by Laura Marney
‘Rebecca?’
‘Yes it’s me Mrs Trixie, we’re back!’
I opened the door a crack and let them in. They were both in top form. Bouncer bounced around while Rebecca, with her cheeks rosy and eyes bright, chattered away.
‘We had a great time didn’t we Bouncer? We walked right down to the loch…’
‘Rebecca, I thought you said you’d asked your dad if it was all right to take Bouncer out?’
I didn’t mean to accuse but it came out that way.
‘I did ask Daddy. I shouted upstairs to him. He was on his computer and he said I could.’
‘What did he say exactly?’
‘He said, yes darling.’
I could see she was telling the truth. She looked frightened and close to tears. Roger probably wasn’t listening when she asked him. He obviously wasn’t aware that he had agreed. I should go back next door with her and make sure he believed her.
As we walked across the garden his car drew up. Michaela, the six-year-old, the one who had dubbed us in, jumped out of the car with a big smile on her face.
‘Daddy says he’s going to kill you!’
She addressed this to her sister. Aye, he’s a great man for the death threats is old Roger, I thought, a great one for killing women and children. Roger got out of the car looking shattered but relieved. The fight had gone out of him. The whole scenario reminded me of my own frantic search for Steven the other night and now I felt for Roger.
‘Roger, I’m sorry. Please don’t be annoyed with Rebecca, she says she asked you when you were working at your computer.’
He didn’t own up but it was written all over his face, he remembered.
‘I should have checked with you. I’m sorry for the worry you’ve had. It won’t happen again,’ I said as gently as I could.
Again Roger didn’t say anything, he only nodded and looked embarrassed.
‘But Daddy I want to take Bouncer out, he’s my friend. I haven’t got any other friends.’
Rebecca put her hand to her eye and began wailing.
‘Maybe Rebecca can come with me when I take Bouncer out? I’ll take good care of her.’
‘Can I Daddy, please, can I?’
Rebecca clawed at his jumper as she begged. Roger lifted his head and nodded his permission before walking off into his house. Rebecca lifted Bouncer’s front paws and danced with him in jubilation.
‘And besides,’ I said to no one in particular, ‘it’ll be good for my fat arse.’
Chapter 14
I thought the whisky and chocs would have softened him, but no. Tuesday came and went as did Thursday and not a dickie bird from Jackie. A week went by and I realised he wasn’t coming back.
With the slightly warmer weather I kept finding more creepy-crawlies. I’d put my hand in the cupboard under the sink to get the scrubbing brush and there they’d be, creeping and crawling. I thought about pouring the scouring powder over them but something stopped me. The beasties had lived here far longer than me. Really it was more their house than it was mine, I was only a visitor. Harrosie was teeming with life. There were hundreds of us here, maybe thousands. And what the beasties lacked in social skills they made up for in numbers.
I was fed up with the amount of money I was spending on cigarettes. I bought a packet of Silk Cut and smoked eight in a row, eventually gagging as I lit one from the stub of the fag before. I kept imagining my blacken lungs, dry and inflexible as popadoms. The remaining twelve I put in the kitchen drawer. The packet had cost me a fortune, I wasn’t going to chuck it away, some other smoker could get the good of it.
Five hours later I was gasping again. I wasn’t throwing the towel in, I told myself, I wasn’t giving up giving up. It was all part of the process. Just like the peace process, it wouldn’t happen overnight. And I was right, I did make progress. I saw a marked improvement in the aversion therapy, this time I only smoked six.
This time I took a more scientific approach and noted that with the first cigarette the impressions were all positive. Sensations of relaxation, well-being and relief were the principal effects. With ciggies two and three I felt a light-headedness that wasn’t entirely unpleasant. Number four was neither one thing nor the other and I smoked on. I gave myself the dry boak on fag five but between retches I managed to light up the next one. I observed that my actual smoking technique had altered and was in direct relation to how many I smoked. On the first couple I had taken deep lungfuls at a time. Now I was only able to withstand short sharp draws. The light-headedness had burgeoned into room-spinning dizziness and nausea. The inside of my mouth was so hot that I swallowed a whole glass of water in a oner. The water was no sooner down than it was up again albeit this time by a diverse route as I discharged thick clear slime from my nose and mouth. Never again, I thought, that was it, I was so over, as they said on American TV shows. I was dizzy and sick and couldn’t contemplate smoking another cigarette for as long as I lived. As I lay on the birling couch, enveloped in thick smoke with the basin by my side, I smiled. It had all gone rather well, I thought.
When Steven phoned I made out that all was well with me. I told him about the dog, not about the accident, just that I was looking after an old man’s dog while he was in hospital, being a good neighbour. As directed by Jenny, I had taken Bouncer’s bandages off that day. Apart from a shovel-shaped scar on top of his head, he was absolutely fine. Steven could hardly contain his delight, we’d never had a family pet. He asked me to bring Bouncer to the phone. I tried to get him to bark, I swished the dishcloth I was holding in front of his face but he thought it was a game, and tried to catch it in his teeth. Bouncer would consent only to breathing and slebbering over the receiver. Steven couldn’t wait for the Easter holidays when he would get to see Bouncer. I tried to stay upbeat, I didn’t want to spoil Steven’s elated mood, he told me he was loving life with Nettie looking after him twenty-four seven. I nearly phoned Bob just for the company but with Steven at Nettie’s there was no good reason.
I read all the Victoria Holt novels in the bookcase. Jenny told me the mobile library wasn’t due for another two weeks so I was forced to start on the dusty old hardbacks. I picked one up and had to laugh. It was about a guy who turned into a beetle. Where do these people get their ideas? I thought, are they on drugs or what? The guy who wrote it was called Kafka, a made-up name if ever I heard one.
But I found I was really enjoying the book. I could hardly wait to find out what happened to Gregor in the end. It was only a wee short book so I had to spin it out. I could demolish a Catherine Cookson in a day but I wanted to savour this Metamorphosis. If I only allowed myself seven pages a day it would last until the mobile library came. Then I could ask for other books by the Kafka guy.
*
I was smoking again but this time it was different. I wasn’t inhaling. This way I wouldn’t get hooked like before. It was quite nice lighting a cigarette and just blowing the smoke straight out. I experimented with blowing it through my nose and as I watched the nine o’clock news I played at framing the newsreaders face in wispy smoke rings. Over the next hour I smoked, without inhaling, another two recreational cigarettes, safe in the knowledge that this way I wasn’t harming my health. At last I had found a solution.
I was down to my last two cigs. Not inhaling was going well except that I was missing the nicotine hit. In fact I was craving it. As I lit up I realised I was going to have to buy another packet. I’d have to spend more money and I wasn’t even getting the buzz. Not inhaling didn’t make smoking any cheaper, there wasn’t a discount for partial use. It didn’t reduce the smell. I’d still have to use loads of perfume and smoker’s toothpaste and mouthwash that tasted like bleach. Unless I wanted to stink of fags I’d still have to wash my clothes after one wear. Neither did it make the house any cleaner. I’d still have to scrub ashtrays and keep a window open in below-zero temperatures. The paintwork and ceilings would still yellow. And still I wouldn’t get the nicotine hit. This was no use, with
not inhaling I was getting all of the disadvantages of smoking and none of the advantages. I’d have to reconsider my strategy.
The fag suddenly tasted so much better when I inhaled. I hadn’t meant to, but then I just continued sucking it in, until I got the hit.
*
Rebecca was away, so Bouncer and I took a new route and had what turned out to be a very long and very boggy walk. As soon as we came in I put on the immersion heater for a bath. After that walk I needed one, my clothes were manky and I knew my muscles would seize unless I had a good hot soak. I fed the dog, had my tea and watched the news. The next thing I knew it was ten o’clock.
I’d fallen asleep in the chair, bog-manky trousers and all, and left the water heater on for four hours. If I didn’t run a bath quick I was scared the bloody thing would blow up. While Bouncer was out for the count in front of the telly I brought in my book, my fags and ashtray and my wine glass, and balanced them all on the corner of the bath for easy access. Then I noticed the beetle. This was happening all the time at Harrosie. There was always some beastie in the bath when I wanted in. Generally I just left it a while and when I came back it would be gone. Tonight I didn’t have time for bathroom etiquette. The boiler was making a bumping noise, she could blow at any minute.
The last time I’d had a beetle in the bath in Glasgow, which was a long time ago, I used the shower head and cannoned it down the plughole. Clean, fast, efficient, I’d quite enjoyed it. But this time I couldn’t do it.
The beetle was trying to climb up the side of the bath. Maybe it heard the boiler whining and banging and was trying to escape an explosion. Instinct was telling it to get out. It would get so far up and then when the sides got too steep, slide down again. I sat on the pan watching the beetle try and try again. I tried giving it a leg-up with a hairbrush. I was trying to be encouraging, holding the hairbrush below it but it just kept tumbling down. Once as it fell it brushed my arm and I got the fright of my life. I gave it chance after chance. Then the beetle stopped. I didn’t know if it was hurt or whether it was just getting its breath back. It started climbing again but I think it was getting pissed off with the hairbrush because now when I tried to help, the beetle just turned and walked down the hill again in protest.
‘Och c’mon now, you can do it, you know you can!’ I said.
Those few words of encouragement seemed to rally him because this time he really gave it his best shot. Hunching his body forward, his wee legs were going like billy-o as he took a runney at it. The momentum did carry him a bit further up but again he fell. The sides of the bath were too sheer, the surface was too slippy; he wasn’t getting enough purchase. What he needed was a ladder.
I had a couple of pairs of tights hanging on the pulley and I wasn’t long in pleating the legs together to make a kind of ladder. At first he blanked the tights, crawling round them, but after a bit of persuasion with the hairbrush he got the idea. It wasn’t easy for him, each bumfled braid of nylon was a mountain to climb. I knew the feeling. Earlier when I’d been out on the hill, I thought I was nearly at the top only to find another peak and another peak ahead. The wee soul worked like a Trojan and his wee black head and legs, finally and triumphantly, came into view over the lip of the bath.
As soon as he got to the top he started running along the lip. I thought he was doing some kind of victory lap but he was probably looking for a way off the bath. Whether he slipped or just chucked himself off the side I don’t know, but he ended up on the floor on his back with his legs flailing.
He needed flicked over but the hairbrush handle was too thick to slide beneath him. In a panic that he might die like that, I did something that I’d never ever done before. I touched an insect.
As soon as his feet hit the floor he was off. No doubt that would be a story for his grandchildren, casting himself as the Indiana Jones of beetles. Not a word of thanks, not even a backward glance. I laughed when I imagined him turn towards me and briefly touch a front limb to his wee antennae by way of a salute.
I just wanted a wash. Not only was I honking of bog water but now my hands were covered in beetle germs. I turned on the taps quickly pulling my arm away from the scalding water. My elbow caught the edge of my book and it clattered to the floor. The wine glass went the same way. Worried that the wine would stain the book, I kicked it away from the spreading pool of red wine. It took ages to mop it up and get myself sorted with another glass. Before finally stepping into the bath I poured in half a bottle of aromatherapy bubble bath and dropped my clothes where I stood.
It was filled to the brim with deliciously smelly bubbly hot water. I made a mental note to leave the heater for four hours in future. Lying back and shutting my eyes, I let the aroma do its therapy and the hot water seep into my skin. After a few sips of wine I reached across to get my book. The fact that I was only allowing myself seven pages made it all the more luxurious. Stuck on the back cover there was what looked like a squashed currant. Surprised, I studied it closely and was horrified to discover that it wasn’t a currant, it was a beetle. Most likely, my beetle. As I lunged forward the flattened body of the beetle and its internal organs landed between my breasts. I freaked. Frenzied splashing turned the bath into a jacuzzi. In my hysteria I flicked the body off my chest and ran screaming from the bathroom.
When I calmed down I realised that there was a perfectly good hot bath going to waste. I knocked back the wine, a send-off toast, before scooping and pouring him down the toilet. Naked, I hugged the toilet bowl and cried more at that beetle’s funeral than I had at Mum’s. It made me think of her body, a poor wee empty shell. I dried my eyes and sat back in the bath until gradually the hot water and the wine kicked in.
Jenny was the only one who noticed my growing depression. Reassured that Bouncer was doing fine, she asked about me.
‘Och you’re looking awful down in the mouth Trixie, are you all right?’
This was the last thing I needed, somebody being nice to me. To my mortification, as I fumbled in my purse to pay for my honey-roast ham, I started to bubble. A tear plopped onto the ten-pound note I was handing her.
‘I’m sorry Jenny.’
I was angry with myself for this display.
‘Don’t be silly, there’s nothing wrong with crying, it’s a woman’s prerogative.’
It was the sort of thing women say to each other in the powder room, making light of my outburst to save me embarrassment. Jenny was trying to cheer me up with a bit of girl power. I felt a flood of affection for this old lady who, until now, I had treated with deep suspicion.
‘My Mum died.’
‘Oh my God! Sit down lassie.’
Jenny took my elbow the way Bob had at the funeral and sat me down in the armchair in the corner. She disappeared into the back shop and for the first time I wondered who the we referred to in the ‘We Care with a Chair,’ sign. It had only ever been Jenny in the shop any time I’d been in. As far as I could make out, Jenny was like me, on her own. I heard her moving about and then she emerged through the plastic fringed curtain that separated the shop from her living space. Both fists held steaming mugs of tea. After milk and sugar was sorted out Jenny dragged the chair she kept behind the till over and sat beside me.
‘When did you find out Trixie love?’
‘Oh months ago, she died months ago.’
Jenny looked confused.
‘I’m sorry Jenny, I’ve given you the impression that it’s only just happened.’
‘It doesn’t matter when it happened!’
She reached over and rubbed my arm vigorously, as if she was trying revive me from a bad dose of hypothermia. I looked up at her, wishing I could gather and re channel the kinetic energy she was expending.
‘It’s still sore isn’t it Trixie?’
At which point I started howling again. Jenny pulled a packet of man-size Kleenex off the shelf, burst it open and handed me a hanky. I blurted out loads of stuff, a litany of self-pity really, about missing Mum, and Steven, and Glas
gow, my lack of friends in Inverfaughie, etc., although I was fly enough not to mention Jackie. After a while I ran out of things to whine about and ground to a snivelling halt.
‘I nursed my mother too,’ Jenny said.
I stopped mid-sniff, delighted, in a perverse way, that we had this in common.
‘We’ve always had this shop,’ she said.
There was the we again.
‘The building has been here for over a hundred years. I feel as if I’ve been here a hundred years as well. I’ve worked in this shop since I was a child. The minute I left school I got as far away from Inverfaughie as I could. London. It was great, and when the Sixties came, och we had a ball! There were tons of Highlanders in London if you knew where to find them, and Irish and Australian, American, you name it. Musicians, actors, painters, London was full of them. I met them all you know, Mick Jagger, Mary Quant, I even knew Jimi Hendrix. Aye, all you see is a wee Highland spinster but let me tell you Trixie, I won’t die wondering.’
‘What was Jimi Hendrix like?’
‘He was American, black fella, fantastic on the guitar.’
‘Yeah but, you know. Sex with a rock star, what was that like?’
‘I’m sure I don’t know!’
‘But when you said you knew him I thought you meant…’
‘Aye well, when I said I knew him, I saw him at a party once, but he was sound asleep on the couch the whole time. He was wasted but I sat on the edge of the couch for a good half hour, right beside his head.’
There was nothing I could say in response to that and so we both sat quiet for a minute.
‘I was in Woolworth’s on Regent Street for twelve years, assistant manageress. I know that doesn’t sound very grand but that was in the days before women were managers. Then they offered me my own shop out in Kent. I took it of course but it wasn’t the same, I missed London. I would have went back to Regent Street like a shot, even as a junior. No doubt you’re wondering how the hell I ended up back here?’