The Radiant City (37 page)

“
Oh, shit,” I said, as Josh and I crouched behind the corner of a market stall.

It went on for a long time. Both sides were entrenched, well covered and unyielding. Minutes ticked. The man never stopped crying out, calling that there was a child there, his daughter, don’t shoot, don’t shoot. It was unclear whether either group of shooters could hear him over the sound of gunfire. More time passed. The man tried to make more room behind his body for the little girl. He was crying. For a long time she shrieked, her tiny mouth wide open, her eyes shut, her hands at her ears. There was a momentary lull in the shooting and the man tentatively raised his hand, began to stand.

“
Come on,” I urged them under my breath, “come on.”

A volley of bullets made the man duck back down. A body fell from the rooftop, landing on the ground nearby with a thud. A Kalashnikov automatic rifle clattered next to it, the strap still wrapped around the wrist. Puffs of brown dirt floated in the air. The ground changed colour as blood, dark as garnet, seeped from mouth and ear and nose.

“
Stop fucking shooting, you assholes!” I yelled. “Stop! Stop shooting!”

The little girl went silent and for a moment, I thought she had been shot, but no, she was probably so terrified she’d gone catatonic. The man waved the white scarf again, crying out to both sides to hold their fire, just for a moment, just a small moment.

They did not hold their fire.

Fifteen minutes went by like this. My heart raced, my stomach clenched in a knot of futile rage. I looked at the gun lying in the sand. Now and then I yelled, but it was useless. I couldn’t bear it. Again, the rifle lying near the body of the Palestinian drew my eyes. I couldn’t stand by and watch. It was impossible, when the answer was right there in front of them, so simple, so perfect. I decided that if someone explained it to them they could not fail to see the rightness of it.

I stood up.

“
What the fuck are you doing?” Josh tried to pull me down, but I shook him off.

“
They’ll get killed.”

“You’ll
get killed!”

“
I have to make them stop,” I said, stepping into the open space. I held my hands up and turned slowly. “Stop!” I shrieked, my voice sharp with fury. “If you bastards want to blow each other to kingdom come, be my fucking guest! But leave these people alone. Do you hear me? Leave them ALONE!” The gun was so near my foot. I wondered if I would pick up the gun. I wondered what I would do with it if I did pick it up. Part of my brain told me that reporters do not pick up guns; another part of my brain told me that these petty distinctions did not matter in a world such as this one. If I picked up the gun I could shoot the shooters, never mind which side. They all deserved to die for what they were doing to the little girl.

I heard a noise and turned to see Josh stepping behind me, the camera swinging around his neck, Josh’s hands outstretched toward me.

“
Matthew, for Christ’s sake!” he hissed, as though speaking softly would draw less attention.

“
Leave me alone. I’m okay,” I said. “They’re going to fucking stop, I tell you.”

For a moment, it seemed as though they would. There was a pause, perhaps because both sides were in shock at the sight of lunatics in their midst. It was a choice between gun and girl. I turned and smiled at the man and the little girl. The man’s eyes were glazed and frozen and his face was drenched in tears. He made an infinitesimally small move.

The shock of the impact sat me down on my ass in the dust. It was as though someone had jammed a hot iron rod into my middle. I heard screaming, a lot of gunfire, and then less screaming. And then, only I was left to scream, the sound—the squeal of a pig being slaughtered—came from my own mouth. I raised my head and looked toward Josh who lay in the dust and blood, next to the Palestinian and his gun. Whatever I had intended, I would never reach the gun now. Then I turned my head, which took a great deal of effort, and looked at the father and daughter, crumpled in each other’s arms. They were as still as the stone wall behind them.

And nothing was the same after that.

Matthew begins to cry.

Anthony reaches over and pats him on the shoulder. “Hey, Matthew,” he says, as he pats him. “Hey there, hey there.”

The next night Matthew goes to the Bok-Bok to celebrate the breakthrough and to buy Anthony a few drinks by way of thanks. He feels lighter, as though the world was crisper, clearer. The wraith light of memory that had blurred his vision is no longer so powerful. He has spent the day editing, and is convinced the centre will hold. He has spoken to Brent. His future is, if not aglow with possibility, at least not such a lump of dark coal. Although the burden of guilt has not lessened, he feels, for the first time, as though he may be capable of shouldering his share.

It is early in the evening and the bar is not yet as full as it will be in a few hours. Anthony and Matthew sit at a table past the bar. Anthony talks of his new morning ritual. He walks up to Sacré Coeur each morning and watches the sun rise. He talks of how the city glows and how even on days when it rains there is a moment as the sun comes up over the horizon when, below the cloud cover, a band of gold appears under the metal-grey blanket above. Matthew listens and considers getting himself such a ritual, something to set him up for the day, to put it in perspective.

Anthony nudges Matthew and points with his chin to the door.

Jack comes in with Suzi. She looks worse, much worse, than the last time Matthew saw her. Although she wears no wig, which usually makes her look younger and fresher, she now looks like a prisoner of some sort. Grey and hollow-cheeked. Her eyes are wide and scrambled. Every muscle in her body is tense and twitching, and even beneath the oversized coat she wears, her body shivers.

“Somebody needs a fix,” says Matthew. Like a bag of sand with a hole punched in it, he can feel the optimism of a few minutes before drizzling out of him.

Suzi makes for the bathroom without greeting either of them. Dan, clearly displeased, says something to Jack. Jack merely shrugs and comes toward them, his hands in his pockets. Dan stands scowling, looking after him.

“She all right?” says Matthew.

“She will be,” says Jack, and his eyes flick to the bathroom door. “What’s up?”

“We’re celebrating Matthew’s writing,” says Anthony.

“Oh yeah, why?”

“Because he’s writing.”

“I got over a hump.” Matthew kicks a chair back with his foot for Jack to sit down. “Hebron.”

Jack smiles and holds out his hand. “You wrote about Hebron? Hey, well done!” Matthew takes his hand; Jack encloses it in both of his, and shakes it. “Big step, man, big step.”

“Thanks, Jack. Really. Not a big deal to many people I guess, but, well.”

“Yeah. I know. I
know.
”

“Let me get you a drink. What’ll it be?”

“Just a beer, thanks.”

At the bar, Dan brings him another round of drinks and says, “I don’t like this shit in here. Jack knows that. So does Suzi. She’s always kept it in line. Until recently.”

Matthew nods but says nothing. He hands Dan the money.

Dan crumples the bills in his fist. “Cops leave me alone. We have an understanding. I don’t want that upset. She’s gonna get banned.”

“Where else would she go?”

Dan snorts. “Are you kidding me? Chick like that, she’ll always find some stinking hole to climb into.” He turns away to the register.

He brings the drinks back to the table. “Listen, Jack. None of my business maybe. Probably. But what’s up with Suzi? She seems pretty strung out.”

Some thing with her kid. She was living with Suzi’s ex and now she’s run away. You know what junkies do when the shit hits the fan. I don’t know. I’ve had about enough, to tell you the truth.”

“She’s been in the bathroom a long time. Maybe you should check on her,” says Anthony.

“Leave her. She’s nodded out is all. She’ll stumble through in a while.” Jack licks the foam off his moustache.

“Dan’s not happy,” says Matthew.

“Dan’s never happy.”

They say nothing after that, for it is hard to talk when Suzi is so close to them in the bathroom with a needle in her arm. Dan keeps looking at the bathroom door as well. Old Charlie, sitting at the bar next to John, has stopped arguing with him and the two sit quietly, watching Dan, watching the bathroom door.

“I better go check,” says Jack after a few minutes.

“Might be a good idea,” says Anthony. “You want me to go?”

“Nope.”

Jack disappears into the bathroom and Matthew fights the urge to get up and walk out of the bar, all his equilibrium gone, nothing but an empty sack inside his chest now.

They can hear Jack calling Suzi’s name. And then there is a loud bang and the sound of cursing. Matthew and Anthony stand. Dan comes around the bar with his crowbar in his hand. Jack comes out of the bathroom. His face is ashen. “Call an ambulance. She’s fucking OD’ed.”

“Not in here,” says Dan.

“What?” says Matthew.

“No ambulances, no cops in here. You get her out. I’ll make the call. Tell them there’s an overdose in the courtyard. Not in here.”

“Are you serious?”

But Jack has already run back into the bathroom and reappears a moment later with Suzi in his arms. Her tights are around her knees. The skin on her thighs is mottled and the veins are red and blue. Her face is blue, her eyes rolled up. Her mouth is open and a trickle of thin vomit dangles. There is more vomit on her chest.

“Make the call,” Jack growls at Dan as he shoulders past him.

Anthony and Matthew follow Jack up the stairs. It is cold outside and garbage bedecks the courtyard. “Where’s her coat?” says Matthew.

“I’ll get it,” says Anthony as he disappears down the stairs.

“Is she breathing?” says Matthew.

“I don’t know. I think so.” Jack holds her until Anthony comes running back upstairs with her coat. Then he kicks a piece of cardboard to flatten it out and lays Suzi on it. He covers her with the coat.

“She’s dead,” Matthew says. There is no movement, nothing. He looks at her lying there and she has become just another body, another mass of tissue, another corpse. He steps back.

Anthony leans down and puts his head to her chest. “Not quite.”

“You guys go,” says Jack. “I’ll stay. I’ll say I found her here. It’s okay. There’s nothing you can do.” He rubs his hands over his face. His features have sagged, fallen, and he looks ten years older. He looks back at the Bok-Bok, as though considering returning to the bar.

“I’ll stay, too,” says Anthony.

“Sure, me too,” says Matthew, although all he wants to do is run. Though shame burns him, presses into him like a red-hot poker, he does not think he can bear to see another body. Suzi’s shoe has fallen off somewhere and her foot is so small, twisted in. She looked like an ungainly, pigeon-toed teenager.

Jack turns on Matthew and thuds him on the shoulder. The blow knocks him back several feet. “No! Fuck that. No. I don’t want you here. She’s my girl. She’s not yours! Don’t touch her.”

“What?” Matthew looks at Jack and sees it then. Sees what Jack knows. The inside of his stomach feels as if a tin cat has dug its nails in.

“You have to be fucking everywhere, don’t you?” Jack stands his ground, his hands in fists, white flecks at the corners of his mouth. “There’s nobody you leave alone. Matthew’s fucking little entourage! You’re supposed to be my fucking
friend
, not some goddamn
asshole!
You’re supposed to be on my SIDE!”

“Jack, listen . . .” Matthew takes a step toward him.

“NO!” The violence in his voice stops Matthew cold. Jack crosses his arms and keeps his hands under his armpits. He rocks back and forth as though he is freezing, trying to keep warm. His mouth twists. “Get the fuck out of my face, Matthew. You don’t want to be here now.”

Matthew opens his mouth, but cannot think of anything to say.

Jack takes his fists and hits himself on either side of his head. “Jesus! Jesus! I need a drink.” And he walks back to the Bok-Bok, kicking open the door. He vanishes into the darkness.

“Go on, Matthew,” says Anthony, who kneels beside Suzi and slaps her face quickly, over and over again. He smiles sadly. “It’ll be all right.”

And although Matthew doesn’t think so, he turns and half runs out of the courtyard, down the street. People get out of his way. He can hear the sirens now, although they are still a long way off.