A is for Angelica

by Iain Broome

  ‘No I didn’t see anything.’

  ‘Me neither, but I heard them. Well, I heard him anyway.’ Don laughs and snorts without meaning to. He half-wipes his nose with his sleeve. I turn and check I’ve closed the door correctly.

  ‘What were they arguing about?’ I say.

  ‘I’ve got no idea. It was mainly him. He was effing and blinding. She said she didn’t want to talk about it. He’s a strange one.’

  ‘You spoke to Angelica? When did you speak to her?’

  ‘She was at the surgery when I picked up my prescription.’

  ‘At the surgery? What was she doing there?’

  ‘I don’t know. I didn’t ask. She looks like Christine, don’t you think?’

  ‘Christine? No. Not at all.’

  ‘Not even a bit?’

  ‘Not in the slightest. The last time you saw Christine she was twenty-one. That was over thirty years ago. You don’t know what she looks like now.’

  ‘No, but if she’d stayed.’

  ‘But she didn’t. They have different coloured hair. What did Angelica say about Benny?’

  ‘She didn’t say anything.’

  ‘Nothing at all?’

  ‘No, nothing. I mentioned it to her and she told me that she didn’t want to talk about it. I didn’t want to pry.’

  ‘That’s it? You should have pushed her. Neighbourhood security.’

  ‘Well I didn’t. So there you go.’

  I’m making Don feel uncomfortable. This would be an ideal time to tell him about Georgina. I could invite him in for a cup of tea and a piece of cake. I could explain to him what’s happening. I think about our evenings in together when Georgina was recovering. Our Tuesdays and Thursdays. Everything he did for me. If I can persuade him not to tell anyone, we can help her to get well again. Like we did the last time. I look at Don and the unwiped mucus on his upper lip. He’s combed his hair into a side parting.

  ‘Why are you wearing the suit?’ I ask. Don’s expression changes. That’s all he was after. A change of subject. Nothing awkward.

  ‘Eric Devaney. We buried him this morning.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Eric. He used to work with your dad.’

  ‘That doesn’t help. I don’t recognise the name. How did you know him?’

  ‘Just from seeing each other.’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘Round and about. Shopping. Just round and about.’

  ‘And you went to the funeral?’

  ‘Yes, his wife invited me.’

  ‘You didn’t tell me about it.’

  ‘You don’t even know him.’

  ‘Neither did you by the sounds of it.’

  Don tries to reply but cannot find the words. He almost looks upset. I want to speak to him about Georgina, but instead I’m bringing tears to his eyes. This hasn’t happened for months.

  ‘Have you come for your pickled onions?’

  ‘No, not really. I came to say hello. That’s all. See how you were.’

  ‘I’m fine.’

  ‘How did Georgina take the news?’

  ‘What news?’

  ‘About Kipling.’

  ‘Right, I see.’

  ‘Is she still at your parents? What’s she doing there?’

  ‘Helping them decorate.’

  ‘Really? That’s good news. What did she say about Kipling? Was she upset? I’ve been upset. I bet she was, wasn’t she?’

  The tears have disappeared and Don is now on the offensive. This is what he does. He tries to help but he wants to know too much. He’s unreliable. If I tell him anything, he’ll share it with the world. He’s a gossip. A nosy neighbour. I need to end this conversation, before he invites himself in.

  ‘Don, this really isn’t your business,’ I say. ‘Not anymore.’

  He opens his mouth to reply but once again the words don’t arrive. He doesn’t know what to say to me. The tears return and settle in the corners of his eyes. He does his best to keep them there, to stop them dribbling down his cheeks. I didn’t want this to happen. It didn’t need to be this way. Don turns and walks away from me. He gets to the end of the garden, stops and looks back.

  ‘What’s your problem, Gordon? What’s wrong with you? She’s better now. There are no excuses. I’m telling you. I won’t have it. Not again.’

  He doesn’t wait for a response and I don’t offer one. Instead I watch him cross the road, muttering under his breath. It takes him more than forty seconds. I wait until he’s gone. Then I open the door, go back inside to Georgina.

  Note: Angelica has been to the surgery three times in as many weeks. Repeat prescription possible. Something serious? Note end.

  It’s been four hours and fifteen minutes since I spoke to Don. I’ve been thinking about our conversation and I’ve decided I should speak to him again and ask him to return my spade. Three weeks ago, I had to steal back my clippers. I’m not going to steal back my spade. Instead, I’m going to ask for it politely. Georgina has been fed and watered. That’s what she calls it. Fed and watered, like a plant or a flower. I’m standing in the middle of Cressington Vale. The street is empty. No cars, no neighbours, no strangers. The moon is barely visible, just a sliver of white on black. I stare at it, two rows of houses either side of me. I look back at the landing light that creeps into Georgina’s bedroom. It’s dim through the curtains. You can barely tell that it’s there.

  I walk past Don’s wheelie bin, up and into his drive. The house is in darkness, because he never switches the lights on in the front. He only ever sits in the kitchen, which is round the back. Even when you knock on his door, like I am now, the lights stay off. He’d rather walk in the dark than pay for the electricity. You can hear him coming. Loose change rattling. I’m listening for it. He’s going to open the door in his pyjamas. I wait thirty seconds. He probably didn’t hear me. I knock again, a little harder. Sometimes he whistles. It becomes louder the nearer he gets. He has three songs, all of which he made up himself. I know them note for note. I press my ear to the door. Still no answer.

  I walk down the path by the side of his house. It’s overgrown with weeds that sprout up through the cracks in the slabs. There’s a patch of different-coloured concrete where the wheelie bin lives. I step over it and into the back garden. I look up at the house. The rooms at the back are dark as well. I walk to the fence, lean back to try and see a light through the bedroom, but there isn’t one. Don’s compost heap is now gigantic. I think about climbing up the side to get a better view. Then I notice that the shed door is slightly ajar. A shred of light flickering through the cracked window. I look closer. It’s a candle dancing, like Benny’s candles dance.

  I walk slowly across the grass and stand by the door of the shed. I look in through the gap by the frame. There are candles all over the floor and less than half of them are lit. The rest have either disappeared or gone out. I push on the door with my foot. It opens slowly, and there’s Don Donald, my best friend, sat dead on his chair in his black velvet suit, arm across his chest, underpants around his ankles. Skidmarked from front to back. On his desk is a picture. A young blonde woman with a loose perm and a hole through her forehead. Christine. His wife that was. I walk slowly towards him and pick up my spade by the window. It has a post-it note attached to the handle. It says, ‘Sorry about this morning, didn’t mean to pry.’ I pull up his underpants, zip his trousers and buckle his belt. I take the picture from the desk and reattach it to the dartboard. The same dart through the same hole. Before I leave, I blow out the candles. Then I pick them up, take them outside and hide them in the compost.

  He’d have done the same for me.

  New testament

  Don’s funeral is tomorrow. I’m standing outside the church gates and looking up at the clock that hasn’t worked for years. This is the first time I’ve been here since Judy broke into my house. She’s inside preparing for Sunday Mass. I was hiding behind one of the trees on the opposite side of the road when her car arrived. It ha
s a black sticker with white writing stuck to the inside of the rear window. It reads, ‘Trust me, I’m a vicar.’ I watched Judy climb out of the car, reach into the air, stretch and yawn. She walked to the boot and pulled out a leather briefcase. It was black and had her initials written on the side with Tipp-Ex. She also took out a red and transparent striped plastic bag with a pair of shoes inside. And what looked like a banana. Judy closed the boot, made her way through the graves and stopped at the church door. It took her three attempts to find the right key. I stayed out of view the entire time.

  I’ve come to church because I want to speak to Judy about what has happened. I want her to tell me that everything will be okay. That’s what she’s paid for and that’s what she does best. I’ve been expecting her to visit us again. She knows that I’ve been missing Mass and I thought she might want to know where I’ve been. There is rain in the air. My fingers are wrapped around the cold metal of the church gates. I take two steps forwards and then stop. I need to know what I’m going to say when I get inside. I have to have a plan of action. How will I start the conversation? With Kipling? Don? Georgina? Angelica perhaps. How much does a reverend really need to know?

  This is exactly how I felt a year ago. The first and only other time I’ve spoken to Judy about a problem. She was new then and Georgina had made little progress in the six months since her stroke, so I decided to stay behind after Sunday service. It was a beautiful day. Glorious sunshine. Judy told us about a fifty-year-old woman who lived in her previous parish and had started running marathons when she found out her father was dying of cancer. A fortnight before he died, her father ran one with her. He did it in his wheelchair. She pushed him all the way. I waited until the service had finished and Judy was saying her goodbyes. I stood at the end of the queue. When she got to me, she shook my hand and smiled.

  ‘Last one out today?’

  ‘Yes, it looks like it.’ She tried to let go of my hand but I held on tight and watched her smile disappear. She knew what was coming. It happened all the time. She was trained for this kind of thing. ‘Could you spare me five minutes?’

  ‘Of course, Gordon,’ she said. ‘Would you like a cup of tea?’

  ‘Thank you. Yes please.’

  I followed Judy through the door at the back of the church and into a small room with a sink, one chair and a microwave. I’d been in there before, but it looked different. Judy had decorated.

  ‘This is my new kitchen,’ she said. ‘Sit yourself down. How can I help?’

  The chair was smaller than a normal-sized chair because she’d made it herself at night class and only had a certain amount of wood. One of the legs was shorter than the others, which meant it rocked from side to side when I sat on it. I watched Judy fill the kettle with water from the tap. She was waiting for me to ask her my question. Standing over me. Like an angel or a skyscraper.

  ‘How do you keep faith?’ I said. Judy turned off the tap.

  ‘That’s an interesting question. Do you mean how do I keep faith or how does anyone keep faith at all?’

  ‘The second one. When it’s hardest to believe.’

  Judy paused. She looked away from me, opened the microwave and took out two china teacups and two teabags. She placed them on the worktop.

  ‘The microwave is also the cupboard,’ she said. I tried to look impressed. Judy plugged the kettle in at the wall and flicked the switch. She wiped her hands on her gown and turned slowly. She bent her knees and knelt on the floor. We were equal heights again. ‘Gordon, you’ve had quite a shock to the system. There’s no shame in admitting that things have been terribly tough. And it’s at times like this, when things are at their toughest, that you need your faith the most. The Lord is with you. Make no mistake about it. And you’re family too, I’m sure.’

  ‘There is no family. We have no children.’

  ‘No. What about your parents? Your brothers and sisters?’

  ‘I was an only child and so was Georgina. Both her parents are dead.’

  ‘Well, I’m sorry to hear that. Your own mother and father? They must be a source of support.’

  ‘I haven’t seen them since Georgina had her stroke. Six months ago.’

  ‘Goodness me, Gordon. Why ever not?’

  ‘Because my father blames me for what happened. He thinks that it was my fault.’

  ‘It was no-one’s fault, Gordon. Are you sure that there hasn’t been a misunderstanding?’

  ‘I’m positive. He told me a week after the stroke when we were at the hospital. My mother left the room to get some fresh air and my father sat on the edge of the bed. He said he’d always liked Georgina. That she was part of the family. But she wasn’t a believer. Not like the rest of us.’

  ‘But he didn’t say that it was your fault.’

  ‘No. But that’s what he meant. That she was being punished. And that I should have seen it coming. Asked her to change.’

  ‘What did you do?’

  ‘I told him to leave. We haven’t spoken since.’

  Judy stood up, leaned on the sink and waited for the kettle to boil. She poured two cups of tea. I held mine with both hands and let the heat warm my fingers.

  ‘Your faith, Gordon, is yours alone. Make of it what you will. It’s not for me to tell you how to keep it. Your father neither. But I believe the Lord is with you.’

  ‘How do you know?’

  ‘I don’t. It’s just what I believe.’

  It’s now half past ten and I am walking home from church having not gone inside and having not spoken to Judy. The rain that was in the air before is now falling to the pavement, the houses and the cars driving past me. It’s spitting in my face and rolling down my cheeks. This is the correct decision. This is the path I need to take. There is nothing that Judy can say or do to make things any better. What’s done is done. I need to do things my way.

  Non-attendance

  It’s the day of Don Donald’s funeral and I’m standing on the central reservation of the dual carriageway. It connects the motorway to the town and there’s supposed to be a service station on the junction. Hundreds of vehicles turn off every day. They get to the roundabout, find the service station is just a garage with ‘coal scum’ spray painted on the side and take the first exit back to the motorway. They’re expecting toilets, treats and Burger King. They get petrol, pies and charcoal. And if it’s summer, and they’re lucky, they get bird tables.

  I’ve already crossed the road heading into town. When the traffic breaks, I’ll cross the road heading out. Cars are flashing past me: lorries, vans and motorbikes. They’re an arm’s length away. I lean back and grip the metal barrier. In the distance, a bus pulls into the fast lane to overtake a caravan. 200 yards away. 100 yards. 50 yards. I close my eyes and feel the gathering roar, the warm, fuel-filled air pressed against my face and the silence of my heart stopping for a moment. Then I open my eyes. The road is clear and it’s safe to move. I make my way across the road, but have to stop in the slow lane, wait for a cyclist to pass.

  Once I reach the other side, I start to walk along the hard shoulder. I put my fist to my mouth like a horn and whistle one of Don’s songs. But I can’t hear it. The sound is lost in the noise from the road. I can smell petrol fumes and cinnamon. The cinnamon is on my fingers from baking this morning. The petrol fumes are everywhere. I look around at the road, the clouds and the sky. Three glorious shades of grey. The police helicopter circling above me. Bright yellow metal, like a substitute sun. I pull my suit sleeve up and look at my watch. Don’s funeral started thirty minutes ago. I keep whistling, march onwards to the garage for cigarettes. And a pornographic newspaper.

  Note: The lorry game. 1 yellow. 2 blue. 3 green. 4 red (two Post Office). 6 plain metal black or grey. Note end.

  ‘Hello, how are you?’ says the assistant from behind the counter. He’s new. He must be in his late twenties, which means he shouldn’t be working in a garage. I’ve only just walked in. There’s no need for him to speak to me yet.
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  ‘I’m just browsing,’ I reply, even though it’s a lie. I know exactly what I’m here for. But now I’ve said it, so I pretend to look at crisp packets, like I’m choosing between flavours. I pick up a carton of milk. Read the label. Put it back again.

  ‘Let me know if you need any help.’

  ‘Will do,’ I say, and turn my back on him. I walk around the shop to the gift section. That’s new as well. It contains pens with furry creatures shoved on the end. Road maps two years out of date. A big bag of bird seed with a sparkling gold star attached to the front. It reads, ‘Half Prise’ instead of price. Most of the display is taken up by travel games. They’re on sale at 99p each. They take up two thirds of allotted ‘gift’ space. I assume they fell off the back of a lorry. I pick up Travel Scrabble and find Travel Magic Set underneath. I pick that up too and read the back of the box, which tells me it contains three dice, three plastic cups, a small sponge ‘wonderball’ and a red handkerchief. It also reads, “Caution: Travel Magic not suitable for bumpy journeys and children under three years of age.”

  ‘You can buy them both for £1.50,’ says the assistant. ‘It’s a special offer.’

  ‘Do you have any cigarettes?’ I ask him as I go to the counter. I look down at the badge pinned to his chest. His name is Martin and his cheeks are covered in pockmarks. They make him look ten years older than he probably is. ‘How old are you?’ I say.

  ‘Eighteen,’ he replies. He could pass for thirty.

  ‘How long have you worked here?’

  ‘Three days.’

  ‘How much would fifteen litres of diesel cost me?’

  ‘Are you getting petrol?’

  ‘No, I said diesel.’

  ‘It’s just you don’t have a car with you.’

  ‘No, I don’t have a car with me.’

  ‘Is it parked round the side? I didn’t see you pull in.’

  ‘I don’t have a car. I was testing you.’

  ‘What was the test?’

  ‘Fifteen litres of diesel.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘How much would it cost me to buy fifteen litres of diesel?’