West Pier (Chapter 1: Old Pier)

Old Pier

The old pier held Noah’s gaze despite the eager conversation that flickered through the circle of friends gathered on the pebbles. It seemed like just the sort of place where magic would congregate, like a modern-day Stonehenge. He pictured the spectres of ballroom dancers waltzing above the calm evening-red water, wisping between the rusted pillars, oblivious to the different world on the shore, the noise on the beach; people at their happiest, bound to this once-splendid place as it eroded and until eventually, it would be swallowed by the sea and passing time. A gentle voice made a welcome intrusion into his thoughts:

“You’re a million miles away, aren’t you?”

Somehow Edie had managed to join Noah in his bubble away from the others. Frantic boyish discussion swirled around them, yet her soft, sure voice was distinctly just for him. Noah turned from the pier, where a murmuration of starlings had joined the dancers and faced her, looking for a second into her green eyes. She smiled calmly and moved a stray strand of long reddish-brown hair back over her ear, where it immediately unfurled back onto the shoulder of the puffy, red ‘Channel Islands Surf Team’ jacket he’d never seen her without.

“I love this place,” he said somewhat unguardedly, forgetting for an instant that they were not alone.

Edie sensed his sheepishness, smiled and put her head on his shoulder. She picked up his right hand from off his knee and clasped it between both of hers.

“Well then. We’ll just have to keep coming here, won’t we?”

A familiar figure appeared at the water’s edge. Noah recognised his father first by his height and then his overalls. In the fast-fading light, he could just make out the familiar streaks of paint that stained Dad’s legs. The tall man stooped and crouched kindly, just beyond the reach of the lapping waves and began to select a pebble. After rising slowly, he sank back slightly on one leg, looping a long arm and expertly skipped a flat pebble over the iridescent sea surface towards the bones of the pier, where Noah’s dancers still hovered and weaved.

“One, two, three, four, five sixseveneightnine…”  As always, Noah lost count as the skips became smaller and faster.

“I’m off, lads.”

A crunching of pebbles underfoot. Noah turned back to see Ben Hughes stand, stumble and recover. Ben caught his eye.

“Maybe next time, you’ll spend a bit more time with all of us, eh Noah?” he joked.

Noah raised the hand Edie had been holding.

“Anyways, tomorrow, yeah?”

“Tomorrow,” Noah replied with what felt like dryness in his throat.

Ben scrunched through the stones and picked out his bike from the tangle of frames, handlebars and wheels behind the friends, before pushing it up towards the walkway. When Noah turned back to face the sea, the dancers and his father were gone and only the starlings remained, barely discernible from the darkening sky.

Mum was at the door before he had unlocked it. The long hug she gave him belied her relief at seeing him in one piece. Noah still hadn’t acclimatised to towering over his mother as he now did. He had shot up over the last year, and at fourteen, stood a head over her.  As he took his trainers off, his mother began turning more of the lights on: the lounge, the passage and stairs. Noah knew that when he wasn’t home, Mum kept herself in the kitchen, where she would sit at the small, round wooden table and pass the days and a good deal of the nights reading. He suspected that the rest of the house was too difficult for her to occupy still, too flooded with memories. Dad was as much a part of the place as the walls and furniture. Here, he clumsily tugged heavily laced boots off this feet and winced as flecks of dirt scattered over Mum’s pristine floor; in the lounge, he surprised with playful energy after long days on building sites, flinging a young Noah into the air or staying up late with Mum to watch television; the floors were infused with his steps and the air with his mischievous laugh. He was everywhere whilst at the same time, he was nowhere.

Noah had grown accustomed to his room never being completely dark. In fact, he felt comforted by the yellow glow of the streetlight that pressed through his closed curtains and gave his space somewhat of an unearthly feel. In bed, with his fingers knitted together behind his head, he looked and followed the scythes of light that made their way from the back wall, across the ceiling whenever a car made its way up Ruskin Road. He could hear Mum unloading the dishwasher and stacking cutlery and bowls away. Then, she clicked off the various switches, the stripe of light beneath his door shuddering to black. Then, silence. Above him, the pier and the dancers returned along with Edie’s voice:

“You’re a million miles away, aren’t you?”