by Luiza Sauma
Clerkenwell was dead. All the architectural practices and design shops were closed. The neighbourhood’s residents, people with harrowingly good taste, were just waking up. One of them ran past – a blonde woman in black athletic gear. She was so clean that you would eat from her hands without a second thought. Imagine being so saintly that you would go running before the sun came up. Iris had colleagues who did such things. Even if they were mean or took drugs at the weekend, they were inherently superior.
By the time she reached Holborn, there were a few more people in the street, but not as many as there would be in an hour, when life really began. Her feet were starting to feel hot between the toes, her underarms damp, but she wasn’t tired, just thirsty. Near Tottenham Court Road, she bought a bottle of water, downed its contents and carried on, past Oxford Circus, into Mayfair, one of the richest parts of the city. Who the hell lived here? People for whom money was like tap water – plentiful and cheap. People who didn’t drink tap water.
By the time she reached Grosvenor Square, the sky was a pallid, dreamy blue. The square was silent. There were no more birds singing – even the footless, diseased pigeons weren’t making a sound. Iris stood at the entrance of the old American Embassy, which was now closed and patrolled by security guards.
Just then, she heard the sound of hooves approaching, too many to count. Horses entered the square from the opposite side, driven from behind. Their smooth bodies glowed silver in the morning sun. They were all the same colour, the same shape, almost naked, but tied together by their bridles. They trotted two by two, rows and rows of them. Twenty or thirty, each one a replica, as pretty as the last. Iris looked around, but the security guards were nowhere to be seen. There was no one else there to witness it, unless someone was peeking out of a window. She had so many questions, but then she remembered Rule 5: Live in the moment. The horses disappeared down the street.
Iris bought a coffee and caught the bus home, where she managed to sleep for a few hours. After that, she spent the rest of the day scrolling for clothes online. It was amazing how quickly the hours passed. She bought three items, but knew she would return them. Later, in bed, she could still see the scrolling dresses, even with her eyes shut. She wished she had made a video of the horses. Not to put it on social media, but because she was afraid she had imagined them.
On Friday night she walked to Hackney Central just after ten. She was nervous of running into people she knew. This was the problem with London – familiar faces everywhere. That guy over there, smoking outside a pub, had the same denim jacket as Eddie and the same wavy blond hair. But he turned and it wasn’t him. The girl at the bus stop – was it her ex-friend Beth? She had the same evil blue eyes. No, not her. But it wasn’t safe out there. Someone would spot Iris and know that she had lied about going to Cornwall. She started walking home.
On the corner where Mare Street meets Narrow Way, Iris saw a figure, draped in clothes. Another madwoman. She wore a pink hijab and stared fixedly at the street. Iris passed her and looked back. The woman was completely still. Iris wondered if she was a statue – some kind of art project.
But then the woman finally moved, pointed at Iris and said, ‘You.’
A double-decker bus went past. Iris glanced up at it, catching sight of a man on the top desk, dressed in black, with a long beard. She looked back at the woman.
‘Yes,’ she said, ‘it’s me.’
Iris went to bed and slept peacefully, at last, until her phone alarm woke her at 6.30 a.m. She put her coat on, over her pyjamas, and walked towards Walthamstow Marshes. The streets were fairly empty, but Friday night was still alive, just about, for some. She passed a block of flats where a party was going on. Two or three people were singing along to Stevie Wonder’s ‘For Once in My Life’ – a strained, lonely sound. She tried not to feel afraid as she walked into the marshes. The tall grass tickled her ankles. There was no need for a torch, because the city maintained a permanent blue-green glow. Birds sang a chaotic symphony above her head in a dark cloud of wings. If someone murdered her, no one would hear her scream – she would be drowned out by the birds. In the middle of a field of dying wild flowers, she lay down with her arms and legs outstretched, looking up at the sky as it lightened. If she went to Nyx, she would never see birds again. At least not these birds, this sky, this sun. She closed her eyes as it warmed her face.
‘What are you doing?’ said someone. ‘Are you all right?’
She raised her head. An old woman was looking at her with a worried expression. A Border terrier waited patiently behind her, showing its pink tongue.
‘I’m fine,’ said Iris.
‘Do you need an ambulance? Are you on drugs?’
‘No, I’m just listening to the birds.’
‘Huh?’ The woman drew her head back in surprise. Her dog barked in sympathy.
‘Honestly, I’m fine.’
The woman walked on. Iris lay back and closed her eyes again. She didn’t wake up until noon, shivering and covered in dew, something wet and pungent on her cheek. She opened her eyes and laughed – a black and white collie was licking her face. Its owner, a man, was looking down at her with pity and fear.
‘Oh, thank God!’ he said. ‘You’re alive.’
‘Yes,’ said Iris, blinking her eyes, laughing and stroking the dog. ‘Sorry to scare you. I was just communing with nature.’
It was the middle of the day, unmistakably. The sun was high and bright, the sky so blue – an impression of a fine day in a foreign country, but with an English bitterness in the air.
‘OK,’ said the man. ‘Just checking.’
Kiran returned the next day, looking gloomy because her boyfriend had admitted, right at the end of their trip, that he wasn’t ready to leave his wife. Iris told Kiran that she’d had an OK week at work.
12.
Interview #3
The final interview was not like the others. Iris realized this as soon as she walked into the black room and saw Edie Dalton, her ex-girlfriend, sitting at a table with an empty chair opposite her. There was a hopeful smile on her face.
‘What the –?’ Iris remembered that she was being filmed. She returned the smile. ‘Edie. What are you doing here?’
‘Surprise,’ Edie said mildly, raising her eyebrows.
Iris hadn’t seen her in a decade. Edie’s hair was still short, but no longer golden – it had darkened to mousy brown. Her pale cheeks had a new, unhappy softness. When she stood up, she seemed shorter than she had been, though that couldn’t be right – she wouldn’t have shrunk, not yet. They hugged. Iris could feel sweat on the back of Edie’s checked shirt. Her heart felt wild and feral, something that couldn’t be tamed. She breathed shallowly and tried to focus on the moment. What would the Dalai Lama do?
‘What is this?’ she said. ‘What’s going on?’
‘Welcome back, Iris,’ said Tara. ‘Congratulations on reaching the final stage of the Life on Nyx recruitment programme. Please take a seat.’
Iris sat down opposite Edie. The light on the ceiling seemed stronger and more focused, like a spotlight. Everything else was dark. It felt like an interrogation scene from a cop show.
‘In the final stage of the recruitment process,’ said Tara, ‘we invite a person from the applicant’s past to take part in the interview.’
‘Is Edie going to interview me?’
‘It’ll be more of a conversation. I’ll return at the end. Edie will guide you through the rest of the process.’
The room went silent. There was nothing to signify Tara’s departure, no click, but her absence seemed to change the texture of the air. Iris was alone with Edie. She hadn’t been alone with her – or seen or spoken to her – since they broke up, though they had never truly broken up; Iris had simply stopped returning her calls. Their twin-like closeness had started to feel repulsive. She hadn’t known that it would echo through her life.
They looked at each other and flinched. It was too much – being there, in the same r
oom.
‘Why did you agree to this?’ said Iris.
‘I don’t know.’ Edie shrugged. ‘I was intrigued.’ She scratched the back of her neck and smiled.
‘You look different.’
‘It’s been a while.’
‘I heard rumours about you.’
Edie laughed. ‘You shouldn’t believe everything you hear. Well, some of them might have been true.’
‘What do you do, these days?’
‘I’m a landscape gardener.’
Iris pulled back in surprise. ‘Wow, that sounds nice.’
‘It is. I really love it.’ It was obvious that she meant it.
Edie’s voice was unrecognizable. Ten years ago, she had the poshest accent Iris had ever heard. The glitter had been rubbed off and replaced with rougher inflections. It made her seem pretentious, a rich girl playing a role. Iris’s stomach pulsed with pain. Inside it, the eternal Edie Dalton, beacon of love and hope, was crumbling like a blown-up building.
‘So what are we supposed to talk about?’ said Iris.
‘Anything you want.’
‘What did they tell you?’
‘They told me that you want to go and live on another planet. That’s a bit nuts, isn’t it, Iris?’
‘Are you here to talk me out of it?’
‘Yeah, kind of.’
‘Why did they ask you? Why not one of my friends?’
‘Why did you stop speaking to me?’
‘Oh Jesus.’ Iris buried her head in her hands. ‘I was eighteen. I didn’t know what else to do. I did love you, Edie. I can’t explain it.’
Edie looked down. Her hands were on the table, spread out. Her fingers were still long and refined, like a pianist’s, but sprinkled with small tattoos – dots, triangles and other geometric shapes. There was dirt under her fingernails.
‘They didn’t give me much information. They just said that I was the person most likely to convince you to stay.’ She looked up. Her eyes were different from how Iris remembered them – dull brown, rather than hazel. ‘Is it true, that you loved me?’
It didn’t seem true now. This version of Edie, with her plump cheeks and mockney accent – she wasn’t the girl Iris had loved. Bold, boyish, sharp – that girl was somewhere else. Perhaps she had been a performance.
‘Yeah, it’s true, I did.’
Edie breathed deeply, her hands still on the table. ‘Why do you want to go to this planet, then? What’s wrong with Earth?’
They’re watching, Iris remembered. ‘It seems like an amazing thing to do with my life – instead of, you know, staring at a screen all day. Have you seen the pictures?’
‘Just briefly. I don’t spend much time online.’
‘It’s beautiful, up there. They have this incredible indoor farm.’
‘We have farms here, too.’ She smiled. ‘You would never see Earth again.’
‘It’s such a great place, Earth.’
‘It’s not a joke. What about your friends and family – you’re going to leave them all behind?’
‘People do it all the time, even on Earth, and they get over it.’
Edie opened her mouth to say something and then changed her mind. Instead, she said, ‘How’s your family?’
‘They’re OK. Mona’s thirteen now.’
‘Thirteen, wow.’
‘Yeah, she goes to my old school. She’s a complete nerd.’
‘What about your mum?’
‘What about her?’ said Iris, irritated by the question.
‘Did you ever get the chance to tell her about –’
‘About what?’ Iris kept her voice calm, but anger was rising in her chest, hot and glistening. It was obvious, what she was referring to. She was the only one who knew. Edie was trying to expose her, to sabotage her application.
‘Nothing, it’s nothing.’ Edie shook her head. ‘Sorry, I got my wires crossed.’
Iris clenched and unclenched her hands, and leaned back on the chair. She had a tendency to lean forward – always too eager. Edie looked at the wall with interest and Iris followed her gaze, but there was nothing there. How do you run out of things to talk about with someone you’ve dreamed of so often, someone you’ve yearned for? But Edie wasn’t the person from Iris’s dreams. They just had a similar face.
‘Any more questions?’ said Iris.
Edie pursed her lips, a little smugly. ‘You’re disappointed with me.’
‘That’s not a question.’
‘Are you disappointed with me?’
‘I …’ She looked away from Edie, at the table. ‘I suppose we all grow up with this idea that love is the answer, that it can save you from yourself.’
‘And I wasn’t the answer.’
‘I’m not the answer, either. No offence.’
‘None taken. I’m definitely not the answer to anyone’s problems.’
‘But, if I can be completely honest?’
‘Yeah.’
‘The way I felt about you was insane,’ said Iris. ‘It was literally sickening. I was so thin when we were together and after we split up, too, because you made me feel too ill to eat. I was disappearing, but I got so many compliments. I remember you loved it, actually.’
‘Hmm. I don’t remember that.’
‘You told me my body was perfect, but I was so fucking unhealthy. It was like you satisfied my hunger. I felt I could live on you. I’ve been chasing that feeling ever since.’
‘Right.’
‘But it’s just biology, isn’t it? This explosion in our brains. With each relationship, it feels weaker and weaker, till one day, I’ll probably find a guy –’
‘A guy?’
‘I’m not really gay, you know that – and I’ll think, Oh, he’s honest and kind and would be a good dad, but at the back of my mind I’ll always feel like it was the realest with you. But now –’
‘The fantasy has evaporated, now that you can see me.’
‘That sounds harsh.’
‘Have you considered that I feel the same way about you?’
Iris didn’t respond.
‘Well, I do, I feel the same way. The feeling is mutual. Since we’re, you know, being honest. I’ve thought about you a lot, but now that I’m here –’
‘What?’
‘This whole thing, of going to space – it’s a mistake, Iris. It’s worse than anything I ever did. I fucked up my life, but I’m here, now, and my parents have forgiven me, more or less, and I have good friends. You seem … completely different.’
‘I was a kid.’
‘And now you’re so jaded you want to step off the planet for good.’
‘I’m not jaded. I just want to do something special.’
‘No one’s special. No one.’ Edie held her gaze. She was completely still. Her eyes, too, barely blinked. It seemed as if she was trying to communicate something with them.
Iris felt a sick shiver in her stomach, a tiny echo of love. Edie smiled.
‘Do you want to get a drink afterwards?’ said Iris.
Edie finally looked away, up at the ceiling, at the wall, then back at Iris. ‘Oh, uh, I can’t, you know. I don’t drink any more.’
‘We could get a coffee.’
‘I don’t think that’s a good idea.’
Just then, Tara’s voice returned to the room. ‘Edith, thanks for helping us with the recruitment process. You may now leave.’
Edie stood. Iris stood, too, thinking they were going to hug.
‘Let’s not,’ said Edie, putting her hands up.
‘But why?’ Iris was still standing.
‘Just because. No hard feelings, OK? Take care, Iris.’
Edie took one step towards the door and did a little wave with her right hand. Iris remembered how they would say goodbye to each other ten times on the phone, before one of them could bear to hang up.
‘Bye,’ said Iris.
But Edie didn’t say it back. She nodded, opened the door and walked out.
‘Tha
nk you for taking part in the Life on Nyx recruitment programme,’ said Tara. ‘We hope you found it an enjoyable and interesting experience. We will be in touch soon to let you know about the outcome. Have a nice day!’ She sounded more like a robot this time. Not like in the first two interviews, when she had seemed almost human.
Iris’s exchange with Edie hadn’t shown her in the best light – too much baggage. She was sure she would be disqualified. Oh, well. She left the room and quickly walked down to the ground floor, thinking she might catch up with Edie, but the building was empty. Outside, the street was crammed with people. No sign of her.
As Iris stood in the Tube carriage, pressed up against strangers’ bodies, she thought of the eternal Edie Dalton, her favourite version of Edie. The eternal Iris Cohen, too. On another planet, in another universe, we’re still kids and it’s summer, and it always will be. That was the planet she wanted to go to.
13.
Goodbye Pie
On a Sunday afternoon in January, Eddie arrived at Iris’s flat with a bunch of tulips wrapped in brown paper. He had cycled there with snowflakes biting his face. It rarely snowed in London, so Iris took it as a good omen. It was her last winter on Earth.
‘Fuck, it’s cold,’ he said as he walked into the flat, rubbing his cheeks. ‘I can’t feel my face. These are for you, babe.’ He handed her the flowers and smiled.
By then Eddie had left Freedom & Co to work for another agency. In recent weeks they had started talking, vaguely, of moving in together. But that wasn’t going to happen any more – not since Thursday evening, when Iris had received a phone call from Los Angeles. They had given her two weeks to think about it. Since then, she had felt deliriously light and free, demob happy.
‘That’s so sweet of you,’ she said. She took the tulips, turned away before he could kiss her and marched to the kitchen to put them in a vase.
Tulips – she can still picture them. Their petals glossy and pink, a few shades darker than the sand on Nyx.