The Things You Didn't See(3)
Tonight, Ipswich town centre was a playground for kids. Children who would normally be in bed were hyped up on freedom and sugar. Portman Road, adjacent to the flat complex where Holly and Leif lived, usually the haunt of lone men in slow cars picking up prostitutes, was alive with childish screams and nervous laughter, enough to jangle Holly’s hypervigilant nerves. They came to a group of primary school-aged children who had just yelled ‘Trick or treat!’ and left a house with small packets of sweets in their clenched hands. Now they were pointing at Leif ’s face and squealing in delighted fear.
‘We don’t have this tricking or treating in Sweden,’ Leif told her, watching the children with indulgent good humour. ‘It’s underbar. Really wonderful!’
Holly, being half-American, had grown up with the yearly festival and thought it was, at best, an excuse for children to beg for candy. At worst, it was a festival that celebrated ghosts and demons.
Leif held her hand more tightly as they manoeuvred past the group. It had been a long time since she’d been touched, and though he was younger than her and not her usual type, he was easy company and – usually – very easy on the eye. The fact that he was Swedish meant that he couldn’t ‘read’ her: he didn’t have the cultural shorthand to glance at her and see the troubled past and her ‘otherness’ that was about neither of these things but something else, a unique trait, that marked her out as different. Holly had synaesthesia; it had started when she was eight years old. When it surfaced, as it always did, previously keen men turned cold, but Leif had yet to notice the signs and persisted.
‘So who taught you to do make-up?’ she asked, forcing herself not to notice how the red greasepaint made his skin look scorched, how the white foundation gave the impression that his eye had melted. ‘Not the Clinique counter at Debenhams, I can see that.’
‘Nej.’ Leif waggled a plastic-bladed glove at the gaggle of pre-teen trick-or-treaters across the road. ‘Trish, my colleague in the film department, specialises in costume and stage design. She used me as her workshop project today. The Film and Media students liked it very much.’
‘I bet they did.’
Holly knew, from their conversations in the shared walkway outside their flats, that Leif was from Malm?, but had started studying for his PhD at Orwell University a year ago, lecturing and taking occasional seminars while writing his thesis on the films of Ingrid Bergman. No doubt the undergrads saw him as the perfect package: clever and cute. Holly couldn’t imagine studying films for a living, being locked in a fantasy world where anything can happen because it’s made up. She preferred anything dramatic to remain firmly within her control.
Their destination was the Poacher and Partridge, popular with students and lecturers alike because the booze was cheap, so Leif ’s usual haunt. Flaccid orange balloons hung from the light fixings, and a greenish skeleton stood in the corner, pointing a bony finger in the direction of the loos. Cobwebs had been strung across the ceiling – although Holly couldn’t be sure they were just decoration – while crudely carved pumpkins with candles flickering in their gashed eyes lined the bar. She challenged herself to stay in the pub and try to be sociable, although her senses were so alert that her skin felt flayed. She’d rather run away, had to fight the instinct not to. Running away never led to anything good.
‘There they are! Come, Holly, meet the gang.’
Leif led her to the darkest corner, where two round bar tables holding several empty glasses had been wedged together. Three ghouls sat in a coven-like huddle around the flickering tea lights: a man with albino colouring in a white coat stained with blood; a second figure in a hairy werewolf mask who could feasibly be of either gender; and seated between them a sexy blonde, carefully made up with cat’s-eye flicks and red lips, sucking on an e-cigarette.
With one arm around Holly’s shoulders, Leif pointed to his friends, shouting to be heard over the loud music and laughter. ‘The mad surgeon is Neil and the werewolf is Adam; they’re both technical wizards in the media department. The True Blood geek is Trish. As well as turning me into Freddy, she’s also my PhD supervisor.’
Holly looked again at the vaping blonde, who was clearly a multitasker. She wore a tight white shirt, open at the cleavage, revealing two bite marks on her neck, and her name badge said she was SOOKIE STACKHOUSE. Holly avoided horror or crime films, but guessed this must be a character from one of these.
‘Hi, Holly,’ Trish said, in a loud voice no doubt used to projecting across a lecture hall, flashing Holly a smile that did not reach her eyes. ‘Come and change the conversation! I’m sick of talking to these film geeks about who’s the most sympathetic killer, Dexter or Hannibal Lecter. And now that Leif is here, the conversation is bound to turn to Ingrid Bergman. I’ll gaslight myself if it does.’ She gave a huge theatrical yawn, then winked at Leif, who grinned. Holly had no idea what Trish was referring to, but it looked like she was enjoying this moment of shared intimacy with Leif.
‘Tell us about real stories,’ Trish said, pointing the e-cigarette at the empty stool nearest her, though her jaw still looked a bit set. ‘Leif says you’re a paramedic?’
‘Not yet. I’m still in training.’ Now she knew for certain she should have stayed at home rather than face this interrogation from Trish. ‘And right now, I’m just a cat – a thirsty one. So, can I get anyone a drink?’