After I gave Sykes the money, I caught a cab home and crawled into bed. The events of the previous day had left me feeling debilitated and exhausted. Neither of us had slept much during the last thirty six hours. Why was it that after an encounter with Sykes I always felt so damaged? It wasn’t just malaise or depression. It was more radical than that, more fundamental. As though my organs had been rearranged or the flow of my blood reversed.
Sykes was devastated by the disappearance of the phosphorescence. Even as the sky paled and the ghostly winter sun rose up above the horizon, he continued to gather rocks and drop them down into the ebbing tide.
‘That’s the only reason I came,’ he cried. ‘To see it one more time. To see if it still works.’
‘But they’re just living creatures,’ I said in an attempt to console him. ‘Tiny little creatures. They’re like everything else. They drift away and then sometimes they come back.’
‘I know,’ said Sykes. ‘ I know that. But I had this idea in my head that somehow, I don’t know, that somehow I might be purified.’
When we went back up to the beach house, Sykes stood at the window while I heated coffee and burned some bread in the ancient toaster. He ignored the coffee and started pacing from room to room, chain smoking and opening cupboards. He kept returning to the empty vodka bottle and tilting it against the light. Eventually, my nerves began to stand on end and I took him by the arm and sat him down in a chair at the table. He had the sallow, defeated look of someone who has just vomited.
‘What are you going to do?’ I said.
‘I don’t know. Get sick. Die.’ He reached into his armpit and then covered his face with his hands.
‘What do you want to do?’
‘Get away. Get the fuck out of here. Escape.’
‘So?’ I said. He looked up at me. ‘What’s stopping you?’
‘I’m broke. I’ve got no money.’ He hugged himself, looking down at his body. ‘And nobody’s going to pay for this. Nobody’s going to pay money for this... mess.’
‘I will,’ I said. ‘I’ll give you some money.’ Sykes didn’t say anything for a while. He sat watching his fingers skim over the oak veneer.
‘And why would you want to do that?’ his eyes narrowed. ‘To get rid of me? Is that it? to get rid of the evidence.’
‘No. Because Fabulina gave me some money for you. When I was looking for you.’ At the mention of Fabulina, Sykes softened. His eyes filled and he looked up at the ceiling. A dead blowfly was revolving, suspended from the lampshade by a filament.
‘I wish she was here,’ he said. ‘I miss her. I really wish she was still here.’
I withdrew five hundred dollars from an Automatic Teller Machine when we arrived back in the city. I handed it to Sykes and he pocketed it without a word. He looked up and down the street. It was Sunday evening, there was no-one about. He shrugged himself deeper into his coat and looked down at his feet.
‘Can I buy you a drink?’ he said.
‘No. I’m fucked,’ I said. I was almost catatonic from nervous exhaustion and lack of sleep. The first mouthful would have toppled me. ‘Why don’t you come home with me? Figure out what you’re going to do.’ I was afraid to let him out of my sight.
‘I know what I’m going to do,’ Sykes said. ‘I’m going to have a drink.’ He took a step toward me. I thought for a moment he was going to hug me. If he touches me, I thought, he’ll have to carry me home. But he just stood there for a while, with his hands in his pockets, staring at me, undoing me with his eyes and that smile of his.
‘See you round, pardner’ he said, and turned and walked off up the street. I watched as the loping figure passed under a lamp. The light gushed down on him. His skinny shoulders were hunched under the black leather coat, the collar turned up against the cold. The stubble on his head looked white in the abrupt light. He looked frail and dispossessed. I almost started to follow him but somehow I felt immobilised, rooted to the pavement. He stepped out of the lamplight and for a moment it was impossible to tell whether he was walking towards me or walking away. But then I watched him growing smaller and smaller until he finally disappeared into the shadows of a sidestreet. The air escaped from me in a gasp. I realized I had been holding my breath. I took great panting gulps, drawing them deep into my lungs and choking them back up like smoke into the cold night air. It started to rain. My face was awash. I shouldered the back-pack and went to search for a taxi.
I dreamed that Sykes was sleeping next to me. I dreamed that I woke to find him smiling at me from the pillow. His hair had grown back. The window was open and the curtains wafted into the room. The warm breeze was scented with freesias and jasmine and the morning sun sprawled at the foot of the bed. I dreamed that Sykes reached out to touch my face with his fingertips. His eyes were filled with tenderness. He opened his mouth to say something and a small snake crawled out.