In the Flesh by Clive Barker

head of Poland Street. 'We could go to the Red

    Fort.'

     

     

      'No thanks. I hate eating late.'

     

     

      'For Christ's sake, let's not argue about a bloody film.'

     

     

      'Who's arguing?'

     

     

      'You're so infuriating-'

     

     

      'That's something we've got in common, anyhow,' she returned. Her neck was flushed.

     

     

      'You said this morning -'

     

     

      'What?'

     

     

      'About us not losing each other-'

     

      'That was this morning,' she said, eyes steely. And then, suddenly: 'You don't give afuck, Jerry. Not about me, not about anybody.'

     

      She stared at him, almost defying him not to respond. When he failed to, she seemed curiously satisfied.

     

      'Goodnight...' she said, and began to walk away from him. He watched her take five, six, seven steps from him, the deepest part of him wanting to call after her, but a dozen irrelevancies - pride, fatigue, inconvenience - blocking his doing so. What eventually uprooted him, and put her name on his lips, was the thought of an empty bed tonight; of the sheets warm only where he lay, and chilly as Hell to left and right of him.

     

     

      'Carole.'

     

      She didn't turn; her step didn't even falter. He had to trot to catch up with her, conscious that this scene was probably entertaining the passers-by.

     

      'Carole.' He caught hold of her arm. Now she stopped. When he moved round to face her he was shocked to see that she was crying. This discomfited him; he hated her tears only marginally less than his own.

     

     

      'I surrender,' he said, trying a smile. 'The film was a masterpiece.

     

     

    How's that?'

     

     

      She refused to be soothed by his antics; her face was swollen with unhappiness.

     

      'Don't,' he said. 'Please don't. I'm not...' (very good at apologies, he wanted to say, but he was so bad at them he couldn't even manage that much.)

     

     

      'Never mind,' she said softly. She wasn't angry, he saw; only miserable.

     

      'Come back to the flat.'

     

     

      'I don't want to.'

     

     

      'I want you to,' he replied. That at least was sincerely meant. 'I don't like talking in the street.'

     

      He hailed a cab, and they made their way back to Kentish Town, keeping their silence. Half way up the stairs to the door of the flat Carole said: 'Foul perfume.'

     

     

      There was a strong, acidic smell lingering on the stairs.

     

      'Somebody's been up here,' he said, suddenly anxious, and hurried on up the flight to the front door of his flat. It was open; the lock had been unceremoniously forced, the wood of the door-jamb splinted. He cursed.

     

     

      'What's wrong?' Carole asked, following him up the stairs.

     

     

      'Break in.'

     

      He stepped into the flat and switched on the light. The interior was chaos. The whole flat had been comprehensively trashed. Everywhere, petty acts of vandalism - pictures smashed, pillows de-gutted, furniture reduced to timber. He stood in the middle of the turmoil and shook, while Carole went from room to room, finding the same thorough destruction in each.

     

     

      'This is personal, Jerry.'

     

     

      He nodded.

     

     

      'I'll call the police,' she volunteered. 'You find out what's missing.'

     

      He did as he was told, white-faced. The blow of this invasion numbed him. As he walked listlessly through the flat to survey the pandemonium - turning broken items over, pushing drawers back into place

    - he found himself imagining the intruders about their business, laughing as they worked through his clothes and keepsakes.

     

     

      In the corner of his bedroom he found a heap of his photographs.

     

     

      They had urinated on them.

     

     

      'The police are on their way,' Carole told him. 'They said not to touch anything.'

     

     

      Too late,' he murmured.

     

     

      'What's missing?'

     

      Nothing,' he told her. All