Anywhere's Better Than Here

by Zöe Venditozzi

  Gerry didn’t look up. He’d started to pick at one of his cuticles.

  She waited until Ed had turned off down a corridor and then stood up.

  ‘‘I’ll be back in a minute.’’

  Gerry glanced up briefly then down again.

  I bet he thinks I won’t come back, she thought. Maybe she wouldn’t, she’d see what Ed was up to first. She walked smartly over to the corridor Ed had disappeared into and glanced down it to make sure he was far enough away that he wouldn’t notice her. She followed him, getting close enough to eavesdrop.

  ‘‘It’s okay, mate. We’ll get it sorted out. We will.’’

  The other person talked at length.

  ‘‘I know, I know. I’ll speak to your mum.’’

  The other person again.

  ‘‘Well,’’ he paused, ‘‘alright, I won’t if you don’t want me to.’’ He nodded.

  She felt like whacking him on the head and knocking a bit of sense into him. He was always nodding when he was on the phone. She remembered, just in time, that she was meant to be secretly tailing Ed and that she wasn’t meant to be too close behind him. She dropped back just as he stopped.

  ‘‘Okay. I’ll be down there in a few minutes. Just sit tight.’’ He disconnected the call, put the phone into his coat pocket and shook his head a couple of times.

  Laurie stepped behind a conveniently dumped filing cabinet and waited until she could hear him walking on. She knew that the chances of her remaining behind him and not getting caught were slim, but she was very curious about who he was talking to and what was going on. Obviously it was a youth-work thing. Probably some maladjusted drama queen teenager who’d identified Ed as a soft touch and was planning on taking him for a ride. She felt an unwelcome pang of sympathy for Ed and his total lack of guile. He probably wouldn’t even notice that some kid was taking the piss and, when he did find out, he probably wouldn’t care, thinking it was all just part of being a caring person.

  Ed stood in front of a wall mounted hospital map. He traced his finger along several areas of the hospital, clearly unable to find where he was. If he’d bothered to come to the hospital as much as Laurie had when her mum was ill, he’d have a better sense of where things were. Laurie contemplated going over and jabbing a finger at their position on the map, but knew then she’d never have this chance to see Ed in the real world as other people saw him. Their relationship was doomed, she knew that. There was no way she was going to carry on the agony, but she had an idea that she’d like to walk away from Ed with some version of respect for him. Perhaps seeing him at work was a way of doing that. Maybe if she saw him being capable and liked, she could treat him like any moderately okay person she’d encounter in life instead of feeling like thumping him every time he breathed.

  Eventually he worked out where he was, tapping his finger against the glass twice.

  ‘‘Right!’’ he set off decisively towards the swinging doors that led to Casualty. There was no way she could follow him through there without him seeing her and he’d know instantly that she’d been following him. She sighed and turned back to the main concourse where, hopefully, possibly, Gerry would still be waiting for her. She’d find out what was going on with Ed later.

  5.30am

  Rain

  Gerry was still waiting at the table. At least, he was still sitting at the table. When he saw her his expression didn’t change much. She almost veered past the table and out of the hospital, but she was nothing if not bloody minded. She pulled her chair out from the table and stood with her hands on the back of the chair, looking down at Gerry who had gone back to picking at the table top. She sat down and they sat in silence for a few minutes until Laurie realised that if they didn’t start talking soon, she’d fall asleep.

  ‘‘So!’’

  Gerry gave a weak smile.

  ‘‘So, Laurie.’’

  Laurie looked around to give Gerry some time to get it together. There was only one other table occupied now. It was a nurse drinking slowly from a mug. She held the mug in both hands and blew on it intermittently. The nurse was about the same age as Laurie’s mum, but she looked tired and probably seemed older than she really was. Laurie tried to imagine that it was her mum sitting a few tables across from her. She tried to superimpose her mum’s features on to the nurse’s face, but she couldn’t quite recall the shape of her eyes or how her mouth would look when the nurse blew on her drink. She could recall, of course, her mother’s face if she remembered particular photos, but it was as if she could no longer make this version of her mum move any more. She couldn’t remember how she’d looked when she talked or when she was eating. She could remember very clearly how she looked when she died; the colour of her at least, the ugly yellow tone she had to her skin and her eyes and the sort of waxy quality of her, lying there in the hospice with her arms tucked unnaturally over the top of her sheets.

  The nurse looked up at Laurie but she wasn’t really seeing her, Laurie could tell. She was at that stage of exhaustion where everything becomes rubbery and useless. Laurie probably looked like a cardboard cut-out to the nurse. But then the nurse scowled at Laurie, forcing her to look at Gerry. Gerry was staring at her.

  She smiled patiently, wishing he’d just get on with it. She didn’t think she could be bothered much longer.

  ‘‘Laurie?’’

  ‘‘Mh-hm?’’ She tried not to look too intently at him and spook him.

  He took a deep breath. ‘‘There are some things I think I need to tell you about.’’

  ‘‘Okay.’’ She waited while he got going.

  ‘‘When I came out of the army I wasn’t …’’ Laurie didn’t say a thing. She waited.

  ‘‘I saw some stuff in Afghanistan and …’’ he paused ‘‘… other places where I served.’’ He stopped again and picked up his mug.

  ‘‘Go on,’’ said Laurie, tying not to sound eager.

  ‘‘I just couldn’t keep going through the motions.’’ He swirled what was left in his mug and looked into it. ‘‘And I decided that I’d had enough.’’

  ‘‘Okay?’’ She waited for more. Gerry made no move to expand further. She waited, but he’d obviously finished.

  ‘‘Right. So what does that mean for me?’’ He didn’t look up. ‘‘Us?’’

  He shrugged. ‘‘I don’t really know.’’ He knocked back what was left of his drink. ‘‘I just thought I’d better tell you.’’

  ‘‘To be fair, Gerry, you haven’t really told me an awful lot.’’

  He shrugged again.

  ‘‘Well.’’ She watched him as he flicked a packet of sugar around the table. ‘‘I mean – are you better now?’’

  He considered for a moment and put the sugar packet in his pocket. ‘‘Better than I was.’’

  ‘‘But that still doesn’t tell me much about anything else.’’

  He looked at her blankly.

  ‘‘For instance: you’re from round here, aren’t you?’’

  He nodded grudgingly.

  ‘‘Why not tell me that? Why’s it such a big, bloody secret?’’ Her voice had risen a bit and the nurse was looking at them.

  ‘‘It’s not that it’s a secret.’’ He sighed.

  ‘‘What is it then?’’

  ‘‘It’s just … I’m not …’’

  ‘‘Aw, come on Gerry. Spit it out!’’

  ‘‘Don’t be like that Laurie. I’m trying to explain.’’

  He reached forward and took her hand firmly.

  ‘‘You aren’t trying to explain at all.’’ She flexed her fingers inside his hand, trying to wiggle free, but he continued to hold on.

  ‘‘What you’re doing Gerry, is giving me some vague flim-flam to keep me quiet.’’

  ‘‘Flim-flam?’’ He had the cheek to smile.

  ‘‘You know what I mean.’’ She wrenched her hand free. ‘‘You aren’t telling me anything that I couldn’t have guessed.’’ She jabbed a finger at him.

  He
was serious again. ‘‘Okay. Okay’’ He let go of her hand. ‘‘What do you want to know?’’

  She couldn’t help it. She knew she ought to build up to this, but why make a pretence of it?

  ‘‘Why didn’t you tell me about your child?’’ She looked over his head at the tapestry. ‘‘Your son?’’ Gerry looked as if he’d been punched in the face. So it was true then.

  ‘‘I knew I should never have come back here.’’ He put his head in his hands on the table top.

  ‘‘Look Gerry, I’m sorry, I am.’’ She realised he was crying. ‘‘Oh Gerry, Gerry, I’m so sorry.’’ She stood up quickly and moved round to the seat next to him. She put her arm around him and nestled her head close to his. She stroked the back of his head until he stopped crying. He sat up with an effort.

  ‘‘Sorry. Sorry,’’ he said, shaking his head. ‘‘I shouldn’t be doing this. It’s my own fault.’’

  ‘‘What happened?’’

  ‘‘I’ve never even met him.’’ He shrugged.

  ‘‘Why not? Don’t you want to know him?’’ She couldn’t imagine having a child out there somewhere and not knowing them.

  ‘‘It’s too late.’’

  ‘‘Surely he’d want to know who his father was? I would.’’

  ‘‘You don’t know that though, do you?’’ he said. ‘‘He might not know anything about me. His mum might have met someone else. Even if he did know about me, surely he’d hate me, want nothing to do with me?’’

  ‘‘Have you ever tried to get in contact with his mum?’’

  ‘‘No.’’

  ‘‘Never?’’ She found it hard to believe.

  ‘‘I decided that it would be kinder if I had nothing at all to do with it,’’ He said. ‘‘I just thought that it would be the kinder option.’’

  ‘‘Kinder to who? You?’’ She couldn’t believe he’d genuinely thought that.

  ‘‘To the boy. To her.’’

  ‘‘I don’t quite get the logic of that.’’

  ‘‘If I was hanging around, seeing him when I was on leave, it would only confuse things. And then if anything happened to me …’’ He rubbed his eyes. ‘‘Then, you know, no harm done.’’

  ‘‘What? No harm done?’’ Her voice rose in volume. ‘‘Are you mental? Of course there’s harm done!’’ She threw her hands up.

  ‘‘I know. I know that now!’’ he shouted. ‘‘Of course, I fucking know that now! But I was only nineteen – I was a child myself.’’

  ‘‘You were not a child!’’ She shook her head. ‘‘You were old enough to get your girlfriend pregnant. And what about her – she must have had to grow up pretty fucking quickly, mustn’t she?’’

  His eyes were full of tears again. ‘‘I know, I know … I’m a prick, a selfish prick.’’ He kept shaking his head. ‘‘I just ran away to the army. And when I was in the army I thought I could make a difference and sort of make up for things.’’

  ‘‘You can’t just go around making up for things.’’ She sighed, exasperated. ‘‘You can’t just go around making up your own,’’ she searched around for the right word, ‘‘system. Life isn’t like that.’’

  ‘‘Well, obviously, Laurie,’’ He said. ‘‘I know that now. Well, I knew that then, but I tried to just get on with it.’’

  She sighed again.

  ‘‘I’m paying for it now, aren’t I?’’

  ‘‘Are you?’’

  He frowned at her. ‘‘What do you mean?’’

  ‘‘Well, no offence, but it seems like you just do whatever you feel like doing.’’

  ‘‘What?’’

  ‘‘Well, now that you’re back, you’re doing what? Working a job where you don’t have to talk to anyone, you don’t seem to have any friends, the only people you do see are those wasters in that shitty pub and that mentalist neighbour.’’ When she said ‘‘neighbour’’ she glared at him, remembering the other night.

  He stared at her, mouth slightly open, a genuine look of shock on his face.

  ‘‘And as soon as things might come to something with me you’re like, oh no, not real, human interaction, heaven protect me!’’ She held her hands up to her face like a distressed old lady.

  Still he said nothing. She’d gone too far, but she couldn’t stop now.

  ‘‘And, since you’ve come back, have you contacted the boy?’’ She couldn’t seem to say the word ‘‘son’’.

  He shook his head.

  ‘‘Why not? What’s stopping you?’’ What was she doing? This could only completely over-complicate things.

  ‘‘I just don’t think it’s a good idea.’’

  She tried, she really did, but she couldn’t keep her mouth shut.

  ‘‘Well.’’ She gouged at the table top with a teaspoon, ‘‘I think that’s pathetic.’’ She lost confidence as she said the word pathetic and whispered it, but Gerry heard her well enough.

  He was clearly trying to control his temper. She saw the muscle in his jaw clenching.

  ‘‘Look, Gerry, I’m sorry.’’ He was still shaking his head and wouldn’t look at her. ‘‘I know it isn’t any of my business.’’ She tapped her spoon off his cup, ‘‘Gerry, come on, look at me.’’

  He looked at her but that jaw muscle was still going.

  ‘‘I just think,’’ she began. He looked as if he wanted to hurt her. She took a breath. ‘‘I just think that, if you’re around and he’s around, then you should, like,’’ she paused, ‘‘make the effort.’’

  ‘‘The effort? Is that what you think it is?’’ His voice had that edge of anger again. ‘‘That I just can’t be bothered?’’

  ‘‘No, no!’’ she protested. ‘‘I’m not saying you’re being lazy or anything, I know it’ll be a nightmare, but you should do it.’’

  He shrugged, the anger defused. ‘‘I doubt he’d even want to see me, especially not the way things are at the moment. Anyway, he might not know I’m his,’’ he looked into his cup, ‘‘father.’’

  ‘‘D’you reckon?’’ She took his hand. ‘‘In a town this size, you wouldn’t be able to hide it for long. I mean, I found out, didn’t I?’’ She considered for a second. ‘‘Unless they’ve moved.’’

  ‘‘They haven’t.’’

  ‘‘How do you know?’’

  ‘‘I just do. But it’s immaterial – it’s too late.’’

  ‘‘It’s only too late when somebody dies.’’ She felt her eyes tear up. Not now, this wasn’t the time.

  Gerry took her hand again. ‘‘Are you okay?’’

  She shrugged. ‘‘I just know what it’s like for it to be too late, you know?’’

  ‘‘What do you mean?’’

  ‘‘Just what I said.’’ She looked at the tapestry, trying to distract herself.

  She could feel him scanning her face, but she didn’t want to look up at him looking kindly at her.

  There was silence for a few minutes.

  ‘‘I don’t even know what he looks like.’’ He took the flask out of his pocket and knocked it back. Surely there couldn’t be much left now.

  ‘‘Do you know how to get in touch with him?’’

  ‘‘I suppose it would be easy enough to get in touch with his mother, Jenny,’’ he said. ‘‘If she’d even speak to me.’’

  ‘‘She’d probably be glad of the help.’’

  ‘‘I doubt it,’’ Gerry tucked the flask away again. ‘‘She’s probably still cursing me daily.’’

  ‘‘Still. You aren’t a kid anymore, are you?’’

  ‘‘No,’’ he laughed, ‘‘that I am not, Laurie.’’

  ‘‘I could help you.’’ She leaned her head on his shoulder.

  ‘‘What?’’ he said, ‘‘You’re a bit muffled down there.’’

  ‘‘You heard me. Anyway, I’m nearer his age than you are.’’

  ‘‘For fuck’s sake Laurie, that’s hardly a winning argument.’’

  ‘‘Sorry.’’ She nuzzled closer. She could fall
asleep like this. They sat for a few minutes.

  ‘‘I’d make a terrible father anyway.’’

  She pulled herself away and looked at him. ‘‘No you wouldn’t.’’

  ‘‘You were right earlier. I am a coward.’’

  ‘‘I didn’t say you were a coward.’’

  ‘‘I am though. You know I am.’’

  ‘‘How can you have been a coward when you were in the army? Isn’t that the opposite of being a coward?’’ She smiled. ‘‘That’s going out and actively looking for danger, isn’t it?’’

  ‘‘I thought I could do it,’’ he shook his head, ‘‘but I was shit at it.’’

  ‘‘What do you mean?’’

  ‘‘At first, you don’t think about it, but then you do and that’s all you think about.’’ His eyes were wet. ‘‘All.’’

  ‘‘But isn’t that normal?’’ She didn’t really know what he meant. ‘‘Isn’t everyone like that?’’

  ‘‘No.’’ He shook his head.

  ‘‘But they must be. They probably don’t show it.’’

  He shook his head. ‘‘Everyone else I knew is still there. Still in the army.’’

  ‘‘But that doesn’t mean anything.’’

  He shook his head again and a tear fell onto the table. He didn’t seem to notice it.

  ‘‘It was awful. Fucking awful. And you start to get used to it. You start to think it’s normal.’’ He spoke in a rush. ‘‘And then, one day, you remember that it isn’t normal and then, that’s it, you’re fucked.’’ He was properly crying now. Laurie glanced around, but the cafe was empty.

  ‘‘What happened? Where were you?’’

  ‘‘All over the place. Afghanistan eventually.’’

  ‘‘What was it like?’’

  ‘‘What was it like?’’

  She nodded.

  ‘‘Hellish. At times.’’

  ‘‘What do you mean?’’

  ‘‘It was brutal.’’ His shoulders slumped. ‘‘Bosnia was the worst.’’

  ‘‘And what were you doing there? Come on Gerry, you need to talk about it.’’

  ‘‘I was working with the UN.’’