by Graham Mort
Zoscia lay in late, deciding not to go into the office that day. She’d work at home on her laptop. It made no difference in the end, whether you were in your office emailing the colleague next door or emailing from home. They all existed as pixels on a screen now, text messages, scraps of thought, binary code pulsing through fibre optics. Disembodied, as if their flesh and muscle and blood had been superseded. Before you registered on the system you were a non-person. Username. Password. Then you existed through your virtual self. You were your own avatar. Though that was to do with something else. Vishnu? Some god or other in human form. She pulled the sheets back and stepped into the shower, letting the water fall against her breasts and tighten them.
She could use the time she’d spend driving to the office doing jobs around the house or just relaxing, taking a few minutes to herself. She towelled herself dry and dressed in casual clothes: slacks and an old shirt of Carl’s, washed but not ironed. She didn’t bother with a bra and the soft cotton seemed promiscuous against her skin. She caught its faint scent of detergent and fresh air where it had dried on the line in the garden. When she opened the kitchen blinds the lawn was covered in bluish dew and there were jackdaws hopping across the turned earth of the flowerbeds. Beyond the garden were fields of maize and barley, cabbages spreading to the flat line of the horizon. Last year it had been sunflowers. Turnesol. The mist had almost cleared.
She made coffee, poured breakfast cereal into a bowl, plugged in the laptop at the kitchen table and piled up a stack of case notes with the report she was working on. The house was at the edge of the village and it was quiet, just the odd farm vehicle moving on the lane outside. It led nowhere, to a farm gate, to those fields of drilled crops. She ate the cereal walking barefoot on the lawn where there was no one to see her except the jackdaws squabbling in the ash tree now. The dew was numbingly cold, like needles against her toes.
Zoscia dried her feet, dropped the dishes into the sink, found her spectacles and set to work. She thought about Carl waking in a hotel room, finding a crisp shirt from his luggage, shaving, fastening cuff links, pulling the lapels of his suit jacket tight. She frowned at the dry air of a hotel, anonymous rooms, air conditioning, the breakfast queue. Malaysian and Filipino maids moving between tables in tight uniforms. The way Carl would watch them. All that smiling politeness, their real lives somewhere else.
Zoscia worked all morning, stopping for coffee and a cigarette which she smoked sitting at the garden table on the iron chairs. Her mobile rang a couple of times but she saw it was the office and let it go onto answerphone. She’d pick up the calls later and deal with them in one go. She could always blame the signal, which came and went like a ghost here. Their phones worked almost everywhere but at home. That’s good, Carl said when they found out it was the downside of their new house. No signal, excellent. Fuck them. Downside was upside. To hell with it. Peace. Until a new radio mast went up and one bar became five. Not yet. As she pulled the smoke into her lungs, she remembered her mother tying up her pigtails before she left for school. Her leather satchel with the broken strap. She was in a home now and didn’t know them. Zoscia stubbed the cigarette. She cleared the dirty cups and plates into the dishwasher and ran a cloth over the sink, spattered with coffee grounds from the cafetière.
Carl entered the main stream of traffic. The sun was trying to burn away the mist. It cast a yellow glow onto the windscreen. Each time he passed into a zone of cold air – a temperature inversion – there was a thicker band of white. The radio news was followed by one of those arts programmes where the guests had done supposedly interesting things and written a book about it. An actress writing about her father who’d been a wall of death rider; an ex-gang leader who ran an NGO in the Sudan; a mother who’d published a diary about her son’s autism. Carl switched the radio off. In the silence, he though about Anika. He thought about Michal, the smell of his baby head, his tiny fingernails, the creases in his skin. Fat thighs buttoned into a striped baby suit. The way he’d bang a wooden spoon against this highchair or patter across the kitchen floor, pulling himself upright against the fridge or kitchen cabinets. He’d be walking soon. Into the future, into whatever lay ahead.
The car appeared to glide, entering another veil of mist that thinned momentarily then seemed to clear. He’d got the climate control on so it was warm. The heated door mirrors stayed clear. Carl pressed the accelerator and gathered a little speed. The turbo was almost silent. He liked that relaxed sense of speed. The scent of leather upholstery that creaked faintly as he shifted in the seat. The leather steering wheel and gear shift. His hands were freckled, the skin softly wrinkled. But the car was almost new, renewed every three years, mocking him.
The banks of the motorway were wooded with birch trees, their pale bark spectral in the light. He thought of the deer fleeing, the little stag breaking through the trees with the foal following, then the doe. Everything in the air was a message to them, every molecule of scent meant something. There was a soft crump ahead, then the glow of brake lights through mist. Carl hit the brake and then was thrown back by the airbag as the bonnet crumpled and was flung open. Just a second later he was thrown back against the seat as a car smashed into his and then span and slewed alongside.
Carl was cursing softly. He pressed the button to open the window. Cold air. The taste of fog. Voices shouting. The smell of petrol. From behind him the squeal of tyres against a wet road, as car after car joined the pile-up. The sound of tyres and tearing metal was softened by fog. Carl needed to run, his body drenched in adrenalin, but he was afraid to step from the car. Then a woman staring in at him, shouting something over and over, blood pouring from a gash in her cheek. He felt stupid, paralysed, the airbag pressing against his face, thinking of Michal, of deer streaming through trees, panicking onto the ploughed land, their breath streaming.
The kitchen was open-plan, joined together with the living room with its big brick fireplace and wood-burning stove. The log pile was at the side of the house where Carl loved to split and stack a load for the winter, piling them in some scientific way so they’d dry in the airflow. It was a good feeling that, being prepared for whatever lay ahead. For those winter days when snow might pile against doors and windows, though it hadn’t snowed that hard for years. Mainly it was grey skies and a sniping wind that hissed over the farmland.
When Zoscia glanced up from the screen she could see through the lounge to the track outside. A tractor passed, towing a harrow. A jeep spattered in mud and dung, rocking over potholes. Someone went by on a mountain bike, passing the window and glancing in to where she was working in the shadow, behind curtains. A blue top, black shorts, grey cycling helmet. There was no through way and she wondered if they were lost. She half expected other cyclists to follow, riding in a posse, the way they did on the main road.
The lone cyclist reappeared a few minutes later outside the window, leaning his bike into the hedge, unstrapping his helmet, reaching into his backpack. Zoscia stood up, went to the window, then the door. When she opened it she saw it was a young man, thick curly black hair spilling from the helmet. He was short for a man – about her height – broad, with strong legs. His sleeves were pushed back where dark hair grew thickly on his arms. The bike looked technical, all cables and levers, like the one Carl kept in the garage with its gadgets for measuring things. She noticed that he didn’t wear a wristwatch. Zoscia smiled and he smiled back, open-faced, showing teeth that lapped over slightly at the front. His eyes were so dark they seemed almost black, the pupils absorbed.
– Are you lost? There’s no way through here.
The young man nodded and smiled and pointed to the map. It was under control, it was all in hand. He unstrapped his helmet and sat it on the saddle.
– Where are you trying to get to?
He didn’t answer but raised his head and tapped two fingers to his throat. She must have looked absent because he shook his head and made the mute gesture again, more urgently. Zoscia felt something melt
. Her belly was a soft fruit, her blood effervescent, washing her away, drenching her. The dark eyes were watching her. He smiled an apology and held out the map.
Zoscia traced the route he’d taken with her finger and he showed her where he must have gone wrong. They were laughing. Standing this close, he smelled of grass and hedgerows and fresh sweat. Then he was in her kitchen drinking a glass of water. Then her hand was on his arm, brushing the dark hair. Then he was tasting her mouth, like the water, like the fruit that had seemed to melt inside her at his muteness.
Zoscia found a fresh towel and led him to the shower. When he emerged she tugged the towel away and led him to bed. His hair was tousled and wet. Zoscia guided him, his eyes widening then closing. She pulled him towards her, into her, feeling his urgency and heat, his arms still faintly damp from the shower. He was gentle as he quickened and they came together in a little tremor that she knew might be the beginning of remorse. Then they lay in a band of mild sunlight that showed up motes of dust turning in currents of air. A dog was yapping faintly at the nearest farm.
After a time he kissed her shoulder before rising to get dressed, smiling at her, pointing to where his watch should have been, that pale stripe on his wrist. When he left, Zoscia watched from the upstairs window. He looked absurd with his curls spilling, peddling down the lane towards the main road. Vishnu in a cycling helmet. Zoscia showered, then dressed in Carl’s old shirt, changed the sheets, and carried on working as if nothing has happened. She didn’t even know which language he might have spoken. She’d stroked his neck like a child’s when he came and sagged against her. She wondered when he’d last had a woman. Her phone beeped and she saw a line of messages from Carl.
Zoscia collects the plates and the beer bottle and bottle cap and glass and neatens them on the old tin tray. It’d been her mother’s before her mind had flown away. She goes to the trellis where the fruit trees are espaliered and brings two plums, dusky with bloomed yeast, and rinses them under the tap. They’re sweet and warm from the sun. Carl takes one and bites into it. She thinks of the boy’s eyes, how dark they were.
– Will you get it finished today?
Carl squirts the plum stone between his finger and thumb and it shoots into the shrubbery where verbena is fading and dropping its leaves.
– Maybe.
He’d worn a surgical collar after the crash, his neck stiff from whiplash. They’d waited in the mist, listening to what was happening on their car radios as the fog gradually cleared. Over thirty cars and lorries had piled together. No one was killed, which seemed a miracle. A white horse had galloped past them in the field beyond the hard shoulder, snorting with terror. That had been two years ago, yet his mind still went back there to the bloom of brake lights, the soft crumpling of metal, to that woman’s face, and to the deer stepping across the road as his engine panted smoke.
– What about dinner. We could go out?
– We could. Is that what you want?
They could walk to the new restaurant in the village. Paulo’s. It was owned by an Italian guy and his wife. He did the cooking and she looked after front of house. The food wasn’t bad and they could drink decent wine, find something to talk about, then walk home arm in arm. They’d pause to read the names on the war memorial, think about those three boys waiting to die, white-faced in the sun. They’d regret the new church, all concrete and stained glass. As if God would mind. The village would be settling down to sleep, curtains drawn, dogs calling from the farms. Then cities lighting up the horizon, shutting out the stars, reminding them how the world turned from sleep to waking, from waking to sleep.
– What do you think? Dinner at Paulo’s? My treat…
Carl shrugs and stands up, stretching his arms, massaging the tendons behind his knees.
– I don’t mind.
– Don’t mind?
A little cloud drifts into her face to darken it.
– I meant it would be nice.
He smiles a little ruefully and she dips her head, remembering to call Anika in the morning, wondering if Michal will recognise them on the computer screen.
– OK. We’ll go out, then. I’ll ring to book a table.
– Do you need to do that?
– Might as well be sure.
– OK. I’ll get on with this.
Carl looks to the wall he’s building. Once it’s up and planted out and the moss has grown back no one will notice its flaws. It’ll blend together with time. Zoscia lifts the tray with its glasses and plates. The bottle overbalances and she steadies it.
It would be a nice thing. Dinner, with Zoscia then the walk home, a bed made up with crisp sheets and nothing much to do next morning except a slow breakfast and the Sunday papers. Carl pulls on the gauntlets and leans down to kiss the nape of Zoscia’s neck, remembering how her hair had glowed once, fierce and tawny. Like a lion. Like a hawk. He picks up a stone and taps it into place.
IN THEORY, THEORIES EXIST
The air above the trees vibrated to the sun’s rising pitch. It looked like ice or flawed glass skimmed by water. The sky was pale, empty of birds, though swifts had flickered over the roofs earlier. To his right, the rocky coastline simmered in foam where an acid-blue sea met burned volcanic rock. To his left, the Pyrenees stepped away, gaunt as caried teeth. Directly behind him, the church glared. From here it was tiny, almond white. Yachts glinted in the marina and a few windsurfers were glittering across the bay on fluorescent blades. He loved the way the headland dropped to the subtle blues of the Mediterranean: earth, sea and sky colliding. Though once the early mist cleared. The land flowed around her: west to the North Sea, east to the heart of Europe.
If you squinted hard, or looked through binoculars, you could see a red fishing vessel moored at the quay where a group of fishermen in yellow overalls were unpacking the night’s catch or mended their nets. A few workmen and tourists were taking coffee in the quayside cafés, reading the newspapers, thinking about what to do with another day. Down there was the stink of fish and chickens roasting in the butcher’s rotisserie. Up in the valley, the air was aromatic with the scents of crushed lavender and rosemary where his boots laboured at the path and his legs brushed the tinder-dry undergrowth. Two years ago a fire had scorched the hillside. The scrubby pines had exploded like fireworks. You could still see blackened bark on the parched cork oaks, the firebreaks where they’d cleared the trees and tried to stop the flames from leaping across.
Ralph was going to be fifty-four in three days. Fifty-four had been unimaginable once. An insect touched against him and he pushed his shirtsleeve from his forearm to see the bite. His grandmother was from Kashmir and his skin had a cappuccino tint, though no longer smooth and youthful. It had the look of aged vellum now. His grandfather had been a professional soldier and met her in the NCO’s mess, the daughter of a famous silversmith. It had stirred things up a bit when he brought her home. Especially when she turned out to be more English than the English after being educated by the Sisters of Mercy. She was long gone, only this trace of her in his genes.
He was going to be fifty-four, so he didn’t much feel like being told what to do. Not by Stella now that Simon had gone. Not by his shrinking circle of friends – half of whom Simon seemed to have pulled away with him. Not by anyone if he could help it.
Stella was flying out to spend a few days at the flat with him. So she’d be here for his birthday on the twelfth. Which promised to be less than glorious. He’d better do what he wanted to whilst there was still some vacation to do it in. After all, Stella couldn’t help telling him what to do. It was just her way. Like her abrupt laugh, her tangle of auburn hair with its threads of grey, her stout calves and her addiction to Scholl sandals with wooden soles that made her feet look like hooves. She’d never had much use for gratuitous physical exercise and she’d think he was mad, climbing up to the monastery in this heat, in his condition. Maybe he was mad. Not bad and dangerous. Just a little deracinated. A good word for it.
He’d
already been in the village for a few days and got pretty well acclimatised. Each morning he started with a swim in one of the rocky bays around the headland, bobbing out towards the opposite side of the bay and back again. He wasn’t a great swimmer, but he loved the astringency of early morning water when a faint mist rose from the calm. Just as the first fishing boats were putting out to sea, before the beaches filled up with scuba divers and tourists. Yesterday a stocky young woman had stripped naked in front of him before pulling on her bikini bottom and lolloping into the sea clutching her breasts. It made him feel old. Wasn’t he supposed to look for God’s sake? She spent the next twenty minutes pretending to shriek at the cold for her husband’s benefit. He was one of those Spanish guys with thick legs, soft brown eyes, a mat of chest hair and a broad, dark jaw. He was fond of her, his idiot wife, and didn’t seem the slightest bit put out when she dropped her skirt. Ralph had grabbed his beach things and the novel he’d been trying to read and headed back to a bar for a cortado. At times like that he missed Simon. How they’d have laughed, Simon mimicking her cries with cruel accuracy and mocking the he-man act.
They’d holidayed in the village every year for the past five. Six? Well, they’d missed last year for obvious reasons, when Ralph had been recovering from the op. So that didn’t really count. He felt conspicuous being here alone. Not as conspicuous as at the university, though, which was just another village with its rivalry and gossip and intellectual bitchiness. If intellectual was the word. The village here stank of hot stone, cat shit and fish. The university stank of mendacity and ambition. Thank God for Stella with her dirty laugh and her dependable cynicism. Though she’d always managed to do OK, somehow. When the shit hit the fan she never seemed to get spattered. Finesse, darling, finesse, she’d say to that, showing her wicked back-slanting teeth, lighting another cigarette, blowing out phantoms of smoke.
