Graffiti My Soul

by Niven Govinden

  Last twenty on the clock.

  ‘What is the capital … Prendrapen … of Australia?’

  Shit. That night in my room, and now my mind goes blank.

  I look up for Moon. She’s still txting and doesn’t register. In a world of her own. I’m looking and looking. Nothing. It’s the longest five seconds of my life. Worse than any run. Not that the answer’s eluding me, there is that, but that Moon is somewhere else when she’s supposed to be here for me. Doesn’t she even feel the change in the atmosphere? I don’t understand it.

  Charlotte breaks into a nervous cough.

  ‘I’ll have to hurry you,’ says the question master irritably. You know he’s itching to give the point to the other side. It’s written all over his face.

  I give Moon one last chance, but she’s still staring at her phone. I don’t wait, I can’t.

  ‘Adelaide.’

  ‘Incorrect. Godalming?’

  ‘The capital of Australia is Canberra.’

  ‘Correct.’

  ‘Fuck.’

  Ding! Match ends. We’re slaughtered.

  It’s a miserable ride home. Morgan thinks the radio will do the trick to cheer everyone up, but none of us are having it. Dizzee Rascal never sounded so lifeless. I make a point of sitting with Charlotte, taking the back left window – the furthest seat possible from Moon. Try my hardest not to stare at her, but can’t help it. She’s talking to Morgan, looking confused. How do you think I feel, babe? I want to shout. I’m the confused party here. What have you been playing at?

  At the petrol stop I break into her bag, fish the phone. I have to see what the big attraction was. Hope it’s worth the price of me now blanking her. She’s saved her recent history, silly girl. The whole story is there for me on a plate, complete picture, no join-the-dots. I catch the txt volley to and from the one particular person who’s captured her attention when she should have been concentrating on the match, and saving me from a thrashing.

  A new boyfriend. Pearson.

  PART 2

  23

  I have the same dream every night, where Moon has her hands around my throat and is strangling the life out of me. At the point before I lose consciousness, Moon’s hands become Casey’s, and he’s stroking my face as much as he’s throttling me. This is when I wake up, heart beating faster than if I’d done the 100m, sweating like a P.I.G.

  The dreams started before Moon died and they still keep coming. I’m the King of Repetitive Strangulation. It doesn’t scare me. It should, but it doesn’t. Anything to keep me closer to her, that’s why.

  24

  Part two in the rehabilitation programme: Mum takes me to dinner round Jason’s. She notices the slight change in me and pounces on it. Thinks it might do me some good to be with guys who have been through a similar experience, that a bit of soul-searching activity with different people might gee me up. Moon wasn’t killed in a hit and run, and she isn’t my sister. OK, both deaths were unexpected, like a fish falling out of the sky and slapping you on the head. An unknown hand flicking the inner switch that shuts off your feelings, mine at least, but I don’t see any other similarity. I sulk for a day, but end up going, more for her sake than mine. She’s been going stir crazy staring at my expressionless mug every night. New boyfriend keeping a low profile out of respect. This is her way of opening us up, by visiting all the best folks our town has to offer. Means I can find myself on any number of sofas.

  Part Three, the final stage of the programme, grieving spring semester, is dinner with Moon’s parents and Gwyn, though none of us are ready yet for that particular evening. We have a long way to go before that invitation appears.

  I do see Mum’s point, I do. There has to be a point when you think, fuck it, and you stop wallowing in this dull ache that seems to be consuming you. But I just don’t know how ready I am to cut my losses. I’m still hoping that maybe there’s something in this pain worth holding out for.

  Mum brings wine, for obvious reasons. Me and Jase even get a glass, which turns into two, and then three. That’s how I know how messed up these women are.

  Jase’s mum, Billie, has made a roast, and makes a big fuss about us eating everything up. There’s enough food for ten people. She makes do with a chicken wing, two potatoes, and a vat of buttered carrots. The three of us take it in turns to watch her eat. Billie, normally sensitive about dinner with company (i.e.: she never invites anyone round, ever), relaxes with us, secure in her new role as counsellor rather than counselled.

  I’m expecting Billie to give a sermon any minute, but there isn’t one. Instead we talk about how Chelsea is slaughtering just about everybody, and whether Catherine Zeta has had any work done. It’s only when we’re all clearing plates that she makes sure we lag behind the others, and whispers in my ear.

  ‘It gets better, Veerapen. It gets better. I know it doesn’t seem like that at the moment, but it does, I promise you.’

  Her hand squeezes my shoulder. It’s the most reassuring touch I’ve had in days.

  The food is good, not like anything Mum makes, who’s all about steam cuisine, and not a fan of standing over a stove for longer than fifteen minutes. I’m used to watching my carb intake over protein, can’t get out of the habit, but since I’ve no use for that regime any more, I keep quiet when Billie piles the roasties on my plate, scoffing everything put in front of me.

  I’m starting to notice what I eat. Feeling the muscles in my legs and belly grow slack from no track work, feel the extra weight when I walk, but no guilt. Different month, different body. Nobody can expect me to go back to how I was before.

  There’s ice cream for desert, not chocolate. No Matchmakers. I expect she’s keeping them for herself when we’ve gone; gonna rip open those boxes and stuff herself silly. I’m a malicious bastard. A big one. Billie’s a lovely woman, why do I have to ruin everything good by thinking this junk?

  As the evening progresses, it’s clear the dinner is all about the mothers. Another bottle comes out, followed by the Baileys. Finally, they want to open up. Stuff they’ve been keeping from each other over the past few weeks. Itching to compare notes. Me and Jase are only getting in their way. We go and hide in his room after the ice cream. He’s downloaded this new Dizzee remix, which is heavy, and plays it on loop for about an hour.

  ‘What’s been happening?’ I go, meaning school.

  ‘Not much. There’s flowers everywhere. Head’s been going round, offering counselling to anyone who was in the corridor when it happened. Lizzie Jennings missed the science test because she said she was too upset. Sat in her office from third period through lunch.’

  ‘Lizzie Jennings skipped lunch? Shit, she must be really upset.’

  It’s the first time we’ve laughed since it happened.

  ‘They say Year Head’s gonna lose her job over it. What with her being there at the time and not . . .’

  ‘Don’t wanna talk about it,’ I go, feeling the proper dinner about to rise out of my stomach, ‘’cos there’s not a lot we can do to help her, is there? My head’s too mashed to make sense of it.’

  ‘I’ve got some knowledge for you, V.’

  ‘Appreciate it. I’m so fucking dumb right now.’

  ‘Check it, there’s nothing you can tell me about death,’ he goes, looking down into his lap, rolling one out without a care. Billie turns a blind eye apparently. Payback for the chocolate.

  ‘The only thing you need to understand, yeah, is that the luckiest person is the one who kicks it. For them, it’s all over. Done. They’re the ones who don’t have comeback. Not like the rest of us.’

  Jason missed Moon’s death by about a minute. He still looks like he wished he could have been there. I’m glad he wasn’t. It’s not the sort of thing you want your mates to see.

  I wasn’t sure whether he was talking about emotional fallout from his sister and the car, the latest buzzword on Mum’s radar, or if he was specifically referring to my situation. Since the funeral and that moment in the
wood, we haven’t seen each other. Steered clear. Thinking it was maybe better that way. Not much fun in mute chatting to mute. Dinner has been good, but the two of us here now, alone now on his bed, is uncomfortable. I’d rather be with Gwyn. We both feel it, though the spliff does something to take some of that unease away, at least for him. Dizzee rattles in my head with the smoke and neither of us say much else after that. Smoking buddies, nothing more.

  25

  Moon’s not going to make me look like a pussy in public. She’s not the only one who can get themselves attached. Kelly Button blows out Lizzie Jennings and takes me to see Britney. Her and Lizzie had been planning this trip for months, but what with us getting together, old tatty ginger is left out in the cold.

  She tells us she’s fine about it, ‘I’m not bothered. Not bothered,’ she goes at every lesson and every break, meaning she’s as mad as fuck and probably suicidal. Lizzie has plenty of friends, but isn’t as tight with anyone like she is with Kelly, so she takes this kind of stuff seriously. Kelly tells me she’s not bothered either. Wants to take her boyfriend and that’s that. Shit, Lizzie would drop Kelly like a stone if by freak chance she managed to get a bloke of her own (one with a guide dog). Also, Kelly’s dad got the tickets so it’s pretty much her shout who comes with her. End of.

  Britney is the first proper date, the official one you tell your mates about, but in keeping with how the girls run things these days, we have a pre-date a couple of days before, which consists of riding the bus into town after school and eschewing Starbucks for Café Nero. Here she makes plans on where we’re going to meet, the best kind of clothes to wear, and how we’re going to get home. All I need to is prop my elbow on the table and take it all in.

  Kel manages to snack and organise at the same time.

  At the point when our plans have been formalised – that’s to say, that she’s happy with them, and she’s going on for the hundredth time about how excited she is, and saying that even though Britney is getting kinda lame these days, that it’ll still be an amazing show which’ll put all those lapdancers in the shade – my plate of food is still untouched.

  Her eyes shark about my chips.

  ‘You’re either not hungry,’ she goes, ‘or you’re incredibly nervous. One of the two.’

  I could have told her about how gluten is the biggest verboten on my diet sheet, and how a chunk of ciabatta would slug me up and turn my running a notch down, making my steps lumpy rather than sleek. But it’s easier this way, keeping my mouth shut, staying silent and mysterious, so that she’s always wondering but never completely pinpointing. The truth, that I’m really fucking nervous on my debut pre-date, and that I’m a Nazi about food, isn’t what a girl needs to hear.

  Britney mimes throughout the show like the lazy whore she is. It’s only the costumes that keep me awake, all see-through body stockings and slivers of g-string. Without these brief flashes of titty and camel toe, beds appearing out of nowhere, and girl dancers snogging each other for the hell of it, I’d be falling asleep. Everyone else around me is hysterical with joy, making me feel like the world’s biggest party pooper.

  About halfway, when she’s getting all serious and true to her artistic self, the on-stage confessional, my phone goes. It’s Jason. He always knows when to call at the most inappropriate moments. Last week it was when Kelly and me were getting comfortable round my house, now it’s Britney. I can barely hear him and shout down the phone like a twat. ‘What? I’m at a concert. Britney. BRITNEY SPEARS! BRITNEY!’ etc. Everyone around us shoots me like I’m the biggest piece of shit. I could have left the call but knew that if I made a big deal with Jason it would get back to Moon. Kelly gives me the smallest of nudges but keeps her eyes fixed on the stage – we’ve all been waiting for Britney to make some reference to her mismatched marriages and this feels like it could be the moment. We are sat in an area teaming with homosexualists. I don’t know whether they want to thump me or do me. I’m wearing my new Nike vest top and my Jesus Is My Homeboy cap so I figure it’s maybe a little of both.

  On the way home we act like one of those couples that’s been together years; we don’t speak to each other. Kelly’s pissed about the call. She’s at her most dressed up tonight, Von Dutch from head to toe, ironed mouse hair cascading from her flat cap, giant gold hoops that are more high street than hip hop, and isn’t happy with anything that makes her look immature. Giving off the vibe that I’m the most childish accessory she’s got. Also, she’s annoyed because I wouldn’t get out of my seat to dance to ‘Toxic’. The only time I did move was when one of the friendlier-looking homosexualists went out for a slash, chasing him up the concourse and persuading him to get a couple of extra beers for two children in need. I thought I’d got a result, because I felt her displeasure fairly early on, but even half a cup of Carling, as warm and as yellow as one of the samples in Mum’s car boot, wouldn’t placate her. She didn’t touch it.

  Kelly dances like she doesn’t care. Come the Madonna duet it’s my turn to keep my eyes on the stage, on the audience below, anywhere but on her. Kel relies on the homosexualists around her to complete the routine when she sees that I’m a hopeless case; she is Britney, they are Madonna. I can’t help it. I’m a runner not a dancer. We play about in her room all the time, but I’ve never seen her dance like this before, like when you’re really caught up in the music and the spectacle; vocal and abandoned. I learn more about what’s going in Kel’s head in those three minutes than I have done in the past two weeks. Her moves are all passion, and they are solely for her. I’m well aware that this isn’t a seduction dance. Her eyes would be open otherwise.

  Watching her from the corner of my eye, all I see is her profile, button nose, skinny slug lips, the eyelashes of a cow; cheekbones as high and contoured and shiny as an Audi panel. She spray-tanned the night before, giving her skin the colour of over-done toast, something close to mine. From this angle I don’t recognise her. It’s like looking at someone else. Honest moments like this always make me nervous, that’s why I’m happier nodding my head, hands in pockets, wondering when Brit’s now fully-clothed prancing will stop. I don’t do emotional exchanges through dance or otherwise.

  The tube is so noisy there isn’t any need to add to it; our silent state is approved. Carriages crammed with more sportswear than JD, including what looks like an orange and black trackie, similar to Casey’s; some dad out with his kid. You get a better class of person in Wembley. More homosexualists clapping their hands and waxing lyrical on how ‘Slave 4 U’ compared to the MTV version, and some drab pasty woman over thirty with a big red mouth looking like a sore vagina harping on to her equally ugly friend about Steve from head office who wasn’t responding to any of her advances. Poor bastard, whoever he is, having to look at that every day. I try and make eye contact with Kel, and when that doesn’t work, knock her knee in the direction of the drab women, as if to say look at those spinster freaks, but she doesn’t see the joke and shoots me the look she’s picked up from the homosexualists.

  ‘I should have known better than to bring a bloke. At least Lizzie would have danced with me.’

  ‘I was dancing.’

  ‘Veep, slouching around with your hands in your pockets isn’t dancing.’

  ‘Tell that to Michael Jackson.’

  Britney being the diva bitch monster down to the last single molecule took to the stage over a half hour late, meaning by the time we push through the cheap trackie bottoms and the Sex and the City cast-offs, and finally reach Waterloo, we miss the last train by two minutes.

  ‘Disaster, mate,’ goes Kel. ‘Bloody disaster.’

  She’s always calling me mate when she’s not using Veep. Her family are traders so everything’s all cor blimey guvnor, strike a light. It’s not what I’m used to.

  Kel calls her mum, who panics and duly dispatches her dad up the A3 pronto.

  ‘Listen to me, Kel. Stay where there’s plenty of people, and don’t talk to anyone,’ she goes, the quivering modulat
ions of a normally hardy woman who has been floored by sitting through too many evenings of Crimewatch.

  She calls back five minutes later.

  ‘Better still, stay near the security cameras. It’s the safest place to be.’

  It makes you want to disappear for an hour or two just to shit her up.

  We pool the last of our cash and set up camp on the Burger King balcony. Fags for Kelly, a milkshake each, and a jumbo box of nuggets for me. A feast. This was exactly the reason I’d endured ninety minutes of Britney’s cod artistry and an hour of Kelly’s wrath – for this late-night one to one with my beautiful girlfriend.

  Kel isn’t like Moon, so everything is easy. I don’t have to try so hard. Her eyes soften after a sip or two of milkshake, curled lips shift from down to up. We snog in Burger King for what feels like an hour. Her lips are the tenderest I’ve ever felt, her tongue the longest, her breath the sweetest.

  There’s this sign tattooed to my forehead that says I’m hookable. She hands over the snogs, knowing this.

  Now that we’re going out officially, Kel is holding back on the sex. Wants us to talk more, hang. Since my treat in the park, we’ve only done it once – on my sofa when Mum went for Chinese. A fifteen-minute wonder. She still flirts like a mother whether we’re alone or not, but unlike Moon none of it’s for show. When we talk, she only ever has eyes for me, there’s none of this looking over my shoulder to check who’s around, grass-is-greener bollocks.

  After the Pearson business, Kel’s honesty comes as a welcome relief; feels like a holiday away from female madness. I’m not as bothered about the sex as I thought I would be. Sometimes just being with her is enough. I’m shooting them off every night obviously – I am fifteen – but I ain’t worried. Sooner or later she’ll get so hot and crack, and then the curtains will part, haha.