Beyond Black: A Novel Read Free Page A

would do—too likely to crop up on the news. For the rest, Cork and Tipperary sounded too comic, Wicklow and Wexford like minor ailments, and Waterford was too dull.
    “Al,” Colette said, “from where do you derive your amazing psychic gifts tonight?”
    Al said at once, in her platform voice, “From my old great-grandmother, in County Clare. Bless her.”
    Bless her and bless her, she said, under her breath. She looked away from the mirror so Colette wouldn’t see her lips moving. Bless all my great-grandmothers, whoever and wherever they may be. May my dad rot in hell, whoever he may be; whatever hell is and wherever, let him rot in it; and let them please lock the doors of hell at night, so he can’t be out and about, harassing me. Bless my mum, who is still earthside of course, but bless her anyway; wouldn’t she be proud of me if she saw me in chiffon, each inch of my flesh powdered and perfumed? In chiffon, my nails lacquered, with my lucky opals glittering—would she be pleased? Instead of being dismembered in a dish, which I know was her first ambition for me: swimming in jelly and blood. Wouldn’t she like to see me now, my head on my shoulders and my feet in my high-heeled shoes?
    No, she thought, be realistic: she wouldn’t give a toss.
     
    Ten minutes to go. Abba on the sound system, “Dancing Queen.” Glass of gin held in one hand, the bottle of tonic looped by her little finger, Colette peeped through a swing door at the back of the hall. Every seat was full and space was tight. They were turning people away, which the manager hated to do but it was fire regulations. How does it feel tonight? It feels all right. There’d been nights when she’d had to sit in the audience, so Alison could pick her out first and get the show going, but they didn’t like doing that and they didn’t need to do it often. Tonight she would be flitting around the hall with a microphone, identifying the people Al picked out and passing the mike along the rows so she could get clear answers out of them. We’ll need three minimum to cover the space, she’d told the manager, and no comedians who trip over their own feet, please. She herself, fast and thin and practiced, would do the work of two.
    Colette thought, I can’t stand them now: the clients, the punters, the trade. She didn’t like to be among them, for any purpose. She couldn’t believe that she was ever one of them: lining up to listen to Al, or somebody like her. Booking ahead (all major cards accepted) or jostling in a queue by the box office: a tenner in her fist, and her heart in her mouth.
     
    Alison twisted her rings on her fingers: the lucky opals. It wasn’t nerves exactly, more a strange feeling in her diaphragm, as if her gut were yawning: as if she were making space for what might occur. She heard Colette’s footsteps: my gin, she thought. Good-good. Carefully, she took the mint out of her mouth. The action left her lips sulky; in the mirror, she edged them back into a smile, using the nail of her third finger, careful not to smudge. The face does disarrange itself; it has to be watched. She wrapped the mint in a tissue, looked around, and looped it hesitantly towards a metal bin a few feet away. It fell on the vinyl.
    Morris grunted with laughter. “You’re bloody hopeless, gel.”
    This time, as Colette came in, she managed to step over Morris’s legs. Morris squawked out, “Tread on me, I love it.”
    “Don’t you start!” Al said. “Not you. Morris. Sorry.”
    Colette’s face was thin and white. Her eyes had gone narrow, like arrow slits. “I’m used to it.” She put the glass down by Alison’s eyelash curlers, with the bottle of tonic water beside it.
    “A splash,” Al directed. She picked up her glass and peered into the fizzing liquid. She held it up to the light.
    “I’m afraid your ice has melted.”
    “Never mind.” She frowned. “I think there’s someone coming through.”
    “In your G and T?”
    “I think I