Kit had of course told me about the eclipse winds, an unearthly portent that can range from a breeze to a near-hurricane. It whipped my hair into silver streamers that Kit smoothed down with his hands then caught and held at the nape of my neck. It was storybook weather, a prelude to a fairy tale. ‘It’s coming,’ he said. Without sight of the sun, the leaching of the light was slow and undramatic; dusk, remarkable only for its eerie timing. Behind us, the festival continued, a screeching treble and a dirty bass building to a crescendo the experience didn’t seem to warrant. Every now and then someone would shout ‘Come on sun!’ as if they were cheering on a Brit in the Wimbledon final. Despite the slicing wind, the clouds above remained a solid mass.
‘There.’ Kit nodded to his left, and pointed his camera. I followed his gaze and lost my breath. A wall of night pressed in towards us from the Atlantic, a black veil being dragged across the sky. I gasped like I was falling. A lone starling in a tree began a frantic chirping, and the music reached a screeching climax, where I had expected a reverential hush. (I would have the opposite feeling a few years later when we travelled to Troms? to see the Northern Lights; I had been surprised at their silence, that they didn’t make a whistling noise or crack like whips as they sliced through the air.) Somewhere, far inland, fireworks sounded.
‘I didn’t know the darkness could be so beautiful,’ said Kit, aiming his lens at the horizon.
As if he had summoned it, at that moment, a hole was torn lengthways through the cloud and the sun was partly visible, a sooty black disc surrounded by a ring of pure light. Kit’s camera clicked and reloaded next to my ear. An ecstatic cheer carried on the strange winds from all around us. There were none of the phenomena I’d hoped for: no shooting corona, no sun leaking through the moon’s craters to create the diamond ring effect, and in a few seconds it was gone, but still I felt changed, as if a giant hand had reached down from the sky and touched me. I was torn between wanting it to be over so that we could talk about it and never wanting it to end. But it did end; the veil pushed east and the colours came back.
I felt suddenly shy around Kit, after the weird heavenly intimacy of what we’d just experienced.
‘I don’t know what to do with myself now,’ I said.
He screwed the lens cap back on tightly.
‘I’ve got a massive boner,’ he suggested.
I laughed, and let him guide me down from the top of the lorry, where I landed in his arms with a thud that toppled him over. We were wrapped together so tightly that the only way to walk was to fall into step, as though in a three-legged race. I had to watch where I was treading; if I hadn’t, I might never have seen the purse. It was a little zipper wallet made of brightly coloured wool in an Aztec pattern. I bent to pick it up; there were three five-pound notes inside, and some coppers, but no ID.
‘Maybe leave it there in case they come back,’ said Kit.
‘But anyone could pick it up. That could be all someone’s money. All they’ve got for the rest of the festival. All they’ve got to get home. There’s that police Portakabin thing near the entrance. We should give it in there, if we don’t see anyone on the way.’
‘All right, if it makes you happy.’ Kit rolled his eyes. ‘I’ll go that way and see if I can see anyone who looks like they’ve just lost a purse.’
‘Thanks,’ I said, distracted; I’d noticed a coin on the ground a few yards away, and then another.
We dropped hands, and it was the last time everything was perfect.
I have replayed that moment in my head so many times since then. If I could live the Lizard again, would I pick up the purse? There is part of me – the cocksure insistence of hindsight – that says I should have left it on the ground and gone back with Kit. But even knowing what followed, I don’t think I could have walked on by. Perhaps, though, I would have gripped Kit a little tighter, for a heartbeat longer, and savoured perfection while I held it in my hand.
Chapter 8
LAURA
18 March 2015
Insomniacs know that when you wake up too early, everyone else’s breakfast time feels like your lunchtime. Bored, I bring my usual mid-afternoon call to my dad forward by a few hours.
I didn’t really expect him to pick up. He’ll be making the most of the morning rush-hour, standing on a street corner, vainly trying to press leaflets into commuters’ unyielding fists.
I text Ling.
Can you talk?
She fires back:
I’m in a case meeting.
And, with that, I’ve exhausted the list of people I can call for a casual chat. It’s not that I worry how few friends I have, just that every now and then I notice it. The babies will change all that. Ronni next door once told me that children were an even better social lubricant than wine.
Suddenly, I realise what’s wrong. I’ve been so preoccupied with Kit’s trip that I haven’t said good morning to my mother. I pick up the black and white photograph in its tatty wooden frame and kiss the glass.