A Model Partner

by Seery, Daniel;

  Tom’s grandfather returned to work for distraction, as early as the Monday following the funeral. Tom didn’t see him for six days. His grandfather aged in that week, all that time on the road with memories of his grandmother for company. Quite possibly there were times when he would forget that she was dead and he would probably look forward to seeing her when he got home, only to realise that he would never be seeing her again, not in this life in any case.

  When his grandfather was at home he drank heavily. It wasn’t as if he was greatly opposed to drinking before her passing but he always had a rule of no drinking the day before he was to return to the road. This rule fell by the wayside. About a month after her death he was due to head for a drop-off in Bantry before heading to Galway for a second load destined for England. He didn’t make it as far as Bantry. He took the side off another truck when reversing at the docks. Tom’s grandfather never had accidents in the truck. He prided himself on this record. His boss encouraged him to take some time off work. He went one better and quit his job.

  ‘It doesn’t really bother me,’ he told Tom. ‘We’ll have a bundle of money before we know it.’

  He was referring to an expected cheque in relation to his wife’s life insurance policy. That cheque would consume him until it arrived some two months later. He would talk about how much it was going to be, talk about what he could do with it, hover around the hall every morning waiting for it to arrive. During that time it was difficult for Tom to figure out how his grandfather was coping with the loss of his wife. He never gave away much emotion and never showed any signs that he knew what his grandson was going through. Tom couldn’t even imagine his grandfather as an emotional man, nor could he imagine him as a young, open-minded man. It seemed to him that people like his grandfather were born old and stuck in their ways from the very first moment they found a ‘way’ to be stuck in. Tom supposed the fact that the television was switched off was an indication that his grandfather was in some way affected by the loss. Before she died he always had it switched on, the volume loud and intrusive. Evenings in the house became silent, his grandfather sitting at the kitchen table, head down, empty bottles of Guinness lined up in front of him.

  The cheque arrived in April of that year. The following day his grandfather informed Tom they would be moving.

  ‘It’s a done deal,’ he said. ‘Spoke to the council and all.’

  There was no room for discussion or negotiation. Instead, his grandfather offered a crooked grin and initiated a guessing game. ‘Where do you think we’re going?’ he asked.

  And he honestly expected Tom to guess. He wanted Tom to take the whole geography of Ireland, if not the world, and guess where they were uprooting to. Tom rolled off four or five towns, receiving no reaction from him. Then, after realising that he was finished with the guessing game, his grandfather told him that he was correct with all his guesses, offering him a wink when he pressed further.

  A week after the cheque arrived he gave Tom an envelope and told him to keep it safe. Although it was sealed, Tom knew the envelope contained money. His grandfather had a system when it came to money. Whenever they would go shopping he would always get his grandmother to hold on to half the money. That way if one of them was robbed they would only lose half of it. It was a system which made sense on a deeply paranoid level. Tom was far from impressed that he was now taking on the role of his deceased grandmother. It would mean that trips with his grandfather would grow in number. The fact that Bicycle Frankenstein was in the front garden was a clear indicator that one of these journeys was imminent.

  Tom received Bicycle Frankenstein when he was eight years of age. His grandmother played with the sleeve of her cardigan and blinked her eyes rapidly when she first saw it, possibly hoping that the monstrosity might disappear from view.

  ‘Where did you get that?’ she asked.

  ‘I made it.’ Tom’s grandfather rotated the bike so Tom could get a better look.

  It had the curved handlebars of a racer, the grips nothing more than some loose insulation tape, and the brakes skewing dangerously outward. The front wheel and front axle were welded to the crossbar of a thin mountain bike while the back half of the creature was a BMX.

  ‘Does it go?’ she asked.

  ‘Of course it fuckin’ goes,’ his grandfather barked.

  It was his grandmother who christened the bike ‘Frankenstein’. His grandfather took offence. ‘It’s not for you. It’s for the boy.’ He carried it over to Tom. ‘Go on. Have a go.’

  Tom tried the saddle. The bike sloped uncomfortably toward the back so that the saddle pressed into his groin when he put his weight on the bike. Tom gave him a strained smile, which his grandfather took as a positive signal.

  Tom had not seen the bike since long before his grandmother passed away. The fact that it was out again wasn’t a good sign.

  ‘You’re coming with me,’ his grandfather said as he climbed up on his own bike. It was a Raleigh Roadster, a relic of the sixties which had seen better days. The edges of the saddle curled upward, the front mudguard had a long crack up its side. It weighed a ton, too heavy for Tom to move comfortably. His grandfather had not had a car for a couple of years at that stage and his old boss had not allowed the drivers to bring trucks home so his grandfather would cycle this bike across the city to the depot at the docklands. His head would jut over the handlebars and he would pump his legs, slow and deliberate, a constant speed.

  Tom followed his grandfather’s steady pedalling across the park into Glasnevin with its roads of rippled concrete. His grandfather’s bike rattled over these ripples. Frankenstein wasn’t too bad. The welding joint at the centre of the bike had loosened over the years and it offered some suspension to the bike, an accidental success in engineering on the part of his grandfather. Still, he was finding it difficult to keep up with the older man. They moved onto the tree-lined route of Griffith Avenue, turned right on to Grace Park Road, down Richmond Road and in the opposite direction to the corrugated roofed football stadium. Tom struggled with the potholes and the bike would whine with each bump or dip. He informed his grandfather of the increased levels of noise from the bike and his grandfather bluntly told him to stop complaining. He had a way of dismissing all forms of disagreements or obstacles as complaints. It was a nice way of avoiding difficult conversations or excusing himself from listening.

  The traffic increased as they reached East Wall Road. Each passing truck pushed Tom to the left slightly so his bicycle was angled and dangerous. There were times that he was full sure he was going to be sucked under a car or flattened by a forty-foot trailer. The creaking in the frame seemed worse in the pockets of silence between passing trucks, the rear of the bike seemed to take a bit longer to follow the front. It was at a junction on the East Wall road when the inevitable happened. The front of the bike disconnected with the back. For a moment the handlebars veered to the right while the saddle end continued on forward. Tom had the good sense to let go of the handlebars but his one-wheeled jaunt lasted a few metres before he crashed to the ground, cutting his elbow and knee.

  His grandfather stopped pedalling and faced Tom.

  ‘You’ve wrecked that bike,’ he said. He then turned back and cycled onward.

  Tom went the rest of the way on foot. It was a relief when his grandfather veered towards the entrance of a yard at the top of the road.

  The depot had a dark gateway about fifty yards to the right of a pub. The wall surrounding the yard was made of the type of bricks that would later remind Tom of wartime in Britain, those orange, tan and teak colours that give character and history to an area regardless of how poor it is. Poverty seems less depressing in places like that to Tom, more sentimental in a sense.

  Inside, there was rubble in the corners of the yard. It smelled of rubber and burning and diesel. Welding irons buzzed and sparks danced, engines let out sudden barks before issuing a relaxed continuous rumble. A truck sat at the front, the cab bent forward as if it had somehow
been cracked open.

  ‘That’s how they get at the engine,’ his grandfather explained when he saw Tom staring at it.

  They walked to an office at the rear, a few plastic chairs and a table with a woodchip top. While they waited his grandfather warned Tom not to mention his grandmother. Tom hadn’t planned on saying anything about his grandmother. He hadn’t planned on saying anything about anything.

  Eventually, a wide man entered the office, Mr Promley. His hair was blonde, short and dense so it resembled fur. His voice was wheezy, the type which almost disappears by the time the person reaches the last word in a sentence. He smiled constantly but the creases running across his forehead told a contradicting story about the man.

  ‘Sorry to hear about your wife,’ he said and Tom’s grandfather looked sharply in his grandson’s direction as if Tom had somehow instigated this comment.

  ‘I’m looking for a box truck,’ his grandfather said. ‘A cheap one.’

  ‘You’re not starting your own business now, are ye?’ Promley laughed. It ended too suddenly to be genuine and his smile was looking more like a grimace the longer Tom looked at him. His grandfather told his ex-boss that the truck was to live in.

  Promley laughed.

  Tom laughed.

  His grandfather didn’t.

  ‘Me and the boy,’ he said. ‘It’s going to be our home.’

  Promley led them out to the yard. Old truck parts lay in rough heaps, the bones and organs of long-deceased vehicles, lengthy exhausts, lone seats free from their cabs. A trail of small rubble pieces led to a Ford Box-lorry. It wasn’t a bad-looking thing, a bit rough around the edges. Promley offered it for seven hundred. His grandfather made a face that he so often made for Tom, the bemused rise of the mouth and the dipping of his eyebrows.

  ‘I wouldn’t pay that much for that heap of shite,’ he said. ‘But I might be interested in the old Bedford.’

  He walked over to a lorry that was partially hidden behind a trailer. There was something tortoise-like about it, the green colour of the front cab, the low headlights like eyes and the large brown box structure that hugged behind like a large shell. It was a Bedford TK, six-cylinder petrol engine, a model which was popular in the sixties. Not only was it not designed for comfort, it was also not designed for humans to live in. It was a horse-box lorry, long wooden eroded planks held in place with a lined metal structure. It was missing its crest but it still had two wide wing mirrors extended on long bars from the cab and indicators extended in front of the driver and passenger doors on both sides.

  They agreed a price of three hundred, with the added stipulation that Tom’s grandfather could work on the truck in the yard until he got it running. They shook hands, the other man twitching at the mouth in the effort of hiding his good fortune. When Promley walked off, Tom’s grandfather touched the front of the cab gently like it was an old acquaintance. He then opened the bonnet at the front with the relaxed and sure attitude of someone who knew exactly what they were going to find inside.

  Chapter 5

  Tom hears voices when he reaches the stairwell in his building, the familiar voices of his neighbours.

  ‘Jesus.’ It is the old man, Mr Walters. ‘We’re only going for three weeks.’

  ‘I need everything,’ his wife replies.

  Tom continues upstairs and meets the man on the landing. He moves aside to allow him to pass with a large suitcase, navy with tan edging. Tom nods and smiles but the old man doesn’t see him. Or if he does he chooses to ignore him. Mr Walters stops at the top of the stairs and holds a palm against his forehead, flat, directs his eyes toward the ceiling.

  ‘Come on, we’ll miss the train,’ he says.

  ‘I’m coming.’ Mrs Walters is at the door to their bed-sit. Tom thinks of an unmade bed when he sees her. She is hidden amid layers of material, ruffled and creased, folds of different colours, the jaded flop of a massive sunhat on her head, scarf over cardigan over blouse, coat draped across her arm, the tail of it disturbing the dust on the carpet. A square, bloated suitcase trails her movement.

  ‘You have the tickets?’ she asks.

  ‘Of course I do. Come on.’

  She pauses before closing the door, narrows her eyes as she reads what is on a piece of paper in her hand.

  ‘Come on.’ His impatience has turned to anger.

  ‘I want to be sure that we have everything,’ she says but follows in any case, swinging the door closed behind her as she moves. ‘We’ll be back on the Wednesday, won’t we?’

  ‘Yes. Yes. Yes.’

  ‘Okay,’ she offers Tom a strained smile and a roll of the eyes before rushing down the stairs.

  Tom listens to their clatter as they round the stairs onto the floor below. When he turns, he notices that the door to their bedsit has not closed properly.

  It is open slightly.

  Tom doesn’t call after them to warn them.

  He doesn’t close the door either.

  It is a couple of hours later when Tom returns to his neighbours’ bed-sit. The door is still ajar. He pushes and it opens with a whine. There is a rug to the right, a slanted hump in the centre, skewing out at the edge. It is this edge that has stopped the door from closing properly. Tom stands in the one spot and surveys his surroundings. The wallpaper is radioactive yellow. There is a fat, flumpy sofa in the centre, bombarded with pillows, a throw and a couple of doyleys on the armrests, an area so cluttered that it takes him a moment to decipher one object from another. The armchair beside is a mismatch of the sofa, straight-backed with long, bone-like armrests. All the seated furniture is aimed toward the hulk of a television in front of the kitchen area.

  This bed-sit is bigger than his, the kitchen area tucked away toward the rear, a door-less frame separating it from the seated area. That counts as two rooms, he thinks.

  Two whole rooms.

  The floor is wooden, raised to the left of the kitchen area entrance, and the bed sits on top. Tom briefly wonders if they are paying the same rent as he is.

  He slowly walks around the space, initially shy about touching off anything. He stops beside an interesting vase, pale with ochre-coloured Chinese figures in different poses, fishing, digging, holding a small bird cage. There is a chip in the rim, a crack near the base. A coffee table sits beside the settee, a stack of envelopes on top, the paper returned to them in a slanted manner so the corners stick out. This is something that Mr Walters would do, Tom thinks, the old man impatiently shoving the letters back in, complaining about the price of gas or electricity. It was probably his impatience that caused the damage to the vase too, moving it from one area to another, Mrs Walters directing him where to place it and telling him to mind his back and take his time.

  Every couple has the stubborn one. Every couple has the one that will push and the one that will bow, the one that will demand and the one that will reason. Isn’t that always the case? He supposes it is only true for those relationships that last. He wonders if Sarah is still as headstrong as she used to be. He doesn’t mind if she is. There are times when pushiness is as essential as reason.

  Tom moves to the kitchen area, a gas cooker with four black hobs, a metal sink and a small, humming fridge. The counter is slate grey with chalky arcs of residue from a half-hearted clean. The area smells of lemon. It wouldn’t be an overly exciting kitchen, to those normally excited by kitchens, Tom thinks. But it does have something which Tom envies, something that makes his apartment pale in comparison.

  A window. A large window.

  Wooden frame with flaky paint, dirty with old spider webs in the upper corner.

  It is much bigger than his minuscule window and it looks out on to the front of the building, to a partial section of the street and an apartment block which faces the building. Looking down he can see the black knobbled roofs of the lower sections, mounds of shiny black tar at the edges, battered walls meeting new extensions, square cage-like extractor fans, drops of shade and long thin corridors that fall away to ope
n space.

  It is a window made for dreamers.

  Tom rests his elbows on the counter. Somewhere out there Sarah McCarthy is going about her business. And she may be married or divorced, with kids or without, in a house or flat. But that doesn’t matter. What matters is the fact that she is out there or that someone like her is out there, someone for him, someone that will potter through this life with his needs on her mind, someone who will laugh at his jokes, someone who will share his happiness and his fears.

  And listen to his stories.

  And take his hand.

  And what was that noise?

  Tom closes his eyes.

  There it is again, a creak on the landing outside. It is followed by a tapping.

  ‘Hello?’ a voice calls, dampened by the front door.

  Tom ducks to the side of the door-less frame and leans against the wall.

  There is the whine of the bed-sit door opening and the soft sound of footsteps.

  ‘Gabby,’ the voice is clear, inside the bed-sit now. ‘Hello?’

  He hears her movement in the groan of the floorboards on the right-hand side of the bed-sit.

  Tom presses his back against the wall and wills himself smaller. He hears his own breathing, the slight whistling in his nostrils. He opens his mouth and drags in a long, steady breath.

  He has to do something.

  Think.

  Think.

  He slowly ducks down and opens the cupboard under the sink. Inside is the glaring greens and yellows of bleach bottles, a packet of surface wipes, j-cloths, some spare rubber gloves behind a dirty white pipe. He remains still this way, listens for her movement.

  All is quiet.

  Perhaps they are both waiting on the other to move, stuck in a pose, still as two figures in a photograph.