Alice and the Fly

by James Rice

  As I retreated to the attic stairs Ian looked up from his lap. He took a second to focus on me but when he did he gave me a thumbs up. Then he shook his head, let it slide back into his hands.

  I sat in the bathroom for a while. I don’t know how long. First I was sick in the sink and then I just sat on the side of the bath, watching my vomit chunks float amongst the leafy green stuff. I thought over the situation. If you weren’t up there with Goose, then you weren’t at the party. If you weren’t at the party then you must be at home. You must have a reason for staying at home and that reason was more than likely your father.

  I knew then, what I had to do. Things were going to be more complicated than I’d thought. I wasn’t able to just meet you at the party, that was too easy. I was going to have to go out to the Pitt and get you.

  A banging came from downstairs. I thought it was the partygoers. I assumed they’d decided to set off their fireworks indoors. The big New Year’s climax.

  When I reached the foot of the stairs I realised it was the Pitt kids – a gang of them had arrived with baseball bats and were in the process of destroying the kitchen. The partygoers were still out in the garden. They’d built a bonfire from the last of the fireworks (the least entertaining ones – fountains, roman candles, Catherine wheels) and were sitting in a circle watching the screaming flames, crackling and flashing in various colours.

  There were four Pitt kids in total. One of them was wearing a blue hoodie, not unlike your brother’s. I couldn’t be sure it was him because of the scarf covering his mouth, and he wouldn’t stay still long enough for me to assess the blueness of his eyes. He brought his bat down on the kitchen sink, the porcelain splitting clean down the middle. Two others were smashing the crockery. Another was dragging out the drawers, emptying them out onto the floor.

  I knew that if I was going to face your father I couldn’t go empty-handed. I considered the Pitt kids’ bats. They were threatening enough but there was no way I could do any real damage, if it came to it. Not against your father. I doubt I could even reach his head.

  Then one of the Pitt kids emptied the knife drawer and a selection of knives clattered across the tiles.

  I crossed the kitchen to the knives. The Pitt kids stopped their smashing and stared at me, bats loose in their hands. They glared from under their hoods. I chose a knife, a large carving knife, like the ones at the butcher’s. I could feel the Pitt kids’ eyes on me as I examined it. Then I crossed the room again, to the door, and left.

  The Pitt’s always been firework crazy. I remember those New Years with Nan and Herb, how they’d always make a big deal about getting fireworks. They wanted to make it special because at Christmas and birthdays we went to Skipdale – this was the only night my parents brought Sarah down to the Pitt. It was the only night I remember Herb leaving his chair. I used to believe Herb spent all year plugged into the wall, charging, waiting to launch into New Year’s Eve – into the drinking of Guinness and roasting of chestnuts and piling of rockets on the kitchen table, which I would inspect thoroughly. I’d pick the order in which the fireworks were to be launched, which would depend on the size of the rockets and the tradition of saving the biggest, most orbit-likely till last. Every year Herb would tell me we’d get at least one of the bastards into space.

  Herb did the dangerous stuff. The garden was concrete so he couldn’t stab the tubes into soil the way the instructions said. Instead he’d arrange the rockets in their own individual plant pots. The garden was only twenty foot long, so the hundred-foot safety distance was out of the question, but for this one night of the year Herb would take a ‘Whatever happens, happens’ attitude (perhaps due to the Guinness) and would light as many rockets as he could, only hobbling to the relative safety of the kitchen doorway when the first few were screaming into the air. It seems odd but when I think back to New Years, to Herb skipping about with his safety lighter and Sarah balanced on Mum’s knee scratching at her toes and all the fireworks in their plant pots with all their screaming light and banging, my favourite part is still thinking about Nan, sitting in silence at the back of the kitchen, Mr Saunders curled on her knee. Thinking about Nan’s furry face as it followed each rocket up into the sky. It was as if after all those years she still wasn’t sure how it was done.

  Tonight was no different. Rockets screeched from every garden, thundering and flowering through the murk of the sky, bathing the streets in light: red, green, golden yellow. The streets were misted in smoke. It was like a war zone. I crossed at the Rat and Dog. A crowd of drinkers had spilt from its doorway and were standing in a circle, linking arms and singing. Music hummed from the pub – chatter, laughter, shattering glass. I pulled my hood up and kept my head down. I hurried to the estates.

  The knife was still tucked into my belt, cold against my hip. I couldn’t help but imagine it, pressing it into your father’s stomach, the resistance at first, before his belly gave way to it. It was a large belly and I’d need to give it some force. I’d need to be quick, if it came to it.

  I stopped at the end of your road. I leant against the wall and heaved. Nothing came up. I couldn’t help but feel it, again and again, the knife popping your father’s stomach. I remembered Artie Sampson’s Father Christmas, doubled over on the pavement. That’s how your father would fall, sinking slowly till his face pressed into the ground. I clutched the handle of the knife and thought of you, your eye all swollen and black.

  Your house was in darkness. Your father’s car was missing. I rang the bell. I couldn’t hear the ring so I tried knocking instead. I knocked again. Nothing. I knelt to the letterbox and pressed it open but it was too dark to see anything. It was only then I realised how much I was trembling. How much I was gritting my teeth.

  I stood and knocked again, repeatedly.

  A voice called out, ‘Are you the police?’

  I stepped back, hiding the knife under the hem of my jumper. I scanned the front of the house but I couldn’t see where the voice was coming from.

  ‘You’re not the police.’

  There was an old woman, squinting down at me from next-door’s bedroom window. She was wearing a fluffy red dressing gown, a large pair of glasses dangling from a cord round her neck.

  ‘He’s not in,’ she said. ‘Did all his roaring then left. As always.’

  I asked if she knew where you were.

  ‘There’ll be hell to pay when the police get here.’

  I knocked again. I waited a couple more minutes, the old lady still squinting down at me. Then I walked round to the park.

  The back of the house was as quiet as the front. Your TV lay on the floor in the middle of the lounge, projecting its light up the far wall. The rest of the house was in darkness.

  I crawled in through the hedge. A whining came from the shed, high-pitched like Scraps, only interspersed with short sharp sobs. I knelt to the missing-plank gap. There you were, a moonlit silhouette in the corner, Scraps across your lap. You hugged his head over your shoulder, nuzzling his chest. You rubbed the side of his face, dragging the skin back to reveal the white of his eye.

  I stood, brushing the mud from my palms and my knees. I dragged my hood down and fixed my hair the best I could, though there was no reflective surface to check my appearance. I took the knife from my belt and stashed it in my backpack. I stepped round to the front of the shed. The grass was frozen and crunched beneath my feet. As I stepped up to the door the whining stopped.

  I knocked.

  ‘What?’ you said.

  I couldn’t think of anything to say so I just knocked again.

  ‘What the fuck do you want?’

  ‘I …’

  The floorboards creaked. You sniffed.

  ‘Well if you’re going to come in, then come in.’

  I opened the door.

  And then came the shot. I must have registered you somehow, in that split-second, standing there in the shed doorway, because I can still picture your face as it was at that moment – stern, fr
owning, unsunglassed. I can still see the hate in your eyes. I must have seen the gun, too, because I raised my arm the instant the trigger cracked, hand spread as if commanding you to stop. When the pain hit I found myself outside again, stumbling from the steps to the lawn.

  I landed on my back. My jaw locked. Each breath hissed through my teeth. I was holding the hand above me by its wrist, limp and clawed and burning, a hot-sharp sting that spread from my palm to the tips of my fingers. Next thing you were kneeling beside me. You were telling me how sorry you were. You were still holding the nail gun but as soon as you realised you tossed it into the hedge. You reached for the hand but I clutched it to my chest.

  ‘It’s fine,’ I hissed. ‘It’s nothing.’ My lisp sounded even worse through clenched teeth.

  Then you saw the blood.

  ‘Shit.’

  You clutched your hair. You rubbed your palms into your eyes. You shook your head. You were wearing that pink dressing gown, beneath it a white dress, patterned with blue flowers.

  I wanted to reassure you but the pain was clouding my thoughts. All I seemed to be able to do was lie there, gritting my teeth, so hard my gums ached.

  ‘Wait there,’ you said.

  You disappeared into the shed again. The toolbox rattled. My hand was shaking and I struggled to hold it still. My stomach was churning. I breathed slowly. Within seconds you were back at my side, clutching a pair of pliers.

  ‘Come on.’

  You reached under my armpits and hoisted me to my feet, took hold of my un-pierced hand and led me over to the house. You were shaking as much as I was but your crying seemed to have stopped, replaced by a frown of deep concentration.

  The kitchen was in darkness. I waited at the doorway while you switched on the light – a bare bulb hanging from the ceiling. It was small for a kitchen, like Nan’s used to be – more of a utility room, only with a cooker and a stack of dirty plates on the side.

  There was a single stool over in the corner and you told me to sit. You scrambled about, emptying every drawer and cabinet – utensils, shopping bags, half-empty cereal boxes. I nursed my hand on my lap like a bird with an injured wing. It was only in the light of the single bare bulb that I noticed the bloodstain, spread across the hem of your dress. I looked down at my hand again. It made me light-headed. I should have known, really, that it wasn’t my blood on your dress, because it had already blackened to that sticky stage.

  You ran out through the hall, up the stairs, shouting for me to wait where I was. I don’t know where you thought I was going to go. My hand was still trembling, coat-sleeve sticky with blood, all the way down to my elbow. I cupped my right hand beneath my left, to catch the drips.

  You arrived at the doorway again. You placed a pair of tights and a bottle of whiskey on the sideboard. Then you knelt and reached for my hand.

  I pulled away.

  ‘Show me.’

  I shook my head. ‘It’s fine.’

  ‘It’s not fine.’

  ‘It is.’

  You sighed. ‘We need to get it out before the tetanus kicks in.’

  ‘I don’t think that’s how it works.’

  You looked me in the eye.

  ‘Show me.’

  I uncurled my hand as much as I could. You took my wrist and held it to the light. My palm was cupping a pool of blood. You turned it, examining it, not seeming to mind when the blood spilled onto the floor tiles. I retched. Not because of the pain (although that in itself was pretty intense) but because of the sight of it – the nail – jutting from the back of my hand like some sort of small metallic fang. I couldn’t believe what a good shot it had been, right through that cigarette burn on my palm, the scab that was finally healing.

  ‘Here.’ You handed me the whiskey bottle. I thought you just wanted me to hold it but then you said, ‘Drink, it’ll help.’ I tried to open the bottle with my teeth but it was tightly screwed. You apologised, resting my hand on the side while you twisted the top off for me.

  I took a swig. I retched again.

  You told me to look away. I tried to concentrate on the light bulb. It was rocking slightly in the breeze. I could already feel the whiskey, warming its way up through me.

  I couldn’t help but glance up as you placed the teeth of the pliers on the nail head.

  ‘On three, OK?’

  I nodded.

  ‘One …’

  I gritted my teeth.

  ‘Two …’

  You yanked. My arm jerked. The pain burnt right up to my elbow. I screamed out and stumbled from the stool to the far side of the room. I crouched in the doorway, biting into the collar of my coat.

  I held my hand to the light. The nail was still there.

  ‘You said on three,’ I said. I was sweating and shaking and my lisp sounded worse than ever.

  ‘It’s wedged right in there,’ you said. ‘We’ll have to go again.’

  I told you I thought we were maybe better off calling an ambulance. You shook your head. You said it was never a good idea to get the authorities involved in situations like this. Besides, by the time they got here my arm would be riddled with the tetanus.

  I perched on the stool again.

  ‘On two or on three this time?’ I asked.

  ‘On three.’

  But that was another lie. This time you didn’t count at all. As soon you’d gripped the nail you tugged, so hard that, when the nail did break free, you stumbled right across the kitchen into the sideboard, tipping the pile of plates onto the floor. The pain was like nothing I’d ever felt. It was like you’d ripped out one of my bones. I managed not to cry out this time but I still stumbled forwards and dropped my rucksack. My Breakfast at Tiffany’s video-case clattered across the kitchen floor the same moment the plates did, my journal and wage packets and various keys and trinkets scattering amongst the shattered ceramic.

  You examined the nail in the light.

  ‘We got it!’

  I bent to gather the contents of my video-case. I tried to piece together the pages of my journal but I was getting blood all over everything. You knelt, trying to help.

  ‘What is this stuff?’

  ‘Don’t read it,’ I said. ‘It’s private.’

  It was only after I’d spoken that I realised how hostile I’d sounded. You lifted the video-case and starting stuffing the pages inside. You glanced at the title on the spine.

  ‘It’s just a box,’ I said. ‘It’s where I keep things.’

  ‘What things?’

  ‘Just things.’

  You picked up the cigarette butt. The one I saved from outside your house.

  ‘Is this one of your things?’

  I nodded. You weren’t paying attention, you were too busy studying it. I added a ‘Yes’ and you looked up and placed it in the box. Then you reached for the pliers from the sideboard. You held out the nail.

  ‘You want this? For your box?’

  You didn’t wait for an answer. You dislodged the nail and wrapped it in kitchen roll, placing it in the video-case with everything else.

  ‘Here, keep it,’ you said. ‘From now on you can always look at it and remember the time that crazy bitch fucked up your hand.’

  The box clicked shut. You smiled.

  ‘How does it feel?’

  ‘The hand?’

  ‘The hand.’

  ‘Like the mother of all bee stings.’

  You stood and passed me the video-case. I slipped it back into my bag.

  ‘Now we just need to sterilise it.’

  I sat on the stool again. You reached into the cupboard for a couple of mugs and poured us both a shot of whiskey. You poured the rest of the bottle over my hand, washing all the blood away. It stung like crazy but by now my hand had been stinging so consistently it was almost expected. I could pretty much remove my mind from the pain. What really bothered me was the smell.

  You stretched out the tights and bound my palm. You apologised for your lack of bandages, assuring me the tigh
ts were clean. I said it didn’t matter. After a few minutes you looked up, eyes fixed on mine.

  ‘Sorry I shot you,’ you said. ‘I didn’t know you were you.’

  I nodded. ‘It was a mistake. People make mistakes.’

  You took a pin from your pocket, fixing the tights in place.

  ‘You weren’t at the party,’ I said. ‘I just came to check you were OK.’

  You stared down at your lap, the black stain on your dress. You glanced out at the shed.

  ‘I’m not.’

  We crossed the garden to the shed. You stopped at the steps and sat, rubbing your eyes. I stood beside you, waiting. You told me it wasn’t pretty and I said it was OK. I raised my hand and told you that, after what we’d just been through, I was ready for anything.

  You smiled. You stood again. You stepped up to the shed door.

  Under the spotlight of your torch we examined the mess. Various tools had fallen from their nails on the wall. The toolkit lay side-on, its contents spread across the floorboards. Scraps was laid out in his corner, mouth hanging open, tongue limp on the shed floor. There was a black patch across his face I tried not to fixate on. Several black boot marks patterned his ribs.

  You switched off the torch then and all we could make out was our breath, curling before us in the moonlight.

  ‘We should bury him,’ I said.

  You nodded. ‘The park. He liked the park.’

  I slid off my coat and wrapped it over Scraps. The blood had hardened. It was sticky in the cold air and peeling him from the boards was more difficult than I expected. His legs had stiffened, bobbing as I lifted. He ached my hand a little but the pain eased when I shifted his weight into the crook of my arm. I caught a glimpse of the right side of his skull, buried in the hood of my coat: face caved, fur black and bloody. His right eye was missing, or maybe just so far buried into its socket it was no longer visible. You unhooked a shovel from the wall and led us, out through the hedge gap and across the field.