‘Neal. Darling.’
Darling? She’s never called him darling. In an instant he realises he prefers the angry, hurt Sally to the patronising one. She’s growing in stature by the second, and he’s shrinking into a demoralised blob. Who the hell is Sally?
‘It isn’t just the fact you slept with her. That was a symptom.’
‘It was? Of what?’
‘Of a relationship that was never right. Come on, Neal.’ Sally sighs now in a calm, wise, irritating way. ‘Not even from the start. We could’ve safely carried on with our mistake till we died. Made the best of it, like a lot of folk. Nothing really wrong with that. But I think we should go out and try to find people who bring out the best in us. Don’t you think we should be brave? Risk loneliness?’
‘No. What a stupid question. Scrapping all these years, for no good reason.’ He blushes.
‘Leaving you doesn’t mean those years didn’t exist. They’re not scrapped, silly. Just I want to end it now, alright?’ She blows her nose. Blushes too. They are a pair of pink soggy adolescents. Soggy and sizzling at the same time.
‘Go on, then. Just go!’
He turns his back till she leaves. Does not respond to her goodbye. Spoiled bitch.
Of course by the next day, he softens again, softens in the empty rooms. The state of the bathroom, the toilet bowl especially, panics him. But she does not answer his phone messages. Both of the women in his life have jumped ship! The minute he really wants them, really loves them, they vanish.
Nothing feels easy anymore. Nothing, nothing, nothing, not even work. He is slow and distracted the next day. Maybe it’s not Alison and Sally. Maybe it’s simply change that is the enemy. Whether it’s in the background or foreground of his life, he doesn’t like it. It makes him cranky, then afraid, then cranky again. It tires him. He types clumsily and when he makes a mistake, he deletes the entire line, not just the wrong letter. He pounds the keypad.
15th March 1955: FORTY-ONE YEARS AGO TODAY
• La Scala Cinema is showing The End of the Affair with Deborah Kerr and Peter Cushing, as a double feature with The Deep Blue Sea starring the fabulous Vivien Leigh.
• Glenview Distillery upgrades their storage, using new purpose-built sheds.
• Miss Melissa Mannerly of Alness and Mr James McIntosh, also of Alness, wish to announce their engagement to be married at Christmas. Melissa, who works at Lovely Locks, will be creating synchronised hairstyles for all ten of her bridesmaids, as well as colour-coordinating their make-up and dresses.
And oh, dear, the very idea of ten matching bridesmaids, perhaps a vision of lavender and pink, and a perspiring kilted groom watching them all troop up the aisle in a church full of over-dressed and over-perfumed spectators – it’s too much. Not funny, no, Neal is not laughing – the old Neal would have laughed quietly at the tackiness, been scornful of the extravagance, but he’s not even within a hair’s breadth of laughter or scorn.
Neal thinks this image is sad. Unbearably, utterly sad. As sad as cracked plastic carnations on a muddy grave. As sad as a mascara-smeared hen-night girl with a cowboy hat, tottering down the street alone. As sad as a small-town High Street at the end of a rainy gala week, with tattered banners fluttering overhead like reminders of better days. Ah, Neal is suddenly awash with sadness.
And touching too, to think of this couple who, forty-one years ago, actually thought celebrating their marriage was worth all this effort! What hope they must’ve had. What trust in the future.
But wait a minute. He knows this couple. This happens now and then, and always gives Neal a queer thrill – like finding a recent demise while out perusing a graveyard full of ancient headstones. Of course! The McIntosh family, down the end of Castle Street! One of their daughters keeps getting busted shoplifting in Markies, according to Sally. So, they survived ten overexcited bridesmaids at least long enough to produce a petty thief. Good for them!
Maybe Sally and himself should have tried that, instead of their pallid registry office affair. Gone to town with it. Engraved invitations, hired kilts, a custom-made cake. Maybe they should have had a kid; even a wee brat. A heap of brats. Anchored themselves down a bit more.
Neal considers this for a full five minutes, staring at but not seeing his monitor. Then he shakes his head and shuts down the computer. Looks around in surprise. Where’s everyone gone? Why has he not seen them go? (He has seen them go. He’s even said goodbye to some of them.)
* * *
Neal goes home and spends the evening putting off going to bed. He watches telly, flicking restlessly through the channels. Actually enjoys EastEnders for the first time, can’t understand why he used to think it terrible. It is fascinating. It’s high art. He eats biscuits, toast, bowls of cereal, till he feels full. He’d cook, but all the pots and pans are dirty in the sink, and the sight of the cold greasy water depresses him. Maybe he’ll buy a pair of rubber gloves. Maybe he’ll break the cardinal rule of no pans in the dishwasher.
He drinks a cup of tea. The Baileys has long since been finished, and he hasn’t the heart to buy more. He looks for the new Neil Young to put on, can’t find it, thinks to himself – Damn it! She’s taken away more stuff! Picks up a book, puts it down. He used to read novels, quickly and with absorption, when Sally was about. Now that he has no interruptions, he finds he can’t concentrate on anything for long. He misses that need to escape.
Neal, in his boxer shorts and t-shirt, sprawling on his sofa, notices that he is getting thinner. Then notices that he hates being alone. Hates it! Especially at night. He hears things. The way the house creaks and seems to breathe. The way a branch scrapes the roof. His neighbour’s door slamming, a car starting. Late last night he heard loud running footsteps on the pavement outside and almost called the police. He lay there, hardly breathing, wide awake for a full hour afterwards. I am a wimp, he tells himself now, and he has no defence. It’s true, he answers himself. I am pathetic. And passive. And pre-historic. All the P things.
I will not survive this.
He considers getting a dog, and he’s not a dog person in the least. He wonders if another woman will save him – bound to happen, isn’t it? He’s only forty-four, and according to Guardian Soulmates, even redheaded middle-aged men have a chance. The world is full of single middle-aged women desperate to be a wife, or at least a hussy. But he’s never made a move on a woman, not really. Always safely waited (mostly futilely it has to be said) to be persuaded. He has no idea how to go about seducing a woman, in case none of these rampant women make a move on him. How is he even going to meet one of these women who might want to seduce him? And meet one he must. It’s either that or get a dog. And then, since there’s nothing on the television now but news and sport, and he has taken to avoiding his own bed, he closes his eyes and thinks about Alison.
It’s obvious, he tells himself. She’d never fancied him in the old days. She’d had sex with all the boys, but not Neal. But then his reward had been her friendship, hadn’t it? He’d been the one she’d wanted when things were bad. She’d trusted him because he never presumed, never expected sex as the price of a cuddle. And she never went off him because she was never on him. ‘You’re my teddy bear,’ she said once. This had seemed an insult, as if he was not a man at all. But now he thinks it was probably this trust that had led directly to Golspie, and she’d not wanted him to be a teddy bear then. Had she? Okay, here comes a belated bit of sexual imagery after all, but only enough to drift off to, not enough to require action. Just the comfort of her pillow breasts, the curve of her lower back.
He’s at the very last outpost of wakefulness now. Eyes still shut, he pulls up the old quilt he’s taken to leaving on the back of the sofa, covers himself, but neglects to turn off any lights. Need a remote control for the light switches, he thinks. Then he sends himself off to sleep by summarising his recent past. Reminds himself how he got here, as if these events are stations his train has shot past and now he has no idea where the train is heading. He
clings to the only certainties, like bits of breadcrumb, in case he has to find his way back.
The story so far, then:
Calum died.
Golspie hotel, made love to Alison.
Alison disappeared. Might be dead.
Sally gone too now.
And tomorrow he’ll begin the Ninety Years Ago Today column, even though the deadline is not till Thursday. Ninety years ago … it’ll be the Great War, and roads snowed in for weeks, and maids needed in the big houses, 3d a year …
Not much of a lullaby, but it does the job. His mouth is slightly open, body curled in foetal position, his hands tucked between his thighs. Relaxed for the first time today. He so obviously needs to get some sleep. He’s frightened every waking minute.
The next day is better, and the next, and the next. He starts to feel like his old self. But for no obvious reason, he has a terrible day a week later. A day like a continual slap in the face. A whole mocking series of slaps. And then that day leads to another bad day, in fact things seem to be getting worse, not better. He’s falling apart. He has no social life. Sally seems to have taken it with her, along with her Jackson Browne tapes, which he does not miss, and the kitchen knives that cut half decent, which he does miss.
Is it really over between them? How can it be? Surely civilised marriages that putter along for years don’t go out with a bang, surely they only know how to putter. He feels sluggish, that the momentum of life is not matching his own internal rhythm. It’s all a bit too fast for him. He will never catch up, never understand what’s happening while it’s happening.
Like Henry the old minister. Henry hits the ground running every day, also sluggishly, also astounded at the speed of change. At the callous nature of change. His small church is fuller on Sundays now. No one needs to stand in the aisles, but it’s still quite full compared to the old three-pews-filled days. Flowers, well there have always been flowers, but who’s been concocting such an extravagance of blossoms and festooning them in every corner? And what angel plays the organ so passionately? Is he dead now, and this is what heaven is? A wish fulfilment hallucination?
But no, there is no heaven anymore, remember? God is gone and his soul is a nothingness. An empty house with coat hangers and empty Coke cans on the bare floor. Don’t tell anyone! He wakes every morning full of naughty secrets, like a petty thief or a peeping tom, and every day he goes through the motions of faith. Of course, he’s a terrible actor, and he gives the truth away in a million ways he’s not aware of.
His wife picks up every nuance but says nothing because she’s hoping it’s just a phase, and least said soonest mended. Men and their moods.
His spiritual wobbliness should have alienated his already pretty scanty flock, but no. His qualms have made him more popular. Psalms with qualms. His church, where gentle doubt is now at the helm, has become more welcoming, and the word has spread. Worried that the truest fact in the world is that you can rely on no one? That on the day of your death, no matter how many people surround your bed, you will be alone? Come to that church in Alness, the one just off the High Street. Henry will not argue with you. He’ll invite you home and his wife will make you the loveliest cup of tea, and no one will ask you to pray with them. You can talk about your troubles, and before you know it, you’ll see a funny side. Or a funny side to something else altogether.
Sunday morning, and he does it again. Henry without his faith is naked, and shivers in the pulpit. Regards his congregation silently, eyes full of unshed tears. Church is the one place he doesn’t laugh. Look at them! he orders himself. Look at their faces. All they’d ever wanted was to know they weren’t alone. And look, there’s Chrissie in the front row. Bless. Poor lass, her nephew dead out of the blue, and her sister likely a suicide.
He has instant access these days to all sorts of feelings, and he understands exactly why Alison would put a rope around her neck and kick away a chair. His own neck tingles, as if it has been his neck, and he feels the blood rush back into his heart, as if it has been his heart that was almost so cold it could not go on.
A9
Midnight, but not dark. Not once you get used to it. Zara should be cold – she left her jacket at home – but she’s not. Her cheeks are pink, her eyes shining. She sits on the ground by the road, very still, and not far away twenty-eight rabbits munch on shoots of grass and dandelions. The A9 is rabbit city from midnight till dawn. So far, they’ve not munched on her growing tribute to Calum. The shrubs have all taken. There’s proof of life in everything she planted that pitch-dark mid-winter night. The gaps between them are filling up.
She sits cross-legged and talks away as she always does. This, right here, is the magic place. The place that might contain, somehow, if she listens hard enough, the vibration of his last heart beat, the last sound of his voice. ‘Course I still love you, you idiot,’ she says, and her hands absentmindedly pat the earth, almost exactly where Calum is, in a sense, still dying. The extinguishing of light and sound and sensation begins to happen again. There’s his voice now, the panicky Mum! The syllable torn from him involuntarily, and perhaps not meaning Mother. Meaning: Help!
If you asked Zara if she believed in life after death, she would instantly say no. A girl of her times, she knows deep down there is nothing but the present, no soul, no heaven or hell. And yet, this aching hope that there remains something of Calum, some version of a listening ear, a receptive heart, a witness to her A9 verge gardening.
The Cherubim yellow roses she planted are becoming famous. Perhaps because they are so early blooming, perhaps the sheer abundance. Or maybe just the surprise of them, blooming on a bit of waste-ground by the A9.
Memories are short. Now there are only a few people who will never be able to pass this place without thinking of Calum, and one of them is 184 miles away. Zara is the only person in the world who knows how these roses smell at midnight. She tries and tries to describe that smell, but can only come up with the mood the smell puts her in. Whenever she is near them, which is about once a week around midnight when the scent is headiest, she is filled with nostalgia. Not just for that fish and chip supper in his car, and the first greasy kisses that followed. Nor just for sitting in those corner seats in The Com and feeling the electricity flicker like tongues between their holding hands. Those were fine memories, but the nostalgia she feels when she inhales those yellow roses is for her future. The future that she’d imagined so often, containing Calum. There it still is, unwinding itself out in front of her with its unique shape, but where Calum should be, the future has collapsed like a punctured balloon.
Zara lives with her parents. She feels a little old to be living with her parents, but after university didn’t quite know what to do next, and her job in the call centre is low paid. In any case, her parents seem glad of her company. They don’t know about Calum. Never even met him. Got to have some secrets, living with parents. What if they’d broken up? Or they’d disapproved of his lack of education or indeed, lack of employment? So much more complicated, once parents are in the picture. Zara packs her trowel and secateurs, and heads home with a half dozen roses. Her mother will think they are beautiful, and Zara will easily lie about where they came from. It’s not a big lie.
Part Five
June to October 1996
Alice Forgets the Bacon Butty
Alice may not have many material objects from her previous life as Alison, but she does have her memories. Especially of her son. She replays them all the time. She’s a fairly bright woman, is Alice, and she thinks she can do this while she does anything else. She moves expertly through a continual landslide of memories. Dozens of Calums flood in all day long. Calum, aged five, bringing her some wild flowers – bluebells from the bluebell woods at Kiltearn. Calum, aged eight, dancing in his new suede moccasins. Calum, frowning jealously as she tells him about a new boyfriend.
She can even chat to customers, take orders for bacon and eggs, hamburger and chips, two milky teas and a plate of toast while
having a conversation with her son that began eight years earlier.
‘So, Calum, who do you want to invite to your party?’
‘Neal.’
‘I mean kids.’
‘No one.’
‘Surely there’s lots of nice boys and girls. We could do pass the parcel and musical statues.’
‘Nope.’
‘Calum! Give me some names, here. I want to give you a bloody party.’
‘I don’t want them.’
‘Why not?’
‘They won’t come.’
‘Don’t be daft. Why wouldn’t they come?’
‘They just wouldn’t, that’s why. No one has birthday parties anymore. Are you insane?’
‘Miss! I asked for black pudding with my eggs, remember?’
‘Sorry, so you did.’
‘And we’re needing more sauce here as well.’
‘Right away.’
So she’d taken him to La Scala to see a Disney film about a talking dog. She seemed to be the only adult, the place heaving with kids. All laughing, throwing popcorn, spitting, screaming, all the way through the movie. Most a fair bit younger than Calum. Had he outgrown this? Was she missing a beat? She sat by her son and they were like a tiny peaceful island, but it was a not a peaceful feeling. Her heart ached all the way through the show, and on the way home, when he tried to crack a few jokes, get her to laugh, it was all she could do to not cry.
‘This soup’s cold, miss.’
‘Sorry, is it? I’ll get another bowl.’
‘In fact, I’ll just have a wee word with the boss, if you don’t mind.’
Alice is smart, it’s true, but perhaps juggling the past while waitressing is beyond even her. Another year, another birthday. Dinner at the local Indian, just the two of them. A delicious, if silent, meal.
‘Well, here’s to you, Calum. Eighteen!’
If I Touched the Earth Page 13