by Will Carver
‘I can’t say that I do, no.’ Gail looked puzzled but heartened.
‘Well, I always have them. And once you’ve tasted it, you’ll find that it is as essential as de-ionised water for your iron.’
Mrs May’s eccentricities made her immediately endearing and intriguing.
‘I have some at my place now and it goes perfectly with the chocolate and walnut cake I also have. If you’d like to talk…’
‘I think I need to understand what all this Blue Mountain fuss is about. That would be lovely. Thank you Mrs May.’
Gail picked up the keys from the shelf by the front door and left her phone, face down, on that shelf, inside the apartment. It buzzed again and she shut the door behind her.
*
Mrs May was right. The coffee was incredible. As was the cake. Somehow, each one made the other taste better. It was ludicrous to Gail. She felt spoilt.
They talked for a while. The old lady asking most of the questions and doing the majority of listening. Gail spoke of her childhood and her parents and school and work, and it all led to meeting the best man in the world, who turned out to be a monster.
Without too much graphic detail, but enough to get the message across, Gail belted out her story and was pleased to have a receptive audience. She had tried to speak about it with her mother once, and the woman who had given birth to her ended up defending the abuser.
Pressure.
War.
He’s a man.
Gail needed to talk about it. She needed the release. She needed somebody to tell her that she had done the right thing. But she left out the part about the poppyseed inside of her. It was too early, anyway.
Mrs May had lost track of time so was unaware that Abe had returned. There was no opportunity to let herself into his flat, even if that was something she had wanted to do. He was back.
When she opened her door to let Gail out, Abe was standing in the foyer with a cardboard cup holder and two take-out cups of coffee.
‘Hello, Abe. Back already.’
‘Just a quick trip. Grabbed myself and Blair a nice cup of coffee. I assume she’s back from her run?’
‘I can’t say I’ve seen her.’
‘Well, I’ll go up and give her a knock.’ He gave a polite nod to Mrs May. ‘Nice to see you again, Gail.’ And another nod to his new neighbour.
He knocked and waited. Knocked again and waited. Then returned downstairs, where the two women were still talking outside Mrs May’s door.
‘Seems she’s still out. Would either of you care for a coffee?’ Abe took one of the cups from the holder.
‘Not unless it’s Blue Mountain,’ Gail smiled, conspiratorially.
‘Oh, looks like I’m no longer the favourite.’
They all laughed lightly before Mrs May broke the moment.
‘Why don’t you come in, Abe? It’s almost time for wine, but I can squeeze in a coffee.’
Blair was dissolving in the bath, there was nothing he could do to speed that up, so Abe agreed. Gail went back to her abusive messages, and Abe went in for his interrogation.
ELEVEN
Jonesy only had one dinner at Mrs May’s. That was enough. From that day, he would still visit her for coffee and even a glass or two of red wine. But no meals. Nothing so long that he couldn’t escape.
The old lady could cook. She was a little old-fashioned in her choices and presentation but she knew her way around a stove, that was for sure. She did not buy into the vegan or vegetarian movements one bit and believed that humans were flesh and they desired flesh – both sexually and nutritionally. Perhaps even spiritually.
Though, strangely, she would not touch milk. The idea of drinking juice from another species did not sit well with Mrs May. Stranger still, she loved cheese.
On that solitary occasion where those two elders of The Beresford did meet for food, Mrs May finished with a very generous cheese board. This was accompanied by a bottle of Barbaresco Riserva San Cristoforo from Piedmont. Jonesy had no idea how much the wine would have cost but he understood that it was delicious. As was the prawn starter, beef main and chocolate pudding.
The conversation was never dry – they had enough years between them on Earth to find something worth saying. Mrs May seemed incredibly interested in her new lodger and had many questions for him. Jonesy managed to sidestep the probing a few times where the subject was, in his eyes, irrelevant. But he did open up.
‘You’re not from round here, obviously, so what brings you this way?’
Standard dinner-party fodder but it was of a personal nature to her guest.
‘I’ve come to visit family. Family that I haven’t seen in a long time, for one reason or another.’
Mrs May nodded and forked some food into her mouth so that Jonesy would have to continue.
‘My son and his wife. And my two grandkids. I haven’t seen them since they started school. They’re teenagers now.’ He looked off to the side, picturing the kids when they were little. His face soon dropped into an expression that Mrs May knew well: disappointment and regret.
‘I’m sorry, Mr Jones, you certainly do not have to talk about it, if you don’t want to.’ Then she shoved more food in her mouth so that he would have to.
He explained, in that soft, soothing voice of his, that he was unwell. Stage-four cancer. The doctors are surprised he’s still on his feet but think he has a couple of months left. Maximum.
‘That’s why I signed such a short lease and paid you up front. You won’t lose any money, and I don’t want you to worry, you won’t find me dead in there. I won’t die. I won’t let myself until I’ve sorted things out.’
Mrs May put down her cutlery and slid her hand across to hold her guest’s arm. She was saddened and wanted to support him. They looked at each other for a tender moment, then she slid her hand back to take a drink of her wine.
‘So, you’ve travelled here to reconnect with your boy. Does he even know you’ve been unwell.’
‘We haven’t spoken in so long. I tried to get through it myself, but it was caught too late. I stopped the treatment and packed my bag. The next time I go home, it will be to die.’
The room went cold.
There was a short silence as they digested the gravity of Jonesy’s situation.
Then Mrs May spoken again. She could have tried to change the subject. She could have tried to stay on a supportive course. Instead, she asked, ‘What if there was something you could do?’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘What if there was something you could do to get rid of that blasted illness within you?’
‘I tried. Chemo. Radiation. The usual things.’
‘I mean something else. There are people out there who would kill another person if it gave them their fifteen minutes of fame, but this is more than that, Jonesy. This is your life. A chance to reconnect and have a family again. If there was something, would you try it?’
Jonesy looked decidedly uncomfortable for a moment, and this section of their conversation was the reason the two had only shared one dinner.
‘Are you asking if I would kill a person in order to save myself from cancer? Maybe buy myself some healthier organs on the black market?’ He placed his knife and fork on the table, and Mrs May was afraid that he was going to get up and leave.
She changed tack slightly. She’d offended him and that was never what she had intended. She wanted to show that she cared, she understood.
‘I’m sorry, I don’t think that came across right at all. I wasn’t suggesting anything like that. I just … I just wondered whether there was an experimental treatment or something. You hear about those things…’
He picked up his cutlery again.
‘I understand your sentiment, Mrs May, I do have some friends who have reacted in the same way. I’m old. I have lived a long and varied life. I have travelled. I have loved. I have lost. I have loved somebody else. I have read great novels and played my own music. I have drunk great wine and
bad whisky. I’ve tried drugs and lived through war. It is my time to go. There is nothing left for me to do but tell my son that I was wrong and I never stopped loving him, and that he should always be the bigger man with his own kids because I only have one regret in my life and it lasted for ten years. That’s more than this cancer ever took from me.’
He took a deep breath that was somewhere between a sigh and complete resignation.
‘So, I guess to answer your question, there is no experimental drug out there that is going to save me in time, there’s no voodoo or magic, and I wouldn’t kill somebody to get an extra fifteen minutes on this planet.’
They never spoke of it again.
Mrs May knew that there was no need to push the subject.
Jonesy was going to die soon, but there was no need for it to happen at The Beresford.
TWELVE
The coffee was already going cold but that didn’t bother Mrs May. She’d had her cold cup in the morning and this lukewarm crap was eating into her wine time. She just wanted some face-to-face with Abe. So that she could gauge what was happening in his life. Something was making her uneasy. It wasn’t maternal instinct, but she wanted to look out for the boy.
She asked how things were going with Blair and he lied. He told her that they were close, that he felt some connection with her and that he believed that she felt it with him. He was worried that their backgrounds were too similar, and that might make them hold back. But he was willing to take it slowly because they were having a great time together.
She probed a little further, because Blair had been absent since the night before and it was unlike her to not be seen around, running or in the library. It wasn’t like with Sythe, where he would disappear for weeks on end then suddenly reappear.
‘Remember Jonesy?’ she asked.
‘Of course. Wasn’t here long but left his mark. Left a couple of poetry books in your library, too, if I recall.’
‘Have you read them?’
‘Nobody really reads poetry anymore, Mrs May.’
‘Ah, so you have read them.’ She swigged the final dregs of her coffee. ‘Oh, thank the Lord below that’s finished. I need a glass of wine.’
Abe stayed in his seat while she unscrewed something cheap and poured it quickly into a glass.
She continued.
‘Jonesy was the real deal. You know? A proper gent. He wasn’t here long but he didn’t just leave without a word. He paid up. He said his goodbyes. He went on his way. I wish more people would do that. I’m getting tired of the deserters. If you ever want to leave, Abe, that’s the way I want you to go.’
‘Of course. I wouldn’t just—’
‘I mean it. Do it the right way.’ She interrupted. A warning, masquerading as concern.
‘Okay.’ He felt like a child being scalded by a parent for misbehaving during class. ‘I don’t have any inclination to move on just yet. I like it here. Blair is here…’
The switch in Abe Schwartz was mystifying. The way he lied so effortlessly. Either he was in denial and was convinced that he would return to his apartment and find Blair there, still alive and sorry, or all empathy had evaporated from his being. He couldn’t feel bad about what he had done because he did not believe that he was in the wrong.
He had bought Blair a cup of coffee from town, knowing that she was chopped up in his bathroom. He was talking about staying at The Beresford because he felt a connection with her and wanted to see how it developed, yet her fingerprints were already starting to melt away, and any other soft tissue that could help identify her was eroding.
The old dependable, affable, awkward Abe was in there somewhere but buried deep beneath the pretence.
As were his memories and his morals.
‘I understand that, Abe, and you are a great tenant, but there is a world out there, and when you find that it’s time for you to see it, I want to make sure that you do things in the correct way. Leave the same way that you came. Okay?’
‘Okay, Mrs May.’ To Abe, it felt like her worry or consideration had given way and, in the end, what she was doing was asking him to leave The Beresford. To get out and explore the world. To leave this all behind. Start anew.
He swallowed the last of his coffee.
‘She’s right, you know?’
‘I’m sorry?’
‘Gail. This stuff was no Blue Mountain.’ He smiled and Mrs May caught a glimpse of the kid she knew. The scrawny Abe, who had arrived with no idea how to take care of himself. The Abe who hadn’t killed anyone. Who hadn’t lost something with every second his thumbs had squeezed Sythe’s airways shut.
The Abe who would have picked up on Mrs May’s not-so-subtle hints.
‘I should be getting back.’ The chair screeched as he pushed himself away from the table.
‘Of course. Oh, I meant to ask. How is the sink?’
‘The sink?’
‘Yes, you had some drainage trouble a while back. Nothing since then?’
‘Oh, that. No. It’s all good. That was just a one-off, I think.’
‘I do hope so.’ And she looked at him like she knew something.
Abe’s paranoia kicked in. All he could think about was getting out of the old lady’s place and back to his own, back to Blair. He had to melt her and burn her and crush her to nothing. He was starting to panic, and panicking almost always leads to mistakes.
Abe’s biggest mistake was that he hadn’t really been listening to Mrs May, he thought the conversation had taken an odd turn. His anxiety would make him forget what they spoke about, that his initial inclination was correct. She was telling him to get out of The Beresford.
WHAT DO YOU WANT?
It’s Valentine’s Day. The loneliest day of the year if you are single. And, for many, if you are in a relationship.
Men can be seen scrambling through buckets of supermarket detritus or petrol-station wastelands for the last bunch of dying flowers because, for some reason, if they don’t give their wife/girlfriend/fiancée a box of chocolates or an expensive candle or make them something meaningful, it means that their love is not real.
And it’s made worse when love becomes public. When somebody posts a picture of the breakfast they were made that morning and accompany it with a long spiel about how great their partner is and how long they have been in love. In fact, throw in some extra images of you as a couple over the years, that way everyone will be envious of your everlasting commitment and ongoing sexual ardour for one another.
Disguise the fact that you are showing off or papering over the cracks by cutting and pasting a set of questions about your relationship onto your social-media platform of choice.
How long have you been together? Who asked whom out first? Which of you does the driving? There’s nothing emotional in there that you have to commit to. It’s supposed to look cute. You’re just joining in.
You laugh off the question about what you do on ‘date night’, because you don’t do that kind of thing anymore and you’re already dreading the fact that one of you has to spread your legs tonight for a day made up by card companies. And the people who are like you feel awful because they know they have to do the same thing this evening. And the people who are in love feel bad for you because they can see the lie. And the singletons hate you because they’d be happy for some contact with another person, even if it’s not that good. And, in the end, every voyeur feels like crap as a result of your public declaration, even you.
Love, whether real or troubled, makes others feel hopeless.
Private love is the dream. The kind that makes you want to scream from the rooftops but gives you the security to know that it isn’t necessary.
What do you want, Abe?
I want to be loved. Needed. I want other people to look at what I have and feel short-changed that they don’t have anything that comes close.
Love is so easily confused. For the most part, it is interchangeable with madness, but nobody would ask to be mad.
You
ask for it because it seems unattainable. It’s a myth. Something you can’t get by yourself.
You ask for it because you were born into this world alone and you will die alone and love ensures that for some point in the middle of your existence, you have somebody else.
Is it really love that you want?
THIRTEEN
He can tell his therapist that his dad was also a mean drunk, that he used to take a large wooden spoon out of the cutlery drawer and smack his son across the knuckles or the back of the legs.
It doesn’t matter.
You don’t hit your wife, Castle.
The things that happened in that war, that he saw, that everybody saw, or heard. The screams. The fear. The heads on the side of the road. All the things they never shared with anyone when they got back. Those events that fucked them all up so epically. How the military just left them. They fought for their country in the blind faith that what they were doing was right. And then they were abandoned by the very people they were fighting for, to protect, as soon as they got home.
Yeah, sad story, Castle. But you don’t hit your wife. Ever.
Gail didn’t even know her husband had been in therapy. It was the one thing the army had thrown his way to help him deal with whatever made-up syndrome was fashionable for veterans that month.
He didn’t want to hit her. He couldn’t control his rage. He was scared of himself so he knew how scared she must have been. And he hated himself for that.
The therapy proved to be a useful outlet for him. There was somebody to talk to who had to keep things confidential – as long as no laws were being broken. It doesn’t stop the rage, though. No amount of deep breaths or tapping yourself on the forehead fifteen times was going to outweigh the devastation he had witnessed and the hatred he felt for himself as a result.
And his therapist knew all of this. His therapist knew more about what was going on in former Staff Sergeant Castle’s mind than his own wife ever would. His therapist had seen this with other ex-military types who had served. His therapist understood the psychology and the history. When Castle wept on that couch and said that he was drinking again and came home to an empty house, and that he thought Gail had probably left him for good this time, his therapist said all the right things – get to an AA meeting because the booze isn’t helping – but, inside, that therapist was thinking, Of course, you idiot, because you don’t hit your fucking wife.