The Kissing Game: Stories of Defiance and Flash Fictions

by Aidan Chambers

‘About that we agree,’ he said. ‘But what we both have to learn right now is how we get out of this mess. Because, honestly, I don’t think the priest—’

  ‘Father Thomas.’

  ‘—will be able to save us for long. You might think you’re absolved or whatever, but, if you ask me, the police won’t care about that.’

  ‘Father Thomas knows what to do.’

  ‘I hope you’re right.’

  ‘You must trust.’

  ‘Maybe you have too much.’

  ‘I trust you. Why not Father Thomas?’

  They looked at each other in silence again.

  Until Nadia stood up and said, ‘There will be kitchen. I make coffee.’

  And went, leaving Jack standing in front of the empty fireplace and the crucified man, waiting for what would happen next, because he could do nothing else.

  on a bus.

  Man: It’s bad.

  Woman: Excuse me?

  Man: The weather. It’s bad.

  Woman: Oh! Yes. Yes, it is.

  (Pause)

  Man: Not as bad as yesterday though.

  Woman: No.

  Man: Colder yesterday.

  Woman: Was it?

  Man: I had to wear my coat. It’s cold today, I thought. I’d better wear my coat.

  (Pause)

  Woman: It’s sunnier today.

  Man: I’m sorry?

  Woman: Today. It’s sunnier.

  Man: Yes. Yes, it is.

  Woman: It’ll rain though.

  Man: You think so?

  Woman: It has to. They said it had to. On the telly this morning, they said it had to rain today.

  Man: It’s bound to. I haven’t brought my coat.

  (Pause)

  Man: It’s bright enough now though.

  Woman: They sometimes get it wrong.

  Man: They do.

  Woman: They were wrong yesterday. Yesterday they said it would be warm and sunny.

  Man: And it was cold and cloudy. That’s why I wore my coat.

  (Pause)

  Woman: Mind you, it’s not easy. Forecasting.

  Man: It’s the weather. It’s that changeable.

  Woman: Me—I just expect what comes.

  Man: That’s the best way.

  Woman: Take what comes. That’s how I look at life.

  Man: That’s the right way.

  Woman: Take what life offers.

  Man: Me too.

  (Pause)

  Woman: The long-range forecast is awful.

  Man: Is it?

  Woman: Terrible. A month of cold winds and rain, they said.

  Man: On the telly?

  Woman: They said it on the telly yesterday.

  Man: I missed that.

  Woman: They could be wrong.

  Man: Life is unpredictable.

  Woman: All guesswork.

  Man: You can’t blame them. With the weather the way it is.

  (Pause)

  Woman: Mind you, I don’t think this sun will last.

  Man: Nothing does, does it? Not for long.

  Woman: Too good to last.

  Man: I knew I should have brought my coat.

  Woman: Still, got to look on the bright side.

  Man: Stay hopeful.

  Woman: Take what comes.

  (Pause)

  Woman: I get off here.

  Man: Me too.

  bridge over a river.

  Ben: There’s something I have to tell you.

  Nat: You’re dumping me.

  Ben: No!

  Nat: You are. You’re breaking us up.

  Ben: No, that’s not it.

  Nat: I knew it. You’ve been different lately.

  Ben: No I haven’t.

  Nat: For the last few weeks.

  Ben: No I haven’t.

  Nat: Yes you have. You’ve been sort of quiet.

  Ben: Because of what I have to tell you.

  Nat: You’ve met somebody else.

  Ben: No.

  Nat: You have. It’s what I’ve always dreaded.

  Ben: It isn’t that at all.

  Nat: Where did you meet her?

  Ben: I haven’t met anybody.

  Nat: What’s her name?

  Ben: There isn’t anybody.

  Nat: Is she blonde or brunette? I bet she’s brunette.

  Ben: No.

  Nat: Not ginger, is she? That would be the worst.

  Ben: No.

  Nat: You want a change. That’s what it is.

  Ben: No, I don’t.

  Nat: You’re bored with me.

  Ben: I am not bored with you.

  Nat: How long have we been going out together?

  Ben: What?

  Nat: There! You see! You can’t remember.

  Ben: Eight months. We’ve been going out for eight months. Eight months next Friday, actually.

  Nat: But you had to think about it. Had to work it out, didn’t you.

  Ben: Listen, Nat.

  Nat: I don’t need to listen. I can guess the whole story already.

  Ben: Please, Nat, listen. There’s something I have to tell you.

  Nat: All right. Have it your own way. Really upset me.

  Ben: It’s that—

  Nat: Tell me all the gory details. Go on.

  Ben: My mother.

  (Pause)

  Ben: She’s in hospital.

  (Pause)

  Ben: They thought she had cancer.

  (Pause)

  Ben: We were afraid she might die.

  (Pause)

  Ben: That’s why I never told you. Didn’t want to upset you.

  (Pause)

  Ben: But they think she’s all right. They’re not totally sure. But she’s probably OK. She’s coming home tomorrow.

  (Pause)

  Nat: Thank god! I thought you were going to dump me.

  Ben: Excuse me?

  Nat: It would’ve been the end of me. Honestly, Ben, it would have totally been the end of me.

  Ben: Did you hear what I said?

  Nat: Yes. Course I did. And I’m really sorry about your mum. But what a relief!

  Ben: Nat!

  Nat: I’m here for you, Ben.

  (Pause)

  Ben: Nat.

  Nat: What?

  Ben: Go chuck yourself in the river.

  Nat: Ben! What’s the matter? Ben! Don’t walk off like that.

  anything I want to do I know I can be anything I want to be and I know I can do anything I want to do I know because they tell us that we can be anything we want to be and we can do anything we want to do all we have to do is want to be it enough and want to do it enough and if we want it enough we can be anything we want to be and if we want it enough we can do anything we want to do and as I look out of my window at people passing by in the street like that woman with a baby in a pram I know that the baby will be anything it wants to be and do anything it wants to do as long as it wants to be it enough and wants to do it enough whether it’s a boy or a girl or black or white or sky-blue pink because that’s what they say.

  (Pause)

  I want to be a Grand Slam tennis player I want to be a Grand Slam tennis player more than anything else in the world.

  (Pause)

  Only they don’t tell me how I can be a Grand Slam tennis player no matter how much I really want it now that I have no legs which they cut off me after the accident with the car.

  (Pause)

  Unless they are lying unless they were always lying unless you can’t be what you want to be and can’t do anything you want to do no matter how much you want to be it and how much you want to do it unless everything else is right and if they are lying all I can be is someone who sits here in this chair with wheels instead of legs and all I can do is look out of my window at the people walking along the street who can be anything they want to be and do anything they want to do.

  (Pause)

  They wouldn’t lie about something as big as that.

  (Pause)

/>   Would they?

  I was fifteen. But what should I write about? I knew I wanted to write stories, novels preferably. I’d been told by teachers to write about what I knew. But what do you know when you’re only fifteen and live a sheltered, unadventurous life? Other people’s lives were interesting. Mine was boring.

  Write about something you feel passionate about, a teacher told me. One event came to mind. The death of my coal-miner grandfather in 1945. I was very fond of him. He took me on walks when I was little, and told me some of the first stories I can remember. His death was a distressing shock. It still upsets me. I was passionate about that. So here it is. I was seventeen when I finished it. It went through many drafts before this one.

  All the other stories in this book are about people aged fourteen to seventeen. It seemed fitting to include a story written by someone of that age.

  When I was ten my mother’s father died. Ever since I can remember until the time he became ill my mother had taken me to see my grandparents on Sunday afternoons. The visits had become a ritual. I would be scrubbed in the kitchen sink until my skin shone, was taut and drum-like. Then I would draw in my breath with a low hiss to show my dislike of the clean woollen socks my mother pulled on, the starched, almost rough grey shirt, stiff grey suit and plastered-down hair. At last I would sit like a life-size china boy waiting for my mother to come downstairs ready to go in her high-heeled court shoes and tight black two-piece costume, which I never liked.

  But when Grandad became ill I only visited once. I was afraid of the warm, forbidding air of the sickroom, the wet clamminess of his hands. I shied away from the restrictions his sickness imposed on the household. The forced quietness, the talk about illness, the general air of trouble made me feel that everyone was infected, not just Grandad. The sharp, bitter tang of coal, which used to fill the miner’s house, had given way to a warm fetid body-smell.

  The news of his death came one night. My mother’s eyes reddened and swam in tears, but as soon as she saw my discomfort, my wonder, she tried to brighten up. Even so, I knew it had hurt her and because I knew it would hurt her even more if I did not, I tried to throw off my fear and promised to go with her to see Grandma.

  The next day was Sunday. The normality of the routine ritual helped me to pretend there was nothing really wrong. But still, I was more cooperative over washing and dressing, and Mother was more gentle than usual with the hateful clean socks and best Sunday clothes.

  We left the house. Dad was digging in the back garden sullen with guilt because he knew he should be coming too, but wouldn’t. He never did come with us on these Sunday visits, I never knew why and never asked. It was a damp autumn day, cold despite the sun, with spongy yellow leaves making the road like sodden old blotting paper. We walked down the road carrying the day like pallbearers by the side of the treacly river we called The Burn, that carried away the sulphurous refuse of a coke factory which smoked all day and fumed all night at the head of the valley. The day seemed like a yellow, wet, washed-out watercolour.

  There were not many passengers waiting for the bus, but the main street crawled with Sunday crowds. Their bobbing heads suddenly seemed ridiculous like rebel jack-in-the-boxes. And all of them, except one or two dusty pitmen just off their shift, who lounged around a pub door, were got up to kill in their once-a-week clothes. Between the banks of people the road was almost deserted but for an occasional car, the odd bus, and a stray dog that seemed to prefer the risk of being squashed by the traffic to the dangerous feet on the pavement. It was a relief when our bus arrived to drag my mother upstairs, from where I could look down on the people below, all heads and shoulders. I felt comfortable and removed peering at them, and wondered if that’s how it felt when you were dead.

  Grandad was dead. Perhaps he was chuckling as he looked down on us. He used to sit at one end of the table in the living room and drum on top of the table with his fingers. He never sat in an easy chair. He used to sit easy in the fields though. ‘Sit easy, son, sit easy, and if th’ canny sit easy, sit as easy as th’ can.’ That was when he used to take me for walks round the fields to get an appetite for tea and to get me out of the house so that my grandma and six aunts and my mother could gossip without me overhearing. But in the summer I never got my appetite because we used to rub the heads of ripe corn in our hands, blow the chaff away and eat the little nuts. And always, once a summer, Grandad used to pick a bunch of ripe corn and hang it upside down from a rusty nail behind the back door, because it was supposed to bring good luck. This year he hadn’t been out for any because he was ill in bed. And this year Grandad died.

  We got off the bus at the bottom of the valley on the edge of the mining village where my grandparents lived and my mother had grown up. We walked up the hill past the rows of terrace houses built of stone, which had turned a dull crumbly black. The streets were long, thick, solid things that seemed to squat because of their chunky length, like great brooding animals. Regularly along their front sides were two windows and a door, two windows and a door, two windows and a door, a monotonous procession. I let my hand clap clap clap along the wooden railings at the ends of the gardens until a jagged edge nicked my finger. I walked on, sucking my injured hand.

  One or two of the men and their wives who were working in their gardens or squatting on the doorsteps nodded to my mother and gave a slight, half-pitying smile, as people do who want to be sympathetic, knowing there has been a death, but none of them spoke.

  When we came to the row where my grandparents lived we turned into the back lane. The backs of the houses faced each other, each house with its walled yard and outbuildings equally divided into coalhouse and dry lavatory. The lane was gritty and hard. Our shoes crunched at every step, a weak echo walking along with us. Children were screaming round a flyblown ice-cream van, which occasionally let off a cacophony of motor-horn blasts. Some of the children stared blankly at me because of my clothes and I could feel them leering at me, then laughing and scoffing when we were past.

  We reached Grandma’s and swung into the backyard without a pause, trying to hide our apprehension and nervousness.

  The back door led straight into the big kitchen/living room. The curtains were drawn over the one window that looked out onto the backyard. The room was shrouded in the suffused light. As we entered, Mother first, me behind clinging to her hand, I saw the arc of quiet women sitting round the black-leaded range. Their heads turned to look at us.

  ‘Here she is!’ cried Aunty Doris, pretending cheerfulness. ‘We were just saying you’d come today.’

  I liked Doris, my favourite aunt. She was playful and never bad-tempered or cross. She had a bulbous pear-drop nose I always laughed at.

  The arc opened, another chair was brought for my mother, and a little stool for me was placed between her and Doris. I was pleased; it meant I would not be stuck up in the air but could hide among the knees. Grandma was at the end of the group, enthroned in the corner against the wall in her big armchair and robed in a copious pink shawl. She looked up now for the first time.

  ‘Aye, I knew she’d come,’ she said quietly, not at all in her usual gay, high-pitched voice.

  Mother went to her, stepping over the legs in the way, and kissed her.

  ‘And my bonny lad,’ Grandma said.

  But I couldn’t move. The pallid face, the great old body filling the chair were unapproachable. They repelled me, made a sour taste invade my mouth. I could only mutter, ‘Hello, Grandma.’

  Everyone settled down again. The fire flickered and blustered in its deep well; the bellicose kettle, crusted with soot, puffed and fumed on the grate. Everyone stared at it. There were two stout greying women in the arc, wearing limp black dresses and stained pinafores. They kept looking round, especially at Grandma, with slow, alert eyes. They seemed to be waiting to catch anything that was said or done like fat vultures. I didn’t like them and wondered why they were there.

  ‘Who’s got the funeral?’ my mother asked suddenly.
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br />   The eyes of the two vultures swivelled round; my aunts moved, grateful for the break into conversation.

  ‘Man from Seggison,’ said Grandma tonelessly, grudgingly.

  ‘Lovely man,’ said one of the old women. ‘Did Mrs. Bains a wonderful job.’

  ‘Aye!’ agreed the other, drawing in her breath.

  ‘Looked beautiful did Mr. Bains. Better than when he was alive, poor man.’

  ‘He’s none so bad,’ Grandma condescended. ‘He gave our Elsie a nice send-off anyway.’

  I wondered what a ‘nice send-off’ was. I tried to remember Great Aunt Elsie’s. It had had a lot of flowers. Perhaps that was a nice send-off? I thought of the pale wooden coffin and the men lowering it slowly into the grave. It seemed so heavy, yet when the vicar said, ‘Earth to earth, ashes to ashes . . .’ and the man from Sacriston had thrown soil in a shower onto the coffin, it had sounded hollow and empty. I imagined Great Aunt Elsie had got out, that only the empty box had been lowered into the grave, that she would come and frighten us all at tea after her nice send-off, when everyone was looking relieved and were overanxiously pleasant because of the relief. But she had not, and now she was a mound of grassy earth in a chapel yard, a few faded flowers bowing their shrivelled heads over her middle.

  ‘Poor lad, he’s gone now,’ Grandma moaned.

  My aunts shuffled uneasily, wondering what to say.

  ‘Aye, and I treated him badly, you know.’

  She lifted a crumpled, freckled hand to support her bottom lip.

  ‘Now, Mother, no you didn’t,’ said Aunty May. She was the youngest, still in her twenties, thin and belligerent. ‘He often said things to you that nobody would have put up with.’ She turned her head away from us.

  ‘Maybe maybe,’ Grandma said slowly and vaguely, not taken in by her daughter. ‘But he was a good man all the same, and he only ever give back what I threw at him.’

  There was a silence. I wanted to move a leg that was going to sleep but daren’t, for I knew if I did someone would notice and speak to me in hope of changing the conversation.

  ‘Ah, why! Th’s looked after him well since he’s been ill,’ said one of the flabby women at last, making a compromise between the two parties.

  ‘Aye, but there was a time when I threw him out of the house. Nor, and he didn’t get back in for three weeks.’