All the Lights Read Free Page B

then he screwed it up and put it in his pocket with the empty envelope and the letter from the job centre. He held the third letter in his hands for a while until the light went out automatically. He stood in the dark, stroking the envelope. He could feel the stamp. There was a large butterfly on it, so brightly coloured that he thought he could still make it out in the dark, and above the butterfly were the large capital letters ‘CUBA’. He didn’t know anyone in Cuba. He had turned the letter over, but there was no sender on the back, no name, no address. He switched the light on and went up the stairs slowly with the letter. He lived right at the top on the fourth floor, and as he climbed up one step at a time he kept thinking over and over, ‘Cuba, Havana, Cuba’. Maybe the letter was for someone else, but his address and his name were written large and clearly on the envelope. He unlocked his front door, put the key in the lock from inside and turned it twice, and then he turned on the light. He thought about his mother and about how he’d have to pay again soon or they’d come round to his place too. Cuba. He hung his jacket on the peg, went into the kitchen and put the letter down on the table, right in the light of the lamp. Then he took a beer out of the fridge but put it back again and made coffee. He had hardly any money left, and the beer had to last another ten days. He could take back deposit bottles, he had over forty empty beer bottles on his small balcony, plus a few mineral water and cola bottles; he’d get a couple more beers for the deposit money but he was ashamed of turning up with large, clinking bags full at the supermarket with the local drinkers standing around outside. The only times they weren’t there were when it was particularly cold in winter. Why don’t I take a small bag to the supermarket, he thought, and get rid of the bottles bit by bit? He poured himself a cup of coffee, milk and sugar, then he sat down at the table. He drank a sip, a few drops of coffee spilt on the table, and he fetched a cloth and wiped across the tabletop a few times, then put the cup down on the cloth. He sat down again. He examined the letter, trying to recognise the handwriting, but he hadn’t got any private post for ages now, only from the benefits office and companies he’d applied to. He held the letter up to the light but he couldn’t make anything out in the envelope. The postmark had ‘Cuba’ in it too, and then there were a few little numbers, probably the date, he could read ‘08’ but the rest was smudged; perhaps it had got wet on its travels. Had the letter come by ship or on a plane? But then it would say ‘Air Mail’ on the postmark, wouldn’t it? His mother had got a letter from New York once, from a cousin, and he’d read something about ‘Air Mail’ on the envelope. ‘Paula’s on holiday in New York, imagine that, New York, an eight-hour flight, you do remember your second cousin Paula, don’t you?’ But he couldn’t remember a Paula, and what did he care about planes and ships and New York?
    He tore the letter open, he tore it open so roughly that he broke the butterfly, and then he was holding a sheet of A4 paper in his hand, densely covered in writing. The writing was so small that he got up again to fetch his reading glasses from the front room. He had to look for them for a while; they were on the windowsill. He put them on and peered over the lenses out of the window. It was night now, and he saw the dark houses opposite, lights only burning in a couple of windows. There were lots of empty places round here. He tugged the curtains closed and went back into the kitchen. He sat down and drank a mouthful of coffee. The coffee was just right now, not too hot any more, and he drank another mouthful.
    He gave a loud cough before he started reading.
    Dear Frank,
It’s been a while since we heard from each other, and it’s been even longer since we’ve seen each other.