I Am Dust

by Louise Beech

  ‘So we three are under one roof again.’

  Morgan turns white.

  ‘Didn’t that spirit say we shouldn’t ever be?’

  ‘It was just a stupid game,’ whispers Morgan.

  ‘You got the role though, didn’t you?’

  Chloe is glued to the spot. She suddenly remembers a night with the Ouija board when Daniel Locke told Jess her mum was a bad girl. Another moment comes to her, when Morgan asked if Jess liked her mother. Subtle clues there all along. Scattered breadcrumbs leading them to Lynda Swanson, but they didn’t pick them up.

  ‘If we hadn’t done that Ouija board,’ says Lynda, ‘you’d never have got it.’

  ‘Yes, I would. I earned it. I gave everything at that audition.’

  ‘So did I!’ screams Lynda. ‘I starved myself so I’d be the perfect size. I rehearsed the lines over and over and over. I lived and fucking breathed them. I neglected my ten-year-old daughter for that role! I’m a better actress than you!’ She pauses, breathing hard. ‘When I brought Jess to see Dust the other night, she agreed that I would have been magnificent. And Clive said I’m his most talented student.’

  Morgan’s face changes. It is ice cold. ‘No, he didn’t. He thinks you’re desperate. He said you’re all ambition and no talent.’

  ‘You fucking bitch,’ says Lynda, in a low, menacing voice.

  When it happens, it’s fast. Lynda grabs the nearest thing and launches at Morgan. It’s a wild, whirlwind of war. Swinging arms, one attacking, two defending. Blood flying, ruining the pure-white walls and roses. Lynda smashes at Morgan’s head – over and over and over – until she falls. Then there is stillness. Silence, except for Lynda and Chloe breathing heavily in unison.

  ‘Shit,’ whispers Lynda. She looks at the bloody Olivier award in her trembling hand and puts it back on the dressing table. ‘Shit.’ She bends down to Morgan with a sob, but it’s obvious from her shattered skull that she is gone. Esme Black’s ghostly costume is crimson now. Lynda’s hair is splattered too. One of the pearl earrings has come out and lies next to Morgan. Lynda takes it. Then she looks up, seems to realise someone might come at any moment.

  ‘I can’t believe it was you,’ whispers Chloe. ‘Did Jess ever find out?’

  Asking questions is pointless; Lynda doesn’t even look at her.

  She starts to leave, but then, perhaps realising how flamboyantly – how memorably – she’s dressed, she grabs a bath robe from a hook, wraps it around herself, and pulls the hood low over her face. She takes her spike heels off, grabs the Olivier award, and carries them, hidden beneath the robe. Chloe follows Lynda as she weaves through the busy corridor, no one taking any notice of a woman who looks like a cast member between costumes. Lynda slips away through the back fire exit. Chloe watches for a moment, wants to scream that she should come back, own up, face things.

  But it is done.

  It is done.

  When Chloe returns to the dressing room, it is Ginger’s once again. The new Dust poster is on the floor, cracked, the flowers are colourful again, and a champagne bottle awaits celebration.

  Morgan sits at the dressing table, no longer bloody.

  She turns to Chloe and says, ‘The dust has settled, and now you know.’

  56

  The Dean Wilson Theatre

  September 2019

  Chloe closes the dressing room door and leans on it. It was Lynda Swanson. All this time. Was poor Jess waiting in the audience that night, left alone after the interval when her mum committed that atrocious act and escaped? No, she hadn’t been at that final show. Lynda must have returned to have her say, alone and angry.

  Chloe sits next to Morgan and looks at them both in the mirror. She realises they are the same age, both thirty – Morgan forever, Chloe for just a while longer. How must it feel to be eternally young? It’s what actresses in Hollywood crave, and Morgan has achieved it. But the price? No one to see it. And loneliness. Absolute loneliness.

  ‘Wasn’t Lynda ever questioned by the police?’ asks Chloe. ‘She auditioned alongside you; she must have been a suspect.’

  ‘She was, briefly, but her husband said she was home all night.’

  ‘So he knew, and he protected her. But Clive must’ve had his suspicions that she killed you.’

  ‘Oh, he did. I’m sure he did.’

  ‘Did he never tell the police that? Insist they check her alibi?’

  ‘No.’ Morgan shrugs. ‘I actually think he was scared of Lynda. Scared that what we did on the Ouija board might come out and somehow ruin him. Scared that he’d be implicated, even if they proved it was her. And how could he be sure? He didn’t see her do it.’

  ‘An usher here said she heard a rumour about witchcraft helping you get the role, so I guess the Ouija board stuff got out anyway.’

  ‘Not to the papers, I don’t think.’

  ‘Did they ever find the Olivier award?’ asks Chloe. ‘What did Lynda do with it?’

  ‘No. She threw it in the River Humber.’

  ‘Clive must have been upset to have been a suspect,’ says Chloe.

  ‘He was. It wasn’t for long though. Too many people saw him at the interval – he was arguing passionately with someone about my acting skills. His loyalty to me saved him, in a way.’

  ‘He was here tonight, wasn’t he?’ says Chloe. ‘My friend Chester said his name was on the ticket list.’

  ‘Yes, he was.’

  In the mirror, Morgan looks sad. How hard it must be to see the man she loves and not be able to touch him, talk to him, kiss him. How would Chloe feel if Ginger could no longer see her? Does she still care about her?

  Yes. Despite everything, yes.

  Still.

  ‘Do you know if Clive talked to Lynda tonight, during Dust?’ asks Chloe. ‘He must hate her.’

  ‘He didn’t. He avoided her, and she avoided him.’

  ‘I wonder if Ginger ever discovered what her mum did. Do you know? I guess you can see stuff like that.’

  ‘I don’t think she did,’ says Morgan. ‘That’s why I didn’t want to tell you back then, when you were kids. It could have destroyed Jess. Would have ruined her life. And if I’d told you, I know you’d have felt compelled to tell your friend. But now you can’t.’

  ‘You mean because Ginger and I have fallen out?’

  Morgan doesn’t respond.

  ‘I guess I understand now why Lynda was so pushy,’ says Chloe. ‘Why she was so obsessed that Jess make it. She knew it was too late for her, so she channelled every bit of her ambition into her daughter’s career. And it worked, didn’t it? Ginger ended up bringing Dust back. How … poetic.’ Chloe pauses. ‘Don’t you hate Lynda? Haven’t you wanted to, I don’t know, get revenge somehow?’

  Morgan shakes her head. ‘No. I haven’t felt anger since I died. Her time is coming though.’

  ‘Is it?’

  ‘Yes. I see it. The police will be at her door by the end of the week. And her husband won’t defend her now.’

  ‘Shit. Poor Ginger.’ Chloe wonders why she feels so calm. She should be wishing Ginger ill. But she doesn’t. Where did that raw anger go? Did it just die out, like fire? ‘I hope it doesn’t ruin things for her.’

  ‘She’ll have enough on her plate,’ says Morgan.

  ‘Was it because of Lynda that you came to us through the Ouija board? Because her daughter was there?’

  ‘No. It was because of you.’

  ‘Me?’

  ‘You called me,’ says Morgan.

  ‘I didn’t though. It was Ryan.’

  ‘But I heard you. You bewitched me, Chloe.’

  ‘Me?’ Chloe remembers then. ‘You got me to cut myself, didn’t you? You invited me to take the dagger that time.’

  ‘I’ve regretted that ever since.’ Morgan looks sad. ‘I self-harmed as a teenager. I never should have suggested it to you. I thought it might help ease your pain the way it had mine. But it was cruel of me. I guess … I don’t know, I wanted us to have som
ething in common.’ Morgan pauses. ‘I taught you to push as well. I knew you’d be able to.’

  ‘You can do that too?’ Chloe pauses. ‘How did you knowI’d be able to?’

  ‘You’re a witch.’

  ‘Am I really though?’

  ‘It’s just a name,’ smiles Morgan. ‘Some call it psychic. Sensitive. Open. I like to call it gifted.’

  ‘You,’ whispers Chloe. ‘You have the gift too.’

  Morgan nods. Chloe studies them both in the mirror again. Is it just the row of lights that makes them glow? She leans closer. Despite the lateness of the hour, the intensity of the night’s events, she has never looked better. Maybe she should get one of these dressing tables for her bedroom.

  Morgan smiles at her. ‘Yes, you’re beautiful,’ she says.

  ‘My skin hasn’t looked this good since I was sixteen. Wow, if Jess could see me now. No, if Ginger could see me now. Why was I so insecure then? I was gorgeous, wasn’t I? Why do we never realise that when we’re teenagers?’

  ‘You still are gorgeous,’ says Morgan.

  ‘I loved Jess so much. Why did she have to betray me? Why?’

  ‘That’s what ambition does to some people.’

  Chloe fluffs her hair up in the mirror, laughs, and pouts like a Hollywood goddess. As she does, her black sleeve drops to her elbow. She frowns. Leans closer.

  ‘What is it?’ asks Morgan as though she already knows the answer.

  ‘I don’t understand…’

  ‘What, Chloe?’

  ‘My scars. They’ve… gone.’

  Is it just her reflection? Is the intensity of the glow washing away the criss-cross of pink and white ridges? Chloe looks at her real arm. Touches the exposed flesh. It is perfect. Not scarred. No longer a map of her pain. Tears spill down her cheeks. It’s all too much. She can’t take it in.

  ‘How on earth did it happen?’ she sobs. ‘I’m … clean. Did you do it, Morgan, you witch? Is this like when the lights filled with red? Am I just seeing it? It’s a cruel trick if I am.’

  ‘No, you’re healed,’ says Morgan warmly.

  ‘How? You?’ Chloe feels light-headed. The two of them blur in the mirror. ‘I’m so tired,’ she says. ‘It’s been such a long, strange night. I must have hit my head really hard earlier. I think I might be imagining you, imagining my scars are gone.’ She pauses. ‘I might come in tomorrow, officially give my notice in, see Edwin Roberts. Maybe see Ginger, find out what happened before I blacked out. Will you be here?’

  ‘I’m always here,’ Morgan smiles.

  Chloe shrugs. ‘Well, I’m exhausted now. I just want to go home and eat something fattening and have a hot bubble bath and sleep for a long, long time.’

  ‘You can’t,’ says Morgan gently.

  She takes Chloe’s hand in hers. Chloe expects it to be the cold flesh of a dead ghost, but it’s warm, like her own. They are the same. Ginger’s bracelet – which Chloe is still holding – tinkles between them, the ghost charm shivering at the movement. ‘You can’t ever go home, not to that one anyway.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ Chloe puts a hand to her chest, feels her heart pulsing beneath. ‘Why not?’

  ‘Because you’re dead, sweetheart.’

  57

  There and Yet Not There

  What if I let go? What if I fall? She is there, in the water, I know she is. What if I swim and don’t look back and swim and don’t look back? Was I ever here, on this ship? Here and yet not here. There and yet not there.

  ‘Where do you think we go when we die?’ asked Jess, sleepily. ‘What do you think there is?’

  ‘I don’t know. I don’t really like to think about it.’

  ‘I mean if we have beenspeaking to the dead, then what’s it like for them?’

  Chloe tried to imagine. Tried to visualise being on the other side; being here – existing still somehow in this world – but not able to speak to the ones you loved. Did the spirits wander among the living? Did they watch them? If so, what must it be like to witness others doing wonderful everyday things while you could not? Chloe hoped that when she went, she would simply go. Be gone. Not exist at all. Yet that was even harder to picture. Where did your soul go? Where did your feelings go? Your essence?

  What would it be like to no longer love Jess?

  If I let go, what will there be? Only the music of the ocean – wordless, melodic, soothing – and the dance of the waves, and the two of us sinking, forever, together, to the bottom of the sea.

  Chloe leans nearer and takes hold of Ginger’s slender fingers. They warm within the protection of her own. And she begins to see something. She closes her eyes. Tries to let it in. This feels like something she has done before and yet never done.

  What if I let go? What if I fall? She is there, in the water, I know she is. What if I swim and don’t look back and swim and don’t look back? Was I ever here, on this ship? Here and yet not here. There and yet not there.

  This was how Chloe had imagined it to be. Floating around in an otherworldly place, not existing but not dead, there and yet not there, watching those you love going on without you.

  If I let go, what will there be? Only the music of the ocean – wordless, melodic, soothing – and the dance of the waves, and the two of us sinking, forever, together, to the bottom of the sea.

  Chloe reached out and put a finger over Jess’s lips, the way she had when that moment fell into place the other time Ryan left them alone. She traced the softness and then leaned forwards to put her mouth there instead of her fingertip. Jess inhaled; Chloe was sucked in. She was lost. Their tongues touched, warm, nervous, then bolder. Chloe put a hand in Jess’s hair, wanting to wrap the curls tightly around her fingers so she could never escape. Be mine, her heart whispered.

  Only the music of the ocean – wordless, melodic, soothing – and the dance of the waves, and the two of us sinking, forever, together, to the bottom of the sea…

  58

  The Dean Wilson Theatre

  September 2019

  ‘Please Chloe, put the knife down,’ cries Ryan.

  Chloe moves closer to where Ginger is still in a heap on the floor, cracked Dust poster at her side like a remnant of a marital dispute. Ginger pulls herself to her feet, not taking her eyes off Chloe for a second. They simmer with realisation – and then fear.

  ‘You,’ she whispers. ‘The time I fell…’

  ‘Yes. I adored you, Jess. I really did. But you’re not taking my script.’

  Chloe inches even closer, puts a hand in Ginger’s hair – wrapping the curls around her fingers – and raises the knife. Ryan is glued to the spot, his face a ghostly mask of speechless shock. The knife cuts the air between the women, as close to Chloe’s face as it is to Ginger’s, dividing them equally. With an animalistic grunt, Ginger grabs Chloe’s arm to stop her. The knife moves back and forth, back and forth, higher, lower, trembling as each woman pushes with all her strength.

  It is the battle following a war.

  There’s hammering on the door then. Voices on the other side. Something heavy heaving against it. The sound seems to break Ryan’s trance. Chloe has the knife at Ginger’s throat. There are tears on her cheeks as though this is not what she really wants. There is blood. Blood dripping over the knife, down Chloe’s hand, onto the floor. Ryan yells again for Chloe to put it down.

  Shocked at the blood, Chloe lowers the knife. Ginger seems to find strength to fight. She grabs the nearest thing – the unopened champagne bottle on the dresser – and hits Chloe on the head, hard.

  Everything stops.

  The war is over. The battle ends. Chloe falls backwards. Hits the ground.

  The door opens at the exact moment of impact; the stage manager falls into the room, followed by Edwin Roberts, his hair a tangle.

  ‘She had a knife at my throat!’ shrieks Ginger, still backed up against the wall, eyes horrified at the sight of Chloe on the floor with blood trickling away from her head. ‘I had to stop her!’ She seems
to remember the champagne bottle, bloody in her hand, and drops it on the dressing table with a look of repulsion. ‘I didn’t mean … I … it was … I thought she was going to kill me…’

  ‘Call an ambulance,’ cries Edwin, kneeling beside Chloe’s inert body.

  The stage manager takes out her phone and goes into the corridor.

  ‘Is she…?’ Ginger moves closer to where her one-time friend lies.

  ‘I don’t know.’ Edwin rolls Chloe over into the recovery position, checks her pulse, listens at her mouth. ‘Have you called them?’ he yells into the corridor.

  ‘They’re on their way.’ The stage manager is in the doorway. ‘Ten minutes.’

  Ryan puts a hand on Ginger’s arm but she shrugs him off. ‘She cut me,’ she cries, hand over her neck.

  ‘It’s not deep.’ Ryan studies her. ‘Just a nick really.’

  ‘She could have done it again and killed me!’

  Quietly, right next to Ginger’s ear, he says, ‘She had lowered the knife.’

  They share a look. It’s clear Ginger realises the implication of this; that it was not self-defence. She was no longer in danger. She could have pushed her away, got free, when the knife was away from her neck. Ryan shakes his head gently and then turns to Edwin, who’s still kneeling beside Chloe.