59

Down Coldstream Walk and Youlgreave Way I heard the drunken cries of the broken with skin arms aloft and beer can swinging empty as the mid-afternoon mid-town workers hit the streets and see him as he spits forth satanic notions to buses, cars and pram-pushing ma's who trot quick sharp to see him pass.

58

And as I approached forty they approached forty and climbed to the zenith of their managerial careers.

57

The mere sound of Lombard's employment made her wet. Such were the times.

56

'It's cross-contamination boy, you don't mix the coffee spoon with the tea.' Everyday a new complaint. Then his elephant hands grabbed his stained mug and he took another long swallow.

55

The bus unnervingly swerves around the tight bend of the crossroads before stopping. A group of passengers, of which I am included, lurch forward as we wait to depart. I make my way through the busy streets.

 

It’s a Friday, and I notice the Friday rush as the mole-faced shoppers start to show their faces. On the ground, a light rain has left a film of muddy water which covers the paving slabs. Imprinted are the footsteps of those that have gone before me.

 

Drinkers come here for the cheap booze. Not the decor. The cheap drinks bring out the heavies, the all-day old sorts with nothing left to do with their lives but while away the hours knocking back ale until the doors close. Lombard is sitting in the far corner of the room reading a paper. I walk over.

 

A weathered black guy with a long white beard stares into oblivion. His hat is frayed around the edges. An old boy stands, takes his plastic bags and rests an unlit smoke between his lips. Down an alley a junkie slips away, his chequered shirt hanging limply off his wiry frame.

54

Even over the revellers’ voices you can hear the boats moving on the river. The creaking of ropes as they tighten and snap to take the strain from this November night’s wind.

Buoys clank hollow against empty hulls and untied awnings lash rebelliously as the wind blows in harder from the North Sea.

I remember after nights like this, when my father would a fret and always come down early the next day to check for damage.

52

And where should I start, where? Sweating at the great machine before me as it spits out great streams of unwanted papers. It never asks for small chat, never asks for star-signs in the age of reason or falls foul to fatness and domestic life death. When are they ever caught with one eye on the window? 

51

When a British man sees the great, bright blue sea his heart can do nothing but melt.

50

The more I worked, the less I burned. I was angry at the circumstance and could not sleep. Those fractures in reality began to reopen and what I saw were brief glimpses of the throbbing white world...awe-inspiring, frightening universes inside oneself which longed to be free and waited hungry, no ravenous, on the fringes of conscious thought.

49

Her urban body is tight against my own. Forget the kooky; this is a dementia of rubble-laced gardens and metal-boarded houses. The vision of the city in profile: I watch her skin erode slowly away as planners and money lenders carve her up like a juicy hot steak. A forked fraternity’s licked this town clean like a nightmare. Riddz crew painted on the walls in graffiti. Gangs stand around. Everything is as sweet as a hamburger.

This whole estate is being removed from existence, redeveloped and re-imagined by our civic overlords. Near the gang, a team of builders smash down part of a terrace house. Murdering sledgehammer swings above, ready to cull the space into an image they see fit. The surgeons play their music whilst they work, cover their slobbering mouths and have their sterile instruments laid out in order.

Scapula. 

48

She collected coloured paper clips and found great joy in that. Her joy gave me joy.

47

A blotting occurred on the white ceiling as it began to shift into bright vortexes of light. 

Lombard tried to sit, failed, and then slumped back down onto the soiled bed. That old oafish ghoul was back, the one who threw a fishing line periodically inside his arm. It hit, split the skin to the soul and extracted it out through tubular fingers hard.

Each tug of the line echoed along the diaphragm, trailing a path up towards the neck veins and directly into his brain. At this point it changed from being a provincial corruption to something worse.

His skin felt like melted butter. Nebulous flushes of deep-heat precipitated through each limb. All actuality evaporated away in a single tipsy minute. Ears warmed up; the nose, the lips, the extremities all tingled enticingly as they shifted across to another reality.

Lombard tried to raise himself again. It was 

all he could do during this episode to shrug

 off the sickly draw of unconsciousness. 

46

In the corner of the foyer, to the left of the door, is a piano. I have no idea where it came from or how long it has stood there. Its motives are unknown. Lana sits at the thing. She perches on its square little chair and pops the lid to reveal its powerful zebra mouth. She runs her fingers over the heavy white keys, waiting with the anticipation of pressure to make a sound. She does it slowly, preciously, as though the instrument is thing of another world. Her eyes close. A crisp ‘A’ note flashes through the room, then another as she draws her finger down again on the key in quick succession.

45

Suited man in cowboy hat lounges on cathedral seats.Tantalizing peeks as summer skirts lift upwards in the wind. All the best girls smoke. Dried leaves spiral, toil  in a trapped cyclones. The black trousers suck down the heat. Everything is aroused and peaking.

ARE YOU THERE, JOHN?

FADE IN: 

EXT. HIGH STREET - DAY 

The shops are closing fast. Checking her watch as she runs, ANNA (34) forces her way through the leaving time rush. 

INT. CARD SHOP - DAY 

ASSISTANT 

We're closing. 

ANNA 

(Catching her breath)

Can I just 

ASSISTANT 

-It's five-thirty. I'm very sorry. 

ANNA 

Please. I’m begging you, just one

minute. I’ll be quick, I promise. 

The assistant sighs. If looks could kill. 

Anna desperately riffles through the remaining Valentine's Day cards. They are torn, some are bent, it's slim pickings. 

One sad card stands out. She hurries it over to the till. 

The shop assistant flashes her an insincere smile. 

INT. SUPERMARKET - DAY 

SERIES OF SHOTS 

A) Anna's hesitates, she holds up two bottles of wine. She doesn't have a clue what’s good. 

B) She stares at the main courses. Grabs one. 

Anna smiles warmly to the man at the till. He waves her along without a glance. 

INT. BUS - NIGHT 

Anna makes her way home. The people on the sweaty bus are mushed together. She reaches down and takes out her phone. 

INTERCUT: INT. ANNA'S HOUSE 

CLOSE UP - PHONE: It rings on the dresser. No answer. It cuts to voice mail. 

ANNA 

John? Pick up. John? I know you are

in. 

(Pause)

I bet you thought I’d forgotten

what day it was. Silly you. John?

There was this thing at work -oh

never mind it, listen, I will be 

home in thirty minutes. 

Anna holds back the tears. A LARGE MAN (50’s) is sat painfully close to her and is listening to every word. 

ANNA (CONT’D)

Hey, yeah you, why don’t you mind

your own fucking business? 

The large man coughs and puts in his earphones. 

ANNA (CONT’D)

John, I don't want to do this over 

the phone. Not again. I know I

haven't been around as much as I 

said I would be, but that’s going

to change. Do you hear me John?

It’s going to change. 

She hangs up and massages her forehead. 

INT. ANNA’S HOUSE - BATHROOM 

Anna look in the mirror. She pushes an unkempt piece of hair out of her face. Dressed to the Nines she applies her lipstick and tries a smile. READY. 

INT. ANNA’S HOUSE - DINING ROOM - NIGHT 

The table is set for a romantic, candlelit dinner. Anna is sat alone: we see the back of her chair from behind P.O.V. 

CLOSE UP - ANNA'S PLATE 

A lavish meal. She starts eating, alone. 

JOHN, a strong-willed little calico, jumps onto the table. 

CLOSE UP - JOHN'S COLLAR 

Swinging from the cat's collar is the name tag 'JOHN'. Anna plants a tender kiss on his fuzzy little mouth. 

Behind her we see there are cats. Lots of cats. SO many cats. 

FADE OUT: 

44

The steam train is rotten and static, its wheels are no longer visible, and much of the front section is half-buried into a sandy mound of slag. The smoke box sits sealed forever, and the coupler, too, is lost to the sands. I stand staring at the façade on the front of the train, near where the slag begins to rise, waiting as it silently slides into the supernal. The ground itself is pulling it downwards. Running my fingers along the Martian tapestry, I feel the craters of the once-shining black metal scream out for repair. On the mottled steel shell, where parched crimson rivers bubble, the entire exterior looked like a beautiful underwater husk; saprophilous in nature, it begged the question as to whether or not it was stationary or sinking into the titanic, dusty realm beneath. 

43

People crawl out of here and they crawl back in when they are old and tired. 

42

The first noise I heard was an electronic gargle.

41

Exhausted, I lay on the nearest bed to the door. No sleep comes. 

40

The American dream, for all its inconsistencies and conservatism, proves at least their nation could dream. I am our nation, I am British, haunted by the spectres of a lost past. With bulldog spirit, the ghost of this dead empire lurches forward, writhing in a history which can no longer be reclaimed.