Drowned Sprat and Other Stories

by Stephanie Johnson

  His shoes hit the floor, she heard his zip, heard the rustle of his trousers, his footsteps. He lay down half on the narrow squab, half on top of her, his upper body still clothed in shirt and jacket.

  ‘You’ll have to show a bit more interest than that.’

  She remembered an instruction from something — a leaflet on sex education, was it? — or maybe she’d read it on the back of a Durex packet. Incorporate the application of the condom into your foreplay.

  ‘You got a condom?’ she asked. Two birds with one stone, then.

  He sighed, got up again and went to his trousers. She watched him closely this time as he opened his wallet, like a man searching for the correct change for a parking machine, the same degree of indifferent concentration.

  ‘Give it to me,’ she said softly when she saw the flash of silver foil.

  She helped him with it, rolled it on, murmured things she thought he’d like to hear, things gleaned from years of watching late-night TV.

  ‘Mmm, you’re a big boy, ain’t ya, looking good, uh-huh, sweet as, give it here, ooo can’t wait, honey, what a big boy you are —’

  ‘Cut the American accent,’ he said, surprisingly. But she wasn’t offended. She lay back and hoped he’d be quick.

  While he did it, she thought about Amber and how pleased she’d be to get the money and how life would go back to how it was before, the good times they had had, the drinking and smoking dak, the odd tab of acid, a bit of E. Lately Amber had been smoking P out of a pipe Tip had given her. Crank was where Chelsea drew the line.

  ‘That’s crazy stuff,’ she’d said. ‘It just brings you down and makes you mean.’

  Blake had stopped suddenly, without making any noise. Was he finished already? She wasn’t going to ask.

  He stood up, pulled on his undies and trousers.

  ‘You enjoy your work?’ he asked, she thought perhaps sarcastically.

  ‘’S’all right. You enjoy yours?’

  He sat on the edge of the sofa to do up his shoes. She looked down at them for long enough to see the kitten shit on the toe of one of them, and looked away again.

  ‘Do you?’ she persisted. She felt pissed off with him suddenly, with herself, with everything. ‘What do you do?’ She wanted to know now. All she had ever read or heard about men who went with prostitutes had it that they came from every walk of life — married, single, rich, poor. Maybe he was a professional like Leonard. Maybe he was a doctor or a lawyer.

  ‘I’m a plumber,’ he said, ‘in New Plymouth.’

  ‘That’s where I’m from,’ she said, before she could stop herself.

  ‘Yeah? What’s your name again?’

  ‘Doesn’t matter.’ What if he went around to fix her mother’s sink or something? ‘I know your daughter,’ he might say. ‘I met her in Auckland. She’s a filthy little hooker.’

  The sex had made her full bladder sting. She couldn’t hold on a moment longer. Sitting up, she pulled the sleeping bag around her, like a slippery, puffy cloak.

  ‘Wait a moment,’ she said, picking her way across the littered carpet and down a short hall to the bathroom. In the silence that followed the last of the gushing water she heard the door to the flat open and shut. He’d gone. The bastard had done a runner.

  Sleeping bag dumped in a puddle from the leaking shower-box, she was out of the bathroom and into Amber’s room, which had windows that gave out onto the road. There he was on the other side, striding through the rain, his shining head and sports jacket shoulders moving from one pool of street-light to another, late-night traffic roaring and slicking in the wet between them. Kneeling on Amber’s bed, she pushed the window out on its hinges — it could only open a few centimetres — squeezed her face into the narrow gap and yelled after him.

  ‘You! Over there! Effing come back and give me my effing money!’

  He disappeared around the corner and the last shreds of the bravado that had buoyed her up all night went with him. Stumbling over Amber’s boots and clothes, her arms locked around her stomach, colliding with the shitty, crumbling walls, she made her way back to the sofa and collapsed on it face down, her chest heaving. Maybe she was going to be sick, toss up the KGB and all the wine she’d drunk at Leonard’s. There wouldn’t be anything else. She hadn’t eaten since yesterday.

  Something sticky and cold glued itself to her knee. She sat up again, peeled it off — the condom, full of spoof. He had come then. She’d wondered. She flung it away and was about to lie down again when her eye was drawn to the candle, which had burnt down below the lip of the jar. In the gentle light, on the carton, there was a sheen of green and blue. She lunged for it. Two twenties and a ten.

  You see, she told herself, in the motherly voice she reserved for the rare occasions she saw the twins, you see? You were right. He was an honest guy. He didn’t rip you off.

  She dressed and left the flat, the fifty dollars tucked into her purse. Downstairs a carload was heading into town and she got a lift with them. She’d go back to Leonard’s and get the money, she decided, then go around to Tip’s and make everything all right. On the way they passed Blake, still walking fast, his hair glued to his head with rain, and she waved at him from her perch on some guy’s knee, but he didn’t see her.

  You’ll Sleep With No Other

  Once there was a blank. As blanks often are, it was white. It was propped up on two wooden legs, and was very bored with itself and everything around it. Especially the five lanes that roared in front of it and gave it a headache.

  One day two men and a woman parked a blue van on the grass verge. They unloaded ladders, some buckets of paste, and several large cylinders of paper. The woman leaned a ladder against the blank with a loud thud.

  ‘Ouch,’ said the blank, but nobody heard it.

  The woman began to slop paste onto the blank with a paintbrush. The blank sighed. The day was very hot and the glue very cool, if a little sticky. After a while the woman climbed down and moved her ladder along. One of the men pushed up a ladder where hers had been. Thunk.

  ‘Ow,’ said the blank. But nobody heard.

  The man unfurled a long piece of paper and pounded it very firmly so it stuck. Below him the other man pasted and pounded other bits of paper. The blank was slowly disappearing.

  ‘Am I dying?’ it thought.

  Eventually all three packed away the ladders and the glue and stood back to admire their work. They’d made a picture of a beautiful young man, stretched out as if he’d just woken up.

  ‘Pretty, isn’t he?’ said one of the men.

  Then the blue van drove away.

  ‘Hello,’ said the blank, a bit muffled.

  ‘Hello,’ said the beautiful young man. ‘Where am I?’

  ‘Don’t ask me,’ said the blank. ‘I’ve asked before myself, but nobody hears me.’

  ‘Who am I, then?’ asked the young man.

  ‘You?’ asked the blank. ‘Don’t ask me. I don’t even know who I am.’

  Then the blank was silent. The young man looked at his downy arms and dark brown nipples in his hairless chest and realised he was beautiful. He felt his legs under the sheet and knew he was strong. His penis pressed hard against the linen, making a little tent. Around him the traffic screamed, and people walked in and out of their houses on the other side of the five lanes.

  Presently two girls dressed the same came and stood underneath him. They were in school uniform, but the man wasn’t to know that. He’d never been to school.

  ‘Look at that,’ said one girl, who had silver bars glinting on her teeth. ‘Isn’t he a spunk?’

  ‘Yeah,’ said the other girl. She scurried around behind the blank.

  ‘She’s lighting a cigarette,’ said the blank, trembling slightly. ‘I hope she doesn’t set us on fire.’

  The young man didn’t reply. Through half-closed eyes he was examining the remaining girl. She was staring up at him with a look on her face that made his penis lie down flat again. The other girl reappeare
d.

  ‘I think he’s fucking beautiful,’ breathed the girl with the metal mouth.

  ‘Yeah,’ said the other girl, breathing smoke.

  ‘He’s a prince,’ said the first girl.

  ‘Yeah,’ said the smoking girl. ‘Wouldn’t you like to meet the real thing, but?’

  They laughed and the metal mouth flashed. They walked on, smoke curling around their heads.

  ‘The real thing?’ asked the young man. ‘I am the real thing.’

  ‘She told you what you are, anyway,’ said the blank.

  ‘What was that?’

  ‘A prince,’ said the blank. ‘I must say, it’s awfully hot under you.’

  ‘Prince of what?’ asked the young man.

  But the blank was silent.

  Later, just before sundown, a very old swallow flew by. She perched on top of the blank and panted.

  ‘I am a prince,’ said the young man.

  ‘Uh huh,’ said the swallow, which was all she could manage.

  ‘What am I prince of?’ asked the young man.

  ‘Everything you can see around you,’ replied the swallow, and flew off.

  The young man swivelled his eyeballs around. For three days and three nights he watched and learned. Through the windows of the houses opposite he saw people eating and making love. He saw them sitting in front of mirrors taking black shadows off their faces, or reddening their pursed lips with pink sticks. He saw children sitting at tables laden with food, screaming for an alternative.

  On the third day two women stopped. One glanced at him. ‘Turn you on?’ she said.

  ‘I think it’s disgusting,’ said the other woman, bending to her bootlaces. ‘I think it’s consumerist sexism.’

  ‘Well, at least the boys are doing it to each other,’ replied the first woman. ‘No need to graffiti this one.’

  ‘What’s he advertising?’ asked the bootlace woman, straightening up.

  ‘Who cares?’ said the first woman, taking the other’s arm, leading her off.

  ‘Consumerist sexism? Advertising? What’s that?’ asked the young man, baffled.

  At least the young man now knew he was the Prince of Sensuality, where people walked about draped in satin sheets eating avocado with their fingers; and Prince of Vanity, where there were so many mirrors people often found themselves talking to mere reflections for hours. He knew he was Prince of Plenty, where everybody always wanted more; and Prince of Noise, reigning supreme above the grinding cars, where people talked loudly about nothing and slowly grew deaf.

  He could see for miles. He could see over the five lanes, and the pink and yellow terraced houses, and the wattle and clotheslines in the gardens. He could see over the barracks to the golf course. He could see through the smog to the tops of the very tall buildings like tall, rich ladies, ugly with flashing diamond lights and grimy pearls. And beyond he could see the Blue Mountains, far off. The young man knew that the mountains meant the boundary of his kingdom. He wondered if they were in fact another prince. A prince so huge that he was distinguishable all around the edge of the city. This other prince did not seem to move much except for inching a little closer on fine days. The young man wasn’t worried. He couldn’t move any more than an eyeball either, and even then only very discreetly.

  All day every day he lay stretched out on the cream bed, his naked torso open to the grey-streaked rain or blistering sun. Above his sleepy mouth and just visible tongue dangled a bunch of purple grapes held at the stalk by a white hand with crimson talons. The hand puzzled the young man. He wondered who it belonged to. Occasionally, when his mouth was dry, he would demand that the grapes be lowered. But the hand remained immobile, the red nails glistening.

  Below the young man’s bed there was a sentence. The letters marched along, hiccupping at the many exclamation marks and hyphens, but making it to the edge of the blank all the same. The young man wondered what the sentence said.

  The summer pounded on. There was a gap when everybody went away, the word ‘Christmas’ on their lips, avarice in their eyes, and pockets jingling lighter each time they walked past. This was when the young man discovered he was lonely. For a month now the blank had been quiet, as blanks should be. And loneliness was not the young man’s only discomfort. He’d noticed his chest was bubbling, little blisters rising and tearing. The sheets were fraying, and although he wasn’t sure, the young man felt he was lying on more of a slant than usual. He wondered if his beauty was impaired.

  One evening, just before sundown, the young man heard a familiar fluttering. The old swallow had returned. She sat on top of the blank, picking nits from under her wings. He waited for her to speak, to acknowledge his presence. Finally he cleared his throat.

  ‘Don’t you remember me?’ he asked.

  ‘Mmm,’ said the swallow, her head beneath her wing.

  ‘I’m the Prince of Everything I See Around Me,’ he continued.

  ‘Mmm,’ said the swallow, scratching her chest.

  ‘Um,’ said the young man, ‘would you do me a favour?’

  ‘If it’s quick,’ said the swallow.

  ‘I’ve got a sentence under me. Do you know what it says?’

  ‘A sentence?’ said the swallow. ‘Once I sat outside a jail and heard them talk about their sentences. Are you in for long?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ answered the young man. ‘Do all princes live in jails?’

  ‘Hang on a tick,’ said the swallow, taking flight.

  The young man looked down on her beating wings as she followed his sentence along the bottom of the bed.

  ‘It says,’ said the swallow on her return, getting ready for the recital, ‘“Once You’ve Slept With Prince You’ll Sleep With No Other.” And underneath that it says “Billboard Enterprises Ltd.”’

  ‘But I sleep alone!’ said the young man.

  ‘It’s a kind of mattress,’ said the swallow. ‘You’re an advertisement.’ And flew off.

  After that the young man grew sadder and sadder. He hardly noticed when people returned from their holidays and once again the five lanes were clogged with cars.

  One morning around dawn, two men walked hand in hand along the road and paused beneath him. They passed a sweetsmelling cigarette between them and looked up at his blistered chest and face.

  ‘He hasn’t enjoyed the summer any more than you have, love,’ said the man whose turn it was with the sweet cigarette.

  ‘I’ll bet his bum isn’t as red as mine is,’ said the other man, uncomfortable in his tight pants.

  ‘He’s become an affront,’ continued the first man. ‘I rather fancied him when he first went up.’

  ‘Oh — you’d fancy anything up,’ said the one with sunburn. He reached up and peeled away a bit of the sentence.

  ‘Once You’ve Slept With Prince You’ll Sleep With No Other,’ he chanted and laughed. They embraced, for a long time, breathing through their noses.

  Just after sunup it rained. It was the first rain since well before Christmas. With his unblistered eye the Prince watched the people coming out of the houses opposite. They were smiling.

  ‘Thank goodness it’s rained,’ they said. ‘That ought to lower the temperature.’

  If his people were glad about it, then he ought to be too, reasoned the Prince, although the rain had weakened the last remaining scrap of paper that held his right arm to his shoulder. While it had previously cushioned his handsome head on the generous pillows, it now drifted about the footpath. The young man watched it disappear under the blank, to be tangled up in the long grass and fraternise with the plastic bags.

  When the sun was at its highest, two women and a man pulled up in a blue van with Billboard Enterprises Ltd written on it. They surveyed the Prince.

  ‘Just as well he’s got to come down,’ said the man. ‘He’s coming away from the board.’

  With that they raised their ladders and began tearing and ripping at the young man.

  He commanded them to stop.

&nb
sp; He screamed in agony.

  But nobody heard him.

  After they’d gone, the blank woke up from its long summer sleep.

  ‘… into the care of his mother’

  Tomorrow morning the Department deliver him up to me — they’ll bring him home. Not that he ever lived here, in this poxy house — how many times have I shifted since he went out into the world for the last time? They’re bringing him between four and six, while it’s still dark, which they have to do, given all the hoo-ha drummed up around his release. I’ll get a phone call on their approach.

  Bed’s made. Did that this afternoon. Three blankets and the spread should keep him warm enough. He’ll notice the difference, how much colder it is. Pare’s a long way north — a long, long way.

  It’s coming up 6 pm. Could turn on the telly, see the news — see the concerned residents, see the Corrections Minister defend the court’s decision. But I’d rather sit here by the window, look out at the darkening street and think about it all, be thankful I went to the supermarket as soon as my benefit came through, bought enough food for a week, so that we won’t have to go outside. Best we stick in the house, best no one sees his face.

  Not sure I want to look at his face.

  Not the face he’s got now — twenty-nine years old, after eleven years inside. He looks forty, his teeth gone bad, deep lines in his brow. He was a handsome boy, Jared, but he’s pissed it away. Father was a looker, too, a brown Casanova with the strongest smoke in Tauranga. Didn’t know him long, only a couple of weeks in the fourth form before my family away to another town.

  Phone’s ringing — but I won’t answer it. It’ll be that journalist chap again. Certainly won’t be any of my four others, born after Jared over the next ten years, all to different dads, all girls and not one of them talking to me, not since some time in the nineties. They like to blame me for the mess their lives are in. They’ve all been offered counselling for trauma and grief at different times, and the counsellors park it all at my door. After Sheena lost her baby in a house fire, after Kareena got stabbed by her useless boyfriend, after Deirdre was raped by the Mongrel Mob, after Shandra’s partner was had up for interfering with one of her kids — all that colossal fucking shit, they told me the counsellors told them, was all my fault.