Shelf Life

by Livia Franchini

  Ten years together. Long enough to forgive and forget. Ruth is everything I like in a girl. There is a reason we’ve been together this long and it’s not about choosing each other each day but about forgetting there is even a choice. In both good and bad ways, for better or worse, the things I find attractive in her are also the things that drive me absolutely mad. That’s how love works. You can’t pick and choose, can’t have one without the other. And, anyway, the sleep paralysis didn’t come back for a long time. I thought I might as well propose to her, in sickness and health, et cetera, et cetera. It made sense.

  Sometimes I have needed a little distraction, felt the need again pulling me in a different direction. If you stick a curious man in two and a half rooms in north London, his mind is bound to wander, at least a little. I have never crossed a line. There were a couple of snogs at work parties – the joy of working in a company with over three hundred employees – but all were isolated episodes. Then when cybering got big, that kept me entertained for a while. Ruth always goes to bed so early. But after a while I got bored of typing, and live-camming with her there next door in the bedroom was out of the question. And so dating sites seemed a more satisfying way to tend to my urges. I really rarely met up with them. All I wanted was to talk, for them to talk to me, nothing perverted. I think to begin with my plan was to talk it all out of my system. I did for a bit. Then there were a few, no-strings-attached flings and a couple of coincidences: a girl who worked really close to my office and a nymphomaniac who practically stalked me. Once I developed a crush on the receptionist at work, but that didn’t really go anywhere. A couple of times I couldn’t say no, but I didn’t pursue them. At night I still find myself pouring my heart into the inboxes of good-looking strangers from company websites or swiping through Tinder profiles within a five-mile radius until there are no more matches available. I’m just looking for some fucking appreciation, you know? I need to keep myself busy. And technology has made it easy. Who am I hurting?

  What is the definition of betrayal? I am both interested in the chase and interested in Ruth. They are two different things. Ruth is my life. At night, on the internet, I wander lonely as a cloud, talking to other girls. I’m just playing, messing around. Sometimes I do meet up with them, not often. Sometimes I do like them. I’ve still got eyes. I would be dead if I didn’t notice other women. There are a lot of attractive girls in the world: it’s a game of statistics. Right now, for instance, I’m talking to a cheeky one. Her name’s Lili, like the song. One thing doesn’t preclude the other. I have tried to explain this to Ruth in the past, though I haven’t bothered going into it for a while. She just pretends not to understand what I am saying. She knows full well what I mean, she just won’t admit it. Whenever we are in a disagreement Ruth listens quietly without asking any questions until I lose track of what I am saying. She always chooses the path of least resistance. Sometimes I wonder if I haven’t spent the best years of my life with her because she never let me get to the bottom of things. The things that I want, the things that I need to be happy, or closer to happy, or whatever a man like me is allowed to have. She knows me; she knows I feel restless. She knows I can’t help it. She keeps me talking, so she doesn’t have to listen. Her mind is made up: she wants things to stay the same way. She is happy with little, unambitious: our home, her work, our pithy existences. So long as she can keep me talking, we’ll never get to it. Nothing will change. It’s easy when someone tells you how to be. But what about me?

  Ten years together: 2006–16. When I write the dates down, one next to the other, they read like the epitaph of a child.

  When I wake up, I can’t remember it all, not straight away. But I recognize the fear, immediately. Her black shadow breathing, in the dark, next to me.

  Something has happened overnight, I am sure of it. I can’t remember seeing shapes, not clearly but I felt their closeness, the horror of their proximity raising the hair on my dead forearms. I sunk back under, smothered in sleep, then rose to the surface again.

  I wake up panting like a dog. I look at my hands and recognize them as my hands. I can move them. I am awake, really awake. It is dawn and grey light floods our bedroom. I am soaked with sweat and my whole body hurts. No details, not yet, but I know they will come back to me. I can feel it in my body, beginning to tense up, bracing. There is another feeling; my spine tightens with a familiar excitement. I don’t need to reach out to touch myself. I know I am sexually aroused.

  Ruth is right there, next to me, right where she always is. One spindly arm folded over her head like a little wing. I watch her face, the side that is visible. Age hasn’t blunted her features, but sharpened them, and she’s even more birdlike now, which suits her, though I can’t decide how I feel about it. I’ve always thought of Ruth as a bird but at first she was mostly a theory of one. At twenty-one she was very vague as a creature, her outline not quite so defined. I thought we would solidify together into a single shape, not separately. But I was wrong. She’s hardened into a singular version of herself: these days she fully embodies her own spirit animal. It has become easier to pin Ruth down to one bird or another, though never a single species in particular. I’ve spotted a swallow’s head as she exits the shower with wet hair all slicked back, a robin’s proud chest when she is busy in the kitchen. Bird watching. I know this isn’t a funny joke – even to me it sounds a little desperate – but the fact of her aging makes me uneasy. It’s unnerving that it is there in plain view for everybody to see. She wouldn’t have it this way, if she could help it. She’s quite private. People think that change goes unnoticed in those with whom we share close quarters, but I don’t agree. I don’t notice it daily, but I’m certainly aware of it. It’s not about the aging itself; I’m not so naive to think it isn’t happening to me too. It’s just that it suits some people better than others. What I liked about Ruth was that she used to be an intangible creature, an ethereal angel. These days, I wonder if I would find white marble under her bedclothes if she’d let me strip her naked. All smooth, with no openings: a statue of an angel.

  Awake, I feel the space between our bodies and am relieved to find the wetness hasn’t spread to her. She is fast asleep. But like a bird, Ruth can be woken by the smallest disruption. I stare at her profile in the low light from the curtains. I know that if I move she will dart her skinny arm towards me, in the anxious way she does, and ask, ‘Are you OK, baby?’ Or something like that. Something nice, concerned. She would want to take care of me, to get out of bed and change the bottom sheet, ring the doctor, take the morning off work. I’d have to explain what happened.

  I’m always fucking expected to explain. I flip on to my side and get out of bed. I realize I am automatically heading to the shower. ‘Are you OK, baby?’ says Ruth, still half asleep. I don’t respond. I shut the bathroom door behind me and lock it. In the shower I run the dial all the way to hot, just a notch under. I masturbate angrily under the jet.

  When I am done, I take her hot-pink scrubbing glove from the soap dish and drag it roughly across my chest. It leaves a hot-pink scratch. I think about the incidence of my nocturnal disease: I know it spikes at times of great distress. My parents signed the divorce papers the year I turned fifteen. Whenever my father rang, which was always in the evenings, my mother would continue to do the dishes, her hands in Marigolds up to the elbow. I had to pick up. Then puberty. Whatever that was. Fucking hell. The time we had sex in my childhood bed and Ruth fell asleep after getting what she wanted. These episodes are easy to pin down, easy to analyse. What has happened this time? What is happening? Nothing’s happening. And that’s it. I can’t stand it.

  I stand in the shower and watch the water collect in the drain. A sliver of beige soap gets trapped in the metal and I bend over to retrieve it. My vision blurs for a moment. I steady myself against the wall. Like water, Ruth trickling into all things. She’s drowning me. The details of the night terror are finally coming to the surface. I close my eyes and it all comes back to me.


  My eyes open on to the blank ceiling. My head feels harnessed to the pillow and, at first, I think it must be the consequence of the two glasses of Pinot Grigio I had with my dinner. There’s a hint of a migraine nudging at my temples. Then I realize that the straps hold firmly across my body. I see that the ceiling is shot across with small lights, like fireflies but electric, part of a larger body pulsating beneath me. More lights ascend, not like sparks from a fire in free upwards flight, but slowly, and I see that they are attached to tiny tendrils of coral, reaching around and above my body. I can hear these fingers creaking. They begin to close in on me as I lie on the bed, defenceless. I can’t see Ruth next to me, but I know she is there. I know that this is her, a creature expanding. Then the light becomes so intense that all I can see is red, burning darkness, and I count the pace of my own breath, slower and slower, as I run out of air.

  STEAK (LEAN)

  Ruth

  Now

  I am half an hour late for work. I just couldn’t get up this morning. The whole weekend is a blur. For the majority of it, I’ve been stuck in a sticky sleep, like a fly caught at the bottom of a honey jar. Granted, I am not a seasoned party girl, but I don’t understand why I’m still feeling so bad two days later. I really can’t remember the last time I had a hangover like this – sometimes a little headache, after three or four glasses of wine at home, but never with the added pressure of having to account for direct interaction with others. My mouth feels dry no matter how much water I drink and the stabbing pain behind my right eye is still there. I’m feeling a desperate kind of exhaustion. I have memories of the party but they are still unlinked. Little scenes with holes in the texture. The girls. Make-up. Frankenstein. Bex’s hand on my knee. Her oval nails like black apple pips. Malus domestica is the Latin name for the apple. Shellac is the upmarket beauty parlour name for a manicure. Alanna’s ear, as I struggled to push a diamanté stud into her lobe. ‘Push harder! Go on! It really won’t hurt.’ Cream shots. Then more women joining us. Dancing. A woman I didn’t know with lots of earrings, who grabbed me by the shoulders. ‘This the maid of honour? Well, kill me now, I’m Franki! Remember me, Beadle?’

  Alanna emitted a high-pitched noise, ‘Oh my God, Francesca!’

  ‘Jammy Rodgers?’ I said, and I realized I was very drunk. Dancing. Alanna pinching me – on the hip, on the top of the hand, on the thigh – whenever she wanted attention. She didn’t care that I bruise easily, though she’d figured it out quickly. Stuart Brandon Pierce. Then the car park as I waited for my taxi home. The fucking car park. Did I take a taxi? I cannot piece together the evening. It makes me feel irritable.

  As always, getting to work, I am reminded that my lack of experience makes me vulnerable. I find the front door shut, which is confusing. I try it several times before realizing it is locked and trying my key. There is no one in the Bowl. I look at the rota on the wall: Alanna and the girls have taken the day off. I know we’ve been calling it the big night for months, but I honestly hadn’t foreseen the kind of weekend that lasts until Monday. It hadn’t occurred to me to check for any alterations in the rota. Anyone can put absences up there, but Mona or I have to OK them as we are the senior nurses. If no objections are raised by the end of the week, any absences are cleared. The girls knew there was no way we would OK this change but in the excitement, Mona and I forgot to check, which is what they must’ve hoped for. We are dramatically understaffed and I am half an hour late. This is incredibly irresponsible. So much for the girls sticking together. It’s only Mona and me today, and unsurprisingly, she is nowhere to be seen. She must be halfway through the first-floor rounds and is probably really mad at me, though I am the one who has actually made it to work. I hurry to take my smock out of the locker and when I get back to the Bowl I see that the switchboard is going off. Room 214. I could ignore the switchboard code: I’m alone in the Bowl and the front door is unlocked. I really shouldn’t leave reception unattended. But the switchboard is for emergencies. Which is precisely why he always rings the fucking bell.

  Mr Hancock doesn’t like me. This is strange, because while I’d hardly win a popularity contest out there, in here I am well liked. And yet he despises me. At least this is the impression I’ve always had. Anyway, it’s OK, the feeling is mutual. I guess you could say we see through each other. Something about him makes me uneasy and I am convinced he senses it, feeds off it. We didn’t expect him to last long, but he’s been with us two years now and seems to be gathering strength as he gets older, like a dry-aged piece of steak, and despite the fact he is veined with rot. I think about Emmy saying that he tried to kiss Bex, that day we were in the laundry room. Mona says that all men get weird with age, when they aren’t already weird before. Still, she knows how us girls feel about Mr Hancock and will cover for us if she’s feeling kind. No such luck today and it’s entirely my fault: I was in charge of this weekend, but I got distracted. I should’ve foreseen this. I hide my face in my hands and hope the light will stop flickering, but it only seems to flash more urgently. Because everything is an emergency for Mr Hancock.

  But then what if it is an emergency? I’m already half an hour late. My head is fucking killing me. Stop being a baby. I grit my teeth. Be practical. It’s easier to get this done than sitting around thinking up an excuse. I lock the front door and head for the lifts.

  Mr Hancock’s room is the largest in the care home, set apart from the others and at the end of the top-floor corridor. This arrangement was specifically requested and no one objected. If anything, we are grateful to be able to store him away from the others. We try to forget about him. Until he gets on the buzzer, that is. Which, yes, he does often, but am I being unfair? Other patients do this frequently, too: a glass of water, a cup of tea, feeling lonely and simply needing a chat. It’s part of our job and a big reason why this job – this place – exists at all. In here, their needs have meaning and are a matter of urgency. Old people get lonely. Most have lost more loved ones than they have left. The heart deteriorates, in the same way as eyesight or hearing. What’s wrong with me today? So I got laid for the first time since the break-up. That’s no reason to get sentimental. It wasn’t exactly romantic. Am I being sentimental? No. I think I am feeling morose. Everything seems so gloopy.

  Mr Hancock’s daughter had suggested ‘a quiet, secluded room’. It was the first on a long list of privileges that were set in stone when he arrived, as if we’d been applying to have Mr Hancock stay with us as an esteemed guest and not the other way round. The special requirements are granted as a result of his daughter’s generous disposition, which we enjoy in large quarterly instalments. Oh yes, she is a patron. She is a close friend of Call-Me-Melissa and just the kind of bitch Melissa would be friends with. She, tragically, is too busy to visit often: ‘My apologies for being rather elusive.’ I can’t say we mind particularly.

  I remember the day he arrived. I feel queasy thinking about it. Miss Hancock, a media big shot with appropriately auburn hair and little pointed heels, strode into the care home at lunchtime. In her right hand, she carried a stapled bunch of paper, fashioned into a sceptre. She unrolled it on my desk and began to stab her way through a bullet-point list.

  ‘Miss Hancock,’ she said, her manicured fingernail already on to item one, no time to waste. ‘We spoke on the phone. Mind if we make this quick? I have a business lunch in Noho in forty and the traffic is just something else today.’

  She flashed a little smile and I knew I didn’t like her. Her lips twitched at the corners. Extreme Type A personality. I ran a list of popular antidepressants through my head: sertraline, citalopram, fluoxetine, paroxetine. Cocaine? A mix, probably. It’s hard to tell at a glance. She wrinkled her nose. Definitely cocaine. She looked down at her list.

  ‘Natural fibre pillows,’ she said. She found my eyes again and nodded. A tinkle of her chandelier earrings. ‘They’re essential to aid my father’s neck issues.’

  ‘It’s not unusual at that age,’ I said. Another perfuncto
ry tinkle as she once again raised her eyes to mine. I knew I’d fucked it already. ‘Most of our oldies –’ I giggled, because I giggle when I’m nervous, not a little nervous, but intensely nervous ‘– our patients. Most of our patients, they suffer from cervicalgia or cervical hernia. Neuropathic flare-ups are a frequent occurrence.’

  Very good, medical language. She stared at me. I could feel Mona’s eyes piercing my back. Sometimes she put me through little tests. This was one of them: I knew I was on my own. I had to act like a senior nurse. Mona’s vote of confidence; she was trusting me to handle this.

  ‘We provide top-quality ergonomic foam pillows to ensure maximum comfort. They are memory pillows. Do you know much about memory pillows?’

  She looked at me as though I was talking about cushions hand-crafted by magical gnomes, and I wanted to shout in her face, ‘They’re all over fucking Groupon!’ But, of course, why would a woman like this know about Groupon? A tinkle. Ice-cold eyes, no-smudge matte lipstick, brick-coloured.

  She spoke. ‘Yes. I would expect nothing less. As I’m practically bankrupting myself to pay for this place, I expect you to be able to provide the appropriate basic equipment. However, you understand that you need to make an exception for my father’s particular condition? This brand –’ her taupe fingernail tapped item one again and again until I had to break eye contact ‘– uses natural fibres that assist his posture during the night. Not only that: there are eucalyptus leaves embedded in the core of the pillow. To help him breathe – sleep better at night.’