by philip boyle
And Edie? The boxer had dreamt of love. He had no means of finding her. His vain, stupid attempts had infected all those around him. Why should her fate have been any different? Linda was falling asleep against his shoulder. Angry with her for interrupting his thoughts of Edie, he wanted to push her away. He took her head gently and placed it back against her own seat. Very slowly he moved out of the seat. He stood in the aisle and looked down at her. Her head rolled against the window. Whatever she had taken had worked its miracle. He noticed the driver was taking his seat so Eddie grabbed his bag from the space overhead and hurried to the front of the bus.
But even then Eddie couldn’t make it. He was forever stuck on that bridge. Looking forward, looking back, always a reason to stay, to move ahead, to turn around and retrace his steps. What was it this time? The driver’s pissed look, the frowning faces of all the other passengers wondering if he was going to delay them. Just minutes ago he was planning what he would do in Edinburgh and here he was on the verge of leaving the bus, looking down the steep steel step to the concourse. And then. And then?
‘Do I close the doors or not, pal? You coming or going?’ Even the driver’s voice had a permanent scowl. ‘I got a schedule to keep.’
‘I’m staying,’ said Eddie, his indecision indecisive. He forced his way past the reclining elbows and the relaxing heads, making his way back to Linda who barely stirred, who looked oh so much younger bowed against the window. Even the tiny bumps as the bus started to move couldn’t disturb her clearly pleasant reveries. He sat down beside her and wanted to follow her down. He closed his eyes but the movement soon made him feel a little ill. Opened them again and the slight nausea passed. Trying to think of nothing while everything rushed in on him. Out on the street that glowed with false glamour, past green glowing football fans on their way back from a match, Eddie couldn’t tell if they’d won or lost. Probably didn’t really matter to most because this was the reason they were here, being part of it, being something they couldn’t be on their own. All his life Eddie had craved and looked down on such belongings. Gone, on the outskirts now, the city was gone, warehouses deserted, desperate lovers at a broken bus stop, fields, houses always in the distance. Now his eyes closed of their own accord and he was finally gone.
Temoxin. A few of them already taken. By her? Amidst the contents of the bag which she’d spilled all over the bedroom floor, this packet of pills was the only thing that she hadn’t seen before. She assumed they were meant for her. They had been so kind to provide all of the other items necessary for her survival. She listened for the woman downstairs, for every creaking step and bone. The bed was ocean floor soft and Edie was on the verge but couldn’t quite make it. How long she lay there she wasn’t sure but her legs were gooseflesh. And it was spreading through the rest of her body. Her heart was racing. She sat up in the dark, making it a little easier. There was still a light out on the landing. She lay back down again and thought her mind was a little easier. Then it came to her. Where had she slept the night before? It seemed impossible not to be able to remember that. As if she had only been born today. On that beach.
She was seized with panic as she heard the woman on the stairs. The shadow of her body against the door, blocking out the landing light. At the door, pressed against it surely. Edie sat up quickly, fumbled for a light, found a lamp and managed to turn it on. The dark echo at the bottom of the door and then the handle turning, squealing in delight and the woman was in the doorway. Edie had fidgeted from the bed, grabbing clothes from the floor, as if they might protect her.
‘I just came to see if you were alright?’ the woman said, frightened spectral eyes, bulging blue veins on the skeletal face. Edie looked towards the old woman’s hands, one was hidden behind the door. Needle in her hand, needle, dripping poison from the tip, waiting, needle in her— The woman was in the room, empty hands clasping each other, no needle, no implements of torture. ‘What’s the matter, dear? Oh, God, look at you.’
‘Where – where was I last night? I don’t know.’ The woman was wrapping a blanket around her, covering Edie’s insipid body. The woman pulled Edie’s shaking head into her shoulder and her old tears fell on Edie’s punished body. ‘Come, come with me.’ Edie had been dressed somehow by this thin slip of a landlady and they were descending steep stairs. The heat in the front room was gloriously oppressive. Edie felt alive again, tired, but she was willing to wait for sleep. She asked for some of the lights to be turned off. She asked for the TV to be turned on. She didn’t want to be left alone, didn’t want this comfort to end, but she didn’t really want to talk either.
‘My name’s Verna Lake, by the way. Some people call me Veronica.’ She laughed at this although Edie had no idea what the joke was. Did this mean she had to tell this kind woman her own name? She could, she remembered that at least, but it would be the gates of the flood opening wide.
‘Edie.’ Verna put out her hand to be shaken, a creasing smile on her creased face. Edie was slow to see it and placed her bony hand in the other.
‘Edie, what a lovely name, almost Victorian.’
‘It’s not my real name,’ said Edie quickly. Why, why the hell had she said that? Was this her judgment day, was this her God sitting beside her, in the form of a too-kindly woman so as not to frighten her? It would make a kind of sense if she was dead. She had woken on her heaven beach with no memory and she was sitting now in the front room of her dreams, no memory but the vaguest sense of herself. And she had told God her name, only to realize that she had lied and corrected herself immediately.
‘No?’ asked Verna.
‘I took it as a stage name. After a black singer from Jackson, Mississippi, do you believe that?’
‘Stage name? You mean you’re an actress, singer, oh my God?’
‘Well,’ continued Edie, the gates of truth open wide past the point of return stable door and all that. ‘I… I was a singer.’
I was a singer.
‘A singer!’ exclaimed Verna with unearthly excitement. She poured more tea from the elaborate teapot on the low table in front of them. From her fragile china cup Verna sipped tea so slowly that time almost appeared to stop.
‘A singer,’ repeated Edie in a whisper of repeat, not believing it herself. For the next few minutes they trawled through station after station on the TV. Like a quick précis of the history of the word. War, famine, murder, sex, destruction, laughter, money, death. Always death.
‘Stop,’ said Edie.
‘What?’
‘Go back, please.’
Verna went back slowly through the stations. ‘There,’ said Edie. ‘There.’ On the flickering screen that threatened to die at any moment. Two boxers in a ring, one black, one white, one bloated and bleeding, the other bouncing and preening, moving in light circles around his ragged opponent.
‘You mean this?’ asked a shocked Verna. ‘But this is—’ Her protests were cut short as she realized that Edie was gone, rapt, lost in the violent images. Edie’s whole body had relaxed, her face looked younger, a hint of colour there, her lips parted with a saliva bond. What exactly was she seeing? She didn’t quite know, beyond what was on the screen in front of her, bleating, battering souls moving in ever slower patterns until eventually they merged and tried to kill each other. It was there, she knew, in there, and she tapped the side of her own head. She’d been there, not to that place exactly, but to places like it, or she’d seen such things. The two men were sitting on stools on opposite ends of the ring, water being poured down over their sweltering faces. A close-up on the white boxer showed bruises forming, already formed, a blade sliced open one wound above the eye and fresh luscious blood poured out. The man hardly moved, his eyes were staring at some invisible horror right in front of him. A bell sounded and he got reluctantly to his feet. What was she seeing? A metaphor too obvious even for her deranged, distracted mind. It was more than parable, more than allusion. The fight ended in relief for white, even in defeat. The screen went dark. Verna t
urned Edie’s face to hers.
‘Edie, what is it?’
What is it?
‘Verna, where are we?’
‘I don’t understand.’
‘Where am I now?’
‘In my house. This is my guesthouse. What is it?’
‘I know. But, where is it? What is the name of this place, this town?’
‘Galston.’
‘And where is Galston? What part of the country? Where are we near?’
‘What happened to you, Edie? Will you tell me?’
‘If you tell me where we are.’
‘Well, we’re in Galston as I said. It’s in the south of England. We’re just a small place. Nothing really happens here. The nearest large town or city I suppose would be Brighton, although I rarely go there. An ugly place full of ugly people.’
‘Brighton,’ said Edie and Verna could swear she saw a smile on Edie’s face. A smile of joy, of horror, it could have been either one. Or something worse. ‘I’ve been there.’
‘You said you’d tell me what happened, Edie?’
A story to tell, in fragments and pieces, is still a story. Sometimes it’s all the clothes a person has on his back. Only thing that keeps them warm, keeps them alive.
‘Well, I’ll tell you about Brighton, what I remember anyway.’
CHAPTER 32
Eddie and Linda The dream was gone the moment he woke. He wanted so much to remember it, to go back into it. The bus was gliding through city streets, turning in wide slow arcs. Linda was awake beside him. Well, her eyes were open although she didn’t appear conscious of him or anything else. Her left hand was closed tight in a fist and it beat down repeatedly on her leg. Past her face to the window, to the street, to signs for Grassmarket and the Castle.
Linda didn’t want to get off the bus, didn’t want to walk whatever distance lay to the house. Eddie suggested a taxi and she didn’t want that either. She looked exhausted and electrified at the same time. She could party all night or sleep for a generation. She seemed to have finally realized where she was. Saw him for the first time. She looked somewhat disappointed.
‘A drink,’ she offered as if she would accept no other. He was going to protest but thought what harm could come of it. He wanted one himself, wanted several. Maybe then she would disappear. Maybe all the women would disappear. They chose the ubiquitous thorns of Rose Street where everyone appeared to find their way to in the end. He let her choose the place and it was apparent that she knew or had known every cracked stone on this broken beer bottle boulevard where tourist and plague-infested alcoholic crossed swords in a battle with no victor only losers. The bouncer on the door locked eyes with Eddie and both acknowledged their equal lowly status in the world. The pub, bar, Neanderthal world was not exactly what Eddie had wanted. He wanted a dark low bar of sweating wooden beams that leaked old ales and hard clear spirits. This however was old trying to look new. Bright as the sun, loud as the end of the world, it heaved, hounded. People didn’t speak they simply moved to the rhythm of the impending apocalypse.
Linda was alive and dead, her eyes too wide, her body shaking because it craved rest. She started with a shot. Eddie drank a beer and felt like her grandfather. She touched him and indicated the tiny dance floor where fluorescent teenagers moved and drove demons from their bodies. ‘Come on,’ she said gleefully.
‘You kidding?’ said Eddie.
‘Why not, because we’re too old? We’d embarrass ourselves? Look at them. That’s the point of it. They’ve had shite weeks, they lead shite lives, that’s what they come here for. I’ve had a shite day, haven’t you?’
Another shot, another vibration of the eye and her legs slithered off the stool and headed for the floor. She didn’t look back, she had forgotten him already. He turned away, intending not to look, but, the music pounding mournfully like an addictive hammer forced him to view the spectacle.
The kid looked nineteen although he was probably twenty-six. Carefully manicured messy hair and skinny arms that showed he had never worked a real day in his life. Slowly, like the reluctant tide Linda moved in closer to him. Following him down. He was trying to hold himself back, contain his excitement, believe his luck. Eddie was the spectator at the slow-motion crash. The accident was not the result of a regretted kiss or touch but simply the intervention of an anorexic blonde who took grave offence at her territory being invaded by Linda hell-bent on destroying everything around her. There is always a moment, a still space in-between when it can possibly all be averted. Eddie simply closed his eyes in that moment. Opened them again to the sight of Linda, supposed normal mother of two from the suburbs, raising her hand to grab the dyed dead hair of the blonde who hadn’t the intelligence to recognize madness when it was swaying in front of her. The girl was dragged to the edge of the dance floor, then to the ground. All stood like blind beggars at the feast, unable, unwilling to intervene, enjoying the spectacle. The poor girl cowered on the floor and her supposed boyfriend hovered meekly, weakly on the margins. Linda was intent on damage and raised her hand with such savage intent that Eddie was compelled to rush from his spot. Yes, he saw the irony, yes he saw the parable. They were every-fucking-where. He was too late to stop Linda from landing the first blow. The sound echoed, bounced, shocked all those who saw and mostly heard it. The poor girl’s head struck the hard glossy varnished surface and rebounded. As Eddie dragged Linda away, the girl sat up in stunned silence, her hand holding her right ear as if she was receiving signals from the heavens above.
Eddie could hear them coming before he saw them. Five, six doormen, replicants, black clothes, dark shadows where their eyes should have been. Linda was sitting on the floor by the bar, unable it seemed to stand. Eddie had his hands raised in surrender. He wanted to leave her there, to their mercy, let them do what they wanted. It was none of his business. When was all this ever going to end? They were both escorted from the premises with a quietness that surprised Eddie. Maybe they saw something of themselves in him. More than likely they knew they would have little trouble with him. There was enough of them after all.
Linda finally found her feet and stood snarling like a wounded animal.
‘What the fuck are you doing?’ Eddie asked with little hope of a reasoned reply. None came. She shook her head, in an attempt to clear it more than in vague answer to his question.
‘What are you even doing here anyway? Why the fuck aren’t you in Stirling? Well?’
He moved towards and then away from her. He knew she was going to cry, knew she would follow him like a dog. Scratch at his door until he let her in. And he would.
‘Where – where are we?’ Believe her or not, what did it matter? They all played him for what they could get. Was it that obvious, was it that visible on his face, his clothes, was that neon spark of gullibility jumping off him like shards of lightning?
‘A long way from home.’
‘Then we’re both in the same boat. So to speak.’ She laughed at her own illiterate alliteration. She wavered once more on her feet, her heels catching in the cobble wet with spilt alcohol. ‘Oops. Steady as she goes.’ She laughed again and put a hand out for his support. He didn’t offer it. ‘No? Aah. Poor Eddie. Loses one woman and stuck with another he can’t shake off.’
‘What did you say?’
‘I don’t know. What did I say?’ Interrupted by a sheepish group of American tourists reeking of cheap Highland whisky. Dressed in far too many clothes they sauntered blindly by, wondering aloud why everything was so un-American in this freezing country.
‘I’m tired, Eddie. Are we nearly there yet?’
‘Nearly where?’
‘Wherever we’re going. I thought you had a house. Why don’t you have a car or did you lose that as well?’ She fell before he could hit her, divine intervention causing her to lose her footing and slide ungracefully to the sodden ground. Something made Eddie turn around and there stood one of the doormen, arms crossed, legs open in the stance of a Roman statue and the ad
monishing look of a man who’d been there himself. ‘I wasn’t going to,’ Eddie wanted to say but why fool himself as well as everyone else.
‘Ye wan’ some help with her?’ was all the doorman said. Eddie shook his head, dragging Linda to her feet once more and trying to move her away from the club. From the eyes. From the cameras. To Princes Street, one arm hailing a taxi, the other holding her up. They collapsed into the back of a filthy vehicle that smelled of tangerines and Eddie smiled the part of the noble husband helping his wife back home. The driver wore a baseball cap and chewed tobacco. He winked at Eddie in apparent understanding of the situation.
It took him a while to get her out of the car when they arrived at the house. She was much heavier now, as if she was dead. She could no longer support herself at all. The lights from the taxi illuminated their inelegant arrival. As he searched for a key, Linda sat on the ground and her head was lilting to one side, precipitating further decline. The taxi long disappeared, they were now bathed in darkness. Why don’t you have a car? Where was it, he suddenly needed to remember.
He left her on the sofa in the living room. He couldn’t have carried her any further. He felt uneasy about putting her in one of the beds for some reason. The house was damp, strange, he expected squadrons of squatters in every room. Waited for the unhealthy presence of Tommy Pearson but there was nothing but the unwelcome cold. He turned on every light, trying to inject some semblance of life. Linda was groaning in her temporary slump on the uncomfortable chair. She had opened her eyes once and he was relieved to know that she was at least alive. He had no idea what she had taken, he didn’t really want to know and yet he knew that he would have to ask her. She was her own responsibility. His inability to have lost her by now made him wonder if he was too caring or too stupid. In the kitchen he kept the door to the room open so that he could listen for her. He wanted her to wake up, he wanted her to sleep without a noise for twelve, fifteen hours, so that he could find the same. There was no edible food in the house, only fragments of things which made him gag. He should clean it now while the spirit was on him, so that further infestations and growths could be prevented overnight. There was some bread in the small freezer, a pizza. It was something at least. He cooked all of it and ate half, waiting for her to wake. She should eat, she had to ingest something. Once again, perched on the edge of his own seat, wolfing down the glorious unhealthy food, he wondered at the contrast between the woman he was looking at now and the woman he had first encountered in the pub that night. Would people, Edie maybe, think the same of him if they saw him now? And who was there to see? Friends, family, there were none, at least none that he could call on at such a time as this. What a failure of his existence that was, he thought. All those years, all those attempts to lead a half-decent life, a mediocre life, no grand ambitions, just a shot at a kind of normality, the kind that always appeared to be the natural existence of everyone else. He thought he had achieved a certain level of respect in his chosen field. But it was here in front of him, his true achievements, the clear evidence that was a house that wasn’t his, rooms that smelled of regret and neglect, a woman lost, on the edge of some personal abyss and he himself, looking, always looking for something, somebody that he could never find. He didn’t own anything, the money in his pockets had been a gift from a dead man, the second such gift because he had managed to lose the first. He possessed only hopes, dreams. A piece of food lodged in his throat and for a second he thought it would stay there. He managed to swallow it but his sudden movements brought Linda to life. She looked at him from her unnatural position on the sofa and smiled weakly. He saw the woman he had always imagined her to be. It made her hippy, youthful, messy clothes looking painted on.