The Glass Book - A London Love Story

by Christian Hayes

  Hello, said the nurse calmly, as though she had always expected that word to emerge from the body on the bed. I wondered when you’d break. Now, how are you, Edward? she asked. A silence was followed by: fine. Good, good, she said. You’ve been here for quite a while. How long have you been able to speak? Edward merely shook his head. Can you do anything else? Edward again shook his head. You look tired, said the nurse. I shall be back tomorrow. Think about anything you want to talk about and we will talk, okay? Edward nodded. Ah, you can nod too. Marvellous. And with that, the woman was gone.

  Just as she had promised, she was back again the next day, sitting on the small wooden chair. It was as though she had been waiting all night for this moment, as though she had been waiting just outside the door watching the seconds tick away. Now, have you thought of anything to ask me, Edward? she asked calmly. Edward nodded. Okay, go on then, I’m listening. There was a silence followed by a quiet.

  How did I get here?

  You were brought here in the ambulance, my dear.

  Another silence.

  Who found me?

  A girl found you.

  Has she visited here?

  Yes, couple of times. A nice girl she is.

  What’s her name?

  She was silent for a moment. Oh, tell you what, I can’t remember. Susan? No. Caroline maybe. Something like Caroline. My mind is going, I tell you.

  Has she been here recently?

  Not for a while now.

  He stared back at the ceiling and remembered her face as it had looked down over him.

  A man came to see you too, said the woman.

  A man?

  Yes.

  Who?

  He said he was a relative.

  I don’t have any relatives.

  Ah, that’s no good. Maybe he was a friend then? Edward could not recall any friends. It’ll come back to you. You never know, he may return, and then you can talk to him yourself. Now is there anything else you want to know, my dear?

  No, said Edward.

  I have a few questions for you, if that’s okay?

  Yes, replied Edward.

  What’s your name? asked the woman.

  Edward, said Edward.

  And your last name?

  Glass.

  Yes, very good. Extraordinary name, Glass. Where does it originate? Edward shrugged his shoulders.

  Ah, I can see you can also shrug your shoulders, very good. Edward again cursed himself silently. Now, can you feel any pain? Does anything hurt? Edward shook his head. Good. So you’re comfortable? Edward nodded his head. Superb, said the nurse. He didn’t want to reveal just how comfortable. We’ll soon have you sitting up in no time but I’ll let you be for now. If you want any music or anything, just ask. Edward nodded, and the nurse left. Edward feared he’d be out of there soon. He still didn’t know if he could yet manage any major movement. Late that night, he attempted it.

  It hurt a lot to move so much, with aching pains shooting around his body, but Edward finally managed it. He sat slumped up against the headboard, now looking out towards the large window that faced him. The darkness was pressed right up against the windowpane and it reminded him of the darkness he had experienced night after night after night. It was only then that pages began to float around his head and he remembered the box that he had left in his room. He wondered what had come of it.

  The next day he asked the nurse if she knew anything about the box.

  A box? No, I don’t think so. What kind of box?

  A cardboard box.

  What was in it?

  Paper.

  Oh. Well I didn’t hear anything about it.

  Edward had never imagined that he would be left with a box full of pages after the words had run dry. He had always thought that he would have escaped by then, that he would never have to deal with them. But now it was lying there in his room, all in a mess, and he wasn’t sure what use it would be any more. Perhaps he should burn it, he thought. He certainly never wanted to read it.

  Every day Edward spoke a little more to the nurse until she had coaxed him into flowing conversations. She would tell him about the daily news, about the weather, about her family. She would even read to him when Edward so desired and would ask him questions that he would sometimes not be comfortable answering, especially questions about his past and how he came to be found on the floor of his apartment.

  Every day he hoped and waited for the girl to come through the door again but she never came. He often asked the nurse about her, what she looked like, what she sounded like. The nurse came to explaining everything she had been told about Edward and how he had been found.

  ‘She said she found you lying out cold on the floor, that she had come over there because your television was keeping her up. I asked her how she got in and she said that the door had been left open, as though you had collapsed while trying to escape. She said she had often thought about going over to your flat to complain about the noise of the television but she was glad that she did that time, just in time to save you. She had been playing her piano that night and she could hear the sound of your television coming through the wall.’

  Edward was silent for a while. ‘I remember a piano. Something about a piano.’

  ‘What is it you remember?’

  ‘Just the sound of a piano. Or maybe I dreamt it.’ He would explain his dreams to the nurse, about mountains and seas and fields of grass and the nurse would often tell him how strange they were. ‘They’re always so vivid,’ Edward told her, ‘that’s probably why I sometimes mistake them for actually happening.’

  And one night he had the most vivid of dreams in which he was drowned by the pages of the book that had risen from the box and engulfed him, and he awoke in the dead of night with the pages still floating around inside his head. He knew that at some point he would have to sit down and read what he had written. Now it felt as though during those past three years he had been caught in a trance and all that he had written had been written in a dream. Only now was he waking from the dream that had become a nightmare.

  Even though Edward was making progress, he remained in the hospital for another month as he was fed and nursed back to health. Every day he would see a physiotherapist and he would be made to do various exercises. On some days he even got to walk around the corridors of the hospital, peering in through doors which had been left open or were swinging shut. He would find himself staring out of the windows and out over the city that surrounded him, imagining it swallowing him as he walked out into it. And every day he feared the releasing of Edward Glass into the city and back into his own life, but the day came closer and closer and he could feel himself becoming healthier and healthier. If there was anything he could do to muddy his progression he would do it, but he no longer wanted to hurt himself. He wanted to be better than he ever had been and he wanted to be the Edward Glass he had been before the writing had taken him over.

  And one day he found himself dressed and in a lift that was descending towards the ground floor. He watched the numbers as they made their way down from twelve, to eleven, to ten, to... until the doors slid open and he could see the large revolving door out ahead where people came and went. He stepped out of the lift and stood still for a moment. He took a few breaths before taking step after step after step, and with that Edward Glass walked down the long corridor, through the large revolving doors, and out into the city.

  5.

  London: roads running off and around doorways and statues and jagged, cracked paving stones, rubble and scaffold: building upon building: the knocking down or the paving over: the shifting skyline of domes and spires: ragged towers pierce the sky and glass structures reflect the smoke. In amongst all this: Edward Glass, inching along the pavement.

  He kept close to the wall, to avoid the stream of people, to avoid the stream of traffic. His feet ached. The sky darkened. Streetlamps flickered on. He had been walking for hours, round and around; he no longer recognised the city, he n
o longer knew his way home. Almost by chance, he found himself wandering along streets that were once familiar, and it was only once night had fallen that he found himself, cold and shivering, creeping down the street upon which he had lived. He looked wearily up at his window on the top floor. The lights were out. The bulb had burst.

  He removed a key from his pocket and guided it into the apartment block keyhole. Entering, he peered along the corridor: a bicycle beneath the staircase, a pair of boots aligned by the first door. Edward made the slow ascent up the stairs, each step echoing flatly against the stone-green walls. When he reached the third and final floor, he passed Catherine Lucia’s apartment, unbeknownst to him that in the only other apartment on his floor, she was reading silently. At that very moment she could hear his footsteps coming up the stairs and stepping along the corridor.

  The second key stuck a little in the lock and he had to force the door open. With the opening of the door came a gust of icy wind, escaping. It billowed over him and entered the corridor. The flicking of the switch threw a harsh yellow glow over the living room. The sofa was still against the wall, the television still out in its centre, its single wire trailing. Beyond: the kitchen, bare. He clung to the doorway; entering any further would mean returning to his old life.

  When he took his first step inside, it felt more like he was returning to the scene of a crime than returning home. Glancing down, he saw a small bloodstain that appeared inconspicuous. He took further steps inside and found himself glancing into the bathroom: empty and unused. From there, the closed bedroom door stared at him, willing him to enter, to witness the horror he had locked inside. Edward cautiously swung the door open. There, sitting at the centre of the room, was the cardboard box, three feet by three feet. The lamp was still aimed towards it, but its bulb seemed to have long since given up. He looked at the desk, neat and bare, and then at the modest bed in the corner: the single mattress, pillow and blanket.

  He took off his shoes and his jacket and, still wearing his socks, trousers and t-shirt, got into bed. It was cold, and he did not yet want to face the world he had to return to. He pulled the duvet over his head and shut his eyes tight. It took a while for sleep to drag him under. His eyes kept opening and he was often out of breath. His future flashed wildly before him: darkness on a blank screen. This darkness soon engulfed itself and sent him off to sleep.

  It took him close to two hours to emerge from bed. He lay motionless, staring at the wall, afraid to turn towards the room where daylight now shined. He did not want to see the room he had festered in for all those years, the room where he had almost died. When he did rise, he put his shoes and jacket on straight away and hurried into the kitchen, barely noticing the chair, the desk, the lamp, nor the box filled with paper.

  He checked the cupboards and the fridge for anything to eat but every compartment was bare. He did not remember the cleaning of the kitchen. The pain in his stomach was beginning to become a nuisance. He hurried back into his bedroom. At the very corner of the room, between the window and the edge of his desk, was a loose piece of carpeting which he flipped over. He tried to get in closer but the desk was blocking his shoulder. He was forced to push it out of the way, finding an energy inside of him he didn’t know he had. He moved closer to the corner and looked down at where the floor had been exposed.

  There, just at the corner, a section of the wooden floorboard had fallen away, allowing just enough space for a hand to be reached into. He could almost see what he was looking for in the light that came from the window and he reached in and pulled out what was there. In his hand he found two five pound notes and a small collection of coins. He counted them up: eleven pounds and five pennies. He looked back down into the hole, but there was no more.

  He replaced the carpet and stuffed the money into his trouser pocket. He hurried into the kitchen and washed his hands. He’d have to buy some soap, he thought. Indeed, the house was bare of any of the essentials he would be in need of. He removed the money from his pocket and counted it over again. It would not be enough for any of these things: toothpaste, soap, rent, let alone food. He paced around his living room in frantic circles.

  All his money had gone. It had stretched to the very last but now he found himself beyond that point with nothing to show for it. He had to get money, he had to get food: money and food. They were essential. He would need a job now, today. He looked at his wrist. He didn’t even have a watch. He would need one if he was going to get anywhere. Perhaps a calendar. What day was it? What time was it? He looked outside: it was grey, the light was white. Was it time for breakfast or was it time for lunch? His stomach told him neither, or more accurately, both.

  He longed for a good meal, even though he had had his final meal in the hospital only the day before. Eleven pounds and five pennies. Five pennies. That wasn’t going to get him very far. He’d have to walk everywhere he went: he had no money for the bus, nor the tube. He had run out of books to sell. He looked around the room. The television could go, even the sofa. He could sit on the chair in his bedroom, that would be practical enough. The sofa would go for more than the chair. Could he sell plates? Where would he go to sell plates? But then what would he eat on? He couldn’t just eat off the table or out of his hand. He had to keep something for himself. First thing’s first: food and job, or job and food? Leave first, walk first, then see what happens: whether you are lead by your stomach or lead by your wallet. Wallet, he needed one of those. Not yet, his pocket would do fine. More pockets, more trousers, more clothes. He’d never get a job dressed like that. He might as well have been lying naked at the centre of the room for all the help it would do him.

  Maybe he could buy some shirts from a charity shop and walk around in a dead man’s clothes. He wouldn’t mind. To all intents and purposes he too was a dead man, spared life by chance, by accident. A tragic accident. Through all this worry and panic, he never gave one thought to the girl who had looked over him. She was fading further and further from his mind. He had come to believe that she had actually come to him in a dream, that the nurse had merely humoured him and fuelled his fantasies in order to make him well again. Everything whirled around inside his mind: money, clothes, food, until all he could do was tuck in his t-shirt, zip up his jacket, run his hands through his hair and walk right out of the apartment.

  The city was grey and dead, its puddles poisoned with dirt and muddy memories of footsteps. Tyres made a wet, glistening sound as they drove over the tarmac and splashed the corners where the puddles lay. And no one seemed to notice the lone man walking through, his hands pushed deep into his pockets, one hand clasped around eleven pounds and five pennies, with his chin hidden under the neck of his jacket, trying to keep in the heat. It was after twenty minutes of walking that he came to a parade of shops. The traffic was heavier here and people came and went, never acknowledging each other. He knew this area from the early days when he used to walk back and forth every now and then, selling the books he had finished reading.

  He ducked into a café and, looking up at the menu overhead, ordered himself a full English breakfast and a mug of coffee. He handed over the money: three pounds seventy-five for the breakfast and sixty-five for the coffee. That left him with six pounds and sixty-five pence, practically half of his money. He sighed and returned the change to his pocket before taking the mug of coffee with him and sitting at the back of the café.

  He was careful not to spill any on the way in fear of wasting what was now very precious to him. He took a sip and it warmed his mouth and throat, and he took pleasure in smelling the aroma and allowing the steam to rise up over his lips, nose and cheeks. It tasted bitter but it was nevertheless strangely pleasant. He swirled the coffee around in his mouth so as not to drink up too much of it before his food came.

  When the small pool in his mouth had been swallowed he looked up at the other people in the café. All were on their own, a fat man with a beard who was very busy eating, an aging woman who was staring straight ahead while
she sipped her tea, and a very old man who had finished eating and seemed to be statuesque, motionless in his place. Edward observed this man. It took a long while for him to move, for him to prove to Edward that he was still alive. It was a twitch of the hand that gave it away and then a jerk of the head as though his brain had coughed. The man slowly got up and left, leaning on a cane and taking sluggish step after step after step out onto the street.

  And as Edward watched him, his attention shifted from the decrepit old man to the waitress who was walking over to him with his food. He eyed the plate as it made its way towards him and felt as though he was being handed everything he wanted in the world, as though the placing down of the plate would finally bring contentment to Edward Glass.

  It was placed down onto the table with a, ‘There you go,’ from the waitress, to which Edward smiled and replied a quiet, ‘Thank you,’ grateful for the mundane interaction that had occurred between them. Edward looked down at his plate and grabbed his cutlery. He began immediately, starting with the sausage, cutting off one of its ends and putting it straight into his mouth. Then he took a forkful of beans and put them into his mouth before he had managed to swallow the sausage. He cut off some white from the fried egg before taking another piece of sausage on the fork and eating them together. All the food felt so good in his mouth, the meaty texture of the sausage against the soft smoothness of the eggwhite against the soft warm texture of the beans.

  He took a sip of coffee before cutting off some bacon and dipping it into the egg yolk and raising it straight into his mouth, quickly followed by even more sausage. This behaviour continued for a short while: he ate continuously without thinking, and in some cases, without chewing. By the end he felt full, almost weighed down.

  He finished off the rest of the coffee, which had begun to cool, serving to dislodge the food that had built up inside his chest and sending it down into his stomach. He sat for a while, licking his teeth, taking in all the flavour he could find. He felt satisfied and warm, and if he had been anywhere near his bed he would most certainly have had a little sleep.