Thin Air by Storm Constantine
‘So what?’ Jay answered.
At the check-out, Julie made a disapproving sound at the cost of Jay’s purchases. Jay ignored it and flashed her gold card at the cashier. She would not let herself feel guilty.
After the shopping expedition, Jay drove to a pub she’d noticed on the way that offered lunches. She was not surprised when Julie protested. ‘We’ve got all that nosh for tonight,’ she said. ‘I can’t eat that much.’
‘Then have a liquid lunch,’ Jay said. ‘This is my treat, Julie. I want to do it.’
‘I can see that.’ She paused. ‘Don’t forget about the birds in winter.’
Jay stopped the car in the car park. ‘What?’
Julie turned sideways in the passenger seat. ‘It’s what I always used to say to Chris, whenever he came up - which wasn’t often, not after he’d left us. He’d start flashing his money about and I’d remind him about people who put food out for the birds. They don’t think about how they’ll not be living in their house forever, and what happens to the birds who’re relying on them when they’re gone? They have to go back to pecking at the hard ground. It’s nice, Jay, all this giving, but it’s not really fair.’
Jay felt herself blushing. ‘Perhaps there shouldn’t have been a winter for you,’ she said, slightly defensively.
‘You don’t have to put the food out in the garden of his house,’ Julie said quietly. ‘I knew Chris better than anybody, and he knew me as well. There’s nothing to make amends for. You don’t have to.’
‘I know, I know,’ Jay said. She closed her eyes briefly. ‘I’m sorry, Julie. I’m not doing this very well.’
‘That’s OK,’ Julie said. She opened her car door. ‘Let’s just go for a drink, shall we?’
Julie went up to the bar to order while Jay took a seat in a bay window. It occurred to her that Dex might have come to see Julie while he’d been living with her in London. He’d never mentioned it. Why had he kept his family so apart from his life? Why had Julie never come down to London, or been invited to gigs? Jay imagined Julie’s children in her London flat; Kylie drawing at the breakfast bar in the kitchen, Melanie rosy and blooming in colourful infant clothes, scrabbling around on the rug with Early Learning Centre toys. Dex could have given his family so much, but had chosen not to. It seemed absurd, given that he was supposed to have been so fond of his sister, but perhaps she didn’t know him as well as she thought she did.
Julie came back with gin and tonics. Jay thought of the groceries in the boot of her car. At least now Julie could probably afford these drinks. ‘I think you’re a bit scared,’ Julie said.
Jay took a sip of gin, rolling the flavour round her mouth. ‘Scared?’
‘You weren’t happy out there in the woods, were you?’
Jay twisted her mouth to one side. ‘Not sure. It seemed close, that’s all, almost claustrophobic. I’m a city girl, remember. The wilderness is a scary place to me.’
‘No, you were afraid to open up.’
Jay leaned forward. ‘What do you mean?’
Julie laughed, too loudly. ‘Oh, I’m a bit weird sometimes,’ she said. ‘I feel things, but I s’pose most women can. I can always feel Chris around when I’m in the woods.’
‘Yet you say he’s not dead.’ Jay paused briefly, then plunged on. ‘How does he speak to you, Julie? Does it happen when you’re in places like the wood?’
Julie shook her head. ‘Not always. It can happen anywhere. We’re so close, see. It’s always been like this. If he took a tumble, I’d feel it, like a slap in the face.’
‘You do realise what Dex was like before he disappeared, don’t you?’
‘A handful,’ Julie said.
Jay laughed. ‘Ye-ess, you could say that. Did you feel any of the things that happened to him then, like when he was angry or depressed?’
‘I’d pick up a whiff of a mood now and again,’ Julie said. ‘I expect you had to cope with a lot.’ She was edging away from the subject.
‘Dex was never a problem for me,’ Jay said. ‘What does he say to you, Julie? What does he say now?’
‘It’s not words,’ Julie said. ‘Pictures more like, or feelings. He knows you’re with me.’
Jay shivered. She could not doubt Julie’s words. The atmosphere in the pub had become thick as fog. The diners and drinkers were like figures in a photograph. ‘What else?’ she murmured.
‘Nothing,’ Julie said. ‘I’ll need some time, Jay. You’ll have to be patient.’
Jay switched to fruit juice, while Julie drank a couple more gins. ‘The world we see is a puzzle,’ she said, ‘but there is more to everything than what we see.’
‘Is there? In what way?’
‘There are in-between places, you see.’
‘In between?’
Julie nodded. ‘Yes. Cracks, I call ‘em.’
‘And is Dex in one?’
‘Yes,’ said Julie. ‘He is.’
Chapter Eight
Jay and Julie spent the rest of the afternoon driving around the town. After they’d visited The Ship so that Jay could settle her bill and collect her belongings, Julie directed her to Dex’s old school, then to where his first gig had taken place, and after that a tour of where his friends had lived. Jay could not discern a sense of Dex in these places. The boy that existed within the pages of Julie’s photo albums seemed unreal. Jay couldn’t fix him into this world. It seemed strange. Finally, they crawled slowly past the drab house where Little Peter had lived. There were no pale faces between the curtains in the upstairs window.
Once the take-away Chinese meal had been consumed and the children put to bed, Jay opened the first bottle of wine. Julie thought it was too dry and, to sweeten its taste, added a generous measure of lemonade to her glass.
‘I’m not a big drinker,’ Julie said, adding meaningfully, ‘not like you.’
Jay smiled. ‘Oh, come on, you know all journalists are drinkers. It’s part of the job.’
Julie shook her head. ‘The ones that drink probably say that.’
Jay sat on the floor, feeling jumpy. She’d finished her first glass of wine before Julie had even got half-way through her diluted drink. Maybe she should cut back on her alcohol intake. But what the hell for? I should have gone home, she thought, and on impulse pulled her phone from her bag. As she suspected, there were plenty of messages from Gus, and a couple from Gina. She must have been mad to speak to Gus like that this morning. She’d pay; he’d make her pay. Perhaps she should phone him now, try to make amends. She could lie, say Julie had contacted her, and that was why she was here. Perhaps she should open the gin instead. ‘Oh God!’ said Jay, resting the back of her head on the sofa.
The two women sat in silence, with only the gas fire lisping between them. Julie drained her glass and sighed. ‘Oh well, I might as well come clean.’
Jay raised her head, reached for the wine bottle. Cold liquid splashed over her hands.
‘Chris came to see me three days before he disappeared,’ Julie said.
Jay took a drink, could say nothing.
‘He told me not to tell anyone, ever, and I haven’t, but now, well, I s’pose you should know.’
‘What did he say?’
Julie laughed. ‘He was in a bad mood, all right. Hated the world and everything in it. I knew he was looking for a way out again. I recognised the signs. It was no surprise to me when he disappeared.’
‘You know, don’t you,’ Jay said quietly. ‘You know where he is.’
‘No,’ Julie answered. ‘Only that it’s no place you could get to. He never mentioned you, though I saw all the pictures in the papers afterwards. I just thought “poor cow”. Didn’t recognise you when you turned up here.’
Jay imagined Dex arriving at Julie’s house; the car at the kerb, like hers was now. She saw him pacing round the kitchen, full of frenetic energy, unable to sit down. Julie would be at the table, making tea, Kylie at the table drawing. How old would the kid have been? There would have been no Mela
Julie offered fragments, like scratched and defaced paintings from the wall of an ancient tomb. Many stories might fit the marks: Dex was ill and unstable and had run away; he’d been afraid of something, or sick of something, or maybe just tired of the life he had made. Maybe it had been something to do with the past, some uncleansed, emotional wound festering away beneath the gloss of fame and wealth. Perhaps he’d had something to run to, rather than away from: a person, or a place, or a dream. Julie’s memory was imperfect, perhaps because at the time she hadn’t imagined she’d never see her brother again. A hope might have fountained within her: Dex had cast off his life in order to spend more time with his family. Had he intimated this?
Julie became agitated by Jay’s constant questioning. ‘He was unhappy, bothered,’ she said, ‘that’s all. Something wasn’t going right for him. I thought maybe he’d had enough of all the stupid people he must have to deal with.’
‘Is that me you’re talking about?’ Jay asked. She had finished one bottle of wine herself.
‘He walked out on you,’ Julie said acidly. ‘Maybe you were part of it. You never reached him.’
‘Who did?’ Jay argued. ‘I did everything I could. I treated him like a real person.’
Jay didn’t know why she was arguing. Julie was right; most of the people both she and Dex had had to deal with were stupid, or shallow, or selfish and greedy. The industry attracted types like that. None of it was real. Hadn’t she said that herself to Jez only a short time ago? She put her fingers against her temples. ‘I thought we had a good life, Julie. It was such a shock to me. I’m not like the others. I’m not.’ Drink talking. She should stop. But it seemed that only a small, sober part of herself was aware of that. A greater, emotional part spoke with the voice of the wine. There were tears on her face now, broken sentences spilling from her mouth. It had come back; all of it. The pain, the bewilderment, the senseless questions, the frail blue flame of hope deep within.
Julie got down on the carpet and wrapped her arms round Jay’s shoulders. She smelled of wine and tobacco. ‘I’m sorry, love. Here, come on, don’t get upset.’ Jay, swimming in maudlin gloom, leaned against her, sobbing. Then Julie’s body stiffened against her.
Jay instinctively pulled away. ‘What is it?’
There was silence, but for the purr of the gas jets. Was Dex there? Julie was staring at the closed door.
‘What?’ Jay asked again in a low, desperate voice.
Julie turned back. ‘You’ll know one day,’ she said.
‘Know what?’
‘He’ll let you know what happened.’
‘How will he do that?’
Julie screwed up her face, shook her head. ‘You’ll just know, that’s all.’
‘How? Julie, please. Tell me. Please’
Their voices seemed to have broken the atmosphere. The room was breathing again.
‘Chris just told me,’ Julie said.
The next day was sunny, but the air seemed hard in the brightness. After dropping Kylie off at school, the two women drove north out of the town, Julie with her baby on her knee - she could not ask Marie a baby-sitting favour twice in one week. The noises emitted by Melanie made Jay grit her teeth, but she hoped that this time, Julie would not be opaque, that she’d really reveal something tangible about Dex.
While Julie chaperoned Kylie to the school gate, Jay sat waiting in her car. She phoned Gus. And lied. Even lies weren’t enough. She was tired of his whining, carping tone after only a minute. Why should she put up with this? Why not simply break the connection, but she listened, making sounds of denial and placation. She let him rant, then said, ‘I’ll be back later. Don’t be angry, Gus. I had to do this.’
Julie had got back into the car at the tail-end of the conversation. Jay threw the phone into the back of the car. ‘God, why do we put up with it?’ She banged her hands against the steering wheel.
‘Boyfriend being off again?’
Jay made a low, growling noise. ‘It’s that bloody attitude I can’t stand. Snotty. Condescending. That’s what it is. Like he’s so fucking faultless!’
‘There’s not a man on this earth doesn’t act like that,’ Julie said. ‘Sod ‘im.’
Jay nodded and started the car. ‘Yeah.’ She managed a smile. ‘Today, he doesn’t exist.’
She wished she could mean that.
As they drove off, Jay felt anxious. Gus was angry. He was so angry he said to her he might not be there when she got home. She knew this was unlikely. In a way, she’d have preferred his absence. What she dreaded were the sulks and interrogations on her return.
The north road skirted the edge of the heath. Further away from the houses, the landscape seemed more natural. Jay sensed it would not be so littered with the careless detritus of humanity; cans and bottles and discarded wrappers. They pulled onto a narrow, twisting track between high hedges, which expelled them into a flat area strewn with gravel, where people could park their cars. Hills rose softly all around, their contours mellowed by age. The parking area was surrounded by oaks, beech and ash, with paths going off in all directions, their entrances blocked by wooden beams on posts to prevent anyone driving up them. In among the older deciduous trees, pine trees seethed up the hillsides.
Julie indicated where Jay should park the car, at the edge of the trees. Only one other car was there; a woman was unloading a brace of tawny Labradors from the hatch-back. Once Jay was free of the heated interior of the vehicle, the air was crisp and biting. It was scented by pine oil and loam; it seemed alive. Jay’s jacket would not keep her warm here. They unloaded the push-chair from the boot and secured Melanie into it. The woman with the dogs had already disappeared up the flank of one of the hills; Jay could hear her high, fluting voice calling to her pets. Julie led the way down one of the paths, pushing Melanie ahead of her. A network of narrow streams plaited through the undergrowth to either side, almost concealed by tangled naked blackberry briar. Their path was straight, it did not rise to one of the hills. Jay followed, wondering what mystical experience Julie had in mind for her today.
They walked down the path for a hundred yards or so, then came upon the wide pool of a natural spring, cradled in a grove of oaks that was surrounded by the dour spears of sentinel pines. The spring had been concreted around the edge, but Julie said that at one time there had just been mud and grass and water; torrential in the spring, fading away to a memory of a stream by mid-summer, but back again in winter. The branches of the oaks enclosed the area, protecting it. It was not oppressive, but somehow soothing. Jay was surprised by the clarity of the water in the pool. Julie said it was drinkable, but Jay shrank from trying it. In such a place, knights would have been offered enchanted swords by mysterious pale arms that sliced without a ripple through the surface of the pool.
The women fought their way through a tangle of sodden dead bracken amid the fir trees. By this time, Julie had hoisted Melanie onto her hip, and Jay carried the folded push-chair. After ten minutes of so, they came upon another oak grove, where the trees shouldered together closely. These trees were squatter than the noble forest lords around the pool. They were like dwarves, their roots rippling over the soil in knotted cables. The grove was situated in a hollow that Julie explained was dusty in summer and a quagmire in wetter seasons. This was Dex’s place, his secret den. He hadn’t even taken Little Peter there. Only Julie knew about it. It had been his hiding place, and she’d always been able to find him there when he’d gone missing after trouble at home. The trees were bare now, their ancient barks ragged. Some had had their insides gouged out by age and parasites. The spreading roots humped like giant arthritic toes from the damp earth, as if intent on tripping and obstructing invading humans
Jay hugged herself as she looked around. Julie stood with firmly planted legs, the baby drooling at her hip, clearly allowing Jay to get a feel of the place, perhaps hoping some deep-seated intuition would be aroused. Could there be a sense of Dex here? Jay was almost afraid to imagine it.
‘Did he come here, Julie, last time he visited you?’
Julie shrugged. ‘All I know is that there’s something here for you,’ she said.
Jay went up to one of the trees and touched its heavily furrowed bark. She realised she felt slightly light-headed again, as she had at the beech grove Julie had taken her to the day before. ‘What’s here for me? A message, a feeling, or a thing?’
Julie pulled a face. ‘No idea. Just something. We’ll have to look.’
Jay kicked at the brown rotting leaves beneath her feet. ‘Where to start?’
Julie had unfolded Melanie’s chair once more and now strapped the baby into it. ‘Looks like you already have,’ she said.
Together, the women turned over the mulchy carpet of leaves with their toes, then their hands. They felt among the geriatric roots, put their fingers into damp, fungal crevices in the tree trunks. Nothing. The trees bowed to the earth. They were easy to climb, with wide laps where the branches splayed. Jay clambered upwards, swinging from tree to tree above the ground. Melanie reached towards her with starfish hands, uttering animal cries.
Julie’s face was pale and expressionless below. ‘Go on, girl, go on.’
Jay’s arms ached, her legs were trembling. She climbed up to a place where a flaking limb bulged in an unnatural way. She reached for it, hauling herself higher and found there a metal box, wedged into an old swollen wound in the bark. Once her hands fell upon it, she felt dizzy. How had she climbed this far? How would she get back down? ‘There’s a box here!’ she called to Julie.
‘Get it!’
‘I can’t. It’s stuck.’ She didn’t want to exert too much force for fear of overbalancing. The ground looked very far away, but probably wasn’t. If she fell the mulch would cushion her, maybe. Jay tugged at the rusting artefact. Could Dex have put it here? It seemed to have become part of the tree, to have been lodged there for longer than three years. Clawing at the bark, she tried to pull the ancient fibre away. Fragments fell down. Julie dodged away from them, laughing. Eventually, a huge corky mass broke off in Jay’s fingers and the box plummeted down to the floor of the grove. Julie just looked at it.