Going Out

by Scarlett Thomas

  ‘I hate this fucking programme,’ David says. ‘Sad fuckers.’

  Luke switches over. A Will Smith film is on. There are aliens.

  ‘I like this,’ David says. ‘Bang! Shit! Fucking kill it!’

  Luke sets the video to BBC2 and presses the record button on the remote.

  ‘Where’s Wales?’ he asks David.

  ‘Down the M4, mate.’ David stares at the TV. ‘Behind you! Fuck! Kill it!’

  ‘What’s the M4?’

  ‘A road.’ David looks confused for a moment. ‘Shit, I forgot. You wouldn’t know about roads and stuff, would you? You’ve probably never been on a road, have you?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Why do you want to know where Wales is?’

  ‘I’m going there.’

  ‘Seriously?’

  ‘Yeah. But don’t tell my mother.’

  David laughs. ‘Yeah, OK. But . . .’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Isn’t it like . . . Won’t you die if you go out?’

  ‘I’m going at night.’

  ‘Oh. Do you usually go out at night, then?’

  Luke remembers when he was a kid and his mother joined an XP parents’ support group. One time they sent through some leaflets advertising something called the Moon Kids Club where children with various photosensitivity problems went out and had picnics and played in sandpits late at night. Luke nagged his mother for weeks asking to be allowed to go: he tried to be really good; then, when that didn’t work, he resorted to being really bad, throwing several tantrums a day. But the answer was always no. ‘It might be all right for those other children,’ she’d said. ‘But your disease is more complicated than theirs.’

  Luke looks at David. ‘No,’ he replies. ‘I’ve never gone out at night.’

  ‘Shit. So you still might die?’

  ‘Yeah. But I probably won’t. I’ll make a . . .’ Luke looks at the TV. ‘A space-suit or something.’

  David can’t seem to keep still. Every time something happens on screen he flinches, says ouch or leans forward a bit more, gripping the sides of the chair. Luke watches him, and the TV, alternately for five minutes or so.

  ‘You’re ill, aren’t you?’ Luke says eventually.

  ‘Yeah. Cancer, mate.’

  ‘I’m really sorry.’

  ‘Yeah, well.’ David keeps looking at the TV.

  ‘Why don’t you come with us?’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Me, Julie and Charlotte.’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘To Wales.’

  David thinks about this for a few seconds. ‘Yeah, why not? I haven’t got anything better to do. No fucking job, anyway. And the college is flooded so there’s no lectures for a week or so. Yeah, all right.’

  ‘We’re going to see a healer. Maybe he can help you.’

  ‘Yeah? I doubt it, mate. But I’ll still come, though. It’ll be a laugh.’

  Chapter 26

  Leanne’s freaking out.

  ‘It’s all my fault,’ she says for the third time.

  ‘What is?’ Julie asks.

  Her car is completely misted up, and it’s not going to get any better, because Leanne’s crying almost as hard as it’s raining outside. It’s like sitting inside a cloud. The car is parked on the street outside Luke’s house. Leanne refused to go to her house, or to Julie’s, or into Luke’s. So they stayed in the car.

  ‘Everything. David, Chantel . . . The rain, even.’

  ‘Huh? Leanne, I don’t understand. You have to explain better.’

  ‘I made Luke love me. Well, not love me, but I made him want to shag me.’

  Julie still doesn’t know what Leanne’s talking about. ‘How?’

  Leanne ignores the question. ‘And I made Chantel win that money, and I made it rain, and I made David ill – but I had no idea until tonight that he was ill . . .’

  ‘How did you find out?’

  ‘Owen spread it around. Everyone knows.’

  ‘Oh. Anyway, I still don’t understand. How is any of this your fault?’

  Leanne blows her nose. ‘I didn’t mean it.’

  ‘Leanne, for God’s sake, just tell me!’

  ‘Do you watch Sabrina?’ Leanne asks.

  ‘Sabrina, the Teenage Witch?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘I’ve seen it a couple of times . . .’

  ‘Well, I saw one where they did love spells and I thought I’d try one out on Luke.’

  ‘You tried out a love spell from Sabrina, the Teenage Witch on Luke?’

  ‘No. I got the spell from a book.’

  ‘Where did you get the book?’

  ‘Crystal Ball.’

  ‘You went into Crystal Ball?’

  Crystal Ball is a shop on one of the small streets off the High Street. It sells whale-music tapes, feng-shui videos, and books on visualisation techniques, Jungian discourse, recovering from abuse, disciplining your inner child, balancing your chi and Tantric sex. As well as that, it has an extensive range of books on Wicca and Paganism, lots of boxed sets of Harry Potter novels, stickers that say Neighbourhood Witch, and a flotation tank.

  ‘I wanted a book of love spells, didn’t I?’ Leanne says.

  ‘But it’s really weird in there. I thought you hated stuff like that.’

  ‘I’ve been in there before,’ Leanne says, slightly defensively. ‘Someone got me a flotation-tank voucher for my birthday last year. They do hypnosis and stuff too – you can get tapes that you play while you’re asleep to help you give up smoking, or become more popular or . . .’

  Julie can suddenly see Leanne lying in her bed, surrounded by soft toys, falling asleep listening to a disembodied, calming voice telling her she’s popular, and everyone likes her, or whatever they say on those hypnosis tapes. She must know she isn’t popular any more, and that the last time she was really popular was when she was about eleven. Poor Leanne. She must be incredibly lonely. Julie bets all Leanne’s soft toys have names, and that Leanne would be embarrassed if people knew that.

  ‘Anyway,’ Leanne says. ‘The spell worked.’

  ‘What, the love spell?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘How do you know it worked?’

  ‘Well, Luke was never interested in me before. Then he wanted to shag me.’

  ‘I see.’ Julie smiles. ‘What about the other stuff?’

  Leanne starts crying again. ‘I gave David cancer. I didn’t mean to, and I didn’t really know that whatever you give out you get back three times – have you seen The Craft? – anyway, I was really fucked off with him one day. I came in to see you at The Edge and he was really rude to me . . .’

  ‘Rude? How?’

  ‘I asked for you, and he just sort of sang at me: “You can suck my dick if you don’t like my shit.” I know he was only messing around, but it really embarrassed me. He did it about four times – whatever I said, he just sang it at me. I think it was a lyric from some Eminem thing or whatever and I know it was just a joke but it was really doing my head in. So I stormed out, and after work I went to Crystal Ball and got a new magic book. Then I cursed him.’

  ‘Cursed him? Hang on – I thought they only sold good-magic books in Crystal Ball.’

  ‘They do. I modified a good spell. I didn’t mean to. I was just angry.’

  Julie sighs. ‘When was this?’

  ‘About six months ago.’

  ‘Leanne, I’m sure you didn’t give David cancer. He would have had it before that.’

  ‘Would he?’

  ‘I don’t know. Probably. Cancer takes a long time to develop.’

  ‘Oh. But what about Chantel, and the rain?’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Did you know that Chantel gave me money?’

  ‘No, I didn’t know that.’

  ‘She gave us all money. She got her mum the house, of course, but she gave me and my mum ten grand each.’

  ‘Wow. That’s a lot. That’s really nice of her.’

&n
bsp; ‘Yeah, but about two months before that I did a whole ritual where I asked for money. You have to be really careful with those spells, because although you usually get what you ask for, you sometimes get it in a way you don’t expect. Like, you could ask for money, then get it in the form of inheritance when someone you love dies. So instead of making it about me, I made the spell about Nicky. I knew if she got rich she’d give me money . . . As it was, she got a house because Chantel got rich and I still got money. So it worked.’

  ‘Well, what’s wrong with that?’

  ‘It proves I’m a witch! And after that worked, I got really freaked out, so . . . When you were a kid, did you ever wonder if God really existed?’

  ‘Yeah, of course.’

  ‘Did you do that thing where you said: God, if you’re there, make it rain so I know you exist, then I’ll believe in you?’

  Julie smiles. ‘Yes. Everyone does. It didn’t rain when I did it.’

  ‘Me neither. But when my magic seemed to be working, I decided to test it the same way. I found a rain spell and performed it. The next day, this rain started, and then everything flooded, and the rain won’t stop.’

  ‘Leanne, you didn’t cause the floods.’

  ‘How do you know?’

  ‘Ordinary people can’t control nature.’

  ‘Witches can.’

  ‘Not to that extent.’

  Leanne shrugs. ‘Maybe I’m a powerful witch. Anyway, I’m scared.’

  ‘What of?’

  ‘This . . . power I seem to have. I never thought any of this stuff would work.’

  Julie wants to laugh. This is ridiculous.

  She fiddles with her car keys. ‘Have you tried to reverse any of these spells?’

  ‘You can’t reverse magic. It doesn’t work like that.’

  ‘Can’t you do a spell to make it stop raining?’

  ‘No. You’re not supposed to mess around with the weather.’

  ‘But . . .’

  ‘Obviously, I didn’t know that when I did the rain spell.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘Also, I don’t know a spell to make rain stop.’

  ‘Have you looked on the Internet?’

  ‘Yeah. People must like rain, there weren’t any rain-stopping spells.’

  ‘I suppose no one wants a drought,’ Julie says.

  ‘Oh yeah. I never thought of that.’

  When Julie walks into Luke’s room, something’s different. David’s there but that’s not what it is. David and Luke are watching a film Julie and Luke have seen before. What is it that’s wrong? A smell – patchouli. But Charlotte was here, wasn’t she? Luke said so when he rang. Maybe it’s this plan; the one Julie doesn’t know about yet. She knows there’s a plan, and in some way the room feels like there’s something new in it, like a plan, like too much electricity before a storm.

  ‘You were a long time,’ David says.

  ‘What was wrong with Leanne?’ Luke asks.

  Julie sits on the computer chair and logs on to Hotmail. ‘Nothing, really,’ she says. Leanne made her promise not to tell anyone about her special powers. ‘Just some girl thing. Nothing to worry about. So what’s been happening?’

  ‘We’re going to Wales,’ David says.

  Julie looks up from the computer. ‘What? Who is?’

  ‘We are,’ David says. ‘You, me, Luke and Charlotte.’

  ‘That’s the plan,’ Luke explains. ‘The one I told you about. David’s coming.’

  Julie’s skin prickles. ‘I don’t understand,’ she says.

  David looks at Julie, then at Luke. ‘Laters,’ he says, getting up.

  ‘Hang on – how are you getting home?’ Julie asks, confused by everything.

  ‘Walking. It’s not far.’ He smiles. ‘I think I’d better leave you two to it.’

  When he’s gone, Luke’s body droops. ‘Sorry,’ he says.

  ‘Sorry? What for? I don’t understand what’s going on.’ Luke doesn’t reply. ‘Luke?’ Julie says. ‘What the hell’s going on?’

  ‘I wanted to talk to you about it first. I . . .’ He gets up and walks across the room, stands in front of his bookshelves for a second then turns and walks back to the bed. ‘This healer – Wei. Charlotte put him in touch with me. She’s due to go to India to do some Ayurveda course or something, and the people she’s going with know this guy and they said he was really good, apparently . . . Anyway, he got in touch and he asked me all these questions and said he could heal me . . .’

  ‘He said he could heal you?’ Her body goes cold. ‘Bloody hell, Luke. God.’

  ‘Yeah. But I wasn’t sure about him at first, and I didn’t want to get your hopes up by telling you about him . . . But after I’d spoken to him a couple of times, he said he wanted to speak to you as well, and I thought . . .’

  ‘Me? Why?’

  ‘I don’t know. I may have mentioned that you don’t like travelling and stuff. Anyway, I’d arranged to speak to him last night, with you there – after the party – and I wanted to find out what you thought and everything but I drank that beer and I forgot and this morning I felt so bad. Charlotte came over from your house and I was in such a state, feeling like I’d let Wei down, and that this was my only chance of being cured, but that I’d stuffed it up. So she rang him, and they decided we should go to see him in Wales. How far away is Wales?’

  ‘A long way away. Why can’t he come here?’

  ‘I’m not sure.’

  ‘Didn’t Charlotte ask?’

  ‘I don’t know. Sort of. I . . .’

  ‘Oh, shit. Have you got her number?’

  ‘Charlotte’s?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  Luke goes to his computer and pulls up the address file for Charlotte. There’s a Brentwood number there. Julie dials it. There’s no reply.

  ‘Hasn’t she got a mobile?’

  ‘She doesn’t believe in mobiles. They unbalance her doshas. Why do you want to phone her anyway?’

  ‘I want to find out what’s going on – why this guy can’t come here to see you; and if it’s because he can’t be bothered, maybe we could persuade him or something. We could pay him, I’ve got tips saved up.’

  ‘He can’t drive,’ Luke says. ‘I heard Charlotte say that he can’t drive – and neither can her friends.’

  ‘Oh, shit. The trains.’

  ‘Huh?’

  ‘They’re not running – you must have heard about that big crash in Hatfield yesterday morning. That’ll be why. The trains aren’t running and there’s no other way for him to get here. Maybe we can put it off until he can come here on the train.’

  ‘That’s not really fair, though,’ Luke says.

  ‘It’s not really fair that you have to travel to Wales, considering you’re not supposed to go out of the house.’

  Luke looks at the floor. ‘And he’s leaving the country next week, apparently. He’s only here for a while.’

  ‘Oh God.’

  ‘Julie?’

  She gets up and walks to Luke’s small bathroom and looks at herself in the mirror. Her pale, smooth skin, her boring hair – never highlighted or bleached or dyed. Her eyes are big and blue, but glazed with fear. She is used to seeing her face in this mirror, or in the one at home, or in the one in the Ladies’ at The Edge – not that she’ll be seeing it there again. She feels like her face wouldn’t fit anywhere else; that she wouldn’t look right outside of those places. She pulls half of her hair to one side, and plaits it. Then she plaits the other side. That’s how Chantel had her hair.

  Chantel wouldn’t have a problem going somewhere, Julie thinks. Maybe if Julie keeps her hair like this she won’t feel like herself, and if she doesn’t feel like herself, she’ll be able to do this. Fuck it. She’s going to have to do this anyway, because she always promised she would. She needs to find out about this healer – but if Charlotte’s recommended him and he says he can help then there’s not much more to find out, really. She’ll have to get a map, that’s the m
ain thing.

  She’ll have to get a map and find a way to get there without going on any main roads. And she’ll have to think of a reason to tell Charlotte that she’s doing that. And David. How the hell did David get invited along? Luke probably asked him to be polite, and David said yes because people like David will always join in with anything if it sounds like a laugh. This doesn’t sound like a laugh to Julie. But there’s still only one thing she can say.

  ‘We are going to have to go there, aren’t we?’ she says, walking back into Luke’s room. ‘This is insane.’

  ‘I know. I’m scared. But you’ll look after me, won’t you?’

  ‘Of course I will. I just . . .’ Julie walks across the room and sits on the bed, slouched over with her elbows on her knees and her head in her hands.

  Luke looks at her. ‘What?’

  She looks up and smiles weakly. ‘Nothing. Everything feels different, that’s all.’

  ‘Like you can’t go back?’

  ‘Yeah. Like you can’t go back.’

  ‘I feel weird inside,’ Luke says.

  Julie wants to say she feels weird too, but she can’t.

  ‘Weird how?’ she says instead.

  ‘I don’t know. This has all happened so quickly. Jules?’

  ‘Yeah?’

  ‘Why aren’t you saying that we can’t go?’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I thought you’d say it was mad and that we couldn’t go.’

  Julie shrugs. ‘Things feel different today. And anyway, we have to go. This guy’s the only person who’s ever said he could help you. And I promised that if we ever found a way to cure you, I’d do anything to make sure it happened.’

  The only problem is that the last time Julie left Essex, seven years ago, she crawled home in tears. And another problem: what does this Wei guy know that no doctor in the world does? Julie doesn’t believe in healers any more than she believes in ghosts or magic. Why would she? But Luke wants to go out, and he wants to try this, and at least Julie can look after him if she goes with him. She can’t say what she really thinks about the idea of healing. If she did, then she wouldn’t be able to go with Luke, and if she doesn’t go it’s fairly likely that he’ll just go without her, with Charlotte and David. And anyway, maybe it is about time Julie and Luke left Windy Close, even just for a day or two. And maybe this healer does know something that other people don’t. And maybe a small part of Julie still believes that if you try hard enough you can cure anything.