Читать книгу So Many Ways to Begin - Jon McGregor - Страница 20

When he made his first journey back to Aberdeen, five or six months after they’d met, they still hadn’t used the words boyfriend, or girlfriend, or going out, and there were a few awkward first hours where they realised how little they still knew of one another – taking a moment to recognise each other at the train station, standing a little way apart, avoiding eye contact and having no idea what to say. But eventually, helped along by a couple of beers and a gin, they stood at the end of the harbour, next to the coastguard’s tower, and dared to put their hands together, and to kiss, and it was a fierce, breathless, impatient kiss which lasted so long that the coastguards banged on the window and shouted at them, laughing and cheering. They walked quickly away to the end of the harbour wall, embarrassed, laughing, looking out at the calm bright sea, looking across the harbour mouth to the lighthouse and the half-ruined gun battery on the rocky knuckle of Girdleness, and the black cormorants standing along the jetty like a funeral party, waiting for whatever the next tide might bring. She pointed out her house, anonymous amongst the rows of stone-built terraces that climbed the low hill away from the shipyards, cut off from the rest of Aberdeen by the River Dee, and she pointed out the rooftops and towers of Union Street’s grand procession, and he smudged his thumb along her narrow eyebrows and kissed her again.

They walked back along the harbour wall, through the huddled rows of fishermen’s cottages and out on to the long unexpected sweep of beach which stretched for two miles or more up to the River Don. Everyone had their deckchairs turned away from the sea to face the sun, and as they held hands along the prom they felt as though they were on a stage. They walked past the ice-cream huts and candyfloss sellers and postcard stalls, and she told him how in winter the waves would race each other up the steps and over the refreshment huts, lunging landwards with the full weight of the North Sea rushing in behind. You should come back and see it then, she added.

They didn’t go to her house that first time. They walked back into town along the harbour road, through streets piled high with fish crates and ropes and chainlinks as fat and heavy as Brunel’s, wandering through the richer part of town to Duthie Park and the old Winter Gardens, scrambling down from a small station platform on to a recently abandoned railway line, hopping along the sleepers and make-believing they could follow the tracks all the way to America. My brother Hamish has been to America lots of times, she told him, once they’d given up and turned back towards the park. He’s in the merchant navy, she said proudly. Donald’s over to see him there next year; him and Ros are thinking about emigrating.

Have you ever thought about emigrating? he asked her lightly. Or going south at least? Slipping his arms around her waist and pulling her towards him, kissing her cheeks and her eyelids and her lips.

Aye, of course I have, she said indignantly, as if the very question was an insult.

Where would you go? he asked.

I don’t know, she said, kissing him back. Anywhere, she said. Away from here.

* * *

School’s the same as ever, it’s difficult and it’s not much fun but I’m going to stick it out, I’m going to get my Highers. Sometimes I think it’s my only chance. I do spend an awful lot of time in class just thinking about you though, and I’m looking forward to seeing you again soon. I suppose really it’s my turn to come see you, but I doubt my folks would let me do that. My da’s already asking after you, he says he wants to know when he’s going to get a chance to meet you! I told him it was nothing like that, but now I’m not so sure – what do you think?

Eleanor’s house was small, as all the houses were on that side of the harbour; gloomy inside, draughty and probably difficult to heat, but well built, with granite blocks from the local quarries, and solid enough to last a couple of centuries or more. There were two bedrooms upstairs, divided by a steep and narrow stairway, a small front room, a kitchen at the back of the house, a scullery and an outside toilet. Her parents didn’t own the house, but her grandfather had lived there as well, and his father before that, so the family history felt as though it was etched into the hard grey stone.

From just outside the house it was possible to look right down the street to the harbour, to the tall crooked cranes of the shipyards, the freighters unloading at the docks, the seagulls clouding and clamouring around the fishmarket on the end of the central pier. From just outside the house it was possible to hear what people were saying in the front room, or in the hallway, or, if they were talking loudly enough, in the kitchen. If there were more than a few people in the kitchen, as there were the first time David went there with Eleanor, it was possible to stand at the front door and hear them all raising their voices to make themselves heard over each other, laughing, banging on the table to get themselves some attention.

It was dark by the time they got there, that first time, finally braving an introduction on his third visit to Aberdeen. The light from the kitchen was shining out through the pane of glass over the front door and Eleanor hesitated before going in, listening. I don’t believe it, she whispered, it sounds like they’re all here. I’m sorry, she said. Her father, Stewart, came out into the hallway and greeted them loudly, shaking David’s hand and inviting him in to meet the rest of the family. It just so happens they were all passing, he said, and from the corner of his eye David could see Eleanor shaking her head as he came into the kitchen and was introduced to her mother, Ivy, her brothers, Donald, William and John, Donald’s wife, Ros, a couple of young children, and a great-uncle James sitting in the corner by the stove. There were bottles of beer out on the table, and the remains of a meal stacked up by the sink, and he was peppered with hellos and how-are-yous before he’d managed to get his bearings. He found himself answering questions about how far he’d come and what he was doing in these parts and what it was he did for a living back home, struggling to understand their flinted accents, and struggling to be understood in return – Eh? What’s that son? Say again? – one of them still asking him to repeat himself while another was asking him something new, all turning to each other and discussing what it was he might have said once they’d given up on asking him again.

It was a small room, mostly taken up with the big wooden table they were sitting around, the wood worn to a shine by the years of scouring and cleaning, the crumbs from the meal already wiped away. There weren’t enough chairs for all of them, so the younger men, Eleanor’s brothers, were standing along the back wall, in front of the window and the kitchen sink, blocking the door to the scullery and the backyard, looking him up and down and muttering remarks to each other.

Coventry? asked one of them suddenly, while David was trying to explain to Stewart about being from London originally but having left there as a small child. Is it Coventry where they make all the cars? David nodded.

You make cars then? he was asked.

No, he told them, no, I work in a museum.

There was an awkward pause, and then another brother said museum, eh? You’re no a geologist like our Eleanor reckons she’s going to be? David shook his head, smiling, and tried to make a joke about being involved with more recent history than the formation of the earth’s surface. There was another awkward pause and then the same brother said aye right, so what do you reckon then, is it true what Ellie says about there being oil under the sea? Great-uncle James, sitting in the corner, burst into a laugh that sounded more like a cough, and even Stewart smiled and shook his head. David didn’t know what to say.

It’s not just me, Eleanor protested, everyone’s saying it. Mr Read showed me the maps and everything.

Aye, said Donald, the oldest of the brothers there, and there’s a herd of camels going by outside just now. Eleanor tutted, and pretended to smile, and nudged David towards the door.

Well, we’ve got to get to the pictures, she said. We’re meeting Ruth and folk, we’d better get going.

What’s on? John asked. Lawrence of Arabia? Everyone in the room laughed, Great-uncle James slapping his hand against his knee, and Eleanor turning and pushing David ahead of her, and as they opened the front door he heard one of the men saying make sure he gets you home in plenty of time now, and another man saying oil be waiting up, and the hard-edged laughter followed them both as they hurried away down the hill.