The Big Smoke

The third part of our weekly serialised story by Stephen Emms.

There are few things human beings are more committed to than unhappiness, thought Archie, as pain shot across his temples. ‘I’m going away for a while,’ read Rose’s email yesterday, ‘but there’s no point telling you where.’    

He had stared at the colourless patch of sky from the window, as a boy bounced a ball on the street corner below. The rain was so fine that if you squinted it was like the air particles were dancing. He poured a whisky on his tiny, bamboo-clad terrace. Traders were packing up for the day, their scaffolding clanging into the open mouths of vans. The road was littered with boxes, crisp packets, card folded into card, empty crates, wandering onions. 

So she wasn’t coming back. He lit a cigarette. Feature continues

Did the key to his happiness lie in the past, or would a future without Rose have some kind of meaning too? And if the only thing in life to aim for was happiness, once you achieved it –which he thought he had, with Rose – wasn’t that a kind of emptiness, anyway? Mothers in burkas flew along, children in tow, and hooded teens circled outside the chip shop, leaning into their bikes. Was life, in fact, better now that he was unhappy?

Perched in silence, he almost missed Ben’s call.       

‘I’ve split up with Daniel,’ his old university friend garbled, sounding sad and thrilled and distant, as if he were calling from Australia, not Manchester. ‘Can I come and stay for a few days?’

Benedict, who had left Israel to study veterinary science in Newcastle −

‘Snap.’ Archie heard himself chuckle. ‘Rose just walked out on me too this week.’

And now Ben was arriving in less than an hour.

***

Marianne sat on the bench, grey clouds frowning over her. So, her notebook had been taken. She had figured it would happen, but had dwelled in possibility; now, however, her delicate features were fixed with disappointment. The city slumped beneath the bushes.‘Pepper!’ a man shouted, as a Jack Russell pawed at her jeans. Her phone trilled. Unknown number.

‘You don’t know me,’ an older voice began, as velvety as her uncle’s, ‘but I believe I may have picked up a diary of yours.’

‘Oh really?’ She watched the Jack Russell shrink into the distance. ‘That’s brilliant −.’

‘My name is Leonard Mulberry. I found it earlier on the Heath – at least, I assume it’s yours. There was anumber −...’

Marianne couldn’t help smiling.‘Yes, yes. It’s mine.’

‘Do you want to collect it?’

On the overground train back to Dalston, she clutched her prize. Happiness, she realized, comes in many shades and tones. Leonard Mulberry, with his clipped white moustache and warm smile, had been friendly, producing tea and walnut cake in the shadows of his sitting room. She sighed, her eyes scanning the carriage.

Flicking through the notebook, she let out a gasp: Archie Bryant. A smiley face. An email address. Possibility ripened in her mind. She searched for a fellow passenger to share her joy, but their faces were blank, as if not a single word had passed their lips in their whole lifetimes.

For chapter 4, click here.