This Isn't the Sort of Thing That Happens to Someone Like You Part 8

Song.

Grimsby.

Chinese restaurants, launderettes, baked-potato vans.

These are a few of my favourite extractor-fans.

I'll Buy You A Shovel.

Marshchapel.

We'd been sat there all evening listening to the music and the laughter come over across the fields and we'd run out of drink about when the sun went down. Ray kept looking over in the direction of the Stewart place and I knew what he was thinking but I wasn't about to say it for him. The two of us sat there looking into the fire and the pallet-wood kept cracking and spitting and we were waving off midges and all these shrieks of laughter kept coming across the fields.

f.u.c.k it, he says, in the end. Let's go, he says.

I went off and got the car started.

Just let me do the talking, he says.

We knew about the set-up they had over there. We'd been watching them bring it in all week. The marquee and the catering tent. The bar. The sound system and the dance-floor. The flowers and balloons and candles and drapes and linens and fancy chairs. Old man Stewart had been keeping himself busy driving around all week, off to town and back and who knows where else. Directing operations, was what he was probably calling it. The roads were hardly big enough for some of the stuff they'd been bringing in. On Thursday a furniture lorry had come past and stopped at the end of the road by the dead-end sign and spent about ten minutes trying to turn round. We sat outside the caravan and watched. Weren't enough room to turn a lorry round. The reversing alarm kept going on and off and the lorry kept edging backwards and forwards, trying to keep out of the ditch. They could probably have heard that reversing alarm as far down as the Sands. Jackie came down from her house to watch. It was a nice day. Hot, but with a bit of a breeze coming in off the sea. I offered Jackie my seat but she said not to bother. She asked how the ditch was going. Ray told her the ditch was going fine and did she want a smoke. Jackie looked up towards the hay meadow at the top end of the site and round at the fis.h.i.+ng lake and back down at us and just sort of didn't say anything. She didn't need to. We'd been there the best part of a month and we'd dug about six foot short of f.u.c.k-all. Ray did one of his sighs and stood up and told her again it was going fine. He said we were just waiting to get some advice on the soil hydrology and then we'd crack on. She looked at him. He looked at her right back. The reversing alarm from the furniture lorry chimed out across the fields. A Tornado went over and dropped a bomb on the Sands and vanished over the horizon in silence.

Jackie started speaking just as the noise of it caught up so neither of us heard a word she said. She turned and walked back to the house and looked up at the hay meadow again on her way. Waddled is more of the word. Not to put too fine a point on it. She's not what you'd call pet.i.te. She holds her weight like that. Ungainly, is a word you could use. We watched her go. I asked Ray what was he talking about soil hydrology, and he said to keep out of it. He went back in the caravan and shut the door and turned the radio on in there. The furniture lorry finally got turned round and came back along the road and stopped. The driver called down to ask if I knew where the Stewart place was and said something about b.l.o.o.d.y satnav. I climbed up the bank and pointed him back to the end of the road and told him it was down that way. Weren't a dead-end like the sign said, I told him, you can go through the farmyard and out the other side and the Stewart place is the second on the left. The look on his face. Thanks for letting me know, he said. I said not to mention it, and I went off and mucked about with stakes and string until I didn't think Jackie was looking out of the kitchen window of her house on the other side of the lake there any more. Pond is more like the word, with the size of it. But they're not going to get any customers for a fis.h.i.+ng pond, so they're calling it a lake. The furniture lorry drove past again and turned left through the farmyard at the end. Another Tornado went over and dropped a bomb on the Sands. The stakes and the string made a pretty nice line coming down from the hay meadow to the edge of the lake. Made it look like the job was near-enough halfway done.

Ray came out of the caravan. We took the short way across the fields to the Stewart place and watched the lorry driver unloading the chairs and tables and linens, and when old man Stewart came out of the house to sign for everything we cleared off back to the caravan again.

The fis.h.i.+ng lake was old man Stewart's. The lake and the land around it and the house where Jackie lived and the hay meadow and the three fields between here and the Stewart place. Also the pine plantation between the Stewart place and the Sands. Also possibly the caravan, although not even Jackie was sure about that and anyway it didn't seem like something he'd want to argue over. It had just always been there she'd told us, when we first moved in, and always seemed like about the right word. We were supposedly on-site security and maintenance, was the idea. We were there to provide a presence. Also to undertake certain unspecified maintenance tasks. Such as for the only example so far digging the ditch to provide drainage from the hay meadow into the lake. There wasn't really any money involved, but the situation suited us and I think it suited Jackie as well in terms of some kind of company and not having to be on her own all the time. But she said old man Stewart had started getting on the phone and asking what was he hearing about these new people on the site, meaning Ray and me. Jackie said it was he was unhappy about the progress but it was also probably due to he knew certain things about certain things which had occurred a great many years previous, certain things which Jackie also had a fair idea about but which she appeared to be putting in the category of now we deserved a second chance but which old man Stewart was apparently placing into quite a different category. Some people have very much longer memories than other people, is what it came down to.

The night before the wedding Jackie was sitting outside the caravan and telling us what she knew about the rest of the Stewarts. Most of the family had arrived that afternoon and most of them had needed to ask for directions, shouting something about b.l.o.o.d.y satnav down from the road and waving their phones around to try and get a signal. The family were all down south now, was what Jackie was telling us. Hadn't been up this way for years. Most of the crowd tomorrow will be from London, she said. That's where the groom's from. They're talking about it'll be near enough two hundred of them there. One of Jackie's cleaning jobs was at the Stewart place, was how come she knew all this. She started off naming names, like who was who in the Stewart clan, the ex-wife and the sons and the half-brothers and the nephews and nieces, but we weren't really listening. I was breaking up another pallet for the fire and Ray was either looking at the stars or else his head was back like that because he was asleep. We could hear most of the Stewarts out the back of their place, shouting and laughing. I asked Jackie how come with all these relations old man Stewart lived on his own and most of them couldn't even find their own way to the house. Ray said something about therein lay the tale. Without lifting up his head. He actually said therein. Me and Jackie just sort of looked at him, and tried not to laugh, and Ray sat up and rolled a smoke without offering one to anyone. Therein. Jackie asked me had I got the pallet from behind the caravan and I told her yes. She said she'd been planning on using those to make the fis.h.i.+ng jetties with. She said she'd told us that. Wasn't much I could say to that, with my foot halfway through the pallet and the fire spitting away like it was. I didn't know much about fis.h.i.+ng lakes but I thought it would probably take something better than pallets to build the jetties with. I told her well I was sorry about that but I was sure we could get some more. Ray lit his smoke and said we'd definitely get her some more no need to worry about that.

It wasn't like me or Ray knew enough about fis.h.i.+ng to build a fis.h.i.+ng lake. We were just there to do a few jobs. I'd never been fis.h.i.+ng in my life but I could see this pond wasn't up to much. It was full of green algae or something like that. She'd told us it needed cleaning up and some oxygenating plants putting in and we'd nodded like we knew what she was talking about. She'd said she was going to mainly stock it with roach and carp but she wanted it all fixed up first before she placed any orders. I couldn't see how that overgrown drainage ditch was ever going to support a living creature but I kept my mouth shut. Ray had said something about using barley-straw to freshen up the water and she'd looked impressed. Don't know where he got that. Could have picked it up from all the reading he'd done when he was working in the library.

When she said goodnight and set off walking back to her house on the other side of the lake Ray watched her and asked me if I would. I said he was joking I would. He shrugged. He said he might do only it would depend on the situation. He said something about gravity and big women and then he went off in the caravan and shut the door and turned the radio on in there.

I sat there with the moon s.h.i.+ning off the water and the bats t.w.a.tting silently about and the noise of all those Stewarts barking out across the fields like each of them was trying to be the last to stop laughing. The groom was probably sat outside another back door somewhere now, smoking a last cigarette and listening to all that and wondering what he was letting himself in for.

A Tornado went over and dropped a bomb on the Sands. First time they'd done it in the dark that I knew of. I felt the shadow of it first and like the weight of the heat of it, and then the noise came dragging behind like it always did but it seemed much louder in the dark and I covered my head with my arms until it had pa.s.sed. I heard shrieking from the Stewart place, and men laughing, and I got up and p.i.s.sed on the back wheel of Ray's car and went to bed.

Ray was a Muslim at one time. He converted when we were inside. You wouldn't have thought it to look at him. He never had the beard or the hat or anything but he took it very seriously. He changed his name to Abdul Wahid and went to the prayer-room five times a day with the other brothers and took down all the graven images from his cell. I asked him what he was going to do with them. He said it wasn't permitted for any man to make images of the human form which Allah has created or something, so I bought them off him for a SIM card and a pack of tobacco. They were pretty f.u.c.king graven. I asked him how come he'd turned Muslim all of a sudden and he said he'd heard the voice of Allah calling to him. I asked him was it just like that out of nowhere and he told me it was out of the blue. He'd been up all night doing press-ups and reading a translation of the Koran he'd got hold of from working in the library and he'd been fasting for three days just to see what it was like, but yes basically he had totally out of the blue heard the voice of Allah. Calling him by name, he said. I didn't ask whether the voice had called him Abdul Wahid or Ray. Turns out the voice of Allah didn't have much else to say so he just kept calling whichever name it was. Ray said it was like nothing else he'd ever heard. He said it was like a light going on inside his head. He said it was like being called home. Which I didn't think was something he would have been hankering after particularly but I didn't say as much. Maybe that's not what he meant. He told me the whole experience had left him feeling blessed. He said it about three times and I believed him even though right then we were standing in line waiting to slop out. But you could see it in his face, the way he felt about it. He asked me how I'd be able to resist if I'd heard the voice of Allah calling me home. I told him that's fair enough Ray, and good luck and all that. He said it wasn't Ray it was Abdul Wahid.

I'm not too sure how things worked out with the whole Muslim thing after that. He spent most of his time in the prayer-room or with the other brothers and I didn't really see him. There was word went round that he'd only converted because someone had been rinsing his gravy-boat and the best protection around was getting in with the brothers, but I don't know if that was true or what. I've never asked him. I got transferred a long while before either of us got out, and we lost touch after that. This was years ago we're talking. And when I saw him again at the start of the summer it seemed like he'd gone back to calling himself Ray. I wasn't sure, but he didn't look like he was feeling too blessed. He certainly weren't forswearing alcohol. Could be he was still a Muslim but he'd toned it down a bit. Could be that was what he was up to when he kept going back in the caravan and turning the radio on in there.

Someone at the Stewart place tested out the sound system first thing on the Sat.u.r.day morning. Nine am on the dot, like they'd purposely waited for what they thought was a respectable time. Didn't seem like a respectable time to me. Ray near enough punched a hole in the caravan wall. They played a few tunes and then they started talking on the microphone. Seemed like they didn't really know how loud it was or at least how far sound can travel around here. This was some of the younger Stewarts, it seemed like. Old man Stewart was probably already out somewhere, like straightening the cus.h.i.+ons on the church pews or something. They said a few things they obviously thought wouldn't carry as far as the church, and then there was a howl of feedback and a noise like the wrong plug being pulled out and it went quiet again. Ray got up and went outside and I heard him p.i.s.sing against the wheel of his car. He came back and got two cans of Guinness from the bag by the door and asked if I wanted some breakfast.

We sat by the lake and drank the cans and threw stones into the water. We could see a few cars pulled up outside the church already, three fields to the north. Old man Stewart's Range Rover was there. I asked Ray what he thought about the line I'd staked out for the ditch. He said it was the finest line of stakes he'd ever seen but I needn't think he was about to start digging anything at the weekend when we didn't even have the right tools anyway. I threw some more stones into the water. They made holes in the green algae and then the holes closed up. It happened pretty quickly and then it was like nothing had happened. I wasn't sure how Jackie thought she was going to get all that cleared up. A car pulled out from the farmyard at the end of the road and stopped. A woman got out and tied a sign and some balloons to a telegraph pole. We watched her. She got back in the car and drove along the road and stopped at the top of the bank and got out and tied some more balloons to the telegraph pole there. She looked about the right age to be the bride's mother, dressed in presumably her wedding outfit already. We waved but she didn't see us. Ray shouted h.e.l.lo and waved again and she looked down to where we were sitting. Ray asked if the balloons were to help people find their way to the wedding and she said they were. She was wearing a big wedding hat, and holding on to it like there was a wind blowing a gale. Ray told her that was a good idea, that it was easy to get lost round here even with the b.l.o.o.d.y satnav. She nodded and smiled and got back in the car and drove off. She drove along and stopped and got out and tied balloons to every telegraph pole between us and the church.

The weather was clear and still and already warm. It was a good day for a wedding, if you liked that sort of thing. I finished my Guinness and threw the can with the others in the ditch at the bottom of the bank and went and had a look around the lake. Ray asked was I going for some kind of leisurely stroll and I gave him the finger. I was wondering how many fis.h.i.+ng jetties would fit around the lake and how close you'd put them and how you'd get them to float. I was starting to think we might as well get on and do some of the jobs Jackie had talked about. Since we were here anyway. Might be good to feel like we were getting something done. She'd need some more pallets though.

A couple of vans drove past. They looked like they were from the catering company. Ray waved as they pa.s.sed but I didn't see anyone waving back. He got up and went in the caravan and came out with another couple of cans. Another van came past, from the off-licence in town. We didn't bother waving.

Late in the morning Jackie came down with a couple of plates of fried-egg sandwiches and said if we were going to be having that sort of a day we might as well get a lining in our stomachs. Meaning the drinking, it seemed like. She had this look on her face like she was indulging us. She said but Monday we'd have to get some work done otherwise old man Stewart would want to have words. She said it was still his land at the end of the day. She called him Mr Stewart. We didn't say anything. We ate the sandwiches. The yolks were soft and the whites were crisp round the edges. We both said they were good sandwiches. Jackie kept looking over towards the church. There were more people standing around outside, and balloons tied to the gateposts at the entrance to the field they were using for a car-park. We'd offered to help with that, earlier in the week, either with the rolling out or even with the like traffic control on the day, but old man Stewart had just looked at us like we weren't even there until we'd turned round and left. Jackie was wearing this sort of flowery orange dress and a straw hat and Ray asked her if she'd been invited to the wedding. She said she hadn't, but she might take a wander over there and see how things were going and see what the bride was wearing and see the flowers and everything. A Tornado came over and dropped another bomb on the Sands. Ray finished his sandwich and licked his fingers clean and told Jackie her dress looked nice. She gave him this look like she was waiting for the punchline and then when there wasn't one she didn't know what to say. Another Tornado came over and then something like a dozen or two dozen Tornadoes came over at the same time and dropped bombs on the Sands and we just stared up at them and the sound was like the actual ground being ripped open. f.u.c.king, asunder. We all crouched down without realising and it took a minute or two to straighten up again once they'd gone.

Ray said the wedding would most likely be ruined if they kept that up all day. He looked pretty pleased about it. He said it would have been a major operation to get the whole squadron in the air and formed up like that, it would have taken serious logistical oversight and a fair amount of groin on the part of the pilots. He said he didn't think they'd be doing that for nothing. One of his uncles had worked on the base for a while, in the kitchens, meaning that was another thing Ray liked to sound knowledgeable about to anyone who'd listen, meaning the planes, not the cooking. I tried to say something about it looking pretty serious now, but I couldn't hear anything I was saying. I was still waiting for the rus.h.i.+ng noise in my ears to fade away and basically what felt like my internal organs to fall back into their rightful place. I tried saying it again, that it looked like things were getting serious. Jackie didn't say anything. She was just looking over towards the Sands. I remembered the thing about her son. She took our plates back to the house. Ray said it was good of her to wash our crockery as well as doing breakfast. He laughed. I told him to leave it out. I went and got another drink. What was his name. Jackie's son. Mark. f.u.c.ksake.

I drove to the Stewart place about as slowly as I could. I wasn't feeling overly confident in my driving abilities by that point, plus not in the state of the car either, and plus there could have been people walking back along the road. There weren't any taxis around and that was probably going to come as a surprise to the crowd they had over there. We saw two of them just before we got to the turning, walking in bare feet with their shoes sticking out of their handbags, their arms folded across their chests. They looked young.

That's what I'm talking about, Ray says.

Just the drinks, I say. Nothing else.

Rinse them dishes any day, he says. I thought he was going to make me stop right there, but he didn't say anything else so I carried on and turned in at the entrance to the Stewart place. We pa.s.sed some older guests getting into their cars and holding on to each other. We drove down a gra.s.sed track which led around the back of the house, past some open barns with more cars parked inside. At the far end of the track, just past the turning into the field with the marquee, we saw a girl being sick into a bed of nettles. Her dress was a bit on the short side for her to be bending over like she was. A lad in a pink s.h.i.+rt with a pinstriped waistcoat was stood next to her, holding her hair away from her face and rubbing her back. They both looked over their shoulders at us, squinting into the headlights. The girl had a string of something hanging from her mouth. We could see her knickers. They were black as sin.

That's what I'm f.u.c.king talking about, Ray says.

Just the drinks, I say.

We knew Mark from school, and for a bit after that. Years back. Spent a bit of time with him. He was all right, he didn't mind getting up to things. Not that there was all that much to get up to. Mostly it was getting hold of some drinks and finding somewhere to go. One time we walked the five miles out to the Sands with a bottle of cider just so we could drink it while we sat and watched the seals. This was the last year of school. Meaning we were fifteen or sixteen. Ray tried chasing one of the seals and ended up turning round and doing most of the running. It's surprising how fast a seal can move, if you start messing around with it in breeding season. That was the day we took a car the first time, when none of us wanted to walk all the way home again. I didn't know Ray knew how to do the thing with the wires, but he said one of his uncles had shown him. We could all drive, just about, but Mark wouldn't take his turn so we kicked him out and made him walk the rest of the way. He never told anyone about it, which was a good start. That was how come we took him on a job soon after, but it turned out he wasn't really up for it. He didn't know what we were doing until we got in through the back door, and then he wouldn't come in any further than the doormat. He kept saying he could hear someone coming, he could hear a car pulling into the yard, he could maybe hear a siren? He was near enough crying by the time we'd finished so we didn't take him on a job again. Ray made sure he knew not to tell anyone.

Could see why Mark signed up, thinking about it. The way he liked things to be done right. He probably liked the discipline of it and everything. Sit tight and wait for orders. It was still a surprise though, him being the fattest kid in the year and everything. No one really saw him after he'd signed up. Besides the other boys in our year who signed up with him. He was off on training exercises and getting rid of all that weight and all that, and then when he was home he probably wasn't meant to a.s.sociate with us anyway. Must have seemed like a good idea at the time, signing up. He must have thought the worst he'd have to face would be ducking petrol bombs in Belfast or maybe getting rained on for six months in the Falklands. Instead of getting stuck in a broken-down tank in the desert and dying of heatstroke.

Jackie got an earful of all that our-brave-boys stuff after that, all heroic sacrifices and dying-for-all-our-freedom, which if it was me I'd have wanted someone to talk me through how that was supposed to work exactly. Mark sitting tight in that broken-down tank waiting for his orders. Waiting for help to arrive without it ever pa.s.sing through his big pink head that it was never coming. They gave him a posthumous medal and everything. No wonder Jackie moved out of town. Must have wanted to get away from all that sympathy. Don't know what happened to Mark's dad. He'd been in all the pictures in the paper, I could remember that, the two of them sat in their lounge with their arms round each other, holding up Mark's school photo like some kind of consolation prize. The sofa was hardly big enough for the two of them and all their crying. He must have just gone and done the off.

f.u.c.king heatstroke though. It weren't exactly Andy McNab.

That was all about the time someone did a job on Hilltop Farm, which old man Stewart didn't exactly own but it turned out he had some interest in, and word went round that it was us who'd done it. There wasn't any proof and it got dropped in the end but that didn't stop word going around anyway. That was when most of the trouble started. It was the interest in that job that meant we got caught out, in the end.

Whoever called it Hilltop Farm must have had some sense of humour, round here.

Jackie came over again before she went to the church and told us that if she did get to go to the reception she'd make sure she brought us back some cake. We told her thanks Jackie, that's good of you, we'll look forward to it. Another load of Tornadoes went over, three of them in close formation going extra-low over the Sands without dropping anything. Jackie said that was how they knew last time round that the war was definitely going to start, when they'd started going at the Sands all hours like this. We didn't know what to say so we told her to enjoy the wedding.

By the time we heard the church bells ringing and the guests were all sweeping out of the church and throwing confetti at the happy couple it had been quiet over by the Sands for a couple of hours. Wouldn't put it past old man Stewart to have gone and had words at the base. National emergency crisis or whatever, this was his daughter getting married. We stood up at the top of the rise by the hay meadow and watched them all coming out of the church. Getting into the line-ups for the pictures. Moving apart and coming together and moving apart again and the young lady in the white dress always at the centre. The women all in hats and dresses like at the races. Ray started talking about how women like dressing up for a wedding. Can't argue with that, he was saying. Strappy shoes. High-heeled shoes. Dresses in bold colours and prints. Purple dresses. Red and white floral dresses. Very tight. Above the knee. Figure-hugging, you get me. Dresses they keep tugging at the hemline like they never noticed how short it was when they put it on, you get me. All that hair-dressing. Hats. Summer hats. Summer dresses and summer hats and straps that keep slipping off shoulders. Bare shoulders. Bare legs. You get me. It was hard to stop him when he got going on something like that. f.u.c.king, monologue is what you'd call it. I asked him could he see Jackie anywhere and he showed me where she was standing off to one side, sort of behind a stone wall. There were a couple of other women from the village with her but she was the only one wearing a hat.

The church bells kept ringing until the married couple got into a car and drove off. That was a lot of bell-ringing. The seals down at the Sands must have thought the end of the world was coming. We watched the whole procession of cars follow the trail of balloons from the church to the Stewart place and then I got another drink and sat by the lake and Ray went and broke up another pallet. It seemed a bit early to be lighting a fire. It was a pretty hot day still.

When he was done he came and sat down and asked if he'd ever told me about the p.o.r.no he'd written once. I told him I didn't think he had. I told him I wasn't sure I wanted to know. He told me it had been a while ago and to be fair it had just been the once. He picked up some stones and threw them in the lake. He went and got an empty can and set it up on a flat rock by the edge of the lake and came and sat down and said the story had been for his wife. He looked at me. I threw a stone at the can and missed and didn't say anything. I didn't want to know. He told me it wasn't like he'd been in the habit of writing p.o.r.n but this had been a long train journey and it was just something that had occurred to him to do. He'd thought she might appreciate it. He'd thought it was something he could do for her, while he was away. To surprise her. I said I didn't know he'd been married. He said there were a lot of things I didn't know about him and anyway this was all a while ago now. He told me don't get him started on marriage.

A stone skidded off the ground and hit the can but the can didn't fall and I threw another one. Jackie's car turned into the driveway by her house and stopped. Jackie got out and went into the house and didn't look at us. She wasn't wearing the hat. She must have left it in the car. Ray carried on talking about this story he said he'd written for his wife. It had been really something, apparently. Blindfolds, gasps of surprise, third parties involved, that type of thing. I held up my hand and told him Ray I don't want the details mate. He said fair enough let's just say it was properly filthy. He said he'd really thought she was going to enjoy it, she'd been known to enjoy that type of thing previously, she'd been quite imaginative. You wouldn't have thought it to look at her though, was his next point. He wanted to emphasise that, it turned out. He spent quite a while emphasising that. She was gorgeous, in summary, a lovely woman. Looked like b.u.t.ter wouldn't melt.

There was a whistling noise from the sound system at the Stewart place, and what sounded like microphones being plugged in and out, and then it went quiet again. I went and got another drink. Ray was still telling his story about the p.o.r.no story. It looked like it was going to take a while. He told me it took him a long time to write it, this story, when he was sitting on this train. He said he kept getting distracted by what he called the old days. I suppose he meant the old days as in when he first met this wife I'd never heard about. He said he hadn't had a clue where the train was going. It was one of those single-carriage jobs and all he could see out the window was fields like this. He said it had been a hot day and all the windows on the train were open and the pages of his notebook kept flapping about in the wind. I asked him when had he ever had a notebook and he said shut up this was a while ago.

They must have started doing the speeches at the Stewart place. We couldn't hear most of what they were saying but the place kept going off in applause and what sounded like people banging their cutlery on the tables.

Ray was still going on about the train, and about how there'd been hardly anyone else on board, just this bloke who looked like a fitter, and a couple of old ladies, and then this girl who was either a young-looking university student or an old-looking schoolgirl, it was hard to tell, she kept staring out the window, she must have had something on her mind, and as it happened she was quite pretty but he was trying not to look because he properly couldn't tell how old she was and you can't be too careful and anyway he was just trying to concentrate on writing this story for his wife because he thought it was something he could do for her, it seemed important at the time, he thought she'd like it, he thought it would help.

I said, Jesus, Ray, don't forget to breathe.

We threw some more stones at the can.

He told me some more about what had been in this story, stuff about firm smacks on the behind and tying hands and stuffing underwear into mouths, that type of thing. I told him I could probably definitely do without the details. They turned the volume up at the Stewart place and we heard someone doing a toast to the happy couple and then the whole crowd of them going to the happy couple again. Ray turned and looked in that direction. We were both thinking about the drink they'd be getting through over there. Ray knocked the can over and went and set it up again and we both moved our chairs a bit further back and threw some more stones. He still hadn't finished. He started talking about how self-conscious it had made him to be writing all that stuff down on a train and how he'd had to keep stopping to sort of catch his breath but he wanted to persevere with it because he really thought his wife was going to like it. I said it was making me self-conscious just having to listen to him go on about it and he told me to shut up again. He said they'd got into that type of thing before, on the phone, when he'd been working away from home, and then he got into how all the working away from home might have been part of the problem, all those nights away and the unpredictability of it was how a lot of the arguments had started. I asked him like, what, you had an actual job and everything? He said sometimes it was like he couldn't say the right thing to make it up to her. I asked him if he'd been a travelling salesman or what. He said some days it seemed like she didn't even want him to try, like she wanted him to just turn round and go out on another job. I said I still didn't know if we were talking about actual jobs here. He said it got to the point where he didn't feel welcome in his own house and all he'd ever wanted was a home where he was welcome. I don't think he was listening to me. It was turning out there was still plenty I didn't know about Ray. He kept mentioning things as if I knew about them when really I had no idea. Like the wife thing. Or like a while before when he'd mentioned living in Scandinavia. Or even like was he or wasn't he a Muslim any more or what.

Another thing I didn't know was whether Ray's mum still lived round in town or if she was still alive or what. I didn't know if he knew. Maybe Ray hadn't said anything about it because he was a.s.suming I'd be as much of a c.u.n.t about it as he'd been when I told him about my mum. Who I happened to know had pa.s.sed on, even though it had been a while before anyone had thought to tell me about it. I missed the funeral when I was inside. That was bad enough but it would have been good to know it was going on. This was what I don't know why I bothered telling Ray one night, when we'd first got here and Jackie had told us all about what she wanted doing, and given us some binbags for cleaning out the caravan, and come down from the house with a couple of fresh pillows and said I don't know about the rest of what's in there but if you're anything like me you'll at least want decent pillows.

They wouldn't have let me go to the funeral anyway but it would have been nice to have been told. It was up in Scotland. Scotland of all places. She never would have wanted to be buried there. She only went up there because her bloke said he'd had enough of it round here and he was going back to Scotland whether she wanted to go with him or not. She told me that, the last time she visited before she went up there. She was good at visiting, I'll give her that. Given everything that had gone off. She said I could go up and join them when I got out, if I liked. While I got back on my feet. Right, I said. Scotland. She said would I write, and I said yes I would, I'd write. I'd definitely write. What was she thinking, Scotland. She must have hated it up there. She never would have wanted to be buried there. I knew she wouldn't. That was what I told Ray about. Scotland had more or less come up in conversation somehow, so that was what I told him about. I said she should have been buried down here, where her family were buried, where the rest of her family still lived. People could go and visit her grave and that then, I said. My grandad had even paid for a plot for her in town. I'd known about that for years. She would have told her bloke about that, I was sure, but he went right ahead and buried her up there in Scotland. I was going to get in touch with my sister at some point. There was a legal thing involved, there were certain rights due to being next of kin. I was going to apply for her to be like transferred or something, once I'd spoken to my sister about it. She had a plot waiting for her in town here. She wasn't supposed to be all the way up there where n.o.body knew her besides that bloke.

Ray thought it was funny. The idea of moving someone like that, once they were dead. The idea of anyone giving a s.h.i.+t where they were buried once they were dead, was what he said. What he said as well was he'd buy me a shovel himself. That was when I told him to shut up. He said I will I'll buy you a shovel. I said Ray, leave it. He said don't worry about f.u.c.king legal process, I'll buy you a shovel and you can dig up your mam. I said Ray f.u.c.king leave it, and I put him on his back and he stopped laughing then.

One thing I remember about Ray's mum. I don't remember much but there's this. When we were kids. We all called round to his house one day and when he opened the front door we heard his mum going Ray will you close the b.l.o.o.d.y door will you, and when we looked up there she was in the bathroom at the top of the stairs with the door wide open, sat on the throne with everything round her ankles. The bathroom door wide open, and now the front door. And Ray just stood there talking to us and ignoring her while she went Ray! Ray! Will you close the b.l.o.o.d.y door there Ray! The door! And all of us trying not to look but we must have looked at least once because later we'd all agreed that you could see her bone china and everything. And Ray just kept us there talking for as long as he could before he put his jacket on and came out and left the front door wide open so we could hear her calling after him as we walked away. Ray! Will you get back here and close this b.l.o.o.d.y door Ray! And the thing we all noticed but n.o.body said was that it was the exact same voice she used when she called him in for his tea, or just whenever we'd heard her speaking to him at all.

It was Ray's car but he mostly let me do the driving. He said the angle of the pedals made his bad back flare up, but also it was because he had trouble concentrating. Plus the blackouts. It was a very particular type of car. It had taken some getting used to. It took a while even getting it started. Also the foot-brake didn't really work properly so I mostly had to rely on the handbrake. Which was another reason I drove so slowly on the way over to the Stewart place that night. We drove right round the back of the marquee and parked up by the catering tent. The catering vans weren't there.

They won't be back until the morning, Ray says. Like he knew. Like he'd been casing the joint or anything. We sat there for a while with the engine running, figuring things out. We could see the portable toilets off to one side of the marquee, and people standing around talking. There was a big floodlight over the toilet, meaning we could see them and they couldn't see us. There was a lot of cheering whenever a new song came on, which meant it was probably only the young ones left in there and the old or sober ones had gone home.

Someone knocked on the window. He had a look of the Stewarts about him. Big square chin and red face and floppy hair. Ray wound down the window. The younger Stewart asked us if we were okay. He was smoking a cigar, or at least he was holding a cigar and wondering what to do with it. Ray looked at him.

Was everything okay with your food? Ray says. The younger Stewart looked confused. He asked us if we were with the caterers. I told him we were just picking up a few things that couldn't be left overnight. He nodded and told us that was a good idea. He turned away and turned back and told us the food had been b.l.o.o.d.y lovely. We waited until he'd gone back round the corner with his cigar. Ray got out of the car.

Keep the engine running, he says. I think this was meant to sound dramatic but it was obvious and he didn't need to say it. If I'd turned the engine off we wouldn't have got it started again until the next day.

Keep the engine running, he says again. I don't know why he had to say it twice.

We must have got about fifty yards back from the can and we were nowhere near knocking it down any more and Ray was still on with his story about writing the p.o.r.no story. He said he'd just been getting to the best bit when he noticed that the student or schoolgirl or whoever was standing next to his seat. He said he didn't really know how long she'd been standing there. She asked him did she know him or like had she met him before, and he didn't really know what she was getting at so he just said no, sorry, he didn't think she'd met him anywhere.

Then Ray got up and more or less started acting it out, which I could have done without. I just sat there looking at the lake, holding my can, waiting for him to get on with it. He stood there next to me, closer than I could have done with bearing in mind the facilities available to us at the caravan. He had his hand on his hip, meaning I suppose that's how he thought girls always stood when they were talking to you, and he put on this voice which must have been his idea of a girl's voice but sounded more like a cat or something. He said, in this voice, with his hand on his hip, that I kept looking at him like I knew him or something and it was making him like uncomfortable and he would rather I didn't. The way he said it, there was a question mark at the end of each sentence. Also, the way he said it, it sounded like he was about to slap me round the face. He sat down again, as Ray.

I could have done without him acting it out but I knew what he was on about. The way these girls are so self-a.s.sertive nowadays. They must teach it them at school. Ray wouldn't have been looking at her like that, like the way she said. But there wouldn't have been anything he could say about it. He would have had to just keep his mouth shut and look at the floor. That's what they do. They get you like that. Wouldn't mind being a bit self-a.s.sertive like that myself, sometimes. Certain situations it would have helped. I asked Ray what he did after that and he said what did I think he'd done he'd got off the train at the next stop.

These birds all went over then. Geese or something. We could hear their wings going. I still hadn't hit the can from that distance, so I shuffled my chair forward a bit when Ray wasn't looking. It didn't seem like it was getting dark but the lights had gone on in Jackie's house. I said maybe it was time to light a fire. I said it was Ray's turn to get the wood. He said it was my turn. I got the last of the pallets and broke them up with a crowbar and heaped them up in the usual place. Some more of those birds went over and when I looked up I noticed the sky was going out at the edges. I hadn't noticed the sun going down. I went and got some lighter fluid from the caravan and lit the fire. We could see Jackie standing at her bedroom window looking over at the Stewart place. We could hear the kids at one of the houses by the church going on their trampoline. Heard it most nights. Someone should take some light oil to the springs. I sat down again and told Ray that when my daughter was little she'd always called them jumpolines. He asked when the f.u.c.k I'd had a daughter. I told him I wasn't going to go into it. He got up to go to the caravan, and I said if he kept polis.h.i.+ng his crockery like that it was going to get chipped or something. He didn't think that was funny. He came over and put me off the chair and drew blood from my nose and then he went in the caravan and turned the radio on in there. Thing with Ray is he's one of those people who can drink as much as they want without causing any problems. It's when the drink runs out is when you want to watch him.

Later he told me how the story had ended. Like I'd been hanging on waiting for the final instalment. He said he'd sat on that station platform waiting for the next train and he'd written it right to the end and put it in the post to her. He said it ended with the woman in the story pulling off her blindfold and realising the other people in the story had gone. I said you can leave it there if you like Ray. I was still holding my T-s.h.i.+rt up to my nose to stop the bleeding. He said so this woman could hear them dressing in the other room and going out through the front door, and she wanted to get up or call them back but she was too done in to move or talk or anything, and then she heard the door close and she was all cold and wrapping the sheets round herself and it was getting dark and everything. He said it was something like that anyway. He said it had all been a while ago. He said he'd put it in the post to his ex-wife but he never found out if she got it or not. I asked him what he expected me to say to all that.

He said could I hear that lot, meaning the guests at the Stewart place, meaning they sounded well into it by then. We sat there and listened, looking into the fire. The pallet-wood kept cracking and spitting and all these shrieks of laughter kept coming across the fields.

f.u.c.k it, he said. Let's go.

He came walking out of the catering tent with a case of Stella. Just like that, jackpot. He opened the back door and slid it in and I told him nice one Ray let's get going.

Wait there, he says.

He shut the door and went back into the catering tent. I could see the shadow of him moving around in there. Also I could see the younger Stewart standing in the light outside the toilet talking to some people, waving that cigar around but apparently still not smoking it. The air was cold and there were these little wafts of steam rising off him into the light, like the way steam comes off of cows first thing in the morning. The back door opened and Ray dumped what sounded like a case of wine bottles in there. I said Ray you don't even like wine let's just get going.

Wait there you, he says. Give me a few more minutes, he says.

When he eventually came out and got in the car he was carrying some kind of black satchel and a vase of flowers. He told me to drive. He s.h.i.+fted in his seat. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. I looked at him. I asked him what he'd been doing in there. He held up the vase. These are for Jackie, he says. I asked him what he'd been doing. He wiped his mouth again and told me to drive.

The younger Stewart gave us a wave on our way out. Ray waved back. There were groups of people standing around all along the track out to the road, but no one else looked at us. I drove with the lights off. There was still some light in the sky out to the west, and the moon was high. If it wasn't for the green algae the moon would have been like glinting off the lake when we got back to the caravan. The fire was still burning, just about. The lights were all out at Jackie's house. Ray set the vase of flowers on a flat stone by the lake and ripped open the case of beers. I put the last of the wood on the fire and pulled my chair up close to it and we both opened a beer. I didn't really feel like a drink after all that. I felt like going to bed. Ray put the satchel on his lap and started going through it. He looked like a woman with a handbag. I didn't say that. The blood on my s.h.i.+rt was still wet from before. I threw a stone in the lake. I asked Ray how come the f.u.c.k he'd taken a bag for. I told him we'd said just the drinks. I told him it weren't like anyone was going to have to look far before they thought of us. He said to stop whining like a little girl. We couldn't hear much from the Stewart place. They must have been winding down.

I asked Ray what he'd got. He said there was some money but it was all foreign s.h.i.+t it was mostly euros. He said there was a phone with a camera on it. I threw another stone in the lake and finished the beer. I asked him what he was going to do with the euros and he said he was going to go on a day trip to f.u.c.king Calais what did I think he was going to do with the euros. He threw a stone at the lake and it hit the vase and the vase fell over without breaking. A couple of Tornadoes went over and dropped bombs on the Sands, and by the time we heard them they must have been long gone. A light went on in Jackie's bedroom. Three more of them went over, and we heard someone screaming or laughing at the Stewart place. Ray said they weren't messing around any more, it was all going to kick off any day now for definite. The light went out in Jackie's bedroom. Ray found a pa.s.sport in the bag. I told him he could get good money for a pa.s.sport, I knew someone. He flicked through it. It's from Norway, he said. This is Norwegian s.h.i.+t. Hence why the euros, I started to say, but he stood up and threw the pa.s.sport and the money on the fire and threw the bag towards the lake. It fell short. I looked at him. I tried to grab the pa.s.sport out of the fire, but he kicked my hand and told me to leave it the b.l.o.o.d.y h.e.l.l well alone. I opened another beer and sat down. I said Ray they're going to come looking for that pa.s.sport and the rest of the s.h.i.+t. He gave me a look. I shut up and drank my beer. I'd been getting to quite like the caravan and the lake and everything. Another Tornado went over. Looked like we weren't going to get that ditch dug after all. I started asking him what he'd done that for, but he told me to just f.u.c.king well leave it.

Don't even get me started on the Norwegians, he says.

Memorial Stone.

Tathwell, Cadwell, Burwell, Rothwell, Hemswell, Harpswell, Hemswell Cliff, Cromwell, Upwell, Cranwell, Outwell, Holwell, Ashwell, Maidenwell.

Haltham, Metheringham, Nettleham, Reepham, Welham, Askham, Markham Moor, North Hykeham, Low Marnham, Helpringham, South Witham, High Marnham, New Boultham, Sempringham, Low Burnham, Alvingham, South Willingham, Cherry Willingham, North Willingham, Hagworthingham, Walkeringham, Hykeham Moor, Threekingham, Stokeham, Laneham, Grantham, Wymondham, Haugham, Castle Bytham, Burringham, Messingham, Waddingham, Grayingham, Pilham, Beckingham, Little Bytham, Corringham, Fillingham, Ingham, Cammeringham, Cottam, Dunham, Boultham, Hykeham, Ba.s.singham, Leasingham, Sandringham, Hougham, Cotham, Snettisham, Holdingham, Shouldham Thorpe.

Sandy Bank, Lade Bank, Ten Mile Bank, Wrangle Bank.

Little Steeping, Great Steeping.

Willoughton, Blyton, Doddington, Burton, Toft next Newton, Newton by Toft, Misterton, Morton, Rampton, Laughton, Laughterton, Welton, Gosberton Clough, Scampton, Scotton, Screveton, Shelton, Sapperton, Syston, Aslockton, Marston, Ruskington, Dorrington, Heckington, Quarrington, Ossington, Orston, Carlton Scroop, North Carlton, South Carlton, South Clifton, East Drayton, Gate Burton, High Toynton, Low Langton, Wold Newton, North Reston, South Reston, Carlton on Trent, Holton c.u.m Beckering, Sturton le Steeple, Kirton in Lindsey, Thornton le Moor, Carlton-le-Moorland, Keddington Corner, North Leverton with Habblesthorpe, Newton on Trent, Bishop Norton, Norton Disney, Market Stainton, Toynton Fen Side, Burton Coggles, Burton Pedwardine, Burton Lazars, Normanton, Haddington, Honington, Allington, Branston, Barkston, Wyberton West, South Leverton, Dry Doddington, Stewton Keddington, East Torrington, Market Overton, North Elkington, South Elkington, Kirton Holme, West Torrington, South c.o.c.kerington, North c.o.c.kerington, Croxton Kerrial, East Heckington, Halton Fenside, Langton by Wragby, Sutton on Trent, Sproxton, Skillington, Creeton, Baston, Stretton, Thistleton, Moulton, Etton, Bainton, Ashton, Helpston, Upton, Fenton, Darlton, Gelston, Thoroton, Alverton, Stroxton, Muston, Foston, Scredington, Denton, Knipton, Harston, Donington, Drayton, Freiston, Leverton, Benington, Horsington, Holton le Moor, Moortown, Muckton, Gayton, Sutterton, Hainton, Harrington, Donington on Bain, Harlaxton, Hungerton, Hallington, Luddington, Spridlington, Lissington, Welton le Wold, Leverington, Frampton, Kirton, Asperton, Gosberton, Pointon, Langton, Thornton, Elton, Belton, Newton, Nocton, Halton Holegate, Wyberton East, Kirmington, Edlington, Wispington, Fiskerton, Long Bennington, Low Toynton, Low Stanton, Little Carlton, Little Welton, Little Ponton, Wootton, Broughton, Dunston, Langton, Sutton, Swaton, Eaton, Croxton, Coston, Kirton End, Great Ponton, Lenton, Panton, Heighington, Great Carlton, Nettleton, Normanton on Trent.

Scrafield, Stainfield, b.i.t.c.hfield, Kelfield, Gorefield.

Wildsworth, Hawksworth, Pickworth, Colsterworth, Stainton by Langworth, Potterhanworth, Cold Hanworth, Faldingworth, Tamworth Green, West Barkwith, East Barkwith, Benniworth, b.u.t.terwick, Susworth, West Stockwith, Ailsworth, East Stockwith, Epworth, Langworth, Epworth Turbary.

Ticks Moor, West Moor.