by Johnny Mains
‘I take it you still haven’t shagged him then?’ said Christine.
Chloe grimaced. ‘No, and I’m not planning to.’
‘You want to watch it, girl,’ Christine warned. ‘Even the nicest bloke in the world won’t stick around for ever if you don’t give him a bit of what he needs.’
Chloe looked away, trying to appear casual, though in truth she felt uncomfortable, out of her depth. If Christine ever found out that she was still a virgin, Chloe thought she might shrivel up and die with humiliation.
‘I’m not sure if I’m really that into him,’ she said. ‘I don’t think he’s the man for me.’
Christine rolled her eyes. ‘I’m not saying you should marry him, for God’s sake. Just have a bit of fun while you can.’
‘But I don’t think I even fancy him that much,’ Chloe said, trying not to sound defensive.
Now Christine looked pained. She shook her head slowly. ‘You know what your problem is?’
‘I’m sure you’re going to tell me.’
‘You’re too picky. Ten years from now you’ll be desperate to get a man into bed. And you won’t be so fussy then, believe me.’
Chloe shrugged, a dismissive gesture to hide the tightening in her stomach, and wandered over to the window. From up here on the third floor she could look down on the bustle of Tottenham Court Road, the continuous flow of people and traffic, and kid herself that she was removed from it all, that for the moment, at least, her world was an oasis of calm amid the chaos.
Directly across from the London Listings office was a row of unprepossessing retail outlets – a printer’s, an office equipment suppliers, shops selling mobile phones, white goods, music and electronics equipment. Gazing out at the familiar view, Chloe suddenly gasped, as if someone had placed a cold hand on the back of her neck. On an anonymous patch of wall, between a sandwich shop and a display window packed with second-hand TVs, was the red door.
As before, it was upside-down, and was situated not at ground level, but about half-way up the wall. People were walking to and fro past it, partially obscuring it at times, but despite its unusual aspect, no one appeared to be giving it so much as a second glance. Chloe stared at it unblinkingly for several seconds, her heart beating hard. Then she closed her eyes, and kept them closed for a count of five, before opening them again.
The door was still there. Immediately a thrill went through her, though whether it was a thrill of fear or excitement she wasn’t sure. She shuddered, her arms bristling with goose bumps, but in her head she was thinking, It is there. It is real.
‘Chris,’ she said, hoping her voice didn’t sound odd.
‘Yeah?’
‘Come over here a sec.’
‘What for?’
‘I want to show you something.’
‘What?’
‘Just come here. It’s easier to show you than to explain.’
Behind her she heard Christine sigh in exasperation, but she didn’t turn round. Now that she had established that the door was there, Chloe didn’t want to take her eyes off it, even for a second. After a moment she was rewarded with the sound of Christine’s chair scraping back and her footsteps crossing the wooden floor.
‘Okay. So what’s so amazing?’
‘Look across the road at that wall between the sandwich place and the TV shop and tell me what you see.’
Christine was almost shoulder to shoulder with Chloe now, which brought her into Chloe’s peripheral vision. Just as she was tilting her head to look where Chloe had indicated, a high-sided delivery van drove past on the opposite side of the road, temporarily obscuring their view of the red door.
When the van had passed, Christine shrugged. ‘I see a wall. What am I supposed to see?’
Chloe felt sick. ‘No,’ she moaned.
‘What’s the matter?’
‘It’s gone.’
‘What has?’
‘What I wanted you to see.’
Christine looked at her in exasperation. ‘Well, what was it?’
Chloe shook her head. ‘It doesn’t matter now.’
Christine’s expression became an angry scowl. ‘Are you taking the piss?’
Miserably Chloe shook her head. ‘No, I’m not. I swear, I’m not.’
‘So what was it then?’
Chloe took a deep breath. ‘A door.’
‘A door?’
‘Yes. A door in the wall.’ She groped for an explanation. ‘It must have been an optical illusion.’
Christine’s eyes bored into her. She looked as though she wasn’t sure whether to respond with pity, anger or contempt. Finally she shook her head and turned away. ‘You’re fucking weird,’ she said.
‘Thanks for taking this so well,’ said Chloe.
Nick gave her a wry look and rubbed absently at the chipped veneer of the circular table. The pub was so cavernous that it seemed relatively empty, though they still had to raise their voices above the buzz of chatter which echoed off the high ceiling.
‘I’ve never been one for screaming and shouting,’ Nick said, ‘though that doesn’t mean I don’t care. To be honest with you, I’m crying inside.’
Chloe wasn’t sure how to respond. Was he joking? ‘Really?’
‘Well, maybe not crying, but . . . I can’t pretend I’m not disappointed. I thought we had something. I thought we were getting on pretty well.’
‘We do get on well,’ Chloe said. She was briefly tempted to reach out and take his hand, but in the end she kept them folded in her lap. ‘And you’re a nice guy, Nick, a really nice guy. You’re good-looking, funny, interesting, kind . . .’
‘Please don’t tell me you’re about to say “it’s not you, it’s me”?’
The remark could have been cutting, sarcastic, but he said it gently, with a faint, sad smile. Chloe matched his smile with her own. ‘I suppose I am in a way. I’m just . . . not ready for a relationship. I’m cut up about Mum, I’m confused . . . to be honest, I don’t know what I want right now. I’ve lived in London for two years, but I don’t actually like it that much. I might even go home . . . or does that sound too much like giving up, admitting defeat?’
He shrugged. ‘It’s entirely up to you. Ultimately, you have to do what you think is best.’
‘I know.’ She sighed. ‘But the trouble is, I don’t know what that is.’
He smiled, a warmer smile this time, and leaned forward. ‘You’re a sweet girl, Chloe, and I understand about you not wanting a relationship right now, what with your mum and everything – but that doesn’t mean we can’t still be friends, does it? We can meet for drinks, days out; perhaps we can go to the cinema or the theatre now and again. What say we jettison the romantic baggage and just be mates?’
She looked at him sceptically. ‘And you’d be happy with that?’
‘Yeah, why not? I do have girls who are just friends, you know. I’m not so desperate that I see every woman as a potential partner.’
He looked sincere. ‘I’d like that,’ she said. ‘But what about the whole online dating thing?’
‘I’ll try again. If nothing else, it’s a way to make friends – and you can never have enough of those. What about you?’
She wrinkled her nose. ‘I think I’ll give it a miss. Not that this hasn’t been nice, but it’s not really my thing. My friend Chris kind of bullied me into it in the first place.’
He gestured at her empty wine glass. ‘Well, now that we’ve got that sorted, fancy another?’
She hesitated. ‘Why don’t we go back to mine for a cup of tea instead? It’s on the way to the tube station.’
He raised his eyebrows slightly. ‘Well, I don’t know. Are you sure you’ll be able to contain yourself once we’re alone together?’
She laughed. ‘It’ll be tough, but I have a will of iron.’
; It was a cold night, windy enough to propel leaves and litter along the street in loops and spirals. They walked briskly up Tufnell Park Road, turning left by the theatre on the corner. The illumination from the street lamps was splintered by a row of wind-blasted trees lining the edge of the pavement, casting a jittering kaleidoscope of vivid orange light and deep black shadow upon the ground. As they walked up Carleton Road, Chloe leaned in to Nick and surprised him by taking his arm. Ironically, now that there was no longer the pressure to become romantically linked with him, she felt more affectionate towards him, more at ease in his company. They were about half-way between the pub and Chloe’s flat when a series of elongated shadows detached themselves from the darkness ahead.
Chloe tensed, unconsciously tugging on Nick’s arm, but he said, ‘It’s all right, come on.’
‘Let’s cross the road,’ she whispered.
‘There’s no need. We’ll be fine.’
His confidence was reassuring, but Chloe still felt nervous. As she and Nick approached the hovering shadows, they began to move, sliding forward out of the darkness with a series of soft, snake-like rustles.
There were four of them, boys in bulky jackets and baggy jeans, hoods pulled up around their faces. One of them spoke, his voice both conversational and threatening.
‘What you doin’, man?’
Nick’s reply was friendly. ‘We’re just walking home.’
Another voice came out of the darkness: ‘Oh yeah? Where you live?’
‘Not far from here.’
‘Where exactly?’
Nick barely missed a beat. ‘I’d rather not say if you don’t mind.’
‘Why not? What you think we gonna do?’
‘I don’t think you’re going to do anything.’
‘You got a phone?’ said the first boy.
‘Yes.’
‘Can I borrow it?’
‘What for?’
‘Wanna make a call.’
‘Haven’t you got a phone?’ Nick asked.
The boy made a clicking sound with his teeth. ‘All out o’ charge, innit?’
‘What about your friends?’
The boys moved forward en masse. The one who had first spoken, the tallest of them, suddenly had a knife in his hand. ‘Never mind about them. Give me your fucking phone, man,’ he said.
‘No,’ said Nick.
‘Fucking give it, or I stab your fucking eyes out.’
Chloe’s throat was dry with terror, but she managed to croak, ‘Just give it to him, Nick. It’s only a phone, for goodness sake.’
Nick glanced at her, as if about to say something. As he did so, like a weaving snake sensing a chance to attack, the tall boy sprang forward.
Chloe screamed as Nick and the boy came together. There was a clash of bodies, a grunt, and then Chloe became aware of a dragging weight on her arm and realised that Nick was sliding slowly and silently to the pavement, his legs folding beneath him. She clutched him for a moment, trying to hold him upright, but eventually had to let him go to prevent herself being dragged down with him. As Nick fell, the tall boy stepped forward and shoved Chloe in the chest hard. She staggered back, certain for a moment that she’d been stabbed and that the shock and the pain would kick in later. As she put a hand to her chest, expecting to feel the wetness of blood, the tall boy crouched over Nick like a hawk over a rabbit, picking at his coat and the pockets of his trousers, pulling out a phone, a wallet, keys. Then the boys were slipping away into the night, not hurrying, crowing over their booty, their victims forgotten.
Chloe scrambled forward, legs like water, heart and head pounding, lips gummed together with saliva that had dried to glue in her mouth. She reached out, touched Nick’s body.
‘Nick,’ she croaked, ‘Nick.’
She touched something wet. She lifted her hand. It was black under the street light.
Nick’s parents were Jean and Brian. His sister, who was in the second year of her A levels, was called Liz. They arrived around 4a.m., having driven down from Durham. When they walked into the intensive care unit, Chloe rose from the chair beside Nick’s bed and said, ‘Hello, I’m Chloe. I’m a friend of Nick’s. I was with him when it happened.’
Nick’s sister looked down at her brother, white-faced; his mum burst into tears. Only Brian acknowledged her.
‘How is he?’
‘They think he’s going to be fine,’ Chloe told them. ‘The knife punctured his lung, but he’s had an operation, and they’ve patched him up. As you can see he’s breathing on a respirator at the moment, but they . . . they think he’s going to be fine.’
Her voice petered out. She was exhausted, emotionally and physically. She swayed on her feet, had to sit down again. Then Jean was stepping forward, grasping her hands.
‘Look at you, pet,’ she said. ‘You’re just about done in. Thank God you were with him. You saved his life.’
Her eyes were wet with tears, but she was smiling shakily now, beaming with gratitude. Like Brian, she was portly, her hair chestnut brown and worn in a way that made Chloe think of Shirley Bassey.
‘I don’t know about that,’ she said. ‘I just called for an ambulance. Anyone would’ve.’
‘He’d have bled to death without you,’ Jean insisted. ‘Little life-saver, you are.’
Chloe didn’t have the courage to tell her the truth – couldn’t bring herself to say that if she hadn’t arranged to meet Nick in the pub to tell him their relationship wasn’t working out, and if she hadn’t refused that final drink, and if she hadn’t suggested he walk her home, then her son would never have been stabbed in the first place. Sitting beside Nick’s unconscious form, staring at the transparent plastic mask covering his nose and mouth, and listening to the machines that were monitoring his life signs, Chloe couldn’t help but think that this was all her fault, that if she hadn’t been so selfish this would never have happened.
Suddenly, surrounded by Nick’s family, she felt stifled, and pushed herself to her feet.
‘I’ll leave you to it,’ she said. ‘I’m sure you’d like to spend some time with Nick on your own.’
Ignoring their protests she stumbled from the room. By the time she had pushed through the swinging double doors and was out in the corridor she was all but hyperventilating. She staggered to a chair with a pale blue vinyl seat and dropped heavily into it. The corridor outside the ICU was quiet, the only sound a faint buzz from the fluorescent strip lights overhead. Chloe slumped forward, closed her eyes, clasped her hands together. She didn’t realise she was readying herself to pray until she actually started to speak.
‘Lord, if you’re there, and if you’re listening, please help me. Give me the strength to overcome my doubts and believe in you again. I can’t tell you how much the thought of losing my faith terrifies and upsets me. Without it I feel . . . cast adrift. But I can’t pretend that I believe if I don’t, I can’t say I have faith if I don’t feel it on the inside. Help me, Lord, please. If this is a test, or even a punishment, then believe me when I tell you that I want to overcome it, that I want my faith in you to be restored more than anything else in the world. But I can’t live a lie, Lord. I need your strength, I need you to help set me back on the right path. Perhaps that’s selfish of me, or weak, but that’s how it is. I’m only human, after all.’
Her voice trailed off. She didn’t know what she expected to happen, but she felt just the same inside. Empty, lost. It was like a kind of darkness gnawing at her, devouring the light. Groggily she raised her head, her eyelids peeling apart.
The red door was on the other side of the corridor, directly opposite her, no more than half a dozen metres away.
Something rushed through her then – not faith, but a kind of tingling heat that was part awe, part wonder, and part raw, primal terror. For a split-second she wondered if this was it, the sign she had been praying f
or, but the notion had barely formed in her head before she was dismissing it.
No. This door was something different. Something wrong. Something unholy. She could sense it. She could feel it in her blood, in her nerve endings, in her very essence.
And yet she felt ensnared by the door too. Tempted. Tantalised. Repelled though she was, she had to know what was on the other side. Had to.
Almost unwillingly, she rose to her feet. Took a step forward. The door seemed to throb like a heart, to call to her. As before, it was half-way up the wall, upside-down. And now, up close, she could see that its paint was peeling and scabrous, that its wooden panels were cracked, its brass knob scratched and tarnished.
She took another step. She felt stuffed with heat, her eyes and throat pulsing, her heart like a drum whose vibrations shuddered through her body. Slowly she raised a hand, readying herself to knock.
‘Our Nick’s awake, if you want to see him.’
The voice was like a slap, snapping her head round. Chloe gasped, blinking and swaying. For a moment her vision swam, and she thought she was about to pass out. Then the blur of colours and shapes tightened into focus, and she was looking at Jean, whose cheeks were flushed, and whose eyes were alive with excitement and curiosity.
Before Chloe could respond, Jean said, ‘Sorry, pet, did I startle you? What were you doing?’
‘Nothing, I . . .’ Chloe stammered, and turned her head back towards the red door. It was gone.
She sighed. She felt partly relieved, partly bereft.
‘Nothing,’ she repeated.
When she woke it was dark. For ten or fifteen seconds she lay in bed, her mind almost comfortingly blank, trying to remember where she was, what had happened. Was it night-time? The early hours? For some reason that didn’t feel right. Massaging her hot forehead with a cool hand, she sat up, groping with her other hand for her phone on the bedside table. She brought it up to her face, peered at the time: 7:13. Time to get up, time to go to work – but that didn’t feel right either. It was only when she looked again and realised that it was p.m. and not a.m. that the memories came flooding back.
