by Lucy English
‘Did you hear?’ said Rachel to Leah. ‘Bailey asked Jen to live at Steep Street, and she refused. She said she didn’t want a live-in.’
‘And how did he take that?’
‘How do you think? He doesn’t like people saying no. He didn’t talk to her for a week. Spoiled prick. She was doing her nut. I don’t know why she bothers.’
Bailey was now looking at Leah in a thoughtful hungry way as if he were debating whether to gobble his dinner in one go or push it round the plate. ‘Saturday arvo. Are we on one or what?’ and he drank nearly all his pint.
Now, a curious game has started between us. You look at me. I look away. I look at you. You look back. We don’t talk and the whole thing is so private, so imperceptible, I don’t think anyone else can see it. Rachel might, but she’s preoccupied listening to Declan and Sally. I’m not even sure if anything is happening at all, or if it’s just my imagination going bonkers.
Then came the confirmation. He was talking to Bill. He moved his cigarette packet nearer to Leah and tapped it with one finger. ‘Cheers,’ she said and took one. He looked round and they stared at each other. She had understood perfectly. Time was being called.
‘Come and watch the vid,’ said Bill.
‘Nah, I’ve got to do me shopping,’ said Bailey.
Carol and Ange were leaving. ‘Shop till you drop,’ said Rachel. ‘Come on Declan, we’ve got a loft to do.’ Sally was asking him round for dinner the following week.
‘Sally, come and watch a vid,’ said Bill, rescuing him.
‘I’m not watching football,’ said Sally.
‘Anything you like. You can choose.’
The others left. Leah and Bailey were putting on their coats, not looking at each other. It wasn’t until they were up the street that he turned to her. ‘Sod the shopping,’ he said.
In his house they sat by the gas fire. ‘Why were you angry with me?’ asked Leah.
‘Because you get to me. You’re dangerous, you are.’
‘I’m dangerous? You’ve got the girlfriend. You’ve invited me back here.’
He began to stroke her cheek with his finger. He traced out the shape of her eyes and then her mouth. ‘You get to me,’ he said again.
‘You get to me. I want to forget you and I can’t. I push you to the back of my mind and you creep forwards. I try not to see you and then I find I have to.’
The pupils in his eyes had widened. He was stroking her hair, rearranging it over her shoulders. She put her hands on his, not to stop him, but to make contact.
I am a starving person fallen into a food cupboard, and you are gorging yourself as well. We are a tangle of arms and tongues on your bed.
I came and you did too and now these are the silent moments. There are no barriers between us, no boundaries, no limitations. What is happening, is happening and neither of us can stop it.
She put her arms round Bailey’s neck and stared into his greeny eyes, but he was already looking uncomfortable. ‘It’s four o’clock,’ he said, ‘it’s teatime, and where’s me fags?’
They watched the football results and early evening television. He made pasta in a strange spicy sauce. They didn’t talk much but he seemed contented, unbothered by the deception that it was all right to pork Leah in the afternoon and lie about it.
Later Bill phoned. ‘We on one or what? See you at nine,’ and they got ready, Bailey changing his clothes at least three times and finally in tartan trousers, a red shirt and his hair tied back. Leah, washing herself, trying to get rid of the smell of Bailey and sex. Then she said it: ‘What on earth do we tell Bill?’
‘You had dinner, so what?’
They were going to the Tollhouse. It was down a flight of steps at the end of Steep Street. Bill will say, what did you do this afternoon, and I’ll go bright red, I know I will, I know I will. The steps ended on the Bath Road. The Tollhouse was a run-down dump next to a piece of wasteground.
It was a cider pub. It was full of rowdy young men, drunk older ones, and rowdy drunk women. There was a pool table and rickety old chairs. It smelt of cider, beer, fags and piss. There was Bill up by the jukebox.
‘So what have you been up to this afternoon?’ he said.
‘We watched the telly and I cooked dinner,’ said Bailey before Leah had time even to blush.
‘Well, Tranmere Rovers?’
‘And City’s looking good … mine’s a pint. She’s on the rough.’
The cider was cloudy and tasted like evil lemonade. Leah forced her way through half a pint. Bailey and Bill talked nonstop football.
‘Anyone else coming out?’ she asked.
‘No,’ said Bill. ‘The girls are shopped out, they’re listening to Barry White at my place. Sally went home. I got out a weepie. Bad move … and Declan’s on do-it-yourself duties. So it’s you, me and the boy wonder.’
In the Tollhouse everybody was getting very drunk. The landlord was a decrepit codger with a drinker’s red face and his wife was a blowsy old tart with bleached hair. They were drunk too. Next to Leah two lads were skinning up and Bill was doing the same. All over the pub people were smoking joints as if it were an Amsterdam café. The jukebox was turned up louder and the place was becoming hysterical. Everything Bill and Bailey said made them laugh. Leah was about three sentences behind and kept saying, ‘What?’ It was well past midnight when they stumbled on to the Bath Road.
‘Coffee at my place!’ roared Bailey.
‘Oh God, those steps,’ said Leah.
Bailey’s front room was blue and quiet. ‘Music, noise, music, noise!’ shouted Bill and put on a tape. Bailey pushed back the furniture and they danced wildly, bumping into each other.
‘Wake the neighbours!’ shouted Bill.
‘Fuck the neighbours!’ shouted Bailey.
‘Fuck the government. Fuck everything!’ shouted Bill.
‘Oh fuck,’ said Leah and fell on to the sofa. The music stopped.
‘Blimey,’ said Bailey. ‘I think it’s teatime.’
‘Noise, noise, I want noise!’ shouted Bill.
‘Shut up. I want me tea.’ He made the tea and put on the Orb, which quietened them all down until they were staring at the cracks on the ceiling.
‘That one looks like a rabbit,’ said Leah.
‘God, I’ve got rabbits on me ceiling,’ said Bailey.
She opened her eyes. Bill was going. ‘Carol’s going to do her nut. It’s gone three. What about her? Shall I walk her home?’
‘Nah, she can have the spare room.’
‘Are you going?’ said Leah.
‘You have been asleep for seventy years,’ said Bill.
‘It feels like it,’ said Leah.
‘You get the freezing cold spare room and the lumpy mattress,’ said Bill.
‘I won’t notice,’ said Leah. She tried to stand up, but she couldn’t.
Bailey laughed. ‘You are monged,’ he said.
I’m in Bailey’s bed and it’s near midday. I’ve got a headache. I can’t remember last night … yes I can … it was friendly. You are asleep with your back to me and now I feel jealous of Jen. It’s like this every weekend for her, undemanding and uncomplicated. A laugh in a pub. A late night boozy shag …
Bailey rolled over. He opened his eyes and smiled. When she didn’t respond he said, ‘Don’t think about it. You’re here and that’s that.’ He began to stroke her and she could respond to that, yes she could.
It’s not just friendly between us, like you and Jen, like a sporty romp, like last night when I was stoned and stupid.
She wasn’t laughing now. ‘You’re weird,’ said Bailey, staring at her silent face.
Leah with a headache and hot pink cheeks, and Bailey breathing hard into her neck lay in each other’s arms. I want this contact. I want to repeat it. He rolled off her and out of bed and into his dressing gown. She knew she would have to go soon. He lit a fag and looked at his watch and looked at Leah.
‘Don’t get upset,’ he said.
‘You’re beautiful,’ he said, but without emotion as if he were saying, it’s raining, or where’s me fags.
‘Will this go on?’ said Leah.
He kept fingering her hair. ‘It has to be yes,’ he said.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Bailey and Leah were a number, but Jen didn’t know, Rachel and Declan didn’t know and Al certainly didn’t know. She hardly thought of it as a relationship; it was like no relationship she had ever experienced. It was wordless and physical, but afterwards unsettling; she was glad to leave and walk home on her own. Then a few days later staring into nothingness at the Project, the whole thing had started again.
The first week of May was hot enough to sunbathe. Clive’s garden was a small paved square surrounded by raised beds; the back wall was the railway embankment. Variegated ivy grew up the walls. It wasn’t much but it was sunny, especially in the afternoon before the sun disappeared over the railway. Leah was reading one of Clive’s permaculture books. This and the sun made her sleepy.
She woke for no apparent reason. When she sat up there was Bailey. He had moved a chair and was sitting on it facing her.
‘I just turned up.’ She didn’t believe him: he looked quite comfortable and was halfway through a fag.
‘The side gate was unlocked, so I came in.’ She believed that.
He handed her her shirt; she didn’t put it on. After all, he was familiar with her nakedness. He was wearing sunglasses so she couldn’t see his eyes.
‘What’s up?’ she said.
‘Nuffin, I thought I’d pop in for a cup of tea.’
‘Pop in?’
‘No probs,’ said Bailey, not moving, ‘I was coming back from work, I thought I’d call.’
‘So you came round the back?’ Bailey didn’t answer this. She grabbed her shirt and made the tea.
They drank it silently. You have come round to have sex with me, but I won’t let you, not at Clive’s.
‘So … how’s the basketball?’
‘Mega … what you doing later?’
It was an invitation. ‘The children … dinner and all that …’
‘Shame.’ He looked at his watch.
‘But I’m free on Saturday.’
‘Are you now?’ He stood up.
I have refused you, this is the first time. Rachel said you don’t like people saying no. Bailey I want you but it’s all muddled, you are in front of me blocking out the sun.
Then, she didn’t know why, she took off her shirt and knickers, stood naked right there in Clive’s handkerchief garden. He didn’t move or touch her or even take off his sunglasses.
‘I can wait,’ said Bailey.
‘So can I,’ said Leah.
Fine weather for the rest of May. At the Project people basked outside in summer clothes. Clive changed his hat to a straw one, puffed and grunted as he worked the gardens controlling the sprouting weeds. Leah became golden, her skin, her hair golden in the sun. But Bailey didn’t contact her.
The last week of May in the half-term holiday, she went to Ruislip to see her mother. I am taut like stretched rope, I was alive and golden, but Bailey was nowhere. If I saw him I would quake, all this held up inside me would pounce out and be visible. My mother’s house is ordered and clean, this is calming.
She was shown all Felicity’s improvements in the garden. The pergola was in place with roses planted to grow up it; a new path led to a wooden seat under what was to be a bower of climbing plants. Leah and her mother sat there while the boys ran in and out of the pergola.
‘The garden was a mess for nearly a month,’ said Mrs Claremont.
‘It’s very impressive,’ said Leah.
Felicity came into the garden, dressed in a long-sleeved shirt and a floppy hat; the sun brought her up in a rash. She sat on the bench too.
‘You’ve done a good job,’ said Leah.
‘They mustn’t bump the roses or they won’t take.’ Felicity looked at her nephews.
‘I’ll tell them,’ said Leah.
‘It’s York stone,’ said Felicity, tapping the path with a sensible shoe. ‘God it was heavy.’ She surveyed her work: nothing she ever did pleased her, but Mama was pleased sitting there with her two daughters and three grandsons.
‘Daddy Claremont would have liked it,’ she said with just a catch in her voice.
A week of shopping trips, teatime in the garden. Felicity had plans for the front now, so they all had to talk about those. Jimbo turned up but Chloe didn’t, Edouard had a rash and it might be chickenpox. The sun shone. It was the hottest May they could remember.
The sun cannot last, and I cannot last. Back in Bristol is Bailey.
She couldn’t sleep. It was past midnight, she had read all the art books but this hadn’t helped.
I think of naked gods and angels, Bailey in a sleeveless top. At Clive’s I will leave and walk across the park. Early evening the sun is setting in pink, orange streaks behind me in a dream.
Walking up the Wells Road to Steep Street, a half-light now over the town, but it’s not the evening; it’s early morning, there is no breeze, a lorry comes up the hill heavy and slow with its lights on. By the small park a cat sits at the bottom of the slide, quite still, not asleep, but listening in that quiet intense way. A tabby cat with black markings. I’m outside Bailey’s door, I’m inside and going upstairs. I’m in Bailey’s bedroom, a candle is burning, he fell asleep and forgot to blow it out, an ashtray full of joints, bedclothes all over, and you underneath with a foot sticking out, on your front. I’m naked and I walked like that across the park. I’m tired and I want to sleep in your bed: it feels peaceful, I want to be nowhere else in the world.
Instinctively she bent over and touched his foot, her hand was real and his foot was real, Bailey rolled over and shouted, ‘What the fuck …’, the candle spluttered out and they both looked at it. The morning sun shone through a crack in the curtains and dazzled her. She was in her mother’s house in Ruislip. It was yet another bright day. She wanted to return: she closed her eyes as if doing that would send her back, but she could see nothing. Along the corridor the children were already awake, her mother saying, ‘Now, get dressed, boys and I’ll make you toast. Leah are you getting up, shall we have breakfast on the patio?’
Going back to Bristol, Al coming round to collect the children, I want to see Bailey, blots everything out, even Al.
‘Well how was Ruislip then, and your darling mother?’
‘She’s fine,’ said Leah.
‘Outings, trips, meals, presents? More money to splash on her poor daughter with the nasty husband. Ex-husband, I forgot.’
‘We had a nice time.’
‘Nice, nice? Everything with you is so nice. Would you like to ask me how my week was?’
‘How was your week?’ said Leah.
‘I missed my children, I got drunk a lot. Last night I was so pissed off I smashed the bathroom window. The bathroom reminded me of you for some reason. Damp and cold.’
‘Daddy’s broken a window,’ said Ben who was listening.
‘Have you packed your bags?’ said Leah. ‘Have you got what you need for Daddy’s?’
‘What window?’ said Jo.
‘Why?’ said Tom.
‘Are you ready yet?’ said Leah. ‘It’s time to go,’ but Al wasn’t shifting.
‘I want to talk to you.’ He rolled a cigarette. ‘I know this mood, you’re hiding something.’
‘I’ve nothing to hide,’ said Leah.
‘Haven’t you?’ But Leah knew he was bluffing.
‘I’ve just split up with you, I don’t want anybody else.’ I’m scared, this is such a lie.
‘Well …’ said Al.
At this point Clive and Tatty came back from the park. Tatty was so excited to see the children she piddled on the floor. In the confusion Leah managed to guide Al and the boys out of the door. When they w
ere completely out of sight she exchanged a few sentences with Clive, then dashed across the park to the Woolpack, but Bailey wasn’t there. She stayed till six, then went to see Rachel, who opened the door in a boilersuit with a big paintbrush in her hand.
‘We’re doing up the kitchen, or rather, I am. Declan took Oliver out to buy some lemons, two hours ago. How can you spend two hours buying lemons?’
It wasn’t until Monday that she was clear in her mind what she needed to do. She took a bus to Cotham Hill.
It will be easy, Bailey will come up to me and say, ‘Fag break?’ and I will say, ‘I want to see you.’ Just like that.
She strode into the Red Café like an Amazon queen. Bailey was at the counter polishing cups; the café was not busy. He looked at her. ‘Whatcha want?’
‘Hi!’ said Leah. ‘How’s it going?’
‘Whatcha want?’
‘A coffee and a Danish. I was just going up to the school. What a lovely day, you think they’d never heard of rain.’
‘₤1.50,’ said Bailey and took her money.
She sat by the window staring at the vegetable shop. I hate him, he walks in and out of me like I’m a cupboard and I can’t turn it round.
He was chatting to one of the waitresses, a girl with curly brown hair. ‘Fag break?’ he said to her. ‘I wouldn’t mind,’ said the girl. They sat down up the other end of the café. There was a copy of the Daily Mail on the table and Leah read all of it, every bit, and listened to the conversation but it was all jokes and banter about people she didn’t know. Some customers came in. Bailey went back to work. Leah did the crossword. She ordered another coffee. Bailey was getting edgy. He was cleaning the tables and keeping an eye on her. Then he was at her table.
‘Finished yet?’ He picked up her plate.
‘I want you,’ said Leah in a whisper, but he heard, she could tell.
Early June rained every day, hard pelting rain. Leah didn’t go out except to work. She stayed in every evening, watching telly with Clive. She was grumpy and fed up. Work was boring, her children were boring, Clive was boring and as for Bailey she just wanted to push him into a puddle.
The clouds blew away, but Leah felt no compulsion to go out, none at all. Sunday morning Rachel phoned.