In a Land of Plenty

by Tim Pears

A young man was dancing beside him. He was staring straight at Harry with a wide grin across his face, and yelled: ‘Yeh. Yeh.’ It took Harry a moment to register that the man was not a mirror image of himself, since he knew he was doing the same thing himself. He had the uncanny feeling that whoever was making the music was reading his mind – or it could have been the other way round – and the smells of sweat, perfume, cigarettes, and something chemical from capsules odd people were sniffing entered his nostrils with a heady intensity.

  Someone offered Harry their mineral-water bottle. He took a grateful swig and hugged the donor; he felt an abundant affection for all those around him, as well as something else he’d never felt before: a sense of total, unqualified acceptance.

  It was there in the middle of the dance-floor that first Tom, then Sam and finally Amy found him, drenched in euphoric sweat and grinding his teeth, and they attached themselves like burrs one after the other until he had all three. With a great effort, they dragged and pushed their father back to the east wing. At the door he turned round. ‘Look, children,’ he said with a frightening smile, ‘we just stepped out of the twentieth century.’

  Alice and the other residents of the house stayed awake the rest of the night in their respective rooms, lying in mute, impotent fury. They were allowed to sleep finally when the music stopped abruptly at six in the morning, and so survived that siege from within. They wouldn’t easily forget Robert’s rave, though, and neither would many people in the town below: the house on the hill had looked like a spaceship, with lights flashing from every window, the roof and walls appearing to tremble and the repetitive beat reverberating forth.

  Amy, Sam and Tom woke up around eleven and wandered back into the main part of the house, to find themselves in the aftermath of a strange massacre: most of the partygoers had driven away at dawn but many had danced and drugged themselves to a standstill and collapsed wherever they were. The morning silence was unearthly; sun streaming through the windows appeared not quite real.

  Gradually, though, those people suffering from self-inflicted jet lags were resurrected, and, parched and hungry, they were led downstairs to the kitchen by the children, who ransacked the pantry and deep-freeze to provide them with assorted breakfasts and mugs of tea before they straggled away by car and on foot.

  As luck would have it Charles returned home early in the afternoon, and was enraged, though whether at missing out on a party or by the last of those layabouts driving their cars off his lawn, having left the house turned upside down and taken advantage of his son’s – and his own – hospitality, wasn’t immediately clear.

  Over the following hours Charles heard the complaints of the other members of the household, and neighbours, about the nightmare inflicted upon them, and he was hugely disappointed in Robert’s naïvety. Until, that is, he confronted Robert himself and discovered that Robert had been charging entry, as well as exorbitant prices for orange juice and other consumables, and had made more money in one night than he ever had in a month of car dealing and antiques trading. Charles confided in Robert his approval, but for everyone else’s sake they agreed the enterprise would remain a never-to-be-repeated one-off.

  ‘Which is a shame,’ Charles said, ‘because I feel I’ve missed a hell of a ruddy shindig. I think I’d have had a marvellous time.’

  To which Robert had to agree that his father was probably right.

  James was at home when the phone rang early in October. The answerphone was set so he just stood there. When he heard Laura’s voice he lifted the receiver, automatically cutting the answerphone off for the first time since he’d bought it.

  ‘I’m calling to invite you out for my thirtieth birthday,’ Laura explained. ‘It’s not a big party, just a few of us going to that Jamaican restaurant down the road from you. Where the man makes up the menu.’

  ‘And the bill.’

  ‘Really? Well, Simon’s organizing it for me, that’s his concern. Then on to some barn dance – Natalie’s organizing that. I don’t know where it is; somewhere else near you, I think.’

  ‘I’d love to,’ James replied. ‘Sounds great.’

  ‘You’re going where?’ Lewis demanded, when he dropped by the next day. ‘People of our age are going to a barn dance? That’s not right, Jay. It’s immoral.’

  ‘It’s not my idea, Lewis,’ James assured him. ‘I’ve never been to one. Could be fun.’

  ‘Fun? You must have seen morris men,’ Lewis persisted. ‘You’re going to look like they look. I’m going to hire a video camera and then use the footage for blackmail.’

  ‘Don’t be so dogmatic, you bloody old disco codger,’ James complained. ‘You may not have noticed, Lew, but we’re almost middle-aged.’

  Laura’s birthday group consisted of Simon, Natalie, Alice and Harry, Zoe with Dog, Laura herself and also three friends of hers James didn’t know; he was glad, though, that none of them had silver hair. The group were late at the restaurant and ate too much too quickly, but when they got to the Community Centre hall they dropped jackets and bags on chairs at an empty table and went straight onto the dance-floor, where the caller was beseeching more couples to tread, for the first dance of the evening.

  James joined Harry at the bar. Harry had tried to make his excuses at the end of the meal, but Zoe and Natalie refused to let him go home.

  ‘He won’t dance,’ Alice told them. ‘Don’t bother.’

  ‘You’ve got a rod up your arse, Harry,’ Natalie told him. ‘Relax and enjoy yourself.’

  ‘I’m quite capable of enjoying myself,’ Harry protested, ‘despite your vulgarity.’ He almost asked whether anyone had one of those White Dove things on them, but held back.

  Harry nursed his mineral water while James watched the dancers weaving clumsy figures of eight and making arches for others to pass through. The movements had a chaste gracelessness that was painfully English, James thought. Lewis was right.

  When the first dance finished, however, Zoe grabbed him to partner her in the second, and by the time it was over James had discovered how different was the experience from the observation of it. The simple steps were explained by the caller and almost everyone got them wrong but that didn’t matter, the music was a chugging train that didn’t stop so you just had to jump back on it somehow, laughing.

  At the end of that dance the group collected the drinks Harry had set on their table.

  ‘Where is Harry?’ Simon asked. They looked around but there was no sign of him, except for a half-drunk glass of mineral water on a beermat on the bar where Harry had stood, watching with mounting discomfort the flailing bodies before him.

  ‘He’s gone home,’ Alice stated nonchalantly. ‘I told you.’

  The rest of the group stayed, and joined in most of the dances that followed. They swapped around partners but that didn’t mean very much because as soon as a dance started you lost contact with the partner you began with anyway, and moved on to the next person in the line or the circle. James concentrated hard on carrying out the caller’s instructions.

  ‘You sure dance to a different drummer, James,’ Natalie told him, but he didn’t mind. It was clearly more enjoyable if you didn’t know the steps and were always one or two behind the beat; James felt sorry for the few experts there, who glided around with an elegant pomposity and a pained expression, trying to ignore the idiots bumping into them.

  Those idiots didn’t include Simon, who moved with an ease belying his 18 stone, nor Natalie, who explained during a breather that she never went to more than one or two ceilidhs a year, so as not to memorize the steps too clearly, because she didn’t want not to laugh. As long as you didn’t master them it was impossible not to have a good time. Only the experts looked like they didn’t want to be there. Natalie also liked the fact, she said, that there were always more women than men; she took the male role, and asked women if they cared for this dance.

  ‘You always get dykes at these things,’ she whispered to Zoe, ‘who don’t know they are.�
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  They bought bottles of beer that Laura opened with a disposable cigarette lighter. She’d tried smoking once but given it up because it affected her tastebuds, but she kept a throwaway lighter in her bag just to impress people with this trick.

  ‘Let me try,’ James demanded, and missed two dances in the vain attempt to master it. He was left full of admiration for Laura’s dexterity; she was on the other hand a surprisingly ungraceful dancer. It wasn’t that she had no sense of rhythm, rather that the movement of her limbs was abrupt and stilted. Some people when they danced – like Simon, and Alice too – looked more comfortable than when walking: their bodies flowing gratefully into the motion.

  The ceilidh lasted till midnight. The hall was bursting and everyone joined in the last dance and then they tumbled outside. James, who lived just up the road, hung around while the group dispersed. Zoe and Dog went off to look for a taxi back across town. Laura’s three friends left together. The others got into Simon’s car; Laura was the last to get in, but she stopped and said:

  ‘Nat, could you possibly let the baby-sitter go? I feel like walking.’

  Natalie frowned. ‘You sure you want to walk on your own?’ she asked.

  ‘I’ll be fine,’ Laura assured her. ‘I just feel like it.’

  The car pulled away, leaving Laura and James on the pavement.

  ‘Do you want to walk on your own?’ James asked. ‘I mean, I feel like walking too, so if you like …’

  ‘That’d be nice,’ Laura replied.

  They strolled up Factory Road a way. ‘Hey, Camera Man!’ someone shouted out. The road was noisy still with cars crammed with people looking for parties and with loud, drunk youths, so they cut through residential streets up the hill to the park, and around the top of it towards the house. After agreeing what a good time they and everyone else – apart from Harry – had, neither said anything for five or ten minutes. As they circled the park, though, as if realizing how close they were to the house on the hill, both James and Laura slowed their pace, and began talking at the same moment. Each laughed and apologized and urged the other to speak, but James said: ‘Oh, it was nothing,’ and Laura said: ‘Me, too,’ shaking her head.

  ‘You know,’ she resumed after a while, ‘I was hoping we might do this. I wanted to talk to you.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Since we took those photographs, I’ve talked to you in my head, we’ve had conversations. Now I’m with you I feel there’s a barrier between us.’

  ‘What barrier?’ James asked. ‘I’m not putting up a barrier. Am I?’

  ‘I don’t know, James. You know, I saw you in the cinema some while back. You were sat a couple of places in front of me.’

  ‘Was I?’

  ‘I was going to say something at the end but you looked like you were really moved by the film. It was only afterwards I thought it wasn’t the kind of film a person’s moved by. It’s one of my favourites. Maybe you were asleep!’

  ‘Who were you with?’ James blurted out. ‘I saw you too,’ he admitted. ‘Is he a suitor?’

  Laura laughed. ‘What a quaint word. I suppose he is. Or was. A client I’ve done some dinner parties for; he’s taken me out once or twice. A few times. He didn’t like the film.’

  They were slowing down as they talked.

  ‘Do you like him?’ James asked.

  ‘He’s been my lover. I’ve shared his bed. He treats me well, and gives me comfort. But I didn’t want to talk about him. Damn it, it’s that barrier, James, it deflects things.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ James said, without knowing why.

  ‘Do you remember,’ she resumed, ‘when we were really young, I don’t know, I was twelve or thirteen, we all went swimming at the pool, you four and me? Simon had that car, an orange VW. Oh, you won’t remember.’

  ‘I remember,’ James assured her. ‘What about it?’

  ‘Well …’ Laura hesitated. They were hardly moving forward at all now. Laura coughed with nervousness. ‘I remember clearly that day, for the first time, realizing I was attracted to you.’

  ‘To me?’ James gasped. ‘You?’

  ‘I felt guilty about it, though, because you were like my brother. Anyway, I’ve always felt you were special, somehow, and I feel it now, only now I know there’s nothing to feel guilty about. Oh, God, I’m so clumsy. You don’t have to say anything, you know. I just wanted to tell you.’

  ‘I don’t know what you are telling me exactly.’

  ‘Neither do I. I’ve never said something like this before.’

  ‘What about Robert?’ James demanded.

  ‘What about him? He’s not like a brother. He’s not like your brother, is he?’

  ‘If you liked me, why did you go with him?’ James asked.

  ‘In the beginning? Because he went for me, I guess, and you didn’t. Anyway, it was different. And that’s all in the past, James. I just know I had to tell you, to get this off my chest.’

  They had come to a stop, with the gates of the grounds of the house fifty yards ahead.

  ‘I don’t know what to say,’ James said.

  ‘Don’t say anything,’ Laura told him. Her eyes were gleaming in the darkness.

  ‘I don’t know what to think,’ he said. ‘The world is upside down,’ he whispered as he stepped the half a step to Laura and kissed her. They kissed for a minute or two. It was like they were putting a seal on something, the end of something or perhaps the beginning, they didn’t know, but either way there was no hurry. Then they hugged each other and they each knew that it was not the sad embrace of parting but that of two people, long separated, who have found each other. They walked to the gates.

  ‘You’re not going to come in, are you?’ Laura asked.

  ‘No,’ said James.

  They kissed again, this time without restraint.

  ‘We should have done this when we were thirteen,’ James said.

  ‘Don’t say that,’ Laura replied. ‘What are we going to do now?’ she asked. ‘Tomorrow?’

  ‘Tomorrow,’ James agreed. ‘I’ll call you.’

  He watched her go through the gates and along the drive and then off left towards her cottage. Then he walked home but by a long, circuitous route, because he had no wish for the night to end. It was still warm and the town seemed to smell like a foreign city. James stopped to light himself a cigarette and strolled on. He raised his hands to his face, to inhale the scent of Laura’s skin and perfume on his palms.

  The next morning Laura drove down to James’ flat and he led her straight to the bedroom, where they made love in fumbled haste as if afraid the long-postponed consummation might pass them by again. A dam of tense desire broke over them in one wave.

  When they’d recovered, they then made love without hindrance or anxiety or desperation: each caress and sound felt less an exploration than a reaffirmation of what they already knew; their movements the concrete part of a puzzle that fitted together, which they had already solved in abstract in some other time and place.

  Afterwards they found words beyond them and so held each other in silence until they fell asleep. Some time in the afternoon James awoke with the feeling that he was in a strange place, as if the contents and dimensions of his flat had subtly altered. He found that Laura was already gazing at him; she had the waxy look of someone who’s just woken up.

  ‘Hello,’ she smiled.

  After they’d made love again, they took turns to have a soapy bath – James’ bathtub wasn’t big enough for two people to fit in – scrubbing each other’s back and giving a watery massage.

  James and Laura were aware of their bodily imperfections, but made the other feel that every part of them was desirable. Laura seemed to have lost her self-consciousness about the stretch marks on her belly, her knock-knees and her small breasts.

  ‘You should have seen them when I was feeding Adamina,’ she told James. ‘They were like melons.’

  ‘I prefer avocados,’ he assured her, carrying her back to
the bedroom. ‘And pears. Melons are ostentatious fruit,’ he said.

  ‘Is it possible for the erogenous zones to spread out and join up until they cover the whole body?’ Laura asked him: she felt like she could hear her body humming, from the tips of her large toes to the split ends of her hazel brown hair.

  While Laura had already begun to convince James that his thin legs, his fishbone scars and his slackening stomach, even his sticking-out ears, instead of diminishing him, added to his manhood; and because he believed it, so, bizarrely, they did.

  They pointed out these and others of their own physical peculiarities, and found them to be comical without detracting from their ardour, because they both discovered for the first time how shameless laughter could be transmuted into passion: the fourth time they made love they both came in a state of ill-suppressed hysteria, with giggles giving an added, dangerous rhythm to the thrusts of their love-making.

  The fifth time, that evening, was just as funny, except that as the climax approached it was clear that they were both not only laughing at the stupendous absurdity of sex at the same time as moaning with pleasure, but also crying hopeless tears, in a mad journey into their equally hidden hearts. Shortly before the end, though, they emerged from those rapids of confused sensation and emotion into calm waters, and at the crucial moment James closed his eyes and murmured: ‘This is it,’ to which Laura grunted what could only be agreement.

  To satisfy the hunger that made their stomachs rumble during placid intervals Laura walked off, naked, into the kitchen. James grabbed the opportunity for a cigarette, listening to scrapes and rattles that were followed into the bedroom by aromas that made his gut grumble all the more, while he wondered why it took her so long to collect the biscuits and cheese and maybe a tin of olives or gherkins that was all there was in his bachelor’s fridge.

  Laura reappeared bearing trays of tapas-style snacks of improbable variety and taste: fingers of grilled cheese on toast, with sun-dried tomatoes and marjoram, olives stuffed with almonds, boiled egg, anchovy and capers in mayonnaise.

  They ate, and drank bottles of beer which James insisted Laura open with her cigarette lighter.