Алия Уайтли: The Loosening Skin

‘Just the house, then? Not me?’

She doesn’t reply to that, directly. She purses her lips, then says, ‘Did you see the photo of Mik, in the paper?’

‘He’s looking good.’

‘He always did.’

‘It’ll desert him at some point. Do you want a drink? Some dinner?’

‘Let’s get Chinese from that place in Shefford that does great chow mein. Did great chow mein.’

‘It still does. Not everything is different around here, you know.’

She laughs. ‘Of course it isn’t,’ she says. Oh, this is good, this is familiar and strong and they can stand each other, they can be more than old lovers, they can be friends, and the Chinese food isn’t delivered for an hour so they’ve confided nearly everything by the time they get to eat. He tells her about the phone call with Howard, and the emergency leak he fixed in a bathroom this morning where the woman recognised him and said she cried when the Six broke up and, maybe he could fix that leak for her too with a bit of personal attention. Was that a come-on? Yes , says Sunetra, and a rubbish one at that . She holds him in her eyes, with her interest.

Her turn: she talks of the poems she’s writing now, poems about loss and good grace and kindness. ‘They all seem to be full of you,’ she says, slowly, a puzzled revelation.

‘You think I’m kind?’

‘You always are to me.’

That brings guilt, for the cruelty she doesn’t know about. He hates her poems, particularly that famous one, in which he found only sentimentality; he’s said as much to Howard and the others a number of times. And even earlier, when they were all still in love, they would laugh at her efforts to be creative. That pot, outside the door, slowly sinking into the wet mud of the garden.

‘I wrote a new poem today,’ she says, ‘while waiting for you to get back. Do you want to hear it?

He hesitates.

‘No, of course you don’t, it’s fine, it’s fine,’ she says. She finishes the last of the chow mein.

‘It’s not that I—’

‘You lived it. You don’t need the poems. So where’s this Liam I keep hearing about? Howard talks to me too. He thinks you’re protesting too much.’

‘It’s not – listen, he’s taken his kids to a theme park. They’re staying over at the hotel there. But he’s not, we’re not…’

‘That’s a shame. I wanted to see this man you’re so busy not loving. Right. Well. I’ll get going.’

‘It’s late. Stay over.’

But she’s already up, and fetching her coat from the living room. His hesitation was unforgiveable, of course.

What did she want from tonight? He knows, suddenly, what he wants from her. He wants to show her the picture of Edith Learner, and have her touch that old skin. He wants to know what she thinks of it, and of him for owning it.

‘You know,’ Sunetra says. ‘I loved Liz first, and I loved Howard because it became clear that he was part of Liz. You I loved because you were so obviously the end of us all. You were our completion, and our end.’ She nods. He can tell she’s pleased with the way she’s phrased the thought. She’s making a mental note to write it down later, and package it up as a poem.

They wait for the taxi to arrive, then kiss goodbye quickly. ‘I forgot,’ she says, ‘a package came for Liam. I signed for it, I hope that’s okay. It’s in the hall. His name looked good on top of our address.’ She looks at him as if she is disappointed with him – as if a parcel arriving in someone else’s name is undeniably an act of love.

‘Thanks. You’d better get going.’

‘You can be happy, you know. That’s allowed.’

As the taxi drives away, her head is bowed. She doesn’t look up at him. She’s already on her phone, condensing their time together into a line, and he wouldn’t have believed he ever loved her if there wasn’t physical proof out there.

‘I’ve found a place,’ says Liam, near the end of their bath, just as the water is turning tepid.

Something in him changed after the visit to the theme park. Maybe it was so busy, so fraught and wild with electrical thrills and sugar and screaming, that it became impossible to top. No other distancing technique could ever work as well, so it has become pointless for him to try. Instead there has to be communication. Speaking softly as one tucks a child into bed at night, in a small quiet house bought for that purpose. That’s what Liam needs now.

They’ve bathed together before, but never like this, without sex between them. Dan leans back, feeling the water rise as his back slides against Liam’s chest. Liam applies soap with perfunctory circles of his hand. The entire reason for suggesting it must be to break this news. What a strange choice of location, Dan thinks.

‘It’s not perfect, but it’ll do for a start. I’ve been given more hours at work, too. Night shifts, so that’ll cover the rent.’

‘That’s great,’ Dan says, carefully, ‘A step forward.’

‘Is that what life is? Steps forward? One foot in front of the other?’

Dan sloshes the water up over his chest. It’s cramped, with his legs tucked up, but he’s strangely comfortable. The foetal position, almost. ‘It’s just a thing people say.’

‘Yeah, I’m not keen on those. Try saying something real instead.’ Liam applies shampoo to Dan’s hair and rubs it in, roughly. The foam forms and drips, and Dan has to close his eyes and mouth tight. So much for saying something real. Still it gives him time to think. He picks his words carefully, ready for when Liam has rinsed his hair clean.

‘I’ll never see you,’ he says.

‘No, probably not.’

‘But I want to see you.’ He tilts back his head, but can’t see anything but the wet ends of his own fringe, hanging down. Liam’s hands are on his chest, though. They press against his skin. He’s listening. Is he angry? There’s an energy emanating from him. It’s so difficult to be honest about this.

‘We’ll work something out,’ Liam says. The pressure from his hands lessens. ‘When people want to see each other, they find a way, I reckon.’

Yes, maybe that’s true. Liam worked all hours when they first met, and yet they would text and meet up, even in the middle of the night when Liam took his break. All in the name of the compatibility between bodies in a time when that seemed like an easy option. Smiles leading to open mouths, no words, no thoughts. Hands tugging at clothes. Dan would wear jogging bottoms to those meetups for ease of access. But then it began: words, afterwards, and shared stories, leaking through drip by drip. I need a place, I can’t stay there. Things are falling apart. It’s just for a little while . He would never have offered a space in the house to a different body, no matter how beautiful, or even made the effort to be there in the moments available. It was something about Liam.

‘Yeah,’ he says, and strokes the hand on his chest. ‘People find a way.’

Liam folds the wrapping paper over the box, and Dan passes him the sellotape.

The present is a fish tank.

Not a tank for living, breathing fish. The pink plastic box will be filled with water by Liam’s daughter, who will then empty a packet of glittery balls into it. The balls will expand, slowly, over time, into fish simulacra. They’ll grow and swim, and she’ll have to ‘feed’ them from a matching little pink tub. But they won’t be alive, and so they can never die.

‘I’m not certain what kind of life lesson this is,’ Dan says doubtfully, as the present is sealed shut by Liam’s hands.

‘It’s the kind that doesn’t get me into trouble with her mother,’ he says.