Dispossession Read Online Free PDF Page A

there was a message in that, this
one’s yours, boy , then there was a terrifyingly subtle mind at work
here. A stud and a ring also for pierced ears and in gold again, heavy enough
for a bloke; but they’d fallen down there at least, because my ears weren’t
pierced.
    At least...
    No mirror within reach, but my fumbling fingers found a
little dimple in one lobe and then in the other, where they stuck out below the
bandaging. I wasn’t even surprised. I’d gone beyond that, somehow, so far that
only their failure in a matter of such crucial detail could possibly have
surprised me. Cue the theme for The Twilight Zone ,
and hear me hum along.
    o0o
    A practical man, a dependent man in a hell of a muddle, I
did what came naturally to me. There was a phone by the bed; I picked it up,
and called Carol.
    At work, where she should still be: I got a colleague and a
mutual friend, who sounded strangely hesitant when she realised who she was
speaking to. She said, “I’ll try,” not “I’ll get her”; and came back a minute
later to say, “I’m sorry, Jonty, she won’t speak to you.”
    I left it an hour, then tried again. Dialled our home number
this time, and heard Carol’s voice recite it, as she always did; said, “It’s
me,” and heard the sudden silence, and the click thereafter as she hung up on
me. Dialled again, dialled many times and got nothing but the engaged signal
each time.
    I should phone a friend instead, I thought, see what they
could tell me; but the timing was bad. People would be getting in from work,
maybe dealing with fractious babies or starting to cook dinner, certainly
wanting to relax. Leave it till later, I told myself, make it easier on them. I
needed someone I could talk to, not someone who had one eye on a crawling kid
and the other on burning toast.
    A couple of hours, I thought I’d give them; but after a
couple of hours The Twilight Zone was in my
head again and playing so loud I could barely hear anything else, except for
Sue’s voice calling me husband, lover, friend.
    She had come back, contrary to hope or expectation; and when
she came, she brought photographs with her.
    And yes, that was me in the middle there: despite the unfamiliar
suit (Issey Miyake, she told me) and the glint of an earring, that was
unquestionably me. And yes, that was Nick Beatty beside me, known of course as
Warren, my oldest and closest friend doing a friend’s duty here and holding me
up with a hug; and yes—alas!—that was undeniably Sue beside me, her arm slipped
laughingly, possessively through mine. And these to this side were my friends
and family, whom I knew and could name, every one; and those to that side were
hers, whom I didn’t and couldn’t. And the background might look like a
warehouse but it wasn’t, she said, it was her parents’ church, Catholic
Chinese; and apart from that, she said, everything was exactly what it seemed.
    That was the two of us, she said, getting married; and here
was another picture of the two of us setting off on our honeymoon—Hong Kong,
she said, and it rained all week, so no tan; but at home she had photos of that
also, which she’d bring next time to show me—and that was James the Second I
was driving, the sports car I’d totalled on an empty road in the Lakes just six
weeks later.
    My car, she said, not hers.
    Then she kissed me, and she tasted of smoke and tea and
spices, alien to me.
    o0o
    And then, maybe seeing that this was too much, that I really
couldn’t cope any longer, she changed the subject.
    “I saw your friend Luke on the telly last night,” she said.
“Luke the angel. Falling,” with a giggle that was more nerves than amusement.
“I’m sorry, I never believed you before, not about him. Not till I saw...”
    And if I’d never believed her before, I believed her then.
Suddenly I believed it all, though none of it made sense yet. Luke was not
exactly private, not a secret, but still he was special to me; not for sharing
unless with