Ellipsis

by Nikki Dudley

  I carried you upstairs and put you to bed, pulling the covers right up. I kissed you on the head and told you you’d feel better in the morning. You didn’t say anything.

  In the night, I woke up and thought I saw your slippers underneath my door. You often check on me in the night and I always catch you just as the door closes, your red slippers flashing in the crack under the door, before I turn over and go back to sleep. That night, I strained to hear the soft bump of your bedroom door against the door-frame but there was nothing. I crept across the landing and listened outside your door and there was nothing. Only silence. I told myself I must be going crazy and went back to my room.

  Two days after the neighbour knocked, I lost you.

  12 Objects

  Thom sits in the dark with his eyes fastened. He knows he can open them if he tells his brain to send a message to the muscles and nerves surrounding his eyes, yet he doesn’t. He lets his facial muscles lie comatose, like caterpillars inert but full of potential.

  He feels an object with his shaky fingers. He has spent two days looking over the objects collectively and hours scrutinising each object’s every feature. With this brush it’s the plastic body with rubber welts that has embedded the pattern into his palm, the stubbly beard that has pressed into his pores until they sting and remind him of his own unkempt face, the curled lip of its head like a sneer. He has devoted hours to using all his senses to analyse this object and now he has spent half an hour holding it in his hands, expecting the lights to suddenly blind him.

  It is several minutes later, when he begins to wonder, why the hell is he holding this washing up brush? Why out of all the contents of that lock up, did he deem this specific object important? Was it instinct that drew him to this object or untold desperation?

  Questions again. And where have all the answers gone? Thom wonders if he should place a missing ‘answers’ report. They seem to have camouflaged themselves in the scenery, the people, the words all around him, and he can no longer distinguish them. The answers he once recognised so easily in life have grown and their adult forms are so matured, he cannot pick them out in a line up.

  He drops the brush onto the floor and it thuds against the collection of other items gathered there. The train grumbles outside the window as though it’s hankering for food. Thom jumps to his feet and yanks the window wide open. He screams.

  It’s a loud high-pitched scream. An animal gnawed apart by a metal trap, or a hedgehog disorientated and screeching for rescue.

  The train doesn’t respond. The train continues to clunk onwards, on its set path, unaffected by this one man’s pain from a window beside the tracks. The passengers inside the train probably don’t notice his cry and if they do, they probably imagine it’s a rowdy schoolchild playing with another nearby. Or if they’re listening to music, they probably think it’s part of the music that they’ve failed to notice before. If they see him even, they presume he is merely shouting to somebody he knows or he is insane and they turn away, back into the safety of isolation.

  Thom wonders if he should talk to somebody. He has barely communicated with anybody since the day he heard the news. The news of Daniel’s death seems like the last thing he heard clearly. The normal sounds of everyday life seem duller like he is submerged in water. The world is an art gallery where he walks amongst the pieces yet he is not a part of them.

  There is a random series of knocks on the door and Richard pops his head in. Thom is relieved that he is no longer alone with the pile of objects, as though they have been bullying him and he is glad he now has someone to fight with him. Although as Richard settles himself on the bed, Thom kicks the pile beneath the bed as he pretends to rearrange himself.

  Richard is a mixture of two extremes and he displays them within the first thirty seconds of sitting down beside him. He fidgets with his hands and his lip twitches, a lizard bouncing on legs like mattress springs. Then, he throws his head back and gives a long extended yawn, gulping in air like an addict.

  “How you going, Thom?” Richard asks and pulls at his ear lobes. He pulls at them every few minutes. Thom has never figured out why. Perhaps it is nervousness. Perhaps it is merely an unfounded habit. Perhaps he just likes how the skin of his ear lobe is so soft. Thom has no idea of the reason or the cause, yet he knows Richard will do it, as he knows the sun will rise tomorrow.

  “I’m okay. You?” Thom isn’t looking at Richard. In fact, to an outsider, he looks disinterested. Similarly, Richard is tracing the lines of the pattern on the duvet.

  “Yeah”, he says slowly, not sure how to answer even a simple question. Perhaps he is merely lying like Thom is. Neither of them probes any further though. They leave it at the words they use to fend off queries, to keep people from digging underneath the pretence worn like clothes every day.

  “Rich…” Thom begins, scratching his stubble, “do you think he jumped?” The words claw out of his throat, each letter stabbing him, breeding in size as he tries to arrange them in order and make sense.

  “What?” Richard frowns. His head suddenly filled with ditches reminds Thom of Mrs Tray and he remembers he must find out more about her.

  “What do you think?” Thom persists. Richard looks down at his lap. Thom loves Richard. He can’t imagine how he would’ve survived his teens without him. Yet, Richard has one major fault, which is his need to believe that life is as it seems.

  “I don’t know”. Richard shrugs. Thom feels like he has snatched a treasured toy from a child. Richard tugs his ear lobe a few times in a row.

  “So you haven’t thought about it?”

  “I guess I haven’t…” Richard mutters, glancing at the door, which is still slightly ajar. “I haven’t thought much about… you know…” He slaps his hands against his knees and a moment later, adds: “trains”. It is a whisper that could be misinterpreted as ‘chains’ or ‘lanes’ or anything else that rhymes with it. Only Thom knows because he has the context. This is the first time he has felt superior with the knowledge he has. Small victories.

  “Was Daniel okay before it happened?” Thom ventures, a feeble attempt, as he knows he should’ve asked much earlier. Richard closes his eyes, thinking.

  “It’s hard to tell. I mean, we both know how strange he could be”. Richard rubs his head as though he is massaging a bruise.

  Thom hates to see Richard massaging that invisible bruise so he shakes his head. “Don’t worry mate. Let’s leave it, for now”. He can’t drag Richard into turmoil too; it wouldn’t be fair. Not now, anyway. He needs to find out more.

  Richard looks at him like he has been given a reprieve and stands up. For a moment, Thom thinks he is going to leave the room but he walks over to the window and heaves it open without flexing a muscle. He reaches into his pocket and pinches his packet of cigarettes out, flipping it open and sucking one out between his lips. He turns round and raises an eyebrow.

  “Want one?”

  Thom doesn’t smoke. Yet, a moment later he finds himself cautiously watching a flame move towards his face, making his eyes cross. He sucks on it tenderly and instantly exhales, as Richard taught him when he was fourteen and they first tried smoking at the back of the garden.

  “I know it’s a stupid thing to say but I do miss him”, Richard says, glancing at Thom. “But the worst thing is I can’t remember the little things he did”. Richard grimaces at the window panes.

  “Don’t feel bad”, Thom tries to comfort him. Yet there is no reason behind the words, no weight for Richard to grab onto.

  “I haven’t cried you know… since it happened”.

  “I vomited”, Thom volunteers, sheepishly. They both chuckle but the chuckle is dry and brief. Thom moves towards the window and tries to flick ash through the gap but he misses, and it falls onto his jeans.

  “You’re a shitty smoker”. Richard grins. Thom starts to protest but eventually shrugs, trying to brush the ash away. “Sometimes when I’m smoking”, Richard starts, watching Thom closely, “I imagin
e I’m being watched”. Richard rolls the cigarette between his fingers and flicks his eyes towards Thom, squinting as if Thom’s judgement will scald him.

  “What?”

  “I just mean, like in films, when the guy’s sitting on some bench somewhere and it’s just him and his cigarette…” Richard gives his a long kiss, moving his eyes along a train snaking past outside. “It’s like one of those moments, when they’re thinking about everything that’s happened over the course of the film and the audience are either really happy for them or thinking God, they’re fucked”.

  Thom thinks about this for a moment and wonders what the audience would think of him, a pathetic smoker with jeans he’s been wearing for five days that are now smudged with ash.

  “So, which are we?” Thom asks, hopefully. Richard pulls at his ear and leaves a temporary red blotch there, like the spark of his cigarette, slowly fading.

  “I can’t decide yet”, Richard answers, disappointing them both.

  13 Blood

  She can’t ruin everything.

  I won’t let her come swooping down on my new life, my new friends and take me back to that room where the walls won’t even talk to me. The only person who talks is her: about her thoughts and feelings, her family life, her next delightful holiday from work with all the trimmings. When she should have been asking me about something, anything and not smearing her perfect life all over my room like shit, to taunt me by having to smell it every day that the lock turned in the door.

  I guess at least her self-fascination got me out of there. And seeing her again now, smoothing her hair in the murky mirror in the hallway leading to my bedsit, I know nothing has changed. She sucks the end of her pen desperately, like a baby controlling a dummy, then pauses to check if she has any ink on her lips and being satisfied, stuffs it in again. Doctor bitch Rosey.

  After our first meeting, I decided she must’ve changed her name to Rosey because it is so fitting. It can’t be a coincidence. Or perhaps her name coerced her into being such a deluded, ignorant donkey. She is the literal translation of rose-tinted glasses.

  I watch her from the bottom of the stairs, her nagging pen harassing the clipboard and paper she carries with her. I’m sure she is making some official note about me not answering her calls and failing to be present for a follow-up appointment. If I could, I would push her in front of a train. And perhaps I will… I can’t let her disturb me, now I have a new family to look out for, now that they need me to help them cope with Daniel’s death, now that I need to find out how he managed it.

  I am just beginning to tiptoe away like a mime artist when the landlord’s door opens.

  “Thanks so much”, a voice says. I halt. His face immediately floats into my head. I think: run! Yet, my knees seize up like cogs unable to turn. For a moment, I imagine he won’t see me, like when we used to hide under the kitchen table and giggle, pretending we were invisible until you grabbed our legs and pulled us out. I am six again and he can’t see me either.

  Yet he does. I have my face turned towards him, my legs and body still facing the door. He backs out of the landlord's flat, clearly knocked back by the stench of sweat, his breath and the collection of half-dead fish swimming in shit. I recognise his nose that is exactly like mine, slightly bent on the bridge and pointed up a millimetre or two at the end. I notice the stubble he has left to fester and stray, his hair creeping over the top of his ears like ivy.

  I see my brother.

  “Michael”, I say. It’s not a question. It’s not the start of a sentence. It is nothing at all. It is as though he is a familiar object I am trying to articulate in a new language.

  His eyes are wide, blood shot. He grabs onto the banister, a lost child doing the sensible thing and waiting for somebody to find him, and he plants his feet firmly on the ground. The landlord burps and closes his door.

  It is only us now, two animals afraid to start a fight, too afraid to find out who is the fittest, who can survive. I think I love him still. I think I still love.

  Mum, your kids are together again.

  He is looking at the door behind me. It is a black hole that will swallow me up and he will not be able to find me in that darkness. I wonder if he can ever detach himself from what he thinks is right and cry with me for the loss. He never talked to me about you; all he did was dress up like a fraud and act his way through the funeral and every conversation we’ve shared since.

  “Hi”, he croaks and coughs, trying to regain his power. The noise causes the dust in the air to pirouette around us. I am entranced for a moment but shake myself awake when I see him staring at me. I wish he would hide with me again. I glance over at the small table by the door and realise it’s far too small for the both of us. I just want to share stories with him and pretend we’re on a submarine looking at all the fish on the seabed, pretending every time your legs pass, you are an enemy submarine that we have to fight with.

  But Michael doesn’t play anymore. He takes people away from their home they’ve always lived in, he tells his children their Aunty is mad, he works at a bank and owns a red BMW, he stands in hallways and doesn’t know what he should say to keep me there.

  “You’re going bald”, I say and watch his lip tremble, like a fishing line bobbing as a fish takes the bait. He lifts his head upwards, his pointy nose keeping face.

  “How are you?”

  “Wonderful. And you?” I smile like the Joker from Batman, manic and sad. Perhaps I am bipolar, insane?

  “You can tell me how you are…” Michael pauses, for effect, “truthfully?” He always does this. He loves to separate his sentences to really emphasise his point, to pretend he is a diplomat. I wish I could scream in his face just to make him turn white and scare that smug undertone out of his words. At the same time, I wish I could fall into his arms and ask him to tell me why I pushed that man.

  “Why are you here?” He doesn’t think fast and the silence wraps around us like anaesthetic numbing bodily function. We are speaking quietly, secretly and, so far, the evil Doctor hasn’t heard our reunion. In fact, I think she is in my bedsit, poking around in my things, trying to understand me for the second time.

  “I’m here. That’s what matters”, Michael says, taking a step towards me. He strokes the banister tenderly as though he is comforting me. Yet my skin only feels cold.

  “That’s a poor way of not answering the question”. I stare through him. Although trying to keep such a flat expression only makes me want to laugh.

  “The doctor asked me to come”, Michael finally explains. Yet his words are no surprise and I wonder why he even bothered to verbalise them.

  “Do you miss her, Michael?”

  “Who?” He bows his head.

  What a traitor, Mum!

  I want to kick him in the teeth and watch each tooth swim in blood and slide away from his gums. I want to watch his lips inflame with hardened skin and struggle to form words that he uses to create scrawny excuses and reasons. I can’t think of a way to express these thoughts without actually carrying them out so I don’t speak. Instead I turn towards the small table that has innocently witnessed our meeting and I grab it by its top. With my arms straightened to their fullest, I watch him watching me and I think the tables have turned. Then I smash the table into the wall.

  One of the table legs breaks and I let it fall to the floor. I only wish it could be his face, his identical nose smashing irreversibly. I’m not sure who looks sadder – him or the table. Then in the next moment I hear the Doctor shouting from the top of the stairs and Michael lifts his face like a soldier following orders.

  I run. The door opens up and swallows me. Michael chases me into the darkness, calling my name, weaving through people, calling my name and getting stuck between the cars. Michael shouts my name and I cry because he is calling me and I want to go back and ask him what he wants.

  Michael, Michael, do you need me?

  14 The Notebook

  Thom opens the notebook. The first pag
e is blank and he is on the edge of relief, feeling like he is peeping into his girlfriend’s diary. It has taken him two days to even get this far but it’s time, after his complete failure with the other objects he chose from the lock up. Thom reasons he shouldn’t feel bad about looking at this notebook though. After all, Daniel left him the lock up and its contents. So, this notebook is his property and he has the right to read every scribble and word it contains.

  The second page is full of writing. The handwriting is an angry scrawl, not like Daniel’s usual composed hand. In this notebook another side of him seems to have taken over or he was too excited to put on a charade, even for himself. He notices the rest of the notebook is full from quickly flicking through the pages. He begins to read:

  I am wandering around without belonging, without stable identity or a true family who love me. From the outside, I’m sure I appear just like anyone else. I’m sure I look like a clean pane of glass but the glass is hiding what’s really there: a stormy sea that is swallowing me up. Sometimes, I can’t even breathe and have to really concentrate on normal everyday actions.

  I’m afraid of myself. I don’t trust my body or my mind anymore. I have begun to hate people. It’s because I’m different, that’s all. I keep losing people and I wonder whether it’s all my fault.

  Perhaps I was born to live alone. Although I have no one I can really ask this question, no one listens to me anymore. My family say they love me but I know they secretly wonder about me, whether there’s something wrong with me.

  I have no idea what to do anymore. I spend hours sitting alone and planning ways to escape. Then I change my mind and go back to living like I have been. I wish someone would help me.

  The bottom of the page has blotches of ink on it and Thom guesses Daniel’s pen broke. Thom feels weighed down by the words, weighed down by guilt for not helping Daniel more when he had the chance. But would Daniel have accepted his help?