Джоан Харрис: Blueeyedboy

Take Tricia Goldblum, the bitch who seduced her elder son — and caused the death of her youngest. It was a pleasure to take care of her. Easy, too: electrical fires are always so reliable.

Then Mrs White’s hippie friend, who thought she was better than they were. And Catherine White herself, of course, so easy to destabilize. And Jeff Jones from the estate, the man who fostered that Irish girl, and who some years later, in the pub, dared to raise a hand to her son. Then there was Eleanor Vine, the sneak, spying on Bren at the Mansion, and Graham Peacock, who cheated them, and for whom the boy had feelings —

He was the most rewarding of all. Tipped over in his wheelchair and left to die alone on the path, like a tortoise half-out of its shell. Afterwards, she went upstairs and relieved him of his T’ang figurine, the one with which he taunted her all those years ago, and which she carefully placed in her cabinet along with the rest of her china dogs. It isn’t stealing, she tells herself. The old man owed her something , after all, for all the trouble he has caused her son.

But in spite of everything she has done for him, what gratitude has blueeyedboy shown? Instead of supporting his mother, he has dared to transfer his affections to that Irish girl from the village, and worse, has tried to make her believe that she could have been his protector —

She’ll make him pay for that, she thinks. But first, to take care of business.

Now, from upstairs, she hears his voice, accompanied by a banging and slapping at the bedroom door. ‘Ma! Please! Open the door !’

‘Don’t be such a baby,’ she says. ‘When I get back, then we can talk.’

‘Ma, please! ’

‘Don’t make me come in—’

The sounds from the bedroom cease abruptly.

‘That’s better,’ says Gloria. ‘We’ve got a lot to talk about. Like your job at the hospital. And the way you’ve been lying to me. And what you’ve been up to with that girl. That Irish girl with all the tattoos.’

Behind the door, he stiffens. He can feel every hair stiffening. He knows what’s in the balance here, and in spite of himself he is afraid. Of course he is. Who wouldn’t be? He is caught inside the bottle trap, and the worst of it is, he needs to be caught; he needs this feeling of helplessness. But she’s there on the other side of the door like a trap-door spider poised to bite, and if any part of his plan goes wrong, if he has failed to compensate for any one of those minute variables, then —

If. If.

An ominous sound, tinged with the grey-green scent of trees and the dust that accumulates under his bed. It’s safe under the bed, he thinks; safe and dark and scentless. He listens as she puts on her boots, fumbles with the front-door key; locks the door behind her. The crump of her footsteps in the snow. The sound of the car door opening.

She takes the car, as he knew she would. His begging her not to do so now ensures her cooperation. He closes his eyes. She starts the car. The engine ratchets into life. It would be so ironic, he thinks, if she had an accident. It wouldn’t be his fault if she did. And then, at last, he would be free —

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blueeyedboy: Still no one here? Right, then. I guess that leaves me all on my own for Stage 4 . . .

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Posted at: 04.56 on Friday, February 22

Status: public

Mood: cautious

Listening to: The Rubettes : ‘Sugar Baby Love’

I think you must have guessed by now that this is not an ordinary fic. My other fics are all accounts of things that have already happened — though whether they happened quite as I said is up to you to determine. But this little story is more in the way of being a work-in-progress. An ongoing project, if you like. A breakthrough in concept , as Clair might say. And like all conceptual work, it isn’t entirely without risk. In fact, I’m more or less convinced that it’s all about to end in tears.

Five minutes to drive to the Zebra. Five more to see to business. And after that — Whoops! All gone! — here comes the explosive finale.

I hope they’ll look after my orchids. They’re the only things in this house that I’ll miss. The rest can rot, for all I care, except for the china dogs, of course, for which I have special plans of my own.

But first of all, to get out of this room. The door is pinewood, and well-made. In a movie, perhaps, I could break it down. Real life demands a more reasoned approach. A multi-tool with a screwdriver, a file and a short-bladed penknife should help me deal with the hinges, after which I can make my exit unimpeded.

I take a last look at my orchids. I notice that the Phalaenopsis — otherwise known as the moth orchid — is in need of re-potting. I know exactly how she feels; I, who have lived for all these years in the same little, airless, toxic space. Time to explore new worlds, I think. Time now to leave the cocoon and to fly . . .

It occurs to me as I work on the door that I ought to be feeling better than this. My stomach is filled with butterflies. I’m even feeling a little sick. My iPod is packed in my travel bag; instead I turn on the radio. From the tinny speakers comes the bubblegum sound of the Rubettes singing ‘Sugar Baby Love’.

When I was a little boy, mistaking baby for B.B ., I always assumed that those songs were for me; that even the folk on the radio knew that I was special, somehow. Today the music sounds ominous, a troubling falsetto sweeping across a fat layer of descending chords to a mystic accompaniment of doop-shoowaddies and bop-shoowaddies ; and it tastes sour-sweet like acid drops, the ones that, when you were a child, you poked into the side of your mouth to make your tastebuds shudder and cramp, and if you weren’t careful, the tip of your tongue would slide over the boiled-sugar shell and snag on the sharp-edged bubbles there, and your mouth would fill with sweetness and blood, and that was the taste of childhood . . .

Nyaaa-haaaa-haaaa-ooooooooooooooh

Today there’s something sinister in those soaring, sustained vocals; something that tears at the insides like gravel in a silk purse. The word sugar is not sweet: it has a pink and gassy smell, like dentist’s anaesthetic, dizzy and intrusive, like something boring its way into my head. And I can almost see her there — right at this moment, here and there — and the Rubettes are playing at migraine volume in the Zebra’s tiny kitchen, and there’s a smell, a sickly-sweet, gassy smell that cuts through the scent of fresh coffee, but Ma doesn’t really notice that, because fifty years of Marlboros have long since shot her olfactory organs to hell, and only the scent of L’Heure Bleue cuts through, and she opens the door to the kitchen.

Of course I can’t quite be sure of this. I could be wrong about the radio station. I could be wrong about the time — she might still be in the car park, or by now it might even be over — and yet it feels completely right.

Perhaps there was something, after all, in Feather’s tales of walk-ins and ghosts and spirits and astral projection; because that’s how I feel now, lighter than air, watching the scene from a place somewhere on the ceiling, and the Rubettes are singing — aaaah-oop shoowaddy-waddy, doop-showaddy-waddy . And now I can see the top of Ma’s head, the parting in her thinning hair; the packet of Marlboros in her hand, the lighter poised above the tip; and I see the superheated air ripple and swell like a balloon inflated beyond its capacity, and she calls out — Hello? Is anyone there? — and lights a final cigarette —