“No idea,” Mark said. “But we’ll hold it together for as long as we can.”
Peggy realised she was still holding Mark’s books from the shop that morning. Iris had given them to her for safekeeping. “She’s taking her time,” she said.
“The Emperor’s New Clothes for Sally,” said Mark, opening the parcel. “And a novel by a certain Iris Margaret Wildthyme.”
As they crowded round to examine the gilded cover of Iris’s long-forgotten novel, Iris’s voice called down to them.
She was shouting for help, although she never meant to. In her long life Iris had prided herself on never really needing anyone’s help. But at this moment she was perched on the perilous fire escape, held tight in the grip of someone wearing a garishly made-up face and Mark’s clothes.
“Tony!” Mark shouted, jumping up, the others following his lead.
Iris, thought Peggy steadily. Don’t be Shelley Winters. Be Orlando. Be a Valkyrie. Just this once.
The next few moments stretched on for hours.
Time was playing its tricks although none of them was pissed.
Mark had never thought to see Tony again. He thought now that he was being betrayed.
They all cleared the bed and stood around, helpless, looking up, as if instinctively knowing they must provide something to break a fatal fall.
For in those endless moments the figure wearing Mark’s clothes launched itself and Iris off the fire escape and into the air. They jerked into life as if pulled on strings, or pushed by a hand unseen.
And then they flew.
The sky was that flinching blue again and no one in the garden could stop their eyes watering in order to see how they fell. The bodies tumbled and soared, seemed never to descend.
Then came, amid the gentle snow, a patter of sharp swan’s feathers upon the mattress. They fell, fresh and inexplicable, as around the bed dropped Iris’s many layers of clothing. And finally, in their midst, with shocking suddenness and no harm done, fell a bright pink child, about the size of a rabbit.
The body in Mark’s clothes hit the wet, stony ground nearby with a hideous crunch.
Peggy took the baby up, picking the feathers out from between its limbs. “She said she was going somewhere…” There were tears down her face. She looked at Richard. “Well, Mr Houseboy. How are you with kids?”
Sally grinned at her. “He was brilliant with me. He’ll look after Granny Iris.”
Ever the vigilant policeman, Bob was tending to the not-so-lucky, the also-ran.
Simmonds made-up face was smashed on the ruined foundations of an outhouse. But they could see plainly who he was.
“We’ll have to report this, Sam,” said Bob as they clustered about, appalled.
She shook her head. “The country’s having snow chaos. We can’t make a fuss. The police have enough on their hands.”
All that afternoon they dug the iron-hard earth and at last buried the old man in his hi-tech trainers.
Then they caught the train back home to the north, back to separate homes, in the same town, as planned.
TWENTY SEVEN
I’M SOUTH, NOW. IN A RAILWAY STATION, IN BRAND-NEW DRAG.
Remember, Mark, when I told you about Anna Karenina? Well, for a while I was tempted to pull off her stunt. Remember Garbo being her, bless her? I want to be alone, too.
I watched your patched-up family board the train at Leeds, happy and contented. I thought about interposing myself, throwing off my disguise bit by bit and making myself apparent. There’s the irony, of course—the more disguise I shrug off, the less apparent I am.
I could have done one final, self-vindicating disappearing act. I could have been Anna, or Garbo, shedding my coat, my shoes, my hat, leaving only a made-up face, a Cheshire-cat grin, and I could have forced you to watch me mangle it on the railway lines as your train pulled out. Just as you went off home to figure out your new, complex lives.
But I sat there instead and pretend to be corporeal.
And you went and I came south.
I don’t know where I’m going yet. This is a stop-off point. I’ve been travelling for a few days now, choosing a place. I can see the Tyre and Exhaust Centre from here. Tired and Exhausted. I think we all are by now.
That’s how the wild woods in winter make you feel. But winter is relenting today. The sky has pink and blue shreds drifting through it. Complementary, not quite oppositional spring shades. It’s fucking cold, though. Here I am on one of those metal seats that make you shudder rather than shiver.
If Frankenstein were written today, would the monster and creator dash about the country on British Rail? They could never be sure of finding each other. If Frankenstein and the monster had an AwayDay now, even if they did come across each other on a dark, windy, romantic platform, they’d never tell who was who anyway.
This red-bricked station occupies many contradictory states: desolate and busy, orderly and chaotic. On the bench beside me sits an old woman in bright red shoes, who rocks herself and stares and stares. Involved in her own drama, whatever that may be.
In these stations we have only one role: the quiet traveller, the bit-part player. And no necessary relation to each other. In stations, we needn’t connect.
Oh, Mark, I’m writing to you again. The lilac paper is resting on my knee. Already written, abandoned sheets lie about my feet on that pockmarked concrete of the platform. Fags are squashed out in the pockmarks like killed beetles. I just feel the need to write again, although I shouldn’t, I suppose.
Across from me there is a disembowelled train, resting on an unused track. It’s undercarriage has large white letters stencilled upon it: NOT TO BE LOOSE SHUNTED.
Rest assured, Mark, I will not be shunted loosely into that good night.
Here’s my train.
Love,
Tony.
TWENTY EIGHT
MISS KINSEY WAS RATTLING THE STAFF-ROOM BLINDS ONCE MORE. IT WAS home time, the end of the first week of a new term and a
