by Aly Sidgwick
‘I can only do the free course if I’ve already got a job …’
‘Uff. So get a dictionary!’
The shortness of Magnus’s tone stings me. I fall silent against my pillow, and watch him trying to pluck a hair from the smooth desert of his chest. With every failed attempt, his skin grows pinker. I consider slapping him in the face, or at least telling him I already have a dictionary. That if people here spoke normally, like Paul and Eirin, I might be able to understand them.
‘The way they speak on TV,’ I say. ‘Do they speak like that in Oslo?’
‘Hmn.’
‘Magnus, I’m serious. If I don’t get a job soon, I’m fucked. I can’t tell NAV I’m here until I’ve got a job. I can’t get a doctor until NAV know I’m here. I can’t renew my prescriptions until I’ve—’
‘I can’t leave town,’ smiles Magnus. ‘What would the kids do without me?’
He has turned around now, but instead of looking at my face his eyes are fixed on my body. Under the covers, his hands move across me. I flap a hand at him. But it’s hard to stay mad when he turns on the charm.
‘I’m sure the kids will be fine,’ I whisper as he kisses my hands. ‘Rock ‘n’ roll will find a way to survive without you …’
‘Hysj,’ he murmurs, and touches his mouth to mine.
‘I’m serious,’ I repeat. Then his kiss flows into me, and the real world swoons into pieces.
#
In the blink of an eye, another week passes. By now, my job hunt has taken on a different slant. Having been refused by the local newspaper, art gallery and tourist magazine, I’ve adopted the hope that a hotel – with its yearly influx of foreign tourists – might welcome a native English speaker onto their staff. I present myself to each major hotel, wearing the cheap skirt suit I begged Magnus to buy me. One after the other, I lay my heart on the line, and one after the other they turn me down. After this I try the English pub and the Irish pub. I try the tourist office, the museum, the cinema and the library. I even try to sell some paintings in the cafés. Everywhere, the answer is no, and with every rejection a little more spring goes out of my step. ‘I’m scared,’ I tell Magnus, several times. I need him to understand my predicament. To realise this is not working and open himself to the possibility of a Plan B. But every time he kisses my tears away, we somehow just end up having sex.
#
Saturday comes round again, and Magnus is due to work the evening shift. It’s now five days since my meds ran out, and the side effects are kicking in. I sit below the dark skylight, crying into Magnus’s pillow, and for one whole hour it feels like I am going mad. This morning Magnus left without waking me and took the single set of house keys with him. This basically means I can’t go out, because once the door has closed I have no way of getting back in.
I hate this feeling. This weakness that descends when I stop taking my meds. It usually happens by accident, when I forget two doses in a row or go on a trip without them. But now I have no choice. I must learn to live without such luxuries. Be strong, where Dad never managed to be. I can do this.
Loop the Loop is a twenty-minute walk away, down by the marina. I’ve been past it once, on my way to a job interview, but until now I haven’t been inside. Annexed to the main building there’s a windowless wooden outhouse covered in graffiti. If Magnus’s descriptions are anything to go by, then that is the rehearsal block. That’s where he spends his daytimes – allotting session times to bands, fixing faulty amps and kick pedals, hiring out microphones. All that guff. But it’s after six now, and that means the rehearsal block is closed. By now, Magnus will be in the main building.
A shiver passes through me, and with disgust I wriggle it away. Why am I so afraid of going there? I wasn’t afraid before. They’re only kids. Not aliens. They may speak a different language, but that doesn’t make them dangerous.
God, I’d do anything for a Valium right now. But aquavit is all I’ve got. Aquavit will have to be my new drug.
Taking another swig, I look at the clock. Seven thirty. That’s not so bad. Magnus is only working till nine. I should go down and surprise him, with a nice dress and a smile. I don’t think he’s seen me crack a smile all week.
Right. Pull yourself together.
I slide one foot over the edge and find the first rung of the ladder. Cautiously, I descend to the bedroom floor and make myself ready to leave. By the time I reach Loop the Loop it is after eight.
As I approach the door, my feet slow. The place looks bigger than I remembered, and darker, and louder. This is the first time I’ve been out alone at night-time, and I’m shocked by how scared I feel without Magnus. Tears form in my eyes as I scan the teenagers outside the entrance. Leaning on walls, sitting on the kerbs, drinking from plastic bottles. Now and again they squeal with laughter, and my eyes dart towards them. But they’re so self-absorbed they’ve barely noticed me. Pulling my hood low, I go through the front door.
‘Magnus?’ I ask the girl at the café, and she points across the crowded dance floor. ‘Takk skal du ha,’ I say, like they do in my Learn Norwegian book, and wander self-consciously into the dark. As I walk, I realise how many of the kids are drunk.
He was right, though. This place is cool. God, I’d have been a much more well-rounded kid if I’d had a place like this to go to. It’ll be fun to hang out here.
There, I think I see him. Smiling with relief, I smooth my dress down and push my way towards the back wall. Past the really tall Hanoi Rocks kid, round the punk girls doing the tango. People move to one side, eyeing me suspiciously. Then I make it through and Magnus is right before me. It’s his face I see first. Sitting laughing by the stage. Drink on one knee, and a blonde girl on the other. Her arms are wrapped around his neck, and until his gaze jerks onto me, his arm is around her too. A cold pain stabs my stomach, and for a moment the floor whirls beneath me. Someone shoves my back and I pitch forwards.
‘Magnus?’ I ask, in barely more than a whisper. Lights flare. Then my hearing slams back, and Magnus is on his feet. His eyes are rounder than I’ve ever seen. Intently, he speaks into my face, and the voice that comes out is panicked.
‘Katty. What you doing here?’
‘I—’
‘You shouldn’t be in here, it’s members only.’
‘What the hell do you think you’re—’
‘Hysj! Not here! I’m at work.’
‘Who the fuck is she?’
‘Not here!’ Magnus jerks my arm, hard, and my neck jolts. People are staring as he pulls me to one side. He takes a deep, angry breath. Again, those eyes. Then his arm flies forwards and rapidly yet covertly pushes the house keys into my hand.
‘Go home,’ he whispers. ‘We’ll talk later.’
I look behind him and see the girl staring at me. She’s even younger than I first thought. Silky, golden shoulder-length hair, fresh skin, ripped black clothes. Her piercing blue eyes are fixed on me, scowling, and as she steps up to take Magnus’s arm, she says some words I don’t understand.
‘Piece of shit!’ I spit, and throw the keys at his feet. Then I turn on my heel and storm through the crowd.
11
Friday.
The dinin’ room wall is finally fixed, an’ Mrs Laird summons us to say a special thank you to the workmen. I don’t speak or look anyone in the eye. Mrs Laird does most of the talkin’. One of the men is a trained blacksmith an’ makes a big show of presentin’ Mrs Laird with a real horseshoe. Ev’ryone coos an’ wants to touch it, so they end up handin’ it round so we can feel how heavy it is.
‘I bet the horses dinnae feel so lucky, luggin’ four ae them around aw the time!’ says the head workman. Ev’ryone laughs except me.
Later, I see someone’s hung the horseshoe on a nail above the kitchen doorway. The nail doesn’t look strong enough to hold it there, an’ this makes me anxious beyond words. Over an’ over I picture the horseshoe fallin’ on someone’s head. The blood an’ the fuss an’ the screamin’. The roar of
ambulance sirens, an’ the scar such an injury would leave. I want to ask them to take down the horseshoe, but I don’t know how to say it in a way they’d understand. Soon the thought of askin’ them grows as terrible as the horseshoe itself. Each time I see it, it reminds me of the workmen. As if they never left, an’ never will. I no longer dare to walk through the kitchen door, an’ sooner or later someone’s goin’ to notice that.
#
I fall asleep in the afternoon, an’ by the time I go downstairs dinner is over. Usually this wouldn’t bother me, but tonight I am starvin’. I sniff the air in the back porch, kickin’ myself for this mistake. I should, of course, go to the kitchen an’ ask for leftovers, but that’d mean walkin’ under the horseshoe, an’ I can’t do that. Somewhere nearby, I can hear Joyce singin’ scales.
On my way past Mrs Laird’s sittin’ room I notice her door is open. I peer inside to see her hunched at her desk. Her head is in her hands. I’m about to ask if she’s okay when she speaks, an’ I realise she’s usin’ the telephone. I shrink back into the corridor, glad that the rug hides my footsteps.
‘Mm hmm ,’ nods Mrs Laird. ‘I know, I know, but … no … Listen … sweetheart …’
She falls silent, one finger raised in the air. But the person on the telephone doesn’t stop talkin’ for a long time. Bit by bit, Mrs Laird’s finger lowers an’ returns, unused, to the tabletop. Several times, she sighs.
‘It’s not … it isn’t … Darling, it’s not your obligation! You have to put your own health first …’ says Mrs Laird. She listens some more, till another gap comes an’ she jabs, ‘Well, no, I haven’t told her yet, but—’
I gasp, an’ Mrs Laird’s face swings towards me. Her eyes look tired. I wonder if I should run. But iss too late. She’s seen me.
‘She’s here,’ Mrs Laird mutters, between her teeth. She raises her hand an’ flaps it at me as she rises. I back away, along the wall. When she reaches me I think she will say somethin’ else, or shout at me for eavesdroppin’, but all she does is pull the door closed.
I wander away uneasily an’ climb the stairs. Jess is cryin’ on the floor of the landin’, but I can barely handle my own problems, let alone hers, so I slip past without a word. I sit at my bedroom window for what feels like hours, watchin’ the sun sink away. Outside, Jess’s sobs rise an’ fall. Dispersin’ into abstract sounds, till I almost forget what they are. As I braid an’ unbraid my hair, my reflection in the glass grows brighter than the outside world. Bit by bit, till I’ve eclipsed it all, an’ the only light left comes from the bulb behind me.
Tonight, my faith is at a low. Ev’rythin’ feels uncertain, an’ laughably, bottomlessly pointless. But I know it wasn’t always this way. I have this misty memory of pickin’ bilberries on a vast green hill. Droppin’ ’em into a sand-castle bucket. I can see my stained fingers on the ride home, an’ the sense of pride when the bilberry pie came out of the oven. There was a beginnin’, a middle an’ an end, an’ all of it was worth doin’. My days have none of that now. Is that because there’s no one left to tell me these things are worth doin’? To threaten or hurry me along? Rhona was the last one who bothered to do that, an’ now it seems she’s abandoned me too.
#
This mornin’ I take care to get to breakfast on time. I’ve never made it down so early, but I must be sure to get some food before iss cleared away. I also take some for later. Oatcakes an’ two little tubs of jam. This goes well. Nobody notices.
‘Golly, you’ve got an appetite today, Kathy!’ says Mrs Laird as I refill my plate. I stare at her. Is she on to me? On my way back to my seat I pass Jess. She’s talkin’ all serious with Aggie an’ Liz, but when I walk past all three of ’em go quiet. Jess’s eyes are swollen. She looks at me once, then at the floor. I don’t like the way they’re lookin’ at me, so I switch to the seat facin’ away from them. As I sit down a tub of jam slips from my pocket. I fluster to pick it up. Did they notice?
‘Ladies!’ says a voice, an’ I look up to see Mrs Laird. She’s on her feet now, at the end of the dinin’ room, an’ she looks like she’s goin’ to say somethin’ important. My eyes move to the horseshoe hangin’ inches above her head. Suddenly the horseshoe’s all I can see. Balancin’ on its nail. Temptin’ gravity …
My foot starts jigglin’. I have to lean on it to keep it still.
‘I have an announcement to make,’ says Mrs Laird. ‘A piece of good news, which may brighten your day. Some of you more than others …’
I feel Mrs Laird’s smile on me, full of teeth, an’ daren’t raise my eyes. I picture the horseshoe smashin’ into those teeth. Scatt’rin’ them in a bloody arc across the floor. Into the cauldron of porridge, roots an’ all. The blood seepin’ in, like jam. People’s teeth crunchin’ into Mrs Laird’s teeth as they feed on the red porridge … Swallowin’ sharp edges … Chokin’ …
Baboom goes my heart. A yelp comes out of me. I clutch my mouth.
‘As you all know,’ Mrs Laird says, ‘our dear friend and colleague Rhona has been away. I know this has been hard on some of you, and I want to thank you for your patience while we’ve been one man down. But! I’m happy to say Rhona will soon be back with us!’
My heart leaps. Several people gasp happily, an’ some of the oldies start clappin’.
‘When is she coming?’ asks Aggie.
‘Thursday afternoon. She’ll be back to work on Friday.’
Joyce noisily clears her throat.
‘Oh, I clean forgot,’ says Mrs Laird. ‘Joyce has some news, too. Don’t you, Joyce?’
‘Thank you, Vera. Yes. No doubt most of you already know about the local production of My Fair Lady. Well, I’m thrilled to tell you my audition went well, and I’ve been chosen for the part of Eliza Doolittle!’
‘Ooooo,’ say the older ladies.
‘Thank you. Thank you. Yes, it’s quite an honour. For the next month I’ll be attending rehearsals at the village hall. Now, this will mean rearranging my Thursday sessions. But I’m sure all my girls understand. And of course, when the time comes, you’ll get free tickets for the show. A little culture for you!’
A dribble of applause rounds off the announcement. Joyce milks the attention for as long as possible, while Mrs Laird returns to her toast an’ jam. I gulp some tea from my flowered cup an’ gaze at the wall where the conservat’ry used to be. Suddenly I feel really happy. Not cos of Joyce’s announcement. I don’t give a shit about that. But the rest of it … Rhona … She’s really comin’ back! Soon my life will be back to normal.
#
I spend the followin’ days wrapped in a delicious haze. My weekly session with Mrs Laird goes ahead, but iss more straightforward than usual, cos she doesn’t try to talk about heavy stuff. She basically asks how I’m feelin’, an’ I tell her fine, which is pretty much the truth since Saturday. She asks a couple of simple questions. Then she nods an’ says, ‘All right, run along then.’
‘That’s it?’ I ask, an’ she nods again.
‘Why don’t you go for a nice walk?’
‘But Joyce said I’m not allow—’
‘Never mind what Joyce said.’
I take a long walk around the perimeter fence. Dark blotches dribble like ink across the hillside, sendin’ the gorse in an’ out of shadow. That night I sleep like a log.
#
Thursday.
I wake at dawn an’ can’t back to sleep. I lean out of bed an’ drag my skirt off the chair. The pockets are still full of oatcakes. I eat them slowly, tryin’ not to get crumbs in the bed. There’s one tub of apricot jam, which I eat last of all, as dessert. The room is quite cold, so I roll back under the covers an’ close my eyes. For a while I try to sleep sittin’ up, but this doesn’t work so well.
I feel like I should feel happier than this. It puzzles me. I should have been out on the moor by now, turnin’ cartwheels. But I can’t even bring myself to get up.
The cold pushes down, rootin’ me to my bed. But iss not jus’ the cold that keep
s me here. Deep inside, my body knows somethin’ is wrong. I feel it there, alongside that damn lullaby, but no matter how hard I try I can’t make sense of it.
As I stare at the brightenin’ window, shapes creep from the dark. A chair, a curtain, a table, a lamp. Sharpenin’ in detail till the whole room is filled. In the mirror on the dresser, a sliver of sky pokes through the curtains. Pure white. Then dappled grey. A whorl of cloud looks down, like a huge, forgetful eye.
Somethin’ is wrong …
#
Mr Duff comes to visit in the afternoon. He’s two days early, an’ all of us are in the day room when the car pulls up. I hear its slow wheels on the gravel, followed by whispers. I crane my neck but see nothin’ through the window. They must have come in the back way, on the other side of the house. Mr Duff sings really loudly today, an’ even Caroline joins in, which she’s never done before. Music therapy goes on for much longer than usual, an’ when iss over Caroline unpacks what she calls a special picnic tea, right here in the day room. Afterwards most people head to their rooms. I set off to search for Rhona, but Caroline stops me an’ makes me go upstairs. At Mary’s room I stop an’ tap on the door, but though I know she’s inside, there’s no reply.
Later, I look through my bedroom window an’ see Rhona. Jus’ beyond the outhouses, walkin’ away from the house. I bang on the glass, but she doesn’t turn around.
#
Friday.
I’m woken by the sound of a car an’ look out in time to see it roarin’ away. Iss a white car. Small. When it reaches the perimeter fence I wait to see who’ll open the gate, but the person who gets out turns out to be Joyce. I creep back to bed.
When I come down for breakfast, nothin’ seems to have changed. Mrs Laird says Rhona has gone shoppin’ an’ will come back this afternoon. I suppose that could be true. I didn’t think to check if there were two people in the car. I fill my plate with toast, takin’ care to avoid the kitchen doorway, an’ sit beside Mary to eat. She looks surprised when I sit down, but doesn’t scowl or move away. Instead she turns her face down, towards the tabletop. Suddenly I realise iss been days since she smiled at me. Have I done somethin’ wrong? I watch her anxiously, but Mary fails to meet my eyes. She stares instead at her plate, where she’s crushed a single dry oatcake into pieces. I stare at it too. I look round to check no one’s lis’nin’. Then I whisper, ‘Are you okay?’