Furious Thing

by Jenny Downham

  ‘It’s only a fucking phone,’ he said. ‘Nobody died.’

  Again, I swallowed the anger. I tried to make a joke. I said, ‘Well, maybe you’ll get me an upgrade now?’

  ‘Jesus, do you only care about yourself?’ He looked at me as if I was subnormal and then stormed out of the kitchen and up the stairs to his study.

  I sat with my broken phone on my lap and the pan sizzling beside me on the stove. I sat very still. On the counter was my list of tasks and the whisky glass and bottle all prepared. Five minutes ago, John was smiling and telling me the food smelled amazing. Five minutes ago, we were planning to drive to Brighton together.

  I shouldn’t have turned around with the spoon and dripped oil on the floor. I shouldn’t have got cross. Or cried. I’d failed to find out the name of the hotel. I shouldn’t have picked up my broken phone as if it was the most precious thing on the planet. I shouldn’t have made a joke about an upgrade.

  Is this how Mum feels? I thought. Is this what he does to her?

  I sat there in her slippers and apron and wondered what was going to happen next. Maybe John would come downstairs and tell me he didn’t mean it, not to take things to heart, not to be so emotional. Was I still making supper? he’d ask? He’d make out it was all a joke. Or, he’d come downstairs and make a great show of putting on his coat and shoes and telling me he was going out to eat. You can fuck off with your supper, he’d say. He didn’t need to sit around with a tortured martyr who saw him as the bad guy. What about his pain?

  And if I was Mum, I’d either make supper and accept he’d been joking, or I’d beg him not to go. Because if he left, there were two ways he could come back: silent or mean. And if it was mean, there were a hundred ways that could play out.

  Is this why Mum never seemed to have any energy? Was she exhausted from trying to work out what may or may not happen next? Is this how he weakened her?

  Here he came now. I could hear his feet on the stairs. My stomach gripped. My pulse raced. Living with him was like following the rules of a complicated and terrible game.

  He stood in the doorway, one hand on the frame and smiled. ‘I’m sorry, Lex.’

  That wasn’t what I was expecting. Don’t fall for it, a small voice warned.

  ‘I’m such an idiot,’ he said. ‘I broke your phone.’

  I felt myself softening. That sunny mirror smile was so warm. ‘It’s all right. You didn’t mean to.’

  ‘I’ll get you a new one.’

  I nodded. ‘OK.’

  He raked a hand through his hair. ‘They will come back, won’t they?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘But what if they don’t?’

  I could hardly bear it. His eyes were the same colour as Kass’s and he looked so upset. He looked like a dog I’d seen hit by a car once, standing lost and bewildered in the road.

  ‘I’ll make the food, shall I? We can think of a plan while we eat.’

  ‘Did your mum say anything about the hotel at all? Any defining detail?’

  ‘She said it was a B&B and not very nice. Oh, and it’s next to a boarded-up nightclub.’

  He nodded. ‘Thank you.’

  ‘You’re welcome.’

  ‘And food would be lovely. Thank you for that too.’

  He left. I quietly returned to stirring the pan. It was such a relief when John was warm. I felt soft as marshmallows. As clouds. I felt like the hair that drifts across old ladies’ heads. Harmless as fluff.

  Ten minutes later, he came bounding back. ‘White Horse Inn. I called them, and a Georgia Robinson just booked in with her daughter.’ He stabbed a celebratory fist at the ceiling. ‘Oh yes.’

  ‘You found them? Does this mean you want to drive there?’

  ‘It means I’m sending flowers.’

  ‘So, we’re not going there any more?’

  ‘New plan. Give your mum time to calm down.’ He grinned at me. ‘Maybe some champagne too. She loves a glass of fizz, right?’

  ‘Why are you sending her presents?’

  ‘A man has the right to spoil his fiancée, doesn’t he?’

  ‘But you only buy flowers when you’re apologizing.’

  He looked guilty. I saw it flash across his face. ‘Now,’ he said, clapping his hands together, ‘how’s that pasta coming along?’

  ‘What did you do?’

  ‘Come on, Alexandra, are you making supper or not?’

  ‘You told me Mum left because I threw the laptop out the window, but she said on the phone she wasn’t upset with me at all.’

  ‘Don’t start.’

  ‘Which means it’s your fault.’

  The slammed look came back in his eyes. ‘I’m not listening to this.’

  ‘Which means you did something so bad she’d rather be in a crap hotel than come home.’

  ‘I said that’s enough.’

  Whatever he’d done, he’d get away with it. He just needed to shine his sunny mirrors on her. And when he did that, she’d do anything. Just like I’d been doing all evening.

  I was such an idiot.

  I wanted to break apart in front of him. I wanted my head to come off and roll across the floor. ‘What was it?’ I said.

  ‘I’m warning you.’

  ‘What horrible thing did you do to make her leave?’

  He took a step towards me. ‘You don’t know what you’re talking about.’

  ‘I know Mum’s gone. I know she’s taken Iris. I know you’ve pissed her off.’

  He took another step. Hit me, I thought. I wanted a black eye – some evidence to show the world. I’d go to the police and they’d arrest him and lock him away. No one believed words, but they’d believe a bruise.

  ‘Mum’ll chuck your flowers in the bin,’ I said. ‘She’ll swap hotels and tell me where she is, and I’ll join her.’

  ‘What bollocks you talk, Alexandra. What absolute bullshit you come out with.’

  ‘We’ll get Kass to come and we’ll change our names and move somewhere new and you’ll be all by yourself for ever.’

  ‘Pathetic.’ He shook his head very slowly at me. ‘Absolutely pathetic. I spoke to your mum when I called the hotel. I asked them to put me through to her room and she begged me to let her come back. She was sorry for not letting me speak to Iris, she knew it was wrong. Should she still drive back tonight? she wanted to know. Would I forgive her?’

  I grabbed the handle of the frying pan and upended it. Onion, bacon and oil spattered onto the floor.

  ‘What the hell are you doing?’ he bellowed.

  I snatched an egg from the counter and hurled it at the window.

  ‘Stop it. Stop it right now.’

  I swept my arm across the counter top and brought the chopping board, knives, salt, pepper and all the other eggs crashing down. I pulled a cup from the hooks and lobbed it hard at the wall where it smashed into pieces.

  He grasped me by the arm, eyes blazing. ‘Stop.’

  I grabbed another cup and he pushed me down on the rocking chair. I tried to scramble up, but he rammed me down again. ‘Sit. Stay there.’

  ‘I’m not a dog.’

  ‘No, you’re a spoiled brat.’

  I threw the cup right at him. He ducked, and I was almost out the kitchen door when he grabbed me again. I pretended he was a crazed stranger who’d broken in, because that was less scary than a man who could make people weak, who could steal their real selves away, who could change brave people into cowards.

  I shoved and pushed and kicked. ‘Get off, get off me.’

  He gripped both my arms and backed me against the wall in the hallway. ‘You’ve done it now.’

  I was breathing all wrong and my throat ached with tears. I didn’t want him to hurt me. He was holding me so hard, squeezing my arms.

  ‘I’m sick of you,’ he hissed. ‘So sick of you stomping about demanding attention as if you’re the centre of the universe.’

  I didn’t want bruises any more. I didn’t want evidence, didn’t w
ant him to be holding me there.

  ‘Sick of you breaking stuff. Sick of your temper. Sick of everyone thinking I live with a lunatic.’

  I wanted to get away from his smoky breath and his eyes all narrow and that look on his face that said, I will destroy you.

  ‘You think you can trash the flat and get away with it? You think it’s OK to hurl stuff at my head? Well, it isn’t. It’s fucking demented.’

  I closed my eyes to block him out.

  On and on he went. I was out of control and everyone thought so. Mum hadn’t a clue how to handle me. He knew exactly, and he was going to break me. He was going to prove I had no power in the world and never would. ‘I’m in charge,’ he spat. ‘You get it? Now go to your room and fucking calm down.’

  I asked the dead to help. Granddad, I said. Tell your friends I’ll give them anything. I’ll give up Kass, give up all hope of love, just help me!

  I thought it. I didn’t say it out loud. And the answer came roaring silently back.

  Do your monster.

  24

  An apocalypse starts with a change in the smell of the air – a wet dust smell, like rain after weeks of dryness. The light changes too – starting off bright like an over-developed photo, then darkening at the edges. A pressure comes next, a kind of tugging like a fish caught on a line, like being pulled towards destiny. People huddle in terrified groups. They whisper, ‘Is this the end of the world?’

  ‘Yes,’ I said, as I held out my arms for balance, as I tiptoed forwards. ‘But not for you. This is John’s apocalypse.’

  At the almost-end-of-the-branch, just before it would no longer take my weight, I looked out through the leaves at the rows of windows twinkling. Behind each window was a room. I counted two up and three across from the fire escape and found Mum’s bedroom where the blue velvet curtains were still open. It looked very still and dark. Had John noticed I was missing yet?

  I leaped from the tree and landed neatly on the wall. Kass and I had done it hundreds of times. But not for years. I jumped down the other side and started walking. The cemetery footpath was worn from dog walkers and cyclists, but I knew the turning where people rarely went. Down there, the trees sounded loud because everything else was quiet. It sounded as if all engines had stopped, all power had gone down. No phones, no radios, no TVs or computers made noise in here. There were scuffling sounds that might be foxes, but could also be rats or even the cold, bright fingers of the dead.

  But I wasn’t afraid.

  If Mum was here, seeing me walk along the path that led away from the main drag, to the very centre of the cemetery, she’d say, ‘Don’t do this, Lexi.’

  I’d take her hand. I’d say, ‘I know you’re not strong, but I’m going to sort this for you.’

  ‘Will it hurt?’ she’d say.

  ‘I guess you’ll miss him at first, but after a while you’ll be glad. So, no – it won’t hurt much at all.’

  ‘I meant him. Will it hurt him?’

  Wild arum berries contain needle-shaped crystals which irritate the throat and result in difficulty breathing. Stinkweed causes hyperthermia and memory loss before it send you into a coma. Just touching aconite (the queen of poisons) can result in multiple organ failure.

  Granddad warned me never to go near certain plants. But I’d asked his dead friends for help and they were drawing me close.

  ‘Just think, Mum,’ I’d say, ‘how uncomplicated John will be when he’s dead.’

  ‘Yes,’ she’d say, ‘I see that. It will be such a relief. Thank you, Lexi, for being braver than anyone else.’

  ‘You’re welcome,’ I’d say. ‘Now go back to the gate and wait for me there.’

  The gravestones glimmered in the dark. The statues winked at me. Above me, in the trees, magpies cried, their wings like rainbows caught in oil.

  Don’t be afraid, they called.

  ‘I’m not,’ I said. ‘I’m a monster.’

  When I was a kid I used to wonder about my future. I never imagined it would be like this. I’d turned out to be the scary one. I was the noise. I was the cold.

  Out in the world, Cerys was probably working her way down her revision plan. Out there, teachers were marking coursework, examiners were setting the papers and sealing them in brown envelopes. Iris would be getting ready for bed. Mum would be raiding the minibar. Soon, there would be a phone call from reception. ‘Can you come down? There are dozens of flowers here with your name on.’

  Names are powerful. Babe, sweetheart, darling.

  Pathetic. Bitch. Idiot.

  Once I called the police. I said a woman was in danger and they came. Me and Iris watched the blue light flashing down in the car park. We watched a policeman walk slowly up the steps. We listened to the buzzer. When no one answered, the policeman stepped back into the car park and looked up at the windows. Me and Iris ducked. I don’t know why. A policewoman got out of the car and the pair of them looked up at the windows together. Then they got back in the car and drove away.

  A dead rat lay on the cemetery path, its belly torn apart and strings of intestine exposed, the blood dried to black paste in the dust. Further along, there was a dead pigeon – a mess of matted feathers and a single wing like the dark sail of a child’s boat.

  The world was a difficult place, Mum said, and we all had our crosses to bear. She didn’t buy a newspaper any more. She switched off the TV when bad things came on. She put a good newsfeed on her phone and read out stories of rescued puppies and people finding Christ’s face on a slice of toast.

  But you can’t avoid bad things by pretending they’re not there. You must look the end of the world in the eye.

  Names are powerful. Snakeroot. Nightshade. Hemlock.

  But action is more powerful.

  When Kass and me were kids, we played in the cemetery. We knew that even though it was sheltered, it was colder than the streets, the cold came up from the ground and down from the sky. There were no buildings to churn out heat. Only thirty acres of the dead.

  ‘How many dead people are here, do you reckon?’ I asked Kass once.

  ‘Thousands,’ he said.

  We tried to imagine it – all those rattling bones, all those grinning skulls.

  Once we made a shelter out of pallets to hide from the wind. Once we plucked flowers from graves that had loads to share with those who had none. Often, we sat on a bench, simply breathing – feeling special, because we were alive when no one else was. Once, when we finally trailed in too late for supper, and John refused to let us eat so we’d understand what a fucking boundary was, Kass said, ‘Lex put a spell on me.’

  Bad things happen when you’re around, Lex.

  That wasn’t true though. The opposite was the truth. Bad things happen when John’s around.

  In stories, if you want a favour from the dead, you have to offer them something special. I’d offered to give up love. Now, I had to tell them what I wanted in return.

  ‘Poison,’ I said. ‘The strongest you have.’

  And, under the ground, the dead shuffled and sighed. ‘Are you sure?’ they said. ‘Giving up love is a considerable price to pay.’

  As I walked, I told them why it mattered. ‘I wanted him to like me. But that’s the wrong thing to want.’

  I said, ‘When Mum gets back, she’ll do the same, hoping for scraps of warmth. Even though he did something terrible to make her leave in the first place.’

  The dead shuffled some more and whispered among themselves.

  I said, ‘He’ll say she’s the love of his life. He’ll say they were made for each other and how could she even think of leaving him?’

  I said, ‘She’ll smile and soften and tell herself he means it. And when she’s safely hooked in, he’ll treat her badly all over again. He’s like a magician casting spells to mess with people’s minds.’

  ‘We recommend the common ink cap,’ the dead whispered. ‘Consumed with alcohol, they’re deadly. It’s an easy mistake to make.’

  I dro
pped to my knees and combed the grass. I was wearing Kass’s coat. I breathed it in. It smelled of leather, which in my memory smelled of him. I could never walk past a market stall selling bags and purses without stopping to breathe.

  Kass.

  If I hadn’t met John, I’d never have met Kass.

  Never mind, never mind.

  I found twigs and small stones and leaves. But eventually I found a mushroom with an orange parasol. It looked ancient and rusty. It had grooves running from the centre and was covered with a deadly-looking white dust. After one, they were easier to find. They stood around in groups calling me.

  Take them, the dead whispered, and you’ll have the power.

  A Third Tale of Love and Death (but mostly Death)

  Once there was a girl who plotted to kill the man her mother loved. This was because the girl knew him to be a powerful magician who’d cleverly disguised himself as a handsome prince. Everyone had fallen for his charm and no one except the girl seemed to notice the appalling things he did.

  So, one night, when her mother was away, the girl stole out to the local cemetery and asked the dead for help. In return for assistance, she promised to give up love. The dead advised her to gather poisonous mushrooms. She followed their instructions and crept back home to make a deathly brew.

  Climbing the stairs to the flat, the girl was like a wild creature coming in from the night. She smelled different – of earth and cold and the ghostly air of the cemetery. The mushrooms whispered in her pocket and she felt strong.

  Soon, she thought, I will live happily ever after.

  But when she opened the door, the magician was standing in the hallway as if he’d been there for ever, waiting for just this moment. And he looked calm and powerful, like he knew everything. And fear washed through the girl’s bones.

  ‘Where the bloody hell have you been?’ he said.