Two Sketches of Disjointed Happiness

by Simon Kinch

  I look around the carriage desperately for something, someone, to keep me in this city. A glimmer, a hint of something. I look at the woman opposite me. Her gaze appears to be fixed on my feet, or my knees, not out of interest, just because they are there.

  I stay on the tube until it reaches the airport. Here, people’s anticipation of holiday sun reacts violently with the grinding disorder of the airport, spilling out and polluting the terminal with airborne frustration. At least I feel some contentment in being unconcerned with the triviality of all these things. I stand in the queue, mulling over what to say to Alyson when I get back. But the woman in front is arguing with her partner about hand luggage. I can’t think. Like it is a smoke, I begin to inhale this airborne frustration around me. I have to breathe deeply. The couple stop arguing and it passes.

  Nothing happens past check-in. My backpack is on its way to the hold and I wander round duty-free, with only my notebook and the detective novel I picked up in Sevilla as hand luggage.

  On the flight to Chicago, I am sat next to a French girl, on the way to the US. I don’t speak to her for the whole flight. She shuffles through some visa documents, which I spy on over the top of my novel. Her name is Nicole. She is 26 and was born in Paris. It is a one-year work visa, although whenever I glance across, the company’s name is always obscured by her passport on top. Why does she want to spend so long in Milwaukee? Adventure is not in the US, it is in Europe, I want to tell her. She suddenly shoots me a scowl and I return to my book.

  TWELVE

  I passed both days of that weekend in the gardens of Parque María Luisa. The sun beat down on the dirt paths that divide the gardens, my every footstep kicking up a yellowy dust. I walked the exact same route both days, entering at the gate nearest the river, then proceeding across the park diagonally to a clearing with benches around a fountain. A hum of insects came from the shrubbery. Cyclists idled past, students talking about studies, fathers out with their daughters.

  I sat in the clearing, doing little more than smoking. Only the day before, sat with Señora Rosales in Cafe Charlotte, speaking about her business and arranging times in even the loosest way possible, I had felt purposeful and organised. Yet after waking up in the guesthouse and taking my breakfast under the Cézanne print again, I again felt alone in the city, an individual with only himself to please.

  I pulled off my shirt. The afternoon heat had caused me to sweat and this was just beginning to dampen the shoulders of my shirt. I laid out the shirt and lay back. I tried to push the paleness of my skin to the back of my mind, but felt overly conscious of my body. I lasted what must have been half an hour, before two Spanish girls came and sat at the benches and began gossiping absent-mindedly about something or other. I caught the words ‘los americanos’ and suddenly became very self-aware. It could have been just a coincidence, but I hurriedly put my shirt back on and gathered my things. They continued talking, unaware of my exit.

  I wandered back through the city and, for no particular reason, towards the hostel. It was mid-afternoon and there wasn’t a traveller in sight. I imagined some were still in bed, sleeping off their Friday nights. The others would be exploring the streets and arcades of the centre. Even the reception was unstaffed. I paused, before walking straight through to the bar.

  The barman was at the sink, drying glasses with a tea towel. He turned to me as I came in. I ordered a beer and paid in small coins. I chose the table I’d had when Jess had approached me, taking the same chair, facing out towards the door. The barman returned to drying glasses. I took a few sips of the beer and waited.

  After a while, a couple of guests came in, ordering sangrias. I concentrated on not making eye contact, twisting and spinning the beer glass in front of me to fan out the ring of water at its base. I finished the beer and got up to leave.

  As I passed through the reception, I saw the receptionist, Clara, coming down the stairs carrying a pile of sheets. She recognised me immediately and, what’s more, remembered my name, looking a little surprised that I was back at the hostel. She asked where I was going. I must have shrugged, or looked a little uneasy. My awkwardness caused her to laugh a little. I said I didn’t have any plans. She then said she finished at 5pm and, if I didn’t have any plans, I was more than welcome to get a drink with her. She put down the sheets, drew a map on a small napkin, then disappeared, taking the pile of sheets with her.

  The bar on the napkin was only a block away from the hostel. It seemed far too close to warrant drawing a map. Clara may have sensed my disorientation, but it wasn’t that bad. I thought about sitting and waiting in the bar, but instead wandered out onto the Alameda de Hércules and kept walking. At the bottom of the promenade there was a small tobacco kiosk. I had enough change for a packet of cigarettes and a can of Coke. I bought these, then wandered back along the other side of the Alameda, keeping out of the mid-afternoon sun. Eventually I found a concrete bench in the shade, sat down and took out a cigarette.

  I stared across the tree-lined promenade. The Alameda was nearly empty at this time of day. Two youths sat on a bench about ten metres further up. Their haircuts consisted of thickly gelled quiffs, with the sides and backs closely shaved. The smell of dope wafted across the thick air, although I was too far away to be sure it came from their direction. I tried to make out the small street on the opposite side of the promenade. It looked familiar – maybe Jess and I had taken that route. I opened the can of Coke, taking a large gulp and swilling it around my mouth, before returning to the cigarette.

  Not long before 5pm, I returned to the bar and took a table outside. The windows of the bar were lined with trellises, in place of shutters. A waiter came out, wrote down my order and returned promptly with a coffee. Clara arrived not long after. I stood to greet her and she kissed both cheeks, before disappearing into the shade of the bar. She had ignored any tone I’d set with the coffee, emerging instead with a whiskey and Coke in a lowball glass. I looked at the steam still coming off my coffee and then at the bubbles fizzing off the ice cubes in her glass. I then looked back at Clara, who either hadn’t noticed the gulf between our choices of drink, or else didn’t care.

  ‘I’ve decided to stay in Sevilla, to live,’ I told her. Clara took to this in a way I couldn’t have imagined. In excitement, she reached over to hold my arm, exclaiming how fantastic that was. She then joked I’d do well to last the summer in such heat. I announced I’d been offered a small job with Señora Rosales’ apartments business. She took out her tobacco, but I quickly offered her one of my cigarettes. She folded her pouch back up, then took one from the packet I held out.

  ‘Let’s eat a little, to celebrate,’ she said. I surreptitiously felt my jeans pocket to check for any bank notes and, on feeling something crumple, agreed.

  I drank the rest of my coffee, whilst Clara went into the bar. She returned with a caña of beer for me. Ten minutes later the bartender came out with a basket of bread, cutlery and a large terracotta dish. I divided up the cutlery and napkins. Clara tucked straight into the stew in front of us and I quickly followed. The meat of the stew fell apart in my mouth, dissolving into its velvety red wine sauce. I asked what it was.

  ‘Carrilladas, this . . .’ and she grabbed my cheek, almost pinching it, ‘. . . but of a pig.’ She took another mouthful of the stew and glanced at me. I saw something in her eyes sparkle and willed mine to do the same.

  We finished and smoked a couple of cigarettes each. I drank another couple of beers and then joined Clara in drinking whiskey and Coke.

  THIRTEEN

  I lose sight of the French girl in the rush to leave the plane, although cannot tell if I do this intentionally or by accident. In the queue at passport control, I find myself looking straight into the back of a balding man’s head. We shuffle forwards. My eyes refocus on the patch of flaking scalp, lit by the pale fluorescent light.

  It is mid-afternoon by the time I arrive home. Dad’s Honda i
s on the drive and the grass of the front yard is long and uncut. The paint on the house’s panelling is more distressed than I remember, but I enjoy this detail. I would shrug my backpack off onto the grass and, feeling the weight lift from my shoulders, stand facing the house I haven’t seen in months. I take deep breaths, tasting the air. This image of home is overwhelming, not due to the length of time I’ve been gone, but because of how close I was to rejecting this homecoming, how close I was to staying in Sevilla. I remember the moment on the jetty in Triana, the sun warming the fine hairs of my neck, the river glistening.

  My mother can’t disguise her surprise when I walk in. She puts down her magazine and comes over, kissing me on the cheek. I feel a deep relief to see her, yet this is curbed by the guilt of nearly staying away. I apologise for missing her birthday. She tells me not to worry and calls my father in. He welcomes me home very matter-of-factly, yet I can see the annoyance my lateness has caused him through twitches across his forehead. As an excuse, I tell them about the theft of my possessions and the struggle back across Europe. I try to recount the story with the feeling and vivacity such an ordeal would give. My parents say how terrible it must have been. My father concludes that it is good to see me home, then looks at his watch. He is to have dinner with his friend Harold. He kisses my mother, then leaves.

  I take my backpack upstairs. My bed is made, yet buried under piles of ironed clothes left by my mother. I let my backpack fall to the floor, then carefully remove the folded garments. I notice two photos of Alyson stuck to the wall, but decide to leave them there. I take my baseball from the shelf and lie on my bed, among the folded clothes, throwing and catching the ball, tracing and relearning the shape of the branches outside my window.

  We eat pork joints and potato salad for dinner. I watch as my mother prepares the food, creating a pile of discarded packaging on the counter. We sit down to eat. The joints are dry and chewy, having been cooked from frozen. Despite how pleased she must be to see me back, she only speaks about the recent news in Madison. A new housing development on the other side of town. An old school friend of mine that she bumped into, on the verge of graduating from law school. She then tells me that maybe I should get a job. Her friend Christyne’s firm is looking for an office temp and she has offered to speak to the partner on my behalf. I find the fat on the pork joints particularly difficult to cut. All this time, we haven’t spoken about Alyson. Mom hasn’t asked and I haven’t brought it up. I wonder if she knows. I feel everything around me sink and the colours of the room fade. My mother is waiting for me to say something, so I nod and agree to the job.

  FOURTEEN

  As we’d sipped our whiskey and Cokes, some travellers from Clara’s hostel had passed and persuaded us to go to a bar with live music. Clara had agreed instantaneously, only looking for my approval after everything had been agreed. Inside, I could barely move, nor hear the people we were with. After a few drinks, one of the guys started hitting on Clara, so I decided to leave and head back to the guesthouse. In the morning I wondered whether I’d done the right thing, as she hadn’t really seemed that keen on the guy and it had probably been more about me feeling a little awkward.

  I started to worry she may have been a little angry with me for heading off that night. I chose my walks so they avoided her work and avoided the bar-lined Alameda. I thought about leaving a note for her at the hostel, but in the end, didn’t get round to it.

  A week passed. I had started work with Señora Rosales. Most days, we’d meet in her office, although occasionally she’d give me the address of a cafe to meet in, if she was to hand over the keys for a nearby apartment that morning. Each day she arrived with a plastic wallet full of apartment brochures and information and often with a numbered set of apartment keys. I would work from her laptop, replying to inquiries or correcting her text. After an hour or two, she would look at her watch and say she had to get going, handing me a crisp twenty euro note each time. She would pay for our coffees and then I’d wander off to explore a little more of the city.

  As we sat together about a week later, she moved the conversation on to where I was living. I told her about the guesthouse and the old lady with thin lips who ran it. She nodded, saying she knew where it was, and then thought for a moment. We were sitting out on the terrace of a cafe near the cathedral, unsheltered from the sun. I had to continuously shift on my chair, or else the sweat would collect on the backs of my knees and seat of my trousers. Señora Rosales kept an elegant, upright posture, her bare shoulders shaded by her wide-brim hat. I couldn’t stay at the guesthouse for ever, she told me, and she had a place she could offer me in the short term. There was a small, unused studio on the roof of one of her tourist apartments, which she was planning to renovate, but not until the end of the summer at least. As long as I kept out of the way of the guests, it could be mine.

  After our work, she took me to show me the studio. We entered through a doorway off a wide alleyway dotted with shops and bars. We climbed three storeys, to where the stairs led out onto the roof. The roof was edged by waist-height walls, covered in a bland, smooth concrete. The studio stood at the far end, a continuation protruding upwards from the building below. She rummaged around in her bag and pulled out a single key, then opened the door and gestured for me to enter. I went in, standing within a small kitchenette nestled just inside the entrance. There was only a sliver of light coming through the apartment’s drawn curtains. Turning to the kitchenette’s sink, I ran the cold tap, then the hot tap, before turning both off as firmly as I could. Señora Rosales looked at me, holding the same upright posture, clutching her handbag.

  I asked how much rent she wanted and she thought for a moment. She proposed I could have it for free, just in exchange for the work I did. Smiling, she pressed the key into my hand and then said she needed to get going. When she’d gone, I went to the other end of the narrow apartment and drew the curtains. They revealed a large window, with a small balcony, high above the street. Next to me, there was a small table, pushed up against the wall, and a tall, simple bookcase. The bed was without a pillow and there was neither duvet nor sheets. With the studio now lit by the midday sun, I looked around properly. The walls had been hurriedly painted white. You could still make out flecks of the previous sky-blue decoration around the plug sockets. I turned and tested the key in the lock a few times and then left, heading in the direction of the guesthouse, to pay up and collect my backpack.

  The guesthouse owner took my final pay and keys and marked something down in a small hardcover notebook I’d never seen her use before. She seemed neither pleased nor displeased that I was finally leaving. I put this down to something that running a guesthouse does to you.

  On the way to the studio I stopped at a small shop, run by a Chinese family. The girl at the counter watched me closely as I collected a short stick of bread, a wedge of pale pre-packed cheese, a litre bottle of beer and some bed sheets. That would be that, I told myself. I’d spend the rest of the day in the apartment, making it home. Maybe buy a few things tomorrow, but for now, I would appreciate the four walls of privacy I’d gained.

  FIFTEEN

  A job is a job, Christyne says to me. She confesses it is far from exciting, but the pay is okay. I take a seat in the foyer, as she tells me. My shirt feels stiff and uncomfortable. I look down at my cuffs. The thread through one button has started to fray, with a few strands of fabric wisping outwards. Christyne returns and introduces me to Robert, the firm’s accountant. We go through to his office. Robert starts running through the role’s duties. On his desk there is a picture of him and his two children, in ski uniforms, with a backdrop of snow-topped mountains. We go through to the main office. He shows me how to check invoices and where to file the paperwork. His hands have almost a yellowy pigment and I notice the prominence of his index finger tendon.

  Later, I am introduced to everyone in the office. The only name I remember is Laura, a girl my age sitting on the other
side of the office, who wears a white cardigan and smiles sweetly. Everybody in the office has identical phones, desks and computers. Even their ring binders are the same shade of green. It strikes me as odd that everybody would wish to have the same furniture and the same stationery as everyone else, but then I tell myself it’s not for the firm to think about what everybody wants and it doesn’t matter to me if I have a green ring binder or a black ring binder.

  I would spend the rest of the day filing invoices. The filter coffee is bitter and tarry, but I drink four cups. It sticks to my teeth and tongue. I start to think of Alyson and where she is. I imagine that she still lives at home, that maybe she has a job in that solicitor’s office on West Johnson Street that she was going to apply to. I make a plan to ring her house phone that night and announce I am back. I will deny that I ever received her message and say that my phone was stolen before that. She will say what she has to say. I am filled with such apprehension that I become nervous and am stapling invoices together with a shaking hand. Robert comes over with more invoices. He asks how I am getting on. I compose myself and say the work looks very interesting and he tells me that he’s impressed with me so far. He goes on to say that a few colleagues normally go for a drink on a Friday and I am welcome to join. I accept the invitation, trying to do so convincingly.

  Later, at home, I sit on my bed. I cannot bring myself to call Alyson. She would know I received that message and feel angry that I should bother her, when I should know things are over.