Hideous Beauty

by William Hussey

  “He’s a little… Well, don’t get me wrong, I am in no way prejudiced,” says Ollie.

  “You’d better not be,” Gemma puts in. “As head of the LGBTQ safe-space group, I will not tolerate intolerance in our school.”

  I drag my gaze back to Gemma.

  “Right.” Ollie nods. “But don’t you think people can take it a bit far? I mean, turning up like that to practice, and then expecting Mr Highfield to let him on the team? Come on!”

  “The question should be, was he any good?” Gemma says.

  “Well, I really liked him.” Mike shrugs. “And he was good. You can’t deny it, Ollie, he placed that corner like a pro. I don’t care if he was wearing pearls.”

  “Pearls?” I say.

  “No one in our team could’ve taken that corner as sweetly, and you know it,” Mike continues. “I argued with Highfield after the game. It’s a disgrace Ellis wasn’t selected.”

  Ellis? He wears pearls to footie try-outs? I have to know this kid.

  Ollie holds up his hands. “I’m with you, but what you gonna do? You know Highfield. He’s a pig-headed old bastard. He won’t back down.”

  “Oh, please, that bitch is going to back down all right. Trust me.”

  It’s a sweet, strong, musical voice. Our little huddle turns and there’s this kid standing behind us, tall and smiling and beautiful and just…overwhelming. I take a sidestep behind Mike, not because I’m scared or shy – something about this guy tells me he’d never want to inspire those emotions – but because I want a moment just to take him in. While I’m watching, he waves about a hundred sheets of paper in the air.

  “So, students of Ferrivale, who’s going to be first to sign my petition?”

  Mumzilla’s brake lights flash in the rain like two angry eyes. I blink, sneeze, and swipe the downpour from my face with the sleeve of my jacket. Carol Berrington gets out of the car just a second or two after Mike bursts from the passenger door. I stand stock-still and watch him splash his way up the gleaming lane. He’s moving fast, no stumble, and for the first time in almost a month I feel my heart beat in a way that isn’t just mechanical. When Mike reaches me his breathing is strong and steady and the bruises under his eyes seem to have faded a little. I want to smile, but don’t. Even for Mike, a smile would be a betrayal.

  “Jesus, Dylan, you’re drenched!”

  I look down at myself. My black school shoes feel squelchy and my funeral suit is starting to bobble.

  “Yeah.” I squint up at him. “I am a bit.”

  Carol reaches us and draws up short, hands on her hips as she takes me in.

  “Oh, honey, what were you thinking?” She shakes her head, but not in the condescending way that has recently earned my parents a pretty spectacular Fuck you! Behind the rain I can see her eyes fill with tears. “Michael,” she says gently, “get him into the car.”

  Mike puts an arm around my shoulder and guides me to the grumbling Volkswagen estate. Exhaust fumes coil, smoky and dragonish around my ankles. I want to kick the fumes away but that would be crazy, and I’m trying my best not to show the crazy today.

  So I’ve learned recently that I’m a pretty good actor. I performed my heart out to our GP anyway, and he never once saw through me. He just gave me a bottle of diaze-something and told me to come back if I ever felt like lying down in front of a train. For that whole seven-minute appointment, I kept everything beautifully under control. I did this by imagining I was standing in front of a huge computer workstation, like Homer’s in The Simpsons. If I sensed a danger signal, I’d vent a little toxic gas and the dials would flick back into the green.

  Did I learn this from you, El? The ability to keep everything running smoothly while underneath all you want to do is scream and shout and tear down the world? Were you at your own safety station that night of the dance, adjusting your switches and dials? You were so scared…

  Suddenly I realize I’m in the back of the Volkswagen, my body half-turned towards Mike. Carol has put on the heater full blast and Mike’s dug out a blanket and is towelling my hair. We always joke that Mumzilla’s car is like Mary Poppins’ handbag – whatever is required can be found, you only have to believe.

  “Hey, Bitch,” I say as Mike unveils me.

  He gives me this watery smile. “Hey, Bumboy.”

  I hear snuffling from the boot and Beckham appears at the guard. I reach through the cage and Becks licks my fingers. I used to have this weird dream a while back that the actual David Beckham would take the place of the Berringtons’ family pet and lick my digits. Weird, I know. The still-sprightly ten-year-old collie gives me this dewy-eyed look.

  “I love you too, Becks,” I tell him.

  “Here,” says Mike. He holds out his black suit jacket. “Take yours off. Mum’ll get it dry-cleaned.”

  “Mum will,” Carol confirms.

  “I can’t, what will you wear?”

  “I’ve got my coat.”

  I thank him and pull on the jacket. It’s too big but Mike manages to arrange it somehow on my skinny shoulders, and I guess it looks okay. Better than my sopping jacket anyway. If I’d walked in like that, the congregation might have thought I’d stopped off for a dip in Hunter’s Lake – you know, for old times’ sake. I shiver. It’s like I can still feel the water’s touch creeping along the inside of my thigh, still hear the jealous lake whispering:

  So you thought this was forever?

  Mike sees my hand trembling. He takes it and cups it in his own. It’s my bad hand; the one I damaged trying to free myself from the seatbelt. My shoulder still aches occasionally – bruised bone – and the cuts on my scalp continue to itch, but the scar on my cheek doesn’t cause me any trouble, and Chris says it looks pretty badass. But my hand won’t do everything it’s told, basically because of nerve damage. It hurts like hell most of the time too. The doctor gave me these painkillers, told me to use them sparingly, but he needn’t have bothered. Soon as I got home they were flushed.

  I deserve the pain. I deserve the crazy. I deserve a messed-up hand. No one’s taking these things away from me.

  The windscreen wipers whump. The heater chunters. Mike angles his body back into his seat, keeping hold of my hand the whole time. We’ve sat like this a lot over the past three-and-a-half weeks, comfortable as we can be in this endless silence.

  “Dylan,” says Carol from the front, “where’s your mum and dad?”

  Hey, it would’ve been weird if she hadn’t asked.

  “They didn’t think it was appropriate to come today.”

  “What?” Mike glares. “Why the hell not?”

  “Michael,” says Mumzilla. “I’m sure Barbara and Gordon have their reasons.”

  A nerve jumps in Mike’s throat.

  So it’s a short story. It went like this:

  I knew your Aunt Julia would struggle with the funeral, El. You lived in a rented flat in Mount Pleasant and, although Julia worked herself ragged managing the bakery, there was never quite enough money. And, El, you were a miracle-worker. You put together the most delicious meals and you looked freaking awesome every single day of your life, accessorizing your uniform in such a stylish way that Mr Robarts could never quite bring himself to enforce the school dress code. But the truth was, you and Julia were only just about getting by. And you were my boyfriend. You were amazing. All I wanted was for your send-off to be amazing too.

  “I’m just saying we could host the wake here,” I said. “It only needs to be a small tea for family and friends.”

  “But, Dylan, it’s not really our place,” my dad objected.

  “His aunt might think it presumptuous.” Mum nodded.

  “I’ll ask her,” I said. “No problem. I’ll go over there right now and if she says she’s cool with it, then—”

  “You don’t understand, Dylan. These people can be very proud.”

  My mum’s mouth clamped shut but the words were out. No way I wasn’t calling her on that.

  “These people? Wha
t exactly do you mean by that, Mum?”

  “Dylan, I think your mother—”

  “Dad.” I stopped him mid-excuse. “I’m asking for a few pots of tea, a couple of sandwiches, maybe some biscuits – what’s the big deal? We can give El a really nice…” My throat thickened over the word, but I forced it out. “…send-off. And you won’t have to pay. Not really. It’ll be a loan to me. Whatever it costs, I’ll give you back every penny, I promise.”

  “Son, it isn’t about the money.”

  “Good, then—”

  “It’s the principle. Hosting a stranger’s wake?” He shook his head. “It’s just not the done thing.”

  That was when I sent Mum’s pube sculpture flying. It smashed against the wall and bits of reed or whatever the hell it was made of ended up just about everywhere.

  “El wasn’t a stranger! I loved him. He was my boyfriend. We laughed and told each other stories and held hands and went to the movies and argued and… And he was my partner, Dad, just the same as Mum is your partner, and I want to give him a final party, that’s all.”

  “Dylan, it isn’t the same.”

  I stared at both of them. “If you don’t know that it’s exactly the same then you never understood us at all.” Hunching down, I tried to pick a few of the reeds from the carpet, but my stupid hand wouldn’t work. “Look,” I said, getting up, “I know you’ve saved for my uni stuff. Well, I don’t want it. I’m not going. So just give me a few fucking quid so I can say goodbye to my dead boyfriend.”

  Mum ran out of the room crying; Dad hung his head and said nothing. So I told him he had a pube in his hair and went to my room.

  I would’ve left home that night, except where would I have gone? To Mike’s maybe. Mumzilla would take me in, no question, but I didn’t want to bring all my crap to their door. Anyway, Mike was really sick all of last week, throwing up practically every time he took a breath. That last round of chemo really took it out of him.

  But the simple fact is, I’m not as brave as you, Ellis. I’m too much of a pussy to leave home properly.

  “Here we are,” says Carol gently.

  We glide into a parking space at a proper funereal pace and all get out. It looks like we’re running late. There’s no one outside the crematorium chapel. Carol turns me to face her, brushes some fluff from my shoulders, and gives me a smile that’s all raised chin.

  “You look very handsome, Dylan.” And she just can’t help it. She bursts into tears. “You’ll do him proud today, I know you will.”

  “Mum.” Mike puts an arm around her shoulder and starts to guide her into the chapel, then glances back. “You coming, mate?”

  “I will,” I promise. “Just give me a minute.”

  He nods and they disappear.

  The rain has stopped. It pisses me off. The world should weep its heart out today. I walk under the crematorium awning where the hearses pull up.

  Yours is there, El. There’s a name card in the window, but it’s empty. I look over the cream-coloured building, built to resemble some peaceful country chapel. It’s all wrong. You should be taken to Hideous Beauty. To our church. To our home. I’d carry you up those winding steps to the belfry and lay your body on the bare boards that used to groan and sing under us. I’d bring you handfuls of snowdrops, the ones that grow around the unreadable gravestones, and make a halo for your head. And then, once I’ve answered the questions that need to be answered – once I’ve found out who scared you so much and who left you to die – I’ll make a place for you in that tangled churchyard and place a marker that reads Ellis Maximillian Bell and nothing else. Because there is no lifetime to fill up the rest of the stone, no special dates and memories and achievements. All we have left ahead of us is ash and dirt.

  I wander into the vestibule. There’s a half-open door with an easel beside it that states: Funeral of Ellis Bell. There’s a book of condolence on the opposite side of the room with a pen on a chain. I snap the chain and use the pen to insert an arrow symbol between Ellis and Bell and write above it Maximillian.

  Then I take a huge breath and enter the chapel.

  George Ezra fills the chapel. That deep, soulful voice that hums in your chest. It’s a bluesy, country tune with soul and twang and, most people would think, completely inappropriate for a funeral. I think it’s perfect.

  Except it tries to force me back into the car: your finger reaching for the off-switch, killing the music before you start touching me.

  No. I won’t go back there. Not yet.

  So the tragic death of a schoolboy is clearly a draw. The place is packed. Carol and Mike have saved a space for me at the back and I start moving towards them. A few kids from school give me a couple of shy waves, which I automatically return. If they weren’t hanging around in the halls when I told Mr Morris I was quitting, or in that assembly where I made the mother of all scenes, then they haven’t seen me since the Easter dance. Mr Morris didn’t say much when I told him, just advised me to take whatever time I needed. I will. Because I’m not “commendable but unfocused” now, sir. I’m very focused indeed. I will find out who pulled me out of that car and why they left Ellis to drown.

  Morris himself is there with Mr Robarts and most of the other teachers – so many teachers that they must have shut down the entire school for the afternoon. Even El’s art teacher Mr Denman, who’s only recently back from sick leave, has shown up. He sits next to Miss Harper, who blows her nose and waves a very un-Harperish handkerchief at me.

  A row or two from the front sits Gemma and the committee witches and at the end of their line is Ollie Reynolds. I note in passing that Ollie isn’t the boy clutching Gemma’s shoulder and handing her Kleenex after Kleenex. I think it’s Paul Donovan, but I can’t be sure. All those square-backed rugby boys look alike. Is that prejudice? Am I ruggerist? I’m pondering this question when a hand touches my arm.

  “Dylan, would you like to come see him?”

  It takes all my willpower to look up into that old-before-its-time face. El’s Aunt Julia is in her fifties, and is always pretty glamorous, but today she looks seventy. Her make-up and mascara have already run into deep lines and canyons.

  In the weeks since you died, El, I’ve sat down a hundred times to call her, and each time I’ve cancelled the call before it could connect. What could I possibly tell her apart from that it’s all my fault? If you hadn’t been distracted by the need to comfort and reassure me, then the accident would never have happened.

  I feel Mike’s hand pat my back as Julia guides me gently out of the row and down the central aisle. Eyes are on me; there are murmurs. I daren’t look up. Not because I’m afraid of the stares – I would have been, back in the days before the bonfire, before you – but because I know you’re waiting for me, like always, somewhere up ahead.

  I’m fighting flashes of memory as we go. The ones that have haunted me these past weeks and won’t let me sleep, but also flashes of Julia herself: the bathroom floor at your flat, blood on the lino, you comforting and cursing her at the same time. I mount two shallow steps and, head still down, see the side of your coffin and the sawhorse things that hold it up. My eyes drift. I see puffy satin; the sleeve of a smart suit I don’t recognize. Maybe it’s not you in there. Maybe this is all a joke.

  Let it be a joke.

  “I’m sorry, Dylan. I didn’t know if you’d want him like this, but I had no way of contacting you and I had to make a decision. It had to be an open casket, didn’t it? Because we don’t want our boy shut away in the dark.”

  I shake my head. “It’s fine. Whatever you want. It was your decision.”

  I can’t move beyond the suit. Not yet.

  “No, sweet boy,” she says. “He wasn’t just mine. He was ours.”

  I nod, though I know she wouldn’t think this if she knew the truth. She’d hate me then, maybe almost as much as I hate myself.

  “I’m sorry, Julia. I should’ve come to see you.” I fight the lump in my throat. Surely we have to move.
Surely they have to start the service. But Julia isn’t the kind of person anyone can move before she’s ready. “I wasn’t…”

  I see her hands reach out and straighten something in the coffin.

  “Now listen,” she says. “None of this is your fault. Are you hearing me, Dylan? None of it.”

  But you don’t know, Julia, I think. You have no idea… I reach into the back pocket of my trousers and take out a crumpled, rain-stained envelope. Unfolding it, I pull back the flap and thumb through a few damp notes, then try to pass it to her.

  Is this appropriate? Who the hell knows? I don’t think there’s an etiquette for losing you.

  Julia sees what I’m trying to do and waves her hand. “What is this, Dylan?”

  “A hundred pounds. I’m not sure if that’s even close to being enough, but… It’s some of my uni savings. I’m not going. Please take it, Julia. I know you’ve probably already paid for all this, but I’d like to make a contribution, maybe towards the wake.”

  “Put that back in your pocket before we fall out,” she tells me. She isn’t offended, she just sounds tired. “If I took that, Ellis would never forgive me. He was so excited about you going to Bristol. It’s all he ever bloody talked about.” And suddenly she’s laughing and straightening something else I can’t – won’t – look at. “Morning, noon and night. You know he had your whole student flat decorated in his mind.”

  I nod. “It would’ve been spectacular.”

  “Course it would. Now listen, don’t you give up on that dream. If you do, you’ll have me to answer to, understand?” She laughs again, and there’s a stir behind us as if everyone’s super-curious about this endless coffin-side conference. “I’m just fine with the expenses. I stopped taking that junk the day you and Ellis found me, so I’ve saved a bit. And it’s a simple coffin…”

  I twine my fingers together. George Ezra has stopped singing about his “Saviour” and there’s a shuffling quiet in the chapel. Someone whispers in Julia’s ear and she hisses back, “Wait. Give him time.