The Ossians

by Doug Johnstone

  ‘You think you’re so much fucking better than us, eh?’ he said. ‘You fucking poncy prick, I should get my mates down here to give you a proper fucking doing. Where do you get off, calling us fucking ignorant? You’re fucking ignorant. Why don’t you fuck off back where you fucking came from, and take your fucking shite band with you, you sad fucking arsehole.’

  For the life of him, Connor couldn’t remember calling anyone ignorant. But he couldn’t speak. He felt the rush of pain, adrenaline and embarrassment in his face as he stood looking into the kid’s eyes, full of anger and hate. He said nothing.

  ‘Come on, Andy,’ said another guy, appearing at Burberry’s side. ‘Let’s just go to the Central, have a game of pool, eh? He’s not worth it.’

  They stood looking at each other for a few more seconds, no one saying anything. Finally the two guys moved slowly towards the door, both keeping their eyes on Connor.

  ‘If I see you again, you’re fucking dead, right?’ Burberry snarled in Connor’s face, pushing past him and out the door in a swagger.

  Now, in the bogs with Danny, he still couldn’t remember what he’d said on stage.

  ‘I never said anyone was ignorant, did I?’

  ‘I didn’t hear anything,’ said Danny. ‘But I had no monitor, so I couldn’t really hear anything except drums. It sounds like something you’d say, though.’

  He laughed, producing a smile on Connor’s face which made the pain shoot from his nose up to his forehead.

  ‘What the fuck are we doing here?’ said Connor, examining his face in the mirror.

  ‘A very good question. Apparently we’re bringing intelligent rock music to the masses of Scotland. Whether they like it or not.’

  ‘What day is it?’

  ‘Thurso, so it must be Sunday.’

  ‘And when do we get home?’

  ‘Friday night, after Glasgow.’

  ‘How many more kickings do you think I’m going to get?’

  ‘A few. Come on, I think we could do with a drink.’

  ‘That’s your answer to everything isn’t it?’ said Connor, smiling.

  Back at Sandra’s the post-gig analysis continued. Connor’s latest meeting with a fist turned out to be from the only unhappy punter in the place, and they’d stayed till closing, soaking up the pissed, enthusiastic praise. As usual, Connor got most of the attention, with Kate and Hannah getting admiring looks from across the pub but little else, which suited them just fine. Connor kept looking for that face, his effeminate angel’s face, but if the boy was at the gig, he couldn’t see him.

  ‘There’s gonna be some headaches in double maths tomorrow morning,’ said Danny, skinning up as the five of them sprawled around the boys’ bedroom.

  ‘I wouldn’t want to be their teacher,’ said Kate.

  ‘I can’t believe you got punched in the face again,’ said Paul.

  Hannah was sitting on a sofa cuddling up to Connor.

  ‘Yeah,’ she said. ‘I wish you’d take care of that pretty face of yours. It’s all right for you, but I’m the one who has to look at it all the time, and I don’t want you looking like a bulldog chewing a wasp by the end of this.’

  ‘Thanks,’ said Connor, poking her gently in the ribs. ‘I like to think of myself as a therapist-cum-punchbag. I travel round the country providing an outlet for the pent-up frustrations of small-town life, an easy target for arseholes to lash out at, representing, as I do, the exciting and glamorous rock ’n’ roll life they can never have.’

  ‘Shut up,’ said Hannah. Her talk with Kate had brought everything into focus. Before that she’d been trundling along, not thinking about this late or missed period. But then she’d had the fit, and things seemed more serious. Now, everything was imbued with thoughts of pregnancy, of babies and all the terror that involved. She didn’t want to think about it. She didn’t want to know, because once she knew, that was it, all other options, all other possibilities were gone.

  Connor got up to go to the toilet.

  ‘Get me another beer while you’re up,’ she said, feeling Kate give her a look from across the room. She avoided looking in that direction as Danny passed her a joint and she inhaled deeply.

  ‘Another day off tomorrow,’ said Danny.

  ‘Yeah,’ said Paul. ‘Not ideal in terms of money, but the next gig in Ullapool is a long drive, and we couldn’t get it booked for tomorrow anyway, so I reckoned stopping halfway wouldn’t kill us.’

  ‘Where are we staying tomorrow night, then?’ said Hannah, exhaling and passing the joint to Paul.

  ‘Durness,’ he said, taking a toke. ‘A place called the Smoo Cave Hotel. I know absolutely nothing about it except it’s cheap.’

  ‘Have you got that road map handy?’ said Connor, coming back in with a handful of beers and settling in beside Hannah again. Paul fished the map out his bag. Connor flicked to the page and traced the road along the north coast with his finger.

  ‘Fucking hell,’ he said. ‘Durness is right next to Cape Wrath. Sounds good, eh? There don’t even seem to be any roads there.’

  ‘It’s an MOD firing range or something,’ said Paul. ‘Probably some top-secret bollocks.’

  ‘Oooh, could we have an adventure, do you think?’ said Hannah. ‘Maybe we’ll uncover a drug-smuggling operation or something.’

  ‘Seeing as how we’ve got the night off, yes,’ said Paul. ‘I’ll pencil us in for a mysterious adventure. Just like Scooby Doo.’

  ‘Scooby Smoo,’ said Danny, giggling to himself.

  Paul looked at him. ‘That doesn’t even mean anything.’

  ‘I know that.’

  ‘Maybe I’d better skin up next,’ said Paul. ‘Put in a bit less of that lethal grass.’

  Connor was still examining the map closely, trying not to think about Hannah’s drug-smuggling quip.

  ‘Seeing as how we’re in no hurry,’ he said, ‘I take it no one minds if we make an extra wee stop on the way?’

  ‘Where did you have in mind?’ said Paul.

  ‘I’ll tell you when we get there.’

  ‘Oooh, we are going to have an adventure!’ said Hannah, clapping her hands. ‘Just like the Famous Five. How positively thrilling.’

  ‘Yeah, right,’ said Connor, patting her on the head. ‘Whatever you say, dear.’

  ‘And can we have lashings of ginger beer?’

  ‘You’ve lost it,’ said Danny, finishing a new joint he’d been working on. ‘Here, want to start this?’

  Hannah felt Kate looking again. She wished she hadn’t said anything if this was how it was going to pan out. There was nothing to worry about, it happened to her all the time. It wasn’t exactly unexpected under these conditions. She wasn’t bloody pregnant, so there. She took the joint and sparked it up, sucking the sweet air into her lungs and feeling her head wobble slightly as she breathed out. There really was nothing to worry about, Kate should lighten up.

  ‘Does anyone else get the feeling we’re a long way from home?’ said Danny.

  ‘Yeah,’ said Kate. ‘Before, when we were playing Aberdeen and Inverness, well, they’re still cities, aren’t they? But now it seems like we’re in the middle of nowhere.’

  ‘We are,’ said Connor. ‘And we’re going to be at the arse end of nowhere by tomorrow.’ He pointed to the map. ‘This road doesn’t look like it’ll be up to much. Probably single track for a lot of the way, it’s going to take us hours to get to Durness.’

  ‘Like you say, we’re in no hurry,’ said Paul. ‘Assuming your little detour doesn’t take us anywhere stupid or dangerous?’

  ‘As if I would do something like that.’

  9

  Durness

  ‘We stumbled on your grave, two thousand years too late

  Rolled away the stone, found your bag of bones

  The stones remember us, like the stars above

  Under northern skies, we knew we had to die’

  The Ossians, ‘Magnetic North’

  Cotton-wool clouds
raced frantically overhead. The van sat rocking as a ferocious wind pummelled it. Despite the gale, the water seemed strangely calm in the small, enclosed bay. They were parked next to a large sign, the last of several they’d driven past down a narrow dirt track. The sign read:

  WARNING

  RADIOACTIVE PARTICLES ARE BEING

  FOUND ON THE BEACHES AT SANDSIDE.

  IT IS NOT ADVISABLE TO TAKE CHILDREN

  OR ANIMALS ON TO OR DIG OR REMOVE

  MATERIAL FROM THE BEACH OR DUNES.

  Next to it Connor was absent-mindedly kicking at a pile of sand as the wind whipped his hair round his face. Behind him was a tiny stretch of sandy beach and a row of fishermen’s houses lining a small stone quay. Across the bay sat Dounreay, a giant golf ball nestled beside towering chimneys and factory blocks.

  ‘How much longer are you going to stay out there?’ shouted Paul through a slit opening of the van’s window into the tearing wind. Connor pretended not to hear and Paul wound the window up.

  ‘Does he think we’re stupid?’ said Kate in the van. ‘Does he think we don’t get it? Oooh, look what they’ve done to our beautiful country, and all that guff. A lovely beach spoilt by the nasty, big man and his nasty, big nuclear power station. Of course it’s bad. Bad things happen. Hanging about here isn’t making any difference. Except that he’s probably kicking up radioactive particles out there. Which I’m sure would cheer him up no end, martyr that he is.’

  No one else spoke. They sat for a while, the Silver Jews’ oddball country sounds playing on the stereo, struggling to be heard over the whistle and whip of the wind. Outside Connor tried to throw a stone into the sea, lost his balance and fell heavily on his arse. He sat there for a while before slowly getting to his feet, taking sideways swipes at the seat of his trousers to dust the sand off.

  ‘Some adventure,’ said Hannah.

  ‘We’ve discovered a radioactive beach,’ said Danny. ‘That’s like something the Famous Five would do, isn’t it?’

  ‘We hardly discovered it,’ said Hannah. ‘It’s been in the news. Wasn’t there some controversy about a possible increased rate of leukaemia around here? Scary, yes. An adventure, no.’

  ‘It’s pretentious,’ said Kate. ‘Standing on a radioactive beach, being all aloof like he’s Bono in a fucking U2 video. He’s got his priorities wrong. He’s all about the big statement, the grand gesture – it’s not all about tilting at windmills. There’s friends, family, relationships to deal with – everyday life that needs managing. Not something Connor’s particularly good at.’

  ‘Preaching to the converted,’ said Paul. ‘You should tell all this to radioactive boy out there.’

  The warning sign rattled as a strong gust made the van sway. The wind raged around Connor, roaring in his ears as he stared across the bay at Dounreay. From here it looked nothing special, just another factory sitting on a seafront. He tried to imagine the microscopic particles of radiation in among the grains of sand under his feet, but couldn’t get his head around it. What an adventure those particles must’ve had, all the way across this windy bay, getting swept along in the sea, or swirling about in the air for days, weeks, months, not knowing where they would end up. Another big, dumb metaphor for something. Except it wasn’t really. And metaphors suck anyway. Radiation on Scottish soil – so what? Wasn’t Aberdeen more radioactive from all the granite? Fishermen obviously lived here, and they wouldn’t do that if it was dangerous, would they? Then again, maybe they didn’t have any choice. Perhaps this had been their livelihood for generations, and their homes and families were rooted here. Then one day some boffins detect deadly shit you can’t see, and the next day they’re hammering in signs warning you not to go on your own beach.

  Connor looked back at the van. Four bored and mildly pissed-off people sat chatting inside. He felt guilty for dragging them all the way round the country on some stupid wild goose chase. For what? Some third-rate, muse-like inspiration for a shit, narrow-minded indie band, with pretensions of intelligence and a singer with a knowing self-destructive streak and a cowardly self-importance. He felt guilty for letting them think all this was about the band and the music, a record deal and show business and stadium gigs and fame, when all Connor really wanted to do was fuck it all up.

  Maybe his stalker was here for a purpose. Maybe he was a guardian angel sent to look after him, deliver him from evil, from himself, from all the bullshit in his head. Or maybe the opposite – maybe he’d come to destroy him. Was he even real? Connor tried to remember their conversation. He could picture the haunting, beautiful pale face, and the quiet, effeminate voice, but what had they talked about? Nothing much, except that he seemed to know every fucking thing that Connor had done since they’d left Edinburgh. And maybe even before that.

  He imagined telling Hannah he was being stalked by an angel, here to save or kill him. He was fed up of secrets, the kitbag full of drugs and drug money, the thoughts in his head that he couldn’t talk about. Maybe the stalker would show up at the next gig, and Connor would introduce him to the rest of the band. He would turn out to be a harmless fan and they’d all get along great. He realised this was just more bullshit in a head already crammed with the stuff.

  The wind was stronger and he was having trouble standing up. An insistent throb at the base of his skull made him reach for another two pills from his pocket. He washed them down with gin from his water bottle, hardly even noticing the burn in his throat. He wondered if he’d accidentally watered down the gin, then found himself wondering if there was anything stronger than straight gin he could be drinking to take the edge off. For fuck’s sake. Let’s get out of here.

  Connor struggled to open the van door in the wind, then had to grip on to it to stop it blowing off its hinges. He shut the door with a whump, and the raging noise the others briefly experienced was sucked out the van, leaving only muffled rumbles and creaks.

  ‘Can we fuck off out of here?’ Paul asked.

  ‘Of course,’ said Connor, then didn’t know what else to say as the van turned and bumped back up the track.

  ‘You OK?’ Hannah asked him.

  Connor didn’t answer. There wasn’t an answer.

  The wind was joined by bursts of sleet and snow. Past Dounreay the road became a rough single track, the ‘Passing Place’ signs swaying like yachts’ rigging in the ferocity of the weather. It was slow going. At Kyle of Tongue they descended the lochside to cross the expanse of eerie green water over a causeway. The van was exposed to the raging storm, large washes of spray drenching it. An exhalation of relief could be heard once they were across. The road twisted up over high ground before looping slowly round Loch Eriboll, the large geometric shapes of fish farms implacable in the water below.

  As they travelled, they saw the occasional Land Rover or farm vehicle and had to backtrack to the last passing place, Paul returning the other drivers’ waves with a nonchalance he didn’t feel. It was almost dark already, the storm bringing an early end to daylight. Driving a dodgy old van in these conditions, on a shitty road he didn’t know, with farm vehicles looming out at him from the gloom, didn’t fill him with confidence. At one point they drove past an expensive-looking executive car parked or abandoned in a passing place with no sign of anyone around, Paul tutting under his breath.

  Cornering a headland they passed a string of sandy beaches getting hammered by the elements, then spotted a sign for the Smoo Cave Hotel, indicating a grassy farm track heading out on to a clifftop. They bumped along the track past a couple of squat, whitewashed houses huddling pathetically against the storm, then the road came to an end at a rusted gate, just a barren field beyond. They U-turned, drove slowly back down the track, and realised the last house they’d passed was the hotel. A disorientating shambles of a building, it seemed to have been built in several bursts, with low extensions jutting out at odd angles. Now they looked, there was a small sign. A chink of light appeared between the shutters at one of the windows.

  ‘This is t
he end of the world,’ said Danny, peering out at the building. Paul cut the engine, leaving just the raging whoosh of the wind and the spatter of sleet on the windscreen.

  ‘Looks like it,’ said Hannah. ‘Why don’t we take a closer look?’

  As they opened the door they were hit by a breathy wailing sound. They stood in a brightly lit stone-walled bar with a pool table, a wood-burning stove crackling away in the corner and an old beaten-up piano next to it. Arranged in a semicircle to the side of the room were half a dozen primary school kids in uniform, all of them dwarfed by the glittery accordions they were struggling to see round. They grimaced as they heaved the instruments’ bellows in and out, creating an aimless caterwaul that bounced around the room.

  Admiring this racket from the bar were a cluster of men with pints of lager in their hands – two in golf jumpers, two wearing blue overalls, one guy in a dirty T-shirt and ripped jeans and a policeman with a giant whisky chaser on the go. A red-faced, balding man in his forties behind the bar spotted them loitering in the doorway and headed straight for them.

  ‘Are you The Ossians, staying the night?’ he shouted in a London accent over the howl of the accordions. He thrust a hand out.

  ‘Yeah,’ Paul shouted back at him.

  ‘I’m Derek,’ said the man. ‘Me and the missus run this place.’ He looked at the kids, who were lost in their own wee world. He stuck a thumb towards them. ‘Accordion lessons, every Monday after school. Don’t worry, they’ll finish up soon.’ He jerked his head over to the bar to indicate the men lined along it. ‘It gives the dads a chance for a quick snifter.’

  Connor watched the kids as they stuck their elbows out before jamming the two parts of the instrument back together. There seemed to be no semblance of a tune coming from anywhere, but as he listened he thought he could pick out something, a vaguely familiar lilting folk melody struggling to cut through the atonal mush around it. He looked along the line, trying to figure out which kid might be making music in among it all. He was distracted from his thoughts by the mention of alcohol.