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Canongate Books - M.J. Hyland

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182 pages

English

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All actions have consequences. This is how life goes. Patrick is a loner, an intelligent but disturbed young man struggling to find his place in the world. He ventures out on his own, and, as he begins to find happiness, he commits an act of violence that sends his life horribly and irreversibly out of control. But should a person's life be judged by a single bad act? This is How is a compelling and macabre journey into the dark side of human existence and a powerful meditation on the nature of guilt and redemption

Informations

Publié par	Canongate Books
Date de parution	01 juillet 2009
Nombre de lectures	0
EAN13	9781847677723
Langue	English

Informations légales : prix de location à la page 0,0400€. Cette information est donnée uniquement à titre indicatif conformément à la législation en vigueur.

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THIS IS HOW
M.J. HYLAND
For Julian Owen.
‘Everything unconditional belongs in pathology.’
N IETZSCHE
Contents
Title Page Dedication Epigraph Part One Chapter One Chapter Two Chapter Three Chapter Four Chapter Five Chapter Six Chapter Seven Chapter Eight Chapter Nine Chapter Ten Chapter Eleven Chapter Twelve Chapter Thirteen Part Two Chapter Fourteen Chapter Fifteen Chapter Sixteen Chapter Seventeen Chapter Eighteen Chapter Nineteen Chapter Twenty Chapter Twenty-One Chapter Twenty-Two Chapter Twenty-Three Chapter Twenty-Four Chapter Twenty-Five Chapter Twenty-Six Chapter Twenty-Seven Chapter Twenty-Eight Chapter Twenty-Nine Chapter Thirty Chapter Thirty-One Chapter Thirty-Two Chapter Thirty-Three Chapter Thirty-Four Acknowledgments About the Author Also By M.J. Hyland Copyright

Part One

1
I put my bags down on the doorstep and knock three times. I don’t bang hard like a copper, but it’s not as though I’m ashamed to be knocking either.
The porch light comes on and the landlady opens the door. She’s younger and prettier than I expected.
‘Hello,’ I say. ‘I’m Patrick.’
‘I thought you’d be here hours ago.’
It’s after ten and I was due at six. My mouth’s gone dry, but I smile, friendly as I can.
‘I missed the connection,’ I say.
I’ve not meant the lie, but she’s forced me.
‘You’d better come in.’
We face each other in the hallway. I’ve got my back to the door and she’s got her back to the stairs. I should say something, but I can’t think what. I put my bags down again and my hands hang heavy.
‘You’ll have to meet the other boarders tomorrow,’ she says. ‘They’ve gone out.’
She takes hold of her long brown hair and pulls it over her left breast like a scarf.
‘Let me take your coat,’ she says.
‘I’m not bothered,’ I say. ‘I’ll keep it on.’
I want the pockets for my hands.
‘There’s a rack just beside you.’
‘I’ve said I’ll leave it on.’
‘I thought you might feel more comfortable with it off. It’s a very warm evening.’
She looks at me and I look at her and she takes a step back as though she blames the place where she’s standing for the silence.
I want her to show me to my room and get it over with. I take my coat off and put it on the rack.
‘There,’ I say.
She coughs and I get to thinking maybe she’s nervous, same as me. Maybe she thinks I’m all right.
‘Is that all the luggage you have?’
I’ve got clothes in one duffel bag, my toolkit in the other.
‘Yeah.’
My coat falls off the hook and, because neither of us picks it up, it’s as though there’s something watching us.
Beside the hallway telephone, a pen hangs from a piece of string. I flick the string and the pen swings.
She laughs, but it’s not a mean laugh.
‘What did you do while you waited for your train?’ she says.
‘I read a book.’
I cover my throat with my hand. I didn’t read. I went to an off-licence and they had a four-for-two deal on bottles of beer. I drank three at the station to get in a better mood and I’ve still got one in my bag.
‘Is it a good book?’
‘So far.’
There are pictures of boats on the wall.
‘I’m building a boat,’ she says. ‘Bridget Bowman’s building a boat.’
I smile and she smiles right back. She’s got a few stains between her teeth, like grout between tiles.
‘That’s good,’ I say.
She points to the hallway wall, to a picture of a half-built boat in a dark shed. I should ask her what kind of boat it is, but I know nothing about boats and she’ll think I’m an idiot.
I pick up the coat.
‘I’ll take you up now,’ she says. ‘You’re on the first floor.’

My room’s small, but it’s at the front of the house and I’ll bet it has a good clear view of the sea.
There’s a single bed, a sink, a draining board, and a rack for cups and plates. Under the window, there’s a table and a wooden chair.
I put my bags down under the sink, go to the bed, and sit. I wouldn’t mind a ham sandwich and a cup of coffee. After that, we could lie down together and I could put my head in her lap, or the other way round. It’d be up to her.
She comes over, stands close to me. ‘What’ve you got in the big bag?’ she says.
‘My toolkit.’
She looks at it.
‘Do you want me to open it up?’
‘Never mind,’ she says. ‘I was just curious.’
I stand.
‘Is the room okay?’ she says.
‘It’s more than okay.’
She smiles. ‘How long do you plan to stay?’
‘Indefinitely.’
‘You’ve come here for good then?’
‘Or bad.’
She laughs, takes a step back. ‘We’d better go down to the office now.’

I follow her down the stairs and she takes her time, goes too slow, keeps turning back to look at me, tells me the ins and outs of the running of the boarding house.
Three weeks ago my fiancée Sarah was standing at the top of the stairs when she said, ‘I can’t marry you, it’s over,’ and when she was halfway down, I called out her name, but she didn’t stop, didn’t so much as look at me, just said, ‘Please don’t follow me.’
I wanted to push her down the stairs, make the kind of impression I didn’t know how to make with words. But I didn’t, and when she’d closed the front door I said, ‘Okay, then,’ and, ‘Goodbye, then.’
Afterwards, I played the scene over and over, imagined how I planted my hands in the middle of her back and pushed hard enough to send her flying.
And I got this sentence in my head, over and over, ‘You broke my heart and now I’ve broken your spine.’ It was something I’d never say, not like anything I’ve ever said. I’ve never done any serious violence to anybody, never even thought about it all that much.
The next day I set about looking in the papers for work and lodgings down south near the sea and three weeks later my bags were packed and I was on the train.
I’m here now, a hundred miles away, and that’s the past. Sarah’s the past. It’s done with. I don’t have to think about it again if I don’t want to.

At the bottom of the stairs, Bridget takes a left turn to her office. The writing in the frosted glass says: Do Not Enter. She unlocks the door, goes in and sits behind her desk. There are more pictures of boats and her black-and-white wedding photographs on the walls and a pile of books about boats on the desk and a vase full of white flowers on top of a filing cabinet. I wonder where her husband is.
‘You’ll need to pay for the first two months and a six-week bond in case there’s any breakage or malicious damage.’
I’ve only ever heard my father use the phrase malicious damage and I expect it from him because he’s a miserable factory foreman, always on the lookout for thievery and wrongdoing. She’s too pretty to be saying it.
‘Right,’ I say.
I open my wallet and take out a wad of notes and without so much as blinking I give her the money. I bet she’ll think there’s a lot more where that came from.
She looks at the notes and frowns.
‘Wait,’ I say. ‘Let me count it for you.’
I’ve given her all she’s asked for and I’ve only got a hundred and fifty pounds left.
‘Is everything all right?’ she says.
I nod.
‘You’re just tired.’
‘Yeah, it’s been a long day.’
‘Of course.’
She wants more.
‘I’m sorry I haven’t been more friendly,’ I say. ‘I’ll be a new man in the morning.’
‘We’ll do the paperwork and get you a set of keys tomorrow then.’
‘That’d be good.’
She moves round to the front of her desk. ‘Well, goodnight then, Patrick.’
She’s lovely.
‘Goodnight.’

I reach the first-floor landing and she calls up.
‘Breakfast’s at seven-thirty on weekdays and eight-thirty on weekends.’
I call back, ‘Okay, thanks. See you tomorrow.’
‘Sleep well,’ she says.
‘You too.’
There’s a good atmosphere made by our voices calling up and down the stairs, something like the mood of being on holiday, just me and Bridget, alone.

2
I’m asleep when the front door slams.
It’s half-midnight and the other boarders are home. Somebody’s fallen against the wall outside, and there’s laughter.
I get out of bed and open the window, try to hear what they say, but all I hear is a tomcat crying for sex.
‘Fuck you,’ I say.
I dress and put my shoes on, try talking myself into going down, but change my mind and take my shoes off.
The other boarders, two men, they go on laughing and talking.
I put my shoes back on.
‘Forget it,’ I say. ‘You’ll meet them in the morning.’
I’ve not meant to talk to myself and, if I’ve done it now, maybe I’ve done it before and not known it.
I take my shoes off again, undress, get back into bed.
But I don’t sleep, don’t even close my eyes.
When the men come up the stairs, one of them laughs and says, ‘The new boy.’

I wake at 4 a.m. The man in the next room’s farting, a sound like sausages bursting in a frying pan. I’m wide awake now and staying in bed’s a waste of time. I won’t sleep.
I get up and dress.
I’ll go out and walk by the sea, watch the sunrise and be back in time for breakfast.
I go down quiet as I can and take one of the keys hanging on the hooks beside the coat-rack.

I cross the empty road to the promenade and walk down to the water’s edge. The only light comes pale from the moon and a few of the unbroken orange lamps further down the esplanade. Waves roll to the sand and suck as though for food and the sound of the sea is like applause.
I walk towards the town. By the time I reach the main street, my tongue’s sticky with thirst.
All the shops are closed. I go on further, down to the train station at the junction. It’s about twenty minutes from the boarding house.
There’s nobody at the station, no attendant, no cleaner, and the buffet’s closed. I climb over a barrier and go out to platform 2. The air here’s cold and there’s a smell of stale ash and engine oil.
I turn back.

When I reach the boarding house, the sun’s risen and the light’s foggy and blue.
I go straight up to my room, open my big bag, take out the toolkit and put it safe under the bed, grab a towel and go to the bathroom at the end o