Composite Creatures Read online

  The restaurant’s speciality was a menu of over a hundred types of cultivated sushi, all listed in a little paperback book on each table. Some of them just had to be made up. Each little dish had a name and price, and a description of how it was made and the provenance of the ingredients. The back page was reserved for whatever real fish dishes were available that day. Usually there’d only be one or two, usually peachy salmon or snapper, and the cost was enough to make my eyes water. I sometimes wondered what the flesh might feel like on my tongue, slipping around like it was still living.

  Before, while Aubrey, Rosa and Eleanor always debated the menu and ordered something different each time – sometimes the four of us breaking down with laughter at how horrendous most of them turned out to be – I always ordered the same thing. They’d usually berate me for that, Aubrey being the first to say, “But Norah, you’ve had that a million times. It’s dull!” Prompting me to remind them all that I wasn’t willing to pay extra for something I didn’t understand and probably wouldn’t like. Nonetheless, I loved seeing the mysterious little plates being carried from the kitchen. It was a huge part of the place’s appeal for me, and though we’d been to the restaurant countless times I still felt like I saw something new and colourful every time.

  But it wasn’t just the dishes that fascinated me, it was the way people approached eating them. Some would be straight in there with chopsticks, expertly breaking the structure down into perfect-sized morsels containing a little piece of each ingredient in every mouthful. But then some people didn’t know what to do, and those were my favourites. They’d start with the chopsticks and try to pull apart this unknown thing to understand it, as if dissecting a model heart in biology class. They’d taste the mystery lumps and stalks one by one, pulling the oddest expressions as they worked out whether they liked it or not. And then others, after failing to lift a single mouthful between the sticks at all, would then migrate to a fork – and stab at the sushi with renewed confidence. As if none of their previous embarrassment even happened. They were all children exploring new toys. I think some parts of us never grow up.

  On entering the restaurant, I spotted Rosa straightaway, her shoulders draped in a thick orange shawl she’d probably made herself. She stuck out like a sore thumb amongst the tables of sleek black dresses and crisp shirts, and on seeing her my stomach did the oddest little flip. She’d spread her belongings across our favourite corner table, owning it like a falcon would her nest. Rosa stood up when she saw me and wrapped me in her arms.

  “Eleanor’s just in the loo. Sit, stranger.”

  I dropped awkwardly onto the chair opposite and saw there was already a glass of wine sitting there. I started to move to the next chair along but she stopped me. “No that’s for you. Happy birthday.” I thanked her, and said that I’d wait for Eleanor to return before I celebrated with a slurp.

  After Eleanor swooped back in and sat next to Rosa, my skin really started to prickle. Sitting side by side, they assessed each part of me like an interview panel, their eyes scrutinising everything from the flyaways at the top of my head down to the thread dangling from a loose button on my velvet shirt. My clothes felt tight and twisted, and I desperately wanted to fiddle with my hair but instead clasped my hands together on the table behind the wine glass. Had I changed that much since December 31st? They looked at me as if waiting for me to reveal something, something they couldn’t ask outright. What did they know? Had they spotted the engagement ring, perhaps? I slipped my hands beneath the table ledge and asked the innocuous question, “How’s Aubrey these days?”

  Eleanor raised her glass to her lips. “Oh, she’s alright. She’s been having a tough time of it at work. She thinks the shop’s closing. Imminently. And quite predictably, too.”

  Rosa chipped in: “Really? It was packed out last time I was there.”

  Eleanor shrugged. “Meh, it’s just what she said. She’s having a rough time of it anyway. I’m seeing her next week at some point.”

  So, though they’d both seen Aubrey, they hadn’t seen her at the same time. They likely had different ideas about how she was. Neither of them seemed to want to pursue it.

  “She’s been asking after you,” Rosa said. “What you’re doing, when we’re seeing you.”

  “Did you call me because she’d told you to?” I spat it out, the anger already building. Aubrey wasn’t even there, and she still had the ability to make me fume. She’ll have been spying on me to find out if I’d admitted making a mistake, and was now having to live with what I’d done. In other words, that I knew that she was right.

  “Don’t be bloody stupid,” Eleanor scoffed. “You’re letting yourself down here, Noz. Stop it.”

  “Well it seems a strange coincidence, doesn’t it? Aubrey wanting to know if my choices are working out, a phone call out of the blue–”

  “Norah,” Eleanor’s voice was low, bristling. “It’s you that hasn’t been in touch with us. We’ve both tried to message you, but you’ve never replied. So don’t blame us, OK? It’s insulting.”

  Beneath the table, my hands gripped my knees. The three of us had only been together five minutes and already it was all going wrong. It had been fine at New Year… OK, not brilliant, but fine. So why was it falling to pieces now? If Art had been here he’d have helped to diffuse the situation, but this time I was alone. I lifted my glass of wine and in two swift gulps finished it off. Eleanor sighed and topped it back up. I took that as an apology from her, so thought I’d take the high ground and move the conversation along. Something I could control. I’d talk about work. That would do.

  I was about to speak when a squeal ripped through the air. All three of us turned to a table by the window, at which a couple were cooing over a swaddled bundle on the table. They’d moved aside the plates and glasses, and were inspecting the exposed face like a precious specimen. All the while, the bundle twisted side to side like a caterpillar.

  “Have you been back to the clinic, Elle?” asked Rosa, quietly.

  Eleanor hissed slowly through her teeth. “Just once. I’m hardly a priority though, am I?” She fluttered her arms up and down her body. “Poor and mightily single as I am. Back of the queue.”

  “Have they mentioned any treatment,” I said, “for whenever the time comes?”

  Eleanor looked at me and I caught a brief but violent flicker of annoyance. It could only have been a microsecond, but I felt its tail like a whip. She blinked and it passed as quickly as it’d appeared. “No, not yet. Besides, it’s going to take a long time to save up, anyway.”

  Rosa sat back and pursed her lips. Eleanor obviously didn’t want to go into it, and I was happy not to. Happier things. Light and airy.

  “What did you think of Art then?” I said. “I never had the chance to ask you what you thought since the party – if you can remember.” I tried to laugh.

  Eleanor pouted. “Audaciousness, that’s what I remember. He was… audacious.” She took a sip of wine and leaned forward conspiratorially. “But honestly, I hate him. I hate you both. You’re both so extremely attractive and yet extremely unavailable. Typical.”

  “Just your luck.” Rosa prodded Eleanor in the arm.

  Eleanor waved to the moustachioed waiter behind the bar and pointed to our wine bottle, already down to the last inch of red. “Fucking cheek,” she smiled. “Hopefully I’ll get one of you so drunk tonight that I’ll have my way with you anyway.”

  “Cheers to that.” We clinked. More like it.

  Rosa leant forward across the table. “And we didn’t know he was some sort of famous writer. You kept that one quiet.”

  I felt the need to play this down. “He’s not all that famous. But he wants to be. Or at least, he wants to do something famous.”

  “Hasn’t he done that already? Now that I know what to look for, his books are everywhere.”

  “It’s true,” Eleanor added. “After I got home from your party, I realised I’d had one on my shelf for who knows how long. All this tim
e. Seems I’ve known him longer than you have, Noz.”

  “Ah,” I pointed my finger in the air. “But have you read it?”

  Eleanor smirked and raised her glass. “No.”

  “That’s it, though,” I laughed. God, I’d missed this. “Neither have I. And from what I can tell even people who have read them forget what they’re about straightaway. That’s what Art says. But commercially, it works. People don’t retain the plot, so they buy another. And it doesn’t matter how similar the stories are because no one remembers. The only inkling you get that you’ve read it before is a nice cosy sense of familiarity, and that doesn’t sound bad at all.”

  They both nodded. “Well,” Eleanor replied. “He’s got his head screwed on, hasn’t he?”

  “And is he, you know,” Rosa whispered, “rich?”

  I thought about it. We never discussed our personal accounts apart from when we worked out bills and expenses. Art’s earnings were a mystery to me. He was never ostentatious with money, but then if he really did earn a lot from his work then surely he wouldn’t have needed me. We wouldn’t have met, and we definitely wouldn’t be together. That there was the cold, hard, truth of it. He wouldn’t be sharing this life with me. If his parents were scatterers, they wouldn’t be able to help him. Art was on his own. Perhaps it was no surprise that he kept a close watch on his statements, in case he ended up wearing the same bleached overalls, his skin beneath them burning.

  I smiled at Rosa. “Question mark, I’m afraid. We each keep something private. Though I don’t think the bards of this world ever set out to be the richest.”

  Eleanor looked confused. “I don’t know. If he’s already got his name plastered over every bestseller list in the country and he’s not bothered about money, then what does he want? What’s he keep pushing himself for?”

  I shrugged. “Now he wants to write something that’ll last. He hardly tears himself away from his laptop.”

  “Let him. We all need our little hunts. As long as the money keeps rolling in, he’s taking care of you.” Eleanor’s merciless conclusions were usually right.

  They thought he was taking care of me, so I’d show them, I’d prove to them he was. I pulled out my left hand from under the table and held it out for them to see. They both stared at my hand like owls; all bulbous, unblinking eyes and pursed bills. Claws perched on the table edge.

  “He asked me to marry him.”

  Rosa was the first to break their paralysis with a squeal and a flap of her hands. She leapt up to my side of the table and wrapped me in her arms, stamping her feet at the same time. Eleanor smiled slowly, and though Rosa was draping herself all over me I kept watching Eleanor. She was thinking, churning something over in her head, and though I wanted to get drunk on Rosa’s enthusiasm, a well-considered response was far more valuable.

  Eleanor reached across and took my hand, stroking the opal with the pad of her thumb. “It’s beautiful,” she whispered. “And you’re happy?”

  Rosa plonked herself back in her chair. “She must be. Oh, it’s a freaking fairy tale.”

  Eleanor kept her eyes on me. “You’re definitely happy?” She held me in her sights, not letting go of my hand. Rosa looked from Eleanor to me and back again. “Because this is serious now. This is the big game.”

  I pulled back my hand. “I know that.”

  “And this is definitely what you want? You’re sure? This is totally different to, well, all the other stuff.”

  “Yes.”

  “You love him, now?”

  “Yes, I do.”

  “And he loves you? As he should, for this?”

  “Yes. He wouldn’t have asked me otherwise.”

  Rosa took my hand from Eleanor, seemingly to look at the ring but I could tell she was trying to diffuse the tension. This was her way but there really wasn’t any need – you had to expect this from Eleanor. In one conversation she could swoop from elation to fury in a matter of seconds. She was very much alive, Eleanor, and her passion was infectious. I’ve never felt so angry at injustice or at politics that I hardly understood than when I was with her. And if, poor you, you became the focus of her wrath, you’d fold up at a mere look, shrinking until invisibility owned you.

  Eleanor let out a heavy sigh, and smiled, as if she’d conceded. But I didn’t want it to be over quite yet. “Don’t you believe me?”

  She fiddled with a napkin, rubbing it between her fingers and thumb. “I just think it might be too soon. Don’t you agree? And don’t you think it’s extremely convenient? I mean, it’s fucking perfect, but it’s also fucking unlikely. Don’t you think it’s all a bit much?”

  “Why do you have to think about it at all? It’s my life. Can’t you just be happy for me?”

  “I’m fucking delighted for you, Noz. I just want to make sure this is right for you. It’s not our world that you’re living in. I just need to be sure that this isn’t something you’re doing to impress. When I know, we’ll get even more drunk to celebrate. That’s all.”

  “You’ve made that clear. Let me work out what’s good for me.”

  Rosa had given up trying to break the strain, and was staring at the table top, her lips puckered in a child-like pout. Her purple lipstick had smudged across her cheek. Eleanor leant over and wiggled her fingers in the fur of Rosa’s shawl as if scratching a cat. “Don’t worry, kitten. I’m done. Obligatory friend-care-taking done. You can get back to planning your bridesmaid dress now.”

  Looking back, I suppose I’d have said the same if our situations had been reversed. She was just looking out for me, though she’d acted cruelly, backing me into a corner like that. I don’t think she realised that she’d stabbed me somewhere delicate, and that her knife was so shrewd that I couldn’t heal. Hidden in those deep nooks there were secrets even I didn’t want to face.

  Eleanor reached below the table. “I’d brought you this as a belated birthday present, but it can be an engagement present too, now. Merry birth-engage-day.” She pulled out a parcel wrapped in shimmery green paper. I took it reluctantly, on edge as if this was a trick.

  “Open it.”

  I peeled back the foil and found within the folds a paperback. It was clearly old, and smelled like I’d imagine bones to smell, somehow dry and damp at the same time. It reminded me of school trips to libraries that had their own special taste on the air. It was like something seeped from people into the books. On opening a cover, it was perfectly acceptable to see stains, maps to someone else’s skin.

  This book could have been an antique, but it still held itself together with some stability. It felt heavier than it looked as if the pages were lacquered, and the front was embellished with swooping illustrations of seagulls. The title in big white letters read, Common Birds of the British Isles.

  Flicking through the pages, each bird had its own double-page spread of sketches showing the bird in flight from the ground, the head in profile, feather markings, and nesting habits. It might have been from when Mum was young, when it was easy to spot birds at the coast or over gardens.

  “To match your mum’s binoculars,” Eleanor said. “You might not spot anything soon, but it doesn’t mean you should stop looking. And this way you won’t look like a pervert hanging out of your bedroom window.”

  In lieu of an embrace I squeezed the book between my hands, taking comfort from the strength of its binding, the physicality of it, anchored in time and place. This was from a time when the air didn’t taste this way.

  I don’t know what Eleanor meant by giving it to me. It was a really thoughtful gift, but it filled me with a sorrow I couldn’t quite fathom. Rather than gain a present, it was as if I’d lost something. I thought back to the feather I’d taken from Mum’s house, where it had been collected so carefully and stored up high – where it belonged. Even though Mum must’ve told me a hundred times what bird it came from, I couldn’t now remember the name. I flicked through the pages looking for a creature that looked similar but they were all little unrem
arkable brown things, not black or blue. I pushed the memory from my head.

  The thing was, the chance of seeing any of the birds in the book were so few and far between I could waste my life with my eyes on the sky. Rather than a guide for the present day, the book was a relic of a time that would never return. I didn’t want the others to see this, so I clutched the volume to my chest, thanking Eleanor with honest tears in my eyes. She leaned forward and gave me a wink. “The future’s bright, kiddo. The birds might come back oneday.”

  By the time we wrapped up the evening, I’d lost the feeling in my legs. I only realised how much I’d had when pulling on my coat seemed more difficult than escaping a straitjacket. When I tried to stand up, I managed to knock over the empties with the swing of a padded sleeve. Strike.

  As ever, despite her tiny frame, Rosa managed to hold herself together with the most decorum. I’ve never understood the biology behind that. Maybe it’s nothing to do with size, and Rosa had just been born with the innate ability to fight toxins with efficiency and finesse. Easton Grove would have liked that.

  Rosa cajoled us into our taxis, before calling her current boyfriend to pick her up. I hadn’t yet met Mike, but then I rarely ever met any of Rosa’s boyfriends. You almost didn’t need to, they were always the same – poetic, usually bulky, and a little on the sullen and protective side. Not the best sense of humour. It’s like she was deliberately seeking her opposite, to balance herself out.

  By the time the taxi reached Dukesberry Terrace I was starting to feel sick. Even I could hardly make out the incoherent vowels I gurgled to the driver, so I signalled for him to stop at the end of the street by gesticulating – pointing at the floor and then to me. He seemed to get it without even needing to turn his head, and when he pulled to a stop I quickly flashed my plastic over the card reader and scrambled out onto the pavement.