Waking Up Dead

by Nigel Williams

  He thought about how little respect people seemed to have for death or life, these days. And about how respect for the dead is indivisible from the respect we owe to life. He thought about politicians, and religious fundamentalists of all shapes and sizes, about how blindly and unthinkingly they inflicted pain on others. And how absurd their opinions on the dead, as well as the living, seemed to be. He thought about children in Syria choking on poisoned gas. He thought about innocent people in markets in Iraq suddenly being ripped apart by bomb blasts. Then he threw back his head and howled, willing himself into some form that at least one person could actually see, full length, as he had been in life, though hideously marked by death and the changes it had wrought in him.

  ‘Aaaagggh!’

  Who was making that noise? Was it him? Had he actually succeeded in getting a remark out there into the real world – well, ‘remark’ was putting it a bit strongly but a guttural scream was better than nothing. Wasn’t it?

  It wasn’t him. It appeared to be a noise made by Pawlikowski. He was also, as far as George could tell, retreating across the rain-soaked patio and – this was very satisfying indeed – trembling visibly as he stared directly at George.

  ‘What’s up, Boss?’ the policeman with him was saying.

  ‘It’s … it’s…’

  Some people had heard him scream and had wandered out on to the patio. Feeling, at last, that he was getting somewhere in the post-mortem rat race, George raised what might serve as his right arm and pointed something he hoped might manifest itself as his index finger at the unfortunate Pole.

  ‘It’s … him!’

  Pawlikowski was actually gibbering now. There was no other word to describe what he was doing. His teeth were chattering as briskly as those of an angry gorilla in a meat safe.

  ‘It’s George Pearmain! I can see him! He’s…’

  ‘He’s what?’

  ‘He’s standing there! Right there! Oh, my God! It’s him! My God!’

  George found this very gratifying indeed. He continued to point in a menacing fashion.

  ‘What’s he doing?’ said his companion.

  ‘He … I don’t know … He … He has no head!’ said the pathologist.

  This, thought George, was typical of the man’s sloppiness. What did he mean ‘no head’? George had no shoulders, arms, chest, waist, buttocks, legs or feet. Why single out his head?

  He wasn’t, of course, at all sure about how he might look to Pawlikowski. How people saw you was a bit of a problem when you were alive. When you were dead it was anybody’s guess as to what they made of you. Was he wearing a suit? Tastefully arranged grave clothes? Perhaps Pawlikowski was getting him with his innards displayed. Whatever, George was certainly scaring the shit out of the Pole.

  Pawlikowski was staring at him, still transfixed with horror. ‘What do you want of me?’ he stammered.

  George liked the way he slipped in the preposition. It added a Gothic flavour to the encounter. Mind you, from the expression on his face, it was pretty fucking Gothic anyway.

  ‘I want you,’ said George, still pointing his index finger at the pathologist, ‘to treat the dead with more respect! In your private and your public life!!

  George had the firm impression that Pawlikowski had heard all or most of this.

  Pawlikowski continued to back away from whatever image of G. Pearmain was being presented to him. He continued to whimper very satisfactorily. ‘I – I’m sorry!’ he whined.

  ‘It’s been a long day, Marek,’ said his companion, glancing nervously at the small crowd of spectators who had gathered by the french windows. ‘You’re under a great deal of strain.’

  ‘And,’ said George, ‘you’ll be under a great deal more strain if you don’t do as I say.’

  Pawlikowski’s jaw had dropped further and faster than a tower block lift whose main cable had just been severed. ‘I mean,’ he muttered, ‘we do … joke around but … what do you want? What do you want?’

  ‘I want you to take early retirement,’ said George, in what he hoped were deep and sonorous tones.

  This was too much for the pathologist. With one last, wild look around him, he pushed his way through the group by the french windows. He was shouting something as he blundered out into the hall and then through the front garden towards the street. George was fairly sure he was telling anyone who wanted to listen that he had had enough enough enough … ‘I can’t believe it!’ Pawlikowski screamed, as he disappeared down Hornbeam Crescent. ‘I can’t believe it!’

  No. Well. George found it all pretty hard to believe too. He was dead. That was fairly incredible. He also seemed to know he was dead. That was even more incredible. Was it a lot more incredible than knowing you were alive? George was not sure. It was certainly not more incredible than thinking you were going to be alive for ever, which most people went around believing until they stepped under a bus, had a heart attack, got cancer or were shot by some passing lunatic for no reason at all. Everything about life – and death – was unbelievable, as far as George was concerned, and one of the only things that made either of them bearable was being able to believe at least six impossible things, preferably before breakfast.

  Pawlikowski’s exit seemed to have signalled the break-up of the evening. His two remaining companions did a bit of half-hearted photography, waved a chunk of incident tape around, then shovelled poor Mullins on to a stretcher and took her body out through the side passage.

  Veronica Pinker helped Esmeralda clear away the plates. She, Geraldine and Rosalina put them into the dishwasher. Peregrine and the Prune disappeared without saying goodbye to anyone. Beryl Vickers was comforted by Esmeralda. Nat ordered a taxi for her and, after she had been carried away, they both embraced George’s widow.

  Veronica said, ‘How will we manage without George?’

  Nat said, ‘With difficulty.’

  Then they, too, went out into the night.

  Maurice and Barry and their wives, who had stayed behind with the children during the funeral, kissed Esmeralda. Bella asked if Granddad was going to stay dead or was he going to come over to tea? George watched Bella Ella and Ella Bella as their mothers carried them out to the car and reflected that, even if he was never going to be able to communicate with anyone ever again, it might be worth sticking around for the pleasure of watching them grow. They would soon be acquiring hamsters and guinea pigs and going to school. George had enjoyed all that stuff. He saw no reason why he should not enjoy it all over again. Perhaps, by then, he would have learned how to manifest himself in a manner that did not send his audience bawling and blubbering up the nearest wall.

  Finally it was the way it had been ever since the children had left home ten years ago. It was just him, Esmeralda and the dog. Partridge was watching the farewells with the same gloomy attention he gave to nearly all human life. As he and George stood on the porch, as Esmeralda waved goodbye to her sons and their families, he looked up at George and said, ‘I’ve remembered what it was I wanted to tell you!’

  ‘Oh,’ said George. ‘What was it, then?’

  ‘It was your brother who poisoned you,’ said Partridge. ‘I saw him put the leaves in your glass. Apparently hemlock tastes a bit like parsnips.’

  ‘How do you know that?’ said George, thinking, but not saying, that it was a little late to be coming up with this information.

  ‘I’m not sure,’ said Partridge. ‘I do know quite a lot of things. Although I am only a dog – as you used to constantly remind me!’

  George did not really want to get into a conversation about the many ways in which he had failed his dog. Especially not with his dog.

  Partridge seem to realize he had overstepped the mark, and when he spoke again, his tone was conciliatory. ‘I don’t think he meant to do it,’ he said. ‘It was an impulse thing. I think he’s basically very fond of you.’

  ‘I’m still dead!’ said George.

  ‘True!’ said the dog, and wandered off into the corner of
the kitchen where he had slept when he was alive. ‘I never really liked him,’ he said. ‘He preferred cats. So he kept telling me. Which I thought tactless.’

  George stood, watching Esmeralda make a last tour of the kitchen. Only when she had closed the security grille did Partridge lower himself painfully to the floor and take up his position for the night in the precise spot where, eight years ago, his cushion had always been placed. ‘See you in the morning,’ said Partridge. ‘Probably.’

  George ignored this. Ignoring dogs, dead or alive, was the best way to treat them. He followed Esmeralda as she toiled upstairs to the room they had shared for so many years. He sat on the other side of the bed, as he had always done, while she rummaged in her bedside cabinet for the blood-pressure pills, the cholesterol pills, the indigestion pills and all the other pills that were supposed to stave off the unmentionable thing that had happened to George.

  They still each had their own side of the bed. That was something. As she levered her legs up on to the mattress she did not stray into his territory, as she had been careful not to throughout the long years of their marriage. If only he could talk to her, George thought, being dead would not be so bad. That was what he had enjoyed most of all. Talking to her.

  There were things he should have said. Not ‘I love you’ – he had said it plenty of times but it was a line that did not particularly impress Esmeralda. She knew he loved her. She wanted to know what he was going to do about it. ‘Love,’ she always used to say, ‘comes out of what you do. Not what you say. Words are cheap with you. You’re good with words.’ Well, yes, he had been good with words and she was one of the few people who appreciated that in him. She had even, sometimes, affected to like his poetry.

  She knew him so well. He was incapable of fooling her. That was what he liked – or loved – most about her. ‘You usually say, “I love you”,’ she had said once, ‘when you want something. Or if you’re frightened. Or if you’re going away. Or if you’re thinking of cheating on me.’

  That was the thing he should have said. He should have told her about the woman from the NatWest. He should have told her about Biskiborne. Maybe that was why he had come back from the dead. Or, to put it more accurately, never properly departed from his life. He should have told her their marriage had not been as fundamentally solid as she thought it had been. That seemed unnecessarily sadistic, did it not? But, then, nothing would have surprised George about what the bastards had in store for him.

  ‘I had an affair with that woman from the bank,’ he said. ‘My secretary. Julie Biskiborne.’

  It was impossible to tell if she had heard him. Probably not, George thought. She would, surely, have looked a little more surprised. She had only just returned from his funeral. What she said next, however, seemed more like the beginning of a conversation than a monologue. Although in long marriages, as George knew to his cost, it was often difficult to distinguish between the two.

  ‘Oh, George!’ she said. ‘Oh, George! I understood you so well.’ She lay back on the pillows. ‘Wherever you are,’ she went on, ‘I hope you’re not worrying about that ridiculous woman. The one from the bank.’

  ‘You knew about her?’ said George.

  ‘It was so obvious you were having an affair with her,’ said Esmeralda. ‘I remember when we went to a party at the bank and she was there and you were so furtive. It was obvious you were shagging her. Well. I wasn’t very interested, was I? At the time.’

  ‘That,’ said George, ‘is true.’

  ‘She had a ridiculous name…’ said Esmeralda.

  ‘Julie Biskiborne,’ said George.

  ‘Julie Biskiborne,’ said Esmeralda. ‘That was it. I couldn’t imagine how you could ever get involved with a person who had such a ridiculous name. And she was, as far as I could see, a pretty ridiculous person.’

  ‘She was,’ said George. ‘She was a pretty ridiculous person.’

  ‘She was absolutely fucking ridiculous,’ said Esmeralda, decisively.

  This wasn’t a conversation, thought George, more like call and response of a rather primitive kind, but it was, he decided, a step in the right direction.

  ‘You’re out there somewhere, George,’ said Esmeralda. ‘You’re not the kind of person who will ever go away. Not really.’

  ‘No,’ said George.

  ‘I mean,’ said Esmeralda, ‘I was in love with you, George. That’s it. It’s simple. If you love someone. Really love them. You don’t stop loving them.’

  ‘No,’ said George. ‘You don’t.’

  ‘Why does Jane Austen always end with the marriage?’ went on Esmeralda. ‘It’s with the marriage that things really start. Everything before that is just making up your mind, and once you’ve made up your mind, then it begins. There are so many wonderful, beautiful things that happen as a result. That’s when the relationship starts. That’s the real deal. And you have to stick with it. It’s why I never bothered to ask you about Biskiborne or whatever her name was. I really was not interested in her. What did she have to do with us? We’re the story, George. You and me. We loved each other. You died. End of story.’

  She got up then and went through to the bathroom. He stood and watched her as she studied her face, with the practised cynicism of the sixty-something, in the mirror. She rubbed cream into her skin. She looked at herself again. Then she shed her clothes in a light and practical manner. George gazed at her white flesh. It was still firm – but he was pretty sure he would like it even when it started to wrinkle and sag and swing around in lumps, which, at the moment, thank God, it did not seem to be doing.

  She had, he noticed idly, a very nice bum.

  When she had brushed her hair (why would you want to brush your hair before going to bed?), she went back into the bedroom. George watched as she went round to her side of the bed and, from his side, he watched her some more. He had no teeth to brush or skin to moisturize or hair not to bother to comb, so he just stood there looking at her.

  Outside, the rain had started again. It fell softly on the neat and ordered suburban gardens. Below, on the patio, he could hear the important snuffle of a badger as it moved closer towards the house and possible sources of food.

  George laid his head on the pillow. He did feel, for some reason, as if he had got a head. Next to him, Esmeralda switched off her light and the room was in darkness. She lay very quietly. He could see her left hand, curled up, as if preparing for the ordeal of sleep. She did not always sleep well. He reached out his hand towards her in the gentle gesture of reassurance he had never performed enough when he was alive. He listened to her breathing. It slowed, gradually. He waited for the light snore with which she sometimes rounded off the evening.

  It didn’t come. He wouldn’t have been able to prod her anyway. She was awake.

  ‘Can you hear me?’ he said quietly.

  ‘Oh, George,’ said Esmeralda, with equal softness. ‘George.’

  She lay there, awake, in the neat suburban bedroom. George lay next to her, as he had done in life. Outside the rain continued. The wind had started up again and beat against the window in a steady rhythm. Down in the street someone was trying to start their car. They turned over the engine. It seemed about to cough its way into life but each time it didn’t quite make it. Further away, a group of lads were on their way home from the pub. He could hear them shouting to each other and, as their footsteps moved further away down the street, the shrill laughter of girls. Some things never change, thought George. They could have been his lads, years ago, on their way back from some party. This was going to continue. Boy meets girl. Boy marries girl. Boy dies. Girl, somehow, carries on.

  He listened in the darkness. Eventually there was a gentle regularity to Esmeralda’s breathing and then, for a while, Mrs Pearmain, as well as her husband, was lost to the world.

  About the Author

  Nigel Williams is the author of over sixteen novels - including the bestselling Wimbledon Poisoner. He wrote the Emmy and Golden Globe award-w
inning Elizabeth I, starring Helen Mirren, and his stage plays are performed around the world. He is also the host of the long-running BBC Radio comedy show HR with Jonathan Pryce and Nicolas le Prevost. He has lived in the London borough of Putney for thirty years. You can sign up for email updates here.

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  Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Notice

  Dedication

  Part One

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Part Two

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Part Three

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Chapter Twenty-three

  Chapter Twenty-four

  About the Author

  Copyright