Beneath the Skin (9 page)

23

When he went down to the basement on Monday morning, Alys was already there, looking composed and freshly showered; even just standing in the doorway, he got the scent of peach. Her hair was damp, scooped up into a neat knot. Perched on a stool, she was leaning into the display case, adjusting a fine detail of moss with a pair of tweezers. She was bathed in a warm glow from the solitary lamp, but there was something else about her, a sort of suppressed fizz, like she was lit from inside.

He'd made no sound, but she glanced around anyway. Her skin was still pale, washed out in the bright light, but her eyes were clear. It was impossible to read her mood, to know what to say for the best. He had never mentioned to Mouse about the coffee, the fox, the red cap, the unexplained delivery. There had to be a rational explanation.

‘Sorry we had to dump the birds,' he said. That sounded lame, and even a bit brutal.

She shrugged. ‘I have a contact in the country. He's going to bring me some more birds. A wren too!'

‘Is that the contact who brought you the dead fox?' She didn't answer. ‘Does he have a key?'

She looked more like her old self, although he wasn't too sure, now, of the real Alys. He didn't know her well enough, and anyway, that's what happens when your mind starts playing up. You lose sight of who you are and so does everyone else. Even the people who know you best, who love you, don't know how to be around you any more.

How did someone fulfil a large order for birds? He shied away from the thought.

Ignoring his questions completely, she said, ‘So in the meantime, I've sketched out what's in my head. So I don't lose it.'

Lose the idea? Or the plot? She fished a large piece of cartridge paper from under the table and held it out to him. He moved closer to take it from her. She was talented. The whole tableau, the vision that made her go crazy, was set out in detail worthy of a Leonardo sketch. In frozen, wintry colours she had captured a band of birds: a crow in a periwig, starlings in neckerchiefs and blackbirds with muskets; sparrows, goldfinches, even a robin in a Dick Turpin hat. And in the centre, the wren, lolling dramatically from Moodie's gibbet.
To be hanged by the neck until you are dead
. No mercy.

Walt thrust the page back at her, and if she noticed anything she didn't let on. Instead, she flashed her lightning smile and said, ‘I
love
starting on a project! Love it, I get so excited opening up a new specimen my hands shake!'

‘Your hands shake?'

‘Yes – just imagining the anatomy inside! The colours, the . . .'

He had to stop her. He put his hands on her, on her shoulders, felt his palms close over the bones. ‘Don't, Alys. Jesus, you're weird.'

She was still smiling. Her teeth were very white, like she never chewed anything with colour in it. He imagined them biting into his skin. Her breathing was shallow; he could see it pushing at the little bones in her neck. Her arms grew warm under his palms. She was whispering something, her lips dry like bruised leaves; she slid off the stool, deliberately bumping into him, into his hips. He hadn't meant to be that close but, like the wren, he'd been too slow to move. She rubbed against him like a cat. Belly to belly. There was something wildly intimate about it: that they weren't even touching or kissing but she'd closed the gap between them just the same. He was shocked at his reaction; he felt the twitch of his erection and so did she, and she grinned all the more and this time closed the gap all the way, pressing against him and looping her arms about his neck. There was something greedy about the way she pressed her mouth to his. The scent of peaches was overwhelming. He knew he should push her away from him, but he felt like jelly. Or his knees did anyway; everything further north was rock hard.

She whispered, ‘I want to ask you something,' and he replied, ‘What, what do you want to ask?' and their voices intermingled like their breath.

‘William told me about your leg.'

Kiss.

‘Mm?'

She pulled back an inch, stroked his face. ‘You never told me about your leg.'

‘My foot. It's just my foot.' Like it really mattered – even though it did. He'd slept with a girl since it happened, just to affirm life, but he was afraid of the pity face, the sympathy. Alys kissed him again, hungrily; he could feel the shake in her and he was shaking too.

‘I want to see it.'

‘What?'

She leaned back, licked her lips. Really licked them, and that light in her eye . . . He should have known Alys would be different.

‘I want to see it – the scar, the stump. Show me.'

An icy chill shaved through his bones. Alys held his gaze. Her hand travelled to his waist, to his groin. Her touch burned through the denim of his jeans. Alys, who always avoided eye contact, was looking into him like he was empty, a vacant skin for her to probe, to play with.

‘No.' He pulled away from her quick, clever fingers.

‘Alys, have you seen the . . .' Mouse suddenly appeared in the doorway. ‘The phone bill.' Her voice dropped away. Walt pushed Alys to one side, kept his back turned, embarrassed. Alys was unfazed.

‘Thought you were at work.'

‘Obviously.'

‘Don't give me that look, Mouse!'

Walt risked a glance at Mouse. Her mouth set in a tight line and she was blushing furiously, and he felt
himself
going red. Why the hell was he embarrassed? He was a free agent. Don't get involved, he told himself. Jesus, Mouse made him feel like a naughty schoolboy.

‘It could have been William coming through this door!' Mouse snapped. ‘It's not on.'

Walt had an inappropriate urge to laugh. The bulge in his jeans was subsiding, so he turned around and tried to reason with her.

‘Sorry, Mouse. It wasn't what it looked like.' For some reason he wanted her to believe it was meaningless, but Alys was getting all uppity.

‘Sorry? Don't apologise! This is my house. Mouse, if you don't like it, you know what to do.' She flounced back to the display case.

Mouse stormed out.

Walt dithered between them. ‘Why did you say that?'

She didn't answer. On impulse he followed Mouse back to the house and caught up with her in the hallway. She stood in the shadow of Shackleton and turned on him, eyes spitting fire.

‘When did my son see your leg?'

He'd been rehearsing what to say about Alys –
I was fighting her off, honest
– but he wasn't expecting that.

‘Um, couple of nights ago, I think. He came into my room.'

‘Into your room?' Her eyebrows disappeared into her hairline. Above her the polar bear looked down his lofty nose and snarled.

‘He thought he heard something. It was late, I'd been sleeping . . . I took him back up to bed.'

‘And he saw your leg.'

‘He was curious. Look, let's stick to the problem.'

‘You are the fucking problem!'

He flinched. Her hair was wild, her face in shadow. He didn't know this person any more. She was a cornered bear.

‘We were fine until you rolled up,' she spat.

‘You weren't fine!' he shouted back. ‘You're trapped here playing nurse, cleaner and fuck knows what else to a woman who needs some kind of diagnosis. You're bringing up a child in a place where there are so many secrets he thinks he can uncover them by turning the place over like a cat burglar. All I did was switch on the light!'

He was breathing hard and so was she, like they'd been for a hard sprint together. Her eyes glittered like ice chips.

‘Stay away from Alys,' she said.

‘Oh, I intend to. You heard what she said about my leg?'

Mouse shook her head slowly.

‘I thought she was going to ask for the blown-off foot so she could stuff it and add it to her little shop of horrors.'

‘Don't.' Mouse slipped a hand across her stomach.

‘Don't? If you distrust anyone around William, it should be her, not me.'

‘That's a horrible thing to say!'

‘Don't tell me it's not at the back of your mind every single day –
what is she going to do next?
'

The ice chips were melting. He didn't want to see her cry. He took himself off up the stairs, but he could feel her gaze on his back.

24

The next morning, Walt popped out for a fag break to find that someone had left a Tesco bag tied to the railings. Lighting up slowly, he gazed at it for several seconds, as if expecting it to move. Eventually, clamping the fag in his lips, he untied the handles. The bag was heavy, and he let it bump to the ground before peering in. A rabbit's dead face stared back at him. There was blood around the creature's nose; the delicate pink insides of its ears were mashed against the skull. He ground out the cigarette, retied the bag with shaking fingers, and carried it, at arm's length, into the kitchen. There seemed no other place for it than the bottom drawer of the freezer. He squashed it in, giving the door a hefty slam for good measure.

He lingered way too long in the kitchen, brewing coffee he didn't want, anything to avoid going back to the basement. When the doorbell rang it gave him a start. What now? Another loony with another carcass?

It was Mrs Petrauska. When he opened the door she was standing in some kind of ballet pose, bearing a dish wrapped in a checked tea towel.

Please don't let it be rabbit stew.

‘Ah, Valter! I have for you
balandėliai
, a dish from my home in Lithuania. I make too much.'

She glided in as he was searching for a suitable reply. A quick stab of her feet on the welcome mat and she was heading straight for the kitchen. He followed in her wake, inhaling the scent of cabbage and onions and pepper, mixed with the sickly perfume she always wore. She placed the dish on the worktop as if she were laying a wreath, making a performance of it, backing away, poppy-painted fingers extended, and then the daintiest of pirouettes and she was facing him, eyes black as raisins.

‘So tell me – how is she, Alys?'

‘Um . . . fine, I think.'

‘You know, Valter . . .' She came up close to him, placed a be-ringed hand upon his arm. The scent of roses wafted up from her bodice and he held his breath. ‘This is not the first time she go like zis. Oh no.' She moved back, wagging her finger. ‘At Christmas, I found her drunk in ze back garden with a man. They were outside my kitchen window, making noise, and when I say to her move on, she fly at me with a hammer! A hammer! I was going to call ze police, but Maura was so upset I could not.'

‘Well, everyone can get drunk, Mrs P.' He wondered how long this was going to take. Though finding out about the hammer was a new twist.

‘And the cats!'

‘The what?'

‘Cats! Breeding all over ze place. Apart from ze old white one, she past it. But all the other cats, they hanging around the bins, having kittens in my shed . . .'

‘Kittens?'

‘Breeding everywhere! I say to her you need to get zem snipped.'

‘What happens to the kittens?'

‘Who knows?' She made an extravagant gesture. ‘Maybe the rats eat them! Zis is where I go now, to scrub ze bins. I came out yesterday and here is a rat, a dead one, lying on my bin and out comes ze Lady Alys and scoops 'im up. I say, “What you do wiz 'im? You crazy.” And she jest smile and say, “I put 'im in an Elvis suit.” An Elvis suit!'

‘Jesus Christ. She's going to stuff it.' He ruffled his hair in agitation. The woman raised beetle-brows at his outburst.

‘I told you.' Mrs Petrauska did the circling crazy sign again with her fingertip. ‘Anyway, you enjoy my
balandėliai
. It is cabbage rolls, wiz pork. The name means “little doves”. Enjoy!'

Little doves? They'd come to the wrong house. He suddenly didn't feel hungry.

The manic trilling of the phone made him jump; he grabbed a pen. Usually it was someone looking for Alys's more mundane services: a hunter with a trophy stag; the museum wanting her to patch up a walrus. Searching the kitchen worktop for a spent envelope, he thrust the receiver into the crook of his neck.

‘Little Shop of Horrors,' he quipped. ‘How can I help?'

‘Walt, is that you?' Mouse's voice was all scratchy at the other end. Walt stopped rummaging, moving the receiver to his other ear. They'd done their best to avoid each other for almost a week, but the line crackled with unfinished business.

‘Yeah, it's me. What's wrong?'

‘I'm at the care home.'

Her voice dropped. Her dad was agitated. She couldn't leave. Their exchange was brief and stilted.

‘William gets out of school at three.'

‘I'll meet him.'

‘I rang Mrs Petrauska but . . .'

‘She's cleaning the bins.'

‘She's what?'

‘Rats.'

‘Rats? Again? For heaven's sake. I wouldn't ask you but . . .'

‘It's cool.'

‘I'm stuck.'

Yeah, he thought, it stuck in her throat to ask him. He had her on the wrong foot and he kind of liked it. He was sick of dicking around; in the army you knew where you were, who you could trust and who trusted you. The lads always had your back, on patrol in Helmand or in a tough bar in the middle of Newcastle. It was unspoken. But he'd been cut loose from all that; lost his band of brothers and stumbled on the sisters from hell. Mouse hadn't trusted him from the start, never given him a chance. She didn't trust him around her child, around Alys, and it cut deep because a part of him knew she was right.

But she was
stuck.

‘Tell me where the school is.'

25

‘We shouldn't have come here,' Walt said. ‘Your mother won't like it.'

‘She won't mind.' William's voice was muffled with toffee.

‘Meet him at the newsagent's,' his mother had said. ‘Not at the school gate because that's uncool. Meet him at the newsagent's but don't let him go in. He'll spend his money on crap and won't eat his tea.'

But William had pulled a fast one, darting into the shop before Walt could stop him.

The place was full of kids in grubby white shirts, boys mainly. Perhaps they needed more sugar than girls. What was that old rhyme?
Lads are made of slugs and snails and puppy dogs' tails
; he could see that in the wriggling of their wiry bodies, grimy hands counting coins. They were all yelling over each other, getting louder and louder until the shrillness drilled into his brain and he just wanted to get out. The Asian guy behind the counter was well used to it. He looked bored, twisting the lids off jars of jazzies, wine gums, gobstoppers. Chocolate buttons melting in sweaty paws. Walt felt like a heron in a swamp of minnows. He spied William and grabbed him by his green parka. The coat was way too warm for the mild weather, but his mother was afraid the wind might blow on him.

‘Hey, kid, come on. I didn't sign up for this. Home. Now.'

‘Hang on till I get some bootlaces.'

‘Well, I'll be outside, mate. I cannot stand this.' He made for the door. It closed behind him with a dull
thwack
. He was standing on the pavement next to a billboard: ‘
TEACHERS IN PAY DISPUTE
'. Christ, they deserved every penny.

The quiet was blissful after the shop. Even the cars sounded like they were rolling on sand. The door banged again and William was beside him, rummaging in a paper bag. The pencil-case smell of school wafted up from his hair.

‘Want some?' William handed over a liquorice bootlace. It was a bit mangled, sticking to his palm. Walt had eaten worse. He shoved it in his mouth, enjoying the rubbery aniseed taste.

‘Man, that takes me back. Me brother and me used to buy those with our pocket money at the garage.'

‘Garage?'

‘We were out in the country. It was a petrol station and shop. It had toilets too. The last bog before Scotland.'

‘Really?' William looked impressed. ‘So what if you didn't go on the way past? Where was the next bog?'

‘Oh, Jedburgh, I guess. Yeah, I think there were bogs in Jedburgh.'

‘Oh. How many brothers do you have?'

‘One brother, Steven. I had a mate who was like a brother.'

William was staring at him with interest, cheeks working, lumpy with liquorice. ‘What was his name?'

‘Tom. He died.'

‘Oh. What did he die of?'

‘There was a bomb with his name on it. Look, kid, we'd better get home.' He turned to go, but William pulled at his sleeve.

‘Let's go and see my granddad!'

‘Your mother didn't say anything about that. I think we should just go . . .'

‘No, let's! Pleeease. I haven't seen Granddad in ages. Mum won't mind.'

And so there they were, standing in the foyer of the home. It was the sort of great pile that had probably once belonged to a captain of commerce and his delicate daughters. You could imagine them ringing for the servants and taking tea in the parlour. The elaborate cornices and the grand staircase had survived, but everything else had been forced into a care-home shape: walls the colour of leek soup; carpets ripped up and replaced with something wipe-clean. Fire extinguishers, safety notices, wheelchair ramps. Someone had taken an angle grinder to the art nouveau tiles to accommodate the lift, leaving ugly scarred edges. Leaving your folks here, your father, would feel unnatural, a forced fit.

‘We shouldn't have come here,' Walt said. ‘Your mother won't like it.'

‘She won't mind.'

A familiar figure trotted past with an armful of flowers. It was Mouse's friend with the geeky glasses. What was she called again? She pulled up short, purple tulip petals cascading to the floor.

‘Hello! What are you two doing here?'

‘How many jobs have you
got
?' Walt cut across her greeting, and she laughed and said it was just volunteering, a few hours every week, for her CV, and then she bowed down to William and said, ‘Are you here to see your granddad? Why don't you go in? Your mum will be there soon, she's just in with the manager.'

‘Okay.' William headed off and Walt's hand shot out and snagged him by the hood of his parka.

‘Hold it, kid. We should wait for your mam.'

Fee – Walt suddenly remembered her name – waved them away. ‘Go ahead, it's fine. Maura won't mind.'

Maura
will
mind. Walt wanted to say no, you needed permission to do things around Mouse, she's that kind of person, but he was taken up with the way Fee had called her Maura. He always thought of her as Mouse. All his mates had a handle of some kind – Mac, Chalky, Muddy (his last name was Waters) – but it occurred to him that Mouse's nickname was a dated family in-joke. He must remember to call her Maura in future.

Fee was telling William just what he wanted to hear: Granddad was watching telly in the day room. Yes, David Dickinson had been on when she'd last looked in. The kid took off like a whippet. Walt stalked after him.

The day room was the first door on the left. Everything about it was full on: the heating, the volume of the TV, the smell of piss. The screen was so enormous, Dickinson's face was stretched out of shape, bloated and brown. By contrast, the residents were as white as shed-grown mushrooms. They sat around the edges of the room in various stages of wilt, most sleeping, some with eyes fixed on the telly. One woman in a brown wig and a stained polyester cardigan strained forward with an empty smile, desperate for company.

Jesus
. Walt wiped his face with his hand.
Jesus
,
Tom
,
at least you escaped this
. Death wasn't pretty, but waiting around for it was worse.

William was standing beside a man who wasn't even looking at him. The old boy was picking threads out of a ruined tartan rug, and judging by the holes in it, that was how he spent his days. His fingers were clawed, nails thick and yellow as toenails, engrained with something brown. All sense of recognition was gone: eyes empty, sunk into the bony hollows of his skull. He had three-day stubble, not just forgot-to-shave-this-morning stubble, but proper don't-give-a-fuck-stubble. Walt fingered his own chin, feeling the rasp of it. They hadn't washed him either. The nauseating sourness was inescapable.

William was still standing there, and when he said ‘Granddad?' in a little voice and got zero reaction, Walt stepped in and squeezed his shoulder.

‘William's come to see you, sir,' he said in the too-loud voice you always swear you'll never use with old folk. ‘You remember William?'

He'd got his attention. The old boy glanced up. His mouth was gummy, like he needed a drink, but he managed to speak.

‘Coby?'

‘Um . . .' Walt looked at the boy, who shrugged. ‘I'm
Walt
.' Still too loud. ‘This is your grandson?'

‘Coby?'

The carers bustled in behind them with a tea trolley. A blank-faced young girl came towards them, blue uniform straining over puppy fat, balancing a steaming cup and saucer.

‘Is that for him? You can't give him that. He'll scald himself.'

‘Are you a relative?' she asked. She had a baby face and round eyes ringed in black. She reminded him of a panda.

‘He is,' he said, shoving William. The girl was manhandling a table with one hand, cup wobbling in the other. Walt caught hold of the table. ‘If you're going to leave that tea there, don't.' His voice was dangerously low.

The girl's bubblegum lips tightened. ‘Are you trying to tell me my job?'

‘Are you telling me you know what you're doing?'

‘What did you just say?'

‘I said for a carer you're doing a shit job. This guy is filthy. He stinks of piss and he needs a shave. These old boys like to be smart, clean. They wear ties and bull their shoes. He needs to be
cared for
.'

The girl's lip quivered. ‘I'm going to call my line manager now.'

‘You do that, darlin'. Put some more milk in that tea and I'll help him drink it.'

She clunked the tea down on the table, slopping it into the saucer, and stormed off.

William was clapping. ‘Aw, man, that was dead good, Walt!'

‘Coby?' said the old man.

‘Who's Coby? Have a sip of tea, sir.' Walt raised the cup to his lips. ‘Take it easy now. It's a bit hot.'

‘No, no, no.' The old man was getting agitated, fidgeting in his chair; his eyes suddenly lit up. ‘Coby!' He knocked the cup flying, showering himself with hot tea; Walt and William jumped back as the cup smashed into white, institutional pieces at their feet.

‘Walt!' Mouse's voice was as sharp-edged as the fragments of crockery. He glanced around to see the room full of people: Mouse, the sullen girl, Fee and a middle-aged woman with a fixed smile and Maggie Thatcher hair.

‘Get a mop, Michaela,' the woman said through the smile. ‘We haven't been introduced.' She proffered a hand to Walt, stepping over the spilled tea on clicking heels. ‘This is a relative of yours, Maura?'

Mouse gave him her I-could-kill-you-right-now glare. ‘He's an employee of my sister's. He was supposed to be taking William home from school.'

‘Oh, I expect William dragged him in here to see Granddad!' She was smirking at the kid now, like Fee had done. Why did adults get in kids' faces like that? Walt remembered his Auntie May used to do that. Come to think of it, she looked like Auntie May, this manager, all tucked in about the middle, as if someone had once complimented her on a trim waist and she'd worn little belts and fitted skirts ever since. ‘But I'm afraid we have security procedures, Mr . . . '

He didn't enlighten her and she went on, ‘You never signed in and you appear to have been abusive to a member of my staff.'

‘Abusive?' He stepped forward, stretching to his full height.

Mouse murmured his name like a warning. She was checking her father's wet shirt.

‘You told her she wasn't doing her job properly.'

‘You think that was abusive?' His face felt like stone. The sulky girl, Michaela, hurried between them with the mop. ‘You should be fucking ashamed, leaving old folk to rot like this.' He swept an arm towards the residents. The old lady in the brown wig was laughing. Mouse's father was struggling to get out of his chair; she was rubbing his shoulder, trying to calm him.

‘If Maura has a problem with her father's care that's up to . . .'

‘Like Maura's going to complain. She has no choice but to leave him here, and you bloody well know it. What is it, a thousand quid a week to feed them out-of-date bread and then you can't even be arsed keeping 'em clean.' Rage was welling up inside him, filling the space behind his eyes, and this smug woman was still smirking at him.

‘Robert!' Mouse grabbed his arm. ‘Enough. Don't make it any worse. Go outside and I'll speak to you later.' Her jaw was so tight she could barely get the words out and her eyes were wet. He felt sorry then, and the fight went out of him. He shrugged off her hand and pushed his way out, knocking into the mop bucket so that dirty water slopped all over the linoleum.