retraced his steps to the house. By now he was beginning to wonder if the girl had been real. He paused on the stoop and remembered how the darkness of the leafy copse had swallowed her up like ink spreading on a drawing. He remembered the cold touch of her hand on his brow.
He walked back inside and was received by a burst of warmth, party chatter, and 'La Isla Bonita'. He re-checked his coat, then cautiously popped his head into the ballroom. Sara was in the corner, talking to somebody, a woman.
He hurried up the stairs and ducked down the twilit hallway. He went to the third door on the right, paused for a moment, and tried the handle.
The door was open and the light was on and the girl was in there.
She'd thrown her overcoat down on the bed. She wore a short skirt and a tight T-shirt with some kind of ironic legend on it. Adidas trainers. In her hand she held several scraps of paper. He saw the word YES. She said, 'What's all this about?'
'You don't want to know.'
'Were you doing a Ouija board in here? Jesus, what are you, twelve?'
Once again, he took the mirror from the wall (in the lamplight, he could see the looped, dried snail-trails of his and Bob's wetted fingers) and laid it on the bed.
He passed her the little pewter tube. He hadn't been able to share it with Bob - to see Bob shove it up his hairy ectoplasmic nostrils. But the girl's nostrils were of an altogether different order. The girl had pretty nostrils, and up them she snorted two of the lines he'd laid out for them.
She sat on the bed and let it begin to work.
She glanced at him. Then she glanced away. Then -- very carefully and very precisely -- she patted the mattress next to her.
'Come and sit next to me.'
He went and sat next to her.
They sat there like that. Their knees were touching. They talked for a bit.
He put his arm round her. She felt tiny. She turned to face him. He moved to meet her. Their lips touched. Her tongue darted between his lips. She tasted of cocaine and cigarettes and wine. He slid a hand beneath the hem of her T-shirt. Her flesh was warm and soft and firm. He pushed her back. Her hands were laced at the nape of his neck. He could feel her ribs. He cupped her breast and squeezed; he felt her nipple harden in the palm of his hand. She arched her back.
The door opened and Bob walked in.
Nathan sat up and said, 'Jesus fucking Christ, Bob.'
He saw that Bob wore an earnest, worried expression. It infuriated him: it made him want to rip Bob's ears off. He said, 'Fuck off Bob.
Please, just fuck off.'
But Bob didn't fuck off. Instead, he said, 'Sara's looking for you.
She's on the warpath, mate.'
Nathan groaned.
'I was introduced to her downstairs,' Bob said. 'She's wondering where the hell you've got to.'
Nathan was bored and angered by the thought of Sara's disapproval; he imagined her tapping her foot and crossing her arms, pouting, flicking back that precisely calibrated fringe.
While he pictured it, Bob turned to the girl and said, 'I'm Bob, by the way. Friend of Nathan's.'
The girl
was smoothing down her T-shirt, saying, 'Elise.'
Nathan peeped at her sideways, as if properly to say hello. She peeped back. Nathan's triumphant erection was wilting away. He moaned, 'Sara's the last person I need to see.'
'So let's keep hiding,' said Bob.
'She'll find us.'
At which, Elise nervously checked the door and straightened the hem of her T-shirt again.
Bob wasn't in the mood to give up. He said, 'So let's run away.'
Nathan thought about it for a moment - not too long, because he wanted to look decisive in Elise's eyes.
He said, 'That may be a good idea.'
He unlatched the bedroom window and wrenched it open - then stuck out his head, to see how far it was to the ground.
Nathan told Elise to wait for him while he shinned down the drainpipe, in case he should slip and tumble to his destruction. But once he'd wormed his way out of the window, the descent proved straightforward; he dropped the last two metres with some elan, pleased Elise was there to witness it.
Then she followed him, clambering down with the dexterity of a spider monkey.
Nathan was embarrassed.
They ran for the bushes, the distant thud of disco behind them.
They stayed in the shadows, following the gravel drive towards the main gate. Here, they squatted in a slough of darkness so black and cold it clung to them like viscous liquid.
After a few minutes, Bob pulled up. He was at the wheel of an old white Volvo estate.
Nathan and Elise clambered on to the back seat, keeping low, and Bob pulled away with too much wheelspin. They passed through the gates, all three laughing.
'Now,' said Bob, at the wheel. 'We need somewhere dark'
Elise said, 'I know the place,' and put her hand on Nathan's thigh.
He kissed her.
Out of nowhere, he felt like he was having the best night of his life.
Elise directed Bob through the small town of Socombe, past some farmland, through a village called Sutton Down, then along a road that ran parallel with a managed forest - an oak woodland. She tapped Bob's shoulder.
'Turn left back there.'
'Back where?'
All he could see was trees. But he reversed until Elise told him to stop. Before them, the headlights showed a place where the entrance to a narrow lane had been occulted by the overgrowth. Bob executed a five-point turn to get the car down there - a tunnel of darkness with a hummocked asphalt surface, just wide enough for a single vehicle.
Soon they were swallowed by it, following the headlamps.
Nathan said, 'How do you know this place?'
