by David Mark
‘Oh God, I look such a state …’ says Liz, her anxiety returning like a flood. Thoughts pop in her mind, bursting like hot kernels of corn. ‘Did you phone Jay? Carly? Did you tell him what had happened?’
‘Did I phone your partner? No, that’s not for me to …’
It feels like there are hot needles in her head. She’s being sent away. Sent packing. Bundled up with a stranger and sent out like a tramp. Why had he bothered being nice to her if he was just killing time until her lift turned up? Why mess with her head like that? She suddenly sees it clearly – this was his thing, the rescuing of damsels in distress, buttering them up, showing them a glimpse of a life they could endure, then pulling the rug from under them. What sort of cruel bastard did that? What sort of nasty fucker treated people that way? She scores crescent scars into the cover of the paperback, clutching it so tightly her arms begin to throb. How had he texted this Sylvia without her noticing? When had he done it? Sent his nasty little SOS? What stupid, idiotic thing had she said or not said that had shown her up as the silly little chubby-kneed toddler who needed sending on her merry way?
‘Are you OK, Betsy? You look a bit stressed out? Sylvia’s literally a nice lady from down the valley and she’s doing you a favour because she owes me a favour, and that’s how the system kind of works around here. As for the car, my pal will call me and I’ll call you, if that’s OK. Up to you what you tell your partner, that’s none of my business. If you’re cool with it, I’ll take your number and let you know as soon as there’s anything to tell.’
She feels different emotions raging inside her. The paranoia of a moment ago twists into a new shape. Is he trying to get in her pants? Is this an elaborate ruse to sleep with her? And Sylvia? How does she know that the old bat isn’t some octogenarian pimp, whisking her away to God knows where to be mercilessly plundered by sex-starved geriatrics?
‘Betsy …’
That name again. The one she’d given him. The one that had felt right. She snatches up a pen from the mess on the table and scribbles down her number. She writes ‘Betsy’ above it. Marshall rubs up against her, his head finding the palm of her hand. Jude stands almost close enough to do the same.
‘Sounds crazy, but I’m pleased you crashed,’ he says, and smiles at the silliness of it.
She nods. Isn’t sure she can speak again without something unexpected rushing up her throat.
‘Well, Betsy,’ he says, extending his hand. ‘I’ll be in touch.’ He takes her palm in his. His palms are rough. Fingertips too. It’s like rubbing her hand across tree bark.
He gestures towards the door. She stands still, unable to propel herself forward. ‘I have to ask,’ she says, lips pursed. ‘Occam’s Razor. What were you talking about?’
He laughs; the same pleasant sound: a grandad reading a joke from a cracker. ‘Entities should not be multiplied without necessity,’ he says, softly.
‘Sorry?’
‘A theory, posited by a monk eight hundred years ago. Sometimes, the simplest answer is the right one.’
Oh,’ she says, replaying back the conversation. ‘Walks like a prick, talks like a prick – is a prick, yes?’
He nods. ‘It sounds better in your accent than mine.’
She grabs her cardigan, warm from the fire. It smells of him. ‘Thanks,’ she says, again, and heads for the door.
He pulls her back, one hand on her wrist. Looks at her for a moment, as if committing her to memory. She doesn’t breathe. Can’t. And then, as if he has drunk his fill, he lets her go.
She holds his scent in her mouth and nose until she fears she will die if she doesn’t exhale.
She holds the cardigan to her face, where it soaks up her tears, and hides her smile.
SEVEN
Sylvia, is transpires, is seventy-four. She completed her first bungee jump the day before her seventieth birthday. Performed her first charity parachute jump three months after. It was her first flight, too. First time in a plane and she jumped out. Fancy that! She left it late to become a daredevil but now it’s all she can think about. She’s going up in a gyrocopter next summer. It’s being paid for by her grandson, Phillip, with a double L, who’s doing very well in public relations and has managed to get three articles in the Hexham Courant about her exploits. She’s raised over £36,000 for Guide Dogs for the Blind and not far off the same again for a special unit at the school in Allenheads, where her neighbour’s two daughters go. Lovely girls, they are. Eight and ten. Always call her by her first name but that’s the modern way, isn’t it? Their mum’s been through it, right enough. Never found the right man, but sampled plenty from the menu, though it pains her to say so. Still, maybe that’s best. Get your kicks while you can, and all that. She sometimes wishes she’d done things differently. Should maybe have moved away when her husband died, but by then she’d grown used to her own four walls and wasn’t sure if it would do her more harm than good to uproot herself. He was a decent husband, truth be told, though he was a long way from dynamic. Solid. Reliable. Like a Volvo, or socks from the Edinburgh Woollen Mill. Been gone nine years now. She’s heard about dating websites and those apps you can get on your phone to help you find a nice gentleman, but it all seems a bit tacky and she doubts she’ll find anybody willing to give her half the thrill of the bungee jump, or do half the damage to her hips …
Sitting in the passenger seat, the window cushioned with the cardigan, Liz is aware she has no obligation to respond to any of this information. She is, largely, a receptacle. It’s a lot like having sex with Jay. Nothing required of her, save the occasional grunt. She has used the journey to compose sentences in her head. She feels an urge to log on to the Bipped forum and write an entry. She fancies she could make it funny and tragic and full of excitement all at once. She thinks she knows the voice she would use: self-deprecating; pithy, matter-of-fact. Can picture the entry on the page.
So anyway, first DBT session went well – got lost, nearly died, totalled the car and had to be rescued from a hillside by a dishy farmer on a quad bike. Going well so far …
There’s a red-haired girl from Oregon who posts on the forum three or four times a week. She’s round-faced with dark eyes and loads of different shades of lipstick and she’s got thousands of followers to her Instagram account thanks largely to her posts on Bipped. Liz wonders whether she should send her a personal message, asking for advice, telling her what an inspiration she is; hoping against hope that she’ll give her a nod of approval and tell her fans that this new girl is an absolute hoot …
‘Just let me know whether it’s left or right at the river,’ says Sylvia, merrily, as they drift around the roundabout on the outskirts of Durham. ‘I used to come to Durham a couple of times a month but the parking’s crazy, don’t you think? I love the cathedral though I do resent having to stick money in the “donations” box. Not a donation if you get told to do it, is it? I never understand the parking neither. Every time I pull in to the multi-storey I think I know where I’m going to emerge and every time I’m wrong. Plenty of students, isn’t there? Lots of the Asians, I’ve noticed – not that I’ve any objection to that, of course. Always seems like a seal of approval to me, when the Asians start appearing in droves. Very good at seeing a place on the up, in my experience …’
They’re fighting the tea-time traffic. The sky is a washed-out blue; the same shade it had been when Liz had left this morning in such high spirits. She sees herself as she was at nine a.m.; her make-up perfect, coffee mug in hand, playing with the controls for the stereo. The memory extends a long, wormy tendril and winds it around her mood. Begins to tug. She feels her spirits fall. Feels the familiar accusatory voices inside. Why would anybody want to read a blog post by somebody with nothing useful to say? Why would anybody take any interest in somebody whose only notable feature is a constant ability to get things wrong? She can’t even imagine telling Jay about what has happened so what does it say about her that she feels more comfortable turning it into an entertainment
for strangers?
She glances over at Sylvia. She’s a remarkably comforting sight. She’s short and plump. She can’t help noticing that her neck is exactly the same width as her head. Crowned with her bright red woolly hat, she looks to Liz like a bruised thumb topped with a raspberry.
‘I think it would be better if I got myself cleaned up at my sister’s place first, if that’s OK,’ says Liz, and is surprised to hear the thought so confidently expressed when she had not known she was going to say it until it emerged.
‘You might be right,’ says Sylvia, nosing the car forward and glancing over from the driving seat. She has piercing blue eyes that make Liz think of wolves and ice caves and various other things she has never actually seen. ‘People wouldn’t bat an eyelid at the dirt if you walked in to the pub round our way, though you’d turn a few heads for different reasons I’m sure. Nasty phrase but any fresh meat gets plenty of the old dogs sniffing, I can promise you that. And a good-looking girl like you? Bloody hell you’d be swatting them away with a stick, you would. Different story here, I’m guessing. I don’t like to stereotype but I’m presuming it’s all dinner parties and hanging baskets, is it? People doing bread in little saucers of oil – as if that’s some sort of treat! I lived in the big city myself when I was younger. Thought it was amazing, right up to the point I needed a bit of help, and then there was nobody willing to give me the time of day. Still, maybe that’s just Hartlepool …’
‘Maybe,’ says Liz, as Sylvia is momentarily distracted by a driver inching a large saloon vehicle into a gap just about big enough for a supermarket trolley. ‘We don’t really do the dinner party stuff. I’m not good with friends.’
‘No? Hard to fathom. You seem lovely, though appearances can be deceiving. Had a neighbour, Olive her name was – brought me a plate of shepherd’s pie one winter when she had some going spare and it took me three days to remember to get the plate back to her. Turned up on my doorstep with two of her sons – huge brutes they were – demanding to know why I was robbing from their mam! People are funny buggers, that’s the knowledge I’ve got after seventy-four years. And nobody’s the same from one day to the next.’
Liz finds herself smiling. ‘I’ve got a few loose wires,’ she says, tapping her head. ‘I’m too emotional. I jump in with both feet. I can’t regulate my emotions. Sometimes I don’t know whether I’m going mad. Jay puts up with a lot from me. I’ve embarrassed him a few times. Done some daft things …’
‘Haven’t we all?’ laughs Sylvia, as the great snow-globe shape of the cathedral appears in the distance, looking down on a city of old bridges and surging waterways; a chaotic centre of narrow alleyways and buildings hewed from old, stout bricks.
‘Yes, but …’
‘Sounds like you let other people do much of your thinking for you as it is,’ muses Sylvia. ‘Emotional? Excitable? Bit of a temper? Sounds like you’ve been diagnosed as a woman.’
Liz doesn’t respond. She’d been livid with Jay when he made the same joke and it feels unfair to extend a different response to Sylvia, however astute it may be.
‘Carly lives over the river, up past the big Tesco. Carry on this way …’
‘You’ll have a story to tell her, I’m sure! You were lucky it was Jude who saw what happened. He’s the sort you want to see lumbering towards you when you’re trapped under something heavy. Salt of the earth, though I don’t know if that’s still a good thing to you youngsters. He’s been through it, poor sod, but he was the first to come and see what help I needed when the bad snows came and he didn’t charge me for fixing the roof or doing a bit of rotivating for the family down the way. He’s not shy of admirers neither, though I don’t know whether the whole “eligible bachelor” thing still rings a bell for you ladies. “Brooding widower” neither,’ she says, taking her hands off the wheel to make inverted commas with her fingers. ‘He said it was that stuck-up twit Campion Lorton-Cave who ran you off the road …’
‘Not really …’
‘If you need a witness for the insurance claim I’m happy to say I saw the lot, and that he’d been at my place drinking meths before it happened. He’s the sort who still wishes people used phrases like “squire”. Would give his right arm to be called Lord of the Manor. Would be plenty of lads pleased to see him get a slap around the chops but when you live in a community that makes its money from farming, it doesn’t pay to piss off the biggest landowner. He’ll be on a high right now. Had three years of worry after that poor lass got shot but it’s all done now. Not for her, mind. What sort of teenager wants to wear an eyepatch?’
She suddenly puts the pieces together. ‘I heard that on the radio! That was him? The same person who owns all the land?’
‘Well, if you go back you’ll find that it’s his wife who’s got the bloodline going back down the centuries. Campion’s married well, you could say. He’s embraced the lifestyle – loves being somebody to doff your cap to. That poor lass who got shot, they made her life bloody miserable. Had to move away. He had dozens of witnesses to say it was her own silly fault and that if the saboteurs hadn’t been stirring up trouble it would never have happened.’
‘You sound like you dislike him almost as much as Jude does.’
‘Nobody can dislike him that much,’ says Sylvia, pointedly. She shrugs. ‘Friends in high places and some in the low. He has some right nasty sods come to his grouse shoots. Not exactly comfortable in their country tweeds, if you’ll take my meaning. Maeve was never scared of him but even she backed down when he brought in the bad lads to make sure the saboteurs saw the sense in going for softer targets. You ask me, she did it because she knew what Jude would do if things carried on the way they were going. Not a man to trifle with, our Jude. Goes quiet for a good couple of days if he has to so much as pull a dying bird’s neck but there are blokes in the valley and further afield who’d have it that he’s somebody not to mess with. Doesn’t back down, that’s what they say. Doesn’t matter what’s in his way, he’ll keep walking forward.’
Liz can barely keep up with the stream of information. She realizes they are approaching the estate. She curses, under her breath. They’re nearly at Carly’s, just as the conversation is reaching the point that Liz has been hoping is its destination.
‘Just up here, right, then left,’ says Liz, sitting up and pulling down the sun visor to check her reflection. She’s dirty and flushed, but there is a brightness in her eyes that she hasn’t seen in too long. ‘I don’t like to ask, but his wife – what happened?’
Sylvia gives her a sly look. ‘I’m not one for gossip,’ she says, and grins, her lips parting to reveal big, white dentures that match the twinkling whites in her eyes. ‘Nearly four years ago now, I’d say. There was a mention in the paper when it happened. It broke him up, and for Campion to suggest there was anything fishy about it, well, that just shows you the type of man he is. Jealous, if you ask me. His wife, Candy – she’s got a bit of class about her and she’d take Jude’s side over her husband’s any day of the week. I’ve heard that Campion sent one of his boys to talk to him when he was doing some work up at the Hall, hottest day of the year – insisted that he put a shirt on! You can picture it, can’t you? Candy at the window, licking her lips, and Campion wobbling about in his Bermuda shorts, gut like a gone-off pear.’
Liz grins, enjoying the picture. Glances through the darkened glass and sees where they are.
‘Right here, and just down there: the one with the nasty front door.’ She can’t help but wrinkle her nose. It’s a defence mechanism, guarding herself against any suggestion that she should try and be more like her sister.
‘Pinkish one?’
‘She says it’s salmon. Maybe after it’s been digested, definitely not before.’
‘I had a sister once,’ muses Sylvia. ‘Apparently I ate her while we were in the womb. I had a boil removed when I was four. Had baby teeth in it, if you can believe that.’
Liz isn’t sure how to respond, so chooses silence. Sylv
ia slows to a halt outside the little terraced house, its front door opening directly on to the street. Carly’s partner, Glen, had wanted to swap the hinges so that it opened outwards; annihilating any passing pedestrian every time he answered the door.
‘Nice,’ says Sylvia, chattily. ‘Windows could use a clean.’
‘I’ll be sure to tell her,’ says Liz, and begins rummaging in her bag. Her hand touches her phone and a sudden torrent of thoughts gush into her mind. She hasn’t looked at her phone since leaving the valley! Why hadn’t she thought about it before? Why not check her messages when it entered a signal area? Why not message ahead? Reassure Jay? Check to see what repercussions there will be with her therapist. She knows the answer instantly. Fear. She doesn’t want to see what trouble she’s in. Wants to exist here, in this little alternative world, with this gossipy old lady and her stories of intriguing strangers. She begins to fumble in her purse.
‘None of that,’ says Sylvia, with an audible tssk. ‘I owe Jude, so no charge. And I fancy you’ll get a chance to do me a good turn somewhere down the road.’
Liz looks up from her bag, confused. ‘I will? I mean, yeah, I do hope our paths cross again – are you on Facebook?’
Sylvia gives a hard-to-read smile. ‘I’ll be seeing you again, I’ve no doubt about it.’ She nods at the house. Carly has appeared at the glass: glaring at the vehicle that stands, motor-running, at the kerb outside.
‘Oh, that’s Carly. And thanks so much,’ says Liz, flustered. ‘And thank him again for me. Jude, I mean. I don’t even know his last name …’
‘I reckon you’d find it out easy enough, but it’s Cullen, love. Jude Cullen. Make sure you spell it right when you type it into the internet. And don’t look at me like I’m a mind reader, you’ve been cuddling that cardigan like it’s a cat. I’ll be seeing you soon.’
Liz climbs from the car, steps uncertain, jelly-legged and aching all the way to the top of her head. This neighbourhood is called Pity Me. It regularly crops up in the list of strangest place names in the UK. It’s also a regular joke of Jay’s. He delights in telling her this is where she would be better suited to living.