Eck nods, looks from one to the other. He trembles with uncertainty.
‘Release him, please.’ Estelle’s gaze is steely.
Bob hmphs with resentment, but he releases the Eck, who stands frozen to the spot. Estelle bends down and holds her arms out to him, but he no longer knows whom to trust.
From her bag, Estelle produces a cake and, instead of breaking off a piece, offers him the entire thing. He sways, torn between fear and the lure of the snack.
‘Bad Eck!’ shouts Bob. ‘Stay!’
That seals it. The Eck scuttles over to Estelle, gingerly plucks the cake from her hands and allows her to pick him up as he eats. He settles into the crook of her arm.
Bob fumes. ‘Put down my pet.’
‘No.’ She does not look at him.
‘You’ll regret it.’ He is God.
She turns to go.
Bob mumbles furiously and pushes the hair out of his eyes. What gives her the right to so superior an attitude? He is frightened of Estelle but will not admit it, even to himself.
As she exits with his Eck, something snaps.
Bob closes his eyes and, with an enormous roar, brings the building down upon them all. It falls in on itself, a vast bouncing hole filled with filthy water and rubble. The collapse throws up a crashing wave that slams against the building opposite and turns back on itself in the narrow road. Like the casualties of a terrible disaster at sea, people scream and weep and bleed and drown, leaving dark stains on the surface of the water, along with the contents of their homes and bowels and skulls.
Well, thinks Bob, with satisfaction. I think that gives me the last word.
He turns to go, stepping carefully over the body of a young woman crushed in what is left of the stairwell. Surely it is time that he and Mr B found a new place to live in any case, maybe bigger, in a better neighbourhood, with more windows and a nicer view. He is considering the possibilities when a figure steps in front of him. It is Estelle. She is very much alive, but she holds the unconscious bloodied body of his pet.
‘How could you,’ she says, her voice icy with rage. ‘How could you be so cruel? He’s never done anything but serve you in the most humble manner. And this is how you repay him? He is not immortal.’ Her voice rises only slightly, but the intensity of it causes him to tip backwards. ‘You are so appallingly self-obsessed that you can’t even manage to love your own pet. What kind of a God does that make you?’ Her eyes flash with a fathomless whirling black fury.
Bob reaches out to Eck, but Estelle steps away.
‘Don’t you dare come near us.’ Her voice is brittle as frozen steel. ‘You don’t deserve the loyalty of an Eck. You deserve nothing.’ She stands very straight, could annihilate him with her gaze. ‘You are nothing.’
Bob transforms himself into a thick cloud of icy black gloom and seeps his way back home, to his and Mr B’s new home, which looks more or less identical to their previous home with the exception of his bedroom, which is considerably smaller than before, and Mr B’s, which is considerably larger.
‘Did somebody say “help”?’ Mr B looks up from his work.
‘Yes, help. Please help me,’ gabbles Bob, a miserable wretch-like version of his former self. ‘Everything’s gone wrong. Get rid of Estelle and my mother and I’ll do whatever you like in return.’
Mr B peers at him thoughtfully. ‘Well,’ he says, ‘I’ll see what I can do. In exchange, I’d like you to sort out the weather.’ He pauses, clears his throat and hands Bob the file marked W, for whales. ‘And see what you can do about this.’
Bob’s eyes widen.
‘It’s a big file,’ admits Mr B. ‘But this is your chance to do something grand and wonderful. Like you did in the beginning. Take it. Read it. Remind yourself why you’re God.’
Bob accepts the file. His mouth is slightly open, his expression bleak.
Mr B watches him go. He has no idea what to think.
Demo version limitation
42
Laura Davenport was preoccupied. It had taken forever to convince herself that the responsible thing to do was to challenge Lucy about the strange young man she was seeing. Only now that she had determined to confront her, she could get no answer on Lucy’s phone.
Lucy rarely left the house this early; perhaps she’d had to, on account of the weather? Laura left messages, waited an hour, and tried her at work. But the person who answered the phone at the zoo didn’t seem to know anything about her whereabouts.
‘Probably couldn’t get here because of the weather? It’s, like, a total nightmare?’ As if to prove the point, a great crash of thunder echoed down the line.
‘But she’s not answering her landline. Or her mobile.’
‘Wish I could help?’ She could hear the shrug in the girl’s voice. She sounded young. ‘We’re trying to sort out the animals. Though, between you and me, I’m pretty sure the rain is, like, nearly finished?’
Despite her anxiety, Laura was taken aback. ‘How could you possibly know?’
‘Tarots? I did a reading this morning and all signs are for, like, change?’
Laura put the phone down slowly. What an odd conversation. She shook the words out of her head, threw on her coat and grabbed the car key from a Chinese bowl by the front door. The engine sputtered at first but then caught, and she set off at speed, travelling half a mile before reaching an uncrossable ford. It was mere luck that a police barricade stopped her going forward, for she would have ploughed on regardless. She pulled up at the last moment and took out her phone.
‘Bernard, oh, thank heavens you’ve picked up. I can’t raise Lucy anywhere and I have such an awful premonition. I know it’s terrible to ask when you’re so overtaxed, but I really must get to her.’
He left immediately.
A trip that might have taken six minutes by car took nearly an hour. By the time he arrived, Laura was rigid with anxiety and, without a word, Bernard swept her off to Lucy’s, following the motorway as best they could, dodging larger craft and makeshift pirate transport. Laura gripped the wooden thwart with bloodless hands, her eyes turned inward, as Bernard brought the boat expertly alongside Lucy’s balcony. Laura slipped over the railings with surprising grace. She knocked loudly on the glass, falling back in relief when Lucy appeared at the window.
Laura folded her anxious daughter into a ferocious hug. ‘I was so worried.’ Her voice trembled. ‘I phoned …’
‘Flat battery.’ Lucy pulled away, impatient.
In the corner of the room, Bernard waited for what came next, while Laura busied herself in the kitchen with the tea. As she handed a flowery mug to Lucy, the girl’s composure sagged and her eyes overflowed. ‘Oh! Oh!’ she said, in a distressed bleat. ‘Mother.’ She began to weep.
Laura froze.
‘He said he loved me.’ Lucy wiped her eyes on her sleeve and took a deep breath, attempting to stem the flow of emotion without success. ‘He said he wanted to marry me and be together forever.’
But, thought her mother, but?
‘He said I was the only woman in the world for him.’ She stopped and covered her face with her hands, choked and shaking with misery. ‘I feel such an idiot.’
Laura put down the tea. She desperately wanted to approach her daughter, but didn’t dare, for fear of inciting her ire. Instead, she tried to radiate sympathy from the spot. It was agonizing.
Lucy didn’t move.
‘Darling? Can you tell me?’
‘It doesn’t matter,’ she said angrily. ‘It’s over.’
To hide her relief, Laura stepped forward and embraced her daughter. ‘My poor darling. He’s not worth weeping over. If he doesn’t appreciate a girl like you …’ But, even to her own ears, the words sounded quaint. What man ever warranted the tears shed on his behalf?
‘It’s fine.’ Lucy struggled free of her mother’s arms. ‘You don’t have to say all that.’
/> Hovering by the window, Bernard was the unwilling witness to this intimate scene. Laura saw him glance at his watch. She crossed over to him and touched his elbow.
‘I’m so sorry, Bernard. It’s not what I expected.’ She spoke softly, even laughed a little. ‘Thank God.’ She had imagined a bath full of blood, dismembered limbs, the awful dangle of feet. Now she could admit it.
‘We had to come. And she’s all right, that’s the main thing.’ Laura looked smaller than usual, and older. He felt an almost overwhelming urge to gather her up in his arms.
‘Go, Bernard. A little heartbreak, that’s all. Part of the human condition. It won’t be the last time.’ The look they shared spoke of the sympathy and wisdom of age, of its disappointments and yearnings, its habit of unacknowledged feelings. Without intending to, Laura took hold of Bernard’s hand in both of hers and laced her fingers tightly through his. It was as good as an admission, and for a moment neither dared to move, except to run one soft thumb along one warm palm. In the future, both would think of the moment with doubt, wondering whether they had imagined the gesture.
Bernard kissed his tearful goddaughter on the cheek, buttoned his jacket against a sudden icy wind and left, nearly bumping into a ragged, distraught-looking youth perched on the ledge of a nearby building with his coat pulled up round his face. The boy muttered and growled at him, like a dog. One of the homeless deranged, Bernard thought. I should probably offer him a lift.
But he didn’t.
43
Estelle has been a vigilant nurse. She is there when he blinks open his eyes and there again when he recovers enough to feel thirst. The water she brings in a glass tastes good. When she strokes his brow, her hand is cool.
She stays with him as he slips in and out of a feverish sleep; her voice, light and cool, falls around him like snow. She tells him stories of her plans in such a manner that he wants to survive.
Estelle holds him in her arms. His nose lies against the outside of her left breast and across her armpit, curling over her shoulder in a soft hook. She smells to him like linen and teacakes. Hour after hour she lulls him to sleep and lulls him awake again. He wonders if he has, after all, died. This is how he imagines heaven.
Eventually his wounds will heal. In the meantime, his feelings for her have knitted them together like two parts of the same bone.
Meanwhile, Bob has been thinking about the oceans until his brain feels wild and spinning and hot. He has managed to stop the rain; the city is already returning to normal. But sort out the whales? It is too much. He has tried, really he has, tried until he is nearly delirious with the effort. The rest of the world has become a blur; he is no longer conscious of anything beyond the turmoil inside his head.
Mr B does not seem to realize how hard it is for him to accomplish things on his own, he, who once created an entire world from nothing. He has not bothered trying to fix anything in a very long time. It seems he has forgotten how.
Hunched and miserable, he dozes off, dreaming of Lucy – beautiful, gentle, Lucy, beckoning to him with open arms and lips of ineffable softness. Oh, Lucy, Lucy! A terrible vision jolts him awake. She came to find him and he sent her away. Why? What had he been thinking? Now he must see her. The power of love courses through him, bolstering his resolve, spurring him on.
He arrives at Lucy’s jittery and distraught, pauses on a nearby window ledge to calm himself. He breathes deeply, running dirty fingers through matted hair. His eyes are red with lack of sleep, his clothes ragged. He does not want to frighten her but cannot help the way he looks. The past few days have been dreadful.
‘Lucy!’ he cries, pounding on her window. ‘Lucy, it’s me!’
But the shutters are closed and locked and it is not Lucy who answers. ‘Go away, or we’ll phone the police and have you put away.’ Lucy’s mother’s voice through the front door quivers with rage. ‘We’ll have you … flayed!’
Flayed? Bob frowns. Who would you hire to carry out a flaying in this day and age?
‘Go away.’ Lucy’s voice is muffled but her pain penetrates wood and glass and pierces his heart. ‘Please, go away. Go away, and never, ever come back.’
He hears a noise that might be a sob and then the other voice chimes in with unnecessary enthusiasm. ‘You are lower than the lowest of the low!’
And the muffled retort: ‘Thank you, Mother. I think I can handle this.’ She thinks of the boy she thought she loved. He is not well. He needs help. But from her? No, not from her.
‘What about our cottage by the sea?’ he shouts through the door. With a pang, he remembers that there is no cottage by the sea. Though he can hardly be blamed for not sorting it out; life has been unusually demanding of late. ‘Lucy? Lucy, my darling, my love, please, please, open the door.’
‘Go away, you monster!’ It is the other voice again.
Abruptly, it stops, and the noises within turn querulous. Then there is silence. He can imagine Lucy’s mother hissing advice: Don’t say a word, it’ll only encourage him.
Bob is suddenly tired of acting human and materializes inside the flat. Lucy begins to scream. None of this is going the way he wishes it would. Lucy and her mother run from him, cowering. He hears the locking of the bathroom door, as if a locked door could make the slightest difference.
Their fear annoys him. It’s just me, he wants to shout. Me, Bob!
He hears the sound of her fear, choking and gasping, and knows that what his mother and Mr B have been telling him all along is true.
‘Lucy,’ he whispers into the crease of the bathroom door. ‘I thought we might be happy.’ Tears choke him. On the other side of the door, Lucy squeezes her eyes shut in terror and prays.
At home, he sags against a wall, his heart heavy with despair. What becomes of him now is a matter of total indifference.
He looks up.
‘I’m sorry about your friend.’ Estelle stares down at him. Her expression, as usual, is serene.
‘Sorry?’ He sounds peevish and wild. ‘No problem! Sorry for what? The conspiracy to ruin my life? Never mind!’ His rage and disappointment have found an object. Great jagged sheets of electricity flow off him.
Estelle does not appear to be frightened. She does not, in fact, appear moved in any way. As if embarrassed, the electrical field begins to fade. It fizzes a little, hisses, then stops altogether.
Estelle waits. She watches him. ‘You haven’t asked about Eck.’
Bob glares, furious. ‘Eck? Of course I haven’t asked about him. Why should I? Has he asked about me?’
Estelle considers Bob. It is not that she feels any particular responsibility for Earth, but she finds it impossible to imagine a world ruled by such a God, especially once Mr B has gone. Bob without Mr B is unthinkable. Mr B, at least, does what he can. He does something, despite the perfectly accurate sense that it is not enough.
‘Eck is due to be eaten in two days. Have you thought about how to help him?’
Bob casts about, desperate. Eck? He’s supposed to save Eck? But who’s going to save him? He tears at his hair; his head threatens to explode. It’s all too much. Lucy, his mother, Estelle. The whales, Mr B. Eck.
‘I can’t save Eck. I have to sort out the oceans. The whales. In order to get rid of my mother.’ He slumps, waves a hand at her, feebly. ‘It’s too complicated to explain.’
Estelle looks at him, at the gaunt face and staring eyes. Her brain ticks over. His mother? The whales?
I can’t cope, thinks Bob. I may be God, but I can’t cope. Let me go to bed and stop thinking; let me close my eyes and ears, curl up in bed and sleep. I need comfort, he thinks peevishly. Where’s my Eck?
Bob misses him.
Estelle’s brows draw together. A muscle in her neck tenses. Once more, she attempts to move the players around the board in her head, like chess pieces. She will know when they have all assumed their proper squares.
Bob kicks the
wall of his bedroom. He feels beleaguered, wrong-footed, oppressed. Why should he care about that miserable penguiny stump? What has Eck ever done for him? Other than run errands and do what he’s told, which is what he’s paid to do in any case. OK, not paid. None of it makes him worthy of love, for pity’s sake. He’s only an Eck, and not even one of the better ones. How dare she look at him that way. How dare she make him feel guilty.
Estelle takes her leave, thoughtful.
He is alone, pacing, distressed. And then all at once outraged pride pricks him, and his energy comes together in a surge. He needs to feel powerful again, needs to feel like a god. His face is hot, his brain buzzing with the fever of creative possibilities; suddenly, a job that appeared insoluble has myriad solutions, each bolder and more dangerously unconventional than the last. Whales. Oceans. His powers may be rusty from lack of use, but a stubborn resolve overtakes him. In a great flash of resentment and fury he sets something in motion. A terrible noise like the sucking of a whirlpool seems to emanate simultaneously from the very centre of the Earth and the outermost reaches of the galaxy.
Something glorious is born.
There, he thinks, collapsing on to his bed, exhausted. There.
Now what?
44
Today is the first day of the rest of my life, thinks Mr B.
Nothing that happens on Earth is any longer his problem. He clutches the envelope; inside are details of his new job. Without pausing, he rips it open. First time through he skims, searching for key words.
Years of valued service … creativity, enthusiasm and skill … our deepest admiration … not toiled without notice … in recognition of the highest standards …
A warmth flows through him, a buzz of happiness unlike any he has ever known. Perhaps all the pain and misery have been worthwhile, just for the sweetness of this moment. What bliss to be acknowledged at last. He feels like singing, skipping for joy.