Ghosts and Lightning (2 page)

—Yeah. Obviously.

—He’s actually keepin the rent money?

—Yeah, Paula. Yeh listenin? It’s his. It’s his house.

Paula thinks for a few seconds. She cuts the spice burger with her fork. —He could let us have it just as easy, she says, eyes on her burger. —The rent money, like. I mean, he’s got his own fuckin house, he could give that rent money back to us. Or split it, even. Sure it’s no skin off his nose if the mortgage is paid off. That’s all profit.

—Say it to him.

She looks up at me. —I will. He can hand that rent straight fuckin back. Greedy fuckin bastard’s rollin in it. I’m not payin rent to live in a ghost house.

—Don’t say that to him.

—Wha?

—Don’t say fuckin ‘ghost house’ to him. Jesus. Cop on, will yeh? Yeh know wha he’s like. He’s already on the warpath cos o the state o the place.

—Denny, it is. It’s a fuckin ghost house. I’m tellin yeh.

—Okay. Wharrever. It’s a ghost house.

—Exactly. And here, another thing, if we’re payin rent then he’s the fuckin landlord and that means he has responsibilities. He can get a new hoover and sort the oven. And he can fix that fuckin toilet, the fuckin smell’d drive a funeral up an alleyway.

—He was lecturin me today about havin people over and that, though. He’s not gonna do anythin when he knows we’ve got loads o people dossin here and all the rest.

—The fuck does he care?

—That’s wha he said. I’m just tellin yeh.

—Fuckin miserable bastard.

I pour the curry sauce in a zigzag over me smoked cod. This is startin to do me head in now. Between Shane and Paula, like. No fuckin peace. No fuckin life this, I’m tellin yeh. Back from Wales to this. Jesus.

—I’m just tellin yeh wha he said, Paula, I say. —Yeh could o come and had all this out with them there and then but yeh were happy enough here knockin back vodka so just fuckin … stressed out to death in that solicitor’s office, I was. Yeh know I hate places like that.

Paula tucks her hair behind her ear. Somethin’s happenin, I can tell — she’s thinkin … the cogs and gears in motion, makin some sort o mad, we’re-all-gonna-end-up-homeless decision. She’s smilin again. Bad news, man. Bad fuckin –

—Know wha we need? she says.

—G’wan. Can’t wait to hear it.

—A séance. We’re gonna have a séance. Talk to the ghost. Get Pajo to do it. Serious.

I shake me head. —Mad. That’s all I can say, Paula. Fuckin … madness. Yer mental.

Paula laughs.

*

A couple hours later I see Pajo through the window, strugglin at the front gate, a big green satchel on his back. He eventually manages to get the gate shifted (it’s gone a bit wonky and scrapes along the concrete) and walks up the garden to the door, disappearin from view. I’m watchin The Simpsons in the front room, one o the older, good episodes, so I wait for a knock before I get up, but after a couple o minutes there’s still nothin. He must be tryin to ring the bell. It occurs to me to just let him keep ringin and, hopefully, he’ll give up and fuck off. I keep tryin to square that with meself, morally. I mean, wha if I hadn’t o noticed him at the gate? He would’ve been ringin the broken bell for ages and I’d never have noticed — nothin Machiavellian, just bad luck. Or good luck, really. I feel dead bad, though. After another few seconds I get up and step over the basket o Paula’s washin by the coffee
table and head for the hall. I can see Pajo’s skinny shape in blurry silhouette behind the glass. I open the door.

—I was ringin for ages, says Pajo.

—The battery’s gone, I say. —Yer lucky I clocked yeh.

Pajo’s an old mate o mine. I’ve known him and his brother Maggit since we were kids. He got into heroin when he was sixteen or so but he’s been on methadone for a few years now, left the needles behind. Although that’s just swappin one ball and chain for another if yeh ask me. It was mad; for a few years no one really seen much of him — he was off with junkies and all sorts, shootin up in parks and squats in town. He doesn’t really talk about it. We knew he was on gear but there was nothin yeh could say to him; the few times I tried he just looked dead sad, dead ashamed. He’s a real soft soul, Pajo.

He’s standin in the doorway and even though it’s cold he’s sweatin slightly and he looks delicate, like he’d break if he fell, a thin gothic doll with his lank green hair tucked behind his ear, so many chemicals in and on him he smells like a breach o the Kyoto Agreement.

—Is Paula in? he says.

—Will I not do?

—Well, it was … she was sayin about a séance. Like, organisin somethin.

—Yeah, I know. She’s up in the shower. Come in.

Pajo steps in behind me.

—D’yeh want tea or somethin?

—D’yeh have any cappuccino?

*

Paula’s hair is still damp and she’s wearin the Reebok tracksuit she bought off our mate Ned’s stall yesterday. She’s sittin on the armchair with the basket o washin on her lap, pickin through her and Teresa’s knickers and all sorts, no shame at all. Me and Pajo are on the sofa. Pajo’s lap is burdened as well, but with a pile o dog-eared books on spiritualism and ghost sightings and Buddhism, and, on top o that, an A4 pad, into which he’s scribblin notes in his big, dopey-lookin handwritin. When Pajo writes he only ever uses capitals, like he’s tryin to convince himself that whatever he’s writin is solid and worthwhile.

—Right so, says Pajo. —We need to, like, establish some stuff before we can … em …

He makes a vague gesture with his hands. —Before we decide what’s the best way to deal with … this … situation.

Paula nods, carefully drapin a red bra over the arm o the chair.

—There’s loads o ways, like, of approachin paranormal situations like this, says Pajo. —Like, a séance, a Ouija board, a –

—Psychologist, I say.

—Shurrup Denny, says Paula.

Pajo looks at me, then at Paula, and then carefully writes somethin on his pad.

—Wha yeh writin? I say.

—Notes. Just for like … reference.

He taps his head knowingly and I shake mine.

—Don’t mind him Pajo, says Paula. —He has no sense o wonder at all.

—Wha? I say. I don’t know why I’m even risin to this; I know Paula’s just tryin to annoy me. —I do have a sense o
wonder, I say. —I just don’t believe in fuckin ghosts, that’s all. It doesn’t make any —

—What’s the big deal, then? says Paula. —Why are yeh so freaked? Yer more freaked than me and you haven’t even heard anythin.

—Yeah, it’s not because, like … I’m not afraid, though. It’s psychological, isn’t it? It’s in yer head.

—Yer sayin more about yer own psychology than mine, Denny, says Paula, and she makes that annoyin ‘crazy’ gesture, pointing her index finger at her temple and makin little circles. Paula’s referrin to the fact I was foolish enough to tell her that me worst fear is goin mad. Not that I expect to go mental or anythin, it’s just … it’s freaky, the way yer head works. I mean, if yer mad, ghosts and monsters, they exist; they’re real, or they might as well be. I have an auntie, Denise, me ma’s youngest sister, and she’s schizophrenic. She sees demons in mirrors and all sorts. Me cousin Martin, her eldest, told one time that Denise attacked him with the bread knife cos she said he was hidin horns under his Nike cap. I mean, fair enough, he
is
always wearin baseball caps, but as far as I know it’s to hide his recedin hairline, not fuckin horns. And then Denise saw that film Child’s Play on Sky Movies and convinced herself that dolls had evil spirits inside them and burned all o her daughter Susan’s Barbies in a bonfire out the back garden. They say madness runs in some families so sometimes I worry that Paula might be losin it. And then I start to convince meself that
I
might be the one goin mad cos I’m thinkin about it all too much, obsessin on it.

Which reminds me —
stop fuckin thinkin about it, Denny
.

Pajo flips onto a new page in his pad. —So go on, Paula, he says. —What is it, exactly?

He’s bein kind o hesitant, which isn’t unusual for Pajo, but I can tell he’s enjoyin this. He’s mad into this kind o thing; life after death, ghosts, yetis, any and all religions. Basically, anythin there’s fuck all proof for, Pajo’ll believe it. Almost like he’s definin himself against the world in some way.

Paula looks up at the ceilin, to where her and Teresa’s bedroom is, and then back to Pajo.

—It’s … well, as far as I’m concerned, there’s a presence in the house. She looks at me. —A definite presence. Definitely.

—D’yeh know she was drinkin vodka when I came back at half two today, Pajo? I say.

—Ignore him, she says to Pajo. —There’s definitely somethin. A hundred per cent.

—Have yeh seen anythin? says Pajo.

—No. I … no, I haven’t
seen
anythin. Just, like, felt somethin. And heard it as well. That’s the worst. It’s under the beds.

—Did it say somethin? asks Pajo. —Or was it just noises?

—Said somethin.

—Is it a fella or a girl?

—Now this is the freakiest bit. This is fuckin … it’s a fella. It’s male, like, but it’s
pretendin
to be a girl. It’s puttin on a girl’s voice. How fuckin mad is that?

Too fuckin mad if yeh ask me. The ghost of a man pretendin to be a girl, hidin under Paula’s bed. For fuck sake.

And this goes on for an hour or so. Madder and madder. Wild speculation and wilder interpretations. Pajo says he’ll have to look some stuff up, consult charts and websites and all kinds o shite, but they’ve agreed on it — they’re gonna do it, they’re gonna have a séance. And they want me and some of our mates to be there. It’ll help attract the spirit’s attention, accordin to Pajo; a bigger group, more energy to feed off.

Pajo packs up his books and pad and heads off. Me and Paula sit there for a while. I need to be distracted. Paula heads upstairs. I turn on the telly and watch Takeshi’s Castle.

*

Next mornin there’s a scream from upstairs and I drop me spoon into the bowl o Cheerios I’ve only just started and hop over the bollixed vacuum cleaner and skid into the hall and grab me brother Gino’s hurley, then it’s up the stairs three at a time and I bash open Paula’s door and there she is, standin in her Snoopy nightdress with her back to the window in the middle of a pile o clothes and shoes with her hand to her mouth, shakin.

—Wha the fuck’s goin on?

Paula looks at me and then looks at the wardrobe and I get a horrible tingle shootin up me spine.

—Wha, Paula? Stop fuckin around will yeh.

—Oh Jaysis Denny. Look behind the wardrobe.

I step into the room, the bed unmade with a pair o jeans laid across it and the telly in the corner babblin low down, Jeremy Kyle pronouncin judgement on a scaldy lookin fella in a denim shirt. There’s a vodka bottle on
the window ledge, the sun behind it, and a few crumpled Bulmers cans. Dolls everywhere. Them weird porcelain ones with real-lookin eyes and hair.

Paula inches along the wall towards me.

—Fuck sake Paula, I say, me heart hammerin. I glance at the wardrobe. I can feel sweat on me back.

—Get it Denny. Oh Jesus. Get it out. The bleedin size o the thing.

I edge cautiously forward. I don’t want to but I do. There’s some grinnin horror waitin for me and I’m edgin me way closer to it. Like in a fuckin film or somethin. A wizened, crouched old man with a little girl’s voice. Jesus. I grip the hurley two-handed.

—Wha is it, Paula? Fuckin hell.

—Just get it!

I turn and look back at her.

—I swear to fuckin god, Paula, if it’s –

—I was pickin up me jeans. Icky ick. A bird or somethin. Jesus. A bat.

I stop and look at her. —A fuckin bat? Wha the fuck are yeh on about?

—A bat. Some mad flyin thing.

—I thought yeh were bein fuckin murdered by the … yeh tryin to give me a bleedin heart attack?

—Shurrup. Get it.

Paula scurries behind me on tiptoe and out the door. She pulls it almost shut, half her face visible.

I stop about six feet from the wardrobe. Me heart’s goin ninety now. The doors are open and there’s knickers and socks and all sorts spillin out. A pile o cardboard boxes are stacked haphazardly at the back and there’s a china doll
in a blue dress with a massive skull fracture sittin on top, smilin. I avoid eye-contact with it.

Paula sticks her arm into the room and points, her eye wide open. —Behind it, she says. —It’s hidin. Grab that torch there. Shine it at it.

I set the battered old hurley down against Paula’s bed. The torch is a chunky yellow Bob the Builder toy.

—Where’d yeh get this?

—Ant’ny left it here.

Anthony’s me mate Maggit’s son. I pick the torch up and crane me neck forward, tryin to see round the back o the wardrobe. There’s somethin black stickin out, about half an inch. The tips o somethin’s wings, I think. I’ve never seen a bat before. Well. I saw a few in the zoo. They were mad-lookin, stalkin upside-down across the ceilin.

—That’s it, says Paula. —Shine the torch.

—For wha? Why?

Paula doesn’t answer. I don’t know why the fuck I’m doin it — the bedroom light’s already on — but I lift the torch and point it at the little wing-tips and click the ON button, and immediately the wharrever-it-is scuttles back behind the wardrobe.

I turn and look at Paula. —Did yeh see that?

—Sicko!

I turn back to the wardrobe and I’m just about to take another step towards it when the wings poke into view again.

—Fuck, I say. —Lookit that.

—I am lookin. Shine it again. It doesn’t like the light.

—It’s not a fuckin mogwai, Paula, I say. But I point the torch at it anyway, feelin a strange combination of freaked-out-ness and curiosity, and click the button.

It scuttles out o view again.

—That’s mad, I say.

—Kill it!

—I think it’s a moth.

—The size o the thing, Denny! It must be a bat or somethin. Don’t they suck yer blood?

—Shh.

Paula points in again, her hand waggin up and down. —It’s too brainy to be a moth. Moths wouldn’t hide, would they? They’re stupid.

I step over a shoebox and press me face against the wall and peer along the gap at the back o the wardrobe. It’s dark and greasy, clogged with hairballs and wadded up socks and all sorts and I can see the fat black shape o the bat or moth or wharrever the fuck it is, scuttlin about in the gloom.