Joseph O'Neill - The Breezes

But, I thought to myself as I drove back to Pa’s, you couldn’t blame her for running away. She had been rampantly on heat, after all, and when the burglars had broken in she had quite naturally grabbed the opportunity to break out. Trusty had responded to a call of the wild which was not of her making.

Good luck to her. Let her have her shot at true freedom, at finding an alternative to the human regimen. Even dogs must long for escape, for some alternative.

The problem was, there was no alternative to living at home with Pa. Rockport was not a hospitable wilderness in which she might thrive, with grassland where a pack of fellow hunters could be found and joined; there was only the city and its streets, and that was no environment for a dog, certainly not one as domesticated as Trusty. Trusty’s normal routine was a bowl of cornflakes and a slice of strawberry jam toast in the morning, followed by a quick turn around the block with Pa before he set off for the office, followed by a day spent snoozing around the house, followed by another, longer, walk and some lamb chops or spaghetti carbonara or whatever else Pa was cooking up in the evening, and then maybe a late-night stroll in the moonlight. Trusty was not accustomed to rifling through rubbish pails at dawn or drinking from puddles. I pictured her stumpily wandering around Rockport, frightened and disoriented. All it would take would be one speeding car and, bang, that would be it, curtains. No one had ever said that dogs enjoyed an afterlife.

But what more could I do? Offer a reward? Put up HAVE YOU SEEN THIS DOG? posters? It was bad enough having pictures of my father plastered all over the place.

I opened the front door of the house, dropped the car keys on the entranceway table and walked through. There was no sign of my father. Don’t tell me he was still in bed.

Up I went. Yes, there he was, just as I had left him two hours ago, curled beneath his duvet as disconsolately as one of those abandoned greyhounds. The cup of tea I had placed next to his bed had not been touched.

I did not try to stir him. I simply said, ‘Trusty’s not at the kennels. If any basset hound turns up, they’ll let us know.’ He did not respond. I stood there for a moment. ‘Here,’ I said, putting that morning’s issue of the Crier next to his bed. ‘When you get up, you may want to take a look at page three. You’ll be in for a nice surprise.’

He rolled over on to his other shoulder, turning his back to me.

I took a seat on a chair cushioned with dirty clothes and began to smoke a cigarette. I became more insistent. ‘Look,’ I said, ‘you can’t just lie here all day. It’s twelve-thirty. Please, Pa, get up. Please.’ More silence. I gave up. I had to go. I was meeting Angela at one. ‘I’ll be back tonight,’ I said. ‘OK?’

I went to the bathroom, rinsed my mouth with toothpaste and checked myself in the mirror: clean-shaven, wearing the black crew-neck which she had bought me as a birthday present, and jeans. Not too bad — but then not too great either, with the slightly overlong nose and colourless skin of the Breezes.

I caught the bus to the city centre.

It took me a couple of attempts to find the discreet entry to Angela’s gym, which was hidden in the basement of an office block occupied by an insurance company. I went down the stairs and stood uncertainly in the lobby, a light-filled, cream-carpeted space where tropical trees sprang vigorously from barrels of earth and green murals depicted shoals of fish. Symbols on the wall pointed towards a restaurant/bar, a swimming pool, a sauna and rooms for aerobics, weights and changing clothes. I approached the receptionist, a young woman dressed like a banker, and stated the purpose of my visit. She responded by producing a bright yellow visitor’s badge and pinning it to my chest. ‘I suggest that you wait in the bar,’ she said, turning towards another arrival.

I followed the signs, going past glass-walled exercise rooms where perspiring professionals ran, rowed and cycled while they gazed at televisions hanging from the ceiling. I had just caught sight of the restaurant entrance when to my left I noticed a young woman with red boxing gloves attacking the pads held up by a fitness instructor. It was Angela, her long neck glistening beneath the dark rope of her hair.

She was wearing dark blue Adidas cycling shorts and a white T-shirt which adhered to her damp compacted breasts, the nipples plainly visible. The instructor, his body a pure aggregate of muscle, loomed enormously over her. Give me three, I could hear him say, now give me three more, and she reacted automatically to his commands, hitting the pads with a grimace of determination. Jab, jab, jab, the instructor shouted, and again she obeyed, her slender arms shuddering as they uncoiled towards him.

On she went, oblivious of my presence on the other side of the glass, now launching a combination of uppercuts, now holding up her hands and simply moving her feet. Keep moving, shouted the trainer, keep that head down. Angela threw more punches, a series of hooks this time, and then more still. She began to grunt with the effort, grunting every time she threw a punch: uh, thud, uh, thud, uh, thud.

I felt myself physically weakening. I had no idea that she boxed.

OK, that’s three minutes, the instructor said, unlacing her gloves. Let’s warm down.

He pulled out a mat and they lay down on their backs alongside each other, their legs slowly flexing in unison. Then he got up, and while Angela stayed on her back and continued with leg exercises, he began firmly massaging her temples and her scalp, her head disappearing into his huge hands.

I couldn’t watch any longer. I went to the bar and bought myself a bottle of beer.

She came in five minutes later fully dressed, washed hair pulled tightly back from her face, cheeks flushed. She looked beautiful and strange. ‘Darling,’ she said, and she kissed me, and I smelled the smell she has.

We sat down at a table next to the windows that gave on to an interior courtyard with a pool and ferns. ‘I’m starving,’ Angela said. ‘Let’s order straight away.’

I looked at the menu: expensive. A tenner for a grilled chicken sandwich. And that was the cheapest item.

Angela said, ‘Don’t worry, have what you want. This is on me.’

‘Why? Have you had another pay rise?’ I asked ironically.

She looked coyly at her menu.

I said, ‘You haven’t really, have you?’

‘Well, yes, I have,’ she admitted, smiling shyly.

‘Well? What are you on?’

‘Johnny, that’s embarrassing.’

‘Embarrassing? This is me you’re talking to, remember.’ I waited for a reply. ‘So?’

She hesitated, then looked at me. Her eyes were still that deep, dark blue. ‘Sixty,’ she said.

Sixty thousand.

That was almost twice what Pa made — had made. That was almost ten times what I could hope to scratch together in a year.

I kept cool. ‘They’ve doubled your salary,’ I said. ‘Nice one.’ I reached for my cigarettes.

‘You can’t smoke here, Johnny. It’s a health club. I’m sorry, I should have told you.’

‘That’s all right,’ I said. I glanced around the room. I was the only man who didn’t have freshly combed wet hair and who wasn’t wearing a suit.

The food arrived. I ordered another bottle of beer.

We started eating. ‘It’s been a while since we’ve done this,’ I said. ‘I hardly know what to say.’

‘I know, Johnny, I’m sorry.’ Angela said, ‘I’ve missed you, you know. You’re looking very handsome.’

I said, ‘I was so worried on Sunday night, I was so worried that something had happened.’ I touched her leg with mine. ‘Things haven’t been easy,’ I said. ‘We’ve had some bad news. Pa’s been fired.’