Broken Ghost Read online

  BROKEN GHOST

  Niall Griffiths

  CONTENTS

  GWELEDIGAETH/VISION EMMA

  ADAM

  COWLEY

  LOSING, AGAIN

  SLOOOOOOW RELEASE

  FUCK BUDDIES

  MESSAGES

  MEAT

  CALON ONEST, CALON LN

  FIVE BIG WHITE UPSIDE DOWN YS IN A LINE

  DO ONE, MOTHER NATURE

  MESSAGES

  MIST

  MAN OF THE CLOTH

  BRIDGE

  SABOTAGE

  SANCTIONS

  TO TELL YOU THE TRUTH

  CAMERA OBSCURA

  TWO SHOCKS

  THE LOWS

  HOLY SHOW MESSAGES

  THIN AND GREY

  LICHEN

  MAN OF THE CLOTH

  MESSAGES

  CYSLLT ADAM

  COWLEY

  EMMA

  UP HERE

  ADAM

  COWLEY

  UP HERE

  THIN AND GREY

  ADAM

  EMMA

  COWLEY

  THE FORCE

  UP HERE

  THE FORCE

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Niall Griffiths was born in Liverpool in 1966 and now lives in Wales. He has published six previous novels: Grits, Sheepshagger, Kelly + Victor, Stump, Wreckage, Runt and A Great Big Shining Star.

  BY THE SAME AUTHOR

  Grits

  Sheepshagger

  Kelly + Victor

  Stump

  Wreckage

  Runt

  A Great Big Shining Star

  to two wild and wonderful women

  Nicola Dawn

  and

  Rebecca Loncraine

  flying forever, now, both of you

  GWELEDIGAETH/VISION

  I remember what a fine figure she showed against the sky as she hung in the misty rain, and how the tight black silk gown set off her shape.

  Thomas Hardy, in a letter to Lady Hester Pinney, on the public hanging of sixteen-year-old martha Brown, convicted of murdering her violent husband

  EMMA

  IT WAS JUST there. Saw it. And maybe I should say her, I saw her, cos it definitely had a woman’s shape. Can always tell that shape – the curves an that. Floating in the air she was, just a bit below us, and I heard words.

  We’d walked up the ridge to watch the sun come up. The sun was behind us cos we’d all turned to look back at the lake. They were all sleeping – them who hadn’t already gone home, I mean; there was a couple of tents but mostly people were just crashed out on the shore, on the pebbles. A few fires still going, aye, but they’d nearly gone out – just smoke. Only a handful of people left, and only the three of us were awake, me and that scouse lad, what do they call him, Adlad is it? An that fuckin nutter, that Cowley, who was messing about with that iPod he’d robbed off one of the students. Didn’t really want him there, me; he gives me the jitters at the best of times, he does, and I could feel the comedown starting to make itself known and I just didn’t want him there but it’s not like I asked him to come – he just followed us up, like, onto the ridge. It had been raining, drizzling lightly, for a bit and hadn’t long stopped and all steam was coming up off the lake in these mad shapes. Like ghosts. An then there was this glow, like, this glow in the air, just below us it was but not on the ground, I mean it was in the air like, floating, and Adam was looking at me with his eyes all big like what the FUCK? and I looked and there was a woman in that glow. The shape of a woman. Not kidding. She was just hanging there in the air and I heard words: I heard the word ‘bridge’ and the words ‘dig’ and ‘wild’ and it was like she was talking to me, telling me something that I needed to know. I don’t know; I can’t explain. And it was like everything went away, everything, Adam an Cowley and the people sleeping on the shore of the lake, everything I’d done in the past, it was like none of that mattered anymore, it was like there was this great big bubble around me. There was only me and what I could possibly do. My skin felt all tingly. A kind of rush went through me, it did, a million times better than the crap E I’d had which had done nothing except keep me awake, even tho it was promising to bring a crash on me. It was … what was it? I dunno. As soon as it was over, and it didn’t last very long like, the very instant it was gone I knew that I wanted it back again.

  I don’t remember looking at the other two. The floating thing, the shadow, the woman-shape, it just vanished into the air and I thought of Tomos and how much I wanted to see him and smell his skin and hold him so I just walked off the mountain and went home. Took fuckin ages, it did. Was knackered by the time I got home. Tom was still asleep. I paid the babysitter and got into bed with my boy, cwtched up and fell asleep dead quick. No dreams. Or, at least, none that I can remember.

  ADAM

  I JUST FELT so fuckin happy. Can’t explain it, an I don’t even want to try, really. I just felt so fuckin happy. Like that shite E should’ve made me feel but didn’t; pure fuckin caffeine or somethin, that was. All it did was keep me awake. Probably for the best, tho, really, considering.

  I went up the ridge because I was following that Emma one’s arse, that’s all. I was about to go home and crash but I saw her, in them leggings dead tight an them little boots, heading off up the ridge so I thought I’d follow her. Get somethin in the wank bank, like. Which was me plan; home, wank, kip. Everybody was asleep on the shore or had already gone home so I was gonna borrow someone’s bike and scoot off home meself. There was a row of bikes, like, mountain bikes, all lined up on the shore and I was gonna take one an leave a note – honest – with me phone number on. Didn’t fancy the walk, like. Miles back into the town. I was even toying with the idea of knocking at the door of Rhoserchan, down the hill, asking if they had a spare bed for a few hours, but didn’t think that’d be a wise move. An besides me plan was to get home and go to me own bed and have a big long thrap to help me nod off an then I saw that Emma going up the ridge so I followed her. We’d been talking earlier, like, getting on well, so I just went up after her. And that fuckin Cowley had followed me, God knows why. I felt him behind me, heard his heavy breathing as we climbed up the slope, an tinny little snatches of music coming out of that iPod he’d lifted off some student lad and was arsing about with. Wicks the dick off me, that, when people scroll through an play a couple of seconds of each song. Does me fuckin head in. Not that I’d tell him that. He’d been standing on the shore, in his fuckin rugby top, no coat, just standing there like Tony Soprano with a skullcrop and great big dragon tat on his neck and you could see him just praying for someone to say something so’s he could kick off. Didn’t want him around me and him farting about with that iPod was doing me head right in but what the fuck can yeh do? So anyway we gets to the top of the ridge an all this steam was coming up off the lake, looked fuckin mad it did, amazing, took the breath out me chest, no lie. It’d stopped drizzling but the air was still kind of damp and then there was this glow … in the air, like, a bit below us cos we were on the top of the ridge by this time, but it was floating, this glow, in mid-air. I even thought that maybe I was asleep and I was dreaming but then that Emma one looked at me with them green eyes of hers gone big an I could see the tattooed stars behind her ear and I knew I was awake. It was like a floating glow. Can’t explain it. Kind of a shadow in it, as well, a vague human shape; I mean it had a bump that could’ve been a head and long thin things that could’ve been limbs. Curves, a bit like a woman. I dunno, Christ, I’d never seen anything like it in me life. I went into a kind of trance. It was like a smack hit, that’s the only thing I can compare it to. I just felt so fuckin happy. Funny how it made me feel that way, cos I mean it was just a shadow or som
ethin. The sun was coming up. The air was damp. Just something in the atmosphere, that’s all it was. An when I started feeling, like, normal again, I looked around an the other two had gone an I was all alone on the ridge on top of the mountain so I just walked home. Took ages. Stroked me cat and went to bed and slept like a log on Mogadon. Didn’t even dream.

  COWLEY

  FUSS ABOUT FUCK all, mun. Jes-a fuckin blob in-a sky. Rising sun or somethin, that’s all. I wazen even lookin, like, I was tryin-a find some decent sounds on that fuckin machine that I found, not fuckin robbed, some stew-dent cunt had dropped it in-a rushes like, don’t even know how to work-a fuckin thing, I don’t. It was all some chart shite or some arty shite I’d never even yurd of, no fuckin ’Phonics or anythin decent. Every borin twat had crashed or gone home so I jes went up-a ridge with-a others, that scouse lad and that girl. Think-a name’s Emily or somethin. An it was jes-a blob in-a sky, that’s all it was. Risin fuckin sun or somethin. In-a cloud or somethin. Fuss about fuck all, mun. I saw fuckin nowt.

  LOSING, AGAIN

  IN THE EIGHTEENTH minute our attacker, our 35 million star signing, goes in the book for diving. Rounds the keeper and decides to do the death of Aida instead of putting the ball in the net. Fuck’s sake. Despair, despair. It’s all collapsing. This season’s gonna end on a low.

  Sion shakes his head at me from over at the bar. Didn’t even notice him come in.

  —Did yeh see that? Pony-tailed pillock.

  —Is right.

  —Orange juice aye?

  —Ta.

  —Drop-a vodka in it aye?

  Just smile, Adam lad. Just smile back at him. Gallons of fuckin orange juice … sure I’m developing a tangerine tinge to me skin. Watch a game in the pub and I leave lookin like an Oompa Loompa. Or a worker at a perfume counter back home, WAG-mandarin. And needing a piss five times a night as me body tries to get rid of the glut of vitamin C.

  Ah well. Better than the alternative, I suppose. Nothing’s ever easy.

  Sionie puts a Britvic on the table and sits opposite with his Guinness.

  —And once again our star man royally tits it up. Fuckin holy show, this.

  —Holy show? What’s that mean? Scouse-ism is it, aye?

  —No. Everyone says it. Means making a twat of yourself. One of me ma’s favourite expressions and she’s from round this way originally. Never heard it, no?

  He sips his pint. I know how it’ll taste, that Guinness; I’ve heard it’s a decent pint in here and I can feel it on me tongue, cold and a bit thick and steely and malty. I start to salivate. God I’m like a fuckin dog. I drink some of me Britvic an crunch hard on ice.

  —It’s a good description anyway. Entire team’s a holy fuckin show.

  I can barely watch, truth be told. It’s a thing you never get used to. And of course there’s always some fuckin prick who thinks that yer not quite suffering enough for their liking, isn’t there? An there he is, knobhead at the bar, fin haircut and Home Counties accent, bound to be a student, wearing a shirt with ‘20’ on the back of it which he turns to show his mates, jerking both his thumbs backwards over his shoulder. Listen to the bellend:

  —See the curves on the 2? Like a woman. Oh that number. I caress her, I stroke her. Such a lovely digit, innit? I worship it. Her.

  Give me fuckin strength, man. I’ve got a nicer number for you, dickhead: 15,000. That’s the amount of ‘fans’ who leave before the final whistle whenever your bunch of pampered and indulged boy-men are losing at home. Buncha wankers. Not happy unless someone else is unhappy. There was a time I would’ve been right in the face of someone like that. And what’s him and his blert mates doing in this ale house anyway? Should be back in town in the Varsity or somewhere. Some student pub. Fuckin prick, I’ll—

  The glow, lad. Remember that glow.

  —Yew okay to be in a pub, Adam?

  —Why shouldn’t I be, Sion?

  —Temptation, like. All the smells n that.

  There’s a moustache of Guinness froth on his top lip. —I can handle it, lad. I put on a deep, African voice: – Strong like lye-on. An besides, where else is there to watch the game? Only boozers show it, don’t they?

  —Aye. Altho why we’re wanting to watch this cack is beyond me.

  The inevitable goal goes in. On the screen I see red shirts pointing accusingly at each other in the penalty box and the goalie bending to pick the ball out of the net and at the bar I see Tit-head 20 slapping his knees, I mean he’s actually slapping his fuckin knees as he roars with laughter. Roars with laughter. His mates are watching this performance and sniggering and some of the people at the bar, the proper people like, are glaring daggers at him.

  I must avoid all temptation. I must be absolutely honest with myself at all times.

  I stand up. —Come ’ed.

  —Where we going?

  —Back room. This is doing me head in. He’s doing me head in.

  I nod in the direction of 20 who’s now hanging onto the bar as if his laughter might bring him to his knees. Theatrical cunt. Christ there was a time when …

  The glow.

  —Can’t watch this shite. Neither the game or that prick.

  —Agreed.

  We take the drinks into the back room where there’s no telly or knobhead; this is the serious drinker’s room. Blokes at the bar not talking, each with a pint and a chaser in front of him. Scraggly beards and baseball caps. Bad teeth and yellowy eyes. The only food on offer a sweaty roll in cling film or whatever comes out of vending machines – peanuts or M&Ms. M&Ms! Sugary chocolate with booze? Yick. Never saw the attraction in that combination meself. And I can’t see M&Ms these days without thinking of that advert where the big red M&M has a voice like Willem Dafoe: you get in the bowl. The feller puts him in a bowl and gives it to his girlfriend and the sweetie’s legs and arms are dangling over the sides. Couldn’t find a bigger bowl, huh?, he says. A living M&M. You’d have to take big bites out of him, eat him alive like, and he’d either be screaming in pain and thrashing his little legs and arms or he’d be making sarcastic judgments and comments as you ate him: Whoops, don’t crack your dentures, there, honey … Either way it’d be a fuckin nightmare. Adverts these days, God. They’re incomprehensible on the one hand and fever dreams on the other.

  Voices in the other bar are raised. Sion asks me if I need a smoke and I tell him I do. There’s a bit of a charge off him, a little bit of shaky energy. He’s a feller of a bit of a nervous disposish, is our Sionie. Harmless feller, not a bad bone in his body.

  We go out into the beer garden and roll cigs. Well, I say ‘beer garden’ … a placcy chair and four flagstones. But it’s outside. It’s a nice day an I can hear seagulls an smell a briny whiff from the nearby sea.

  —Benny’ll be here soon. He’s coming straight from work.

  —Is he? On a Sunday?

  —Got to unload a wagon or something. Be a load of mad stuff from Germany. Pickled herrings n stuff. Sour Krauts.

  —Hope he’s getting double time.

  —From Lidl? Nah, not a chance. It’s not even ovies, this, just a normal shift, like. No one pays moren normal time anymore, do ey? He works over forty hours a week an he’s in debt up to his eyeballs, him. Living wage is a thing of the past, mun. He spits a shred of baccy off his lip. —Got an interview meself next week. Warehouse work out at Glan-yr-Afon.

  I have to laugh; he sounds so woebegone.

  —What are yew laughing at?

  I use the word, speak it like, cos it’s a good one: —You, lad. You sound so fuckin woebegone.

  —Well, wouldn’t you be? Twelve-hour days for buttons, slogging me bollax off? Not looking forwards to it at all, mun.

  —You haven’t even got the friggin job yet. Haven’t even had the interview.

  —Kind of hoping I don’t, either. Not fuckin looking forwards to it at all. But I’m skinto. An if I get it an don’t take it they’ll stop me dole. Mad for their fuckin sanctions, they are.

  The phone
trills in me pocket. It’s Benj.

  —Where are you? I’m in the pub but you’re not.

  —Having a smoke outside, Benj.

  —I’ll join. Orange juice is it?

  —Nah. Sick of the stuff. I’m alright.

  —Sionie with you?

  —Aye.

  —He on the Guinness?

  —Aye.

  —There we are, then. See you in two.

  I put the phone back in me pocket.

  —Benny?

  —He’s at the bar. Be out in a minute.

  I’m thirsty. So thirsty. The familiar thought creeps in; just one. Just one drink, one pint. Guinness, all black and cool and creamy with condensation on the glass, drips running across the gold harp, a shamrock in the foam. Just the one won’t hurt. It’ll be a test, a test I’ll pass, I’ll have just the one and savour it and then go back on the juice, just for the taste like it would be, not the buzz at the back of the neck, just the taste cos it’s utterly unique, that taste, nothing comes close, just that cool and slightly burnt taste. One won’t hurt.

  Except it fuckin will. It’ll hurt me and everyone around me. It’ll hurt everything. Just the one and it’ll end in only one way and that’ll be chaos and fuckin ruin.

  The glow.

  —You alright butt?

  I nod.

  —Yewer lookin a bit sweaty there, mun.

  —I’m alright. Don’t worry about it.

  The door thwacks open against the wall cos Benny, hands occupied with drinks, has hoofed it open. There’s a great big grin on his face and his hair’s all sweat-matted with dust in it. Two stripes of muck on his cheek like war paint.