Renée Knight - Disclaimer

She remembers her discomfort. She wasn’t used to being out on her own anymore. She wasn’t used to being looked at like that. She didn’t know how to be. And she didn’t know that the photograph he’d just taken would find its way into her home years later and be thrown in her face by her husband. A triangle of lace and darkness, of hair and skin and shadows. She didn’t know that then, but she does remember the feeling his attention gave her. It made her nervous, but it excited her too, she has to admit that. She felt excited. And what she forces herself to remember too is that as she sat on the terrace, with a glass of wine and an anchovy on a stick, she thought of being in bed alone later and touching herself and that it would be that boy she would fantasise about. She punishes herself with that memory and how her thoughts of having sex with a stranger were interrupted by a phone call. It was her husband, the waiter said. He was on the phone in reception. She picked up her things, left her wine unfinished, and followed the waiter back into the hotel.

When she was on the phone to Robert, she saw him walk through the entrance of the hotel and her heart flipped in anxiety, not excitement. He walked through reception, right past her. She remembers wondering whether they would stop him, but they didn’t. He had an expensive camera round his neck. And he had a nice face. She turned away, concentrating on Robert, telling him she missed him. He told her he loved her, which he did then. She loved him too. Does she love him now? She won’t think about that, not yet, she can’t. That’s not the point of this remembering. She remembers blowing a kiss into the receiver before putting it down. When she turned around she saw him sitting on a stool at the bar, looking directly at her, two drinks in front of him. His bag was on the next-door stool, and still looking at her, he removed it and put it on the floor. And then he smiled. Finally. Right at her.

“When did you get home?”

Catherine opens her eyes and looks at her mother.

“A little while ago.”

“Did they let you out early then?” Her mother smiles and Catherine wonders for a moment whether she thinks she’s been let out early from school, but that can’t be. She’s not that far gone yet.

“I finished what I needed to do.”

“Have you got another of your headaches, love?” Tears spring to Catherine’s eyes. Her mother knows and doesn’t know but it doesn’t matter because she knows what Catherine needs. She needs to be cared for without being interrogated. She needs someone to trust that she isn’t a terrible human being without having to tell them — without having to explain anything.

Nick had spent most of the afternoon up in his bedroom, smoking dope; half day he was going to say if his dad came home early, but he didn’t. It’s ten PM and he’s back up there, door shut, windows wide open. He rolls another spliff, lights up, and leans out of the window. The spare room is directly above the kitchen, and when he looks down he can see his dad through the glass roof of the extension. He’s clearing up after supper and Nick knows he should be helping him, but his dad didn’t stop him when he left the room. He leans back in case his dad looks up and sees him. Surely he can smell the smoke drifting down though, but Nick doubts he’d say anything about that either. He won’t want to risk driving Nick away. It is not easy living with a parent, but at least he’s saving money. It was all he could do to stop himself screaming during supper when his dad kept asking him about work. Thank fuck for football, which got them through the rest of the meal.

He flops down on the bed, catching his reflection in the mirror on his way. He looks like death, all colour in his face washed out. He lays his laptop open on his chest and imagines the unearthly colour his skin is now with the light from the screen reflecting on it. A stoned sarcophagus of an unknown young man, arms holding his book of life. He announces his return to the world and is greeted with a torrent of hellos and welcome backs. Virtual strangers, virtual friends. He gets to them all in turn, pressing the flesh, gently wafting through their outstretched hands, desperate to touch him, eager for his attention. He graces them with his presence, glad to be back in the world of the living.

He hears his dad call goodnight and Nick echoes the word back, but he might as well have barked like a dog, the sound is meaningless. He is in midconversation and won’t be interrupted, his fingers chatting away, telling anyone who’s out there what he thinks, what he’s up to. And some of them try and tempt him out. Not far, just round the corner — a boarded-up heaven where they gather to hang out. A shithole of a place, but it’s fine once you shut your eyes and after a while you don’t notice the smell. Not something you’d want to make a habit of and he hasn’t. He’s only been a couple of times, creeping out of the house when his dad was asleep and making sure he was back in time for breakfast, beating his dad to the table already dressed for work, and even though he was too tired to speak, his dad understood. Nick’s never been good in the mornings.

Not tonight though, tonight he is content to stay at home. He has a message he has saved ’til last — a private message meant only for him, from a new friend. And for once the word has a ring of truth. He gives him his full attention — one to one, just the two of them. He’s only a kid and he looks up to Nick, hangs on his every word. How you doing? Nick asks and the friend can’t wait to tell him everything he’s been up to since their last chat.

They have a lot in common. More than you’d think given the age difference. Even a fucking book. He’s read the only book Nick’s picked up in years. Nick confessed he’d skipped to the end — hadn’t read the whole thing but, you know what? He has now. Fingered through the recommended chapters, the sexy stuff. Bit tame love: try some of this, and Nick’d sent him something hot — better than he’d read in a fucking book. Nick’s older, seen more of the world. Follow my lead — don’t go to university, fuck Bristol or Manchester — stay in Spain — the sun’s shining in Spain. He’s hungry for Nick’s advice and Nick has dished out plenty of it. Life’s too short to waste, he says. Like he can talk, but he does. Can’t stop himself — comes up with all sorts of things he’d never say out loud, never say to anyone else — and Jonathan listens to every word that drips off Nick’s fingers and asks for more, wants to know about the girls Nick’s fucked and his business plans and the year he spent travelling round the States. Jonathan laps it all up and listens and learns.

I know all about what’s going on at home: she’s moved out and he’s on his own with dad, who’s not himself, poor man. My little delivery of books to her office seems to have unsettled things too. She is off sick, they told me when I phoned. They had no idea when she would be back. Hope it’s nothing serious, I said before I hung up.

My heart has become as hard as my toenails. There was a time when I might have felt something for that boy. Once I might have tried to help him. It’s touching how he’s opened up to me. My teaching days taught me to spot them a mile off: the boys with the black hole at their centre. They tried swaggering nonchalance to cover it up, pretending they didn’t care about anything, least of all the consequences of giving up on themselves. But I’m talking about adolescents. He’s not a boy, he’s twenty-five years old and however much he “bigs” himself up to my nineteen-year-old self with his dismal little fantasies of travelling round America and whatnot, he can’t hide his shivering, shrinking soul from a man with my experience.