Lily Poole

by Jack O'Donnell

  The police, after a formal review of their conduct by an outside force, had let it be known that although there wasn’t enough evidence to prosecute, they weren’t looking at any other suspects. He knew what that meant. It was written on his body. When he had been on remand in Barlinnie, the other cons had called it a waste of good sugar whilst a pot of boiling water was poured over his head, the sweet stuff acting as an adhesive. Slashed and burned with cigarettes. Sucker-punched and kicked. Fair game for anybody with a grudge and a reputation. He had been an easy target until he started to stand up for himself. All he wanted was to be left alone.

  ‘Can I help you, pal?’ John’s tone of voice had grown harsh over the years. But the youthful features of the boy standing at the door threw him a bit. He had grown wary of folk trying to make friends with him, trying to drill him for information, but he looked gormless enough not to be a rabid homebuyer on the make. John speculated it was some new tactic Mormon missionaries were using, one that included not dressing in Marks and Spencer suits and shiny shoes, not turning up like identikit two-by-two clones, but going undercover in brown leather jackets and denim faded at the knees.

  ‘Mum said there was only one person dafter in the world than her and that was you.’ His light blue eyes crinkled, moist and good-natured, sharing a joke in which they both arrived at the punchline together. ‘I’m Jack.’ He stuck his hand out for him to shake, nails pearl-white as a baby’s.

  John stood motionless. He watched Jack’s hand wavering and slipping down, slapping against his leg, and his adolescent grin sanded down to a straight line. ‘I think you’ve got the wrang house, pal.’

  ‘No,’ Jack shifted from foot to foot, unsure, but stuck at his task with a stolid stubbornness. ‘I recognise you from news clips from the Daily Record Mum showed me. She said you lived here. She said you two were really close once and you’d be able to help.’

  ‘I don’t think so, pal,’ John lowered his voice. He took a step backwards, away from the neediness lurking in the younger man’s eyes, and shoved the door shut, putting the sneck on the Yale and turning the key in the mortise. The boy’s head drooped, reminding him of the tramped-down bluebells punctuating the side beds beneath the window, and for a few seconds he felt sorry for him. He was half way up the hall before he realised his mistake. Fingers and thumbs playing funny buggers on the locks slowed him down. Then he was outside, his sandals slipping off his feet as he ran down the hill. Out of breath, he caught up with the boy at the huts. ‘Whit’s your mum’s name?’

  ‘Janine Poole.’

  A grin zipped across Jack’s face, a near permanent feature, so unlike his mother, but the lips and eyes were certainly Janine’s. The hair and the way he stood, however, reminded the older man of his younger self. ‘You better come up to the house, then, for a cup of tea.’ He traipsed up the hill ahead of Jack, listening to the footfall behind him, forcing himself not to look round, not to quickly check who was following him and if he had a weapon.

  In the kitchen, John flicked the kettle on. He had forgotten the language of small talk. Jack sat in the corner chair at the table, the smug imperviousness of youth, waiting for him to say something. He ran two mugs, both chipped at the rim, underneath the taps at the sink, and found the tea bags. ‘Whit dae you take in your tea?’ Then he bridged his awkwardness with the bluster of another innocuous question. ‘How’s your mum keeping, anyway?’

  Jack showed his good breeding. ‘Just milk, please.’ And dipping into that smile again. ‘Grand. She’s grand. She’s an accountant. Doing really well.’

  ‘An accountant!’ John tried to keep the surprise out of his voice, the shock off his face. Behind him the kettle hissed, allowing him to turn away and flick the switch off, swill the cups out into the sink and make tea.

  ‘Well, she’s always been good with numbers and spreadsheets and working things out.’ Jack’s smile dis­appeared and he spoke in a doleful way that indicated that those were the areas where he was not gifted.

  John tamped down a smirk and passed Jack his mug of tea. He sipped at his own, glancing through the steam, keeping his voice neutral. ‘Whit about your da?’

  ‘Oh, he’s an accountant too.’ His untutored smile and his earnest face made it easy to believe that the world was chock full of accountants and it was a sign of rebellion not being one.

  ‘Any brothers or sisters?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Just you, then?’

  ‘Aye, Mum had trouble with her pipes and things.’ Jack made it sound like a blocked connection to a spin dryer. His cheeks pinked and he looked away.

  John gnawed at the jagged red skin round his thumbnail. ‘And whit does your mum think I can help you with?’

  Jack would not meet John’s level gaze. Instead they scanned the woven straw placemats on the table. ‘At first I’d nightmares, stupid dreams. I’m getting ready for school. It’s always snowing outside. I keep slipping. I’m petrified, but I don’t know why. A policeman comes to help me and he’s joined by a school janitor. I don’t know how I know that because they’re wearing masks but I do. I run and run and run. They aren’t really human. They’re wolves. You know what I mean?’ He looked up to gauge John’s reaction before continuing. ‘They easily catch me. And they put me in a dark room. That’s part of the game. Then they can take their masks off. And I scream and scream and scream. But they love that. It only makes them hungrier and me more frightened. In a way, it’s hard for adults, for bigger people, to understand. And I close my eyes and hear a daft tune: Jack, Jack, where are you, where are you? I don’t know if it means anything,’ he said, his voice dropping. ‘I see what is ­happening and I’m there, but I’m also not a part of it. I can escape, and then I waken up safely in bed.’

  ‘Drink your tea,’ John urged. The cup lay in front of him untouched. ‘So, in a nutshell, you have a bad dream and then you waken up?’

  Jack curled his fingers round the mug and sipped. ‘I’ve had the same dream for as long as I can remember.’

  John coughed, slapped his chest, and cleared his throat. ‘So, you’ve had the same bad dream?’ He slurped at his tea, chewed it to help him think and made an ‘ahh’ sound when he swallowed. ‘Did your mum ever talk about me?’ He hurried on, ‘You’ve seen bits and pieces in the papers. Whit I mean is, did your mum,’ he swallowed, finding it difficult to say her name, ‘did Janine put you up to this?’

  ‘Aye, she did.’ Jack brushed awkwardness aside with a dismissive flick of his wrist and he became more resolute, leaning forward and speaking firmly. ‘But it was the little girl Ally. She said she loved you. I was to come to you because you’d understand. You promised you would find her.’

  The front door chapped, saving John from maudlin tears. ‘I better goin’ and get that.’ He stood up, slapping Jack’s shoulder on the way out. ‘I’ll no’ be a minute. Make yourself at home.’

  Jack looked about him. The kitchen walls and ceiling retained the imprint of fag smoke and the linoleum floor was torn and worn with pitted holes. It smelt familiar as an old oil rag, and the worn diamond was a pattern that prodded memory. He stood up and shut his eyes. He felt sure he’d be able to find his way in and out the living room and three bedrooms. He felt as if he’d been in the house before, and he was comfortable with that. It felt like a home from home. The front door banging shut made him sit down again and sip his tea, his face screwing up because it had become cold.

  ‘Sorry about that.’ John slapped his hands together and laughed. ‘Someone tryin’ to buy my house dirt cheap.’ He had a renewed energy after telling the profiteer where to get off. ‘Where were we?’ He refilled the kettle.

  ‘I was telling you—’

  ‘I know,’ John cut in, coughing, holding a hand over his mouth. ‘Whit dae you want me to dae?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Jack’s voice was strained. ‘I was hoping you’d be able to tell me.’

  ‘Well, to be honest, I’ve no’ got a clue.’ John’s lips parted in a slow smile. �
��Let’s have some fresh tea and we’ll work something out.’

  ‘You still see ghosts?’ Jack said, feeling more at ease.

  ‘Nah, the living haunt me in the way the dead cannae. That’s enough for me.’ John took the mugs over to the sink. He swilled them under the taps in a cursory way, splashing water on his hands, looking out at the bright spring weather and the brush of trees framed against the rain-soaked Old Kilpatrick hills. ‘You search for something your whole life and you find it’s behind you. Already passed. It’s a hungry kind of knowing that burns your flesh from the inside. That’s probably why all those saints have got a big burning bush round their heid and that startled look on their face, like they’ve seen too much. Or maybe,’ he added, fussing around, fiddling with the tea things – dash of milk, spoon and sugar – ‘they just need a good shite and it’s just a bad portrait with an artist having too many flecks of gold paint left over.’

  Jack giggled. Another mug of tea was pushed in front of him. He warmed the palms of his hands and fingers on the cup. He studied the older man’s face and felt he had to explain. ‘I’m sorry, I’m not a Catholic. I’m not much of a Christian either.’ He brooded whilst sipping tea, concluding, ‘I’m more an agnostic.’

  ‘Ah, well, believe me, if you’re no’ a Catholic, then you’re a Proddy. That’s the way the world works. Agnostic means Proddy, unless you’re a Catholic agnostic, which means you’re simply misguided.’

  ‘I’m neither Catholic nor Proddy.’

  ‘Well, in my da’s day there was a simple solution to that.’ John took a gulp of tea. ‘Whit team do you support?’

  ‘I don’t support any team.’ Jack glanced at the damp patch under the armpits on the older man’s shirt, then at the sink, his nostrils flaring from a sour smell. ‘I’m not much interested in football.’

  ‘Nah, you’re no’ allowed to say that.’ John joshed the boy. It had been a while since he’d laughed. ‘That’s like saying you support Partick Thistle. Which team would you support if you had to support a team that was not Partick Thistle?’

  ‘I prefer rugby, to be honest. I played in the first team for the school.’

  ‘Ah, well,’ he admitted, ‘you got me there. You might as well have told me you were Jewish. But then I’d need to ask: “A Catholic Jew or a Proddy Jew?”’ Growing more serious, his tone flattened. ‘Whit happened to you?’

  ‘I don’t know, I’ve always been kinda different,’ said Jack. ‘I thought it was normal to have an old woman sitting beside my bed every night, watching over me.’

  ‘Whit was she like? Did she ever speak to you?’

  ‘No she seemed content to just sit. She was old-fashioned, like something you’d see on the telly, reddish hair and a bluish dress made out of dowdy candlewick material. The smell of cigarettes always alerted me to her being there.’ He leaned across the table as if to speak in confidence, ‘I liked her. She made me feel safe.’

  John’s chair squeaked as he shifted sideways, dipped his hand into his back pocket and brought out his wallet. He put it on the table, opened it, and held out a black-and-white picture of Joey and Mary for Jack to look at. ‘Is that her? Is that the old woman?’

  Jack pursed his mouth. ‘Yeh.’

  ‘Whit about the little girls then? The one you called Ally.’ John asked, ducking his head slightly and lowering his tone.

  Jack hesitated, his Adam’s apple bobbling up and down. He slipped the photo back to John before he spoke. ‘When I was wee I didn’t bother. I’d my trusty teddy. Nothing scared me. Childish nightmares about spiders, or snakes, or falling, I faced up to them all. Then, later, the girls invaded my dreams. Took them over. Took me over. Broad hands pressed down, squeezing me. Faces looming out of nowhere, dark and sudden. As I said, they were part of my dreams. But they scared me. I wanted them to go away.’ His head dropped and he looked down at his lap. ‘I even prayed that God would take them away, that he would save me.’

  ‘I did that too.’

  ‘You did?’ Jack perked up. ‘And what happened?’

  ‘Disaster after disaster.’ John tried to keep it light and jocular. He didn’t want to scare the boy. ‘Mum said we were cursed.’ He swirled his tea. Placing the mug carefully back on the table, he sighed. ‘We probably were.’

  ‘So praying wasn’t much use?’

  John tilted his head and puckered his lips as he considered. ‘I’m no’ sure. It doesnae dae any harm. Probably at some level it does some good. Essentially it’s a question with nae answer. Like one of those childhood origami fortune-telling games. “I am here God”, and you shuffle about the handwritten responses in your hands to get an answer to the question, “Where are you?”’ He laughed. ‘And the answer always comes out flush as the same one: “I am here, where are you?” If we’re goin’ to believe in a God it stands to reason that the least we can do is crown Him with thorns and crucify Him.’ He scratched the back of his head. ‘You cannae murder a dream, so I guess we’re sorted?’

  Jack sipped cold tea. ‘We would be if they didn’t start to bleed into my everyday life. I’d be going to school and, out of the corner of my eyes, I’d see a little girl in a school uniform trailing behind me. I knew it wasn’t right. I recognised her from my dreams, but when I turned and went chasing after her, she’d disappear behind a parked car, or another person, or a bush. I’m not sure how she did it.’ He took a deep breath. ‘It was a relief I couldn’t catch her, but afterwards my dreams were even more vivid and intense. I’d hear voices, names: Ally, Carol, Ann, Rachel, Sarah, and they’d whisper to me in my sleep. Tell me things I didn’t want to know. I became them. I was tortured, raped and buried. It got so bad I was terrified to go to sleep. I’d try and stay up all night, but I’d fall asleep at my desk at school. I was a nervous wreck. But it didn’t take my mum long to figure it out. She pads about at night and never sleeps either. So after a few nights she started drifting into my room and asking me questions. Gave me the third degree.’ He grew more subdued. ‘Dad said I should go and see a doctor, a psychologist or something. Mum said I should come and see you. And she always gets her own way.’

  ‘Aye, I remember that well. Your mum always got her own way.’ John covered his mouth with his hand as he yawned. He grunted and stood up, his fingers winding behind his neck and stretching his chest. ‘Well, as the man said, I’m a stranger in a strange world and that’s for sure. Music waits to be heard. Books wait to be read. And ghosts are wailing that they’re not dead. There’s no use endlessly yakking about it.’ He enjoyed watching the growing disbelief in Jack’s face. ‘Let’s go.’

  Jack scrambled out of the seat. ‘Where to?’

  ‘You’ll see.’

  The boy shook his head and smirked at the Crombie coat John pulled out of the hall cupboard and put on. John used Jack as a balancing post as he slipped on a well-worn pair of gardening boots with bulbous steel toecaps. ‘Right, that’s us set,’ John said. ‘Let’s no’ dae anything sensible.’

  Outside, rain droplets spangled the pavement with watery sequins. ‘It’s no’ the weather we want, but it’ll need to dae,’ John said. His coat protected him from the worst of it. Jack’s leather jacket hung heavier on his shoulders. They walked close together. John stood for a few seconds at the shortcut, the young man at his elbow. He let his eyes wander over the changes wrought over the years: a tarmac pathway where there used to be long grass, muck and clay; concrete stairs cutting into the hill leading down to Shakespeare Avenue, with a stepped wooden fence backing onto the houses below.

  ‘This used to be all overgrown,’ John explained.

  John clattered down the stairs, Jack following behind him. The rain eased and the sun came out from behind some clouds. ‘Shite. We didnae want that.’ He gripped onto Jack’s arm. Fir trees planted close together and trimmed horizontal at the top acted as a screen, preventing them from looking along the street below. ‘This is where I first saw Lily,’ his voice had an edge to it. ‘The weather was terrible, deep snow. This is th
e kind of coat we wore in those days. A man’s coat. Something you could sleep in if need be.’ His voice became more subdued. ‘I walk down this way every day now, on the off-chance I’ll see her again. Nothing.’ They kept walking, the double-storey houses, whitewashed boxes, reflecting light against grey sky. John squinted. ‘Can you see anything?’

  ‘Aye,’ Jack said. He squealed like a much younger boy as John clutched and held onto his arm. ‘I see the same little girl I’ve seen her countless number of times. Her name’s Ally.’

  ‘Where is she?’

  ‘Over there.’ Jack sauntered ahead, sure in his step.

  ‘I cannae see her.’ John sounded disappointed. He tugged at Jack’s sleeve to slow him down. ‘Whit does she look like?’

  ‘School uniform, blondish hair.’

  ‘Hing on.’ John put his arm across the boy’s chest, stopping him from going any further. ‘You seen a picture of my missing wee sister?’

  ‘No.’ The boy was unflustered. Behind him a crow took off from the flat rooftop and cleared its throat with cawing.

  ‘Whit colour anorak is she wearing?’

  Jack looked down the street and then back at John’s face. ‘She’s wearing a bluish anorak and a school blazer is poking out beneath it.’ He turned back towards John. ‘That’s not a trick question, is it?’ He began to sing ‘Brother John, Brother John, where are you? Where are you?’ to the tune of Frère Jacques.

  The recitation bushwhacked John. He crouched low, as if he was going to be sick, and locked his fingers round his knees to keep his balance. ‘How do you know these things?’

  ‘I just do. I can’t really explain it. Part of her is part of me and she’s part of you too.’