A few more lines on that calm but troubled face, just starting; maybe. Those little crinkles under her eyes are still there, but there are slight shadows underneath them now. Her hair is longer than I recall. I cannot see her eyes properly, but those cheekbones, that elegant nose, the wide dark eyebrows, the strong jaw and soft mouth ... those I can see.
She leans forward and takes his hand, still gazing at him. Why is she here? Why isn't she in Paris?
Scuse me darlin'; you come her oftin?
(Is this now? Is this in the past?)
After a little while, still holding his hand and staring at his white, expressionless face, she slowly lowers her head to the white, turned-over sheet near the man's hand, and buries her face in its starched whiteness. Her shoulders shake; once, twice.
The screen in here goes dark, and then the lights go off. The lights in the room next door with the bed in it stay on.
My subconscious, I suspect, is trying to tell me something. Subtlety never was its strong suit. I sigh, put my hands on the arms of the leather chair, and slowly rise.
I dump my clothes on the floor by the bed. There is a short, rear-fastening cotton night-gown laid out on the pillow. I put it on, climb into bed, fall asleep.
Coda
Fool! Idiot! What the hell do you think you're doing? You were happy there! Think of the control, the fun, the possibilities! And what are you going back to? Probably chucked out of the partnership, certain to be tried for drunk driving (no more flash cars for you for a while, lad), getting older and less happy all the time; losing her to another illness, another bedside. You always did what she wanted; she used you, not the other way round; it was role-reversal all right, and you got screwed. She turned you down don't forget; she rejected you; she went on rejecting you and if you show signs of recovery she'll be off again. Don't do it, you idiot!
What else can I do? For one thing they might just turn me off; no doubt my brain shows signs of life, so they know I'm not brain-dead, but if I just lie here showing no other signs of life they might decide to take the drips away, stop the water and liquid foods and let me die.
So, for self-preservation; isn't that meant to be the most important principle?
Anyway, you can't leave her like that. You can't do that to the woman. She doesn't deserve it; nobody does. You don't belong to her and she doesn't belong to you, but you're both part of each other; if she got up and left now and walked away and you never saw each other again for the rest of your lives, and you lived an ordinary waking life for another fifty years, even so on your deathbed you would still know she was part of you.
You have left your marks on each other, you have helped to shape one another; you have each given the other an accent to their life which they will never quite lose; no matter.
You have a greater call on her than the other one only while you are so much closer to death. If you recover, she may well go back to him. Well, tough. You had decided you didn't grudge him that, or was that just the drink talking?
No, it -
Louder.
I said no it wasn't the drink -
Still can't hear you, man. Speak up.
OK! I meant it! I meant it!
Damn it I did, too. And another thing: she still thinks things happen in threes. There was her father, dying in the car; then Gustave, under sentence, slowly deteriorating ... then me. Another car another car crash; another man she loved. Oh, I don't doubt now that Gustave and I are very similar, and that we both might like each other, and I'm sure he would have got on with the advocate just as I did, and for the same reason ... but if I can stop the similarities there, by God I will. I will not be the third man! (Pale fingers rise from the screen's black grating, trembling in the night wind like white tubers ... damn thing's sticked again; the monochrome image peels and bursts, white light behind. Too late again, the sniper first sees then aims then fires and the third -)
No, this little sequence ends at two, if I've got anything to do with it. (And another, slightly sneaky, thought occurs, now that I've realised how alike Gustave and I might be: I know what I'd tell Andrea if I was the one slowly deteriorating and she wanted to martyr herself looking after me ... )
I'll go to that other city; I always wanted to, really. I want to meet this man. Damn it I wanna do things! I want to travel the Trans-Siberian, go to India, stand on Ayers Rock, get sodden wet in Machupicchu! I want to surf!. I will get a hang-glider; I want to go back to the Grand Canyon and get further than just the rim rock this time, I want to see the aurora borealis from Svalbard or Greenland, I want to see a total eclipse, I want to watch pyroclastic displays, I want to walk inside a lava tunnel, I want to see the earth from space, I want to drink chang in Ladakh, I want to cruise down the Amazon and up the Yangtze and walk the Great Wall; I want to visit Azania! I want to watch them push helicopters off the aircraft carriers again! I want to be in bed with three women at once!
Oh God, back to Thatcher's Britain and Reagan's world, back to all the usual bullshit. At least the bridge was predictable in its oddness, at least it was comparatively safe.
Well, maybe not. I don't know.
I know one thing: I don't need the machine to tell me the choice. The choice is not between dream and reality; it is between two different dreams.
One is my own; the bridge and all I made of it. The other is our collective dream, our corporate imagery. We live the drean call it American, call it Western, call it Northern or call it just that of all we humans, all life. I was part of one dream, for good or ill, and it was half nightmare and I almost let it kill me, but it hasn't. Yet, anyway.
What's changed?
Not the dream, not the result of our dreams which we call the world, not our hi-tech life. Me, then? Maybe. Who knows; could be anything, inside here. Just won't be able to tell until I get back out again, and start living the shared dream, abandoning my own, of a thing become place, a means become end, a route become destination... Three of diamonds, indeed, and a quality bridge, an everlasting bridge, a never-quite-the-same bridge, its vast and ruddy frame forever sloughing off and being replaced, like a snake constantly shedding, metamorphosing insect which is its own cocoon and alway changing ...
All those trains. Going to be on a few more in the future too. Sure to get banned from driving. Stupid bastard. Writing the car off, drunk-driving just before Christmas; how embarrassing to have to come back to that. At least there wasn't anybody else involved, just me and the two cars. Not sure I'd have wanted to come back if I'd killed somebody, or even injured them badly. Hope whoever owned the MG didn't dote on it too much. Poor Jaguar. After all that time and money, after all the careful crafted work people put into it. Maybe just as well I didn't have it very long before I wrecked it; might have got sentimental about it, might have come to feel something for it ('Were you very attached to the car, Mr X?' Attached to it? I was jammed inside the bastard for three hours.').
And that bridge, the bridge ... have to make a pilgrimage to it, once I'm better; if I can. Walk over the water (assuming I can walk), cross the river; throw a coin for luck ha ha.
Sections three; first second third Forth Firth ... loco me loco ... There were great grey Xs in the road bridge towers too; I remember now. Three big Xs one above the other, like laces or ribbons ... and also ... and also ... what else? Oh yeah and I didn't get to hear all the Pogues tape either. Missed A Man You Don't Meet Every Day; fave track that; sing it kid ... Had the Eurythmics on the other side furra bitta contrast like; young Annie beltin out wiff auntie Aretha; doin' it for themselves and why not? and singin Better To Have Lost In Love (Than Never To Have Loved At All); so it's a cliché? Clichés have feelings too.