A Commonplace Killing - Siân Busby by A Commonplace Killing

Author:A Commonplace Killing [Killing, A Commonplace]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: ePub Bud (www.epubbud.com)
Published: 2013-05-02T05:00:00+00:00

20

There were times when it seemed to him as if it hadn’t happened, not in the way he remembered it. Memories came to him in improbable shards, distinct but unreal; the act of remembrance was inescapable, relentless. At other times it seemed to him that it was the only thing in his whole life that was real, such that he wondered if it was still going on somewhere outside of his head. Was this, he wondered, the missing part of him, the part that had been blasted out of him? How would he know when he could not remember how he had felt before, only that it was different from how he felt now? When he thought like this he worried that he was going round the twist. In dreams, men screamed at him from beneath the frozen sea, pleading for his help. He tried not to think about them when he had had a good night out, but he had no control over his thoughts, which seemed to come and go as they wished: whenever, wherever. He hadn’t had a good night out in a long while.

He hung up the green tweed swingback jacket in the wardrobe, admiring it hanging there. It was easily the best thing he had ever owned: no Burton’s ready-mades for him. You never knew what you’d find in the suitcases. That’s what made it such a good line. He lay down on the bed and stared up at the light bulb hanging from the dingy brown ceiling. He didn’t feel up to King’s Cross and suitcases today. On the way home he had considered going into Finsbury Park Station, boarding a train somewhere, anywhere, and climbing out of the compartment. Just to get a thrill. He’d done that. But today the smell of the diesel on the Seven Sisters Road had made him panic, and the crowds hanging about the entrance to the park had depressed him. Pasty-faced kids; drab bints in unmade-up faces and horrible clothes. What the hell had happened to this country anyway? As he had crossed over the road towards his lodgings he had wondered what it would be like to be hit by a bus.

He remembered flying. He had looked down at the debris of the ship and all the body parts scattered on the surface of the sea, the sea which was all lit up like Christmas and Bonfire Night: a great sheet of flame. His eyes were burning inside his head. When the smoke cleared he could see the whole aft section of the ship silhouetted against the orange sky. He didn’t remember hitting the water, but he remembered being in the water. It was oily and filled with the remnants of men. Screams drifted on the icy air. He was clutching a hatch-cover and struggling to keep ahead of the flames as bodies drifted past him. He had no idea how long he had floated like that before he had felt the nudge of a Carley float.

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