For some reason that doesn’t especially interest him, the house is quiet early tonight. They’re possibly at a party somewhere else. Vincent is calm; focused about what he is going to do. Sure, Rowan will be upset but he will get in touch once she has had a chance to think on. Maybe she will agree to move on too.
The decision to up sticks and simply leave has been simmering for a while. But now he can’t believe he hasn’t done it sooner. He’ll head to Leicester Square and look for a waitering job in one of the restaurants round there. If he has to sleep rough for a bit, so be it. It’s summer and it will be better than being here.
He packs his sleeping bag, then a few items of clothing, toiletries, and some snacks into a rucksack and heads down the staircase onto the main landing. A sound makes him stop in his tracks.
It’s his mother. She sounds slurry and upset and keeps saying, ‘I think I’m a bit sick. Maybe I should go to sleep.’
Then, voices gently shushing her.
He creeps along the landing. It’s either Celeste’s room, or Hugo’s. Maybe both, it’s unclear. No surprise that’s where she is. The usual hot rage pulses through him at the thought of Hugo and his mother. He should ignore whatever is going on in there and leave. She’s made her choices. He turns to leave, then hears that she is weeping now, her words indistinguishable.
Swearing, he drops his rucksack on the dirty landing carpet and walks towards Hugo’s door, hesitating for only a moment before shoving the door open with both hands.
The scene that greets him is so odd and confusing, he can’t work out what is happening at first. So many white limbs, entangled, like a creature from the deep sea with pale tentacles.
When he begins to untangle it, he feels a wave of revulsion that almost makes him sick.
Celeste has her face buried between his mother’s legs, the dirty soles of Rowan’s feet facing him like those of a doll. It’s horrific seeing Celeste properly naked. She’s always wandering around with a bra and seeing her big white arse in the air makes him want to heave.
And Hugo …
He is squatting over his mother’s face, his broad back and shoulders making it look as though he is squashing her like a bug. She has him in her mouth and is making little sounds, as is he, looking down at her, his big shaggy head bent and his hands clasping her face.
‘What the fuck are you doing?’ says Vincent in what sounds like a surprisingly neutral tone, considering the feelings pulsing through him. ‘Stop it. You’re total perverts. Leave her alone!’
Hugo turns his whole body free and meets Vincent’s eyes with a gratifying amount of shock.
Celeste scurries off the bed with a little shriek and now she is laughing. Actually laughing. She sounds demented.
His mother looks at him with unfocused eyes and then starts to cry, before rolling off the bed and grabbing a dress that she holds in front of her body.
‘I’m sorry, baby!’ she wails. ‘I didn’t want you to see this!’
‘Hey, man,’ says Hugo, hands held up in front of him. ‘You’re too young to understand our scene. Just be cool and we’ll talk about it in the morning, okay?’
But Vincent doesn’t feel cool. He doesn’t think he ever will again after the sight that has been burned onto his retinas. He wants to vomit.
If he had a gun, he’d kill Hugo now. One bullet in the centre of his forehead.
Instead he launches himself at the other man with a scream of pure hatred, managing to land a blow right in his eye. Reactions slowed by the drugs, Hugo yells in shock but is slow to push him off. Vincent begins to punch him over and over again in the face, his fist on fire with pain but it feels good.
And then a new agony explodes at the side of his head and the world turns to the brightest white.