Home Boys

by Beckett, Bernard

  ‘It’s going to rain.’

  ‘Probably,’ Dougal agreed.

  ‘You heard her say it didn’t you?’ Colin started, still standing because his friend hadn’t moved to make room. It was good Veronica was still asleep. They could settle this now, the two of them, the thing that had been on his mind all night.

  ‘You were there, when she told me there was no cave.’

  ‘So? I already knew. It doesn’t make no difference.’

  ‘But, that was our deal. We only let her stay, to show us where the cave was.’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘But there is no cave.’

  ‘I know that too. Already told you.’

  ‘So,’ Colin struggled to make the point. ‘What do we do now? I mean with her. Now that there’s no cave?’

  ‘We do what we were always going to do, because there never was a cave.’

  ‘So, you’re going to tell her to go then?’

  ‘She won’t need to be told. She knows the deal.’

  ‘But, couldn’t we …’ Colin looked to his feet. His big toe was black from kicking a rock, the night before last. ‘Couldn’t she stay anyway? It’s good having her here isn’t it?’

  He looked up at Dougal, but Dougal’s stare didn’t leave the horizon.

  ‘If she finds us the cave, she can stay. That’s the deal.’

  ‘But there is no cave,’ Colin repeated. ‘That’s the thing. There is no cave.’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘So why don’t you want her to stay with us then? It’s good isn’t it, having the three of us? You like it too.’

  ‘No I don’t. You’re the one who likes it. I liked it better when it was just two.’

  ‘Well I don’t,’ Colin told him, moving around to the front of the rock so Dougal had no choice but to look at him. Colin didn’t know what it was, this strange feeling he couldn’t name, but which had become so familiar; that could be traced back to the first time he had seen Veronica. Not love. Love was for other people, older people. Love couldn’t feel this strange, or this bad. It started in the stomach, like a weight that was slowly expanding, until there was a pressure building in the throat, and down below too. Then it would become too much, like an itch you couldn’t reach, or a load you couldn’t carry. It would burst free, leave in a lurch of dangerous movement or a mouthful of careless words, if you didn’t find your own way of setting it free, with a run or a scream or a stream of tears in a private place. It was about to burst free now, and Colin knew there was nothing he could do to stop it happening. He didn’t want to hurt his friend. He would never have done it, if he’d had the choice.

  ‘I like it much better like this. I don’t just want it to be me and you. I want it to be with her too. I like it better when she’s here.’

  Dougal’s eyes filled with the hurt of betrayal, and Colin would have apologised but it was too late. He’d said it now, and it was true, so apologising had nothing to offer.

  ‘I should never have told you,’ Dougal said, his dark eyes drilling a hole inside Colin’s head.

  ‘You didn’t tell me,’ Colin reminded him. ‘You told both of us.’

  Dougal looked away, and stared at the rock beneath him.

  ‘You’d better hope she finds this cave that don’t exist then,’ he mumbled. ‘Because we had a deal.’

  * * *

  The rain held off all morning as they walked on, mostly in silence, each with their own worries to keep them company. Today there was nothing good about being with Veronica. It didn’t matter which way they walked, they were heading towards goodbye. Colin knew that, and didn’t consider any other possibility. There was him and there was Dougal, and there always would be now. Maybe, if it came down to a choice, he would be able to turn his back on his friend, but it didn’t work that way. Nothing came down to choices. It came down to promises and deals, dreams and blood brothers, simple dads and old lies uncovered. And the shape of the earth beneath your feet, but Colin didn’t dare believe in that.

  And Veronica was feeling it too, or feeling something different dressed up in the same silence, because she only spoke to answer Dougal’s questions, his which way nows and are you sures but not like she had yesterday, when she’d still been pretending.

  ‘Of course I’m not sure,’ she told him, not once but three times, and although it showed Dougal was right, and he’d been right all along, he didn’t look all that happy either.

  They stopped for lunch just as the first drops fell, the round heavy hits that had been promised all morning, exploding little craters in the soft soil beneath them. Then, the heaviest rain Colin had ever felt. There was no wind and it fell vertically, coming down with such force that every drop registered its pain on the top of Colin’s head. Dougal and he both put on their coats but Veronica was forced to continue in the only set of clothes she had.

  It was still warm, smelly hot beneath the oilskins, and the weather had closed off visibility. They walked close together, and it was hard to say exactly who was leading. Whereas earlier the lack of talk had been through choice, now the loudness of the downpour made speaking too difficult to bother with. So they walked as one, with no idea where or why, marking time with their footsteps and struggling to breathe through the waterlogged air. It continued that way for hours.

  ‘Come on, we can shelter there. Let’s take a break.’

  It was Dougal who saw the overhang of rock, and was shouting in Colin’s ear. They were somewhere on the western slope, below the main ridge, and were working their way across and down. The bush cover was sporadic. The young, small-leaved trees were taking their own hammering from the rain and afforded no shelter. Colin looked up and saw the place his friend meant. The bank to their left had become abruptly shear, and a steep jutting of rock had shaken itself free of topsoil. At the far end another great slab of shining wet grey angled across the top. It reached out far enough to act a shelter, if they pressed in hard against the face.

  Veronica was at one end, and crouched to the ground, shivering with the cold that comes when walking stops. The wet had collected her dark hair into twisting thin lines and from above Colin could see the white of her scalp.

  ‘There’s other shirts in with our gear,’ he offered, having to shout above the relentless rain. ‘Do you want something dry to put on?’

  ‘Don’t be daft, we’ll be moving again soon enough,’ Dougal told him.

  ‘It doesn’t matter,’ Veronica added, looking up and smiling a cold and painful smile. ‘I’ll move back here a bit, where it’s properly dry.’

  She moved along to where a long vertical scar had split the rock in two. She turned, to look back at Colin, and a moment of puzzlement swept across her face. Then she disappeared.

  ‘Jesus.’ Dougal said, already past Colin and moving forward. Colin followed, not ready to take it in.

  It wasn’t a split at all, more an opening. A good foot higher than any of them, and narrow at first, so Colin could feel the deep coldness of rock on either side as he edged himself through. Then it opened again, at the place where Veronica was sitting. There was enough light to see the grin on her face, and the fear that sat beneath it. Behind her was only darkness.

  ‘It’s drier here,’ she told them, as if that might be the important thing. Inside the cave the sounds of rain were muffled and Veronica’s voice bounced sharp and clean off the close rock.

  Colin sat down next to her, not knowing if he could speak in a place like this. He chose the side where the light was, with Veronica between him and the darkness. Dougal sat in front of them, his back against the wall, his eyes turned away from the blackness. They all looked, from one to the other, and Colin saw in their eyes a picture of his own uncertainty. As if everything, his whole future, had shifted one step to the side, and now there was no way of getting to the places he might have been headed. Like they were taking a moment out of time. Outside the rain still fell, and the earth still turned to mud and streams, and the light still slowly left the sky. But
in here there was no rain and it was always close to dark. In here there was nothing.

  ‘I told you there was a cave,’ Colin finally said, surprising himself with the sound of his own voice.

  ‘This isn’t no cave,’ Dougal replied.

  ‘Of course it is.’

  ‘It’s not.’

  ‘What is it then, if it isn’t a cave?’

  ‘It’s just a hole in the rock.’

  ‘It’s the same thing.’

  ‘It’s not. This is too small.’

  ‘That’s stupid. This is a cave. Just like she said. Isn’t it Veronica? Isn’t it?’ Colin turned to Veronica.

  ‘It gets bigger,’ she said. ‘If you go further in. This is just the opening. It gets bigger.’

  ‘How do you know?’ Dougal said.

  ‘Go and see for yourself,’ she replied, ‘if you don’t believe me.’

  ‘There’s nothing to see in there. It’s too dark.’

  ‘It is a cave,’ Colin told him, feeling the triumph of it. ‘It’s a cave, so Veronica has to stay. That was our deal. We had a deal.’

  And Dougal didn’t argue, same as he didn’t agree. He sat in silence, and so did Veronica, and Colin didn’t disturb them. It was some time before Colin noticed he could no longer hear the sound of the rain.

  * * *

  They found an old log and stretched the fly off the side of it. After eating they tried to light a fire but there was no wood dry enough. By then the decision had been made, although it was never discussed. Veronica was with them now, the way Colin wanted it to be, but he knew it would be some time before it would feel that way. First, there was this time, where it felt like nothing. Where they couldn’t even talk about it.

  They went to bed early, Colin on the side nearest the log and Veronica beside him, choosing again to sleep in the middle of the two boys. They lay there a while without talking, and without sleeping either. The day was already so dim that true darkness came without warning. Colin felt the fear creeping up on him. A dull dread, a knowledge of what pictures would form, as soon as he closed his eyes; the sounds that would come, and thoughts that would settle, when his listening stopped and his mind relaxed. The Grey Man had never been so close. So he stayed tense, alert and awake, half a step beyond fear. Fear of the known. Of the murder that slept so close, of flames and lies, and a man burnt to grey. Of a cave, its opening so close that he could smell the mustiness of it on the light breeze; the deep earth breathing in and out through the narrow slit in the rock. And Dougal stayed awake too, for reasons that weren’t hard to guess.

  ‘Tell us a story then,’ he whispered, as if the night was thick with creatures who could not be allowed to hear.

  ‘Me?’ Veronica asked.

  ‘If you’re going to stay you’re going to need a job. You can be our storyteller. That can be your job.’

  ‘And what’s your job?’ she asked him.

  ‘I’m the leader aren’t I?’

  ‘No you’re not,’ Colin spoke up.

  ‘You still awake?’

  ‘Yeah, and we never said you were leader.’

  ‘It didn’t have to be said. I don’t even want to be. I just am. It’s my job. You can do it if you want. You get tired of being leader. I don’t even like it that much.’

  ‘I couldn’t be leader could I?’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Because you wouldn’t listen to me.’

  ‘That’s true,’ Dougal agreed, and Veronica laughed.

  ‘Maybe I want to be leader,’ she said.

  ‘Do you want to be?’

  ‘Not really.’

  ‘Then it has to be me.’

  ‘So what is my job then,’ Colin asked, ‘if you’re the leader and she’s the storyteller?’

  ‘I haven’t agreed to that,’ Veronica told them.

  ‘You’re my blood brother.’

  ‘That’s not a job.’

  ‘It’s better than nothing,’ Dougal told him. ‘Anyhow, you’re too daft to be leader.’

  ‘Why can’t I be a blood brother too?’ Veronica asked.

  ‘You’re a girl.’

  ‘What is it anyway?’

  ‘It’s a promise,’ Dougal told her.

  ‘To do what?’

  ‘If he was dying, I’d come to his rescue. And we never fight, except when we’re playing, and I can trust him with my life. If I need his help he gives it to me, and I do the same. And it’s a promise that nothing can break. Never.’

  ‘It sounds like being married.’

  ‘Well it’s not,’ Dougal replied. ‘It’s much better than that. Come on, tell us a story. It’s your job.’

  ‘I don’t know any stories.’

  ‘Yes you do. What about all the stories that guy told you? Like about the cave?’

  ‘We can’t talk about the cave,’ Veronica’s voice was cold and serious, like another part of her, twenty years older, had delivered the line.

  ‘Why not?’ Dougal asked, as if reading the signs was beyond him. Colin felt Veronica’s hand slide down the side of her body and take his own. It was wet with sweat.

  ‘Because it’s just here.’

  ‘You’re talking nonsense. It can’t hear anything. It’s just a hole in the rock. It’s not alive.’

  But Colin heard a different story, the one carried in the wavering of his voice. He was afraid too. They all were.

  ‘We shouldn’t have camped here,’ Colin said. ‘We should have kept moving.’

  ‘You’re not scared of a stupid cave too are you? I suppose you’ve been having your dreams again.’

  ‘There’s nothing wrong with being afraid,’ Veronica told Dougal, her hand still wet and firm around Colin’s fingers. ‘Fear keeps you alive.’

  ‘I’m not scared of nothing,’ Dougal announced loudly.

  ‘Everybody’s scared of something.’

  ‘I’m not, and I’ll prove it.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘That’s easy. I’ll spend the rest of the night in the cave. Do you dare me?’

  ‘You never would,’ Veronica told him, the wrong thing to say to Dougal.

  ‘I would too.’

  He backed out from beneath the fly and stood, a thing that could be heard but not seen in the darkness.

  ‘Colin, are you coming too, or are you afraid?’

  It was a good question to ask, and Colin had two answers ready for it. Opposite answers, that only made sense when the other stayed quiet.

  I’m not scared. I can sleep in there same as you can – I’m not scared. It’s just daft. Sleeping in there is daft.

  And both answers had different meanings, that Colin would not speak, no matter how he answered.

  Blood brothers, said one voice, Veronica, said the other.

  ‘You shouldn’t go in there,’ Colin finally told him, a way of giving no answer at all. Of letting Dougal decide.

  ‘So you’re scared then?’

  ‘I didn’t say that.’

  ‘Don’t have to.’ A pause. Waiting for something that wasn’t on offer.

  ‘So you’re not coming?’

  ‘I don’t think you should go.’

  ‘I’m going.’ But I don’t want to, and I wish I’d never said it, in his voice. ‘Are you coming too?’

  ‘No, I’m not. I think it’s stupid, is all.’

  Veronica, who had stayed clear of the argument, squeezed harder on Colin’s hand at the sound of his friend’s footsteps, taking him slowly to the entrance of the cave.

  ‘You’re soft.’ Dougal called and then, Colin imagined, waited at the opening, for a response, before feeling his way into the rock.

  ELEVEN

  Alone

  LIGHT rain fell on the fly above, the only sound. Colin rested his head against his forearm but the darkness was so complete he could not see it. Dougal had been gone a while, and neither sleep nor conversation had filled the gap. Veronica was awake too. Colin could feel it in her breathing, the rise and fall of her back against his s
ide. There were words which would fit in a place like this, surely, but Colin did not know them.

  I wonder how long he’ll stay in there? he asked inside his head a hundred times, and then Do you think he’s all right? To fill the gap. He didn’t wonder, and he didn’t worry either. His thoughts were here, with Veronica. Dougal wasn’t a part of the things he wanted to say.

  A body cannot sink into hard ground. Stones grow large and uncomfortable, blood stops flowing, numbness and pain imitate one another, discomfort scrapes at the edges of unconsciousness. You wake, turn, settle again. They turned, together, so that Veronica’s breath was close and warm on his face. Colin pretended to be asleep, breathed in her breath, gave it back. Waited. She squirmed, to make herself more comfortable. He squirmed too, in the manner of a sleeper, but with the careful motivation of a boy, alone with a girl. In the darkness he felt her body against his, her arm across him, her hand against his back, not asleep. His heartbeat began its own conversation, loud, hard, insistent. His breath resisted, slowed, called for calm. Her cheek was warm against his. Her legs parted, so that one of his own was trapped between them, damp trouser leg against damp trouser leg. Her breasts squashed against his delighted, panicked chest.

  And it was dark. Black. Empty as a cave. If Colin concentrated on just that, let his breath win the battle against his pulse, this was no place at all. The ground beneath him left his exposed side alone. Held him, that was all. Her breath grew warmer, until there was a familiar taste to it, and a touch, a kiss. Her tongue touched his and he withdrew it in sudden surpise. He felt the corners of her mouth tighten to a smile. Her hand moved down to the back of his leg and pulled it further forward. Her own legs moved, renewed their purchase. It was happening. Colin knew that much. And all he had to do was be careful not to disturb it, not give it a reason for ending. His own hand moved; was not moved, moved itself. Found the highest point, her hip, rested, continued. He was learning to breathe again. Finding it held within for too long, having to remind himself to let it out, breathe in, forgetting once more.