"Christ, 'bout time you turned up. Thought you were dead as well."



     Sylvie's words were flat-- to the point. They were not calm so much as they were drained of emotion-- all of which had obviously been cried out through her small gray eyes. She held the door to my parent's home opened but stood before the gap to dissuade entry. Under different circumstances the scene would've seemed comical. Sylvie was a tiny woman (the top of her head barely grazed my chin) with dark blond bobbed hair and hipster fashion. Nothing about her was the least bit threatening to anyone.
     "You wouldn't be so lucky," I told her as I leaned in for a hug. I kissed her on the cheek.
     "You look terrible," Sylvie said, "Need a shave and your hair smells."
     "You're lovely as ever." She looked over my shoulder.
     "Who's that?" She asked.
     "That's Nin," I answered.
     "Hello," Nin greeted.
     "Hello," Sylvie replied then shot me a look of questioning.
     "She's a friend," I said.
     "Uh-huh," Sylvie responded with a nod and disbelief. "Your mum's been asking for you."
     I felt a slight heart ache. Guilty, maybe.
     "Yes. I suppose she would do." 
     "She's in the kitchen. You should go in and see her. I'll see if we can't get your friend settled into a room." 
     "Nin can stay in my room." 
     "That's where I was going to put her." 
     "I'll sleep on the floor or the sofa..." 
     "Sure you will."


     I rolled my eyes at the insinuation. Not that her accusations were unjustified. My lack of care to conceal my indiscretions had earned me a reputation. Sylvie had no reason to believe that Nin was a special case because there had never been a special case before her.


     "Come with me, Nin," Sylvie instructed, "I'll show you to the room you'll be staying in. Please forgive my manners. I'm not normally so terrible." 
     "You aren't being terrible," Nin was quick to comfort, "The circumstances are most forgivable." 
     "They shouldn't have to be. Where on Earth did you get that accent? Certainly not from around here." 
     Nin self-consciously smiled, "The States." 
     Sylvie slid me another look then attempted to give Nin a warm welcoming expression. 
     "What brings you so far from home?" 
     "I'd never been overseas before and always wanted to visit. Lee is one of my best friends."


     I was amazed at how two honest statements that had nothing to do with each other could be put together to lead people to believe something less than the truth. I was almost proud of Nin; straight away she was making explanations easier by failing to explain anything at all.


     Nin and Sylvie begun down the hall when I reached out and caught Sylvie by the elbow.


     "Sylvie, wait..." 
     She turned to me. 
     "How's mum?"I quietly asked. 
     The guard that Sylvie had been wearing appeared to slip away and she was overcome by an exhausted softness. 
     "Dunno. Sad. Distracted." 
     They begun to walk away again. Once again I caught Sylvie's elbow. 
     "Wait..." 
     She turned to me more alarmed this time then she had been the first. 
     "How are you?" I asked. 
     "It isn't real," Sylvie answered, "I'd seen it happen. I'd seen it and I'm still watching the door like he's gonna walk through it."


     I tried not to imagine her horror. I tried not to imagine having seen it.


     The girls walked down the hall and I had nothing to stop them with.


     There were a dozen people sat and stood about talking in my parents living room-- making it only about five people more than the room, itself, could comfortably contain. Every face was familiar in someway to me, yet, absolutely unrecognizable as having a name or identity, but each person acknowledged me with such certainty of who I was that I convinced myself it was impossible that I hadn't previously befriended them all. 
     I accepted handshakes and hugs-- pats on the back and condolences-- with the forced sympathetic stares from people who looked me in the eye and said my own name to me as though it meant more than it actually did or represented more than myself. 
     I never stopped walking, not even for a second, but I could swear that everyone in the room had touched me before I had reached the kitchen.


     My mother was stood at the sink, scrubbing the porcelain basin with powder cleanser and a brush. The scent of bleach and artificial lemon hung strong. It was warming. I inhaled deeply and enjoyed the sudden rush of light-headedness. 
     I looked at the table-- there amongst sandwiches, savory pies, fruit & cheese platters, crisps, crackers-- were no less than four different kinds of cakes, varying in sizes, shapes and colours. The flavours were probably different, as well, but I wasn't interested in sampling them to find out. 
     My mother caught sight of my reflection in the window above the sink. 
     "Lee," She gasped as though surprised to find me there then regained her composure. 
     "Hi Mum," My voice was soft and broken-- as small as a child's. At 28-years-old, I suddenly felt no taller than her narrow waist. 
     "Wasn't sure you were coming." 
     "Neither was I." 
     "I know at least that much about you, anymore." 
     I smirked. I knew she wasn't being completely serious. Truth be told, though, and despite myself, no one knew me better than my mother. This was disconcerting. I was up to a lot of things that no one's mother should know about, let alone my own, but mum had a bizarre intuition about me-- a psychic connection, so to speak. I could never figure out if it was because I was the first born or she was a clarvoyant but it seemed something that she could only do with me and no one else. 
     I was an almost exact replica of my mother. We had the same shade and fine texture of dark chestnut hair. The same clear milk white skin and lips so pink they were almost red like it looked as though we had been biting them even though we hadn't been biting them at all. The same teal blue eyes and delicate bone structure. We had the same sense of humour, same laugh, same manner of speech and hand gestures. We walked very similar. 
     A lot of people considered me to be "pretty", which, as a man, is the last thing that you want to hear. One would rather be "handsome" "rugged" but rarely ever "pretty". That's practically an insult. Sure it does okay by the girls but it doesn't win over a lot of friends. Men feel threatened by is for some reason though fuck all can be done about it. 
     I blamed my mother that I ended up "pretty". 
     Ian was a perfect balance of both our parents; making him more like our father in this respect-- making him "handsome".


     "See the cake has arrived," I commented as I sat at the table. I picked up a cracker, sniffed at it as a possibility for food, changed my mind about it and placed it back on the plate.   
     "Seen that," My mother scolded as she moved on to polishing the faucets, "Take it off the plate, Lee. You don't have to eat it." 
     I sheepishly did as I was told. I didn't feel like getting up to throw it in the bin so I put it in my jacket pocket, instead. 
     "Neighbours brought the cakes. Don't know how they had the time the bake them... who would want cake at a time like this?" She paused then muttered, "It's not his birthday." 
     She dropped the brush in the sink and held the back of her wrist to her forehead as if to wipe away perspiration. This was out of habit. I doubted she was sweating. 
     "You came with an American girl." 
     "I'd be quite interested to know who your news service is."  
     "Auntie Helena heard you talking to Sylvie." 
     Helena was my mother's eldest sister. She had seperated from her husband years before my birth but in her quest to remain bitter and suffer no warmth or emotional attachment to anyone she found that the only thing that brought any joy to her miserable life was gossip. She was the second most infamous gossip in the western world. 
     Worse than being a gossip; she was also a snitch. 
     When I was eleven she accused me of nicking cigarettes from her kitchen drawer. 
     Who keeps them in a drawer, anyhow, if they aren't want to share them? 
     When I was thirteen she told mum that she had found me drinking cider behind the off-license-- well, I certainly wasn't going to bring it home with me. 
     When I was fifteen, Helena's friend, Ruby, told her that their friend, Sharon, had seen me down at the pub. 
     I admit that my first mistake in the matter was having bought a drink for Sharon but she wasn't exactly a reputable source and at the time that I had seen her, I couldn't imagine her having had a recollection of anything at all. She had nice legs, though. 
     When I was sixteen, Helena accused me of taking drugs--well, yeah. No explanation for that 'sides fun, suppose. 
     "She's young," My mother continued, "The American girl." 
     "How would Helena know that from hearing the conversation?" 
     "She wouldn't. Rita had seen the girl in the hall." 
     Rita was my father's cousin and also thee most infamous gossip in the western world--though she gossiped more than Helena, there was one quite admirable trait to Rita-- she never once ratted me out, though she had been provided with plenty of opportunities to. 
     "Not that young, really. Twenty." 
     "Twenty?" 
     "Is twenty young?" 
     "It's younger than you. By a bit. By almost a third," She turned to face me. Her eyes met mine. Her eyes were the most familiar eyes that I knew. Not only did mine mirror hers but they were the first that I had ever looked into. 
     "Not that it matters, Lee. Twenty-eight to twenty. The difference seems big now but in five...ten years time, it turns into difference at all. It's because each of your numbers are small that the difference seems large, doesn't it?" 
     "I wouldn't call twenty-eight small. I've never known a larger number. A lot of people have it sorted by twenty-eight. You did." 
     "I was settled by twenty-eight-- not sorted. Things were different in those days." 
     "Those days?" 
     "Yes, those days and don't start in about how you're old because I'm older and I'm not ready yet," Her thought was caught on something else and at once I knew what it was, "I'm not ready, yet." 
     "Mum?" 
     "You're a good boy, Lee. Don't allow anyone to tell you different." 
     "Nin. That's the American girl." 
     "She's called Nin?" 
     "Hm-mm." 
     "That's nice." 
     "She's a nice girl." 
     "Is she..." 
     "No, only a friend. She's visiting and doesn't know anyone else." 
     "You couldn't have left her at yours under the circumstances." 
     "She wasn't at mine. She was at a hotel." 
     "Even still, it wouldn't be right to leave her in London... even if it is a funeral." 
     "You don't want an explanation, do you?" 
     "I wasn't particularly looking for one, no. I like the version that I've conjured up and can't imagine that your version would do anything 'sides spoil the innocence. I'm not in a state to take on additional information." 
     "I can assure you that it is innocent...or at least she is." 
     "That is reassuring." 
     "It's odd..." 
     "I'm intrigued." 
     "I'll spare you." 
     "At least for a... heavens, maybe I don't want to know-- have you eaten?" 
     I eyed a chocolate cake, conspicuously. 
     "No." 
     "I can't, either. Lee..." 
     I looked up at her. I watched as she struggled with her mouth to get it to form Ian's name. When her bottom lip quivered and the task became tiresome, she opted for a less trying grouping of words. 
     There was resignation in her new expression. 
     "Your father is in the garage. He'll want to see you." 
     "Cos you don't," I smiled at her to show it was in jest. 
     She smiled back her understanding. 
     "Not for the moment-- take two beers with you." 
     I opened the fridge. It was filled beyond capacity with elegantly wrapped sympathy edibles. I unearthed three bottles from within the cellophane and ribbons. I slid one bottle into my jacket pocket and held the other two between the fingers of my left hand. 
     "Should I bring him a tray of-- something?" 
     "Don't bother. He won't eat it--," She paused, "On second thought, take something just to get it out of the house." 
     "I'll conveniently leave it behind." 
     "I don't want to know-- oh, and Lee, don't leave your friend too long, it's impolite." 
     I pulled a tray from the fridge and closed the door. I gave mum a small nod and left the kitchen out the back.


     My father used to keep a bottle of scotch hidden behind a loose board beneath his work bench. I would steal sips from it until he got wise and started marking the label. There was never a word spoken between us about it. It was a silent understanding. No one was supposed to know that he had a bottle of scotch in the same way that no one was supposed to know that I had been drinking from it. 
     He also, at one point, had a tarnished silver trinket box of weed stashed with the scotch but once he figured out that I was hip to that-- he removed it all together. 
     I sometimes got the impression that my old man was a lot of fun in his younger days and that perhaps family life was something that he had been talked into but never fully adjusted to. 
     (I sometimes got the impression that I was something that happened behind a pub on a Saturday night-- though I couldn't be bothered to calculate my birth versus my parents' marriage). 
     Once in awhile, in the dead of night, when I was off my face and trying to sneak back into the house-- I would lean up against the outside wall of the garage for a rest and through the wall I could hear the muffled sounds of my dad playing his little old Gibson electric through a practice amp-- trying to keep up with the record-- trying to imitate all of John Fogerty's parts. 
     This time when I walked into the garage the bottle of scotch was in plain sight at my father's feet as he sat on a wooden box. He stared at the red Volvo sedan.


     "Hey dad."


     He brought the tumbler in his hand up to his mouth and drained the contents. He uncorked the bottle and fixed himself a healthy pour. 
     It was the quiet of this action-- that I knew that I hadn't been unheard but, rather, was being ignored-- that felt like vinegar against my teeth. It set me on edge. 
     I crept forward and set the tray of what looked to be cubed cheese beside the scotch. I placed the beers beside that and lastly, I pulled the pack of cigarettes from my pocket and balanced a few atop the bottle caps. 
     I twisted one between my lips and shuffled slowly backward before lighting it. 
     In all my life I had never seen my father severely drunk or cry-- and even as an adult the prospect of this being a possibility firghtened me. 
     I edged for the door knowing that the last place in the world that I wanted to be in for the moment was that garage with him-- when he reached into the breast pocket of his flannel jacket and withdrew a shiny black chrome rectangle. He held it above his shoulder as though offering it to me. 
     It was with great caution that I stretched toward it and slid the object from his hand. 
     The object was a-- mobile phone. 
     I flipped it open and for one solid second was genuinely puzzled to find a kissy faced photo of Sylvie as the background. 
     An awful cold rushed my body. 
     Frantic, I tapped the button below the left corner of the screen. The text message inbox appeared and the first name displayed was my own. 
     I gasped-- then failed to regain breath. 
     "Where was this?!" 
     My voice sounded like yelling against the silence. It pounded within my own head. 
     I turned the mobile over and over again in my hand studying it for a trace of blood, skin, dirt, hair or even a fingerprint but it came up clean. 
     "Where did this come from?!" 
     My father sipped his scotch. 
     "Are you giving this to me?!" 
     "His body--," My father started-- then stopped. 
     I knew at once what he was trying to tell me. It had nothing to do with the mobile or him having read my message to Ian-- he was trying to tell me that he was in the garage, away from people, silent and drunk because he had seen Ian's body. 
     I didn't want to hear anymore. 
     I turned from my father and left with haste. 
     I sprinted through the kitchen. 
     "Where's your father?" Mum asked. 
     "Uh-- working on the car." 
     I shook people from my limbs in the living room and by the time that I had reached what had once been my bedroom-- I had ran to get there. 
     "Nin, we have to go!" I burst through the door with a shout, "We have to get out of here! Every one is--." 
     I heard an unfamiliar sobbing. It was not Nin's weeping, as I had become quite accustomed to that in the last several hours, but the new crying made me starkly aware of my surroundings. 
     I saw Nin first. She was sat on the edge of the bed with her knees together and back straight. She was playing the strong. Her face was soft with sympathy. Her voice was, perhaps, the most soothing that I had ever known. 
     Then I noticed Sylvie-- she was the source of the sobbing. I could not see her face because it was buried in Nin's shoulder. Even with Nin's youth and almost fraility, Sylvie seemed so small. Nin had an arm wrapped around Sylvie's back and a hand at her blonde hair. 
     I wondered if this was what Nin and I looked like from the outside. 
     "Why?" Sylvie cried, "Why Ian?" 
     I couldn't decipher any of her other words. They were garbled in tears and muffled by Nin's neck. 
     Sylvie and Nin, in a strange way, suddenly had a lot in common. 
     Nin's eyes met mine and she noticed me. I passed her a look as though to tell her to pretend that she hadn't seen me in the first place. She seemed to understand because she focused her attention back to the top of Sylvie's head. 
     I backed out of the room and gently closed the door after me. 
     "I can't do this," I whispered to no one, "Please don't make me do this." 
     I leaned against the wall in the hallway. I closed my eyes for what seemed a second, just one, but saw spots behind the lids and felt an overwhelming exhaustion take my body. I struggled to open my eyes and couldn't-- my body slid down the wall and the last thing that I heard before I hit the floor was Rita call out--


     "Helena come quick! Lee's fainted!"