by Matthew Crow
A car pulled onto the kerb as I made my way towards Donna’s block of flats.
It had been following me since I’d left Jacob on the beach and my pace had quickened to a gentle trot.
Hers was the fourth tower along – the farthest from the beach – but her flat was the highest in the building. The penthouse suite, her mum would sometimes joke, as we held our noses against the stench of piss in the corridor.
Two car doors opened and closed behind me and footsteps grew in speed and volume as I skipped the last paces to the doorway of her building and hammered her flat number into the scratched keypad.
‘Scuse me, love,’ came a voice from behind, as I pressed the buzzer frantically, trying to appear as casual as I could in the pinhole camera.
‘Come on now, Claudette.’ A second voice. ‘Manners cost nothing.’ It was said with a laugh and their outlines spread in the glass of the door just as it buzzed open and I hauled myself inside, pressing it shut with my back as two fists pounded to be let in.
I ran towards the lift and pressed my finger on the UP button as it whirred and clanked in its familiar descent. Just as its doors began to open a third voice and a jangling of keys came from the entrance.
‘Couldn’t help us out mate?’ said the blurred figure from the car. ‘Only gone and left my keys inside.’
The man laughed obliviously and opened the door as I hammered fourteen and pressed myself against the back of the lift, as the doors closed slowly and sealed shut.
I had no idea who had followed me there, or what exactly they had wanted, but as the lift rose my legs buckled beneath me, and I spent the short journey on the floor, clawing desperately at my own breath as I blinked back tears.
I had only known the outlines of Sarah’s world since I’d gotten out of hospital, and already it felt like it was destroying me.
I was amazed she had survived for as long as she did.
Donna’s room was cut through with the invisible ripples that always linger after an argument. I’d asked Jacob how she was before I left him and he’d said she didn’t hate me. Nobody, he said, gets angry if they don’t really care. It was her concern for me that caused her to lash out.
I wasn’t convinced by his logic. I spent half my life getting mad at dumb people and stupid shit that in the grand scheme I didn’t care one bit about. And Donna seldom said anything she didn’t mean, so there had obviously been some heft to her outburst.
Any attempt at small talk was futile but I was determined to give it a damn good shot regardless.
‘I almost had sex with Ross,’ I said expectantly, keen to appeal to one of Donna’s biggest areas of interest.
She shrugged and turned her back to me.
‘You probably should have,’ she said. ‘I’m worried your business is going to heal over if you leave it much longer.’
‘Nah it’s safe. I’m always messing around down there.’
There was a silence, and then an audible intake of breath from Donna.
‘I do hate you sometimes,’ she said. ‘No matter what Jacob said to make you feel better. And I mean hate. Not, like, I hate maths or I hate it when you wait ages for a bus and two come along at once. Like, fully blown biblical hate. I want to kick the shit clean out of you sometimes, Claudette. You wind me up so much it’s unreal.’
‘I know.’
‘Yep. It’s all your fault. As you know, I’m perfect,’ she said, turning with a frown tightly screwed on to her emerging smile.
‘I know,’ I said, allowing myself a small smile. ‘I’m sorry. I’ve played it all wrong, haven’t I?’
Donna sighed and shrugged.
She told me how she’d first gone to Jacob when I’d spent so much time avoiding her, with the intention of assassinating him for having stolen me from her. And that she had stayed in touch as he was the only way she got any sort of news about me, and how he’d kept her updated, and she’d acted as a sort of translator for him – explaining my behavioural quirks as best she could as I tangled him in the web of my recovery.
‘So maybe you’re right,’ she said with an arched eyebrow. ‘Maybe everything really is all about you.’
‘I’m sorry,’ I said.
‘It’s just, I spent so much time with you when you were unwell… I felt like I was the one you leaned on. Then Jacob serves you an ice cream or whatever… and suddenly he’s your BFF. When I did see you, Claudette, I didn’t recognise you.’
‘Oh Jesus,’ I said. ‘Really?’
‘I just…’ she began. ‘You’re not the only one who needs a friend. I missed you. I still miss you. You go away and then you come back and I’m so happy you do. And I know people change, and you’ve had all this stuff happen to you that can’t not change you, but… I want a friend and I want that friend to be you and when you don’t give me that friendship I feel like shit.’ She took a breath and carried on. ‘I don’t want to have to catch up with you every so often because you feel duty bound to keep up appearances. I want a relationship where we know every detail of every moment so that there’s never anything we need to catch up on. I want us back,’ she said, her voice beginning to wobble. ‘You’re my bro.’
I groaned.
‘Donna,’ I said fervently. ‘I love you so much. And I will have this discussion completely, but if I don’t have a piss in the next thirty seconds, I’m going to wet your bed…’
I stood up, doubled over with my legs crossed tightly.
‘Oh, Claudette. You kill all our special moments,’ she said, with a weary sigh of resignation. ‘Just go.’
I ran from the bedroom and flung myself onto the toilet, moaning deep relief as I relaxed my lower region for what felt like the first time in my life.
In my frantic scramble to relieve myself I must have forgotten to lock the door, as Adam burst into the bathroom with a towel draped over his shoulder and yelled in horror when he saw me sat there, red faced and panting in ecstasy. I screamed back in turn, and stood up instinctively, shooting a steady stream of piss down my leg and onto the pink fluff of the toilet mat.
I swore and so did he as he turned to leave but bumped into the door frame.
‘Sorry,’ he said.
‘Sorry,’ I said, hurriedly sitting down.
‘Sorry,’ he said again, closing the door behind him.
I finished and decided to go and bug him further.
‘Hey perv,’ I said, drying my hands on my jeans as I poked my head through the kitchen door.
Adam was sat at the kitchen table, hands outstretched with the look of a man who has seen things he could not un-see glued to his face. I’d watched videos of returning soldiers looking less haunted than he was at that precise moment.
‘Claudette. That was an accident…’ he said with panic in his voice.
‘Yeah, I know it’s fine. It happens all the time,’ I said, shaking my hand. ‘I got caught on one of those train toilets once and let me tell you… those electric doors close s-l-o-w,’ I said, stretching out the word for comic effect.
‘Yeah, but just in case you thought…’
‘What? That you get your kicks by watching me panic and piss down my leg? No, I trust that’s not your bag.’
‘No!’ he said, still shaken. ‘It’s not.’
‘Are you working tomorrow night?’ I asked eventually and he nodded, pleased for the change of subject. ‘Around town?’
‘Yeah,’ he said.
‘Good,’ I said, but was gone before he had a chance to ask why.
‘Better?’ Donna asked, as I slumped back into the room and lay on the bed, placing my head on her lap.
‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘I think your brother saw my fanny though.’
‘You didn’t lock the door?’ she asked.
‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘But he barged in with one of those door-bashers the riot police use and he was like Drop your knickers and don’t move a muscle.’
‘Classic Adam,’ Donna said, pulling a thin strand of my hair gently from my head, until th
e roots pulled tight at my scalp, before twisting it into a tiny little Princess Leia bun that stung behind my ear.
‘He’s a monster,’ I said.
‘You are,’ she muttered, rubbing her hand across my arm.
‘You are,’ I whispered, feeling myself grow sleepy against her warm body.
Once I’d said goodbye to Donna I made my way back as quietly as I could into the kitchen. Adam was still sat there in mute horror, making notes from a crescent of textbooks which he had open on the counter.
‘Hi,’ I said quietly. ‘Hitting those books like they’re criminals, I see.’
‘Just doing my bit for society,’ he said.
‘They’d be mad not to have you,’ I said, hovering over his studies as he tried in vain to shield his rather childish handwriting. ‘Maybe you need to make a splash, get their attention.’
‘I don’t think the police are really into elaborate gestures,’ he said.
‘No, but I mean if you caught someone…’ I tried, as vaguely as I could. ‘If you caught someone bad, doing something bad, I don’t know, if you did something that should have been done a long time ago, would that make a difference?’
Adam shrugged, half-nodding, looking quite interested in my line of enquiry.
‘Why has nobody ever arrested Daniel Vesper?’ I asked and Adam laughed once in a knowing sort of way.
‘He’s not as stupid as he looks,’ Adam tried. ‘Keeps a safe distance.’
‘But the club. The drugs. Everything,’ I said as Adam leaned in closer with a growing concern.
‘What are you up to, Claudette?’ he asked and I shrugged as best I could.
‘I just always wondered. He’s hiding in plain sight. He’s in the club most daytimes. There must be enough in there to get him for something?’
‘Nothing is that easy,’ said Adam, trying to look me in the eye despite my best attempts to avoid his gaze.
‘Adam,’ I asked eventually when my awkward lingering had not incurred the offer I’d hoped it would. ‘Will you do me a favour and walk me home?’ I asked.
For some reason seeing Dad that night made me burst into tears.
I’d been at home alone for a good hour or so. Not really doing anything. Not really minding.
I felt positive enough, having patched things up with Donna, and I was certain I was as solid with Jacob as I was ever going to get. It felt, tonight, as if things were starting to calm down. The fog was settling. I could see things about my life that I hadn’t seen clearly before; dozens and dozens of different paths that needed tending to in their own time, at their own pace, rather than one terrifying, unmanageable whole. The thought was soothing to me, albeit long overdue, and all the better that I had Donna back to match my pace and keep me centred.
‘How are you, clever girl?’ Dad asked as he made his way in the door, his empty Tupperware box making a hollow thud sound as his backpack swung behind him and caught on the doorframe.
‘Hi Dad,’ I said, though the second syllable was distorted beyond the point of recognition as the tears began to flow.
Dad dropped his bag to the floor and came straight to my assistance.
‘Hey now,’ he said, rubbing my back and hugging me to silence with shushes and there-there’s. ‘Hey now. What’s all this? What’s all this silliness, eh?’ he asked, rubbing my back harder and harder until I was still.
‘I’m fine,’ I said, swallowing hard on tears.
‘Clearly,’ he said, taking my shoulders as he stared straight into my eyes. ‘What’s happened? Where’s this come from?’
I smiled despite the tears.
‘Nowhere. Nothing’s happened, Dad. I’m fine. I’m feeling better. Really I am. I really think something has clicked today. I just had this huge row with Donna and she said some awful things but they were true but…’ I said, winding myself up again and again. ‘I’m just happy to see you, that’s all. I’m happy you’re home.’
‘Silly girl,’ he said, taking me in his arms again. ‘I’ll always be here no matter what. No matter where you go, no matter what you do. Whatever happens. I’ll be here when you get back, and I’ll be so, so happy to see you.’
21
Chasing Fire
I kissed both Dad and Paula goodbye after dinner.
We’d had a quiet meal. Quiet by our standards, anyway. Normally Dad would have anecdotes from work, or Paula would be relaying the latest battle within the gilded hierarchy of the community centre. But that night conversation was forced or non-existent. For some reason the meal felt tense, as though we’d all received bad news and were trying to put on a brave face for the sake of one another.
The scrape of our cutlery was interrupted only by the satisfied ‘ummmmms’ and ‘aaaaaahs’ of Dad and Paula, who’d been suitably impressed by the new stir-in sauce they’d picked up at the corner shop.
I was preoccupied with a flaking Ross, who I’d been texting, and who was becoming increasingly reluctant to aid me in my mission.
He said that he was certain it wouldn’t work.
There was too much chance involved.
What if it went wrong?
What if one of us got hurt?
What is the best possible outcome even if everything went to our admittedly loose plan?
For a long time, the thought of some bleak ending would not have bothered me. It was hard explaining to most people just how little you cared about yourself for a large proportion of your life. If a person hasn’t experienced absolute indifference to their own mortality then they could never possibly understand.
But it wasn’t the cruel bravado of depression that carried me to the Mariners that night. More and more I was feeling better. I felt connected again, to myself and to the world; a world I sometimes enjoyed, and actually wanted to be a part of. Caution had returned as I grew better and stronger, but my desire to confront Dan hadn’t cooled.
I wanted him gone. I wanted him captured. I wanted him to feel helpless and beholden. I wanted him kept in a place that he couldn’t escape, like Sarah had been, like all the lost souls who’d gone to him for help and ended up stuck and spinning for ever and ever in the hungry mechanism of his small-town empire. I wanted to give him a taste of his own medicine.
I felt about him the way I sometimes felt about my depression. I wanted to pick him out like a splinter; remove him from his context until it was just him, alone and vulnerable and small. At the very least I wanted to see that someone knew, knew what he had done; knew that he was responsible for the death of a girl. A girl he should have cared for. A girl he could have saved.
I’d made it up and into a bath just as the Countdown theme was beginning to play. I dried and dressed myself and sat on my bed as I cooled and calmed before straightening my hair and scraping it back painfully until it was glossed against my head and held tight at the back, the way girls at school always would before starting a fight.
By dinner time I was as ready as I’d ever be.
The night was warmest we’d had all summer. It was the sort of night where it never really grows dark. The sort of night where nobody sleeps and everybody rises the next morning feeling exhausted and leaden; coated in sweat. Even the jeans and the vest top that I wore were clinging to my skin.
Within a moment of finishing my last mouthful, my phone buzzed in my pocket. The clock on the dining room wall struck eight and I knew that the message was from Ross.
‘I’m off,’ I said, kissing Dad and then Paula on the head.
‘Oh,’ said Paula, taken aback. ‘What was that for?’
I shrugged and knotted the laces of my boots tightly.
‘Just because,’ I said.
She and Dad shared a glance and then he followed me into the hallway as I tucked my keys into my pocket.
‘You are going to be OK tonight, aren’t you?’ he asked, as I opened the front door. Warm air blasted into the hallway like we were stepping off an aeroplane into some exotic land.
‘Yeah, of course. I’m just out
with some people from school. I might stay at Donna’s.’
‘I have a bad feeling about this,’ Dad said, taking my hand in his. ‘Don’t go out, Claudette, not tonight. Stay here. Stay home.’
I smiled and released my hand from his, hugging him as I slid one foot out of the door.
‘I’m going to be fine,’ I said. ‘Really. I’ll go and then I’ll come back. Trust me.’ I attempted to unfurl from our hug only for Dad to hold me tighter and tighter.
‘I love you, Claudette,’ he said quietly. ‘Be safe.’
I made my way out into the night.
‘I’ll be back,’ I said, as I made my way down the street. ‘I’ll see you in the morning.’
I met Ross two streets back from the Mariners, behind the old newsagents. He was smoking a cigarette and clutching a plastic bottle of cider that was half drunk.
‘So cool,’ I said, rolling my eyes as he jumped at seeing me. The cigarette shot from his lips and rolled off the kerb and down the drain.
Ross sighed and took a sip from his bottle.
‘It’s you, you make my nerves bad.’
‘Welcome to my world,’ I said and took the bottle from him, taking a swig before grimacing.
‘What is that?’ I asked, as the sugary poison trickled down my throat.
Ross shrugged.
‘It was only a quid. Well, would have been if I’d paid. Deep pockets…’ he said with a smile, sliding his hand across the large gap at the front of the hoodie and pushing it outwards from his belly, demonstrating the full scope of his shoplifting abilities.
‘Nice,’ I said, taking another reluctant sip. ‘So much for supporting local trade.’
‘Nah, it was from the supermarket. Sticking it to the Big Man, aren’t I?’
‘Robin Hoodie,’ I said, taking a third sip before conceding defeat and handing it back to him.
‘That was nearly funny.’
‘Two more sips and that’d have floored you and you know it,’ I said.
Ross checked behind me to make sure the coast was clear. ‘What’s the plan, then?’ he asked.
‘I just need some time on my own with him. I want to talk to him.’