Happy People Live Here

by C. Sean McGee

9A

  Before she left for her swimming lesson, Linda stood at the balcony, holding onto the ledge and thinking that she should hire someone to put up a net. She never had any children come round her house and she didn’t have any pets, except for Bill Clinton of course, but he was a fish so there was no way he was going to climb out of the bowl and fall over the edge.

  But what if she left his bowl there overnight, so he could have some fresh air?

  And what if in the morning it was gone?

  What if the bowl fell, at a time that everyone was asleep and The Porter was doing crosswords and listening to his headphones? And what if Bill Clinton was flapping around on the ground and there was no one who could hear him and no one who could see him too? But worse still, what if someone stole him?

  Linda twisted her head to the side and peered upwards. It looked like all the apartments above had already had their nets put on. And the apartments below too, most of them had nets and the ones that didn’t have hooks sticking out of the borders of the window frames, so they’d probably have their nets put up before the weekend.

  Maybe she could ask one of her neighbors for a number or a card, and maybe she could find out how much they paid. She didn’t want to pay too much. Maybe she could get a discount on account of all the work the person was already doing, it wouldn’t be much work for them to do one more. She’d tell them that when they were already at her door. They’d probably be less inclined to say no after coming all that way and already having all their stuff and being ready to do the work.

  It was important that she put the net up. Everyone else was doing it. If she didn’t, from the street, it would look like she was the only one that wasn’t worried about safety and probably everyone would talk bad about her and say things like “That’s the reason why she never has any visitors.”

  “I’ll get a net,” she said to herself. “But I’ll find a cheap one.”

  Her intercom rang again, but she ignored it, knowing that it was The Porter about to tell her something she already knew. The Teacher was downstairs and no doubt, so were all the other kids and they’d be waiting for her to come down before they started the lesson. The Teacher always did things like that. It was her lesson and her time and her money so she could take as long as she wanted, if that’s what she wanted to do.

  The elevator took forever in this building. Linda hated having to wait for things. She could be doing nothing at all if that’s what she wanted to do, and that would be ok because she liked, from time to time, sitting down on her sofa and watching the television, imagining what shows might be showing, if she had cable. She didn’t have cable, though. It was too expensive. And she didn’t know any criminals yet who could put in a wire or something and give it to her for free, like people said that all the poor people did.

  But Linda hated, more than anything, planning to do something and then having to wait a really long time, just so she could get it done; especially seeing as she didn’t do many things, outside of going to work, of course, and coming home from it too. So if she did have to do something, it was always pretty important, and she hated that she paid a lot of rent and condo fees and still had to have to wait as long as she did.

  Elevators were really boring because they were so slow. And traffic was really boring too because it was always bad, especially when she was in it, and it was just a slow as the elevator, sometimes slower. And there were heaps of other things too that were just as boring as elevators and traffic.

  Queues were boring and having to wait in them with other people, especially old people, that was boring too. Old people didn’t work, they didn’t have to be anywhere and they could do whatever they had to do at a different time if they wanted, when there was nobody around, when other people - younger and more important and far busier people - were at work or studying or in meetings or doing other important things. But old people just liked to slow things down and make queues.

  And it wasn’t just elevators or traffic or queues that were boring. Young people, they were boring too. They walked around in groups and when you were walking on the sidewalk, there would be five or six of them and they’d all be side by side. And sidewalks were made so that people could go both ways, like on the roads. And they shouldn’t be walking together like they always were. They should be walking with three in front and three behind. Or better yet, they should walk in groups of two, so everyone has a person to talk to.

  Young people were boring too, though, because they all wore black clothes and had they had rings in their noses and big plugs in their ears, not like the ear rings she wore, which were really pretty and expensive and a present from Graham – he is a millionaire, you know?

  And when they took out their plugs, those young people, their ears would look like elephant’s ears or an old lady’s breasts. They’d hang down all soggy and floppy like. That’s what young people thought was attractive.

  In Linda’s day, it was good posture.

  And she still had it.

  There was so much stuff that was boring. ATMs were boring because she could never remember her password. She would, if the stupid bank didn’t make her change it all the time, especially after that incident with the email when those bad people took her money. Linda hated her bank and more than that, she hated her account manager. He never rang her back when she wanted him to. He was always in a meeting or out to lunch and he always promised that he’d call back, but he never did.

  People making promises and not keeping them, that was boring too.

  And people were the most boring; because they were always thinking about themselves and ignoring everybody else. Especially at the supermarket, when people left their trolleys behind someone else’s car. This was the most boring thing that anybody could do. Linda hated when people did this. If she saw it happen, she would march over to the trolley and she would stare straight at the driver who was reversing out and she’d have a mean and angry look on her face. Her eyebrows would be straight but bent, on an angle. And her lips would be closed real tight. And her eyes would be real beady like as if she were aiming a gun at someone very far away and she needed to squint, so she could see them better.

  And she’d look just like a jagged stone, ready to throw.

  And she wouldn’t say anything, she didn’t need to. She’d wait until the car pulled up beside her and then, when the driver was about to put the car in gear, she would rattle the trolley away and put it back where it belonged, setting a firm example. And she’d turn it round real quick and swing her face so that, if she had a long fringe, it would look like she was swishing it out of her eyes. And she would make a sound. It was the kind of sound that if you had to spell it out, it would look like this – humph.

  Linda would probably spell it ‘humff’.

  That was another thing that was boring, having two ways of spelling the same sound and not knowing which one was right, and then always feeling that she had chosen the wrong one and that she’d spelt it the wrong way. And then even worse was spending the rest of the day thinking that that would be the first thing anyone would notice when they read what she wrote and they’d probably think she had no education or that she was poor, or worse still, that she wasn’t from around here.

  And the internet, that was the most boring of all. It was so boring mainly because everyone said it was so good and that you could do so many cool things on it. But whenever she used it, all she ever did was look at was the weather channel. And she could see that on the evening news for free. And she wouldn’t have to be worried about viruses or hackers breaking into her computer and stealing the photos that her niece put on there when her sister visited two years ago, that time she had to have surgery on her small toe.

  “Hi.”

  Linda woke from her daydream.

  She did that a lot; daydreaming. And sometimes, when she did, her tongue hanged out of her mouth. Not all of the way, just a bit. The tip of it, it poked out. And if someone was really far away, they wouldn’t be able to see it. But if so
meone was close enough, like standing in an open elevator, they’d probably notice.

  “Good evening,” said Linda, her tongue dried and stuck to her lower teeth.

  The only thing worse than waiting for an elevator was being inside of one. It was probably the most boring thing in the world, more boring than the internet even. No definitely. It was definitely more boring than the internet. At least on the internet she could delete the stupid things she sometimes said.

  Linda always felt that she had to say something and she never knew what to say. She didn’t really like talking to people all that much. She didn’t like what they had to say and she wasn’t really interested in the things that they found fun or interesting or cool. And she shouldn’t have to talk to them. She had no reason at all.

  But for some reason, when she was in an elevator or when she was waiting for someone to finish pouring their coffee in the break room or when she was waiting in line to buy fresh bread, she always felt this itch, like a nervous tick, that made her jumpy and edgy. It made her feel like she had to speak, that she had to say something, the same way black beans made her feel like her stomach would explode if she didn’t pass wind, always when she was in the middle of an appointment.

  Linda stayed facing the metal doors. Even though she wasn’t facing the other person, she had a feeling that they were watching her and probably thinking she was rude or stupid or something because she hadn’t said a thing. Her heart was pounding in her chest. So loud, that probably the other person could hear. Theirs probably wasn’t beating that hard. Then why didn’t they speak? Why didn’t they say something? Why was it up to her?

  It wasn’t fair.

  She was breathing too loud, way too loud. The other person would definitely think that she breathed too loud and then they’d probably think something bad about her because of it, like that she snored at night or that she picked her nose or that she had sucked her thumb for really long when she was a girl, longer than most other children, and that’s why her teeth were crooked.

  She held her breath.

  Everything was quiet now. She could still feel the other person staring at the back of her head, probably looking at some of the grey roots that were showing. She was going to go to the hairdressers on Saturday, but they didn’t know that. Maybe she should tell them. They were obviously looking and they would have noticed. She did when she looked in the mirror. It was the first thing she could see. She noticed it in other people too. It was always the first thing that popped out – the grey in people’s hair and what their teeth looked like, especially if their gums were receding and their teeth hanged low, like what happened when people got old, like what was happening to hers.

  She held her breath.

  And it was really quiet.

  And it was still only the fifth floor.

  She tapped her feet on the ground and she tried to think of a song to hum in her head, to tap out with her feet. She tried, but she couldn’t think of anything. She’d always have some stupid song bouncing around in her head when she was driving to work or brushing her teeth or even when she was on the toilet – it helped her be less nervous and being worried about whether she could do number two or not. She worried about that quite a lot.

  The elevator stopped on the fifth floor and some people got on. Linda smiled when the door opened, lifting her head for just a second before looking back at her feet. She didn’t move, though. Why should she? She was there first. They could squeeze past her, it wasn’t that hard. And anyway, if it really bothered them that much, they could just wait until she got off.

  The two women got on. They were young, not what Linda would call a ‘young person’, but they were young, younger than her. Both of them looked really classy. They had the same haircut, both with their hair bouncing on their shoulders when they walked. And their fringes were cut short too and they were very straight. They probably got their hair done at a real fancy hairdresser; probably a hair stylist. That was where Linda wanted to get hers done, but only when she had more money.

  Linda immediately pressed her hand over the top of her head, hiding her roots.

  Thinking that the people in the elevator were waiting for her to say something and because she hadn’t said anything yet, Linda assumed they were laughing to themselves, secretly, but enough so that she could tell. And they were laughing because she was not smart enough or cultured enough to say anything and they were laughing because of her grey roots and the spider veins on her legs and her receding gums too. And if she wasn’t holding her breath, they’d probably be thinking that she breathed like a truck driver.

  The elevator was taking too long and Linda couldn’t hold her breath anymore. She exhaled loud and triumphant, like a breaching whale, and then gulped in long and deep. The women all stared at her as she heaved over herself, one hand pressed on her stomach and the other over the crest of her head, maybe stopping her brain from falling out. One of the women even reached forwards with her manicured hand, so that it was almost touching Linda’s back.

  ”Are you ok?” the woman asked, her hand moving back and forth, close to Linda’s shoulders as if she were playing her emotional chords like a Theremin. But she looked hesitant as if she expected some static shock the moment she touched Linda’s hunched and heaving body.

  So she didn’t.

  “Excuse me, miss?” she said.

  Linda had her eyes shut and her breathing was heavy, but it was starting to slow. How dare they assume she wasn’t married. Miss? Did they assume that she was some spinster, living alone in her apartment? That she never had a boyfriend? And that she only ever ordered the smallest pizza because she didn’t want any to go to waste? Is that what they thought? That was it wasn’t it? That was exactly what they thought. That she was lonely and pathetic and that she’d probably never even had sex. And that she always wore sweatpants all the time because she had nowhere to go and no one to go with, even though underneath, they probably didn’t even know that she had a swimsuit on and that she was about to have a lesson.

  Stupid donkeys.

  “I’m fine,” said Linda sternly, as if she were turning away a beggar at a traffic light.

  And she held her breath again because her breathing was too loud. And she held her hand over her head because her grey roots were showing. And now she clenched her cheeks because her new swimsuit was writhing up her bum.

  Elevators were so boring.

  And so were people.