He moved out as soon as he could, taking just the essentials like in an emergency evacuation. He got a flat with a football mate whose name I forget. It was above a chip shop, damp and with mice, but they got free portions from the chippy in exchange for not reporting the rodents. When exams were over, he took on extra hours at the video store to pay the rent. I think he knew he was digging himself into a hole, but once the bills were paid, he had enough left over for a bit of weed and a pub crawl once a week, and he seemed happy with that. I texted him now and then to check whether he needed anything, and he always replied that he was fine. He seemed happy with that.
September 2003
I’d been ready nearly forty minutes when her text came through: Just coming down your road now.x
I took a final look in the mirror and ran a hand over my freshly shaven head, before giving the tie knot a little shake to check it was still secure. I hadn’t worn a suit since Mum’s funeral, but here I was, a decade later, dressed up in a week’s wages’ worth of navy.
A car was slowing down outside. Shiny. New.
I left my cigarettes on the bed. I’d broken the cellophane seal before I even took a morning piss, and somehow half the pack was now jammed into the ashtray. I opened the box of nicotine patches from my pocket and stuck one on my arm beneath my shirt.
As I walked to the waiting car, I folded the navy suit jacket over my arm and spied Anna’s face in the back. She was looking at me through the window, and I smoothed my tie and watched the ground as it disappeared under my feet.
I opened the rear door and climbed in next to her. Her friends in the front introduced themselves with affable ease – Hi! I’m Pete and this is Jen – as she watched from the sidelines.
She kept her hands very much to herself as I leant back and fastened my seat belt. She wore an appropriately modest outfit, a dress that fell just below her knees and covered her shoulders. It made little difference. Even in our Sunday best, the air felt rife with danger.
‘Well, look at you,’ she said finally.
Anna had agreed to take me a few days before.
It had been a month since she’d driven off from my house, and we’d avoided each other until now. Perhaps I was waiting for her to make a move, to test what was left of her feelings. Every evening when she didn’t text, every morning when my phone screen shouted the absence of her name, my head would say See, she’s with him. This head of mine knew impossible things, but doubt and fear invent their own answers. I’d be damned if I was going to message her first. Society said that pride mattered, so I should cling to the shred I had left.
At work, I learned to keep my eyes and ears alert at all times, so that by the time I saw her, I’d already clocked her position. If she was walking towards me down a corridor, I’d become engrossed in whatever I was carrying, or perhaps adjust a 3D stand in apparent danger of toppling over. I’d be so lost in my activity that we’d pass seemingly without notice, or else our eyes would meet at the final moment and I’d contort my face into an eyebrows-raised-kind-of-smile, the type you hope suggests brevity and casualness, but could also be construed as needing the loo.
Finally, we were assigned to work Bar together. I knew it would happen eventually. Usually there are rules about working the same areas as partners or exes, but when nobody knows the history, neither do they know the present.
My shift started an hour after hers. I pushed open the door and she was standing in the empty bar, polishing glasses. She looked up as the door swished shut.
‘Hi,’ I said.
She did the eyebrows-raised-kind-of-smile.
‘Want a hand?’
‘Sure.’ She picked up a tea towel and threw it at my face. ‘Here.’
‘Okay.’ I leant across and picked up a glass. ‘How are things?’ I said after we’d each polished a glass in silence. ‘Been a while.’
‘Great. Really great.’
From the furious effort she was making, I half expected the champagne glass to smash.
It did.
‘Shit.’
‘I’ve got it,’ I said, moving behind the bar.
She muttered something I couldn’t hear as she opened the cupboard doors and slammed each of them shut. And then, ‘Where’s the bloody dustpan and brush?’
‘Calm down. I said I’ve got it.’ I put my hands on her arms and guided her to one side. The dustpan and brush were in the first cupboard she’d opened.
Anna sat on a bar stool and watched as I cleared the tiny shards of glass from the counter. The phone on the side began to ring and she jumped, then leant across and picked it up.
‘Hello? Yes, I broke a glass.’ She looked up at the security camera as she spoke, the one pointing at us at the bar. ‘Well, if you’d been watching, which you clearly were, you’d have seen it was an accident … I am working, I’m polishing glasses … So I have to stand, do I … Tell you what, why not come and carve out my pound of flesh right now, or else just dock the 20p from my pay … No, I know … Fine, bye.’
She picked up another glass. I was still wiping down the side and pretended not to have heard the conversation.
‘I hate working here,’ she said.
‘No, you don’t,’ I said, sweeping the floor near her feet.
‘Yes, I do.’
‘So leave.’
‘My God, you men,’ she said, laughing. ‘You sound like him on the phone. Stop telling me what I am, or what to do.’
‘Careful,’ I said, giving a slight nod to the camera. ‘They’re probably reading your pretty lips right now.’
She turned her face away and picked up another glass. ‘Don’t be giving me the pretty lips. You’ve not spoken to me in a month and avoided me at every turn, so you don’t get to pay me compliments.’
I tipped the broken glass into an empty cardboard box. ‘Stop acting like you don’t want it. It’s written all over your face.’
She looked at me with a mixture of fury and surprise. I’ve done it, I thought. She’s speechless.
‘Because you don’t want it, do you?’ she said, her eyes narrowing. ‘You’re above all that. So calm, so chilled, so in control. But perhaps you’re just incapable of feeling anything. Or unable to voice what you want, like, really want. You give everything up without a fight.’
Anna threw down the towel and walked through the swinging doors to the galley kitchen out back, where she took the oven trays from the shelves and slammed them down on the metal counter.
I slowly untied the apron and pulled it over my head. I bundled it into a ball and threw it on the side, then I too went into the kitchen and into the view of another camera.
‘What do you want from me?’ I asked.
She dropped another pot.
‘Tell me what you want.’
Anna walked to the freezer at the far end and took out a bag of baguettes that she tore open and spilled on to a tray. ‘You always want to be told,’ she said. ‘That’s the problem right there. You never do the telling.’
I walked past and slipped my hand into her trouser pocket, pulling her gently along with me. When we were out of sight of the camera, I became more forceful, taking her elbows and dragging her closer.
‘What do you want?’ I said again. ‘My blood?’
She looked at me. ‘Yes. I want your blood.’
And then she shivered, and I stepped forward to hold her, but something in her expression told me she was scared. It was as if this was what she’d been waiting for, what I had been waiting for, and we were on the cusp of something new that could begin. A different fate, another life, if just one of us spoke up. But right now she looked like she might cry, and this was not what I wanted.
‘Wait,’ I said, letting go. I grabbed a bag of chips from the freezer and dashed into the camera’s view to throw them into one of the pots. As I jogged back, she started to laugh.
I knew the moment had gone.
I’ve become skilled over the years at playing the fool in times of need. It defuses countless situations, ev
en those that in hindsight would benefit me greatly if I just let them play out.
‘Here,’ I said, pulling her towards me. I held her close and she relaxed against my body and pressed her face against my chest.
We stood there for a minute, not speaking, not moving, even when the phone outside began to ring.
Anna dropped me home. It was a busy shift and extra staff came in to help. We didn’t talk for the rest of the night, but at the end, we were left alone to clear up.
‘I’ll give you a lift home, if you like,’ she said, scanning the floor for any rubbish. ‘If you haven’t got plans, that is.’
‘No,’ I said, switching off the lights, and she looked at me in the dark. ‘I mean, I haven’t got plans.’
Anna met me in the KFC car park, like she’d done throughout the summer. Her car still smelled of jasmine, as if the air and cheap upholstery had absorbed her essence.
We didn’t say much on the journey. Outside my house, she seemed to hesitate and I cleared my throat. ‘Why don’t you pull up for a bit?’
She turned off the engine and it felt like the silence would break through the windscreen.
‘God, that was a knackering shift,’ she said finally, closing her eyes and leaning against the window. ‘My feet are killing me.’
‘Give them here.’
‘Eh?’
I slapped my leg with my hand. ‘Get those shoes off and let me rub them for you.’
‘Don’t be ridiculous. I’ve been running around for eight hours. They’ll be sweaty as hell.’
‘It’s a good thing you have nice feet then. Come on.’
She looked amused. ‘You actually want my feet?’
‘It’s a good offer.’
Anna thought about it for a moment, then leant down to slip off her shoes. ‘You asked for it. Even if they stink, you can’t reject me now.’ She rolled back her chair and swung her legs across the gearbox, resting her bare feet on my lap. ‘You’re crazy, you know that.’
I picked up her foot and began to rub it gently.
‘I didn’t know you were left-handed,’ she said, watching me. ‘You’re even rarer than I thought.’
I smiled at her in the dark. ‘My dad tried hard to make me switch. He refused to give me anything unless I took it with my right hand. Said life would be harder otherwise.’
‘Harsh.’
‘He was right,’ I said, looking at the house. ‘I couldn’t use a fountain pen at school because I always smudged the ink. The teacher made me sit at the front so he could keep an eye. He said I couldn’t be trusted not to ruin my work and so gave me a pencil. Did wonders for my confidence, as you can imagine.’
‘Your teacher sounds like a knob.’
There was a solace in the rhythm as I confessed my truth while my fingers kneaded her skin. I could feel the bones of her toes deep down under the flesh, where the blood and muscle lay hidden from view. She did indeed have beautiful feet.
‘I’ve never been much of a foot man,’ I said. ‘But I think I could develop a fetish for yours.’
‘How romantic,’ she said, her eyes closed.
I remembered something she once said in my bed, and I bent down and slid my mouth over her big toe. She instinctively gasped and I had to tense my grip on her foot to stop her kicking my face.
‘What are you doing?’
‘I remember you like that.’
‘I do.’ She bit her lip. ‘That’s why you have to stop.’
I ignored her. It had been weeks since we’d touched each other, and there was something about my mouth on an unexpected part of her body that felt dangerously intimate. She gave a soft gasp and pulled her foot away.
‘I mean it. Stop.’
I picked up her other foot to rub. ‘That little moan was all I wanted.’
She gave a shiver, as if I was still sucking her. ‘I can’t help that it feels so good.’
‘What we all want to know is who was the first to suck Anna’s toe?’
Two boy racers flew by, leaning on their horns as they tried to out-rev each other in their garish, souped-up motors. The sounds faded away. The silence came back louder.
‘I’d better go.’ Anna shifted in her seat and I released my hold.
‘When are you next working?’ I said, knowing her rota by heart.
‘Monday,’ she said, looking at the keys in her hand.
‘A whole weekend off?’
She turned away to face my house. ‘Yeah. I have this thing.’
I allowed the silence to grow.
She drummed her fingers on the steering wheel. ‘An assembly. Bible stuff. Two days sitting in a hall listening to suited men give talks.’ She yawned. ‘Can’t wait.’
‘Talks?’
She picked at a loose thread on her trouser leg. ‘How to be a better Christian, how to live, how to dress, how to be. You name it, there’s a rule.’
‘You have to go both days?’
She nodded. ‘Aren’t I the lucky one?’
‘Is it just for people of your religion?’
‘Pretty much.’
‘How about you take me?’
Anna looked at me, frowning. She laughed. ‘You’re joking.’
‘I’ve never been more serious in my life,’ I said, and in my head, this made total sense. ‘Go on. Let me come along one of the days.’
‘No, no … You don’t get it. It’s incredibly boring. I’m only going because I have to go. You don’t choose to go.’
‘Don’t you knock on people’s doors to try and convert them? Well, here you are. Jackpot.’
‘But you don’t believe in God?’
I rubbed my chin. ‘I’m open to new things, and this is something important to you. I guess a part of me is intrigued.’
She looked embarrassed and terrified, and I knew it was within my power to make her feel better, to laugh and say Relax, I’m joking and return everything to normal. But the truth was, I wasn’t joking. I had to know more about the mountain that stood between us. The huge, powerful, shadowy mass that seemed to dominate every part of her life. I needed to know what I was up against, and whether it was even possible for me to climb.
So I watched and waited for her blushes to fade, for her to think it over as she pulled on her socks and shoes, and I didn’t say a word as she folded and unfolded her arms. But then she turned and looked at me and nodded, and I’m sure I saw something in her face that was happy.
We got there early as Anna’s friend Pete was volunteering to run something. The venue was a rectangular box in the middle of the countryside, immaculately white with walls of glass. An attempt had been made to soften its edges by planting trees throughout the grounds, but the overall effect was startling and unexpected, as if it had been dropped overnight from outer space.
There were no crosses or icons anywhere and it felt nothing like the churches I’d visited on school trips. Everything was shiny and new, with limestone floors, brilliant white walls and artful accents of wood. All along one side of the entrance lobby were tall glass windows, through which light poured down in shafts. It had a vacant feel.
The only aspect that marked it as a religious building was a collection of pictures hanging at regular intervals along the white lobby walls: scenes of war and devastation, of fire raining down from heaven upon screaming hordes of people. As we passed, the pictures gradually changed to scenes of peace, of happy families eating picnics on rolling fields of green, gathering water from a glistening stream that stretched far into the horizon and up to heaven. One picture showed a girl cuddling a lion. Her trusting face was buried in its golden mane as it rested its paws in her small hands. The people in these peaceful pictures, with their placid and undisturbed faces, were clothed in pastel polo shirts, cotton dresses and different types of national dress. They all held baskets of fruit.
It was like an art gallery, but without the little signs that explain the meaning. I suppose if you were here, you already knew.
Anna turned as we passed
and gave an embarrassed shrug.
The auditorium itself was like a theatre, with different levels arranged around a long stage. A thousand identical seats patiently waited to be filled. At the end of the stage was a small square pool with a banner hanging overhead: You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free. It could be seen from every seat.
‘There are my parents,’ Anna said, nodding at two distant figures on the other side of the hall. ‘Let’s sit here.’ And she put her things down on the seats nearest to where we were standing.
She’d arranged for Pete and Jen to sit with us. Apparently it wouldn’t do to sit alone – tongues would wag – but I found out much later that my being there was already breeding talk, the kind that would follow her for months and possibly years to come. Someone of the world is to be welcomed, but the arms only open so much.
As the hall began to fill, I noticed how alike everyone was. They were dressed in smart attire, men in suits and women in dresses or skirts, and the children looked like miniature replicas of their parents. Everyone looked clean and presentable with shiny faces, as if they were all interviewing for the same job.
When the orchestral music began and people sat down, it struck me how little difference there was between a thousand empty seats and a thousand filled ones. You lose sight of the individual when everyone is the same. Later, I’d realise that’s the point.
Pete handed me a bible as the first talk began, and Anna shifted in her seat.
‘Friendship with the world is enmity with God,’ said the smart man on stage. He held a black bible aloft as if every word came from God himself. ‘We must remember that Satan is a lion seeking to devour us. He is catching us with traps designed to appeal to our flesh, our desire, the hidden cravings of our hearts, and it is only by marking a line in the sand and stepping on the side of our Father that will result in Life.’
At one point, when looking around at the passive faces, some of which occasionally glanced our way, I remembered how I’d held her in my bed. How she’d fallen asleep in my arms and nobody here knew a damn thing about it.
‘So guard your hearts, brothers and sisters,’ the speaker went on. ‘Do not be tempted by the ways of the world, with their offers of momentary pleasure. Remember that we are awaiting another life, a perfect life, when all will be made new and death will never touch us. Hold fast to this. Hold fast to what is true.’
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