The Music Shop

  Braving his tea, Frank discovered it was stone cold.

  Nice, though.

  The best tea he had ever drunk, in fact.

  He had chosen her the ‘Moonlight’ Sonata, he said, because it was one of those very famous pieces that everyone liked and no one really heard. So he wanted to help her listen. What he was going to tell her was not the kind of thing she would ever find in a textbook. It was just how he felt when he played the record.

  Ilse Brauchmann nodded.

  He explained the whole story about Beethoven and his student Julia, just as Peg had once done. ‘When I listen to the “Moonlight” Sonata, I see him sitting at his piano next to her. It’s as if he’s playing his own love letter, just waiting for a sign that she understands. The music starts softly. It’s kind. Because here he is, this man who’s old enough to be her father, this man who’s always falling for the wrong woman, but this one, you see, she’s so beautiful, and she’s so above him. The music builds up and down, but it never runs away, it just waits for her. And the higher notes go up, up, and the lower ones repeat the pattern, saying yes, yes. It’s like two voices, asking one another if they feel the same, without – you know – without using words. But then Beethoven does something else as well. He makes the higher notes lead the way, as if he – Beethoven – is now Julia, and she – Julia – is him. It’s so intimate, what he’s doing, he’s practically having sex with her.’

  ‘Sex?’ Her face stretched wide. ‘Beethoven?’

  ‘Or at least good foreplay.’

  Sex? Foreplay? Horrified, he heard the words that had come from his mouth. He reached for his tea, and got another mouthful of cold. It was probably best to keep talking.

  ‘So we get to the second movement. And it’s fast. It’s happy. It’s a bit of a surprise. You think, Oh I get it. You’re all right, Beethoven. This isn’t hurting you. Good man. But that’s just a trick. Because then we get the third movement and it’s like he’s a different person. It’s wild. Beethoven jumps off his stool and he leaps right on top of that piano. I mean he’s inside the thing. He’s ripping it up. It’s punk. He takes everything that has come before and he kicks it sky high. Because Beethoven knows, you see. He knows that you don’t find peace until you’ve been to hell and back. So what’s he saying? Is he saying, Don’t believe the hype, life is shit? Or is he actually saying, Yes, it’s shit but it fits inside a sonata. It’s up to you. But you will never find out unless you listen.’

  In all this time she had barely moved. Was she even breathing? He felt exhausted. If the waitress had offered him a blanket, he would have lain down and slept – and yet by the same token, he felt so wired he had no idea how he would ever sleep again.

  The Singing Teapot waitress bashed through her saloon doors carrying – not a blanket at all, but a Hoover. It was already six thirty. Fully dark outside.

  Frank passed Ilse the bag of records. There was the ‘Moonlight’ Sonata, as well as Kind of Blue, along with another of his favourites, Pet Sounds by The Beach Boys. He asked her to listen. That was all she had to do. If she took the time, there was so much waiting for her that she didn’t yet know. It would be like new spaces opening up, one after another.

  At last Ilse Brauchmann spoke. Her accent broke the words into separate syllables, making them seem larger and more complex in meaning. ‘Thank you, Frank. That was an amazing lesson.’

  She paid the bill, and passed Frank an envelope. Fifteen pounds. More cash than he made in a day. She rose to her feet and slipped on her green coat, all the time without looking at him, then she moved to the door. Thanking the waitress repeatedly for her kindness, Frank gambolled after Ilse Brauchmann in case he lost her all over again.

  It was her idea that they should see the moon on the lake. ‘I mean, I know the music is not about that, but still it would be nice to see it? Ja?’ They had made their way along the cobbled alleyway from the café and crossed Castlegate. The gates to the park were unlocked. He didn’t even think about it. He just said ‘Yes!’ – actually, he said ‘Ja!’ – and followed.

  The moon was low. Not really a full one; more like a half-sucked sweet. All along the path, the dark bare trees were strung with coloured lights, stretching ahead in loops of red and green and yellow. A slight wind soughed and rustled in the branches.

  They passed the bandstand, closed up for winter, and left the main path to go down towards the lake. It was wonderfully quiet. Just the tiny purling of water against the shore, and the muffled city in the background. She led the way to the jetty and he followed until they stood at the very edge, with the dim water all around them. It rocked the line of pleasure boats tied up with rope and shaped like white swans. Now that his eyes were used to it, the dark was a smudge. Not fully black, but more a velvety blue. The two of them stood side by side, watching the lake. Smoking. He felt curiously at ease.

  ‘Wouldn’t it be nice to go in a boat?’ she murmured. Before he could object, she had knelt and untied one. ‘Get in. Quick.’

  Part-way between the boat and the jetty, three important things occurred to Frank.

  One: he was very large.

  Two: the boat was very small.

  Three: he couldn’t swim. It was another of those ordinary things that Peg had neglected to teach him. Point of fact, he was afraid of water.

  As his right foot hit the boat, it – the boat – appeared to plummet downwards. Water came sloshing over the sides and it jerked away from the jetty. So now here he was, one plimsoll safely land-bound, the other already drenched in very cold water, while the gap between his two feet seemed to be growing at an alarming rate, with the rest of Frank stuck in the middle.

  ‘Jump,’ said Ilse Brauchmann.

  Jump? Had she any idea who she was talking to? He said, ‘Whoa!’ That was all he could come up with.

  Two firm hands pushed his shoulder and sent him flying into the boat. It was like landing in a plastic cup. The boat pitched high to the left, then high to the right. Water poured in – the bottom of the boat was a puddle. He held out his hand for Ilse but she was already stepping in, all by herself. The boat see-sawed violently. It was hardly an equal distribution of weight but at least he was less in danger now of tipping backwards and plunging head-first to his death at the bottom of a lake.

  ‘How deep is this water?’ he asked.

  ‘Very deep, I guess.’ Completely matter-of-fact, she was.

  She slotted the oars into the rowlocks. Water seeped over her shoes but that didn’t seem to bother her. He heard the muffled splash as the oars hit water, and the rhythmic creak of the boat.

  ‘When did you learn to do this?’ he said.

  She glanced over her shoulder, guiding the boat towards the centre of the lake. ‘Oh I never did. But it can’t be difficult.’

  His feet were so wet, his shoes felt stuck to his socks. And he was squashed inside what must be the rear end of a small plastic swan, with his knees jutting towards his chin. There was a lot about his situation that struck Frank as uncomfortable and potentially life-threatening. Nevertheless he felt childishly thrilled. As a boy he had stood looking down from the cliffs towards the beach below, while other kids played in the sea and their mothers sat with picnics and towels. He had longed to join them.

  The moonlight lay in pieces all across the water, and so did the reflections from the little coloured lights strung up in the trees. As the boat moved forward, the water parted and sealed.

  Ilse Brauchmann pointed out the cathedral in the distance. She showed him the direction of his shop, Castlegate, and then the docks. She craned her neck backwards and told him the names of the stars, pointing at the different constellations so that he could find the pictures. Who knew there was an actual plough up there? Seven sisters? A boyfriend of Peg’s had mentioned the Plough once and suggested Frank should go look; but without adding anything so helpful as instructions as to where he might find it. The oars hit the water, swish, swish. Ilse Brauchmann’s hair was not flat any more. It was hoopy wi
th curls. (Hello, curls.) Over on the jetty sat her green handbag and his bag of records; the sensible pieces of them waiting, like parents, on dry land.

  She said, ‘Poor Beethoven, huh?’

  ‘Yes, poor Beethoven.’

  ‘I guess he was really in love.’

  ‘I guess.’

  ‘Are you married?’

  ‘Me? No.’

  ‘I thought you and the tattooed woman were an item?’

  Frank laughed so much he almost capsized himself. ‘No. I kind of don’t do all that stuff.’

  ‘Are you gay?’ The straightness with which she asked the question threatened another small drowning.

  ‘No, I’m – I’m good on my own. But you’re getting married. That’s great.’

  ‘Oh,’ she said. Then, ‘Hm.’

  She rowed until they were right in the middle of the lake. It was like floating in a sea of ink, he thought, not in the past and not in the future, but a place of their own. The water rocked them gently. He couldn’t even see her face any more, only the slender shape of her like a cut-out in the dark.

  She said, ‘When I was a child, I wanted to be famous. I wanted it so much. I even practised in the mirror. I really did, Frank. Being a famous person. I practised laughing and saying hello and even taking a bow. I couldn’t bear the fact that life was just – you know – here and gone. All for nothing. But now I don’t think that. I think that loving another person and being kind is about the best thing you can do. What is it they say? No man is an island.’

  Afterwards she tied up the boat exactly where they had found it and he walked her back through the park. They still didn’t speak. It was as if the two people who had sat in a café and then rowed in a pleasure boat and quietly talked about love were no longer the two people now heading back to their separate lives. Occasionally he thought she gave a sigh, as if she wanted to say something, but it was more than likely her feet were wet and extremely cold. Ice particles moved like flittery flies around the lamps. They reached the gates.

  Stopped.

  Waited.

  ‘Well, goodbye,’ she said to her nice shoes.

  ‘Goodbye,’ he said to his old plimsolls. ‘You have your records?’

  ‘Yes. Thank you.’

  A silence. One so taut and complicated and beautiful that in another life he might have kissed her.

  ‘A cab,’ she said, spotting a free one across the street. ‘See you next Tuesday!’

  He watched her climb into the back seat and wave as the cab moved on. Being with her was the same as staring into the sun; he saw nothing and yet when he looked away, there she was, a raucous white light imprinted at the heart of everything. Yes. She was going to marry someone else. But he had never felt so happy.

  22

  A Night to Remember

  ‘HELLO? IS ANYONE home? Hello?’

  Henry stood calling at the door. The house was so silent he was afraid Mandy had finally gone and left him. They lived thirty minutes outside the city, on a modern estate with electric gates and leafy avenues that were named after English poets. ‘Mandy? Boys?’

  ‘The boys are upstairs,’ Mandy’s voice called back.

  He found her in the kitchen. She seemed preoccupied with a tricky stain that only she could see; she kept rubbing at the worktop in small concentric circles.

  Henry remained hovering at the doorway, useless and smiling in his socks. He hadn’t touched his wife for over a year. He said, ‘Frank came in today.’

  She said, ‘Oh.’

  ‘He wants an overdraft.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘It’s going to be difficult. He’s taking a big risk.’

  They spoke in the flat monotone they used these days in order to remain on open road where nothing would jump out and surprise them. One wrong word and it was like trees coming down.

  ‘Apparently he’s branching into music lessons.’

  ‘Oh,’ she said again. ‘Wow.’

  Henry couldn’t explain how it had happened. He couldn’t pinpoint one particular moment. Long ago they had been very happy, they talked about everything, they could argue and make up and nothing seemed the worse for it, the world was still in one piece. But after the birth of the boys, a gap had begun to open, so small at first it was barely noticeable. Nothing terrible was said. Nothing terrible was done. And it wasn’t that he had any desire for anyone else – he was too tired, and so was she. It was as though several signposts had been missed – easy instructions, that you thought you could do without – and now it was so vast, this space between them, he had no idea how he would ever reach her.

  ‘By the way, Frank sent this.’ Henry held out the record. For the first time she stopped doing things that didn’t need doing, and she looked at him.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘Shalamar. He said something about track one.’

  ‘Put it on.’

  ‘It’s not really our sort of music, Mandy—’

  She screwed up the cloth and threw it in the sink. ‘Oh for God’s sake, Henry. Put the record on.’

  There was no light in the sitting room, save an orange glow from the street lamps, and it was cold too; they had stopped sitting down together around the same time they stopped touching. Henry switched on the sound system and eased the vinyl from its sleeve. Really he was a prog rock man. Emerson, Lake & Palmer. And Mandy – well, she was the bookish type. Always reading some romance from the library. He placed the record on the platter and cued the tone arm to track one.

  It opened with a funky electric guitar that caused Henry’s shoulders to make an involuntary lift and fall. Then came a small section on keyboard that reminded him of Phil Collins and instantly reassured him. (Phil Collins and a keyboard equalled a ballad.) No sooner had Henry thought this than a synthesized bass and drum arrived, accompanied by a waft of violins, and a stab of horns from the brass section. Then a young woman with a clear and strangely sweet voice sang, ‘When you love someone it’s nat’ral, not demanding.’ By now it wasn’t only Henry’s shoulders that were moving; it was his feet and arms too.

  ‘Turn the volume up.’

  He was shocked to turn and find Mandy watching at the doorway.

  ‘What about the boys?’

  ‘They never leave their bedrooms.’

  Henry twisted the volume dial on his sound system, causing a pillar of red lights to spike upwards. Mandy sauntered around the three-piece suite, swinging her arms with the gesture of someone flapping her blouse to get air. He stayed swaying in the corner of the room, while she swayed in the middle. ‘… to you, baby, I surrender. Get ready. Tonight—’

  ‘Dance with me,’ she said.

  ‘Me?’ Henry pointed at his chest, totally baffled, as if he’d only just met himself.

  ‘Who else have I got? Come on.’

  So now Henry made his advance across the carpet, bobbing his head, and trying to clap in a carefree way, so that she might think clapping and bobbing were the sort of things that bank managers did all the time when they travelled from one side of a room to the other. The rhythm was a grasshopper – the moment he thought he had it, it snapped out of his hands. Henry didn’t know this music, he had no idea how you were supposed to dance to it, but as Mandy began swirling round and round, and he hovered close by – not exactly in her way, but in her general vicinity – he discovered a happy movement that struck him as a little like digging, without actually employing a spade. Now that he listened, he felt there was something irrepressibly good about this song, as if everything would be all right. More than that. As if everything was about to happen. Henry put down his spade and began swinging a pair of imaginary tassels. Meanwhile Mandy had also moved on to something new. Hands clasped above her head, she rolled her hips as if she were riding a pony. A button on her blouse slipped loose and he saw the softness of her skin. Smelt the earthy sweetness of her.

  He wasn’t thinking any more. He was just dancing. Henry lunged past the three-piece suite and grabbed hold of his wife
.

  23

  Silver Machine

  ‘SO, FRANK?’ ‘DID she turn up?’ ‘Did she like the “Moonlight” Sonata?’ ‘Did she take off her gloves?’ ‘Are you going to give her any more lessons?’

  That morning Kit’s questions came so fast, Frank had to swing left and right in order to dodge a direct hit. He repeated the details over and over. (‘Would you say her hands looked strange?’ No, Kit. ‘Big? Small?’ Average. ‘Would you say they looked real?’ Yes, Kit. They looked extremely real. ‘Did she say anything about her fiancé?’ Not much.) When Father Anthony popped by, it was the same. The same with the Williams brothers, Mrs Roussos and Pete the barman. They all wanted to know what had happened. By the time Maud shoved open the door and stood with her arms folded, looking dangerous, Kit knew the story so well, Frank sat behind his turntable and left him to it.

  ‘So?’ said Maud.

  ‘He told her about sex in Beethoven and then she took him on a pleasure boat. We still don’t know the situation with her hands.’

  Maud kicked something inanimate, and left.

  For the rest of the day, Frank moved in a stupor. He was sick with longing to see Ilse again and by the same token, he had no idea how he would face her, how he could keep going through this. It was like existing on turbo power. He felt a desperate need to lie down. And on Thursday there was more good news.

  ‘Oh my God! Oh my God!’ sang Kit. ‘We’ve got it, Frank! You did it!’

  Henry had come up trumps. Confirmation of the overdraft arrived in the post, along with paperwork to sign, and a thank-you card from Mandy. (‘How did you know we needed Shalamar?’ she had written at the bottom, along with several kisses and some hearts. ‘We love you, Frank!’ Henry had added a more conservative ‘Jolly good record.’) Frank glanced briefly through the paperwork and ticked all the boxes marked for him to tick and crossed the ones he was supposed to cross.