I sat down with a groan and started to lift and shake the papers, arranging them in some kind of order. Once done, I picked up the top form, studied it for a moment, then returned it to the pile. I shuffled the invoices and knocked them against the desk to make them neat again, then put them to one side, in the corner, and finished off the lager and the second doughnut. The forms were in exactly the same position they had started in.
When B phoned, I was agonizing over whether I could deal with the humiliation of ringing Thomas for work. I knew I would need a valid excuse for failing to contact him weeks ago, but as I’m loath to lie I was having a difficult time of it. B wanted to come round for a chat because he had thought of an angle for an article about foreign students and prostitution.
‘Undercover Education?’ he suggested as a headline. It didn’t bear comment.
When B is serious about anything, he discusses it hurriedly over the phone. He usually comes round to talk when he wants to have a drink, though he is too polite to admit this. I went through the pretence of being interested in what he had to say regarding the prostitutes. I even got as far as mentioning contacts I could use for photographs. But after a while, I suggested it would be better if we discussed the matter over a drink. He immediately agreed.
The Café Rio isn’t the least bit exotic. Save for a few faded posters of Corcovado’s Christ and some bathing beauties on a beach, it could be any run-down bar in any city. It can be sombre during the day; the windows don’t appear to have been cleaned in years, and the lighting isn’t effective. In the evenings, however, the dreariness lends the bar a certain worn ambience. Several nights a month, Claus, the proprietor, hires a jazz band. He isn’t very discerning – I suppose he can’t pay them much – and although they are hardly ever outstanding, it’s always refreshing to listen to new acts. Occasionally he will hire a rock band, but that happens rarely as it tends to ruin the atmosphere and drives the regulars away.
There was a group called Blue Grit that evening, and although I’m not partial to rock, I can tolerate it after a couple of beers. I tried unsuccessfully to order our drinks above the maze of other people’s heads. I noticed B had failed to register the clamour as we walked in. He smiled inanely as he nodded to the music, which was odd considering he hates rock.
‘We’re not getting anywhere at this rate,’ I said.
‘No problem, man,’ he replied, still nodding. ‘Patience.’
I looked at him, turned and ploughed to the front of the bar. A woman in tight leather trousers muttered, ‘That’s right, queue jump, fat arse.’
I ignored her.
‘It’s not bad,’ B shouted, ‘this rock’n’roll.’ His Cameroonian timbre made it sound like an academic subject.
‘Since when have you liked this music?’ I asked.
He shrugged as if he didn’t understand the question, then pointed to two women who were pretending to bang their heads against a wall.
‘How is Lucille?’ he asked.
‘Fine,’ I shouted. ‘She’s fine.’ I tried not to betray my uncertainty about this. ‘She’s very busy at the moment. Says hello.’
We turned back to the band. The rock chicks were now playing ferocious air guitar. The lead singer turned occasionally and sang specifically for them. This only encouraged more head banging. I drained my bottle of beer while B went to replenish the drinks. I scanned the room, but the only attractive woman was the leather-wearing complainer by the bar.
‘How’s work?’ I asked when B returned.
‘Quite well,’ he smiled. ‘Quite well indeed.’
‘Really?’
B works as a journalist on a small community newspaper and as a part-time household removals man. He never enthuses about work. Neither of us does. There is either too much or too little of it, or there’s something about it that isn’t quite right. There is too much stress involved, the lifting and carrying hurts his back, the pay is inadequate, or it simply doesn’t stimulate him.
‘Yes, I have a few projects on the go at the moment.’ He didn’t elaborate. ‘Hey, have you thought any more about joining us with the moving? There are still vacancies, you know.’ B is always trying to get me involved in the removals business, but I will have none of it.
I rocked back and forth on my heels for a moment. ‘Okay B, what’s the story?’ I said. ‘What’s her name?’
He gave me a look of false incredulousness, but I could trace the ghost of a grin in his eyes.
‘Whose name?’
‘Come on, don’t make me beg. I know you’re up to something.’
A laugh boomed up and tumbled out of his deep brown face. Frown marks and worry lines made him seem older than thirty-two.
‘Well, my friend.’ He looked down at his feet, then back at the band. ‘I have, actually, been seeing someone – for several weeks now … Angelika is her name,’ he announced. ‘Things have been going very well, I must say. Very well indeed, man.’
‘Weeks? You didn’t say anything.’
‘Well … you know, I wasn’t too sure. These things, they are tricky sometimes. I didn’t know how it would turn out.’
B is not one for secrecy. I must have let my disappointment show with my silence. He cradled his beer in both hands and we stared out at the stage.
‘You know, I think this might be the one, my friend,’ he added, regarding me closely. ‘She could be the one.’ And from the way he had said it, I knew it was probably true.
I could tell he was getting drunk and that pleased me. It doesn’t take him long. He didn’t need much convincing in order to proceed to the club.
By the time we reached the Atlantic, Tunde was already on the dance floor. He waved, but didn’t bother tearing himself away to say hello. One wave and then he was flush up against a perfect stranger. That was nothing new. The atmosphere was frantic. B’s glasses steamed up the instant we entered the room. People squirmed about on the floor like so many eels in a bathtub. A Latin American woman writhed in her own space. Every so often she hiked up her dress for an instant, followed by the whoops and cheers of other dancers. This only encouraged her. Looking at her face I could tell she was very happy, very crazy or very high. Probably all three. Merengue and salsa oozed from every pore in the room. Condensed sweat dripped from the ceilings. I went to fetch the drinks while B perched on the edge of the dance floor, not quite drunk enough to venture forth.
At the bar I noticed a woman with a mane of blonde and copper-coloured hair, wearing a ruffled white skirt and pastel blue blouse. I was about to look away when she smiled and turned to a woman standing beside her. I paid the barman and stole another glance at her. She had the most cheerful-looking face I had ever seen, even when she wasn’t smiling. I couldn’t imagine her ever being morose.
I drank one of the beers at the bar, pausing once for breath. It didn’t seem fair that B was already half drunk while I was still sober. The woman in pastel blue was talking to her friend. They had their backs to me. Once in a while they would look over, then turn away and begin their chatter again.
When I returned to the dance floor, B had disappeared. I thought he might have gone in search of me. I was about to circumnavigate the club when I noticed the Latin American woman in the middle of the floor, her arms draped around Tunde’s neck. She reached up and stroked his hair, then let her hands drop to his buttocks and reined him in. I looked away. I noticed B dancing in a corner by himself, away from the fireworks of centre stage. I felt awkward standing there with a drink in each hand so I went to work on both of them. I looked back at the bar, at the cheery-faced woman, who glanced and smiled and turned again to her friend.
‘Where’s my drink?’ Tunde shouted when he managed to disentangle himself. Perspiration dribbled from his sideburns.
‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘This is mine. Look – someone’s taken your place.’ On the dance floor, the Latin American woman’s legs were wrapped round another man’s hips.
Tunde shrugged and moved off to buy more drinks
.
‘Good idea!’ I shouted, but I don’t think he heard.
By the time he returned I was feeling peculiar. People kept zooming in and out of focus. I’d drunk too much, too quickly. I like to drift into a gradual inebriation. I could have sworn he had brought along the cheery-faced woman and her friend.
‘Claudia was just admiring your moves,’ he said. ‘Here’s your drink.’ He looked at me appraisingly. Then, quite suddenly, he seemed to find something else fascinating and promptly sped away.
I looked at Claudia. She was still grinning. I mumbled something even I could barely make sense of, but she only smiled.
‘What’s your name?’ she shouted, leaning towards me. I shouted back. I knew her name already so there was nothing else to say. There was a moment of silence, which may have been a few seconds, but could just as easily have lasted minutes. I had no way of knowing. She reached up and half-whispered, ‘My friend Claudia quite likes you.’
I wasn’t sure what she meant. Did she refer to herself in the third person? She turned to indicate her friend who was still standing there, swaying slightly to the music, pretending she had no idea we were talking about her. I took a good look, but I couldn’t place her. She looked North African or Latin American or mixed. She too had long hair, black this time, decorated with what looked like bits of coloured string. The pair of them wouldn’t have been out of place at the circus.
‘So … you’re both called Claudia, then?’ I ventured.
They burst into laughter, and the North African looked away. It was shyness, I suppose, or loss of interest, or both. But it seemed rude to me.
She turned back. ‘I am Claudia,’ she said.
‘Ah! I see.’ I turned to the blonde. ‘And you – what’s your … ?’
‘Let’s dance,’ she cut in, and dragged us to the centre of the floor. Annoyingly, Claudia shuffled along behind us.
The cheery-faced woman seemed to find something about me amusing. Her smiles developed into giggles and soon she couldn’t help but laugh. Then her guffaws began to irritate. I was grateful I’d become partly deaf on account of the volume of the music. It was obvious Claudia wasn’t going to disappear in a hurry and I felt rude for not having said a word to her all evening.
‘D’you want another drink?’ I shouted. My shirt was wet with perspiration. I needed to prop myself against the bar and rest.
‘Not really thirsty!’ Claudia screeched. She and her friend continued to dance.
I shrugged and went anyway.
I couldn’t find B anywhere and this surprised me because he never leaves without letting me know. I tried another level of the club, a more tranquil area. I sat at a round drinks table opposite a couple in the midst of an embrace. The woman’s leg was straddled over the man’s thigh.
‘Don’t mind me,’ I said, but they ignored me. I put the beers on the table. I vaguely remembered something about Claudia not wanting anything. Maybe her grinning friend would appreciate a drink. I sat in a sort of stupor staring at the couple opposite, not really seeing them. Time was a hound on a leash I had lost a grip of. At one stage, the woman’s eyes peered out at me from behind the head of her lover. She must have whispered something to him, because the next minute he was shouting – sharp monosyllabic profanities, but I couldn’t really take anything in. I smiled at them through half-closed eyes and when I focused again, they had disappeared. I held onto the edge of the table and pushed myself up. I was going to leave the second drink there, then decided to take it back to the dance floor. By the time I returned to the main level, the two women were back at the bar. The smiler ignored me.
‘What happened to you?’ Claudia grilled. I didn’t think she had a right to be annoyed. She had narrow, scrutinizing eyes, which sat in an over-made-up face, framed by the technicoloured hair. She had probably stored up years of resentment as the smiler’s less glamorous sidekick.
‘Been looking for B everywhere,’ I explained. ‘Can’t find him.’
‘Is that mine?’ The smiler pointed to the beer.
‘No … I’ll get you one if you want.’
‘Nah, don’t bother.’ She gave a little wave of dismissal. ‘Not really thirsty.’
‘Neither am I,’ Claudia put in, as if I had asked her. No one said anything for a while.
We looked out at the dance floor: two women were screaming at each other, but it didn’t get physical, which seemed to disappoint onlookers. The amorous couple I had earlier incensed swayed gently in the middle of the room, despite the liveliness of the number. I thought B might have already left. I closed my eyes for a minute to escape the cigarette smoke.
‘Why d’you call him “B”, anyway?’ Claudia shouted, destroying my momentary peace.
‘Yeah, doesn’t he have a real name?’ the friend chipped in.
I said the answer to the second question was probably ‘yes’, but regarding the first, I couldn’t remember.
Claudia studied me for a moment. She wasn’t sure whether or not I was pulling her leg. Her friend continued to smile. It was a wonder she didn’t pull any facial muscles.
‘You speak English?’ Claudia asked at length, in English.
The friend’s eyes widened. I thought there might be some success after all.
‘Sometimes. Only when I have to,’ I replied.
‘Cool! Fantastic!’ the friend’s language skills exploded. She brushed her blonde mane over her head with one hand and let it cascade down again, and shook it. I could envisage being lashed by her locks in bed.
‘The discotheque we are in … it is very hot, no?’ Claudia said. ‘You believe it is so?’ The words emerged like a goods train chugging past a railway crossing – you didn’t know when it would ever end. She fanned her long neck with her fingers, more for the friend’s attention.
‘Hot, hot!’ the smiler screamed. I didn’t know why she had to start shouting simply because she was speaking another language. She bunched her hair together, then pulled the mess of it over her left shoulder exposing only one side of her face. She pouted and rubbed her lips together as if for the moisture, then reached up to her neck and began to massage it. I sipped my beer. She seemed completely oblivious to what she was doing. I had almost forgotten about Claudia.
‘What is your name?’ I asked the smiler, a little loudly, fearing she might be hard of hearing.
‘Hot, hot!’ she screamed again. She looked at me expectantly and smiled.
I was getting nowhere. The English was hopeless – it dragged like a two-legged dog at the end of a chase. My eyes must have glazed over because Claudia and the blonde had moved back into the vernacular. I watched them chirruping away, but I could hardly hear above the music.
‘Hey, ladies!’ Tunde sauntered up and slid a hand round each one’s waist as if he had known them for years. ‘What are we doing here? Why not dancing?’
Claudia’s friend’s eyes lit up. ‘Yeah, dancing,’ she parroted. She started to sway in Tunde’s snaky clinch.
He withdrew his grasp of Claudia in order to envelop the smiler. He was my friend and she had no idea what he was like, but she would find out soon enough. There was comfort in that. Claudia and I tried not to look from either side. We glanced at the dance floor, while watching events unfold from the corners of our eyes.
Tunde wrapped his arms across the smiler’s stomach while she reached up round his neck so that her breasts jutted out. I couldn’t help but stare.
‘Where’s B?’ I asked, attempting to distract them.
Tunde shrugged. They were rocking gently against each other now. They didn’t seem to consider moving away. What hope was there for me if the smiler could fall for another man in a microsecond?
The Latin American woman wrenched free from the dance floor and began to sway towards us in heels the height of a table knife. Tunde started to disengage from the smiler’s torso, while she continued to pitch and moan. The Latin American woman was barely five metres from us now. Still, Tunde kissed the smiler from behind, slowly,
on one side of her neck. He gave her hips a firm squeeze, then he was off, his arm round the Latin American woman. The smiler looked dumbstruck.
‘I should be going,’ I shouted, to gauge a reaction. I glanced at my watch. ‘It’s getting late.’
‘No, don’t,’ Claudia said. ‘Why … why don’t you come to ours?’ She poked me in the ribs, becoming familiar. Did she mean the both of them? At the same time? She was wilder than she looked. I glanced at her friend’s legs, the way they stretched from beneath the miniskirt and didn’t seem to stop.
I remembered Lucille. An image of her face loomed up. For an instant I thought I should at least feign resistance or perhaps invent an excuse and leave. Uncle Raymond always said he could tell whether someone was lying or not. He simply had to focus on their breathing. If the person inhaled irregularly and appeared to hesitate before exhaling, then sure enough that person was lying. Invariably, most people were liars in Uncle Raymond’s eyes. All the same, I always worried whether people could discern by their own secret method whether or not I was telling the truth. It annoyed me to think I could never tell a plain lie. I have never made a good liar. I accepted Claudia’s invitation without giving it another thought.
I think Claudia may have had something entirely different in mind when she invited me to her apartment. I recall being helped up at the bottom of the stairs in the Atlantic. I don’t remember falling. Claudia and her friend held on to me on either side. I seemed to spend the entire evening asking Claudia’s friend her name. She repeated it once or twice, but I forgot almost as soon as it was given.
The woman with the elusive name attempted to bundle me into a car. I tried to protest, but what I really wanted was to lie down. Someone complained, ‘He’s no lightweight, is he?’ but it could have been either of them. I must have passed out because the next moment I was being shaken awake by Claudia. The friend was standing to one side of the car, holding on to the open door. Her smile was a mere memory. When I got out I could feel the warm breath of the evening waft over me, and the whole world seemed to tilt. Claudia caught me by the arm and things stabilized for a while. The downtown lights had vanished.
Goodbye Lucille Page 2