Rise (13 page)

Hannah was at the hospital last night, is there again this morning, as if her presence alone will force him better. Such urgent mother-love. Is that normal? She reckons they’re all a bit fucked-up in this house. Man, she’s glad it’s only a stopgap. What is it – three days now? This is a wee ledge; she’s been climbing a mountain and now she’s clinging to a ledge. Only till she gets her breath back. She’ll count her money then too. At the moment, it lies in a baleful pile, stuffed in the back of her wardrobe. She swallows, rubs her neck. Ever since she did her mental, suicidal, do-or-die runner, there has been a falling dread which hides behind her, can be distracted with the muffle of this lovely place, but which bowfs out when she’s not looking. Justine is so tired. But she’ll feel better in a week; Christ, look at that pile she’s hefted: already her limbs are stronger. She shoves a clump of hair from her eyes. Begins to stack the sheets in colour order, because the armoire has a kind of wire-netted front, and you can see the towels and linen on the shelves. If this was her house, she’d ditch the wardrobe, get a big power shower in instead. Maybe a corner bath in place of the stupid roll-top – which is not all it’s cracked up to be. Massive big thing, which you can only half-fill with half-hot water, then you canny even relax because your back all freezes on the chilly enamel. Not comfy, regardless of how many of Hannah’s bath salts you pour in.

She shifts the lilac sheets, so they sit between the aqua and the cream. Pretty. There is a jarring royal-blue set, which she hides at the back. These will be Euan’s sheets; his room is white and blue, there is a Rangers scarf above his bed, posters of rap stars, heaps of smelly clothes she has been trying to sort. His room smells of boy. Probably pictures of girls beneath his bed, if she chose to pry there. She pats the bright-blue fabric so it’s tucked under lilac. Every day, she asks how Euan’s doing: one, because she wants to know and two, because, as soon as he comes home, he’ll recognise her. There’ll be a big stushie, the polis will be called and then . . . And then. Justine the scabby hoor will be infamous. A bad girl with her name in the papers, right next to the ads for fertiliser. Then he will track her down. A chill rinses her. Already, Charlie Boy will be doing that. He will be sniffing air with his teeth exposed. Those blank eyes, shuttering. Beaten-leather jacket on. Laced-up boots and laced-up mouth. Fisted hands, lackey in tow. People to see. To hit. He’ll know for definite by now that the money is gone. Can Askit track folk? He can certainly bite them. Justine doesn’t flatter herself. It will be the theft that kills her, ultimately, not twisted ‘love’.

She moves to the master bedroom. Purple velvet curtains, grey-mauve walls. First time she’s done more than peek in here. It’s like being inside a bruise. Checks out the bedside tables. On Michael’s side – she susses this is Michael’s side because there is a Bible and she honestly doesn’t see Hannah reading a Bible, not even for practising being nice – so yes, there is a Bible, some medical book called
Germinal
, two pens, a box of hankies, some Rennies, two packs of Panadol and a nasal spray. She can see him scooshing and fussing and sniffing up all those potions before bed. Yup. Definitely Michael’s side. But there is also a smell, coming up off the pillow, that is . . . she lowers her head, so her cheek lies where Michael’s might. It smells of breath and moistness. And something acrid.

The other table has cherry lip salve, and fancy handcream in a dark-blue jar. Couple of notepads, a ton of books. She turns the top one to see the title.
The
Testament of Gideon Mack
. Sounds religious. Maybe Hannah is a believer after all; how could you live with someone and not share their life’s work? A bright image of Charlie Boy’s bloodied fist appears and she immediately reconsiders. Beside the books is a black silk eye mask (or kinky sex aid? Nah. She doesny think so. In Justine’s professional opinion, a big tin of antifreeze is what’s needed here). Perfume, which she squirts idly as she browses. Gorgeous. Same lemony smell Hannah wore in the café. More books on the floor, beside pale-mauve slippers. In her stocking soles (which are really socks, always socks, so why do folk say ‘stocking soles’? But it’s how she likes to operate. Slippers are for fannies. Bare feet are for idiots who don’t care what they step in), Justine tries them on.
You shall go to the ball
. Nae chance. Even without her woolly socks, there’s no way Justine is getting her size sixes into these.

Downstairs, the door bangs. She jumps from the bed, pat-patting the duvet, still a bum-shaped dip, plumps at it and kicks the slippers straight and shuffles the ironed T-shirts over the tell-tale unevenness.

‘Hello?’ Hannah calls.

‘Up here,’ shouts Justine. ‘I’m just putting the ironing away.’

In the silvery mirror, her cheeks glow. She picks up a sweatshirt of Ross’s that got tangled in the pile, hurries out as Hannah reaches the top of the stairs. She seems distracted.

‘Hiya. How’s it going?’

‘Yeah. Fine.’ A tight smile.

‘Done the laundry. Just about to hoover downstairs.’

‘Great. Good.’ Hannah makes an exaggerated little sniff. ‘You smell nice.’ The smile is thinner.

‘How’s Euan?’

‘Oh . . . the same. Quiet.’

‘Did he sleep?’

‘Not really? Pain’s worse today.’

A quick slip of guilt. ‘Wee soul.’ Above Justine’s head is a skylight of coloured glass. The centre is a yellow sun, then a rectangle of frosted white glass, etched with little stars. At certain times of day, she’s seen the shadow of the stars, dancing on the stairs. The frosted glass is edged in thin rectangles of blue glass, with red squares where the blue lines intersect. Ross’s sweatshirt is folded over her arm. If she shifts her elbow up, the grey marl takes on a yellow cast.

‘Get some good writing done?’ she says. ‘At the hospital?’

Hannah scrutinises her. Justine smiles at the notebook in her hands.

‘Yeah. A bit. Well . . . not really. My main character’s in the middle of a dilemma. She’s this Bronze Age girl: Maraq, who’s pregnant—’

Justine tunes out. Some chis about cavemen. Bound to be a bestseller. The coloured light jiggles on her arm.

‘. . . it’s a bit of a trauchle, to be honest.’

‘Then why are you doing it?’

‘Sorry?’

‘If you’re no enjoying it, and you’re finding it hard, why are you writing it?’

Hannah frowns at her. ‘Because I’m being paid to. I mean . . . all work is hard, isn’t it. If it’s good?’

‘I guess.’ She has an urge to stick out her tongue, to catch the star-shadow and swallow it. Work that is dire and vile and squelchy; how would shimmery Hannah quantify that?

‘. . . need inspiration. Like filling up your creative well . . .’

Oh, shut up, doll. This house was nice and peaceful without you
.

‘. . . and we’ve got the archaeologists arriving today. So that’s all good. No word, I take it?’

‘What?’

Would a star taste of silver or gold? Or ice? ‘From archaeologists? No.’

‘No. From the police. Anyone.’

‘No.’ Justine moves past her. ‘’Scuse me.’

‘Did the people from the John Muir Trust call?’

‘The what?’

‘About the windfarm. You have noticed that giant balloon floating above the village? Massive turbines that high, all round Kilmacarra?’

‘Oh yeah. Mhairi mentioned it.’

‘But they haven’t phoned?’

‘No one’s phoned.’

‘Right. See if they do, just take a message.’ Hannah’s long nails tap against the door jamb. ‘Don’t let on to Michael, right? Oh, and don’t forget the duvet covers. Did you do them?’

‘Not yet.’ She lays the sweatshirt on Ross’s bed. Moves to the door. ‘Sorry, Hannah. Can I get . . .’

‘And the police definitely haven’t phoned either?’

‘Nope.’

She heads back downstairs. Click-clack, click-clack. Hannah following. What was the point in her coming up? The woman is hovering. Not passing, not quite in the road. Justine is not sure if she’s supposed to speak, or bustle silently in the background. Up till now, they’ve not really been alone together. Ross was their wee buffer, but nursery started back yesterday. Bizarrely, the Easter holidays have already been. Before Easter. Justine gropes for conversation, safe phrases that will ingratiate her – but not involve much input.

‘Your house is really nice, Hannah.’

‘Thanks.’

‘It’s a funny place but, isn’t it?’

‘Pardon?’

‘Kilmacarra, I mean.’

‘I’m not following you?’

Aye you bloody are
.

‘All those stones and that. Having them right outside your door; it’s a bit creepy, no?’

‘No.’

‘Mm.’ She tries again. ‘Did folk live there, then? Was that their houses?’

She hears a
pfuh
or a sneer; there is unpleasantness, certainly, in the noise Hannah makes. Then: ‘
No
.’

The colours from the skylight skip across Justine’s toes. They’ve arrived at the foot of the stairs. Her hand rests on the wooden acorn at the banister’s end. Banister’s End. There was a book in Hannah’s bedroom called Something’s End.

‘No,’ Hannah says again. ‘They’re more like monuments.’ She puts her notebook on the hallstand. ‘Folk didn’t live here. They’d move about, I think, but come back here at special times.’

‘Like church at Christmas?’

‘They didn’t have Christmas then.’

‘I know that. I mean, coming home. Going to places you always went to, because your family did.’

‘Yeah.’ Hannah considers this, her pretty mouth turning. ‘That’s quite a good way of putting it. The glen’s definitely been a gathering place at one time. Lots of different people have passed through here.’

‘Yeah. Mhairi told me all that too. Crannogs and kings. You should write a leaflet.’

‘What?’

‘Well, I was just thinking.’ An idea is growing itself, and is emerging, and is fully formed. When she prods it, Justine revels in her complicated brain, how it rises to the occasion and frequently reminds her: she is not thick. ‘The archaeologists and that – what you were just saying. When you were going on about the windfarm—’

‘I’m not “going on” about anything—’

‘Yeah, but if you wrote it all up for a wee booklet, you know, stuff about the stones, walks round the glen, all that kind of history stuff, you could maybe sell it.’

Hannah flicks her golden hair. ‘I write books, Justine. Not booklets.’

The wood under her fingers feels hard, but when you press down with the ragged edges of your nails, there is a soft, pleasing give to it. Justine is making the petal-shapes of her ideas with her nails. And not imagining it is Hannah’s face.

‘So,’ she changes tack, ‘why don’t you like this windfarm, then?’

‘What? It’s not just me – loads of us are against it.’

‘But why?’

‘Because . . . well, they’re ugly. And inefficient. They industrialise the countryside . . .’

‘But Michael’s for it?’

‘Michael’s for toeing the party line.’

‘Even though the folk that live here don’t want it?’

‘Some do.’

‘Like Michael?’

Hannah makes that same curt noise. ‘Michael will do whatever he can to make the best of all possible worlds. He is “open and receptive to all points of view” – it says so on his campaign leaflet. I think it’s a Church of Scotland thing: you must never give a definitive opinion on anything.’

‘Except God.’

Hannah stares, as if she’s just noticed her for the first time. Her mouth gives a sad, wry ripple. ‘Indeed.’

‘So how come he’s not a minister any more?’

‘Sorry.’ Hannah wipes her finger over the dado rail in the hall. ‘Sorry, Justine, but this is really filthy. Did you not think to dust here?’

See those long nails? You could just rip them out her fingers. Poke her in the eyes with her own painted nails.

‘Well, there’s been quite a lot
to
dust. I will get round to it, don’t worry.’

She can hear her heartbeat in her ears. It’s so quiet when Hannah stops yakking. She can hear Hannah’s breathing too. Their eyes lock, point-to-point, until Justine breaks the awkward post-stairs stance. She will finish off in the lounge, be busy and useful. Will she fuck as like dust the
day
-do.

‘Just going to make a quick coffee,’ says Hannah at her back. ‘You want one?’

‘Eh . . . sure.’

Yet again, the woman wrongfoots her. And follows her. They both end up in the lounge, where Justine has the Hoover plugged in already. Proof, thank God, of her intentions.

‘Oh great. You got the fire to light.’

‘Aye. It was a bit of a struggle. I think the kindling’s damp.’

‘Mm. We don’t usually light it till the evening.’

‘Oh. Sorry.’

‘No, it’s fine. No worries.’ Hannah runs her finger along the mantelpiece.

‘I’ve still to dust there too.’