The Summer We All Ran Away (10 page)

Isaac was staring at a spot just behind Jack's shoulder. Jack turned around and, with a sense of foreboding, saw a girl with brown hair and an acid-green coat in the studio doorway. She looked familiar.

It was Evie.

Jack remembered the shifty look on Alan's face as he took the phone call, and vowed that as soon as he got back upstairs, he would pull the phone out from the wall and ram it down Alan's throat.

“Hey.” Evie, trying to smile, trying to seem casual. He could read the cost of the effort in the lines around her mouth. “How are you?”

“Fine,” said Jack grimly, trying to contain his utter fury. “I'm fine. How are you?”

“I'm great.” Her smile was crooked. “Well, you know, I miss you, but, um, great.” She turned her gaze to Isaac. “We've met before, haven't we?”

Isaac just looked at her.

“But I'm sure we - oh!” she stopped suddenly. “Oh, yes. Sorry. Um - how's she doing?”

Isaac sighed, and made a rocking gesture with his hand.
So-so
.

“I'm sorry,” said Evie, sounding as if she meant it.

Isaac looked towards the door.

“Would you mind?” Evie looked grateful.

“There's really no need,” said Jack. Isaac shrugged in gentle apology, and left. Jack took a deep breath and reminded himself to be fair.

“I asked Alan to call me,” Evie said, before he could speak. “I rang him every day for a week and begged him to tell me when you were coming up. I told him he ought to be grateful to me, for looking after you so you could write it in the first place. And I've been waiting at a phone box round the corner since about six this morning and ringing every ten minutes to see if you'd arrived yet. I'm sorry, I know you don't want to see me but I had to make sure you were alright. I just had to.”

Her frank confession disarmed him, replacing his righteous anger with a kind of guilty tenderness.

“I'm fine,” he said. “There's no need to worry.”

“I take it Alan liked the album.”

“Yes, he did actually.”

“I knew he would.” There was no mistaking the pride on her face. “So when will it come out?”

“About three or four months, I think. Alan's trying to round up the band from
Violet Hour.”
He resisted the urge to
look at his watch.

“And did that girl come back?”

“Mathilda? Yes.”

“I told you she would.”

“You did.”

“Is she still there with you?”

“Yes.” He wouldn't allow himself to say
sorry
. He'd never been gladder of anything in his life.

She moved closer, and took his hand between both of hers. He could smell the bitter aloe of gin on her breath. “Is she looking after you?”

He took his hand away. “I don't need looking after. She makes me happy.”

“No, she doesn't! She doesn't, she can't, she - ”

“Yes, she does! Remember that feeling when you find someone who completes your world? Waking up and your heart skips a beat because they're next to you in the bed? And you can't sleep because you'd rather lie there and watch them?”

Her eyes were bright. “Are you saying this to try and hurt me? Be honest.”

“No, of course I don't want to – well, I want you to understand, so maybe a bit – look, we're not in fucking therapy any more, I don't have to tell you everything.”

“You just did.”

“Evie - ”

“That feeling you described. That's not happiness, it's obsession. If you're going to do your best work you need rest and quiet and - ”

“What makes you think you know what I need?”

Despite all she could do, the tears were spilling.

“I knew enough to keep you alive. I helped you get clean and sober, I ran our home all those weeks, we talked every day, we laughed about things,
that
was happiness,
we
were happy, you were working, it was great - ”

“Evie, I want a lover, not a housekeeper! And definitely not
a nurse! Oh look, please don't cry, but you have to understand, I just don't love you, okay? And I don't understand why you ever thought I did.” His guilt had the taste of bitter chemicals. “If there was a nice way to say it, I would, but there isn't.”

“Then why did you ask me to come and live with you?”

“Stay
with me!” The craving gnawed at him, that fierce compulsive demand for something to numb the pain. They'd warned him in rehab –
when you get stressed, when you're upset, an automatic response, you'll have it for life
– why was he having this conversation? Was this his punishment for trying to be happy? The chemical taste was growing stronger. He was being haunted by the Ghost of Addictions Past. “I asked you to stay with me. Remember? Because you - ”

“Because I got fired,” she said. “And whose fault was that?”

The answer –
yours, for sleeping with one of your bloody patients
– was so obvious, he was paradoxically convinced he must be missing something.

“This isn't getting us anywhere,” he said instead. His mouth was dry and tasted of burning.

“There's no point pretending it didn't happen,” she said.

“I'm not trying to pretend anything, I - ” he stopped. “My God, look at that.” A slender trickle of smoke had begun to coil delicately around the edges of the doorframe.

“Stop trying to change the subject, that's just childish.”

“No, you don't understand, there's a fire.”

“What?”

“There's a bloody fire! Come on, we're getting out of here.”

“No, I don't believe you, you're making it up, stop trying to get out of this, we're going to talk about it whether you like it or - ”

He was surprised by how strong Evie was. As he dragged her across the room, trying to be gentle, he could feel her heart pounding against his arm. He wrenched the door open and a wave of choking smoke boiled towards them. Alan was
pounding down the stairs, looking furious. When he saw Jack, he glared.

“Is this anything to do with you?”

“Of course not!”

“You sure? It's the sort of thing you might do.”

“When have I
ever
set fire to your offices? We need to get out! Has someone called the fire brigade?”

They scurried out of the door onto the street. Outside, a crowd was collecting. Alan's secretary stood on the pavement with her arms folded crossly, as if the whole thing had been staged solely to disrupt her day. The dirty plate-glass windows of the conference room shattered. There was no sign of Isaac.

“What are you doing?” Evie grabbed onto him.

“I can't see Isaac.”

“Shit.” Alan went white. “Didn't he come out with you?”

“He was in the toilet,” Alan's secretary said.

“So he's still in the building?” Another window shattered. Jack winced.

“Don't you dare go back inside,” said Evie.

“Of course I'm not going back inside,” said Jack. “Let go of me, I'm just going to check he's not round the back.”

Behind Alan's offices, a narrow alleyway stank and festered, but was overlooked by the frosted windows of the bathroom. Orange light glowed from the windows. Jack clambered onto a dustbin, put his hands on the ledge, felt the heat of the blistering paint and recoiled from a tongue of flame that tried to lick his cheek and realised how insane this was but decided to do it anyway. He pushed up and got his head and chest through the window and into an appalling furnace of heat, swallowed a sour lungful of smoke. Someone was pulling him back down. Evie again, trying to save him? He kicked out, but couldn't shake her off. Another breath, and he had to stop fighting because he was coughing so hard. He slithered back out of the window, and found the person he was fighting was Isaac.

“How did you get out?” he demanded, still coughing. “I
was about to go in after you.” Isaac looked horrified. “Look at those flames, that must be the soundproofing going up. What the hell happened? Did you see it start?”

Isaac looked at Jack for a moment. Then he sighed, put his hand in his pocket, and took out a box of matches.

“No,” said Jack. “I don't believe you.”

Isaac looked affronted.

“Seriously? But God, why the hell would you, you could have killed someone!”

Isaac rummaged in his pocket again, found a pencil and paper, and drew hastily. He showed Jack a tiny sketch of a man on horseback, dressed in armour and carrying a long lance.

“You set fire to the studio to rescue me from Evie?”

Isaac's smile was radiant and his face was smudged with smoke. He looked, Jack thought, like a rather grubby angel. The fire engine arrived. Hordes of firefighters poured into the street. Jack glimpsed Evie's bright coat, and felt a treacherous spasm of relief.

“You're insane,” Jack told him. “Do you know that? You're absolutely insane. But, oh, Christ, am I actually going to say this? Thank you.” He shook his head. “Look, I'm supposed to be meeting someone. If you swear you won't burn the café down I'll buy you a coffee.”

They met Mathilda in the Rainbird Café at three o'clock. As soon as he saw her, he knew the audition had been good; her skin glowed and her eyes were dazzled. For the moment his mouth brushed hers, there was no-one else in the café.

“It went well,” she told him, economical as always.

“They said yes?”

“They want me back when they've cast Torvald. How did it go with Alan?” She put her nose against his shirt. “Have you been in a fire?”

“Kind of.”

“You're not hurt, are you?”

“I'm fine. Can I introduce someone?”

Isaac was guarding a large battered rucksack by the door. Jack was slightly unnerved to see Isaac's gaze fixed on Mathilda, not staring exactly, but studying the planes and contours of her face and body as a visitor might study a sculpture in a gallery. “This is Isaac. Alan wants him to do the
Landmark
cover.”

“Do you know Jack's work?” Mathilda asked Isaac, as they drank strong, sweet coffee from heavy Portmeirion mugs.

Isaac nodded.

“What do you think of it?”

Jack shifted, uncomfortably.

“Jack hates people talking about him,” Mathilda told Isaac.

“I don't mind when I'm not there to hear,” said Jack. “I'm a reasonable man. Just, you know, don't tell me about it. Let me live with the delusion I'm not public property.”

“How did you ever end up a star?” asked Mathilda, laughing.

“Freak accident? Mistaken identity? Alien intervention?” He drained the last of the coffee in his mug. “I'll get more coffee.”

It wasn't until he saw him from across the café that it fully dawned on Jack how good looking Isaac was. His skin was smooth and brown and flawless, his hair thick and curly, his eyes black and liquid; a Hollywood fantasy of a young Italian peasant. Mathilda's long legs were folded beneath her on the wooden chair. He could see her hands move as she talked. It occurred to him that Isaac and Mathilda were probably around the same age.

Stop it
, he told himself, and sat down, conscious that as he arrived, Mathilda fell silent and they both turned their faces towards him.

“Is it okay if Isaac stays with us?” asked Mathilda. “While he works on the
Landmark
cover, I mean.”

“You want to do it?” Despite his misgivings, he was pleased.

“He needs somewhere to stay. Do you mind?”

“Of course not, do
you
mind?”

Mathilda laughed. “It's your house.”

“So it is. Maybe I'll fill it with bass-players and bunny-girls.”

“You'd get sick of them before I did.”

“How did you get to know me so well?”

Mathilda's laugh of pleasure was low and sweet. She ruffled his hair and returned to her coffee. Jack took Mathilda's hand and held it for a second beneath the table, then brought it to his lips and kissed it.

It wasn't until he emptied his pockets in the hotel room that night that he remembered the sketch Isaac had given him. He unfolded the paper and studied it by the dim light of the bedside lamp. It was amazing what Isaac had accomplished so quickly with a stolen pencil and a sheet of cheap typing paper.

As he looked closer, admiring the deft little strokes that subtly suggested the heavy pile of the curtains, he realised that the face of the girl was familiar to him. Standing in the empty theatre in front of the drawn curtains, her face raised hopefully and a tear on the curve of her cheek, Isaac had drawn Evie.

chapter seven (now)

Davey awoke a few days later to find a bone-deep chill and a thin West Country rain falling like mist. When he dressed, his clothes were clammy and he could see his breath in the air. Beguiled outside by the rain's gentle appearance (“It's like walking in a cloud,” he declared poetically, trying not to mind Priss' snort of derision), he found himself drenched within twenty minutes and wandered disconsolately back to the warmth of the kitchen, where Priss, shivering and trying to hide it, sat on the floor by the Aga with her arms wrapped around her knees.

After a few minutes, Isaac joined Davey at the scrubbed pine table. He had been mysteriously absent for the whole of the previous day, returning at some unknown time after midnight. He looked tired but content. He carried a chewed-up pencil stub and a stack of paper held together with a giant bulldog clip, and he wore an ancient oiled-wool sweater that glistened with flecks of rain. Davey, trying to concentrate on
The Cruel Sea
, found himself distracted by Isaac's insistent gaze. When Davey caught his eye, Isaac looked at him questioningly and made a miniscule gesture towards Davey's rapidly-fading black eye.

“It's nothing,” said Davey defensively, wishing he had long hair like Priss that he could hide behind. Isaac looked disbelieving. “I don't want to talk about it, okay? Sorry.”

Isaac leaned over the table and turned back the hair Davey had combed over the crusty scab along his hairline. He looked
at Davey sternly.

“It's
nothing
,” Davey repeated. “Really. It's nearly gone now.”

Isaac put one finger to his lips, and then glanced out of the veranda windows. Tom was just visible through the rain-kissed glass.

“Oh my God,” said Davey, horrified. Isaac shook his head and repeated his
shhh
gesture. Davey lowered his voice. “Of course it wasn't, you don't think I'd stay here if he'd, you know, b-b-b-beaten me up, do you?”

Isaac's gaze was unflinching. Davey had never realised how disconcertingly intimate the act of looking into someone's eyes could be.

“Look, it wasn't Tom, okay? Why does it matter, anyway? It's not going to happen again. What?
What?
It's not, okay? I w-w-w-wouldn't let anyone d-d-d-do that to me ever again, it was a w-w-w - ” he stopped in exasperation. “A one time thing. Alright?”

Isaac continued to look at him.

“Why are you asking, anyway?” Davey whispered. “Kate and Tom never ask, never. Even Priss doesn't ask.” Isaac was studying the stain of bruises that spread down Davey's neck. Could he tell how much further they spread, underneath the thin blue cotton? Isaac looked again at Tom. In his eyes was an unmistakeable warning.

“What is it? Why do I need to be careful? Do you know him or something? Why do you think he b-b-b- why do you think he might have d-d-d-d-d – shit – why would you think he hit me?”

Isaac shook his head in surrender, and returned to his pencil and paper. He was drawing Priss as she sat by the Aga. Isaac, Davey thought jealously, seemed to draw Priss a lot. Was he interested in her? Surely he was far too old to think he had a chance. He wondered if Isaac made a living from his art. Probably not. If he had money, why would he sleep in an ancient tent pitched on someone else's lawn?

Kate, looking uncharacteristically harassed, came through the French windows carrying two hemp bags of shopping.

“Priss,” she said.

“Mmm?” Priss was flushed and drowsy with the warmth of the Aga. Davey thought she must look like that first thing in the morning, before she hid behind her make up.

“And Davey as well, come to think of it,” said Kate. She put the bags down on the table. A bunch of overripe bananas slid furtively out and made a bid for freedom. Isaac put out a hand and caught them without looking.

“Yes?”

“I want you to do something for me,” she said. “I want you to promise you'll stay out of the other half of the house.”

Davey blinked. Priss held her face carefully blank and smooth. Isaac watched with intense interest.

“Why?” asked Priss.

“I think you know,” said Kate, so sharply that Davey flinched and Priss blinked in surprise. “I'm sorry, I didn't mean to, but I think you know.”

“Because it's dangerous?” Davey asked.

“We're not stupid,” said Priss. “We can look after ourselves.”

Kate sat down, reached across the table and took his hand, a warm and intimate gesture that caught him off-guard. Then she beckoned Priss to come and sit with them. She reached out to stroke Priss' hair. She flinched, then let her.

“This house,” she said. “It's beautiful, of course it is. And you're welcome for as long as you want. But you have to be careful too. It's - ” she hesitated. “It's very old. It has ghosts.” Priss shook her head in disbelief. “I don't mean
ghosts
like people walking around dressed in white sheets, I mean bad memories. Old secrets. Things that are best left undisturbed. Do you know what I mean?”

To Davey's horror, Kate seemed close to tears. Davey didn't dare move. Priss' eyes were huge and her face was a milky white. Isaac was watching them intently.

“Sometimes it's best to let the past lie undisturbed,” she
continued. “If you wake it up, it can be dangerous. So I want you to promise me you'll stay away. Not stir things up. Be safe. Okay?”

“Okay,” said Davey instantly. Kate squeezed his hand and smiled.

“Thank you. Priss?”

Priss had got the colour back in her cheeks. “Alright,” she said.

Kate looked unconvinced. “You really mean it?”

Priss met Kate's gaze head-on. “I promise.”

“Thank you.” Kate tucked a strand of hair behind Priss' ear, and stood up. “Then that's settled. I'm going to make some bread.”

Priss looked guilty. “I'll help,” she said.

“No, I don't mind.”

“Then give me something else to do. It's not on, you running round like a slave.” Priss poked Davey hard in the chest. “And you can do something useful an' all.”

Davey put down his book obediently and waited for orders.

“Are your rooms tidy?” asked Kate, laughing.

“Yes,” said Davey.

“No,” said Priss. “But I'm the only one who sees it so it doesn't matter.”

Kate shook her head mockingly. “Didn't your mother ever tell you to tidy your room?”

To Davey's astonishment, this question seemed to impale Priss like a bayonet. She stared at Kate speechlessly, her mouth quivering. Kate put her hand up to her mouth. Davey felt he should rescue the situation, but had no idea how. Then Tom, his arms loaded with logs, banged impatiently on the veranda door, and Kate went to let him in. Priss sat back down by the Aga and pulled her hair over her face.

“This'll keep us going for a bit,” said Tom. “The bedrooms'll be cold, but we can get warm before we go up. Which room do you want a fire in?”

“We've got a fire,” said Priss, yawning and stretching.

“You can't sit there,” said Kate. “I'm making bread. You're in the way.”

“We can have cornflakes.”

“With dinner?”

“Why not?”

“Because Kate said so,” said Tom. “Pick a room, this is heavy.”

“Or Weetabix,” said Priss.

“Or I could make bread,” said Kate. “Just be told, Priss. You're not spending the day in front of the Aga. In fact, that goes for all of you. I want everyone out of the kitchen. Leave me to commune with the dough.” She was trying to keep her tone light, but she looked strained and tired.

“Let's go in the library,” said Davey.

“Library it is.” Tom strode off. Priss trailed after him. Davey stood up to follow him, then felt Isaac's fingers close around his wrist. He tried to snatch it away, but Isaac's grip was surprisingly firm. Something slipped into the palm of his hand. When Davey tried to look, Isaac pressed his fingers tightly closed.
Not here
.

In the hall, he found Isaac had given him a folded sheet of paper. Of course. What else would it be? His skin itchy and uncomfortable from the unwanted contact, Davey stuffed it into his pocket without looking at it and went into the library.

“There,” Tom said, crouched on the hearth. “Keep it topped up, but not too much or you'll likely crack the oven.” He picked splinters off his jacket and dropped them into the flames. They danced and leapt like fireflies. “See you later.”

“Are you going out?” asked Priss. “It's raining.”

“I don't think I'll melt.”

“But it's fuckin' freezing,” Priss said. Tom looked at her reproachfully. “Sorry, but it
is
. It looks alright, but it kind of soaks you all the way through and gets into your fuckin' bones - look, I can't help it, it's how I was raised.”

Tom smiled. “I like being outside. Behave yourselves, okay?”

As soon as he was gone, Priss snatched Davey's book out of his hands. “What the hell was all that about?” she demanded. “All what? I was reading that.”

“Read it later, daft lad, this is important. About the other half of the house.”

“She doesn't want us to go in there.”

“But why?”

Davey remembered his brief glance into the chilled ruin that lay behind the connecting door, and shivered. “Because it's dangerous. I think she's right. It's horrible in there.”

“Or maybe because there's something she doesn't want us to find.” Priss bit her thumbnail. “She was warning us off, wasn't she? And I've looked in there, I've looked everywhere, I couldn't find a thing! I was really starting to think - shit.
Shit!
I wanted to be wrong, Davey, I really did.” There were tears on her lashes, which she blinked furiously away. “Is every good thing in this whole fuckin' world a fake?”

“I think you're wrong. Kate and Tom are lovely, Priss. They're
lovely
. Where do you think we'd be if they hadn't taken us in?”

Priss wiped her nose on her sleeve. “You'd be lyin' dead in the outhouse, mate,” she said. “No way I'd have dragged you in over the doorstep and then mopped up your spew all night.”

“And how about you?” he asked daringly.

For a moment, he thought she was going to answer. Then she laughed, and kissed him lightly on the nose.

“Nice try, posh boy. But you don't need to know
nothing
about me. What was Isaac talking to you about?”

“Nothing. He never says a word to me.” A spasm of jealousy stabbed the backs of his knees. “Does he talk to you?”

Priss looked amused. “There's no need to be jealous. I'm not interested in him.”

“I d-d-d-didn't mean that! That's disgusting, he's far too old for you.”

“He's not bad looking, mind you,” said Priss. “He'd be alright for breeding purposes.”

Was she trying to make him jealous? “I doubt he wants a baby at his age.”

“Well, he wouldn't
have
a baby, would he, I would. We'd get a council flat and live off benefits.”

“Would you?”

“Of course I wouldn't, you dozy twat.”

Her face was radiant in the firelight. He thought of Botticelli's Flora, of the swell of her belly beneath her gown, female and disturbing and mysterious. “Do you want to get married and have children one day, though?”

Priss laughed. “You know what love and marriage really are, posh boy? Stockholm Syndrome. All those centuries of oppression, it was the only way women could survive.”

“But that's not how it is these days. Women aren't property or anything.”

“And that's why the institution of marriage is collapsing. We don't need you any more. These days, we can fuckin' bin you off as soon as you've knocked us up. Fifty years from now, men and women won't even bother trying to live together. We'll just maintain separate residences and meet up for a shag occasionally. Romance is over, mate. Here. Have your dodgy war-porn book back. And don't talk to me for a bit, alright? I need to think.”

The flames shone on Priss' hair, and the wood crackled. This whole setup, Davey thought gloomily, was wrong. He should be making a move, maybe sliding his arm around Priss' waist and moving her closer, or putting one hand under her chin and tilting her face to his. Instead he was trying to justify his existence as a man, and to explain why he didn't – yet – believe that the kind, gentle woman making bread in the kitchen was some kind of murderer.

Davey found Tom in the garden, inspecting the vegetable beds. The existence of an actual working kitchen garden, like the library, was another astounding miracle Davey couldn't get used to. The beds were well-tended, their borders cleanly
defined, the weeds kept in check. Tom was hardly ever in the house, and when he was, he was constantly looking towards the doorway. Was this where he spent his days?

“Want to help?” Tom asked, offering Davey a wooden basket half-filled with bean-pods. Drips of water rolled off the sleek grey strands of his hair and down his collar. Davey hunched himself deeper into his jacket in sympathy.

“Is it these ones here?”

Tom plucked a ripe pod from the long green coils of a stand of beans, broke it open, and breathed the scent deep into his lungs.

“Just the big ones,” he told Davey. “Careful,” he warned as Davey reached clumsily into the centre of the tripod. “Don't knock them over.”

“Sorry.” Davey laid the beans carefully in the basket, took a step backwards and knocked into another tripod. “Oh, shit I mean, sorry - ”

“It's okay.” Tom took his elbow to steady him.

“I d-d-d-didn't mean to wreck all your work - ”

“You haven't. It's fine. See?”

“But you must have worked really hard on these, um, planting them all out and everything.”