Work Text:
Love Songs to the Lighthouse;
an elegy in three parts
– i –
nursery rhyme
(lone boy, haystacks, etcetera -etcetera—
oh, don’t be daft, you mustn’t say never!)
It happens by accident, of course it does. They’re not even supposed to be here.
Shaggy green dunes like sheep’s winter coats, lighthouse perched at the very edge: cherry-on-top. No, they’re supposed to be in Greece. The land of Adonis and all that.
It was sure to be fab, Sirius and James have been learning Greek on and off for months. Boró na parangeílo to pio dynató alkoól sas? Please and ta very much.
Only Walburga has a fresh-but-no-less-ardent passion for all things Virginia Woolf.
Newly and happily widowed, Walburga woke suddenly on the morn of her honeymoon (her life, she’s fond of saying, began when the sorry-for-your-loss cards began littering the front mat like so many autumn leaves), with a desire to write an anthology or thesis or something on Virginia. Draft One now lines the floors of Walburga’s new flat, so when they come round to visit they have to sit in the hallway for tea.
It's why they’re in sunny St. Ives, along with what seems to be the entire population of middle-aged America—although they’re probably here for the over-priced pasties and bad tan lines, and neither know nor care that this was the town Virginia’s family frequented when she was a girl. Or where later she and her sister returned annually (allegedly), for thirteen long years to walk the craggy edge of the sea, where Hayle beach stretches on and on and on, like a trumpeter’s last, trembling note.
(Sirius has decided he adores Americans. They’re so dear, they go crackers over perfectly normal things, like vinegar on chips, or deckchairs on the sand.)
So, there’s the beach and seagulls and chips and hopefully minimal rain. And, obviously, there’s the Lighthouse.
Coaxed along by the promise of sun and sand and all things warm, Sirius and Narcissa have had a banging old time lying about coated in suncream and nursing a growing vendetta against seagulls. They’ve been working their way steadily through all the Bridgerton books and mumbling a vague complaint whenever they can summon the energy, about the lack of sexy Greek-speaking, god-sent boys.
Sirius is perfectly happy with his ice-lollies and Anthony B’s river-soaked tee-shirt.
Disaster comes – unexpectedly, as it is want to do – by way of a bird-spotting tour. On a boat, no less.
It’s those damn seagulls again—see, he always knew they were trouble.
*
Idly contemplating which beach it should be today – stay here (close proximity to ice-lollies, but also a bothersome, never-ending number of screaming children), or Hayle (a bit of a drive, no ice-lollies, but less children) – Sirius and Narcissa are waiting for the kettle to boil when Walburga breezes in with a handful of brochures.
The covers are blue, glossy. Covered in words like “scenic” and “rare,” and other adjectives that don’t hold Sirius’ attention for long.
‘Birds?’ Narcissa sounds sceptical as ever.
‘Birds!’ Walburga nods so enthusiastically her glittering beaded earrings jangle like car keys. ‘Lots of them! And! Maybe seals!’
‘Whoopie,’ says Narcissa, dry.
‘So fun,’ says Walburga, beaming at them. Sirius sighs; a morning spent with Colin B’s Curvaceous Crisis dissipates like mist.
‘We can still tan from the boat,’ he says to Narcissa, who takes this to heart, and comes armed with magazines she only leaves behind when poor Walburga’s smile wobbles piteously.
There’s a small crowd already waiting on the pier when they arrive, seven-fifty-am sharp. Two of those Americans Sirius has grown so fond of—these looking proper profesh, kitted out in stout hiking boots and rain-proof trousers, binoculars hanging from string around their collars. They’re giving an elderly couple what seems to be an exegesis on every bird known to nest on the British Isles. They could write a guidebook: One-thousand-and-one Feathers of Cornwall.
There’s Narcissa, trying fruitlessly to protect her puffy fringe from the wind and looking delicately irate. Two girls who later introduce themselves as Emmeline and Mary, busy laughing themselves silly at a sign which begs somewhat plaintively: PLEASE no selfies with the seals!!!!!!!
Emmeline has a little pink rose pinned in her curls; Mary a pair of ginormous Poundland sunnies perched on her nose, the kind women in films hide behind when they’re secretly crying.
‘So fab,’ gushes Walburga, eying them up.
Sirius is thoroughly preoccupied in bugging Narcissa and disturbing the hair-by-hair arrangement of her fringe, which is perhaps why he gets such a start by the sight of their guide.
He stomps up the steps from the water, fe-fi-fo-fum, clad in a floppy straw hat and knee-high wellies decorated with a pattern of brightly coloured chickens; new-and-improved polka dots. A vest hangs from his shoulders, faded image of Princess Di stamped over the chest, her eyes dark and coy as ever. A Princess Di vest—and a little pair of football shorts. Cheltenham’s, Sirius knows exclusively, because they’re Regulus’ team.
The gulls continue to soar, waves rock against the pier; in other words, the world keeps going about its turns as usual, and nothing extraordinary happens (your name on a stranger’s lips, a Brexit reversal, the moon turning blue), though it feels as if it’s supposed to. Sirius is staring. He’s forgotten all about any possible Adonises. The boy is like one of those 70’s cardboard cut-out dolls, clothes filched from different sets. Royalist Rosemarie, Sporty Sue, Farm-girl Frannie.
Sirius glances around somewhat desperately. Where-oh-where is the old, retired sailor with a long beard and blackened tooth and endless tales he tells with a rasp and a lilt. Maybe he smells a little of fish. Maybe he likes to wink at old ladies for cheeks. He has a name like Graham, or Otto.
‘Well, heya,’ says the boy brightly, and everyone turns to face him expectantly, American couple and the girls falling smartly silent. Bright, he’s very bright; Sirius is squinting for some reason. Looking at him, Sirius has the ridiculous and entirely inappropriate urge to giggle. He’s not even sure what’s funny. There’s something fizzing in his chest, something essential that’s slipped and spun loose to buzz against his ribs, flies on the wrong side of the window.
Narcissa turns to smirk at him. Smug, thrilled. Sirius aims a kick at her ankle.
The boy is all kinds of wrong, that’s all, a jigsaw puzzle promising a mountain scene, but instead the pieces create a cobbled, medieval street. He has a rickety nose, a grin he keeps pinging around at everyone. A bit of a shock each time, pennies in the well, finger trembling on the trigger. An accent pulled from, Sirius thinks, the Cotswold fifties, of all the damn epochs—but a little off, you and yer all mixed together, a closed-eyed lucky-dip.
‘I’m just gonna fill you in on the basics before we set off,’ he says at one point—“u” in just like the “u” in push, a sound of surprise, alarm bells a-gong. They’re in Cornwall, for god’s sake, and Sirius can’t smell no fish.
He can feel the drag and pull of those vowels in places words shouldn’t reach; his finger nails, the arches of his feet. Stingy like nettles, plaintive like an ad for dish soap.
The boy tells them his name is Remus, and then he says some things about birds, which Sirius doesn’t hear, because he’s busy being extraordinarily fascinated by Remus’ hands. He’s waving them around so quick they’re blurred – look over there, now there, now there! – then abruptly he turns, jumps like a cat down all seven steps to the lower pier.
There a small, open-topped fishing boat bobs in the water, waiting for them.
Remus waves them all in, chipped-tooth-split-lip grin akimbo, keeping the boat steady with one chicken-covered boot resting on the prow. Whatever he said must’ve sounded proper good, because Narcissa has lost her grumpy look. Now she’s smiling gaily at, apparently, the newly-delightful prospect of all those seagulls.
Sirius makes the colossal mistake of looking up as he steps into the boat, catches Remus’ eye and promptly stumbles. There’s a hand gripping his wrist. Ice cold fingers, cold enough to burn.
‘Woah!’ Another grin; the cut in Remus’ lip snags like a long afternoon. ‘Careful now!’
Sirius has another inordinate desire to laugh. This is all hysterical, really. The boat chugs around the bay and the little islands, shaken in a hand like dice and scattered face-up, lots of lucky sixes. Remus tells a story of birds that sounds like it’s really a story about something else, a fairy-story, there are mermaids involved. Winking pearls, seaweed wishes.
‘Seals!’ cries Emmeline at one point, pointing, then she and Mary fall about laughing again. Several fat, brown seals are slumped like slugs over rocks, jutting out from the coastline.
‘Oh, yeah,’ says Remus affectionally. He takes them to land so they can all explore the cliffs and rockpools, and gestures vaguely along the coast. A lone lighthouse perched on a tiny island in the distance, like a single candle atop a birthday cupcake. Close-your-eyes-and-make-a-wish. What did you wish for? No, no! You mustn’t say, then it’ll never come true, then it’ll never—
‘That,’ says Remus, fatalistic, dimple in cheek, ‘is Virginia’s Lighthouse.’
Walburga gives a stuttering gasp; Sirius and Narcissa share commiseratory sighs.
‘Is it?’ Walburga turns to Remus, wide-eyed. ‘Is it really?’
‘Sure is,’ Remus nods. ‘Inspired the book an’ all.’
‘Can we get to it?’ asks Walburga, rapt, ‘can we get inside?’
‘None been on that island for over twenty-year, now,’ he says. ‘Lamp lights itself an’ that, see. But you can walk real close,’ he adds, when Walburga’s face falls, ‘we’ve plenty of time. You go on, you can see it better from up on them dunes.’
So, Walburga, Narcissa, Emmeline and Mary set heartily off up the rocky cliff-face, Pooh Bear on his expedition he can never pronounce properly.
The elderly two are busy inspecting rockpools a little way off; the Americans photographing some grey-eyed gulls with a fancy, high-speed shutter that sounds like the tumble-turning machines at a drive-through car wash.
Sirius makes it halfway up the hill after the girls before he convinces himself to turn around.
Lounging in the boat like it’s a throne, Remus is reading a weathered copy of Cider with Rosie, absently chewing on a red lolly that looks a bit like a lolling tongue. The packet beside him informs, somewhat ominously, “Red Skins.” Sirius has never heard of them before.
He eyes the book cover. It’s sunflower-yellow, covered in petals and bundles of hay. He’s pretty sure he studied it at A-levels. He’s trying and failing to remember a quote, when Remus glances up.
‘Sirius!’ He sounds buoyant. Vaguely amused.
Sirius blushes like a reflex, then momentarily loathes himself. It’s distressing, it’s all the sun, and salt air, and, well, all those seagulls. Gotta blame them for something, huh.
‘I heard yer sister callin’ you,’ Remus explains. No-it-was-not-a-lucky-guess.
Sirius laughs. ‘That’s my mum.’
Remus’ eyes widen like desert suns. He places the book face-down on the bench beside him. ‘Poppycock. She’s never a day older than twenty.’
‘Yup,’ says Sirius, hands tucked in his back pockets. He toes the rocks, dislodges a pebble from a crevice. The pebble is smooth, oblong like an almost-full moon. He kicks it into the water where it vanishes with a little splash, and he thinks of that old 60’s film Regulus loves so much, about two people who aren’t meant to fall in love, but do. (Of course they do.) Sirius’ favourite part of the film is where Harold gives Maude a coin engraved with “Harold loves Maude,” and Maude immediately flicks it into the sea.
‘Now I’ll always know where to find it,’ she says. (The sea keeps secrets like cupped hands.)
‘We had a Marie Antoinette themed do for her fiftieth,’ Sirius offers. ‘Wigs and all.’
‘Well, I’ll be.’ Remus sits forward, elbows dug into thighs, and twists the lolly around and around, still clamped between his teeth. Tongue-tied, like the chains of a swing after going for a spin. ‘So, can I help you with somethin’?’
And see, Sirius had an excuse all ready, hello-yes-you-see-I-was-wondering—but Remus is looking at him, and Di printed on his vest is looking at him, and both their eyes, twin sets – Clytemnestra and Helen, seductress and murderer; visa-versa – are like brown river stones. Age-old, mossy, flecked with secrets and taunts and soft things, like shyness, or platitudes. It’s a bit disorientating.
And so instead Sirius says, ‘You must really love seagulls, huh.’
Remus barks out a laugh, waves crashing over rocks. ‘Naw, I fookin’ hate them, like most normal people.’
Sirius makes a face.
‘This ain’t my job, not really,’ Remus explains, ‘I was just passin’ through here, an’ I needed some dosh, an’ so I thought: seagulls. Ye-eah. I could waffle on about them for a bit.’ He spreads his hands, quod erat demonstrandum.
‘Fair,’ says Sirius.
Remus sucks on his lolly, squints at him. The floppy hat pushed back, hanging from a ribbon around his neck. His hair is very curly, messy as a haystack, ruffled by the wind. Sirius would like to sink his fingers through it, give it a tug.
‘You down here for a holiday, then?’
‘My mum’s obsessed with Virginia,’ Sirius smiles, takes one hand from his pocket, shoves it back, toes the ground again. ‘Watch, she’s gonna get down on her knees and pray to that lighthouse if we’re not careful. Possibly come back at night to sacrifice something.’
‘Hmm. Wouldn’t be the first time. Them Virginia die-hards are right doolally.’ The last of the lolly disappears, Remus scrunches the wrapper.
Then he takes another two from the pack and holds one out.
lullaby
(honey-sweet, toothache, sea-stone grey;
well yes, I suppose, if that’s what they say)
Gulls wheel and complain overhead. The sun bleats, warming up for another oozing summer day. Before him stands a chipped-teacup boy. A bit Snow-White; her hair and skin.
Sirius is a little short. He’s got rugby thighs, an Edwardian-straight nose like a dollhouse roof. Cheeks that blush easily, willingly, quick as a smile. He’s very beautiful. Remus feels like he may have met him before, somewhere inane, like Soho at three-am. The cat food aisle of a Tesco’s Express.
Remus likes how nervous Sirius is, likes that he can tell.
And there are lots of rules about dreams, some do’s and many more don’t’s. But this rosy, rose-cheeked boy, for no reason at all he makes Remus want to be still, just for a little while. Still, quiet, long enough to see the sun rise and set and rise again.
He is a real, live boy, that’s all, with a pumping heart and everything. Atrium-ventricle, atrium-ventricle. Knuckles, elbows, knees and wrists. It feels like trespassing just to look at him, it feels like trying to remember. This-is-a-pulse; it-beats.
Time flies, huh, it flies and flies.
‘Let me guess, can I guess?’
Sirius takes the offered Red Skin, climbs cautiously into the boat. Standing there like shoes placed atop the kitchen counter: something that draws the eye. He squints at the purple-and-red wrapper. A twist at either end, kisses on cheeks. Hello-and-how-are-you!
‘Well, alright.’ Tees as crisp as spring, as spearmint tea, boiling hot, just as it should be. Iis like honey dripping from a spoon, a perfect embodiment of Princess Di’s swaying lilt of melancholia. The type of posh that lower-middle class people can’t help but laugh at, all in good humour. Fancy-pants, that’s what Remus’ mam would’ve said.
‘Ooh, an’ ’ee’s someone ’oo’s ’ad all them bleedin’ al-o-cu-tion lessons, now, ey!’
Right up there with Marjorie Majors, the elocution princess.
Remus unwraps his own lolly, chews on a smile. ‘Oxford boy, born an’ bred in London.’
Sirius’ mouth twists. Endearing, endearing. Remus wants to press a thumb there, tuck it into a locket, keep it safe.
‘How’d you guess Oxford. Could’ve been—’ he wrinkles his nose, slightly miffed ‘—Kings, I could’ve gone to Kings.’
‘Nah Rosie, you give yerself away.’ Remus points the Red Skin at him, waves it around—only to realise Sirius is unwrapping his own. He contemplates it, then brings it to his mouth and sucks. He’s still standing in the middle of the bobbing boat, blinking down. Remus looks up at the sky. Goodness, it’s so very, very blue. He counts to ten, looks back. The wind is being coy, playing with Sirius’ hair. Ebony like a velveteen midnight, it’s almost down to his shoulders. Hair made to be wound around fingers, lit up by the sun to glow blue-black. ‘See, everyone who goes to the Great O comes away soundin’ the same. Just like a fake tan, ye-eah? Everyone tellin’ you that you look stunnin’, when yer actually just orange. Ha!’
Sirius’ face does something complicated. Well-you-got-me-there.
‘An’ you got a job as one of them punters. You know, push tourists up an’ down the river an’ point in the vague direction of Christ Church an’ say “an’ there’s Christ Church!” exclamation an’ all.’
‘Jesus,’ Sirius rolls his eyes. ‘Golly. Well that’s slightly embarrassing. Perhaps I should take up…’ he makes a face. Well-crap-I-don’t-know. ‘Quilt making. Good grief, know-it-all. And there I was thinking I could be mysterious.’ Then he takes a seat, stretches out his legs. Their feet: inches apart, frogs on lily pads. Something ticks in Remus’ bones, volatile and hungry.
‘An’ you play rugby,’ he finishes. He’s proud—quite proud, in fact, of how he does not look down at Sirius’ thighs as he says this.
He’s treated to another blush staining Sirius’ cheeks. Remus’ chest aches suddenly. Oh, says a little voice, remorseful, regretful. Missing, missing. A dandelion carried on the wind, a wish you put out on your tongue.
‘Yeah, yeah,’ Sirius rolls his eyes, ‘okay, you got me.’
chorus
(really, Rosie, pull yourself together!
them wishes certainly won’t last forever!)
Remus raises an eyebrow, sharp point that slithers down Sirius’ spine like a suppressed urge to shiver.
‘Well, an’ you know what they say about them Oxford boys.’
‘Not true,’ says Sirius, ‘except the stuff that is.’
It earns him a grin, flashing like a snake’s tongue. A drop of blood glistens at the cut in Remus’ lip. Sirius looks away quickly. Hayle beach stretches off to the left, a huge plane of butter-coloured sand. There’s a group learning to surf, they’re all standing at the edge of the waves, practicing bending their knees and holding their arms out. It looks like they’re training for the military. Left-right-left-right.
‘And you?’ Sirius says, ‘let me guess you now.’
‘Naw, I’ll save you the trouble.’ Remus sounds wry. ‘Seein’ as you’ll never guess any of it right.’
‘I might.’
‘You won’t.’ The smile Remus offers is a little sad. Sorry-but-it’s-true. Before Sirius can say anything else, Remus adds, ‘I’ve a friend who went to O. Had a prof with a liking for limericks, made students invent one whenever they got a seminar question wrong.’
‘Oh, old Sluggy? He’s still there.’ Sirius clears his throat. Lets his foot fall sideways. (Brave, brave.) ‘Here, ready? There was a young bugger from Dover / Who moaned as loud as a mower. / Well, he liked ’em tight, / Liked ’em to bite, / But loved when they bent him over.’
He holds out his hands, mock bows. Remus’ smirk flares, crooked and cutting.
‘Hmm.’ He sucks thoughtfully on his lolly. ‘Alright, I got one. There was once a wee lad from Cole / Thought maids he was a kindly soul, / But he was no saint, / They only felt faint / For his cock was long as a maypole—oh!’
He looks up. Everyone seems to be returning all at once, the Americans with their big camera, the girls, Narcissa and Walburga clambering down the rocks, the elderly two with their hands full of seashells.
They all scramble aboard, chattering like children, and the waves carry them back around the coast. The sun is heavy now, hanging in the sky like a warning. The Americans pull out sensible, wide-brimmed hats. Narcissa applies another liberal layer of suncream, pushes the straps of her dress off her shoulders a little, tilts her head back to face the glare. Walburga and Emmeline seem to be having a long-winded and slightly competitive discussion on Virginia, voices carried over the gush of waves.
Sirius folds the Red Skin wrapper. Slips it into his pocket. He smiles at his knees, glances up twice and catches Remus’ eye each time. Quick: a stifled laugh. Joke no one else understands, one they don’t really, either, but the differences is, to them it’s still funny.
*
Back at the pier, everyone thanks Remus and shakes hands then clambers off the boat, beginning to talk about deck chairs and ice-creams and oh, maybe some chips? Yeah, yeah, with that stuff they pour on them. Sirius’ hands are clammy. He wants to do something momentous. Hello, I got off the plane. Something like—
Like—
But his courage fails him, as courage often seems to. Does something irritating at the last minute, something embarrassingly skittish, like a centipede curling in on itself, and he stumbles up the last step of the pier instead and, busy focusing on that, walks on.
Hurrying after the girls, he thinks he’s probably going to regret it later, big time, those regrets people spend lifetimes puzzling out, as if that will make up for all the Not Doing they committed.
And then—and then his name is called.
Sirius nearly falls off the pier.
When he turns around, Remus is grinning at him. He jerks his head. Come ’ere!
Sirius goes to stand before him. Maybe he leans forward a little, maybe he doesn’t. We’ll never know.
‘Hi.’
Remus cocks his head, sunhat flopping like rabbit ears. Flopsy bunny, something soft. His nose is a little sunburnt. Eyebrows crooked like a question. It’s sort of devastating, actually. Simple, simple, a dizzy desire Sirius can feel. A bit like heatstroke.
‘Hmm.’
Sirius sort of laughs. ‘What?’
‘Just thinkin,’ Remus says, and Sirius wants to crawl up in the tug and pull of his uus, curl up like a cat on a warm grave and fall asleep.
‘Oh?’
‘Hmm. Yes.’ Remus narrows his eyes a little, seems to decide something. ‘Say, what are you doin’ later?’
‘Later.’
‘Yes, later.’
‘Uh. Nothing.’ Nothing, obviously.
‘Ahh, brill!’ Remus grins so suddenly Sirius almost jumps. His heart rockets up to cower behind his Adam’s apple in protest. He rubs his chest, swears, tries not to sound out of breath. Remus’ eyebrow twitches, knowing, knowing. ‘Meet me back here at midnight.’
Sirius laughs. ‘What, like the end of the fairytale balls?’ Be home by midnight, or else the carriage will be a pumpkin again, poof! and it’ll all go back to the way it was, and everything will have changed.
‘Precisely.’ Remus seems to miss the joke; now he’s solemn as ever.
‘Um.’ Sirius’ smile is a little shaky. ‘Um, okay. Okay, yes, I’ll see you at midnight.’
‘Well, that’s right then!’
Sirius risks a glance up; Remus looks entirely genuine. His grin is all wonky, like a preschooler’s drawing, with all the people floating an inch or so above the ground.
Sirius turns, presses a smile into the back of his wrist.
Someway down the pier: ‘Oi! Bring provisions!’
‘Provisions?’ Sirius starts to laugh, and, turning, breaks off to frown. Remus is nowhere in sight. Poof, indeed.
bridge
(three lucky wishes to last the day
careful—you don’t want to wish them away!)
Sirius has no idea what “provisions” could mean.
Walburga and Narcissa, on the other hand, have lots of ideas.
‘Condoms!’ cries Narcissa far too loudly, deep into her fourth rum-and-coke-in-a-can, bought from Tesco’s, buried in wet sand to keep vaguely cool.
‘Jesus Christ.’ Sirius’ cheeks flame worryingly; he presses his own can against them.
‘Don’t tease,’ Walburga scolds Narcissa, reproachful, patting Sirius’ shoulder. ‘Though you may have a point.’ She sips pensively, gnaws on her straw. ‘Ooh! Maybe he’s going to take you on a wild adventure and pull you deep down into the sea, where you’ll become very-very small, and dine with the foam fairies on seaweed, and they’ll show you how to make their dear little necklaces!’
‘Necklaces!’ Narcissa laughs so hard she starts to choke.
Chin cupped in palm, Walburga smiles. Lying on her front, legs kicking merrily, her waist-long hair is loose around her shoulders, ends trailing in the sand like blue-bottle stingers. ‘Yeah, with those little spiralling shells.’
‘You’ve been reading far too many folktales,’ says Narcissa. ‘We’re not in the realm of the Zennor mermaid.’
‘How do you know,’ Walburga shrugs. ‘We could be.’
‘But we’re not.’
‘But we could.’
‘But we’re—’
‘Yes, but you don’t know that really.’ Walburga narrows her eyes. ‘Do you?’
‘Well—’
‘Um—!’ Sirius waves a hand. ‘Hello!’
‘Oh. Sorry darling.’ Walburga turns back to him. ‘Bring snacks. Nice things. Teacakes!’
‘No!’ say Sirius and Narcissa simultaneously.
‘But why?’ asks Walburga, dismayed. ‘They’re so scrummy.’
‘You’re alone in your teacake obsession, you do realise this,’ says Sirius. ‘And I still don’t have an answer!’
‘Oh, chill,’ Narcissa waves a hand, painfully blasé. ‘You probably don’t need anything. Bet you’ll just snog on the pier for a bit.’
‘Fisherman style,’ says Walburga, then she and Narcissa burst into giggles.
– ii –
ditty
(the mother-of-pearl moon
promises it’ll be your turn soon)
They do not, however, snog on the pier. Fisherman style or otherwise.
Remus greets him with a boo! popping up out of nowhere like a genie in a bottle, then laughs his head off while Sirius tries not to have a heart attack.
He’s holding up a swinging kerosine lamp, his face is all a-glow. Will-o’-the-wisp, drawing you deeper and deeper. A spiral with no centre, poem with no rhyme. The Owl and the Pussy-cat went to sea in a beautiful pea-green boat.
Suddenly Remus’ eyebrows pull together.
‘Oh,’ he says, properly distraught, ‘oh dear. You—brought a basket.’
Sirius winces. Ah, crap, there go his flaming cheeks again.
‘Blame my mum.’ He thinks of moving the picnic basket behind his back a minute too late. ‘She got far too excited. She thinks you’re god’s gift to womankind just because you introduced her to Virginia’s Lighthouse, so she spent the afternoon making gratitude-jam.’ He holds up the basket. Ta-da. ‘It’s, um, raspberry and cinnamon.’
Remus’ expression is still crumpled. Napkin left on the table. ‘That’s the dearest,’ he says, soft.
Sirius shrugs. Walburga likes to give, she’s good at it; he and Narcissa hadn’t been fazed when she returned to the little cottage where they’re staying after a Tesco’s expedition, armed with about fifty boxes of raspberries and screw-top jars she then plonked in a ginormous pot of boiling water to sterilise. The cottage still smelt sweet when Sirius left; sticky dishcloths all stained red.
‘It’s no biggie,’ he adds, when Remus continues to look quietly devastated. ‘She does stuff like this all the time, it’s nothing.’
‘’S not nothin’,’ Remus frowns. ‘Tell her ta ever so from me.’
‘You can tell her yourself,’ Sirius says, ‘watch, she’ll be waiting here tomorrow morning to beg her way onto the tour to see the lighthouse again.’
Remus makes a face. A bit of a wince. Apology, something like guilt, bitter tang grating against teeth. ‘Naw, she’s real darlin’. I’ll tell Earnie to let her on. It’s him that takes the boat, usually.’
‘Why,’ Sirius asks quickly, ‘what do you mean, won’t you be there?’
‘Give her this, would you?’ Remus says instead of replying, digging about in a satchel Sirius has only just noticed, slung across Remus’ chest like a schoolgirl’s lunch bag. He’s still kitted out in the same outfit, floppy hat hanging from his neck and all, though now it’s significantly colder than this morning. If Walburga were here she’d snap at him that he’ll freeze to death.
‘Put cotton wool in your ears!’ she’s fond of saying, ‘or the wind’ll blow right through you!’
After a good minute or so of digging, Remus pulls out a stone and drops it into Sirius’ offered palm. Beaten smooth, there’s a hole in the centre, like the dark-silver inner middle of two-pound coins. Sirius runs a thumb over it, feels the groove like a dimple.
‘Them’s lucky.’ Remus jerks his chin at it. ‘Protect you from ill will and the like. An’ there’s this old lore, see, says that if you look through the hole at certain times in the day, you can see into other worlds.’
Sirius smiles, pocketing the Hag’s Stone. ‘My mum’ll like that. She believes in—’ he waves a hand. ‘You know. Foam fairies or… whatever.’
‘Thought she might.’ Remus smiles too. ‘Clever girl. Knows what’s what, huh? Alrighty!’ Abruptly grinning again, he gives the kerosine lamp a vigorous shake so the metal handle jangles. Sirius blinks, startled. Remus’ grin is canine in the dim, wicked and damnable and foolproof. ‘Ready to roll, Rosie?’
‘Um—’ Sirius falters, ‘I mean, yeah, but—uh, where?’
‘Where?’ Remus rolls his eyes, ha-that’s-a-good-one! ‘Aw, you kill me.’ Then he turns and starts off down the steps to where the boat is waiting, there for always and always, like the boat in the underground lake that takes the Twelve Dancing Princesses to the ball every evening. The gulls are still there, too, cawing and squabbling, just out of sight, disembodied voices in the ponderous darkness.
Remus settles the lamp at the prow, climbs in and offers Sirius his hand. The arpeggios of his knuckle bones. Arid salt on the rim of a martini glass, the first book he ever read through by himself.
Busy talking about seals – apparently they’re often out and about at night – and tugging on the engine lever like a lawn mower to start it up, suddenly Remus turns to face him.
Shut up, Sirius thinks, knowing already, shut up, shut up.
‘Hey, Rosie. I—I don’t want you gettin’ the wrong idea, yeah.’
Remus is looking at him, Di’s look, well-there-were-two-of-us-you-see, and Sirius looks back. His heart squeezes like a frown. A whiplash boy, all ends and no middles, a beginning or two, here and there. Looking back in the same way one gazes up at fireworks; a little awed, waiting to flinch. They’re always brilliant, aren’t they, while they last. Pop Rocks on the tongue. Brightly coloured, eating up sky like mouthfuls of cake, a heart that’s a bit hodgepodge, made of sparklers not flesh. Three-two-one-midnight! And then the banging starts; the sounds of war.
Remus’ mouth twists. Sirius wants to bite his nose. Eat him whole, sparks and all. He lifts a shoulder, easy-peasy-no-probs-babes-that’s-all-hunky-dory. For sure, for sure. (Something burns, low in his throat.)
‘No ideas,’ he says, ‘never had any. No biggie.’
‘No—’ Remus frowns again, hurting. He reaches out a hand that hovers between them momentarily – kiss me, Sirius thinks, and almost asks it – then inexplicitly he winds a lock of Sirius’ hair around a finger. ‘No, Rosie, you’re lovely. I think you’re lovely, see,’ he says. (Sirius swallows hard, the boat rocks.) ‘I just mean, you can’t go takin’ this for some kinda promise, that’s all.’
‘Promise for what?’ asks Sirius, though he thinks he knows.
‘Just…’ Remus shrugs. ‘No promisin’. Promise?’
‘Um—’ Sirius half laughs, wishing he could go back to this morning, when everything was infallibly hysterical. ‘Um, yeah, okay. Promise.’
‘Ta,’ says Remus, quiet. Then he gives Sirius’ hair a tug, spins around and yanks on the motor one last time, and it chugs into life. ‘There’s my girl,’ Remus says appreciatively, giving the boat a fond pat. ‘Takes her sweet time, huh.’
Remus must know the waters blind, because he seems to have a perfect idea of where they’re going – or else is just guiding them along on a whim and a fancy and nothing more, which could quite probably be true – though the lamp doesn’t give off very much light.
The wind whips Sirius’ face. It smells of salt, of rain.
‘Are we going where I think we’re going?’
Remus takes his eyes off the darkness to lock onto Sirius’. Stepping stones. Double knots. Unshakable things. The light is doing something funny to his face. Foxy. Shadows in the wrong places, eyelashes short as forever.
He smirks. ‘Well, an’ look at that, the old O doin’ something good to them brain bits of yours, huh. It teach you some real nice tricks?’ He winks, slow and true, snorts on a laugh; Sirius rolls his eyes. ‘Yeah, I’ll bet.’ Remus is smirking again. Then his face falls. ‘But I don’t wanna break them windows, see. I’d feel bad an’ that. Like breakin’ a bone. You know?’
Previously comfortable they were on the same page, Sirius is now not so sure. ‘Um… uh-huh…?’
‘Yeah.’ Remus nods to himself. ‘I mean, I can work one of them hairpins as good as anyone, but I’m thinkin’ it’s gonna be one of them old locks. Reckon so? Big brass key? Always have trouble with them kind, drive me right up the wall.’
Sirius frowns. ‘Um, I’m sorry. What?’ (Christ; wot like the Queen, good grief.) ‘Are we breaking in somewhere?’
‘Oh, har har. Not breakin’ in nowhere, we ain’t some bloomin’ pirates.’ Remus rolls his eyes, endeared. Sweetheart, sweetheart.
‘But you said—’
‘Well, for sure we’re going in,’ he rolls his eyes again. ‘What’d you think, we’re just gonna dance about on the island? Ha!’
Sirius clears his throat. ‘So how are we getting in exactly?’
At this Remus shrugs. Well-what-a-daft-question. ‘Uh, through the door?’
‘You’ve a key?’
‘No?’ Remus sounds genuinely surprised. ‘Why, do you?’
‘Um—’ Sirius wants to laugh again, ‘no, no I don’t.’
‘Oh.’ Remus frowns. ‘Too bad. Oh well, none’s a loss. We’ll be just fine. It’ll be open, I’ll bet.’
Sirius opens his mouth to say he doubts that, but then closes it again. Remus seems the sort of person for whom impossible things just happen like normal, everyday things. Sure the door will be open. Of course it will end happily.
‘I just thought—’ grave now, Remus is frowning a little. Catching Sirius’ eye, he shrugs. ‘It’s just… it’ll be lonely, I reckon. None’s been there in years, like I said. I thought we could maybe say hello. I felt real bad leavin’ without saying hello, you know?’
Sirius knows.
‘I just thought, well, we could keep it company a while.’
Yeah, Sirius knows.
hymn
( apples and honey and biscuits and tea;
just for you, sweet as can be)
The lighthouse looms out of the voluminous night like a sigh, a crooked finger. Come here, here, here.
They fall quiet and silence settles itself, grows thick enough to taste. Clouds heavy as a winter duvet, there are no stars, no bursts of brightness. The coastline a saw-toothed shadow; the sea and sky, black-black-black—and the lighthouse on its little island like a rickety fence, paint peeling at the stile where hundreds of hands have brushed. But the field has run wild now, nettle and grasses stringy and tangled as fishing nets, and the path has long since grown over, and the stile wilts, soggy with rot and age.
Sage, lonely—yes, lonely, a place that has not felt a footstep nor heard a voice in as long as a memory can stretch. Light at the core like a heart, bleating out a gentle warning; stay away, away, away, a lament tinted in gold. Pacemaker keeping its own time, it will beat even after the heart has stopped, after the lungs squeeze no more breaths, and the eyes are sightless.
Sirius has never felt more sorry for anything or anyone in all his life. Oh, you, he thinks, and his heart breaks a little. Tiny, hairline cut on a single chorda tendinea, snaring so it pulls loose, twanging free like a broken c-string of a cello.
The light beams in a wide semi-circle – look!-it’s-one-of-them-Yew-Eff-Ohs! – blinks on and off, on and off, steady as deep breaths. The magical order of a beehive; the delivery schedule of a postman.
Remus secures the boat with ropes to a jutting rock, then they collect the basket of jams and the school satchel and the lamp, and climb onto the island. The rocks are slick with sea foam, sharp and untamed. A-scattered with feathers, courtesy of the gulls.
‘I wonder if Virginia comes here,’ Remus whispers, peering around as if he expects her to jump out of the shadows, arms aloft like Circe, crying, Who dares step foot on my island! He squints at Sirius. ‘You believe in ghosts?’
‘I dunno…’ Sirius winces. ‘I try not to, I’d rather my bastard father stayed where he belongs in the ground, to be frank.’
‘Hmm.’ Remus looks around again, light held high over their heads. ‘Well, I reckon if she’s hangin’ out here, she’ll know we come in good spirits.’ Then he leads the way over the rocks and up the small grassy slope to the base of the lighthouse, walks around until they come to a little door and tries the handle. A bit rusty, he gives the lamp to Sirius and tries again with both hands.
Well, it opens of course.
Inside, it smells like time. Stone and deference. Forgotten things. Remus pats the wall.
‘Hullo,’ he says, absent, peering around for a light switch. ‘Hullo, hullo.’
When he finds it, miraculously light sputters to life somewhere above them, filtering down through a spiral staircase that fills almost the entire cylindrical space.
‘Well, up we go!’ says Remus brightly.
Up on the landing, it’s completely empty.
Just wide enough for Sirius to lay down lengthways with a touch of space either end, the floor is made of uneven wooden panels that creek together like a ship tossed in a storm, and slant down at one side rather concerningly. The walls are whitewashed, paint peeling on the window frames. A single light above their heads, dangling on a wire like a noose.
‘Naw.’ Remus is grinning around at the bare-boned space affectionately. ‘What a doll.’ Then he kneels and begins to tug things out of his satchel. A picnic rug, which he spreads over the floor. A miniature radio with an unwinding antenna. Late-night oldies, a scratchy piano from three planets over. An opened pack of cooking-chocolate buttons, secured with a rubber band. A seemingly endless string of bunting, red-and-white-striped, which he coaxes out of a front pocket like a clown pulling a handkerchief from his mouth, long as a football field. It goes on and on and on.
Sirius stares, dumbstruck. It’s like Mary Poppins’ bottomless bag. Next come a handful of paintbrushes. A pack of thumbtacks. A small, pocket-sized hammer. Then Remus upends the satchel and shakes it roughly; a bazillion paint tubes come clattering out. A final shake, then he tosses the empty bag over his shoulder and looks up at Sirius expectantly.
‘So?’
Sirius unsticks his mouth. ‘Uh—so…?’
Remus waves a hand. ‘Provisions? You were on provision duty.’
Sirius clears his throat about five times. ‘Right. Yes.’ He kneels beside Remus and uncovers Walburga’s basket. There’s about a dozen jam jars nestled like eggs in a nest, and something wrapped in a dishcloth. Still vaguely warm, like Walburga has them under some sort of spell.
‘Teacakes!’ cries Remus, apparently delighted. ‘You ledge.’
Sirius makes a face, pinches out a raisin and eats it. ‘Forgot a knife.’
‘That’s nothin’.’ Remus shrugs, looking around. ‘Here, we can use one of them.’ He selects a paintbrush, waves it about. ‘Let’s try that jam, you reckon?’
Sirius uses the end of Remus’ paintbrush to cut a teacake roughly in half, then holds it open while Remus spreads on jam. Raspberry-tart, cinnamon like early September mornings.
‘Oh, wait, also—’ Sirius sucks jam off his fingers, brushes his hands on his jeans then digs in his jacket pockets for two bottle of elderflower pressé. ‘Ta-da.’
Remus’ mouth falls open in a round “o”, then abruptly he takes Sirius’ cheeks between his jam-sticky hands and kisses his forehead three times in quick succession.
‘You’re brill,’ he says, fervent, Sirius’ face still gripped in his hands. ‘That elderflower stuff’s the only thing to have with teacakes. Hey, I should stop makin’ fun of the old O, huh, just look where it’s got you.’
‘Oh bugger off,’ Sirius grins, batting Remus away, then wishing he hadn’t a second later, when Remus lets go. The radio has taken it upon itself to start up a sombre quadrille. Sirius breaks apart another teacake, nods to the paraphernalia Remus has scattered all over the rug. ‘What’s all that for then?’
Remus gives him a look over the top of his teacake. That-is-the-daftest-thing-anyone-has-ever-asked-you-numpty. ‘Well, we’re gonna paint them walls, aren’t we?’
Sirius smiles, sucks jam off his thumb. ‘Right, yeah. Obviously. Silly me.’
‘Well, sure,’ Remus lifts a shoulder. ‘Make it all cheery-like. So it’s got company, see. Can’t be lonely if it’s covered in bright colours. Just inside, yeah, just here—’ he waves a hand around abstractedly ‘—where none else’ll see. Like a little secret. Hush now.’ He pats the floor.
Sirius smiles into his teacake and the quadrille band strikes a chord: e-flat minor.
*
And that’s just what they do. They crack open the sparkling elderflower like beers, and pause every now and then to jam-up another teacake, and polish off all the chocolate buttons. They string up the bunting in random criss-crosses over the ceiling with the thumbtacks, and use the hammer to bang them in where the wood doesn’t give.
Then they fetch some seawater in their empty elderflower bottles and set to work on the walls, red and yellow and orange and blue and green and purple and pink and violet—ginormous flowers, wonky petals, mismatched centres. Butterflies as big as windows, a humongous apple-and-blueberry tree from floor to ceiling, only they run out of room so the branches sprawl out sideways, crawling around the walls like arms. There are pink stars and two suns and a bright blue, rectangular moon—and seagulls, of course. Purple ones, and a single orange seal.
‘Looks like a thumb,’ says Remus ponderously.
Sirius tilts his head sideways, squints. ‘Put dots on it,’ he suggests.
When they’re done, they lie down on the rug, looking up. Lots of colour, all around them. Hello-dear-how’re-you-doing. And let me see what spring is like on a-Jupiter and Mars. They tried to draw shells, then gave up, and so instead there’s lots of spirals, there and there and there, like bugs under stones.
Sirius snorts out a laugh; it sounds funny lying down. ‘That butterfly looks like it’s hungover.’ A big blue-and-purple butterfly, with feelers that curl like a phone cord.
‘Bless her,’ says Remus, fond. He shifts a little; his shoulder presses against Sirius’. Hard, like praying hands. Sirius presses back.
‘What did I promise?’ he asks, quiet.
‘Hush,’ says Remus, then jostles him, laughing. ‘Listen to the song, Rosie. Listen, listen!’
The radio is humming out a two-step.
A jolly jig, as-I-live-and-breathe; Sirius starts to laugh. Delirious, delirious. Vince Gill, of all them bloomin’ buggers.
She was standing at the front door
When I came home last night
A good book in her left hand
And a rollin' pin in the right…
requiem
(hush, don’t say it now,
we mustn’t speak of old-time vows—
that’s bad-luck ain’t it, Rosie-gal)
They blow goodbye kisses to the lighthouse; it slinks away into the night as they sail away.
Back at on pier, Remus stands before him. He’s half a head taller; Sirius keeps looking at his nose. Bump like a bend at the end of a familiar street. Home around the corner. Almost there, almost there. Dawn; now curling like mist at the edges of the horizon. A wan, faded morning.
‘Ta for keepin’ Virginia’s old lighthouse company with me,’ says Remus. Walburga’s basket is at his feet; satchel over his shoulder.
‘I—’ Sirius shrugs. ‘Yeah. ’Course. No biggie.’ He tries for a smile; he doesn’t like how fast the day is creeping up on them, can’t bear it, actually. He’s looking up; Remus knows what he’s asking. The time-weathered question, sweeter for each time it’s unuttered.
Remus kisses him so very softly. Sirius barely feels it. Tender and twangy; rust, resin. Red flames at the centre of a bonfire, sparks that fizzle in the gelatinous night like Halloween pumpkin teeth. Jagged and seamed as a scar, something that leaves a mark.
There is an ancient Hindu story that Sirius loves to think of. There are many versions, layering over each other like threads in a rug, but in the one he likes most Shiva and Sati were in love, deep love, but Sati’s father forbade their union, and in her devastation she incinerated herself—she caught flame and burnt to a cinder.
And then, anguish and rage and desolation, Shiva obliterated the entire world. A black, endless ash, the stuff of waste lands, the stuff of nightmares; a high school memory, your twenty-fourth birthday. Oh, why do we keep getting older? Why do the years crawl on? As if we’d ever wish for them to stop still—imagine the awful stasis, the long, long forever. There, that is your catastrophe. (Didn’t you say you adore them?)
Wait and see, wait and see.
‘Naw, Rosie,’ says Remus, and does something even worse than obliteration, and kisses Sirius’ temple, lips grazing skin. Moth wings, tulip petals, sky dawning pink. ‘You know,’ he adds, ‘I’ll miss you like none other,’ and presses their noses together like linked pinkies. Briefly, briefly.
Something in Sirius’ throat pulls tight, Lemon Sherbets and Fizzy Cola Bottles. He’s going to ask, he thinks, he’s going to—
But, of course, Remus doesn’t. It’s not that kind of story; theirs never is. Some aren’t, just one of those things.
‘Ahh, I’m sorry I can’t walk you home,’ he says, ‘I would. I’d like to. Only, see, I can’t leave the pier.’
‘Oh—yeah.’ Sirius nods. The wind blows his hair; he pushes it out of his eyes, looks away. Somewhere, around the cove, the lighthouse waits patiently to be known again. ‘So I’ll—see you. Sometime. Soon. Uh-huh?’
Remus’ lips twitch, a funny upside-down smile. ‘Sure,’ he says. ‘Sometime. Somethin’ like that.’
He smells of paint, cinnamon. Like the sea. Or maybe that just is the sea.
Sirius inhales it in deep and holds his breath, turns around and walks down the pier very quickly and just before the docks curve, path winding between buildings then out again onto the main promenade, he turns back.
And the pier is deserted, save for the seagulls.
– iii –
elegy
(the waves, probably,
will keep yawning until the end of time, see.
Do you? Do you see what I mean?)
The rest of the week runs its course, and every day at eight-am an old sailor stumps up the steps to greet the little group gathered at the edge of the pier. Earnie, with a lame gull swaying on his shoulder. He has a water-proof hat, a big gap between his two front teeth. He’s smoked so much that smoke leaks from his lips every time he speaks, regardless of whether he has a cigarette in hand, like an ancient dragon in a fairy tale.
He smells a little of fish; he does indeed wink at old ladies. All in good fun, all in good fun.
A week of sparkling elderflower pressé that bubbles like summer on tongues, and the seagulls that can be heard through the open window, crying on all night long, as regular and reliable as the village clocktower, chiming each quarter like a dove.
An elegy in a major key; seagulls always remind Sirius of lighthouses, now.