COLETTE: What happened?
ALISON: Catherine and Nicky Scott would come in, they hadn’t got jobs, they were on the social. When he saw them, Morris would start fiddling around with the contraceptives. Taking them out of their packets and strewing them around. Blowing them up like balloons. Naturally they thought it was me. They thought it was the sort of thing a sixteen-year-old would do—you know, have her mates in and have a laugh. So that was that. Then Mrs. Etchells got me a job at a cake shop.
COLETTE: And what happened there?
ALISON: I started eating the cakes.
When Alison decided to change her name she rang up her mother in Bracknell to ask if she would be offended. Emmie sighed. She sounded frayed and far away. “I can’t think what would be a good name in your line of country,” she said.
“Where are you?” Alison said. “You’re fading away.”
“In the kitchen,” said Emmie. “It’s the cigs, I can’t seem to give up no matter what. Do my voice in.”
“I’m glad I don’t smoke,” Alison said. “It wouldn’t be very professional.”
“Huh. Professional,” said Emmie. “You, a professional. That’s a laugh.”
Alison thought, I may as well change the whole thing while I’m about it. I don’t have to stick with any part of my old self. She went to a bookshop and bought one of those books for naming babies.
“Congratulations,” said the woman behind the till.
Alison smoothed down the front of her dress. “I’m not, actually,” she said. Sonia Hart. Melissa Hart. Susanna Hart. It didn’t work. She managed to lose Cheetham, but her baptismal name kept sliding back into her life. It was part of her, like Morris was.
Over the next few years she had to get used to life with Morris. When her mum went off to Bracknell she made it clear she didn’t want a daughter trailing after her, so Al got a temporary billet with Mrs. Etchells. Morris no longer stopped at the gate. He came inside and exploded the lightbulbs, and disarranged Mrs. Etchell’s china cabinet. “He is a one!” said Mrs. Etchells.
It was only when she got older and moved among a different set of psychics that she realized how vulgar and stupid Morris really was. Other mediums have spirit guides with a bit more about them—dignified impassive medicine men or ancient Persian sages—but she had this grizzled grinning apparition in a bookmaker’s checked jacket, and suede shoes with bald toe caps. A typical communication from Sett or Oz or Running Deer would be, “The way to open the heart is to release yourself from expectation.” But a typical communication from Morris would be: “Oh, pickled beetroot, I like a nice bit of pickled beetroot. Make a nice sandwich out of pickled beetroot!”
At first she thought that by an effort of will and concentration, she would make him keep his distance. But if she resists Morris, there is a buildup of pressure in her cheekbones and her teeth. There is a crawling feeling inside her spine, which is like slow torture; sooner or later you have to give in, and listen to what he’s saying.
On days when she really needs a break she tries to imagine a big lid, banging down on him. It works for a time. His voice booms, hollow and incomprehensible, inside a huge metal tub. For a while she doesn’t have to take any notice of him. Then, little by little, an inch at a time, he begins to raise the lid.
five
It was in the week after Diana’s death that Colette felt she got to know Alison properly. It seems another era now, another world: before the millennium, before the Queen’s Jubilee, before the Twin Towers burned.
Colette had moved into Al’s flat in Wexham, which Alison had described to her as “the nice part of Slough,” though, she added, “most people don’t think Slough has a nice part.”
On the day she moved in, she took a taxi from the station. The driver was young, dark, smiling, and spry. He tried to catch her eye through the rearview mirror, from which dangled a string of prayer beads. Her eyes darted away. She was not prejudiced, but. Inside the cab was an eye-watering reek of air freshener.
They drove out of town, always uphill. He seemed to know where he was going. Once Slough was left behind, it seemed to her they were travelling to nowhere. The houses ran out. She saw fields, put to no particular use. They were not farms, she supposed. There were not, for instance, crops in the fields. Here and there, a pony grazed. There were structures for the pony to jump over; there were hedgerows. She saw the sprawl of buildings from a hospital, Wexham Park. Some squat quaint cottages fronted the road. For a moment, she worried; did Al live in the country? She had not said anything about the country. But before she could really get her worrying under way, the driver swerved into the gravel drive of a small neat seventies-built apartment block, set well back from the road. Its shrubberies were clipped and tame; it looked reassuringly suburban. She stepped out. The driver opened the boot and lugged out her two suitcases. She gazed up at the front of the building. Did Al live here, looking out over the road? Or would she face the back? For a moment she struck herself as a figure of pathos. She was a brave young woman on the threshold of a new life. Why is that sad? she wondered. Her eyes fell on the suitcases. That is why; because I can carry all I own. Or the taxi driver can.
She paid him. She asked for a receipt. Her mind was already moving ahead, to Al’s accounts, her business expenses. The first thing I shall do, she thought, is bump up her prices. Why should people expect a conversation with the dead for the price of a bottle of wine and a family-size pizza?
The driver ripped a blank off the top of his pad, and offered it to her, bowing. “Could you fill it in?” she said. “Signed and dated.”
“Of what amount shall I put?”
“Just the figure on the meter.”
“Home sweet home?”
“I’m visiting a friend.”
He handed back the slip of paper, with an extra blank receipt beneath. Cabman’s flirtation; she handed back the blank.
“These flats, two-bedroom?”
“I think so.”
“En suite? How much you’ve paid for yours?”
Is this what passes for multicultural exchange? she wondered. Not that she was prejudiced. At least it’s to the point. “I told you, I don’t live here.”
He shrugged, smiled. “You have a business card?”
“No.” Has Alison got one? Do psychics have cards? She thought, it will be uphill work, dragging her into the business world.
“I can drive you at any time,” the man said. “Just call this number.”
He passed over his own card. She squinted at it. God, she thought, I’ll need glasses soon. Several numbers were crossed out in blue ink and a mobile number written in. “Cell phone,” he said. “You can just try me day or night.”
He left her at the door, drove away. She glanced up again. I hope there’s room for me, she thought. I shall have to be very neat. But then, I am. Was Alison looking down, watching her arrive? No, she wouldn’t need to look out of the window. If someone arrived she would just know.
Al’s flat was at the back, it turned out. She was ready with the door open. “I thought you’d be waiting,” Colette said.
Alison blushed faintly. “I have very sharp earsight. I mean, hearing—well, the whole package.” Yet there was nothing sharp about her. Soft and smiling, she seemed to have no edges. She reached out for Colette and pulled her resistant frame against her own. “I hope you’ll be happy. Do you think you can be happy? Come in. It’s bigger than you’d think.”
She glanced around the interior. Everything low, squarish, beige. Everything light, safe. “All the kit’s in the hall cupboard,” Al said. “The crystals and whatnots.”
“Is it okay to keep it in there?”
“It’s better in the dark. Tea, coffee?”
Colette asked for herbal tea. No more meat, she thought, or cakes. She wanted to be pure.
While she was unpacking, Al brought in a green soupy beverage in a white china mug. “I didn’t know how you liked it,” she said, “so I left the bag in.” She took the
cup carefully, her fingertips touching Al’s. Al smiled. She clicked the door shut, left her to herself.
The bed was made up, a double bed. Big bouncy duvet in a plain cream cover. She turned the duvet back. The sheet was crisply ironed. High standards: good. She’d seen enough squalor. She picked up her wash bag. Found herself in Al’s bathroom—Al hovering and saying, rather guilty, just push up my things and put yours down—shall I leave you to do that? Another tea?
She stared around. Floris, indeed. Is she rich or just in need of a great deal of comfort? It’s better than we had, she thinks, me and Gavin. She thought of their second-floor conversion, with the clanking and erratic central heating, the sudden icy draughts.
“Come through. Make yourself at home.” There were two sofas, square and tweedy; Al flopped onto one, a stack of glossies beside her, and indicated that Colette should join her. “I thought you might like to look at my advert.” She picked up one of the magazines. “Flick through from the back and you’ll see me.”
She turned back, past the horoscopes. For once she didn’t pause to glance at her own. Why keep a dog and bark yourself? Alison’s photograph was a beaming smudge on the page.
Alison, psychic since birth. Private consultations. Professional and caring. Relationships, business, health. Spiritual guidance.
“Are people willing to travel to Slough?”
“Once you explain to them it’s the nice part. I do telephone consultations, if need be, though given a choice I like to look the sitter in the eye.”
“Videophones,” Colette said. “Can’t be long now. It will make all the difference.”
“I can travel to them, if the price is right. I will if I think it’s going to be a long-term arrangement. I rely on my regulars, it’s where most of my income is. Do you think it’s all right, the ad?”
“No. It should be in colour. And bigger. We have to invest.” Above it was a listing for cosmetic surgery, displaying BEFORE and AFTER pictures. There was a woman with a sagging jawline who looked, in the second picture, as if she’d been slapped under the chin by a giant. A woman with skin flaps for breasts had sprouted two vast globules; their nipples stood out like the whistles on a life jacket. Below the pictures—
Alison bounced across the sofa towards her, causing the frame to creak. “Surprisingly sleazy, these journals,” Al said. She laid her long painted nail on an advert for Sex Advice, with a number to call after each item. “Lesbian anal fun. Did you know lesbians had anal fun?”
“No,” Colette said, in a voice as distant as she could manage. Al’s scent washed over her in a great wave of sweetness. “I don’t know, I mean, I’ve never thought. I don’t know anything about it.”
“Neither do I,” Al said. Colette thought, Spicy lesbo chicks. Al patted her shoulder; she froze. “That was not fun,” Al said. “That was reassurance.” She dropped her head and her hair slid forward, hiding her smile. “I just thought we’d get the topic out of the way. So we both know where we stand.”
The room had magnolia walls, corded beige carpet, a coffee table that was simply a low featureless expanse of pale wood. But Al kept her tarot cards in a sea-grass basket, wrapped in a yard of scarlet silk, and when she unwrapped and spilled its length onto the table, it looked as if some bloody incident had occurred.
August. She woke: Al stood in the door of her room. The landing light was on. Colette sat up. “What time is it? Al? What’s the matter, has something happened?”
The light shone through Al’s lawn nightdress, illuminating her huge thighs. “We must get ready,” she said: as if they were catching an early flight. She approached and stood by the bed.
Colette reached up and took her sleeve. It was a pinch of nothingness between her fingers.
“It’s Diana,” Al said. “Dead.”
Always, Colette would say later, she would remember the shiver that ran through her: like a cold electric current, like an eel.
Al gave a snort of jeering laughter. “Or as we say, passed.”
“Suicide?”
“Or accident. She won’t tell me. Teasing to the last,” Al said. “Though probably not quite the last. From our point of view.”
Colette jumped out of bed. She pulled her T-shirt down over her thighs. Then she stood and stared at Alison; she didn’t know what else to do. Al turned and went downstairs, pausing to turn up the central heating. Colette ran after her.
“I’m sure it will be clearer,” Al said, “when it actually happens.”
“What do you mean? You mean it hasn’t happened yet?” Colette ran a hand through her hair, and it stood up, a pale fuzzy halo. “Al, we must do something!”
“Like?”
“Warn somebody! Call the police! Telephone the queen?”
Al raised a hand. “Quiet, please. She’s getting in the car. She’s putting her seat belt—no, no, she isn’t. They’re larking about. Not a care in the world. Why are they going that way? Dear, dear, they’re all over the road!”
Alison tumbled to the sofa, moaning and holding her chest.
“No use waiting around,” she said, breaking off, and speaking in a surprisingly normal voice. “We won’t hear from her again for a while.”
“What can I do?” Colette said.
“You can make me some hot milk, and give me two paracetamol.”
Colette went into the kitchen. The fridge breathed out at her a wet cold breath. She spilled the milk as she poured it in the pan, and the gas ring’s flame sputtered and licked. She carried it through to Al. “Oh, the pills, I forgot the pills!”
“Never mind,” Al said.
“No, wait, sit still, I’ll get them.”
Al looked at her, faintly reproachful. “We’re now waiting for the emergency services. We’re slightly beyond the paracetomol stage.”
Things happen fast, in the lawless country between life and death. Colette wandered up the stairs. She felt de trop. Her feet were everywhere: weaving, bony, aimless. What shall I do? Back in her bedroom, she tugged the cover back over her bed, for tidiness. She pulled a sweatshirt on; she sat down on the bed and pinched her thin white legs, looking for cellulite. There was a muffled cry from below, but she didn’t think she ought to interfere. I suppose this is where people smoke a cigarette, she thought; but she’d been trying to give up. By and by she stabbed her new PC into life. She had it in mind to prepare a series of invoices that would take advantage of the event. Whatever it was.
Only later, when she thought it over, did she realize that she had never doubted Alison’s word. It was true that from Al the news arrived piecemeal, but it was more exciting that way. In time the radio, placed beside her, brought the confirming details. The event, in the real world, had actually taken place; she stopped typing and sat listening: lights, a tunnel, impact, lights, a tunnel, black, and then something beyond it—a hiatus, and one final, blinding light. By dawn, her mood was one of shock and unholy exhilaration, combined with a bubbling self-righteousness. What did she expect, a girl like Diana? There was something so right about it, so meant. It had turned out so beautifully badly.
She dived downstairs to check on Alison, who was now rocking herself and groaning. She asked if she wanted the radio, but Al shook her head without speaking. She ran back to catch the latest details. The computer was humming and whirring, making from time to time its little sighs, as if deep within its operating system the princess was gurgling out her story. Colette laid her palm on it, anxious; she was afraid it was overheating. I’ll do a shut-down, she thought. When she went downstairs Al seemed entranced, her eyes on some unfolding scene Colette could only imagine. Her milk was untouched, standing beside her with a skin on it. It was a mild night, but her bare feet were blue.
“Why don’t you go back to bed, Al? It’s Sunday. Nobody’s going to call yet.”
“Where’s Morris? Still out from last night? Thank God for that.”
You can just imagine the sort of inappropriate joke Morris would be making, at this solemn time. Colette snigge
red to herself. She got Alison wrapped up in her dressing gown, and draped over her bulk the raspberry mohair throw. She made a hot-water bottle; she piled a duvet on top of her, but she couldn’t stop Al shivering. Over the next hour her face drained of colour. Her eyes seemed to shrink back in her skull. She pitched and tossed and threatened to roll off the sofa. She seemed to be talking, under her breath, to people Colette couldn’t see.
Colette’s exhilaration turned to fright. She had only known Al a matter of weeks, and now this crisis was thrust upon them. Colette imagined herself trying to heave Al up from the floor, hands under her armpits. It wouldn’t work. She’d have to call for an ambulance. What if she had to resuscitate her? Would they get there in time? “You’d be better off in bed,” she pleaded.
From cold, Al passed into a fever. She pushed off the duvet. The hot-water bottle fell to the carpet with a fat plop. Inside her nightgown, Al shook like a blancmange.
By eight o’clock the phone was ringing. It was the first of Al’s regulars, wanting messages. Eyes still half closed, Al levered herself up off the sofa and took the receiver from Colette’s hand. Colette hissed at her “special rate, special rate.”
No, Al said, no direct communication yet from the princess, not since the event—but I would expect her to make every effort to come through, once she gathers her wits. If you want an appointment next week I can try to squeeze you in. Fine. Will do. She put the phone down, and at once it rang again. “Mandy?” She mouthed at Colette, Mandy Coughlan from Hove. You know: Natasha. Yes, she said, and oh, terrible. Mandy spoke.
Al said, “Well, I think in transition, don’t you? I shouldn’t think at this stage she does, no. Probably not.”