The Beginning of the End of the World
by Katy Darby
Everybody’s got their own story about End of the World Night, haven’t they? Just like everyone can tell you where they were when Princess Diana died.
A lot of people went out and got drunk or high; some stayed in, alone or with friends, and did the same. Some watched it on TV, or hid in the cellar with panic-bought groceries, spare batteries and the kids in sleeping bags, muffled and waiting like pupae. Quite a few went to the Apocalypse in the Park gig, organized by the K foundation, that one where Amy Winehouse actually showed up and played alongside all those death-metal bands. It was shit, apparently.
Still more of us ignored the whole thing, of course, carried on as usual, assumed it was all a hoax or a prank, although given the nature of the invitations I was pretty sure our host, at least, was taking the forthcoming End of Days very seriously indeed. But I went along; I mean, why not? Tower Bridge was only a couple of stops away and it was a nice night for it. I had to work next morning – or perhaps, ha ha, I didn’t – but I reckoned quite a few people would be chucking sickies tomorrow, and that they’d be so glad to have survived (assuming we did survive, that was) that the bollocking would be worth it.
Edgar and me and Raoul and Daisy had made a pact to go along together and get there early, so we’d have a good view of whatever went down (rains of fire, moon of blood, the Woman Clothed in the Sun riding a seven-headed beast, etc.) Ed packed matching insulated backpacks full of posh sandwiches, champagne and Belgian beer, plus a bottle of Talisker from Christmas which he planned to open only if the world did not end. We had a bit of a fight about that, actually; I maintained that we ought to drink the whisky just before zero hour – have a toast during the countdown, perhaps, so that if the apocalypse did actually happen, we’d at least have drunk it.
“But if it doesn’t, we’ll have nothing to celebrate with!” Ed objected.
“Yes we will,” I said. “We’ve got three bottles of champagne, remember? Which I’m carrying.”
“You know I don’t like champagne,” said Ed.
This was news to me. “You drink it.”
“Yeah, of course. It’s traditional, isn’t it? But I don’t really like it.”
“Well, I don’t really like whisky. Why can’t you take Bailey’s instead?”
He stared at me. “I’m not even going to dignify that with an answer.”
“You just did.” Ha. Score one to me.
“Oh, shut up.” Ed stomped off to make the smoked salmon sandwiches. Those were his idea; I wanted to get fish and chips along the way, but Ed insisted. Anyone would have thought we were going to bloody Glyndebourne.
As we were sulking in separate rooms, the phone rang. I waited just long enough to hear Ed’s exasperated sigh and the thud of water in the sink as he rinsed his salmony hands before I picked up the receiver next to me.
“Hello?”
“All right Faith? It’s Raoul.”
Raoul always introduces himself on the phone, even though we’ve known him and Daisy for four years and even though he’s got about the most distinctive voice I’ve ever heard, like hot cloudy honey. Or maybe like sap flowing slowly from a maple tree when they tap them in Canada, in the spring snow.
Sometimes I have a little daydream that Ed and Daisy will go off on a business trip together and their plane will crash on a deserted island. They’ll both be fine, naturally, and given how clever and resourceful and generally perfect both of them are, I expect they’ll have built a luxury villa, organic jungle café and airstrip by the time they’re rescued – but meanwhile (and this is the important bit) Raoul and I will be in shock, pole-axed by mutual, nearly inconsolable distress, mourning together nightly; comforting one another. We’d develop this weird, terrible bond that no one else could possibly share or understand, like in Random Hearts, and we’d spend long evenings staying up and talking about what had happened and how we felt. Raoul would probably write a lot of songs about it; maybe a whole album of those heartbreaking acoustic numbers he does so well, and I’d always be the first to hear them, and tell him they were beautiful, because they would be. And –
“Faith? Hello?”
“Hey Raoul, still here.”
“Thinking about the Apocalypse?” There was a grin in his honey-maple voice.
“Just watching the build-up coverage. They’re really going for it.”
The Government and the police and all the usual suspects had initially issued blanket denials of the end of the world being in the offing, followed by denouncements of our host, whoever he was (Forensics still hadn’t been able to track him down, even after a year of trying) as a hoaxer, a crook, a David Blaine-style attention-seeker, and my personal favorite, a “psychological terrorist”.
But when it began to look like everybody but them was taking it pretty seriously, they admitted defeat and started organizing crowd-control and extra police officers and so on. A bit like Millennium Night, except that this time everybody was hoping rather than fearing that it would all cock up. Which, on reflection, made it a lot like Millennium Night.
“I was just calling to say that Daisy can’t make it tomorrow,” said Raoul. I felt a twinge of disappointment. Daisy is a bit of a robot, admittedly, with her seventy-hour weeks and offensively exquisite grooming and her ability to make imperfect human beings, i.e. everyone around her but Edgar, feel as though they have, in some final and indefinable way, failed at their lives. But she loosens up after a few drinks, and – well, she’s part of our foursome. Two couples minus one person equals couple-and-gooseberry. It’s like an atomic nucleus losing a proton; it makes the whole structure unstable. But I wasn’t really surprised. Daisy was always skipping things like this, and it was always for the same reason.
“Work?” I asked.
Raoul sighed. “Yeah, as usual. She’s got a huge presentation tomorrow morning and needs to work on it.”
I stared at the muted television. BBC News 24 was showing an invitation, like everyone in the country didn’t know what they looked like by now. “Have you mentioned that there might not be a work to go to tomorrow morning? Might not be a tomorrow?”
“Tried that,” said Raoul. “She said she wasn’t prepared to risk it.”
“You’re still coming though, aren’t you?”
“Wouldn’t miss it for the world.”
I grimaced into the receiver. “Ba-dum-tisssshhh!”
“Sorry.”
“S’okay. What time are you coming round, then?”
“Well, sunset’s at, what, nine?”
“Nine-twenty,” I said.
“So I’ll come round straight after work, sixish, we’ll have a couple at yours and watch the coverage on TV, and then set off. Sound like a plan?”
“OK,” I said, feeling ridiculously happy. Ed wandered into the living-room and proffered a plate of tiny, crustless pink-and-white sandwiches.
“It’s Raoul,” I said. “Daisy can’t make it.” I popped a sandwich into my mouth.
Ed made a sympathy face. “Poor Daze,” he said, loud enough for Raoul at the other end to hear. “Work, I suppose?” He sounded almost envious. He and Daisy are the same age with the same degree, but she’s his line-manager, and although he’d never admit it to her, let alone me, this itches him like a mosquito-bite. It’s almost funny, how competitive he gets about staying late and coming in early. I know that look of envy on his face when he talks about the meetings he doesn’t get invited to.
“These are great,” I said, and smiled up at Ed, taking another sandwich. He looked pleased and grateful.
“What are?” asked Raoul in my ear.
“Have to wait and see, won’t you?” I said. “Ed sends his love to Daisy, by the way.”
“Cheers,” said Raoul. “I’ll pass it on. See you tonight.” And he hung up.
* * *
As it was such a beautiful evening, and as tradition
dictates that on every national holiday or major event, the
Underground will be buggered, we decided to walk from our
place to Tower Hill, and maybe have a drink at a pub along
the way. Ed objected to this idea on the grounds that a) we
already had two bottles of champagne (we’d finished one
before setting out) and b) we wouldn’t get a good spot on
the bridge if we stopped off, but Raoul and I shouted him
down.
“It’ll be harder to get a place in the pub than on the
bridge,” Raoul argued. “I mean, where would
you
rather spend
your last night on Earth?”
Ed considered. “You’ve got a point.”
We decided to break our journey at the first pub we saw
after Tower Hill tube.
“That way we’ll be nearly there,” I said.
“Let’s get an outside table,” said Raoul.
I wasn’t too keen; after only fifteen minutes’ walking I
was already unpleasantly sweaty and I knew my eyeliner was
running in the heat. I’d tried to strike a balance between
practical and glamorous when choosing my outfit, but my
shirt was already sticking and the heavy backpack chafed my
shoulders.
“No,” I said. “let’s look for a big pub with lots of full
tables outside and then go inside
and
cool off.”
Ed looked a bit taken aback at my vehemence.
“All right,” he said, as though I’d just offered to fight
him over it.
“Are you OK with that rucksack, Faith?” Raoul asked me.
“Shall I take it for a bit?”
I smiled at him gratefully and shook my head.
* * *
The pubs, as I’d predicted, were heaving outside but
half-empty inside. We chose the first one with
air-conditioning and stood just inside the door, feeling
the sweat chill on our skin as the AC whirred and sighed.
Everyone else was out on the picnic tables, enjoying the
longest day of the year, drunk on sun.
“They’d better soak it up,” said Raoul in an odd,
portentous voice. “Might be the last time.”
Ed smiled and then frowned.
“Better get you a drink old son,” he said.
Raoul and I found a table while Ed went to the bar. Raoul
was acting a bit strange, I remember; it seemed that the
nearer we approached Tower Bridge, the more antsy he got,
until he could hardly bear to sit still. His eyes were
darting everywhere and he looked sickly pale beneath his
Mediterranean tan. I wondered if he’d done some coke or
something when he’d nipped to the Gents. After all, if it
was your final evening on Earth (and Raoul looked like he
was beginning to believe that it was) then why the hell
not? I imagined a lot of London’s dealers were feeling like
all their Christmases had come at once.
I was a little surprised to find so many pubs open along
the way, actually – after all, even if you only
half-thought that anything interesting, let alone the end
of the world, was going to happen, surely you wouldn’t want
to work through it? Well, unless you were Daisy. Christmas
and New Year were different (I used to be a barmaid and I’d
work every overtime shift I could get my hands on over the
festive season); they were an opportunity to choose
long-term gain over short-term loss, money over time. But
all the money in the world won’t do you any good if time
itself is suddenly running out.
“Are you OK?” I asked Raoul. He looked at me and smiled a
sweet scared smile.
“S’pose so,” he said. “I wish Daisy was here.”
“Yeah, I know what you mean.” Daisy was so organized and
sensible; I was pretty sure the world wouldn’t dare to end,
even a little bit, if she was around.
Ed returned with drinks.
“See they’ve got themed music,” he said, smugly, and drank
off the head of his beer, then licked his lips precisely.
Raoul and I listened to the faint, piped notes seeping from
the recessed speakers. When we recognized the song, I
groaned and Raoul laughed. It was REM’s The End of
the World As We Know It.
“Wonder if that’s on repeat?” I said.
“Which album’s this off?” asked Raoul.
“The Best
End of the World Album … Ever!” I suggested.
“Apocalypse
Aid?” said Ed.
“How many songs about that can there be, anyway?” I
wondered.
“Oh, more than you’d think,” Raoul said instantly, and a
look of concentration passed across his face. This was a
music question, something he was good at. He looked
relieved to have something else to think about; a trivial
but absorbing task. I watched his face and slid into that
daydream again.
What if the world ended and somehow Raoul and I survived,
the last two people alive, wandering through the emptiness
together? I wondered what our kids would look like. Awful,
probably.
Raoul isn’t handsome. He’s got an odd-shaped, sulky-looking
face with lush, childish lips, heavy cheeks, brown eyes and
golden-tan skin. He wears his curly dark hair long and wild
in classic rock-musician style. Daisy and I share a
loathing for long hair on men (Ed has a
short-back-and-sides), but I forgive it in Raoul: it suits
him. When people see him and ice-blonde, silk-and-cashmere
Daisy together they’re always surprised. I’ve fielded a lot
of glancing comments from Daisy’s girlfriends (they’re
always girlfriends, never just friends) about slumming it
and bits of rough. Ed told me once, drunk after the firm’s
Christmas drinks last year, that Daisy was pregnant when
she and Raoul got married; that Raoul wouldn’t have
proposed otherwise. He sounded angry. Daisy lost the baby
soon after the wedding, and went back to work the next day.
I love it when Raoul sings; he has a clear, solid, yearning
voice which streaks bright
across the music like paint on canvas. Beautiful white
teeth, strong like a horse’s. The sort of physique that’s
obviously never been given a thought, and looks infinitely
better for it. He’s still got that adolescent leanness
about him, with just enough muscle to take the edge off it.
And, unlike most attractive men, he has no
self-consciousness. He takes his shirt off when he’s
playing gigs sometimes, when it gets hot like a boiler-room
with all the sweat and steam rising off the audience, and I
have to look, and then look away.
“Until the
End of the World,” said Raoul.
Ed nodded wisely. “U2, right?”
Raoul had a glassy look in his eyes.
“How about that Carpenters song?” Ed said suddenly. “You
know the one.”
Raoul’s brow creased. “There’s a few of them. How does it
go?”
Ed took a breath. Oh
Lord, I
thought, don’t sing.
Don’t sing in the pub.
“Why does my heart go on beating?
Why do these eyes of mine cry?
Don’t they know it’s the end of the world?
It ended when we said goodbye.”
He was half-speaking, half-singing under his breath. Raoul
glanced at me briefly, then looked down at the beer-rings
on the table, a funny half-smile on his face. When Ed
stopped I relaxed, unclenching my embarrassed fists. I knew
the song from somewhere; an advert, maybe, or a TV theme
tune. Ed grinned triumphantly at his feat.
“Well,” I said, “I’m going to the loo.”
* * *
I avoided my own stare in the mirror; I already knew that
those swathes of skin which weren’t cave-dweller white were
pink from the unaccustomed sun, my shoulders just starting
to blister from the frottage of my champagne-heavy
backpack. I should have brought a jacket. And I also knew
that if I looked, I’d then have to spend a lot of time and
effort making myself up to look halfway-decent in the awful
fluorescent toilet-light, and would resemble a dowdy
drag-queen as soon as I went outdoors.
I washed my hands. My fingers were fat with the June heat
and my left hand hurt when I made a fist, the wedding ring
digging into the flesh of my third finger. On impulse, I
slathered soap on and began sliding the ring up and down
until it eased tightly over the knuckle and shot into my
waiting palm. I dried my hands on a paper towel, pocketed
the ring and refused to look myself in the glass as I
walked out.
* * *
When I got back Raoul was scribbling something on a
bar-napkin and Ed was lost in thought, a frown ruching his
forehead. I realized wearily that this had, inevitably,
become a competition for Ed, yet another forum for his
constant need to prove himself.
“Whoops
Apocalypse,” Ed said
desperately, as I approached the table. “Oh no, that’s a
film.”
“End of the
World,” said Raoul.
“The Cure.”
Ed frowned.
“Good one.”
“What are you writing, Raoul? A list?” I leaned over to see
and he hid it from me with a crooked arm, like a clever kid
in an exam.
“Nothing. A song, maybe.” He glanced up at me. Brown eyes,
almost black; crinkled, shining, like his hair. “Got any
paper?”
I rummaged through my handbag, dumping tissues, pens,
make-up and receipts onto the table. In there too was a
clean white card I’d forgotten I’d brought. Raoul reached
hungrily for it, but I flipped it over.
“No,” I said, “not that.”
“Oh,” he said, and withdrew his hand.
“Why’d you bring your invitation?” asked Ed.
“Just in case,” I said.
“Why not?” said Raoul tightly. I realized then that he’d
brought his too. Our borough was the first to get the cards
in the whole of London, and Raoul and I were the first in
our neighborhood. We’d met up, matched them, thought it was
a joke at first. Well, everyone had. All those expensive
stiff cards, gold-edged like wedding invitations,
beautifully hand-lettered in black ink. A central London
postmark, June 21st. I got it next day, the 22nd. A year
ago exactly. It’s funny to think that if Ed had come
downstairs before me that morning, he’d have been the first
person in the country to receive an invitation to the end
of the world.
Raoul stroked the faded gold border on my card and tipped
it up to the low pub light.
“You are cordially invited,” he read, “to join your host in
celebrating the Revelation of the Apocalypse at sundown
(9.20pm GMT) on 21st June at Tower Bridge, London SE1.
Dress: come as you are. All welcome.”
He laid it gently flat again. Ed sucked on his pint.
“Millions of the bloody things,” he mused. “What a nutter.”
I watched Raoul: his stillness unnerved me. He was
somewhere else entirely. I reached out and slid the card
slowly from under his fingers. He didn’t react.
“Penny for them?”
“Just thinking,” he said.
“Obviously. About what?”
“What if it really does happen?” he said, and as he said it
he looked right into my eyes, serious as a car crash, dead
on. “What will we do?”
It was like staring into a bright light. I looked away. The
truth was that I hadn’t really thought about it. I hadn’t
ever taken it any more seriously than the Millennium, or
the wars in Iraq, or the undeniable but easily forgettable
fact that one day I, myself, would die.
There was an awkward silence.
“Cheer up mate,” said Ed, who had the knack of saying
exactly the wrong thing at moments such as these, “it might
never happen.”
Raoul didn’t bother smiling. I thought about Daisy at home,
face underlit by her laptop’s glow, focused on the future.
“Another drink?” I said.
Ed checked his watch.
“Better press on,” he said. Raoul scribbled something else
on the napkin, folded it and put it in the pocket of his
leather jacket. Then he zipped the pocket.
“No peeking,” he told me. I shouldered my rucksack and we
left the moody gloom of the pub and joined the evening
stream of people flowing towards Tower Bridge.
It was almost half-eight by now, the sun low and lazy in
the sky. Ed and Raoul walked quickly, drawing ahead of me;
I struggled to keep up. Nearing the bridge, we could see
the day-glo yellow of crowd-control, the human chain
breaking; the panicky, shifting police-horses drawing
slowly towards the pressure areas. My heart hiccupped in my
chest, and I laughed nervously, pointlessly; they’d clearly
abandoned any attempt to control the situation. There were
far too many people, all heading in one direction like
migrating animals; a slow stampede. Ed grabbed my hand and
dragged me closer. The mob shuddered around us, yelling,
waving, crushing us against one another like pulped fruit,
close-packed as cattle
trundling to slaughter. I looked around
for Raoul but I couldn’t see him. Panic lanced my stomach.
“Ed!” I shouted. He was pulling me towards the southern
tower of the bridge; the high arch of baroque orange
brickwork looming above our heads. He didn’t react. I
glanced behind us, sweeping the crowd, and caught a flash
of brown curls and mustard-colored t-shirt (thank goodness
he was conspicuous). Raoul was scanning the approach behind
us, wide-eyed searching for Ed and me. I waved crazily. My
watch said 9 p.m. The slanted sunset light drenched
everyone in gold. The faces of the crowd glowed, their skin
shone; their eyes were blind against the light like the
blank eyes of statues. Raoul couldn’t see me. He looked
beautiful. Sadness buckled my body, and I felt free and
weak as water. I let my rucksack fall with a clank,
startling Ed.
“You go on,” I said. “I’ll get Raoul. Meet you on the
bridge.”
I turned back towards Raoul. The amber light made him
ageless, like something preserved, perfect and dead, since
the last time the world ended.
He’d look like shit in ten years’ time. So would I. And
maybe we didn’t even have that long; although that way at
least we’d die pretty. They haunted his features even now;
the ghost of the old man he’d become and the shadow of the
child he’d been. I could see the mask of Raoul’s
middle-aged self settling over his face, sagging and
roughening it, dragging it down. Ed, on the other hand,
would age well. Time would make his face more manly, knock
the edges off that feminine delicacy. The blond hair would
turn silver-fox grey, but he’d still look young for his
age. People would start mistaking me for his mother. I knew
all this, the way that you walk outside and know it’s going
to rain, and I didn’t care. Sooner or later we all fade and
die. Bang or whimper, it doesn’t matter: they both end in
silence.
I caught Raoul’s eye and he smiled delightedly, wading
through the crush towards me. I turned to Ed but he had
disappeared into the crowd.
It was almost a joke, this slow-motion coming together, by
the time we finally reached each other. We were only a few
feet apart but we couldn’t quite touch, separated by a
sturdy pair of hiker-types. I grabbed his warm hand at last
and laughed with triumph, and he did the same. It was like
a game we’d unexpectedly won.
And then the crowd surged forward a little, shivering its
flanks, and pushed us together. His arms came around me
tightly; I smelled the hot leather of his jacket and felt
his mouth on my mouth, warm lips and stubble and sweat, and
then we were kissing as though that was what it was all
about, all it was ever about; as though we were lonely and
afraid, because we were.
I didn’t want to open my eyes. I hid my face in his hair,
clinging to him like a baby monkey. I could hear
everything, the murmuring bicker of the people around us,
the far-flung braying of the stopped traffic, even the
river’s rush twenty feet below. His body was steady, like a
stone in a stream, as he held us against the urging of the
crowd, pushing under the arch and onto the bridge proper.
He was shorter than Ed, slighter, but stronger than he
looked. I felt his mouth soft on my cheek, in my hair.
“It’s OK,” he said. “Whatever happens.”
I couldn’t answer. My voice had lodged in my throat, like a
nut. I sank my head
into his chest. I wasn’t shaking; it felt like the other
side of cold, when your body stops shivering to keep warm
and just relaxes into stillness, gives up. We were pressed
against the scabby barrier on the eastern edge, nothing
between the sunset and us except an ache of empty air and
the dark water throbbing beneath us. I held on to the
railings so hard my fingers went white and numb. Raoul held
on to me.
“Nine-fifteen,” somebody said behind me.
Everyone’s faces turned towards the lowering sun as it
blazed slowly towards the horizon. My eyes streamed and
blurred; it looked like it was underwater as it trembled on
the glimmering edge of the horizon, a sliver of fire still
burning the river. I glanced up at Raoul, who was staring
at the sky in the east through dark, slitted eyes. I looked
back along his line of sight, but in that instant, the sun
had gone. Vanishing light ebbed from the sunken clouds,
tinted the ravishing colors of penny sweets and wild
flowers; indigo and lavender, chartreuse and pink.
We waited: a minute.
Two.
We watched and yearned for something, anything. What people
a thousand years ago might have called a sign. The crowd’s
silence was like a great held breath. But there was only
darkness, spreading like ink in water. We strained our eyes
searching in it.
Then someone, somewhere, popped a champagne-cork. The
crowd-murmur began again, as people breathed out and
started talking, laughing, embracing one another with a
little too much relief. I don’t know who first broke the
silence with their bottle. Perhaps it was Ed, because when
I turned around he was standing there, right behind us, a
big smile on his face.
“So that’s where you two got to,” he said. “Keeping my wife
warm, eh Raoul? Hope you had a better view than I did.
Couldn’t see a bloody thing.”
Ed hadn’t brought glasses so we had to drink from the
bottle. I had champagne; Raoul and Ed passed the Talisker
between them. The night had turned cold and I hadn’t
brought a sweater. Ed offered me his but he only had a
t-shirt on under it. I ended up wearing Raoul’s jacket,
draped stiffly around my shoulders, smelling of leather and
him. We didn’t say much on the way home; after a big
non-event like that, there wasn’t much to say.
* * *
I keep telling myself that I never really believed it
anyway. All that nonsense with invitations and prophecies,
what was I on? What were any of us on, those thousands of
hopefuls on the bridge that night? What did we think we
were waiting for, never mind our mysterious host? This is
not the age of miracles, not any more.
But sometimes I wonder whether, somehow, it was true, and
we just don’t know it yet. Whether maybe the world
did
end
that night; and that even though we keep walking around and
talking and watching TV and going to the pub and working
and reading the newspaper and having sex, these are just
the reflexive twitches of a world that doesn’t know it’s
dead yet. Like a headless chicken, I said one night to
Raoul, as we stared through the bedroom window at a fight
in the street outside, and he nodded.
Ed says I should sell my invite on eBay; one from early
July went for three times the reserve price a few weeks
ago, so God knows what mine would fetch. The invites being
sold as souvenirs are getting harder and harder to find;
people don’t want to part with them. I certainly don’t, not
just yet. It sits there on the mantel and I take it down
and look at it occasionally, like a crossword puzzle I
can’t quite complete, searching for clues. And just the
other day, I found one.
I never noticed it before, but in the date section there’s
a day and a month, but no year. I keep wondering whether
the first time was just a dry run, or whether something
went wrong. Perhaps that was why nothing happened; why our
host, whoever sent those millions of polite invitations,
never showed up. They still haven’t caught him, or her.
Even now, nobody knows if it was some kind of Situationist
prank, guerrilla marketing (but for what?), or the work of
a religious obsessive.
But I don’t think it’s any of those.
I think that maybe, this time, not enough people believed
that what was promised on the cards would or could come
true. But I have an idea that if we turn up at Tower Bridge
next June 21st, at around sunset, hundreds of thousands of
us, all with our invitations, maybe millions this time,
something worth witnessing might happen. Raoul thinks the
same. Some nights it’s all we talk about. Adultery and
apocalypse make for a full evening. It’s not hope, exactly;
nor is it fear.
It’s just a feeling.
Copyright
2008 by Katy Darby