Awkwardly and painfully on with the jacket, and then with the rucksack, which was worse. I jammed the helmet down over sticky hair, hoping the weight of it might act like a compress, maybe stop the bleeding for a while; I sat for a while sidesaddle and then astride, feeling the strength and solidity of the machine against my own frailty, thinking that it should be making the decisions here, it should do the driving; finally I turned the key and pressed the switch, felt the responsive rumble beneath me, shivered against the vibration that set all my nerves once more ajangle.
Kicked the stand up, worked clutch and gears, went slowly and a little wobblingly away from there.
o0o
Knew the roads, yes; didn’t know, didn’t have the first clue where I was going. Up the hill, yes, away from the river, so much was easy. The quayside had become my father’s territory, and he might yet be back for more kicking. Besides, quayside housing was all grand Victorian sandstone stuff, shipping-company offices and warehouses converted; nice flats they made, to be sure, big rooms and many of them, but not for the likes of me or my friends. Collaborators, councillors, clever and unscrupulous folk made their homes on the river front. You had to be clever and unscrupulous both, to stay rich in this town. You had to make my family like you. QED.
So up the hill I went, blinking and squinting and trying to fight through the dizziness that was kicking in now, brain-damage or a haemorrhage or just the after-effects of being well kicked by my father, just the shock and the pain and a deeper level of distress spilling over. Could’ve been any of them, could’ve been all; privately, though, I suspected that the brain-damage had happened earlier. I accused myself. Lack of oxygen at birth, maybe, or too many drugs as a teenager. Something, anyway. I mean, even given my inheritance, my genetic tendency towards it, just how stupid could I get?
Driving into town at sunset, when they became strong and I lost it, I became a target, a victim, nothing more... Okay, so I couldn’t have predicted or anticipated this, no one could; but that my family might be unsure of me at best, that they might have wanted me restrained and perhaps softened up a little, as a warning or just as a habit—that I should have been prepared for. The last they knew of me bar the postcards, the last sign they’d seen to say Benedict was here, I’d left my favourite uncle splattered and defunct in his hospital bed, and was it any wonder that I wasn’t getting the prodigal welcome the prodigal son had never really deserved?
I should have stopped out of town tonight, come in with the daylight, if I really had to come at all.
Ah, hindsight. Wonderful thing. I might not be seeing so clearly just then when I looked ahead, but my hindsight was as sharp as ever.
o0o
Where to go? I didn’t know, I couldn’t think. Keeping upright, keeping moving, kicking myself in the only bit my father hadn’t kicked, that black hole I called my mind: those took all that I had of strength, of energy, of reserve. Nothing spare for thinking with, for making any of those tough decisions, left or right at the junction, west or east, where best to look for shelter.
Disconnect the brain, and muscle-memory takes over. Some cellular imitation of intellect, maybe it’s what we had before we had a brain, a kind of genetic preamp that just boosts your chances of survival a wee bit above the chaotic mush of instinct. Whatever, it boosted mine that night. I drove unthinkingly, and my body or maybe my bike took me left and right and along and up, till at last we came to what had been my own front door, last time I saw it.
Not my parents’: I wasn’t going anywhere near there, or no nearer than this, at least. This was a sight too near for my entire liking. And a foolish place to come, O my foolish muscles. What was the point? I used to share this flat with Jacko, but I had no keys now and no right of entry. He’d have finished his course a year ago, and students are a motile population; the betting was heavy against his still being here. I could knock, sure, but it’d only be some stranger answered the door. Some kid nervous anyway in this neighbourhood this time of night, opening up on demand to find a man unknown bleeding and hurting, close to fainting on their doorstep: not a kind act, Ben, to put them through that. Engage your brain, engage your gears, get yourself away from here...
But something held me, as I gazed at the window of the flat. The light was on behind the familiar ill-hung, ill-fitting curtains, but it was more than that. No sure sign of occupancy anyway, a burning light, and I’d already worked out that any occupant would likely be a stranger. So why were we sitting here, the bike and me, both rumbling in neutral, going nowhere?
It was the cheeseplant, was what it was. Taller than me, taller than Jacko, almost taller than that high-ceilinged room despite all the twists and kinks in its pale trunk, vast leaves like fingered fans, it had probably also had more character than either me or Jacko, certainly more than the room. Jacko’s pride and joy, that plant. He’d raised it from a cutting or a seed or whatever you do with cheeseplants, however they’re propagated by barely-teenage kids; he’d hired a van to move it when we moved in, though the rest of his stuff would hardly have made one load for a small car; he loved it almost as much as his instruments, or possibly more. Instruments he’d sell, he’d trade, he’d upgrade, but the cheeseplant was forever.
So he’d said, at any rate, more than one drunk or stoned evening in, lying on the carpet with his head almost in its water-tray, gazing up at it in barely-exaggerated worship. Drunk or stoned myself, I’d believed him, and I believed him still. Some things you cling to, you just have to. Hell, I was still riding my sister’s bike, wasn’t I? Still wearing her helmet?
And the cheeseplant was still in the alcove, still getting in the way of those faded, fraying curtains, a leaf or two thrusting through, reaching for the streetlight. Harbouring ambitions, maybe, I know I’m supposed to be a daylight creature, but if I slurp up all this heavy yellow stuff, can I get to be as tall as you?
I was surprised but confident now, not a question in my head beyond would I be welcome or would this be truly bad timing, would he just have his hand up some sweet boy’s T-shirt or down his jeans? I dismounted, gave my steed an approving pat for finding me a refuge—well, actually I leaned for a moment for support but I did it one-handed, just to pretend—and walked up to the door, trying not to stagger as I went.
Made a fist and made a noise, flesh on wood; and waited, listened, heard footsteps and thanked a God I gave no credence to. Tried to ready a smile, didn’t do so well at that to judge by the feel of it on my sticky face, lost it altogether when the door was opened and all my logical, inarguable assumptions were proved false.
I’d been looking for fizzy red hair and a scant red beard, and didn’t see either one of them. Looking for my former flatmate, I emphatically didn’t see him; and for a moment, seeing no more than that failure, I assumed I was seeing a stranger. A young lad he was, cropped bleached hair just showing dark at the roots, an earring and uncertainty fading into something more anxious, and no wonder. What was he seeing? A stranger again, surely: a figure of menace, black leathers and black helmet, tinted visor shoved up to show a face pale with distress and streaked dark with blood...
But after a second he said my name, he said, “Ben...?” on a rising note, startlement mixed with concern; and then I knew him, despite the change of style. Not Jacko, no, but the next best thing, perhaps.
“Jonathan...” Hard to credit, two years on and the same boyfriend; but I supposed stranger things had happened. Leopards could after all change their spots, I knew that from my own life-story. “Is Jacko in?”
“No. No, Tim doesn’t live here any more. But listen, Christ, come in, what happened to you? You don’t...”
I didn’t look so good, I knew that. I might have demurred, but he’d already slipped an arm around my waist, and there was nothing left in me to resist with. He guided, I leaned on him more than I wanted but no more than I needed, and we crabbed awkwardly together down the hall. Not into the front room—my assumptions again and again confounded, he pulled against me when I twi
tched that way, so I just went with the flow—but around the corner and straight to the bathroom. He helped me peel off rucksack and jacket in a single hissing motion, knocked the toilet cover down and settled me on top of it, then lifted the helmet carefully off my head when my shaking hands couldn’t manage the thing.
“Jesus, you’re a mess. Just sit still, okay? Let me...”
Actually, I didn’t have much choice in the matter. A friendly voice and firm, helpful fingers had sapped the last of my will. All I could do suddenly was slump, and give myself over to whatever amateur nursing he could provide.
He didn’t do so badly. A clean J-cloth soaked in cold water, he used it to mop up the worst of the blood and then pressed it against what must have been an open cut above my eye. The water dribbled down over my cheek and eventually under the collar of my T-shirt, but that was cool and welcome. The cut stung a bit, briefly, and I didn’t mind that either.
“Look, can you hold this?” he asked, lifting my hand for me and touching my fingers into place. “Just till it stops bleeding?”
I could, I did.
“Good.” His fingers searched hurriedly through bottles and jars in the cabinet, came up with nothing. “I thought we had plasters, but maybe it’ll just scab by itself. So what else, where are you hurting?”
Everywhere. I couldn’t even shrug without flinching. I shrugged, I flinched, I said, “Ribs, stomach. Legs and arms. Back. Nothing else is bleeding, though.”
“How do you know, have you looked?”
“No.” I didn’t want to look, and I didn’t want him looking either. Didn’t want to put it on show, what harm my father wished me. “I’m pretty sure, though. I think I’d feel it. The leather looked after me, pretty much. That’s what it’s for, you know? Second skin...”
“Uh-huh. Came off your bike, then, did you?” he asked neutrally. He knew damn well I hadn’t come off my bike—not a scratch on the helmet, lots of damage underneath—but he was giving me the chance to be discreet, if I chose to take it.
“No, Jon. I just met someone with a score to settle,” though I hadn’t realised and still didn’t understand how deep it had gouged him, how acid it burned. “Um, I’ll tell you in the morning, okay?” Couldn’t face it now, didn’t want to shape my mouth around the words though I didn’t want to lie or hide the truth either. And then I realised what I’d said, the implications of it; and here I was making easy assumptions again, and, “Oh, fuck. I’m sorry, Jon, landing you with my troubles again. Would you mind, if I just crashed the night on your floor somewhere?”
“Well, you’re not going anywhere else,” he said, “that’s for sure. You can have my bed.”
“No, I don’t want to—” though I did, bed sounded heaven the way I felt, set against a sleeping-bag and a couple of sofa cushions.
“Doesn’t matter what you want, that’s the way it’ll be. It’s not a problem, I’ll just double up with my flatmate.”
“Oh. I didn’t realise,” though I should have thought. “I’m sorry, have I been interrupting...?”
“No, not at all,” he said, grinning. “She’s been in bed the last two hours. First to crash, last to get up, always.”
“She? Jonathan, are you losing your grip?”
“Flatmate, I said. That’s all. Share the rent, share the cooking. Share a bed sometimes, when we’ve got visitors. No big deal, we’re very sisterly. I do her ironing. Chances are she won’t even notice, she’ll be well away by now. Sleeping’s a religion with her. Are you sure you don’t want me to check you over for broken bones or whatever, before you go to bed?”
“I’m sure. What could you do, if you found any?”
“Get you to hospital, of course. You should probably go anyway, just for a check-over, just to be safe.”
I shook my head. “No hospital. Nothing is broken, I’d know if it was.” A rib or two might be cracked, I thought, breathing was such a hard and painful business; but cracked ribs would heal without attention, without fuss or strapping, without taking me through the doors of the hospital where I’d last seen my uncle. Splattered and defunct... “Tell you what you could do, though. You could bring the bike inside. You’ll need the keys, here, there’s a steering lock. It’ll jam the hall up, but...” But I don’t want it sitting outside all night, telling everyone I’m home.
“How’s about if I take it round the back, stick it in the yard? No one’ll see, with the gate closed.”
“Even better. Don’t rev her too loud when you start her up, she doesn’t need it and you don’t want to wake the street.” Don’t want to wake the street to the sound of a bike the neighbours know, if there are any of the old neighbours left and I bet there are...
“Can’t drive,” he said cheerfully, quite unfazed. “I’ll push. Back in three minutes, you just sit there.”
I wasn’t planning on doing much else. From the angle I was sitting, though, I could see a couple of prescription-looking plastic tubs in the cabinet; so I did stand cautiously up and edge a couple of steps across, grabbing at cistern and wall en route to keep from keeling over—having finally quit moving, it was hellish hard to get going again, and the floor was bucking beneath me—and modified joy, one of them said ’Ibuprofen’ on the label and wasn’t empty. Might not be Ibuprofen inside, of course, but the odds were in my favour; and while it’s not my favourite treatment for a headache or other hurts (I’m a bedtime Co-Co man myself), I knew it to be punchy stuff, and oh, my head and other parts did hurt.
So I took three for now with a glass of water, and kept a couple for later in case I couldn’t hang on to sleep. Perched myself on the edge of the bath to wait for Jonathan, the toilet seemed too far away; showed him what I’d found when he came back—“Look,” I said, “treasure...”—and I carried more water through to the bedroom while he all but carried me.
Same old room, unredecorated except for a change of posters. Same old bed also, and it felt pretty close to coming home as I collapsed onto it. Jon helped me undress, rolled me under the covers and tucked me in like a boy much practised at nursing sick young men, which I dared swear that he was. And he kissed me goodnight chastely on the cheek, took a baggy T-shirt and shorts to sleep in, not to shock his flatmate too much when she woke, and turned the light off and left me; and I sighed, groaned a little as I tried to settle sore bones in sore flesh, and span into the darkness like I was drunk or stoned or both.
Three: Not The Same River
Woke by degrees, feeling my way reluctantly back into a world that had left me battered and bewildered, headsore and heartsore and humiliated. No, worse than humiliated: being his victim of anyone’s, being so thoroughly done over by my own father made me feel craven, self-pitying, pathetic. Logically I knew there had been absolutely no defence, nothing at all that I could have done; even so, my mind-set had slipped back years overnight. I felt like cattle again, like one of the contemptible herd, despite sunlight and memories and all available evidence...
God. One night back and already I was thinking Macallan-style once more, dividing all of humanity into us and them and only we counted. No great surprise, though, and no real blame either: this town really was a Manichaean universe in miniature, where there was only light and darkness, good and evil, no shading in between. White hats and black hats, and my family wore the black. Except for me. Never any use on either side but hating the night and its uses—and to be honest my inability to use it, my freakishness—I’d chosen to live among the much-abused townsfolk though I could never truly be one of them either, my blood and my smiling, contemptuous relatives had lent me too much immunity. And then when I did at last discover my own talent, it wasn’t the needs of the ordinary people that drove me to use it. Blood called to blood, and cousins of mine were being killed; it was to defend my abominable family that I finally turned assassin in my turn.
If there was any grey at all in this black-and-white city, I thought it was myself. Ambiguous and uncertain, not knowing where I belonged and finally needing to find out, I
thought I was a loose cannon with its fuse already lit, charged and unpredictable and deadly.
Had thought so, at least. That had been one of the pictures in my head on yesterday’s long road up, one of the arguments not to come. And I’d come regardless, dangerous though I was; and first thing that happened, first human contact, I got beaten up by my dad and I didn’t know why.
This did not feel good. This felt worse than my body felt, and my body felt bad indeed.
I was lying on my belly, and my legs, I thought, felt worst. Impossibly heavy they felt, as well as aching throughout, all the way from hip to heel.
Impossibly heavy was right, actually; but it took me a while, took me an embarrassing time to figure out that some of the weight was extrinsic. Something was sitting on the back of my knees.
o0o
Also impossible, surely. What was I suggesting here, had Jon brought me a breakfast-tray and confused me with the bedside table, left it carefully balanced just where I couldn’t get at it? Let’s not be foolish, folks.
But yet, there wasn’t any real doubt about it: something heavy was lying on top of the duvet on top of me, pressing me deeper into the mattress. Check it out, Macallan. I lifted my head from the pillow to see what gave, apart from my knees and the bedsprings.
Tried to, at least. I lifted my head and the pillow came also, rising two or three inches before it peeled away stingingly from my cheek, like sticking-plaster ripped off too soon. When I gazed, gaped down I saw dried blood on the pillowcase, a glue that had failed but a stain that would stay, bugger it.
I worked one hand out from under the duvet to touch my cheek with tentative fingers. No new bleeding, that I could feel; but I should’ve thought last night, I should’ve made Jon search harder. There’s rarely very much in a young man’s medical arsenal, but he can usually run to Elastoplast.
Elastoplast and pills for a headache, that last guaranteed. And I had pills and a glass of water ready by the bed, and I had the mother—no, the father of all headaches pounding away inside my skull, and all I had to do was reach.
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