‘Yeah?’
‘What?’
‘You looked like you were going to say something.’
Greg smiles, that faraway expression still on his face. ‘No. I don’t think so. No. Just that I think I’m going to get in the shower.’ He puts his empty bottle on his tray, screws up a paper napkin between his palms and Josh has the terrifying, elating thought that his partner has a secret from him. Perhaps he really does know who Jean’s screwing. Maybe he wants to tell him that Michael finally gave in to Henry the hot violinist’s relentless pursuit and that business with the mushrooms in class was actually a sex thing. Maybe he’s had sex with Henry himself!
But he says none of that. Habit wins. ‘You’ll have a clear run,’ Josh mumbles. ‘Everyone’s in here by now.’ The mundanity of it, the sheer idiocy of their conversations.
He slides out from the booth to let Greg past and gets a pecking, chaste kiss.
‘I’ll be reading, okay, so don’t worry about disturbing me when you come.’ Josh nods, munching on his rice, deliberately not turning to see Greg leave the dining car.
It’s difficult to imagine now, but when he first joined he was desperate to get Greg into bed. He can’t remember what it was that did it for him. If he’s honest with himself – which he might as well be now – it was that Greg was the only one of the cast or crew who reminded him of the world he came from. Ballet is filled with posh people and bohemians, or quirky individuals who were some mixture of the two, and by the time he joinedThe Apple and the Pearlhe’d sat silently through enough conversations about skipping family skiing trips for fear of breaking a limb, flute lessons, holidays in Tuscany and birthday treats at the opera. Greg’s dad was a postman, his mum a dinner lady at the local primary school and his accent – as well as the fact he didn’t even seem to be trying to hide it – made something inside Josh unclench. Even before they got together, Greg’s mere presence quietened that insidious inferiority in him. He could be all of himself with Greg, the gay man, the dancer, the scholarship lad from Preston. He still can. He mops up some curry with a hunk of bread and chews on it. If nothing else, he should remember that.
He seduced Greg with facts about crows and ravens and jackdaws. Greg’s Crow rehearsals started a couple of months after Josh’s first pledge and Cecile was vocal in her disappointment.You are a boy in a stupid costume!she’d shout at him during run-throughs.Be a bird, dammit!It did not help that Cecile was, as usual, right.
Did you know crows can recognise human faces?he’d said one day after class, when he looked up from the noticeboard and found Greg beside him. He’d blurted it out before he could change his mind and regretted it instantly. What sort of fucked up come-on was that? But Greg had looked interested.Really? That’s cool.Emboldened, Josh continued.And they hold funerals for their dead.Greg had given him a wry smile before climbing the stairs to the dressing room.Don’t give Cecile any ideas.
Four months ago, when Cecile beckoned Josh over at the end of class and told him to start learning the Crow, Greg had reminded him of those first awkward conversations. He’d gone rifling through an old box and pulled out the card Josh had written him for the first time he performed the Crow. He’d read it aloud, the earnest, hopeful message and the silly rhyme written out in its entirety in his best handwriting. They’d laughed and curled up in bed together from something more than just habit. That was the last time he’d felt anything more than quiet contempt for Greg. He can’t remember the time before that.
Josh swallows the last of his dinner with a heartburn-inducing gulp and picks up his tray as he’s chewing. He’s got a job to do, the last obligation of the day.
He slides his tray across the kitchen hatch, where Romero takes it with a nod – he should be getting paid for this extra kitchen skivvying, or maybe he does it for love, the thought of it is unimaginable – then he hangs around the serving hatch, trying to catch Gino’s eye.
Just over a month ago, the night of his first show as the Crow, Stuart had put a hand on his shoulder as he returned his plate to the kitchen hatch.Before you get stuck into your truffles, he’d said,there’s something I need to show you.
He’d taken a tray from the serving hatch bearing one of those old-fashioned embossed silver cloche things over a plate. Next to it were two shot glasses filled with a clear, oily liquid that barely swayed as Stuart pulled it off the counter.
Follow me, Stuart said, and Josh followed him out of the dining car and along the corridor, leaving the noise behind. They walked through eleven carriages of cabins and bathrooms, Stuart confident, with the tray secure in his hands and Josh confused, stumbling behind him, a dread mounting behind his breastbone that Stuart knew something about Ritchie and he felt panic rising. Stuart and Greg were pledge-mates. Maybe there was some honour thing involved, some vow to punish your pledge-mates’ cheating partners.
They reached the caboose and Stuart wedged the tray between the wall and his hip while he wrestled with the doorknob.
Mate, Josh had said, trying to keep a lightness in his voice though he was starting to panic.What the fuck are we doing?
Did Greg not tell you?Stuart bent to put the tray on the floor of the caboose and moved it across the flaked-paint floorboards with one trainer-clad toe.
Josh shook his head, swallowing.The sly bastard, Josh thought.Can there really be anything, anything at all that teddy bear’s kept from me?
Good man. It’s supposed to be a secret, but you know what things are like.
Who is this for?
Stuart grinned.The Crow.
There was a silence. Josh stared at the tray on the ground. He wasn’t sure what to say.
Is that a metaphor?
Stuart burst into laughter.You don’t need to take it so seriously! Gino gives you the tray, you bring it here, you go to bed with your boy safe in the knowledge you’ve kept the spooky creatures at bay for another day.
Do I have to pick up the tray too?he’d asked, stupidly, wondering what the penalty might be if he overslept, if he forgot, if it was simply a freezing morning and he couldn’t face wandering the cabins in his pyjamas.
Nah. Belinda sorts that out.Josh thought of the times when he’d woken up early and left his cabin to go to the loo to see Belinda walking briskly through snow or slanted golden light with an empty tray crooked in her elbow.
Is it—dangerous out here? Like, has anyone ever actually met the Crow?Josh was more than familiar with the Crow’s keening after a snatching, but the idea of ascending to a new level of weird and having a tête-a-tête with the creature now that he was dancing this role was making him feel sick.
Stuart had shrugged.I haven’t but Mara’s good mates with it, apparently. Shouldn’t say you’re in danger. Crow probably thinks you’re a grumpy old git.
