Beyond Here Lies Nothing cg-3 Read online

  These days the place had lost its edge, but the essence of that hostility remained, wedged like ancient mortar into the brick joints. Even today, packed out with old men and women who were seeing off an old friend, there was the sense that violence might kick off at any given moment, triggered by nothing more than a change in the temperature or a rogue air current drifting in through an open window.

  “What are you having?” He turned to Rose and leaned in towards the man, so he could hear a reply over the clamour.

  “Whisky, please.”

  “Double?”

  “Well, I wouldn’t say no.”

  Marc elbowed his way through the crowd and towards the bar. The two members of staff on duty were struggling to cope with the rush, so he had to wait a while before catching the barmaid’s eye. She raised her eyebrows to signal that she’d made a note of his presence and finished off pulling a pint of mild for an old man who looked drunk already.

  The man paid for his beer and staggered away from the bar, slopping half the contents of his glass down the front of his shabby suit jacket. The barmaid moved over to where Marc was standing.

  “Aye?”

  “A double whisky and a bottle of Becks, please.”

  She turned and bent over to the low-level cooler box, opened the glass door and took out a cold bottle. Marc stared at her enormous backside, unable to look away. The thin waistband of her tight black trousers had slipped down to reveal the lacy edge of her underwear and the flesh of her ample waist formed a bulging muffin-top around the beltline. She straightened and poured the whisky from the optic: two aggressive jabs with the glass.

  “Anything else?” she asked as she turned back to him and placed the drinks on the wet bar. She had a pretty face but her dyed blonde hair was tired and dried out. Her makeup failed to hide the scars of a hard life.

  “That’s all, thanks.” He took a sip of his beer straight from the bottle. It felt good, like a soothing balm for whatever might ail him.

  Marc paid for the drinks and made his way back over to Rose. The man wasn’t standing where he’d left him and he felt stranded for a moment, gripping the two drinks and scanning the interior for a sighting of his companion.

  Rose waved to him from across the room, where he’d managed to squeeze onto the end of a long seat at the edge of a table cluttered with empty pint glasses. Marc made his way over to the table, dodging elbows and spirited hand gestures. He reached the safety of the table without spilling a drop and set down the drinks before spotting the low three-legged stool Rose had commandeered for his use.

  “Thanks,” he said, grabbing the stool and sitting opposite Rose at the narrow wooden table.

  “Cheers,” said Rose, raising his glass. “Here’s to Harry.”

  “To Harry,” echoed Marc, lifting his bottle and taking another drink.

  The level of conversation inside the pub had settled to a lower volume. Now that everyone had a drink they were beginning to settle in and find a rhythm.

  “I’m glad you called me to let me know about Harry,” said Rose. “I’d never have forgiven myself if I’d have missed his funeral.” His eyes were glazed. Marc wasn’t sure if the whisky was working already or the man was holding back tears.

  “It’s okay,” said Marc. “To be honest, I was only doing what Harry asked me to do.”

  Rose put down his glass. “What do you mean?”

  “He’d asked a couple of times that I call you if anything happened to him. He knew he was ill. His heart wasn’t good. The doctor had told him that he shouldn’t make any long term plans.” He took a drink, licked his lips. “So he gave me your number and asked me to make you sure were informed when it happened.”

  “Shit,” said Rose, wiping the back of a hand across his eyes. “We really were stupid… stubborn and stupid and intractable.” He gulped down the rest of his whisky. “My round,” he said and rose to his feet. “Same again?”

  Marc finished his bottle. “I might join you in a whisky,” he said.

  “Good lad.”

  He sat and looked around as he waited for Rose to return with the drinks. Making mental notes, he studied the other people in the pub. It was the curse of a writer, this constant logging of minor details. He was unable to be anywhere without mentally listing character traits, quirks and twitches, even the dun colour of the wallpaper behind the heads of a chatting couple.

  Most of the customers were the wrong side of middle age, but there were a few younger people present. Only about a third of the people here had been at the funeral, so Marc assumed that the rest of the group was made up of regulars and those who knew Harry but not well enough to attend the service. A bunch of kids in their early twenties occupied the bay window, talking in low tones, their faces hidden by the peaks of baseball caps. He watched a man and a woman as they kissed in the corner by the cigarette machine; her lips mashed against his teeth and Marc caught a glimpse of her tongue as it snaked into her partner’s mouth.

  He wasn’t quite sure when he felt her gaze — even later, when he thought back to this moment, he could not be certain of the exact moment that he noticed her — but he gradually became aware of a vague warm sensation at the back of his head. Turning, he looked past the crowded bar and saw a tall, thin woman leaning against the wall by the jukebox. He’d caught her eye just as she looked away, but he knew that she’d been staring at him.

  The woman’s face was long and narrow, vaguely horse-like, with a long nose and a wide, appealing mouth. Like a lot of women on the estate, she had dyed blonde hair, but hers was pulled back into a severe ponytail. Her black suit was cheap and in need of ironing but the blouse she had on underneath the jacket looked as if she’d spent a bit of money on it back when it had been in fashion. She looked at him again but this time she didn’t look away immediately; she held his gaze for a long moment and a smile played at the edges of her broad mouth.

  “There you go.” Rose was back. He pushed a shot glass into Marc’s hand and slammed down two bottles of Becks on the table. “I dunno about you, but suddenly I feel like getting pissed.”

  Marc raised his glass. “I’ll drink to that.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  THE AFTERNOON WORE on in a comfortable haze of whisky and beer. The craving for tobacco was almost crippling at times, because Marc kept seeing people nip outside for a smoke. He was drawn to follow them, as if some invisible umbilical were tugging him in that direction. But he fought the urge and managed to get through the worst of it. He drank more alcohol instead. It seemed to numb the craving.

  He and Rose talked about a lot of things but they didn’t discuss anything of importance. Their conversation lurched between football and politics (Rose was a life long supporter of Newcastle United; Marc was a Sunderland fan. They both voted labour but Rose was in favour of a return to a more rigidly socialist doctrine), women and wine, friendships lost and broken and relationships renewed. The old man soon became maudlin and the effects of the whisky were showing. At some point after 3 pm, he announced that he was going to call a taxi and rose unsteadily to his feet.

  “Here,” said Marc, all too aware of the slurring in his voice. “Use my mobile.”

  “Thanks.” Rose thumbed the number and ordered a cab. He was told that it would arrive in about five minutes.

  “I should’ve left earlier. I can’t take the booze like I used to.” His face was loose on the bones, the skin sagging. “But I’m glad I had someone to drink with, Marc. You’ve saved me from an afternoon sat in a corner drinking alone and wallowing in self-pity.” He smiled and showed his teeth, which were so white and even they could only be dentures.

  “I’ll keep in touch,” said Marc. “Harry was a good man, and it would be a nice tribute if his death meant that we stayed friends.” He was surprised to find that he actually meant what he said.

  “I’d like that. I know I can’t take back what happened between me and Harry, but the fact that you spent time with him in his last days is comforting. Right then…
” He stood, swayed, and steadied himself against the table, clattering the glasses. “I have to go. My cab will be here soon. I’ll speak to you next week?”

  Marc nodded. “I’ll give you a call. We can go for a pint.”

  He watched as the old man wove across the floor, managing not to walk into anyone, and then pushed through the door and went outside.

  Marc had about an inch of whisky left in his glass and the beer bottle was only half full. He knew that he should drink up and go, but the urge to keep drinking surged within him, a throwback to his younger days when he’d struggled with an addictive nature.

  Just one more, he thought. One more drink after this one, and then I’ll leave.

  The room seemed to shimmer around him. He knew he was drunk, of course; but what he didn’t realise was how drunk. He hadn’t stood up for about half an hour, and his legs felt strange, as if they’d blended with the table and the chair and were conspiring to keep him seated.

  He finished the whisky without really tasting it and picked up the Becks bottle.

  When he put the empty bottle back down on the table it was like coming out of a trance. He knew that only seconds had passed between his last thought and the act of replacing the green bottle on the table, but it felt like he’d somehow fallen asleep and lost at least a couple of hours. The air in the room felt different, heavy. The quality of the light had changed, as if the sun outside had moved across the sky without him noticing the passage of time. He was familiar with this sensation of dislocation from drinking bouts in the past, but still it troubled him. It was as if he’d emerged from a lacuna, a blank spot. Anything could have happened while he was away.

  Panicked, he checked his pockets. His wallet and his phone, his car and house keys… they were all still there. He hadn’t been pick-pocketed during his mini fugue. He had no idea how anything like that could even have occurred, yet it made him feel calmer to confirm that everything was still in place about his person. The world might have changed fractionally, but he was still the same.

  He glanced up and around and realised that the Unicorn was a lot less busy. People had drifted away, perhaps going home to their families or seeking a cheaper method to bring on oblivion by raiding secret stores of black market beer and spirits kept in the space under the stairs or beneath the bed.

  The woman he’d noticed earlier was still in her spot by the jukebox, but now she was pushing coins slowly and methodically into the slot, one after another. He’d been aware of music playing but only now that the volume of the drinkers had lowered could he identify a tune. Neil Diamond: Sweet Caroline. That song, he knew, was one of the many that formed the soundtrack to the lives of people who drank in rough pubs and social clubs. Songs like this one — sad and sweet and with an instant hook — were sung by club singers throughout the country. The performance was always the same — a low-rent crooner on a low stage belting out bygone hits through a dodgy sound system. An overweight man in an ill-fitting black suit with white sweat marks under the arms, singing songs about divorce and heartbreak; always delivered in a fake American accent in a small northern town, a desperate attempt to delineate the boundaries of even smaller lives. To Marc, it was one of the most depressing experiences the world had to offer.

  “Jesus,” he muttered. And he fought the urge to laugh at his own bleak musings.

  He needed to do something to break his mood, so he slowly rose from the chair and started moving in a crouch towards the bar. At the last minute he jinked to the right and walked along the length of the bar, following its curve towards the jukebox.

  The woman picked that exact moment to stop feeding money into the machine. She turned around and faced the room. Marc was too close to her by now to back out, so he kept going and only stopped walking when he was right in front of her.

  Suddenly this seemed like a bad idea. It was as if he’d entered another of those drunken fugues and only come out of it when it was too late to make any difference to the situation.

  “Hi,” he said, aware that he was swaying gently.

  The woman stared at him. Up close he could see that she was wearing too much makeup. The dark rings around her eyes looked like week-old bruises. Her lips were thin and her skin, beneath the layer of foundation, was slightly rough, as if it had been sandpapered. But her eyes were beautiful: ice blue, piercing, holding within them the promise of something that he couldn’t define. Staring into those eyes was like catching sight of a cold, quick, elegant movement; the flickering of something living encased within an iceberg.

  “I, erm… I noticed you earlier. Thought I’d come over and say hello.”

  She didn’t stop staring at him but she looked bored, barely even interested in what he had to say. Not that he could blame her: his patter was as stale as the air inside the pub, and as lifeless as her stoic face.

  “Okay… sorry. I’ll go away.” He started to turn, his cheeks burning. He wasn’t usually this awkward around women. In fact, he usually found it easy to turn on the charm; faking was simple, it was honesty he found a difficult trick to pull off. But there was something about this woman that disturbed him — the same thing that drew him to her.

  “White wine and soda,” she said, without moving. She had her back to the wall. The glass in her hand was almost full. Slowly, she raised the glass to her lips and swallowed the contents. Her eyes never left his face.

  She handed him the glass.

  He struggled to think of a witty response, but there was nothing left to say. He turned around and walked over to the bar, ordered the drinks. Then he returned to her side, feeling as if he’d been trapped somehow, or manipulated into doing something against his will. Not a big thing, just a tiny act of coercion, something unnoticeable to everyone but himself: a minuscule defilement of his sense of self, or a minor mutilation to a part of his body that would remain unseen.

  He handed her the drink and waited. Why was he acting like this? What the hell was wrong with him?

  “What’s your name?” He couldn’t stop looking at her eyes. He wanted to see that movement again, to try and discern what had caused it.

  “Abby.” Her voice was cold and hard, the inflection flat. The vowels were truncated, as if she could barely be bothered to form the words.

  “I’m Marc.”

  “Oh.” Her thin lips twitched apart as she spoke. She took a sip of her wine.

  “I’m not usually this crap with women,” he said, thinking that honesty might be the way forward. “You make me feel uncomfortable. Do you know that? The effect you have. Are you aware of it?”

  “Do I look like I give a shit, Marc?” Those icy eyes, that tough voice.

  “Listen… you’re obviously not interested. Enjoy your drink and I’ll –”

  “No.” That was all she said. Just one word. But it was enough to keep him there, as if someone had applied quick-setting glue to the soles of his shoes.

  “You don’t want me to leave you alone?”

  She shook her head. “You can hang around for a bit. Talk to me. Nobody else does around here, not these days. It’s like they’re afraid they might catch something off me.”

  Puzzled by her choice of words, he wondered if she perhaps had some kind of disease. She looked thin enough that something might be eating her away from the inside. The suit jacket hung loosely on her frame and her legs beneath the hem of the skirt were so thin that he was afraid they might buckle if she stepped away from the wall and put all her weight on them.

  Cancer? Was that it? It might explain her demeanour, the way that she didn’t seem to care, and that faintly hostile coldness behind her eyes.

  “It’s nice to see a new face around these parts,” she said, as if continuing some conversation the precise details of which he’d missed. “You get sick of these mardy bastards around here.” She twitched her head, indicating everyone else in the pub. “Sometimes I want to smash their faces in just to see what they’d do.” She smiled at last, but it was a bitter expression that didn’t qu
ite suit her long face. “Do you know what I mean, or am I scaring you?” The question was a challenge. He could feel it. She was testing him, feeling him out.

  “No, I knew exactly what you mean. Sometimes I get like that myself.” But it ran deeper than that. He knew it even if he was unable to vocalise his feelings. This place — it lent force to the everyday negative emotions people had, and it amplified them. He didn’t know how, or why, it happened, but here in the Grove bad thoughts took on substance, became even worse deeds-in-waiting. All it took was a trigger, and sometimes the finger pulling that trigger was the last one you expected.

  There was a pause, then, and she looked around the room, her face resuming its previous set expression of mild distaste. Marc tried to judge the true shape of her body underneath her clothing, and he was left with the off-putting impression of skin and bones. Usually he was attracted to women with a fuller figure, and he failed to understand what it was about Abby that he found so appealing. Was he simply drunk and horny and had seen an opportunity here, or did the attraction run deeper than merely the possibility of a quick fix of empty sex? He couldn’t be sure; his thoughts refused to settle and his emotions were unfamiliar.

  “How about another?” he said, draining his bottle. He’d abandoned the whisky in favour of sticking to beer. He was already too drunk to repair the damage, but at least he could prevent drinking himself insensate.

  “Yeah,” she said. “Thanks.” Gratitude — this was new. He felt like he might be getting somewhere.