I would ask the creator. I walked down the shed, around the scrapmetal pile, the car bodies, car doors, the assorted steel junk.
Sarah was where she had been the first time, in the open space. She was on one knee, wearing a full black mask, welding something onto the metal figure. A stream of sparks was erupting from the seam she was creating.
I stopped and watched her, her deftness. She must have felt my presence, she could see nothing but the glow of the weld through the helmet window. She stood up, raised the torch, turned her back on me, doing something, I saw the flame diminish, die. She put the torch on the stand, turned.
Sarah pushed up the helmet and looked at me, took off a glove, ran fingers through her hair, smiled the half-furtive smile.
She was lovely. My throat felt dry.
The world behind her went white, then bright orange.
The floor between us erupted.
In the air, backwards. A knife of pain. Darkness, I couldn’t see, pain in my side, something inside me.
I could see flames, hear a terrible roaring sound. Get to the door. I crawled. More explosions. A blow to my back.
The door, open, blown off, I felt a wind on my face.
Get there, just get there.
Black.
Nothing.
20
They let me out on a Friday in early May, round 6 of the football, damp, a wind shaking the bare trees. Drew carried my bag to his car. It wasn’t necessary, but I didn’t want to argue about it.
We drove in silence. He was going the wrong way.
‘What route is this?’ I said. ‘Have they reconfigured the city while I wasn’t looking?’
‘My place,’ said Drew.
‘Mine, I think,’ I said. ‘I have a need for home.’
‘You can’t come out of hospital after umpteen weeks and go back to an empty house,’ he said.
‘Bullshit. Anyway, what do you mean empty? Furniture gone? Haven’t you noticed it’s been empty for fucking years? No one there except me. Take me home.’
I heard the harsh tone of my voice.
We stopped at lights. Drew turned his long face. ‘Jack,’ he said, ‘don’t spoil my plans. Tonight, we have a beer or two. Then we eat these steaks from the main man. With them, a red I’ve been saving for fifteen years. Then we sit in front of the fire with a drop of Rutherglen nectar and watch the footy.’
He coughed. ‘Unfortunately,’ he said, ‘we then see the Saints get their scrawny arses kicked to buggery.’
I looked away, willed myself to be a normal person.
‘Steak?’ I said. ‘Just steak? Is that all?’
‘Good boy,’ said Drew.
I saw relief on his face.
‘With home-cooked thick-cut chips,’ he said.
‘Yes?’
‘Well. Heated at home in the home oven. Defrosted. That’s close, isn’t it?’
‘And the wine? What’s that?’
We pulled away, he jerked his head at me. ‘I can just as easily drop you off at home,’ he said. ‘You appear to me to be fully recovered.’
‘Drive,’ I said. ‘Just drive. It’s what you’re not good at.’
Peter Temple
White Dog (Jack Irish Thriller 4)
Taken home on a Saturday of fleeting sunshine. At the boot factory, at my downstairs door, I said thank you to Drew.
‘Well,’ he said, ‘I’ll come up and see if you’ve got everything you need.’
‘If I need anything, I’ll go out and get it,’ I said.
I set off up the stairs, stopped after the first few, shocked by my weakness, the heaviness of my legs. I looked down. Drew was rubbing his unshaven jaw. I thought I could hear the sawing sound.
‘What?’ I said.
‘You know what,’ he said.
‘Fuck off,’ I said. ‘That’s not going to happen again.’
‘You’re too quiet for my liking.’
‘Well, it’s a good thing I’m not dependent for my state of mind on your liking.’
He shook his head. ‘You and explosions,’ he said. ‘There’s a fearful fucking symmetry.’
‘Thank you for that perceptive observation and goodbye.’ I set off upwards again.
At the top, I had to stand for a minute to recover before I unlocked the door and went in. Everything was as I’d left it on the morning: on the kitchen sink, the glasses, the teapot and cup. The novel was on the kitchen table, place marked with an old window envelope, a bill-carrier.
I washed up, put the spoiled cheese, fruit and vegetables in the bin, switched on the heating, walked around — sitting room, study, spare bedroom, kitchen, sitting room. I looked out of the window at the trees, the park beyond, there were children playing, splodges of colour. I sat down, got up, went back to the window, put my forehead against a cold pane.
I didn’t want to go into the bedroom. I’d left the bed unmade that morning. Her perfume would be on the pillows, the sheets.
Drew offered to get cleaners in, I said no. Why? What stopped me?
A drink, a drink, and then I’d do it. I felt a strong desire for a drink, went to the kitchen and looked in the cabinet. Whisky, a Glenlivet, an unopened bottle. Just the ticket, a whisky, neat. I took down the bottle, found a cut-glass tumbler, also an explosion survivor, now we were both explosion survivors, I didn’t want to think about explosions, poured two fingers, added another two.
I had the glass to my mouth, I had the peaty smell in my nose.
That’s not going to happen again.
Explosions.
You and explosions. There’s a fearful fucking symmetry.
I poured the liquid back into the bottle, spilled a lot, put it away. I went into the bedroom, pulled the sheets off the bed, pulled off the pillowcases, didn’t breathe, stuffed everything into the laundry bag, half full already. I lugged the bag downstairs. But then my energy was spent. I left the bag at the front door, went slowly upstairs, each step an act of will, and I lay down on the sofa and closed my eyes.
When the telephone woke me, it was dark, I had no idea where I was, panic.
‘Are you all right? You sound awful?’
Rosa, the baby my father never saw, named for a Communist heroine.
‘A nap,’ I said. ‘I was asleep.’
‘How could you leave the hospital without telling me? I ring the hospital only to find that you’ve been discharged.’
‘I didn’t know they needed your permission.’
A deep sniff.
‘I trust you’re not doing a line while talking to me,’ I said.
‘I resent that,’ Rosa said. ‘I assumed that, being your sister, I assumed I would be the one.’
‘Which one?’
‘The one to take you home.’
‘It’s just driving, Rosa, it doesn’t have any significance.’
‘Who took you home?’
‘Drew.’
‘I think I might have been told. I wanted you to come here.’
‘Why?’
‘Why? So that I could look after you, that’s why. Is that a bad instinct?’
Standing in the dark, only the weak light from the street-lamp in the window.
‘It’s a good instinct,’ I said. ‘Thank you for having it. Only I don’t need looking after. I’ll be paying for the looking after I’ve had until I die. After I die. So now I’ll just get on with what remains of life. What about lunch, you could shout me lunch? Name the place.’
The silence.
‘Jack,’ she said, ‘I tried to pay the hospital bills. They’d been paid. You owe nothing.’
Tiny branch shadows moved in the corner of the window, twitches of dark little fingers.
‘Some clerical error,’ I said. ‘I appreciate you trying to pay. If you’d succeeded, I’d have repaid you.’
‘What do I have to do to be your sister?’ she said. ‘I think I’ll stop worrying about it.’
‘You don’t have to do anything and you don’t have to worry about it. I’ll drive over your way tomorrow for brunch. You’ll know the top brunch spot, where the Nokia elite gather to chatter. To people elsewhere.’