Chapter 50: A Green Light (Part 1)
Cully was waiting to be disappointed. Not that it was what she wanted, but it was what she expected, she'd learned that much. Over the course of the last few months, it was what had happened more often than not. She turned over her wrist, glancing at the watch she rarely wore: a few minutes past seven. That's nothing, she reminded herself, tucking her left hand back into her elbow. A couple minutes is nothing, and he'd call if something came up…He was sometimes late, sometimes forced disappear into the afternoon or night, but he always came.
The normal evening life of a Friday night in Causton bustled past her as she paced at the withering edge of the green, her shoulder bag tucked into her side. The first of October, the last hints of sunset shone over the horizon and the cool night air nipped at her, biting through the grey cardigan she wore. She peeked at her watch again; eight past the hour.
Cully pulled her mobile from her bag, flipping it open...no message, no missed calls. She almost tapped out a short message—but she snapped it closed instead, dropping it back into her purse. She thrust her hands back into the crook of her arms, pushing her expectation aside. He was allowed a few minutes, wasn't he? That would be better than...Taking a few more steps as she shook the thoughts away, she turned back around—
Gavin rose in her vision, waving at her as he crossed the street, hurrying through a gap in the traffic. A smile broke across her face as she waved back. How was it that it only took a second for everything to change and transform: just one moment and everything was somehow different, that swelling happiness warming her chest. His jacket flapped around his torso as he slowed, and she held her place as he came closer.
"Sorry," he said, pausing a few feet away—and as often happened, his eyes wandered away from her. "I mean—"
"I was almost starting to wonder," she said, stepping closer. The knot in his tie had come slightly loose and few drops of sweat glistened on his cheeks beneath his mussed hair. She wanted to run her fingers through it, smooth it down...
"I almost got out early, just a wonky statue came out of that room."
What? It broke her examination of him, trying to comprehend what he said. "Statue?"
"You wouldn't believe what came out of that school," he said, loosening his tie further over his dark indigo shirt. "Spent most of the last hour taking notes on that one itself."
"Dad didn't say too much yesterday, just that it was unbelievable. And neither did you, by the way."
"Truth will out," he muttered, looking back at her. Somehow, beneath his gaze now, with her oversized grey cardigan slipping from one shoulder beneath a charcoal scarf, a white button-up shirt underneath both and a brown bag sliding from the other shoulder, she felt under-dressed. "Would have been here a bit earlier, but the traffic got in the way." He stopped again, and she tried to not watch him purse his lips, his eyes finally heavy on her. And how quickly they shifted away again, like even now, he was...almost self-conscious, looking at her like that. "You...look nice."
What way do you mean? Cully asked herself. Or is that just what..."Well, like you don't always," she managed, pulling her bag back up to her shoulder. And it was true, wasn't it? She could hardly remember a time he didn't, even if he wore a simple jacket and a pair of jeans.
"Part of the job, you could say."
"Oh, really?" she asked, his voice dragging her back from her thoughts—back from Sunday, if she was honest. In that moment, with his hands and mouth relearning her body and its curves, she had been ready to be anything he wanted, anything to keep him pressed to her and with her. Was that selfish? Only if it isn't what he wanted, she told herself. No worries about that answer.
"...be looking like part of the underworld," he was saying, opening the top button of his shirt before he looked at his watch.
"I don't think you need to worry about that, Gavin," she said quietly.
He ran his fingers through his hair, flattening it against his head. "You never know—"
Cully took a couple more steps toward him, near enough that her eyes could trace the barest hint of color and stubble along his jawline. "No, I think I'm certain." What are you doing? she asked herself. Don't pretend you don't know.
"Ah..." He scrubbed his fingers around the back of his neck, pulling his shirt collar from his skin for a second. "Did you—" He stopped for a second. "Did you think about a film you might want to see?"
"Yes. Did you?"
"A little." He almost laughed with a shake of his head, thrusting one hand into his pocket. "Not too much time lately, thanks to Mr. Eckersley-whats-it."
"You still don't like him, do you?" Sometimes, Gavin felt like a character right out of a daytime drama, he was so predictable.
"What's there to like?"
"I'll have to take your word for it, but I don't think Dad's too fond of him either."
"I'd worry if he was."
"I'm sure."
"Where to?" he asked quietly—and held out his right hand to her, waiting for her—looking at her, the barest tremor in his fingers fading in a second.
Her heart skipped ahead. Outside, where eyes pried—ever ready and eager to ask questions, at least in Gavin's imagination—he was inevitably wary and hesitant. But in the privacy of his flat, sometimes even in her parents' back garden, those hours immersed in their own tiny world of scripts and lines and memories: there and then, he was freer, less constricted. (Particularly in his flat where he was almost unrestrained...not that she minded.) And now, standing before her in the greying twilight as his pristine façade frayed at the edges and loosened, his hesitation was for her. Her choice.
Cully pressed her hand into his. His larger hand folded around hers, his palm warm against her skin as his fingers tightened. Her heart pounded again, like her pulse was ready to throb to the tips of her fingers. She wanted to say...well, anything...But this, it felt like something she might crush, like accidentally trodding on a spider. Fragile or breakable.
As they strode along the green, occasionally pushed closer together to avoid colliding with other pedestrians lost in their own thoughts, Cully snuck a glance up at him. Under the city's streetlamps, the angles and curves of his face gleamed against its own shadows. Pale as ever, his chin was the slightest bit rounder than she first remembered—but not even a trace of a flush. So often, she wondered if he felt exposed, out like this; even as she chided and prodded, she did understand his qualms.
Her father had worked with Gavin long enough that, over the years, she and her mother had come to know him rather better than any of the other officers, even before the beginning of this summer. But they still knew many of the others much more than just to ask "Hello, how's your son, is he at university yet?" or "What does your wife do again?" Even at CID, rumors and innuendos bubbled beneath the surface, rising at the worst time. And even if he had never said so, Cully sometimes wondered how much it troubled him—if it did.
He was speaking again. "Where was it you wanted to go?" he asked, and she looked up once more.
"Oh—there's a small cinema—somewhere nearby." Causton's primary cinema—with domestic first runs; the latest Hollywood extravaganzas finally reaching Europe after weeks exclusively in America; and its dull, whitewashed interior, utterly lacking in personality—stood a few blocks from the Playhouse. Making a point? Cully had often wondered. Some days, she knew how Sisyphus felt. The struggle to create drama and art on a wooden stage beneath scalding lights never ended—but against the dizzying bright effects and explosions and actors commanding millions of pounds for a single role...Sometimes, it felt like a rigged game that a theater show or small film could never win.
"That's helpful," Gavin muttered.
"I haven't been there for a while, that's what I meant."
"I know." He glanced down, running his fingers over the back of her hand. "It's been a long couple of days, Cully."
"Then why didn't you say something?" she asked quietly, her palm beginning to sweat—not that she wanted him to let go of her hand. It was an honest enough question, even when she sometimes didn't want to know the answer.
"Why are you asking? Don't you know?"
"That wasn't what I meant, Gavin—"
"So why complain?"
"I'm not." She clenched her hand and he stopped at her side.
"I didn't mean to be sharp." He loosened his fingers, but she kept hers tight, still holding him close.
"You weren't." His eyebrows crinkled together. "Well, not really," she added. "I just—never mind. But there's a new film about Peter Sellers—a biography, I guess. It was broadcast on telly before, but they've just released it in cinemas today."
They finally continued forward again and Cully let out a deep breath, walking closer beside him, her arm touching his. In the silence that settled for a few minutes, she almost wanted to apologize. She hadn't wanted him to feel guilty, second guessing every word because her own tongue was too sharp and always had been.
"Peter Sellers," Gavin said at last. "Inspector...How do you say that name?"
"Clouseau," she said slowly. "Among other things."
At last, he smiled again, maybe remembering a few moments of saxophones dancing amongst the rest of orchestra, a song so iconic you remembered it even without seeing the film. "Better than the latest action flick, you reckon?"
"Probably." Working their way from the edge of the green, Cully rifled through her own memory, recalling more of the actor's roles that Gavin might be familiar with. He knew a few, and that would have to do, she decided.
The older streets of Causton rose around them, bumpy streets with a few worn bricks breaking through the asphalt snaking between the buildings. Many a café and tea shop lived here, smaller bookshops as well; deep in the mix, a couple of smaller theaters stood alongside two or three small cinemas. The Jupiter* had gone through several names over the years—Cully couldn't remember them all, though the changes had ceased before she left for university—but its exterior...well, that was almost constant. Its pale yellow sign, name in large black letters above a reel of film, capped twin columns clad in purple and yellow, the checks not quite worthy of Harlequin. Beneath the eaves, a few people queued before its lone ticket window, buried beneath the shadows of the early twilight.
"Never been here before," Gavin said as they took their place at the end of the line.
"I'm not surprised." There she went again. "I mean, I know you're not a massive fan of theater—or more theatrical films."
"Well, they don't have that punch, do they?"
Cully shivered as another breeze wound its path through the narrow street, cooler in the vanishing twilight. By the streetlamps, she just saw the swirling clouds: grey against the darkening gloom. "That isn't always the point."
Ahead of them, the queue moved in pairs as an ancient till rang in succession, the jingling louder with every few steps. "Wouldn't find that anywhere else," Gavin said quietly into Cully's ear.
The couple before them hesitated, one of them scrambling to shove his wallet in his pocket as the other collected the tickets. "If it's not broken, no reason to fix it." Now the man lost hold his keys, crouching down to retrieve them.
"I suppose."
Sheltered behind the ticketing window's shiny glass with its brass speaker, a young man sat, his thumbs already bouncing over the keypad on his mobile as the couple at the window finally stepped aside, hurrying into the door for the theater proper. A pair of earrings dangled from one his lobes beneath bright white hair and a stack of rubbery black bracelets lined his left wrist. "Um, excuse me?" Cully asked, her eyes scanning over the films and their times. Well, she meant to: the film they had discussed—the Peter Sellers biography—was listed alone, a showing in about twenty minutes. Don't they have at least two screens?
The young man's pale face popped up, darker eyebrows testifying to the bleach that must have been painted on his hair, a few dabs of dark liner around his eyes. "Yes, how can I help?"
Cully tried not wince at the man's high-pitched voice. Don't say anything, Gavin, she begged in her mind. Just let it alone. His hand stiffened around hers and a glance at him saw his jaw clench. "Um, two tickets for the Peter Sellers film, please."
The clerk's eyes dropped his phone, the screen glowing as a message came through. "Sold out until ten," he muttered, his focus now on his own conversation. "Sorry..."
"So then, what's the next thing?" Gavin asked, shuffling his feet. Cully didn't need to ask: she already knew what was troubling him as she finally pulled her hand free.
The clerk pointed up to the sign behind him, the thumb on his other hand still running over his mobile's keypad. "Other screen: House On Haunted Hill**, starts in...twenty minutes."
"House on what—"
"That's fine," Cully said loudly, despite the film's absence from the sign.
The young man glanced up finally, dropping his jaw into a hand he propped on his elbow. "Hmm?"
Happily, Gavin didn't say anything beyond a muffled thank you as they collected their tickets; the clerk had muttered how the showing was only half sold, leaving plenty of seats toward the back with the clearest view of the screen. A few feet away, as he opened the door for her, he said, "He might want to stop and pay attention to what's behind him, not—"
"Gavin, we're at the cinema," she interrupted as he followed her into the lobby. "This is supposed to be about having fun—together. There's no sense in getting upset at the salesman."
"Yeah."
The cooler evening air disappeared as the door fell shut, Gavin stepping rather closer to her than she expected. Even after all the years since she had set foot here, the interior remained almost unchanged: bright singular colors painted over whole walls, silvery spiky ornaments dangling from the ceiling, a small balcony behind a wooden banister set over the concession. Despite it being a Friday evening, the lobby was fairly empty, a short line for snacks, a moderately longer one to hand off tickets to the usher. "Well, you aren't seeing this at most cinemas," Gavin said, glancing up and down at the vibrant walls and vicious chandeliers.
"You might someplace similar."
"Artists don't know when to stop?"
"Something like that."
He looked at his watch, though she glanced over his shoulder instead at the large antique clock clinging to the wall, the mahogany harsh against the intense red. "Care for a drink?" he asked.
That would be nice, Cully thought. The only other time she had attended any sort of theater with Gavin (her mother's drama group didn't count in her mind), drinks in the interval had been almost as pleasant as the play. But…"How about dinner later instead? It's not too long." She unraveled the first loop of her scarf as they walked further into the warmer lobby, loosening the layers beneath from the base of her throat. "And," she added, another faster heartbeat deep in her chest, "we never did find dinner, that evening." No, dinner had faded into something else, satisfying a hunger burning much deeper, stronger, and harsher.
He had a half smile as he took her right hand one more time—firmer than ever—and she wondered if he was remembering that night as well, breathing harder and harder, falling farther and farther into...She shivered. "Whatever you say," Gavin said quietly, letting her lead the way to the queue marked House On Haunted Hill. It was rather shorter than the one opposite. "At least they managed to have it marked in here."
"Shh," Cully hissed, squeezing his fingers as they took another few steps forward, the usher seated at his podium ripping away the bottom half of tickets, handing them back with a reminder of assigned seating.
"The title sounds a bit familiar, doesn't it?"
"It's a rerun, that's all."
"Don't remember if I've ever seen it."
She tugged her scarf away at last with her left hand, tucking it into her bag. "It's a bit older. A murder story—of sorts." She laughed under her breath. "Just right for the first day of October."
Gavin searched through his jacket pocket, for their tickets Cully assumed, ready to present. "So—a mystery, is it?"
"I guess you could put it that way."
"You don't sound certain."
"Well, it's a little difficult to take seriously, the effects being what they are. You'll probably solve it before the end, Gavin."
"You think they'd have something different to show—something new." He fell silent, the light and shadows rising and falling over the angles and curves on his face. "'If it's not broken' again, is it?"
"Just so," Cully said quietly. There may be hope for you and drama yet.
Coming face to face with the usher as he tore away the bottom portion of their tickets before dropping them into his box ("You'll be in the middle, almost at the back of the auditorium."), she pulled him forward faster. "There's plenty of time before it starts," Gavin said, though he followed without any real protest. "It's just adverts right now."
"I'd rather not trip over everyone else in the dark. Although at least out here, you can see your mobile to turn off the sound."
He didn't protest, setting it to silent with her as they continued along the corridor.
The overhead lights in the auditorium were half-dimmed, shapes suddenly without form, voices low and murmuring in the darkness. Along the stairs leading to the back rows, minuscule lights twinkled on the sides, marking each step. Within a few seconds, Cully's vision sharpened anew, the brass numbers bolted to the end armrest of each row emerging from the shadow. "It's smaller than I remember," she said quietly, letting Gavin's hand loose to better keep her own balance.
"Didn't you say you hadn't been here for years?" he asked. Maybe it was a trick in her mind, Cully wondered, or some sort of gust of air from a vent, but she thought she felt his fingers drift across curve of her lower back.
"Yes, but I didn't remember it this small." As they climbed higher, she noticed more cinemagoers at first. Still ascending the stairs searching for their row, however, the numbers decreased; when she at last found their row, almost flush against the very back wall and the projection window, only two others sat at the far end.
Settling back in her seat, she slipped her bag off her shoulder and tucked it beside her left leg as Gavin sat on her right. "So, what's the point of this haunted house, that you're not sure is a mystery?" he asked, bending closer, whispering into her ear. For the second time that evening, his breath rustled against the fine hairs at the base of her skull, tickling her cheek, stoking—
"What?" she asked, turning toward him. His face was a few inches from hers: even in the artificial dusk she traced the thin lines feathering across his forehead, brushing against the corners of his eyes. And what else, unspoken, lingering on his mouth, waiting...She blinked, sucking in a deep breath as heat burst through her skin. "Uh..."
Gavin leaned back again and after a second he coughed, covering his mouth with his fist as his shoulder brushed against hers— And then vanished. She could still see his nose and chin, his arm in his lap, looking straight ahead again. Oh, Gavin. Thrusting a chunk of her own pale hair behind her ear, she propped her elbow on the rest between them, staring ahead the advert for some sort of fizzy drink. More than a few times over the past weeks—even as he flushed and sometimes protested—Cully thought, or maybe hoped, she saw something else.
No, it wasn't just her imagination she decided, her chin sinking into her palm. Sunday—coming to collect her from home; asking her here, knowing she would say goodbye to her parents, that she wouldn't pretend to have been with anyone else; forgetting his hesitation completely less than a quarter of an hour ago, his warmth and roughness bleeding into her...Even as creaking cut through her thoughts, she frowned. And no, it wasn't too much to ask—
A gentle weight sank across the top of her back, fingers curling around the top of her left arm. "Sorry." Now for the third time tonight, she felt Gavin's voice in a shudder against her ear and face.
"Don't say that." She pressed her face against his shoulder for a brief moment as the electronic warning droned throughout the auditorium, reminding them all turn off or silence mobile phones. "Don't worry about it."
Following the very first credits—a woman's shriek from behind the blank screen—the flattened, dead words of a man who wore fright on both his face and in his eyes—the black and white images began to fly across the screen. Funerary cars wound along an empty, withered road to an abandoned mansion as Cully settled deeper against Gavin's shoulder, feeling him breath deeper once or twice.
She remembered watching this once or twice many years ago, maybe even in a drama class. After all, it was just as important to know what not to do, even as entertaining as campy films and productions could be. As each of the characters suffered introductions from their host Frederick Loren unaware, Gavin whispered his own opinions, leaning closer as he did. She tried to listen, not feel his words in her belly, not now.
Lance Schroeder, a test pilot who needed the money if he was brave enough to stay all night. ("Doesn't know what's good for him, it sounds like.") Ruth Bridges, a newspaper columnist allegedly planning to write a feature article on ghosts, but in need of money to stoke a gambling habit. ("Busy body.") Watson Pritchard, the manor's owner, his own history and ten thousand US dollars—in 1959!—mixing into a bleak darkness buried in his eyes. ("Doesn't know what's good for him either, does he?" "Shh!") Dr. David Trent, a psychiatrist specializing in hysteria, perhaps with a greedy look to him, and certainly something off to Gavin. ("Sounds like an Oxford toff, poking his nose where it doesn't belong.") Finally, Nora Manning, who worked for one of Loren's companies to support her family, probably a secretary. "Isn't she pretty?" the older high pitched voice queried, the young woman peering out the window with no idea of how she was being picked apart by her employer. You can almost hear Loren licking his lips, Cully thought. ("Creepy." "Oh, like you wouldn't say the same thing?" "He makes her sound like a cut of meat." "You sound like you're about to interrogate someone." "What else do you expect?" "For you to watch it, not jump to conclusions already.")
* Modeled on a small cinema close to where I used to live, both physically and in choice of films.
** This movie was chosen for many reasons. It's public domain, first day of October in the story (even though I've heard Halloween is nowhere as big as in the US), and...Vincent Price, who did some acting in the UK!