Eight Rooms

by Various

  ‘What should we do with him?’ I ask, with renewed effort.

  ‘We could take him to the park?’ says Rachel. I don’t know if she’s asking or telling, what with the way that most of the things she says are concluded with this god-awful inflection at the end. In some television programme that I watched once hosted by Stephen Fry, he claimed that this was because of kids growing up raised by the television; most of the kids our age were immersed in soaps like Home and Away and Neighbours from an early age, and gradually started to talk like the young Aussies and the Yanks. I wonder if in a few years time, we’ll all be talking like our text messages; kids seem to get them earlier and earlier nowadays. I wonder when CLJ will get his first mobile phone.

  ‘The park?’ she repeats. This time I know that it is unquestionably a question; it has that begging tone to it that she uses when she tries to get me to go out and do something. The two words are also full of the knowledge that an affirmative response from me is deemed to be in the ‘highly unlikely’ category.

  ‘Looks like it might rain,’ I say, with practiced decisiveness. ‘We’ll have to take the whole kit and caboodle; umbrellas, the pram, a change of clothes, a flask of hot tea. We can’t have Jacky-Wacky getting wet or cold…’

  Rachel gives me a fluttery little smile. For a second I think that she’s bought my excuse, but not for long. When I look back over at her, her face has settled into that sulky expression she uses when she hasn’t got her own way. She likes being out and about; she likes putting the fear of god into people with her frosty glare. She likes daring builders on construction sites to wolf-whistle at her. She likes it when men have to give her that surreptitious double-take look before they shuffle away, back to their bus-stop women and their humdrum bus-stop lives.

  I hate being out and about. I hate the air of menace that exudes from the men that see her on my arm and automatically want to prove themselves against me. I hate the way that people become so jealous. They are all like children; they think that if they can’t have a woman like that, then nobody should be able to. Samantha’s ex-boyfriend is out there somewhere too, and after my last run-in with him, I can’t walk down the street without seeing shadows by the wheelie bins and angry eyes burning out from the darkest ginnels and passageways. Flat 1 is my safe-house, just like it is for Mr. Snootles.

  In here, we’re kings of all we survey. And we’ve got everything we need. We’ve got the internet, the television, the games console, the well-stocked wine rack, the takeaway menus, the luxury shower, the cappuccino machine, the rowing machine, the weights, the pouffe, the decorative display shelf, the collector’s-item Star Wars figures, the Alan Majchrowicz print, the subtle lighting, the wooden floors, the exposed brick-work, the king-sized bed… Oh, and CLJ. I forgot about him for a moment, but a ripe smell emanating from his nether regions soon reminds me of his presence.

  Rachel wrinkles her nose but doesn’t gag like I’d thought she would. When I first met her, she took about three showers a day and washed the sheets on an almost nightly basis. She had, she claimed, a very sensitive sense of smell. This meant that my Camel cigarettes were out; unless I wanted to go outside to smoke. It also meant that for the first few months I was seeing her, I never dared go for a shit in my own house lest it offend her nostrils. There were times when I could hardly move I was that desperate, but I developed a kind of obsession about it. I thought my natural bodily smells would be the thing that would drive her away. Even now, I make sure that I shower before she comes home from work.

  But now look at her. CLJ has just soiled himself right in the middle of our majestically stylish front room like one of the old drunks that pass out in the bin store and she’s barely even noticed. In fact, come to think of it, she’s sporting this indulgent smile on her face like CLJ’s social faux-pas is already forgiven.

  ‘Has Jacky-Wacky done a shit?’ I ask.

  Rachel narrows her eyes and whispers: ‘Not in front of the baby you don’t, mister.’

  ‘What you worried about?’ I ask. ‘It’s not like he’ll understand what I’m saying…’

  Rachel elbows me out of the way and moves round the sofa. She picks up the little bundle of fun and dangles him over her shoulder, sniffing at his bottom.

  ‘Pass me the changing mat from out of that bag,’she orders. Meekly I submit to her will, just as Mr. Snootles had done.

  The ‘bag’ is a euphemism; the carrying-case that Samantha has so kindly landed on us is actually the size of a small lorry. Even so, I can hardly unzip it such is the vast, over-flowing amount of crap that’s been packed.

  ‘Anyone would think Jacky-Wacky’s moving in,’ I mutter, discarding tiny socks, rattles, dummies and books on my search for the elusive changing mat. ‘I didn’t bring this amount of stuff when we moved here.’

  ‘That was because in those days, you used to have a life outside the flat,’ snarls Rachel. I hadn’t noticed her getting angry, but evidently something that I’ve done – even if it was something entirely unconsciously done – has set her off. Perhaps she’s still irritable about my perceived assault on her cat, or perhaps it is just my general uselessness and my seeming inability to find the largest single object in the goddam body-bag.

  Finally, I find it. It’s made of that terrible cheap material that sings when you run your fingernails against it; the sound goes through me. It must be easier to clean or something. Or does Samantha shop in the bargain bins now that CLJ’s come along? I throw it over to Rachel and zip up the bag again.

  In seconds, Rachel whips his blue all-in-one suit off him and starts unfastening his nappy. She moves with an easy speed, which makes it look as though she’s done this sort of thing before, even though I’m pretty sure she hasn’t. She isn’t put off by the smell, or by the kicking from his little legs. She isn’t even put off her stride when the nappy comes loose and a fountain of baby-shit sprays out onto our magnolia wall. I once spilled a bit of blackcurrant juice on that wall and she didn’t speak to me for a week. Even Mr. Snootles got the cold shoulder after pissing on the rug, but here, she doesn’t even seem bothered. I am literally open-mouthed, such is my shock at seeing her so willing to throw herself in at the runny, yellowy-brown deep-end. Even CLJ seems a little over-awed. He’s not even making those cooing sounds or blowing snot bubbles out of his nose.

  ‘Your turn next time,’ she says ominously as she sellotapes the new nappy shut and hands the changing mat back to me. ‘And will you get a cloth for the wall?’

  CLJ has been crying non-stop for about an hour. It feels like longer; my ears are ringing and we’ve already had our polite neighbour knocking-on to complain on two separate occasions. The weirdo from the flat above keeps stamping on the floor too, making sure that his own grievances are heard. Jack’s been crying for so long now that his face has begun to take on a purple hue and I fear that he might have deafened himself.

  Rachel and I have tried everything; we’ve offered him warm milk, checked his nappy, rocked him in the cot, held him in our arms, sung to him and stroked his back. Rachel’s tried to read him a story from one of the books in the body-bag and I’ve tried pulling faces at him. Nothing has worked. No, not even Rachel’s CD of whale-song that she bought when she went through her relaxation-techniques phase.

  ‘I’m going to call Sam,’ says Rachel, rifling through her handbag to find her mobile phone.

  ‘Probably a good idea,’ I muse. ‘She’ll be able to get back here in about an hour and a half and…’

  ‘We’re not asking her to come back,’ says Rachel, who now has the phone in her hand and is rifling through the address book. ‘I just need a bit of advice… I need some help here and you’re not doing a good job of it.’

  Before I can even attempt to answer her latest jibe, Rachel has the phone up by her ear and a finger on her lips. She cocks her head and tries to listen to the ringing over the sound of CLJ’s increasingly desperate yells.

  ‘Come on, come on,’ says Rachel, sounding worried.

 
I move onto the sofa next to her, starting to feel a little concerned myself now.

  ‘She’s not answering,’ says Rachel, clicking off the phone.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ I say, trying to sound as relaxed as possible. ‘She’s probably in some treatment room or whatever they have in these places. Maybe she’s having her nails done. Just call her back and leave a message.’

  Rachel actually smiles. She looks pleased that I’m here and able to play the voice of reason. For once, she does exactly what I say. She calls back and waits for the answerphone message to kick-in.

  ‘Hi Sam,’ she says, her voice sounding strange and put-on somehow. This is her phone-voice, the voice she reserves for use with her friends; the one that makes her sound less composed than she usually is. ‘This is Rachel. I’m calling because… well, there’s nothing to worry about, but Jack just keeps on crying and crying and won’t stop. There’s nothing seriously wrong, but I was just wondering if you had any suggestions… uh… thanks, Sam. Just don’t worry okay?’

  She clicks off the phone once again and starts to put it back into her handbag.

  ‘Wait!’ I shout. Suddenly, CLJ has stopped crying all on his own. He is now staring at Rachel’s gold-covered phone with great interest. Rachel sees this too now and without a moment’s hesitation, hands over her most treasured possession to a four-month old child. CLJ tries to grasp the phone in his tiny fat fingers. His eyes are wide-open with delight, his crying jag now long-forgotten. He loves the phone; loves the weight of it, the fact that it feels expensive.

  ‘He’ll be in telesales when he’s a bit older,’ I say, my relief at the flat’s renewed silence putting me into a buoyant mood. Rachel gives me this look that tells me that she’s about as sick of my lame jokes as I am of her refusal to ever answer the buzzer.

  BRRRRZZZZZZ. BRRRRZZZZZZ.

  The noise cuts into my sleep like the constant prod of a sharp knife into my chest. I yank the cushion over my head and try to settle back down into the dreamy caresses of Keeley Hawes, the actress of choice recently. I don’t feel guilty about this fling with Keeley. Indeed, if it ever came down to it and I had to explain my actions to Keira, I could always call upon the fact that through squinted eyes, Keeley and Keira look pretty similar. Hell, even their names sound similar…

  BRRRRZZZZZZ. BRRRRZZZZZZ.

  Use the force, Mark; use the force… Nope; no good. Sleep won’t come back to me now, whatever I do. Thoughts are already starting to dance round my head, and these thoughts don’t tread lightly; they wear goddam Doc Marten boots, apparently. And whoever’s wearing them likes po-going around, crushing my early morning optimism into the chalk-dust floor.

  BRRRRZZZZZZ. BRRRRZZZZZZ.

  There’s nothing for it now but to get up. I crane open my tired eyes and for a moment, don’t recognise my surroundings. Then I remember: halfway through CLJ’s midnight caterwauling last night, I’d simply stormed out of the bedroom and dragged an old blanket out of the cupboard in order that I could sleep on our too-small couch. But even the front room looks different in the cold light of day; CLJ’s jumble sale of crap is still littered over every surface and there is a faint smell of shit in the air.

  ‘I love the smell of shit in the morning,’ I mumble, with a nod to Apocalyse Now, as I creak up from where I’ve bent myself into the sofa. And it’s a fitting reference too, considering the fact that everything feels faintly postapocalyptic.

  Gingerly, I walk towards the door entry system. It’s still in the back of my mind that Mr. Snootles may have escaped from imprisonment at the cattery and somehow made his way back here, just so he can catch me unawares. As I pass the cinema-screen mirror, I note how bedraggled I look. Give me a couple of days, and I’ll have the same saddlebags as Samantha. As it is, I have this big red mark on my face from where CLJ’s discarded rattle dug into it and my hair looks like a tramp’s. Indeed, my hairstyle can’t even be described as bird’s nest any more. Bird’s nest would be a euphemism; there’s so little order here that it now looks like a demolition site.

  I press the button and a familiar face crackles into view. But it’s not the familiar face that I’d been hoping for; it’s not Samantha, here to collect the little one.

  ‘Morning sleepyhead,’ says Rachel. ‘I thought you’d never let us in.’

  ‘What time is it?’ I grumble, through my poor, sleep-numbed mouth.

  ‘Half nine,’ says Rachel. ‘We let you sleep as long as possible. Jack and I have been out for a nice walk so as not to disturb you.’

  I feel a pang of guilt as I buzz her into the flats; Rachel must have had even less sleep than I had. But even so, this whole stupid baby-sitting weekend is her idea, so she should take the brunt of the punishment, shouldn’t she? I sigh with frustration and wait.

  When I let them into the flat-proper, Rachel doesn’t let me peck her on the cheek. She doesn’t make a big fuss about it, but by this small gesture alone, I know that we’ll be having one hell of an argument later on. This knowledge is almost too much for my over-loaded brain, and I’m in half a mind to get the bawling-match out of the way now. After all, it’s not as though we’ll be bothering CLJ. Judging by the way he can shout; his ears will be pretty much immune to loud noises anyway.

  Rachel deposits Jack in his cot in front of the plasma screen television and makes herself busy unpacking a couple of shopping bags that she has miraculously pulled from some kind of secret compartment in the pram. It’s like the smuggling compartment in the Millennium Falcon, I reckon, and would make an excellent hiding place for any shop-lifted items that Boba Fett the Security Guard might be on the lookout for. For a moment, I think about letting Rachel in on my amusing observation, but the way that she’s standing – that backs-to-me at all-costs stance – tells me that she’s giving off all the wrong signals. In fact, she’s pulsing out these lightning bolts of negative energy, which remind me of the emperor at the end of Return of the Jedi.

  ‘Where’ve you been?’ I ask, by way of conversation. I suppose that in some situations, my question might have been misinterpreted as the demand of a jealous lover, but Rachel knows me better than that. She knows I don’t care. And I’m not sure that she cares enough about me to care if I care any more.

  She ignores me.

  ‘Any word from Sam?’ I ask, hopefully.

  Freeze-frame; Rachel stops, hand mid-way into the fridge and straightens her back; a defensive gesture if ever I saw one. Then, ever so slowly, she speaks: ‘Oh, you’d love that, wouldn’t you? You’d love it if I told you that good old Samantha was on her way back here this minute to get poor little Jack out from under your feet. One night; that was all she asked for, but the way you moaned and cried about it…’

  ‘She hasn’t called then?’ I interrupt. ‘I’d have thought she’d have called as soon as she got your message. Some concern she’s showing, eh?’

  Rachel slams the fridge door shut. The handle, which I’d spent so long lovingly super-gluing back on last night, promptly clatters to the floor. She turns to face me, anger burning in her cheeks.

  ‘Samantha is trying her best with Jack,’ she hisses. ‘She is supposed to be away this weekend in order to recuperate. Just because she hasn’t called back yet…’

  Jack must have heard his name mentioned and bursts forth with a clarion-call of hoarse yells. I’d never known that babies could get hoarse before, but CLJ sounds as though he smoked a few packs of Camels last night. And with this new, husky voice of his, he seems even more likely to ruin my ear-drums. His yells seem to be ripping through the whole flat, virtually de-framing the prints on the walls.

  ‘Look what you’ve done now,’ I say, in triumph. It had been Rachel’s hissing that had set the little bundle of fun off, not me; I’ve somehow landed myself in a better position than I’ve occupied for the whole weekend. It’s a position from which I will have no qualms about launching a counter attack. ‘He’ll have us thrown out of the flats by the evening if he continues like this. The neighbours are already co
mplaining. And I don’t blame them. I hate that noise.’

  Rachel stares at me for a moment, as though deciding which particular clause in my argument will be the first one she’ll attack. ‘Hate,’ she says finally. ‘You hate everything. You hate even inanimate objects like the door-buzzer. You sit in this flat all day long in your own little world, designing your stupid little computer games for stupid little stay-at-homes like you that can’t handle the real world. This isn’t Star Wars you know. I’m not Princess Leia and you’re…’

  ‘You’re damn right about that,’ I manage to cut-in. Bringing you know. I’m not Princess Leia and you’re…’ Leia in is a step too far, and she knows it, but before I can engage the heavy artillery, she’s talking over me once again.

  ‘In here, in your little galaxy far, far away, you don’t have to care about anyone. You’re just as much a little kid as Jack is…’

  Jack starts to cry even more frantically at the mention of his name. I make sure that a wide grin is slapped right across my features. When I smile or laugh in the middle of one of Rachel’s tirades, it’s as though it pushes that final button, the one that launches her into full-on, light-speed rage.

  ‘Look at you smiling,’ she roars. ‘You think you’re so special… You think you’re in a film or something. But the fact is; nobody would watch a film about you because nothing happens to you and you don’t do anything!’

  I simply smile, but already I fear that I may have unleashed a monster that I can’t contain.

  ‘It’s not all about you,’ she continues. ‘Jack is not crying just to piss you off. The world does not revolve around you or the daft games you play. There is a world outside these four walls.’

  There is a world outside the four walls, Rachel’s right about that, and right now, it is banging on our front door with a frenzy that stops even CLJ from screaming. I give her that now look what you’ve done look, but she doesn’t respond this time. She walks to the door looking broken – her shoulders all hunched-up – and I hear her talking in a soft voice to my neighbour from across the hall.