Life's Lottery (23 page)

But – it’s incredible – you really do feel sick.

This has got to stop. You have to talk to Rowena, coax and purr and smooth. You have to get things settled. When she’s your official girlfriend, you can relax.

The cow is driving you mad. There’s nothing to stop her calling you. Unless Victoria has poisoned her mind against you. Or Roger has been creeping around, trying to get back in with her.

Roger really needs a belting.

After what seems like hours, Laraine coos farewells and hangs up. Happy, she sits down on the sofa, and runs her hands through her long hair.

Is she in love with Fred? Probably.

You want her to go away now, so you can call Rowena. You don’t want to have this conversation with your sister eavesdropping. It’s too important.

You put the magazine down.

‘I’m still bloated from Christmas dinner,’ Laraine says.

She looks thin to you.

‘I’m starting a diet in January. My New Year resolution. When the leftovers run out.’

You have nothing to say. If this doesn’t turn into a conversation, she’ll go away.

‘Keith, do you want a cup of tea?’

‘No, thank you, Laraine.’

‘I think I’ll have one. Are Mum and Dad around?’

They’re in the garden. If you tell her, she’ll have to go out and ask them if they want tea. Will that give you long enough to make the call?

‘They’re in the garden.’

Laraine gets up – victory! – and looks out of the window. Your parents are seeing to things neglected over the holiday. Janies helps, raking dead leaves blown from the compost heap.

‘I’ll make a tea run, then. Sure you don’t want one?’

Actually, your throat is completely dry, desert sands swarm over your tongue. But you have made a statement and don’t want to retract it.

‘No, thank you, Laraine.’

‘There are still mince pies left.’

‘That’s okay.’

Fuck off, Laraine. Go out into the garden. Leave me alone.

‘Looks chilly. Do I need a coat?’

Inside, you scream.

Laraine wraps a shawl round her shoulders and goes out into the garden.

Freedom.

You are on the phone within a second. You have the receiver to your ear.

Your finger stabs the first digit of Rowena’s number.

Don’t think about it. Dial.

You dial the number.

You hear the ringing at the other end. It’s not too late to hang up, write this off as a mistake. Maybe you should have this conversation face to face.

The telephone rings.

One of Rowena’s parents will probably answer – you don’t know if she has brothers or sisters – and you’ll have to ask them to fetch her. Has she told them about you? Almost certainly not. You haven’t told your family about her.

This is the era of the secret life.

The telephone still rings.

It’s been a long while. How big is Rowena’s house? If she were in the attic and the phone by the front door, would it take her this long to answer?

You start counting rings. Twenty more and you’ll assume nobody’s home.

More rings.

‘Calling someone?’ Laraine asks, returning from the garden.

No, I’m scraping the wax out of my ears with the receiver.

‘Uh-huh.’

She goes into the kitchen.

You’ve lost count. Twenty rings must have passed. Just to be sure, you start again.

Twenty rings.

The Douglass house, no matter how huge, must be empty and cold. They’ve gone out for the day, visiting grandparents, or just to get away from leftovers and Christmas telly.

Give it a little more time.

Finally, heart heavy, brow sweaty, you hang up.

* * *

In the afternoon, you try again. Still no answer. Everybody ought to buy those machines Jim Rockford has that record a message. Or maybe not. You don’t think you could put what you need to say in words that could be taped and played back in evidence against you.

‘Sure you’re over your cold?’ Mum asks. ‘You still look peaky.’

You shrug that you are fine.

You go to bed early but can’t sleep. You run through Rag Day in your mind, over and over again, playing it out as it happened. Then you imagine variations: what would have happened if you had made an effort to stop Rowena drinking so much, or had left her alone in Victoria’s van despite her clumsy come-on, or had punched Roger for being a bastard, or had gone to the show in the evening and made an effort, or…

Might-have-beens haunt you.

The comics you used to read as a kid often ran might-have-been tales, ‘imaginary stories’ – it only now hits you what a tautology that is – in which Bruce Wayne’s parents aren’t killed or Krypton doesn’t explode or Clark Kent marries Lois Lane. All ‘imaginary stories’ end with the heroes manipulated into the lives they lead in the ‘real stories’ – with Bruce Wayne becoming Batman anyway or Kal-El as the Superman of Krypton or Clark and Lois being super together.

No matter how the plot changed, the character was the same.

No matter what happened, you’d still be you.

‘Keith, you’re pathetic,’ Victoria said.

She’s right. You’ve discovered too late that you can really love, but you’re the kind of person no one could love back. What you did in the van proves it.

You’re a bastard. You’re the one who needs a right belting.

If you’d been a gentleman and left Rowena to sleep it off, you’d have scored about a thousand points. Instead, everyone is going to know what a swine you are. When you go back to college, it’ll be a living hell.

Two more terms, university applications, a bunch of exams, and then it’s over. You can leave Sedgwater, like Laraine, and start all over again.

In the meantime, you’ll have to deal with yourself.

Shamefully, you remember Rowena in the van. In your recall, the scene is longer, almost romantic. You remember the feel of her breasts, the taste of her kisses

bitter, with vomit

That doesn’t work.

Tomorrow, you’ll try telephoning again.

* * *

‘Good morning, Mrs Douglass. This is Keith Marion. May I speak to Rowena, please?’

Negotiations in the background.

Last time you phoned, to ask Rowena out on Rag Day, you were handed over instantly.

More fuss. Seconds tick off, marked by punching thumps from your heart.

‘She’s out, I’m afraid, Keith. Do you want to leave a message?’

She’s not out. It’s a brush-off.

Mrs Douglass is being civil to you, so Rowena can’t have told her about the van.

‘Just ask her to phone me,’ you say, giving her your number.

‘I’ll tell her,’ Mrs Douglass says. ‘Happy New Year.’

She hangs up. You listen to the whine of the dead line.

You made a mistake. Many mistakes. You should have said you’d call back. Then, maybe, one time, Rowena would pick up and you could talk to her, persuade her of your sincerity, work on her hurt feelings.

She’ll never take the initiative, never call you.

She was home. She had her mother lie to you. That’s despicable. You’d never ask your parents to lie for you.

They must know
something.
But Mrs Douglass was cheery, polite. She wished you Happy New Year.

Maybe the negotiation was Mrs Douglass asking someone if Rowena was home and being told she wasn’t. Rowena’s Dad could have been in the room.

You thought you heard a girl’s voice. Rowena could have a sister. She could. Roberta, Rosalind, Rosemary…

Mrs Douglass will pass on the message. Rowena will call you. She will.

Then things will be all right.

* * *

Days pass. It’s 1978. Your nerves are stretched tight. Rowena doesn’t phone. Her mum lost the message. You should call again. No, she was there. She’s avoiding you. You’re in the Arctic. You stay at home, even when the rest of the family goes out, just in case. Rowena doesn’t phone. You have to call again and yet you can’t. You can’t bear this much longer. You’re sure you’re losing weight. You certainly haven’t had a good night’s sleep since you were ill and dosed up on Lemsip.

You wonder if you should write to Rowena: a long, detailed, romantic letter. That might work on her. You could explain without interruption. But she might show it to her friends, to Victoria, to anyone. You’d be walking around bleeding and naked for half a year, with everyone knowing about you, laughing.

Actually, if you think about it, all the people you know at college are your age. They’re all going through this to a greater or lesser extent. It’s adolescence. A fucking nightmare.

But it’s worse for you than for anyone else.

It’s never been worse for anyone ever in history.

* * *

The holidays crawl by like a glacier. You should be thinking about the future. This is the year you leave college, and – you have assumed until now – go to university. You have UCCA forms and interviews to cope with. And your A levels. You are on the fast track to exams.

But you can think only of Rowena. Ro. Her friends call her Ro. Roger calls her Ro.

You’ve had sex with her. That must mean something. You’ll always have it between you. Even if she never speaks to you again.

You dread going back to college and you can’t wait for it. This limbo will be over, but maybe hell will replace it.

* * *

Finally, the day before you go back, you give in and call Rowena again. This time, her father tells you she’s out. You tell him you’ll see her in college.

Not if she sees you first, you imagine him saying.

He just hangs up.

You feel as if you’ve been stabbed. With a serrated blade that’s worked back and forth in the wound, grinding your ribs, bursting your heart.

You can’t go on like this.

* * *

The night before you go back to college, your parents and Laraine and James are out, taking Laraine to a restaurant because she’s going away again to East Anglia tomorrow. You have cried off. You say you want to get an early night for tomorrow.

You dial Rowena’s number. After two rings, the phone is picked up.

You stumble over your long-planned sentence.

‘Is Ro-wena there?’ you ask, before anyone has said anything.

You hear breathing at the other end of the line. Then it cuts off.

You call again. Engaged.

Again. Still engaged.

It was her. You’re sure.

The house is empty. All the lights are off.

You realise you are crying. Not just leaking tears, but body-racking sobs.

How can you face college tomorrow?

She’ll be there. In all her loveliness, her unassailable, unreachable beauty. Having glimpsed paradise, you’ve been cast out into the dark regions, there to dwell for all time, your torments all the worse because you have known sweetness.

It’s insupportable. You can’t take any more.

You cry yourself out. Every muscle in your body aches.

You go upstairs, into the bathroom, and are sick into the toilet. In the dark, you void your stomach. The last of the turkey.

You flush the toilet and wash your face.

You pull the light-cord and look at yourself in the mirrored front of the bathroom cabinet. You are empty. You see yourself as nothing.

Perhaps over your shoulder there is something, a shadow at the window. You turn round.

All that is left in you is fear.

Your own stare fascinates you in the mirror. You know, suddenly, what’s behind the reflective glass.

This doesn’t have to go on. There’s no reason.

The shadows have invaded the room. It’s brightly lit, but that makes the darks more concentrated.

And the worst dark is in you.

Your hand goes out to touch the cool mirror, fingertips resting against the handle of the cabinet.

The dark rises up.

If you let the dark surround you and open the cabinet, go to 84. If you overcome the shadow and go to bed, go to 65.

Y
ou open the window and Victoria tumbles into your arms. She is lithe, in black and white. She wears knee-high black boots, elbow-length black gloves, a hooded black cloak fastened at the neck, and nothing else. Her hair is permed out in a
Bride of Frankenstein
frizz, with an electric-white streak.

She doesn’t say anything, but hungrily slips her tongue into your mouth, and delicately clamps her hand on your erection.

You don’t wonder how she came to be outside your window.

She pushes you back towards your bed, lays you down and climbs on top of you. Her cloak tents around you both, and she guides your cock into her warm, welcoming slit. She unfastens her cloak and lets it fall behind her. Her slender body shines white like a knife. Moonlight dapples her as she rides you, slowly. You reach up and stroke her small breasts.

Her face is in shadow. She murmurs, throat pulsing.

You want to hurry the building sensation, but she guides you, keeping the pace even, slowing you down.

You always imagined this but never expected it.

Not in your bedroom, with your family asleep in adjacent rooms, with your college textbooks on the shelf, with your outgrown pirate hat in the back of a cupboard, with a Christmas star made by your mum stuck on the door.

You reach up further, feeling Victoria’s neck, sliding fingers into her sprayed nest of hair.

Her murmurs get louder. Tiny speckles of red dot her white throat and breasts, drops of blood almost surfacing.

A cooling wind, flowing in through the open window, rushes around your bed.

Your mouth is open. You are at the point of climax. Warm, white, melting, bursting.

Victoria swallows a tiny scream and bends like a bow. You have come almost together.

Her head comes forward, into the shaft of light.

Her face is a blank.

* * *

The next morning, your pyjama fly is stiff with dried spunk and your bedroom window is shut behind drawn curtains.

But you can smell her hairspray on your fingers.

This was more than a dream, if less than an experience.

* * *

The next night, again, you wake suddenly. Victoria is sitting in your chair. She’s dressed all in black again, with jeans and a T-shirt under her cloak. Her hood is up, but her white face is distinct, like a night-light.