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beann-e · 3 years

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um wow , idk what to say i’m a bit flustered but i hope i say it right. I was only gone for a couple of days and this is what I come back to. 😮 Tysm guys I love you all thank you for taking the time out of your scrolls to even follow me >:’) So, I decided to follow through on my haikyu x police force idea and here it is a sneak peek! I hope you enjoy !

May 1 , 2021

-recording take one

" I am under oath to tell you that everything being said here today will be used to further the investigation against yourself. That being said If you choose to answer a question or provide a statement I will have no choice but to write it down to be processed and turned into someone of higher authority than me is that clear "

" i'd say that's a bit — well stupid to me saying yes when your the highest fish on the food chain no? "

" what else can I say except lucky you that everything you say won't be passed around and relayed much less having your words twisted by those listening "

" cute "

" i'd say same goes to you if you weren't chained up in front of me right now — I might've just asked you out on a date "

" i'm free friday at 10 — though it's in the morning so I pose the question— Would you like to sneak me from my court case baby I promise i’ll make it up to you "

" mm i'll think about it seeing as though i'm the one escorting you to your new cell anyways we might just have to have a uh a talk inside hmm"

" what no balls ? "

" sadly none —or at least physically seeing as though i'm a woman "

" I never would've guessed if it wasn't for the way that suit hugs your curves — your pretty full out huh you must be fun "

" i've gotten that before though people tend to say i’m a bit more fun elsewhere "

" aw you wound me you didn’t tell me I had competition babe “

" of course not your first in line in my eyes, it sucks that the ring on my finger says differently though "

" isn't that sweet I might just have to take you up on your offer "

" oh? didn't think you'd be so excited ,much less interested on being the first one on my list to be put in jail but, I guess i'll try my best to speed your trial up for you if that's what you want "

The rooms silence was heavy as the camera panned the room. Your fingers silently being clawed into the table as it drained all your anger from you.

Your shoe tapping against the floor with a slight grimace appearing on your face when you heard the buttons on the camera in front of you being pressed.

" what no slick comment ? " A heartfelt laugh moved to fill the once silent room as you watched small hands wrap around the camera and fix it to where it showed nothing but your upset face—fingertips slamming down one by one on the table

" don't you have a fucking job to do glasses "

" aw what happened no more flirty y/n ? "

"your an asshole— I don’t know why I expected much in the first place seeing as though you were trained under him "

" such a foul mouth — you do know this is going on your transcripts right ? " the eyes in front of you narrowing on you the voice only coming out in mock care for your situation " you wouldn't want the jury — much less the judge reading this when their deciding your sentence right ? "

Your fingers glided over the table and into a fist in front of you as your head went to look down at the table

" you've grown submissive so fast "

" I find it hard to believe you don't like that kind of thing fucking pervert "

" aw you wound me — but if I had to supply you with an answer to your question— I can imagine your dying to know since you've been flirting with a married woman this whole time "

" married? "

" I know your observant y/n you have to be " the next words making you breathe heavily " I mean the way you noticed your s/o was cheating before they could even notice themselves is just wow"

The click of the door being heard as a deep voice made its way in the room " Kiyoko your not allowed in here "

" I have just as much right to be in here as anyone else — "

" but I could’ve sworn I just said you don't — so again why the hell are you in here ? "

The room turning cold with the woman in front of you straightening herself up not wanting to go back and forth with the male in front of her but, at the same time not wanting to come across as small, being seen as a woman down here was hard much less having your own husband be relatively close to the one in charge " I came down here to test out inmate 4890 psyche"

" did anyone give you that kind of permission? that kind of clearance ? to even get down here in the first place ? "

" I mean their hidden underground so i'd say their the main event down here "

" you can't just come down here to see it whenever you see fit "

" but I was interested in the way it's mind works "

" what the hell am I an attraction at sea world? "

" your whatever the fuck I want you to be " your once strong eyes were met with brown ones that held your gaze almost testing you— daring you.

You seeing the hate swirl with annoyance meeting to radiate off of him. His face made up in a snarl as he finally turned his whole body to you.

Arms crossed across his chest eyes now lazily focused on you causing a chill to move through your spine. Youd never wanted to grow submissive to anyone and you never had not in all your years of living so why were you now?

Kiyokos eyes moving from between you to the male in front of her and back. Her body already telling you she knew something was off by the way you'd just been playful with her until you felt the energy shift by someone elses approach showing how easily your personality could changed.

Something was off and she was interested

" if necessary I can always stay and play mediato— "

" your ok " he smiled widely " we're fine together — down here "

your body shifted in the seat wrists being pulled back and down to the table by the chain in front of you when you heard his claim.

" y/n ' s good with that — their fine ive known them a long time I can speak for them — we’ve done this before countless times this isn't their first crime maybe one of this stature yes but "

" mhmm " the woman in front of you shook her head lightly before leaving the room your heart clenching tightly when you heard the door click closed

" I just wanna do my job and then i'll get out ok y/n " the fake sympathy in his voice shining through as he put down his clipboard on the table before standing behind the chair at the table across from you

" god " his voice was heavy as he spoke " it's like you get hotter and hotter everytime we see each other " his body moving around the small rectangular table " it's such a shame "

Your body tensing when you felt him nearing you only to keep going past you.

Body letting out a breath you didn't even know you were holding only to restore another one when you heard the click of the camera turning off and powering down.

Your eyes darting around the room to watch him out of the corner of them reaching up to turn off the corner camera that showed the police force what was happening in the room

Not that they would care seeing as though he was chief he could do anything he wanted to you and not have to tell anyone in his unit. It didn't help that you were a world renowned criminal now you'd fully fucked this up for yourself

" crazy how your fucked yourself over " his words only confirming the thought in your head " you were only into petty crimes before so I could barely get my hands on you i'd always have to pass you over to everyone else because no one of my status ever needed to intervene — though I would've loved to— just to feel the way your face would drop anytime I entered the room or to even feel the shift in your attitude like I felt earlier— holy fuck is that powerful and now look at you "

He laughed at your body that sat slumped in your chair trying to cover your face with the cuffs on the table " pathetically sitting in a room bawling your eyes out in front of me "

His words only feeling closer now as his breath hit your ear.

Heat from his mouth moving to your neck instantly causing you to scoot away only for him to grab the back of your neck " have you no respect for yourself "

You gritted your teeth together at his hold on you " I said have you no respect for yourself "

You bit at your lip trying to decide what to say you always wanted to spit a comeback at the male but right now was definitely not the time with his heavy hand on your neck moving slowly into your hair to grip tighter

"ah every single time we do this — it's almost even more pathetic than the droplets I keep seeing falling and landing on my perfect fucking table that I bought with company’s money— fuck their gonna cut my paycheck "

His hand tightening as he spoke again " one more time asshole " his voice held all the rudeness to it " have you no respect for yourself "

" y-"

The action was quick as he slammed your head hard into the table in front of you. your vision blurring before he sighed blood dripping from your forehead and leaking out of your nose onto your lips as it trembled slightly

" ugh I hate when this happens with you —- you always bleed so fucking easily " he huffed " I ask you something you answer learn something about respect for once in your life and maybe you'll take better care of yourself "

He scoffed " your so fucking pretty and yet you do things like this — you slut yourself out in my business and then turn around and get arrested god your such a fucking ditz "

your head being brought to meet the table once again as you whimpered tears mixing with your blood brain muddied and shut down by his actions

" i'm so tired — so so tired of sweeping everything you do under the rug— I mean you act like I can’t fucking see you y/n i run the whole fucking thing I don’t— I don’t understand you your just fucking stupid so so so stupid it just blinds me and throws me for a loop sometimes "

His voice was low almost as if he only wanted you to feel the weight of his words " and then you never even say fucking sorry " he pushed your head down again " i'm the fucking cleanup crew ,, the shitty bodyguard when you drag yourself in some mess ,, the contact list when you need a plug ,, the boss when you need a job i'm fucking tired y/n "

" I know I know and i'm— im so sorry really please i'm sorry "

you braced yourself for another push as he backed away the heavy hand leaving your neck as he peered down at your head that was still hovering over the table

" what the fuck do you want another bash ?What are you doing "

" no — no please no”

" then bring your head up — god you seriously take your role on as the youngest dont you " he sighed as he moved his hands to pinch at the bridge of his nose. Your eyes darting to the camera kiyoko left and feeling hope enter your body thinking of how she would see the whole scene that’s played out with the male in front of you

" your not staying here "

" what—what "

" you can't — I dont want you here— i’m outta this your not my responsibility anymore your 19 now so I don’t know what to say except get it to fucking gether — you stay here your never gonna go to jail you'd just stay in a confined room for moths — fuck i’m always getting dragged in this shit "

" how — what do I do — what am I gonna do "

" the hell do you mean ? what am I gonna do ? as if the shits not obvious your gonna do fucking nothing while everyone else does all the work for you again "

your voice grew quiet as he scoffed " that's what I thought god — one day i'm gonna get fired "

your eyes darted to the camera and back down " for what exactly "

his eyebrows creased as he stared at you eyes moving all around your face before he spoke ignoring your question " you got yourself in some real bad shit this time y/n "

" but it wasn't even my fau— "

" you don't say shit — you know it wasn't suppose to go down like that and when one goes down we go down together you swore it— that’s how you got our trust don’t fuck yourself over again or you’ll be down in hell by yourself "

" like what ? "

" don't fuck with me y/n "

he moved to grab his clipboard your body lifting when he walked off and forgot about the camera only to drop the clipboard to the floor with a loud clang and start using his shoe to tear the papers apart

" wh-what are you doing " your voice came out soft as your eyebrows creased

His body moving over to the table and throwing the camera youd just put all your hope into someone seeing what you went through being thrown to the ground and stepped on harshly with the heel of his shoes.

Though it wasn't broken broken it was unsalvageable and couldn't be fixed your eyes going wide unable to process anything before he walked to the door and opened it his hand coming up to cup around his mouth

" THEIR ATTACKING " he screamed your body trembling at the way the table shook along with it " calling all units anyone in the vicinity the inmate I am locked up with is having a tantrum of some kind and I do not think I can handle it alone "

Your heart broke as you watched the male in front of you turn back to look at you holding nothing but hate in his eyes " I ask that you help me remove the inmate and get them out of our station immediately "

Several people running in cleaning up the scene and taking pictures before someone uncuffed you and dragged you towards the tall male by the door.

" Chief where do you want em "

" I want em on the next bus to tokyo "

Your head swirling " wh— "

" everyone exit while I talk to the inmate quickly alerting them of their next adventure " everyone moving silently to follow his demands his eyes going directly to yours as everyone raced down the hallway and away from you two

" your going to tokyo — I can't fucking do this — "

" but what would I do there's no one "

" go see bokutou — at this point you've pissed me off I can't do much else for you just — go ask for a new life really " his voice came out in a short laugh at his ending words

" boku— "

" y/n I said i'm pissed off and done with you — you keep interfering with my job and honestly this murder charge was the last strike for me— your of age now I can’t get you outta this shit— so if you could just get a new identity and get the hell away from me id seriously appreciate it "

" daichi I "

" you don't say anything "

" your my — your my brother we’re suppose to be there for each other and you "

" i'm not your anything as of right now you prick " his voice was sharp and held meaning as he snapped at uou " not your brother — your friend — your back up call when you get into weird shit I — I wanted to be a nice police officer and move my way up to chief I wanted to have kids a — a family y/n " he scoffdd " not a shitty sibling who keeps using my job against me and has me pulling strings that shouldn't even exists "

" but "

" you see how I keep cutting you off it's because I don't want to hear you y/n — you annoy the fuck out of me so seriously " he moved his shoulder to glide through the doorframe and past you "just go do what you criminal assholes do and get a new identity and the fuck away from me as soon as possible I want nothing to do with you "

" sooooo thats how you ended up with me " the air in the new room shifted from confusing to happiness as the dual colored male in front of you screamed " THATS AWESOME YOU HAVE SUCH A BADASS BACK STORY "

He jumped up and covered his face dramatically before he spoke "twas a dark night when y/n changed their ways and gave birth to a criminal — a murdering criminal who came to the one and the only — bokuto koutaro the amazingily cool , strong , funny , king of connections — thus creating a beautiful friendship and a dark and powerful villian story "

He smiled at your beat and battered face youd received from your brother a day ago before he spoke again his hair drooping slightly " too much ? "

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the-revisionist · 8 years

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The Tristan Chord, chapter 15

[Edited to fix typos, thank you @farminglesbian, and to change a musical selection that came to me out of the blue.]

xv. the book of miracles

The tragedy isn’t that love doesn’t last. The tragedy is the love that lasts. —Shirley Hazzard, The Transit of Venus

“High fructose corn syrup.”

The phrase, dropped like a gauntlet at dinner, brings idle conversation to a halt. It is spoken by Lawrence, who points in a very melodramatic j’accuse fashion at Flora.

In turn, Flora blinks at him slowly, decides he’s playing at something, and giggles.

Why do I not have normal children? Caroline wonders. One is terrified of Latin and cries at soppy commercials on telly, the other apparently hears voices and is seriously considering going to clown school. The jury, however, is still out on Flora. Please be normal, she silently begs the child. If I screw you up somehow, I won’t be able to bear it. Meanwhile the others assembled around the table—Alan, Celia, and Greg—stare at her, awaiting a Solomon-like proclamation on Lawrence’s bizarre declaration.

Caroline makes them wait. She gulps wine, girds her loins, and unfurls a mighty sigh. “What are you on about?” she asks Lawrence.

“She said it.” Lawrence wags his finger at his sister. “The other day. Quite clearly, I might add. At breakfast, I swear she was looking right at the cornflakes box—”

Greg gasps. “You didn’t let her eat any of those, did you?”

“What? No.” Irritated at the interruption, Lawrence screws up his face in a profoundly unattractive fashion, the expression on a scatological scale somewhere in the not-so-vast plane between taking a shit and actually smelling one.

“Good,” Greg says, “because they do have high fructose corn syrup in them. Corn flakes are the devil.”

God, I am going to be completely pissed before this night is over if this keeps up, Caroline thinks as she polishes off her second glass of wine. “Can I quote you on that?”

“That’s not the point,” Lawrence says. “The point is, like, totally out of the blue, she just says ‘high fructose corn syrup.’ Just like that. And I was like, ‘What did you say?’ And she looked all smug and wouldn’t say anything else! Not a single word. And she won’t say it now. She just won’t. I’ve been trying all day to get her to say it.”

Bright with paternal enthusiasm, Greg gives it a go: “Flora. Sweetheart. Say, ‘high fructose corn syrup!’”

Celia pinches her brow.

Thoughtfully Flora regards her dinner plate. She positions several tiny pieces of broccoli upright on their stalks near a mound of uneaten casserole, creating a little mini-forest surrounding a hilly terrain. Caroline interprets this as a potential clue to a future occupation: Maybe she will become a naturalist. Or an urban planner. Or a demented celebrity chef.

“See? Nothing. She’s gaslighting me,” Lawrence says.

“Very significant achievement for two years old,” Alan observes. His mobile pings and he pulls it out of his pocket.

Celia glares at him. “Don’t look at it.”

“Just a peek.”

“I said don’t look at it.”

“I’m looking at it.”

“Don’t look at it.”

“I have to!” Alan protests.

“It’s dinnertime. You’re being very rude.”

“You know I have to,” he repeats. “Could be urgent.”

“They’re fine. The worst is over, that’s what the weather service says.”

“It’s still raining,” Alan says plaintively.

It’s been raining for a week, and as a result the valley is flooded. Well, Halifax is flooded; as for Harrogate, Caroline cannot help but summon words of wisdom from Gillian’s own personal saint, Morrissey: the rain falls hard on a humdrum town. It’s not exactly flooding of biblical proportions all around, as a rather hysterical local weatherman had decreed, but bad enough that Gillian’s farm and sheep have felt the effects: washed-out roads, power out, ruined hay, sheep driven to higher ground, and bad enough that Raff has been bunkered at the farm alone with his mother for three days and serving as the reluctant point person in keeping everyone else informed via increasingly irate and desperate texts to his grandfather.

“Well?” Celia prompts. “What does our Raff say?”

Alan squints at the mobile and enunciates slowly: “‘Is matricide a crime?’”

Lawrence gives his mother an inscrutable look. Caroline glares back in a manner that, she hopes, conveys that she will not be very easy to kill. Which he should certainly be aware of by now. He sulks and resumes surveillance of his sister, who tosses a piece of broccoli in his direction; whether it’s a peace offering or a come at me bro challenge cannot be discerned.

“Oh, dear,” murmurs Celia.

“Also, they’re almost out of toilet paper!” Alan places the mobile on the table. “That settles it. I think I should go out there.”

“But the roads may be bad, love.”

“Roads are fine now, rain should stop tomorrow.”

Celia’s eyes narrow. “Thought you said Gillian isn’t convinced the rain will stop.”

“Well—”

“‘She knows rain,’ you said. You always make her sound like she’s some sort of bloody American Indian, out on the prairie doing a rain dance.”

“There’s a mental image,” Caroline says. She starts clearing the table.

Alan frowns. “Harry will come with. If I ask, he will. We’d be all right, together. I just want to know they’re all right, want to see with my own two eyes.”

“Why don’t you sleep on it?”

“‘Sleep on it,’” Alan grumbles. “You’re just hoping I’ll forget.”

“Yes, dear, I am.”

In the kitchen Caroline stacks plates on the counter and grabs a casserole dish to scrape out before putting it in the dishwasher. As she turns around she finds her mother has magically materialized before her with the shocking stealth of a malevolent, enchanted garden gnome; rearing back to avoid certain collision, the contents of the dish—mixed remnants of noodles, various vegetables, and crumbly tofu in some kind of peanut sauce that Greg said was inspired by West African cuisine even though Caroline thinks he probably knows as much about West African cuisine as she knows about Renaissance poetry or the inner workings of her Jeep—find themselves gloppily splayed against her chest before gently sliding down her shirt and plopping onto the kitchen floor.

She counts to ten—normally an effective way of tempering her reactions, but in this case with random food gunk clinging to an expensive silk blouse finds herself going full on sacrilegious: “Jesus Fucking Christ!”

Lawrence enters the kitchen and then quickly backpedals out.

“Must you sneak up on people like that?” Caroline shouts.

“Must you swear like that? Gillian really is an awful influence on you.” Celia frowns at the floor. “Now that’s a right mess.”

“No shit, Sherlock.”

“I’m sorry but I wanted to talk to you alone, while I had the chance,” Celia says in an undertone.

“Well you’ve a captive audience now, so fire away.”

“You need to go to the farm tomorrow.”

Of course, the old woman would ask her to do precisely the one thing she does not want to do. “Why?”

“If you don’t go, Alan will and he’ll drag Harry along, and those two together—good God. If they don’t get stuck in the mud somewhere or lost God knows where while chasing errant sheep, Harry will drink all of Gillian’s wine and you know how she gets about that. In other words, they will drive her right ’round the bend and none of us, ever, will hear the end of it—well, I won’t hear the end of it, because she’ll blame me for not keeping her father put. She said as much to me when the rains started. She actually called me, can you believe it? She never calls me unless someone has a gun to her head. But she told me to keep him here.” Celia pauses to recharge from this breathless petition and plays with her necklace—pearls, a gift from Alan on their first anniversary. “He’s in fine fettle these days but I know, I just know, he will push himself trying to help her if he goes out there now and I don’t want him to risk making himself sick again.”

“I understand, but why me? Why not send—Greg?” As Caroline marvels at the nonsense out of her mouth, Celia seems to seriously ponder it but exactly five seconds later they burst into simultaneous fits of laughter.

“You are really funny sometimes,” Celia chortles.

“I know. Missed my calling.”

“But really, love. It’s not like you’d have to actually do anything strenuous. Just take them some food, you’ve got that leftover origami—

“—orecchiette,” Caroline says.

“—oh, and toilet paper, and just sweep the floors, wash the dishes, say an encouraging word or two and you’ll have done your duty.”

Like a wife, Caroline thinks.

“So will you?”

She sighs. “If you think it will—”

“Ah, wonderful! Thank you, love! You’ll go tomorrow then, will you? I’ll tell Alan right now.” Celia whirls out of the kitchen.

“I didn’t say yes yet,” she shouts at Celia’s retreating form.

Celia cackles triumphantly. “You’re my favorite daughter!”

She stares at the greasy smears on the floor.

The beginning of the flood had arrived at a most inopportune time: immediately after the pub kiss, which had left her fiery-cheeked and dazed on the ride home, quietly holding herself as she stared at pearl drops of light random and fleeting against the panorama of darkness. Twice William asked if she was all right. Later, alone in bed, she touched herself briefly and found no satisfaction in doing so. Bored before I even began, she had thought and then, oh Christ, quoting Morrissey, and finally, dismally she threw herself off the cliff into sleep. She woke to a morning heavily cloaked in rain and fog, the relentless downpour hissing with such persistence that when it briefly let up three days later the air rang with empty glory, not unlike the ripe silence following the violent peal of church bells.

At least Raff will get a good laugh out of seeing her in Wellies; she will actually get use of the pair that she bought years ago at the last threat of flooding. In fact, she is excited to wear the boots because they are a lovely, glossy black that will go smashingly with practically anything. Oh Christ, she sighs, and imagines the women’s mag headline: Dressing for Natural Catastrophe: What to Wear!

The drive to the farm the next afternoon is fraught with detours and muddy roads along a horizon that reminds Caroline of a Rothko: dark gray land and light gray sky cauterized together with a ragged white line across the horizon, the gleaming line absorbing every bit of light that daytime can possibly spare. Splinters of thin, light rain fall against the windshield. In the drive up to the farmhouse the Jeep gets caught in a muddy rut; she manages to back out and then maneuver around it, but the flood-damaged dirt road is bumpier than usual and despite the Jeep’s otherwise excellent shock absorbers Caroline gets a shaky, tediously unsatisfying ride that brings to mind the nadir of her sexual relationship with John.

As she pulls up within sight of the farmhouse she sees that Raff has spotted the Jeep from afar and he awaits her impatiently, bouncing on his heels. She is unprepared for the intensity of his greeting: He throws himself into her arms like a long-lost son or lover. She doubts she will receive a similarly enthusiastic reaction from Gillian; Christ knows you certainly don’t deserve it, she thinks.

“Thank God!” he says. “A normal person.”

“It’s nice to be thought of in that way,” Caroline replies.

“Please tell me you brought—”

“—toilet paper, yes, and pasta, sandwiches, biscuits, salad—”

“None of that healthy stuff for us,” Raff says. “Oooh, look at those fancy Wellies! Very chic, Cazza. You look like a farmer on telly—like you could be on a show about a sheep farmer who solves murders all the time.”

Caroline rolls her eyes in mock exasperation. “So where’s your mum?”

“Out in barn. I find it’s best to keep her out there, away from polite society.”

After they’ve unloaded the Jeep she reluctantly follows Raff out to the barn while he talks of dead sheep, wet hay, and power outages; the sheep were two dumb, young ewes that fell down a ravine, some of the hay might be salvageable but at least half of it might be bad, and the power is back on.

They find Gillian pulling an empty wheelbarrow into the barn. From the knees down her jeans and boots are spackled with mud. Her left elbow looks skinned and the sleeve of the flannel shirt on that arm is torn, and her hair is greasy and pulled back into a ponytail. At the sight of Caroline she drops the wheelbarrow; the clatter echoes and Caroline jumps. Gillian frowns and tugs at her work gloves.

Over the past week Caroline has rehearsed various speeches in her head ranging from the florid to the plainspoken, but all these thoughtful peregrinations made her wish she could simply present Gillian with a Venn diagram of intersecting emotions where each panic-riddled state or practical consideration included Gillian as the common element. Additionally the circular aspect of the diagram alluded rather obviously to Caroline’s typical mental roundabouts on the subject. Even allowing for Raff’s presence, what comes out of her mouth is still light years from either an articulate summation of the current chaos of her mind, or a poetic expression of inchoate desire:

“I come bearing toilet paper,” she says.

As expected she gets Gillian’s flinty look of irritated incomprehension, not unlike the time Greg tried to educate her on the nutritional value of mung beans in refutation of Gillian’s steadfast refusal to eat anything called mung.

“Sometimes you don’t get the hero you want,” Raff says as he claps a hand on Caroline’s shoulder, “but the hero you need.”

Gillian shuffles, stares at the floor. “That’s great.”

“There’s food,” Raff adds. “She’s brought food.”

“Good.” Gillian pretends that peeling off work gloves and tossing them onto a tool bench is an effort requiring both massive strength and supreme concentration.

Resigned to his mother’s surliness, Raff merely shoots her an exasperated look.

Look at me, Caroline thinks, but now Gillian busies herself with wiping dry the handle of some dangerous-looking tool that could easily be used for disembowelment and so she quickly turns her attention back to Raff. “Are you hungry?” she squeaks at him.

“I am, but I was gonna shove off—” He hesitates, fixing a glance on his mother. “—if that’s still all right.”

Gillian nods, digs around in her jeans pocket. In flight, the keys to the Landy flash across the barn.

Raff swipes at the air and catches them. His face softens as he jiggles the keys in his palm. “You sure?”

“Yeah, yeah. I told you it’s all right. So go on already, go see your girls. Come back tomorrow.”

Not content to proffer a mere thank you, Raff strides across the barn and engulfs his mother in a bear hug. Caroline allows herself to be amused at the spectacle of Gillian squirming, looking irritated, then pleased, then smiling, and then berating her son’s manhood: “All right, stop hugging me before you start growing ovaries.”

Would that be such a bad thing? Caroline decides not to say this.

“I love you, man,” Raff drawls oafishly in imitation of an American drunkard.

This makes Gillian chuckle and Caroline experience a brief fit of jealousy. There was a time when she used to make Gillian laugh; was that gone now, did the leaden intensity of this thing between them somehow drain the light from their relationship as the cursed, bloody flooded valley drained the sun from the sky?

She clears her throat and asks, “Is there anything I can do?”

Back to the squinty glare. “Yeah.” Gillian grabs a wide broom. She swaggers in Caroline’s general direction and then effortlessly tosses the broom at Caroline, who manages an awkward catch of it. “Sweep in here. Muck it out a bit.”

Once again irritated at Gillian’s behavior, Raff asks pointedly, “What are you gonna do?”

“Well,” Gillian drawls as she continues walking away from them, “since we’ve got toilet paper, thought I’d celebrate by taking a shit.”

They watch her leave. While she walks down the path to the house she occasionally glares up at the sky, as if daring it to rain more.

Raff shakes his head. “She’s really too much.”

You have no idea, Caroline wants to say. Instead she hugs Raff again before he sprints out to the Land Rover. As he drives away, he waves with frantic, grateful desperation, as if she ceded a place on a lifeboat for him. It’s like Titanic and she is Leonardo DiCaprio, Raff is Kate Winslet, and Gillian is the fucking iceberg. No matter, Caroline smiles bravely in a quintessentially English well chaps we’re doomed fashion while waving listlessly back at Raff and murmuring, “God help me.”

After sweeping the barn Caroline sits gingerly on an ancient stool that should be consigned to the woodpile. The stool wobbles and abruptly she stands. She rubs her back, stares at the large metal tool chest tucked under the tool bench. The red enameled exterior has clearly seen better days; the tool chest’s squat body is covered with dents and dings and dirt. There are five drawers of varying sizes, ranging from the smallest at the top to the largest at the bottom. The largest drawer looks a bit crumpled, as if it had been targeted in Gillian-driven fit of pique; as a result, it does not close properly. Caroline is not certain what compels her—other than sheer nosiness—but she pries open the drawer. It is crammed with books: Both paperbacks and hardcovers, all in varying stages of age and decrepitude. History, poetry, literature. Even a Stephen Hawking book. Philip Larkin. J.B. Priestley. Wallace Stevens. Barbara Tuchman. A book called The Transit of Venus catches her eye—her hope that it is actually about astronomy is immediately dashed by an abstract, pastel cover that indicates it’s a novel or perhaps poetry. Some of the paperbacks are warped with damp, their pages as furbelowed as the skirts of a Victorian matron.

All of these, Gillian’s books–as hidden and damaged as she is.

Caroline knows now that she has misjudged Gillian from day one. Thought she was reckless when in fact she possessed patience borne from a lifetime of denials and disappointments. Thought she was fragile and frail until Caroline discovered the untold muscles and sinew coiled under her skin and the sure and steady grip of her hands. Thought she was an uneducated rube and not a woman who secretly read books in a damp dim barn—probably because she didn’t want her shit husband to find out and knock her upside the head and who does it now simply because it’s a force of habit or is unwilling to admit to anyone that she needs the grace of solitude. Or both. Thought she was incapable of fidelity or love when she would gladly accept the smallest scrap of anything remotely resembling love, including its many seductive duplicities.

Tell me a lie, tell me you love me.

The glinting rain, which had stopped shortly before she arrived, picks up again, deepening the puddles and dips along the rough path that leads to the farmhouse. She imagines Gillian walking this path everyday, through all kinds of weather. Day in, day out. Sun warming her skin, wind stiffening her clothes, rain soaking her bones, snowflakes dusting her hair. Or on days when she’s hungover, or menstruating, or too wired on coffee, or walking with a spring in her step because she had if off with someone she met recently and it was good. Or walking slowly because Eddie has broken her ribs and they’re still mending.

Gillian told her this story while in that strangely lucid state of drunkenness that lent itself to her compulsive confessions: She had been too frightened to go to hospital because they would have asked too many questions, so she spent a fortnight in bed feigning a bout of flu to everyone until finally, with her torso bound up with bandages—the perpetrator himself had gently wrapped her up while crying and saying it will never happen again, I swear to you—and stuffed with as much paracetamol and oxycodone as she could take, she went back to work, doing some light chores every day. The path to the barn every morning was the hardest bit, she had said, like walking a gauntlet and every uneven step sent waves of pain beating against her core; once she got past that, everything seemed easier. A miracle then, a bloody fucking miracle that she did not die, a miracle that the man Celia Dawson reacquainted herself with after so many years was not just a widower but a bereft parent showing them photos of his lost child—a handsome, weary woman with haunted eyes the elusive shade of sky, sea, and earth commingled. There, that’s her, that’s my Gillian.

Caroline riffles the stiff, yellowed pages of The Transit of Venus. As words flutter by she encounters her name in the book several times. There are signs and miracles on this rainy day to be interpreted and treasured in equal measure, and the last one is divination for the disbeliever: She stands here looking at Gillian’s books and know that this, all of this, is heading where it’s heading despite her complete and utter lack of faith.

CHAPTER SOUNDTRACK:

The Smiths:

“There is a Light That Never Goes Out” “William, It Was Really Nothing,”

EDITED TO ADD:

Patricia Barber, “You Don’t Know Me”

Note: The great Shirley Hazzard died recently, so the reference to her novel in this chapter is a hat tip to an extraordinary writer who, I fear, will not be as remembered and revered as she should be.

#are we cool vincent #Caroline x Gillian #the one with the books

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