by Unknown
‘Six weeks.’
‘Six weeks, six months,’ said Hayden. ‘Who knows in this crazy old world?’
‘What?’
‘It’s about Edinburgh, Dad.’
‘What about Edinburgh?’
‘I’ve been thinking I might take a gap year after all.’
‘What for?’
‘I think we should play the next set now,’ Amos interrupted.
Guy ignored him. ‘When was this decided?’
‘I’ve been thinking about it for ages.’
‘But you know what you want to do. Go to university.’
‘What about the university of life?’ This was Hayden.
‘Is this your doing?’ said Guy.
‘We’ve talked about it,’ said Hayden, with a slow smile, as if he was enjoying the effect this was having on Guy.
‘Have you even asked Edinburgh if they’ll defer your entry?’ asked Sonia.
‘I’ve only just decided,’ said Joakim.
‘Decided?’ said Guy, his voice rising.
‘You should talk about this afterwards,’ I said. ‘Privately.’
‘Maybe I’ll make it and not have to go anywhere,’ said Joakim, talking to his father over me. ‘I don’t know anything. I’m starting from zero.’
‘Make it?’ Guy’s voice was a croak. ‘What do you mean,make it?’
‘Hayden said he’ll help me.’
Hayden lifted his hands modestly. ‘I’ll do what I can. Joakim has definite promise.’
‘You stay out of this,’ said Guy. ‘Don’t do this, Jo. Please. Don’t just throw everything away.’
‘It’s my life,’ said Joakim.
‘Is that what you want? To be some ageing failure sleeping on other people’s floors and sponging off friends of friends, waiting to make it?’
‘Enough,’ said Sonia. ‘Now we’re going to play.’
‘I don’t feel like it,’ muttered Joakim.
I leaned towards him. ‘You want to make it as a musician, Joakim? The first thing you have to do is learn a bit of professionalism. Play now, we’ll talk later.’
‘I’m ready.’ Hayden picked up his guitar.
‘You’ve got a lot to answer for,’ Guy said.
‘I’ve nothing to answer for.’ The smile disappeared. Hayden’s face became hard with dislike. ‘Because I’m free. That’s what you can’t bear, isn’t it?’
The cat a boy had thrown a stone at earlier brushed against Guy’s legs and he kicked it viciously so that it ran away with a high mew of pain.
‘Dad!’
‘One – and – two – and – three,’ I said, and the music filled the garden and the rain began to fall.
Later, Hayden said cheerfully, ‘That wasn’t too bad. Now, let’s go and celebrate.’
‘Do you mean have a drink?’
‘No. This is for kids. Let’s go somewhere adult.’
I had a sense of foreboding: his pupils were dilated and his speech was faintly slurred.
‘I’m going home,’ said Guy, his voice thick with hostility. ‘My wife will be waiting and there are things she and I need to talk about.’ For some reason, he always called Celia ‘my wife’ when Hayden was around, as if he needed to remind himself of his own unassailable stability.
Hayden shrugged. ‘As you wish. But one of my mates is throwing a party. We might as well drop in, see what it’s like – it isn’t far from here. Ten minutes’ walk, if that.’
‘What kind of party?’ asked Amos.
‘A grown-up party.’ Hayden grinned at him. ‘You look a bit anxious.’
‘Why should I be anxious?’
‘I don’t know. Why should you?’
‘I’m not.’
‘So you’re coming?’
‘Yes,’ said Amos.
‘I thought we were going to have a meal together,’ said Sonia. I could see that she was trying to give him a way out.
‘I’m not hungry,’ said Amos. ‘I had a burger, anyway.’
‘You’d better come as well, Sonia,’ said Hayden, jovially. ‘Keep an eye on him. Make sure he doesn’t go wild.’
Sonia looked at him icily. She was the only one among us who ever seemed to quell Hayden, but not tonight. He patted her shoulder and said: ‘Is that glare your way of saying yes?’
‘I’ll come if you want,’ said Sonia to Amos, turning her back on Hayden.
‘Great. Neal?’
‘No,’ said Neal.
‘No?’
‘I’m not in the mood.’
‘OK. That’s the four of us, then.’
‘Your maths is wrong,’ I said.
‘You, Sonia, Amos and me – I assume young Joakim is staying with his mates.’
‘You haven’t asked me. You’re making assumptions.’
‘You’ll like it.’ He touched the back of my hand. ‘You’re a party animal.’
‘A tired and pissed-off party animal.’
‘Please.’ He leaned forward and said softly into my ear, ‘I need to be with you tonight.’
I was glad that in the dim light no one could see me blush. ‘Just for a bit, then.’
‘Well.’ Neal aimed for a casual tone and missed. ‘If you’re all going, I might as well join you after all.’
Hayden smiled widely at him. ‘Of course,’ he said. ‘Why not? The more the merrier.’
It was a big party and a tiny house. Every room bulged with people. They overflowed up the staircase and spilled out into the narrow garden. Music pumped loudly; I could feel the walls shake and the floorboards vibrate. As far as I could tell, in the smoky half-darkness, it was a motley collection: some young, even as young as Joakim, and some much older – men with grey hair pulled back into ponytails, women with tattoos on their shoulders and a musky smell. It was like being in a music tent at Glastonbury, except the beer was free, cold and plentiful.
Hayden was swallowed up in the crowd, most of whom seemed to know him. I saw a woman with beautiful red hair throw her arms around his neck. Sonia and Amos went into the garden together; later I saw them sitting on the uncut grass under a small dead tree, sharing a glass of wine and talking to a hugely pregnant woman. Neal stuck to me as I threaded through the rooms in search of a drink and a place I could sit and watch the crowd. When I was a teenager, I used to hate being at a party where I didn’t know anyone: that agonizing self-consciousness when you stand in a room full of animated strangers talking to each other, hugging, kissing – what are you supposed to do with yourself? Arrange your face in that I-don’t-care look? Spend a large amount of time in the bathroom, while people who genuinely need to be in there rattle the door handle? Walk purposefully around as if you’re searching for a friend you know isn’t there? I can’t remember when I stopped feeling awkward and learned just to sit back and see what happened.
‘Where are we going?’ Neal said.
‘I’m going to sit on the stairs, I think.’
We found a step near the top and I took a gulp of beer from the can I’d found in the bath, which was full of ice cubes. From there, I could see Hayden. If he looked up, he could have seen me too, but he didn’t look up. He was focused on whoever was with him: at that particular moment, it was two women and another man, and they were all laughing. I understood that, before long, Hayden and I would part. There was a kind of giddy momentum between us. It was like being on a swing, swooping high, but soon we’d reach the top and curve down again. Then it would be over.
‘Is this step free?’ a woman with a handsome face and prematurely grey hair asked.
I smiled at her and she sat just below Neal and me and leaned her head back so it was resting against my knee, as if we were old friends.
‘I’m Bonnie,’ I said. ‘This is Neal. And we know nobody.’
‘I’m Sarah. If you don’t know anyone, how come you’re here?’
‘Hayden brought us along.’
‘Hayden?’
‘That’s right.’
‘I didn’t know he was h
ere.’
‘He’s down there.’ I nodded in his direction. He’d got hold of a bottle of whisky from somewhere and was pouring it into his glass and the glass of the woman he was talking to.
‘So he is. Charming another poor fool.’
‘Do you know a lot of the people here?’ asked Neal. His voice was unsteady; he seemed mysteriously to have got drunk without drinking anything.
‘Not as many as I thought I would, considering it’s my party.’
‘Oh! You live here, then?’
‘Yes. I’m dead tired but someone’s in my bed. Two people, actually. Hello, Hayden.’
He was making his way up the stairs, still holding the whisky bottle. The woman he’d been talking to trailed after him, huge kohl-rimmed eyes, and a cigarette jammed between her lips.
‘This is Miriam Sylvester,’ said Hayden. ‘She’s a teacher too.’
‘Hi.’ I raised a hand.
She gave me a curious look. ‘You’re the friend of Sonia’s.’
‘You make that sound like a bad thing,’ I said, with a laugh. ‘I’d thought I wouldn’t know anyone at all, but everybody seems to know Hayden and now I meet an old buddy of Sonia’s.’
‘Well, we worked together in Sheffield.’
‘You’ve got to tell me something embarrassing about her,’ I said. ‘Something I can use against her one day.’
Miriam took a deep drag on her cigarette. The column of ash grew longer, then delicately dislodged itself and fell at her feet.
‘And Sarah here,’ said Hayden, ‘Sarah knows an ex-girlfriend of Amos’s.’
I looked at her with new interest. ‘You mean Jude?’ I said.
‘We were at school together,’ said Sarah. ‘You know her?’
‘Bonnie was the girlfriend after,’ said Hayden.
‘This is insane,’ I said. ‘Can someone please introduce me to someone who doesn’t know everyone I know?’
Miriam lit another cigarette. ‘So you know Sonia, do you?’ she said, with the irritating glint people have when they know something about you. ‘And I know about you.’
‘Me?’
‘Banjo,’ she said triumphantly.
‘I’m not ashamed,’ I said. ‘In fact, I’m unashamed.’
I saw a face I thought I recognized and then realized it belonged to Hayden’s quarrelsome friend Nat; he was clearly very drunk and walked with a shuffling, crablike gait through the gradually emptying room. Then I saw Amos and Sonia come in from the garden and I raised a hand to catch their attention. Sonia looked up and grimaced. I beckoned to her but she hesitated, then shook her head, taking Amos’s hand and leading him towards the front door. I could guess what she was feeling. In a way it was fun to meet people who knew friends of mine but it felt claustrophobic as well. Lucky Liza, I suddenly thought, travelling far away where she knew nobody. Except that, with my luck, if I climbed Everest I’d probably find a previous girlfriend of Hayden’s at the top.
There was another reason to avoid us. I could see from the way Amos was holding himself that he was really quite drunk. I remembered all the stages of Amos’s drunkenness: he would be argumentative, just a ratchet or two up from his usual confrontational self; then he would be emotional and confessional, and maybe he would tell Sonia they should get married and have children, lots of children with her hair and his eyes; then depressed; then asleep in his clothes.
Miriam now had her head on Hayden’s lap and his hand was resting on her hair, as if she was a small child. Her eyes were closed. He smiled at me and shrugged helplessly, mouthing a word I couldn’t make out. I didn’t smile back and gradually his smile faded and we stared at each other. Beside me, Neal gave a quiet snore; I felt his head settle on my shoulder. I went on sitting on the stairs with Hayden, sleeping people all around us, and waited.
After
At twenty past seven on Monday morning, a phone call woke me. It was Danielle. She sounded breathless, as if she’d just come in from a run. It must have been obvious she had woken me. ‘If it’s about the band,’ I said, ‘you don’t need to worry. It’s in hand.’
‘Well, it is about the band, in a way.’
‘You don’t want us to play after all? That would be fine.’ More than fine,wonderful.
‘No no no. I’m longing for you to play. Especially now.’ She sounded excited. ‘Though you might not want to.’
‘What are you talking about?’
‘Hayden Booth,’ she said. ‘He was playing with you, wasn’t he?’
‘Oh, you heard? Don’t worry. We’ll be fine without him.’
‘That’s a bit hard-hearted, Bonnie.’
I sat up in bed and shifted the receiver to the other ear.
‘What do you mean?’
‘Haven’t you heard?’
I heard my voice asking, ‘Heard what?’ I heard Danielle telling me that a man’s body, found in Langley reservoir last night, had been identified as that of Hayden Booth. She’d heard it on the radio just a few minutes ago.
What would someone say if they knew nothing?
‘Oh. God.’
‘Isn’t it awful?’
‘Awful. Yes. It is. Awful. God.’ I was thinking: Ring Sonia. What about Neal – did Joakim know yet? Guy? Or Sally. Did poor Sally know?
‘I know. I mean, I’d never actually met him, but it’s so shocking. Wasn’t he one of your best players?’
‘He was in a different league.’
‘So will you still be able… you know?’
‘I’ll let you know. But we’ll be fine.’
‘It’s only a matter of days away.’
‘We’ll be there,’ I said, raising my voice a little.
‘I’m just the messenger, Bonnie.’
Before
He lay in the water on his back with his arms spread out. My day out, my little snippet of a summer holiday. His body moved lazily as small waves rolled under him, gathering to breakers as they reached the shore. I swam towards him. His eyes were shut against the sun but he reached out an arm and pulled me towards him so that we both went under, gasping. I felt his limbs tangling with mine, put out my hands and touched his long wet hair, his cool neck, came up to see his laughing face – a laughing face that turned grave as he pulled me against him and we were hugging, holding each other and trying to tread water, and there was salt stinging our skin and the chilly slap of waves against our flesh and light bouncing off the sea in dazzling arrows. Lips against my shoulder, my eyelids, my mouth, sinking and then rising again and finally making it to shore, where there was no one to be seen or to see, and we lay on the gritty sand, seagulls shrieking and the shush of the waves, fragments of shells digging into us. Then we ran into the water again and washed each other down. He dried me with his shirt and rubbed the sand from between my toes.
Afterwards, Hayden insisted on buying a dozen oysters from the shack along the coast. We sat outside at a scrubbed wooden table and squeezed lemon juice onto the quivering slimes. He ate eleven and I ate one. They were too alive, too slimy, too salty for my taste.
Hayden seemed happy that day, sweet and sunny. I guess he was on holiday too.
After
I tried to ring Sonia but it was hopeless. I could imagine that everybody was ringing everybody else in that gleeful excitement people feel when something really terrible happens – that great pleasure in life: being the bearer of bad news. Have you heard? Have you heard? I texted her: Ring me. I switched on my answering-machine and sat numbly listening as message after message was left. Twice, it was Joakim, in the first sounding dazed and in the second shouting with grief. Then I heard the beep, a hesitation, and Sonia’s voice. I ran forward and snatched up the phone.
‘Sonia, it’s me, I’m here.’
‘I got your text.’
‘Yes? Well?’
‘I’ve heard.’
I’d known that I needed to talk to her but I hadn’t really thought about what I had to say.
‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘This wasn’t
part of the plan.’ There was silence on the line. ‘Are you still there?’
‘Yes.’
I couldn’t tell whether she was frightened or angry or shocked or just being Sonia. ‘There’ll be an investigation now.’
‘Of course there’ll be an investigation,’ she said. ‘A body’s been found dumped in a reservoir. It’s in the paper. There’ll be a murder inquiry.’
I took a deep breath. ‘Sonia, I’m so sorry I brought you into this. If you want to go to the police…’
‘It’s too late for anything like that.’
‘You’re probably right.’
‘Just don’t try to be clever.’
‘That won’t be too difficult,’ I said.
‘I mean it, Bonnie. No more of your brilliant improvisations. We just do nothing, and say as little as possible.’
‘I’m scared.’
‘Of course you are. But sit tight.’
I put down the phone, and before I could put the answering-machine on, it rang again.
‘This is Nat, Hayden’s friend. The bassist.’ His voice was thick – whether with drink or wretchedness I couldn’t tell.
‘I know who you are.’
‘You heard?’
‘Yes.’
‘It’s fucking awful. We’ve got to talk.’
‘We are talking.’
‘I mean face to face. I’ll be in Camden Lock in half an hour.’
I reluctantly agreed, and he gave me elaborate instructions on how to find him, which involved locating a falafel stall and a weaver of baskets. Then I switched the answering-machine back on and turned off my mobile. I checked my computer. Thirty-four messages and most weren’t trying to sell me things. While I was watching, a thirty-fifth, a thirty-sixth and a thirty-seventh arrived. I looked through them. Four were from Sally. Oh, God, Sally. I switched the computer off and put my head into my hands, trying to block out the world.
Everything was switched off. The door was locked. But still I had the feeling I always got on a day when I was going to play a concert. I’d do things that felt normal but all the time there’d be a bit of me that knew that soon I’d be in front of an audience, that I’d be in a situation where things could go right or wrong and there wasn’t very much I could do about it. I made myself a cup of coffee and got dressed in a pair of jeans, a shirt and a sweater that looked casual but not grungy. I was prickly with heat, so I took off the sweater and put on a different shirt. Though I wasn’t hungry, I had a piece of hot buttered toast. Then I put on a bit of makeup, just enough to stop me looking entirely strung out. I was about to leave when the bell rang and I opened the door to find two people standing there, a man and a woman, both dressed for business. They could have been insurance salesmen but I knew, even before they said anything, that they were detectives. They took out their ID cards and showed them to me.