Looking for Alex

by Marian Dillon

  ‘Well…it is. I’m sorry.’

  Fitz winces, as if to say, ‘You should have lied’. My father sees that and mistakes it for, ‘Now you’ve dropped me in it’, and begins grilling Fitz over who he is and what he is to me. Fitz answers honestly, with me prompting. My mother, still speechless, sits down on one of the grubby kitchen chairs, wiping it surreptitiously first with the hem of her skirt. She sits with her head bent, her hands twitching at imaginary creases. I don’t dare say anything to her for fear that my father, not her, will explode.

  Once he’s satisfied that Fitz is telling the truth my father goes quiet, frowning down at the floor and rubbing his top lip with one finger, back and forth.

  ‘And we understand,’ says my mother then, in a small, controlled voice, tucking back a lock of hair that’s escaped the rest, ‘that Alex is here. Been here all the time. So where is she? I think I’d like a word with her.’

  I look over at Fitz and see that he doesn’t have a clue what to do now. I really do not want to go and wake Alex to come and explain herself, after the bitter words we exchanged. But my father nods at the stairs.

  ‘Go on,’ he says.

  I walk slowly, trying to gather my thoughts, and knock quietly on Pete and Alex’s door. Then louder. When there’s still no reply I turn the handle very gently, easing the door off the latch. There’s no one there. The room is bare except for the mattress, on top of which are scattered some old Socialist Workers, a couple of books, a pair of worn-out desert boots and a bag of rubbish. The sash window is open and a cool breeze flutters the curtains. As I stand and stare I hear movement above, in the attic. Celia. She always knows everything. I go to the foot of her stairs and pull back the green curtain.

  ‘Celia?’ I call quietly, and to my surprise she tells me to come up.

  ‘They’ve gone,’ she says. ‘Done a moonlight flit. Except there wasn’t any moon.’

  She holds her door open and beckons me into her room, for the very first time. It’s gloomy, lit only by a couple of dim lamps, the skylight so filthy that no light comes through there. Fringed and beaded shawls cover the lamps and hang on the walls, and Celia stands by the bed in a long white nightdress, an old Victorian thing. Her cheeks are more hollow than ever, and looking at her makes me think of the crazy wife in Jane Eyre.

  ‘Do you know where they’ve gone?’ I ask.

  She laughs. ‘Why would either of them want me to know that?’

  I turn to go, see the wall behind me, and stop abruptly. Its crumbly, bare plaster is alive with plants and figures and faces, all drawn and shaded with thick black pencil. Ferns and foliage grow from the skirting and reach up to the ceiling, their curling tendrils shooting off at intervals, all tangling together. In between are glimpses of people and animals, their limbs and faces half hidden. The people are simplistic, almost stick-figures, while the animals are fleshed out, mythical: griffins, centaurs and unicorns. I stare, fascinated, rooted to the floor like one of Celia’s plants. Then I notice a section in one corner, where two figures are drawn larger than the others. I move closer. On the left is an ape, crouching sideways on, facing a young, skeletal woman. The ape’s hands are outstretched towards her, cupped. The woman’s hands hang loosely, her eyes fixed on the ground.

  ‘Do you like my jungle?’

  ‘Like it? I don’t know.’ I shake my head, wanting to give her a better answer. ‘It’s…disturbing.’ I’m taking in the leering face of the ape and the girl’s submissive pose. ‘I suppose you’re trying to say something?’

  ‘Work it out,’ she says. ‘It’s not hard.’

  We hear footsteps on the landing below, and Fitz’s voice. ‘Beth?’

  ‘She’s here,’ Celia calls, and I tear myself away from the picture. ‘Is that your parents downstairs? I guess they’ve come to take you home.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Are they nice parents?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You’ll be okay, then. See you, Beth.’

  She turns away from me and I leave the room.

  I have a hard job explaining to my parents that I have no idea where Alex has gone. They obviously, quite reasonably, think that I must have known right from the beginning where she was. Now they’re convinced I will have been given her next secret address. My father insists on searching upstairs himself and interrogates an amused Celia. I’m in tears of frustration by the time I finally convince them how angry Alex was with me.

  ‘I’m probably the last person she wants to see right now,’ I say miserably.

  Fitz is leaning against the sink, arms folded, head bowed, and I ache to hold him. My mother sees me looking at him and says, wonderingly, ‘All those lies, Beth. How could you tell all those lies?’

  This seems to spark my father into action because he orders me to go and get my things. Fitz stays where he is; I suppose he doesn’t want to make things worse for me. It means that we have to say goodbye in front of my parents and all my feelings towards him get stifled somehow, in an effort not to make a fool of myself. We go to hug each other and my mother has the decency to turn away. She goes out into the garden. My father stands and waits.

  ‘I’ll write to you,’ I whisper to Fitz.

  ‘Oh, no, you won’t, young lady,’ my father barks. ‘And you.’ He points to Fitz. ‘You leave my daughter alone now. I don’t want you writing. I don’t want you appearing at my house. I don’t want my daughter down here again. Have you got that?’

  ‘Dad, you can’t ask that!’

  ‘Keep out of this, Beth. Have you got that?’ he repeats, his eyes square on Fitz, who dumbly nods. Then he takes me by the elbow and hustles me out.

  The journey home is desperate. My mother alternately sighs and sniffs and wipes tears from her eyes, and her pained silence is worse than any telling-off. My father, normally a ten-a-day man, chain-smokes relentlessly as he drives us home. I sit in the back, staring numbly at passing fields and pylons. I know I have completely lost their trust but right now it’s hard to feel the weight of that; there’s too much else I’ve lost: a friend and a lover, both.

  And somewhere in all of that I’ve lost myself, although I don’t understand that yet.

  Chapter Eight

  20th June 2013

  ‘You’ve gone quiet,’ Fitz said, and squeezed my hand. We were walking from the tube to his flat and suddenly I was utterly sober.

  ‘I’m fine,’ I said.

  There was one practical consideration to take care of, which meant Fitz buying condoms from a twenty-four-hour shop while I loitered outside in the cool night air, thinking, There’s still time to change your mind.

  ‘I feel like a teenager,’ Fitz muttered under his breath as we walked away.

  ‘Well, it’s too bad,’ I said, laughing, ‘that you don’t look like one.’

  Once inside his flat we embraced and kissed, absorbing the feel, the smell, the taste of each other, hands remembering the contours of our bodies and the way they fitted together.

  ‘Hold on,’ he said as we stumbled up against the wall. ‘Let’s do this in comfort. Just give me a minute.’ He opened the door to his bedroom, one finger held up. ‘One minute.’

  I used the bathroom, and stood before the mirror, brushing my hair to soothe my nerves. I wiped away small smudges of make-up and then stared for a moment at this strange creature who looked a little wild-eyed. My head felt numb, as though padded with cotton wool. ‘Don’t be silly,’ I said to the person in the mirror. ‘It’s just Fitz.’

  When I went into the bedroom he was tidying something into a cupboard. He shut the door and fished a lighter from his pocket, lit two candles on the drawers.

  He turned to me. ‘You always liked the half-light.’

  It was as if I’d been shot in the heart. Stunned, I sat down heavily on the bed. ‘Christ, Fitz. Don’t do that.’

  He frowned. ‘What?’

  ‘Remind me what we’ve missed out on.’

  He came and sat beside me. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said.
I waited for him to put his arms round me, or kiss me, or something, but he was just looking down at the floor, hands clasped loosely between his legs.

  ‘We don’t have to do this,’ he said. ‘I can call you a cab.’

  I shivered suddenly. ‘Can we get into bed? Let me just lie next to you.’

  We undressed without looking at each other, got under the covers and lay still. For a while I had no thoughts in my head and nothing to say, I just lay there, feeling warmth slowly return to me and the racing of my heart subside. Gradually I became intensely aware of his body next to mine, but it wasn’t so much a sexual feeling, more like the animal pleasure I’d always had with him, that pure enjoyment of being naked, without defence. I reached my hand across for his, took hold of it. Slowly we started talking, just random things, about the evening, about Alex. And then there was a shift, a gear-change into talking about ourselves — taking each other back through layers of living, selecting events and episodes that somehow or other we triggered. Finally I got to hear about Fitz’s marriage, when he was twenty-four, and in which, he confessed, they both behaved pretty badly.

  ‘Neither of us was ready for marriage,’ he said. ‘That’s about it. We could have tried harder but we didn’t have the stomach for it. She was a nice girl,’ he added. ‘But seriously unfaithful.’

  ‘And what were you?’

  ‘Me? I was becoming a philanderer. Then I stopped. Got out.’

  We talked on into the early hours, with longer and longer gaps between stories, the candles flickering lower and lower. At some point I turned over onto my side, facing Fitz, who turned towards me. I could just make out his features, and saw him smile. He traced the line of my jaw with one finger.

  ‘All those years,’ he said.

  We fell asleep for a couple of hours, a light, dazed sort of sleep, aware of each other’s stirrings, of lighter or heavier breathing. It was half-past three — I had just looked — when we reached for each other wordlessly and began to make love. All the anxiety of it not being right, or just not living up to some huge expectation, all of that was subsumed by the lust of half-sleep.

  Soon I was catching the beautiful urgency that being with Fitz had always induced, like a train on a track, with only one endpoint. I closed my eyes, imagining his old room, imagining we still lay on that lumpy mattress on the floor. You can’t go back, I told myself, this is now, but when I heard Fitz groan I almost got there; in the last moments it was as though we’d never been apart, as though we’d moved seamlessly from past to present without a jolt, without a backward glance.

  When finally we rolled away from each other we were exhausted, and slept like the dead.

  *

  In the morning I woke at eight, alone. The flat was silent and still. Fitz had obviously showered, dressed, breakfasted and left, all while I was asleep. How had that happened? It used to be the other way round, that Fitz would slumber on while I padded about, or sat with Alex in the kitchen. I remembered blurrily telling him I would be in no rush, knowing I had the morning set aside to write a report, which was mostly done. I’d said wake me before you go to work but there was a note on the bedside table, propped up next to a cup of cold tea, saying that I’d been in such a deep sleep he hadn’t had the heart. I smiled lazily as I read it, with its small but definite kiss at the end, and then burrowed down into the bed with my head under the covers, replaying last night and trying hard not to think about cold reality until I had to.

  Eventually I forced myself out of bed. I showered and dressed, then made coffee and toast even though I wasn’t hungry, hoping food would stave off an incipient headache. Outside the sky was brightening, gleaming with the promise of sun. Looking out of the kitchen window, I could see all Fitz’s pot plants being buffeted by a strong breeze. One of them, a baby fuchsia, had come adrift from its support and flopped sadly over the side of the pot. I looked around for a key to the back door, so I might go and rescue it, but couldn’t see one.

  It was so quiet in Fitz’s flat; the only sound came from the dripping of the cold tap. I tried shutting it down tighter, but drips still formed and fell with monotonous regularity, into a plate in the sink that brimmed with water. I moved it to one side, watched the water slop out and trickle down the plughole. By the side of the sink sat dishes and plates, encrusted with the remnants from last night’s meal and this morning’s breakfast. There were two pans put to soak and a drainer that contained a clean version of everything: one glass, one mug, one plate, one saucepan and one frying pan. Everything looked a little forlorn.

  Coffee in hand, I wandered round the flat for a while, absorbing the small details of Fitz’s life: films he’d watched, books he’d read, all the music, of course, that he’d collected. In the spare room, where his vinyl and CDs lined the walls, I searched for some of the old records that we’d listened to together. Dylan, Jefferson Airplane, Pink Floyd, The Clash, The Stranglers, The Ramones, Donna Summer: all still there. I slid one or two out from their alphabetically assigned slots and held them up to my nose, sniffing them, wondering if I would catch that peculiar musty scent that had pervaded the squat, but all I could smell was plastic and card. I replaced them carefully. On the fourth wall were old posters, and a pin-board dotted with flyers for gigs and tours. Some of them had been ringed and there was a pair of tickets pinned on for a band I’d never heard of.

  In my wanderings I stopped to examine photos, on window sills and shelves. Some were obviously family — the likenesses were striking — and then random others: friends, holiday shots, a cycling group. I studied them all; his friends with a vague curiosity, his family more intently, trying to work out who was who, or which year it might have been — big eighties hair or skinny nineties jeans. There was a noticeable absence in this gallery of people; there were none of him and a woman who might be Kirsty. I went back into the bedroom, but there were no photos at all. Then I remembered how I’d seen him put something away, in the cupboard. I went and stood by it, my hand hovering on the handle. Gingerly, the sense of intruding like grit in my soul, I opened the door. There they were, photo frames, lying face down on a shelf.

  I lifted them out, placed them on top of the drawers, examined them closely. There was Kirsty on a beach with her boys, all grinning at the camera. On her own in another, in an evening gown. Then one with Fitz, leaning into him, her arm around his waist, looking confident and assured. She looked younger than us — us? — by several years, with the sort of beauty that came from knowing who you were and where you belonged. Dark, slender, although a little severe. Her eyes stared straight into mine, challenging. They seemed to see the emptiness I was only just holding back. These photos, all the photos, made me feel like the outsider I was, viewing Fitz through the lens of spent decades, a whole swathe of life that was lost to me.

  My phone rang, startling me, its shrill tone piercing the silence. I scrabbled around, finally locating my bag under my jacket, my heart jumping crazily when I saw it was Fitz.

  ‘Hi. How are you?’

  ‘I’m fine, fine,’ I said breezily, a little too breezily; I didn’t want him to think I could cheat on Phil with such impunity. ‘Well, you know.’

  ‘Where are you?’

  ‘Still at yours. I’m just about to leave.’

  ‘Did you find everything?’ My head swam for a moment, eyeing the photos I’d discovered. ‘You’ve had some breakfast?’

  ‘Yes.’ I sat down on the bed. ‘A little. I’m not hungry.’

  ‘If you want any paracetamol they’re in the drawer of my bedside table.’ I laughed, and said how had he guessed and that I might take some. ‘You were sleeping like a baby,’ he went on. ‘I thought you must need it. I hope you don’t mind I didn’t wake you?’

  I found I had to think about this.

  ‘Beth?’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘You don’t mind?’

  ‘No. It’s okay.’ I would have liked to see him, though, to know that he could still look me in the eye. ‘I’m going back
to my hotel now,’ I said. ‘Then I have a quick meeting at work this afternoon.’

  I waited for him to say, ‘Shall we meet, later?’

  ‘I’m going to Cornwall this evening,’ he said. He sounded matter-of-fact and I thought he must have decided that that was the best way to manage the situation, to deal in facts. ‘Catching the train straight after work. We’re going to a wedding tomorrow,’ he added, as if he needed to explain.

  ‘Oh. I didn’t know that.’ Stupid woman, I chided myself, why would you?

  ‘I didn’t say anything last night, it wasn’t…’

  ‘A good time?’ I suggested, and he rushed to say that he knew what it must look like but he hadn’t planned last night to happen, that the bad timing was just that. ‘Look, it’s okay, Fitz,’ I said. ‘We’re both grown-ups and we know what the score is. And anyway, if you weren’t going away we’d be tempted to repeat it and then we’d be in a proper mess, wouldn’t we?’

  ‘Beth…’ I waited resignedly for this conversation to be over, so that I could begin to work out how bad I was going to feel. ‘Last night was, you know, it was just great. I…it’s so complicated. I mean—’

  ‘Fitz, I know. Neither of us is free.’ I heard him sigh heavily. ‘I’m fine, honestly. Have a good weekend. Bye.’

  I rang off, before he had time to say more, to spell things out, then stared blankly at the text that immediately followed.

  Will ring Mon

  Feeling slightly sick and with a headache now digging itself in I opened the bedside drawer. A pack of codeine nestled near the front. Heavy-duty. Just what I needed. I took two with the water that Fitz had brought me some time in the early hours, then picked up my bag and jacket. I was at the door, about to leave, when I thought: something in that drawer spoke to me. I didn’t know what it was but I knew I had to go back and look. I opened the drawer again and searched the contents with my eyes, just my eyes, not wanting to disturb anything. There it was, nestling at the back. A smooth grey pebble, marbled with white in the shape of a B.