‘Whadjou mean? Man’s comin over tonight, everyting curry, yuh get me? Everyting’s hooked up. What’s wrong wid you? You fraid?’
‘No, jus has it got to be today? Feelin kinda funny, yano.’
‘Save me from your fuckeries dis morning.’
‘It’s half one.’
‘Wah?’
‘Nutin.’
‘What did you say?’
‘Nutin, it’s jus not morning.’
‘You see! Dat’s what I’m talking about! I’ve nuff fi do widout you stressing out my head top.’
‘It’s jus that it’s afternoon, is all.’
Jay got to her before she could turn away and grabbed her by her face. He pressed her head against the window, her forced-out breath frosted the glass.
‘Don’t you get it, the pressure dat I’m under? Dis is it, we’re doin it today, now move your fat arse and go and fine him and tell him the coo. Alright?’
She couldn’t speak. He squeezed a little harder so he could see the blood pumping around her eyes. And then he let go. He started to look for clothes.
‘Fuck, you’re getting fluffy, your batty looks big, man. Gonna have to lose some weight, starting to look like my grandma. Go and keep him sweet.’
The smoke had moved from her lungs to her head and took movement away from her arms and legs. She didn’t feel like doing anything.
‘Move!’
Jay’s shouting snapped the light in her head. She shuffled to the door and was about to open it when she said, ‘I think he likes me.’
‘For fuck sake, dat’s the point. Allow dat.’
She grabbed the weed, Rizla and cigarettes off the bedside table.
He was sitting on the sofa staring at the TV. He turned to look at her, struggled to get up, and she thought she heard his knees.
‘No, no, it’s alright, don’t get up.’ She sat in the armchair opposite and tried to pull her skirt down. She started to skin up. It was the only thing that was keeping her from running.
‘What you watching? Oh, it’s not on.’
‘Don’t need it, pictures all in here.’ He took one of his short, stubby fingers and tapped his head. They were the shortest, fattest fingers she had ever seen, with thick grey-brown nails at the thumb. Just the shortest and fattest ever.
‘You’ve got very strong hands.’ She was transfixed by them. Imagined them twisting a chicken neck, swinging a bat, beating a drum or squeezing a woman’s throat. That was the talk on the estate, that he’d killed his wife. He found her with another man, and while she was still naked and warm, he squeezed all the breath out of her. He spent twenty-nine years in prison. He’d slept rough for years, until he was given this place. That was the talk.
‘Steady as a rock.’ He held up a hand but a tremor started, so he used it to rub his head. Brown meeting black and grey.
‘Oh yeah,’ she humoured him. He knew it, she knew he knew – all a part of the game.
He looked at her long fingers, curling the papers over the tobacco and weed, her tongue, small and pink, licking the edge of it. She put it in her mouth and lit it, catching his gaze as she looked up.
‘Want some?’ She held it out to him. Maybe he wasn’t so stiff after all.
‘Me? Oh no, no, dat ting will mess you up dat will.’ She chuckled. ‘That’s the point.’
‘I don’t know why people need it.’
Her eyes darted across the room; she was looking for the spotlight, she suddenly felt under.
‘What, you’ve never done it?’
‘No.’ He was proud, actually proud.
‘What never, ever? Big man like you? What’s dat about?’
‘I didn’t mean to …’ He rubbed his head. ‘Sorry.’
‘It’s alright you know, I’m alright.’
‘Sorry.’
‘Stop saying sorry!’
‘Sorry.’
‘No, I’m sorry. I don’t know why …’ She let her voice drift away from her, too tired to catch it back.
‘Why what?’
‘Why I do it. I don’t know, it makes me happy.’
‘Happy?’
‘Yeh, you know. Like nothing matters, everyting cool, you know.’
‘Everyting matters.’
‘Yeh, but it’s nice to feel like it doesn’t.’
‘Did your man tell you dat?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Dat nutin matters? Everyting matters. And when you know dat you can live straight.’
‘Like to live widout killin people?’ She felt misjudged, who was he anyway? She looked at him and saw shame.
‘Anyway,’ he continued, and fought the silence that fell between them, ‘it’s bad for you.’
‘I don’t do it cossa Jay.’
‘Bad for you health.’
‘Every thing bad for you if you do it too much.’
‘And he don’t mind?’
‘Who, Jay? Fuck no!’
‘I’d mind.’ He stared at his slippers.
‘You what?’
‘If, you know, if I cared about you, I’d mind.’
She didn’t know what to say. Words gathered in her mouth and rested there.
‘Is … is he up?’
‘Who? Oh yeah, he’s up. Jus getting dressed. Er, um. Thank you for putting us up, we didn’t have anywhere else to go.’
‘Is alright.’
‘Really, thank you, we’re very grateful.’
‘I’ll put on di kekkle.’
‘No, let me.’ She floated up out the door towards the kitchen.
‘I mean it, Mordacai, you’ve given us your bed and everything. Thank you. I don’t know what we would’ve done if we hadn’t met you. Is that your local shop, then? They were nice. Couldn’t go back to the last place, too many scopers, yuh get me? So, you live by yourself then?’
She didn’t know why she kept this up. Everybody knew he had no one. That’s why they were there, cos he had no one. No one should have no one, she thought, everyone should have someone. She felt tired, small and stupid. Why was she here? Why wasn’t she at home? But they wouldn’t let her stay by herself. They wouldn’t let her stay in the hospital with her mum, either. They grabbed her in front of Niomi, still in her school uniform. She couldn’t go with her then and she cried, cried longer than she had been alive, she cried so much she felt like all her water done. She thought maybe she would never cry again but she did. She cried in all the homes she stayed in, she cried when her last foster parents wanted her out, she cried when a boy first kissed her and then slapped her, she cried when she had her first abortion. That was when she stopped crying. She looked over. Mordacai was staring at her.
She was talking too much but the weed was making her tongue loose. She shut her mouth. She put the kettle on, it was one of those old-fashioned ones with a whistle. She was still holding her neck. Her own hand made her jump. When she looked up he was standing in the door-way. Smiling, at least she thought he was smiling. He was showing her his teeth. Yellow and crooked. She wondered if he did like her, the way he scoped her all the time. She wondered if she wanted him, the thought of his naked, short, spongy body made her drop her cup.
He eyed her suspiciously, as if he knew what she was thinking. ‘Lucky it didn’t break.’
‘Yeah, lucky.’
She thought she could poke her finger through the lines under his eyes, that the skin would just envelop her. All that time on the streets. He was probably younger than he looked.
‘How did you wash?’ She couldn’t help thinking about him, on a corner, in a doorway, cold, wet, spat on, Big Issue people looking down on him.
‘What do you mean?’
‘When you lived rough. How did you …?’
‘Oh, well. Soap is cheap, me moder always seh, an I could go into public loos or MacD’s or …’ He stopped, the image of his mother, dark brown, ample, flat-footed, cherry and almond smelling, waving a bar of soap under his nose. Soap cheap. She could tell he wasn’t there.
‘Mordacai?’
‘What?’
‘Oh, er, nuffin.’
He went to sit down, she brought him tea.
‘Dis rain won’t stop, will it?’
He looked out the windows that took up half the wall. He wished they weren’t so big. They were letting the world in. All life under him, all death on top. She wanted to know what he was thinking.
‘Mordacai, I …’
‘What?’
‘Listen to me, you should leave.’
‘Leave what?’
‘L—’
‘Mornin, all.’ Jay breezed in, pulling on his trousers, shirt in his hand. He kissed Niomi on the cheek and stared into her eyes. ‘Who’s leavin?’
‘I was telling him to leave his tea, I’m crap at making it.’
‘You’re not fuckin wrong there.’ He stood over them.
She looked like she had been electrocuted. Her eyes wide, her mouth slightly open. She looked up at Jay, he winked, she recognised the fake laughter. How could he just not care at all? Mordacai looked puzzled.
‘Wah gwan, Mordacai, you want piece?’ Jay pointed at Niomi and then slapped Mordacai on the back. Mordacai started to tremble and stutter. ‘Cos if you want it, it can be arranged, you get me?’
‘Jay!’
‘What? I’m joking. What’s up wid you two. Somebody dead?’
‘Me don’t tink so, but me haven’t been out as yet so me don’t know.’
They both looked at him.
‘How are you dis morning, Mordacai, you feeling good?’
‘It’s nearly two.’
In the silence her laughter ran in and settled between them all like another person.
‘Yeh, well, anyway.’ Jay looked at Niomi and told her with his eyes that she was going to get a box.
‘Mordacai, we did tell you we’re having some friends over tonight?’
‘Well, I don’t know about that.’ The look of worry increased the lines and made his eyes wide. She was looking at a child.
‘You mean ah party?’
‘Yes.’
‘A real one?’ The excitement was building in his voice. ‘But, but, what will we do?’
‘Bout what?’
‘Eeer food an music.’
‘Well, that’s it.’ Jay sat next to him and put his arm around him and shook him every time he spoke.
‘So, check it, Mordacai, we goin to have a nice time. But you’re on it, we do need food an that. You an my girl go out and get some stuff, then we good. That cashpoint in that shop still works.’
‘I don’t go in dere.’
‘But we need cash, you got some innit? Take some out and we’ll pay you back tomorrow. Not much. Take her wid you.’
Mordacai looked at her and she looked at him, and the rain whispered against the window. Mordacai was trying not to look at Jay, who was sitting closer to him than anyone had done in a long time. Their noses almost touched.
‘You’re going to get some money out, innit Mordacai?’
‘Y … y … yes.’
‘Good, that’s good times. I knew you would. Tell you what. Take out enough for tonight and maybe tomorrow? Eh? We could go on a little trip, dat nice park, and on the way back we can get you your money.’ She watched him pretend to ask, like she had so many times before.
‘I not sure.’
‘Is nutin, you worry too much. I need to bus a piss.’ They heard him in the bathroom. ‘And get some toilet paper too!’
She felt it in her soul, the look Mordacai had on his face, and she tried not to let him see the guilt in hers.
‘Shall we go then, rain looks like it’s eased a bit.’
‘Go?’ Mordacai hadn’t moved. It was as if Jay was still there, his arm around his shoulder.
‘Yeh.’
‘I …’
‘Just a minute.’
She rushed to the bedroom and stuffed her things in a plastic bag. When she came back he still hadn’t moved.
‘Come on.’
‘Yo! Did you hear what I said? Paper, don’t figet paper!’
‘We won’t!’
She went over and took Mordacai’s arm.
‘Where’s your coat?’
He didn’t answer, and she went out into the hall and found it on the floor and came back.
‘Come on.’
‘We goin?’
‘Yes, we goin.’
THE POSSIBLE PARABLE OF CAROLINE CARLTON
ROBERT WILLIAMS
Each morning as Caroline Carlton rode her bike to work, she was filled with dread at the thought of the people she would meet during the day. Some mornings she would be required to stop at a pedestrian crossing on the busy road beneath the low green trees, and the people crossing might wave or nod thanks to her. On lush summer mornings, on snapping blue winter mornings, they were liable to call out, ‘Lovely day!’ or, ‘Beautiful morning!’
Caroline, feet poised on pedals, ready to push forward, would reply, sometimes, with the smallest of nods.
People wore Caroline out. There were so many of them. And because each and every one was different there was no single position to assume, no multi-person approach guaranteed to work; you always had to be alert, ready to switch tactics. It was exhausting. For example, people could be impatient or jolly or lazy or needy or friendly or sad or sulky or whiny or loud or smelly or helpful or moody or anxious or delighted or satisfied or grieving or in love or bored or playful or witty or gormless or smug or arrogant or kind.
Everyone was always something.
But that wasn’t even the half of it. People could be more than one thing at a time. A person could be ill and angry, for instance. Caroline once met a woman who was tired, happy, mischievous and impatient all at once. Where do you start with that?
Every day, all day, she longed for the moment when she would sink into the cold-at-first water of the council swimming pool. All day, every day, she was sustained by the thought of those first seconds underneath the water when she would hear nobody, see nobody, sink slowly, deeply down. And then, when her lungs could take no more, just before they imploded, she would kick back to the surface, take a few deep breaths and start on the first of her fifty daily lengths. By the end of her time in the water, Caroline would feel strong enough to see the day out. She would survive the few remaining inevitable encounters before resting her head on her pillow and sleeping until the next morning, when it would all begin again. If I couldn’t swim, I’d rather be dead, thought Caroline every night.
And then, of course, disaster struck.
Caroline was riding her bike to work, dreading the day ahead. A new colleague had been assigned the desk next to hers, and he talked, this man. He wanted to make Caroline drinks, he wanted to know if Caroline had had a good night, a good weekend, a good whatever he could think of next. What was her favourite colour, he wondered. Her favourite country, month, biscuit, animal, programme, book, tree, band, her favourite song … He sucked so much from Caroline that by the time she finally plunged into the water at the end of the day, she was nearly empty, almost unable to sink to the void at the bottom of the pool.
And so, it was not inconceivable that on the morning of the disaster, Caroline was more preoccupied than usual when she nearly rode her bike into the bouncy little girl on the pedestrian crossing. Seeing the danger at the last moment, Caroline swerved sharply and only squashed the toes of the girl’s left foot. But the girl cried out in pain and hopped in a circle wildly before falling to the ground and writhing in the exuberant manner only a healthy, unharmed child could. As the crowd gathered around the whirling, vigorous little thing, Caroline pulled herself up, holding one useless arm in the other scraped and bloody arm. It was two hours before she was shown the clean break on the X-ray, a thin black line spearing the bone like a shot arrow. She was discharged from hospital with her arm in a cast, two boxes of painkillers, her nose bloody, her right cheek a grazed, gory mess. Six weeks, they said. Six weeks before she would be mended, six weeks before
she could swim again. A disaster.
Life became intolerable.
Work informed her they would send a taxi in the mornings and a woman from HR would drop her back home at the end of each day. It was no trouble, Caroline was told when she protested, when she said she would prefer to walk – they had an account with the taxi firm and the woman from HR would be passing her house on the way to visit her mother.
So began Caroline’s nightmare.
First thing in the morning, a chatty taxi driver. ‘What happened to you? You look like you’ve been in the wars. How’s the arm today? Any better? Does it itch? You want to get a knitting needle down there.’
And then work and the fake concern of colleagues she didn’t like, colleagues who didn’t like her. Then the final torture: stuck with the woman from HR in heavy traffic on the way home, slowly passing the blue, blue pool, trying not to listen as she was told her about the mother’s descent into dementia. ‘She doesn’t even know who I am anymore,’ the woman said sadly. Caroline felt a twinge of jealousy.
On the fourth night she could take no more. She waited impatiently for the bath to fill. When the water was to the brim she removed her dressing gown and lowered herself. And then, after a second of anticipation, she plunged her head under, the white-plastered arm held aloft, a mini lighthouse in a tiny sea. But it was no good, the water wasn’t deep enough, and she could still hear the chatter of the taxi driver, the nattering of her colleague, the squeal of the little girl as she ran over her toe, the sad and lonely voice of the woman from HR with the demented mother.
*
The next six weeks were the most miserable six weeks of Caroline’s life. Weeks filled with people and no swimming. Finally, the day arrived to have the plaster removed. Caroline had booked the day off work and went straight from hospital to the pool, staying there until she was asked to leave. In the water, for the first time in weeks, she felt relief, a deep peace settling inside her. Before she fell asleep that night, Caroline remembered the previous six weeks with a shudder.
Test Signal Page 11