Ivory (23 page)

Ivory arrived
at her home after two hours of Martin waiting, and her return to
her home was a wound reopened. With the same wariness of being
followed she entered the gate and reached into the letterbox to
retrieve the key. He thought it strange that she didn’t keep her
key with her, but then in working the streets she was vulnerable,
and he supposed that if she was robbed of her earnings she and
Ebony might have some comfort in knowing that their home was safe
from uninvited guests.

She
disappeared within the house and after half-an-hour she left in the
direction that she had come, although today he doubted if he would
find her at his house when he returned. Sure that Ebony would tell
Ivory of his visit the day before and that Martin knew she still
worked the streets. The duplicity would be over. For a moment
Martin wished that he didn’t know what she did when he wasn’t with
her. Ignorance would mean the charade could continue, but he knew
that although fantasies could be infinite, his finances would not
be. Tonight would be the last night he could pay for her to stay
off of the streets and the last night he could pay for her to stay
with him. After tonight Ivory would be gone. All he would have left
would be questions. Questions that were impossible for Ivory to
answer and that Ebony would refuse. The age-darkened house stood as
a keeper of secrets.

Chapter
Nineteen

Martin checked his rear-view mirror, seeing that there were
no other cars behind him he eased his foot off the accelerator and
rode slowly down his road. He was in no hurry to return home. He
had called in sick at work. He had once considered witnessing
King’s death to be the worst thing that he had ever experienced,
and it had been difficult enough to hold it together and maintain
the status quo, but unimaginably yesterday he had experienced, and
been involved in, far worse events. Work would have been impossible
to focus upon today. He had not spent the day with Ivory as he
might have done a few days earlier before he had realised the
charade. He hadn’t even told her he was taking a sick day. He had
driven around London, stretched his legs on Hampstead heath and sat
atop Parliament hill, and looked out over the city spread below
him. The grand view of the city’s monuments and landmarks had
always impressed him and this spot had been a place to escape any
troubles he might have had. From this vantage point he could see
the whole of London, his world, from afar and everything seemed
knowable and understandable, and he took comfort from being outside
the world and looking in upon it with the knowledge that although
he might not be connected to them, there were millions of others
struggling with their own personal dissatisfactions and
difficulties and he was not alone.

Today the swathe of the city had appeared dwarfed by
grey clouds that built from the horizon into black tumultuous
ranges. It was not only the threat of a storm that robbed him of
his comfort. He had returned to Ebony’s again yesterday, intending
to discover what drove Ebony and Ivory to live the life they lived
and for what purpose. As a result of that fateful visit, the world
was now a different place. In Ebony and Ivory’s suburban corner of
London, within a quiet street, indiscernible within the vast
panorama that had stretched out before him he had
encountered
things
beyond his
comprehension. If Ebony’s revelations yesterday were to be believed
then he finally had answers, although they were answers he could
never have imagined and would rather not have, it was knowledge
that opened him up to a world beyond the one that he understood.
The world he had looked upon that afternoon had not been one of
familiarity that connected him with his surroundings; it had been a
landscape of potential frightening secrets and unnameable
terrors.

The mountainous clouds had spread across the city like a
pyroclastic flow over the course of the day, as though the world
were growing darker with his awakening. The broad stripe of sky
visible from within the trench of the terraced houses in his street
was a slowly churning flow of dark clouds. Martin glanced from the
sky to the road and his eyes were caught by a face in the mirror:
lacerated and grisly with beady black eyes and a mocking grin. He
turned sharply to the shadowy back seat from where the smile came,
but found nothing but the clutter of the parcel shelf and his coat
propped up on the backseat. Back in the mirror he saw that the
simulacra face had gone from the gloom, but for the voice in his
mind;
“We are the same, you and I.”
He was struck with terror, not at the voice but
that he knew that he was worse than his father and King.

He drew the car to a stop beneath the orange glow of a
streetlight and sat for a moment staring up at his home. He had
been surprised that Ivory had been waiting for him at his home the
previous night. Ebony had told her that Martin had been to see him
and that he now knew she was continuing to sell herself. Ebony had
said to Martin that while he paid her she would continue to stay
with him, and he had been right. Why should she feel uncomfortable
about her deceit being uncovered when Martin would actively provide
for it to continue anyway? He had left her the money that morning
as before. However, this had not been a payment to ensure that she
would return but was pretence, because after yesterday things would
be different.

He stepped out of the car and the static heat hit him as
though stepping from a plane into a tropical climate. There was no
breeze and seemingly no air. The warmth brought his blood closer to
the surface of his skin and caused the wounds he had received
yesterday on his ankle, hand and ear to throb. After his ordeal he
had realised that he couldn’t have hidden his wounds from Ivory,
and he had had no choice but to come home bloody from his ordeal.
He had lied and explained that he had been set upon by the pimps
again. She had looked concerned, he had been unsure if it had been
for him or for Ebony’s safety, as the pimps knew where she and
Ebony lived. Her fear that the pimps might set upon Ebony could
prove useful later. He was glad he had used the pimps lie, as it
allowed him to exhibit his frayed nerves and shock from his actual
experiences.

He
couldn’t bring himself to have sex with her last night, not after
what had happened. He hoped she would have thought it was the shock
of the pimp’s attack that had doused his lust and that he hadn’t
given himself away by not performing. He couldn’t face being
intimate with her now that he knew what he knew: she frightened
him.

There was a
brooding static energy emanating from everything, natural or
man-made. No bird took to the treacherous sky and no sound filtered
through the calm silence. Martin hesitated on the pavement and
stared at his front door. He wanted to be out of the eerie weather,
and any other day he would willingly take shelter within his home,
but today his front door was a portal into an uncertain place and
the potential for a storm far worse than the outside elements.

He prepared himself. This was the second evening he would
have to face her and hide his real anguish and his deeds. Tonight
would be more difficult though; she would have been home today, and
he was sure that she would now suspect he was deceiving her. He had
to be prepared for any reaction she might have. Tonight would be
the test for his act.

Maybe she wouldn’t be waiting for him and what had happened
at Ebony’s house the day before had brought everything to an end.
He might never see Ivory again. As much as that pained him at least
he would escape the fall that he had been warned would be his fate.
Martin looked up at the house. Despite its size and familiarity his
home seemed claustrophobic and menacing in the shade of the boiling
grey sky. The rushing clouds hung as a low ceiling that appeared to
threaten toppling the chimney pots, and flickered with yellow
light. The storm was here.

The clouds sprayed their rain down in a hissing torrent that
dissolved surfaces into a haze of surf and sent him running for
cover, forcing him into the house. He closed and locked the front
door against the deluge that had drenched him in the short distance
he had had to cover. He stood in the silence and darkness of the
house. He felt a presence mute him from calling for Ivory. He kept
still and listened to the house for a tell-tale sound of movement.
Nothing. He deposited his keys carefully and quietly on the flat
top of the newel post.

The hall was shadowy and cold but all appeared as it should
be. He called out to Ivory and his insides nearly disgorged after
his voice onto the floor. He calmed himself and called her again.
The lounge was empty. He shuddered around the exhalation of a held
breath. She was not on the sofa as he had always found her at this
time. Yesterday, after Ebony had informed Ivory that Martin knew
about her continuing to leave his home and work the street, she had
still returned to him and Martin had found her waiting in that spot
on the sofa. Maybe she had been giving Martin the choice of
continuing to delude himself. Today, however, she was not there.
The front door was locked and he was safe from her and her world.
The relief was euphoric, but he knew that after the high, the fall
into longing would be quick crushing and agonising. He needed to be
sure that she wasn’t there and went from room to room checking. He
wrestled with hopes for her absence, and also for her presence,
playing into a romantic fantasy that what had happened yesterday
would cause her to come to him for help and comfort.

The backroom was empty. The kitchen was empty. He stopped.
The kitchen window’s long narrow opener was open. His flesh chilled
and his muscles tensed. It was the only window that could not be
locked with the keys, but it was too narrow to allow anyone but the
smallest of children to climb through, he ignored it and decided to
check upstairs. He returned to the hall as a soft yellow light
flickered through the windows and briefly lit the passage. The
lightning and the grumble of thunder that followed shortly
afterwards made him conscious of the dark. He flicked the light
switch. The hair on his body bristled in a wave of scurrying
insects. The light had not come on.

He toggled the switch on and off. He laughed at how foolish
it was to be scared, but then he thought of the ‘things’ at Ebony’s
house the day before and the influence of reason was lost. He could
leave. Yes. He could simply unlock the door and escape the feeling
of unease. But where would he go? He would have to return at some
point. He couldn’t just abandon his home. He stole himself against
the fear that sat at his back and whispered dark imaginings in his
ears. Step after step on the stairs he repeated a mantra in his
mind that his mother had taught him to recite as a child against
his fear of monsters under the bed and in the wardrobe; “This is my
home. I am alone but I am safe.”

The landing was devoid of windows and darker still. Martin
tossed open the bathroom door in the hope that any light from
outside might filter in, but what light there was had been consumed
by the storm clouds. He reached in and pulled the light pull but
the lights didn’t work in there either. The bathroom was empty. He
peered into the shadows of the third bedroom, the office was also
empty. He flung open the door on the children’s room, its
unfamiliarity was disorientating for him. He hadn’t visited it very
often in the last year. He knew the room should be full of rainbow
colours from drawings pinned to the wall, and suggestive of
childish energy with its clutter of toys, but the shade drained the
life from the colours and the playthings languished neglected for
days, like grim reminders of a tragedy. Ivory was not there. “This
is my home. I am alone but I am safe.”

Martin’s hand rested on the door handle to the master
bedroom. If Ivory would be anywhere else she would be here. It was
the only other room he equated her with. He turned the handle and
opened the door. His ears were assaulted by the colossal sound of
the ceiling cracking open and the loft room being torn from the
building. He hunched down in terror before understanding the sound
was thunder. He laughed at himself but continued to pant the
breaths he had lost in fright. None of the lights seemed to be
working. Power cut, or
cut
power?

He snatched hold of an escaping breath and held onto it and
stilled himself. On the tail of the rumbling sky there had been a
sound. A mouse of a sound compared to the Titan sound of the
thunder, but he had heard it nonetheless. “This is my home. I am
alone but I am safe.” His studio was the last place he had to look.
He soft footed to the stairs, ignoring a sudden urge from his
bladder to empty itself. He listened. Nothing. He carefully mounted
several steps and listened again. Nothing. The door at the top of
the stairs was half-open. He always kept it closed to contain the
pungent smell of oils and linseed. “This is my home. I am alone but
I am safe.” He climbed cautiously to half-way. The sound had not
repeated itself. Two-thirds of the way up the stairs his line of
sight was level with the studio floor and he could see into the
murky cluttered room. He hesitated and scanned the interior with
his head cocked for noises. “This is my home. I am alone but I am
safe.” A sound of drumming fingers tumbled against his hearing, the
sound of a cat trotting on the bare boards of the loft studio.
Except he didn’t have a cat.

From where Martin stood on the stairs he lunged onto the
landing grabbed the handle of the door and yanked it shut and
twisted the key in the lock. From behind the solid wooden door the
closing drumming sound lessened then ceased, as if the thing that
had made the noise had given up its sprint. He flopped onto the
stairs, the key held firmly in his fist.