Green Light

by JG Alva

  “You’ve missed your ride,” he said.

  All at once, Angela was very shy.

  “Yes.”

  “Never mind. You can share my taxi.”

  “Thank you.”

  He paused. As of that moment the taxi hadn’t arrived. He wiped the glass beside the door, looked out. At the end of the street the bright lights of the city could be seen, distorted by the rain. They seemed very far away at that point in time.

  “Maggie told me to ask you about the portrait you’ve done of me,” he said. She seemed embarrassed. “Do you want to show it to me now?”

  “Yes,” she said, with all the animation of a statue. “If you like.”

  They waited in an uneasy silence until the taxi arrived and then scuttled out to it. Breathing hard in the back seat, he was very aware of Angela as she leaned forward to give the taxi driver her address, was aware of the curve of her back, and very aware of the warmth of her body…all of this very close to him on the back seat.

  It was a good quarter of an hour taxi ride.

  When it finally arrived at her address, Sutton was surprised.

  “You live here?” He asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Why here?”

  “I don’t have anywhere else.”

  He stared at her.

  Her head was turned away, staring out of the window at the offices of Green Light at the top of Whiteladies Road.

  “Why didn’t you tell me you lived here?” He asked.

  She shrugged.

  “I was embarrassed, I suppose.”

  “It’s just a place,” he said, partly with frustration, partly with hope. “It doesn’t define you. Any more than the job you do, or the clothes you wear.”

  She turned to him then.

  “They define how other people see you,” she said, “and that’s bad enough.”

  He couldn’t counter that.

  He paid and they both got out. It was still raining, but not so hard. They both stood there on the pavement and watched the taxi drive off and both exchanged a glance and allowed themselves to get wet. Sutton had no means of getting home, a fact they were both aware of. She had said yes without even saying it. He took her hand, because she looked all but terrified. Her hand was like a block of ice.

  “This way,” she said, and very self-consciously led him to a stairway around the back of the branch office, which provided access to the upstairs rooms.

  Behind the burnt sienna of the back door it smelled slightly musty. They stood in the hall and hung up their coats, and then she led him inside.

  “In here,” she said, turning on the living room light.

  He could see the window she was in the middle of sanding down. It was bare, and an old sheet had been laid underneath it, to protect the carpet. But on the other side of the room, an easel had been set up. All around it were small waist-high tables stacked with all different types of paint pots, dirty palettes and filthy glasses full of dirty green and black water. All manner of paint brushes stuck pertly out of the tops of glasses, like alien flowers yet to bloom. There was a sofa at the far end of the room, brown and green patterned, and directly behind it curtains had been drawn over what he assumed were patio doors. Other than that it was bare. No TV, no computer. Sutton whole-heartedly approved. All that clutter...he had an idea, even before he looked at the drawing, that it would be good.

  He went over to the easel.

  There was a piece of paper on it, about A4 size. It wasn’t good grade paper. It didn’t have to be. It was undeniably him. It was a three quarter profile, but she had used real heavy pencil, 6 or 7B, so that all but about twenty percent of his face was in shadow, and there was a frantic energy in the strokes, almost a violence, as if the white of the paper had been scratched away to reveal the image. It was a moody piece and he liked it. He was moody in it. Angry perhaps. It was good.

  He smiled.

  “Is this how you see me?”

  Slowly, she shook her head. Her eyes seemed huge.

  “No,” she said. “It was just that first day. When you were jogging. You seemed…angry.”

  “I wasn’t.”

  “I know.”

  “You didn’t falter,” he said.

  “No.”

  “Even though I seemed angry. You stayed to face me.”

  “Yes. I couldn’t…turn away.”

  “And you went to that engagement party as well.”

  She frowned.

  “What are you saying?”

  “What do you think I’m saying?”

  She shook her head, but he could tell that she knew.

  Finally, she said, “I can be strong if you’re there.”

  “No. You don’t need me.”

  “It turns out, I’ve got less backbone than Daniel.”

  “Stop it,” Sutton said. “Stop putting yourself down.”

  “I’m just telling you the truth. I’m useless. I’m afraid. All the time.”

  He grabbed her upper arms and shook her. Her head rattled around like a rag doll’s.

  “Why are you like this? Who made you like this?”

  “I did,” she said, staring into his eyes. “I let him. Because I’m…weak.”

  “Did you love him?”

  “I hope to God that it wasn’t love,” she said. She was very close; he could see the grain and texture of her skin. “If it was...” She shook her head hopelessly.

  He kissed her. She was so close, and he wanted her so much, that it just seemed preordained. But the shock of the sensation as his lips met hers was something altogether different. Her lips were cold, but her mouth felt somehow familiar, as if he had known it before.

  She kissed with a sort of innocent hunger. The impression she gave was of having kissed before, a long time ago, but of being uncertain of it now. It lasted a long time.

  Eventually they pulled apart. Her big brown eyes stared up at him solemnly.

  “I don’t want this to happen,” she whispered to him miserably.

  “Why not?”

  “I’m damaged goods,” she said.

  He kissed her neck, slowly, lovingly.

  “I wanted to be whole and healthy and successful when you saw me, so that I could impress you. Now look at me. Look at me.”

  “Shh.”

  He started to unbutton her blouse. The skin underneath was very pale. Her breathing entranced him, her chest rising and falling with each inhalation and exhalation. He uncovered a black bra, edged with frilly lace. He kissed her there and she sucked in her breath. He noticed with something like wonder that she was trembling.

  They somehow made it to the old, brown and green patterned sofa, discarding their clothes along the way, as if leaving clues to a trail back to their former selves.

  As if they each knew this would change them both forever.

  *

  They sat in silence on the sofa as rain tapped against the south facing window. A light was on in the hall. Everything else had been doused. There was a peculiar smell in the air, peculiar but at the same time known. It was she and he, mingled together.

  She was troubled, this one. It would not be an easy relationship…if that was what she wanted. Where the cogs of shrewdness turned so effortlessly in his head he was wondering what he had let himself in for, at the same time – in the back of his head, in the dark turbulent waters of his emotions – he had already said yes.

  “What’s the hardest thing you’ve ever had to do?” She asked, her fingers playing over his chest.

  She had a small compact ribcage which he felt carefully with his old painter’s hands. She seemed delicate, like bone china.

  “The hardest thing I’ve ever had to do,” he said carefully, and then hesitated, because he knew he was going to lie. There were parts of his life – things he had done – which would not be understand by anyone but those directly involved. He couldn’t tell anyone about them. It was best to leave th
em buried.

  But he didn’t want to lie to her.

  So he did the next best thing.

  He changed the question.

  “The hardest thing I’ve ever had to do,” he started again, “was watch my mother die.”

  Angela said nothing for a moment. She was feeling his hands; his palm, his fingers; like a blind woman tracing her reality.

  “Mum told me,” she said eventually, quietly.

  “She would know.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  He paused, but then said, “it was a long time ago.”

  “Some things last forever,” she said. “Some things go on and on.”

  “Only in your mind.”

  “They never stop.”

  He digested that a moment in silence.

  “So,” he said, “since we’re comparing battle scars, what’s the hardest thing you’ve ever done?”

  “First, ask me why I stopped painting. And then I’ll tell you everything, right from the beginning.”

  “Okay,” he said, wiling to play along. “Why did you stop painting?”

  She hesitated, smiled at her hesitation, and then plunged straight ahead.

  “Why do you think?” She said. “A man.”

  “Ah. Of course.” The man.

  “He looked a lot like you,” she said, almost shyly. “Otherwise I would never have been interested in him.”

  “Tell me what happened.”

  “At first, it was exciting. It was my first love affair…my first proper love affair. But almost straight away I recognised that things weren’t right, that things didn’t feel right. Barry Sheffield was his name. He’s not a well man.”

  “How so?”

  “Controlling. Insecure. Angry. His parents died when he was young, and he was partly responsible. He had Bronchitis during a holiday in the south of France, so they had to come back home to get him treated – they crashed their car. Barry was lucky to survive. He came back and lived with an aunt who blamed him too. I suppose, if I’d had such a shit childhood, I’d have resorted to drugs and alcohol to make myself feel better. But he got worse and worse…I had to get away from him.”

  “I’m assuming he didn’t take it well.”

  She smiled blandly.

  “No. He didn’t.”

  “The ultimate loss of control. The prophecy of his own lack of value fulfilled. I bet it got ugly.”

  “I didn’t give him the opportunity. I left him a message on his voicemail and packed up my things and came back here. Ran, basically. With my tail between my legs. How is that for courageous?”

  Sutton was silent for a moment.

  “If he was all the things you say he was, then it was probably the best thing to do. It sounds like he was on a self-destructive course.”

  “It didn’t help that I had to have an abortion when I got back,” she said, in a tight voice.

  She started to cry.

  He held her.

  “And you went through it all by yourself?”

  “I did.” She nodded. “That’s the toughest thing I’ve ever done.”

  “Rock solid,” he said, touching her face. “Fire and iron.”

  “When my last year of university was up,” she said haltingly, “I came home, but everything was different. When I started university I was so excited about everything. It was all an adventure. Now everything seems to have lost its sparkle. I’ve been here, decorating this place, for months now. Mum, bless her soul, hasn’t said anything yet, but even she must be wondering why I’m taking so long. I catch myself just wishing that I’ll never finish it, that I’ll still be doing it when I’m eighty, and that I’ll pass away one night in my sleep with only one more curtain left to hang.”

  She looked at him, her face completely naked for a moment.

  “I might start hiring you as a bodyguard,” he said gently, with wonder, and she laughed amidst her tears.

  “I’m sorry,” she said.

  “Why?”

  “Because I’m a wreck.”

  He held her hand tightly.

  “We’re all wrecks, Angela. We’re all broken inside. It’s just that some people are better at hiding it. You know that, don’t you?”

  They held each other. The rain had stopped, and the night was very quiet. He could hear, very faintly, the swish of tires on wet tarmac as an occasional car swept past on the road outside.

  Some things go on forever…

  But unfortunately the good things don’t. This was to end all too soon, as the best things usually do.

  It was just that neither of them knew it.

  *

  CHAPTER 14

  The next morning, it was raining once again. Humid, but stormy. A wet July.

  Sutton left around ten.

  Angela was a small, sleepy, curled up figure amongst a tangle of sheets that moaned only semi-consciously when he told her he had to go. She asked him to stay, in almost unintelligible moan-talk. He told her he had things to do, but that he’d see her for lunch. She extended a hand and he kissed it.

  He got back to his flat about twenty minutes later and had a shower. He got out, dressed informally, and made a cup of tea. No sugar. He was missing a few essentials. Okay. There was a newsagents on the corner. He made an attempt to organise his hair and then went out.

  On his way back, the heavens truly opened, and in only moments he was soaked through. Visibility dropped to a bare minimum, and it got dark. He could barely see his way home. That was why he didn’t spot Bobby Rice until he was almost on top of him.

  He came from around the corner of the building, sliding out of the curtain of rain with frightening speed. Sutton dropped everything just in time to put his arms up to ward off three quick blows that were aimed at his head. The plastic milk bottle bounced at his feet and he kicked it at his attacker. Bobby dodged it effortlessly and came at him again. Sutton didn’t have time to wonder why he was doing this, not before the next round of punches. They were aimed at his kidneys, and he had to pull his arms down to cover himself. After giving that a good going over, in which he only managed to get passed Sutton’s defending arms once to land a rather hard and brutal punch to the left side of his ribcage, he decided to give up any pretence at professionalism and just grabbed hold of Sutton’s head. He started pounding on his shoulders and neck, big powerful punches with the side of his wrist, like he was hammering in supports for a fence with his bare hands. The rib he had hit, which felt very fragile and hot, faded into background next to the blows Bobby was raining down on his head. Sutton got under his arms and managed to land a few punches of his own into the man’s gut. Bobby backed off momentarily, breathing hard. Sutton tried not to show that his neck and shoulders were on fire, and were rapidly seizing up. For a little guy, he was tough. He must have been a good foot shorter than Sutton, and more than a few stone lighter. But rarely is it about the physical. It’s about the mind, and the will to do hard things.

  The rain battered them both. They were alone in the squall, cordoned off by the heavy precipitation; no help was coming. Sutton’s hair was plastered to his head, and his clothes were wet, cold and heavy. His feet felt like two blocks of ice. Bobby was wearing a leather jacket and jeans. The rugby ball shaped head sat oddly on the stringy neck. Still, for all his odd appearance, Bobby seemed to know what he was doing. He took evident pride in his work, which is always dangerous, because there’s always going to be somebody better. He came in and went for Sutton’s head again, staying very close, so Sutton couldn’t get enough swing into a punch to give it any power. Time to try something different. He took the blow to his head and shoulders for the moment – one glancing off a temple and making his ears ring – and then he went for Bobby’s arm. It was a move that Sutton had only been able to get away with once…because an opponent would become wise to it. But Sutton was fast enough to catch Bobby unawares. He pulled Bobby in and then head-butted him, and while Bobby was dazed, Sutton used his
hold on his arm to spin him around and get the arm behind his opponent’s back. Bobby was not a big man, so it wasn’t difficult, but he did struggle with the power of somebody a lot bigger. In the end it was his own thrashing about that popped his arm out of its socket. He slumped suddenly and almost hit the pavement with his funny shaped head before Sutton got hold of him. He turned him around. He had passed out with the pain. He lay in a puddle in the pouring rain with his right arm pointing in an impossible direction. Sutton silently cussed him. He had wanted to talk to him. Now he was going to have to call an ambulance. Quality time alone would be more difficult to acquire.

  The ambulance arrived a full five minutes later. Sutton stood over Bobby and used his coat to shelter him from the rain. They put him on a stretcher and stuck him in the back of the ambulance. They asked Sutton who he was and he told them that he lived here, and that he’d just found him this way. They nodded but they were suspicious. They wouldn’t let him ride with them, which was fair enough.

  Sutton hurried to his car to follow.

  *

  He was in a curtained off area on the far side of the casualty ward. He had a window overlooking most of the city. When Sutton finally managed to slip past the nurses, and duck under the curtains, he saw anger cross his face like a dark cloud. He tried to sit up. His arm was in a sling, but he was obviously still in some pain. After struggling a few moments he carefully laid himself back down. He would not take his eyes off him.

  Bobby was a small man with a small face. He had small ears, a small thin neck, and small yellow teeth. His eyes were a watery green. He did not look anything like his sister.

  “Come to finish I off,” he said sullenly. He had a strong Bristolian accent.

  “If I have to.”

  “Fuck you.”

  “Where does it hurt?” Sutton asked, reaching to feel the arm in the sling.