Malcolm and Juliet

by Bernard Beckett

  ‘What?’

  ‘Just do it.’

  And perhaps because he was too numb to think it through, or perhaps because instinctively he knew Juliet was right, Malcolm unscrewed the camera from the tripod, checked the battery and prepared for the chase.

  ‘Looks like it’s just you and me now,’ he heard Brian tell Juliet, as he slung the camera bag over his shoulder.

  ‘Yes,’ came her reply. ‘But that isn’t a reason.’

  Bystanding

  It wasn’t reason that compelled Malcolm and his camera to pursue the unlikely couple. Malcolm was a great believer in reason, of course, but he also understood that reason only takes you so far. It may have been reason that designed the first flying machines, but it took something beyond reason to test them: the same something that now coursed through Malcolm’s veins as he struggled to keep his prey in sight.

  In part it was the urge of the wildlife documentary maker, intent on capturing the vital moment on film. In part it was curiosity too, a chance to look and learn. And then there was that inexplicable human addiction to pain. If this really was going to happen, that worst thing imaginable, if Charlotte really was going to allow herself to be swept along by another’s wave, then Malcolm would watch it. Watch it, record it, play it again, a thousand times over, until the pain quit the body through pure exhaustion.

  Luckily for Malcolm he had a fair idea where the two of them were headed. Once again his research was proving invaluable. Things hadn’t changed so much since his mother’s time. There were still recognised places you went when the time for sex arrived. These days a degree of comfort was expected and so a group of enterprising lads had clubbed together and paid the annual hire fee for a clapped out caravan at the local holiday park.

  For a sum, you could buy a copy of the key, as Alex Winter, the chair of the Shagging Committee, had explained. In fact Alex, whom Malcolm strongly suspected was more spectator than player, had even slipped a key to Malcolm, in case he wanted to do some filming.

  So Malcolm ran on, glad he was in training, hoping he could get back to his house, pick up the key and cut across to the caravan before the startled lovers-to-be arrived. He was aware that this sort of filming transgressed any number of legal and ethical codes, but once again, while reason wasn’t entirely absent, it wasn’t in the ascendancy.

  It was a ‘permanent’ caravan, the sort that could still technically be moved, the way the bylaws required, although achieving this would require two new tyres, the destruction of a windbreak and the digging up of drainage pipes.

  Malcolm approached from the rear, having negotiated a two-metre-high hedge in his efforts to remain undetected. He stopped outside the awning and listened. He could hear nothing but his own breath and figured they hadn’t yet arrived, or that they’d performed the operation with admirable efficiency and were now both fast asleep. Malcolm zipped open the outside door and crept inside, waiting for his eyes to adjust to the darkness.

  As he’d feared the portable love shack wasn’t exactly the ultimate place of concealment. The awning was furnished with nothing more than a half-deflated air-bed, two thin sleeping bags and a foldaway chair. Any game of hide-and-seek was doomed to end prematurely. The caravan itself, which the key did indeed fit, was just as basic. The double bed was permanently down, making getting in and out awkward. There was no wardrobe, or even a table, and someone had gone to the trouble of safety-pinning the closed curtains together.

  Aware that time was running out, Malcolm considered his options. There weren’t many. He unpinned the curtain at the window facing the awning and folded back a corner to create a small peephole. He went back into the awning and checked it through the camera. It provided a limited view of the bed, so long as they remained fairly still. He then unbuttoned the canvas storm flap hanging down from the caravan floor and rolled beneath it. He waited.

  He heard Charlotte first. The sound of her voice tightened his stomach and made his eyes dry and scratchy.

  ‘Yeah, this must be it. The key works.’

  Malcolm felt the floor above him rock with their weight and heard the door close behind them. He rolled straight out, determined to catch as much of the action as he could. It was a difficult move to pull off quietly and he was sure they would hear but, when there was no response from within, he pointed his camera at the small gap.

  The light inside was poor and the camera struggled to find its focus. The grainy picture that finally emerged showed Kevin and Charlotte, still fully clothed, somewhere between sitting and lying, joined only at the lips and barely moving, like a still from an early silent movie. Malcolm hardly knew Kevin but in that frozen moment he felt a hatred for him that was startling in its purity. He wondered whether the camping ground had a fire alarm, and what would happen if he set it off.

  Charlotte broke free and stood up. Even in the half-light she was beautiful. Malcolm bit his lip to distract himself from the torture of watching her.

  ‘Well, suppose I should take this off,’ Charlotte said, reaching for the strap of her dress. Malcolm’s lip began to bleed. Behind Charlotte, Kevin’s face travelled from uncertainty to terror, passing through a small town called torment on the way.

  ‘No don’t,’ Kevin called out, too loudly. ‘There’s um, something I should tell you. It isn’t you, but, it’s just, well, I don’t really want to do this.’

  ‘Oh.’ The relief on Charlotte’s face was obvious. ‘Well that’s okay actually, because neither do I.’

  ‘Oh, right. Good.’

  ‘Yeah.’

  They were sitting again, on the edge of the bed, grinning awkwardly in the direction of the camera. It was a lovely shot.

  ‘So what were you going to tell me then?’ Charlotte asked.

  ‘Oh, um nothing really.’

  ‘I think you should. I’ll tell you mine.’

  ‘You first.’

  ‘No, you started it.’

  ‘Okay.’ Kevin paused. ‘Well, you see, I only said I wanted to have sex with you to impress Brian.’

  ‘I thought so.’

  ‘You did?’

  ‘Sure. Girls are as bad, you know.’

  ‘No, I don’t think you understand.’ Kevin’s features contorted with a new sort of pain, as if he was physically giving birth to each word. ‘I wanted to impress him, because, well, I’m in love with him. I’m in love with Brian.’

  A small breeze passed through the campsite causing the caravan to shudder. Malcolm almost dropped the camera.

  ‘Oh, but,’ Charlotte was struggling to find a sentence to fit the occasion. ‘But, Brian’s such a prick. You must be able to do better than him. No, sorry. Your business.’

  ‘You won’t tell will you?’

  ‘No, of course not.’

  ‘I’m waiting for the right moment you see. I don’t think he’s ready yet. So, ah, what’s your big secret then?’

  ‘Well, okay, I suppose I owe you. The thing is, I only came here because I was so angry, about what Juliet said, about her and Malcolm. You see, I’m in love with Malcolm.’

  Malcolm dropped the camera.

  ‘What was that?’

  ‘Hey, it’s…What the fuck?’

  ‘Malcolm?’

  Malcolm struggled to retreat but Kevin had already rushed out and taken hold of one end of the camera. Malcolm’s elation at Charlotte’s confession was quickly drowning in the tide of a pervert’s embarrassment. He did the only thing he could do, in the circumstances. He let go of the camera, turned and ran.

  Orders

  Malcolm was still running when he reached his house. He hoped his mother would be on the phone and his father would be out, so he could slink to his room without interrogation. She was, he was, he did. So far so good.

  Malcolm climbed the stairs quickly, unsure whether he would go straight to his computer and e-mail Charlotte his grovelling apology, or opt for bed where he could, on the strength of her professed love for him, all complications aside, end the day with a satisfying
wank. On opening his bedroom door he realised that concentrating on either task would be difficult. Juliet was sitting on his bed, looking uncommonly pleased with the world.

  ‘Let myself in, Camille was on the phone. Hope you don’t mind.’

  ‘Um, oh no, not really,’ Malcolm lied. It was one of those days that didn’t know when to quit.

  ‘So, did you get it?’

  ‘Get what?’

  ‘Syphilis. What do you think? The two of them, on camera. The sex. Did you get it?’

  ‘No, they didn’t.’ Malcolm decided against explaining. It was too complicated.

  ‘So did you get them not doing it then? That could be good too. You’ve got to admit, tonight worked out brilliantly, didn’t it? Told you it would. Sorry about telling Charlotte and that, had to be done.’

  Juliet was pulsing with excitement. Maybe this is just my lot in life, thought Malcolm. Maybe it is my job to disappoint women.

  ‘We should watch it now,’ Juliet continued. ‘Go on. Go and get the camera.’

  ‘Um, there’s been a bit of a problem there.’

  ‘What sort of problem?’

  So Malcolm told the tale, every painful and sordid detail. He lingered over Charlotte’s revelation and hurried past his own departure, but Juliet zoomed straight in on the key point.

  ‘You have to get the camera back then. You understand that, don’t you? Go on. Go round there now, to Kevin’s place. I’ll wait here.’

  ‘He’s not going to give it back though, is he?’

  ‘So make him!’

  ‘How?’

  ‘I thought you were meant to be clever. Think of something.’

  ‘Well, he might do it if Brian asked him to, and Brian might do that if he thought you’d have sex with him in return.’

  ‘Hey, I’m not the one who lost the camera. You have sex with Kevin, if that’s what it’s going to take.’

  ‘Kevin’s a one-man guy,’ Malcolm reminded her. ‘He loves Brian.’

  ‘Then he’s an idiot.’ Juliet was angry now. Proper, shouting angry. Malcolm felt fear.

  ‘Maybe it doesn’t matter that much anyway,’ he tried.

  ‘Of course it matters,’ Juliet replied, her nostrils flaring with rage. ‘I need that money.’

  ‘Couldn’t you just ask your father?’

  ‘You know I can’t. That’s the whole point with blackmail isn’t it? It doesn’t leave you with any choices.’

  ‘Okay then,’ Malcolm said, because he had seen her angry once before, at a kickboxing tournament, and he knew he had to calm her. ‘I’ll go to Kevin’s and I’ll try to get the camera back, but I wouldn’t hold my breath. I’m not exactly in the strongest of bargaining positions.’

  ‘So bluff,’ Juliet ordered.

  ‘I’ll try.’

  Trade

  Try as he might, Kevin couldn’t escape the fact that the night had gone very badly indeed. She would tell, Kevin was sure of that. Maybe only one person at first, in the strictest confidence, but that was all it would take. Like the first sneeze of an epidemic, the information was out, and once out it would spread. And the spreading would be uncontrolled, for the human being has developed no immunity to information. And so it would reach Brian, who wasn’t ready to hear such a thing. All that planning, every last drop of patience Kevin had squeezed from the impatient world, would come to nothing.

  Kevin sat down on the floor at the end of his bed, his thinking place. He pulled his knees up to his chest, and let out a long low groan of defeat. It was hopeless. He looked at the confiscated camera beside him, with the file he intended to destroy, just as soon as he worked out how to find the damned thing on the menu. Not that it would help. There was still Charlotte, and Charlotte would still tell.

  There was a knock at the front door and Kevin’s heart gave one of the little flutters it usually reserved for sightings of Brian. Maybe it was Brian. Maybe the story had spread that quickly. Kevin didn’t move. He was the only one home. Whoever it was would go away eventually. Another knock. Pause. Then the knocking again. Persistent, heavy knocking. The sort you can’t hide from. Reluctantly Kevin stood, put his clothes back on, and walked down the short hallway.

  ‘Kevin. Sorry to call so late. Look, the thing is, I have to have that camera back. See, it doesn’t belong to me, and I can’t afford to lose it.’

  It was Malcolm, Kevin’s other problem.

  ‘Ah, come in. Yeah, have a seat. Sorry about the mess. Would you like something to drink?’

  ‘I just need the gear, then I’ll go,’ Malcolm told him.

  ‘Look, I can give you the camera back, but you have to delete the file. Sorry.’

  ‘Right. Um, perhaps we could negotiate.’

  ‘There’s nothing to negotiate,’ Kevin told him, trying to sound more certain than he felt.

  ‘Look, I know why you want to delete it. You’re scared people will find out, aren’t you? About your feelings for Brian.’

  ‘Not people. Brian. I’m scared Brian will find out.’

  ‘Well then,’ Malcolm told him, ‘as I’m the only other person who knows, if you give me the camera, I promise not to tell anyone, not a soul.’

  ‘But that’s the thing,’ Kevin pointed out. For a supposed genius this Malcolm guy was being fairly thick. ‘It’s on the camera. So me letting you have the camera, so no one will find out what’s on it, doesn’t make much sense does it?’

  ‘I don’t need that bit though. I’ll edit it out.’

  ‘I’m sorry but I don’t trust you. It’s nothing personal. I don’t think I would trust anybody in these circumstances. I can’t afford to. So you’re not having it. End of story. Goodbye.’

  Kevin tried to be forceful, even though he knew what would happen next. To be fair, Malcolm didn’t look like he enjoyed saying it.

  ‘Ah, you have to trust me Kevin, because I’m afraid if you don’t give me the camera then I will tell everybody what I heard. Promise. I will ring Brian, this very evening, as soon as I leave the house, and I will tell him.’

  ‘That’s blackmail,’ Kevin protested, hoping he could at least stop himself from crying.

  ‘I know, and I don’t like using it but, well, it is very effective and I really do need that footage. Sorry.’

  ‘But, but…’ Kevin was as desperate as he was short of ideas. He would have to fold, and hope he could trust this scientific pervert. ‘Can’t I just give you something else instead? Anything you want, it’s yours. Name your price. Please!’

  ‘Kevin,’ Malcolm said. ‘You don’t have anything I want. See, that footage is the thing I need most. It’s my future. But I don’t want to hurt you. So give me the camera, and what I’ll do, for nothing, is I’ll ring up Charlotte and get her to promise not to tell anyone either. She will. She loves me, remember.’

  It wasn’t fair and Kevin wanted to shout it out, stamp his feet and throw things round and cry why why why until the neighbours rang to complain about the noise. He wanted to turn back time, so he could keep his big mouth shut. He wanted to be transported to an alternative universe, where Brian was his stalker. He wanted Malcolm to notice the tears in his eyes and take pity on him. He wanted a thousand impossible things, but there was no point wanting. Wanting was what had caused all the trouble in the first place.

  ‘Okay. I’ll get it for you. I couldn’t find the damned file anyway.’

  ‘Oh right. They are quite tricky. It’s my auntie’s. She’s a digital junkie. You want to see her house. Computer in every room, blue-ray recorder, the car’s got wireless, the kitchen table’s a converted photocopier.’

  Photocopier. It hit Kevin just in time, a reproductive flash of recovered memory. Nothing to offer indeed!

  ‘No wait. I’ve changed my mind.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I want to bargain again. You delete the file now, but I give you something much much better.’

  ‘I’ve already told you. There’s nothing—’

  ‘No, listen first. This is go
od. See I know something you can film. I work at the school, as a cleaner, and well, it’s all to do with Mr Ramsay.’

  Science Again

  As Malcolm walked the corridors on the way to Mr Ramsay’s office, he was sure of one thing. He was a Scientist. If this whole film debacle had taught him nothing else it had taught him this. Sure, he was other things too. He was a son, and a friend, a teenage ball of confusion, a hormonal maelstrom and a failed lover; but most of all he was a Scientist. That’s why he felt so lightheaded, laptop under his arm, the clip digitised and ready to play. Malcolm was coming home. Home to Science.

  Malcolm knocked on the principal’s door and let himself in without being invited. Mr Ramsay, who was in a meeting with the ailing Ms Margin, Head of Economics, did not look impressed. Not impressed turned quickly to furious when Malcolm, ignoring them both, went about setting up the laptop in the corner of the room.

  ‘Malcolm, what on earth do you think you’re doing? Can’t you see I’m in the middle of a meeting?’

  ‘Oh, she’s most welcome to stay. In fact, you might want to call in Ms Charters too. She’s come out rather well on camera.’

  ‘Malcolm, I have no idea what you…’

  ‘Did you know, Ms Margin,’ Malcolm continued, enjoying the power more than he’d anticipated, ‘that Mr Ramsay here has accused me of being a pervert? Well I’ve got a little something here that I’m sure is going to change his mind. Perhaps you’d like to stay and give your opinion.’

  Ms Margin gave the smile-without-understanding she was famous for and Mr Ramsay, finally realising what this might be about, cut in.

  ‘Ah, Ms Margin. I think it’s best we continue this discussion at a later date. Thank you.’

  ‘Oh, I really wouldn’t mind, if you think it might be helpful…’

  ‘It’s sex Ms Margin,’ Malcolm added. ‘I think you might enjoy it.’

  ‘Another time,’ and Mr Ramsay manhandled her through the door, then turned and slammed it behind him. Pure hatred filled his eyes now as he lumbered towards the student he had once favoured.