At Greenacres, I’m often the last in this world to touch a person, and it’s as if their spirit haunts my fingers. I have to find a way to release them through writing. After work, I go home and scribble out ideas for stories, writing those lost souls back into existence as brand-new characters. Maybe that’s it – maybe that’s my talent. I want to believe it.
TWO
Sam, March 1983
A sea breeze salts the morning air, tugging at his hair. Sam wishes it would blow away the clatter and beep of slot machines. There’s a smell of coffee coming from somewhere, making him realise he hasn’t eaten since lunch yesterday. People around him all seem to be chewing bagels, or munching salt-water taffy out of paper bags. His mouth waters. He puts his guitar down carefully, unhitches the rucksack from his shoulders, letting it drop onto the boardwalk with a grunt. The weight has got lighter with each week he’s been travelling, but it’s still vertebra-crushingly heavy. According to his guidebook, there’s a hostel not far away. He takes the map from his pocket and presses it flat with his palm; the place is within walking distance.
He’s calculating just how much he has left to spend on food when a couple stop to ask if he’ll take a snap of them; they pose beside a neon casino advert shaped like a huge dollar sign. He aims the camera at their shiny smiles, directing them to stand closer.
After they’ve gone, he hoists his rucksack up, adjusting the angle of his body to balance out the familiar weight.
He’s lucky, one bed left. A bottom bunk. He asks the woman at the front desk of the hostel what the local attractions are, and where he should go to get a flavour of the city. His stomach rumbles as he says the word ‘flavour’. She admires her painted fingernails. ‘Just stick to the boardwalk,’ she says in a bored voice. ‘Don’t go past Atlantic Avenue. Not if you wanna keep your watch and your billfold.’
The dormitory is empty apart from a young man in Y-fronts doing press-ups in the middle of the room. Sam puts his guitar case on his bed. Sleeping in communal rooms is a bit like going back to his boarding school days, long over. Waking to find himself in a tiny bunk with someone else snoring close by came as a shock after the privacy of his airy flat in Barnsbury, the comfort of his and Lucinda’s double bed with its Egyptian cotton sheets. But he’s got used to travelling on a tight budget; he’s even come to like it, because it means he appreciates luxury all the more on the odd occasions he has it, and because having limited means forces him to use his imagination.
The young man doing press-ups gets to his feet with a grunt. He glances at Sam. ‘One hundred, every day.’ He smiles a little self-consciously, inclining his head in greeting, ‘Levi Hansma.’
‘Sam,’ Sam says, craning his neck to look up. ‘Sam Sage.’
‘Sam Sage,’ Levi repeats, exaggerating the hissing sounds. ‘Nice name, buddy.’
‘Your English is good. You’re German?’
‘Dutch. Are you here for the gambling?’
‘No. Just passing through,’ Sam says. ‘Leaving tomorrow. Planning on visiting Miami, then New Orleans.’
Levi pulls on a pair of jeans, shrugging his head through a checked shirt without undoing the buttons. ‘We’re here for the casinos. There’s three of us. You want to join us tonight?’
Sam is tempted. He likes Levi’s big, open face, his straightforward friendliness. He imagines Levi’s companions will be similar amiable blonde giants. He’s missed male camaraderie, his friend Ben and his constant banter, taking the mickey out of everything. But he shakes his head. ‘I’ve got no money left. Nearly at the end of my visa. Just three weeks left.’ He sits on his bunk. ‘I’ve been in the wilderness. Haven’t slept in a bed for a while.’
‘You’re a musician?’ Levi nods at the guitar.
Sam pauses. ‘Yeah,’ he says. He sits up straighter. ‘I am.’ He opens the case and puts his hand on his acoustic instrument, pats it affectionately.
‘Cool. We were in a bar last night. The music was good,’ Levi says. ‘It was on Pacific Avenue.’ He frowns. ‘What was the name …’ He holds up a finger. ‘Ally’s. That was it. Not far from here. It was like, um, rock music? Live. It was good.’
‘If it’s free entry, I might give it a try,’ Sam says. Then he sniffs his underarms and rolls his eyes. ‘Think I’d better take a shower before I eat something. I’ve gone feral the last few weeks.’
‘Feral?’ Levi raises his eyebrows. ‘I don’t know this word.’
Sam grins. ‘Wild.’
Levi opens his mouth in an ‘ah’ of understanding. ‘Communal showers down the corridor. Hot-dog stand on the corner of the street.’ He gives Sam a thumbs-up. ‘See you later.’
The shower room is deserted. There’s a public swimming pool smell of feet and disinfectant, and the drip of a leaky shower head. Sam steps out of his well-worn jeans, dropping his black sweatshirt onto the tiled floor, kicking off his trainers. He stands under the stream of water, letting it hit his scalp, his sore shoulders, the base of his neck.
He looks down at the scum of water running down his skin, his gaze falling on his new tattoo. He grimaces. Lucinda will hate it. The thought gives him a familiar twist of guilt; he needs to find a phone booth. He promised he’d be in touch every week. He knows each time he rings that she’s hoping he’s ready to return to their life together. Ever since they started to date in their last year at Oxford, Lucinda always had grand plans – for going to London and applying for their first jobs, for moving in together, for decorating their new flat, and now for him to rise to partner in the law firm he works for. He’s tried to explain that he doesn’t want that. But she won’t listen. He dreads their stilted conversation, pauses magnified through the crackle of the long-distance wire.
THREE
Cat, March 1983
I’m still a rookie at the funeral business. The young ones are especially hard. ‘No sense in taking on their grief, isn’t room enough in your heart for it all,’ Ray tells me. But unlike him, I haven’t spent forty years adjusting to the matter-of-factness of death.
After work, I take the jitney to Maryland Avenue, heading for my favourite bench on the boardwalk. I like to spend a few minutes sitting there, looking out at the ocean. It makes me feel better.
Get out in the evenings, Frank keeps telling me. You got to live a little. I want to do exactly that: find a drink in a bar, loud music, the rowdy press of other living humans at my elbows. I long for the casual touch of someone’s hand on my shoulder, to share a joke or two. The only people I know here are Ray and my boss, Eunice. Neither of them is going to be my drinking companion. And much as I know Frank would love to oblige, circumstances mean he can’t.
I walk down the steps onto the beach. At the edge of the surf, I slip off my shoes and sit on the cold sand, wiggling my toes so that my feet are half submerged.
‘Wanna get a drink with me?’ I ask a nearby seagull, and he fixes me with a sceptical eye, flaps his great wings and takes off over the blue. ‘Well, I was only asking,’ I murmur, wrapping my arms around my knees.