Deep Black

I got a smile out of him again, but I hated it when he did that: he looked as if he could see right through me. ‘Nick, what you’ve really got to remember is that by doing your bit to help end that war, you probably did save a whole lot of lives.’

I lifted my hands. ‘So what? The war was bollocks. People got killed for nothing, kids got killed for nothing. Anyway, whatever. Over and done with.’

His eyes flicked towards the clock on the wall behind me. ‘I see we’ve run over our time again.’

That was always my cue to get up and take my leave. Most times I’d have liked to wrench the door open and make a break for it. But I knew that would only mean the next fifty-minute session would be spent talking about why I’d done a runner, so, as always, I got up and put on my leather bomber slowly. I’d learned that I needed to take it off when I arrived, because if I didn’t we’d end up talking about the reasons why I’d kept it on. Did it mean I didn’t want to be here, and was hoping for a fast getaway?

He stood up with me and came to the door. ‘I’m glad you finally went to Bang Bang, Nick. The psyche, you see – you can never rush it, it takes its time to work things through, to help you take the right decisions.

‘I think Bosnia affected you more than you think. I think there’s a connection between losing Kelly and the death of Zina. We’ll get there eventually, when the psyche is ready to beam us in.

‘But that can only happen if you feel comfortable with our therapeutic relationship. I’m not here to hurt you, I’m here to help you. All your life you’ve had to hold things inside and not show your feelings, so I appreciate it was never going to be easy to let all this emotion out. As long as you realize it’s going to take some time . . .

‘And, Nick, even if you were lied to, it sounds like you really did make a difference during that time.’

I stood on the threshold. ‘Just like old Beardilocks, yeah? At least he had the bollocks to let a few die in order to save the rest.’

12

Friday, 3 October

My neck was stiff and my face was stuck to the leatherette. The sofa wasn’t the most comfortable place to sleep, but that was what I always seemed to end up doing these days.

Forcing my eyes open, I checked Baby-G. It was a pink one – Kelly’s fifteenth and last birthday present from me. There was still time, so I pulled the blanket over my head to block out the glare of the TV and the dull grey light just seeping through the blinds.

I pressed one of Baby-G’s side buttons and watched the face glow a purple colour and the stick man do a break-dance. She’d thought it was a bit silly, but I liked it. Fucking hell, I missed her. I rubbed my hair and smelt the grease on my hand as I closed my eyes.

She lay so perfectly still, as I’d seen her lie so many times when she was asleep – stretched out on her back, arms and legs out like a starfish. Except that this time there’d been no sucking of her bottom lip, no flickering of her eyes under their lids as she dreamed. Kelly’s head was twisted to the right, at far too unnatural an angle.

Why the fuck hadn’t I got there quicker? I could have stopped the fucking nightmare . . .

As I’d leaned over her, my tears had fallen on to her hair-covered face. I checked for a pulse, even though I knew it was futile.

I’d dragged her to the edge of the bed and gathered her in my arms, trying to hold her as best I could as I stumbled back towards the doorway.

They would be coming up the stairs soon, respirators on, weapons up.

I’d lain down next to her, gathering her head in my arms and pulling it on to my chest.

And buried my face in her hair.

Avoice from the TV told me tonight’s hot ticket was going to be Lost Dinosaurs of Egypt. The TV had kept waking me during the night, but I couldn’t be arsed to scrabble around for the remote to switch it off. In fact, last night I hadn’t even been arsed to get undressed before channel-hopping for hours and eventually falling asleep. On an MTV night I could learn quite a lot about the latest bands out there. Kelly would have been proud of me.

It was no use. I was awake now. I felt about on the floor, knocking over a couple of empty mugs then running my hand over the remains of a toasted cheese sandwich. I finally got hold of the remote and flicked through the morning soaps and re-runs of Jerry Springer until I hit a news channel. Another two US soldiers had been killed in Iraq.

I planned my day, which didn’t take long. It was going to be exactly the same as most of the other days I didn’t spend sitting in front of Ezra. Or maybe not. I remembered promising myself I was going to open the windows today. It was getting so rank in here that even I could smell it. And, of course, there was another meeting with George.

I rolled off the sofa and threw the blankets back on top. The kitchen was a disaster zone. The stainless steel and glass had been clean and shiny when I took up the tenancy, but these days I seemed to be sharing the place with a gorilla. He came in every night while I was asleep and messed up all the cleaning I’d done. He dirtied all the plates, filled the bin to overflowing, then spilled coffee and tea on the work surfaces. To top it all, he chucked bits of stale bread and empty spaghetti-hoops cans about the place, and after trashing the kitchen he fucked up the rest of the flat. The last thing he always did before leaving, as far as I could tell, was shit in my mouth. It certainly tasted like it, this time of the morning.

I shoved the last couple of slices into the toaster and peeled the plastic from some processed cheese. A constant stream of aircraft headed into Ronald Reagan, and the TV next door blasted out that Channel Nine was going live to an armed siege in Maryland.

I fired up the kettle and wandered back in to watch, munching on the cheese. I never knew why I bothered taking the wrappers off: it all tasted the same.

I found myself watching a young black guy coming out of his front door in just a pair of jeans. His hands were in the air, but there was a pistol in one. The place was surrounded by police, one barking at him through a megaphone to put down the gun. It was hard to tell from his body language: was this guy drugged up or just pissed off?

I tried to unstick the cheese from my teeth and the roof of my mouth. The black guy shouted for them to shoot him, pounding on his chest with his free hand. The megaphone screamed at him to put down the weapon, and for a split second it looked like that was what he was going to do. He started to lower the weapon, but instead of laying it on the ground he turned the muzzle towards the group of police hunched down behind their cruiser, and that was the last thing he did. Six or seven rounds hit him at once and he dropped like liquid. The screen went black, then we were back in the studio, the anchors changing swiftly to traffic conditions on the Beltway. Another suicide-by-cop for us to watch live over our corn flakes.

The toast popped up. I went and shoved a fresh batch of cheese squares between the unbuttered slices and scraped the last bit of Branston from the jar with a dirty teaspoon. I’d been getting through three or four jars of the stuff a week. Ezra would have had a field day if I’d told him: I clearly had an unfulfilled yearning for the old country. Sliced white bread, cheese slices and Branston pickle – often three times a day, and lying on the sofa watching Oprah. No wonder my jeans were getting difficult to put on.

I turned towards the window, looking through the gloom in the direction of his office to have my daily mimic. ‘Do you have any idea what that might mean, Nick?’

Chewing on the sandwich, I shoved what was left in the air at him. ‘Shove it up your arse.’

‘That’s ass, Nick – you’re an American now.’

I rooted round in the empty boxes on the worktop but with no luck. I was out of teabags but not out of pills. I had nine big bottles of the stuff Ezra prescribed me. I told him I was taking them but, fuck it, I didn’t want that shit inside me. I had enough problems with the Branston.

I was going to have to haul my fat arse out of the flat and down to the Brit shop in Georgetown that all the embassy boys went to. All Brits hate the fancy teabags on a string they try to fob you off with in the States. They