One for the Road by Neil James

Dean cradles the pint glass like it’s the only thing holding him together. I don’t know how he survived losing Sophie and the baby in the same night, but eight months later he’s made it to The Lantern on Christmas Eve.

When the bell rings for last orders, we’re the final two of our party still at the table, drinking. The rest of the old gang has drifted away, one excuse at a time. Visiting the in-laws, prepping food, last minute shopping … by ten to eleven, it’s just me, Dean, two half-finished IPAs and the wound that no one can mend.

What do you say to a man who’s lost everything, when this morning you were in bed, winter sunlight streaming through the curtains, proudly running your hand over your wife’s soft belly to feel ‘the bump’? Here’s a spoiler: there’s nothing you can say.  

“Glad they’ve finally got Brewdog on draught,” is my best effort.

Dean nods with half-closed eyes and takes another empty sip.

We’ve already exhausted the easy conversation topics: how Donald the landlord’s face gets redder every year; how the students in the corner, singing Christmas songs they’re too young to remember, are basically us ten years ago; how the wallpaper hasn’t changed in a decade. But the longer we sit at this table, the heavier the air becomes, and the more I feel obliged to talk about the thing. The subject that nobody knows how to address.

Oh, and there’s the other thing too. A secret I’m scared of spilling whenever I’m drunk. Something so dark that I picture it crawling from my mouth like a giant cockroach as I try to cram it back with bare hands…

“So you’re hosting Christmas dinner?” Dean asks, pulling me back into the moment.

“Yeah,” I say. “Grace will still be in the kitchen. I offered to help, but she wanted me out of the way. You know what she’s like when she’s cooking. I’m still hoping you’ll change your mind and come over though.”

He drains his glass and stares at the dark wood of the table. “Cheers, man, but I’d feel awkward. Too many reminders, you know?”

“Yeah, no worries, I understand.”

What I don’t add is that somewhere inside the pulsing black opal I have for a heart, I’m glad. Glad he won’t be bringing his darkness to our perfect family Christmas. And this is the sort of friend that I am. The sort that nobody decent should ever have. I tell myself again that I love him like a brother, as if saying it over and over will make it true.

Tom and Rich made a similar Christmas Day offer. He turned them down too. Dean should be sharing our steps on the same life journey, but he’s not. He’s broken, and our charity only widens the cracks.  

Our gang of six are all approaching thirty. Wedding rings are everywhere, and a couple of babies are due, including ours. Grace just had her thirteen-week scan. My response to the ultrasound image, a tiny human-prawn version of me, wasn’t a sense of overawed wonder, it was, How will Dean react to this?

Before the thing he was aftershave-and-moisturiser handsome, but he’s aged a decade in under a year. His career in advertising was soaring, the Don Draper of Manchester, we used to joke; he’s on his last month of compassionate leave now, and the agency are running out of patience. But how do you sell dreams when yours have all been shattered?

Sophie and Dean were the yearbook couple. The couple that all of us, deep down, wished we were. Intelligent. Beautiful. Rich. Now it’s all gone. Torn apart in one tragic night. Women aren’t supposed to die in childbirth. Not in the modern world.

We sink our beers and step into the cold night air, neither of us steady on our feet. We could wait for a taxi, but we decide to walk ‘for old time’s sake’. It’s a case of putting one foot in front of the other for a mile without falling over. Dean’s house in the moneyed streets of Bowdon is first enroute.

Occasionally, we see people leaving pubs and parties, the odd flash of passing headlights, but these familiar streets are mainly deserted. We don’t say much, but when we do, Dean’s words land like a bomb.

“I see her sometimes, Kyle.”

“Who?”

“Sophie.”

I pause. “You mean, like, in dreams?”

“No.”

Jesus. My throat tightens. I search through my clouded brain for a response. What do I say? Do I pretend that’s normal? Say it’s fine? Argue it’s impossible? Nothing feels right.

“Where was she?” I ask, my voice weak and reedy.

“At the end of the bed in her hospital gown. I wasn’t dreaming either.”

The only sounds are those of the night. Leaves swirl as the wind picks up; a distant ‘Merry Christmas’ drifts our way, followed by the finality of a door closing; a woman’s laughter floats though an open window from a brightly lit room full of people. I focus on each one. Then when there’s silence, and rows of dark houses, I focus on them instead.

We walk on for another fifty yards, surrounded by the night and Dean’s confession.

“Don’t tell the lads, will you?” he says as we pass a bus stop.

“No.”

Neither of us says anything more about it. He kicks an empty can down the road like when we were kids. He probably regrets saying anything. We talk about United to break the awkwardness. Boxing Day at Villa. Conversations like this are a safety blanket for both of us, but I can’t get Sophie out of my head.  

We reach his house, a beautiful, detached property with a red door and ivy climbing the walls. A porch light flicks on, and he scrapes his key around the lock. Eventually, he hits the jackpot and stumbles into the hallway.

“One for the road?” he says, turning to me.

For a second, I freeze.

“Another drink?”

“Sure, mate,” I reply, and follow him inside as he gropes for the light switch.

Mate. Not just that, but my best mate. We played in the same football team aged ten. I was the tall lad at the back; he was David Beckham. I’ve known him for ever, and I love him. Really, I do.

 Keep saying it, Kyle. Keep saying it until it’s true.

The hallway lights up, and I’m met by Sophie’s photograph on the wall – graduation cap and gown, a waterfall of blonde hair and eyes the colour of a June sky. At eighteen she was a model. At twenty-nine she was running the whole agency. Beautiful, intelligent, ambitious. Everything you’d want in a partner.

Dean leads the way into the lounge and lamps click on, bathing the room in a soft, lambent glow. This is not my home, but it feels like it. The imitation wood burner and white stone feature wall; the dark beams traversing the ceiling; a thick-pile cream carpet and enormous sofas you can melt into. Dean still sees Sophie because she’s everywhere in this house and in this room. So many photographs – her beauty captured in different poses and frames. She designed the whole interior. Everything down to the rainbow of scatter cushions spread across the sofas.

“Scotch?” he says, pulling a half-empty bottle from the drinks cabinet.

“Yeah, that’d be great.”

Dean is present too. The broken version of him. A takeaway box hides under the coffee table. A crumpled duvet slumps by the side of the sofa where he’s clearly been sleeping. Empty bottles sit in clusters around the room.

He pours two glasses of Scotch. Double, treble, quadruple measures all round.    

“I’ll put the fire on,” he says. “It’s bloody freezing in here.”  

The warmth quickly fills the room, and we watch TV, Dean spread across one sofa, me across another. The comforting burn of the Scotch settles in my throat, but Dean’s already necked his. My eyelids are heavy, and I can’t focus. The screen flickers the familiar black and white of a much-loved Christmas movie, but Dean’s asleep long before Clarence gets his wings. I place my glass on the coffee table with a clunk, then settle back into the sofa.

My eyes soon close, and Jimmy Stewart’s distinctive drawl seeps from the screen, merging with some half-remembered conversations from the pub. I jolt my head up, but the heaviness of sleep pulls it downwards.

In a drowsy fog, I hear her whispering my name. Just memories, or is she trying to tell me something? “The baby. The baby,” she says. She’s sobbing. Is the voice Sophie’s, or Grace’s? My blood runs cold. Grace … the baby.

I need to get home.

I open my eyes.

The room is cold and dark, the fire’s out. Every hair on my body stands on end.

The door creaks. I don’t want to turn, but something makes me look.

She’s in the doorway, translucent and spectral. Sophie. I see her.

Her blonde hair is now white, and her eyes, once summer blue, are hollow and dark. Her hospital gown is blood stained from the waist down, and the baby in her arms is ashen and lifeless. The only light is the glow of the television.

I blink, convinced I’m dreaming, but I’m wide awake. Dean is asleep on the sofa, just as he was. My glass still sits on the coffee table. Jimmy Stewart’s family and friends are singing ‘Auld Lang Syne’ on the screen.

She advances and I feel her in my heart. Her grief, her sorrow, the emptiness of her loss.  I want to shout, to run even, but I can’t. I’m paralysed.

She offers the baby, limp in her hands, its tiny limbs dangling.

“The baby, Kyle. Our baby,” she whispers.

“No,” I say. “No.” I close my eyes and cover my head with my hands.  

One night. One stupid mistake for both of us. Dean was away on business and Sophie was enjoying a works night out. By absolute chance, so was I. A million-to-one shot that we’d be in the same bar, on the same night, at the same time, but we were. Nobody deserves a friend like me.

Denial is pointless. It happened. But this, right here, right now, can’t be happening. I don’t believe in ghosts. There is no other world, just sofas, whiskey, drunk people cheating, It’s a Wonderful Life, tragedy, spending Christmas alone. That shit all happens. Coming back from the grave? No.  

“Get away from me!” I shout, curling myself into a ball. “You’re not real!”

Suddenly, hands are on me, shaking me.

“Kyle…Kyle…”

I open my eyes. Dean is staring into my soul. The lamps are on, the room is warm.

“You alright, man?” he says, gripping my shoulders.

I nod. “Sorry, it’s … I had a weird dream, that’s all. Listen, mate, I need to go. Grace will be worried.” I rise from the sofa, brush my way past him and hurry towards the door.

In the hallway, I avert my eyes from Sophie’s graduation photo, yet her eyes still follow me. Behind me, Dean’s footsteps are steady and close.

He knows I saw her. He must do.  But what else does he know? In life, did she ever hint at what happened between us? In death, did she appear to him exactly the way she appeared to me? The secret is climbing into my throat. I must leave. Now.

Without turning around, I say goodnight, then stumble through the door and down the gravel path.

I know he’s still watching me.

 The ghosts I see now are in my mind. They drift past me, towards the front door, arm in arm. A tall man and a stunning blonde, returning from a night out. I walk on and try to forget, but even as I round the corner, I picture them at the red door under the porch light.

  “I know I shouldn’t say this,” says the tall man, “but I don’t want tonight to end.” 

  “Me neither,” the blonde replies. “One for the road?”

Neil James

Image: Scary Christmas Baubles from pixabay.com. Silver balls with nasty faces.