The Midnight Train (The Midnight World, #2)(53)

Ultimately even love was weak against the desire to avoid pain. Because what was love but another door into it. Better to keep those doors closed. Better to stay on the train of work. Better to aim for a stock-market flotation instead of happiness. Until, of course, you actually die and realise the mistake you made. Until you realise that most damage was caused by things escalating, things spinning out of control.

‘We worked too hard,’ the Ghost said, watching Wilbur, late at night, studying his account book, with Maggie asleep beside him.

‘What’s wrong with working hard?’ the Dreamer wondered. ‘We saw Mam struggle. We saw Dougie thieve to make money. What was wrong with earning an honest living?’

‘Nothing. Nothing that society would see. But there are many ways to betray yourself in life. Some obvious – like thieving and fighting and getting chased by the police – and some subtle. Some betrayals look very much like success. But make no mistake – you’ll see – we betrayed ourselves. Yes, sure, some couples aren’t right for each other … But that wasn’t us and Maggie. Maggie was perfect.’

‘She is. I know.’

‘We loved Maggie as much as anyone ever loved anyone, yet we turned away from her. Eventually you won’t hold her gaze. Not because you have fallen out of love, but because …’

‘Because?’

‘Because love slows you down. But slowing down is what you should have done.’

The Ghost sighed as it all became so clear. To look around, that was the best way to slow down. To live fully, that was the best way to die. And he had failed on both counts. But now he was going to make things better. He was going to give his young dreaming self a chance.





The Idea of Enough


They were looking inside a Bagdale’s Bookshop. The first and original. Looking at Wilbur talking on the telephone with a champagne bottle in hand.

The Ghost pointed. ‘You know what that is?’

‘I got the loan?’

‘That’s right. More money than we ever dreamed of. Enough for two more shops.’

‘It wasn’t my money. It was to expand.’

‘Yes. And make money. And make shops. And then get more money from the bank. And make more shops. And make more money to make more shops.’

The Dreamer felt a little hurt by this. ‘And make a difference! And employ people. And get more people reading. By opening bookshops. Like that one.’

They were now passing the brand new bookshop in Manchester. Gleaming and white with wide front windows. Now under the name of Budd Books. They saw straight inside to the opening day, where Maggie was watching Wilbur make a speech.

‘Wow. It looks fantastic.’

‘Yes. It was. And there are more of them to come. This is 1975. By 1982 you will have twenty shops. By 1990 there will be a hundred. At the peak there will be 203 different stores.’

‘Two hundred and three? That’s … that’s … almost as many shops as Woolworths.’

‘You will be rich. You will be famous. You will win awards. And you will have worked hard for it. You will become an expert at targets. You will set targets and when you reach them you will set a new target. You will be scared of the idea of enough. And you will no longer care about books or readers.’

The Ghost watched his dreaming self even more carefully now. Watched his mouth twitch at its corners with a nauseating excitement and pride. Still not getting it.

‘You might be looking at this all the wrong way,’ the Dreamer said. ‘You’re forgetting what it felt like to make money after having none.’

The Ghost sighed. ‘I don’t think it’s about money. Come on. The train is slowing. Let me show you.’

The train stopped and they got out onto a quiet leafy road in the Sheffield suburbs.

‘It’s our house,’ said the Dreamer. ‘It’s our new house. 38 Watson Road. The train just stopped right outside our house!’

He turned to see the train had disappeared. ‘What the …?’

‘Now follow me,’ said the Ghost as he walked through the front wall and window of the house as easily as passing through an open curtain. And his dreaming associate looked around him and saw a boy at the end of his newspaper round with an empty satchel. The boy kept walking towards him, and just as the Dreamer was about to say, ‘Hey, watch where you’re going,’ the boy walked right through him without noticing a thing.

‘I’m in Venice, not Broomhill … This is not happening …’ muttered the Dreamer.

And he stood there for far longer than a dream would allow and decided eventually to follow the Ghost into the house.





A Nice Sunday Roast


‘I just walked through a brick wall ten inches thick and I didn’t feel a thing.’

The Ghost nodded. He and his younger apprentice were standing in the living room as Wilbur and Maggie and Edith were eating a Sunday roast, complete with Yorkshire pudding and all the trimmings.

‘That’s because we aren’t physically here and this is the physical world,’ explained the Ghost. ‘We are – for want of a better word – spiritually here. You via your dreaming self and me via my – how to put it – dead self.’

‘Bloody hell.’