Authors: Kristina Lloyd
In the en suite, I flushed the rubbers and dropped a few empty foils in the pedal bin. Immediately I thought better of it, retrieved the wrappers and put them in my make-up bag. No one would check there. The bathroom was compact and shiny: shower over a clawfoot tub, washbasin and toilet, but with the same twee aesthetic of the bedroom. Scalloped soap dish, gilt fittings, knotted bows on the tiles: that kind of thing. The towels were draped neatly over a ladder of gold rails, all apart from one, which lay crumpled in a corner.
I was puzzled. I hadn’t dumped a towel there. I wouldn’t do that. I’m a neat freak. I bent to retrieve it, a worn, coral-pink bath sheet, fishing among memories of the previous night. Had one of the men gone for a post-coital freshen-up? I couldn’t remember either of them doing so but the sex was such a blur of bodies and vodka it could easily have happened. No biggie. I was about to drape the towel over the bath edge when I caught its smell. Chlorine.
I sniffed closer. Yes, definitely chlorine. How peculiar. Where had that come from? Misha hadn’t returned from his swim so how could his towel be here? Was it even his? The colour was the same as the others in the bathroom, orangey-pink like factory-farmed, over-dyed salmon.
I pondered what to do: air the towel or add it straight to the laundry? Did guests have access to spare towels if they ran out? Should I have brought my own? Then I thought, no, this is not what I should be dwelling on.
Why was a damp, chlorine-scented towel here? Had Misha returned then headed downstairs again? Perhaps he was an insomniac. Or had someone else snuck into the room to return it? No, too crazy. Someone must have been at the pool with Misha. Sol. Sol must have been with him, the two men leaving me in peace as they continued socialising, or maybe fucking, outside.
But if Sol had been with Misha, why was Misha dead?
I admit, I panicked. I was bothered about the police crawling over the room, asking questions about what the three of us had done together. I like to think I’m old and wise enough to be immune from sexual shame but the prospect of the authorities prying into my private life in a quest for answers appalled me. Rationally speaking, I had nothing to feel guilty about. We hadn’t broken any laws or caused any damage. But ours wasn’t regular behaviour so I was eager to keep the encounter under wraps. I needed rid of the towel. Correction: I needed rid of all evidence. Flushing condoms wasn’t enough.
So I took the damp bath sheet, laid it on the bedroom floor, and placed all the equipment we’d used in the centre. My hands began to tremble as the reality of my situation kicked in. The sound of sirens and of people moving on the floors below made me fear someone would come galloping up the stairs of the tower any second. What would I do? There’s nowhere to run in a turret room. You can only fly or fall. I drew the corners of the towel together and twisted them to form a bundle. No, no good. It would come undone. Keep calm, Lana. Don’t panic. Think.
I grabbed the polka-dot scarf from the contents and used it to secure the towel, making an enormous Dick-Whittington knapsack. Metal clanked against metal as I stood, cupping the lumpy package. The Clejuso handcuffs weighed a ton. I glanced about for somewhere to stash the item but figured the outcome would be worse if I was rumbled for having concealed something that could be construed as evidence.
I dressed quickly in a denim skirt and pastel-striped sun top, whisked a brush through my hair, cleaned my teeth and flicked on some lippy and mascara. Awkward in sandals and clutching the handrail, I clomped down the spiral staircase with my bundle and then along the west wing corridor to the room my friend, Nicki, was sharing with her partner, Ian. They’d been looking out for me since the start of the weekend, aware I’d arrived on my own and might appreciate the support. Plus, they were a broad-minded couple, which was going to help immensely.
Nicki was making coffee in a cafetiere. Ian was showering. Their room, larger than mine, was tidy and fresh, sunlight glossing the frame of a chintzy four-poster bed. The open windows gave on to a view of the gravel driveway sweeping around the striped lawns to the front of the house. As I moved deeper into the room, I saw blue flashing lights winking in the morning’s glare. The bright day, with its intimations of hope and joy, didn’t suit the dark events unfolding.
Nicki didn’t bat an eyelid when I asked if she’d store some bondage gear. I gave a brief rundown of the story, omitting the detail about the damp towel. Her main concern was for my emotional and psychological welfare. She understood my fear that the police, often mistrustful of non-mainstream sexualities, might get twitchy if they knew they were dealing with the death of a man whose proclivities were on the kinky side. And we agreed if the tabloids got hold of a story like this they’d be all over us, spewing out their judgemental adjectives: sick, twisted, perverse. I didn’t want to be part of that narrative.
‘I don’t see why they’d want to search the room though,’ said Nicki. ‘He died in the pool, didn’t he? Just a tragic accident from the sounds of it. You haven’t done anything wrong.’
Tears burned my eyes because I felt as if I had.
‘Hey, c’mere. Give us a hug.’ Nicki stepped towards me, arms outstretched.
I stepped back in alarm, my hand raised. ‘Don’t, Nick. Please.’ I blinked rapidly and dashed away a single tear. ‘If anyone’s kind to me, I don’t think I could … I just need to hold it together here. Sorry. Don’t be nice to me, please.’ I dug my nails into the palms of my hands, creating pain to distract me from pain.
Nicki folded her arms, frowning. ‘Well, OK then, bitch. Have I told you how dreadful your hair’s looking these days?’
A noise came out of my mouth, half laugh, half sob. ‘Thanks, hun. Don’t mention this to anyone, will you? That I was with him last night.’
‘No, course not. Not if you don’t want me to.’
I returned outside in search of Sol as a new wave of sirens became audible. In the pale morning sunlight, people sat on benches and walls, or stood in small groups. Some people held each other in casual, supportive embraces, looking numb and bored. Some were chatting, some smoking. Medics in high-visibility jackets and bottle-green coveralls talked to guests, or walked across the grounds with a reassuringly steady pace. Radios crackled. Nobody seemed to be panicking now.
Sol stood alone at the far end of one of the manicured lawns, his phone to one ear, his hand covering his other ear. He paced in short lengths, agitated, head shifting from low to high, looking anxiously around. When he spotted me, he raised a hand and beckoned me towards him with a flick of his fingers. As I approached, he turned his back to me, body hunched into his phone call.
Married, I thought. He’s fucking married. On the phone to her now, making excuses as to why he didn’t call last night.
He snapped his phone shut as I neared. ‘Come on.’ He walked ahead, nodding at a great froth of pastels and foliage edging the lawn.
‘What’s going on?’
‘Cops are here. We need to make ourselves scarce.’
‘Why? Where are we going?’
‘We need to get our story straight. Just keep walking.’
We hurried into the dappled shade of a gravel path flanked with rhododendrons and azaleas. The blooms were on the turn but the candy pinks and whites still looked sugary enough to sweeten the air. Among the cloud of floral femininity, Sol was incongruously masculine and solemn. Dark clothes; dark hair; dark, perplexing Sol. He kept checking back to ensure I was following him. Each time, his gaze swept our surroundings as if he were expecting an ambush. He didn’t once offer a glimpse of the wisecracking, cocksure man I’d met only the day before.
‘You think he was on something?’ he asked in a low voice.
‘We were all pretty wasted.’
‘Yeah, but there’s drink and dope,’ he replied, ‘and there’s dying. You sure you didn’t hear him leave the room?’
‘No, I was dead to the world.’
Ouch. Clumsy phrasing. Gravel crunched underfoot in our silence and the pump of my breath grew quicker. After a while, Sol deviated off the main drag and down a soil-stamped track set with flat stones. A tumbling rockery bordered the narrow path, patterned with alpines, ornamental grasses and lush, deep green ferns. Fronds wafted around Sol’s ankles as he strode forwards, the feathery leaves springing off him to tickle my bare shins. Despite the early-morning warmth, the touch made me shiver.
‘Do you know where you’re going?’
‘No. Guesswork,’ he replied. ‘Just want to get us away from the grounds. Man, this is such a ball-ache.’
The track led to a wooden stile in the gap of a dry stone wall furred with mustard-yellow lichen. On the far side stood a dark, tangled woodland, the canopy of overhanging trees casting mottled shade on the rockery’s contrived chaos. Birdsong trilled in the leaves. The air was becoming cool, a touch clammy.
My mind returned to the damp, coral-pink towel in my room. How had it got from the swimming pool to my bathroom floor? Was it safe to go into the woods with this man? Did he want to get
us
away from the grounds? Or me? Was I a danger to him?
In one swift, easy movement Sol lunged upwards and over the stile, arms flexing as he grabbed the side posts. The muscles in his broad back shifted beneath his tee, the wings of his shoulder blades jutting. Fabric gaped above his jeans, flashing the crevice of his arse and a strip of two-tone skin, toffee dark and creamy white. No underwear. I’d seen him get dressed, battling urgency and composure in his eagerness to take control. The memory made me horny. I tried to push the feeling aside. A man was dead. Lust had no place here.
Sol thumped down onto hard soil and stood, gazing into the woods with a grim, preoccupied expression. Gold-green sunlight filtered in through the trees, patterning him in shifting, citrus colours. He checked his front jeans pocket and absently withdrew his cigarettes. I stepped onto the stile’s narrow plank in backless sandals, clutching both posts. I hadn’t banked on a country walk when I’d selected my footwear.
Sol turned, looking beyond me, face still pensive as he thumbed open his cigarette packet. Then he switched gear, instantly alert, as if seeing me for the first time in all my city-girl awkwardness.
‘Hey, here.’ He stuffed his cigarettes into his pocket and stepped close, offering a hand, his smile strained.
My fears melted into relief. He was pleasant and kind, not evil at all. I had nothing to be afraid of. I grasped his fingertips, reassured by their strength as I tottered over the wooden structure. I plunged down to the grassy path, shifting my weight onto his hand. His grip tightened in response, fingers curling into mine.
His fingers, oh God. That small moment of intimacy and support. Something broke inside me. Such a cliché, I know, but that’s how it felt, as if a bar of steel which had taken up residence behind my sternum was shattering into a soaring fragility. A sob rose, too high and hard to contain, a tsunami of emotion. I made a sound, a strangled wail, my shoulders crunching, my eyes flooding.
Sol was motionless, still clasping my hand like a chivalric prince. To think that he held me so politely as I ruptured. To think it, oh God. So close. I heaved for breath and straightened my back, pinching my lips together. I made my eyes wide, fighting back tears as I shook my head. ‘Don’t be kind to me,’ I wanted to say. ‘Don’t be kind.’ But I couldn’t speak. My constricted throat wouldn’t let me form words.
Sol stared in bewilderment, the light of pale leaf-ghosts flickering over his face. For a second, we were worlds apart. I might have been on the other side of the stile, where order reigned. Then his face softened and he clutched me in a hard embrace, hiding me in his shadows. He nestled me in the crook of his neck, tilting his chin as he cradled my head, his other arm wrapped tight across my back. His chest was a solid wall of security, and the scent of his skin made me weak.
‘Hey, it’s OK,’ he soothed. ‘If you need to cry, go for it. I’m here, I’ll hold you.’
I gazed into the blur of his T-shirt, tears falling fast as I fought to put the brakes on. If I started crying properly I might never stop.
‘This sucks,’ he murmured. ‘Such a shock. He can’t have been more than mid-thirties. And only hours ago we were all …
I gulped for calmer breath, digging my fingernails into my palms again as I quelled the tears. I could hear Sol’s heart pumping steadily in his ribcage. Dark splashes marked his tee. I remembered his tennis-match sweat dripping from his torso onto the stone floor of the utility room, and the blood which surfaced on his lip when he laughed. All these liquids; all this life. Bodies which can’t contain themselves.
How long ago that utility-room meeting seemed. How uncomplicated and innocent. If only we could rewind and do the day differently. I could barely comprehend how rigid the dividing line was, how this sudden death had fallen like a guillotine. There was a before and an after for us. For Misha, there was nothing, neither before nor after, unless you believed in heaven.
And right at that moment, across the world, were Misha’s friends and family, oblivious to his death, unaware that a bomb was about to explode in the timeline of their lives. How could this man, who’d recently been so vital, now be cold and breathless? The heart behind his ribcage didn’t beat, and yet Sol’s was a dull, regular thud in my ear. How arbitrary life seemed. How prosaically fragile, when it was contingent on the functioning of this organ, on meat.
‘You OK?’ asked Sol, stroking my hair.
I tried to remember when a man had last held me so closely. Probably Jonathan as our marriage nosedived and we didn’t dare face it. Sol’s embrace seemed to me the essence of humanity, the living comforting each other in the face of death, two bodies with heartbeats finding solace together. For an instant, I saw the chambers of the heart as four glorious, magical cathedrals, keepers of life in all its shimmering, painful beauty.
Maybe Misha was out there somewhere. Maybe he wasn’t meat that had ended too soon. Instead, something of him was scattered across the cosmos in a manner we couldn’t even begin to imagine. His strewn consciousness could be glittering among the stars, inexplicable fragments, transcendentally bright and far beyond knowledge.