Street Song

by Wilkinson, Sheena;

  It failed. She looked me up and down and the look didn’t say, What a cute and charming young man; it said, Who is this scruffy waster? She didn’t shake my hand. She said, ‘Toni – I’m going to unpack and have a bath. I’ll be down in half an hour, and I expect this room – every room – to be pristine. OK? Then we need to have a chat.’

  Marysia organised us both into stacking the dishwasher, filling the recycling – oh God, how could we have drunk so much? – hoovering, and then rubbing all the surfaces with a damp cloth. Toni opened the windows wide, and I felt suddenly sad, as if all the music was evaporating in the night air, along with the stale food smells and the alcohol fumes.

  ‘Will she kill you?’ I asked, when we’d finally reached the stage of surveying the living room.

  ‘Yep. She’s always going on about trusting me. And until now I’ve never given her any reason not to. God knows what she’ll do now – ground me, not let me play in the band—’

  She blabbed this all out incoherently while she scrubbed at a stain on the arm of the sofa.

  ‘You haven’t done anything wrong,’ I said. ‘We weren’t doing drugs, or having sex.’ I sighed. ‘You didn’t have a party. You’ve gone to school every day. You’ve even done your homework! I mean, realistically, she hasn’t much to complain about, has she?’

  ‘We did drink nearly all her wine,’ Marysia pointed out.

  ‘I’ve let a total stranger stay in her house for—’ Toni counted on her fingers, ‘six nights.’

  ‘Actually,’ Marysia said. ‘She doesn’t know that.’

  We all looked at each other.

  ‘OK, so if we get rid of all your stuff from the spare room while she’s in the bath she doesn’t need to know you’ve been staying here. And then she’ll only half-kill me.’

  ‘So where am I meant to go? It’s nearly ten o’clock at night.’

  ‘Um – could he stay at yours, Marysia? Just for tonight?’

  ‘No! There’s no way my parents would let me bring a strange boy home to stay the night. And we don’t have a spare room.’

  ‘You have that big shed. If he sneaked in from the back entry and you smuggled him out a sleeping bag—’

  ‘You’re making me sound like the class hamster here.’ I tried to hide the panic in my voice. ‘And I’m not sleeping in a bloody shed.’

  Water gurgled down the waste pipe outside the window.

  ‘We haven’t much time. If she goes into the spare room for any reason—’

  ‘She won’t. Why would she?’

  ‘OK. I’m going up to grab your stuff. I have to, Cal. I’m sorry.’

  ‘I’ll get it,’ I said.

  ‘No – if she sees you upstairs—’

  ‘I’ll say I’m going to the loo. Christ’s sake, Toni, lighten up. We haven’t done anything wrong.’ I was already starting out of the room, when a very sharp voice yelled down the stairs.

  ‘Toni! Get up here right now!’

  9

  It was like Goldilocks. Who’s been sleeping in my bed?

  I hadn’t been sleeping in anyone’s bed. I’d been sleeping chastely and alone in the spare room. Which Toni tried to explain, not in that exact language, but it wasn’t going well. Marysia and I were listening from the bottom of the stairs, and though the row had begun in hisses and whispers, Toni had started shouting and her ma had followed suit.

  ‘You can’t just open my house to anyone you feel like giving a bed to.’ Never mind the class hamster; she made me sound like some kind of smelly tramp.

  ‘He’s my friend,’ Toni said.

  ‘Since when? I’ve never heard of him before.’

  ‘I met him in Dublin.’ Sulkily.

  ‘When?’

  Hesitation. ‘Ages ago.’ Six days probably was ages if you were a butterfly or something.

  ‘Where?’

  ‘Near Dad’s.’ Please let her not say she picked me up in a park.

  ‘So he’s someone you met through your dad?’ She didn’t sound impressed.

  Another hesitation. Never mind guitar tuition; Toni needed coaching in how to lie. Then, ‘Yeah. He’s – he’s one of Dad’s musician friends.’

  Marysia grimaced. ‘That may not be the smartest thing Toni’s ever said,’ she whispered. ‘Her mum hates her dad. Even more than Toni does.’

  ‘So what’s he doing in our spare room? Apart from drinking the place dry and – God, Toni – look at the mess in here!’

  Please let her not go through my stuff. She so obviously wasn’t the kind of mother who’d be cool about the tiny lump of weed she might find in the bottom of my backpack. I’d moved it from the guitar case because I didn’t want the girls to see it. And the stupid thing was, I’d never felt less like taking anything in my life. OK, we’d hit the wine fairly hard, I suppose – I mean, it was just there – but other than that I was clean as a whistle.

  ‘Look – he’s just a nice boy on his gap year,’ Toni said. Nice boy? Is that what she really thought? ‘Dad let me down last week – you don’t want to know – and Cal offered to help out. He plays the guitar like an angel. He’s been so generous about helping me. You should hear the difference he’s made to the band!’

  ‘Well, it’s time he went and made a difference somewhere else.’

  ‘Mum – it’s ten o’clock at night. We can’t just throw him out on the street.’

  Long silence. I held my breath. I had most of my five hundred euro left. I’d been to the bank about my swallowed-up card and they’d told me the card had been reported as stolen. I hadn’t wanted to go into it in too much detail, obviously, but I took it as a sign from Ricky: he was alive and severely pissed off, and he could still control me from a distance by trying to starve me into coming back and taking what I deserved.

  There were buses to Dublin all through the night. Was it time to go back?

  But I couldn’t hide in Dublin. Even though people didn’t seem to recognise me – the stubble was coming on well, and the stupid highlights Ricky had always made me get to make me blonder and cuter (his words) were pretty much grown out and my hair was back to its natural brown – I didn’t know how long it would be before I started seeking out old mates. Only they weren’t really mates. Just people I knew. People who wouldn’t be good for me. Or I could go home and face my mum’s disgust and Ricky’s rage. No way.

  ‘Mum . . . ’ Toni sounded pleading. ‘I’m sorry, OK? But don’t take it out on Cal.’

  ‘He’s not my problem!’

  ‘He’s my friend.’

  ‘One more night,’ the ma said. ‘And he goes in the morning – I mean it, Toni.’ Even from the bottom of the stairs I could tell that she definitely did. ‘And this is not over. Now let me get dressed and then I’m coming down to inspect your cleaning. And I’ll have a glass of wine – if you’ve left me any.’

  Toni came clattering back down the stairs, her red hair swinging as she shook her head. She blew out through her fringe.

  ‘I’m sorry. She went into the spare room for – I don’t know what. Just her dirty mind.’

  ‘Should I go?’ Marysia asked. ‘Actually I sort of should anyway or my parents will be on my back. I was meant to be back at ten.’

  ‘Oh God. I’m sorry.’

  ‘It’s OK.’ Marysia hugged her and stroked her hair back into place. ‘See you tomorrow. Cal’ – she turned to me – ‘will we see you again? I mean – you can’t just go.’ She gave me a sudden hug too, her long hair tickling me, her hands firm against my back. I hoped that Toni would join in the goodbye hug thing.

  ‘I have to.’ OK. Not Dublin. But there were other places.

  ‘Cal,’ Toni said, ‘I know you want to go travelling, but would you not stay and be in the band? At least until the first heat? And see what happens?’

  Oh God. This is what I didn’t want them to ask. Going on stage again – the lights, the screaming from the dark audience, the high – and then the low. Always the low. I couldn’t go back there. Sweat pricked my neck at
the very thought. But I supposed it would be different. Just a low-key local competition in the upstairs room of a Belfast pub. And I could be the quiet guy playing guitar in the background.

  But they’d have to know my name and everything.

  And there was no such person as Cal Ryan.

  I couldn’t say all that, so I just said, ‘It’s been – magical …’ My voice cracked. Shit. I was always making friends – girls and boys – and just walking away. I’d been sleeping with Kelly all summer and I’d hardly given her a thought. ‘Sorry.’ My voice came out harsh and dismissive. ‘I need to move on.’

  10

  The morning lightened to pale grey outside the window. I pushed my spare hoody further down in my backpack. I looked round the room that had been my home for nearly a week. It was your standard issue suburban guest room – odds and ends of furniture that didn’t quite fit in anywhere else – but I’d got quite fond of it. I’d tidied it, stripped the bed and opened the window, so when Toni and her ma got up, it would be like I’d never been there.

  It wasn’t seven o’clock yet, but I’d decided to split. I’d been awake most of the night, and I didn’t feel up to a long, drawn-out goodbye. And it would be easier not to have to face Toni’s ma in the cold light of day. I hitched my backpack onto my shoulder, lifted my guitar case and left the house as quietly as I could.

  I had planned to leave Toni a note – I didn’t feel great about how we’d left things last night, but when I tried I couldn’t. I didn’t know what to say and most of all, I couldn’t sign it Cal, and I certainly couldn’t write Ryan.

  Lugging my backpack and guitar down the early-morning street, I shivered. I’d left Dublin with just a couple of hoodies, no actual coat, and a week had made a difference to the weather, especially at this time of the morning. To keep my mind off my greater existential problems, I focused on practicalities. I needed to change my euros into sterling – until I did that I couldn’t even buy a cup of tea. Maybe it had been a bit stupid to walk out of Toni’s before breakfast. I needed somewhere to stay that night too. Somewhere as cheap as possible. There must be a backpackers’ hostel or something. I imagined myself sitting in a bright room with loads of guys from all over the world, and pretty Australian girls. I’d be popular because of the guitar. We’d have sing-songs and I’d go off with them, busking round Ireland. I’d keep on being Cal and it’d be brilliant.

  But I couldn’t do anything until I could get to a bank, and I was starving, with that hollowed-out chill that comes after a sleepless night. Wandering the streets, my guitar heavier with every step, watching people with normal lives rush to school and work, clutching takeaway coffee cups, talking into phones or to each other, made me feel lonely. By the time the banks opened and I was able to change my pitiful amount of euro, I was as shaky as I used to be coming down off the various substances that had kept RyLee going.

  A café helped. And my first Ulster fry, which left me feeling I wouldn’t need to eat again until Sunday. The café wasn’t as nice as Kopi, but it was cheap, and cheap was going to have to be my number one priority.

  Which is how, after one of the most frustrating mornings of my life, I checked into the Crossroads Hostel. The sort of place RyLee wouldn’t have known existed. The sort of place that Ryan Callaghan wouldn’t have known existed either. But by the time I was walking through its peeling front door, I was so tired, fed up and footsore that I didn’t much care where I was. Not having a phone was a pain – I cursed myself for throwing it into the Liffey – because I couldn’t look up hostels or even a map of the city. I trudged round for ages and finally found a tourist information centre, which gave me details of several hostels. Three perfectly decent, if basic, hostels where travellers from all over the world came to stay for the famous Belfast craic. And one really grotty-looking one, Crossroads, that I knew I wouldn’t be seen dead in, in an area that even I had heard of. And when you’ve heard of an area in Belfast, it’s not usually a good sign.

  The first one, in a leafy suburban street not far from Toni’s house, was fully booked for the next fortnight.

  No worries. There were two more decent hostels on my list. Both of them had beds. Both of them refused to let anyone book in without ID. I tried all my RyLee charm, but it was no go.

  ‘No ID, no stay,’ they both said. ‘We have to be careful.’

  Careful of what? I wondered, but there was no point arguing.

  Which is how I found myself at the Crossroads. A tall thin house with dirty barred windows in a short dead-end street about a mile from the centre. It overlooked a terrace of bricked-up industrial buildings, and a deserted play park with the swings thrown up over the bars and broken glass round the bottom of the slide. The street was dead-ended by a wall, covered in graffiti that meant nothing to me. The kerbstones opposite the hostel had been painted red, white and blue, but, like the peeling front door, not recently. I hesitated on the crumbling steps and looked down the empty street. Was I mad? A hundred miles away I had a lovely room in a comfortable, luxurious house. I hated Ricky but he wasn’t going to abuse me or anything. He probably wouldn’t turn me in to the police. And he couldn’t actually force me to go and be a good boy for Father O’Dwyer.

  So why was I even thinking about paying to stay in this dodgy-looking dosshouse in an area where I knew people would stare at me as soon as I opened my mouth and they heard my Dublin accent? Maybe more than stare?

  The receptionist was an oldish guy whose belly pressed up against the wooden counter, straining against the confines of his red T-shirt. Both thick arms were tattooed with symbols I didn’t recognise and didn’t feel like analysing too closely. But he looked up in a friendly way when I walked in, scratched his woollen beany hat and said, ‘All right, son?’ His accent was so strong I had to concentrate to make him out.

  I said I was a tourist, and needed a room for a few nights. I’d had my wallet stolen on the train – I was pretty good on details when I was lying – which is why I’d no ID.

  Beany frowned. ‘Not meant to let you in without ID.’

  ‘Ah come on, sure it’s only for a few nights,’ I wheedled. ‘I couldn’t help getting my wallet nicked. I’ll pay cash.’ I pulled out a wad of twenty-pound notes.

  He looked down at my guitar case. ‘No drugs. No drink. Any trouble and you’re out. I don’t do second chances. No curfew, but there’s a lockout ten till five. And, son – I wouldn’t flash that cash round if I were you. Or that fancy watch. We can’t take responsibility for anything lost or stolen. Single for fifteen pound a night, or a bed in a dorm for a tenner. Pay in advance. Breakfast and bed linen included. But not towels. I’ll inspect your room personally before you leave and if there’s any damage you pay for it.’

  I couldn’t stand the idea of a bed in a dorm, so I said I’d have a single and paid for three nights.

  Beany shoved a dog-eared book across the counter. ‘Sign here.’

  I scribbled Cal Ryan for the first time, and felt like a criminal. The names above mine looked eastern European. I wondered if they were travellers, or new immigrants looking for work. I imagined befriending them, telling them about my talented Polish musician friend. Or maybe this wasn’t the sort of place you made friends. I couldn’t really imagine that international sing-song happening here. Beany took back the book and frowned so deeply at my name that I wondered if he’d somehow worked out that it was a fake, but then he looked at me quite kindly and said, ‘Look, son, keep your head down, all right? I’m not saying this is a bad area, but – ach, you know what I’m saying. Mind yourself.’

  He handed me a key and told me I could go and leave my stuff in the room – it was on the ground floor – but then I’d have to clear off and come back after five.

  The room, down a long dark corridor that smelled of bleach – which was better than some of the things it could have smelled of – was tiny, with a single bed against the wall, a wooden chair, a few hooks for clothes and an incongruously pink sink in the corner. There was a ba
throom next door, tiny, clean but damp. I’d have to go out and buy a cheap towel, which was just one of the many essentials I didn’t have.

  It wasn’t even three o’clock. I’d been trudging the streets of Belfast all day and all I wanted to do was fling myself down on the empty bed and sleep. But Beany was waiting for me to hand my key back in and then I’d have to make myself scarce for another two hours.

  I didn’t want to leave anything behind, though my arms ached from carrying, so I hefted my backpack over one shoulder, grabbed my guitar case and set off again. I headed for the city centre. I’d seen enough of Belfast with Toni to know that parts of it were really nice so I didn’t actually need to hang round the scuzzy bits. I’d find another café, relax until it was time to go back to the Crossroads and then—

  Then what? I wasn’t great with my own company. Last week would have been lonely if it hadn’t been for Toni coming home every day. I could find a pub, and stay there until it was late and I wasn’t sober enough to notice the surroundings of the Crossroads. But then I’d be even broker. And Cal Ryan wasn’t meant to be that guy – the one who got off his head when things got tough.

  In a café near the City Hall, I read the Belfast Telegraph and drank a cup of coffee as slowly as I could. They did free top-ups, but when a gaggle of women and prams crowded in, and then a group of girls in school uniforms, and all the tables but mine were full, the waitress gave me a meaningful look and told me I could pay at the till, so I sighed, picked up my stuff and left. It was still only four. Toni would be getting home from school soon. Why hadn’t I said goodbye properly? She’d have given me her number, and even without a phone, I could have got in touch with her. There were still a few phone boxes around if you searched hard enough. In fact, there was a payphone in the hall back at the Crossroads beside Beany’s desk.