by Sara Alexi
‘I must walk the dogs,’ he says and looks around for his jacket. It cannot be found and, for an awful moment, Saabira fears that she – or, worse, Aaman – has thrown it in the skip. It is with relief that she remembers she hung it up on a peg on the wall outside to keep such a thing from happening.
Once he has it on he seems keen to be gone. The light has turned pink and the purple heather looks soft and inviting. Coco and Zaza come out from their hiding places behind the furniture. Blackie Boo joins them, and Sabi, behind Coco. Cyril calls, ‘Gorilla Head, Mr Perfect, Teddy Tail!’ and three more dogs appear, one from the cupboard under the stairs and two from the floor above, their nails tapping on the bare wooden treads.
As Saabira closes her back door she turns to see a rush of dogs heading onto the moors, bouncing, chasing and happy. It seems that Cyril is taking them out all together.
‘It was very kind of you to give up your day off to help,’ she says to Aaman.
‘If I am truthful, Saabira, the sooner that place is cleared and clean the happier I will be. You are lucky that you have no sense of smell, but it is really quite unbearable. I am a little concerned that we took Jay in there.’ This last sentence is said very quietly. He pauses to light the fire. ‘You know, I am really not surprised that his neighbours are not enjoying living next door to him on the other side. I am sorry for them but grateful that the wind is favourable to us.’ The fire is alight now and he turns his head to face her. ‘I think your way of dealing with this is very kind, and much more productive than being aggressive and getting all these official people involved.’
‘I worry it might not turn out very well for Cyril. If Archie died two years ago, who is Cyril paying his rent to? It might be that he is illegal there. Mr Brocklethwaite could use that to make him leave.’
‘Well, I know how it feels to be Illegal,’ Aaman says. Saabira sits on the sofa and reaches out her free hand to him.
‘You know, it was not as I would have imagined,’ he says. ‘Mostly it is shock, that such a thing has happened to you. You feel that the world has turned against you and you cannot understand why. You are still you, and have not changed. You are still the caring, law-abiding citizen you always were. My heart had not changed. I still loved as I always have, had feelings just as I had always had feelings, and yet I was being treated as if I was something else. Something inhuman. Everything I believed was safe about society and the world was gone because I was suddenly on the other side of this invisible wall. The world turns its back on you.’ Aaman rocks back as the fire catches, and he sits on the floor, leaning against the sofa. Saabira strokes his hair with her unencumbered hand as she feeds Jay. ‘Yes, I think the first thing is shock, then disbelief,’ Aaman continues, ‘Then horror and panic and then loneliness.’ He is silent for a moment.
‘I began to judge myself by how I was treated. I began to wonder if they were right, if I was this thing that they made me out to be. I treated myself as if, indeed, I do not have any value. I even caught myself behaving as I thought they all expected me to behave once or twice, lowering my standards.’
He sighs.
‘I am not sure if I have told you this, but when I first met Juliet in Greece and she had given me work in her garden – this was before we became friends – I asked her if she had any clothes that would fit me.’
Saabira cannot help her intake of breath. She has heard so much about his adventures but she has not really considered the day-to-day practical side of his life whilst he was away. Where did he get his clothes, his shoes, his soap, when he didn’t even have money to feed himself?
‘She offered me a carrier bag full of clothes. But do you know what I did?’ Saabira shakes her head. ‘Instead of thanking her and taking them graciously, I was angry. I was angry that I had to ask and angry that I had to accept. I was angry that she thought that, because she could offer me a bag of her old clothes, she was better than me. I was angry that she thought she was better than me because I spent my days cleaning up the mess in her garden, cleaning up after her. It made me lash out like a heathen, like the illegal immigrant they had labelled me. I wanted to hurt her. So I looked through these clothes as if I had a choice of what I would wear. I showed her where the trousers she offered had a hole, I dismissed the shoes as being too big or too small, I forget which, and then, as a final insult, I left all that she had offered just strewn over her verandah so she would have to clear up after me, so she would spend her time clearing up the mess I had made. The dirty, messy, ungrateful, illegal immigrant.’
Saabira knows from his tone that he will not want her sympathy. He is analysing his own behaviour, telling the events out loud to allow him to see them more clearly, trying to find his peace with them.
‘Did Juliet understand?’ Saabira asks.
‘I think that is why it has stuck with me. I have never explained it to her. Whilst I was still there I was too embarrassed to mention it. Now we are apart, our emails are more matter of fact. We do not mention the past, just our present and future plans. But that is how it has always been since we became friends, just looking forward.’
Even though she knows they stay in touch by email, this reminder of it tightens her chest. But she keeps stroking his hair as if there is nothing wrong. Does he expect her to make some sort of response, offer a reply?
Chapter 27
Jay continues to suckle. Saabira tries to remain relaxed, so as not to pass on her agitation.
Aaman looks tired.
She is still considering her reply. It is forming – something about explaining his actions to Juliet when the time is right. She is checking over what she is going to say to ensure that it betrays no signs of her jealousy when she says it.
‘I think I might take a bath,’ says Aaman, yawning. He leans his head back against her knee. His fringe, which she has been smoothing flat against his head, bounces as she takes her hand away.
‘Yes, I feel dirty, too, after being in Cyril’s house, even if I touch nothing.’ Saabira agrees.
‘You want a bath too?’ Aaman speaks in his teasing tone, a spark in his eyes.
‘Ah, so now, suddenly, you are not so tired?’ she teases back, the relief of the change of subject apparent in her voice, to her if not to him.
‘Maybe I am. Maybe I am so tired that it will be you who has to wash my back.’ With his hand on her knee for leverage, he pushes off and stands.
She picks up the nearest cushion and gently bashes him on the back of the legs.
‘Okay, I am going now – I know when I am not wanted.’ He scissor-jumps to avoid the second swipe of the cushion, all tiredness gone.
His bare feet slap up the stairs, water whines through the pipes, and the sounds of splashing and singing can soon be heard: the song is an Urdu song he sometimes hums to Jay.
Saabira sits staring into the fire as her daughter falls asleep on her knee. How does she resolve this whole thing with Juliet? She is jealous of a woman she has never met. Jealous of a relationship that she has never witnessed. It is impossible to put it in perspective because it is all in her mind. Nothing Aaman has said has led her to believe that anything happened between them, but somehow it is difficult to understand why someone would be so generous for no reason. Employing him to help with the garden is just a straight transaction, but offering him the use of her laptop, finding an online course for him to do in order to learn basic programming, getting him customers so he could gain experience. Why would anyone do all that? Unless…
With Monday being a bank holiday the working week is only four days and then Aaman is home all day again.
Saabira is pleased with the progress she has made with Cyril on his house, and the skip on the road is becoming fuller as the rooms are emptied. The magazines add a colourful layer to the top of the rubbish as their pages flutter in the breeze. The greatest triumph as far as Saabira is concerned came when Cyril himself suggested that they dispose of the bookcase up against the window. It seemed too heavy for them to move, but the
n Cyril remembered that Mr Dent had told him it came apart, and they spent the rest of the time until Jay woke up breaking it down into pieces. With this item gone, what light could get through the grubby front window illuminated all that was left in the room. It did make the work a little more cheerful and it was certainly easier to see what they were doing, but it also showed the level of grime everywhere.
‘It’s such a waste,’ Cyril says as he stacks pieces of the bookcase outside his back door. The plan is to chop it into pieces later and use it as firewood. ‘Everything is plastic or that pretend wood now.’
‘But do you have books to fill it?’ she asks. Cyril’s cheeks mottle and the colour extends all the way down his neck. It seems an odd reaction. He looks away from her and with a little frown of her own it occurs to her that he might not be able to read. She accepts this without question but as the moment passes it also occurs to her that she, who is supposedly from a poor country, a tiny village, has a degree, and this man, a white man, born and bred in Great Britain cannot even read? Maybe?
‘What about this, Cyril?’ Saabira asks, holding up a coal scuttle with a large hole in the bottom. She has his attention for a second but then, with no warning, he dives into his wardrobe porch and peeks through the crack in the door. The sound of a car stopping tells Saabira what he is doing.
‘It’s a man,’ Cyril inform her. ‘He’s getting out.’ He pauses. ‘He’s going to your house.’ Pause. ‘He’s knocking.’
‘My house? Who could that be?’ She leaves by the back door to go round to her house. Jay is still sleeping. It is the only time Saabira feels she can help Cyril. Aaman has bought her this wonderful thing that plugs into the electricity next to Jay so she can hear every one of her sighs on another device that she has hung on a piece of cord around her neck. She stops to press a kiss lightly on her sleeping daughter’s forehead as she heads for the front door.
The knock is repeated and she opens it to a man with a smiling face, his teeth glinting. Behind him the sky is still bright, so she cannot make out the details of the rest of his features.
‘Hello.’ He holds out his hand for her to shake. ‘Gavin – I work with Aaman. Did he tell you? The twins have just outgrown their cots and he said you had a pair of beds.’ He sounds nervous.
‘Oh yes. Beds.’ She opens the door for him to come in and leads him through to the backyard.
Over the moors the skies are a blue-grey, darker than the sky out of the front door, and slightly threatening in a romantic way. This country is so changeable, so dramatic. The blue-grey sky is such a wonderful colour it draws her in, and for a second she stands there staring at the purple of the heather, the green of the ferns and the deep hues of the sky. Deep, rich, hues.
The man coughs politely and Saabira recovers herself.
‘It is a bunk bed, one bed on top of the other.’ She points to the stack of wooden pieces.
‘Even better.’ He is young, with red hair and glasses. He touches the pieces of bunk bed with the air of someone who has no idea what he is looking at.
‘I am afraid we have no mattresses,’ Saabira adds.
‘Aaman wasn’t clear on the price but he said it would be reasonable.’ He clears his throat and pushes his fringe to one side with the flat of his hand, stroking his forehead. ‘It’s amazing how two such little kids can use up so much income.’ He laughs but there is a tension in his voice as if what he has said is more of a worry than a joke.
‘The man who is selling the beds says he would like a bag of dog biscuits, or the equivalent in money, I suppose,’ Saabira says.
‘A bag of dog biscuits?’ The words come out with a great deal of air, as if he allows all the tightness he is holding to escape. He takes some money from his back pocket and carries on talking. ‘There you go, a bit more than a bag of dog biscuits.’ He offers her the note, quickly sealing the deal. ‘I don’t suppose you have anything else you’re selling, have you?’ The price is presumably the attraction.
‘No, sorry.’ She watches him take an armful of the pieces to his car and come back for more. He is on his last journey when she says.
‘Oh, actually, do you need a bookcase? Solid wood. Tall?’
‘Oh my God – what is that smell?’ The wind has changed and he puts the end of his suit jacket over his nose and mouth.
‘That is why next door is being cleared out. That is where the bookcase was,’ Saabira explains.
‘Would I have to go in to get the bookcase?’ The man’s eyes widen. The wind changes again.
‘It is just here.’ She points over the low wall.
‘Oh, thank goodness for that,’ he says.
The young man inspects the bookcase briefly, before taking the pieces out to the road and strapping them to the roof of his car. When the pile is gone, Saabira goes out to see him off. He tries to closes the door of his car. The pieces of bunk bed are laid from the back window all the way into the footwell of the passenger seat. He rearranges them, pushing at them so the door will shut. A knee against the door encourages the latch to click.
He fumbles in his pocket again.
‘Here – for the bookcase,’ he says, a gruff giggle escaping him. He sounds pleased with himself. ‘Get another bag of dog biscuits.’ He is just about to speak again when the breeze switches direction and the man puts his nose into the crease of his elbow and hurries to get into the car.
Saabira flattens the two notes out, one on top of the other, and goes back to Cyril’s.
‘Here,’ she says, offering the bills. ‘For the beds, and the bookcase.’
Cyril looks but does not touch.
‘So much?’
‘Two bags of dog food.’ Saabira nods encouragingly.
His hand lifts from his side, his fingers twitching towards the money.
‘The skip,’ he says, and looks away from the money and into her eyes.
‘What about it?’ Saabira asks, her attention slightly caught by the sounds of Jay’s stirring coming through her monitor. She will have to go back soon. Also, she needs to think about cooking… She loves Jay dearly and Aaman is her life, but there must be more to her life than cooking and feeding, she thinks. Something a little more intellectually demanding, perhaps?
‘How much?’
‘How much what?’ Saabira has lost the thread of what they were saying.
‘The skip. It must have cost something. How much?’ He points to the money in her hand.
‘Oh yes, about this much.’ The cost was double the value of the notes in her hand. It is not that she wants to undermine Cyril’s independence but, judging by his clothes and his house, he barely makes enough to keeps his life together on what he earns.
‘Good.’ He turns his back to pick up the coal scuttle. He puts his finger up through the hole and wiggles it. ‘Can this be mended?’
‘No, but it can be recycled,’ Saabira says. Jay is definitely stirring, and seeing as Cyril is now sorting things without her help it seems like a good time to leave.
Chapter 28
Cyril doesn’t even notice Saabira leave. A bent metal lamp base clangs as it hits the skip. Cyril punches the air with one hand, then looks up and down the street. There is no one watching. A tattered wicker basket is squeezed in a tight embrace and then put underfoot, stamped on until it is flat and put out with the wood. It will make great kindling.
A chipped vase is next, and it will shatter marvellously if he throws it into the skip from any distance. He starts to take aim but then stops. Glass is recyclable; the lamp is placed gently in a line with six old milk bottles and two beer bottles by the front gate.
He is getting good at this tidying. If he had known he was capable of doing such a thing he would have done it years ago. He looks around for Saabira, to share this feeling with her, and realises she has gone. The light feeling in his chest that, until that second, he had not noticed deflates a little, but not much. The growing space in the house keeps him buoyant. He will continue, make real progress so when she next
comes she is amazed.
The radio alarm up in his bedroom rings, muffled by joists and floorboards. His head rolls back and he screws up his face, closes his eyes tightly and moans out load. It is so unfair that he has to go to work.
His boots drag on the moor path that leads to the road down to the abattoir. It is an old stone building, which would have been built for the wool trade, and which sat derelict for decades until a group of local farmers used an EU directive to take on the building at a very low rent – the directive said it was an offence to cause or permit an animal to suffer avoidable excitement, pain or suffering, and the farmers used it to manipulate local government so they could have it, along with a sizeable grant to convert its use. That was what Archie had said. He had been to the library in Bradford, looked it all up. That was not long after the hospital had moved him into Archie’s house and Cyril had been told to start work. They didn’t know each other then.
‘Truth is, those greedy sods just wanted to cut down their transport costs. Easier to move lumps of meat than live animals,’ Archie said, tottering across the room from his easy chair to the table.
‘Look here, I got this today.’ He picked up a printed sheet and began to read.
‘“John Cartwright, a long-time worker, told the Bradford Post that he frequently has to cut the legs off completely conscious sheep. “They blink. They make noises,” he says. “The head moves, the eyes are wide and looking around… They die piece by piece. Because they are unloaded from trucks so quickly and the lines move so quickly and many workers are so poorly trained, the technique of stunning the animals often fails to render the animals insensible to pain.”’
He hated Archie for reading him this. As he physically reacted to the words, the back of his head bumped against the wall. The pain was better than the thoughts of the animals suffering so he jarred his head back again… and again, and again.
‘Hey, hey.’ Archie dropped his printed sheet and rushed over to him, pulling Cyril by the shoulders and putting a hand behind his head to soften the impact. ‘Hey, fella – hey, my friend, hey Cyril, it’s okay.’ Then he muttered to himself, ‘Oh shit.’