by Nick Green
Mrs Powell began explaining how the high priests of Pasht developed pashki as a form of worship and exercise. Ben found it hard to pay attention. He’d never had a pet of his own, but he liked taking his aunt’s Labrador for walks down in the West Country. Cats, on the other hand, left him cold. Worse than cold.
And now Mrs Powell was bringing Jim round to each of them in turn.
‘You see his forehead,’ she said. ‘Ordinary tabbies have these markings too. The patterns make a clear M shape. M for Mau. After more than four thousand years, the original cat is still among us.’
Hands reached up to caress the fur. Mrs Powell stopped by Ben.
‘You can stroke him,’ she said. ‘He won’t scratch.’
Ben shook his head.
‘What’s the matter?’
‘I don’t stroke cats,’ Ben said, hoping no-one else would hear. ‘They always give me electric shocks.’
It was true. His friend Rajesh’s moggy only had to brush his bare arm for him to feel the crack of a tiny whip of fire.
Mrs Powell peered at him for a few seconds.
‘Yes,’ she said, ‘they can do that occasionally. Poor you.’
Ben made a non-committal sound.
‘You don’t like cats?’ said Mrs Powell.
‘Not really.’
‘Why is that?’
Ben shifted in discomfort.
‘I don’t like the way they stare,’ he replied, knowing as he said it that Tiffany was staring at him. ‘They always seem really…I don’t know, selfish. Chilly. They’re not like dogs, are they?’
‘In what way do you mean?’
‘Dogs, well. You look after them and they love you back.’ He was beginning to sweat. ‘Cats don’t care. They can’t help it, it’s how they’re made. I’m just not a cat person.’
This evening was light-years away from what he’d had in mind. He yearned for the simple violence of Tae Kwon Do. Mrs Powell was silent a moment.
‘That’s fine,’ she said. ‘So you hate cats. I’ve known many cats who hate cats. Take the tiger. He won’t let another within three miles of him. Unless love is in the air.’
She set the cat down and it trotted back to its place by Tiffany. Ben could feel Tiffany’s look turn hostile, as if she’d been personally offended by his words. Mrs Powell settled into her sitting-cat pose.
‘Yoga,’ she said, ‘is about becoming one with yourself. Pashki awakens the part of yourself that is like a cat. For cats have much to teach us. They are proud spirits yet calm. They live in the present, without worries beyond it. Cats are pools of serenity that may surge up in storms. They are weightless clouds that can quicken to lightning.’
The grey cat chose that moment to yawn and wander back to the bead curtain.
‘Jim? Leaving us already?’
Jim ignored her completely and disappeared into the room beyond. A smile stole over Mrs Powell’s face. She began to recite:
‘I heed no words nor walls
Through darkness I walk in day
And I do not fear the tyrant.
‘The words of Akhotep,’ she said. ‘A poet of ancient Egypt. What he observed then still fascinates us today.’
Ben’s legs were really killing him. He would have moved but he didn’t want to attract any more attention. Several others appeared equally uncomfortable, especially Tiffany. She looked desperate to get up, her face struggling to hide the agony her knees must be feeling. He bet himself that she cracked before he did.
Mrs Powell told them to stand. She demonstrated a couple of stretches, like the ones her cat had performed. They made Ben’s hamstrings twang, but helped to shift the ache in his legs. After that the lesson appeared to be over. Mrs Powell went from person to person, collecting money. Ben handed over the five-pound note he had saved, thinking of the fish and chips he might have bought.
He hurried out, leaving Mrs Powell chatting with Tiffany. They already seemed thick as thieves, those two. Cats were evidently like football: some people were just obsessed. Not that he’d ever use a cat as a football, he wouldn’t go that far. He was merely glad his first and last pashki lesson was over.
On the stairs he heard Mrs Powell call after him.
‘See you next Thursday, Ben.’
‘Uh-huh.’ And he whispered to himself, ‘Not if I see you first.’
He had reached the scuzzy hallway when her voice floated down:
‘You won’t.’
He was so unnerved that he almost forgot to pick up his stuff from the leisure centre.
‘Oh the shark has, tam ta-daa, pretty teeth, dear…’
Ben walked more slowly as he drew near home. Someone was singing.
‘And he shows them, ta ta-daa, pearly white…’
Suddenly wary, Ben stepped behind a parked yellow van and shaded his eyes. The evening sun was flaring off the shop windows in Albion Road.
A figure in a pale suit strolled into view. He could only have come from Defoe Court. Where the flat was. A passing lorry blocked the sun glare and he saw the man clearly. It was John Stanford. By a silver car parked on the pavement he fumbled for keys.
Ben’s heart was sticking in his throat like a chunk of gristle. Stanford had come while he was out. He cursed himself. He should have stayed at home—stood behind the door with his cricket bat. If anything had happened to Mum…
‘On the sidewalk, oh yeah, Sun-day morn-ing…’ Stanford clicked his fingers, opening the car boot to put a carrier bag inside. ‘Lies a body, oozing life…’
He got behind the wheel. The engine gunned and music sprang from powerful speakers inside. A big band sound.
When the shark bites…with his teeth, dear…
The song grew fainter. The instant Stanford’s car accelerated round the corner, Ben dashed down Defoe Court and into his block. He beat on the flat’s unpainted door.
‘Mum!’
She opened it, startled.
‘What’s wrong?’
‘Are you all right? What did he do?’
‘Who? What did who do?’
‘Mr Stanford. He was here!’
‘No, he wasn’t.’
‘Outside! I saw him.’
Getting his breath back, Ben explained. Mum sat down, sucking thoughtfully on a chocolate wrapper. When he told her about Stanford’s singing, Mum gave a bitter smirk.
‘I never figured him for a Frank Sinatra fan. Likes to do things his way, I suppose. Well, I don’t know why he was snooping around, but he didn’t come in here.’
‘Maybe he was hassling someone else.’
Mum shook her head. ‘All the neighbours have gone. Haven’t you noticed how quiet it is now? We’re the only ones left in these flats.’ She touched the tiny scar at the corner of her eye, something she always did when she was sad. She’d cut herself late one night, four years ago, walking into a door when coming home in the dark.
‘We could leave too,’ Ben burst out. He was sure he’d had a bright new idea. ‘Sell the place properly to someone else and get away!’
‘Berk.’ Mum poked him, not unkindly. ‘Who’s this mystery buyer with piles of cash and half a brain cell? You couldn’t give this flat away. And we can’t rent anywhere, and we can’t buy another flat on what Stanford would pay us. We have no choice except–’ she gripped his hand, ‘–be brave.’
That night, Ben lay awake in the streetlamp-stained darkness. The words of Mr Stanford’s song writhed like maggots in his head. For a second, hiding behind the van, he had been sure they referred to his mum. The horror of that thought was still with him. Every passing car was the silver saloon. Every creak was Stanford’s footstep in the hall.
He had long since despaired of sleep when his restless mind washed up some other words. He could not immediately remember where they had come from, but they brought a strange, lonely kind of comfort.
I heed no words nor walls
Through darkness I walk in day
And I do not fear the tyrant.
He slept.
ONLY NATURE’S OWN
‘I want you to imagine,’ said Mrs Powell, ‘that you are balancing on top of a thin wooden post. The post is no wider than your wrist and is as high as you are tall. If you wobble, it will sway and tip you to the ground.’
Tiffany sneaked one eye open. Her fellow pupils stood, like her, on tiptoe, one foot overlapping the other. Cecile was already tottering. Tiffany shut the eye quickly as Mrs Powell glided past her.
‘Now you see a second post, just as tall, just as thin, one stride ahead of you. Beyond that is another post and beyond that, another. See that row of tall posts in your mind. You are standing on the first.’
Tiffany heard a sharp breath as someone almost overbalanced. It was getting harder to believe in the sturdy wooden floor underfoot.
‘When I say,’ Mrs Powell went on, ‘take a single step forward onto the next post. You must tread precisely on the top. Anything else will make the post bend and you will fall.’ She paused for two of Tiffany’s heartbeats. ‘Step now.’
Tiffany placed her right foot blindly ahead of her and brought her left foot to join it. She was steady. She could feel the imaginary stake beneath her, trembling but upright. Slowly she breathed out. There was a thump as somebody fell. It was followed by another.
‘Ugh.’ Olly picked himself up. ‘Have I only got eight lives left now?’
‘It’s really hard!’ whined Cecile.
‘Back on your post. Start again. Eyes shut please.’
Although Mrs Powell snapped at them like a games teacher, Tiffany didn’t mind. She couldn’t remember enjoying a physical activity so much. She was also adding to her (rather small) circle of friends. Once she’d found the confidence to introduce herself properly, she’d recognised several of the class from her year at school, although none of them had lessons with her. Susie seemed nice and chatty, and Olly promised to be a laugh. Tiffany had proudly told her parents that she’d found a suitable Thursday-night amusement, and that her expensive, neglected ballet leotard would finally get some use.
Not that pashki seemed anything like as energetic as ballet. Their lesson last week had been almost totally still. Mrs Powell had taught them cat meditation. One technique, Pur, involved crouching like a Sphinx and trying to make a strange rumble in your throat. Deep meditation, or Omu, meant curling up with your legs just so. This had caused amusement at first, but in a room with Mrs Powell no-one laughed for long.
Arriving at that second lesson, Tiffany had been surprised to find Ben the cat-hater still among them. No, that was unfair. He must be open-minded or he wouldn’t have come at all. She wondered what had happened to change his attitude. This week she’d even tried saying hello to him. All she got back was a grunt. Still, he had seemed pretty wrapped up in his thoughts.
Today’s challenge was Eth, or cat walking. There were, Mrs Powell said, nine rudiments of pashki that every novice had to learn. Eth was the third.
‘When you have mastered one step,’ said Mrs Powell, ‘take another. You should be able to walk from post to post without swaying. Don’t hurry. It takes time to come.’
To an outsider, it would look as if they were merely walking along the floor. Yet people were finding it incredibly difficult. Olly had fallen three times and Yusuf had to keep windmilling his long arms to stay upright. And he kept catching Susie’s eye, making her grin stupidly until both of them were giggling.
‘Eight out of ten for effort, Suze,’ said Yusuf, his American accent even stronger than usual. ‘But one out of ten for impressing the boys, you know?’
Daniel was compact and obviously pretty agile, yet even he was getting frustrated. Tiffany couldn’t believe it. I’m the only one doing it well, she thought.
Or had she thought too soon? To her surprise (and slight irritation) she saw Ben taking one step, another, then a third, lowering each toe with the precision of—well, a cat. His closed eyes, under their strong dark brows, were a picture of serenity, spoiled only when he walked smack into the wall.
Tiffany couldn’t stop the laughter spurting out of her, unfortunately just as he turned her way. He glared. But everyone was chuckling a bit and Mrs Powell was trying not to.
‘Do this,’ Mrs Powell called to Ben. She made a great show of rubbing her fists against her mouth, the way a cat licks its paws. ‘It says you don’t care. When a cat makes a mess of things, dignity pulls it through.’
‘Thanks for that,’ Ben muttered. He checked to see if his nose was bleeding and gave Tiffany another black look. She was sorry she’d laughed. Despite her twinge of jealousy, it would be a shame if he got the hump now, just as he was getting into it.
‘Now you see why cats have whiskers,’ said Mrs Powell. ‘But that’s for later. We’re going to get this Eth walking right.’
She stood in a corner of the studio and crossed to the far window. Everyone stared. She had covered the space in a twinkling, without seeming to move fast at all. And she had made no sound.
‘Your feet are getting there,’ she said. ‘But you’re thinking like bipeds. Cats are four-limbed. When you walk, your arms should move too. Don’t swing them. They are your forelegs. Tiffany, come and demonstrate.’
It took a moment to sink in. She was being chosen. If her PE teacher ever singled her out, it was only to show her up as useless. Terrified and delighted she joined Mrs Powell at the front.
‘Eth uses all four limbs.’ Mrs Powell angled Tiffany’s arm so the others could see. ‘The cat’s pace is a diagonal pattern in four beats. Right fore, left hind, left fore, right hind. Nature has no better way of moving over the ground. Tiffany, show us.’
She pictured the tall posts in her mind and took a few steps. She found that by thinking of Rufus and how he walked, the rhythm flowed naturally to her legs and arms. Her hands were like paddles, pushing the space behind her.
‘A perfect example,’ said Mrs Powell. ‘Everyone walk the posts again.’
Having two extra things to think about wreaked havoc with most people. Yusuf managed three steps before getting muddled. Daniel did five and Susie, with gritted teeth, reached six. Olly couldn’t stop falling over, eventually getting the giggles so badly he had to sit gasping by the wall. But Tiffany let herself glide across the room. She widened the gap between the imaginary posts, until she was no longer stepping but striding. Her pace quickened, she pivoted from tiptoe to tiptoe, as light and bouncy as a spring.
Those ballerinas could keep their pirouettes.
‘I’m home!’
No-one answered. Tiffany looked in the lounge then the kitchen. Rufus ran to her with a mrrp of welcome. She put her stuff in the washing machine, found herself a cereal bar and wandered upstairs.
‘Anyone in?’
The study light was on. Mum and Dad were squashed on one chair at the computer.
‘It’s really, really great, that class,’ said Tiffany. ‘It’s sort of like dance and a bit like yoga only miles better. And it’s been around for thousands of years but only a few people know it now. And I’m good at it already. Most of the others were falling over but I can do Eth now which is cat walking and it’s so weird, you hardly even feel like you’re moving but you are. And that lovely silver cat likes Parmesan cheese.’
‘Did you have a good time, sweetheart?’ Mum murmured. ‘That’s lovely. There! See?’ She pointed at something on the screen.
‘Okay, give me a chance to read it.’ Dad frowned at the monitor.
Tiffany draped her arms over their shoulders and hung between them.
‘What are you looking at?’
‘I may have found something interesting,’ said Mum.
‘Is it to do with Stuart?’
‘Can you back-page?’ Dad asked Mum. ‘Show me the article you found first.’
Oh well. At least they weren’t telling her not to interrupt. Curious, Tiffany stood behind them and tried to read through the gap.
On the screen was an article from the New Scientist magazine. It talked about a Dr J. Philip Cobb an
d his research into traditional ethnic remedies. There was a fair bit of fluff about his life, which she skimmed over: as a child he’d mangled his arm in some accident that killed his mother, while they were travelling in Asia. His father took him for treatment in England, but the muscle in the bad arm never grew properly. That was when the article got interesting. Cobb had grown up to study biology and herbology. He searched for nutrients that could repair muscles damaged by accident or disease. This was the hook that had snagged Mum’s internet search (she compulsively trawled Google for the phrase ‘muscular dystrophy’).
‘And look, Peter,’ said Mum. ‘He has his own company that makes these treatments. There’s a link.’
She clicked on it.
‘Cathy, I’m not being negative, but if there was some new wonder drug wouldn’t the hospital know about it?’
‘Maybe not,’ Tiffany put in. ‘Pashki is wonderful and no-one knows about that. In the lesson today–’
‘It’s not a drug. It’s a supplement. You don’t need a prescription. Ah, finally.’
The screen blossomed with a colourful homepage. The banner headline appeared in leafy letters: Only Nature’s Own.
‘I like their name,’ said Dad. ‘Shame about the acronym. O NO.’
‘Can you be serious for a moment?’
Mum clicked around until one page made them all lean forward. It showed a toffee-brown pill jar with a striking orange label. A panel popped up beside it.
‘“Panthacea”,’ Dad read. ‘“A revolutionary new formula that combines traditional Asian medicine with the latest research.” Well, that covers all bases, doesn’t it?’ He read on. ‘“Proven in trials to stimulate muscle growth in tissue-damaged areas. To be taken as a dietary supplement with meals.”’
‘I don’t think you say Pan-thay-se-ah,’ said Tiffany. ‘It’s probably Pan-tha-saya.’
‘And see here, Peter. “All natural ingredients”.’