S.O.S. Read online

  ‘What are you thinking about, Daddy? Have you seen? Rollo seems to have made a new friend. How terribly fond.’

  David heard these words from his little girl (who, going by the tone, was less than pleased about this friend, did she say, of Rollo’s: siblings, he had observed, could be like that) and by way of reply he smiled quite distantly and touched her hand. And then he said:

  ‘I was just thinking, as I said, that I’m actually pretty, you know – hungry, sort of. Yes – they do seem to be getting on rather well, don’t they?’

  Yes they do. Just take one look at him. Chatting away and laughing with that very pretty bargirl. And what do I feel about that? Do I feel like a proud father – one who has raised his son to man’s estate, and now gazes fondly at these early and crackling first steps in the endless dance? No I fucking well don’t. I feel envy. Raw and mean and bloody envy (pure and simple – not, of course, that it could ever be either).

  ‘Daddy – can we wait for Mummy at a table? These stools are just murder.’ And as David lowered his eyes in acquiescence to that (along with just anything else that might later occur to her) and prepared to move away from the bar, Marianne suddenly clutched his arm just above the elbow, and was whispering earnestly into his ear: ‘Look – see him? Just there, Daddy. That’s the weird bloke from when we were boarding. I think he must be terribly lonely, or something, poor sod.’

  David clocked him, and nodded. ‘The man in black,’ he said. ‘Rollo – when you decide to put down our delightful barmaid, do you think you could ask her to pilot across a large Grouse to that table over there? Good of you.’

  Rollo was caught mid-bray, but still managed to turn on to his father a look of extraordinary sourness.

  ‘Oh Christ …’ sighed Rollo, as David and Marianne moved away.

  ‘What did he say?’ asked Jilly. ‘He’s your father, right?’

  ‘Oh right, yes. That’s him. That’s my father all right, yes. He said to ask you for another vat of Scotch. Christ Almighty, he’ll be falling over and it’s not even dinner time, yet. God, I’m starving. Anyway, Jilly – I got the message about the Regatta Club: shit-hole, right?’

  Jilly wrinkled her nose, and one of her eyes might even nearly have winked at him before she turned away to attend to the Grouse.

  ‘It’s not,’ she said airily over her shoulder, ‘all that bad. Provided,’ she tacked on with a smile as she crossed the bar with David’s drink, ‘you don’t mind listening to Mambo Number Five about ten times a night.’

  ‘Oh Christ …’

  ‘And,’ went on Jilly – who now was back – ‘Voulez-Vous Coucher Avec Moi Ce Soir?’

  Rollo looked down into the scummy swirl of the last of his Bud.

  ‘That,’ he said slowly – and now he risked a roguish glance – ‘is not such a bad idea …’

  ‘Ha ha,’ said Jilly, flatly. But she didn’t seem upset, or anything, don’t think. Was she upset? Oh Christ – so hard to tell. This sort of job, she’s paid to be nice, isn’t she? So how do you tell? ‘But they do stay open late, there – which is good. Cocktails are cool. And even if the music’s crap, at least it’s loud. What sort of stuff are you into, then, Rollo?’

  ‘You want a drink, or something?’

  Jilly shook her head. ‘Maybe have one later. I like electronic.’

  And Rollo’s eyes were instantly ablaze. ‘Me too! I do! That’s what I – ! Techno, yeh? You ever go to raves?’

  And Jilly’s eyes were dreamy. ‘Love going to raves. Love them. Moby’s my man.’

  ‘Moby! Moby! I think Moby’s just fantastic. Jesus, Jilly!’

  ‘Trouble is, I don’t go bloody anywhere, now. Been stuck on this ship for months. Seems like years. Only get a day – less than a day, just get a poxy few hours in New York and then we’re – ’

  ‘Oh no – really? You mean you can’t check out the scene?’

  ‘Can’t check out anything, can I? We’re off to Jamaica after that. Won’t see that place either. And even back in England, my bloke – Sammy, yeh? At the bar?’

  ‘Oh yeh. Sammy. Right.’

  ‘Right. Well he’s really into saving, you know? Everything I spend it’s, like – a sin? Getting to be a real drag.’

  ‘What – saving like in … what, you getting married, or something?’

  Jilly spread her fingers on the bar, and looked down. And then she really startled Rollo by suddenly looking up again, and then right at him.

  ‘Yeah – I suppose … he thinks we are, anyway.’

  ‘And you?’

  ‘Yeah – I suppose. Dunno. Not sure. Haven’t really done anything yet, you know? And Sammy, he says that’s the whole point: we get married and we do everything together. But I don’t know. On this cruise, right? You see so many couples that just bloody hate each other, you know? I mean, they seem to be married to the only person in the world they can’t even stand to be with …’

  ‘Mm. Mum and Dad are a bit like that.’

  Jilly nodded slowly. ‘So … I don’t know. Really. I think you’re wanted, Rollo – they’re calling you, looks like.’

  Rollo chucked his eyes skywards – for Jilly’s sake, mainly – before reluctantly rolling them round to focus on whatever (he just could guess). Yeh – Mum has finally and about bloody time rolled up, and now she’s making all these impatient gestures as if she’s been stuck here waiting for us. Christ. Not that I’ve minded waiting.

  ‘Yeh,’ he said, with drawn-out resentment. ‘Gotta go. So look, Jilly – what about I maybe meet up with you in the shit-hole, later?’

  Jilly smiled. ‘Mambo Number Five?’

  ‘Better than nothing. Better than this. And the cocktails are cool, you said.’

  ‘I’m here till eleven-thirty …’

  ‘So, what …? Twelve, then?’

  ‘Mm. Maybe round twelve. Yeh – why not?’

  ‘Cool.’

  ‘Great. See you there, then, Rollo.’

  And Rollo turned away and all he thought was Yeeeeesssss! And then she was calling him back again:

  ‘What’s your cabin number?’

  Is what Rollo could swear that she said. Possible? Jesus.

  ‘Jesus,’ he said.

  ‘I mean,’ clarified Jilly, with heavy and – even to Rollo – unmistakeable put-down, ‘so I can charge for the drinks.’

  And Rollo, oh God, was only doing it again: going all red, like when that manky ponce had told him to put on his bloody lifejacket thing. Oh Christ, oh Christ.

  He dangled his key fob before her, signed the tab, and was hugely irritated when he realized that Marianne was fizzing at his side, and tugging at his sleeve.

  ‘Oh God come on, can’t you, Rollo? Mummy’s going mad.’

  Rollo brushed her away and inhaled very deeply, the better to be equipped for the pantomime sigh that now accompanied the weighty droop of his leaden eyelids.

  ‘Here’s to Techno,’ he said to Jilly.

  She smiled. ‘It beats my heart. Midnight.’

  And Rollo barely heard his mother berating just anyone for getting in her way, as she repeated again and again full into a series of increasingly startled faces, ‘Signal Deck. Captain. Where is it? Signal Deck. Captain. Where is it? Oh God nobody knows anything!’ But he was brought back to earth by that bloody odd bloke they had gaped at while boarding. As David, Nicole, Marianne and finally Rollo were bustling by him, he held up a pen as if to bestow upon them the Sign of the Cross. His eyes as he sat there, thought Marianne suddenly, seemed so terribly mournful.

  ‘Most interesting article,’ came his light and wistful voice, as his pen started tapping at the magazine before him. ‘According to this,’ he went on quite ponderously – seemingly impervious to the fact that his reluctant audience had crashed and thudded into the backs of one another, so abrupt was this curtailment of their headlong dash for the Signal Deck – ‘it surely would seem that the best-selling bra in the United Kingdom goes under the name of ‘Doreen’. Revels in it, one might s
ay.’

  Nicole – now practically exploding with impatience – had failed to register a word Tom had said, but bestowed upon him anyway her smile that said And Aren’t You A Perfectly Sweet Little Idiot? – while almost punching David into forward motion. Marianne had caught her father’s eye and the gleam there warned her not to erupt just yet, while promising that he too would do his utmost to keep down the worst of it. And Rollo was just thinking Jesus, listen to this: It Beats My Heart. And his next thought was Midnight (whereupon his mind took life and spun off wildly).

  *

  They didn’t, mused Tom, seem at all eager to stop and chat – which must, I quite see, wholly be my fault, yes, but for the life of me I couldn’t in honesty tell either of us why – quite what foot I put wrong. I’m out of the way of it, is the truth of the matter – striking up a conversation with someone quite unknown to me. Even with Mary, over all those years – did we talk? Did we? Were we really talking? There were sounds with meanings that passed between us, so yes – communication, certainly … but could such muted mutterings in all frankness be construed by the outsider to be general, everyday talk? Not, of course, that any of it was destined for the outsider – which is maybe where we started to come unstuck. We lived together, Mary and me – ate together, listened to the wireless together (even used to, yes, sleep together, one time, in the same quite cramped bed – but you get so scared of moving, I used to find, when another body’s that close to you: you daren’t even clear your throat). And if we were ever out – restaurant, say, or on one of our little jaunts – we’d address to a third party only those comments absolutely essential to the smooth running of the event itself. We would order our food, and thank the waitress when it was set before us. At the meal’s closure, I would ask for the bill (and, more often than not, request it again – they could be so lax). We certainly would have expressed our appreciation had someone helped us on with our coats, but you so rarely get that, these days – like porters at stations and chairs in shops: gone, all gone.

  The point, I suppose, I am making, is that even when Mary and I were out in the world and people were about us, we still felt quite secluded. And now she’s gone, the only one left to talk to is myself, which is why now I am given, I can only suppose, to such protracted ponderings as these. I have tried to talk to Mary – tried that, yes – but you see, I can’t actually recall quite what words I used to form, and nor her mode of response. There were just soft sounds between us, warmly undulating, launched and fielded, and somehow unerringly finding their nebulous target.

  I think, now that I have finished my coffee, I shall take a short stroll. See a little bit more of the ship. Because if I have dinner this early, it’ll be over so soon, and what, pray, am I meant to do then?

  So I did try, you see, to talk to those people. I gave to them one of the facts I have carefully garnered and gleaned over the weeks and months: I thought they might have helped to break the ice. I had not really just read about ‘Doreen’ in a magazine, no (a little white lie, which I thought acceptable). I had in fact hoarded it (with others) for ages. I judged it to be slightly amusing, in maybe a rather endearing and British sort of a way – conceivably engaging. Apparently not. I thought that Mary might rather approve – of my talking, I mean: she would be sad for me, I felt, knowing I was sitting all alone – which is all I really did with Mary beside me, but then she would quite regularly glance across to me, you know, and smilingly encourage the continuance of my musings; whereupon it felt quite all right to do so. It is possible, I feel now – and not just now (towards the end I felt it too) – that maybe all that seemed so right between us was not that at all: in the larger sense, it could be, could it – wrong? A thing I hate to be. It’s a difficult thought, but I have to think it: could be our togetherness drove us apart.

  *

  God knows, thought Stacy, where Mum’s got to now. We’d gone up in the lift to some deck or other – not this one, pretty sure – heading we thought at least vaguely in the direction of the restaurant (not one of the posh ones, as Mum kept on pointing out: we’re down the slummy end, girl) and then she discovered she’d laddered her tights.

  ‘Oh shit! How the hell did that happen? Oh God – I’ll have to go and change them, I suppose. Should have kept on the trousers. Where the hell are we, Stacy?’

  ‘Says Two Deck, here. Oh come on, Mum – no one’ll see your tights, will they? Let’s go – I’m starving.’

  ‘Correction, sweet child. My legs, I shall have you know, are one of my most attractive features.’

  ‘You have others?’

  ‘Cheek. All eyes, I promise, will be focused upon my legs – and although I am not wholly against the existence of ladders, they should really be seen only in the context of fishnet stockings whose tops are just showing beneath something short and rather slutty. You have to pick your moment, of course.’

  ‘Oh Mum – you’re quite insane. Well look – go back if you have to. I’ll meet you, yes? Where shall I meet you? Restaurant?’

  ‘Need a drink,’ said Jennifer, with emphasis. ‘I’ll find you at – I don’t know … I mean, presumably there’s a bar attached to the restaurant, yes? I’ll see you there. I mean – God’s sake, Stacy, if you’re that worried you can always come with me.’

  ‘Oh I can’t be bothered dragging back down there again. I can’t stand that cabin – it’s so dark and poky.’

  ‘That’s because there’s two of us. And there’s no window thing. And, of course, because it’s dark and poky. Be thankful we’re not in the engine room.’

  ‘OK well look – I’ll sit somewhere close to the aisle, passage – what do they call them? Gangways? Near the restaurant.’

  ‘Sit where you like. Just don’t, do not – understand? Be anywhere near those dreadful people. OK? We want to sit with Cary Grant or James Bond, not that grinning one-man freak show Nobby.’

  Yes. Well. That was simply ages ago, all that, and I’m still just sitting here waiting – and I keep on getting foody smells from somewhere and I’m absolutely ravenous, now. God knows what she’s doing – even what deck she’s on. Maybe she’s run into Cary Grant.

  It’s odd, wandering about a boat, ship, this size. Never seen anything like it before. Sometimes you forget you’re afloat at all because unless you go quite high – you know, the upper sort of open decks – you don’t actually see the sea all that much: just little glimpses of bluey grey, here and there. You’re aware of the motion forward, though, I think: the speed. It’s a bit like the floor is strumming beneath you, and when you walk along your feet always feel as if they landed an inch or so away from where you thought they’d come down. On the staircases – the steps seem so shallow, I don’t know if they are – you certainly feel you want to hold on to the railing, but still you find yourself getting up there in a sort of a crablike way – a bit sideways? I felt I looked like a gateleg table.

  I went up too far. I was looking for Upper Deck, right, but somehow I came out on to what they call the Boat Deck (which is pretty nuts, isn’t it? I mean – they’re all that) and the view there, God – totally amazing. Well – that’s the odd thing, really: I say view, but of course there’s nothing actually there to look at. I think the weirdest thing is the constant horizon. I mean – we’re all used to horizons at the seaside, right? There’s the sea – boat or two, buoy maybe – and it touches the line of the sky. Then you turn back to the town and there’s the pier and the traffic and the front and the noise. But it’s not like that here: the horizon goes all around you. All you ever see is the deep flat grey of the ocean, and the slightly brighter sky coming down to meet it. And nothing else at all. I even thought I saw everything dip down at the corners of my eyes: I was sensing the actual curvature of the earth – it’s like we’re on a tiny, so litary island amid a liquid wasteland. I tell you – if this ship weren’t so bloody big and solid, it’s quite a scary thought. The distance – that’s what makes you realize. I mean, we’ve been at sea for what, now? About three,
four hours, I reckon – and here we are apparently in the middle of this vast world of nothingness; but we’re not in the middle, are we? We haven’t even started – there’s another six days of this. Tell you: scary.

  I wonder who all these people are. I can’t decide if they’re a real mix of types, or not. I mean, what I suppose I was absolutely dreading is that everyone around would be just, like, totally ancient – like you keep hearing people on these cruise things are. Maybe crossings are different from cruises; of course, this is just the tail end of a simply eternal cruise for a lot of them: they’ve spent whole seasons on board. And I heard the steward or whatever he is just say to that couple behind me that the more expensive, the grander the suite, the less likely they are to actually ever get off the ship at any of the amazing places they stop at. Mad or what? It’s almost as if they’re just waiting to die, and only feel safe in very posh places. But there seem to be youngish people too, and quite a few families, which I didn’t expect. Hee – there was this little boy here earlier with his mother, looked like, and she was going, Oh Timmy (or whatever he was called) – just look at your hands! What have you been touching? We’ll have to go down to the cabin and wash them. And then the little boy – all big eyes and really standing his ground, you know? He goes Oh no – and the mother says Oh yes, young man – right now. And the boy comes back with No listen – if we all sit down and wait, my hands will both come clean all by their own. Sweet. If you like kids, and stuff.