Nicola Barker - Behindlings

‘We’ve been lucky,’ he said, ‘there’s all kinds of crap hanging around under the bridge. Planks left over from the construction work…’

He began knotting the remaining segments of rope together. When he’d finished he tied the end section firmly around his waist.

‘What are you doing?’ Arthur asked.

‘Your hands are too weak,’ Wesley explained impassively, ‘I’m going to have to come over.’

Arthur looked astonished. ‘The boat couldn’t possibly sustain the extra…’

‘Bollocks. It’s the back section that’s fucked. The front’s fine.’

Wesley put his good hand onto the remaining guide rail. The rail slowly, but inexorably, collapsed beneath it. He watched the wood hit the water, then shrugged. ‘I never liked that rail,’ he said.

He led the horse to the pike, tethered it, then arranged the planks he’d collected in order of length. The longest he manoeuvred out towards the stricken vessel, sliding it along what remained of the gangplank. It was only just long enough, and the bank’s dense muddiness didn’t improve its grip. Wesley tested it with his foot. He shrugged. He slid the other planks between the two.

‘I certainly hope that deer’s sure-footed,’ he murmured. Then he stepped out.

She suddenly felt the urge to clean —

Everywhere

Everybody

Everything

Started off in the hallway: found an unused roll of black plastic refuse sacks, unwound them, tore them off — one by one — and began piling stuff, en masse, inside of them: bottles, bags of bottles, junk-mail, the broken coffee filter machine, an old draining-board, a shrunken jumper, a cracked flower-pot, a stained sundress, a batch of carpet samples…

She pulled her plaits out, yanked her hair back. Tied it up with an old rubber band. Smoothed her hands roughly — matter-of-factly — across her still-wet cheeks. Left a series of long, dirty, finger-strokes there.

Sniffed.

Coughed.

Glanced down at herself. Pulled off her slippers (black and purple Chinese-pattern antique satin, criminally worn-down at the heel) and threw them in. Took off her dressing gown (a small tear under the arm). Did the same again.

Drew a deep breath, panted it out.

She walked through to the living room, dug around under the table, found an old denim overall. Unfolded it. Stepped into it. Pushed the poppers together on the front. The arms were too long. And the legs. It didn’t bother her. Found a half-used bottle of pine-scented disinfectant, an old cloth. Poured one onto the other.

Then she started over.

Soon she ran out of bags and surfaces (the disinfectant was making her fingers tingle, her nose run), so she pulled her throw off the armchair and began piling things onto that instead: dried flowers, an old tape recorder, a framed photo of herself, at school, straight-backed, smiling — middle-toothless — into the camera.

She gazed around, her chest heaving.

The nets.

She went to the window, grabbed them from the bottom and yanked. They fell — with a twanging-snap — like a fire-curtain during an intermission.

Dewi stood there –

Huge

— staring through the glass at her.

‘Tell me it isn’t true,’ he said.

His voice sounded like he was speaking underwater. He looked like an indignant hero on an American soap opera, helplessly trapped inside the unmanly bubble of TV forever –

His destiny

She shook her head.

‘Tell me it isn’t true,’ he repeated.

‘I can’t hear you,’ she murmured, applying her disinfected cloth to the window and rubbing at it; not intending to provoke, but provoking, nonetheless.

‘Lie to me, at least, ’ he said, ‘to spare my feelings.’

‘No.’

She shook her head again, speaking calmly through the frenzied squeak of her wrist action.

‘Step back,’ he said.

She frowned.

He lifted both his arms, his fists — as if about to play a major solo on the bass drum with a touring orchestra — and then held them there, mid-air. She visualised a series of notices slung neatly between them (Bob Dylan’s Subterranean Homesick Blues style) –

You

Are

Killing

Me

Katherine

He bent his elbows in slightly — as if pulling the handbrake on an old-fashioned freight lorry — and then smashed them forward, forcefully, into the centre of the largest glass pane.

She stepped back –

Quick

The glass collapsed in about five large segments. Some of the smaller pieces made contact with her legs, her feet. But she wasn’t hurt. The thick denim protected her.

A moment later — and almost more of a shock — her warm and smeary face was blasted by an unwelcome gust of ice-cold winter air.

‘You bitch,’ he said, once all the commotion was over. His voice was very clear. Then he bent down, and with both strong hands — like Samson, blind with rage and righteousness — he ripped up her hydrangea.

The dog didn’t want to walk, but she yanked him on, sternly. He responded by stiffening, rocking back onto his hindquarters, glancing yearningly –

The minx kidnapped me —

Do something!

— over his shoulder.

She was struggling up the Furtherwick. The young guide and his associate were trailing five paces behind her. She couldn’t shake them. She didn’t really know if she was afraid or not — Should I be?

They seemed…

She glanced back –

They seemed…

Shell-shocked

‘Looks like that fool journalist finally got his story,’ the young guide said, trying valiantly to engage her.

She ignored him, lifting her haughty chin, cussing the dog.

‘D’you really think the Old Man will be alright?’ he persisted, his tone penitent, almost wheedling.

She drew a deep breath. She stopped. She turned around. ‘Stop Following me,’ she blasted, ‘I’m not him. I’m not Wesley. And I’m not Doc, either — you hospitalised him already, remember? ’

His face was swathed in a look of pure astonishment. She blinked.

‘Of course he’ll be fine… ’ she backtracked, sullenly –

Mollified

‘We thought we were doing him a favour,’ the older man interjected — he had a strong Northern accent, ‘he must’ve just misconstrued it…’

‘Sure,’ she yanked the dog on again. But the dog –

Typical

— was uncooperative. He appeared to hold the older man in inexplicably high esteem. She glanced over at him, irritably, observing his hand in his pocket, detecting –

Huh?

— the subterranean crackle of a crisp packet.

‘We’re meant to be keeping an eye on him,’ the older man continued, taking her attention as a sign of encouragement, ‘this really is the last thing we wanted.’

She stopped in her tracks.

‘Pardon?’

The young guide shot the older man a warning look.

‘Let me get this straight,’ Josephine turned to face him properly, ‘you’re saying you’ve been hired to protect Doc?’

The older man looked to the younger for direction. The young guide merely shrugged.

‘Who by?’ she persisted.

He looked a little shifty.

‘More to the point,’ she continued, ‘who against? ’

‘Hippie. Seven o’clock,’ the older man murmured.

The young guide glanced around. ‘Head him off, quickly.’

The older man did as he was instructed, striding rapidly towards the Hippie, raising his hands dramatically and embroiling him in a noisy discussion about what’d just befallen the Old Man (his own questionable involvement duly eradicated from the narrative).