Phantoms

by Marie O'Regan

  An observer – there was none – might have thought that the upswell of the water lingered too unnaturally long on the face of the rock, clinging to it in a languorous, almost gelatinous manner. Then it subsided gracefully, and the metal links clinked softly back against the rockface. Tiny rivulets of seawater ran down the bare stone. The figure that had clung to the chain was gone.

  * * *

  A little later, Kirsty came puffing and panting along the cliff path above the chain walk. If she could not follow Fraser along the chain walk, she was determined to meet him at the other end. She found without difficulty the place where a worn track led down to the end of the chain walk, and there she waited, hands on hips. But there was no sign of Fraser at all, not then, nor ever after.

  THE ADJOINING ROOM

  A. K. Benedict

  “Will you be wanting two keys, Madam?” the receptionist says, his voice flexing on “two” almost as much as his right eyebrow. Behind him, a clock tocks against wood panelling.

  “No, thanks. It’s just me,” I say.

  “Have two anyway,” he replies, leaning closer as he hands me the white plastic cards. There’s a slant to his smirk and a grey edge to his teeth that matches the uneven flagstones. “You never know, you might get lucky.”

  I laugh. I’ve only shared a bed once at a conference, and that was with a type of mite. Left me with an unscratchable rash on my back. I take the keys anyway. He’s right, you never know.

  “You’re in room 535,” he says. “Lift to your left. Do you need help with your bags?”

  I hold up my small suitcase. “I’m fine. Travelling light.”

  He nods, eyes already sliding to the person behind me. “Enjoy your stay, Dr Phillips.”

  I’m sure I will. I like it when conferences are held in old places. Identikit box hotels may have better beds but they lack stories and atmosphere. It also takes longer to get drunk in them, as if the air-conditioning sucks up alcohol fumes as well as fun.

  This hotel was grand, once. It’s there in the name and the ghosts of gold leaf on the mouldings. I walk straight past the birdcage-style lift to the staircase. I got stuck in a lift once and haven’t been in one since. Anyway, it’s good to take the stairs – keeps my step count up.

  My room is at the very end of a long corridor. I’ve definitely had worse rooms: the bed doesn’t sink in the middle; my knees fit under the desk; and the art deco bathroom, patched with brown grout, is clean. Best thing is the sea view. Cagoule-grey waves and parka-hood spume.

  Suitcase open on the bed, I unpack. As I hang up my suit, I hear sobbing. It’s coming from the room next door. The cries are muffled but I recognise them. They’re the kind that give sound to the searing that’s going on inside. The kind that tear. I hover by the locked door that links our rooms. I want to say something, but know it wouldn’t help, would embarrass them. Last thing they need is knowing someone can hear them.

  * * *

  Downstairs, welcome drinks are being set up in the ballroom. Conference-goers gather for free glasses of wine. It is already too loud, voices rebounding off mirrored walls. I walk past, head down, towards the revolving doors. I’m not in meeting people mode yet.

  The wind greets me as I step onto the seafront. It pushes back against me, as if wanting to spoon, but I walk through it and over the road. Beyond the railings, the sea kicks against the shore. I breathe in. My lungs fill with salt-baked air and, as I exhale, the whole journey, and all of last year, empties out onto the sand. They’re dragged back in again on the inhale, but a few memories are left, bladder-wracked, on the beach.

  I walk on, past dog walkers, shuttered shops, a bandstand waiting for a band. The rain is at a slight angle, like cold commas aiming for my face.

  Back over the road, a café is still open. Light bleeds through steamed-up windows. I could go in. Sit with a chipped mug of tea. Read yesterday’s paper. Decide I don’t want to deliver the keynote speech and go home.

  I should get back to the drinks, though. The opening ceremony will take place soon and I’m supposed to be there, shaking hands and smiling. I turn, and this time the wind pushes me in the small of my back, speeding up my feet until I round the promenade and see the off-white edifice of the hotel.

  * * *

  At dinner, I’m sat next to a man who can’t stop talking about ellipses. He’s already delivered half of a lecture on them that he’s going to give tomorrow when I interrupt.

  “And here would be a perfect place for an ellipsis,” I say. “That way I get to keep the mystery going till tomorrow.”

  He laughs. Continues his lecture. A woman on the other side of the table rolls her eyes.

  Face aching from fake smiling, I get away before the after-dinner speaker starts, claiming that I want to go over my speech. The carpet swirls as I climb up to the fifth floor. I stop by room 534 but can’t hear anything. They must’ve gone out, or cried themselves to sleep.

  As my key bleeps me into my room, I feel the relief of being alone. Make-up removed, pyjamas on, I slip into bed. The sheets are so cold they feel damp. Or so damp they feel cold. It’s quiet. The sea seems a long way away. I turn the telly on to hear voices: just because I want to be alone, doesn’t mean I don’t get lonely.

  A Friday night panel show is on. Comics discuss the merits of pork pies.

  I lie on my side, the spare pillow pressed behind me (in theory, to support my back; in fact, to give the impression that someone’s there), close my eyes and wait for the room to spin. I’ve had enough wine for it to cartwheel but it stays put. In my head, I start to recite my speech on “Asyndeton and Contemporary Disconnection”.

  * * *

  It’s half three when I wake. In the next room, a woman is shouting. She bangs on the walls, screams at someone to get out.

  I wrangle the blankets off the bed, stumble across the room. “Hello?” I call out. “Do you need help?”

  The shouting stops. All I can hear is a faint, low hum, and the sound of someone breathing, inches from me, on the other side of the door. “Please. Help me.” Her voice is so close she can whisper.

  “I’ll call reception,” I say.

  “There’s no point. They won’t believe you.”

  “’Course they will. Stay there.”

  She says nothing, only laughs the kind of laugh that says nothing’s funny.

  I pat across the wall for the light switch, blink until I can see, pick up the phone on the desk. Dial 0 for reception.

  “Good morning, Dr Phillips. What can we do for you?” the voice says. It’s not the same receptionist. This one has a deeper voice, seems annoyed at being contacted.

  “There’s a problem in the room next to me, 534. Someone’s asking for help.”

  A pause at the other end. A muffled voice, as if a hand has been placed over the receiver. Then removed. “Thanks for letting us know, Dr Phillips, we’ll look into that immediately. Our apologies for your disturbance.” The line clips closed.

  Behind the door, the woman moans. “You’ve got to help me.”

  My hand goes to the lock of the linking door, and stops. It’s the middle of the night and I’m thinking of going into a stranger’s room, into an unknown situation. I step away. Coward. “They’re on their way,” I say.

  “You don’t understand.”

  Footsteps down the hall. Stop just before my room. Knock on another door. “Hello? Can you open up, please? We’ve heard there’s a disturbance.”

  I run to the peephole. I can’t see, the angle’s wrong. I open my door an inch and look through the gap.

  A security guard stands outside room 534. He knocks again.

  The door opens. A man comes out, tying a hotel bathrobe. His hair is pillow-fuzzed. He blinks, adjusting to the light. Maybe she’s had a breakdown and he slept through it? That can happen. “What is it?” he says.

  “A guest contacted us, says there’s a problem in your room, sir,” the guard replies.

  “You’ve got the wrong room. I’ve be
en asleep,” he says. He sees me. Scowls. His mouth seems huge, lips striped with red wine stains.

  “Can we just have a look around?” the guard says. “Check everything’s okay?” He moves forward slightly. It wasn’t a request.

  The guest huffs then retreats into his room. The guard follows. I can’t see anything without stepping right into the corridor.

  “There,” the guest says, coming back into view. His arms are folded. “Satisfied?”

  “Very sorry for the inconvenience, sir,” the guard says, re-emerging.

  “I’ll be wanting a discount for this.”

  I want to barge into the room, fling open the wardrobe, whip back the shower curtain. She’s in there, hiding. Hurting. It’s what people in her position do. Whereas people like me, in my position, lurk behind doors, listening.

  “Talk to reception, sir.” The guard glances at me and looks quickly away, as if he were a guilty child, and strides back up the corridor.

  My neighbour turns to me. “Had a good look, did you? Enjoy your little trick? Pathetic bitch.” His artificially red lips stretch into a sneer. I can almost hear them cracking.

  I step back, close the door. Put the chain on. I move across to the other door, place my ear close to the wood. I can hear him moving across the room, very slowly, dragging his feet. She’s whimpering.

  “I’m sorry,” I whisper to her.

  “Leave me alone,” she says.

  * * *

  Breakfast next morning. I load up my plate with pastries, sit in the corner window. Outside, waves pay no attention to railings. They land on the promenade and on surprised passers-by. The dining room is full of draughts and hungover delegates. The coffee, though, is good. I peel layers from a croissant but do not eat them.

  “Can I join you, Dr Phillips?” Henrik Villiers says, gesturing to the empty chair at my table. He is a lecturer at Queen’s, whose thesis on the em dash causes a surge in the pulse rate of punctuation pedants. I nearly got up the courage to talk to him in Vienna last year on the pretext of discussing his paper, but I turned away at the last minute. And now he’s here. He has kind, seventies-brown eyes behind his glasses and, for a moment, I feel seen.

  “I was just leaving, I’m afraid,” I say, standing up and brushing pastry flakes from my trousers.

  “That’s a shame,” he says. We stand for a moment, facing each other, like a pair of square brackets. “I’m looking forward to your keynote later. It’ll be fascinating.”

  “Let’s hope so.”

  “See you in the bar after?”

  I nod, stride off as if I know where I’m going.

  * * *

  The day is so crammed with events and lectures, punctuated by hallway meetings with people only seen in other conference hallways, that I don’t return to my room till late afternoon. I have one hour before my speech. Time enough to make a cup of tea and go through my notes. My heart punches like unending ellipses. I’ve never been the keynote speaker before. I hope it doesn’t show.

  I angle one of the armchairs so that I can see the sea, place my laptop on the little table. As I open the presentation, a fist hits the adjoining door.

  “Open it,” the woman screams. “Help me, please.” Her words blur, plosive “p”s missing.

  I go straight to the phone. Dial 0.

  “Yes, Dr Phillips?” It’s a different voice again.

  “It’s Room 534 again. A woman says she needs help.”

  That pause. Muffled voice. The feeling that I’m not hearing everything I need. “Room 534 is empty, Madam. The previous guest left this morning, after an unnecessarily disturbed night.”

  “The woman is still in there. In pain. I think she needs medical attention.”

  The receptionist sighs. “The room was cleaned an hour ago. The maid would have noticed anyone inside the room, and tonight’s guests have yet to arrive.”

  “But she banged on the adjoining door, less than a minute ago. Calling for help.”

  The pause is long this time. “You are mistaken, Madam. There are no adjoining rooms in the hotel.”

  “I’m looking at it now.” The door is right in front of me, bolted.

  “That is not true. If you would like an adjoining room then our sales team would be delighted to talk to you about one in our sister hotel?”

  “I. Don’t. Want. Another. Hotel.” I’m shouting. Punching the words.

  “We are glad you are satisfied, Dr Phillips.”

  The line dies.

  I let out a screech of frustration. Slam the wall with my palm.

  “Told you,” the woman whispers from behind the adjoining door. “They wouldn’t. Believe you.” Her words emerge slowly, as if they’re hurt.

  “How did you know?”

  “I’ve been. Where you are.”

  “And where are you?” I unbolt the adjoining door. Reach for the handle.

  “Don’t,” she says. “Don’t open the door.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  She is silent for a while, then says, “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have asked. You to open. The door.”

  I press my face against the frame, whisper into the crack. “Why? You need help.”

  “I’m past that.”

  She whimpers. “No,” she shouts. “I won’t. You can’t make me.”

  “Who’s in there with you?”

  But she doesn’t reply. Behind her whimpers, the low, revving thrum gets louder.

  * * *

  My keynote comes out on autopilot; I don’t even feel the words in my mouth. The audience laughs in the right places, claps in others, gets to its feet at the end. After, I shake hands and take business cards without hearing anyone’s names.

  Henrik walks over. “That was brilliant.” He holds out a gin and tonic. I take it.

  “Thanks,” I say. “I don’t remember saying most of it.”

  “Well, you had this lot in the palm of your hand.” He gestures to the room of flush-faced delegates.

  “Helps that they were already pissed.”

  He laughs. “They weren’t for my paper on terminal points this morning. Two people fell asleep and one left in the middle. Clearly gripping.”

  “I’m sorry I missed it,” I say.

  “I’ll send it to you.”

  “I’d like that.”

  We’re smiling at each other. Proper grins, top lips stuck to gums. We find a table, tucked around the corner, and, for the next hour, we talk. We talk about everything other than full stops: David Lean, broccoli, our relatives, our exes… Possibility passes between us. For a moment, I think of us going through life together, of us being old, bent over like guillemets, on either side of the family portrait.

  And then I remember the adjoining room.

  “What is it?” Henrik says, brows meeting, voice dropping.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Your face changed,” he says. “Like you tasted something that had turned.”

  “I had a difficult night. Not a great day, either.”

  “Do you want to talk about it? I’m a good listener. Secrets stop with me.”

  “It’s not easy to say.”

  “Say it anyway,” he says, turning his back on the crowd.

  I test the words in my mouth before letting them out. When I do, they rush at him. “There’s something wrong in my room I don’t know what’s going on I need to show you please help me.”

  He doesn’t even flinch. “Of course. Do you want to go now?”

  Cuban heels spit against parquet. “This is where you’re hiding, Lisa,” Mark, the conference administrator says, grabbing me by the elbow. He is tall and thin with a small, round head, like an upside-down exclamation mark. “People want their guest of honour.”

  Henrik watches as I’m wheeled off to meet and greet – is still watching when I crane back to where he’s standing.

  I’m dragged off to talk semi-colons with one group, next year’s conference with another, and then it’s dinner. The room is fille
d with clinking and clattering and high-pitched laughs. Even the smells are loud – peas, cleaning fluid and gravy. I’m told stories by those next to me. I know by their teller’s tone when to show concern or make my mouth upturn, but their words fall away. I keep thinking about what I said to Henrik. I’ve got two options: tell him to forget everything, or let him in on what’s happening. Not sure which is the braver.

  Conversations go on around me; chicken cools on my plate.

  Before they serve the desserts, I get up to go to the toilet and, on the way back, stop at Henrik’s table. I still don’t know what choice I’m going to make.

  “How’s it going?” he asks when I crouch next to him.

  “Not great. Though everything’ll look better after the sticky toffee pudding.”

  He nods, making a show of taking this very seriously.

  I laugh. Eyes swivel in our direction.

  “What would you like to do, later?” he asks, his voice soft and low.

  I open my purse and palm one of the keys. “I’ve got to do the rounds after dinner,” I whisper. “But I’ll meet you in my room after eleven. Room 535.” I hand him the key. At this point, I don’t care who sees. Gossip needs nourishment and will be well fed tonight.

  * * *

  It’s only half ten when I get to my room. I take off my shoes and lie on the bed. The ceiling spins, taking me with it. I sit back up again, it’s the only way to make it stop.

  Knock, knock.

  It’s not Henrik. It’s from the other side of the adjoining door. The knocking comes again, along with a sound that reminds me of scales being ripped from a fish.

  “HELP ME!” she screams. Her voice is metallic and stretched as if squeezed through a pipe. “OPEN THE DOOR.”

  I can’t wait for Henrik. I have to help.

  I grab the handle. It doesn’t turn at first. I have to keep forcing it, trying to block out her sobs. I can’t stand her pain anymore.