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I hear her voice in the sky. I’m walking through the park and I’m telling her I’m walking through the park and I hear myself tell her I’m walking through the park. My voice is mine and someone else’s. My voice is a radio. The radio is broadcasting my voice and my voice is calm. I am calm. There is a breeze on my face and the air is cool and smells of night. Blue Eyes is in the sky; the sky is dark blue and calm. The boy is with me. He feels like Kieron beside me, the way he walks, his energy, his smell. He’s young and he’s telling me his troubles like Kieron used to do. I tell him it’s going to be all right. I tell him being gay isn’t wrong. He’s going to be OK and one day he’ll find someone who loves him for all the reasons he thinks he’s unlovable. There’ll be heartbreak along the way but there’s heartbreak for everyone and the important thing in this life is to love, to get out there and love, love your head off and take the knocks as they come because living without love isn’t living at all, not really.
‘We get to the bench and he sits down,’ I hear myself say from the sky. ‘I put my arm around him. With my other hand I feel the knife in my bag. And he’s talking to me and I’m comforting him and telling him everything’s going to be OK. And then he says he needs to go and I say OK, all right, I’ll walk you back to the road, and there’s… there’s a smell. And he says he has to go. And I say I’ll walk with him but he says he’s changed his mind, he wants to stay awhile. I say OK. OK, love, I say, and I say goodbye and I wish him well and I tell him not to worry about things and I smell smoke. I can smell cigarette smoke. It’s strong, wafting over on the breeze. But there’s no one there. There’s no one… there’s no one there…’
‘Rachel?’ Blue Eyes, blue skies, calling my name my name my name. ‘Can you look in your bag, Rachel. Look inside your bag.’
‘I can,’ I say to the sky. I am calm and the air is cool. I am opening my bag and my bag is dark.
‘Can you tell me what’s in the bag, Rachel?’
‘My purse. My cloth bags for the supermarket.’
‘What else?’
‘My umbrella. Glasses case. Tissues.’
‘Can you find the knife, Rachel?’
I am looking into my bag and my bag is dark. I am rummaging around in my bag, rummaging around around around.
‘Can you find the knife, Rachel?’
‘It’s not in my… I can’t… but I can smell smoke.’ My breath comes shallow and fast. I am not calm. The air is cold.’
‘Can you find the knife, Rachel?’
‘The bench is cold. I can smell… I can smell cigarettes.’
‘Rachel, can you find the knife?’
‘Cigarette smoke. I can smell… Oh God. Oh God help me.’
‘Rachel.’ Amanda’s voice in the sky. ‘Rachel, it’s OK, we’re going to come out in one, two, three… out.’
I open my eyes. I am panting. There is sweat on my forehead and my mouth is dry.
Blue Eyes is looking at me with concern. ‘Are you all right?’
‘I said goodbye to him,’ I say. ‘I left him there on the bench. He was alive. There was an umbrella in my bag. Not a knife. I smelled cigarettes. But neither of us smoked.’
And at last she smiles, a proper smile with all her teeth. And I was right. It was worth the wait.
‘That’s very good,’ she says. ‘Good work.’
‘I comforted him.’
‘All right.’
‘I comforted him. I told him it was all going to be OK. We said goodbye. We had a little hug and I went on my way. I didn’t take the knife out of my bag – the knife wasn’t there. I could smell cigarettes even though there was no one else there. I don’t smoke. And he didn’t smoke. I didn’t put the knife in him. I just imagined it. I just imagined it. I didn’t kill him, did I? I didn’t kill that beautiful boy.’ My eyes fill.
‘Rachel, look at me.’
I look at Blue Eyes. Amanda, that’s her name. She is called Amanda Frost and she can see me.
‘Rachel, are you listening to me?’
‘Yes.’
‘You didn’t kill that boy.’
