Landing Gear (11 page)

He had no intention of leaving Harriet, he had no intention of moving to Toronto and taking up with Marina. He had no desire to explain himself. He couldn’t explain himself, in fact. He had no idea why he’d done what he’d done. Nothing had changed. Nothing was going to change. He was not going to explain a thing.

While Michael was in Toronto, he watched CBC news and listened to CBC radio; he read
The Globe and Mail
and
National Post
newspapers; he bought
The Walrus
magazine. He watched
Hockey Night in Canada
with Marina. He measured his Canadian pulse, his Canadian heart rate. It beat on, as regular as ever. He wasn’t sure what exactly made him Canadian, but the unexpected week in Toronto confirmed it: he was. But he lived in London; London was his life.

Marina had been upset when they said goodbye. “I wish we hadn’t done this,” she said.

“But it has been really, really, great.”

“I know,” she said. “Now I’ll miss you. Before I never would have missed you.”

“Our ash cloud idyll,” Michael said.

“Our ash cloud paradise,” Marina replied. “Mein lieben Dick Schwein.”

He pulled her close. She sighed. Then he got into his waiting taxi.

He hadn’t reckoned on the fact that Harriet would know. He walked in the door with his suitcase, looked at her, and she knew.

And Michael didn’t have a fucking clue what to do about it. So he ironed his shirt and went back to work, where risk was theoretically quantifiable.

30

The atmosphere both at home and at school remained very strange. At home, Jack’s dad returned to his normal long hours at work, and Jack’s mum was also busy. She was much more on edge than was normal, locking windows, locking doors, spending hours on the computer in the evening. He was surprised that they hadn’t asked about David McDonald; the story had been in the local paper, though the school was not named. Neither of them seemed to have heard a thing about it and Jack wasn’t about to volunteer any information.

At school the atmosphere remained subdued; groups of girls still spent time huddled in the corridors crying. It felt as though everyone, from the most senior teachers to the youngest of students, had decided the right response to David McDonald’s death was to behave as though he had been their closest friend in the world and they didn’t know how to continue without him. Jack knew full well that to most kids in the school, himself included, David McDonald was a name and an image—tall, a bit mean looking—nothing more. The longest and only conversation Jack had ever had with him was last Friday night with Ruby.

The police were still hanging around the school. The rumour was that conversations between police, teachers
and the sixth form had revealed that the school had its very own rather large recreational drug economy. Jack had spent most of the past week sweating and paranoid at school during the day, sweating and worrying at night. But he’d finally found a solution to his problem.

FRANK: sUre ill take em off u

JACK: really?

FRANK: no problemo LOL

JACK: gr8

FRANK: c U by the portacabin at brk

Jack left his maths class and made his way outside. He could see Frank standing there, and it was all he could do not to run to him and throw his arms around him. He reached into the inside pocket of his backpack and pulled out the plastic bag. The weed was fairly pulverized after being stashed and stored and hidden, and one of the bag’s corners was slightly torn. As Jack handed it over, a little trail of weed dust fell down the front of Frank’s trousers. Frank stuffed the plastic bag deep into his backpack.

“Not every day that I get given something for nothing,” Frank said.

Jack felt so relieved he was almost floating. “Think of it as all the birthday and Christmas presents I’ll never give you rolled into one.”

The bell rang. Frank sloped off. Jack stood where he was, trying to remember where he was supposed to be.
He watched as Frank rounded the corner of the portacabin and walked straight into the two friendly police officers who, for the first time that week, were there with a sniffer dog.

31

Very bright light shining in her eyes. She was prepared for this. Over the past three weeks she’d talked herself up for it, written and rewritten, rehearsed and re-rehearsed, but she had forgotten what it actually felt like; it had been a long time since she’d been live on camera. Microphone on her lapel, earpiece in, so she could hear the producers—one here in the hall, standing next to the cameraman, the others down in London with their election-night holograms and graphics. It was two o’clock in the morning; she had planned to arrive before lunchtime. Sweating.

“Why are you so fucking late?” the producer had hissed at Harriet when she ran through the door, Jack trailing behind her.

“It’s a long story.” She attempted to keep her voice low, but Jack heard her anyway.

“A guy tried to kill us,” he said, his voice calm.

Harriet had left London much later than she had planned and there had been numerous and increasingly irate phone calls from the producer as she drove up the motorway. Then a long deviation from her intended route as she attempted to lose George Sigo. “It’s all right,” Harriet said, to reassure the producer as well as Jack. “It’s over now. We’re here.”

The producer looked at Jack. She had sharply cut black hair, heavy black-rimmed designer spectacles, and she was juggling two BlackBerrys and a laptop. She spoke to Harriet while continuing to stare at Jack. “You bring your child to a live broadcast? Very professional.”

Harriet spread her hands and shrugged, hoping for a smidgeon of female solidarity. Jack had been suspended from school for a month. Despite the fact that Harriet and Michael weren’t officially talking to each other, there had been hours of family conversations about what had happened at that party the night that boy had died. It was Michael’s idea that Jack accompany her today. “Take him. A live election night broadcast—it will be interesting for him.” She’d been pleased by the suggestion. That was before she’d spotted George Sigo sitting in a car outside their house.

“A guy actually tried to kill us,” Jack said. “A psycho. He chased us in his car. Aren’t you a journalist or something? There’s a story here.”

A technician was behind Harriet now, fiddling with the wire that ran up the back of her jacket.

“No,” the producer said loudly, “we do not need Television Centre to take over this count. We are on it.” She was speaking to London. She moved her own mic away from her face to speak to Harriet again. “You’re lucky they dropped a box of ballots and had to do a recount. If you don’t get it together we’ll lose this broadcast—I’ve been fending them off all evening. Who are you, anyway? Why have they landed me with you?”

Harriet got her mirror out of her bag and took a look at herself.

“Last election,” the woman continued, “I worked with Martha Kearney. Martha Kearney! What kind of fuckery are you involved with?”

“Local radio,” Harriet said, though she wasn’t entirely sure what the producer’s question meant.

“Local radio. Great.”

A voice in Harriet’s earpiece: “The candidates are getting up on the stage.”

Jack stood behind the cameraman. Harriet wanted him where she could see him, and he wanted to be where he could see her; ever since Jack had been suspended from school, he’d stuck close to his mother. The candidates lined up behind Harriet on the stage, a rumpled-looking group that included the Tory with a heavy five o’clock shadow, the LibDem in a yellow dress, the Labour candidate looking mournful, as well as two fringe candidates—a member of the Flying Nun Party in her habit and a member of the Monster Raving Loony Party dressed as Frankenstein and holding a guitar. Harriet had written a short script, she had memorized it. This was her chance. Mallory had given her this opportunity. What happened today with George—being pursued by him, shouting at him in the petrol station forecourt—she had to push it out of her mind. Jack was safe. Harriet didn’t know what was going to happen to her marriage, but Michael was home and would be watching. She needed to show Michael and Mallory and Jack as well as
this bloody producer that she could do this. Concentrate.

In the monitor in her line of vision, she could see them hard at it in Television Centre.

“Over to Harriet in ten,” said the voice in her earpiece.

She counted. The green light on the camera went on. The election official was droning away in the background. Very bright light shining in her eyes. The producer waved. The monitor was showing a hall full of ballot boxes, party supporters, election officials and there, beside the stage, a middle-aged woman in a dark red jacket. Harriet. She began to speak.

“Here at Tipton Mallet—a town unaccustomed to media attention—the battle for votes has been intense. Last year’s unfortunate death of the Labour incumbent, Simon Taylor, MP for twenty-five years, combined with the accusations of Conservative Party HQ interference in candidate selection, and the unexpectedly high ratings in the polls for Geraldine Coogan, the Liberal Democrat candidate, have created a firestorm of political—”

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw George Sigo. She stopped speaking. He was walking toward her. She looked back at the camera. George Sigo was heading toward her. Voice from London in her earpiece: “Come on, speak! Speak!”

The producer started waving her arms.

“A firestorm of political intrigue,” she continued. “It’s an open field here, David, the gloves are off.”

On the monitor, the man in Television Centre smiled. “What’s the atmosphere in the hall like, Harriet?”

“Tense,” she said. “Trepidation.”

Harriet looked at George. He looked at her.

“No one knows what’s going to happen.”

George Sigo charged, head down, and grabbed Harriet around the waist. He lifted her onto the stage. Then he continued to push her backward into the line of candidates. Frankenstein fell, then the Flying Nun, and another, and another.

The producer screamed.

Or was it Harriet?

PART TWO

FLYING MAN

SPRING 2012

1

I cycle behind her car down the street, veering off

at the roundabout as she turns into the supermarket.

There is almost no room for me on this shelf; there is no secret entrance into the cargo hold.

I finish the shopping beneath the supermarket’s

harsh lights and zombie-walk muzak; the boy

at the checkout is unaccountably cheerful,

and this makes me smile.

I’ve been watching her for so long;

today is no different.

I am crushed into this too-small space; I have been here for an eternity.

I push the loaded trolley across the car park,

battling to keep its wonky wheels on track as

it veers toward a row of shiny bumpers.

I ride home and climb the stairs to my flat.

Freezing hot, then burning cold.

I pop open the boot of my car and then for

some reason, I have no idea why, I look up,

into the clear blue sky.

Suddenly, I am released.

The woman who might be my mother looks up

into the sky—looks up and continues looking up.

And I see him.

And then, through the eye of my camera,

I see him.

I am free.

It takes me a long moment to figure out

what I am looking at.

A man in the sky, falling.

I am flying.

A dark mass, growing larger quickly.

I am falling through the sky.

He is falling from the sky.

The earth is coming up to meet me.

I let go of the trolley but I can’t move and am

dimly aware that it is getting away from me.

I am stuck in the middle of the supermarket

car park, watching as he hurtles toward me.

I nearly knock over my camera, but I steady

myself and find him again.

Almost there now, my destination.

I have no idea how long it takes—a few seconds,

an entire lifetime—but I hold my breath as the

suburbs go about their business around

me until …

I’ve arrived, at last.

He crashes into the roof of her car.

2

Filming the falling man was accidental. It was a calm, clear morning, mid-week, spring. Emily had the day off; she was waiting for Harriet to come out of her house. She’d been following her for the better part of two years, on and off. As far as she could tell, Harriet was oblivious. As usual, around ten, Harriet got in her car. Emily lurked farther up the street on her bicycle; these days, Harriet never seemed to leave Richmond, and it had proved easy to follow her around by bike, helmet and cycling gear helping to obscure her identity. Emily had to be careful, since Harriet knew what she looked like from Facebook.