Poppyland (6 page)

‘Yes, it's just chance,' she agrees.

With difficulty Ryder stops himself gasping and smiting his brow like a ham actor in some ridiculous pantomime. He can't believe the air hostess is acting
so normally. It's the flight to New York! This kind blonde woman is trying to see him off the aeroplane courteously without succumbing to this astonishing information. She is bafflingly preoccupied with her walkie talkie and uninteresting news about the door-opening schedule. But of course she is unaware of the enormity of the situation. That it must be her. It must be. The plane is going to New York. She lives in New York. It can only be the girl he met on the waterfront and whom he has never forgotten. She has a lovely name – Grace – and she is English, though she lives in New York. She is here again. The painter. The beautiful painter is back. Well, in fact, she's leaving, but she was here a minute ago. Here where he is now.

Suddenly Ryder is right back in time with her. There on the harbour wall in Copenhagen five years ago. It was so unexpected. Though what else could it have been? How can you expect to bump into someone you didn't know you were looking for? In his mind, Ryder is again standing with her on the harbour. This girl whose presence was so magnetic, that he wanted to put his arms around her and hold her close, even though he scarcely knew her name and it was so dark he couldn't even see the colour of her eyes. But he could see her smile and the shape of her face and her skin bathed in moonlight. And then, in the gallery, he lost her. Her world swallowed her up in a dazzle of flashing cameras and the white walls of the gallery which seemed to Ryder to do the exact opposite of creating a sense of space. One moment they were holding hands and then she was gone. He left without
saying goodbye, though he left a note with the gallery owner: ‘Dear Grace, I . . . you . . .' Crossed out. Rewritten. Crossed out. Finally, he just put his name and number on the match book in his pocket. She never called.

In the tedious delay while Ryder's plane doors do not open and everyone stands expectantly in the aisle, their briefcases and hand luggage gripped for the fray, night creeps across the sky above the orange glow of the airport lighting, and Grace's jet taxis off, twinkling like a decorated Christmas tree. Ryder feels wildly, absurdly elated. The connection he made with her is palpable. It may have been dormant for five years, but it has sprung up again and he is run through with it – the energy and the optimism of sexual chemistry surges in his veins and he is amazed. He has not felt this love struck for years. It's like a drug, but the drug has just got on another plane without him actually touching it. Finally the plane doors open and the passengers trudge off and out along miles of carpeted corridor. Ryder sleepwalks through the terminal. Why has she been in Denmark again? Who will know? How can he find out? In the queue for passport control he notices that the woman in front has an international edition of a Danish newspaper under her arm.

Without knowing what he hopes to find, he taps her on the shoulder, ‘Could I look, please?'

She smiles and hands it to him. He smiles back. It must be a sign of something important that everyone is so nice, he thinks, flicking through to the arts pages. It is senseless to think the answer will be in
the newspaper, but never mind, it's good to start somewhere. He is not sure what he is looking for in among the album reviews and interviews with illustrious film-makers. Not bad coverage, in fact, for a small-scale paper such as this. And suddenly, she is there. In a photograph with a lot of people.

Oh my God, thinks Ryder, I've lost the plot. This is like those moments in the tabloids when people find Jesus in a pizza or the Virgin Mary in an olive growing on an olive tree. OK, so this is in a newspaper, where information is generally supposed to be. But the chance of it happening . . . It's a million to one for sure. He shakes the paper and holds it closer. It's a terrible mug shot, the colour has run, and all the faces are pale green. Grace does not look her best, pale green, but undoubtedly it is her, looking unhealthy next to the Mayor and behind the right shoulder of the Queen of Denmark. She should never wear black, she looks like a ghost. Or else she should make sure she doesn't have green photographs taken. He must tell her. How can he tell her? He has not seen her for five years, he just saw her leave the country and he has no idea how to get in touch with her.

Ryder buys his own newspaper and gets into a taxi, his thoughts uninterrupted. It's usually a mistake telling girls that a photograph is not flattering. They do not take kindly to anything less than superlatives about photographs. A girl sees it as criticism, not realising that what it is, in fact, is fascination in every tiny thing about her. One of the things Ryder finds most difficult to come to terms with in breaking up with a
girlfriend, and it has happened more often than is strictly desirable or necessary, is the sudden absence of daily female minutiae. He loves the intimacy of everyday life shared with a woman. Her cosmetics on the bathroom shelf, the ritual of her bathing and getting ready to go out. Her shoes kicked off in the hall. The subtle scent of her on her clothes and at home. It is his pattern to forget how much he loves these small things until they are gone.

Growing up with Bonnie, so tuned into her he could tell her mood from the colour of her clothes, he has never come to terms with losing this whole female element in his life. He misses it, yet repeatedly, whenever he has a girlfriend and they get to the stage of beginning to share intimacy, he begins to absent himself – cutting off from the very thing he longs for just as it is presented to him.

Not that there is any intimacy on offer here with Grace Hart. It's absurd to think there might be, but it's impossible not to dream. He is drawn back to the photograph. Better to keep it light. Look how lovely her eyes are, even appearing as they do here, slightly cross eyed. Ryder doesn't need the picture to remember they are beautiful, he has seen them in his dreams. So many times afterwards he wondered what might have happened if he had stayed. Walking into the gallery with Grace had fazed him. A crowd parted and then swarmed over them and Grace was taken from his side, passed on a chain of handshakes to a smooth-looking American businessman with eyes like a lizard and hair receding down the back of his head.
Grace stretched a hand back to him and he came to join her, but even though she introduced him, there was an insularity, like blobs of mercury sticking to themselves, that repulsed all hope of Ryder melting into the flow. He didn't know this world, he didn't know Grace, and he had nothing to contribute save his presence on this occasion. Jerome Michaels had his hand on Grace's back within seconds of meeting her, a big gold watch glinted from beneath the cuff of a pristine shirt, and the aura of money and power which surrounded him was as strong as the scent of a dog fox marking his territory. It was astonishing to think that this girl, who had been trembling in the cold on the harbour wall on her own, and who seemed as free as the moonlight dancing on the dark water, was big business for the City suits prowling possessively around her.

Ryder walked around the gallery alone. The pictures surprised him, not that he knew what he was expecting; they were so big and expressive. Ryder longed to pull Grace away from the American now resting a tanned hand on her shoulder so that she could tell him about her pictures. Without her he had no language to interpret them, and he felt pride in her that she had done all this. There was no hope of looking at them with Grace, however, and after half an hour, during which he watched her work for the gallery owner, Ryder accepted that the spark they had made outside together had burned out and he must go. He whispered goodbye as she was led to a chair to give an interview, and their eyes met in a moment he
had recalled a hundred times, including now, as he stands in the taxi queue waiting to leave the airport.

Her eyes were beautiful, her skin was smooth. He can even remember the feel of her body, though he had only touched the small of her back through her dress. Otherwise all of the sense he had of her was from his other senses. Now, though, he is able to conjure the feeling of her with incredible urgency. Extraordinary urgency. Quick, better think of something else to stop the excitement, he thinks. It's definitely perverted to be in transit getting a hard-on about a green-faced person in a group photo with the bloody Queen of Denmark. The caption reads:

The unveiling of the new picture wing of the National Gallery took place in the presence of Queen Margrethe last night. The Lord Mayor played host to international artists including Njenst Dinnisk, Luis de Corliune and Grace Hart, at thirty-two the youngest living artist to have work in the Danish National Collection.

Ryder looks at his watch. There should be enough time, it will be open for another hour. He gets into a taxi.

‘National Gallery please,' he says, and blood is rushing, drumming in his head with the loud pulse of his heart.

Later, with the key poised to let himself into Cara's apartment, he changes his mind and rings the bell. It's not that he has met someone else, for of course he
has not, he has only seen her, but Ryder, with a poignant sadness, knows that he and Cara have reached the point where it should either go further or end. His work in Denmark is over.

Cara lets him in. She is wearing a long green skirt and her hair glows in a pool of light from the sitting room.

‘You didn't use your key?'

‘No, it's here.' He puts it on the table in the hall. Cara looks at it silently. The apartment smells of a smoky incense that clings to Ryder's throat. He sits opposite her on a low chair, and in the faraway look in her eyes he sees that she has moved on too. He looks around the cluttered familiar space, wondering whether to speak first, wondering whether he is making a mistake, the usual mistake. But maybe it has never been a mistake, maybe it is just that he has not met the person to share his dreams and realities with.

‘How have you been?' Cara pours him a drink. She is wearing lipstick and a different scent.

‘Oh good, thanks,' Ryder replies, stilted in his manner with his glass, stilted in his voice. He rubs his hands through his hair and moves over next to Cara, putting his arms around her, resting his chin on the top of her head. Two candles have burned low on the mantelpiece and a blue scarf hangs off a chair, forming a pool on the floorboards.

‘I know,' she says.

He squeezes her tight for a moment. ‘I know you do, I could tell when I walked in. I am sorry, I suppose
I never thought about what might happen between us when the work here ended.'

Cara wriggles away from him to reach for her drink.

‘Oh come on,' she says gently, ‘it's been nice, you and me, but we were never going to end up together.'

Relief and sadness hang in the air between them. ‘I suppose I'm wishing we had known that from the beginning,' he says.

Cara stands up, and in a flashing moment Ryder realises she is going out and her actions are tinged with impatience. This makes it easier. Logs crackle in the wood-burning stove, and one cracks loudly. Cara throws her lighted cigarette into the fire.

‘I've got to go, I'm meeting someone.'

Ryder gets up and hugs her. ‘I'm sorry,' he says.

‘Don't be,' she replies. ‘Be glad we are friends and let's keep in touch.'

She crouches to stoke up the fire and they walk out of the apartment together.

In the street Ryder hails a taxi. He can hardly look at Cara because he is experiencing such an odd, weightless sensation. She stands next to him, delving in her handbag for her car keys. Ryder turns to kiss her goodbye, and, wanting to make a ritual of their parting, he suddenly remembers something he learned for an exam.

‘You never knowingly do anything for the last time without a certain sadness of the heart,' he quotes.

Cara looks surprised as she considers for a moment. ‘What?' she says.

The taxi purrs next to them, the words tumble out of Ryder: ‘It's Oscar Wilde, and it's true. The idea
that this is the last time I'll see you makes my skin crawl with sadness.'

Cara laughs and pushes him towards the taxi. ‘Let's make sure it isn't, then. I will call you when I come to London.'

‘Yes, but you never do.'

And he is in the cab looking round at Cara in the street. She waves her hand and walks towards her car. Shame leaps inside him as he watches her vanish from his sight because just as he never made the effort to learn to speak her language, so too he never made the leap or whatever it took to love her. And it feels like all he ever does is say goodbye to anyone his heart is touched by. Almost swept away by self pity, Ryder is stopped in his tracks as he realises the taxi is still stationary outside Cara's apartment block. Where is he going? He has no idea. Back to the airport is the best idea, but he has the meeting tomorrow morning in town. That's why he is here. Sitting outside this apartment is freaking him out. The empty street hits a spot of desolation very deep in his heart and Ryder taps the driver on the shoulder and gives the name of a hotel he has often had business meetings in.

The reception desk is a pale green slab of glass which reminds Ryder of Grace's paintings. Thinking of Grace at the same time as thinking of Cara is utterly exhausting. Actually, thinking of anyone is too much right now. Ryder opens the door of his room by pressing his hand flat on to an infrared pad, and enters. The room has soft grey walls and a carpet the colour of damsons. Glass surfaces appear to float without
support near the walls; two on either side of the bed form little tables and another, positioned to the side of the window, is clearly a desk. On top of it is a cream-coloured telephone and a vase containing one twig. It does not even have a bud on it. Worn out, Ryder throws himself down on the bed, flat on his face, arms spread wide, surrendered. Stroking the silk shimmer of the bedspread, he wonders why the fuck he is alone. ‘How does this keep happening whenever I am with someone? I want to be with someone, but when I am, I end up leaving. How can I change that?' he says aloud.