Calliope -- The Great Novel Race of 2008 -- Last Train to the Sun by Luigi Marchini -- Chapter Two

The Great Novel Race 2008:

Last Train to the Sun

by Luigi Marchini

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Chapter 2

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I am glad you changed your mind.

He is fighting for his life against a swarm of killer bees. They are all around him, biting, pinching, buzzing, and pushing him backwards. He turns round and sees the hive. In its middle is the queen bee, staring at him. She slowly opens her mouth, and he sees that her jaws open as wide as those crocodiles he sees on nature programmes. Her tongue protrudes out, further and further. So far he has been too frightened to feel the pain, but now as the drones slowly fly off, Jamie feels the swelling and the bites and he starts to cry. Cry as only he knows how - tearless, silent. Now the tongue is getting closer, reaching out for him, almost touching him. So close he can see the gooey mess engulfing it, a green and brown liquid that stinks of burnt toast and Peter’s shit. Mummy! Mummy! Help!

Jamie opens his eyes and looks up at the screen.

The young man pulls the drab blanket over his dying mother, simply, without a fuss, without a word. Sokurov is a master of economy: Tarkovsky could certainly have taken a leaf out of his contemporary’s book. Mother and Son’s running time is just over an hour, and Jamie shudders when he remembers Stalker and Solaris: he couldn’t really say if they were any good, having slept through most of them, though images of the Stalker, Writer and Scientist journeying into the Zone have stayed in his mind. And what was that quote-something like: ‘my conscience wants vegetarianism to win over the world. And my subconscious is yearning for a piece of juicy meat. But what do I want?’-who was it- the Scientist? He can’t remember and why should he in any case? Tarkovsky (if he were alive of course) on Celebrity Big Brother would be interesting – just imagine him and Jade Goody having a conversation. Jamie smiles. On screen the youth carries his mother down a winding path that seems to dissect the Russian summer that cuts through lush forests, verdant fields and leads to who knows where. The music impresses him most, sparse but lyrical-sounds a bit like Mercury Rev’s Deserters Songs in places, and like some classical music he vaguely remembers in others. He must remember to stay for the credits.

Outside the NFT he pauses and looks at his watch. 5.10 pm. He hesitates - normally after a Sunday screening he walks along the Thames. Today he doesn’t feel like it-the film has left him in a melancholic mood, kind of like the feeling he remembers when his mother tucked him into bed-secure and safe but also apprehensive about what the night would bring. Maybe he would have felt different if he had known his real mum.

He turns left and then left again towards Waterloo Underground Station. The carriage is quite full so he fails to find a seat without someone sitting next to him. He is between a girl with mousy brown hair who has her eyes closed, and a woman with grey hair and glasses who looks like an older Jean Brodie. He forms these profiles by looking in the reflection in the window ahead, averting his gaze from the faces opposite. Then he shuts his eyes. The carriage smells of staleness; maybe it’s the heat that awakens dormant and brings to life hitherto dead odours. There must be conversations taking place, but the film’s theme music still resonates, mingling with the droning noise of the archaic train. His mind wonders to school and those Russian lessons (it was a grammar school after all)-it was because of them that he started to play truant and indulge in his love of films. How ironic that the first film he saw at the NFT was Russian! Battleship Potemkin. The National Film Theatre (soon to be called the BFI Southbank he’d read) was a short walk and it had seemed the logical venue for his education. And he now spends most of his spare time there. He failed his Russian GCE (among others), dropped out of school in the 6th form but so what? You have to do what you enjoy in life-and he loved the cinema and hated academia. Opening his eyes he sees the faces of the film’s mother and son seated opposite.

Ok-what do we have so far? A few hundred words, some minutes from Jamie’ life. Isn’t that all we are? Words? Either spoken or thoughts. Do you describe your wife/husband, son/daughter, friends, countries and so forth using words? Of course you do. When I get asked ‘How are you?’ I sum up my condition by answering either simply ‘Ok’ or some other exclamation. I cannot think the reply because by saying nothing surely that diminishes the meaning of my existence? Not to me because obviously I can formulate the answer in my mind, but I have to acknowledge my own life to others. Don’t we all? Don’t we all want to be recognised, given substance to? By saying nothing, by remaining dumb I would extinguish my own life, however insignificant. And Jamie’s life is only a life because I say so. Actually because we say so – you are helping me aren’t you? Our thoughts, our actions are mere words, lexis and syntax. Frightening isn’t it? Even in death there is no respite from the overkill of language - descriptions, eulogies, prayers. Headstones are always engraved, sermons are never silent. For words substitute narrative. Our ancestors communicated, told stories in signs, pictures, grunts and so on. There is no reality without language: the world wars, the discovery of America, the Crusades, the Roman Empire, the birth of Christ would not have happened. No narrative means no life. Fact.

Of course the story is a little boring so far, isn’t it? No ‘action’ as such, no dialogue. You don’t like it do you, my friends. You are quite right, of course; the truth is that Jamie doesn’t take the tube home. This is what really happens.

He turns left and walks under Waterloo Bridge, along Queens Walk. Raindrops fall as he sees the familiar green and white awning of the café/bar. The rain is warm. He spots Merlin seated at the back. It’s not an ideal meeting place but Jamie is still wary of his ‘friend’ even after almost a year of these weekly al fresco rendezvous. Merlin is an imposing figure – over 6 ft tall with a physique somewhere between Stallone and Van Damme. Good guy, nice guy even-occasionally. Most of the time he is a morose individual with a nihilistic streak who seldom loses his temper but when he does…For some reason he likes Jamie. Treats him as his younger brother, though there must be 20 years between them.

‘Hi Jimbo!’ Merlin’s faintly Irish drawl greets him.

‘Hiya’. Jamie sits besides him. He notices the empty glass on the table, chaperoned by the near empty bottle of Glenfiddich. Used to be Jack Daniels-business certainly has picked up over the years. It’s raining properly now. ‘Let’s go inside.’

‘No. I’m fine here.’

Jamie looks at Merlin who is staring at a barge drifting past. Well he thinks he is but this thought is quickly dispelled when Merlin’s head doesn’t move even when the barge is out of vision. Jamie knows better than to disturb Merlin when he is in a ‘reverie’. He moves inside and orders an orange juice. The rain is beating harder now, and still Merlin doesn’t move. Boy, he’s getting soaked. Jamie looks out at the river, watches the rain hit the water and the tourist boats go by, occupants with hoods and coats all done up. He is just about to turn away when he sees a small speedboat appear in his line of vision. Its sole occupant is a very young man dressed in dark shorts and t-shirt. He is standing, hands on the controls until he turns his head round, spots Jamie and waves. Jamie doesn’t respond - he is wondering what a fictional Russian character from an obscure film is doing on the Thames. And where is the guy’s mother?

He shuts his eyes, opens them and the boat has gone. He looks for Merlin. Where is he?

‘Are you alright?’ The voice comes from his right. ‘You look as if you’ve seen a ghost, if you pardon the cliché.’

How does someone so large move so quickly and silently? He turns to Merlin who is now inside the café and seated next to him.

‘I’m fine. Just a little tired and hungry.’ It’s true of course, he hasn’t had any ‘food’ for a long time. That’s why he’s here. Merlin doesn’t know anything about Jamie’s personal history and that’s the way Jamie wants it. He could tell him about his nightmares, strange ones in that he dreams them in a child’s voice. But he has told no- one about them. Somehow it doesn’t seem right. Merlin belongs in a different world, one where the only family is not a blood one, but one that is made up of individuals held together by intrigue, needs, desire and cravings. One where a family ‘loss’ is not so much grieved over as greeted with glee and a free-for-all over the deceased’s possessions. He is close to being part of this family. ‘You seemed to be day dreaming there as well.’

'Yeah I was. Thinking about the week. Did you hear about the train crash?’ Merlin asks, shaking his head.

Jamie nods, catching the scent of alcohol. He knows what this means. Merlin has lost his temper badly this week. Hearing about other deaths seems to have a cathartic effect on Merlin, almost as if God were saying ‘that’s ok mate, do your worst-anything you can do, I can do better.’ All Jamie wants to do now is leave. So he ventures:

‘Have you got it?’

Merlin looks at him, unzips his sodden jacket and hands him the small plastic bag. Jamie glances round quickly and puts it in his inside jacket pocket. Merlin carries on looking at him. Jamie knows what he is thinking. He is having a pang of conscience. But in the end that never gets in the way of business, and he brightens up when Jamie hands him the envelope. Better make some idle chat:

‘Been to the gym today?’

‘Nope’.

‘How’s Celia? Haven’t seen her in ages!’

‘Fine.’

Seeing this is going nowhere, Jamie gets up.

‘Sit down.’

Of course Jamie obeys.

'Jimbo, ever seen The Third Man? Silly question- course you have. You’ve seen everything. Well, it was on telly yesterday. There was a bit where wassis name…Brando…’

‘Welles’, I correct him.

‘Yeah, him…he says something that sort of made me think.’

‘You mean the cuckoo speech?’

‘What’s that? No, I mean where he talks about victims, and about how he don’t feel any pity for any of his. Well, I do, ya know. Every one of mine. I wish I didn’t do what I do. Part of me says I am merely providing a service…making a living. It’s all I know. If I didn’t do it, someone else would. Ever since I see that film, Jimbo, I think that maybe I should be getting ready for the big one, that maybe I don’t deserve to be alive, ya know?’

‘Yeh, I know.’

‘When do you start preparing to die? When you are born? When you reach twenty? Thirty? When you have sinned? If that the case I’d be dead a thousand times over.’

It’s supposed to be a joke; neither of them laughs.

Back in his Camden bed-sit, Jamie switches on Virgin Radio and deposits the bag behind the bookcase with the unread classics: Dickens, Austen, Hardy. News headlines. A murder. 24- year-old mother of two. Family member suspected. Apparently he is a builder. So what? Jamie starts to shake. What difference does someones occupation make? A murderer is a murderer. Come to think of it why did they give her age and say she was a mother of two? Sympathy vote? A life is a life is a life, surely. Is a student’s life worth more than his? Unfulfilled potential maybe. Is it fair? Is a spinster's life worth less than a mother of five? What if the spinster does great charity work, is kind, generous and selfless, and the mother of five abuses her kids (by 5 different men), is a druggie (well maybe he can forgive her that), is a benefit cheat, a shoplifter. What difference is there between a 24 year old woman and a 30 year old? Because she has lived more, is the older woman more expendable? Jamie switches the radio off, and sits down on the bed. He looks at the pieces of paper strewn on it. He is shaking more now. He picks up the pages and glances at the lists: Top Ten War Films, Top Ten Musicals, Top Ten Westerns, Top Twenty Albums - there are only 12 though; he hunts around in vain for a pen/pencil without moving from the bed. He must remember to put Blue Lines at 13 later. His hands are worse now, and his body is following suit. Still, he manages to take a needle from underneath the pillow. Not too dirty. It'll do. He goes back to the bookcase and moves it away from the wall. He picks up the small plastic bag, holds it up and inspects its contents. He opens the small storage cupboard above the sink and picks up the yellow plastic bottle of lemon juice. Empty. He pauses and thinks for a moment. He picks up the vinegar bottle. Italian wine vinegar, not malt. Just the job. Half full. More than enough. He picks up a mug as well and sits back down on the bed. He empties the white powder into the mug and pours three quarters of the vinegar into it. He has forgotten a spoon. Never mind - he can't wait any longer. He mixes the contents of the cup with his right hand index finger, every now and then tasting it. When the powder has dissolved into the vinegar completely, he fills the needle.

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