There was nobody quite like Liv. At least nobody I’d ever met. She was fun and mischievous and full of the very stuff of life like a spaniel puppy on a sunny day. She found me by default. Her sheer niceness had made her prey to a couple of double-hard bastards and one unpleasant short-lived marriage. So, she put it behind her and sought out someone without any that possessive baggage, someone with whom she could share good times as an equal, not some second-hand accessory.

That’s when she found me. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not a goody two-shoes saint or some dull as dishwater bread-head banker, but I know how to treat people, I’ve got some good ol’ fashioned values. I know what’s right. And when Liv went full throttle, she brought out the very best in me and we never looked back.

Seventeen years we’d been married. No kids because we ourselves were just a couple of big kids and they have a habit of ruining your party life. Selfish, I know, but parenthood isn’t mandatory. And that’s where we found ourselves on that sun-kissed Saturday a year ago. Though a little before our time, we’d both been brought up on a heady mixture of Hendrix, Clapton, Floyd, Led Zep and the rest. Rotherton Rock ‘n’ Blues Festival was a very small event of just a few hundred souls, all of them come for an array of relatively unknown but battle-hardened guitarists and crazy drummers and raunchy lead singers.

It was Saturday, the second day of the festy. We were under a large marquee, insurance against the mercurial English weather. It housed about three hundred people along with stage and other accoutrements. There were two large electric candelabra hanging from the central beam which I thought was a bit incongruous till I realised the marquee was an all-purpose affair including wedding parties. The sound system was superb, and you were liable to lose your eardrums if stood too close. And, yes, it was a standing event; you don’t sit down quietly in neat rows and clapping politely when a long-haired, bearded rocker with a black strat is scorching a guitar solo to make your hairs stand on end.

The crowd? They were just like me and Viv really. Same demographic, mostly 50’s and 60’s, with as much silver on their heads as they were wearing around their necks, ears and fingers. A lot of them were married couples or long-term partners. Nearly everyone, especially the blokes, were dressed in faded blue jeans and a t-shirt, usually black, a memento of a gig or a festival they’d been to with the names of performers on the back. I was wearing a blue t-shirt commemorating the Rhythm Festival from 2014. Liv had faded black jeans with a silver Mexican looking belt, a tie-dyed multi-coloured blouse and a battered straw hat that made her look like a poor cowgirl from the Tennessee backwoods but also impossibly beautiful because, well, because she was Liv.

A band had been playing. They were called ‘Mickey Green and the Pirates’. Mickey, the lead guitarist, was wearing a bandana and it was only after a few minutes, that I realised he had a moveable metal claw where his left hand should be. Such is the dark humour of the rock world. They sounded terrific, the fast frenetic rhythms, Mickey blasting out a solo, the drummer holding it all together. The crowd were moving, some shuffling their feet, many of the women grooving a bit more energetically. Liv, of course, swinging her hips from side to side, a huge grin on her face. There was such a buzz at these festies, the goodwill, the shared enjoyment, the raw appreciation for these virtuoso’s. You could almost reach out and touch it.

I glanced to my right and that’s when I noticed him. He was on his own, around mid to late 30’s, shortish hair, clean shaven. His jeans looked brand new as if he was wearing them for the first time. He wore a Pink Floyd ‘Dark Side of the Moon’ t-shirt, standard issue really. He looked so inane that, in this crowd, he may as well have been wearing a bright pink Hi-Viz. The other thing which made him stand out was that he didn’t seem much interested in the band, he seemed more fixated on Liv. He kept glancing over, watching her intently. This wasn’t unusual. Liv was not conventionally attractive, but she was vivacious, and she smiled at everyone which gave some blokes the wrong idea. I’m an easy going fellow but also a hefty 6 foot, two, which usually acts as a deterrent. What troubled me about this guy was the look on his face; it wasn’t lust, it was worry.

The band finished their set, we whooped and applauded, and people started to leave the marquee. Pink Floyd guy approached us. He seemed nervous. He stared Liv straight in the eye and said, “Excuse me, but I-I need to speak to you about something.” Then he glanced at me and said, “Both of you.” Liv shot me a bemused look, I shrugged, motioned to the exit and said to him “Lead on, maestro.”

We found one of the many picnic tables placed in the main area near the marquee. Liv and I sat together, the other guy facing us. He looked from me to Liv for a long moment then began.

“When….when I was seven years old, I dreamt that my brother fell out of a tree and broke his arm. Next day, he fell out of a tree. And broke his arm.

When I was 17, I dreamed that my Uncle Pete would die of a sudden heart attack. Two days later, guess what?”

“Heart attack?” I ventured.

“I think you’ll find it’s called ‘coincidence’, matey boy” retorted Liv.

He sighed as if carrying a burden. “It-it happens a lot. Too much. And then, then it started happening to strangers. People I don’t know.” He paused for a moment. “I’d see them die.”

Liv just laughed and cackled “I see dead people!”

“And then,” he continued, “I try and seek them out. To warn them. I don’t know how but somehow, I just know where they are. It’s like a voice inside of me, a voice without any words.”

“’There’s someone in my head but it’s not me’” replied Liv, a half-smile on her face.

“Er, what?”

“It’s a line from that album on your chest” she said.

Pink Floyd guy glanced at me for help. “I-I didn’t ask for this. It just….it just happens. I know how it sounds.”

“Mate,” I replied. “I don’t….to be honest, I don’t know what to say to you.”

And I didn’t. Liv was a star child. The universe was a place of infinite fun for her. She put aside the heavier aspects that could affect her sunny disposition. And me? I well remember my Aunt Steph who wasn’t really my aunt but a good friend of my mother. She knew stuff. I mean, she really knew stuff. She could tell me things about myself that I kept from my mum. I once asked her if she was psychic and she shrugged and said “I’m just a hollow bone. Things pass through me from one end to the other.”

I turned to the guy. “What do you want?” I asked him though I could already guess at the answer.

He focused on Liv and jumped in. “I dreamt I saw you die. Tonight. Those big candelabra’s hanging in the marquee? You’re standing underneath one of them, it breaks loose from its moorings and falls on you, killing you instantly.” He turns to me. “You asked me what I want? All I want is for your wife not to dance under that stupid candelabra tonight. That’s all.”

Liv turned to me, was mock-serious for a moment then burst out laughing. “Well, I gotta say, Mr Crazy Person, you’ve given us a bit of entertainment in between bands.”

“No, no, I-“

“-mate”, I interjected, “if you’ve seen all this death and mayhem shit, why don’t you just approach the organisers and tell ‘em it’s a bit wonky? Job done.”

“That doesn’t work. It never does. I’d just be ejected from the premises” he replied sadly.

“By men in white coats” suggested Liv.

“You’ve got a strong south-west accent” I said to him. “Have you travelled all the way up here to tell your story?”

“Well, yes,” he muttered. “I have to. I’m told to.”

“Told to? By who?”

He seemed embarrassed. “I think…I think it comes from God. And you know what’s funny? I don’t even believe in God.”

“That is funny” I replied, staring at him with not a little sympathy.

Liv stood up and took my hand. C’mon, lover boy, I’m in need of a pint. She turned to our guest. “Thanks for the funny story, Mister Scary Guy. I’ll be sure to tell it to my grandchildren. Oh, I forgot, I don’t have any.”

She pulled me along, leaving our messenger of doom staring into nothingness. She gave my hand a yank. “If there’s a beer called ‘Fake Prophet’, I’d like a large pint of it.”

* * *

Evening came. It was mid-August and pretty dark by 8.30. There was a bit of a chill and a sharp breeze had come in from the north through the open exit. The candelabra was swinging slightly. Some of the crowd were a little tanked-up and raucous. Faded denim jackets made an appearance as well as shawls, poncho’s and various light summer wear. Most of my fellow rockers were holding a pint, me included.

The band were called ‘Dark Orleans’, a guitar heavy band with an unusual Cajun feel to them, like the next generation of Creedence. The jaunty combo of fast blues, electric fiddle and Louisiana grooves was highly infectious, and everyone was moving in varying levels of dancing athleticism.

Liv had abandoned the straw hat and was swinging energetically to the music, her gorgeous silver-streaked hair twirling around her shoulders. I don’t think I loved her any more than I did than that moment in time. But perhaps I’m being nostalgic. I moved with her, perhaps less frenetically, but enjoying the charged atmosphere.

We were to the side of the marquee, perhaps twenty feet away from the stage. I glanced over at the candelabra, still swinging. The heavy brackets were fixed either side but it didn’t look like it was going anywhere. Nobody else seemed bothered by it. Liv caught my eye, a wicked grin on her face.

“Hey, Big Fella, fancy tempting fate?”

“No”, I replied. “I bloody well don’t.”

I wanted to tell her that we should stay where we are. I wanted to say that maybe Crazy Man wasn’t so crazy after all. I wanted to admit that I was just a little bit frightened. But I didn’t. And before I could open my mouth, Liv, this child-like force of nature, had pushed her way to the centre, some people obliging, others a bit indignant.

The candelabra hung there, heavy and not quite motionless. Liv got to the spot. She turned to me. I was struggling through the crowd to try and pull her away from this potentially lethal contraption. She stood defiantly, beneath it, a huge, stupid grin on her face, both hands open, outstretched, as if to say “See? I’m fine.” Till the support brackets broke, the same support brackets which had been replaced with cheap inferior ones and couldn’t take the weight. They cracked simultaneously in a split second and the heavy candelabra from somebody else’s dream and my eternal nightmare plunged downwards, its dull metal point piercing the skull of Liv, my beautiful Liv, that crazy wonderful smile fixed on her face and my aching memory for all eternity.

* * *

I looked for him everywhere. He never gave his name. Why would he? Maybe like Aunt Steph, he was just a hollow bone and things passed through him. Maybe he really did think he was some messenger from a God he didn’t believe in. Mr Crazy Man on a mission of mercy to help the helpless. I needed to find him and tell him to stop the madness, that if he hadn’t walked into our lives, then Liv would still be with me, dancing into our later years with grace and love like a comforting blanket of warmth and companionship, her summer smile which created its own special glow.

Till then, I sit in this darkening, quiet room as the coming night slowly envelops me like a shroud.