The Little Death

by Sarah Till

  ‘Gabriel, it’s me. Look, I’m sorry about coming over to Sarah’s, for banging on the door. I just need to know why. Why you said those things to me then left. Why you said you’d stay, gave me the phone. You even said you wanted us to be together. Anyway. I’m ready to talk sensibly now about it. Please call me, please.’

  I end the call and my tears drop onto the worksheets I’m writing, smudging the ink and making the paper thin. The tears turn inevitably to sobs and the sobs to a deep yearning for him. I haven’t even got a photograph of him, of us both, all I’ve got is the memory of a few days together. My mind tells me that I’m being dramatic, that it’s impossible to love someone straight away. But love is like physics, there are lots of rules, just a cover for what we don’t and can’t know, places where time is inexplicably elastic and feelings take the proportions of mountains. Where a lover’s face, imprinted on a memory, can affect a lifetime.

  I take a pencil and rub the graphite over a blank canvas, the greyness on the creamy surface reminding me of Gabriel’s stubble. I draw him once, but it’s not him, the eyes are not right. I draw him another twenty times, but I can’t catch his high cheekbones, or the way his hair falls a little over his face. More, the pencil becoming quite blunt as the graphite molecules flow over each other to bring Gabriel back to me. Each one nearer than the last, I draw and shade and rub with my wet fingers, until suddenly he’s there hidden within the flatness, staring out at me from the paper, a perfect facsimile of my heartbreak.

  I throw the spoils away and press the picture between the pages of a book, with the single hair I found on his pillow. How many people do this? How many people, in the privacy of their forced loneliness, made this shrine to someone they may never see again?

  Polly, now me, learned from her memory catcher, the development of the graphite molecules into something tangible and recognisable, something permanent that was once there right in front of you; a two-dimensional shadow of life. I pull the picture of my house that she gave me from my pocket and put it on top of Gabriel’s picture. I’m building up quite a portfolio, and suddenly I’m pleased with my work today. I feel the sparkle of starlight inside me, a tiny piece of energy that might, on a day somewhere in the future, develop into excitement. I’d normally have to clear up, move my folders and files before David got home, and I had to start cooking. Tonight I leave them there, eat another sandwich and some soup and have a long bath, long enough to look back on the day and the moor and Polly and wonder what we will find tomorrow.

  The Invisible World of Moorland

  Birds and bees see a moorland world that is invisible to human eyes. Birds can see ultraviolet and have at least four types of color sensitive cone cells. Bees, like humans, have three receptor types, although unlike humans they are sensitive to ultraviolet light, with loss of sensitivity at the red end of the spectrum. This spectral range is achieved by having a cone type that is sensitive to UV wavelengths, and two that are sensitive to "human visible" wavelengths. Because 'colour' is the result of differences in output of receptor types, this means that bees do not simply see additional 'UV colours', they will perceive even human-visible spectra in different hues to those which humans experience.

  The language of bees is an instinct. It doesn’t have to be learned. When worker bees reach a certain age, they know this language automatically the bees’ language is a language of smells and dancing. When a bee has discovered nectar or pollen and returns home, it begins to dance. It goes around and around in narrow circles. The dance excites other bees and tells them the dancing bee has discovered nectar or pollen. So the bee has been able to communicate several things. The dance says that there is nectar or pollen to be obtained. The language of birds and bees is functional and not manipulative, as there can be no mistakes in meaning.

  Birds and bees are living in a different sensory world, hidden from human eyes, but all becomes clear if we shift to the perspective of the bird or the bee. Why have so many behavioural and evolutionary ecologists failed to recognise that human colour perceptions are irrelevant for their studies? One reason is the feeling, long discussed by philosophers, that sensory perception mirrors an objective reality. In other words, seeing is believing.

  Chapter Eleven

  I’d cried myself to sleep last night, thinking about Polly and what she’d been through. That poor woman has no one, and I know the feeling so well. For years now, I’ve seen her every day, passing my house then coming back. Every day I could have reached out to her, formed some kind of friendship, something that would benefit us both, some kind of understanding. I didn’t and the reason was my preoccupation with something invisible. Something that had distracted me from my own life, and from myself.

  In the morning I’m up, showered and waiting by the road for her car. Sarah isn’t there again, and the explanation that she and Gabriel have gone on holiday, far away until I’ve calmed down and stopped banging on her door and ringing his phone, has taken full hold. It’s the only reason that they could be away for this long. For the first time in a while I think about David and wonder if he’s OK. Although I despise what he’s done to me, I don’t want any harm to come to him and, incredibly, a small part of me wishes him well. I’m still reeling from my newfound generosity when Polly’s car appears over the hill. She beeps the horn and waves through the window at me. She’s got a different bag today, a bigger one.

  ‘Hiya, love, how are you? Bright and early, eh?’

  Her chirpy voice resounds and echoes in the barn and the owlets stir. A flock of starlings that have been pecking at the left-over grain from last night’s feeding time scatter, then settle back. She laughs and looks delighted.

  ‘Ooh. The little beauties. Did I tell you about my birds, the ones in my yard?’

  We set off across the moor. She is slower and more laboured today and I am concerned and hold her elbow. She lets me and we stop and have a cup of tea in the rock shelter. Today we set off in a slightly different trajectory, a small rocky path that begins to climb straight away. She’s wearing a bright purple head square, with a gold paisley pattern around the edges. I help Polly over the sharp stones and up the steeper parts, and in no time we’re on the top of a plateau of heather, a purple sea. It’s breath-taking, and I stare at the top of it. Polly laughs again.

  ‘Here we are. The problem with this bit is you can’t see what’s under your feet. It would probably be better to come up here in winter, I’ve tried a couple of times, but it’s so high up that it’s constantly icy. This is what I wanted Gabriel to help me with, really.’ She stares at my face when she says his name, searching for something. ‘You were keen on him, weren’t you, Patricia?’

  I nod slowly, not wanting to burden her with the unbearable weight of my heartbreak. We begin our walk across the purple sea. As soon as we step into the heather I feel a fear. It’s like those icebreakers you do at college, where you fall backwards and trust someone to catch you. I never really knew what to expect, even though there were only two choices. My fear of doing it was disproportionate to the outcomes. This was the same. I would either find a good, clear foothold and confidently make good progress, or suddenly feel something nasty, something furry or slimy against my leg. Or worse, the crunching of bone.

  Polly’s moving slowly, the heather coming up to her thighs. I set off, and it’s like wading through sand. My legs are already sore from the past day’s exercise, and this is a real test. I try to see through the dense plants, past the brightness of the tiny flowers, past the pale wooden trunks of the bonsai trees, onto the dry ground. It’s impossible. Polly turns round. All around her is a halo of pollen, clouds of it billowing into the atmosphere, and I think about physics and particles and how this, if anything, is proof that we’re all just particles milling around.

  ‘Come on, slowcoach. I want to get to that other side and have a cup of tea. I’m bloody parched.’ She moves a little then glances back. ‘Just don’t look down. You have to have faith. Just trust your feet.’

&nbs
p; I start to wade again, thinking all the time about my mother and her faith, faith that everything would be all right, everything would work out. What she must have felt when she couldn’t find me. I don’t think about it a lot because it’s too painful. My mind covers it with a sheaf of conflict, protests that we were different people, grew apart, she didn’t understand me. But she did. And I understood her. Somewhere, buried under the different lives, was a thread that attached us, a shared understanding. I knew that she wouldn’t forget me, I knew she would search for me. Sometimes I was glad, happy that she was suffering, because, after all, hadn’t she treated me unfairly, stopped me doing what I wanted to do, made my life a misery? Didn’t she deserve to be upset?

  I knew, deep down, that this wasn’t true, that this was the same woman who had cared for me, loved me, told me her deepest secrets. I knew that she knew this, and that I would be thinking of her. It’s that shared knowledge that makes it so much more tragic than if we had just forgotten about each other. Because she had faith, she knew I would come back. I did, but it was too late.

  I look at Polly, far ahead, with enough faith to form her own religion. She’s almost floating through the heather, and it’s me who needs help. I shout her, and immediately there’s a scurry of activity, the heather moving in waves as creatures run for cover. A small flock of birds fly up out of the heather beside here and she laughs.

  ‘You’ve done it now! At least they know you’re coming.’

  We carry on and eventually we reach a spot where the heather grows thinner and the ground is covered in reeds and grass. She walks around and examines it, then sits down in the middle.

  ‘People used to live here a long time ago. I met a bloke up here who told me he was looking for stone circles and cairns, prehistoric and that. He knew a lot about this. Turns out there used to be a circle here, but someone’s used the stones for part of a wall.’ We both look around for dry stone walls, and there’s one in the distance. ‘Bit early for dinner, but who’s making the rules, eh?’ She lights a cigarette and I’m a little bit worried about it sparking and setting the dry scrub on fire. It’s dangling out of her mouth as she unpacks the food. ‘Special today.’

  She brings out some sandwiches, cream cheese and strawberry. The two carefully wrapped strawberry meringues, with cream oozing out. A huge punnet of strawberries. Crisps, scotch eggs, a bottle of Schloer.

  ‘I’ve met all sorts while I’ve been up here. It’s busier than you think.’ She unwraps everything and we dig in. ‘So, you’re keen on Gabriel then, are you?’

  Her repeat question takes me by surprise. I haven’t talked to anyone about it, and I’m not sure what to say.

  ‘Yes, yes, I like him. But I think...’

  ‘You think he’s gone? Left you?’ She shakes her head, chewing. ‘I doubt it, lovey. He strikes me as a bit of a one, on the quiet. He’s one of those we know are trouble from the start, but we can’t help it. Contrary, you know, always looking at other women. A bit fast. Oh yes, I know his sort, all right. But I know he likes you. He told me.’

  ‘Oh. What did he say?’

  ‘He said you were lovely, gentle. He likes you a lot. And when your husband was out of the way, he was going to ask you out.’ It’s such a quaint saying, ask you out, and our writhing, hot bodies flash in my mind, making me exhale. ‘So, where do you think he’s gone then, lovey?’

  ‘Sarah. He...he...was with her previously.’

  ‘Do you mean he had sex with her?’ She says the words in a low voice, so no one on the empty moor can hear. ‘Wouldn’t surprise me. Ooh, that Sarah Edwards, all fur coat and no knickers, we used to call ‘em. Got a shillin’ on herself.’

  She is clicking her teeth and shaking her head. She gets hold of my arm roughly to push the point home. ‘There’s nothing annoys me more than someone like her, going round, all dressed up, looking for men to sleep with. Doesn’t want to settle down, oh no, not Miss La-de-da. Independent woman. That’s what she says she is. But she’s not, lovey. Oh no. I’ve got her number all right.’

  I stare at her for a moment.

  ‘Well. To be fair, she is independent. She can do what she wants.’

  Polly laughs.

  ‘Oh yes. I bet she does everything she want, not a care for anyone else’s feelings. One of those who thinks they know what’s best for everyone else?’

  I laugh quietly.

  ‘Yes, she does.’

  ‘She’s one for the fellas as well, I’d wager. Bloody mutton. All that preening and getting ‘em upstairs. They won’t stick around though. Always chuntering on about bedroom things, that sort, as if that’s all as matters. Eh?’

  She nudges me with her elbow hard, and I blush and chew on my sandwich, stifling a laugh.

  ‘Funnily enough, she has mentioned this from time to time.’

  Polly laughs.

  ‘Bloody hell. I knew it. You can spot it a mile off. Not that there’s anything wrong with doing bedroom things in the privacy of your own home. It’s them women who like to tell everybody that annoy me. She might as well wear a sign saying ‘had a bloody ruck with your wife, well don’t worry, I’ll see you right and I won’t even charge you for it.’

  ‘You don’t like her, do you Polly?’

  ‘Well, as it goes, no. But it’s not because of that in her case, really. She’s a bad un. There’s lots of women like her, shouting the odds about bloody sisters doing it for themselves, when they haven’t even attempted the hardest part of life. Or keep a relationship going while you’re bringing a kiddie up. They’ve not been able to know somebody, really click with them, and make that last.‘ She stops to take another bite of a big, juicy strawberry.’ You have to make allowances, oh yes. You have to have respect for the other person, proper caring like. Not go around shouting bloody demands and sleeping with everyone. That’s just an excuse.’ She lights up a cigarette now and shakes her head. ‘No, the real bloody test is carrying on, when it’s difficult and you feel like lying in bed and crying yourself to death. It’s about fighting for your wages to be the same as the bloke working next to you, so you can feed your kids and sharing the housework with your husband. It’s not about you, it’s about everyone else.’ She sucks hard on the cigarette and I can taste the nicotine. I can taste Gabriel’s mouth. Polly continues. ‘She’s like a lot of them, selfish, only thinking about what they get. How’s that bloody equality? Eh?’

  ‘So you don’t think Gabriel’s with her then?’

  ‘No, lovey. I don’t. She was probably just entertainment for the night. Men don’t want to stay with women like her. There’s nothing in it for them.’

  ‘Mmm That’s exactly what he said.’

  ‘Well, there you are then. He’ll be back. If he loves you and there’s nothing stopping him, he’ll be back. Perhaps he’s waiting for your husband to be off the scene, you know, gone completely? What happened there, dear?’

  ‘Well, he had another woman. He’s gone to live with her. In the process he’s had an affair with my Aunty Jean. A couple of years ago. I found this in his drawer.’ I take the bracelet off and hand it to her. It’s left a red ridge on my arm. ‘It’s hers. Me, my mum, my cousin and Jean all had one. These two are mine and mums. They’re inscribed.’

  She holds the bracelet to the light and scrabbles around in her bag. She brings out a small jeweller’s eyepiece.

  ‘Got it when I started to find coins up here, to see the dates and suchlike. See if they were from around when Jimmy went missing.’ She spends a minute reading the inscription. ‘Ooh that’s lovely. ‘All for one and one for all’. But this isn’t Jean’s bracelet, lovey. It’s someone called Leanne’s.’

  I take the bracelet and the eyepiece and look myself, I’m suddenly hot. The suspicion floods back now, all the wondering I had done over Sam. Why would David have Leanne’s bracelet? I force a memory of the night I thought he’d slept with Aunty Jean. It was just him and Leanne in the house, her grinning from the chair, ruddy and blonde, still in her school un
iform. I retch and run through the heather to a nearby rock, where I’m sick. I sit there for a moment, and Polly appears with a glass of Schloer.

  ‘It’s the shock, lovey. But don’t worry, it’ll all sort itself out in the end. Everything does eventually, even if we’re not here to see it.’

  ‘I thought I was mad. I thought I was imagining it.’

  She laughs.

  ‘Bloody hell, Patricia, I think I’ve got the monopoly on madness. I’ve been looking for my dead boyfriend for more than sixty years.’

  ‘I know, but he kept telling me that I was a lunatic, it was my hormones, that I should see someone. All the time he was a fucking liar. Sorry.’

  ‘It’s all right. I’ve stood up here sometimes and shouted out obscenities. I’ve called the world a bastard for taking my Jimmy away, and that’s not a word I like to use generally, I can tell you. But I’ve stood and shouted it, tears running down my face. It seems mad when you think about it, but actually, it’s all that’s kept me sane, that outlet. Come on. We’ve not found nothing but a load of old prehistoric stones. We’ve still got hours more walking to do. I want to do a full round today, we’ll take it slowly, look for anything odd. We should be back at your house about five. Only don’t worry about David. You already knew, didn’t you? So remember that. You were right. Take comfort in that. OK, lovey. Dry your eyes and let’s get on.’

  My legs are heavy but she’s right. I already knew, somewhere inside, in the starlight I was made of, that it was Leanne. She would have been about fifteen then, nearly sixteen. I shake my head and wonder what my life has become, a constant round of discoveries about David’s love life. Where, amongst all the deceit and lies, was my life?

  We walk for hours, stopping in between for cups of tea and bites of juicy strawberries. We walk around the perimeter of the moor and up to the ridge and look out over the reservoir. Every now and again she turns round and shouts an obscenity, and I laugh wildly. I picture Sarah, holed up in her little house, pouring over her Ann Summers catalogues and Nancy Friday books, and feel a tiny spark of sorrow for her. Her little death, la petite mort, covers only a small part of her life, her inner feelings and wants. I am starting to see now how the little death of each day can change our outlook and experience. I never imagined that I would stand up here, dead people and creatures beneath my feet, my hair blowing in the wind, and feel free.