by Heidi James
‘You should be a detective.’
‘Nope, I just pay attention. Best way to avoid trouble.’ She raised her eyebrows and winked. ‘I don’t like trouble.’
They went upstairs, ducking their heads into each room to finish off her tour. She asked questions, pointed to photos and paintings, wanted to know who was who, when and what. He was her tour guide, giving her the abridged and exaggerated family history. He had never felt so fascinating.
In his bedroom, she kicked off her shoes and sat on the bed, leaning back against the wall, while he perched on the chair by the desk.
‘Nice.’ She nodded at the posters of Sonic Youth and the Beastie Boys tacked up over the pale blue walls. She reached out and grabbed Cecil from the plumped pillow.
‘You still have a teddy?’ She sat him on her lap, facing Marcus and finished her juice, her face magnified by the curved glass.
‘Well, I don’t cuddle him at night, if that’s what you’re asking.’
‘That’s alright. There’s nothing wrong with needing a cuddle from your teddy.’ She laughed and put her glass on the bedside table, before sitting back and turning the toy towards her. ‘What’s his name?’
‘The bear?’ The soles of her socks were worn thin, and there was a small hole by her big toe. She saw him looking and tucked her feet up under her bottom.
‘Of course the bear.’
‘Cecil.’
‘Hello, Cecil. Nice to meet you.’ She pressed the paw of the bear with her fingers and pretended to shake his hand. ‘Anyone else you going to introduce me to?’
‘Not right now,’ he said, unsure if she was teasing or not. He knelt down by the stereo stack and pressed play on the CD. Prince, intoning like a preacher over a wavering organ chord, oozed from the speakers.
‘Good choice. Unexpected, but good. Love this album,’ She put Cecil back and lay on her side, her head propped on her hand. ‘It’s a shame you’ve only got Cecil, ’cause I have a bunch of busted-up Barbie dolls for you to meet.’ She pulled her lower lip into her mouth, resting her top teeth there for a moment.
‘Can I ask you a question?’ He’d settled back, sitting on the floor by the fireplace.
‘You can ask. It doesn’t mean I’ll answer.’
‘What’s going on with Georgie?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘You know, you seemed a bit upset that day, after we saw her.’
‘Was I? I don’t remember feeling upset.’
‘Well, quiet then.’
‘She has a lot to lose, that’s all. And she wants to be liked so much that sometimes she tries too hard, she does stupid things.’
‘Oh, OK.’ He’d never heard anyone their age speak like that before. ‘I thought you were annoyed at me.’
‘Really? Why?’
‘I don’t know, you just went quiet and I thought I’d done something wrong.’
‘Nope. I’ll tell you if you upset me. My turn to ask a question.’ She turned over onto her stomach, resting her chin on her hands. ‘Why did you leave Coombe Hall?’
‘Because I hated it.’ He swallowed the flood of nervous spit in his mouth with a loud gulp.
‘Really? Do you like Danner?’ She raised her eyebrows.
‘Eh, no, but it’s better than Tomb Hall. Seriously, you have no idea how awful it was there.’
‘OK, if you say so.’ She turned over onto her back, closed her eyes and lay still except for her fingers that twitched and plucked at an air guitar. The music filled the space and he picked up the CD cover and pretended to read the back, blushing. He didn’t plan to be honest about who he was. The thought didn’t occur to him, not then; it wouldn’t until much later. She would always be the one to uncover the truth, to see it clearly. She made it happen. She was the catalyst.
‘I was kicked out of Coombe Hall.’ He put the cover back down. She didn’t sit up, she just turned her head towards him a fraction to indicate she was listening.
‘Someone found a love letter I’d written and gave it to the Headmaster.’
‘Kicked out because of a love letter,’ she said, almost under her breath; not so much a question or a statement, but an acknowledgement, letting him know she’d heard but not pressing him to continue. She watched as he pressed the heels of his hands into his eye sockets, plugging up the tears that stung his lids.
‘It was to my best friend, Anthony. His parents found it and went mad.’
She sat up on the edge of the bed and leaned forward, her elbows resting on her knees, her hair covering most of her face. He could hear her breathing, slowly, calmly. She looked up through her hair. ‘What did your mum say?’
‘She thought they’d overreacted, that they’d misunderstood my letter, that they were the perverts, not me. She couldn’t do anything about it though, and I didn’t want her to. I wanted to leave.’
‘And Anthony?’
‘I haven’t heard from him since.’ Then he started crying, heaving as though he might be sick. Half-blinded by a mess of tears and spit and snot, he felt rather than saw Mel put her arms around him. She pulled him in close and starting rocking back and forth as if he were a baby, slowly keeping pace with the rhythm of her breathing. Her hipbone pressed against him and he could feel her soft breast against his arm. The contradiction of her body, hard bone and soft flesh, was pure comfort and he let her hold him, crying a little harder so she wouldn’t let go.
Then, aware that his tears had become a lie, he shifted and sat up, rubbing his face.
‘Sorry. What a cry-baby.’
She got up and moved over to the shelves by the desk where his CDs and vinyl were stacked in neat rows.
‘Let’s have a DJ change, this song is sad.’ She peered at the spines of the covers, chewing on the inside of her cheek, and he wiped his face on his school jumper. ‘This will be perfect.’ She pulled a CD from the shelf, plucked it from the case and swapped it in the machine. ‘The Beastie Boys! You can’t beat these bad boys to cure what fucks with you. Hang on a sec, I just need to find…’ She pressed the forward button until she found what she wanted and then got up, bouncing around the room and rapping along to Fight for your Right. ‘What do you think? Have I got the moves?’ She started banging her head with the beat, flipping her hair around her shoulders and banging imaginary drums.
Looking in from the outside, it would be easy to assume a sweet and clumsy teenage romance was in the offing, but this was no such thing. Later, when he is a grown man, Marcus will pity those who confuse love with the ancient urges of the body. He will think love is something pure, untouchable.
‘Come on, dance with me!’ She pulled him up next to her and wrangled his arms to make him dance, pushing and pulling them to shift his body in time to the music. ‘Come on!’ She let go of his hands and he stood there watching her as her dancing slowed to a halt. ‘What’s up?’
‘I can’t dance.’
‘Everyone can dance.’
‘I can’t.’ He folded his arms across his chest, still embarrassed and raw.
‘Who says?’
‘Everyone who has ever seen me try.’
‘And are you positive those people were equipped to judge your dancing? Was Wayne Sleep on the panel?’
‘Pardon?’ He was clueless, but no way was he admitting that he rarely watched the telly or, more accurately, that his mother rarely let him. That was a confession too far.
‘Doesn’t matter. Everyone can dance, trust me. You just have to let go. Who cares what other people think? Just have a good time.’
‘I care. I look like an idiot.’
‘Then we’ll close our eyes. Come on, it’s good for you.’ She closed her eyes and started dancing again, her shoulders and hips zigzagging. He joined in, not wanting to be a bad sport, his public school manners automatic and absolute. Closing his eyes, he shuffled on the spot
. When the song ended, he opened his eyes to find her watching. ‘OK, so we gave it a good try.’ She rolled her eyes and sat down on the floor.
‘I did warn you.’
‘You’ll just have to practice, because the alternative is that you can never, ever go out clubbing and then you will be alone and a virgin forever.’
‘Right. I’ll keep that in mind.’
She smiled, looked down at her hands in her lap – long fingers curled in towards her palms, the nails short with ragged cuticles – and the mood changed. It was a slight shift in her attention, no big statement, but they’d gone from larking about to a certain stillness in a second, just with the change in the direction of her gaze. It was strange, and at first he felt anxious wondering what to say or do, but then he realised that he didn’t have to do anything, that he could just be there, with no need to say anything. It was just peaceful. No one was being scrutinised. It was just being. There was no other way to describe it.
Then, ‘Tell me a joke?’ She had turned back towards him, her cheeks plumped by her smile, revealing one slightly chipped tooth. Returned to real time, the room resettled back in the world, tangible and precarious.
‘I don’t know any.’
‘Well that’s no good.’
‘I’ll tell you something funny, if you like? It doesn’t qualify as a joke, I don’t think. Or at least not a good one.’
‘You’re not selling this to me, you know.’
‘Well, I’m just not good at jokes.’
‘Come on then.’ She shifted as if she were settling down and getting comfortable for a long story. ‘I’m all ears.’
‘A Roman walks into a bar holds up two fingers and says, ‘Five beers, please.’
He held his fingers up in a V and laughed. ‘Get it?’
‘Yes, I get it.’ She stretched her arms above her head and yawned. ‘I’m not sure you’re supposed to laugh at your own joke, though.’
‘Can I ask you a question?’
‘Another one? Go on then.’
‘Have you had your heart broken?’
‘Nope,’ she said and shook her head decisively from one shoulder to the other.
‘Really? Have you ever been in love?’
‘Yes, I’m madly in love with Kurt Cobain.’
‘No, I mean someone real.’
‘He is real.’
‘You know what I mean. Someone we know; someone local or at school.’
She smiled her lazy, easy smile that lit up her eyes. ‘I’m saving myself for Kurt.’
‘Would you like to stay for supper, Melanie?’ his mother asked, her voice metallic, shiny and resistant. She had come in from work, a pile of files balanced under her arm, her hair damp from the soft mizzle of rain.
‘Thanks, Mrs Murray, but I have to look after my brother for my mum.’
‘I didn’t know you had a brother?’ Marcus said.
‘Well I do.’
‘Oh, how old is he?’
‘He’s two.’
‘Where does your mum work, it’s a bit late isn’t it?’
‘In a pub.’
‘Marcus, stop asking Melanie so many questions. Another time, then.’ His mother walked over to the Aga and stirred something in a pot. ‘You’re always welcome.’
‘Cheers,’ Mel nodded, her expression serious. ‘You have a lovely house and I love all your books.’
‘Thank you, dear. Feel free to borrow one, any time.’
‘I will, thanks a lot.’ She picked up her bag, tipped her head at him and left, pulling the door shut behind her.
‘Are you not going to see your guest out?’
‘She didn’t give me a chance, Mum.’ They both looked at the closed door as if expecting her to come back in and say goodbye. She didn’t.
What the Heart Can’t See
I woke early, after a crappy sleep squashed into my old bed, and felt nervous as if I were about to embark on something dangerous. But as I stood in the kitchen drinking my coffee I realised that it wasn’t the usual anxiety about work grating the lining of my gut, but something else, something half-recognised, a feeling with all the texture of a memory, something just out of reach.
I rinsed my coffee mug and checked the time – 6:03. Then I walked through to the study and sat at my father’s desk, pulling the phone and a note pad and pen over. David picked up after the second ring. It was never too early to call the news desk.
‘David?’
‘Marcus?’ His voice was still morning-slow and thick.
‘How’re you doing?’
‘I’m fine. You?’
‘Yeah, pretty good considering I’m in the wilds of Kent. What’s going on there? Anything interesting breaking?’
‘Well, you know, there’s always something…’ There was a pause, and I heard him swallow. ‘Pretty quiet without you around. What’s up?’
‘I just wondered if you’d heard anything about the supposed misappropriation of funds for the high-speed link?’ I leaned back in the chair, ducking the sun as it cut through a gap in the heavy curtains, slicing through the room like a cheese wire.
‘Why do you ask? You got something?’
‘Not really, just following a potential lead. I’m trying to get a handle on this piece Edward has got me on.’
‘Right, yeah, the body that’s turned up and scuppered work on the link.’
‘That’s the one. What about rumours of a fall-out at the Department of Transport? Or anything on Finborough?’
‘Not that I’ve heard, mate, nothing.’
‘Alright, if you do hear anything let me know, yeah?’
‘Of course. By the way, has Edward called you?’
‘Why?’
‘It could be nothing, but Edward was holed up in his office with lawyers all day yesterday. Then Jennifer said he’d been called to an emergency board meeting. I’m surprised he hasn’t spoken to you.’
‘Why would he talk to me?’
‘The St Clair story, Edward has asked to see all the files. There are… whispers. I hope your sources are reliable, Marcus.’
‘Of course they are, Edward gave me the go-ahead himself.’
‘Fair enough. Look, I’d better go, but don’t let on that I mentioned it, especially not to Edward. OK? I’m sure it’s nothing but, just in case, be careful.’ The phone went dead, and I put it on the desk, slowly.
St Clair was a private bank, one of those banks that operates behind closed doors and moves a series of promises and digital IOUs around the world, creating ever more vast black holes in the global economy. When I was first approached by my source, a tentative phone call to my desk, I thought it would be the usual story about reckless City thugs risking the country’s economy while they got ever richer, but I couldn’t have been more wrong. My story exposed them, exposed the false companies set up to bounce funds back and forth around the world, funds constructed of pixels on a screen like the dot in a game of Pong, sent one way then another before arriving in an account in Libya where the strings of codes were translated into cash, then weapons: weapons manufactured by British companies, companies partly owned by the St Clair family. The story was huge and, most importantly, it was rock solid. My instinct for a story had never been wrong.
I sat there, thinking about my source: the risks she took; the documents she showed me; the emails; the twisting trail of numbers; the recorded phone calls and photographs; the meeting with her colleague in a deserted Starbucks on the Brompton Road. It was rock solid. I had nothing to worry about; David was prone to overreaction. It was a major story and I knew there would be blowback. I’d been through this before, the scrutiny and scramble to protect the paper, the due diligence, etc. etc. It was nothing. For a moment I considered calling Edward, but I couldn’t do that to David, and anyway, I trusted Edward. Sort of.
I’d known him for years: we met on my first day at the Sentinel, hired because I’d just won the Student Journalist of the Year, which promised I’d have promise. Edward was the type that usually won all the awards. A rising star at the paper, he was the son of a milkman from Enfield and after attending the local grammar had been a star scholar at Cambridge and the editor of Varsity. Edward was the type who won no matter what, even now after all this. Anyway, together we’d made an all-right team, as long as I’d got the stories and kept my nose clean.
I padded back into the kitchen, flicking on the kettle just as Mum walked in, fully dressed and ready to go. She eyed my boxers and t-shirt. ‘Morning, darling.’
‘Morning, Mother.’ I kissed her cheek, and she stepped back, flaring her nostrils like an animal.
‘What’re you doing up so early?’
‘Just doing a bit of work, actually. Coffee?’ I dumped two spoons of instant coffee into the mugs and filled them to the brim.
‘Please. You OK? You look pale.’
‘Fine, just getting on with work.’
‘Well that’s wonderful.’ I handed her the coffee and she sat at the breakfast table. ‘What are you up to today?’
‘Going back up to the site, see if I can turn anything up.’
‘Will you be out most of the day?’
‘Looks like it.’ I wrapped my hands around the warm mug.
‘So you’ll get dressed, then? Soon? Joyce will be here at nine.’
‘Yes, I’ll get dressed. Don’t worry, I won’t embarrass you any more.’
‘You don’t embarrass me.’ She looked down at the table, her lips pinched. ‘I just don’t want to shock poor Joyce.’ She looked back up at me, a smile relaxing her mouth. We’d always been at odds, irritating each other, but we were close, too, my mother and I.
My childhood had been a clammy mix of Calpol, heavy blankets and books. Boiled sweets and the radio, like a child of the fifties not the eighties. She was over-protective but, to give her her due, she had coped with a queer son and a dead husband with all the stoicism of the Queen. I didn’t like to upset her.