The Elephant Tree (13 page)

Right now Scott felt directionless. He’d had the bus dream again last night, memories of it returned to him now as he walked. Although he didn’t dream too often, or at least didn’t remember them if he did, Scott tried to pay attention to anything he remembered the following morning. This was a recurring dream he’d had from time to time over the years. The location would often change but the main elements remained the same. He’d be riding a bus, always sat on the upstairs deck, and to begin with everything would be fine. After a while it would become clear that the bus was increasingly travelling too fast. When he would try to alert the driver, the bus would accelerate even more, tipping dangerously as it attempted to turn corners, further heightening Scott’s anxiety. Sometimes the scenery passing by would be familiar: his old school bus journey, a route he’d travelled years before to an old girlfriend’s house. But mostly it was just generic dream landscape, the feeling of familiarity without actually recognising the setting. Sometimes there’d be other people on the bus that he knew. They would look at him but never speak. Paige travelled with him on occasion, often sat next to one or another of his regular customers. No matter how hard he would try, Scott would never be able to get off the bus, make it slow down, or even see the face of the driver.

Trying to push it all out of his mind again, he looked up to locate Boris and found the dog had led them on their usual route and was now already stationed by the Elephant Tree waiting for Scott to catch up.

Sitting down on the fallen trunk Scott took out the sandwiches. The crinkle of cellophane and the smell of the freshly cut sandwiches unearthed memories of his mother. A day when they were children, Scott, Jack and their mother picnicking here, perhaps. Memories of his parents, his mother especially, came as fleetingly as dream fragments, like the sudden flight of a bird at the end of a long corridor, by the time he turned to look it was gone. Sometimes it got hard to distinguish memory from fantasy. When he was still a child, Scott would often lie awake at night imagining them all still together as a family, visiting places they had never been. Happy. He knew not all returning memories could be trusted, but fictional or not he would savour whatever he could.

Taking a sandwich from the pile he tore it and tossed one half to Boris. The dog caught it in mid air and devoured it greedily, almost as if Scott might realise he had made a mistake and take it away from him. Chewing thoughtfully on his half, Scott looked up into the thicker grey clouds now gathering like dense flocks of migrating birds. The temperature had begun to drop and there was probably only around an hour of light left in the day.

So far he’d avoided looking at the face in the tree. His uncle had looked to it for wisdom and guidance, but often all Scott felt was judgement and malice. He knew this was more down to his own mood at the time, but some days it was harder to convince himself than others. He felt watched, like the eyes of a painting that would follow you around the room. Eventually he gave in and looked up at the face and was met with the unshakable feeling of making eye contact with a stranger. He shivered. From the angle he sat at, it was mostly the elephant side he could see. Scott stood and slowly walked around watching the face change. The appearance of deep lines in its apparent skin caused by the formation and growth of tree bark. The deep recess of an eye socket. The trunk, one of many large branches to have been cut off long before Scott’s time here. He kept moving around. The ridge slanted away on the far side of the trunk then curved upwards into a lump that looked like the definition of a human cheekbone. Below that a slight rise before dropping away into a hollow shaped distinctly like a mouth. Minimal light now with the amalgamation of large rain clouds overhead. The more Scott moved around the tree, the more the mouth appeared to be twisted into a vicious sneer, the eye above the cheekbone pulled back into a squinted look of contempt. Scott took a step back. The unmistakable feeling of scorn, bitterness and loathing ran through him. A sudden rumble of thunder overhead took him by surprise and he barely stifled a cry. Boris, equally alarmed, began a succession of panicked barking. Raindrops began to fall all around them as the blanket covering of clouds commenced a shedding of their load. The rainwater released a fresh green scent as it permeated the surrounding fir trees. The feeling that had previously inhabited Scott had now passed.

He halved the last sandwich with Boris and picked up his bag, cursing the weather for ruining what he’d hoped would have been a peaceful afternoon out, and started back towards the house.

Having resigned himself to a soaking, Scott plodded back with little urgency. As he climbed over the wooden stile at the bottom of the land he was reminded of his phone as it pressed insistently against his ribs from his inside jacket pocket. Scott reached for it and turned it back on. No messages.

The last Friday before Christmas, Scott had been told by Jack years before, was known in the industry as
Black Eye Friday.
The office blocks and other businesses generally broke up for the holidays at midday, their staff spilling out onto the streets and inevitably into the bars like excited children who have a whole summer of no school to look forward to. They generally tended to be the folk who would enjoy the odd weekend night out, not the kind of people accustomed to all day drinking benders. So when alcohol consumption started at twelve noon instead of eight at night, the consequences tended to be fairly predictable and often disastrous.

For Scott and Neil it had become something of a ritual for them to hit the town early and enjoy, for Scott at least, what was probably the best part of the holiday season seeing alcohol-crazed white-collar workers beat the shit out of each other, or even being thrown down a flight of stairs by overly stressed doormen, in the past had been enough to put a smile on his face. But this year because of the party they’d thrown last weekend, half the population of the bars they frequented had heard about it and subsequently all wanted invites to this week’s event. Having repeated the same thing dozens of times already, that the party was a one off and no, there wasn’t a repeat this weekend, Scott was quickly tiring of the whole affair. Keeping the customers placated was bad enough, but Neil was still convinced that laying on a regular venue could be the future for them, and no amount of dissuasive comments from Scott were about to change his mind.

After giving explicit instructions to Neil to continue fending off party requests and to sell as much gear as he could before they hit the club, Scott decided he would have a few drinks in a more sedate environment and meet back up inside Blitz later.

John Henry’s was a depressing place most of the time, but Scott at least knew he wouldn’t be plagued by the customers like he had been at every stop on their usual route. Right now a few quiet drinks and to blend into the background was what Scott felt he needed.

The bar looked pretty much exactly as he’d left it on his last visit. There were more bodies now, but he recognised many of same faces in the same seats from earlier in the week. Scott went to the bar, he didn’t see Joanne so ordered a pint from the first barmaid he could flag down, and lit a cigarette while he waited.

‘I’ll get that for you,’ a voice he didn’t immediately recognise said from behind him. Scott looked over his shoulder and was surprised to see Twinkle.

‘Twink,’ Scott said with a thin smile. He hadn’t heard anything since the job so didn’t know of any possible developments either good or bad, and naturally felt a little suspicious. ‘I didn’t realise it was you.’

Twinkle pushed in beside him at the bar and catching the barmaid’s attention got her to pull another pint to go with Scott’s, then paid for both.

Picking up their drinks, they saw a table just being vacated by three old men, and went to sit down.

‘There been any word yet then?’ Scott asked.

‘No, nothing yet but I expect the call will come through tomorrow.’

Scott stubbed out his cigarette and swallowed a mouthful from his pint. After the mood Twinkle had been in following the job, Scott had expected a more low profile approach and for him to avoid the city and stay drinking locally. Watching Twinkle over the rim of his glass though, he seemed to have recovered from the crisis of confidence he’d suffered during the job and everything that followed after.

‘You stay out for long after I dropped you off last night?’ Scott asked tentatively.

‘Yeah, I was in there ‘till closing, then on the cans back home after that. I must’ve fallen over trying to get upstairs or something,’ he said, lifting a handful of hair away from his temple revealing an angry purple bruise the size of a tomato.

Scott took another drink from his glass and looked at the wound, allowing Twinkle time to continue with his story. This was pretty much what he’d expected to hear, but was more concerned with what might have been said in the bar rather than any injuries Twinkle had sustained through the subsequent drunkenness.

Twinkle took a drink also, and moved his hand up to reflectively run fingers over the damaged flesh, leaving his story hanging.

‘Did you bump into anyone or talk to anyone while you were out then?’ Scott asked, prompting him.

Twinkle snapped back from whatever drunken nostalgia he’d been reliving and his hand fell from his temple sharply onto the table. ‘No Scott, I didn’t talk to anyone. Jesus, is that why you’re here now? To see if I’ve been saying shit that could put you at risk?’

‘No, that’s not it,’ Scott said, trying to regain control of the conversation, as he glanced cautiously around. ‘I didn’t even know you’d be in here, I just came in for a change of scene.’

Twinkle appeared to relax and gave a shrug. ‘I know I was a bit out of it then, Scott, but I didn’t talk to anyone that night. After I woke up this morning at the bottom of the stairs like that, and then remembering everything from yesterday I knew it was time to at least try and make a change.’

‘So you what, joined the Red Cross?’ Scott asked sarcastically.

‘No, fuck off. I phoned Sharon.’

Scott was more surprised by this than if Twinkle had taken on voluntary work for a charity organisation. Any time her name was mentioned Twinkle would curse at any involvement they’d ever had together and reiterate his vow never to speak to
that bitch
ever again.

‘What happened then, did it go OK?’

‘Yeah it did. I told her that I wanted to kick the drink and to start over, fresh, hopefully with her and the kids.’

‘Just like that?’

‘Well no, not right away or anything, she doubted I meant any of it which is understandable, but I kept going and must have said some stuff that hit home ‘cause eventually she started to listen to me. She said I could come and see them on weekends and stuff to begin with, see how we go. Probably to make sure I’m really not gonna be drinking and taking shit at clubs, that’ll be why she said weekends, but that’s fair enough. I reckon I have a chance to start again now Scott, I have to do this.’

‘You know where they are then?’

‘Yeah I always knew. I stayed in touch every once in a while, birthdays for the kids and that.’

This surprised Scott as well. Twinkle had always claimed to maintain a zero contact policy since she had taken the kids and moved out. At least that’s what he had always had his friends believe.

‘That’s really great Twink, it is. But what about this meeting we’ve got coming up and commitments that are gonna follow on from it?’

‘I know it was me got you involved but I just can’t go through with any more. I’m sorry Scott but that’s the way it is.’

‘I understand that, but it’s not me you need to convince.’

‘Yeah, well I’ll just try and explain it the way I have to you, and if the worst comes to the worst and I have to walk away without any pay then I’ll do that,’ Twinkle said, and looked up from his pint meeting Scott’s eye. At that moment Scott realised why he hadn’t recognised Twinkle when he first spoke at the bar, what it was in his voice that had made him sound so different. It was hope.

Scott arrived at the club before Neil. He did a quick walkthrough then settled down with a Budweiser and cigarette to wait.

After a while, vibration from a pocket pulled Scott back from thoughts about his conversation with Twinkle. He’d said he was going home after drinks at John Henry’s. No clubbing, maybe he would manage to turn his life around.

Scott pulled out his phone and checked the screen before answering. Withheld Number. That didn’t mean anything. People would withhold their identity when phoning a drug dealer even if the call was innocent. Scott answered and said hello. The music around the club was loud and Scott could hear nothing from the phone. Again he said hello, and told whoever was on the other end to speak up but the connection was terminated.

Sliding the phone back into his pocket he caught sight of Neil sauntering into the club, tonight with a brunette on his arm making their way towards the upstairs bar. Her hips oscillated as she walked, as if the worn out carpet in the club were a Milan catwalk.

Scott pushed in beside Neil at the bar, changed his order for one bottle of Becks to two and introduced himself to the brunette.

‘Hello, I’m Elizabeth Flight,’ she said, extending a limp hand towards Scott. The way she said her name made it sound like it should be followed by an exclamation mark. Like you’d just heard something important, something you should store away in a deep recess of your brain. Scott wasn’t used to surnames. Most people he came across gave either only a first name or a nickname. When he met someone else with the same first name as someone else he knew, he would mentally assign them a number. Micky Two or Tony Three. Scott took a moment to appraise the latest addition to Neil’s long list of concubines. She had a haughty smile that was accentuated by the elevated lift of her chin, giving her the appearance of looking down on everyone despite her average height. Black leather boots and a tight fitting short black dress were undoubtedly what first made her pop up on Neil’s radar. She was OK looking without ever being in danger of real beauty, but the way she carried herself made you wonder if perhaps there was something there you had missed at first glance.