None of these thoughts came close to being the truth and they only reveal how little I understood him. But I got so used to imagining his whereabouts it almost compensated for his absence. What the mind cannot experience, it can project. I’m sure you’ll figure this out for yourself some day. Happier lives can be lived outside reality. Not in dreams or hallucinations. In brighter reflections on things past. Scenarios that we invent because the facts alone are just too hurtful. Sweeter flesh we eat because the sharp, dark pit cannot be swallowed.
For instance, Friday 18th August, quarter to six or thereabouts. I’m in the pantry, emptying myself into the bucket. Ammonia of my boyish piss becoming froth. All that orange juice escaping. The walkman batteries are done and I can’t settle. But my elbow’s still electric, pain is crackling down my side. I look up at the ceiling hatch. The shelves won’t take my weight. Maybe if I stack the boxes and the other junk then I can build a platform high enough, try again to reach. It only needs to hold me for ten seconds, twenty at the most. So I make a base out of the boxed-up cans, the oil drums and crates. Add the baskets and the Tupperware, the bowl of the food mixer. Add the kibble bags, the wooden tray, the plastic bottles, and the jars. It’s holding steady but it needs more ballast. I see a small brown parcel on the middle shelf, behind a hardened pack of demerara sugar. Square enough to fit between the jars and stabilise them. I bring it down, but something on its flank catches the light.
Silver ink.
Addressed to me.
My father’s upright scrawl.
Daniel Owen Hardesty, c/o Campion Ghyll Farm, Wasdale Head, Cumbria, England.
Fives stamps in the corner showing the same image: a woman in a bonnet walking in a copse with geese. One word printed in the sky above her: EIRE. A broken circle of a postmark but it’s smudged: DUBLIN 13 FEB 93.
The paper doesn’t rip. I have to bite the edges to unwrap it. A jewellery box. Grey velvet. Thin and square. The gold motif has worn away. I lift the lid.
A tarnished key.
I hold it up to my right eye, point it at the naked light bulb. It looks to be the perfect size. I try it in the pantry door. It opens to reveal a different evening, brighter sunshine. My father frying sausages and eggs on the kitchen range. Two dogs fussing at his heels. He turns to me, ambivalent. ‘I thought you’d never work it out,’ he says. ‘Fetch your plate. It’s almost done.’ He gestures to the empty table where a place is set for me beside my granddad and QC and Chloe Cargill. ‘We can’t stay till morning, so we’ll have our breakfast for dinner. I promised you the royal treatment next time, didn’t I?’
For instance, Friday 18th August, six thirty or thereabouts. He’s driving south, alone, depleted. In the Volvo with its tank refuelled. Every drip of diesel pilfered from the jerry cans in the machine shed. The twilight lingers over Nether Wasdale. An orange-purple glister on the fells. The lake is fading in the rearview. Another Wintermans scorches his fingers. White smoke eddies in the car. The smell of burned coffee. He can’t get a radio signal. Music’s up loud just to keep him awake. Garlands, Cocteau Twins. Fretless bass and synthesisers. Voices singing underwater. He’s keeping to the limit. Beyond Eskdale, beyond Ulpha, beyond Grizebeck. Bloody thumbprints on the atlas. Gawthwaite and Lowick Green, Spark Bridge and Penny Bridge. Back to the roundabout in Greenodd. The A590 all the way to Kendal and onto the M6. He’s driving with a private purpose. South. And she’s driving with a different purpose. North. They’re meeting at the halfway point, determined on a phone call with a faltering connection. One hour earlier.
‘No, Fran—Rugby.’ She was on the mobile in her car.
‘Rugby? You’re still miles away.’ He was on the cordless in the farmhouse.
‘Where exactly are you going?’
‘It’s for a shoot. Last minute thing.’
‘No, I said where.’
‘What?’
‘I said where. Which part of Wales?’
‘South. Near Abergavenny. Look, you should get off the M1.’
‘I know that, Fran.’
‘Get straight on the M6.’
‘Don’t start giving me orders. This is your mess I’m sorting out, not mine.’
‘Either way, you’ll want to get on the M6. There’s a service station at Sandbach. You know it?’
‘Why the hell would I know it?’
‘All right. Jesus Christ. Just find it on the map, then. It’s halfway. And it’s easy.’
‘Fine.’
‘You’ve got a decent map?’
‘I’ve got a map. I don’t know if it’s decent.’
‘I’m sure it’ll do.’
‘Put him on now, would you?’
‘I told you. He’s sleeping.’
‘Go and wake him up.’
‘What d’you want me to do, throw a brick? He’s in the car. I’m in a phone box over the road.’
‘Well, hang up. Wake him. Call me back.’
‘I’m on my last bit of change here.’
‘I’ll call you back, then. What’s the number?’
‘No idea. Doesn’t say.’
‘Fucking hell, Fran. You’re useless.’
‘How am I useless?’
‘Oh, if only we had time to count the ways.’
‘I’m telling you that lad’s just had the best day of his life, and you’re calling me useless. Typical.’
‘You’d better not be lying to me.’
‘About what?’
‘I don’t know. You’re acting funny. I know that much.’
‘I’m telling you, he really hit it off with Maxine. He got signed photos, little trinkets from the show. You want to see the haul he’s coming back with.’
‘It didn’t sound like he was having fun to me.’
‘Yeah well, you know Danno. King of the understatement.’
‘I’m so fucking mad at you. What the fuck were you thinking?’
‘Calm down. You’re acting like I took him on a tour of Wormwood Scrubs.’
‘That’s not the point and you know it. You should’ve phoned.’
‘Yeah, all right.’
‘I mean, Berwick, for crying out loud! That’s fucking ridiculous. It’s not what we agreed, Fran. Not even close.’
‘Yeah, but come on. Sometimes you’ve got be spontaneous, don’t you? Maxine’s got a cinema in her house up there. She was making a thing of it, and Dan wanted to go. What was I meant to do, say no? She’s a knight of the realm.’
‘What was that? I lost you for a second.’
‘It’s a bad line. I said I didn’t have a choice. Dan wanted to go.’
‘I can’t hear you very well. What’s that clattering noise?’
‘Lorry parking up.’
‘Your voice has gone all tinny.’
‘Let’s just make sure we get our plans in order, otherwise—’
‘Sandbach Services, you said. What time?’
‘About nine.’
‘Nine?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Okay. Got it.’
‘We’ll see you later, then.’
‘Make sure he’s belted in.’
‘Yeah, yeah.’
It’s dark when he passes through Lancaster. His headlights puncture the gloom. An intermittent sheen from the motorway lamp posts. Not quite enough to read the atlas, spread out on the passenger seat. He clicks the interior light on. His finger tracks the throat of the M6. Which junction is it?
The radio begins to grate. Voices far too merry and self-satisfied. Every song is bubblegum. He opts for silence. The hymn of tyres on bitumen. He’s exhausted. Hard to tell one concrete walkway from the next. Which junction is it? Overpasses and footbridges. Hard to keep his lids from dropping. Are they headlights or cat’s eyes? The verges are becoming girders are becoming traffic cones. Where did the road markings go? Which junction? His wheels creep towards the slow lane, the hard shoulder. A sudden judder perks him up. Clock face jounces in the dashboard, all a blur. The shotgun slides on the backseat.
The hymn of tyres on bitumen. He reaches for the glovebox. A bit of Treasure, maybe. The shotgun slides on the backseat. He hunts for the cassettes. Right hand on the wheel. He peeps above the fascia. Road is clear. Not in the mood for Blue Bell Knoll. Not in the mood for Louder than Bombs. Tired of Garlands. Tired. He should’ve brought more tapes along.
A leftward creep to the hard shoulder. Tired. That sudden rumble. Tired.
Glovebox bounces shut. Too late to correct it. His eyes blank out. He doesn’t think about the hay barn. Doesn’t think about the pantry. Only thinks about himself.
The car scrapes up the banking. Flips. Drops to the ground like a fumbled cassette. Skates across three empty lanes and smacks the central reservation. The shotgun hits the ceiling, fires. Windows shatter. Hits the floor and fires again. Roof is crushed. He hangs, ensnared by his own seatbelt. Still breathing. Still breathing. The backed-up traffic waits for him to finish.
For instance, Sandbach Services. 18th August, ten past seven. The place is a temple for transient life. A mirror image of itself. She comes in from the northbound section of the road with the unnerving feeling that the same facilities are offered on both sides. He didn’t say which one he meant: northbound or south?
There’s an Esso station and a low brick building promising fast food and toilets. A footbridge like a stranded train across the motorway. Futuristic, probably, when it was built. The rest is car park. A segregation system. First, the HGVs with all their colourful containers, the coaches, trucks, and caravans. Then the cars and motorbikes. Not many spaces left for her. She circuits, prowling for an empty bay. Spots one near the boundary fence, where constant traffic shakes the chain-link, where passing headlights saturate the hedges. In she goes, between two vans: a plumber and a carpet layer.
She steps onto the tarmac, locks the car. Smell of chip fat, smell of petrol. Cold summer evening, rain on the way. Hardly anyone outside. Driver underneath a lamp post with a newspaper. Teenagers by the atrium with cigarettes. The automatic doors slide open. A whir of hand dryers from the toilets. Hours to kill in this ungodly place. She goes to get a cup of lemon tea, but they don’t have it. Just normal tea in polystyrene. She carries it to a bright corner of the seating area. A vantage point from which to check the car park. Puts her father’s mobile on the table. Gets the book out of her handbag. Snow Falling on Cedars. Hard to concentrate above the chorus of those hand dryers. Hard to quiet her thoughts. She settles in.
She reads five chapters and absorbs none of the words. Drinks three cups of mediocre tea for comfort. Visits the ladies’ twice and browses magazines in the newsagent’s. By ten to nine, she’s standing in the atrium, observing the incomings. By quarter past, she’s outside in the spitting rain with folded arms, treading the kerbside, scanning every row of cars in case she’s missed him pulling in. At twenty past, she sees an old blue Volvo and her spirits lift. But the number plate isn’t the same. It’s driven by a white-haired woman. Small dogs in a cage inside her boot. Still no sign of him by half past. She decides she’s on the wrong side of the services. She looks up at the covered footbridge, all its dismal portholes, and understands she’ll have to cross it.
The metal stairs are flecked with fag ends. A fragrance she can’t place. Body odour? Fox piss? What? But she’s the only person in the long chute of the bridge. Walking over traffic. The oceanic wash of it below her feet. Her steps are noiseless.
She emerges on the southbound side. The building is a duplicate. Same atrium of tinted glass. Same fast-food promises. Esso signage looms above the rooftop. But no whirring hand dryers. No sounds at all. Even the rain has abated. And her first sight of the car park locks her knees. She almost trips.
Every bay is vacant but for one. Streetlamps shine at the perimeter.
An old blue Volvo estate.
Alone in the lot.
She knows the number plate by heart.
On this side, everything is closed. The automated doors are all unmoving. Not a soul around.
She heads towards the car, trying to catch a glimpse of them behind the windscreen. It feels like an ambush. There’s something odd about the car. Has it been cleaned? The paint is glossy, fresh. The bumpers polished to a gleam. Not a speck of rust. Is that a brand new roof rack? The closer she gets, the stronger the intuition. No one’s in the car. She peers in through the driver’s window. Empty.
The grey upholstery is pristine. The Ordnance Survey Road Atlas of Great Britain is laid upon the passenger seat. This can’t be right. The car looks better than it did the day she bought it. She tries the handle, knowing it’s pointless. But it clicks, it opens. She gets in. A showroom model scent. Only noughts on the milometer. The key in the ignition. Dealership fob hanging down. What is this? Where are they? She sits there, considering. She wonders at the footbridge. She listens to that oceanic wash.
The new-car smell is making her eyes water. She’s allergic to the chemicals. Her lashes start to sting. Mascara comes off on her fingers. She flips the visor. No mirror. Instead, she notices a blemish on the vinyl. Somebody has written on the beige with biro. An upright lettering in green. Dear Kath, it reads. Change of plan. Follow the map to Vicarage Lane. We’ll wait for you. Signed Francis, with three kisses.
The atlas opens at a page he’s folded down for her. A route is highlighted in yellow: it takes her off the motorway, ends somewhere called Audlem. Cheshire. What the fuck is he thinking?
She leaves her own car on the northbound side and takes the Volvo south. Sticks to the route he’s charted. Onto the A500. West. Past Barthomley, past Chorlton. Quaint names on the map she’s never encountered before: Hough, Walgherton, Hankelow. Eighteen miles on the clock now. It’s five to ten or thereabouts. She’s almost arrived. He’s circled the junction. That’s where they’ll be waiting. End of this long village road.
Three paths merge up ahead. A cast-iron lantern stands on the verge, spreading a warm downy light. A medieval church on a hill: St James the Great. Shadowy Anglican cross in the yard. Cottages and shops both ways she looks. A pub to her right—maybe there? No. To her left, there’s a street sign under a window: Vicarage Lane. She follows it.
When she comes down the track, she passes allotments and boarded-up premises, ivy-clad fences and gardens. Next thing, he’s there in the beams of her headlights. Fran Hardesty. Perched on a plain wooden cattle gate. Wearing blue overalls. Smoking. There’s a wedding marquee set up in the paddock behind him. Dirty white canvas. No guy ropes. He tosses his Wintermans, hops to the ground. Nonchalant wave. A gesture that says, Wind the window down, Kath. So as soon as she pulls in beside him, she does. And before he can lean in and utter a word, she confronts him: ‘What’s with the treasure hunt, Francis? Where is he?’
He plants his hands on the roof, smiling in. A face like a riddle he wants her to solve. His hair has grown down to his neck, tied back with elastic. His skin is tauter in the darkness. He looks more like the man she used to know. The man she met. ‘You can park up there, by the old folk’s home.’ Even his voice is rejuvenated—warm and lower-pitched. It could persuade her of anything once.
‘Fran,’ she says.
‘What?’
‘You know what.’
He’s still smiling in at her. ‘Hold your water for a few more minutes. You’ll see him soon.’ He backs away, a finger to his lips. This is how he used to be, this is how he used to influence her, this is what she’s missed. His quiet authority. Inscrutable thoughts. The confidence she used to have in him. ‘Leave the car there and I’ll take you in.’
‘In where?’
He nods at the marquee.
A long time since she’s felt so little anger in his company. What’s another few minutes? She takes the car ten metres down the lane. There’s a grassy collar to park on. An old brick building just over t
he way, leaded windows gleaming on the lower floors. The air is lush and warm as she climbs out. A second weather.
He’s waving at her from the gate, beneath a lamp post. Giving her the hurry-up. She bounds along the lane. His fists are in the pockets of his overalls. He’s not himself tonight, in the best way possible. The loyalty is back. The kindness he mislaid has been returned to him. It’s in his stance, the partial listing of his head each time he looks at her. Southbound Francis. So much better than the northbound Francis.
In the paddock, the marquee is glowing amber from within. The night is perfect. There’s a clarity about the stars. How has he managed this? Tricks of perspective. Everything made to look real from afar. He extends a hand for her. ‘Show won’t start until we go in,’ he says. ‘It’s okay. Trust me. This is going to be something you’ll remember for the rest of your life.’ Her palm closes round his thumb. It’s not a mistake. She lets him lead. He swings back the gate with a pleasant low squeak. Tows her across the nubby old grass like a kid. Into the heart of the field. The tent brightens as they near it. He parts the canvas ingress. She steps inside, believing. No more disappointments from now on.
When I heard the invocation of a woman’s voice outside the door, I thought that it was hers. ‘Daniel? Daniel, if you’re there, love, say something.’ She rattled the handle again. My mother had arrived at last with all her calmness and gentility. The soft pitch of her speech was just the same. I had watched the skinny blades of daylight come and go beneath the door three times. My elbow wouldn’t bend and I had gut-cramp. But here she was, calling. Her old self. I spoke back: ‘Mum. Mum.’ There was an exalted cry after this. She shouted through the kitchen: ‘In here! I’ve got him! He’s here!’ I recognised the difference in her then. Another accent. ‘It’s all right, my love, you just sit tight,’ she said. There was a scratching and chirruping. Radio noises. ‘Are you hurt, Daniel? Are you feeling okay in there?’
A Station on the Path to Somewhere Better Page 21