The Way Out (18 page)

Not that long ago, I was convinced I'd had enough. Love wasn't worth the inevitable heartbreak when the balloon burst and all the promises and possibilities shredded down to a twisted hard knot. And the long nights spent picking at that knot, trying to understand how it got that way. It wasn't so much that I'd lost heart, more that I'd worn mine out. I couldn't go through all that again and I reasoned there was no real need to. I had friends and family for love and company, and it wouldn't be that difficult to
find sex, if I felt the need. Sayonara deep and meaningful. Your arse is out the window.

So now what the fuck am I thinking?
Stupid, stupid, stupid
.

‘Look, do you want something or have you just come in here to insult me?' The newsagent looks quite cross and I realise I must've said that last bit out loud.

I mutter an apology and grab the first paper I see, thrust some coins at him, and hurry out of the shop. I am ridiculous.

I tried talking to Liz about it all on our night out last week. We've always been around with an extra box of tissues and catering quantities of alcohol to help mop up each other's emotional disasters. (The ice cream idea is bullshit. Drinking heavily and swearing a lot – that's the thing.) In this case, however, maybe because the carnage hasn't actually happened yet, she was no help.

It's raining hard by the time I get to the bus stop so I go inside the shelter. There's an old woman perched on the narrow strip of metal masquerading as a seat. Her coat and hair are the same rain-grey colour as the painted metal frame. She looks as if she's physically part of the shelter, like a modern day gargoyle. I almost jump when she turns and nods to me. I nod back and take the paper from under my arm, hoping to avoid a conversation about the weather or the eccentricities of bus timetables. She doesn't show any sign of wanting to talk and has already settled back into stony watchfulness.

I sit down and cross my legs only to be pulled up short by a sudden eye-watering tug of elastic. This has definitely gone too far. I've got my knickers on sideways. Easy enough done with those little triangular ones, especially when you've removed the deeply unsexy washing instructions so they don't spoil the general effect, and even more especially when you're too distracted in the morning to pay attention to what you're
doing. But all the same. I can feel the colour rising up my neck, inundating my face with the indignity of it all. After all the hard lessons learned, after all the promises I made myself, here I am, snared by my own underwear and helplessly blushing at a bus stop. Ridiculous doesn't even begin to cover it. The gargoyle pays no attention while I not-so-discreetly rearrange matters. She just stares into the rain.

I sit back down, very carefully, and flick through the newspaper. A headline catches my eye,
Hammer time for ex-lover's Ferrari
. The story printed underneath explains how a woman found her boyfriend was cheating on her with her best friend so she smashed up his car with a hammer. I try to imagine finding himself in bed with Liz, just to see if I have any urge to set about his Ford Focus with something heavy, but I just feel a bit queasy.

Maybe this feeling isn't even real.

Black rainwater has formed an ominous puddle which laps at the open mouth of the bus shelter. Cars go skiffing through the edges of it, making waves that only just stop short of the gargoyle's shoes. Still she doesn't move.

Eventually, the blurry image of an approaching bus is visible through the plastic window, bubbled with raindrops. I can't make out the number. The old woman bolts to her feet with surprising speed and leans out into the road as the bus comes nearer. It's travelling too fast. I open my mouth to call her back but it's already too late. The bus comes ploughing up the gutter without slowing down and hammers on past the stop.

The old woman turns towards me and blinks as rainwater streams down her face and drips from her chin. Her shoulders begin to shake and she makes a muffled noise I at first mistake for crying. But she's laughing. It starts with a slow chuckle and builds until she throws her head back and releases this wild whoop of a laugh that goes bouncing around the inside of the
shelter like a rubber bullet.

‘You live,' she says, pausing to shake herself like a dog emerging from a river, ‘but you never bloody learn, do you?'

She's still laughing and I can't help joining in. Then I see, coming along the road, the glowing red promise of another bus, spreading through the rain like a big, stupid smile. I could let it go past. I still can't see what number it is, whether it's the one I'm supposed to take or one that'll get me lost and leave me stranded in some godforsaken place I don't recognise, full of industrial units and three-legged dogs. I could stay right where I am, safe and dry. Or I could step out and take a look.

Story Credits

Worst Case Scenario
originally appeared in
Gutter
magazine, issue 8, published by Freight Books in February 2013, under the title
The Heart of a Pig
.

Ladies' Day
originally appeared in
Gutter
magazine, issue 9, published by Freight Books in August 2013 and was subsequently reprinted in
Best British Short Stories 2014
, ed. Nicholas Royle, published by SALT in July 2014.

Human Testing
originally appeared in
Valve III
, published in November 2013.

Mezzanine
originally appeared in
Gutter
magazine, issue 10, published by Freight Books in February 2014.

How to Not Get Eaten by Tigers
originally appeared in
Firewords Quarterly
, issue 2, published in August 2014.

Bingo Wings
originally appeared in
Gutter
magazine, issue 11, published by Freight Books in August 2014.

Fitting
and
Her Feelings About Auckland
were originally published together by
Structo
magazine as a chapbook.

10 Types of Mustard
was originally published in
The Grind IV
.

Odd Sympathy
was originally published in
Gutter
magazine,
issue 12, published by Freight Books in February 2015.

Red Bus
, in a longer version, was broadcast on BBC Radio 4 as part of the
Shorts: Scottish Shorts
series in February 2015.

White Pudding Supper
was shortlisted for the Manchester Fiction Prize 2009.

Worst Case Scenario
(with title
The Heart of a Pig
) was shortlisted for the Bridport Prize 2012.

Home Security
(as a single story) was shortlisted for the Bridport Prize 2013.

Thanks

To Adrian Searle, Robbie Guillory and the team at Freight Books for their energy and enthusiasm in producing this collection and for their vigorous promotion of new short fiction in Scotland, not least via
Gutter
magazine, in which a number of these stories first appeared.

To Rodge Glass, whose incisive but good-natured editing made the process a joy and the collection better in every way.

To Nicholas Royle for his encouragement back in 2009 in Manchester, and for choosing
Ladies' Day
for inclusion in
Best British Short Stories
. Short story writers and readers, myself included, continue to benefit from his tireless championing of the form.

To Janice Galloway for her insight, wisdom and extraordinary generosity of spirit.

To the following people for guidance, support, feedback and friendship over the years it took to write the stories that make up this collection. Their fortitude in the face of multiple drafts and hairy canaries has been humbling. It is my good fortune to find myself indebted to: David Hill, Gwinny Gordon, Gail Honeyman, Kirsty Mitchell, George Craig, Dickson Telfer, Martin MacInnes, Bernard O'Leary, Sonja Cameron, Catherine Simpson, Gladys Taylor and Janet Gairns.

To Adrienne and Bill Jarrett for always being there.

To Mike, Andrew and Heather for the love and laughter that keep my Home World turning.