Black Chalk

Dee looks at me as if I have disappointed her hugely. Oh well, what do I know, Jolyon? she says. And Jack even seems to have found some strange Jack-twisted form of happiness. But you could at least have given me the small pleasure of a vote for impotence, Jolyon, she says.

I’m so sorry, I say, using my apology as a natural opportunity to touch Dee on the shoulder. And how about Chad? I ask. Do you see anything of him?

No, Dee says, and I don’t even have any idea what happened to him.

I try to think of a next line but suddenly I am stumped, all this talk of old friends and there is one name we’re missing, of course.

I can see that Dee knows what I’m thinking. Jolyon, please, she says, there’s one part of your story I have a problem with. This overwhelming sense of guilt. Look, I understand how you might blame yourself for what happened. But you’re wrong, Jolyon, you’re not to blame. If you’re a murderer then all of us are murderers. We all chose to play, Jolyon. What happened to Mark wasn’t in any way your fault.

And what am I supposed to say to this? Oh, Dee, you just wait. Keep on reading and you’ll get there. And then you’ll find out just how wrong you are. So instead I reach for Dee’s book of poems, there are three more I have marked for tonight. Would you like me to read for you again? I say.

Dee looks as if her heart is breaking for me. She nods and I open the book to one of the pages I’ve marked.

When I finish, the fireflies have begun threading the air with their lights. And soon our hour is up.

Maybe we could stay a little longer tonight, I say to Dee.

Oh, Jolyon, I’d like to spend more time with you too. But you need your rest, you have to finish your story. And then after that we have as much time as we like.

After that. After that. Those words sound so sweet and thrilling to me. And Dee is right, there remains so much more to tell.

Mark’s new abode. Emilia’s return. My fight with Chad.

LIV

LIV(i) And then there were three. Chad, Jolyon and Dee. And they were happy, they were in the mood to celebrate their success and this fine thing, this game they had whittled with their minds. They played and no one pushed excessively hard.

The final three. Gold, silver, bronze. Had Jolyon known that Jack would not arrive then perhaps he would have bought Pol Roger for champagne cocktails. A sugar cube in each glass dissolving, throwing up sparks like Roman candles. But instead a burst of warm weather had prompted the buying of rum and Coke and a bagful of limes. They dealt and tossed dice, they drank Cuba Libres as they bickered playfully over the cards.

A bottle of rum between three and Dee fell asleep soon after they finished playing, soon after Shortest had left, taking with him his frenzied notes on Jack’s departure. Jolyon recounted the story, it was a shame that Jack wasn’t there to tell the tale himself.

Chad and Jolyon drank a little brandy and then when it seemed time to leave, Jolyon told Chad that perhaps he shouldn’t wake Dee. She looked so peaceful in her sleep. And this was true, so Chad left resignedly on his own.

The next day, it simply became known that Dee and Jolyon were together now. There was no need for any announcement because gradually the news became apparent, like a distant billboard being driven toward in a car. A suspicion on the horizon and then very quickly it’s there, looming large on a hillside, spelling out the truth in giant red letters.

LIV(ii) They performed a few trifling consequences over the next several days, during which time an envelope was pushed across a table by Tallest. Jack’s name was displayed on the front, scrawled across a brown paper plateau sustained from within by a bulge of twenty-pound notes.

Meanwhile there was a lull in the play, as if they were all saving their strength for the finale. Jolyon was grateful for this pause and grateful for Dee to hold, Dee to stroke, Dee to love.

Because despite having someone to soothe him at night once more, Jolyon’s days were entering one of their dark ages. The once placid pace of his routine was becoming a stumble. And the mnemonics that nudged his days down the right path were beginning to lead him astray. He had started to eat his breakfast cereal midway through the afternoon. He hadn’t showered in three days and when at last he did cleanse his body, it was not an object that reminded him but Dee, a gentle suggestion that he might wish to consider a shower. And he had abandoned writing his diary, he didn’t remember when, he must have tossed it deep in a drawer at some point. It had become a grind in any case, he liked to write his essays at night and the diary would cut into his work time.