Chapter Three
Off To The Circles
She kept her foot to the floor until she remembered that Gnash had manys a speed camera. She stopped for gas and more coffee, bought bars of cooking chocolate to suck on. The smell of petrol clung to the cotton of the jumper, and she flipped her sunglasses back on.
A call from Jemma told her that she wouldn’t be able to sleep at night if she didn’t meet her for assignment titles, so she swivelled to the left when she got back to town, heading to the docks. She steered with one hand and gulped mineral water with the other, replenishing the tears she hadn’t lost. Needed to pee. Hypnotherapy made her want to pee. Yet, she’d survived. Grateful to have survived the session, and also content that she wanted to continue surviving, instead of bleeding suicide. Images of dangling pocket watches and sleep made her heave, and she clamped down her stomach with more chocolate.
The road to Grammar was shared by the beach, both on the only pseudo-motorway the west had, derelict and quaint, built so that boats could be beached closer to help. Only half the road was properly chipped, broke her heart to drive it. Metal pylons and spruce limbs. Marshy land to the right, even marshier land to the left. Only through pauses in growth could the beach be made out. Well, beach was a misdemeanour, anyway. Only during a day like this, when wind could drag the plastic away to let shine the black sand beneath, to let the water thrive through treks of dog prints and broken glass. Sive and Sile hugged the inlet, tall, broad, one with proud with the blowhole, watching the tide.
She’d only ever spent time on the swings and slides by the shorefront, shoes kicked off and jeans rolled up, with no intention of meeting the water, just looking the part. She’d buy chips and burgers and throw onions at seagulls. The water scared her. It fed the lake.
Let her shoes fall off as she freewheeled, darting below sea-level as she met bumps and hump bridges the pamphlets heckled. The high school obviously had never been a priority, as the amount of cars that ruptured on the dirt track to it was amazing. No curbs, no flower beds. Smoothing had been ordered years ago, but all that had arrived was more steaming aggregate. In the boot, she had heavy coats and cans of glass resin for when she met turbulence. Then she’d just stopped going.
The school itself had been under continuous construction since the ribbon had been cut. 1978. An anonymous pocket kept it going. When work ended, there would be apocalypse. Construction Winnebagos broke up the campus, bright colours against the drab exterior of a miraculously good-looking building, and the constant smell of Portland cement was a narcotic for those who played outside. Why have drugs when you can snort the windowsill.
Though catering for two hundred hung-over teenagers, and fifty infants in the basement nursery, Grammar barely hit the three-story mark, enforcing a decree of cardboard prefabs and garden classes. Art was done outside as much possible, Biology and Math were divided by Chinese privacy partitions. Large gardens leading to the foot of the cliff, where a pool and tennis court had been stamped. Wrought benches led to the front office, shadowed by sways of purple-veined butterwort and white chocolate roses. It was even better in the vinyl sun, light and airy and warm. She hated it and parked.
People turned their backs to her at the door, the brave met a gaze she didn’t have to return. She met Jemma inside, by the loft of lockers, and photocopied sheets in the spacious library, asking Paul the librarian exactly what he did to avoid paying. The end of lunch had the corridors in heat, and conversation assaulted the lower airspace. After being chastised for missing half the day, and then getting a slap on the shoulder when she let it slip that she intended to miss the rest of the day, Jemma rung the rest of the girls to complain about their fallen comrade. In the hallways, people parted for the two girls. Kere got most of the girth.
Mary Kennedy was the first to appear, slinging bag over inch-thick back to greet both with a high-five. She’d been waiting by the computers, holding a chocolate milk she’d really wanted all morning, wearing a KISS t-shirt, flip flops, a Rachel Christopher yellow blazer. Megan to the rest of the town because of she looked too much like her mother, Kere was the only person on the earth exempt to this rule, as her accent got them every time. Murry Kennedy. She didn’t get it. The dark hair had had a little bit of blonde in it today; Kere was irked she’d missed that.
The heat beckoned them out the main patio doors, they met their fellows by the stone steps, Agnes and Magdalene, outside with cokes and hunky dorys to share. Questions were raised by the two who hadn’t seen her the longest– she’d missed eight days, still got a lecture - but she waved them off, and made hasty motions of departure, not in the mood for the mindless banter the four of them could breed when huddled together. She had to go home and wait for her mob. Agnes heard none of it, and immediately insisted that Kere should take them to lunch in town. No one present had bones tough enough to make the walk. Arguing with Agnes was like arguing with a wall for not telling you it looked better another colour. Useless, and you’ll be talking to yourself anyway.
Kere, visibly reluctant - and only giving in when all four girls were waiting for her in the Jeep – slammed the car out and back into town.
Once far enough from school, Jemma kept watch, the girls did their usual; they wound down. Shoes off, water out, “Hey, Kere, I think you should play this, and then like it.” These were her friends. Music, make-up, throaty laughs. Car in front let them pass; the five freaks in the Range Rover Sport ruled the school. Good looks were what made you Gods in small towns, and all the rich and pretty families got the front pews in Mass. The admired here never bullied, everyone knew the comfortable ranks, especially when they weren’t in them. The pretty would one day inherit the earth, so everyone made nice quick.
The four – now five – girls had been written about the most in the boys toilets.
They needed the Jeep to wind down in, take a break, be flawed. Mary Kennedy was on her most phenomenal high, enjoyed it by resting her head on the dash. It was the sun, got her excited. Magdalene turned her hearing aid off once she woke and began to sing. Jemma fiddled with her glass eye, Agnes worked her stutter over on her tongue. Kere had been abducted by aliens.
She was beautiful, she was the law. She was feared, but not approached. Not by much, the most beautiful of the five; when she’d moved here, she’d been welcomed. Weeks later, the jealousy faded. Companionship. In October, that didn’t change. She’d recovered well, they’d helped, and had gotten back into her role in their collection of freaks. Cold, quiet. Never approached, unless you were handsome enough. She venerated the rumour that she’d swallowed a tub of drugs and had gone swimming.
They had lunch in a quaint teashop and ate on the terrace overlooking the traffic, sidling into tables with scalding saucers of tea, coffee and warmed milk, with trays of sandwiches, frozen artichokes and carrot paninis to follow. Table underneath brown umbrellas, sandals and Mary-Janes extended to catch rays sifting through the giant trees above the pavement, hands slapping suntan lotion so they could get to buying skirts. Ten bare brown legs tangled underneath the curtained tabletop, ashtray for gum wrappers, salt and pepper eaten purely through boredom. Magdalene ordered a latté from the trellis coffee cart, returning after to poach Kere a cup as well in case they’d spit in it.
Sugar and chai sweet on her tongue, she slipped into the conversations easily for the next half hour, paying attention, not knowing enough on each topic to really have a say. She’d been absent a lot lately, even when at the girls’ houses. Small talk remained dominant throughout, the five girl’s attentions limited to the goings on in each of their homes, and Kere treated them all to stories on Beck’s recent thrill of night terrors, and a new bubble bath she’d mistakenly used in the shower. What a fool she’d been. They were bright girls, worked well to keep that hidden.
Only when they were alone, did they respect each other, did they utter “friends forever,” bestowed not because of perfect skin, wavy hair and plastic cards, but because of flaws. Highs, ears and eyes.
The conversation led to back to work once the complimentary muffins came (they tipped), and Kere was glad for the sure footing. Agnes, in her blazer and green earrings, had already got the clear that she could carry a bleached laptop into an exam later in the month. She told them at length. Agnes told everything at length. Nothing interesting could happen in five minutes. Her dreams of architecture hung by her Math tutor’s fingertips, and he was currently on leave to get married. She spoke about the loss like a death.
Every time she spoke of graduation, you could smell the Tropicana. Mendoza was calling her. Mary Kennedy intended to go abroad for a year out, somewhere where she could learn to ski and kill and cook her own food, while Magdalene and her sister were called to business, and would eventually take over their mother’s gastro chip shop when they both returned to Gnash with husbands.
Kere stayed quiet.
“Holy fuckface! Maria Sims is pregnant!” Jemma squeaked from her chair, pointed a sparkly finger directly across the table. She was aflame with energy; her espresso was gone. Her blonde hair was arranged over her shoulder, classic Jemma, and a pink bra poked out from her top. It was as if someone had held a gun to their talk of the future and blown it sky-high, bye-bye. Three heads snapped towards Jemma quite instantly then, and Kere, who stared down the pointy finger pointed at her, could see they looked disappointed. Jemma wasn’t discouraged, even though they’d heard the story before. Many times. At school, at home. Nice boy. What does that pretty friend of yours think about all this? Didn’t they...? Mom! Drama. The four caught each other’s eye, knowing to tread carefully. Jemma nodded her apologies when they kicked her under the table.
“Tramp.”
“Muff-diving whore.”
“I’m Maria and I only shop in Abu Dabai, are you slamming me?”
“I’d show her Penneys... with my dick.”
“Beautiful, Megan.”
“Poor Sayer... Stuck with that beast until its dead...”
“I want a yellow skirt like his sister. The neon one. Remember she wore it ... that one time...”
As softly as they could, four bodies turned from the dark blonde at top of the table, the conversation off limits in mercy. Kere wondered why they couldn’t wait until she left. She wanted to leave. Gossip was fuel, even if it hurt one of the gathered. She excused herself to the bathroom, ignored eyes as she manoeuvred downstairs, firing herself toward the back, past the “Have You Seen My Cat?” and “Have You See These Girls?” collage and into the seclusion of the staff corridor. She sat on the toilet sink.
It’s okay. This doesn’t count. Cry! I allow you.
She didn’t, and instead whipped her bag on the counter, plunging through pennies, notes and military arms until she found a small paper box, which she withdrew a cigarette from. She flipped open the window and lit a match off the wall, pulling till the tip caught. Desperately, inhaled. Left the cigarettes in her bag as a constant temptation, hoping to resist and get her breath back, but now she regretted her trusting. Quit a week ago.
Watched the reflection, shrouded in blue-white smoke, in the mirror, and began the inevitable task of comparing herself to the freshly fertilized Maria Sims. Fingered her empty stomach. Maria was taller and had filled out early, so you could fondle her from a young age. Duped boys into thinking she was older. She’d gotten slightly chubby after her parents had started feeding the family from their own restaurant, and it had never left her. Intensely rich, they lived four feet from the Sims joint, but drove a honey-coloured Mini there every morning for eggs. They held raffles for trips to Santa Ponsa, and let the bishop have as big a bar tab as he wanted. Maria wasn’t exactly pretty, but in that moment, Kere saw her as diabolically beautiful, if Sayer would entrust her without a condom.
Sayer. He was beautiful.
A tear. A little one. Spineless, tingling, destructive. Fell before she could stop it, but she punched a fist to her face to stop it. Pried it off, wiped it away, didn’t count. Sayer. Washed her face and inhaled the rest of the cigarette, willing it to take health, pain and all the eleven minutes it could want from her. She’d heard of Sims’s accidental pregnancy a few weeks ago, and that Sawyer was more than likely the father. More than likely, it was a guarantee. Sayer didn’t like wearing his pants. His family had demanded all kinds of tests, the kind that needed lots of money, pee and blood, and from what the news could carry, the tests had come back lovely-jubly positive.
Sayer was a blonde boy, and he was beautiful.
She washed her hands, splashed perfume on her shoulders, returned to the table. Sympathy when she sat. She ignored them and ordered another latté, a double with little enough milk to just taste that it was there. Canapés had arrived, and steamed the plate, warming the napkin beside. Agnes could smell the smoke, didn’t comment. Scooped the finger sandwiches past her lips, avoided being caught up in a new conversation, which had turned to some raise Jemma had gotten in her father’s pharmacy, which had bumped her up from a Seat to a Ford Focus in under a day.
“Paddy” – she infuriatingly insisted on calling her father Paddy, even though his name was Hugh -“went ape-shite when I landed home with it in tow, but he calmed down when I found his petrol siphon under my bed.” She toasted herself.
After lunch was cleared and brandy balls dispensed by a bashful waiter, the Jeep was piled low with bodies. Several education-related arguments ensued, the girls building momentum as they begged Kere to spend the day with them, she was left on the roadsides of the town, alone, once more.
Halfway home, she pulled over and had another cigarette. And, then another. They were good. She squashed the empty packet underneath her heel. Fury came out of nowhere. Bashed her door. She kicked a pebble between her shoes, popping it up, up, then let it fall. She whimpered into herself and stared off into the dark nooks of the forest beyond, misplaced in thought. Bad idea. In her mind, she was playing football with a large, blonde boy, one who had asked her to call him baby, but who the rest of the town knew as Sayer Bailey Christopher. She popped the ball up, up, then let it fall. It was a friendly game, but he took every opportunity to foul her, out of sheer need to be playful or because she was winning.
Kere had stopped seeing him several months ago – remembered - but they hadn’t argued. She hadn’t loved him. There was a lot about him to love. Their business was their own, but a few more days of football, she’d have loved him.
Three weeks after he’d called, Maria Sims was everywhere the blonde boy was. Two months later, they held hands on the street, her uterus officially rented out. Pregnant. How could he have been so stupid? She’d spent the past few weeks in a stupor, intent to believe that these were just rumours Maria’s friends had concocted to make sense of the disappearance at school. She’d met up with the girls and silently hoped they’d avoid the issue, in case one would substantiate it all. They did today.
She was back in the Jeep, destroying her way through a packet of chewing gum to ease the taint in her mouth, flying through the speedometer. The trees on both sides thinned, morphed in shape as the ground rose and changed, up, up, up through the Grey. Kere never allowed her thoughts to wander, only on special occasions like this. Unruly thoughts could cause trouble, and she was feeling it now. Memories of strong hands guiding her own. Shaking her head wouldn’t disperse the pressure, and she caught her breath when vivid recollections brought her back to the days when she needed strong hands to guide her own.
Sayer broke up with her in October. Remembered. Remembered well.
She tapped the radio up, and belted loud enough to shake bubbles into her water bottle. She closed her eyes and let speakers make the vehicle bulge, only discovering when the road disappeared beneath her that she’d overshoot her junction. Badly. On purpose.
Eased the car down. The sudden exposure to the bright sunlight came too much as a shock, and she squinted, behind sunglasses. The woods had fallen away as she left the Grey far behind, and the sun beat steady on her face. She watched the road to her house whiz by. Gone. Earthy scars of trenches spread out on either side of her now, speckled with baby donkeys, all mulling in the quiet of three o’clock. She took a gulp of water and leaned out over the wheel, slowly but surely acquainted with the new backdrop. She was only ever used to going through these plains, not going backwards as she was now, so she double checked all sign posts before she was persuaded. The bypass. The Gap.
Sayer Christopher had presented her with a condom once.
She let her feet do the work, speeding dramatically as her nerves went wired. Her window fogged, hit the air, didn’t dare lower it. Telephone chime. The hurried desperation of the priest’s voice made her a clumsy, spilled some water, and she flipped the sun visor down as low as it could go, then the passenger’s and the side window tint. The windshield would give her away, no doubt about it, so she stuffed hair under her collar, popped the sunglasses lower. A wasted attempt; she was popular. Speeded even more, the hole in the exhaust sending shivers through the surrounding fencing, scaring lost pigeons and gulls from the litter in the ditch.
The road was empty, everyone who had a job in town. She met not a soul; a blessing on the Gap, as the road would narrow at both ends soon enough and allow only cyclists to manoeuvre through. Two way traffic on a one way road. Hoping that whatever had occurred on the bypass this morning had lost all fervour, and that the priest had left a message on her home phone giving her an embarrassed all-clear, she trudged through, teeth on edge to scream if someone jumped on the roof.
The Gap was by far the most cosmopolitan road in town. Popular only because it led to seven bypasses, seven to take you away from the scenic routes, to the stars. One of these bypasses led straight to town, and halved the driving distance by half, so Kere haunted it almost every day. Seven roads that circled, leapt and parried. You did not take on Gap ignorant of it. You would get lost and die. The Channels would drown you and take you far away. Sparkled in the sun. They carted water to the houses of the Grey, taken from sources high in the hills and purified through depositories of artificial sand and dirt. Manmade only at certain corners, the canals had been dug car-wide by rain alone, and left to serve water to the sea beyond, miles beyond where they dropped into sinkholes and circled underneath the town until they hit the shore. Instead of ditches, hard, rigid electrified fences held the Channels out of reach, dented and bruised in places.
She was determined. Slowed down. Stop sign. A pick-up resting against it. Beside it, a small brown Beetle, and then, far off along the vastness of the canal, Father Joans Grace’s Toyota Avensis, three wheels too close to the sizzling fence. Thirteen different gleaming cars lay between them, all shiny and dry and scalding. A coaly pup roared from one, tongue out and red with thirst. There was no wind here, just a fickle breeze that could barely lift hair, and it was too warm, in the highest barrens of Gnash. It was suddenly suffocating in the Jeep, so she beat back her instincts and rolled down her window. She slowed and meandered along the track, the road now shaven to barely contain the mammoth ass of the 4x4, cars parked on both sides when one had become too popular. Each was empty.
The field to the left, lowered, swollen with matured corn and the stalks of a high wood fence, swaying and danced as wind moved through them, lost. The colours of hair and shirts speckled throughout, in the distance, walking, out of sight. The dark navy of a police uniform’s jacket hung from the fence, and sure enough, along the way, a pearly white car hung by the outskirts, clean and hottest of all. Footprints smacked through the bridge over the canal, dirty where feet had run to cars, and then run back into the shadows of the field.
The lack of life made her bold, and she sped up. It was only when she let a T.V. van pass her did she realize she needed to get out. She needed to know why she wasn’t supposed to be there.
Urging a rim as close to the fence as she dared, feeling a crackle along the glass, she flipped the keys and left the Jeep unlocked, anticipating a quick getaway if she were to be seen. Choked on nerves and bugs. Walked in the fresh muck, a stamping mesh of footsteps. Crawled along the humming wire links, counting cars. Five lunches had ended an hour ago and two of them had a class full of kids waiting in Grammar. Knew them, didn’t like them. Why were they here? Voices, from the TV crews as they unloaded. Frowned.
Head down, she scrambled the canal bridge, a boorish piece made from mud and old car wings, and watched as the path, a truck wide, slit through the corn. It’s end watched by three people, chequered backs to her. Ducked to the right. The corn staggeringly tall and heavy. Their shadows reached to the cars outside. She squeezed through. The noise of birds and cracking stalks wafted along the pathway, and she kept her footsteps in a line, keeping noise to a minimum. Found another pathway, tiny, secondary.
Knew then that if she were to be caught today, whether she was to blame or not for whatever was going on here, she would be crushed on the spot. They wouldn’t ask her questions. She’d left her bag and phone in the car, so she slid off her shoes. Speed. A girlish paranoia of voices approaching drove her to the hedge of corn to her side, and she bent stalks apart to squish her form in, working quickly but desperately. A sliver of sense spoke to send her back to the Jeep and the gun there – get the gun, come back - but she didn’t listen. She was in too far, she’d be seen.
Quiet as she possibly could, she glided further through the corn, destroying more than she slid along, keeping both ears and eyes trained on the thin path she’d just left, where only one set of footsteps lay. They’d fill with water and disappear, but not today, not fast enough. Watched neighbours and concerned farmers appear as she crawled, gathered and spoke, five feet from her, through the corn. Didn’t hesitate to try and recognize any faces.
A man dangled out of the helicopter, the side door ajar to let him and his camera out. Held in only by a thick strap that connected him to something inside. He hovered at an area further on into the field, kept wiping his forehead, kept talking on the phone.
For some weird reason, she was instantly on edge, slamming to a stop and being hit with an almost visible urge to relent, to surge back to her car and make as much noise as possible on the way. To not be alone in this quiet, which could hold anything. What was going on here? Fear kept her feet from moving, fear of something lurking in the corn, waiting for any reason to make its presence known, fear of why she wasn’t allowed to be here. She tightened her grip on a trunk and wanted a cigarette bad, watching treks of torn leaf dance on her breath.
If she left now, she’d have definite safety, but no quiet. She’d toss and turn all night, day dream of people knocking down the doors, then sleep with no threat of dreaming, and be safe with her restlessness. Delicious. If she stayed, the fear would grow and she’d fear for her heart, but she would hopefully sleep with only one cowbell up. She might even leave the gun away. She could dream.
She prised peace of mind.
Impatient now to be done with this, she trudged on, kicking maize, significance no longer placed on quiet. She’d gone farther than the main path, its corner taking the trail in a sharp left out of sight. Moved quicker, knowing she was truly alone now, breathing and groaning, exertion. Sweat now gave her hair a soggy bump, and her back ached, calves bulged under the weight of her body and alarm.
Light. Coming fast. Didn’t notice. Someone was in the corn with her, lost, with a huge camera, but he ignored the clumsy yellow sweater. He wanted to ask her the quickest way inside, but didn’t, would find it himself. Hands slapping madly to fight off wasps, the world parted and she was in open space, a ground carpeted in moss rising her catch her face with a thud that made her bones hurt. For a second, she lay there, breathing in fertilizer, and listening in case her smack down with the foliage carried to other ears. All was calm, and voices still softly spoken bored over the flecks of blossoming yellow, unperturbed, deaf to her and the helicopter.
Picking herself up on sore knees, she’d found herself in another narrow strip of bare land, a shoulder-wide pathway of corn that had been flattened, bent over at the extreme base of its stem to lie flat, surface warm from shadowed sun. Stood up, blindly feeling her way to the left, watching as the path slowed to a corner, created a perfect arc. Stumbled over a floor with no strength, breaking all she stood on. Lungs at peak, she found herself abruptly in a chamber of unfathomable sunlight, and she winced and nearly cried out when she became blind. Calmed, heard voices, remembered that she wasn’t here.
Wrenching back into the shadows, she heaved her eyes closed and bucked against the dark corn again, waiting until her ears had stopped ringing with surprise to open them again. Steps beyond, the narrow pathway widened and spread, more corn flattening until the path disappeared into nothing, melding perfectly into a large golden circle. A coin of sunlight.
Frowned. Leaned forward, pain forgotten. She squinted and held her eyelids open long enough until they watered slightly, then shut them off. Opened them again. A searing heat bit down her entire front, ending with a flame of glass in her stomach.
Without loitering, she left the field. Retraced her steps exactly until she got a little lost, pausing once to ask a man with a camera to lead her out, clawing, stumbling, wanting the roadside. Inching out, she was spotted, but ignored when someone called her name, told her to run, that they were going to kill her, and ran. Put her shoes back on, pulled her hair out, drove. Away from her mob and away from the circles.