‘How much?’ I ask the guy in overalls. He jerks his thumb at a wooden wendy house floating in long grass. There’s a big, white face at the window. I wave. It goes away. I flatten my tongue with my fingers, split the road sounds clean in half with a whistle. A man steps out, smooth and plump, stuck to his hand, a polystyrene box. Oily slap chips go box, fingers, mouth, box, fingers, mouth.
‘How much?’ I point at her with my boot. She looks past, smiles.
He comes closer, spits chips, ‘All between three and four.’
I bend down, look into her patient, grey eyes.
I want her. Badly.
A red and cream Carmen Gia ramps the curb, swerves, stops. Idles like a flippin lawnmower, blowing black smoke. The little car rolling with boy students. Elbows, twitchy eyebrows. You know, good teeth. Their fear smells like earthworms. Plus yeast from their Dutch courage beer.
‘How much?’ The redhead at the wheel’s got serious, red eyes. A dry throat, his lips pulled up like a nervous dog. The dark boy on the back seat’s already got a hard on. I can tell by the way his skin shines, the way he swallows like he’s downing raw egg. Another huge oke, curly brown hair, face cut in a block. Full of giggles.
‘Buy it for me.’ I tap her head. ‘The stone lady. Three hundred bucks.’
They’re confused.
‘We can put her in the boot …Then find some nice, soft grass.’ But they’ve got golf clubs in the boot, maths notes and clothes. The red head explains, ‘Ox is moving digs.’
The big oke says, ‘But we got waylaid by the Red Parrot.’
‘Waylaid, ha ha ha.’ The shiny oke goes on a bit long.
Ox adds some maths. ‘About … twenty three kilometres off our course.’
I never, ever do groups. Not since that navy oke broke my arm. These boys are pack dogs, but they’re as green as the overgrown grass at the Princess’s feet. So me and the Princess squeeze against the window on the back seat. We sit quietly, not one unladylike laugh. The boys drink like pigs on the way, guzzle beer like they’re going to their flippin death.
We stop in a nice, neat graveyard. Nothing like the one on the M5. There’s money for big headboards in these bloody beds, money to trim the nice, green blankets. Far, far away, a guy works a weed eater.
Princess watches us through the windscreen.
I pay for her one at a time. The redhead chickens out. Sobers up too fast, sits worrying on the back bumper. We do it behind a huge headstone, some girl who died when she was six. 1970 to 1976. ‘Our Darling, Our Light.’ Four years before I was born. The big oke, Ox, is quite out of it. Hefty beef shoulders, beef flanks, sits slack against a tree, drinking some more. Shiny Face is hyperactive. ‘We might as well do it all, hey Ox? We might get shot tomorrow at the ATM. If Bush carries on with his shit, we could be totalled by a radioactive cloud. If the wind switches to North.’
Ox nods, his elbow slips off his knee.
‘Don’t watch, Ox, you’ll make me anxious.’
Ox laughs a slow, gurgling laugh.
Shiny Face is premature. Talks through his oops. ‘We might as well go all the way, hey Ox? Why not?’ He zips up. He hasn’t spoken to me once. Not even thanks. Ox’s not sure, but Shiny Face pushes him, ‘Be a man, Dan. Be a man.’
Geez, Ox nearly breaks my spine, collapses on top of me before he even starts. There’s no chance of me going on top, not with another ou watching. Men are like that. Shiny Face talks all the way through, ‘Not bad stock, she can carry you, Ox.’ I turn my head, give him a dirty look. Try brace my back.
Ox slurs, ‘Sorry sweetheart.’
They smoke a joint in the car afterwards. I take some tokes cause it’s late. Nearly time for my big five. Princess handles the smoke, graceful. She must have put a good word in for me while I was busy, cause the redhead offers me a lift home. I’m stoked cause I’m hanging for my Syns. Twenty minutes to Muizenberg, twenty minutes to easy sweet.
I make him drop me a block from my flat, cause I don’t trust guilt in a growing boy. The coloured oke from number twenty two lugs the Princess in. Me saying nicely, ‘If you drop her, I’ll kill you.’ He goes for the balcony. I shout ‘No!’ a bit loud.
I climb the ladder, tell him to pass her up. But she’s too bloody tall. I lug her down, scraping skin, shaking. I stagger past him. Shunt her in the corner. ‘She’s sick of the sun.’
I nudge him out. He goes slowly like he’s expecting something. Then I climb up, away from that fat sunbeam in the flat. Have my sweet snack from the belly of the doll. I chill with my statue, just like Helen of the desert.
I come across Evil again.
It’s the same day that Musica comes back. When Musica pulls up, I think I’ll go, so long as he locks up his cats. He gets right out the car, holds his breath like he’s gonna propose or something. Drops a CD on the tar. Picks it up. His curls are waxed stiff to spite the South Easter. He hands me a whole pile of CDs. Annie out on a jump, Natasha and Aisha staring from their yield sign.
‘What, you haven’t got cash?’ but I smile cause they’re watching.
‘It’s to say thanks.’ He looks serious. ‘I got you Avril Lavigne and Dido and Evanescence. I wanted to get you Ferdie but …’ ‘What for?’ I smile for Natasha and Aisha.
‘Just sommer.’
I shrug. ‘It won’t get you free sex.’
He tries to hide his hot cheeks with his hands. ‘Man, I’m just saying thank you.’
‘Ohhh.’ I get it then. ‘For saying you’re gay?’
He stares at his black laceups.
‘Sheez, that’s nothing.’
He walks to his Beetle, all awkward, his arms and legs going wrong. As he gets in, the wind whips his smile skew. I’ve got a new friend, whether I like it or not.
I leave the CDs at the garage. The mechanic there keeps stuff for us cause he’s into Annie, thinks he’s in with a chance.
My last jump’s scared of gangsters hijacking him in the bush, so we go all the way to the Marina picnic park. A salesman from Bloemfontein. Bit of a dirty number. Blackheads in his ears, for God’s sake. Glasses that turn his eyes to goldfish. An old man goes past the car with something small on a leash, so we get out and go into the bush. It stinks like hell, but there’s a nice, thick bush and a dip in the ground from two bodies rocking. It’s weird cause there are white houses across the water, facing us straight with blind, flashing windows. All they can see is the bush moving, like there’s birds nesting in it. But it’s just me, rocking for my supper.
I make the ou drop me off in St. James, half a kay past my flat. He says I look like his very first girlfriend. I tell him, ‘Trust me. It wasn’t me.’ Before he drops me off he asks where he can find me at night.
‘I don’t work in the dark, dork.’ I duck off the road, in case he chucks a u-turn and tries to find me. I stick to the concrete path along the sea, watch it grab at the land, tryna settle its foam. A train comes past like an axe, cuts the land off from the sea. Screeching, full of strop. I’m nearly at the dip in the path, there at the subway, when I see a guy standing in the shadow. His hands in his pockets. His pants rolled up, skraal calves. He’s wearing Nikes, skollie brand. His head sags back like he’s tripping a bit. He’s got a side fringe, a snub nose. Piggy nostrils pull up his top lip. As I go closer, I see the kink. And the ink lines on his skin. It’s the tattooed guy from the beach. The same ugly air around him.
I stop, lean against the rail. Make like I’m looking at the sea, slide my eyes sideways. Flick off my shoes, one in each hand. The CDs are already rolled in my jacket, the sleeves tied. I’m ready to run, but I stare straight at him instead. His eyes inside are black spinning clouds, flippin horrible. But I whip my fear into anger, an old trick. I let it hassle my spine, up and down, up and down, a dog on a wire. I walk past him, straight through his sneer. Right through the dip. I’m safe on the straight. I turn, walk backwards. Hold him back. Get the hell out.
The wind comes front, side, back. It feels like he’s following me. Up pa
st Bailey’s Cottage. I think he’s after me. He is. The wind’s in my body now, gusting. I’m shit scared, I dunno why. I bang creeps every day.
Just after the thatch roof of Bailey’s, I pass a square old bag with a hunch. Misted up glasses and a cross terrier. Fat little dog on a leash. ‘Come on Esprit,’ she nags the dog, tryna stop him from doing legups.
I go over the rise, run a few steps. Force myself back to a walk. Suddenly the air behind me goes slack.
Shit.
The bulky old bat. And Esprit.
I run up the bank, onto the railway line. Jump the space between the sleepers. Scoop a handful of stones, run the line till I spot her behind Bailey’s. The old girl’s spread on the path. Esprit’s paws on her back, licking her ear.
‘What’s it?’ I shout.
She turns her head, sniffs the wind. Blood runs from her scalp. Her glasses are gone.
‘What happened?’ I ski down the bank. ‘It was that flipping guy, wasn’t it?’
She starts to cry. A tired, toddler sound. She’s ruined, shaking. I swing round a full circle, snarling, add my own weird sound to her crying. My heart beats my knees as I crouch down, rub her hunchback. Esprit jumps at me, blood on his tongue. ‘I know who did it. Don’t worry. I saw the guy. Come.’
She can’t get up. She’s like set in the cement.
‘I can’t see.’ She cries some more. Grips onto me like she’s in a current. I shove off the licking Esprit, twist my wrist out of her flippin steel grip. Check all around, a growl still in my throat. Her glasses are under a bench with some cigarette butts. Cracked. She hangs them on her face. Her sight shocks her to think. ‘My rings, love. My watch!’ Only then I check the horrible scratches on her arms, her hands, evil lines of missing skin.
It’s like moving furniture tryna get her into Bonita’s flat. The girls run up, call Bonita down. We push and pull her up the stairs, like moving a flipping fridge. The flat is full of snoek air. Snoek getting lekker burnt. Bonita gets some chocolate from deep in the bedroom. Gives some to the old bag. Gives us all a block, sticks one in her mouth, ‘For the shock,’ she says. What a joke. Bonita’s been throttled, stabbed, chased by a gang.
She dials the police. Lets it ring till the end of its life. Tries again. And again. When they answer, she gives me the phone. I speak low and hard. Mustn’t let them know it’s me. I recognise Constable Chandler, she arrested me once for soliciting. I know her little knife eyes. Her interest starts nice and high when I say, ‘There’s been an attack.’
It fades when I say, ‘She’s got a cut in the head.’
‘No, she’s conscious, but she’s in bad shock,’ switches her off.
All she says is, ‘No van.’
When I put the phone down the old bat says clearly, suddenly grown up. ‘My car key. He took it from my pocket.’ She pokes a claw at the window. ‘He took my Toyota.’ She starts crying again, like a small kid that’s lost its mother.
Bonita gets onto the phone. Also changes her voice. Stands there in a black flouncy skirt blotched with orange pansies. A scar like a bicycle tyre up her calf. Criss cross stitch scars. She was up on Ou Kaapse Weg with a new regular. She’s got quite a tight life, you know with the girls. She sets tight rules. Mornings only. Regulars only. She was busy with this new regular, who slammed her down, hung her head out the car door. Pulled out a cardboard cutter. Everyone made jokes after September Eleven but I’m telling you, those cutters cut you like butter. He hung her out, tryna cut her throat so she’d bleed on the grass. But she kneed him or something and the cutter swiped up, cut off the tip of her nose. No jokes, the tip’s missing. Gone. It’s got a flat end. Bonita ripped herself out from under him, but he grabbed her foot. Looked into her eyes and cut through her muscle, right to the bone. She said she hopped like it was the mother’s race at sports day. The pig went after her. Bonita’s got a helluva voice, she must’ve moved rocks with her screaming. Thank God for the guy in khaki. All dolled up to track the baboons. Veld hat, water bottle, sun cream. A volunteer baboon monitor. Instead he got screaming Bonita.
She had the bastard’s number plate. She’s got a good brain for numbers. I can ask her any of her regulars, she rattles off their registration. But the police did bugger all. Bugger all. It’s not legal, you see, to go and lie on the mountain for money. So mad pigs can slice us like flipping polony.
Bonita’s crafty. She says on the phone, in a university tone, ‘One of Councillor Drummond’s neighbour’s has had her car stolen. She says the Councillor will bring her up to the station if you don’t come …’ Then, ‘Thank you. Surfer’s Corner … That’s right. See you, dear.’
I give the CDs to Bonita’s girls. They’re stoked. Sharonne takes Avril and Dido to the room. Josie sticks Evanescence on their little player, goes back to her horse riding. She’s made stirrups with an old leather belt. A skipping rope for reins, tied to an old oil heater. She trots on the back of their stuffed up brown couch, keeping up, maybe, with the white horses in the sea.
I go watch Sharonne plaiting her hair. ‘Here, let me do that. I’m hot with hair.’
‘Uh-uh. Nooit.’ She grabs her mirror and runs into the bathroom.
‘Come on,’ I tease her outside the door. ‘I’ll make it like mine.’ ‘Nooit! No thanks.’
She can’t believe my hair. I scrunch it, just about Chinese bangle it to get it to lift. She stretches her hair. Binds it tight to make it quiet. She’s weirdly neat, this kid. Her clips in a line on the table. The table scrubbed bald, I swear. Bonita picked that table up on the pavement. I remember, it had Solly is my soul mate and Scum scratched on top. Sharonne scrubbed it raw with Goldilocks, extra strong steel wool.
There are three beds in the room, hers is the one that looks bandaged. Pulled so tight there’s no chance of a wrinkle. Bonita says she’s been like this since Bonita split from their dad. When Sharonne was two she started storing stuff in plastic bags. Shoprite bags rolled up tight. Her toothbrush, her crayons. Her shoes, even. Said she was keeping them clean.
I take out my extra Syns. Check I’m alone. It’s a bit early, but with all the drama, there’s no harm. I chuck them back, swallow. But they get stuck in my pipe and I’ve got to get to the kitchen tap fast.
Evanescence is quite cool. She asks, like, Help me, wake me, it’s so dark inside me. I dance a bit, stare at the old woman’s cut. Her scalp’s like rubber through her wispy white hair. She nods as Josie jogs the couch with her trotting. Evanescence sings, like, Help me, help me, I don’t wanna be a nothing. Bonita unsticks the burnt snoek from the pan.
Downstairs, the beach preacher’s by the showers as usual. His arms and legs too long for his black suit. His bible too heavy for his bony wrists. Mad in the head, he doesn’t make sense. I open the window a bit.
‘God will bring terrible things. He will break up the ground. He will bring down the sky. God will burn us so our skins come off, like … like …’ He watches a plastic bag blow against a surfer’s leg. ‘… like a plastic.’
Another surfer under the shower, the water blowing sideways. He stares at the preacher like he must be dreaming.
‘The woman at the house she goes out and she drinks. The husband he gets very angry. He beats her up. God will beat him. God will beat her. When God comes again, he will beat them all. He will show the ANC. And the IFP. Even Buthelezi. Even the Democratic Alliance. Everyone. Even the drug dealers. Even the prostitutes …’
Geez. My TV’s not keeping him home.
Randall and Muffy, the bergies, are going through the bins in the car park. Some kid just ditched his chips and I know why. It’s that sick sauce they chuck on the chips at the surfer’s snack van. Looks like the blood of a lamb, tastes like poison. Randall and Muffy scoff it. An old, silver haired surfer swerves away from their red fingers as they beg for small change. Trots away with his board, stretches his hamstrings on the sand. There’s a guy standing in the circle, looking up at me.
‘There he is! It’s him, I swear!’
Blu
e lines tickle out his cuffs, crawl up his neck. His thick wavy fringe, dark eyes like drills.
‘It’s the guy from the catwalk! Look man, Bonita, on the circle, with the tats.’
‘Don’t be dom, Tess. That’s Merrick.’
He lifts a hand. His teeth glint like blades.
Josie says, ‘Mommy’s boyfriend.’
Bonita waves the spatula, smiles a smile you don’t often see.
She waves him up.
I keep trying, ‘I swear, he’s the flipping robber.’
Evil shakes his head, calls her down. She says, ‘Tess, don’t be dof.’
‘He followed me. He attacked her.’
‘Man he’s always on the catwalk. He’s a businessman.’
‘Drugs?’
She says nothing.
‘It was him.’
‘Tess, are you on something?’
‘It was him.’
Just then, the cops pitch up. Bonita hustles the old lady downstairs. She handles the whole thing, chats to Hanif and the Pretoria policeman. Not once does she look up or point. Cuts me dead as a witness.
Right at the end of Jan, the real trouble starts.
Flip, it’s weird. I think it’s the thirty first.
Hanif takes the coast road towards Mitchells Plain. Whacks through the bush, parks his cop van on a screaming steep cliff. Here even the fynbos ducks away from the wind, cause if it lifts its head, it gets a helluva haircut. Everywhere else in the bay the sea is shallow at the edges, but here the deep sea races up from the south and rams into the rock. It’s chronic, this place. Wind, sea, rock. Everyone says, a hot spot for suicide.
Hanif sticks his van in reverse, snaps bone, it sounds like, to get a good view. Pays me half price, a pink one. I’m flippin glad cause it’s rent day, but I hate him for making me. I can’t say no to this cop, up on a suicide cliff, working his day off in my vagina. And he likes me bare, bare in the bloody bush while he stays dressed. His gun and his baton strapped on. He’s perched on the back of his van, and I’m doing the up, down, us both facing the sea. I’m sweating, feeling faint, the South Easter needles my teeth, dries my eyes. I’m due for a dose.
Whiplash Page 3