Strip the Willow

by John Aberdein

  I see, said Jim. I’m not knocking it, said Iris. I just think the heyday for unions and party stuff is past, as well as for dependable, lovable workers like Charlie there. These struggles were too titanic, too set-piece. We need to take over the actual workplace, large and small, that’s where it’s at, with workers’ councils. You don’t develop enough confidence treading a union line. I know, said Jim. Do you? said Iris. There was some commotion or other on the dockside. The door tinged. Iron Curls reappeared. A guy with a scuffed leather jacket and a rakish Lennon cap entered and crossed to the counter. In a hurry, pal, dae ye mind? said the guy. Carry on, said Jim. I’ve got the rest of existence. Cheers, said the guy. Mina darlin, fit are ye like for biscuits, tea-bags? Ony sugar? Course, Nat. I’m a café, amn’t I? Rax us ower a bunch, then. Onything ye can spare. Pit it doon tae the Spare Me. Nae accounts, Nat, said Mina. Dinna dae accounts. Young Mr McClung can come in and pay me personal. That’ll mak his day, Mina, said Nat. There ye go, said Mina. Abernethies, one packet. Digestives, one packet. Butter biscuits, two packets. Four pund o sugar and four quarters o Lipton’s tea. And where’s Master McClung headed this fine morning? Tell him I dinna work wi tea-bags. The wild West, said Nat. In that case tell him tae pay me afore he sails. Or I’ll hae his guts for garters when he comes back. The three at the window had stirred as far as having a chuckle. It’s time ye lot were buyin fresh mugs, said Mina. Ye think ye can jist bide here aa nicht, an sit an ogle.

  Jim thought he could see Spermy rumbling about in the dockside shadows. He pulled up his coat collar. Ye cauld? said Nat. Ye fisher? Ye dinna look the type. No – na. Why – fit wey like? said Jim. We’re stuck for a coupla men, said Nat, that’s fit wey. When are you – fan ye aff like? said Jim. When we’re fuelled and watered, an hour at the ootside. Good luck, said Jim.

  bitch, said lucy

  Jim went back and sat opposite Iris, with the mugs. The good thing, if there was a good thing, about stewed tea, was that it was never too hot. Know who that was? he said to Iris. I’ve seen him, I don’t know him, said Iris. Just some guy off Spermy’s boat, topping up supplies. Spermy McClung, he said, there’s a name to conjure with. You know I’m working at our old school? she said, Frederick Street. Fredericker, he said, I would have thought you. Oh I had choices, said Iris, but I chose Fredericker. Remember that time Pinners gave three of us a camera? she said. And we went round shipyards, down the docks, and up the Citadel? It was Timmer Market time, said Iris. With me I think it dates back to then. Photographing the occupied faces. That was the day it began to sink in. You’re either a tourist in your own place, or you’re in deeper.

  Christ, Iris, he said, admire that. You’re off your tiny rocker working in Fredericker, but yeah, admire that. Since we moved to Northfield, I’ve got a bit unattached. Or detached, I suppose. From? said Iris. The old haunts, folk, other people’s purposes. Varsity lulls you away. Are you still at Varsity? No, building sites. Building sites? she said. But they’re nae real, he said, I’m jacking that in. You’re not seriously happy, he went on, at Frederick Street School? Not entirely, said Iris. But, fair do’s, they’re not happy with me. The kids are great, total toerags, pretty damn loyal. We’ve started a big project on Eskimos. You know how a couple came to be washed up, more likely dumped and deposited, in Aberdeen? Still in their kayaks. A couple of centuries back. Well it started from there. Now we’re about to build our own. Never had you down as a kayakist, he said. Got an intro at College, said Iris. At Stonehaven, the Summer Isles. In bouncier water a low centre of gravity seems to help.

  – So quite big hips? said Lucy.

  – Iris and I— he said.

  – Were just good friends, said Lucy.

  It turned out Iris had let herself become influenced by the deschoolers while at College. Nothing of that in the lectures, of course, but you can’t keep a good library down. She’d devoured everything from Neill to RF Mackenzie, from Goodman to Ivan Illich. I see the problem in our society as hierarchy, said Iris. I’ve already had an oral and a written warning. For thinking? he said. For building Eskimo kayaks? For getting too close to the kids. For not accepting that I was getting too close to the kids. And for challenging the heidie. I’ve got feelers out on a teachers workers’ council, she continued. And I was one of the ones who called this meeting tonight, you heard? The solve lovelessness in a jiffy malarkey? said Jim. Sorry, Group to Unstick Stuckness isn’t it? The same, said Iris. GUST. Lots of the potentials said they’d try and come. What about you? Dunno, he said. I was attracted, but it seems a bit forced, a bit put-on. Okay, said Iris, but everything the Left starts up seems awkward at first. It’s only since I started teaching I’ve realised the forces that hold us down, said Iris. We’ll never achieve much if we’re stuck on our own. Say you’ll come? Might, said Jim. Which strand do you represent? Strand? he said. Which group? said Iris. Eh, existentialists, said Jim. Hardline? Very. What’s your line on Vietnam? said Iris. Coexist. On stuckness? Get a new life. On lovelessness? We seem to be still out on that one, said Jim. Anyway, apart from X, you said there was something else, said Iris. Two things, you said, wasn’t it? Did I? he said.

  – Your memory was rubbish even then, said Lucy.

  Yes, said Iris. I’ll maybe come to it, he said. By the way, X is the daughter of a Commie sculptor. That’s about all I was able to pick up. Lucy Legge, said Iris, that’s who that’ll be. She’s a one. Fancies herself culturally, I’ve been told.

  – Bitch, said Lucy, and read on quickly.

  The door opened. Master McClung, said Mina, good tae see ye, that’ll be four pounds twelve and fourpence. Spermy glowered at the pair nearest the door and ignored her. Seein it’s yersel, said Mina, four pounds twelve. I’m nae a grocer boy, said Spermy, I’m a press gang. This twat’ll do. He pulled the twat up by the scruff of its coat, and located its scrawny elbow. Let’s keep it in the family, eh? Your Da’s fishin for ma Ma, so ye’re fishin wi me. Let’s go. Let him go, said Iris. Fit’s in it for me? said Spermy. You’ll be lucky, said Iris. Lucky? said Spermy. Iris, doll, I wouldna gie ye typhoid. C’mon, twat. Take proper care, skirled Iris, pair o ye! Be in touch, Jim said, as he was propelled.

  very well in

  Eventually, at half past eight, the first sun of the year arose, fierce as gold from a forge. Julie gazed across the sea as it vibrated into view. She snapped it.

  – Julie again, said Lucy. Going down.

  – That’s her business, said Jim.

  Then zipped herself into her 8mm neoprene longjohn.

  – Sure you don’t shag her later?

  – Read on and I’ll find out.

  She kicked into her second jetfin, spat generously in her mask, bent to the sea and swilled it. There was no substitute for human spit. No proprietary substitute. Even Dow Chemical, who had managed to gel petroleum, couldn’t come up with one. Her father, the Lord Provost, had shares in Dow. They’d had a row about that. When she was doing her Masters in Massachusetts, half the demos, more than half, were against Dow, for the napalm. Not that she’d been on one. Then her parents gave her a Calypso Nikkor for Christmas, with Dow lube for the rubber seals. She’d made a show of binning it, then retrieved it. Water in your new camera was not ideal.

  She was on a shingle beach. Any stray crab or brittle star would soon be crushed by wave action. She clenched the hard rubber snorkel between her teeth, and waded backwards till she felt resistance against her thighs. She lay back, trusted herself to the water, and was borne up. A chill eel entered her suit at the neck and channelled along her spine. Julie turned on her belly so that she could see the underwater shingle redeemed by bubbles. There were pulses of swell coming from seaward, against a strong riverine ebb pushing her out. Poised between two forces, she felt her own decisive. She exchanged snorkel for demand valve, blew to clear it, checked round quick for boats and beasts, jackknifed her jetfins high, and slid on down.

  In the clench of pressure, wheeze of alloyed air, in the flick and drive of her fins, she was in her element. H
ow could you not think we came from the sea? The water was on the murky side. Silver sand eels shimmered into view, sensed her, spun like the snap of a flag, and ribboned away in ragged unison. There was a shard or two on the shifting bottom. She moved her glove to pick one up, and a dissolute cloud of mud rose up and streamed away. The current was getting stronger; she could feel a sting of ice coming down from the hills, she could see the odd rainbow of harbour oil hallucinant on weed. One of the reasons she didn’t do drugs. No need. She had visions while she worked.

  – Tam seems pretty well into her? said Lucy. Very well in.

  – In his dreams, maybe. Problem—?

  – Oh, no. I quite like Julie, said Lucy. Now she’s underwater.

  Yet it was wrong, Jamie had kept telling her, her over-responsive approach. Her tutors said isolate, take one variable at a time, form a disprovable thesis and test it rigorously, for scientific peers worldwide. Ahead, in about mid-channel, she saw a big plate of reddish metal, embossed with an acne of juvenile barnacles.

  i’d rather be who i am

  Spermy in the harbour mouth gripped the spoked wheel with his left hand, while he twiddled with the radar-scale. He’d retained his ex-schoolmate on watch, the rest packed off below, to snore off their binge of dark rum and lager.

  – I notice we don’t see the name Jim so often, said Lucy.

  – Not for a while.

  – Are you really Jim, is that who you are?

  – Interim Jim, maybe. Best keep reading.

  There was no booze allowed aboard Spare Me; you couldn’t become best boat in Scotland by pishing it up against a wall, or thumping into the base of a cliff in a bastard stupor. No clink of cans from the galley, but still drink in the men. Spermy couldn’t wait to get back to the grounds, to do what he did best. So many ways you could track herring. Gulls, echo-sounder, a glisk of their oil smoothing the surface. Or a sprachle of bubbles released from their swim-bladders, as they rose at dusk to feed.

  In the harbour’s jaw the Spare Me now. In the very spot. Spermy checked and rechecked the echo-sounder. The Dépense would be in smithereens long ago. Wake up, twat. This is far ma Da and them drowned. I ken, I was there, mind, on the pier? said Jim. Ye were just wee then, said Spermy. So were you, you spat on my boot, said Jim. I still get nightmares, said Spermy. Clap yir een on the soonder there. What for? said Jim. Read the traces, said Spermy. Ye’d better look, ye’re the expert, said Jim. Why dae ye nae look? Spermy spun the wheel slowly. Scared ye’ll see somethin? said Jim.

  – Then a spate of Jims again, said Lucy. I keep thinking. Would they not still have you on file at the hospital?

  – I’m not going back there. No more ops. I’d rather be who I am.

  – Namely?

  – Don’t think the hospital had a clue anyway.

  Spare Me circled sunwards. The waters live and scarlet-shimmering. The water was rocking back and fore in the channel. His drowned father never told him stories, not that he often asked. I come ashore tae forget aboot the sea, loon, nae tae blabber on. So he followed his father to sea, and made his own story. Just ahead, interrupted, a stream of bubbles rising. It could hardly be herring, this time of day, not this close in.

  bubbles

  – Julie, said Lucy. Bubbles.

  Jim decided not to rise to the bait.

  Julie approached the reddish plate. It was waving with weed and knobbled with barnacles. The marine archaeology side didn’t concern her. What was under the plate might. A conger laired, with parted snout, ready to slash a diver’s finger off with slimy needle teeth. Or a lobster, not red by nature, but perhaps taking on a rouge under this hulk. She poked with a knife. She picked up a vibe, which grew to a vibration. A butterfish pouted and fled. Her quick snap with the Calypso probably missed it. Something heavy was arriving over her, sending a whop-whop through the column of water. She held onto the section of wreck with both gloves, and took a buffeting.

  She waited till the vessel was on an away path before beginning surfacing, not holding her breath, that was fatal. She was only half-way up when the prop began to throb again. They might do something mad like chuck a stick of dynamite in. Engine hum permeated the waters. They were about to do something. She finned upwards, expelling air in expanding gouts.

  Her third snap was of a bronze prop, very close, steadily carving water.

  – That’s it, I’m afraid. End of third folder. Where’s the rest?

  – No more? But none of these so-and-sos has so much as breathed my name. We’re no further forward.

  – Well, you’re on a boat, heading out to sea, or playing about in the harbour mouth, trying to pick up or carve up you-know-who—

  – He must have got more on tape than that, Tam, he must have. What was he playing at?

  – Did Julie come? said Lucy. I mean come on board. Did she?

  – Search me.

  – Oh, you getting up now?

  – Need a good walk, he said. Blow the webs away.

  – Want someone to go with you?

  – No. Do you mind? It’s a lot to try and digest.

  – How long do you feel you’ll be?

  – Not terribly long.

  my sieve’s a memory

  They called it his voyage or inner voyage or trip but it hadn’t helped.

  Trip had a double meaning of course.

  A specialist in an understated tweed suit had said, Now you were undertaking a nautical trip if my dossier serves.

  Sorry?

  You had run off to sea.

  Had I?

  You were all at sea? ventured one, a lady psychiatrist with white earrings like sugary pandrops.

  Part of me wasn’t, he had replied.

  But they needed you to be all at sea, floating on their couch.

  When he came back from his latest wander, reeling in invisible wool and stuffing it in his right hand pocket, Lucy was sat in front of the bedroom mirror. She was running her hands up through her hair both sides, running it through her fingers.

  – Is bouffe a word, would you know?

  – Boof, he said.

  – Bouffe, said Lucy.

  – Yes, something went boof, he said, I seem to remember. Keep saying it.

  – Bouffe. Bouffe, said Lucy. Bouffant.

  – Nice pausing.

  – I wasn’t always a pauser, she said. I went at things full tilt, Tam got it right.

  – Why?

  – I wanted everything.

  Again she ran her fingers, both sides, up through her hair.

  – I used to have a beehive, do you remember? Do you remember beehives?

  – Like gold wire stuck high with lacquer, he said. They made girls’ faces seem smaller, so nobody would think they were too brainy and be put off. Were you too brainy?

  – Probably, she said, not quite brainy enough.

  She stopped putting her hair up and just elongated her face in the mirror to try and diminish the deepening lines.

  She glanced at her eyes, then glanced away.

  – I don’t know what brainy is, he said. You need to remember a lot of stuff to be brainy. My sieve’s a memory. I must have gone to sea in it—

  – No, said Lucy. Enough. I want you to tell me straight what happened out there.

  – At night. All I know is, it happened at night.

  – Just take your time. I put some lobster on earlier, we need to go down and look at that.

  – A lobster?

  – Some lobster, said Lucy. Bisque.

  – Never heard of it.

  – Very slow soup.

  – When did it come in?

  – It’s been in a while. Lobster bisque.

  making love to the skull

  – Let’s have a look at that head of yours, said Lucy.

  – Being the only one available, worst luck.

  – Pull your chair this way a bit. Under the light.

  – Then you can interrogate the skull, I’ve done my stint. What will your weapons be? Apart from li
ght, Lucy?

  She tucked a couple of tea towels round his neck. One was a terry towelling identification chart for the more exotic auks and seabirds. Razorbill, albatross and such. The other was of smooth linen and just said, on a green strip, GLASS. She went behind him and rattled in a drawer. He could hear the sound of scissors or small shears.

  – Your hair, she said.

  – Often compared to patches of gorse on a half-burnt hillside, he said. In the traditional love poetry of High Priest Island. I always thought the title of that island was ambiguous.

  – Was it nice, apart from the ambiguity?

  – I don’t remember getting there and I don’t remember leaving. I could have been wrecked and then unwrecked, I suppose. Snatches I recall.

  – Uninhabited?

  – Yes. I breathed and slept, ate and shat there. I wouldn’t give myself airs, I didn’t go the length of inhabiting it.