Fragile Animals, page 1
Praise for Fragile Animals
“Gorgeous and gothic.” – i-D
“A slick literary vampire novel to sink your teeth into. Hot!”
– Alice Slater, author of Death of a Bookseller
“To read Jagger’s prose is to be riven; like the call of the ocean, one gazes into the story and becomes engulfed – Fragile Animals invites the reader into an awakening of the self which feels at once violent and immobilising.”
– Elle Nash, author of Deliver Me
“Shirley Jackson meets The Wasp Factory. Fragile Animals is bold, beguiling and breathtaking.”
– Carrie Marshall, author of Carrie Kills A Man
“This book took me on a wild ride and I was absolutely obsessed with it.”
– Emily Dowd, NetGalley review
“Captivating and unique … I genuinely can’t believe its a debut.”
– Poppy Kimish, NetGalley review
“Every single page, every chapter made me absolutely feral with anticipation with what’s to come next.”
– Cecily Co, NetGalley review
“First word that comes to mind thinking about this book is just… wow.”
– Alexandra Gilliam, NetGalley review
Published by 404 Ink
www.404Ink.com
@404Ink
First published in Great Britain, 2024
All rights reserved Genevieve Jagger, 2024.
The right of Genevieve Jagger to be identified as the Author of this Work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patent Act 1988.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without first obtaining the written permission of the copyright owner, except for the use of brief quotations in reviews.
Editing: Elle Nash
Proofreading: Heather McDaid
Typesetting: Laura Jones-Rivera
Cover design: Luke Bird
Co-founders and publishers of 404 Ink:
Heather McDaid & Laura Jones-Rivera
Print ISBN: 9781912489961
Ebook ISBN: 9781912489978
404 Ink acknowledges and is thankful for support from Creative Scotland in the publication of this title.
Fragile Animals
Genevieve Jagger
Contents
When In Doubt Run Away
Salt
The Confession
Lake Mirror
Careless Homosexual
Women Of The Jugular
Haunted
Alive Like a Candle
It’s True I’m Terrified
Gore Me Like A Peach
Ascent of the Blessed
Toulouse
Ghost Angel
Bitch
All the Time
Lovers
Fall of the Damned Into Hell
Cockheart
Goodnight Prayer
Take Me Apart
Red Inside Myself
Oranges Are The Only Fruit
Cygnet
Judgement Day
You’re Not Sorry If You Don’t Beg
The Truth Will Always Be Purgatory
Love List
About the Author
for that little girl crying in bed
When In Doubt Run Away
I have many wounds from the cold thing called claustrophobia.
Bruises on my thighs, lungs that cottonise in the winter, a myriad of snippeting scars, hidden in creative and domestic places across my body: the armpit, the back of the knee, the groin. None of them are sincere, none gouged too deep; most unclear how they even came to be. Standing at the edge of the harbour I am inclined to wonder if whatever mark coming will be more of the same. This trip, a little nick, a short bleed, before heading home again.
The ferry leaves me behind, travels homewards to the mainland, cracking the glass of the water as it goes. After some time, the fog intervenes and the entire hulking force of the boat is eaten by the sky’s grey mouth. I once read somewhere that winter does not officially begin until December 21st, but in Scotland we are barely past the first blows of November and the clouds in their closeness have descended. The wind on my bare skin feels like white alcohol and teeth. I slip my hands beneath my jumper, press my fingertips between my ribs. It’s shivering season. My mood shivers too.
I had a brief flash of decisiveness last night. Of course, I knew what I was doing, when in the drunk depths of the smallest hours, my fingers typed in ‘travel’, and all the websites with their slot machine buttons appeared. My mattress and breath were beginning to smell the same and the disgusting fact of that had galvanised me. It was 3am and God had left his post. I spun the wheel of possibilities. It landed on the Isle of Bute. Little island. Clean winds. A quieter place. I threw up my room trying to pack, took my notebook from my nightstand, spent an hour searching for a pen, then walked to the 24-hour shop to buy a new toothbrush, passed out with it still cupped in my palm.
Now, my hands, of their own accord, are excavating my pockets. No cigarettes. No phone, because I left it where I’d thrown it, lying reproachfully beneath the radiator in the corner of my room. No sense of direction because I’ve never had that. Creeping up my spine, the feeling of a blunt knife is edging from vertebrae to vertebrae, anxiety threatening to cleave my muscles apart.
The harbour ground is sodden from the air itself, which is cold, penetrative to the bones of my fingers. I stare out at the water for so long – not an ocean, yet still undulating and dark. In this time the sky observes me then shakes its disinterested head. Finally, my stiff feet turn from the water to face the town, the craggy, old stone buildings. Rothesay, the bleak button nose of the Isle of Bute.
First foot, then the second. Inched with force. Aching. Moving. It takes more than a moment, but eventually I am walking normally – or how I think normal people walk. It has something to do with the swing of the arms maybe, a certain pace that is not skittering nor hunched.
The small shape of this world is a decision I have made for myself.
In the sunshine, the town could be sweet, with boutiques and chip shops lining a brief promenade and houses mounted like paper crowns on the unassuming peaks of hills, but the sky is stony and low, and almost everything fits within the width of my peripheral vision. The place is small. Small enough that everything closes on a Sunday, a fact enforced by the church bells that clang dimly through the muffle of the fog. That sound… Big He is at his watching post again today. Overseeing through the haze of His clouds. None of the people wandering down the wide flat streets seem to mind. They keep their heads bent as the tolling of bells fades out.
I realise with some horror that without a map and a phone (a phone), I am going to have to ask someone for directions.
Bakery, bus stop, baby boutique. Closed. Most people are friendly in a rude way, keen to ask questions, to stare with open suspicion at my unfamiliar face. They offer little and linger long, keeping me standing, nodding, then giving no information. Eventually I walk through an open door, the only one open along the street. A bell jingles. The rusty smell of blood engulfs me.
‘Yer staying at Baywood?’ the butcher asks. He’s bald and sweet-faced, with a little white cap upon his pockmarked head, peppered hair tufting out the sides. ‘That’s away into the hills. Are ye walking?’
He eyes my suitcase as I nod, then shakes his head in a way that irritates me. A silence draws out long and terminal until I ask, ‘Is there a bus?’
‘Nah, ye’ve missed it,’ he says, and walks round the counter, flips the open sign on the door to closed. Does not actually close the door.
‘I’ll give ye a lift.’
I don’t feel so strange coming here without a phone. Most people I know won’t notice if I’m gone for a week. Until recently I’ve had a flatmate and a half.
The half is long gone, all trace of her disappeared, apart from a few remnants in the medicine cabinet that seem too nice to throw away. Washes, gels and creams, scented with things like chamomile or clementine; a few half-finished blister packs of iron tablets that I can’t remember if I was prescribed and she was taking or if it was the other way around. She left a Mooncup too. Thin, stringy film still clinging to the rubber rim, blood gone brown as the iron pills. I have trained myself not to look at it because it’s too disconcerting. Too jarring to see blood so casually and blood that is not mine. Every time I open the door, it has progressed further in its rot. As such I have not managed to throw it away.
My other flatmate is the whole. That’s Eddie. Eddie is a gay, deep-voiced smoothie shop manager, also studying for his master’s degree in supply chain management. He was the first person to respond to my ad about looking for a flatmate and so we are flatmates now. We have a casual friendship in which I do not see him much, if at all. I sometimes hear him come in at 5am and change from his thigh-high latex boots into the smock he wears for his smoothie shifts. Once every couple of months Eddie and I will spend a night together in the flat, usually out of some mishap in Eddie’s social life, like a missed bus or a snowstorm, with a few of Eddie’s friends and a myriad of spirits. One time, sitting at a full kitchen table with Eddie’s friends – who cackled about things that, if I ever went out, I’
‘For someone who’s always drinking, why do I never see you drunk?’ Eddie demanded, smacking the table. Then he fed me knock-off Bailey’s shots until I puked sour milk through my nose.
My point is, Eddie won’t notice I’m gone. Our relationship is more or less a means to afford the city. A lot of times it feels like living alone and I so wait up to hear Eddie’s key in the door, a reminder that I’m not. The only person who might notice my absence is Lorne, my friend, my almost-uncle. Though recently I’ve felt Lorne could quite easily do without me.
Not that I plan to be here that long.
Not that I really plan anything at all.
The butcher’s van smells like a butcher’s van and we are bundled together, along with my suitcase, into the tight-seated cab.
‘Come a long way?’ he asks, over the croak of the engine. He catches my eye in the rear-view mirror as I worry my tongue against an ulcer on my gums. There’s another in the right side of my cheek.
‘From Edinburgh,’ I say.
His eyes dart from the road for a minute, as he gives me the once over. ‘That explains a lot,’ he chuckles. I frown at him, but he doesn’t notice. The engine grizzles as we drive along the coast.
The weather makes the water appear endless. Technically the water offshore of Bute is a firth, or an estuary, but with the fog in the way, it looks like it could go on forever. Logically, I know a crowd of mountains sits just behind the mist, the beginning slopes of the mainland, but the distance makes my stomach sour. I focus instead on the opposite window, looking past the greasy profile of the butcher to the view on the other side of the van: greener, safer, lots of trees. Houses of incongruous design with sleek extensions built onto their old stone bodies, all pebble drive and solar panels and bright gnomes in the driveway. We pass a kind of church thing with turrets and a crumbling slated roof. Surrounded by overgrowth the place looks as though it was once possessed, but the spirit has since gotten tired and left rooms cold and empty.
After that I see some sheep. Sheep are the same everywhere you go.
As the butcher drives the van up into the hills, I count their woollen bodies. They are surprisingly sparse. High tide and paved coastline turn into fields and moors, land warping quickly though we’re driving slowly past. I have only seen nine sheep. Ten. Eleven. Thirteen. The butcher sticks a finger up his nose and I turn back to my own window.
‘Surprised yer staying at Baywood,’ he says. ‘Most people go to one of the hotels in Rothesay. Fancy down there, and cheap too. Featured in the papers recently.’ He hacks, clears his throat and my fingers reach down to touch my suitcase handle. I insisted on not putting it in the back after the butcher mentioned a recent shipment of veal. ‘I suppose there is still some love for these crooked old places out here, though. My wife put up our spare room for tourists to stay in. Hundred and twenty quid per night and booked up the whole of next spring. This one couple sent a message saying they were coming here to swim. Swim!’ He laughs until it turns into a cough again. ‘This isnae Arran.’
The road rambles on, no traffic except a few lone farm vehicles riding from the fields back to town. There are more tractors here than power lines and we’ve not passed any cars either. This is the kind of place you go through, I think, passing by to someplace else – but then that doesn’t quite make sense because there’s nowhere to go from here. It took me three lines of transport just to arrive at this dead end. This is a separate place, I’m thinking, stagnant, by itself, when we turn abruptly into a long grey driveway and are confronted with the hard fact of a house.
‘Here we are,’ the butcher says.
‘Thanks.’
The house is made from stone but painted an ill pale pink at all the doors and fixtures. The pop of colour makes the stone look surly. The front of the house is dotted earnestly with potted plants, some painted on the sides with pink things like flowers, little birds, but anything growing has been tamped down by the November chills. Dead for a month, at least. The sky won’t hold its weight and the fields are minding their own business. There is only one car parked in the driveway – an ancient Mini Cooper in matching baby pink.
After I have pulled my case from the van, slamming the door behind me, the butcher leans over the seats and winds down the window to shake my hand. He holds it longer than necessary and says, ‘That’ll be a tenner, darling.’ Then he guffaws and ruffles my hair. He yells ‘ciao!’ out the window and drives away. I pat down the static in my hair and stare up at the contradictory building. I peer through all the windows, trying to decide whether or not to go in, waiting for something to stir me. Behind each pane of glass the house is dark. A magpie settles on the guttering and assesses me with its swivelling eye. It hops behind the chimney as though looking for a friend, then reappears alone.
The front door swings open and an old woman in a magenta dress beckons to me.
‘Are you coming in?’ she shouts. ‘I’ve been watching you for the last five minutes.’
I struggle to answer.
‘Come on! Come on! You’ll catch your death of cold!’ She flaps her hand at me, smiling despite the annoyance of her tone, and I surge forward as if caught on a line. When I am close enough, the woman grips me by the shoulders and pulls me into the house.
The smell is instant – worn, dusty fabrics and eggs fried hours ago. It climbs in through my mouth as I climb into it, making me feel as though I have been swallowed, licked up by the wet tongue of the woman’s grasping fingers. My case makes a thud on the floor at the same time the door clicks shut. Closed jaw. No decision necessary now. I am consumed by the mouth of a house called Baywood.
I find myself in a busy, low-ceilinged kitchen. Most of the floor space inside is taken up by a messy kitchen table that makes the floorboards creak as if it’s shifting from foot to foot. The woman takes my coat from my shoulders then grabs me again with both hands. She pulls some winged spectacles from her head as she tries to get a better look at me. Over her magenta dress she is wearing a magenta cardigan and a magenta apron and under it she has some woolly magenta tights. At her ears are pink, pearl clip-on earrings and on her chest is a necklace that seems to have been knitted.
‘Miss Fraser?’ I ask, a name inexplicably remembered from the booking website. Miss, not missus, never wed.
‘Oh, please, call me Cairstine!’ she says, rolling her crinkled eyes. ‘Miss Fraser is my mother.’ She sticks her tongue out mischievously and giggles before patting me like a child. ‘Please, pet, please take a seat. I love it when we have guests on the island. What’s your name again? Noleen?’
‘Noelle.’
I stand a moment longer and she busies herself with a kettle and teapot. She’s wearing purple slippers and they slap against the floor as she moves around. I don’t want any tea, but I pull out a chair anyway. It has a little cushioned cover on the seat, embroidered with weepy-eyed Scottie dogs. I feel a smidge of guilt as I sit upon their heads.
‘You’re late, lovey. Do you know you’re late?’
My hands are limp in my lap. The clock on the wall has a different kind of fruit representing each number. It’s Apple o’clock. Outside the light is sinking fast.
‘I’m sorry. I didn’t know there was a check-in time. I got a little lost on my way in,’
She turns to me. ‘No, no! Don’t be sorry. I’d rather you came when you felt ready to come. I’m just surprised it’s so late. Not everyone is as urgent as I am. Some people like to dawdle. That’s the wonder of people isn’t it – their differences. Me, I’ve always been too punctual for my own good. Don’t worry about it, darling, don’t worry.’
Miss Fraser’s slippers slap, slap, slap as she arranges our teacups, plopping two sugar cubes into each one without asking. She sets mine before me with a flourish, knocking a little tea out into the saucer. The cups are not pink, but they feature pink piglets, running daintily along a porcelain field of grass. There is nowhere to put it down on the table, so covered in magazines and tissue boxes and initial preparations for dinner, that I am forced to hold the saucer in my hand. Miss Fraser watches me until I take a drink, malty and fat with whole milk, and then, at a loss for what else to do, I give her the thumbs up.
