The Otherlife Read online

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Epigraph

  A Guide to the Norse Gods

  Ben May 2012

  Hobie’s Diary

  Ben

  Hobie’s Diary

  Ben

  Hobie’s Diary

  Ben

  Hobie’s Diary

  Ben

  Hobie’s Diary

  Ben

  Hobie’s Diary

  Ben

  Hobie’s Diary

  Ben

  Hobie’s Diary

  Ben

  Hobie’s Diary

  Ben

  Hobie’s Diary

  Ben

  Hobie’s Diary

  Ben

  Hobie’s Diary

  Ben One Month Later

  Acknowledgements

  This ebook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorized distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.

  Epub ISBN: 9781448188451

  Version 1.0

  First published in 2016 by

  Andersen Press Limited

  20 Vauxhall Bridge Road

  London SW1V 2SA

  www.andersenpress.co.uk

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  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form, or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the written permission of the publisher.

  The right of Julia Gray to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.

  Text copyright © Julia Gray, 2016

  The lines from ‘Education for Leisure’ by Carol Ann Duffy are from Standing Female Nude, 1985, reproduced by permission of Anvil Press Poetry.

  The lines on here are taken from The Prose Edda by Snorri Sturluson, translated by Jean I. Young and published by Bowes & Bowes. Reproduced by permission of The Random House Group Ltd. The lines from the same work on here are based on Arthur Gilchrist Brodeur’s translation, reproduced by permission of the American-Scandinavian Foundation.

  British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data available.

  ISBN 978 1 78344 422 9

  For C.K.G.

  Now, in the city of Asgard dwelt one called Loki, who, though amongst the Æsir, was not of the Æsir, but utterly unlike to them; for to do the wrong, and leave the right undone, was, night and day, this wicked Loki’s one unwearied aim.

  Annie Keary, The Heroes of Asgard

  It is an ordinary day, a sort of grey with boredom stirring in the streets.

  Carol Ann Duffy, Education for Leisure

  A GUIDE TO THE NORSE GODS

  Here are some of the main Gods and monsters that appear in this book.

  Asgard

  The home of the Gods

  Baldr

  A handsome and noble God, the son of Odin and Frigg

  Fenrir

  A fearsome wolf. Son of Loki and father of Hati and Skǫll

  Freyr and Freyja

  God and Goddess, brother and sister

  Frigg

  Odin’s wife, mother of Baldr

  Hati

  The wolf who chases the moon across the sky at night

  Heimdallr

  The God who keeps watch from Bifrost, the rainbow bridge

  Hermódr

  The messenger God. (Also written as Hermóðr)

  Hǫdr

  Blind God and brother of Baldr. (Also written as Ho¸đr).

  Jo¸rmungandr

  The ocean-dwelling World Serpent

  Loki

  A mischief-making, shape-shifting God

  Odin

  Father of the Gods. He only has one eye, having sacrificed the other in exchange for wisdom. (Also written as Óðinn)

  Skǫll

  The wolf who chases the sun across the sky each day

  Sleipnir

  An eight-legged horse who is ridden to Hel, the underworld

  Thor

  Son of Odin and a ferocious warrior, whose prized possession is the hammer Mjo¸llnir. (Also written as Þórr)

  Tyr

  A brave God whose hand was bitten off by the wolf Fenrir

  BEN

  MAY 2012

  There’s a God in the Stonehills’ garden.

  I’ve been out here for a while now, waiting for my T-shirt to dry. About a quarter of an hour ago I made the mistake of going into the library, where some girls were making Flaming Sambucas, cackling with drunken hysteria. Clear liquid splashed on the carpet; shot glasses cracked underfoot. Someone pushed past me. I staggered, and somehow, as one of the girls was waving a long-handled lighter like a malevolent wand, the hem of my T-shirt caught fire. Not just any T-shirt: my vintage, ’94, Pushead-designed Metallica T-shirt, and the most precious item of clothing I own.

  Pushing my way through the crowd, I drenched it in the downstairs bathroom, where a genuine Matisse stands watch over a shell-shaped sink. I lamented the scorch mark, a dark scar on white cotton. Then I retreated to the terrace, where the wicker furniture is set out in a mathematical arrangement and every potted plant is so beautifully maintained that it could have come straight from a gardening catalogue. Normally when the Stonehills have parties, there’s a handful of people out on the terrace, drinking and smoking and shouting, and maybe a few people here and there on the lawn. But for the moment, I’m the only one.

  The low drone of guitars and drums surges in waves from the basement, where a jam session is going on. In a bit, the Stonehills will let off fireworks. More and more people will come, alerted by social media. Sooner or later the police will turn up. They always do. It’s definitely time to go home, but I’m slightly too drunk to make the decision to leave. I’ve had three Coronas: too many, considering that it’s a Wednesday night, and I have an exam in the morning. Nobody here cares about exams. Money will get them wherever they want to go. I don’t have much in common with any of these people, apart from a love of metal.

  I shouldn’t have come to this party.

  All day I’ve been feeling different. On edge, my head full of unwanted electricity. I’ve been feeling like something unusual is about to happen.

  Now I think maybe it is.

  Eyes unfocused, I look down the stretch of polished lawn. The garden is lit by solar lights, glowing like half-buried stars from the flowerbeds. Counting them, I let my gaze travel further and further back. And that’s when I see it. Another light. A different light. Right at the end of the garden, past the fishpond and the organised ranks of roses and miniature lemon trees. Up where the yew trees grow tall and close together and the ground rises higher as it reaches the wall. There’s an old treehouse that the Stonehills used to play in when they were younger, custom-made by some bewilderingly expensive company. That’s where it is, this other light. Just under the treehouse. But it can’t be a solar light. For one thing, it’s the wrong colour. Also: it’s moving. Fading in and out, circling, dipping … as though it’s looking for someone. I have seen this kind of light before. I know what it means.

  There is definitely a God in the Stonehills’ garden.

  And that means the Otherlife is back.

  Down the terrace steps and along the path, past shadowy flowers and silent sprinklers. Tennis court to my right. I wal
k like a ghost, my feet light. The sides of my vision are soft. The nerves in my palms are glittering. I look for the light as I draw closer to the bottom of the garden. The early May night air is cold on my skin; my T-shirt clings to me wetly. There’s a slight wind; the leaves rustle, as though the trees are breathing. I hesitate for a moment. Then continue.

  Now I hear another sound. No more than a whisper: so slithery, so silvery, that it could almost be just a sharp breeze dragging a crisp packet over a scratchy surface. It’s an old sound, an oceanic sound. A familiar sound.

  ‘Skǫll …’

  I slow down, still looking for the light. The treehouse looms just ahead, with its peaked roof and shuttered windows. The trees are dark statues against the ivied wall.

  ‘Skǫll …’

  Now I see the light. No: lights. There’s more than one. Trickles, like the residue of fireworks, leaving gilded traces in the pre-dawn sky. One, two … there are seven, eight of them, flickering, assembling in front of me, pixelated against the trees. The eight lights are lengthening, gradually, into tensile, supple legs, and above them a body blooms: pale grey, pearlescent, itself made up of hundreds of filaments of light, rippling and pulsing. An elongated head. The suggestion of teeth. Now I am aware of enormous strength and vigorous movement; I know this is Sleipnir, the horse, and I am aware of his rider, too – not pale grey, but greenish bronze, and also formed of filaments of light.

  Hermódr, the messenger God.

  He presses his knees into Sleipnir’s sides and the great grey horse takes a couple of steps towards me. A wall of movement pushes through the air: particles are displaced, hot and cold at the same time. Hermódr reaches one hand down, as though to beckon me closer. I cannot see his face, but somehow I know that he is sad.

  He calls me again, by the name I used to call myself, and finally I hear myself, throat dry and corrugated, replying, in English: ‘Yes. I am here.’

  Hermódr speaks to me. I can’t make out what he’s saying. It’s been so long since I read anything in Old Norse. He says it again – the same words, three times, four. But I can’t understand him. In the presence of the Otherlife, this grand London garden and this mock-Tudor house with its palatial halls and staircases no longer exist. My burnt Metallica T-shirt no longer matters. Nothing matters but the messenger God and his eight-legged horse, and whatever he’s trying to tell me. A little pulse begins near the old scar on the side of my head.

  I wish I could understand him.

  Hermódr turns away, and I feel the air move again, like an ethereal tide.

  ‘Wait!’ I call out. ‘Please, wait!’

  But the lights grow smaller, fainter, melting into the ivy at the back of the garden. Then, just as they are disappearing altogether, Hermódr turns his head to speak to me one last time. And finally there’s something I think I recognise: a couple of words I think I know, something I must have learnt a long, long time ago.

  ‘Dead. He is dead.’

  Mum opens the door in her running gear. ‘Oh no, Ben,’ she says.

  I avoid her eyes.

  ‘Forgot my key,’ I say.

  ‘Not today. Not when you’ve got exams. I should put you on a lead.’

  ‘It clears my head. Walking.’

  ‘Plenty of daylight hours for that. I must say, though, your head doesn’t look especially clear at this moment. Don’t tell me you’ve been out all night.’

  I follow her into the kitchen.

  ‘No, not all night,’ I tell her. ‘Couldn’t sleep. Went out about an hour ago, that’s all.’

  The kitchen is aggressively bright. There are too many shiny surfaces, reflecting too much light. On Radio 4 the presenter is snapping at the heels of a defensive politician, demanding answers to some unanswerable question. They always sound so angry on Radio 4. Mum manages to fill the kettle, throw bread into the toaster and clink the milk bottle so hard against the table top that I worry the glass will break, all at the same time.

  Bright lights, loud sounds, sharp corners. It’s impossible to sit comfortably in the plastic kitchen chair. I blink at the table top, my brain in soft focus. Mum puts a plate of toast in front of me. A cup of tea. The bag floats sadly, a shipwreck, at the top. Then, because I don’t move, she digs a knife into the Lurpak and plasters butter over my toast. If she could eat my breakfast for me, she would. She’s that kind of mother.

  ‘And today, when we’ve got the French Listening paper.’

  ‘We don’t have a French Listening paper,’ I say through buttered toast.

  She ignores this editorial adjustment.

  ‘It’s a Big Day. Go and have a quick bath and I’ll drive you to school.’

  ‘Mum …’

  ‘Not now, Ben.’

  Another Big Day: one of so many. My life is a series of small days leading up to magnificent, do-or-die, all-singing, all-dancing Big Days. And my mother is probably right: it wasn’t especially smart of me to go out the night before a Big Day such as this one: the first of my GCSEs. But I find, sometimes, that I can’t help myself. I need to go out at night. Not generally to parties, unless, like last night, they’re going to be playing metal. Most of the time it’s enough to be out and about, looking with different eyes at the buildings I see by day. Usually I’ll find a park, or – even better – a cemetery, and stay there, like a soft-footed zombie, until I’m tired enough to go home. I don’t really know why I do it; perhaps I feel like it calms me, in some indescribable way. I even have a name for it.

  Nightwalking.

  I make the bath as hot as I can stand. While it’s running, I open the bathroom cabinet, and rummage around in the rubble of old bandages and nail-varnish bottles. I check in the woven baskets perched on the edge of the bath, where rolled-up flannels compete for space with those miniature shower gels and see-through caps that you get in hotels. I look in the medicine box, remembering that things are often in the likeliest place, and, sure enough, find what I’m looking for. A small brown bottle, with a single triangular apricot-coloured pill inside it. Filling a tooth mug with water from the tap, I tip out the pill and swallow it neatly. Then I climb into the bath.

  He is dead. That’s what Hermódr said, or what I think he said. I wonder about my grandfather, who hasn’t been that well. But no: Mum would have said something, if anything was wrong with Granddad. Sometimes I think she hides things from me, but not about anyone as special as him. In the shallow water I watch my skin turn from blue and white to white and red, like a changing political landscape. I slide down, feeling the crack in the ceramic glaze scrape my shoulder blade, until only my nose remains out of the water. Now I listen for hidden sounds: the buzz of the fluorescent strip over the mirror, the gurgle of the radiator.

  Why has the Otherlife come back now? That’s what I can’t understand. It’s been gone for so long. I wish I knew what Hermódr was trying to tell me.

  I hope nothing bad has happened to any of the members of Metallica.

  ‘Be-en! Ben!’

  I climb out of the bath. For a moment I’m surprised by a black smudge on my ribs, shimmering in the corner of my vision. I close my eyes, and it’s gone.

  My room is a small gallery. The Late Greats of metal adorn the walls, the ceiling, the cupboard doors. Most of them are vintage posters, found online or in Portobello Market. There’s something almost holy about them. Flailing limbs and leather and halogen hair. Microphones and guitars and drumsticks, wielded like weapons. Under the stage lights, the faces and limbs of the Late Greats are ghostly, glowing green and blue.

  My mother hates my posters. ‘These people glorify death,’ she’ll say, wincing. As though she’s imagining being there in the mosh pit, enduring the feedback and distortion and screaming. She finds metal distasteful, like the smell of drains. I don’t agree with her. True: the Late Greats are, by definition, dead. There’s Dimebag Darrell of Pantera, who was shot onstage by a gunman. Layne Staley of Alice in Chains, whose tale of addiction and self-neglect never fails to make me sad when I list
en to his music. There’s Randy Rhoads, Ozzy Osbourne’s guitarist, who was killed in a plane crash. Gar Samuelson, drummer for Megadeth, whose reported cause of death was liver failure, at forty-one. And my favourite: Cliff Burton, who died in a road accident aged only twenty-four. Bassist in the best metal band of all time: Metallica.

  But it’s not death that makes them special. They died doing what they loved, and that’s what matters.

  I put on a white shirt. My hands shake. I unbutton it, do it up again correctly. Black trousers, a black and grey tie. Grey socks, black shoes. If my uniform was all black I’d like it more.

  ‘Benjamin! We’re going to be ridiculously late!’

  I shut the door and run downstairs, avoiding the broken floorboard. Mum is holding my blazer out, an arm aloft, like a signpost. I take it from her. She hustles me out of the house.

  ‘Do you have your revision folder? Do you have your keys? Do you have your—’

  I tell her yes, yes, yes. I climb into the car and can’t fit my legs in the space between the seat and the glove compartment. The early morning traffic rumbles and roars: a procession of lumbering beasts. Mum slams her door.

  The drive to school is sluggish, fraught with roadworks and ill-timed traffic lights. Mum bangs the steering wheel and shouts at a lorry that pulls out in front of us. She fiddles with the radio until she finds a French station, and we listen to a discussion about the Olympics and the prospects of the French athletes. I have to get A*, or A at the very least, in all my subjects: I’m a Scholarship kid, ninety per cent of my fees paid by the school. The conditions: good behaviour and academic achievement.

  ‘What do you think your grades will be?’ Mum asks as we speed along the Westway. It’s a question she’s asked before. Many times. I watch the blur of houses, bus depots and railway lines, deliberately allowing my vision to distort so that they become a mishmash of line and colour.

  ‘I dunno,’ I say. She doesn’t know this, but I’m predicted Bs in all the sciences and a C in geography. My standards seem to have slipped.