Games with the Dead

by James Nally

  All last night’s unbridled joy now feels tainted, our wild celebrations shallow and spurious.

  ‘Why is an atrocity like this stuck at the bottom of page 11?’

  ‘We’re under orders from on high, play down anything that might jeopardise the peace process.’

  ‘Oh yeah, the peace process, punctuated by the occasional under-reported massacre of the innocent.’

  My mind turns to our Da, a Sinn Fein councillor in the Irish Midlands and unashamed IRA supporter since the late 1960s. Only he knows how many people he helped slaughter in pursuit of the Provos’ most nebulous of goals, ‘The Cause’. Somewhat ironically, he’s now risking his neck going against fellow ‘volunteers’ to support the peace process.

  ‘Da says they were on the verge of announcing a total ceasefire,’ says Fintan. ‘Now they have to be seen to retaliate. Another round of tit-for-tat killings. I’m telling you, there are dark forces at work here, stirring this up, making sure peace can’t happen.

  ‘But he assures me it will, and soon, as impossible as that seems,’ he says, standing and rubbing his palms together. ‘So, what’s the newly unattached, responsibility-free Donal up to today? I rather fancy a booze-fuelled, three-match World Cup marathon.’

  ‘I’m seeing Matt today. Then I suppose I’d better show my face back at the Cold Case Squad tomorrow, though nobody’s been in touch.’

  ‘Oh, the joys of the lackadaisical public sector. What about tonight?’

  ‘I may have a hot date!’

  ‘Anyone I know?’

  ‘Edwina Milne.’

  I cringe in anticipation of a barrage of verbal abuse about false teeth and fallen arches.

  ‘You hound,’ he smiles. ‘She is a silver vixen, in a sort of Susan George / Felicity Kendall way. When did all this come about?’

  ‘I bumped into her in the Lamb in Pyecombe.’

  ‘And now you’re succulent lamb to her Wolverine slaughter. There’s something a bit dominatrix about her, wouldn’t you say?’

  ‘You think that about all upper-class women,’ I smile. Truth is, I don’t really know if it’ll lead anywhere. I’m just going along with it for now, no pressure, because I haven’t the stomach for any more rejection.

  ‘Well good for you,’ he says, and I can tell he means it. ‘A torrid affair might be just the thing to flush Zoe out of your system. Make sure you seize the moment if it arrives, Donal, and win the day.’

  As I force down a coffee that could trigger a zombie apocalypse, my pounding head exhumes last night’s drunken call to Zoe. Pumped by Ireland’s fearless soccer heroics, I’d given it the full, unreconstructed, wall-thumping rhetoric.

  First, I told her I was moving back in with Fintan and Aidan.

  ‘I understand,’ she’d said, ‘but please don’t disappear for days at a time again like you’ve just done. It really worries me.’

  Second, I read her my rights. ‘Regardless of what happens to us, I shall carry on being a dad to Matt, starting tomorrow.’

  ‘Hang on, Donal, you can’t just announce you’re moving out and then start invoking rules about your role in his life.’

  I was taking none of her lip. ‘I’ll be over at 1pm sharp, and you can expect me every Sunday at that time.’

  ‘You charge on round at one then. You won’t find us in.’

  ‘What do you mean, you won’t be in?’

  ‘Matthew will be with his grandparents.’

  I remember my mind cartwheeling through scenarios: She’ll be out with Charles. No doubt catching a musical. Or gawping at some monstrous hunk of modern art.

  ‘I’ll pick him up from your parents so. As long as your mum doesn’t make me tarmac the drive first.’

  She sighed pointedly.

  ‘All right, take him to the park tomorrow, but don’t use Matthew as a way to control me, Donal. Not now you’ve announced you’re leaving us. I won’t stand for it.’

  ‘I’m just thinking of him,’ I said and hung up.

  She’s right of course. Since uncovering her affair, I’ve been using Matt’s devotion to me as a way of punishing her and expediting her chucking of Chuck. But I’ve come to realise that our mutual, undying love for Matt won’t be enough to save us. She has to still love me.

  Those toxic Costa Rican caffeine dregs galvanise me. I grab my phone and psych myself with Fintan’s rousing words: ‘Seize the moment … win the day.’

  I text Edwina: I looked up convivial and would like to give it a go tonight! I then press send before I have a chance to agonise/re-type endlessly/suck out every cheerful, carefree spark of spontaneity.

  I refuse to let Edwina’s lack of reply dent my new-found positivity, jump in the car and head up to Crouch End, for once not cringing at the prospect of meeting Zoe’s mum and dad.

  She’s never believed you’re good enough for her. Neither has her insufferably snobby mother …

  Well look who’s trundling up your fancy fucking hill now, the wronged man, so imbued with honour and decency that he eschews all personal grievance for the benefit of a twenty-two-month-old boy who isn’t even his own. Look down on me now, Sylvia, with your wanton slut of a daughter.

  Sylvia answers the door resignedly, as if I were the Gestapo and she’d been expecting me.

  Matt runs for me like there’s nothing else in the world, jumping and crashing face-first into my stomach. ‘Dong!’ cries his muffled voice and I feel myself go.

  I bury my face in his hair and breathe deeply. I can’t show weakness. Not in front of vinegar tits.

  Zoe’s dad appears, smiling meekly. Good old Arthur.

  ‘We were surprised to hear you were coming, Donal, after all that’s gone on.’

  ‘Pleasantly surprised, I hope, Arthur.’

  ‘Well I, or rather we’re impressed actually, that you’re handling it all so … maturely.’

  I put Matt down in case I fall over from shock.

  ‘Well I just want what’s best for this little fellow. And for Zoe too,’ I stammer.

  ‘Matthew will thank you in years to come,’ says Sylvia, nodding earnestly. ‘You know, for swallowing your pride.’

  ‘Sure, it’s only a trip to the park, no big deal.’

  ‘You know what we mean,’ says Arthur, as Sylvia places her hand on my upper arm.

  Jesus, I’m thinking, zero to hero in a day. Moving out has proven a master stroke. Fintan’s a fucking genius.

  I survey them both meaningfully, my newly proud parents-in-law.

  ‘We’ll find a way through this, I’m certain of that,’ I say, cryptically but with conviction.

  ‘It hasn’t been easy for Zoe,’ says Sylvia. ‘But we know she’ll always put Matthew’s welfare first. And now we know you’re doing the same, well, we’re so relieved.’

  ‘Well he’s worth it,’ I say, inexplicably mimicking the female American voiceover from that ghastly shampoo ad. Sylvia looks uneasy, Arthur aghast. Not for the first time, I wonder why I feel compelled to ruin genuine emotional moments.

  ‘Make sure you’re back here by four on the dot,’ says Sylvia sternly. ‘Or you can expect the Spanish degree.’

  ‘Of course,’ I say, fighting the urge to add: ‘Don’t you mean Spanish Inquisition?’ But their kindness is just the emotional validation I need post Zoe’s betrayal. They’ll never get my humour, but at least they’re starting to get me.

  At Priory Park, we ‘do the rounds’ twice until Matt finally plants himself on his favourite ride: the see-saw. I straddle the other end and launch into a painfully slow and controlled ‘Jane Fonda squat’ so as not to send him into orbit. Undercarriage creaking and screaming for mercy, I check the time and realise we’ve killed a measly twenty minutes. I’d forgotten how tedious and knackering childcare is and ransack my brain for a plan B that might less strenuously pass the remaining 100. I’m then consumed with guilt. Is this all that parenthood has really meant to me; a relentless see-saw of duty versus guilt? Then I think of Zoe out on her hot date with Charles and
feel instantly vindicated. How had she so effortlessly dismounted from the parenting see-saw? Even Sylvia is so obviously horrified by her daughter’s selfish behaviour that she has finally identified some merit in me!

  ‘Pelvis has left the building,’ I tell Matt, heaving myself off and lowering his end with my hands. ‘Dong’s hips are a little rusty. A lot rustier than mummy’s, as we now know.’

  My phone pings a reply from Edwina. Juan Gris, the Cut, 8pm?

  I’ve no idea what she means. Is that a restaurant, a bar or a man? Maybe it’s some class of art house cinema, or Juan’s a famous opera singer I should know about. I opt for a safe, See you then Edwina, until I can find out more, adding an ‘x’, then deleting it, then repeating that process countless times. Seize the moment, win the day, I tell myself, adding two kisses. I then remove the Edwina so that the kisses look more habitual than personal. Never mind seizing moments, I think to myself, let’s just try to make sure she actually shows up. After all, I’m the only man I know with a track record of scaring women off before a date.

  ‘I’m hungry,’ whines Matt and I’m suddenly struck by a deliciously petty, small-minded way to hit back at Zoe and her folks.

  ‘What about McDonald’s?’ I say, knowing that the recently opened branch in Hampstead village still has wax-jacketed local buffoons protesting outside. How I’ll relish crossing that particular picket line. Of course, poor sheltered Matt has never heard of the ghastly American corporate behemoth and asks if we’re going to Old McDonald’s farm.

  ‘In a way,’ I say. ‘It’s like Old McDonald’s organic farm shop, something I know you’re far more familiar with.’

  I’m one of several solo dads in there, hoping that a Happy Meal will provide at least some temporary emotional nourishment. I make sure he brings his box and toy back to Nanny’s. A message to you Zoe, I hum, adapting the old Specials classic; I’m not beholden to you, your parents or your parenting books any longer. I set my own rules now.

  We return to a welcoming committee of Sylvia and Arthur in their front garden. They seem in a real hurry to get Matt back inside and me gone, as if they’d earlier exhausted their annual allowance of ‘niceness’ towards me.

  Back in the car, I suddenly remember the breeze block I’d retrieved from the Julie Draper ransom drop. I haul it out of the boot, carry it to the front door, ring the bell and wait. After an eternity, I ring again. Finally, Arthur’s voice warbles from above.

  ‘Now look here, Donal, we don’t want any unpleasantness,’ he says. I take a reverse step and look up. He flinches from a barely open upstairs window.

  ‘What are you talking about, Arthur?’

  ‘Leave now, without using that, and we won’t call the police.’

  I laugh. ‘What? You mean this block? What do you think I’m going to do, Arthur? Smash your lead-glass windows?’

  ‘I’ve got the phone in my hand.’

  ‘Arthur, for God’s sake, it’s an exhibit from a case. I was hoping Zoe could use her forensic skills to check it out for me. Why would I suddenly want to smash your windows?’

  ‘Very well then. Leave it right there and go, at once.’

  ‘Jesus, Arthur, what the hell is going on?’

  The window slams shut, the aftershock shattering my heart into a thousand stabbing little shards. Because, at that very moment, I realise; something’s changed and they’re plotting to take Matt away from me.

  Chapter 16

  Waterloo, Central London

  Sunday, June 19, 1994; 19.30

  It worries me that Time Out’s London Guide rates the Juan Gris tapas restaurant ‘one of London’s cosiest and most authentic Balearic experiences’. My only previous ‘authentic Balearic experience’ involved heat stroke and an emergency stomach pump.

  By ‘cosy’ they clearly mean overcrowded, over-hot and underlit, with tables rammed so close together that salsa splashback is a genuine peril.

  To top it all, perched upon what appears to be an oversized Ikea shelf above the mayhem, some moustachioed wannabe Gipsy King wails ‘Bamboleo’ as if it were a Mexican ten-second bomb warning. I’d anticipated an intimate evening getting to know each other; not a front seat at Los Lobos.

  It doesn’t help that the horseshoe-shaped bar dominating the centre of the restaurant is rammed, shoulder-to-shoulder. I could really use a few sharpeners, but there isn’t even a tiny gap to ‘motor boat’ through. I notice with thinly disguised contempt that most of these barflies aren’t even drinking. They’re eating meals. At the bar! They’d never stand for that in Ireland. It’s all I can do not to reclaim some ancient bar rights for the liquid-only species by yanking one of them off a stool.

  I finally manage to demand three bottles of their strongest beer, hurriedly plucking the alien green fruit from the spouts before they pollute the contents. I stand there drinking at the very spot every single waiter needs to repeatedly pass through. But I ignore the chorus of Iberian harrumphing because I need this pre-emptive alcohol hit. Booze is the antidote to my crippling twin social shortcomings: lack of confidence and lack of energy. But I’ve got to get the balance just right; anaesthetise and energise without straying into morose or mental. And by Christ, the margins are slim, as I’ve discovered to my cost.

  For some reason, I turn towards the entrance just as Edwina makes hers, oozing the right amount of confidence and well-bred poise; summer-school muscle memory. She looks elegant but foxy in a high-collared white blouse, short black jacket and pencil skirt. I’ve never seen her in a skirt before; the notion that this is a component part of her overall seduction strategy sends a lightning bolt of glorious anticipation zinging through me. It’s followed by heaving great black thunderclouds of guilt; I still love Zoe.

  Waiting staff almost collide in their rush to greet a favoured regular. The pieces click together. A Home Office pathologist must earn a packet. Edwina leaves her country pile every Sunday evening, taking the train to Waterloo and a short walk to her bijou flat overlooking the Thames. She hasn’t time to shop or cook so joins the barfly diners here where she can eat alone unnoticed.

  She glances about, sees me and smiles. She points to the only empty table in the joint, buried deep in a corner, mercifully the furthest from El Throat Cancer’s dismembering of Spanish culture and his own guitar. Maybe we’re going to have that intimate evening after all.

  ‘Your usual, Edwina?’ says the waiter as we sit.

  ‘Yes, please Marco. This is Donal, a friend from work.’

  He frowns at me in confused disapproval.

  ‘Hi Marco. What is her usual, if you don’t mind me asking?’

  ‘Dirty Martini.’

  ‘Shaken not stirred?’

  He scowls at me. ‘Shaking a Martini is the sure-fire way to spoil it.’

  ‘And it should be stirred with a wooden spoon, not a metal one, isn’t that right, Marco?’ teases Edwina.

  Marco smiles, his eyes misting bashfully like some loved-up Lab Beagle. Time to remind El Horno that she’s my date tonight.

  I hand him back the drinks list. ‘Make that two.’ Why am I feeling so possessive? Has what little confidence I possessed been so obliterated by Zoe’s betrayal?

  I watch her weighing up the menu. Her lustrously constructed Anne Bancroft hairstyle could render a less classically beautiful woman severe. It would make Zoe look like De Niro in Cape Fear.

  I’m mildly terrorised by the menu; no English translations or helpful photos.

  ‘You know it might be best if you order for both of us, Edwina,’ I say casually.

  ‘Well I have had everything here at least ten times.’

  ‘Oh it’s not that,’ I say. ‘The only words I know in Spanish are cerveza and cigarillo.’

  She smiles. ‘How refreshing. You’re not a veggie, are you?’

  ‘God no! If I’d been a veggie in 1980s Ireland, I’d have starved.’

  ‘Good. You’ll like it here then.’

  Marco brings the drinks and takes her order.

/>   ‘To our trusty source of income, the dead,’ she says, raising her glass.

  ‘The dead,’ I smile and we clink.

  I manage not to wince, just, at the bitter, salty onslaught, and wonder if love rival Marco further muddied my Dirty with a lace of vinegar. He has that malevolent look; like a camper version of Angel Eyes in The Good, the Bad and the Ugly.

  ‘Do you know what I love about this place,’ she says, second-guessing my first question. ‘It makes me feel like I’m on holiday, without a care in the world.’

  ‘If I was exposed to so much gore, I’d need a regular dose of cheerful release.’

  She laughs kindly. ‘The gore doesn’t bother me remotely. I’ve never been squeamish. I started out in vascular surgery where we sometimes found ourselves working in geysers of blood. I remember after one operation, I removed my boots to find each filled with a pint or so of blood clot. I suddenly understood why everyone else had worn their scrub trousers on the outside!’

  She giggles at the memory while I grip a table leg and will my light-headed swoon to pass.

  ‘At medical school, I remember my excitement at the prospect of cutting a real human body and dissecting it with my bare hands. Of course, it was all a bit of an anticlimax. They prepare bodies for dissection by embalming them with formaldehyde solution. Embalming leaches blood from the body, and formalin stiffens the tissues and fades them dull grey. It felt more like cutting up alien dummies. After the first couple of incisions, I knew I’d be okay. In fact, the worst part was my hands getting all greasy and slippery from the fatty tissue.’

  Right on cue, bowls of assorted meats land on our table.

  ‘I strongly recommend this,’ she says, pushing one my way. ‘The Spanish have a way with pork.’

  I force a smile and swallow hard at the shiny white meat, trying not to think of her elbow-deep in porcine human flesh.

  ‘Are you okay?’ she asks.

  ‘I am a little squeamish to be honest, Edwina.’

  ‘How bad?’

  ‘Put it this way, last Christmas morning I fainted while stuffing the turkey.’

  ‘I thought you’d be inured to it all by now,’ she says, her voice steeling. ‘You do keep finding young women’s bodies, after all.’