Painkiller (23 page)

What is that tart wearing?
 

God. Desperate for attention or what?
 

I wish my wife had the courage to show her boobs like that.
 

We order, and the meals arrive very quickly. Too quickly. Like they’ve been sitting on a hot shelf – identikit meals, like fast food burgers, sliding down a chute ready to put in a box with paper napkins, plastic cutlery and a toy for the kids.

Dominic notices my expression.

‘It’s all right, isn’t it? The meal?’

(
No, actually
), I think
(
it’s not
)
.
I’m looking down at my plate, and I’m looking at something inadequate; underprepared, overcooked pre-packaged slop for the masses.

This is what we have to do. This is what we can afford. We have no money left. Remember that, Monica. Be nice to him. He loves you.
 

I’ve just taken a mouthful, so I just nod my head vigorously. ‘Absolutely,’ I eventually say. ‘It’s absolutely perfect.’

‘It’s very convenient, eating here, at the hotel. That’s my thinking. We don’t have to walk back from anywhere.’

I keep eating, pushing the indifferent lasagne around my mouth, moving my jaw furiously. Trying to swallow.

‘You pulled an odd face. Are you sure you’re OK?’

‘Yes, Dominic,’ I say in a very low voice. ‘It is very convenient. We don’t have to walk back from anywhere. But I want to eat in different places. In case you haven’t noticed, I’m feeling better now. I can do things now. I can walk out of a hotel and get a cab and eat somewhere nice.’

‘I know that. But we have to be careful…’

‘And I know there’s no money. But the restaurants here are cheap. Cheaper than the hotel. But you’d rather not go out. Once you’ve seen the things you want to see, you’re happy to stop there…’

‘Monica…’

‘So you don’t have to pretend you’re not doing all those things because you’re being thoughtful to me. Seriously. It insults me and it insults you.’

There’s an expression on Dominic’s face; or rather a collection of expressions, a Picasso portrait where all the different aspects can be seen at the same time. The recognition from the hotel room, mixed with resentment, confusion, and above all, fear.

Fear.
 

He’s afraid.
 

My mind spins back to another hotel, another time.

‘Why did you have to do this?’
 

‘It’s a four-star hotel. It said so on the website.’
 

‘
In these countries, Dominic, five star is four star, four star is three star, and three star is a slum. Have you ever seen a three-star hotel advertised on the continent? It’s like haggling. They say five star assuming you know it’s nothing of the sort. Have you learnt nothing from your time with me?
’

‘Are you all right?’

‘What?’

‘You were miles away. Staring into space.’

‘Just thinking.’

‘About what?’

‘About Egypt.’

‘What about Egypt?’

‘Another hotel meal. Another restaurant.’

‘What can you remember?’

His voice is suddenly urgent; his eyes are fixed on mine with an intensity that borders on the fanatical.

‘What can you remember?’ He says it again, low, almost menacing. ‘Tell me what you can remember.’

I have a sudden flash,
of plates crashing, people’s heads turning. A waiter rushing over to our table as I stand up and walk out of the restaurant. I am walking strongly, briskly, without pain, one arm stiff by my side, another clutching my purse, and I can see myself in many mirrored walls, stunning in my silk green dress, and behind me I can see waitresses rushing to pick up the mess I’ve made, and Dominic flapping like a startled chicken, throwing money on the table, trying to make things right, and I feel
suddenly cautious about talking to Dominic. Suddenly there is something else, an undercurrent. Something that has always been there, that I had not truly appreciated until this second. My eyes focus on my left hand holding my fork, the tablecloth decorated with bulging tomatoes and dancing wine bottles.

Perhaps he’s not scared of me running away.
 

He doesn’t want me to get better. But there’s another reason. Another, completely different reason.
 

‘What can you remember?’ A third time. He’s holding his serviette in his hand, so very tightly, like he’s about to perform a magic trick. Like he’s about to pour the jug of water into it.

‘I… nothing.’

‘What?’

‘I think a waiter dropped a plate. Did a waiter drop a plate?’

‘Yes, that’s right. He dropped a plate.’

His voice is now relaxed but his eyes are still fixed on me, searching my face.

(
What big eyes you have
)

Time went by, and Mrs Monica Wood slipped DI Geoff Marks’s mind. He assumed DSu Cooper was still conducting his
Sweeney
-style investigations in Crouch End and his ‘vital piece of evidence’ was on the money. Good luck to him. Then one evening, just as he was clocking off, Mike Fennel waved a piece of paper under his nose.

‘Oh, I forgot. Someone came in for you a while back. A woman. Asked for you specially.’

‘OK.’

‘Actually, she didn’t know your name. She just had a description of you. The usual. Ginger. Face like a boiled swede…’

‘Right…’

Geoff tensed. Citizens who come in with a description of an officer, rather than a name, have usually seen a copper doing something naughty and want to make a report.

Mike knew what he was thinking. ‘No, it was nothing like that. She wasn’t a “concerned citizen”. She said you helped her a few years ago. Wanted your help again.’

‘Did she say how many years?’

‘Must have been at least two. She mentioned you had a shitty ’tache. That pubic monstrosity that used to fester under your nose.’

‘Oh. She mentioned the ’tache, did she? That means it was a while back. I was shamed into shaving it off at least three years ago.’

‘Yes. And she still wanted to see you. She’d tried three of the local nicks before she came here. You might want to put a bit of cream on your forehead, Geoff. She looked a bit of all right. Long dark hair. Nice eyes. Nice everything, in fact.’

‘That’s lovely, Mike, as ever. They should name the sexual misconduct forms after you.’

‘Just telling you what I saw, Geoff. Nothing wrong in appreciating the female form. That’s how we all got here, after all.’

‘That’s how
I
got here, Mike. They found
you
under a rock.’ He looked at the note. ‘Any idea what she wanted?’

‘That’s all she said. She just left a name and a mobile number.’

He looked at the paper – ‘Monica Wood’…

And felt like the air had been pushed out of him.

‘You all right, mate?’ Mike sounded concerned. ‘What is it?’

‘When did this come in?’

‘Ooh…’ He pulled a face. ‘About a week ago?’

‘A
week
? A whole week? You’re kidding!’

‘Keep your ginger wig on, Geoff. She said it wasn’t urgent. She just said to ring her when you had a moment. Why? Who is she? Not an old flame, is she?’

‘Oh nobody,’ Geoff said, pouring on the sarcasm. ‘Just nobody. Just a potential murder victim.’

He looked at the piece of paper, the numbers dancing in front of his eyes. It was her. After all these years. Right now. Coincidence? It couldn’t be. He glanced at his watch – it was a shade before ten p.m. Was it too late to call?

He couldn’t resist.

It’s evening, but it’s still hot, and we have the hotel windows and the shutters open, the curtains are billowing inwards like ghosts from the past.

We are making love again; me on top, again, bouncing furiously and energetically, him once again below, a helpless passenger. I hold on to him fiercely, as if trying to pull his whole body inside me. I’m clinging to him like a drowning woman holding on to a piece of reassuring driftwood.

After we finish, it’s only a few seconds before we untangle from each other’s arms and Dominic’s breathing comes slow and even.

My eyelids flutter and close.

‘I’m so sorry.’
 

(
Christ, was that it?
)

Silence.
 

(
That receptionist looked a nice boy – perhaps I should ring for room service?
)

I shake my head.
It’s you, isn’t it? My Angry Friend, sticking these mad thoughts in my head. Go away. Go away and shut up and leave me alone. I adore my husband. I know I do. I can feel it. I have always adored him. Even though I never suffered fools gladly, I love him.

He starts to snore.

There is a dull buzz and my phone flashes and scurries across the bedside table. It threatens to leap off and escape. I dive for it, and answer it.

‘Hello?’ I whisper.

‘Mrs Wood?’ says a voice, well spoken.

‘Speaking.’

‘I’m Detective Inspector Geoff Marks. I got your message. Is this too late for you?’

I glance at the bedside clock. Our evening is over, and it’s still only eleven o’clock.

‘No, not too late.’

‘I’m sorry I didn’t get back to you earlier. I gather you’ve been asking for me.’

‘I have.’

A long pause.

‘I… think I know what you want to see me about?’

‘Right.’

‘I think we’d better meet, don’t you?’

‘That’s a bit difficult. I’m actually in Rome.’

‘Right. I thought the line was a bit echoey.’

‘I’m on holiday.’

‘With your husband?’

What an odd question.
 

‘Yes, I’m with my husband.’

‘Is your husband there? In the room with you?’

‘Um… yes. He’s asleep.’

‘O… K…’ There is a note of caution in his voice.

‘I don’t want to disturb him. I’ll go through into the bathroom, if you want.’

I dance around the bed, picking up my pyjamas from where they’d landed, keeping half an eye on Dominic’s slumbering form. I bend down to retrieve my slippers and my face is level with his. And his eyes are open, staring into mine.

‘Dominic?’ I hiss quietly.

But he doesn’t respond. He is still asleep. He’s sleeping with his eyes open. We share a bed so rarely these days, I forget he does that sometimes.

I open the door, so very gently, there is only a dry click from the lock, and I stand on the other side, allowing my bottom to guide it shut with another faint click. I plonk myself down on the toilet.

‘OK…’ I whisper.

‘I wondered if I’d ever hear from you again. I hoped I would.’

‘Right…’

‘How are you now? How’s your back? You were in pretty bad shape when we last met.’

‘So you know me? We’ve met before.’

‘Sure we have.’

‘I think I should explain something before we talk. I don’t remember you at all. In fact, the only reason I managed to track you down is because I kept seeing you in a dream.’

‘A dream.’

‘Yes. You’ve been inside my head, for years, in my dreams, only I thought you were a car park attendant. Then I saw you were a policeman.’

‘I see.’

‘That sounds a bit mad.’

‘Well, you said it.’

‘Sorry about that.’

‘So you can’t remember how we met.’

‘Not in the slightest. It’s the drugs that made me forget. And the pain too. I have to spend so much of my mind focusing on the pain I can’t retain anything. I’ve forgotten whole chunks of my life from years back; mostly from the first year of my accident. It’s like the body’s own way of protecting itself.’

Silence. I can hear his breathing.

‘Hello? Geoff?’

Then I hear a noise from the other room. A squeak of bedsprings. The scrabble of fingers on a bedside table as someone retrieves spectacles. Dominic is up and lumbering to the bathroom. I can hear his heavy tread. His shape is in the glass of the door. The door handle squeaks up and down, but he doesn’t say anything. He doesn’t even knock at the door.

He’s groggy. He doesn’t even realise I’m not still in bed. He can’t work out why the door won’t open.
 

‘Look…’ Geoff starts to speak at last.

‘I’m a bit busy now, Geoff,’ I snap. ‘Something’s come up. Can you ring me tomorrow? Would that be convenient for you?’

‘Monica?’ Dominic has staggered back to bed and realised it’s empty. ‘Are you in there?’

Geoff is pondering, thinking. ‘I understand,’ he says. ‘How about I phone you at midday tomorrow?’

‘Monica?’

I snap the phone shut. ‘In here.’

‘You OK?’

‘I’m fine. Just a spot of… You know… The usual.’

‘Oh.’

‘It was never going to be perfect, Dominic. We knew painkillers were never going to be the answer.’

A black shape appears at the top of the glass, about the size of a football. He’s resting his head against the door.

‘No. Painkillers were never going to be the answer.’

We’ve nearly finished breakfast when Dominic says, ‘You’ve been glancing at your phone a lot. Are you expecting a call?’

I realise what I’ve been doing: pressing the button to illuminate the screen, checking the battery power, looking at the tiny phone icon to see if there are any missed calls.

‘I suppose I am,’ I say. ‘I’m waiting for a call from Angelina. She said she’d keep me posted if she sold anything after her viewing party.’

‘Good for her,’ he says, neutrally. I’m not sure he believes a word of it.

The morning bleeds away, so slowly, and we go sightseeing. I still want to go back to see the Keats-Shelley memorial house, but Dominic insists on his timetable. So we go to the Pantheon. I sigh, and give up the fight. It’s nearer, after all.

The Pantheon is, of course, another place of worship. Originally constructed by Marcus Agrippa, it fell, rose again under Hadrian, and the Roman Catholic church moved in hundreds of years later, occupying the site like a godly hermit crab. Now it’s a big cool building full of pews and statues. Dominic makes a beeline to a pew and kneels to pray, while I wander around looking at the statues.

Of course I’m drawn to the cross; Jesus hanging limply, fastened to his wooden prison, body twisted in an ugly V shape, hips hanging to the left.

His head lolls down at me, staring past me.

‘That night,’ I whisper. ‘In the garden of Gethsemane. You were waiting for something dreadful to happen. You were waiting for all your friends to betray you, one by one. And you were waiting for the pain to start. Pain and betrayal. You knew there was going to be both, sometime soon, and all you could do was just… wait for it. Was that hard?’

Jesus doesn’t answer.

‘Because I’m not coping well. You can talk to me because, seriously, I do feel your pain. I do. I know how you feel. Seriously. I get it in the hands and feet too. All the time. I think about you sometimes when I get those pains. Did you get that thing with the pain? It stops you thinking, but it can’t stop you thinking.’

Jesus doesn’t answer.

‘Could you think about the future, when you were up there? All those people who would talk about you in years to come? How your friends and your mother would cope without you? I bet you couldn’t. I can’t. Pain keeps you in the present tense. Past and future are too much effort, am I right?’

I’m babbling now. My voice is increasing in volume too. I know it, but I can’t stop.

‘I know what you were thinking up there on that cross. Exactly the same thing that crosses my mind eight times a day. Life is just one long hilarious irony after another, right? That’s all we need to know. We’re two of a kind. Look at me. Falls down hospital steps while trying to have a baby, and now so full of pain and drugs it’s a kindness to the world I don’t have one. And look at you. Born a carpenter, and you die on a huge wooden shelf. We’re a right pair, aren’t we?’

An old woman in black, in the process of crossing herself, shoots me a look of pure venom, but I ignore her. This is my time. I’m talking to the Son of God. I think, after the last five years, I’ve earned it. I let my voice climb in volume.

‘Tell me, Jesus. I often wondered, well, you probably know I’m going to ask this. When you came back, you know, when you resurrected… was the pain still there? It’s just my doctor told me about this… phenomenon. It’s really fascinating. You can feel pain in a limb, and even if you lose it, you carry on feeling the pain. Does that apply to the whole body? Was it agony, even when you lost your body?’

The old woman decides it’s time for an intervention. ‘
Silenzio, per favore. Questo è un luogo santo
…
’
Then she goes ‘shhh’ at me.

‘Are you shushing me?’ I snap. ‘I’m talking to him, not you. This happens to be a private conversation.’

I advance towards her and she scuttles away, tutting.

‘You know nothing about that man up there,’ I cry, pointing a quivering finger at Jesus. ‘You might think you do, but you don’t! At least I have some idea of how he felt…’ I wave my hands in the air. ‘There are stigmata in here, you know! Right in here! But just because no one sees them, then it doesn’t matter!’

An arm grabs me. It’s Dominic. ‘What are you doing?’

‘Talking to Jesus. What of it?’

‘Let’s talk to him outside.’

He steers me, quite roughly, out of the church
. It’s amazing how quickly he got used to me not being in pain,
I think.
If he did that to me two months ago, I’d have screamed the place down.

‘Take your hand off my arm. You’re hurting me.’

‘You were causing a scene.’

‘She shushed me!’

‘She had a right to. It’s a holy place.’

I can see he’s angry.
That’s you. The big man. Willing to face up to mumbling Atos inspectors and feeble old geezers, but when it comes to God I know whose side you’re on.

I say nothing, but something, probably force of habit, makes him assume that I filled the silence with an apology. ‘That’s all right. No harm done.’ He smiles. ‘Let’s go and find lunch. I want some proper pizza.’

(
Of course you do
)

‘It’s still morning,’ I snap. ‘It’s not even lunchtime.’

‘It’s twelve o’clock.’

I know it’s twelve o’clock.
Any minute now Geoff is going to call. Any minute now
…

Dominic is still talking. ‘By the time we get to a pizza restaurant it will be lunchtime.’

‘Dominic, I could throw a stone into the air and hit a restaurant. We’re not five minutes away from one wherever we are.’