Skin

by Tobias Hill

  ‘But do you eat? Do you really eat?’

  She stares at Alan. He nods. ‘Yes. I like to eat,’ she says.

  ‘Good. Well. It is a good name, isn’t it? You’ll have to change personal tutors. Tomorrow, will you? Mm. Say I recommended you for my International Studies special module, can you? And tell Kozo we’ll be five for supper, I’m sure he’ll be so pleased. Goodbye.’

  She puts the phone down. After a moment Lorna comes and sits beside her, drapes a slender arm around her. ‘Well, what did he say?’

  She shakes her head. ‘He said I could stay for supper.’ She looks at the others.

  ‘I knew he would. How nice. A new student,’ says Lorna. Alan nods cautiously, still watching Alia.

  ‘I thought he might. Well, I’m sure he’s right. Kozo is cooking Japan tonight. I hope you like fish.’

  Kozo stands in front of her, squinting down. He picks up her hand and shakes it gently.

  ‘I will be happy to eat with you. We cook extensively. Because we are foodies. We are food-crazy. We explore world cultures and break down taboos. I hope you will enjoy tonight.’ He smiles. Alia sees gold fillings glint behind the white dog-teeth. She stands up, unzips her coat. Smiles back.

  He is massive in all senses, in the bone, with close-shaved hair that makes Alia think of skinheads in bus-stations and dark streets. The chopsticks are enveloped in his hands. He flexes them like fingers made too small to grab whole mouthfuls. She feels hungry just watching him.

  ‘Food and religion are always linked. Why is that, do you think? I think it must be a question of purity and poison. Christ is poisoned with vinegar but purifies with his blood and flesh. Cultures that have traditions of eating raw meat, or bleeding their meat, often have exaggerated religious concerns with purity. Shintoism in Japan, where the white snake, salt and rice are holy. Or poisons in Judaism, even better – blood and mud. Alia, are you Muslim, would you say?’

  ‘No.’ She feels thick-headed, as if his role as eloquent teacher has boxed her into a sympathetic dullness. She sits back on the hard chair. Concentrates.

  The kitchen is big and functional, with stainless-steel sinks and a long scrubbed wood table. The door clicks open and Lorna comes in wearing a shot-silk evening dress. She sits down next to Alan, puts a dictaphone and notebook on the table and starts adjusting Alan’s tuxedo collar, lips brushing against his neck.

  Alia is still wearing her college clothes, Levis jeans and a green jumper knitted by her Auntie Yasmine. Sweat trickles from her armpits down her sides. She tries to breathe sensibly, not too fast. At the far end of the kitchen, Kozo is hitting something with a meat tenderiser. She winces at the impacts.

  ‘Mm. Pity. But you still have your cultural foods, yes? Foods are edible social histories, Alia. Japan, for instance, has an ancient tradition of raw fish from the southern settlers, followed by Buddhist taboos on working with dead animals. Then we have the Portuguese merchants arriving with their fritters and egg-tempera painting techniques. Lo and behold, the Japanese create deep-fried tempura. Nowadays they eat beef via America, but they often eat it raw. The traditions are sublimated but they evolve, you see? Lorna, you look ravishing.’

  ‘Oh, thank you.’ Alia watches the way the younger woman blushes across her neck and cheeks, crossing her legs. She looks back at the Professor. He is sitting astride his chair, mouth slightly open, small eyes moving from one student to the next. Gauging them for something.

  What are you doing here? she thinks. She stops watching him, uncomfortable, while Kozo sets bowls and trays on the table. Angus boosts himself up to look into his bowl. He chuckles. Kozo sits down.

  ‘I will explain to you.’ Alia looks into her black lacquer bowl. Inside is a pungent mash the colour of fried liver. She draws back at the smell of it.

  ‘This is called natto,’ says Kozo. ‘It is the rotten beans of the soya plant. On your trays are soy sauce, yellow mustard and the egg of a quail. Mix in the condiments like this.’ Kozo breaks the pebble-sized egg over his bowl and beats its raw gold plasm into the beans. ‘Then the soy and mustard. And taste. You see?’

  They eat without talking. The natto is delicious. Angus is the last to finish. He licks his chopsticks clean and sits back.

  ‘Very interesting. Perfectly satisfying in dietary terms. But the perfect product is perfectly dull. You have to give a little humanity to bring the food alive. Don’t you think? Lorna?’

  ‘Sorry Kozo, but look, even Alia likes it, don’t you Alia? And it’s her first lesson. What we want’ – she leans forward towards Kozo until he begins to move back – ‘is something to talk about. Even something we can’t talk about. So that when we’re trundling into campus on that provincial little Falmer train, we can look at all the first years with their packed Spam, and know that we’re better than them. Excite us, Kozo. That’s what the World Feasts are about.’

  Lorna has let her face sink into her hands, posing. Alia feels a smile playing round her lips. Kozo is staring at the thin blue veins in the blonde girl’s eyelids, the thick ink-blacked lashes. ‘When Angus was talking, Japanese food sounded so cruel and unusual. Like the people.’

  ‘No. It is Chinese food that is most unusual. Excuse me, please.’ Kozo stands up, his chair falling back as he walks towards the work surfaces. Alan stretches out one hand and catches it.

  ‘Easy on, tiger!’ He stands the chair upright. Alia sits back, quiet. She folds her napkin into a carp, but her movements are jerky in the growing threat of silence. There is a distant sound of police-car sirens through the rear windows. She flattens the carp out, looks up, tries to think of something to say.

  ‘Are you married, Professor?’

  She knows it is a mistake immediately. Alan draws back from the table. She stumbles over the words and no one says anything. For a moment she thinks Angus is going to ignore her. Then he rolls his head up and smiles at her.

  ‘Of course. I’d forgotten you were a first year – a fresher, in fact. Any second year knows about my marriage. Well. It was a bloody mess. Ha! Ha!’ His laugh is brittle and stagy. ‘Bloody and botched. Scenes all over campus, we were like boxers on tour. I haven’t seen my wife or children in almost a year, they upped and left. Alan, could you pass the tea? Thank you.’ He pours green tea into his own cup, then offers it to Alia. She shakes her head. He shrugs. Leers at her.

  ‘I’ve still got my kitchen, though. And my personal students. Oh look, Lorna, it’s puffer fish. And you’ve just made the chef so angry, my love.’

  Kozo is setting down an octagonal platter in the middle of the table. The surface of the dish is covered with wafers of flesh, cut almost to transparency, mottled, bloody. They are arranged as the petals of a chrysanthemum. Alia feels saliva against her teeth.

  ‘Please.’ Kozo motions to the platter, sits down. Lorna cranes forward.

  ‘Well. It’s not Spam, anyway. What is it, Kozo-san?’

  He grins, a white flash of vindictiveness. ‘Cruel and unusual delicacies.’ He claps his hands together in prayer, then begins to eat. His eyebrows rise comically. ‘Quite safe and tasty. Eat please!’

  Lorna sits back next to Alan. Alia watches the way he laughs without opening his mouth. She imagines him with a beard, russet like his hair. ‘I thought it was poisonous, puffer fish?’ says Lorna.

  Alan sighs. ‘Who says its puffer fish?’

  ‘It takes years of training. The filleting. Alan.’

  ‘He never said it was puffer fish, all right? Stop thinking and just eat it. Eat it.’

  ‘You eat it.’

  ‘You first. You’re the one who got nasty, remember?’

  ‘It’s nice,’ says Alia. When they stop and look at her she feels the warmth spreading out from her full stomach. The feeling of belonging. There is a mottled piece of flesh speared clumsily on her chopsticks. She chews. ‘Really. Not fishy at all. It’s not fish is it, Kozo?’

  He takes off his spectacles, wipes them clean with his napkin. ‘Puffer fish is most specially expens
ive. Professor Hayter’s department would balk at such expenses.’

  ‘Thank you for thinking of me. Now then. Raw belly of tuna, is it? Good with salt, yes. Kozo? What is it?’

  He points: bloody, mottled, purple. ‘Heart, tongue, liver. Of horse. A speciality of Hiroshima. Please eat up. The next course is alive and time is a factor.’

  ‘Good,’ whispers Angus, ‘Very good.’

  Alia licks the meat into her mouth and grins. Skin and hair prickles along her thighs; the raw heart of a horse.

  Alan laughs, his voice high, almost hysterical. ‘What do you think, Alia? Are you hooked? Or out? Alia.’

  She picks up her cup of green tea. Drinks without letting it spill. It tastes wonderful. ‘I think we must do this more often.’

  ‘I can’t believe it.’

  Alia lies back on the shingles. They are cold and grey against her hair. The feeling is good, solid. At the periphery of her vision she can see Lorna sitting up on the picnic blanket, pouring champagne. Hair haloed against the sun and seagulls. She leans close, nestles a glass into Alia’s hand. Strokes her cheek.

  ‘You have such beautiful skin, so smooth. What can’t you believe?’

  ‘You know what. Oh, all of it – what we ate, what we said.’ She pauses. The tide hisses against Brighton West Pier. She can smell sour salt and rust. ‘That I enjoyed it.’ Lorna lies back next to her. Just the two of them. Friends. Alia wants to laugh and she does, a little.

  ‘Oh well. I know what you mean, though. But just remember the parsnip principle.’

  ‘What’s that?’ Lorna’s hair is curling into Alia’s mouth. She pushes it gently away.

  ‘When I was little I used to hate parsnips. Then one day we were at a dinner somewhere and they served this soup and I couldn’t get enough of it. So after the umpty-umpth serving my mother leans over and says, You’ll never guess, Lorna, and of course it’s parsnip soup.’ She laughs, head back, shrill as the gulls. ‘She was going to tell all the guests and I said Don’t, so she made a promise to try everything once and I did. That’s the principle. Because you never know what you’ll like. You should try everything once.’

  They say nothing for a while, listening and drinking. In the distance is the synthesised jangle of fairground attractions on the Palace Pier, the rush of traffic. Somewhere out to sea a tanker hoots. Alia leans up to watch it, wrinkles her face against the sun. Ships crawl against the horizon.

  ‘When did it start? The World Feast?’ Behind her Lorna shifts on the blanket, getting comfortable.

  ‘Last June, end of term. We stayed down over the summer break. I suppose we’re addicted, really. India, Brazil and Japan we’ve had, so far, one every few months. We were just a tutorial group, to start with. It was Angus’s idea. He is remarkable. But it has become more – well, unusual. That just happened, I think. Just a sort of slippage.’ She sits up.

  ‘Angus is cooking next. Then it’s your turn, if you like. That doesn’t worry you, does it?’

  Alia shakes her head.

  ‘No. Angus wouldn’t have chosen you if it did. I bet you’re a great cook. Are you drunk yet?’

  She laughs. ‘A bit. Lorna, can I tell you something?’

  ‘If you like.’

  She sits up, pulls her knees up to her breasts. ‘I was really glad when I met you. The three of you. I don’t know what I would have done otherwise. My parents, they moved back to India last month. To be with my aunts and uncles. I don’t have family here now. But I wanted to stay.’ She blinks back stupid tears. ‘It was the best thing. Meeting you.’

  Lorna stands up. ‘Is that all? God, Alan thought they must have died or something.’

  Alia looks up at her; she is brushing off her skirt, slim and meticulous. Suddenly the taste of champagne in Alia’s mouth is sour and musty. She tries to stand up, staggers. Lorna takes her arm.

  ‘You are drunk. You are nice, Alia. Come on, let’s get you home. It’s almost time for tea.’

  The first of November smells of gunpowder. A cold mist comes in off the sea and the odour of corner-shop rockets hangs around the clocktower and the grim concrete architecture of the university. Alia works in the library until the lights start being turned off at closing time.

  She packs away her books, walks to the main exit. Figures stand outside on the wide steps, dark against the darkness. Students smoking cigarettes, waiting for friends. Alan is sitting on the wall to one side. He shucks away from it, takes Alia’s books, kisses her. His lips are cold but his mouth is warm. They walk together to the train station.

  ‘Angus called.’

  Alia smiles out a cloud of white breath. ‘What did he say? When is the lesson? Is it ready?’

  ‘He said to say that Angus called.’

  She grabs him. ‘What else?’

  They stop. He is laughing with his mouth closed again. ‘He said it’s ready. He’s cooking England tonight. Nine o’clock.’

  ‘Shit! What time is it now?’

  ‘Don’t worry.’ He points out into the dark. A car is parked at the university entrance, pale and sleek. Lorna is waving to them from the driver’s window. They run across the lawn.

  The roads around Angus’s Kemp Town house are crowded with parked cars. Lorna has to drive round the block three times. She clicks her nails against the wheel, sharp and nervous.

  ‘Oh well. Lucky in parking, unlucky in love, that’s what my mother always says. Here we are, anyway.’ She eases them into a space. They get out and stand on the pavement while she straightens up. Kozo’s face is white against the blackness of his hair and dinner-jacket. Alia takes his hand.

  ‘Are you all right, Kozo?’ He nods and pulls away. Alia looks at Alan and he shakes his head, Leave him. The car door slams. Lorna comes round the bonnet, heels loud against the cold ground. Alan walks up the steps to the door, turns.

  ‘Are we ready?’

  They go inside. The doors to the kitchen are open. Five Bauhaus chairs at the smooth black table. There are objects on the table. Even with the spotlights, Alia can’t make them out. She goes closer. Looks into the blood-stuffing of a giant puffball. Strokes the fairground tail of a peacock.

  ‘And do we eat this?’ says Kozo. He is at the head of the table. Something stands there, tall and winged, balanced on jointed poles. Kozo looks back at them. ‘Is this a funny joke?’

  ‘No, actually it’s a heron.’ Angus is standing in the cellar doorway. He is holding four bottles of wine by his fat butcher’s fingers. Watching them. Carcass freezers hum in the dark behind him. ‘Roasted with sandalwood and raspberries, mediaeval recipe. Hell of a time getting hold of it. RSPB, etcetera.’

  He lumbers in, filling the room. Alan steps back towards Alia. ‘The peacock’s imported, so that was easier, but it’s a trick to get it back into the skin after roasting. Barely fits, like a swollen foot. Anyway, lovely to see you all, do sit down, let’s eat first and talk later, yes? A hungry stomach has no ears. Who’d like a honeyed dormouse?’

  Alia sits down. Angus rubs his hands together, cleaning, cleaning. ‘Dinner is served.’

  *

  They never eat with Angus between lessons. They never go to restaurants. Alia is doing well in all her courses, but there are rumours of staff cuts and Angus has no allies on the faculty. The school secretary tells Alia she used to worry for the wife, she was such a small woman. She gives Alia a form to fill in on Angus’s teaching. Alia throws it away. It’s not something she wants to think about.

  She spends time with Lorna and Alan, sometimes with Kozo. The other students seem cut off from them. She dreams of eating – meringues of sea-foam, the bitter metal of knives and forks, anonymous meats – and when she wakes from the dreams, she is always hungry. The campus doctor gives her something to help but the dreams don’t go away. She stays at Southover Street over Christmas because she has nowhere else to go. They all do. She plans the next World Feast. She is going to cook France.

  It is the day before term begins. They are sitting in the front
room, trying to study. The phone rings and Alan takes it, still writing course-notes.

  ‘Hello. Yes, it is. Yes.’ He sits up, puts down his pen.

  ‘No, no problem. We were just –’ He listens, frowning. ‘Muscardini. No, I’m sorry. It sounds like an Italian wine –’

  When he laughs everyone stops. Alan never laughs out loud. His eyes lock with Alia’s. ‘Dormice. No, I’ve never heard anything like that in relation to Professor Hayter. I must say it sounds rather News of the World-ish. But I’m sure he’ll talk to you himself if you ring him. Mm? Oh, no problem. No. Goodbye.’

  He hangs up and dials immediately, waving Lorna away. ‘Angus. I just had bloody Animal Welfare ringing me.’ His voice shakes. Alia puts her hand on his shoulder. She can hear Angus’s voice, distant and tinny.

  ‘Alan! How are you? I never see you these days. When is Alia going to be ready with the next lesson, eh? No, listen. Don’t worry about the animal people. It’s all taken care of. It just takes a little money. Trust me. This is bound to happen as we explore food cultures in such depth. Next time we’ll have something less traceable, won’t we? Oh, and don’t ring me again.’ The line clicks shut.

  It takes her nine days to cook and it’s still a failure. Alan helps her with the heavy work, the gutting and stitching. They use Angus’s kitchen because the table is stronger. They compliment her cooking and eat. Alia feels her pride shrivel inside her.

  M. F. Le Maëstre’s Escalopes de langoustes à la Poincaré with a chopped cockscomb sauce; Louis Kannengieser’s Pains de foie gras à la Française, with its quarter-kilo of truffles and two kilos of foie gras. Larks enshrouded with pig’s lungs and a bouillon invented by Carême. They eat at Alia’s creations in queasy silence while Angus talks and talks.

  ‘I was a gastro-nomad at your age. I was fascinated by taboos and pleasures. Not consuming honey or crayfish. Consuming lambs’ testicles or smoke. Sex and death and filth – kitchens have it all and people love it.’

  He picks detritus from between his molars, twisting one thumb between the canines. It makes him ursine, thinks Alia, the face snarling. ‘Some more than others. Met my wife in China, she couldn’t stand it, just wanted McDonald’s. The boys, too. Quite picaresque, it was. Got all the way to New Britain and back. Excellent soups. They use three different kinds of turtle eggs.’