Selfish People

by Lucy English

  But I don’t care because this is the end. This is the end of the end. This is the flakes settling and the fire has gone.

  Bailey was in black and so was Leah. Black jumpers. Black jeans and white faces. Dark-ringed eyes. We are unearthly. She sat on Bailey’s sofa as he smoked one cigarette after another. ‘Where’s Kerry?’ Her things were still there. Their cuteness now out of place.

  Bailey turned the fire up. The room was already warm. ‘She’s gone. She’s getting her stuff after Crimbo.’

  ‘Is that what you wanted to tell me? I’ve been here twenty minutes already.’

  He shifted in his chair. ‘No … I wanted to say … I wanted to say … It’s you and me now, isn’t it?’

  ‘You and me what? On different sides of the battlefield?’

  ‘No, together,’ and he punched the chair.

  Leah hadn’t expected this. ‘Bailey, I blew you away.’

  ‘And what about you? You’ve been in bed for a week.’

  They watched each other from their chairs. The room was getting insufferably hot. His long face was expressionless but his eyes slid over her. Into her hollowness and emptiness: her inside papery skin was becoming soft and pink. He pointed at her.

  ‘You see, you know about me, you know –’ and he choked on this – ‘you know I’m bad,’ but it didn’t sound daft. He was admitting it, to her, to himself. ‘And you are bad too,’ he said with another point.

  ‘But you see,’ said Leah, ‘it’s different for me. I don’t care. I don’t know what’s going to happen. I don’t know and I don’t care. You have brought me to this. Bailey, I don’t care any more.’ She laughed, because she really didn’t care – about Kerry, or Al or her mother – and to demonstrate this she walked towards him and stood in front of him. He stood up too. His hands around her and up her jumper. His tongue slid over her face and into her mouth.

  ‘Push me,’ she said. They fucked on the floor, and on the stairs and eventually in Bailey’s bed. Kerry’s things were still there, useless now, functionless. ‘Push me further,’ she said and he did, but it wasn’t far enough because the world was still there, the stupid world.

  ‘How much further do you want?’ said Bailey against her back, whispering in her ear, sliding into her.

  ‘Until I’m not there any more,’ said Leah. He stopped and sat back on his knees. Leah lay on her front. She could hear him breathing hard. ‘Is that what you want?’ he said in a voice that wasn’t his but deeper and more fluid. She was going to turn round and look at him but he was holding her.

  He pulled her against him and her head was down. She felt the pressure on her anus and gasped.

  ‘Relax,’ said Bailey. ‘You have to relax,’ and he shook her, once, twice, like a dog does. ‘You have to relax or it hurts.’ His words poured into her ears like hot oil. He pushed. She screamed because it hurt.

  Like splitting. Like splitting skin. No one should be there, it’s private.

  ‘No, stop!’ but he didn’t. He was pushing further. She would split completely.

  ‘Relax, fuck you, get into it.’ And she tried, she tried. These few minutes leapt and looped out of time. She wasn’t splitting now but the intrusion was deep. He put his hand over her mouth to shut her up and he was thrusting now. She cried in his hand. His hand was on her face. Then he pushed her off him and back on to the bed. Their bodies smelt like a compost heap.

  ‘I hate you!’ shouted Leah.

  He made a noise in his throat. He pushed her knees up and fucked the rest of himself into her.

  He rolled away. ‘I asked you to stop,’ she shouted.

  ‘Don’t you give me that. You said, ‘‘push me’’.’ He reached for his fags but he wasn’t in control.

  ‘I meant feelings, emotions. I wanted to feel –’ she was in tears and knelt up on the bed – ‘not that … it hurt … it hurt.’ She ached, inside and out.

  ‘I know what it feels like!’ he yelled and lit up. His hand was trembling. He lay there, stiff and awkward, not looking at her.

  ‘It felt it wasn’t you,’ she said, and she was afraid he would change again. This bad-tempered Bailey was at least familiar.

  ‘Don’t you give me that weird stuff.’ He got up. He put some clothes on, not the ones he was wearing earlier. He smoked the rest of his cigarette pacing about the room. ‘Don’t you start blaming me, you asked for it.’

  ‘Is that what your dad used to say?’ She held on to a pillow. She was scared. She was very scared but she was going to go on.

  ‘Shut up!’

  ‘Did he use to hold you down like that? Put his hand over your mouth like that? Did he, did he?’ She wiped her face and held the pillow closer. Bailey banged his head with his fists and fell on to his knees.

  ‘We have created this,’ said Leah. ‘It belongs to us. We are in this together.’ But it felt so vast and reeling she wasn’t sure it could be contained. Bailey, still crouched on the floor, looked huge and volatile as well.

  What he hates. What he fears most is himself. Is inside him.

  But her own hurting body reminded her. ‘Bailey, if you are your dad, then who am I?’

  He looked up at her, horrified she was going further.

  ‘Who am I? Your little girl?’ It was a terrible admission. At last a line had been drawn, the perimeter.

  Bailey stood up, composed now. ‘I never touched her,’ he said and moved towards Leah rapidly, next to her on the bed, not to be close to her but for emphasis. ‘Get that clear. I did not ever … even think that … with Ghislaine.’ His voice faltered but the force behind it didn’t. ‘She was … perfect … I felt … I was afraid … I would. I left when I began to remember. It did me in. It keeps doing me in that I will, I might, feel that way with her. She’s four. She’s my little girl and she’s perfect.’ He was not crying, he would never cry in front of Leah, but she touched his arm and he let her.

  ‘I don’t understand you. I treat you like shit and you keep coming back.’

  But she understood it now. ‘You felt like that with your dad.’

  He wiped his eyes with his large hands. What was in the room had settled, but inside him, it looked like his skin could barely hold it. Sitting that close to him she could feel the pressure.

  ‘Please go,’ said Bailey. ‘I need to flip.’

  ‘I don’t want to go. I want to be with you. I don’t want to leave you.’

  ‘Not when I flip,’ he said wearily. ‘Nobody sees that.’

  ‘Why not? What do you do when you flip?’

  He breathed out slowly. ‘You are so fucking dangerous. I want you to leave. You cannot be with me.’

  ‘We are together. You said it. We can’t go this far and go back. We have to go on.’

  ‘You don’t understand.’ He was looking manic now. ‘When I flip … I go … I don’t know what I would do.’

  ‘Worse than just now?’

  ‘Oh Christ, what are you made of? Yes, yes, worse. I might kill you … I might want to kill you.’

  ‘I don’t care,’ said Leah, ‘if you kill me.’

  ‘God, you do not mean that.’ He was now shaking all over.

  ‘I don’t care. I’m sick of everything. I’m so sick of it all. Al and the kids and my mum and Clive’s dirty house, and this, Bailey, going forwards and backwards when we feel so much and go through so much. I cannot bear to leave you again.’ She began to cry. ‘To walk out of that door and not be with you, hurts. It hurts, Bailey. Haven’t I felt everything you’ve felt, aren’t I as bad and demented as you? Must we keep separating …’ and she stood up, naked and pale, but it wasn’t about flesh, not any more. Bailey was still and his expression was changing from fear into something she couldn’t recognise until he smiled and his voice was again like black pitch, ‘If that’s what you want’ being filled by something that wasn’t him, snaking right down him. He moved fast like a lizard’s tongue and touched her face. The repulsiveness of it made her gag, but she stood there. He was stroking her cheek. Th
en another flick and he was just sad, so sad she wanted to hold him.

  He said, ‘Please go.’

  She left. She left quickly and was still getting dressed as she left the house. She was up the street looking down. Below her the city was spread out, the sky already dark. The city light shining. Beneath her was Bailey wrestling with his demons.

  You ask me to leave because you care. You left Ghislaine because you cared. You are not your father. You are not that weak. Know this, know this, brave man, I wanted to be with you.

  She walked back down to Bailey’s house and crouched quietly behind the dustbins near the front window. She did not want him to know she was there, but she wanted to be there all the same. Inside, the television was turned up loud but underneath were other noises. Fists being slammed on the floor and a gutteral hollow moan. It was wretched to hear it.

  Your dry despair. No tears but endless self-loathing. Hell is like this.

  In the blackness, in the shadows, she lifted up her hand and pressed it against the cold window pane.

  This is the nearest to you I can be.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  There is nowhere further. I’m still by your dustbin wanting to hold you. You are too scared of yourself to connect. Not with me who kept looking in the darkest corners. My body still hurts where you hurt me, and who will hold me? Not you. You cannot move out, only turn in and fight yourself. I heard it. You battling you. There is no winning.

  I have no place in that. You. You. You.

  She was in the chair in Clive’s breakfast room where she had been two days ago. The house was clean because she had cleaned it and the house was quiet because Debbie and Clive had gone to her parents for Christmas. It was Saturday and she waited for her children.

  Jo, Ben, Tom. I have not been thinking about you. I have been crawling through nightmares and hiding in corners. I have been splitting myself open so I don’t feel dead. I have been wanting to die because I don’t want to feel dead … and I do want to die. Your mummy wants to die. I don’t mean kill myself, I mean slide away. Bailey, you would have slid me away. Didn’t I feel it when you held me down, how you could. You didn’t because you care. You have spared me for this.

  I mustn’t cry because my children are coming and so is Al. I must say, how are you, and how are you and smile and pretend as I always have done. Let’s pretend everything’s all right and I’m happy because if I don’t what is there? That I’m sick of everything. I’m so sick of this nothing I want a sick man to split me … to find something living.

  She looked at her geraniums but they were not inspiring. On the windowsill behind the curtain was a bean in a jam jar. Tom’s science experiment. A bean stuck between blotting paper and the glass sides. It had been there for weeks, inert.

  It’s not working. I remember I did that with Jimbo and our beans went bonkers. The shoots went up and the roots curled white round the bottom of the jar. It was almost scary. How could all that come out of one bean? And the seed itself shrivelled up and died, but who cared, we had bean trees.

  The force that splits the seed. Sarah said, keep the image of the seed …

  She got up and looked at Tom’s bean closer. It was purple, mottled and bloated. It had split, but there was no shoot.

  There was a knocking at the door. Al was an hour late but that wasn’t unusual. He was on his own.

  ‘Where are the children?’ said Leah, looking up the road.

  ‘They’re fine.’ He walked right into the kitchen. He was angry, in a way she hadn’t seen for some time. Recently their communication had been polite and brief. Since being back at college he was too preoccupied with his life to investigate hers.

  They stood on separate sides of the table. ‘Are they coming?’ said Leah.

  He was dressed in his stripy dungarees. He only wore these at weekends now. They reminded Leah too much of Garden Hill.

  ‘What gets me about you is how you can lie and lie and then appear so perfectly innocent. How do you do it? You must have had years of training.’

  ‘I don’t understand,’ she said, holding the table and fear stuck her to the floor. But I don’t have to be afraid. I must not be afraid.

  ‘Look, I want to believe this isn’t true, because if it is then you are the most scheming cow I have ever met.’

  Your face is lined with anger. I want to talk about the weather, your course. You haven’t brushed your hair, it’s sticking out on top. ‘Believe what?’ she said in a whisper.

  ‘You and Bailey. You and Bailey!’ shouted Al.

  ‘Me and Bailey what?’ she said even more softly.

  ‘Are fucking, you stupid cow, have been all this time. I asked you, didn’t I, and you lied, you lied …’

  She didn’t say anything, she couldn’t.

  ‘Stop pretending. I know. Did you think I wouldn’t find out? How could you be so thick? You were caught shagging him on the stairs, by his girlfriend, and you told his other girlfriend to her face. It’s everywhere. It’s written in big letters in the sky and you’re still lying to me.’ He moved round the table. He didn’t touch her but yelled in her face, ‘Stop lying. I want you to tell me.’

  ‘How do you know?’ said Leah, trying to stand her ground but it was hard to.

  ‘Stop trying to change it. You always do this. I will not hit you. I will not hit you, but I have a right to hear it from you and not from the Totterdown sewers.’ He pulled himself up. ‘OK, Sally told me, she thought I ought to know what people were saying about my wife behind my back. She’s looking after the children. She’s been great, and the men’s group, they say I should discuss it with you, openly, and the implications …’ He sat down and rolled a fag. ‘I want to hear it from you. It’s true, isn’t it?’

  ‘It’s true.’

  He licked the cigarette paper. ‘Is that why you left – to go and fuck him?’

  ‘No, I left because you hit me.’

  He ignored this. ‘So, when did it start? Two weeks after. A month. What? I want to know the details.’

  She stared at him. ‘You expect me to tell you?’ She was getting angry. This was something he wasn’t used to. It was his turn to gape.

  ‘I did have a relationship with Bailey. Off and on and now … it’s over,’ said Leah. ‘I can’t have a relationship with him.’

  ‘That’s handy.’ He narrowed his eyes. ‘I’m not sure I believe you. I find out and suddenly it’s over.’

  ‘I don’t care what you believe,’ said Leah.

  ‘And that stuff about the stairs and the other girlfriend. Was that true?’

  ‘Yes it’s true.’

  ‘You slag,’ spat out Al. ‘You cheap whore. You cheap bitch to fuck that jerk. Was he a good fuck? Better than me I suppose?’

  ‘Go away,’ said Leah, moving towards him. ‘Take your hurt pride to your men’s group.’

  He stood up.

  ‘Where are my children? It’s my turn to look after them.’

  ‘There are things we need to discuss.’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘Like whether I want them to see you at all. There is nothing legal about our arrangement. I don’t want them to have a mother who’s a slag.’

  ‘You can’t do this,’ said Leah. But he could and she knew very well he could. He could argue all night just to prove a point. She sat down at the table. She felt quite sick. Al drew a chair up as well.

  ‘Let me suggest something. I will have the children for Christmas and up to New Year. In that time you can think about things. Go and see your darling mother, you may need her help, and after New Year we shall meet up with our solicitors and draw up a settlement.’

  ‘Not see the boys for Christmas!’ She was feeling knocked down and not at all strong now.

  ‘It sounds like you have been keeping yourself occupied. I’m sure you haven’t missed them.’ It was true and she hated him for it. ‘If you like you can give me their presents.’

  ‘But I haven’t got their presents yet,’ she wailed
.

  ‘Christmas is on Thursday,’ said Al. ‘Don’t you care about your children?’

  ‘Of course I care, but I was ill and then I was … busy.’ She had damned herself. Al smiled, triumphant, but she was turning. ‘You have no right to punish me just because I slept with Bailey and you have no right to involve the children just because –’

  ‘You’re a whore.’

  ‘I am not a whore. Who are you to judge me? We had separated. We were apart. Can’t you take it, that I wanted somebody else?’

  ‘You lied to me,’ sneered Al.

  ‘Because I was scared. You beat me up. You thought Bailey and I were together and we weren’t. You beat me up for a thought. What if I had told you? You’re punishing me now. You’re saying I can’t see the children because you can’t take it, can you?’

  Al jumped up and knocked the chair over.

  ‘I don’t care about you any more and you can’t take it.’

  He rushed round and grabbed her by her hair. She screamed, ‘I don’t care about you, I care about my children! I care about Bailey. But I don’t care about you.’

  ‘Shut up, you!’ yelled Al. ‘You never cared. Did you? Did you?’

  ‘Let go of me!’ screamed Leah. ‘I don’t know if I cared or not but I don’t now. I don’t care what you think or what you do or anything.’

  ‘And Bailey?’

  ‘I love him. I feel with him. I feel nothing with you.’

  Al roared. He bashed her head on the wall. ‘You selfish bitch’ – each word another crash. She struggled and hit and finally kicked him hard on the shin. He let go with a yelp and she fell on the floor. She crawled into the comfy chair holding her face. Her eyes felt like they were falling out and her head was bursting. The room jumped up and down. So did Al by the table rubbing his leg. ‘I didn’t want to hit you and I have.’

  ‘And you care about me, do you,’ screamed Leah. ‘Go away!’

  ‘Bully, bully!’ she shrieked at the empty house. ‘You will not bully me any more,’ and she slammed the front door. ‘Hateful bully, get your lawyers, what can they do?’