Bonfire Blues

Bonfire Blues

  James Eddy

  Copyright 2012 James Eddy

  Bewilder

  Heart over Head over Heels

  Lily Green

  The Devil eats Coleslaw

  Fading Polaroids in Reverse

  The Graveyard

  Hello, Emptiness

  Revelations

  The Ghosts Are Out Tonight

  In Dreams

  Diamonds

  Cover by Marko C/O Morguefile, Michael S. Richter, Lauren Bathurst

  Publishers Notes

  Disclaimer

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places, events and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Manufactured in the United Kingdom.

  Bonfire Blues

  As I stepped off the train and stumbled out onto the platform’s smoothed stone surface, I was searching for something. At least I think I was. It might just have been an excuse for not knowing where I was going. Dan had said staying somewhere different would be good for me, and, at the time, I hadn't argued. Daniel Liman always dealt in absolute certainties when it came to his friends and he'd told me I could stay with him for a while. Just to get my head together. Of course, things are rarely ever that simple.

  I probably should've seen it as a sign when I couldn't find his bloody house. I ended up taking a guess on it being a red brick two-floor building that was in just about the right place. I tried looking through the windows. My view was blocked by blood red curtains. I didn’t know what to do other than to go to the front door and knock. I'd hoped it'd be Dan who opened it. Perhaps unsurprisingly, it wasn't.

  But that's when I first saw Rebecca Blake. She was so tall and blonde and her brown eyes were so huge that even less made sense to me then. Looking back, I can kind of see how that was heightened by the angle of the light shining above her. And how it gave her a halo of hair and light that only disappeared when I shifted slightly where I stood.

  The next thing I saw was confusion on her pretty face.

  “Hi. I’m Scott Drake,” I told her.

  I didn't understand the look she gave me then. She didn't seem unhappy but I hadn't seen anything quite like that look before in my life. There wasn't time to try to understand. It was already clear that one of us had to say something. And I was a bit flustered for some reason.

  “Um… Dan?” I babbled.

  In an instant, understanding passed across her eyes and I knew I was in the right place. She smiled at me for the first time and turned her head to look back into the house. As she moved, I glimpsed silver butterfly earrings, hidden within the straightened strands of her butterscotch hair. They were followed by the sound of the sweetest, gentlest voice I would ever know.

  “DAN?” she shouted, in a tone that was friendly but intimate enough to tell me they were a couple.

  “YEAH?” he called back from somewhere unseen inside.

  “YOU'VE GOT A VISITOR… SCOTT?”

  Each syllable of his response contained more genuine enthusiasm than most people manage in a month of words:

  “YEAH! DAMN GIRL… SHOW THE BOY IN.”

  He was never going to actually let her do that. I'd already seen the blur of his limbs moving over the carpet's thinning ultramarine. And then he was there, encasing us, all together, in his arms. It was moments like that when he seemed much larger than life, especially for such a skinny guy. And I could see then that he hadn’t changed.

  “Come in, come in.”

  He took the bag from my hand and carried it inside.

  “I can’t believe you’re finally here… That’s a bloody good way to end the day.”

  It was only later he told me that the day I arrived he'd been panicking about his most recent work. He never let it show at all that night.

  He and Rebecca were kind to me. With him it wasn't a surprise. We had history. But she didn't even know me and still understood how much I needed a cup of tea to deal with my latest emotional cul-de-sac.

  I'm probably overplaying it. I'm sure it sounds like a pretty small thing but it felt amazing that night. Rebecca was super sympathetic. And Dan cracked jokes, with kindness in his eyes and a consoling arm around my shoulder. It wasn't long before we were all smiling and moving onto much stronger drinks than tea.

  The gentle, pleasant smell of coffee and croissants woke me but still couldn't fully convince my eyes to open. Then I heard movement from somewhere in the room and, through my eyelashes, I saw Rebecca was tidying. It was definitely needed. The morning light, stained red by the curtains, revealed the blue carpet was covered by bottles and cans.

  The obstacles couldn't obscure her grace. Rebecca had a way of walking that made it seem like she was floating over the ground. It might've been because she was always on her toes or maybe it was just the slight flaring at the bottom of the jeans she wore. I don't know and I guess it doesn't really matter.

  All I did was watch her step over the debris, picking up each thing delicately and occasionally glancing in my direction. She was trying not to wake me. Eventually, I'd find out this sort of kindness was typical of her.

  I soon realised I couldn't go on deceiving her though, so I slowly opened my eyes fully and yawned.

  “Oh, I’m sorry. Did I wake you?” she asked.

  “No it’s all right,” I said looking at her, “I think it was just time to wake up.”

  I didn’t know how, but she'd cleared away almost all the mess. I realise now that I must've been watching a lot longer than I realised.

  She asked if I'd like some breakfast. I couldn’t even begin to deny it. My stomach was growling so loudly it might even have been the reason she asked. I sat up on the sofa and only a few seconds later I was sitting at a table, breathing in fully the homely smell that woke me.

  The first of the croissant and butter melted into oblivion in my mouth and my mind became clear enough to realise that Dan wasn't there. In the following three months I found out that wasn't unusual. The sun would barely rise each day before he was off, out and about, taking the kind of beautiful photos that had made his name. Thinking about it now, I figure he kind of knew that time was running out. After all, he'd known for most of his life that things can often be that way.

  To begin with Rebecca and me would share breakfast and talk. Usually, it was just about my atrocious taste in women or the fact that I was a 'resting' actor and failing songwriter. She seemed to find it fun and easy to laugh at me. I didn't really mind and it didn't last too long anyway. The more the weeks went by, the more conversations drifted into other areas.

  Usually, I tried to make conversations about her. That's how I found out she was a writer, although she never gave much away about what she actually wrote. I understood, although it did seem a little strange. I never saw her pick up a pen or sit at a typewriter or anything; not even in the quiet, fragile moments after she'd talked to her mum on the phone.

  I think something was holding her back and I hate to say that it might have been Dan. Not deliberately obviously, but he couldn't help casting a long shadow. Back then it hardly made a difference though. There wasn’t much time to think about those things. The days went by too fast and the nights were even faster. I was happy to immerse myself in an unreal world of streets and sirens, barely there skirts and broken eyes and glasses. Along with the sweet sound of laughter and music that seeped into the night through the walls and cracks in the pavement.

  Being in a group of Dan's friends was simply chaos. Drinks flowed far too freely, even for people already drunk on their own strangeness. I still can't say those night's weren’t a damn good time though.


  Dan was always at the centre of it all too. With his camera always in hand, he'd tell us tales about every picture from every day. Each photograph, developed or not, always had a story. The one I remember best was from when he'd seen and photographed a teenage boy fast asleep at the foot of a tree. From that image, he came up with this ridiculous story to explain the look of contentment on the boy's face as he lay in the early morning sun. Dan always said that if he could come up with those stories then anyone could. I still reckon he should've given himself a lot more credit.

  There was something chemically right about that mix of people. And it meant that coming up with ideas was more like setting fires just to see what would happen. The fact those ideas rarely led anywhere wasn't really the point. It was more about being brave enough to throw those thoughts out into the night. Brave enough to be fun and clever and dumb all at the same time.

  It was a beautiful and exciting time but now I feel