Bright Stars

by Sophie Duffy

  ‘Has he seen me?’ she whispered, not wanting the others to hear about her sordid little secret.

  ‘Don’t think so.’

  ‘Good,’ she said. ‘He looks so old.’

  I raised my eyebrows.

  ‘Let him get on with his little life in his little town with his little wife and little kids and little pub and his great big pint of watery poop.’

  I shook my head. The world and everything in it had gone very mad, mad, mad.

  Bex slumped in her chair, morose by the fireside, the fierce heat from the logs pounding her cheeks. She looked feverish, as if she were going down with flu. I didn’t feel so great myself, shivery and light-headed, not that she was paying me any attention whatsoever, far more interested in the old collie sprawled at her feet. She was stroking his tufty ears and I wished I were that dog, lying down next to her. I wished I could curl up in a tight ball and sleep forever.

  She shouldn’t be sitting in a pub. She should be recovering in her room, tucked up in bed, in the dark, safe, and away from Tommo.

  The glum atmosphere was oppressive. A miasma of fag smoke hung over us. The fire crackled and hissed. Life would carry on but this was the end of the band. Maybe the end of Bex and Tommo. He was already cut loose, drifting, drinking too quickly, in a needy, desperate way.

  And I remembered the letter in my pocket, folded carefully and kept safe. Now wasn’t the right moment to remind Bex of it. She had to make sense of everything in her own time. Her dad was moving on, leaving her in the lurch, without a place to call home. She couldn’t rely on him and she couldn’t rely on Tommo.

  I was only going to drink orange juice but Tommo stuck a vodka in it and I wasn’t bothered to argue. I couldn’t even taste it, was feeling more and more sick as the evening progressed. So I drank it and then another one that Christie got for me. Even she was drinking more than I’d ever seen. But I left it there at two. I knew my limits. I needed a Lemsip and my bed.

  But Tommo insisted on another round. I asked for an orange juice, no vodka. I could do with the vitamin C, this cold I was getting.

  ‘Sometimes you can be such a poof,’ Tommo snarled. ‘Orange juice? Call yourself a Jock?’ He laughed as he said it, matey, jokey, ironic, but it wasn’t funny. Not at all.

  I went to the loo to blow my nose.

  What felt like hours later, Christie told Tommo we had to leave as Bex looked exhausted. She did look exhausted.

  ‘Let’s get outta here.’ Christie stood and, as we shuffled on our coats and gathered our stuff together, she nodded discreetly at her lecturer who was as startled as a rabbit caught in the headlights. With a pipe.

  Bex gave the mangy dog a final pet and heaved herself up. I had to hang onto her arm to steady her. She stumbled a wee bit and her arm came free of my grip. So I held on again, more tightly, as I could see she needed my support.

  Moments later, we stood outside, in the street, breathing in the cold air. Tommo was clearly under the influence and then, for a reason no one quite knew,* he took a swing at Hyper. Hyper ducked like a cartoon character and then responded with a left hook that caught Tommo smack on the cheek with a sickening crunch and had him off his feet and onto the pavement where he lay with his eyes closed.

  No one moved.

  Then Hyper, rubbing his precious piano fingers, abandoned his Cortina there on the street and got in the van with Dave and Carl. They skidded off and left us behind.

  Christie, Bex, Tommo and me.

  Christie was the one to go to Tommo, to reach down and help him to his feet. He rubbed his cheek, grimaced, wiped the grit off his jeans and staggered towards the Cortina. He didn’t have the keys but the door was unlocked. Of course it was unlocked. The lock didn’t work. And of course the keys were waiting helpfully in the ignition. Tommo half fell into the driver’s seat and revved up the engine.

  Christie was right behind him, furious, yanking open the door, trying to pull him out. ‘You hoser!’ she screamed.

  ‘I’m fine. I’m dandy,’ he said, resisting her, stronger than he looked. ‘I’ve only had a couple of pints.’

  ‘Get out the car. You’re drunk and probably concussed. We can get a cab back to campus.’

  ‘We’ll be waiting all night. It’s only a mile. We’ll be fine. Come on, get in.’

  ‘Go ahead. Kill yourself but you are not gonna kill me. I’m gonna walk.’ And she stormed off.

  Bex meanwhile got in the passenger seat, on automatic, out of herself, floating somewhere else, not caring, not thinking. Tommo pulled away, spectacularly stalled, giving me the chance to leap in the car, a stupid thing to do, I know. Such a stupid, stupid thing to do. I should’ve followed Christie. We could’ve walked back to campus together, let the others go. But I could not, would not, leave Bex alone with Tommo.

  No sooner had I got in the back seat, shuffling over so I sat behind Bex, as close as I could be, Tommo kangarooed off. After a hundred yards or so he had the hang of it and I actually thought he might be okay, not totally blasted. He was driving very carefully, purposefully like he was doing his driving test. I put on my seatbelt all the same and just as it clicked, there was Christie up ahead, under the spotlight of a streetlamp, arguing with her lecturer, her arms wind-milling, her hair flicking. She was shouting, shouting at him, and he furiously grabbed her by the shoulder, quite violently.

  Tommo slowed, pulled over, wound down the window. ‘Get in!’

  In a flash Christie kicked the Marketing philanderer, dived into the back seat next to me and slammed the door, shutting in a waft of perfume and bitter air, her blonde hair shining like pearls in the moonlight.

  ‘Who the hell was that?’ Tommo asked. Then he swore as the engine cut out again.

  ‘Just some dude,’ she snapped. ‘He totally has a crush on me but I put him straight.’ She elbowed me to keep me quiet. Then there was this rap on the window and a mad face appeared. The dude. ‘Let’s go, Tommo,’ Christie urged.

  He’d got the engine turning over again, put his foot down and we shot off through the village and within moments were out on the open space of the A6, a short stretch then we’d take a right turn and head up the windy hill to campus.

  Tommo seemed okay, cruised in the slow lane. Maybe he hadn’t drunk all that much after all. He seemed in control. Maybe he was in control of the car. Maybe it wasn’t his fault.

  I might have been woozy, my instincts warped and out of sorts, but I knew something was wrong. The moon shone brightly, lit up Tommo’s musician’s hands gripped on the steering wheel with deliberation. He was forcing himself to concentrate. Concentrate? Knowing what he’d lost? With the drama back in the village? With booze in his bloodstream? What the hell were we doing?

  Then, a light from nowhere. In the moment before I shut my eyes, I saw a dazzling white monster coming towards us. The wrong side of the road. Our side. It vanished as quick as it had come, but the car, the old Cortina, it swerved, spun, left the ground and flew up, squealing and wailing into the waiting night.

  There was a rush of wind and noise. After, came a quiet so intense it hurt my ears. There was nothing. Only a space where our old lives used to be. I thought this must be the end of the world.

  But it was only just beginning.

  _________________________

  *This was 1986, remember. Thatcher loomed large. London hospitals were third-rate. Mines were shut. Docks were shut. Council houses were sold. Utilities and railways were privatised.

  *Later, in the statements, the witnesses were all vague about this.

  Bright Star

  A creaking sound. The smell of smoke. A darkness so thick you could touch it. Shallow breath. Pain. Groaning. A ghost’s sigh.

  I lifted my head but it was too heavy for my neck. The world had slipped and tilted.

  I reached out my hand in front of me, stretching my arm, as far as I could manage, to the space where Bex was supposed to be. But she wasn’t there. Panic forced me to move, sit up, grapple with my seat belt, ease my
self forward, bit by bit, inch by inch, fighting the hurt in my chest, forcing the air from my lungs.

  I saw her shadow. But it wasn’t her shadow. It was her. Deathly quiet. Slivers of glass glittered on her coat.

  ‘Bex?’

  ‘We have to get out. I can smell petrol.’ Her voice, far off, husky, urgent.

  Thank God.

  I listened to her unclip her seat belt. The rustle of her coat as she scrambled to open her door and clamber out.

  The wail of wind, the whoosh of cold air.

  Fumbling for the door handle, but Bex already there, opening it, grabbing me by my jacket, heaving me out.

  A field. Soft, soggy grass. The road had disappeared. We were in a field.

  I struggled to my feet, dizzy and breathless, searched for her in the dark, but she was gone. I could hear her panting, shrieking like a vixen, banging, banging what must be Tommo’s door. ‘Get help, Cameron! Quick! Get help!’

  I did as she said. I had to get help. So I hobbled towards the light, the university beaming like a spaceship on the hillside, out of reach, on the other side of the road we had left behind. I staggered across the field, towards that road, the A6, each step sickening, each breath useless, back to the verge, clutching my side, shards of glass scattering like stars in the moonlight.

  The road was quiet. Then footsteps, running, a man from another car. Someone’s gone to phone for an ambulance. The splatter of vomit. The smell of it, sharp and bitter. Cold, deathly cold wind.

  Then a siren. Flashing lights.

  Bex?

  I looked round, couldn’t see her, everything was moving when it shouldn’t be.

  I staggered back down the bank, weak legs, scorched lungs, but my body not mine.

  She was kicking the car door, a woman possessed. Tommo was out, hopelessly pulling her, crying, urging her to get away. ‘Leave her!’

  ‘I can’t leave her. She’s stuck in there.’

  Christie.

  Bex banging, yanking the handle of what was no longer a door. I tried to help Tommo get her away from the car, grabbing one of her arms, but she wrenched it away; she was too strong, adrenaline whizzing, eyes glistening, shouting words I couldn’t hear because of the buzzing in my ears, the panic in my head.

  And then men, big men, stiff jackets, helmets, torch beams bouncing, clambering down the bank, shepherding us into a huddle away from the very place we wanted to be, big men wielding workers’ tools, like they were going to dig the field, like they could be archaeologists, house builders, quarrymen.

  Bex banged and kicked and banged that car until her knuckles bled and she would have carried on, she felt no pain, but she wasn’t strong enough to tug herself away from those men. Only when she realised who they were, did she finally let go. And then she started to sob, a small, frightened lassie, and Tommo had to guide her from the wreck, helped along by a burly policeman.

  The moon, the street lights. I could see it all now, back here on the road. The four of us should be up there, up on campus, in the JCR playing pool, working on essays, reading, dancing, laughing, but we were far away from there, in an upside-down world.

  Fire engines. Ambulances. Police cars. An army of uniforms rushing round, on walkie-talkies, on a mission. Tyre marks veering off the road, muddy tracks through the field. Hyper’s mashed-up mess of a car. Fire officers surrounding it. The head-cracking buzz of a saw, metal fighting metal, and Christie trapped and hidden away inside.

  They had the door off. They were doing something to her. Two men stood to one side, heads down, shoulders hunched, their bodies saying what I couldn’t hear.

  And that’s when my own body failed, when the ground came up to meet me and I saw the moon floating above, smiling grimly, and the stars all around merged and melted into one mass of light before swallowing me into a massive black hole.

  I was on my knees now, chucking up my guts again, ribs taut with the strain, brain crushed in my head, blood in my mouth and my eye blurry, like the day of the hunt, a day from another lifetime, one I couldn’t recognise as belonging to me. I was here now, in this nightmare, wet, cold, confused.

  Then a blanket wrapped around me, warm and heavy, a voice asking for my name, and I wondered if it was my mum come back for me.

  ‘Cameron,’ I said. ‘My name is Cameron.’

  This person, I don’t remember if it was a man or a woman, but they felt like an angel who just might make everything better if I did as I was told, this person bundled me towards an ambulance, lay me down inside it, a mini hospital, a mini heaven, all bright lights and technical contraptions.

  I’d cracked my head open, they said. It would need stitching, they said. I might have concussion, they said.

  My lungs were wheezing like Granny Spark’s creaky old bellows and they gave me something to help me breathe. My head cleared a little and I remembered.

  ‘Where are the others? Are they okay? Did they get Christie out?’

  ‘Stop talking,’ the voice said. ‘Stay calm. Lie still. They’ll be news later. Not to worry.’

  But that’s what they’d said about my mum. Not to worry.

  Worry doesn’t stop the bad things happening.

  A fuzzy face loomed over me. Man or woman or angel, I didn’t know, it didn’t matter. I watched their lips move but it was all gibberish. They could’ve been reading the last rites for all I cared. The last rights and wrongs. The wrong, wrong, wrongs.

  The song played on an endless loop, but it was mixed-up, in a fankle. ‘Bright Star’. My eyes shut tight so I did not have to see. Eternal lids apart. I made myself remember the poem that Tommo had desecrated. I wanted to think of that and that alone. In lone splendour. There was nothing else for me to do except recite it, word by word, every word in the right order, till I had it word perfect. Then everything would be okay. This would just be a bad night, one to put down to experience. Hung aloft the night. Not a catastrophic one. Sleepless Eremite. Would someone call my dad, my next-of-kin, or would they not bother, I was only a wee bit battered after all. Not like Christie. Her tender-taken breath. I spoke the words, spoke them aloud to block out the vision of Christie entombed in the shattered car. And so live ever. But however hard I tried, I could not get the words in the right order. Or else swoon to death.

  Then the hospital. Stark lights. Being pushed on a trolley. The old pram, round the garden, the streets, dressed up like a girl in Mum’s clothes. I wanted to go back, hold Mum’s hand one last time. But she was always out of reach and all I could do was grab the empty space where she used to be.

  Edinburgh, December 2013

  Yes

  Jeremy says I must write this all down. All these words. The incident. The episode. The underground shenanigans. Whatever you want to call it. Words are important. They tell the reader or the listener your point of view. Words are who you are. Bex would’ve disagreed. She’d say actions are what count. But words come first, otherwise you are flailing around in the dark. In the beginning was the Word.

  I’m not writing from a Christian perspective. I’m not sure if I have a faith. If I do, then it has been tested many times and it will, no doubt, be tested many more times to come. At school we were told that only the Elect would go to heaven. Now some people say that Heaven is here on earth, sitting cheek by jowl with Hell.

  Hell is being a Scotsman stuck underground with a stag party of beer-swilling, rugby-playing Englishmen, much how a comprehensive teacher might feel doing supply work with privately educated, unruly, uncouth children.

  There’s always a ringleader. A frontman. On this day, down in the vaults, it was the one with the black hair, the irritating drawl, the smart-arsed, scrawny-arsed scrote of a Tory boy.

  He reminded me of someone, of course he did. Jeremy spotted the likeness straightaway. (I don’t pay him £55 per hour for nothing.) He gave me the creeps in a way our ghosts have never done. He had menace in his eyes. An attitude that had been formed and nurtured through genes, birth, upbringing, boarding school, university
, jobs for the boys. Rugby balls. Cricket teas. Golf clubs. Everything I hated.

  Believe me when I say I only did what I did out of the best of intentions. I was responsible for the whole group, remember. When this ringleader stepped over the line, I had to be there for the majority and get them to safety. There was nothing else I could have done, I felt, at that moment, other than do what I did.

  And of course there were the two lassies. Did I mention the two lassies? They’d joined the tour at the last minute. Students, they were. Nineteen, twenty years of age perhaps. I had to look after them. They were my responsibility. That needs to be taken into account.

  Lancaster, 1986

  Money

  A strange man was in the cubicle with me. He told the nurse he was my father and though it was hard to see with my blurry vision, I knew it wasn’t my father. Wrong accent. Wrong smell. It was someone else pretending to be Dad.

  ‘You were driving,’ the man whispered in a sharp voice, just him and me in the curtained cubicle, shadows and muffled sounds beyond, out of reach. ‘You were driving when the vehicle veered towards you and you swerved to avoid it and went off the road.’

  ‘Tommo was driving.’

  ‘I want you to say you were driving or Ptolemy will be kicked out of university. He’s on his last warning. He was drinking, the stupid idiot. Four pints and two shorts. He might go to prison. But you have a clean slate. You only had two drinks. You’ll be fine. Do this and you will be looked after.’

  Looked after? I tried to work out who on earth this man was and then it all became clear. The voice. The dark hair. The handsome face. This was Tommo’s father. And Tommo’s father wanted me, Cameron Spark, to say I was driving.