Jon McGregor: Reservoir 13

Lynsey stopped working at the Gladstone, partly because Guy had said he wasn’t comfortable with her being up on show behind the bar all hours like that. She’d started a place at nursing college, in Derby. Guy had bought her a newer car so she could drive in each day without worrying about breaking down. It was a lot of driving but she enjoyed having the time to herself. The quarries and the lanes were thick with rosebay willowherb, the purple stemmy flowers curling over and the seed-flights wisping away. The first guests came to stay at Irene’s and she told Winnie the weekend had gone well. They weren’t all that talkative, she said. I don’t think they wanted to chat at all, which was a shame. They spent a lot of time in their room. But they were very complimentary when they left. Winnie asked if there were more bookings and Irene said that since Andrew had made the website for her the diary had been filling up quickly. He must have done a good job, she said. Andrew was in the supported-accommodation place in town, and apparently very content with it. He was doing a course at the college. Irene went to see him most weeks, and he sent her emails. He’d shown her how to do emails. Late in the month Ashleigh Wright left for university, and Susanna was alone in a three-bed house. It was sudden and there was nothing to be done. She made enquiries about exchanging for a smaller place, and even though nothing was available she still had to pay the bedroom tax. She spent a lot of time at the allotment, harvesting the beans and first squashes and preparing the ground for the following year. In the cold evenings Ruth sometimes walked down from the allotment with her for dinner, and when she’d had too much wine to drive she stayed over. In the conifer plantation above the Hunter place the young goldcrests were already feeding up for the winter, fattening.

In October the old Tucker place went up for sale, and was on the market for no more than a month. A removal van appeared and the house was cleared. Jones helped himself to what fruit there was. The sound of two-stroke engines came from the Hunters’ land, and the whining of chainsaws cutting into timber, and the branchy crash of another tree felled. From the beech wood the young foxes lit out for new territory and were killed on the roads in great number. At the river the keeper took out the crayfish traps. They seethed with claws and bodies crawling over each other. There was a rattle as he tipped them into a damp sack. The eating was a perk although his girls wouldn’t touch them. It was true there was a job in stripping out the flesh but the work was worthwhile, he thought. The swallows which had left a few days earlier were most of the way to South Africa by now, and would spend the winter on feeding grounds down there before finding their way back in the spring. Richard had been seen spending nights at Cathy’s house, but nobody had felt need to comment. The two of them were entitled, was the feeling. In the mornings Richard was out of bed first, moving quietly through the house, making coffee. Getting into bed again, drawn back for more. They wanted each other in a way he had forgotten was possible or perhaps had never really known. He felt restless unless he was fitting his body to hers. When they’d done this as teenagers, high on the far side of the hill overlooking Reservoir no. 12 and the motorway, the two of them had felt weightless, lifting each other into the air and whispering. Thirty years on they both had more substance but there was no less delight. Her body weighed down on his and he gave himself up completely and only now did he realise how often he’d held something back before. With the others, even when it had been serious, he’d always looked ahead to what would come after. He’d always assumed there would be a moving on. He’d convinced himself it wasn’t the case but it was clear now he’d been waiting for Cathy. Waiting for this. The two of them grown old and returning to each other, surprised by the things they could still do. The things they could do better than they’d ever been able to do back then. When she pulled him back against the bedroom windowsill and took him inside her, their fingers laced together and the sash window rattling in its frame, he could see in her eyes she was thinking these things as well. There was no need to say them out loud. This was the way he had thought they would be. Coming to their senses. While she slept he cooked dinner and they ate it and went back to bed. There would be questions about arrangements in the months ahead but for now those questions could wait. As they were falling asleep again that night she told him they should be careful. She whispered this into his ear. He thought he knew what she meant.

On top of the moor a wreath of poppies was laid beside the remains of the Lancaster bomber. There were few in the village now who could remember the years of the air-raids; the bombers nightly ploughing the sky and the glow of burning cities from beyond the horizon, and the smell. There was a mishap with the fireworks at the bonfire party, a couple of rockets tilting over in the soft ground after the fuses had been lit and shooting over the heads of the crowd. But no one was hurt, and it was agreed to go on with the display. In his studio Geoff Simmons loaded the glazed pots into the kiln for a second firing. It was raining and there was water running down one of the walls. He had buckets under most of the drips but the rugs were wet. There was a smell of mouldering paper and the pots were taking longer to dry. The whippet was gone and he didn’t know what to do with the hours the kiln was firing. He opened the door and let the air blow in and a curtain of rain swayed across the threshold. Nobody came up the lane. The river turned over beneath the packhorse bridge and moved on towards the weir. Nobody much mentioned the missing girl, but she was still thought about often. What could have happened. She could have been hurt by her parents in some terrible mistake, some push or stumble that wasn’t meant that way at all, and in a fury of panic they could have carried her somewhere they’d know she was at peace before running back down to the village for help. She could have been hurt by her parents in some deliberate way, pushed or tripped or struck repeatedly from behind, and fallen without getting up again, and they could have taken her up high on the hill and laid her to rest somewhere they knew she would never be found.

Richard and Cathy were in bed together when she told him she didn’t think they should carry on doing this. His first thought was whether she couldn’t have waited until they were dressed. He’d had enough of these conversations to recognise the pattern but it had never happened in bed. Lately it hadn’t even been while he was in the same country; and geography was usually the point being made. Cathy’s point was something more elusive. They were trying to re-create something from the past, she told him. It couldn’t work like that. They had both changed so much, and yet they still thought of each other as being eighteen years old, and they would come to resent each other for changing. She knew this, it seemed. She could see it would cause a problem. But is it a problem now, he asked. No, but it will be, I can see it, she said. I want to protect us both from that happening. I want to protect our friendship, she told him. He didn’t know how to disagree. When he dressed he was suddenly self-conscious and he carried his clothes in a bundle to the bathroom. He ran the taps. Downstairs he told her he wouldn’t stay for coffee. He told her again that of course he understood. He said hello to Mr Wilson, who was standing in his open doorway with Nelson, and walked to the top of the lane. There were carol singers going from door to door for the local hospice, carrying candle-lanterns on poles, their breath clouding in the yellowy light and their voices pressing through the low air. For a moment Richard was caught up amongst them, and obliged to join in. O little town of Bethlehem. How still we see thee lie.