Catch Me When I Fall (18 page)

his face redder. 'You're just kicking her when she's down. Enjoy it, do you? Last bit of power. Like you enjoyed humiliating me, sneering at me in front of everyone. How do you think it felt? Get off on it, do you?'
"Just because you're having some kind of thing with Deborah doesn't mean that '
'Are you fucking insane?' he said. "Can't you get it into your fucked-up head that there is nothing between me and Deborah? I'm just -I'm just trying.., and you're sitting there making fun
of me.'
'VII make us coffee," I said. 'I never meant to make fun of anyone.'
I made for the bedroom door but his hand was on my shoulder, spinning me round to face him. There was spittle on his chin and the sour-sweet reek of alcohol on his breath as he brought
his face towards me. 'You're going nowhere.'
"Get your hand off me.'
"You're going nowhere until I say so.'
He pushed me up against the wall. I shoved him hard and he stumbled backwards. From the chest of drawers, I picked up a mirror that my grandmother had given me and, holding it by its handle like a tennis racquet, whacked it into his face, hearing him howl in pain and fury. I was through the door and thought I was free, but he caught me by my dressing-gown and held me back, then hit me a glancing blow across my face, jerking back my head, sending shooting pains down my neck.
He still had his hands on my shoulders but his face took on an expression of horror and puzzlement. 'Holly, I didn't mean
it,' he said, "but you just went on and on. I had to stop you." "No,' I said. 'No.'
He tightened his grip. I brought up my hand and hit out blindly at him, and as he reeled back, I ran for it, out of the room and to the top of the stairs. I thought I could hear him behind

me when all of a sudden I was falling, feet catching on the steps, arms reaching out to save myself, and scraping futilely against the wall, head bumping against the banisters, the floor below coming up towards me in slow motion, so that everything was very clear: the plaster on the walls that I'd never got round to painting; the threadbare carpet under my shins; the heavy breathing behind me; the shoes in the hall, laces trailing.
And then my head was bouncing on the hard floor. Lights fizzing inside my skull. Pain exploding round my body. I heard someone whimpering and knew it must be me. I opened my eyes and saw both hands spread in front of me, as if! was a diver entering water. One leg was still half-way up the stairs. I couldn't feel the other, until I tried to move and realized it was bent under me, the ankle twisted and sending out little pulses of agony.
"Holly,' a voice said. "Oh, God, Holly."
There was the sound of wailing inside my head. No, not inside my head, outside. Someone banging on the door, the door swinging open, and once more I saw shoes in front of my face, blunt black shoes. I raised my head and saw a man, two men in uniform, and behind me Smart was saying, "It was an accident, I didn't push her, it was an accident, I didn't mean, I never meant...
"Hello,' I said, and laid my face on the cool, dusty floor, closed my eyes. I felt very peaceful, almost happy. 'I'm glad you came.'

They took Stuart away in handcuffs although I kept saying it wasn't his fault, really. I didn't blame him. I didn't blame anyone. I felt far off now from all the ugly, roiling passions of the day. What a day. A day full of hatred and nastiness and spasms of violence; of gargoyle faces and foul words and groping hands.
Now I lay on a stretcher and a soft blanket was put over me and a woman held my hand as I was slid into the ambulance.

They all knew what they were doing and I didn't have to think any more; didn't have to feel or fear. There were people gathered on the street, watching, nudging each other, pointing, a rising chatter of excitement. I heard someone say my name and it was repeated like a rustle of wind in rushes. Holly Krauss, Holly Krauss, Holly Krauss... But nothing really mattered.
Then someone else was beside me, a figure pushing its way through the open doors of the ambulance, kneeling down beside me.
'Holly?'
"Hi, Charlie. You came home, then."
'What have you gone and done?"
"More like what was done to her,' said the woman who had held my hand. 'She's lucky."
'You smell nice,' I said sleepily. 'Vanilla."
"Who did it?'
'Stuart. But he didn't mean to hurt me. He was drunk, that's all.'
'Your face..."
"I'm all right, really."
'It's all...'
'Do I look awful? Never mind."
There had been a hurricane, I thought, but it had only lashed
us with its tail. 'The weather's inside me,' I murmured. 'What?'
'Never mind. Will you hold my hand?'
He took it, but almost absentmindedly, patting it gently, like a man in a daze.
'We have to talk,' I said. I seemed to have been saying the same four syllables for weeks now. Charlie didn't reply. The doors closed and the ambulance moved forward into the darkness.

There wasn't much wrong with me, although they kept me in overnight just to make sure. A bruised face from earlier, a new gash on the back of my head, which needed a couple of stitches; an ankle that had swollen; a sore neck; scuffed shins from my slither down the carpeted stairs. The police officer who came to talk to me the next morning said that Stuart's face looked worse than mine. Poor Stuart. I told her what had happened and she wrote it all down, and read it back to me before I signed the sheet of paper. I asked what would happen to him now and she shrugged. I turned my face to the wall and waited for her to leave.
The peace of the previous night had turned into something more like sadness. I thought about Charlie and me. I thought about Meg and me. And I thought about Charlie and Meg. They were the two people I loved most in the world. Perhaps they were the only people I really loved at all -except my mother maybe, whom I loved only because she was my mother. If you took away Meg and Charlie, who would I have left? A great crowd of bright acquaintances who knew nothing about me except that I was a party animal: fun to have around but could get a bit out of hand. I limped to the bathroom and stood in front of the mirror. Greasy hair and one side of my face a dirty yellow, chapped lips, great rings beneath my eyes. If they could only see me now, perhaps they'd think again.

21

On the way home I felt like a hideous messy parody of a new mother being collected from hospital by her loving husband. Except there was no baby. And no rapture. On my lap I clutched a carrier-bag stuffed with my torn, stained clothes. We hardly spoke until Charlie pulled up outside our house. 'I'm sorry,' he said. 'I should have been there. I should have protected you."
'The forces of law and order arrived just in time,' I said. 'Who told them?'
'You did, apparently.'
'I didn't have time to give them our address." 'You don't need to.' 'How clever,' I said.
'I thought he was a friend," said Charlie.
'He was,' I said. 'Now my friends hate me even more than my enemies do.'
We got out of the car and walked up the steps to the front door. 'Don't say that,' said Charlie.
We stepped inside. I started to say I was sorry at the same time that Charlie started to say something and then we both apologized and both said that the other should go first. I insisted that Charlie go first.
"Are you feeling all right?' he said.
'Is that what you wanted to say?'
'No. I wanted to apologize. I ought to stay and look after you,
but I've got a meeting. It's about a job."
'That's great,' I said. 'Who with?'
'It's on a design magazine. You wouldn't know them.'

'I'm so pleased. When is it?'
'Now, I'm afraid. You don't mind?'
I touched his arm. 'Go. I'm just going to have a rest.'
"It feels wrong to be leaving you."
"No,' I said. "It's no problem. This was the crisis everything was building up to. Now the boil has been lanced. The nettle has been grasped. And I'm going to collapse.'
He smiled, then looked quizzical. 'I interrupted you,' he said. "What were you going to say?"
"I was going to say sorry. Again.' "
'What for?' said Charlie. 'You were the one who was attacked.' 'The repetition,' I said. "What?"
"It happens over and over again. But each time it's worse. It's
like a ratchet. Do I mean that? What's a ratchet?'
'Are you serious?' Charlie said. 'It's the bar that goes through the notches on a wheel, so that it can move forward but not back. Like the wheels in a clock.'
'See?' I said. "You know these things. That's exactly what I
meant. When this is over, when we're through this, we'll talk." | 'Yes,' he said shortly. "But meanwhile...' He ran upstairs and
came back down in a smarter jacket.
'You look great,' I said. 'I'd hire you.'
His expression darkened. "You know I'd never ask you for work.'
'I didn't mean that,' I said, stammering.
"I'd better go.'
'You've forgotten your portfolio.'
Charlie looked at me and paused for just a beat too long. 'He
knows my work,' he said. 'I don't need it.'
'Good luck, then,' I said.
He nodded. 'Oh, by the way," he said. 'I had a key cut for you.' He chucked it on to the table.

"Thanks. But I was thinking, what if someone took the other one?'
'Who?'
'Never mind.'
He left. I just stood where I was. I was trying to remember a poem I'd read at school. 'I lie to her and she lies to me and by these lies de dum de dum de dum." And possibly 'de dum'. There was a knock at the door and I smiled in anticipation. Charlie. He'd changed his mind. I prepared myself to hug him and have the talk now that we had been putting off for too long.
'That was quick-' I said, and broke off because it wasn't Charlie but Dean, clutching a beer can.
'I waited for your old man to go," he said, stepping past me
into the house. 'I'm being considerate, see?'
He took a sip from his can.
'I brought my own this time,' he said. He looked at me
curiously. 'Been in another fight?'
'Sort of,' I said.
He rubbed his nose as if it itched. He muttered something I
couldn't make out. 'So?" I said. 'Yeah?'
'What are you here for?'
'You know what I'm here for."
Ive just been in hospital,' I said. 'I only got back a few minutes ago. Anyway, I told you, I don't have any money. I can't pay Vic Norris.'
"What do you mean you can't pay?' Dean said, in a jeering tone. 'This is your fucking house, isn't it?'
'It's all mortgaged. I don't have any money.'
He took a gulp of beer. 'It don't bother me," he said. Im just the person he sends to get things. I'm not the person he sends

to do things. I'II be in the shit when I tell him that you've done nothing but you'll be in worse shit.'
"I can't.. "
He walked over to the mantelpiece and picked up an ornamental
green glass decanter that we'd been given as a wedding present.
"That's worth about a hundred pounds,' I said. "You can have it.'
He dropped it on to the floor and it shattered into a thousand green fragments. 'It's not enough,' he said. He drained the last of his beer. 'You can get the money. Anybody can get money if they really have to. And you fucking really have to.'
'If you threaten me, I'll call the police.'
Dean placed the can on the coffee-table. Then, almost absentmindedly, as if he were alone, he unzipped his flies, took out his little pink penis and pissed in a heavy pungent splashing yellow stream that formed a pool on the floorboards. With an awkward twist of his hips he pushed it back inside his trousers and zipped himself up.
'What you'll do,' he said, 'is get the money. If you don't have
it next time, you won't see me again. I just do the messenger
stuff. I'm the nice one." He walked to the door. "We'll discuss it with your old man as well.' He grinned. 'Thanks for the use of your toilet.'
I walked to the lavatory calmly enough, leaned over the bowl and vomited and vomited until my stomach was empty. Then I fetched a bucket, a cloth and a toilet
roll and cleaned up the living room, the broken glass and the piss. When it was all gone, I wiped the floor with bleach and then I wiped it with bleach again. When
I was done, I looked at my palms. They were like those of a corpse that had been under water for a week.

I had a night of jagged dreams and woke to thoughts that were themselves like nightmares.
"You're ill,' Charlie said, standing over me as I tried to get dressed. He even took me by the arm and tried to pull me back to bed but I was stronger.
I tore myself away and plucked a garment from the wardrobe. It had a creamy ruff at the neck and sleeves. I was Elizabeth I. I was a Tudor gentleman. I wrapped a scarf round my gashed head. 'Peasant woman instead,' I said. 'Potato-picker. Northern Spain and donkeys, and the men just sit and drink in the shade.'
'Listen to me, Holly," said Charlie. His face was very near mine, and his mouth was opening and shutting like that of a fish. I could see the veins on his skin and the individual tiny stubble hairs on his chin. I could smell his breath. I drew back. 'You have to go back to bed now,' he continued. 'You have to let me look after you.'
'Don't shout," I said. 'It's like a rubber ball inside my head, bouncing all over the place. I could draw a diagram of the
surprising angles. Arrows and dotted lines. Cut here.'
"Holly, darling Holly, it's not even seven.'
'I need to work. I need to pay the mortgage. If I stop, every thing will just go off the rails,' I said. 'Crash. Shriek of tearing metal. No one else can pick up the pieces. Just me.'
I pulled out a pair of shoes. One seemed higher than the other. Never mind. I pushed my bandaged foot into it.
'You need to work,' I said. 'You need to get going, Charlie. Your life's running away and it's leaving you behind.'

'Look, give me a moment and I'll come with you. All right? You can't go, alone. Ill put some clothes on, we'll have breakfast, and then we 11 get the Underground together.'
Never again,' I said.
"What?'
' Never the Underground again. Never. All together like ants in an antheap, bugs under a slimy great boulder. Stone and earth above and beneath and to each side. We're buried alive down there, Charlie, don't you see? Stuck in this little capsule of oxygen and everyone breathing in everyone else's stale, dirty,
morning-after breath.'
'We'll get a bus."
'We can walk together, over the rickety bridge. You have to hold me tight -you never know what I may go and do."
'Holly, sit on the bed and wait. I'll have a shower. You should put on some proper clothes.'
'Never mind that,' I said" 'Never mind me.'
'Do you promise you'll wait?"
'Promise,' I said. "Cross my heart and hope to die."
What a darling idiot to trust me. He went into the bathroom and I heard the water start. I wobbled
lopsidedly down the stairs and out of the house.
I was walking but it felt oddly like being in a speeding car.
Things loomed up at me unexpectedly, trees and people and walls. My feet hit the kerb and I skidded out on to the road. A horn blared and brakes shrieked. I turned and saw a face twisted up in a car window just behind me. Someone who really hated me, I could tell by their glaring, maddened eyes. I made it across the road, limping, one shoulder higher than the other.
'Look where you're going!"
A woman with a buggy. I could see the dark roots in her dyed blonde hair. I wanted to tell her that everything shows up. You can't get away with tricks. You can't fool anyone for long. We're