"Harris, Joanne - Blackberry Wine" - читать интересную книгу автора (Harris Joanne)

party -- the launch of a new award for female authors under
twenty-five - and the house was silent. Jay used the typewriter
for what he thought of as 'real' work, the laptop for
his science fiction, so you could always tell what he was
writing by the sound, or lack of it. It was ten before he came
downstairs. He switched on the radio to an oldies station,
and you could hear him moving about in the kitchen, his
footsteps restless against the terracotta tiles. There was a
drinks cabinet next to the fridge. He opened it, hesitated,
closed it again. The fridge door opened, Kerry's taste
dominated here, as everywhere. Wheat-grass juice, couscous
salad, baby spinach leaves, yoghurts. What he really
craved, Jay thought, was a huge bacon-and-fried-egg sandwich
with ketchup and onion, and a mug of strong tea. The
craving, he knew, had something to do with Joe and Pog Hill
Lane. An association, that was all, which often came on
when he was trying to write. But all that was finished. A
phantom. He knew he wasn't really hungry. Instead he lit a
cigarette, a forbidden luxury reserved for when Kerry was
out of the house, and inhaled greedily. From the radio's
scratchy speaker came the voice of Steve Harley singing
'Make me smile' - another song from that distant, inescapable
summer of '75 - and for a moment he raised his voice to
sing along - 'Come up and see me, make me smi-i-i-ile' forlornly
in the echoing kitchen.
Behind us in the dark cellar the strangers were restless.
Perhaps it was the music, or perhaps something in the air of
this mild spring evening seemed suddenly charged with
possibility, for they were effervescent with activity, seething
in their bottles, rattling against each other, jumping at
shadows, bursting to talk, to open, to release their essence
into the air. Perhaps this was why he came down, his steps
heavy on the rough, unpolished stairs. Jay liked the cellar; it
was cool, secret. He was always coming down there, just to
touch the bottles, to run his fingers along the dust-furred
walls. I always liked it when he came to the cellar. Like a
barometer, I can sense his emotional temperature when he
is close to me. To some extent I can even read his thoughts.
As I said, there is a chemistry between us.
It was dark in the cellar, the only illumination a dim light
bulb hanging from the ceiling. Rows of bottles - most
negligible, chosen by Kerry - in the racks on the wall;
others in crates on the flagstones. Jay touched the bottles
fleetingly as he passed, bringing his face very close, as if to
catch the scent of those imprisoned summers. Two or three
times he pulled out a bottle and turned it in his hands
before replacing it in the rack. He moved aimlessly, without
direction, liking the dampness of the cellar and the silence.
Even the sound of the London traffic was stilled here, and
for a moment he seemed tempted simply to lie down on the