My Friend is the Devil

Chapter 20

I drift in and out of sleep, and it happens so frequently that I have no idea what's real and what's dreaming. The sky starts to lighten. Floorboards creak upstairs. I reach my hand back, slip it underneath the pillow, and feel the zipper of the backpack I stuffed back there last night.

There's nothing online —nothing yet— about a body pulled out of the water. My plan might work.

I hear a faint shriek.

"MORAG?" The sound of my own name is startling. I've forgotten that I even exist.

I get out of bed and look into the hall while Liz barrels down the stairs. The Chinese take-out receipt flutters in her fist.

"MOR-OH!" She stops dead and touches her hand to her throat when she sees me. She points to my hands. I've forgotten about the scars, too.

"What do you want?" I ask.

She does a double take at the receipt as if she has no idea how it got in her hand. Then, slowly, she holds it out for me.

"What?" I ask, folding my arms.

"Read it."

I snatch it from her. I smooth it out and move my eyes side to side so she thinks I'm reading it and then I lift my eyebrows up to feign surprise.

"He took a bag and some of his clothes," she says.

"So he's really gone?" I paus. "Where do you think he went?"

"I don't know..." She covers her mouth and nose with her hands and shakes her head. "I can't believe it. I... I can't. No, no, no, no, no." She falls to the ground. "NO!"

"Did you try calling him?"

"Dead," she mutters.

I stiffen. "What?"

"The phone was dead. It didn't ring."

"Oh."

She slowly lifts her head up to look at me. Her eyes narrow. "Did you follow him? Is that how you got those?" she points to the boils on my fingers.

"No."

"Liar."

"I didn't follow him!" I pull up my sleeve to show the rest of my scars. "I was on a train. I was following Graeme."

"You only care about Graeme." She laughs hysterically. "You're sick! You drove your father away. You drove him away!"

She grabs the nearest potted plant and throws it at me. It hits my ankle while I try to jump out of the way.

"Get out of my sight!" she screams. She looks wild and crazy, like Cruella De Vil at the end of 101 Dalmatians.

She reaches for the ornamental stool at the foot of the stairs and drags it, swinging it at me. "GET OUT!"

I grab the backpack and run out the door while Liz writhes on the floor, screaming all kinds of profanities at me.

In my haste away from Liz's street, I nearly trip on an empty beer bottle. I give the bottle the finger, as if it tried to trip me on purpose. Then it gives me an idea. I pick it up and carry on towards Tollcross. The neck of the empty beer bottle in my hand makes me feel powerful. People should fear me.

Stand back! Don't fuck with me. I'll swing!

As I step into Nickie-Ben's Close, the familiar crunch of rocks underneath my shoes fuels my fury. The Green Lady looks open, the lights are dim inside. There could be people in there, and maybe Lewis is working, maybe he's not—I don't pause to check.

I hurl the bottle against the window. It collides with the pane and shatters. Its impact put a crack in the glass, but nothing more. I pick up the largest broken piece and throw it at the window, forcing it to break into dozens of pieces. Some of them ricochet towards my face.

I sprint out of the Close and across the street while a familiar voice screams at me to come back, calling me a "cunt" but no one actually chases after me.

I linger from coffee shop to coffee shop, cupping a warm mug of coffee to help calm my shivers. The baristas ask if I'm okay, either due to the scars or the bleeding. The bridge of my nose stings to the touch. Though they might just think I'm homeless.

Eventually I'll have to go back to the flat and put on real clothes. I'll need a real plan.

Every time my mind drifts towards panic—questions of what the fuck do I do now? What do I do with the money? Where do I go? What happened to my father?—I sip my coffee and count back from 100.

One hundred, ninety-three, eighty-six, seventy-nine, seventy-two, sixty-five, fifty-eight . . .

#

The flat is uncomfortably quiet when I return. I can hear the television upstairs. The items Liz threw at me are still scattered along the hall, with the addition of paintings ripped from their hooks and the grandfather clock slightly wedged away from it's usual position, revealing a cleaner shade of the wall behind it.

I change and put some extra clothes in the bag, on top of the money, incase I need to stay somewhere else. Before leaving again, I make what I know is a stupid decision and investigate upstairs.

Liz is in the living room sitting on the couch with her neck craned back and mouth open. An empty bottle of red wine rests on her open palm. There are large stains of the wine soaked into the couch. She's drunken herself into a stupor.

I smile at the sight. Good.