Josie - Part 2

Shani’s on a one-to-one with her key worker after group. I wait around a bit with some of the others, having a fag outside. I don’t want to wait a whole hour, though. I want to get home. I just want to get back to my flat and go to bed. I had a bad night last night and I want to catch up a bit. I want to sleep through the evening, too. The evenings aren’t good at the moment. Sticky indoors. Nothing on the telly. That’s when the urge hits me worst.

We sit under the tree and smoke, out of the sun – me, Geoffrey, Carol, Mark and Keith. The others have already gone. Elaine’s dropped Jon home because he lives near her. There’s no sign of Bruce anywhere. Keith seems much more relaxed now, and I’m struck again by how nice-looking he is. He doesn’t smoke. He eats a lot of sweets, though. Hard gums. There’s always something. He passes the bag around.

“How do you feel now, Keith?” says Geoffrey. “Glad you came?”

“Definitely. Just being able to listen to everyone. It makes a big difference.”

“You can’t beat it,” says Geoffrey, licking down another rollie. “You spoke well, anyway. You too, young Josie. You got it all out, girl. Best place for it.”

Carol is staring at the ground, nervously flicking her ash every couple of seconds. Her eyes are red. She had a good cry too, near the end. She talked about the abuse again. About her stepfather. He started on her when she was seven and carried on until she ran away when she was nineteen. She doesn’t talk about it for ages – then suddenly it all comes out again. Usually when she’s been dry for a bit and when she’s thinking about lapsing. She’s tried killing herself four times already. Last time was a year ago. She cut her wrists – did it the proper way, though, up to the elbows. She was lucky. Or not, depending on how you look at it. She hasn’t long been off a Section.

I light my last fag. I need to get down that shop. All the booze lined up behind the counter, alongside the fags. I think about it. I’m always thinking about it, really.

“How long’s it been now, Josie?” says Geoffrey. It’s like he can read my thoughts. I’ll swear he can. He just has to look at your face. He knows the look. We all know the look.

“Forty-seven days, with today.”

“Well done, girl. That’s bloody marvellous. Forty-seven days. Nearly seven weeks, eh?”

Just what I’m thinking. Seven weeks on Friday. Cause to celebrate, eh? I can almost fucking taste it. Twenty king-size, please… oh, and while you’re there, one of those small bottles of…

“Anyone walking down?” I say.

“I’m going to catch the shuttle bus,” says Geoffrey. “I don’t feel like any more walking today.”

Mark’s got his scooter. Carol’s waiting for her son to pick her up.

“You can come with us,” she says. “We’ll drop you.”

They know what it’s about. Safety in numbers. I won’t if you won’t. Works the other way too, sometimes. Go on, then… I’ll join you. Who’s going to know?.

“I’m walking down,” says Keith. “I need to go in the shop for some more sweets, anyway.”

Geoffrey winks at me.

“See you tomorrow, Jose. Keep it up. You coming tomorrow, Keith?”

“I’ll be up,” he says. Well, that’s good.

We walk down the driveway and across the green at the front of the Hospital. He’s tall and can easily stride ahead if he wants to. But he hangs back.

“How long you been coming?” he asks me.

“Nine months. It should have been longer, but I didn’t have the courage before. Had the hardest job just to go outdoors of a day. It was Shani helped me. I helped her, too. We did it together, bless her heart. We’ve carried each other along.”

He’s quiet for a moment.

“Nine months,” he says at last. “Then there’s what’s his name… Geoffrey. Nine years he was telling me.”

“That’s right.”

“And some of the others have been coming a couple of years.”

“Yes.”

He’s quiet again. I know what he’s thinking before he says it.

“It takes as long as it takes,” I say. “It’s always there. Some people are better at getting on top of it than others. Some people go, then they come back. Some people go and don’t come back. Some people just keep coming.”

He pops a sweet in his mouth.

“Like another form of addiction, really. You get hooked on it.”

“We’re addictive personalities, Keith. We wouldn’t be here otherwise. It’s in the nature of it. I can only say it’s the only worthwhile addiction I’ve ever had. The only one that’s ever done me any good.”

He smiles.

“You get it as long as you need it,” I say. “Until you feel strong enough to go your own way again. Group gives you that strength. It does me, anyway. I wouldn’t have lasted this long without it, I know that.”

He’s thoughtful again – taking it all in. Chewing it over, like that sweet. We reach the road and turn left towards the town.

“What do you do, Keith?”

“What did I do. I was a draughtsman. Architectural work. Trouble is, I started missing off too many important bits. Like entire floors. If they’d used some of my last plans to build anything, there’d be a lot of houses with serious problems now. A lot of newlyweds with nowhere to put their furniture. Not that they’d’ve let it get that far anyway. Which they didn’t, of course. Didn’t take long for someone to notice. Being pissed all the time makes the world seem better, but it fucks up everything else. Though you look at some of the stuff that’s been designed by sober people, and you begin to fucking wonder.”

I find myself chuckling – but then, he does too.

“Anyway… now that’s all I do. Fuck things up. My liver, my marriage, my job, my teeth. You name it.”

“Yes… but you’re starting to do something about it now, eh?”

“I hope so,” he says. “I really do, ‘cos it’s my last chance.”

We walk in silence for a few moments. The road is busy on this stretch and a couple of lorries go thundering by, almost smothering us in diesel exhaust. They kick up a bit of a breeze, though, which is good. The sun is baking.

“So… you think today’s made a difference, then?”

He nods. “Just being with people who are going through the same. It makes me realise it ain’t just me.”

“Do you get much support from your family?”

He makes a noise in the back of his throat, like he’s going to spit.

“My sister and her husband are closest family. They might as well be living on the fucking moon. She won’t even talk to me now. He’s been over a couple of times to give me a pep talk. ‘You need to buck your ideas up’ kind of thing. ‘Think about the effect it’s having on Laura.’ As if the effect it’s having on me doesn’t count.”

I shake my head at the recognition. My own sister disowned me because of the effect my fuck-up was having on mum. As if I could put a stop to it like that. She couldn’t even see that she was part of the reason I was fucking up. Stupid bitch.

“Pair of curtains,” I say.

He looks at me sideways.

“’You need to pull yourself together, Josie.’ Pair of curtains.”

He laughs.

“Yeah, that’s it. That’s exactly it. Pair of curtains. I have to remember that one. ‘Look… I’ve had a drink problem too, Keith,’ he says to me. ‘I was drinking too much one time, so I just packed it in. I could see it wasn’t worth it.’ Easy as that, in other words.” He makes that noise again. “Drink problem. A bottle of whisky a week, I think he said.”

“A week?”

“Exactly. Wanker. I told him, at one point I was getting off the bus in the morning, going straight into Sainsbury’s when it opened at eight, buying a bottle of sherry, then necking it in the toilets before going into the office. Five days a week. And that was just to start the day. And that was before the weekends. ‘Why?’ he said. Jesus!”

We reach the road crossing. The Happy Shopper’s on the other side. I press the button.

“I was doing the same,” I say. “Except with half a bottle of vodka.”

He doesn’t say any more just then. The lights change and we cross over to the shop and go in. Keith gets his sweets, plus some chewing gum, and I get my fags. When I’m paying, I don’t even look at the bottles behind the till. I can still see them, though. Outside, I light up and offer one to Keith anyway.

“No ta. That’s one thing I’ve never taken to.”

He offers me a stick of gum in return and I take it.

“You did me a favour there,” I say.

He puts some gum in his mouth and gives me a sideways grin. He knows what I’m on about.

“We did each other a favour. If I’d gone in there alone, I’d have had something. A couple of cans. A bottle of sherry.”

The enormity of it hits me and my hand is shaking as I take the cigarette out of my mouth.

“So would I. I knew it. I think I was even planning it when I got up this morning. That’s why I left it ‘til after group to get my fags, instead of getting them on the way up.”

He looks at me as we continue walking down the hill.

“What? And break that fantastic run? Christ… nearly seven weeks. I can’t even imagine that yet.”

I take a long, nervous puff. I can feel it calming me a bit.

“You’ll get there. Just keep coming to group. Whatever else you do, keep coming. It’ll give you that push. And you know you’ve got others rooting for you. You know there’s others in the same boat.”

There’s a gap in the traffic and we cross back over, keeping step together, his lean body swaying along loosely beside mine, like we were a couple of nervous kids out on a first date. Glancing back, I can see the hospital shuttle bus coming along.

“It’s like Geoffrey says, though, mate. It’s always there. It never goes. I think of it like this snake under the bed. It’ll be there, coiled up for ages, not doing anything, minding it’s own business. And then one day, when you’re not expecting it, it’ll spring out and sink its teeth in. And once that poison goes in, you don’t want it to stop. You need more and more of it. It's the old thing. One's too much, ten's not enough.”

He nods again.

The shuttle bus passes us and we see Geoffrey sitting in a seat near the front. We put our hands up and he waves back. Then he’s gone.

“I never did like snakes,” says Keith.

*

It’s busy at the bus station when we get there, but not as bad as it’ll be in another hour, when the schools start turning out. That’s another reason why I didn’t want to hang on for Shani. If there’s one thing that really makes me want to drink, it’s too many people. Especially noisy schoolkids. That’s why I only come into town for the group. Never to stick around and shop. One day, my bus was cancelled and I had to wait around for the next one. The place started filling up and I got the shakes so bad I had to run to the toilets before I threw up. I sat in the cubicle with the door locked and waited ‘til the time was right.

Keith walks with me to my stop and the bus is there waiting, though the driver’s not arrived yet.

“Mine’ll be along in a few minutes,” he says. Then he stands for a few moments looking around.

“Whereabouts do you live?” I ask. I’d half-hoped it was Hunters Bay, but clearly not.

“Shelstone,” he says. Across the other side of the coast. “Will you be coming tomorrow, Josie?”

“I’m not missing a day at the moment. I need all the help I can get.”

“What about work?”

“I’m on the sick. Have been for almost a year. I’ll be on half-pay soon. I don’t want to go back, though. That’s a big part of the problem.”

“What do you do?”

“I work for the local council. Benefits department. It’s soul-destroying. It is for me, anyway.”

“The council, eh?” he grins. “The bloody council. Their planning department was the bane of my bloody life.”

“The entire place is the bane of my life.”

He unwraps another gum and puts it into his mouth. I can see my driver coming across from the office. It’s the he-she today. She’s looking more and more feminine as the weeks go past, but she can’t shake off that manly way of walking. I think she’s bloody wonderful, what she’s doing. She’s got more guts than I have. She’s got a better figure than I have, come to that. Keith looks at her, then back at me. To his credit, he doesn’t pull a face or anything.

“Ah, well. I guess I’ll see you tomorrow, then.”

He’s about to move off, but I stop him. I don’t want to miss the chance.

“Here…” I take a pen from my bag and jot my mobile and text numbers on a scrap of paper. “In case you get in a state and want someone to talk to.”

He looks surprised. Pleasantly so, I think.

“Thanks. I appreciate it. I’ll try and be good, though.”

The driver starts the bus and opens the door. People begin to jostle towards it. I jump aboard.

“See ya, then. And thanks again.”

I show the driver my ticket, then go upstairs and sit by one of the left-hand windows, where I can look across in the direction Keith went. He’s already gone, though.

The bus pulls out of the station and onto the ring road, and then we’re in the traffic. There’s a nervous tension nestled in the pit of my stomach. It’s a combination of things, I know. The feeling I had when I got up this morning – the feeling I had as soon as I thought about going into that shop. The anticipation of it. But there’s something else, too. A strange thing. It’s Keith. I’m quite taken by him. It’s that weird, fluttery feeling you get when you meet someone like that. He’s not normally the type I’d go for – he’s much younger than I am for one thing. But that doesn’t matter. There’s something else there. He seems quite intuitive and sensitive. Open, too. And he’s got a certain look about him: a light in his eye and a ready way with a smile. Whatever it is, he’s in my head and I find myself wishing it was tomorrow already.

I take out my compact and open it – and my feelings sink again. The bathroom light is so much kinder: it shows up less than broad daylight does. I can see the tucks at the corners of my eyes, the crow’s feet in the darkened hollows underneath. The blotchiness of my skin. The tiny spidery veins just beginning to show at the sides of my nose. The smoke lines on my lips. The greying strands of hair just above and behind my ears. I look much older than my years, I know that. No one could mistake me for being under forty, even though I’m only a few months the other side. That was some party, my fortieth: me, the telly, and my old best mates Smirnoff and Dr Pepper. Life begins, eh? Who was the fucking idiot who said that?

So, what would someone like Keith see in someone like me? The years of drinking and smoking and not eating right and not sleeping enough have taken it out on my face and my figure. My bottom and hips are okay, but I’ve got too much around the waist and my tits are getting saggy, and my legs – permanently clad in jeans nowadays for the very reason – are no-go areas. I’ve not been with a man now for over three years. I’ve not found one who’d be prepared to even give me the time of day – except my key worker and some of the guys at group. And they’re all out of bounds for obvious reasons. Two alkies getting together is not the best idea.

But how long can you go on denying yourself these things? We all have our feelings. The thing is, I’m reaching the stage when I feel I’ve got less and less to offer – not that I ever really had much to begin with. There’ve been plenty over the years, of course. All wrong ones, though. Drunks. Two-timers. Too ready with their fists. You get rid of one and another comes along, like a bus. It’s not as if I don’t have a good heart. It may be a little cracked and brittle, but it still beats in the same way. I just never was much good at finding someone to give it to. At finding someone to keep it properly, and look after it.

I put the compact away again and look out at the street. We pass a used car place, a chip shop, a Lidl’s and a pub. The Portcullis. The door’s open and I can see, in the gloomy bar-room, men standing around their pints. One of them’s out on the street, glass in hand, talking into his phone. Rowing with someone, by the looks. Spinning his lies, perhaps. Telling it like it isn’t. The kind of thing we all do. We pull up at a stop near a petrol station and I look at the people getting on. A studenty-looking guy with a rucksack and headphones. An old girl with a shopping trolley. A young woman dressed in a supermarket uniform. Another bloke, in his thirties perhaps, looking a little the worse for wear. His suit doesn’t fit very well. He’s got a shirt and tie on, but the tie knot’s pulled down and the shirt collar’s open. There’s something about his eyes, too. Weariness. Piss holes in the snow. He doesn’t look too good at all. It’s a haunted look, like someone’s after him. He’s holding a carrier bag, which has got what looks like bundles of paperwork in it. I think I can see the outline of a can, too. He’s almost on when he looks up and catches my eye. I look away again.

The student comes upstairs and sits at the front. I can hear the music from the phones. It sounds like insects buzzing in a tin. Then the other chap comes up,too, and goes straight up the back. As he walks past me, I can smell it on him. Like being downwind of a distillery. Just that smell of it is enough. I get up and go downstairs, and take the single seat by the luggage hold. I’ve just settled when my phone vibrates in my pocket. I take it out. It’s a text from Keith.

DINT GIVE U MINE

He’s texted his number and I save it. I text him back:

THNX
STAY DRY
CU 2MROW

Two minutes later, he’s back again:

U2 THNX
& 4 TALK
FL BTTR ALRDY
CIAO
X

A kiss, eh? Hm… I text back:

GLD 2 HR IT
XX

Then I switch off. That feeling is still there, but it’s shifting. I could still use a drink. 47 days. Almost.

When I get home, I’m going to lock the door, pull the curtains and go to bed until it’s time to get the bus tomorrow.