Rain

by Barney Campbell

  ‘Crikey, you’re right. Do you know, I’d never realized how thin. We don’t have any mirrors up there. Might break one and get bad luck, you see.’ Oh Lord. This is risible. And did I really just say ‘Crikey’? This is terrible, terrible.

  ‘Well you better get yourself some burgers!’ Tom thought he recognized a glint of something he had seen before, and he took a moment to place it. It was when he had seen Cassie the day he had left. This girl was just like her. He drew a breath, and behind him the bell on the door tinkled as some other customers came in.

  ‘Um, I know this is all a bit sudden, and you probably get this from every soldier who walks in here, but I wonder if when you get a break you might, er, you might want to come and get a burger with—’

  He broke off as a shout came from across the shop: ‘Oi, boss, so this is where you been!’

  Bugger. He turned around. Dusty, wearing an LA Dodgers baseball cap and aviator sunglasses, was with Ellis. He was holding aloft one of the LASER-GUIDED DEMOCRACY! T-shirts. ‘What do you reckon? Suit me?’

  If ever a moment had been ruined this was it. Tom looked at the shop assistant apologetically and her eyes met his. He smiled, and she winked and turned back to the till to pretend she was examining a receipt. Dusty and Ellis looked at Tom and realized they’d interrupted. Dusty stage-whispered, ‘Oh sorry, boss; didn’t realize you were on duty as it were. Did we disturb anything?’

  Tom walked over to them, turned the baseball cap on Dusty’s head back to front and clipped him gently around the head. He sighed, ‘Nothing, Corporal Miller, nothing at all. Come on, brews on me.’ They laughed and left.

  That night they boarded the plane. They hadn’t slept all day, too excited about going home. The plane was two-thirds full and also taking home an RAF Regiment squadron which had been guarding Bastion. Trueman shepherded the boys away from them, pushing them towards the back of the plane as if scared that they would catch something from the REMFs. ‘Don’t want to be associated with that filth, sir,’ he told Tom as he patrolled the rear of the plane like a mother lioness, snarling when one of the RAF Regiment lads even so much as dared to intimate he was going to sit near them.

  As they were taxiing to the runway Jessie got out of his seat and made an announcement. ‘Well, fellas, we’ve got this far. Who’d have thought it? Just wanna say, everyone have a crackin’ leave.’ He reached into his pocket and pulled out a little white plastic bottle. ‘We all wanna be in fine fettle when we get back home, so I went to see the Dutch doc in KAF, told him some bollocks about how I was suffering from PTSD and had trouble sleepin’. Well, you know what the Dutch are like. He gave me the strongest, most hard-core sleepin’ pills around.’ He looked at the bottle proudly. ‘Here the fuckers are. Called Schleepz. The quack said they knock you out like a light. He said no more than three at a time though. Otherwise you die.’

  He passed around the bottle, and they all took one. Dusty was next to Tom, and when the bottle reached him he looked with contempt at the pills. ‘What? They’re mini, these. Only three? Bollocks to that.’ He poured at least six onto his palm and before Tom could stop him gulped them down. ‘Bet you they’re fuck-all use. Sleeping pills are a complete joke. Always are. We’d be better off having a spoonful of Calpol.’

  Five minutes later, as the engines roared into life and they shot down the runway towards home, Dusty was fast asleep, mouth wide open and a stream of dribble dripping from it.

  A cold and frosty late-January dawn was breaking when they touched down at Brize Norton eight hours later. They emerged from the plane drawing great gulps of air. It was the first time in months they could breathe without dragging dust down their throats. Tom and Trueman stood at the bottom of the steps and heaved great breaths of clean, pure Atlantic air. Behind them at the top of the stairway Ellis and Davenport struggled out the door, supporting a comatose Dusty still fast asleep. They staggered down the staircase and Trueman led them over to a fire hydrant, where they rudely woke Dusty up with a high-pressure blast of icy water to his face. Cackling with laughter, they went inside to pick up their bergens.

  A bod from rear party met them with a minibus outside the terminal, and soon they were speeding down the motorway towards Aldershot. They looked out the windows in silence, mesmerized by the green and brown countryside, wet with thaw and with spindly trees spreading their bare fingers into the sky. Winter had never looked so beautiful.

  Through the drops of drizzle clustered on the train window Tom looked, resting his forehead on its cold surface. The train followed the route he had taken into London when he had last seen Cassie. Back then the river had shone and the city had looked fantastic; four months on, it had shed that coat and lay naked in its greyness; grey buildings, grey pigeons under the eaves of the stations they stopped at, grey sky arching overhead.

  Tom got off at Clapham Junction and walked north to Victoria. He was wearing his uniform. There were some civvies in his room in the mess, but he had decided to stay as he was. For one, he couldn’t bear to take his deserts off; they had become almost a part of him. For another, he wanted to walk through London pushing his uniform into people’s faces, to show them what men who fought in Afghanistan looked like, to rub their noses into the fact that the war wasn’t just on the news, but something fought and lived by real Britons. As he walked he glared at everyone he passed, as if daring them to say something hostile.

  He tried to grow used to the sensation of the city and its unaccustomed background hum. In Afghan there was no such thing as ambient noise. The only thing that you heard, ever, was what was going on right in front of you. It was strange having these new layers of sound impede his senses. He walked up Albert Bridge Road and stopped where he and Cassie had split in September. It looked different. The river then had sparkled; now it seemed old and dull, the only brightness coming from the reflection of passing headlights on the wet road.

  He crossed the river and walked up to the King’s Road. He had wanted to come there specifically; he might bump into Cassie, but also he couldn’t imagine anywhere on earth more different to Loy Kabir. It was raining heavily now, but he didn’t make any concession to it and puffed out his chest in defiance at the freezing drops streaming down his neck. He looked with contempt at grown men scuttling like beetles down the street, or cowering under awnings afraid to step out into the wet.

  Scum. None of them were fit to lick his boots. It was Sunday lunchtime, and here they were, masters of the universe, wallets heaving and all clearly doing something clever with money, and Tom hated them. Some looked at him with curiosity, and Tom hoped that they felt a piercing, emasculating shame. Digging his fingernails into his palms he realized how angry he was and told himself to chill out and enjoy himself.

  He stopped at a delicatessen to satisfy a sudden urge for a cake; he hadn’t had a cake for ages. But when he went inside he couldn’t decide what to choose from the array of pastries before him, and he sensed the queue becoming impatient behind him. He found the shop bewildering, and everything seemed to swirl around: the bright cakes, the thick make-up on the women’s faces behind him. Two children were screaming at a table a few metres away, an incompetent nanny trying to get them to behave. Tom found this infuriating and began to feel hot. He hurriedly and awkwardly left the shop to continue his arrogant snarling march up the road.

  In Victoria he queued for a ticket and then stood in front of the departures board, becoming tenser as the world moved around him and the board flicked its changes from right to left until his train appeared. He went to the train and found a seat, bolt upright and with his daysack on his lap, feeling scared by his anonymity. An old lady came to sit opposite him and smiled. He smiled back and then shifted his gaze.

  The train left the station, and they crossed back over the river again. The old lady was wearing a black fur hat and an elegant dark-blue coat; she had perfect skin, if heavily wrinkled, and bright, piercing blue eyes beneath shining white hair. She leaned towards him conspiratorially and said, as th
ough not wanting anyone else to hear, ‘Bet it’s strange to be back.’

  Tom looked surprised. ‘How did you know?’

  She laughed with a rising, girlish peal. ‘Young man, look at you. It doesn’t take Einstein to work out where you’ve been. Besides, you look like my son did when he came back from the Falklands. Wound up like a coiled spring. Is it very bad out there?’

  Tom was taken aback. He found that he wanted to tell her everything. He had never thought about how he would explain it. In a few seconds he scanned back in his mind’s eye over the entirety of the last months in crystal-clear review, and then, in barely more than a whisper, he replied, ‘Yes. Yes. It is very bad out there. It’s … unforgiving. I don’t think I’ve learned so much in all my life. There are horrible times, but, do you know, there are some rather wonderful times as well.’ His muscles loosened and he settled back into his seat. ‘I suppose … that, well, I suppose … I never really thought properly about coming home, the whole time I was out there. You just blank your mind off to it. I think … I think that in a funny sort of way I never thought I was going to come back. And now I am back, it feels strange. I mean, I’ve only been back in the country for what –’ he looked at his watch and noticed it was still on Afghan time ‘– seven hours, and this city doesn’t feel like home at all.’ He flicked his hand contemptuously towards the suburbs as they sped by. ‘It sounds strange, I know, but I’ve sort of found a home from home with my soldiers.’

  He broke off as if he’d said too much, and to fill the gap she stepped in: ‘And where are you off to now, if you don’t mind me asking? To your parents? A girlfriend?’

  ‘No, home. To my mum. My pa died when I was young. I can’t wait to see her.’

  He saw a tiny glint of moisture in her eye. ‘Yes. Your poor mother, she will have been worried sick about you. Do you have to go back out again?’

  ‘Yup, but only for four weeks or so. Peanuts really. And most of that will be taken up with handing over our kit to the guys replacing us. So I’m basically home and dry, to be honest. I mean, fingers crossed and all.’ He grinned, and with his smile felt the last of his tension ebb away. He began to enjoy being where he was. In a comfy train heading home, shooting past familiar fields now, fields he used to tick off in his head whenever he was heading home from Cambridge or Sandhurst. He lost himself in the late afternoon, and the old lady let him be for a while as he sat contentedly watching the countryside.

  A drinks trolley came, and despite his protests she bought him a gin and tonic. He sat and sipped at it like it was the most delicious thing in the world. She looked at him approvingly. ‘There. That’ll take the edge off. Where are you getting off the train? How are you getting back home?’

  ‘Probably just get the bus from Teynham station to my village and then walk home from there.’

  ‘Nonsense. You’ll catch your death of cold. My car’s parked at Sittingbourne. I can give you a lift to your home, if you would like.’

  He looked at her, overcome with gratitude. ‘Are you sure? That’d be great, but … but you don’t even know me.’

  She looked indignant. ‘Young man, I may not know you personally, but I know your type. You are just like my son and his friends when they were your age. And, to be honest, just like my husband after he had just come back from Korea.’ She stopped frowning and beamed at him. In that moment he felt as though he had never been away.

  ‘Well, if you’re sure … ’

  ‘Of course I’m sure. It’s the least I can do. Tucked up back here in a nice warm house while you and your soldiers are fighting for your lives. And don’t worry; you don’t have to talk in the car. Just tell me where to go. I won’t press you for conversation.’

  He tried to say thank you but felt his eyes welling up with tears.

  She stepped in. ‘Don’t worry. Get some sleep now. You need to be in good form for your mother. I’ll wake you when we’re there.’

  A minute later he was fast asleep.

  The final trace of the sun was dipping beneath the trees at the back of the Old Mill when the car pulled in at the top of the drive. He got out and looked back in through the window. ‘I don’t know how I can possibly thank you. For everything. For the lift, obviously, for the drink too, but also … ’ he tried to work out how to express himself ‘ … for teaching me to enjoy being back.’

  ‘Young man, my pleasure. Just one favour, that’s all I ask.’

  ‘Anything.’

  ‘When you hug your mother, hug harder than you have ever hugged her before.’

  ‘I promise.’

  ‘Righty ho, best be off. I have to get back to feed the dogs.’ She put the car into gear and started off.

  ‘But wait, I don’t even know your … ’ he trailed off as the car sped down the narrow lane, leaving Tom to darkness and himself.

  The silhouette of the house loomed in the gathering purple. Tiny flecks of white lined the drive, guiding him home, as snowdrops pierced their way out of winter, leading the charge towards spring. He set off down the drive, glorying in the cold air.

  He knocked too quietly on the wooden door to the kitchen, and when he pushed it open he saw Constance standing by the sink, chopping carrots. Zeppo was lying on his beanbag and didn’t even stir.

  He stood in the doorway and said softly, ‘Hi, Mum. It’s me.’

  She looked up, dropped her knife into the sink and blanched as though she had seen a ghost. And then she was hugging him harder than she had ever done before. Tom felt as though he was a little boy again. He remembered his promise and made sure he hugged back harder.

  The train was pulling into the station, and as the car screeched into the car park Constance held him back as he tried to get out of the car and pecked him twice on the cheek like a woodpecker. He squirmed away and shouted back as he ran to the platform, ‘See you on Tuesday, Ma. I’ll ring when I know what train I’m getting.’ He just made it onto the train, and as it pulled away to London he pushed the window down to wave again.

  Constance shouted to him, ‘Behave yourself, Tom! Don’t get into any trouble!’

  He pointed to his ears and shook his head, laughing as the train picked up speed. ‘Can’t hear you, Ma. Can’t hear you!’ He watched her recede, tiny and alone, and when she was out of sight he flopped onto the seat, restless with excitement. After five days at home he was heading into London to see Will and Cassie. He had put on a tiny bit of weight in the past five days; Constance had pushed food down his neck from morning to night. He had finally got rid of the last dust in his skin, and after six bouts with a shampoo bottle had managed to rid his hair of it as well. He would spend ages in the bath amazed at the velvety water and the bubbles against his skin.

  He went for long walks with Zeppo, lost in the newness of the world around him. It was like he was seeing a colour world after previously being able to view it only in black and white. As though he had had a second birth. At nights he sometimes thought about Afghan, looking into the fire, lost in the roots of the flames and with a glass of whisky in his hand steadily rising to his lips. He would see all the past weeks in the flames until the fire died.

  One night he shifted from the fire and stared fixedly at a photo of his father when he was Tom’s age now. It was of Leonard and his platoon in Northern Ireland. He was standing at the back with his crooked grin and looked so young, younger than all his soldiers. Tom looked hard into the photo until a tear fell on to the glass, and he remembered himself and embarrassedly wiped it off. He put the frame back on the mantelpiece and went upstairs. He stood outside Constance’s room, made sure he could hear her heavy breathing through the ajar door and went to his room to sleep in total peace for ten hours, his body and brain now back into home life.

  On the train he sat and scrolled through the messages on his phone. He was going out for supper with Will tonight and then tomorrow having lunch with Cassie. Will was going to give him keys to his flat in Primrose Hill. There were a few other guys kicking around town on leave
from A and B Squadrons, so he might bump into them as well. He watched the fields go by and felt a million miles from Loy Kabir.

  Sunlight streamed in through the windows to prise open his eyelids. A bolt of pain tore through his head. His mouth was dry; his tongue felt too big for his mouth. He fell off the sofa, staggered to his feet, tripped over the coffee table, which was littered with empty beer bottles and cigarette butts, and crashed onto the floor. He stumbled to the loo, threw some water over his face and locked his mouth around the tap. In the mirror he saw huge bags under his bloodshot eyes. He looked at his watch. Nine o’clock. He was meeting Cassie at one, more than enough time to get ready and sober up.

  He stood in the shower for twenty minutes, seeing alcohol steam from his body. He smelt a whiff of tequila and had to gulp down a retch. He came out, shaved, and then brushed his teeth and tongue. He left the bathroom and smelt bacon in the kitchen. Will was there, already dressed, over a frying pan brimming with sausages, bacon and mushrooms.

  ‘Here he is! The dead man riseth. Wow. Do you feel as dreadful as you look?’

  Tom rubbed his head. ‘Worse. It feels like someone drove a Scimitar over my head. What happened last night?’

  ‘Well, apart from you almost getting us arrested five times and then drinking me out of house and home, not an awful lot.’

  ‘I can’t remember anything after supper.’

  ‘Well, we then tried to get into every bar in London, but you were so lashed that no one was letting us in. Every bouncer who refused us you then had a stand-up argument with, calling them war-dodging REMFs.’

  ‘Oh God, really?’

  ‘Yeah. It wasn’t very conducive to getting in anywhere. So we just came back here and got on it. You passed out at about one on the sofa, and I threw that duvet over you. Impressive, mate. After five months away you can still take down some grog. When I came back from tour I was in pieces after a pint.’