Significance (32 page)

Walk away, in silence.

Leaving the scene as a snapshot of perfection.

He goes to sleep with this image on his mind. Wakes at six
-
thirty. Cannot remember his dreams, nor very clearly his train of thought last night, but is nonetheless decided. He is going to dress, then go to Lucy's flat first thing to confront her. To confront the demons of his imagination.

Out into the crisp, still
-
dewy morning, London filtered through a fog of early morning mist. A slight chill in the air. Footsteps echoing sharply as he moves down the flagged path to his car. His body brushes the honeysuckle vine that oozes from his neighbour's garden. The scent briefly entering his consciousness, a vague memory of something familiar; hotter, stronger, more pungent at night.

To the car. He unlocks the door. He could be going to work. It could be an ordinary day. The time on the dashboard is seven. Some idiot has pulled up tight behind him making the job of escaping his parking space next to impossible, but he works the gears, the brakes, shunting forward and twisting the wheel, then shunting back until, by degrees, he is free.

The time on the dashboard is now six minutes past seven.

After that, he's in full punching mode again, ready for a fight. Not that he has been in a fight since he was sixteen or seventeen, and that was only a semi
-
serious scuffle with his brother. The traffic gets worse near Shepherd's Bush, but it's not far from there to Lucy's flat on Hammersmith Grove. He parks a few doors down from the entrance, fits the lock on the steering wheel, gets out of the car and surveys the street. The mist has lifted now and the air seems heavier. It's going to be a hot one.

A youngish couple are walking towards Lucy's apartment block. The woman is wearing red shoes and a navy linen dress, her hair is sleek and black, the man she is with is sharply dressed in a dark suit that reminds Thom of those smooth Italian looks from the films of the nineteen
-
sixties;
Blow Up
or some Fellini extravaganza. The couple look unreal, too smart, too young, too rich, too confident, too stylish.

Just before they reach the entrance to Lucy's block, another man, also dressed in a dark suit (though his is more conventional) gets out of a parked car, carrying a leather document case. He calls to them and they stop walking, then stand holding hands as they listen to whatever it is he has to say. Then, when Thom is just a few yards away, all three mount the steps leading to Lucy's building. Thom, sensing an opportunity, speeds up his pace so that when the main entrance door is open, he is able to confidently slip into the building behind them. Predictably Thom caught in their wake the scent of expensive cologne and also the faintest aroma of new shoe leather.

The three proceed up the stairs with Thom following close behind. One, two flights. Then they turn into the hallway where there are doors to four flats, two near the stairway, two further off down a corridor without natural light, but where low energy bulbs burn day and night in frosted mint
-
green wall sconces.

The three strangers ahead of him pass two doors and head towards the last two. Thom finds himself imagining some weird sexual tryst going on between the three of them. The smartly dressed man and woman are high
-
class prostitutes or escorts; they are making porn films. Renting the flat next to Lucy's to shoot movies. He wants to discuss this with Lucy, to question her about strange goings on, peculiar noises from the flat next door.

He is confident the threesome will disappear into the flat next to Lucy's and hopes to catch some telling glimpse into that flat's interior; a ruby
-
red velveteen couch, a large gilt mirror, studio lights and a video camera on a tripod.

But they go to the right
-
hand door – Lucy's door. They are mistaken and will soon discover their mistake.

As Thom closes in on them, the man with the document case uses a key from a large bunch to unlock the door. To Thom's surprise the door opens.

‘Hey,' Thom calls. ‘Hold on.'

They seem oblivious to him and troop into Lucy's flat, talking loudly and confidently amongst themselves, not even noticing when Thom follows them in through the front door.

The flat is full of Lucy's things; straight ahead at the end of the hall, framed in blonde wood, is her ‘Sensation' poster from the Royal Academy exhibition. The image on it, a slippery pink labia
-
like tongue descending from the top edge of the picture to meet and mirror the hard cold tip of a domestic iron, had always disturbed Thom, though he did not quite know why. To his right between the Ikea side table and the door he was shocked to see piles of mail – slip
-
sliding mountains of it, letters and documents from the college, numerous magazines and journals which Lucy subscribed to, invitations to gallery openings and conferences, bank statements, junk mail.

Scarves and hats are hanging on a set of antlers Lucy had bought in a car boot sale in Arbroath, and on the table there's a silver
-
rimmed, turquoise Moroccan bowl filled with black and grey and white pebbles, and beside it a wooden hairbrush from the Body Shop with pale hair tangled in its plastic spikes. Lucy's hairbrush, but not her rich brown hair. Not that this registered with Thom at the time.

And beyond the hall lay Lucy's living room; her furniture and curtains and rugs and three strangers who look like characters in a film. But no sign of Lucy herself.

The man in the cheap suit is talking.

‘The living room is a good size,' he says, ‘and benefits from a view onto the Green. Double glazing throughout and the service charge is reasonable for a property of this quality and location…'

‘Hey!' Thom says, cutting off the man's well
-
rehearsed patter. All three turn to look at him with mild surprise.

‘What do you think you are doing? This is my…' Thom had been about to say ‘my girlfriend's flat' then changed his mind and said, ‘…my flat.'

‘Pardon?' the man with the briefcase says.

‘I said, what do you think you're doing?'

The perfect couple gaze at Thom wide
-
eyed. He is nothing to them, an irrelevance, about as interesting to them as a tramp or
Big Issue
seller.

The letting agent, looking mildly confused, pulls a document from his case, and squinting, reads it.

‘Lucy Swann?' he says, without a hint of sarcasm.

‘My partner,' Thom replies. ‘This is her flat.'

‘And you are?'

‘Never mind who I am, who the hell are you?'

The man digs in his pocket, produces a business card, hands it to Thom.

‘Josh Maguire, London Living.'

Thom stares at the card. He senses a wave of mild irritation seeping from the young couple. ‘And?' Thom says, glaring at the estate agent.

‘I'm conducting a viewing.'

‘You can't do this.'

‘I'm sorry?'

‘I said, you can't do this. I know my property law and I suggest you get your arse out of here now!'

Thom turns towards the couple and rather relishes the chance to speak directly to them. ‘You too,' he says with nuanced menace.

This has no visible effect on them, but galvanises the agent into twitchy, snivelling authority.

‘I would ask that you do not address my clients. I would also like to inform you that our contract with Ms Swann and the terms of the lease which she signed, do give me every right to be here. She was sent a letter informing her of the date and time of the viewing and was quite free to change the date according to her wishes and could have picked a more convenient time. Furthermore, as you are clearly not the tenant mentioned in the legal documents, I would suggest that you leave the premises and let me get on with my work.'

As Thom listened to this it came back to him that Lucy had been unhappy with her lease as she had to renew it yearly and it was filled with many sub
-
clauses that stripped her of nearly all her tenant's rights. He'd only half listened to what she'd said about it, as he thought she was hinting that the best thing for her was to move in with him and he hadn't wanted that. Not then.

He pondered the situation. The three of them watched him, waiting. Finally he conceded. ‘Alright, carry on. But, as she's not here, I'm going to stay.'

He sat down on the sofa, leaned back with his arms stretched along the back, rested his right ankle on the knee of his other leg. Expansive. At home. His castle.

‘Fine,' said the agent, with a tight little smile.

This battle won, Thom now remembered his real purpose for being there. It had been a stroke of luck in a way that he had come at this precise moment, otherwise he'd be down on the street ringing her buzzer. Or inside the building, but locked on the wrong side of Lucy's door, knocking it repeatedly, and peering, then calling through her letterbox. Not knowing if she was inside and stubbornly ignoring him.

The agent was leading the young couple into other rooms.

‘The second bedroom is currently used as a study, but the shelving could be easily dismantled and as you see, there's enough room for a double bed here.'

Thom's gaze went to Lucy's answer machine; the red light was blinking indicating that she had new messages. He was tempted to press ‘play' so that he could hear them in order to figure out how long she had been gone, but the heap of unopened mail by the door told its own story. She hadn't been here for several days, possibly over a week. Maybe even longer.

The three interlopers emerged from the study and trailed into the bathroom.

‘Now although the bathroom lacks a natural light source, it is of course fully ventilated.'

There was a click followed by the noisy rattling buzz of the automatic ventilator that came on every time you pulled the light cord.

‘It's very claustrophobic, terribly depressing.' The young woman's voice, a sort of posh drawl with a hint of cockney twang unconvincingly peppered over the surface.

Thom got up from the sofa and went into Lucy's study.

Claustrophobic. A room ten foot by eight. A small window, with a desk under it. All the walls, floor to ceiling, lined with shelves. Every shelf filled with books. Sections on art, fashion, culture. Fiction, mostly novels, mostly published in the last thirty years. Mostly unread. Lucy, a sucker for those book clubs where the dazzling opening offer gives you five books at ninety pence each. SAVING YOU ALMOST EIGHTY FIVE POUNDS!

Lucy who was so hungry for knowledge she could eat the world. Or imagined she could.

He would tease her about this.

Where are you, Lucy?

What the fuck is going on?

Distant voices emerging from the bathroom, retreating down the passage to the bedroom.

Lucy's bedroom. Almost everything in the room was white. Her double bed against the furthest wall away from the cold draught by the window. He imagines it. The candles she had lit the first time she'd invited him in. Vanilla scented. Her leading him by the hand, saying, ‘Here, come and see where I sleep.'

Yeah, the guided tour of her flat.

The white room. The candles. The past.

It seemed so long ago now.

Lucy putting a cassette into a player. What did he expect? Chopin? Miles Davies?

Seduction?

She had moved across the room, fished through a wobbly pile of cassettes, then found what she was looking for.

Joy Division. ‘Love will tear us apart'.

How much attention had he been paying?

This creature. Lucy the seductress with her web lit by the flickering soft flames of candles.

Joy Division? He'd never heard of them.

And the song: ‘Love will tear us apart'?

Threat, promise or repressed fear?

Now three strangers were in that same bedroom – he could hear the agent's voice droning on distantly like a badly tuned radio.

No computer on her desk. She had a laptop, but didn't use it much.

Then, feeling as if he were violating her somehow, Thom opened the top right
-
hand drawer of her desk. Here was a dense sea of pens and pencils, scissors, papers, glue sticks, paint brushes, paper clips, rubber bands, drawing pins, loose change, books of stamps, scalpel blades, marker pens. Nothing else.

He opened the drawer on the other side to find another sea, this one of paper, mostly consisting of shop receipts, bus tickets, business cards, vouchers. Lucy had a habit of letting her purse fill up until the zipper on it would hardly close and the seams were stretched to breaking point, then she would empty everything she didn't need into this drawer.

He picked up a tube ticket from the top of the pile near the front, it was dated twelve days ago. Close to it there was a Waterstone's receipt for a book called
Picturing the Self: Changing Views of the Subject in Visual Culture
. The date on this receipt was from the beginning of
July. Another receipt was from the college coffee bar. She'd had soup and fruit. What soup? What fruit?