Midnight All Day Read Online Free PDF Page B

the same for me.’
    ‘What was Rob doing this afternoon?’ Florence says. ‘Don’t leave me out of the game.’
    ‘Ha, ha, ha! You’re a dopey little thing who never notices anything!’
    ‘Don’t talk to her like that,’ I say. ‘Talk to me like that, if you want, and see what you get!’
    ‘Rob,’ says Florence, soothingly.
    Archie slaps Florence on the behind. ‘Dance, you old corpse!’
    I stare at his back. He is too drunk to care that he’s being provoked into a fight.
    I feel like an intruder and am reminded of the sense I had as a child, when visiting friends’ houses, that the furniture, banter and manner of doing things were different from the way we did them at home. The world of Archie and Florence is not mine.
    I am waiting for Martha on the bed when I hear Florence and Archie in the corridor opening the door to their room. The door closes; I listen intently, wondering if Archie has passed out and Florence is lying there awake.
    The door opens and Martha rattles a bag of beer bottles. We open the windows, lie down on the bed and drink and smoke.
    She leans over me. ‘Do you want one of these?’
    I kiss her fist and open it. ‘I know what it is,’ I say. ‘But I’ve never had one.’
    ‘I hadn’t till I came down here,’ she says. ‘These are good Es.’
    ‘Fetch some water from the bathroom.’
    Meanwhile I remove the chair from its position beside the wall and begin shoving the heavy bed.
    ‘Let’s have this … over there … against the wall,’ I say when she returns.
    Martha starts to help me, an enthusiastic girl, with thick arms.
    ‘Why do you want this?’ she asks.
    ‘I think it will be better for our purposes.’
    ‘Right,’ she says. ‘Right.’
    A few minutes after we lie down again, undressed this time, there is a knock on the door. We hold one another like scared children, listen and say nothing. There is another knock. Martha doesn’t want to lose her job tonight. Then there is no more knocking. We do not even hear footsteps.
    When we are breathing again, under the sheets I whisper, ‘What do you think of the couple next door? Have you talked about them? Are they suited, do you think?’
    ‘I like him,’ she says.
    ‘What? Really?’
    ‘Makes me laugh. She’s beautiful … but dangerous. Would you like to fuck her?’
    I laugh. ‘I haven’t thought about it.’
    ‘Listen,’ she says, putting her finger to her lips.
    Neither of us moves.
    ‘They’re doing it. Next door.’
    ‘Yes,’ I say. ‘They are.’
    ‘They’re quiet,’ she says. ‘I can only hear him.’
    ‘He’s doing it alone.’
    ‘No. There … there she is. A little gasp. Can you hear her now? Touch me.’
    ‘Wait.’
    ‘There … there.’
    ‘Martha –’
    ‘Please…’
    I go into the bathroom and wash my face. The drug isstarting to work. It seems like speed, which I had taken with my friends in the suburbs. This drug, though, opens another window: it makes me feel more lonely. I return to the room and switch the radio on. It must have been loud. We must have been loud. Martha is ungrudging in her love-making. Later, there is a storm. A supernatural breeze, fresh, strangely still and cool, fans us.
    Martha goes downstairs early to make breakfast. At dawn I run along the stony beach until I am exhausted; then I stop, walk a little, and run again, all the while aware of the breaking brightness of the world. I shower, pack and go down for breakfast.
    Florence and Archie are at the next table. Archie studies a map; Florence keeps her head down. She does not appear to have combed her hair. When Archie gets up to fetch something and she looks up, her face is like a mask, as if she has vacated her body.
    After breakfast, collecting my things, I notice the door to their room has been wedged open by a chair. The maid is working in a room further along the hall. I look in at the unmade bed, go into my room, find Florence’s sweater and gloves in my bag, and take them into their room.