David Mitchell - The Book of Other People

He’d been in the kitchen marking the reflections with his blood. Then he’d paused for a few millilitres before he needed to swipe his whole arm back and forth in mid air, blood hitting the dark glass of the doors in punctuated curves, the drops legging down before they dried, being distorted by motion, direction, gravity. He’d pumped his fist, then tried to cup his hand, catch some of his flow, then cast it off again, drive it over his ghost face and the night-time garden outside, the dim layers of wind-rocked shrubs, the scatter of drizzle, thinner and less interesting than blood. He’d thrown over-arm, under-arm, tried to get a kick out of his wrist until the hurt in his hand felt anxious, abused. Then he’d rubbed his knuckles wetly across his forehead before cradling them with his other palm, while his physiology performed as could be predicted, increased heart rate jerking out his loss, building up his body of evidence. Read the blood here and you’d see perhaps a blade that rose and fell, or the clash of victim and attacker: blows and fear and outrage, shock.

He’d been in the kitchen and she had come in. Never even heard her unlock the front door, nor any of the usual small combinations of noise as she dropped her bag and shed her coat, made her way along the corridor and then stood. He’d only noticed her when she spoke.

‘Jesus Christ, Frank. What have you done. What the fuck are you doing.’

He’d turned to her and smiled, because he was glad to see her. ‘I’m sorry, the soup’s not ready. It’ll be…’ He’d glanced at the clock and calculated, so that she’d know how to plan her time – she might want a bath before they ate. ‘It’ll be about nine. Would you like a drink?’ He could feel a distraction, a moisture somewhere near his right eyebrow.

‘What the fuck are you doing.’

He’d smiled again, which meant that he might have seemed sad for the second or two before. ‘I know, but nine isn’t too late.’ He needed to apologise and uncover how she was feeling – that would help their evening go well. Time spent paying attention to people is never wasted. ‘Unless you’re really hungry. Are you really hungry?’ Her hair had been ruffled, was perhaps damp – a pounce of bad weather between her leaving the car and reaching their doorstep had disturbed it. Skin paler than normal but with strong colour at her cheeks, as if she was cold. Her suit was the chocolaty one with this metallic-blue blouse, a combination which always struck him as odd but very lovely. ‘You look tired.’ It was the fit of the suit. So snug. It lay just where your hands would want to. ‘Would you like a bath? There’ll be time. Once it’s ready, it doesn’t spoil.’ She’d kept her figure: was possibly even slimmer, brighter than when they’d first met. ‘I got some organic celeriac, which was lucky.’ He seemed slightly breathless for some reason and heavy in his arms.

‘What if I’d brought someone back with me. What if they’d seen… you.’

‘I didn’t…’ and this was when he’d remembered that his finger was really currently giving him grief, extremely painful. He’d felt confused. ‘I didn’t think you were bringing anyone.’

At which point she’d lifted up a small pot of thyme he kept growing near the sink and had thrown it towards his head and he’d bobbed down out of the way so it had broken against a wall behind him and then hit the tiles and broken again. Peat and brownish ceramic fragments were distributed more widely than you might think and the plant lay near his feet, roots showing from a knot of earth as if it were signalling distress. Thyme was quite hardy, though, he thought it would weather the upset and come through fine in the end.

‘It’s all right. I’ll get it.’ Frank wondering whether the pan and brush were in the storm porch or the cupboard underneath the stairs. ‘It’ll be fine.’ He couldn’t think where he’d seen them last.

‘It’s not all right. It won’t be fine.’ And she walked towards him, sometimes treading on his track, her shoes taking his bloodstains, repeating them, until she stopped where she was close enough to reach up with her right hand – she wasn’t right-handed – and brush his forehead, his left cheek, his lips. This meant his blood was on her fingers, Frank softly aware of this while she met his eyes, kept them in the way she used to when he’d just arrived back from a trip, a job – this was how she’d peered in at him then, seemed to be checking his mind, making sure he was still the man he’d been before.

After the look she’d slapped him. Fast. Both sides of his jaw. ‘It’s not all right.’ Leaving and going upstairs. He didn’t follow because he was distracted and he shook his head and tasted metal against his teeth and felt he might have to accept that he no longer was the man he’d been before.

Not that he’d been anybody special.

And this evening he was apparently even less: the sort of man who’d sit in a cinema but never be shown a film.

The projection box had quietened, the rattling stilled. There had been a few ill-defined thumps a while ago and then silence and the sensation of being watched. Frank was quite sure the projectionist had decided not to bother with the movie and was waiting for Frank to give up and go away.

But that wouldn’t happen. Frank was going to get what he wanted and had paid for. Overhead, deep mumbles of amplified sound were leaching through the ceiling, so the other feature had begun. Still, he suspected that no one was watching upstairs, either – he’d not heard a soul in the foyer.

Half an hour, though – if the comedy had started, that meant he’d been stuck here for half an hour.

He removed his hat and then settled it back on again.

Being left for half an hour was disrespectful, irritating. Any longer and he would be justified in growing angry and then making his displeasure felt.

He coughed. He kicked one foot up on to the back of the chair in front, followed it with the other, crossed his legs at the ankle. He burrowed his shoulders deeper into the back of the seat. This was intended to suggest that he was fixed, in no hurry, willing to give matters all the time they’d take. The next step would involve conflict, tempers, variables it was difficult and unpleasant to predict.

Only then a motor whirred and the lights dimmed further then evaporated and the screen ticked, jumped, presented a blurry certificate which adjusted to and fro before emerging in nice focus and showing him the title of his film, the entertainment he had picked. Silently, a logo swam out and displayed itself, was replaced by another and another. Silently, a landscape appeared and displayed itself, raw-looking heaps of brown leaves, blades of early mist between trees, quite attractive. Silently, the image altered, showed a man’s face: an actor who’d been famous and attractive some decades ago and who specialised these days in butlers, ageing criminals, grandfathers, uncles. Silently, he was looking at a small girl and silently, he moved his lips and failed to talk. He seemed to be trying to offer her advice, something important, life-saving, perhaps even that. But he had no sound.

The film had no sound. What Frank had thought was an artistic effect was, in fact, a mistake – perhaps a deliberate mistake.

He kept watching. Sometimes, when he’d been abroad, he’d gone to the cinema in foreign languages and managed to understand the rough flow of events. He’d been able to enjoy himself.

But this was an artistic piece, complicated. People seemed to be talking to each other a good deal and with a mainly unreadable calmness. As soon as the child disappeared, he was lost.

So he stood, let the chair’s seat bang vaguely as it flipped out of his way, and strode up the incline of the invisible floor towards the invisible wall and its hidden doorway.