Thames Gateway 01; Wide Open

by Nicola Barker

  And then…she blinked. She blinked again. Her eyes focused between the smooth forest of chair and table legs. Was it? Could it really be? She grinned, almost hysterically. A bunny?

  Its ears. That’s principally what identified it. Classic bunny ears. Beatrix Potter ears. Bugs Bunny ears. One up and jaunty, the other curved and half-cocked. A plain brown bunny. Tiny. In the kitchen. Connie bent down slightly. It was facing away from her, but she could still make out its white cotton-ball tail and the gentle sprigs of paler fur on the back of its brown heels. It held its head to one side. It must have crept in, she reasoned, a short while ago when the kitchen was empty.

  Her nose kept on running. She put her hand to it and gave a small sniff. The rabbit reacted. It lurched. It wheeled around to face her. Its head all lopsided. Its eyes almost bursting. Connie straightened up a fraction. This could not be right. There was something wrong. Its eyes were all weird-angled, and its head…It moved slightly and hit the table leg. Its head swivelled again, aimlessly. It looked upwards but at nothing. She saw its chest palpitating.

  Who was the more frightened between them? Connie took a step backwards, away from this sick creature, this cornball perversion, this diseased thing, towards the back door. She reached out her hand and opened it. “Go on. Get out. Go on. Shoo!”

  But it moved away from her voice, towards the Aga, horribly tentative, as if every second it might risk a bump or a crash or a jolt. Its eyes rolled uselessly. Its ears, so sweet before, so funny, now looked forlorn and broken and ruined and faulty. It hit the wall. Its head sank, then rose. It was lost. It no longer knew or cared about the difference between night and light.

  Connie remembered her father breaking the neck of an abandoned fledgling. She remembered an old boyfriend stamping on an injured frog. To kill it. That would be the brave thing. She clenched the fork in her hand. “But I can’t. I can’t!”

  She dropped the fork, hating herself, and grabbed hold of a kitchen broom. She held just the end of it. Slowly, she edged her way around the table. She swept the bristles along, hoping that their approaching swish would comfort the rabbit and not seem too cruelly random when they eventually made contact with it. The rabbit didn’t move. It remained close to the Aga, its nose twitching, its eyes bulging. The broom was soon merely a few feet distant, and then simply inches. Connie’s hands began shaking. To prod it! And what if it ran towards her instead of away?

  But it did not run. It did not jump. The broom touched it. Connie barely felt the weight of the rabbit before it was moving, and not voluntarily, it was swept along, all stiff and still lolling.

  She felt ashamed. Past the table she swept it, past the chairs, the wicker basket, the lines of boots, the galoshes, up to the doorway. But she couldn’t push it off the step and out into the darkness. No. There was a small metal rim at the lip of the doorway. The broom, the rabbit, came to a halt here.

  “Get out,” she said. “Get out.”

  She gave the broom a harder push. But the rabbit was stiff. It was lost in terror and in blackness. It would not move. All its places were terrible places.

  Connie dropped the end of the broom, hoping that the clatter might frighten the rabbit backwards, over the doorstep, away from her. But the broom clattered and still it did not move.

  “Oh no.” She fell to her knees. She waved ineffectually at it. “Go on. Just go.”

  She inched closer.

  “Goon.”

  Closer. And then her hands were only centimetres away from it. Her fingers felt stiff and unwieldy in this close a proximity. She bit her lip. “Out,” she said, and then she touched it. It was a thing so full of horrors and yet so soft. And she felt its heart beating under her palms. It was terrified, but its head rolled,, uselessly. She lifted it slightly. It was so light. Its ribs. She felt them. It was so thin.

  “Go on boy. Out.”

  Over the rim of the door and into the dark she lifted it. She gently touched it down. It was wet out and raining. She saw the rain hitting the rabbit. Its head swerved up to meet the rain, as if the rain could have been tin-tacks or little fists or anything.

  Connie looked down at her two hands. Her mouth curled. She jumped up and ran to the sink. She turned on the tap and shoved her hands under it. She was crying. Her nose was running. She picked up a bottle of washing-up liquid to apply to her fingers.

  The phone started ringing. She put the bottle down. She ran to the doorway, her hands still dripping, and stared out into the darkness. Was it gone? She wasn’t certain. She saw something pale near the woodpile. She slammed the door shut. She leaned up against it, shuddering. She tried to move the broom but a wave of revulsion prevented her. She sprang over it and sprinted into the hallway.

  “Hello?”

  The phone was in her hand.

  “Constance?”

  Not a voice she recognized. A rough voice, but gentle.

  “Yes?”

  “Hello. My name’s John Arnold. I’m ringing from the prison.”

  “Yes?” She was almost gasping.

  “Is this a bad time?”

  “Uh…”

  Connie felt a supreme urge to answer his question literally. Was this a bad time? Was it?

  “I have a cold,” she said, and sniffed, “that’s all.”

  She tried to stop her hands from shaking.

  “I’ve been away on a transfer,” he said, “in Durham. My daughter’s been in hospital there.”

  “Yes,” Connie nodded.

  “It’s all been a bit…well, nerve-racking, but she’s fine now.”

  “Good. Yes…”

  Connie was staring down at her feet. They were covered in mud. She hadn’t noticed before. The man took a deep breath. “I heard that your father died.”

  “Um…” she frowned. “Yes…” she blinked, “yes, he did die.”

  “I’m very sorry.”

  She sniffed. “That’s OK.”

  “I only met him a couple of times but I liked him. He took people on face value and that’s a rare quality.”

  “So…”

  Connie could not think of her father.

  “You shared a cell with Ronny, then?” she asked tiredly.

  “No.”

  She paused. “Pardon?”

  “No.”

  “You didn’t share a cell with Ronny?”

  “No.”

  “So…” She was confounded.

  “I wrote down his letters,” the man said casually, “that’s all.”

  Connie couldn’t understand him at first. “I’m sorry…? You wrote Ronny’s letters?”

  “No. I copied them. For your father. From the walls.”

  Connie was stunned, then wobbly. She sat down with a bump on the carpet. “You’re saying that Ronny wrote those letters himself, and that he wrote them all on the walls?”

  “Yes,” the man sounded unperturbed, “he scratched them into the plaster. It was a strange habit. But when I moved into the cell I really wanted to redecorate. I made a request for paint. Then your father turned up at a good moment and sorted it all out for me.”

  “But you copied the letters?”

  “For your father. Yes. Before we painted. He found them interesting.”

  “Interesting.”

  Connie’s mind was spinning. “And your daughter? You said she was sick?”

  “She’s on the mend now. For a while we thought we’d have to take her to America for special treatment. Private treatment. She has a problem with her ears. But they sorted it out here after all.”

  “Good.”

  “Your father was a kind man,” he said, “and extremely generous.”

  “Yes,” Connie sniffed, “he was a kind man. He was a generous man. Thank you.”

  They said good night and hung up.

  Connie pressed her hands to her diaphragm and took a deep breath. She felt her own ribs with her fingers. She was dizzy.

  “I’m relieved,” she muttered softly, “and that’s why my chest feels this
way. It’s only relief.”

  She looked around her. Oh Jesus, she so much wanted to leave this place!

  But she remained where she was. She rocked back down on to her heels. She listened to the house creaking around her and to the vague tick of the kitchen clock, and to the rain.

  ∨ Wide Open ∧

  Forty-Five

  Ronny was no longer interested in what was happening outside. He was sitting on the sofa, his hands folded on his lap, saying nothing, staring straight ahead of him. This time it was Jim’s turn to take heed, to stand at the window and scrutinize. He turned the light back off to facilitate his observations.

  Eventually the players returned to the boar and Jim saw plenty. He saw Nathan and Sara and Lily struggling with the carcass. He heard cursing and hearty expostulations. He saw Luke rolling up his sleeves and lending a hand. Luke was stronger than the others.

  The forklift was difficult to utilize on the beach. It kept sinking into the sand or lurching over sideways. Eventually they abandoned it and opted to drag the carcass manually to the harder dirt road behind the prefabs, with Nathan and Luke to the fore, a trotter each between them, and Sara and Lily to the rear.

  Jim kept up a running commentary in a thin, bleak voice, even though Ronny gave not the slightest indication of comprehending him. But Jim kept it up just the same, feeling that it was the least he could do in the circumstances, to try and distract Ronny and to buoy him.

  “Sara seems to be having problems with her back…” he observed gamely, and then, “Lily isn’t helping much. I think she’s feeling the cold…Luke’s tougher than you might think…”

  At no point did Jim mention Nathan’s involvement in the proceedings, but his eyes strayed more to Nathan’s hard endeavours than to anybody else’s. Yet at no point did Nathan direct his gaze towards Jim’s prefab. Not even for the shortest or meanest of glances.

  Lily came and knocked at the door three times. Each time Jim imagined that she would turn the handle and walk straight in. But she did not. Each time she knocked, waited, knocked again, but she didn’t try to force things. She exhibited an admirable restraint.

  “It’s Lily,” Jim muttered, each time she knocked. “It’s Lily at the door.”

  He almost wished Lily would rush on in and snap Ronny out of it. But she didn’t, and Ronny remained on the sofa, studiously dumb and numb and motionless.

  ♦

  Sara played a leading role in all of the manoeuvrings, but her back started to niggle her half way through so eventually she abandoned the lifting and the humping and decided that it was preferable to oversee the entire operation instead, with her hands placed firmly on to her hips and with an eye to maintaining the ultimate good condition of the carcass. This was business, after all. This was lunch and dinner. This was a full freezer. And now that the main drama was over she felt no pity for the dead creature, no spark of sentiment. She couldn’t afford any.

  Once they’d moved the boar to the dirt road they loaded it on to the forklift without too much difficulty and Sara prepared to haul it to the farm on foot.

  Lily had climbed into the back of Nathan’s car to shelter from the rain, and was sitting there expectantly, hoping shortly to be driven home again.

  “I’ll need you to give me a hand, Lily,” Sara said, beckoning her out with a peremptory finger, “I can’t manage this thing myself. The road’s getting really muddy.”

  “What?” Lily tried to look disparaging.

  Luke stood nearby. He touched Sara’s arm to attract her attention. “I’m happy to help out,” he said quietly, “my car’s parked over at the farm anyway.”

  Lily observed Luke’s hand on Sara’s elbow, and expected it to be removed at any second. But the hand remained there, and Sara did not shrug it off.

  “It’s fine, I’ll do it,” Lily said determinedly, yanking up the hood on her mac and preparing to clamber out of the car again.

  “Luke’s stronger,” Sara said, and then smiled at him.

  Finally he removed his hand, then busied himself turning the forklift around in the road, grunting as he shifted it. Nathan started up the engine. Lily didn’t move.

  “Will you close your door?” Nathan asked.

  Still Lily did not move. Sara stepped forward and slammed the door shut, seemingly oblivious to Lily’s pique. “Do we turn,” Nathan asked, “or can we head back this way?”

  “Did you notice the fish?” Lily answered.

  “What?”

  “The fish. He stinks of fish.”

  Nathan shook his head. “No,” he said, “I didn’t notice.”

  “Fuck him.”

  Lily delivered the back of the passenger seat a ferocious jab with her boot. Nathan turned on the ventilation and fervently hoped that her shoes were clean.

  They were no such thing.

  ♦

  “So, will you eat this thing?” Luke puffed, a full five minutes after they’d begun pushing.

  “Of course. I can’t sell it.”

  “Why not?”

  “Regulations and stuff.”

  After a short pause Sara added, “I appreciate your help.” She removed some hair from her eyes. “And I am truly sorry about the pornography mix up.”

  “I know you are,” Luke smiled, “and your photos were great too. I was just a little intimidated initially.”

  “Watch out for the pothole…”

  Luke steered sideways.

  “You saved my life back there,” he grunted, “this thing could have killed me.”

  Sara shook her head. “He would never have escaped in the first place if I’d been doing my job properly. It was poor husbandry.”

  “I’d love a picture of you with the boar and a gun,” Luke grinned, “like a hunter. Foot on the body, hands on your hips…”

  “With the carcass?”

  “Yes.”

  Sara visualized what he’d described. After a while she said slowly, “And would I be wearing any clothes in this photo?”

  “Uh…” Luke thought for a moment, “probably not, no.”

  Sara smiled to herself.

  “I could do a series of them,” Luke said, quite delighted with the idea.

  Sara took her hands off the forklift and shoved them into her pockets. Luke positioned himself more centrally at the handle.

  “I could do a spread,” he said thoughtfully, “in the Sunday Telegraph Magazine. Very wild, very rural.”

  Sara glanced at him sideways to see if he was joking. He didn’t seem to be. But he was frowning and concentrating principally on the load.

  That I could have shagged this man and enjoyed it, she thought amazedly. Then silently congratulated herself on her sharp use of the modern sexual idiom.

  Snagged. Now that was surely progress.

  ♦

  “What can I say?” Jim stood in front of Ronny, but Ronny stared straight through him. “Is there anything I can do to make things easier?”

  Ronny felt an impulse to respond to Jim’s question, but failed to summon up the energy. He was elsewhere. Miles away. Somewhere grey.

  “I’ll even read you the letter,” Jim said finally, “if you really want me to.”

  Ronny struggled to focus. “You will?”

  His hands rested passively upon the bundle of letters on his lap. The final letter was on top of the pile.

  “It’s very short,” he said, brightening visibly, “it won’t take you long.”

  He passed the letter over. “Will you need more light?”

  “No.”

  Jim took the letter. It was too dark to read it properly but he knew what it said. He didn’t consider altering the content or varying the words. He saw no reason to employ cunning. Anyway, he believed that everything in the world had its own kind of truth. Its own integrity. Even lies.

  Ronny, he began, then he cleared his throat and his voice grew softer, Ronny,

  ♦

  I dreamed I saw you dead in a place by the water. A ravaged place. All flat
and empty and wide open. Not like here at all. Not full and moist and dense. Not like here: all blocked up and hot and savage. But on a moon’s surface. And you were covered in some kind of binding. Like a mummy. Cotton. Or plastic? Something white and reflective. From head to toe.

  And the light shone on you. Oh, how it shone on you! It glanced off you and it was like a pure bright silver. The wind was singing. It sang: you have suffered enough. You have suffered enough.

  Then Death came and he kissed you. Lightly. Gently. Upon the lips. There is nothing beyond, he whispered, only me, only me.

  There is nothing beyond. Only me.

  ♦

  Jim finished speaking. When he next spoke his voice was louder.

  “It’s cold,” he said, “don’t you think?”

  Ronny said nothing.

  “Ronny?”

  “I can’t talk,” he whispered, “I feel so happy.”

  “Happy?”

  “Yes. Happy.”

  “May I tell you something about Monica?” Jim asked.

  “No more words.”

  Ronny closed his eyes. “It’s too beautiful in here,” he said, touching his hands to his temples, “my head’s all golden inside.”

  Jim watched Ronny, silently. The need to unburden, he reasoned, was a selfish need. Words were cruel things. So he held his tongue and savoured the discomfort it afforded him, continuing to savour it, quietly, passively, as the night gradually dragged its heavy black belly the length and breadth of the patient heavens. Was Ronny sleeping? Bolt upright with such a wide smile on his face? Was he waking? Was he dreaming?

  It didn’t matter. Nothing mattered. Jim guarded him with every inch of his attention, every shred of concentration, perched on the sofa next to him, all eye, like a loyal, gentle, wordless cyclops.

  ∨ Wide Open ∧

  Forty-Six

  They pulled up outside the farmhouse. Nathan killed the engine and switched off the lights.

  “It’s late,” he said.

  “Will you drive home now?” Lily seemed unconcerned by this prospect.