Fifteen Modern Tales of Attraction

by Alison Macleod

  ‘Very good.’

  She wanted me to go away. Her pretty head was bent so she didn’t have to see me. I was drooling slightly on her desk. My hair had not been combed. My face was stubble black. I knew I didn’t smell right. Pinkie was fearful. Her hair was all smooth and stuck together, but it was only the bright lacquer of her hair spray that kept her fear under control.

  ‘What are you doing, Simon?’ She was staring at my zipper. Then I saw my hand – gripping the anchor of myself through the hole in the lining of my pocket. Pinkie anchored me whenever I saw her. She held me fast to the world.

  ‘Go back to your room now, Simon.’

  I told my carpet slippers to move, but only the once. So they stayed and I stayed looking. I said, ‘Pinkie, c-c-come.’ My voice was a thin wind whistling in my head.

  She looked up. ‘Hmmm?’

  ‘Crumb, I said. Bread crumbs: twelve cents per quarter pound.’

  ‘Is that right?’

  ‘Y-yes. Good for fish b-b-batter. Grandad fished cod and blue-fish. S-s-sometimes lobster. He’d set them scuttling on the kitchen floor till the p-p-pot was ready. Then he’d b-beat them down with the wooden spoon till the l-l-lid was on.’

  Another nursie was at the desk now. She had no eyebrows. Only greasy brown lines she drew on each day. Pinkie was talking to her through barely moving lips.

  Carpet slippers across the floor. Simon says. Shuffle shuffle.

  There was a time when I could have said come. Said it once, said it twice. But time rolled in a wave over my head and my thoughts got tangled in the weed, like Grandad’s traps after a storm-churned day. It was Arts & Crafts. It was Pinkie’s turn to sit in the chair behind Teacher and keep an eye, but her chair was empty still.

  Only at juice-and-Wagon-Wheels time did she run in, nearly tripping over Tom’s false leg. I could tell she wasn’t well. Her coat was dark with the soak of the rain, and her hair lay in wet, sticky streaks across her forehead. She took off her coat. Her blouse had escaped the tuck of her pinafore. Her pinstripes were crooked, and there were arcs of sweat under her arms. I watched her dab her nursie shoes and tights with a Kleenex, but she was making the mud worse.

  We were making Popsicle-stick lighthouses that day. Teacher was going from table to table, counting in her head everyone’s share of sticks so that her old furred lips moved silently with the numbers but not as silently as she thought. By now Pinkie was trying to fix herself in a little mirror she had taken from her purse. She wiped away dribbles of black that ran from her eyes. She tried to smooth down her hair with a pat here and a pat there. But she wouldn’t come right.

  It didn’t help when she saw Tom scratching his false leg. Or Emma, the half-dressed schoolteacher, counting up to thirty-three with her sticks. I just sat in my fold-up chair, sipping from my straw and crying. Crying for the fear of my nursie-girl and her hair that was flying away. I wanted to say, poor, poor girl in your pink-striped pinafore, come with me. Come to the Superstore.

  I wanted to tell her about the shiny gold cans of hair spray, row after row. About the mirrors on the walls behind Fruits & Vegetables where she might forever put herself together. Then there was that music, those melodies so soft in the back of your ear. Better than a pill on your tongue. They’d make her forget about Tom and his itchy plastic leg.

  ‘There’s no need,’ she was saying to Emma, who was on number 26. ‘No need at all.’

  She looked at me looking at her and crying. There was a wrinkle in Pinkie’s smooth forehead. She knew I knew. She knew that I knew that she was this close to not knowing the difference between her and us. More than ever I wanted to say, it’s not too late… Not too late to come to the Superstore with me. There’s MORE in the Superstore. Not just aisles and aisles but smiles and smiles.

  ‘Why are you crying, Simon?’ Her pink pinstripes widened into bars in front of me. You would never know that anything had ever been crooked. ‘What do you want?’

  ‘MORE,’ I said sniffling.

  ‘Juice?’

  ‘No,’ I sobbed.

  ‘A Wagon Wheel? You want one now?’

  ‘No!’

  ‘I’ll bring you more sticks. You can have extra sticks. Your lighthouse will be the tallest.’

  She laid a small pile at my side. I was still crying snotty tears. As she showed me how to turn a red Christmas tree ball into the beacon for the lighthouse, I raised my hand and touched her hair.

  ‘Time to make your beacon, Simon.’ Her voice was firm. Her hair was under control once more. She would never now be mine.

  ‘A store is m-m-more,’ was all I could say.

  ‘Whatever you like then. Make whatever you like.’

  I was at sea in my grandfather’s Cape Islander and my anchor was gone.

  And that’s why I could only say crumb though I wanted her to come as I stared as she sat behind Nursie Station B. That’s why I had to go alone in the end.

  I left Pinkie talking to the nursie under the greasy arches as I went all the way to the front door. All the way to on my way. I told myself it would be like the other times. I had only to walk past the porter with the hat that falls over his eyes, and through the revolving door. Only, suddenly, I was looking at the porter and he at me. They had given him a new hat and it sat square on his head so I was looking into his eyes for the first time. They were sharp, like the knives they use in the kitchen to dig the black eyes from potatoes. I tried hard to keep my eyes from going big and black in the white of my potato face.

  ‘Going somewhere, Simon?’

  ‘To the S-S –’

  ‘To the Superstore again, eh? What for? Plenty to be had right here, right? Everything you need.’

  ‘Everything I need,’ I repeated, but I couldn’t stop staring at the revolving door. People were going round and round, women turning into men turning into children turning into old people. Suddenly I remembered a merry-go-round from a place I didn’t know any more. Jump on, they had said. Come on, jump! But I was too afraid.

  ‘You head back to your room now, Simon. Lunch in a few hours.’

  Shuffle shuffle.

  In my room, I open my window. I do not hear the barks of gulls. I do not smell the ocean. When I ask where the ocean is, they smile and tell me, exactly where I left it. There is a patch of a courtyard with a dying maple tree in the centre. Its branches reach in a tangle up to my window. At the bottom, concrete slabs surround its trunk. It is time to jump ship.

  My leg is through the window. More bone than leg. I put one carpet slipper on to the difficult branch. Brave. Be brave, Simon. The concrete slabs look unmissable. Simon says be brave. I put all my weight on the branch. It groans like my old grandad when he died last year of pneumonia. He left me the Reverence, his nets and traps, his night-fishing lanterns, and his Queen of Heaven rosary that always hung above the radio. He left it to me because there was no one else.

  My slippers fly from my feet. I don’t look down. That’s the trick, everyone says. I’m looking straight ahead, over the red rooftops where all the families live; homes so square I can almost forget the wild of these unwieldy branches and my heart reeling. And there, beyond the rooftops and the barbed-wire of the TV antennae, I can see it. The big neon letters: SUPERSTORE. Not far now.

  I go down and down until my toes hit ground and wriggle against the cold of it. I take my slippers from the roots of the tree. The day is damp. Someone has forgotten to turn off the street lights. They burn yellow in the dirty grey of morning. No need. I know where I’m going. Just one block, two, to go.

  Those are faces in the fog of that window. Children’s faces drizzling tears down the window panes. I want to say, come to the Superstore with me, open twenty-four hours a day. It’s never grey in the Superstore. But they are staring at my slippers that go flap against the soles of my feet, and a woman comes suddenly to the window.

  In the parking lot, I pass yellow line after yellow line. Yellow lines that stay yellow even in the rain, even after the rain, even after you
and me. I run so fast that one slipper flies into a puddle, black and purple and green with the car grease that floats on top. No matter now that I’m here. I might even get a new one at the Superstore. Anything is possible now.

  The doors slide away with my footfall. Like Open Sesame.

  Sesame seed buns: aisle 4. I know it.

  And there, right there, are the bright candy-red gum machines. Double-trouble. Jawbreakers. Sweethearts. Good & Plenty. I pull out a quarter and slip it in the slot. I catch the two small squares of chewy pink in both hands and unwrap them greedily. I slap my thigh at the wisecracks of Balooka Jo, then offer the comic to a child who’s telling me she can’t talk to strangers. Balooka Jo’s no stranger, I say. I’m blowing a bubble, bigger than my face, and everything goes rosy: the child, the shopping carts, the horse that goes giddy-up for a dollar, even my slipperless foot.

  And I’m walking. I walk towards myself who is walking towards me in a black-and-white TV. I’ve never been on TV before. I’m waving. I’m blowing another bubble. This one’s for you, Pinkie, I announce live, on air.

  Everything is as it should be. I smile at a pretty blonde cashier and she smiles back. Not just aisles and aisles but smiles and smiles. I hum along with a tune that drips from the ceiling. Dee da dee, da dee da dum… And the light that goes on and on is breaking over every tin of soup, sardines and fruit cocktail, like sun on a silver wave.

  Frozen Foods now. Butterscotch ripples golden through containers of ice cream. Over at the Deli, squares of processed cheese slices make orange-and-white checkerboards in the display case. I wander into Cereals. ‘Looks like rain today, sir.’

  It’s the stockboy. At first, I don’t trust myself to speak, but there’s no need to fear in the Superstore. His eyes, bright as new nickels, say as much.

  ‘Yes,’ I say, say it smooth. ‘But it’s always n-nice in the Superstore.’ I’m staring at his price gun. 2.69 2.69 2.69 2.69 2.69 2.69 2.69 2.69 2.69 2.69 2.69 2.69 2.69 2.69 2.69 2.69 2.69 2.69 2.69 2.69 2.69 2.69 2.69 I’ve never seen one in motion. 1.88 1.88 1.88 1.88 1.88 1.88 1.88 1.88 1.88 1.88 My heart can’t resist its rhythm. 1.88 runs swift in my blood.

  ‘Are you all right?’

  I make myself walk away, numbers leaping in my veins.

  Around the corner, the candies invite. Hundreds of coins of red and peppermint green spill over the open bin. There are slabs of white almond-bark too and dreamy dark Chocolate Temptations, just 48 cents per half-pound. My mouth waters. It’s only a reach away. No one is looking.

  Simon says, I dare you. Just a taste. My hand reaches… it’s nearly there in the chocolate dream. A spinster of a woman scooping up jelly babies turns and stares at me. My hand closes into a fist and I shove it back into my pocket.

  Two rows over, the Superstore hostess in her fresh white smock is offering cheese and crackers to the morning shoppers. I take a broken cracker from the plate she holds out to me. Her teeth are so white. I know those teeth. Then it comes to me. She’s the girl on the Pepsident Toothpaste box. And here she is, offering me cheese on a toothpick. Wouldn’t Grandad slap his leg at the thought.

  I pass Fresh Produce, rich pickings laid out on grass greener than I’ve ever known. It is always summer in the Superstore. There are peaches, rounds of gold and rose with hairs that catch the fluorescent light. There are baby potatoes so clean you’d never know they were lifted from the earth by human hands. This is Paradise. This fruit, these vegetables, shall not wither.

  There’s a long, loud whirring coming from behind me. I turn. The butcher is at the Meat Counter, grinding mounds of beef into soft twists of red. Pork shanks are today’s Special Saver. Compare with the rest, then come back to the best.

  I never want to leave. Not ever no way.

  I did not mean to go down aisle 8. I was heading for aisle 7: Cleaning Products. But the thought of Lysol and linoleum caught in my nostrils and made me turn away. Now I’m in Aisle 8 and there they are. One slim gold can after another. New Formula 17. Staying power so your hair won’t have straying power. Pinkie’s brand. I’m sure of it.

  It’s going to rain today. Maybe she hasn’t remembered her plastic rain hat. Or her umbrella. Oh for the thought of her hair coming undone, and Pinkie with it. Everyone is so easily dishevelled in this world.

  I start to sweat at the thought of it. Antiperspirants, aisle 6. How can she feel better than us if I’m not there to help her feel like herself? Forgive me, my nursie-girl.

  I stare at the golden cans of Formula 17. Simon says, take it. Simon says.

  I’m running fast but it seems as though everything is running past me faster still; that I’m not running at all. There goes the butcher, the shampoos, the cleansers, the Pepsident Lady, the spinster with her jelly babies, the girl at the checkout. I’m a blur on the overhead TV… But will the doors open? I hear the almighty crash of a broken sea of bottles as the bottle bank is emptied. A Superstore boy passes me, wrestling a long scorpion’s tail of shopping carts. Will it ever end? Please let me leave the Superstore! I cannot stay.

  The butcher is after me and yelling things. I’m in the parking lot. My last slipper flies below a white Chevrolet. The dog inside starts to bark and froth. There’s green bottle glass on the pavement, green glass in my feet… Then the butcher’s on me, his meaty shanks pinning my legs.

  The pretty cashier is somewhere behind us. ‘Don’t hurt him, Jim. He’s one of them from the Villa.’

  They bring me back. Pinkie is at Nursie Station B. She smiles at them like she is meaning, couldn’t be helped, and they all shrug their shoulders and smile some more. Pinkie peeks over the desk and sees the smear of blood from my feet on the yellow linoleum. She says to go with the other nurse. She will get the glass out of my feet and bandage them.

  But I stay and stare at her as always. I have to be sure.

  ‘Simon?’ says the other nurse.

  Pinkie is looking at me like she doesn’t know me. She is smiling easily. Everything is clear. ‘Well, what does Simon have to say for himself today?’

  I am looking at her hair, smooth and shining with spray-on light. She is the Queen of Heaven. She is the light of the day. My anchor strains again below my zipper. It grounds me to the world.

  ‘Simon? I asked you something, now, didn’t I?’

  I unzip my trousers. I give thanks.

  The Will Writer

  No, he replies, no, he plans ahead; he’s someone who likes to be prepared. So he had no trouble finding the house. He always checks his route carefully using one of the internet street-locators.

  ‘How clever,’ she says, taking his overcoat.

  He smiles, feeling the heat of a blush climb up his neck and over his collar as Mrs Richardson ushers him into the sitting room. ‘There are those who wouldn’t be having it,’ he adds, ‘but I must say, I rather enjoy life on the road. You see, as soon as I’m out of the car park at Head Office, I’m essentially my own boss.’

  ‘I’m sure.’

  He takes a seat on an ample leather sofa. ‘And there’s the peace and quiet of a car. Your own home away from home, as the saying goes. Not that I’m not glad to have my wife and son to return to every evening.’

  ‘Of course.’ She’s at the window, drawing a heavy set of drapes. ‘What age is your son?’

  ‘He’s just turned seven.’ He gives her a tentative smile. ‘I suppose you could call me a late starter…’

  Mrs Richardson tuts politely and pulls a neat mahogany tea trolley into place.

  ‘The good thing is, I’m home most nights in time to read him – Michael – his bedtime story. At the moment, we’re working our way through the pile of Just William books I read myself when I was a boy.’

  The Skills Facilitator at Head Office says that it’s important to let the client see that you’re perfectly ordinary with perfectly ordinary concerns. And the will writer assures himself: he is perfectly ordinary. He has never had aspirations to be otherwise.

  Mrs Richardson apologizes that her husband has
not arrived home yet. He says, not to worry, though he must remind her that nothing, of course, can progress without both their signatures, as they’ve indicated interest in a joint will package. ‘I can’t imagine what the delay is,’ she says as she passes him a cup of Earl Grey and a Duchy Originals shortbread biscuit.

  He smiles reassuringly, snaps open his company-standard briefcase and lifts out a royal blue YOUR WILL folder.

  ‘Do you have another appointment today?’ she asks. On the folder she can see her name, her husband’s name, and the words ‘Will Deluxe Service’. It makes her want to laugh. It makes her want to laugh at this man who’s come peddling death’s wares. His trousers are too short, and he’s wearing light socks with black shoes and garters that clip on to the socks. She hasn’t seen those things in years. ‘I’d hate it if we kept you.’

  ‘No, you’re fine,’ he replies, straightening the flaps of his tie against the spread of late middle age. ‘I had one appointment in Sutton after you but Head Office phoned just before I pulled up your drive to say the young couple in question were obliged to reschedule.’

  ‘I see.’

  From somewhere in the house an antique clock wheezes and chimes the quarter hour.

  ‘I guess that goes with the territory,’ Mrs Richardson adds.

  ‘Hmm?’

  ‘People rescheduling… trying to postpone the inevitable.’ She smiles, as if at a shared joke, and he decides he rather likes her smile. It is delicate, even nervous by habit, he would guess, yet, just now, oddly reckless.

  He relaxes slightly. ‘The stories I could tell.’

  ‘Really,’ she says, and her grey eyes widen with mischief.

  ‘The male of the species, I have to admit, is the worst.’ He swallows the last of his Highland shortbread. ‘Cowards, almost without exception. If I’ve learned anything after eighteen years in the business, it’s that.’

  ‘How so?’

  ‘I can’t tell you the number of men who have opened the door to me, drunk at three in the afternoon – you see, it’s usually the lady of the house who makes the appointment.’