SOUL MUSIC

by

Ryan Lee

Someone had left the lobby doors open and the wind was bucking and whipping through the lower floors of the apartment that Carrie James shared with Andrew Miles. It was barely midday but all the lamps were on, spinning webs of marmalade light around pockets of shadow. Beyond the slanted picture window billowing rainclouds hung like doom balloons above the sooty black rooftops of the old dockside buildings.

Andrew returned to the piano just as Carrie came out of the bathroom. Absently his fingers began to pick out the melody to the old Beatles song, She's Leaving Home. He watched her with silent, soulful intensity as she breezed through the apartment, folding clothes and dropping them into one or other of the two large suitcases on the bed.

"You're taking a lot of stuff," he noted.

Carrie stopped and looked at him guardedly."Why d'you say it like that?"

"Like what?"

"Like it was an accusation or something?"

"I wasn't aware that I did."

"You did," she told him flatly.

"It was just an observation, Carrie. No need to jump down my throat."

"I'm not arguing today, Andrew."

She went over to the wardrobes and selected the white Yves St Laurent suit. The going away suit.

"Christ, there's hardly anything left."

Carrie laid the suit carefully on the bed and lifted her cool blue eyes to his."Say something?"

"I said you're taking a lot of clothes. Supposed to be a model, aren't you? Don't they give you clothes to wear these days?"

She flicked him a quick disparaging look and turned her back on him. The black and gold kimono slid down her naked body like a fireman down a pole, all slick and smooth and practised. She ran her fingers slowly down the legs that sold Whisper Stockings in a thousand bus and railway stations."Don't be silly. Of course they give me clothes to wear."

He stopped playing abruptly."So why are you taking so much stuff? I mean, you're only going away for a week."

"London."

"What?"

"I'm doing an important assignment in London, Andrew."

"It's a motor show."

"It's still important. And it's still London, not..." She swept a hand towards the dark, stormy afternoon baying at the window."Not this. This is so...It's so Leeds."

"Oh, right," he said, as if he understood. He started playing again as she changed into the suit, picking out the notes with dull, dragging monotony."I worked with BA Robertson last time I was in London."

"Who?"

"BA Robertson. It was a long time ago. I think Dick Whittington was still Lord Mayor at the time."

"You should get back to writing pop songs."

"Why?"

Carrie twisted her head around and shrugged blankly."I don't know. You're not happy writing tunes for dancing sausages, though, I know that much."

"It pays the mortgage."

"Not lately."

"Well it gets me on the radio at least. You've never been on the radio have you, dear?"

She favoured him with a sweetly radiant smile."No, love. Been on telly a few times, though, haven't I?"

"Dolly-bird with money in her hands. It's a classic subconscious male fantasy, Carrie. You were nothing but a subliminal flash designed to activate some chemical reaction in the viewers' brains."

"It was Play Your Cards Right."

"Same thing."

"And I've been in all the national newspapers, Cosmo, Health and Beauty, GQ, Esquire-"

"Herpetology News."

"What?"

"Nothing. Just following a thought chain."

"Are you jealous, Andrew?" She asked, smiling with lofty amusement."Are you jealous of me?"

"In a way. I envy the way you can make a pile of money without really doing anything."

Carrie drew her head back, her eyes widening."Don't you dare suggest that I don't work hard for my money."

"Our money. And I wasn't suggesting you didn't work hard for it, only that it doesn't take much talent to gawp at a camera or sprawl over the bonnet of a new Lexus in your bikini."

"And writing songs about fish fingers does I suppose? Do you think people would still feel the same about John Lennon if he'd written the words to I Feel Like Chicken Tonight?"

Andrew just huffed.

"Touché, Andrew?"

He met her eyes and smiled sharply."Not yet. First tell me how your intellectual and creative talents are going to be stretched at this motor show?"

"Boor-ring!"

"Do you even get to drive any of the cars?"

"Andrew, stop being such a baby and deal with it. I'm going away and that's that."

A look of innocent surprise sprang to his face."What's what?"

"That's why you're picking fights with me. You've been doing it all week, moping around the flat, sulking, picking fights for no reason. It's got nothing to do with modelling, not really. You just can't stand the thought of me going away and having a good time without you."

"I thought you were working?"

"Not all the time. Hence all the clothes, to answer your question. We've got most evenings off and we're determined to make the best of it.

"We?"

"The gang." She turned around and stepped into the skirt, pulled it up her valuable legs and slender hips and fastened the catch."Did I tell you Greta got that job in Milan?"

"AC or Inter?"

"Versace, I think she said. Anyway, she was telling Jason about it, and Jason said-"

"You'll be going to nightclubs and stuff?"

"I suppose."

"Who with?"

"With everyone."

"You mean with "The Gang?" "

Carrie froze, her back to him."I saw that," she said, and pulled the zipper on her skirt. She turned around and fixed him with an icy look."Don't think I didn't see that."

"See what?"

"What you did with your fingers. You made those marks with your fingers-" She made a set of quotation marks in the air with her fingers "- Like that."

Andrew laughed incredulously."You had your back to me. How could you see any-"

"It was in your voice. Anyway, it's what you always do. I heard the capital letters, too."

He grinned guiltily. Carrie let the ghost of a reluctant smile drift across her face before she turned away and began rummaging through drawers for things she might have forgotten to pack.

"So, are they all going along to this shoot?"

"Yes. It's an agency package. You know all of this."

"You can say that again. You haven't stopped talking about it for the last six months."

"Play another tune, Andrew."

"Are you speaking literally?"

"Don't get clever. It's so out of character."

"So say what you mean."

Carrie closed a drawer forcefully and turned on him. "I mean stop knocking my friends, okay?"

"But you go on about them all the time!" His hands fell heavily on a minor chord."It get's so boring at my end. I'm sick of hearing how great they are, how pretty they are, how much fun they are. It's boring, Carrie. They should come with a health warning: May Cause Drowsiness, Do Not Drive Or Operate Machinery."

"You missed your vocation, Andy," she told him with a quick, mirthless smile."You could have been a crap comedian instead of a crap musician."

"Ouch."

"You asked for it. I don't mock your friends."

"But none of my friends deserve it."

Carrie blinked hard, stunned."And mine do? You don't even know them!"

Andrew rested his hands on top of the piano and appeared to think."Mmm, well let's see about that...okay, they all drive white VW Golf Convertibles. They all read Cosmo and marie clare. They like sushi - No! They eat sushi because it's fashionable but none of them really like it. They won't dare say as much though, because that would put them in with the out-crowd."

"I'm not listening to this." Carrie marched off to the bathroom, her bare feet swishing across the polished wooden floor.

"Their all time favourite record is What A Fool Believes by the Doobie Brothers. They think Ikea is "pedestrian" and-"

The bathroom door slammed shut.

A fist of wind rattled the window. Andrew turned his melancholy face to the blackening sky, watching baubles of silvery rain slide down the glass. For a moment or two he looked like Bogart.

"And they're taking you away from me," he finished quietly.

**

Carrie was making coffee in the kitchen area. Andrew came over and stood against the wall, his hands behind his back; he never knew what to do with his hands when he wasn't playing the piano.

"Have you called a taxi yet?"

"It's booked."

"For what time?"

"One."

Andrew glanced at the clock. It was fifteen minutes to. He should have panicked but what he felt instead was a wretched sense of misery and loss.

"I wouldn't mind a coffee."

"Good for you."

She breezed past him, avoiding his eyes. He followed her into the living area but didn't join her on the sofa. She sat too rigidly, too uninviting. Her knees were pressed together, her face drawn and tired.

"Do they ever ask you what you're doing with me? I mean, a beautiful, sophisticated model shacked up with a loser like me?"

"That's in your mind," she said.

"But they must."

"They don't."

"Not even Jason?"

She glanced at him. There was something in her eyes he couldn't quite recognise, something he didn't want to recognise. Was it pity? Was she pitying him?

"Jason's a friend, Andrew, no more than that."

"But he's a model isn't he? Gillette Man, Milk Tray Man, Diet Coke Break?"

Carrie closed her eyes and shook her head."You see, that's exactly what I've been saying. You stick labels on people you don't even know."

"I don't want to know him."

"Why? Because you might find out he's human after all? Because you might actually like him?"

"I won't like him," Andrew grunted."How can I like a bloke who drinks Bacardi Breezer and never needs to get his trousers altered? I hate him, Carrie. I hate everything he represents and...and I just hate him, that's all."

"If you'd only meet him, just once." Carrie set her cup down and rose to face him. A flush of hope came to her eyes."Meet them all, Andrew. I could bring them here, your ground. We could have them all to dinner and you'll see just why I like them, I know you will."

"Yeah, bring them round!" he cried with sarcastic enthusiasm."We'll eat sushi and have a big pajama party!" She was walking away again. Andrew's voice sprang at her back like a striking cat."Better still let's move Jason in with us! We can live together like fucking Rod, Jane and Freddie!"

The bathroom door slammed shut again.

**

The taxi was waiting outside. Andrew lugged the two suitcases down to the foyer and left them by the open door. The weight of them distressed him. Carrie came down a few minutes later, clutching her Gucci bag and a jazzy little umbrella, the picture of effortless elegance and style.

"I'll call you," she said.

"Tonight?"

"Yeah, tonight. Feed the cat."

"Sure, I'll feed it to next door's dog."

They smiled faintly together, an old joke, comfortable and familiar. Impatient, the taxi driver snatched the suitcases out of the foyer and loaded them into the boot of the car.

"I was going to give a few of the lads a call," Andrew said at last."Might go out for a few drinks and a game of pool or something."

"You should."

"You don't mind?"

"No. I trust you, Andy. I just wish you had trusted me more, that's all."

"Past tense," he said with a crooked little smile."Did I ever tell you about my stepdad, about how I tried to get rid of him when he was dating my mother?"

Carrie just shook her head and continued to watch his face with steady concern.

"Well, I put his shoes outside the door, that's all. He was staying over at our house a lot and I was sick of the sight of him. I don't know why because he was a nice guy and everything, but sometimes that's not enough is it? Being a nice guy I mean. One night, after they'd gone to bed, I sneaked downstairs and put his shoes on the front doorstep. It was a hint. Big hint. I couldn't say anything to his face because deep down I liked him and would have felt sorry for him afterwards, and because I didn't have the stomach for a showdown. All these years later I still think about him picking his shoes off the front step. And you know what, Carrie? I still feel like the world's biggest shit for doing that to him."

"You think too much, Andrew, that's your problem. Sometimes things are just things, you know? No hidden meanings or anything like that."

"Sometimes I wish you were ugly. Sometimes I wish you'd have an accident and end up in a wheelchair, that way you'd only be able to go outside if I was there to push you. What do you see in that, Carrie? Is that love or hate or what?"

She leaned forward and kissed him warmly on the cheek. Her perfume washed over him, a scent like roses and tragedy. The million pieces of his broken heart divided like cells.

"And I just want you to get out of the flat a bit more," she said.

They walked to the front door together. Outside the make-up was running on this bright cosmopolitan city, washing away under the force of a grim northern downpour. The young and the vibrant was overshadowed by the stern and imposing legacy of Victorian industrialism, by the ghosts of poverty and hardship.

"I did meet them, you know," Andrew said suddenly, almost too quiet to hear above the rushing wind and clattering rain."Well, almost."

Carrie tilted her head quizzically."What do you mean?"

"That night I was supposed to join you all at that Italian place, and I never turned up because I got a flat tyre on the way, and the spare was knackered...remember?"

She nodded.

"Well, I lied. I did turn up. I watched you all for about ten minutes. I was hiding behind those big rubber plants by the door. I couldn't go any further. You all looked so..." He shrugged and gazed at her helplessly."You all looked so young and attractive, so chic, you know? All of a sudden I felt old and ugly. I didn't belong with you."

She was silent for a long time, absorbing. "I don't know what to say."

"Best say nothing then."

She frowned slightly."No, no I'm glad you told me."

The taxi driver honked his horn.

"You'd better go," Andrew said, and she nodded absently."Sure you haven't left anything behind?"

She gave a dim smile and briefly squeezed his hand."Nothing I need," she said.

END