All around me I could hear sirens but they seemed to be taking forever. In my mind's eye I saw a fire-engine parked by the side of the road, the driver and the guy next to him arguing over a map, in the end one of them asking a passer-by for directions to the fire. When they did finally arrive it was largely disappointing from my angle. I saw one fire-engine pull up but no actual fire-fighters. The nearest hydrant was further round towards our place so all that kind of action was out of my line of vision. The police came too—there were blue as well as red flashing lights—and they moved everyone back out of the way. The family groups broke up then reformed a few steps back. As they moved backwards with their faces all lit up they looked for a moment like Chinese lanterns drifting across a river.
Of course I missed all the best bits: the fire and what happened with Mr Kemp. I heard plenty of versions later, though, and mine is probably no more or less accurate than anybody else's.
Early on there was some concern for the Kemps themselves. It was only when Mrs Kemp turned up with Mrs Curnow—someone had managed to get through to her at the Bridge Club—that she was able to reassure everyone that Mr Kemp was also out, at a meeting, something to do with the Planning Authority. They had a cat but she'd put it out earlier and she was sure the place and its contents were fully insured, so there was no panic there; all in all Mrs Kemp seemed pretty together about the whole thing. Someone went off to call Mr Kemp at the council.
It was only when they came back a few minutes later with the news that there was no Planning Authority meeting that night, the only person at the council was a cleaner, that people started to wonder if Mr Kemp wasn't in the house after all. Several fire-fighters got round to the back of the house and there they found these suspicions confirmed. Mr Kemp was at an upstairs window, calling out. Apparently the fire had blocked off the stairs fairly early so he'd smashed the window, hoping to climb down a drainpipe or something but there'd been nothing at all to grab hold of. The only way down had been to jump and unlike my grandfather's friend with the backgammon set he hadn't fancied his chances. Besides—and this was only discovered when the fire-fighters got a ladder up to the window—Mrs Richards from next door—Glynn's mother—she was up there with him. You can imagine them I'm sure, trying in a panic to work out what to do, whatever they decided still trapped in their crime, knowing everyone would find out. As they say, hell or a hot place.
Of course everyone later said that they'd already known Mrs Richards and Mr Kemp had a thing going, catching them at the fire like that was just the icing on the cake, that's all, although it certainly didn't appear like that to me the way people carried on later that night. For my part I was forbidden to talk about it to anyone under any circumstances, it just wasn't the kind of thing you talked about, my parents said, though they talked about it enough themselves. Of course I discussed it with everyone anyway, I discussed it in depth, we all did, it was too good a story not to discuss, and I was in a special position as I only lived three doors away from the Kemps and next door to Mrs Richards. Mind you, not actually having been there counted against me for a while.
The worst thing was that Mrs Richards moved away about a month after the fire and of course Glynn had to go with her. He even had to change schools. I saw him occasionally on weekends but it wasn't the same; we'd have a good time but we just didn't see each other enough and I gradually became best friends with Danny Tucker instead. Danny lived miles away, so it was never the same as it had been with Glynn. One thing though: right through the fourth form I always came top of my class in Maths and Science.
For me, now, standing on the Trotters' drive, that was all to come. You must remember the fire itself probably only took half an hour at the most. The fire brigade had it out in under twenty minutes; there was hardly anything left to see when I finally got there myself. But I should tell you what happened to me.
I was standing there, one eye on the bonfire, the other on the crowd outside the Kemps', when someone said Scott! from behind me. She appeared from the shadows and I saw it was Frances, the oldest in the Trotter family, one year behind me at school. Frances was right into roller-skating; she even raced competitively. You'd often see her rolling up and down the footpath on our street. She had brown eyes and long black hair, always tied up in plaits. Her family had moved in about a year before the Kemp fire and I'd never really gotten to know her.
Scott, she said. What are you doing?
I'm minding the bonfire, I said. How come you're not down at the Kemps'?
I don't know, I thought it was silly. It must be horrible having your house burn down.
I nodded seriously. I'll say, I said, although that side of it hadn't really occurred to me up to that point. Listen, I said suddenly, I'm supposed to be watching the bonfire. Dad'll kill me if he catches me here. Should we go back over?
Frances looked at her watch. You go on ahead, she said. I'll catch you up in a minute.
The bonfire had died down a bit, so I threw on more wood. There were bicycles all over the place and everyone had just left their stuff lying there—even their fireworks—in the rush to get down to the Kemps'. I could have done good business if I'd wanted.
Frances arrived and we stood with our backs to the fire. You could see the silhouette of our bodies on the fence at the back of the section. The edges of the shadows flickered with the fire.
Cigarette? she said, taking one for herself from a packet of B&H.
I've given up, I said.
I know what you mean.
Could you see the fire from your place?
Don't know, didn't look. I think it's mean, everyone standing there. I'd hate everyone to be standing there if it was my house.
I wonder if anyone was in the house.
Don't think so … Scott, let's not talk about it.
Okay, I said. Fine … what do you want to talk about instead?
Whatever you like. Only not the fire.
I tried to think of something to say but the fire seemed the only logical thing. Finally we both started talking at the same time—I can't think what I'd decided to say—and we looked up at each other and laughed.
You go, I said.
No, you go. Our eyes caught, for a moment held together. I realised with a rush of pleasure through my whole body how easy it would be for me to fall in love with her. After a year of hardly knowing her, just like that.
Scott! I heard my father call. Scott!
I'd better go, said Frances, dropping her cigarette to the ground and grinding it out with her shoe.
Listen, I said. Can I see you tomorrow? After school or something?
She smiled, bent towards me, kissed me on the cheek. As she pulled back her hand ran down my arm to my hand. She lifted it a few inches towards her then dropped it. No one had ever been like that with me.
Scott! called my father, louder this time, and closer. What are you doing?
Can I see you tomorrow? I said again. I was shivering. Frances sighed. We were looking right into each other's eyes. Neither of us wanted to move. I would have kissed her if only my father hadn't been there.
Scott!
Tomorrow, she said. That's a promise.
HANDYMAN
(In Memory of)
The washing machine is broken. Fix it? I tried to fix the tap when it broke and look where that got me. So if you've got some fifties, I'll go down the street.
God, she says, we're turning into Americans. She has no fifties.
Got any quarters?
She has no quarters.
Outside, it's hotter than. I've put the washing in the bag with no handles, so I carry it in my arms, like a bundle of wood. It keeps slipping down, and I have to keep turning round to check that nothing has fallen out—some of my underpants have my name on them. Flies buzz around me, knowing I can't move my arms. They laugh in my face.
I get some fifties in the dairy. As always, the woman eyes me with a mixture of suspicion and disgust—a grown man struggling about the streets with a bag
of clothes. You can't be too careful, though. Maybe I stole the washing off her line.
Where'd you get all those clothes from, huh?
By the time I make the laundromat, I'm sweating badly. Puffing too. What I need is an exercycle. I amble in through the flyscreen, sit down, dump the bag on the floor. The clothes I'm wearing smell now, too. For half a second I think about washing them along with all the other stuff, but a Truth headline imposes itself:
LAUND
ROMAT
SEX
FIEND (story page 2)
No, they will have to stay on. Besides, I've got to get home afterwards as well.
I like laundromats. I think it's those faces, all in a row, some falling, some fallen. Lots of sad faces in laundromats. I sit there for a while, watching the faces fall.
There is only one other person in the place with me—Alberta Hunter—and, like me, she sits watching the faces. She sits opposite her own face, raggedy face, blue dress tumbling—the same blue dress she wore at the Smithsonian last summer. What a concert that was. She's a mean old singer, Alberta.
Hey, Alberta. I lean across. How's it going Alberta?
She turns towards me. Her brown brow furrows. She doesn't know who I am.
After a minute or two, her own face falls still. She gets up, walks across and opens it, pulls out her linen, her shirts, her blue dress, stuffs them into a New World plastic bag, and leaves.
I wait till she's out the door, saunter over to her fallen face. I open it, and look inside.
Behind it is a street, an alley. An old man sits on a step, strumming a guitar. Two skinny cats scrape at his feet. He strums real slow.
What you playing, man?
Hey, he laughs, that's the blues, mister.
Flies buzz round bins, struggle at smells, artful flies. Like thoughts they buzz, light and quick.
Where's Alberta?
He stops strumming, looks up at me, black-eyed man with a guitar.
I'm sorry, mister, but she got a mind to ramble. She ain't here no more.
RIDDLE
I'm the stairs you ran up and down as children, the suitcase requiring six friends;
Computer for love letters, silent film noise; loom on which dancing is spun.
LET'S GO SHOPPING!
Selected Items
SPECIAL OFFER
The music is interrupted for an announcement: there's a traffic jam in Aisle 3—Health, Beauty and Toiletries. Give it another minute or two, advises the woman, till they clear the place out a bit.
There's a small girl in a blue summer frock in front of the Deli, crying. Two men nearby are arguing over the last bag of charcoal. Not long ago over in Fruit and Veg a woman on crutches knocked over a temporary tomato display table. Already there are red tyre tracks up and down every aisle. A young couple behind us angrily discuss divorce.
Welcome to Foodtown, Foodland, New World. Welcome to the Shopping Complex.
Somehow a dog has gotten loose: it runs past with a rotisserie chicken in its mouth. Twins from a large family waiting at the checkouts have taken off all their clothes. Apparently an overladen trolley failed to take the hairpin on the ramp to the carpark and a woman is now trapped underneath. The music stops again. They need a doctor down there urgently. A man in a tie runs past.
Hey, it all happens here! Last year a man died of a heart attack at the taxi-stand right outside when a can of air freshener he'd just bought exploded. It was only a week ago a pregnant woman unexpectedly gave birth in the Bakery—a little girl, someone said. And look! Over there! It's Kiri!
Strangers mingle. Old friends reunite. Future lovers catch each other's eye over the Frozen Food. In America nowadays they have special singles' supermarkets: men start at one end of the first aisle and women the other. That way their paths criss-cross all the way to the other side. Every aisle they bump into each other again. Big Fresh! And you can definitely learn a lot about someone with a careful glance or two over their groceries.
The wilful-looking redhead in Books and Magazines: dark eyes, long lashes. Pale, slender arms. The tall dark stranger with the piercing gaze who always seems to be shopping … perhaps he is. I saw a fly-on-the-wall documentary on loneliness and that's exactly what some people did.
A chance meeting in the Dairy, the carefully selected queue. That long, slow walk up the aisle … relax, take a trolley, come shopping. You too can find love in the supermarket.
… a young boy emptying a bottle of Diet Pepsi over his little sister's head. An old woman on her knees, fumbling with her coupons … your wallet, somehow forgotten, still sitting at home on your bed.
IT'S THE NAME OF THE DAY
Cheap? The dream is free … free parking, free delivery, free entry in the Grand Prize Draw … a year of free groceries! A small triangle of cheese on a savoury biscuit, a sample of shampoo/conditioner. The free bread and milk of supermarkets at war. The bits and pieces you somehow forgot to pay for …
O free, free market!
The 60 second dash, live on TV: everything in the trolley at the end of a minute is yours. If you're smart you'll head straight for the meat and empty the Butchery freezer. Take your marks! screams a man with a microphone …
Did I tell you about the hold-up just down the road a few years back? Our local supermarket, one Saturday lunchtime. I remember it well, largely because Rachel and I had done our own groceries there only an hour or two earlier—and from the full reconstruction on Crimewatch several months later.
What made this particular hold-up so special was the seeming nonchalance with which it was carried out. It's a quality all too often missing from modern-day crime. While his de facto waited in the car with a crying baby, an ordinary-looking young man wandered into the supermarket, bought a Peanut Slab at an express checkout, then re-entered the store immediately—in the TV version absently tearing at the wrapper with his teeth—making his way to Toys, Sports and Hardware, where after a moment's hesitation he chose a 1:1 scale model pump-action water pistol—range: 50 feet—and proceeded to unwrap it then and there. After sauntering up and down a few other aisles randomly pointing the weapon at stunned shoppers, he finally went up to the mezzanine floor—only now finishing off the Peanut Slab—where with the aid of his gun he convinced the cashier to hand over a hundred thousand or so in cheques and cash. Only then did he run.
The getaway car was a Morris 1100, with all the usual deficits of that make. This one apparently had in particular an irritating tendency to repeatedly stall when idling and was notoriously unreliable in the cold—surely the carburettor—but somewhat luckily it was a warmish day, the queue at the carpark exit was only one or two cars long, and the getaway was clean. The receipt from the Peanut Slab proved the couple had been shopping in the complex and accordingly the carpark attendant waved them through free of charge.
While in general impressed with the relaxed audacity of this crime, most people tended to feel the couple had been if anything a little too off-hand. Usually such criticism was accompanied by detailed alternative plans; everyone, it seemed, was secretly an expert at holding up supermarkets. At parties for a few weeks you heard little else.
They did maybe have a point, all these armchair outlaws: police caught up with the couple in the next few days. Both got several years, the baby Social Welfare, but to this day the money remains hidden—hence the feature on Crimewatch. No doubt police will be paying the pair close attention when they are finally released. And, for the record, no one else I know has yet put their own superior plan into practice.
All afternoon and the following day the supermarket broadcast appeals over the local radio stations asking everyone who'd written cheques for their shopping that morning to come in and write another, with the offer of 10 per cent discount and a Free Mystery Gift for those who were quick. Fat chance! Generally those of us who'd been shopping there before the hold-up accepted the generosity of circumstance without further thought, the only regret perhaps being we hadn't had some prior warning of the robb
ery so that we could have been more appropriately extravagant in our original purchases.
… it's all yours! screams the man with the microphone. He's wearing a checked sports jacket and his tie is seventies wide. Take it all! he screams. Take the lot! A cardboard policeman is the grim referee.
You curl your fingers round the steel. Your palms are sticky, you can hear your heart. Someone is counting down from ten.
The hypermarket. The megalomarket. The supermarket chain.
BOY WITH A WIDE BROOM
Not long after my fifteenth birthday, my mother came into my bedroom one day after school for a private chat. These talks were not so common but reasonably predictable in content. Usually they heralded some serious new obligation in my life I had up till that point been able to overlook, but I enjoyed them anyway, as my mother was invariably friendly and confiding in a way quite foreign to our normal relationship. Over the next hour or so we talked about how school was going, what plans I had for a career, girls—and how abstinence was the best contraception—the whole issue of growing up and attaining independence.
By independence it was apparent my mother meant independent means and so in response to this nudge I duly spent the next few weeks half-heartedly looking out for some kind of part-time work. I asked in a few shops that looked well-enough staffed already and put my name down for a paper run once I knew for certain the list was hopelessly long. I made vague plans to start up a leaf-raking service—I didn't mind raking—and got as far as designing an elaborate multicolour felt-pen advertisement I planned to copy out and put up in local shop windows. I actually even did a couple of nights' baby-sitting for a neighbour.
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