Chapter One

Chapter One

 

Waking up in a car gives everything a synthetic, unfamiliar glaze. It’s the same feeling you get in airport terminals and hospital corridors. They’d pulled up in a Cornish seaside town and the sudden slam of the car boot made Elizabeth’s eyes jolt open. Noah went to buy a few bottles of wine, leaving her to wake herself up a little more. She redid her makeup and lit a cigarette, listening to the news on the radio. All these worldwide crises, natural disasters and unnatural crimes, she couldn’t relate to them. Nobody could, not really, they weren’t involved. Everyone acts horrified, she thought, fakes empathy, it’s bullshit. I don’t care, not really, neither does the newsreader, neither do the public. We’re all just voyeurs.

Noah returned with two doubled-up plastic bags clanking with bottles. He placed them in the back seat and drove the last few minutes to the outskirts of the town, and parked outside the bookshop where Leo Spencer lived.

Elizabeth was almost nervous. Noah didn’t see any of his family any more, and as Leo was his ‘mentor’, this would be the closest she was likely to get to a meet-the-parents scenario.

Noah had dressed up for the occasion- sharp suit jacket, silk necktie and stack-heeled cowboy boots polished to a shine. He pushed his dark hair out of his eyes before pressing the bell.

While they waited for Leo to buzz them up Elizabeth peered through the glass front of the bookshop. It was the kind of place she would have loved to visit when it was open, stacked to the ceilings with much-loved dog-eared paperback Penguin-Classic-type volumes yellowing at the edges and covered in a thin layer of that clean type of dust.

The door clicked open suddenly, making her start a little. She remembered where she was and followed Noah inside.

The stairs spiralling up to the flat were ancient and wooden. They creaked with every step the couple took, the protest groan of something beneath you about to give way. To Elizabeth’s relief they held fast until they reached the door at the top, which Noah pushed open and strode through as if he were in his own home. She followed suit, laying her heavy bags down as soon as she could and shutting the heavy door behind her. The room she had stepped into was large. Thick, sugary sunlight poured through the open sash windows like honey, casting long shadows of the mismatched furniture.

“Leo?” Noah called, placing his off license bags carefully on the dining room table.

“Just a second,” a voice came from one of the adjoining rooms, a muffled drawl through an inch of wood. There was a brief moment when Elizabeth and Noah stood watching the door as if suspended in silence, but soon enough it swung open and Leo was standing in front of them.

As Noah went over to embrace his friend Elizabeth couldn’t help but feel a tad disappointed. She wasn’t exactly sure what she had been expecting, but she had at least presumed that he would be an something of an imposing figure. Leo was of average height, she supposed (making him a good four or five inches shorter than Noah), with grey flecking his brown hair and thick-rimmed glasses resting on a long, straight nose. He wore a white shirt with the sleeves rolled up, pinstripe trousers and leather brogues, which all fitted well but were worn at the edges. Thin lips, sharp eyes. But appearances must have been deceiving. Noah didn’t speak in reverent tones about just anyone.

Noah broke apart from Leo and wrapped his arm round Elizabeth’s shoulders.

“Leo, the beautiful Elizabeth Gallo.”

Leo shook her hand- a handshake worth trusting, she noted- and smiled warmly at her. “Yes, you have been mentioned once or twice.”

Elizabeth felt a warm glow rush to her stomach. She loved to know that Noah acknowledged her, even spoke highly of her. His standards were so high and unforgiving that she felt an incredible privilege.

Leo invited them both to sit down, offered them drinks.

“I bought some,” Noah called over, gesturing in the direction of the dining table.

“Ah, thank you.” As he opened a bottle of wine with a gratifying ‘pop’, Elizabeth cast her eyes around the room again. Only then did she notice how many books there were. They seemed to fill every available space, crammed into boxes, leaning on windowsills, squeezed into gaps between cabinets. It was as if they grew there like mould, in the dark corners. Leo brought over three generous glasses of Merlot. He sat down in the armchair opposite the corduroy sofa where Noah and Elizabeth were sitting side by side, leaning forward as if waiting for some great knowledge to be imparted upon them.

Noah took a large sip of wine and laughed to himself. “Jesus, Leo, it’s been too long, what, like, a year? Year and a half?”

“Must be at least, yes,” Leo spoke quietly, not a decibel louder than he needed to. He had the polite, awkward manner usually reserved for people who don’t have much to say at parties. “So… been getting up to much recently?”

“Was back in Creswick a few months ago,” Noah grimaced. “Back to f*****g hell on Earth while I sorted some stuff out with the old lot. But I picked this one up on the way, so it wasn’t all bad.” He looked at Elizabeth with a roguish smile, running his hand over the back of her neck. Turning back to Leo, he continued. “She gets it you, know, she really gets it, the whole thing. She always knew she was better than the rest of them, she just never harnessed it before, you know, never acted on it.”

Elizabeth didn’t feel the need to interject, feeling that Noah had pretty much hit the bullseye once again. The first time he’d taken her out it seemed that he was vocalising every thought that had been brewing quietly in her head. He asked her why, if she wasn’t satisfied with her life, she wasn’t doing anything about it, asked her why she was following the same process that everyone else was, asked her if she secretly felt better than the people around her, asked her why she was letting other people make rules for her like their opinions on what was right and wrong were any more valid than hers. He’d awoken something in her that day that hadn’t died down since.

“How about you,” asked Noah, lighting a Camel. “Got any news for us?”

Leo shrugged. “Not really. It’s tourist season so the shop’s been pretty busy but apart from that… hardly anything, I’m afraid.”

“Back in Creswick any time soon?”

“Doing a talk at the Academy in September I think.”

“What on this time?”

“Lord of the Flies, probably.”

Noah turned proudly to Elizabeth. “His lecture on

L’Étranger

Leo didn’t seem to know what to say. “What time did you leave this morning?” he asked seemingly out of nowhere.

“About eleven,” Elizabeth croaked, propping her dozy head up on one arm. This was her first contribution to the conversation.

“Jesus, you must be starving. Do you feel like eating yet?”

They both nodded. Neither of them had eaten all day.

“Good, so do I. I won’t be a minute.” Leo wandered off into the kitchen and started rummaging around in the cupboards.

Noah turned to Elizabeth and whispered. “So, what do you think?”

“He seems really nice,” she said. “He’s a lot quieter that I was expecting.”

“Yeah, he’s like that in private, total introvert really, like, subdued you know. It’s crazy, when he’s giving talks and s**t he’s so f*****g powerful, you wouldn’t believe it’s the same guy. Gorgeous, you wait, you’ll learn so much from this man. Unbelievable...”

*****

As the light of the day faded into the tangerine glow of the evening the couple slid back in their seats, wine in hand, and watched Leo through the kitchen doorway. He moved slowly and methodically as he cooked, not rushing anything. There was an almost meditative quality to it, about the way he smoked and sipped at his wine as he worked.

A few minutes later he carried through a steaming bowl of pasta, half a baguette and another bottle of wine. They sat around the dining table to eat, a great sturdy bare wood creation covered in a million tiny scratches and indents.

The food complemented the atmosphere, it was simple and rustic and wholesome, the kind that you can feel doing your body good. They ripped off chunks of bread with their hands as they ate, crumbs scattered artistically across the table. They ate slowly, allowing time to savour every mouthful and make conversation between them. Noah spoke animatedly about his plans for the future. He wanted to travel around Western Europe, see the birthplaces of his heroes, find cafés he’d read about in books from the thirties.

Leo topped up his wine glass. “It’s certainly an iconic image of bohemia.”

“Have you travelled much?” Elizabeth asked him.

“I spent a few years in America in my twenties. That was years ago now of course. The Midwest mostly. It’s absolutely beautiful out there.”

“You should go back,” Noah interjected.

Leo shook his head. “No. There’s always the chance when you revisit somewhere you once loved intensely that the only thing you’ll do is tarnish the good memories.”

“Yeah, I get you. Anyway, it’s all McDonalds and f*****g Starbucks now. Corporate f*****g wasteland, you know?”

*****

Night began to creep in through the open window and when it became too dark to make out each other’s faces Leo lit candles and an old fashioned paraffin lamp he had on the dresser. They carried on talking and eventually, inevitably, the topic turned to Creswick. All three of them had lived there from an early age, all three of them had been tormented by years spent in a landlocked beauty spot where the young came to start families and the elderly came to die.

The men had both attended Creswick Academy, a private school where ambassadors and businessmen sent their children to board amongst locals whose parents could afford fees for the day school. Both had bolted not long after hitting eighteen.

Elizabeth’s family could have easily sent her to the Academy, but as her father was the headmaster of the local OFSTED-gratifying state school it followed naturally that she should go there.

Always intending to leave that oppressive town just as soon as she had saved enough she never quite got round to it, always setting herself deadlines that she postponed before she had passed, forever chasing her own white rabbit.

“Why does Creswick affect people like this though?” Elizabeth’s words tumbled out slowly, a silk scarf from a magician’s sleeve. “It’s a nice enough place, the setting’s beautiful, the people are polite, the demographic’s wealthy… but it’s awful, just, awful. You spend too long there are you start getting suicidal.”

“It’s because there’s nothing there to stimulate people like us at all. It’s a f*****g safety blanket you know, there’s no element of risk to it. There’s nothing to discover, you know everything and everyone and everywhere already. Stay there all your life and you’ll just waste away, die because you’re not even living,” Noah spoke passionately, leaning forward in his chair and gesticulating wildly.

Leo had his elbows resting on the table, the tips of his slender fingers meeting in front of his face. He tilted his head to one side for a moment as if he was thinking about this, and then he spoke. “I think… I think it’s because in Creswick you have everything you’re supposed to be working for just handed to you. All the things you’re told you have to aim for in life… wealth and status and a beautiful house in a beautiful town… you’ve achieved them without working for them at all. And when you’re young especially, that‘s a tragedy. It’s supposed to be your upward struggles that define you after all. So I suppose that’s why most of us end up leaving for places where we have to work harder at life, it just makes us uncomfortable when life comes easily.”

Noah clapped his hands together. “That’s it, you’ve got it, that’s exactly right.”

I have never had a real challenge

, Elizabeth thought. I have never had to try hard at anything.

“I suppose in that way class becomes a curse,” she said. “If you come from a comfortable background like ours you can never really be free of it because you’ll always have that soft option hanging over your head. No matter how hard you try to live the poor romantic lifestyle it’ll never be real because it’s a choice, not a circumstance. You could go back to living the easy way if you really wanted to.” she smiled. “It’s like the Pulp song.”

“Yes, unfortunately that’s true,” Leo said. “Heaven knows I tried to find a way around it but in the end I suppose I just resigned myself to the fact.”

Noah nodded and said “That’s why I severed ties with all my family. Weighing me down like a lead balloon you know, I couldn’t be free with them available to me like that.”

“But if you went back to them now would they take you?” Leo asked.

“I wouldn’t go back.”

“Let’s say hypothetically.”

“Well… I don’t know, I suppose it’s possible. It’s been too long now to know for sure.”

“Then returning to that way of life could still be viable?”

“They probably wouldn’t take me back. If there is a chance it’s slim. And I wouldn’t take it anyway.

“You’re sure about that?”

“Yeah, totally.”

When they’d all eaten their fill Noah and Elizabeth cleared the table. Leo told them that they could just leave the dishes in the sink and that he’d deal with them in the morning. Noah opened the third bottle of the night.

They re-entered the main room to find Leo crouched in front of a large CD rack, running his index finger along the titles and studying them intently.

Noah groaned. “Come on Leo, you’re a child of the sixties, you should be playing f*****g vinyl.”

“Being born in the sixties doesn’t necessarily make you a child of the sixties.”

“Whatever, they didn’t have CD’s in the seventies either.”

“Well call me old-fashioned, I know that retro’s very hip with you kids nowadays but the fact remains that CDs take up half the room and sound twice as good.”

His finger paused on an album and he pulled it out, studied it for a second and then placed it carefully in the CD player, switching to the seventh track. John Martyn’s ‘May You Never’ resonated around the room.

Elizabeth had kicked off her heels a while before, and in spite of herself she began to dance, her inhibitions dulled by alcohol. The floorboards were cool under her bare feet and her cigarette was warm between her fingers. She wasn’t a world class dancer, but the way she oscillated with dark rimmed eyes shut tight and a Mona Lisa smile playing across her lips was nothing if not endearing. She moved her arms slowly like a Bollywood dancer and allowed her head to roll a little on her neck, letting thick hair fall over her shoulders.

Noah sat back in one of the armchairs for a while, watching her with deadly intensity. Smoke curled up from between his fingers, up over his shoulder and dissipated in the air above his head. He drew the cigarette to his lips; it was in its death throes and he took one last long drag before extinguishing it in a terracotta ashtray and rising to his feet. He paced over to where Elizabeth was dancing, lost in a world of her own, and took hold of her slender wrists. She stopped moving and looked up at him. Letting go of her arms, he laced the fingers of one hand in hers and placed his remaining hand in the shallow dip at the base of her spine. She sighed contently, wrapped her free arm around him and pressed her head against his chest. His scent crept in through her nostrils and filled her head with pheromones. With her body tucked into his she could feel the contours of his torso, the strength in his arm as it pulled her closer. They moved slowly, in time with the music. She could feel his hooked nose tickling her ear as he searched for the best spot to breathe in her perfume. She broke away from him for a second and snaked both her arms over his broad shoulders. She saw a flash of smug little smile before she pressed her lips to his. He twisted his head further to one side and held onto her tightly. After the kiss had finished Noah stepped backwards and collapsed onto the sofa. Elizabeth slid down next to him, her head resting in his lap. He stroked her hair absent-mindedly, like one would a Persian cat, as he poured himself another glass of wine. She glanced over to where Leo was standing by the window, smoking a roll up with one hand in his pocket. It was impossible to read from his expression whether or not he had been watching. For now, at least, he was looking outside. At something going on in the street or on the beach beyond, or at the sky now freckled with the firmament.

changed my f*****g life. Stopped being a stupid little kid, grew up, got smart.”

“I wouldn’t say eighteen’s a kid exactly, Noah,” said Leo.

“A kid in here, in my head,” Noah rapped his knuckles against his skull for emphasis. “Still just a kid you know, dossing around looking for meaning, there is no f*****g meaning, you know? Damn, it’s been a long time Leo, too long.”