The first memory comes from a morning. She was standing, brushing her hair in the mirror, silhouetted against the sun shining through one window. Her hair, that she’d once been so proud of, was coming out in clumps, and I realized how close to death she was.
The second is from the evening. Late evening in the summer before she died. Once again the sun caught her. This time as we were sitting together and watching TV. And for a brief instant I saw her as she would be if she lived to be very old. But by then, her body was old, and within a few months it would close down completely.
The third memory is how she was that Sunday morning when I went to see her for the last time in hospital. Her skin was tight over her skull, there was a white crust around her mouth, and when she saw me, and reached out to touch me, her fingers were like claws.
And finally. The last memory is from when I went back the next day. When I plucked up courage to go. I remember how she was lying in her coffin. She should have looked peaceful then. The battle over. But she didn’t. She looked totally pissed off that she was dead. And I could only bring myself to touch her face for a moment. It was cold, and hard like wax. And I hated it. And hated myself for feeling like that, and not being there when she died.
As I left the room where she was lying, the old man who dealt with the bodies gave me the ring she was wearing when she died. It was a sapphire and diamonds set in platinum. I went home and put it on a chain around my neck so I wouldn’t forget her.
I still have it.
‘Hello Paul,’ she said from where she was standing. ‘Long time.’
‘Louise,’ I said, confused. ‘Is that you?’
“Course it is.’
‘But you’re…’
‘Dead, is the word,’ she said, and came around and sat on the bed next to me.
I looked at Jules lying there, beside me, and wondered why, of all the hundreds and hundreds of mornings I’d woken up alone since Louise died, she’d decided to pop round on this one.
I said as much. I wasn’t frightened or anything. Just curious.
‘Because of her,’ replied Louise, poking Jules. ‘You two are going to make a go of it.’ And she poked her again. Harder.
Jules didn’t wake, just sighed in her sleep and rolled over.
‘She won’t wake up,’ said Louise. ‘You did a good job on her last night.’
‘I don’t understand,’ I said. ‘Am I imagining this?’ What else could I say under the circumstances?
‘Feel me,’ she said, and held out her hand. The hand I’d touched a million times before.
I took her hand in mine. It felt like solid flesh. But cool. Not cold. Not warm. Cool.
‘So where have you been?’ I asked.
‘I don’t know. Somewhere.’
‘Why haven’t you come back before?’
‘It’s difficult.’
‘Are there other people there?’
‘Yes. But we never meet.’
‘So you’re alone.’
‘Not entirely. Percy’s with me. Look.’
She pointed towards the door, and there, with a look on his face as supercilious as the one he’d worn when he’d been alive, was her cat.
‘He just turned up one day,’ she said.
‘So what is this place?’
‘It’s like a beach. Hard sand. Red. And sometimes I can hear the sea, but I can never find it. It never gets dark, but the sun never shines. You never sleep or get hungry, or go to the loo. You don’t sweat or get dirty. You salivate a little. Just enough to talk, and your eyes are wet, but you never cry. Sometimes I find footprints, but I’ve never seen another soul except Percy.
‘I had to have him put down,’ I explained. ‘It was a kindness.’
‘I know. I’m not cross. I like his company.’
‘And you can see what’s going on here?’
‘I can see what’s going on everywhere.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Look up at the stars, Paul. And you’ll know what I mean.’
‘You can see what happens on other worlds?’
‘Sssh, Paul. I shouldn’t be telling you all this. I shouldn’t be here at all.’
‘Who told you that? Who told you everything?’
‘No one. I just knew. When I got there I just knew the rules. The same as I knew what would happen if I disobeyed them.’
‘And what would happen?’
‘Well, if I get found out. Poof!’ she said. ‘I’ll go to another place.’
‘What kind of place?’
‘I don’t want to think about it. There, there be dragons.’
‘And you just look, and you can see what’s going on here?’ I was beginning to repeat myself.
‘I’ve never missed an episode of EastEnders.’ That had always been her favourite programme.
‘And now you’ve decided to pay me a visit. Just like that.’
She got my drift. ‘Don’t worry,’ she said. ‘I’m not going to suddenly turn into a flesh-eating zombie like in the films. And Percy won’t change into the rabid cat from Hell with six-inch fangs. It doesn’t work like that. I just know that now you’ve met her,’ she looked disgustedly at Jules’ still form, ‘you’re going to forget all about me, and I’ll just fade away.’
‘No,’ I said. ‘You’re wrong. I’d never forget about you in a million years. She’s nothing to me. An easy lay. It’s you I love, and always will.’
Louise smiled, got up from the bed and stood beside me. ‘We’ll see,’ she said, bent down, picked up Percy, who put his paws on her shoulder like he always did, and she walked out of the room.
I lay in bed for a minute at least before I followed her. The flat was empty, and I knew it. But even so, I looked in every cupboard and behind every chair.
I went back to bed, and although I didn’t think I would, I fell asleep again, and when Jules gave me a shake at eight-thirty, I was sure I’d dreamt it all.
‘I had a hell of a dream,’ I said.
‘Me too. I dreamt that you were going to fuck me again.’
So I did.
Dream or not, Louise had been right. Jules and I did make a go of it.
We saw each other constantly that summer, although I must confess I tried to spend as much time as possible at her place, a pied-à-terre down the Goldhawk Road. It wasn’t bad. Just twenty minutes’ drive away, or a few stops on the Victoria line, then change, and a few more stops heading west.
But Louise didn’t come back to visit, and eventually I forgot all about it.
Then, one evening that September, I came in from work to get changed for a publisher’s dinner, and she was sitting at the kitchen table holding Percy on her lap. He was looking longingly at the fridge, and it struck me that whatever Louise had said, some dead creatures still remembered about being hungry.
‘Hello,’ she said when I walked in. ‘Fancy a cup of tea?’
It was the same thing she’d said to me myriad times before. And I answered like I’d always answered. ‘Sure,’ I said. ‘Put the kettle on.’
She dropped the cat on to the floor and did just that. ‘I told you that you two would get on, didn’t I?’
I nodded and lit a cigarette.
She made the tea. Just one cup, and said, ‘Party tonight?’
‘You obviously know,’ I replied. ‘Been using your crystal ball again?’
‘That’s right. Taking Jules?’
I nodded.
‘You could always take me.’
‘Can anyone else see you?’ I hadn’t asked that question before.
She shook her head.
‘It’d be a bit weird then, wouldn’t it? Me sitting next to an empty chair having a conversation with an untouched plate of chicken Kiev.’
‘I suppose you’re right. But I might come anyway. The Savoy, isn’t it?’
‘Is there anything you don’t know?’