Whiplash

by Tracey Farren

  So I faked being filled. I threw myself down like I’d seen at the community hall when I spied through the window.

  ‘Ah Jesus, thank you Jesus, Thank you Lord, for changing me, showing me I’m a sinner.’ I started making up a funny language, like they did at the community hall, but that freaked him out. He grabbed me, stuck his hand over my mouth to stop me talking in tongues. His face against my face. I struggled like a maniac, till suddenly he let go, made me spin and fall.

  He ran into the bathroom. Came out with Jeyes Fluid drain-cleaner. Poured some into his juice bottle. Poured a bit of water. Oh my God, I thought. It’s suicide. He’s dying for Christ! I tried to snatch it, but he held me off like I was a bloody insect. Way too strong for me to save. I wanted to run for help. ‘Tell me! Where’s the key?’

  He put up a hand, took a swig. Washed the poison round his mouth. Chucked his head back. Gargled. Ran and spat into the basin. Spoke to the plug hole, ‘I do that every time I want to kiss a girl.’

  ‘It’s poison!’

  ‘It’s right.’

  ‘You’re gonna …’ Sheez, then I worked it out. ‘You’re stuffing up your teeth!’

  ‘My sacrifice.’ He shrugged, all noble.

  This oke was cooked. I sighed, ‘Bless you,’ like they did at the community hall. ‘Hallelujah. Can I have the key?’

  It was in the inside pocket of his school blazer. He got it in the lock, but before he opened up, his eyes got stuck on my mouth. He bolted back to the bathroom for another dose. I got the hell out. Ran home in the dark. Green liqueur on my uniform, my school bag left behind.

  You were up. I mean, can you believe it? You were up and waiting in the lounge. You shrieked at me and hit me with your slop. A beach slop, from the old days. A slip slop across my face. Graham was up, his pajama pants hanging on his hips, his white haunches showing. He whispered, ‘Flossie. Nymph.’

  But he left it to you. You flew all over, arms waving. Screaming, ‘How dare you!’

  ‘He locked me in!’

  ‘How dare you stay out with a boy?’

  ‘He didn’t touch me!’

  ‘You stink of alcohol. How can you not come home? Like a slut!’

  ‘He was playing the piano!’

  ‘What kind are you? Where’s your self respect?’

  ‘He was waiting for the Spirit!’

  A mad screaming conversation. My face swelling from the rubber slapping. Christ, I suffered cause of Jesus. Hit in the face by a ghost of a mother, eyes burning black, her hair flat at the back from years on the pillow.

  Graham tried to punish me with sex. He came in whispering, ‘Little slut.’ I kicked at him. I kicked cause I’d seen my mother rise up.

  ‘Leave me, leave me, get out of my room!’

  I thought, I’ll take fiddling in the night for the sake of love. But I won’t take it for punishment. For punishment, I’ll take my mother’s slop.

  Something happened to me that night. I got locked up by a Christ maniac. I didn’t get kissed. I didn’t get laid. I didn’t get filled with the Holy Spirit. But I saw you in a state of rage. I saw you rise up and say No.

  So I said No.

  I’ve got No in me, now, but I hit the road hard. It’s weird cause all the time I’m remembering No, I’m saying, Yes, try your best.

  I mean, half the time I’m thinking, flip, I survived, I got out. The other half I’m legs wide taking it from a stranger.

  I get this guy who owns a chill business. A whole flock of salt water tanks, he says, for stressy city slickers. Tells me they go into small, dark tanks and float around in salty water. Tells me it’s like the Dead Sea. Talks non flippin stop. ‘Do you know why the Dead Sea’s so salty?’

  Like I care.

  ‘It’s the lowest point on the earth. The water has nowhere to drain to. It sits and evaporates and leaves intense concentrations of minerals behind.’

  It’s like me, the Dead Sea. The lowest point. Nowhere to go.

  But all I say is, ‘I bet it burns your fanny.’

  He’s all serious. ‘Maybe a little. But the Queen of Sheba, Cleopatra, they all went in to be healed.’ He’s got smooth, olive oil skin. Shadowy lids. Doesn’t stop talking till he goes in. Starts telling me the Dead Sea’s where some goat herds found a whole lot of ancient scrolls. They sold them to an antique dealer who sold them to a university who sold them to a monastery … I interrupt him, ‘Man, do you want your money back?’

  He gets on with it. I dunno if he’s Arab or Israeli or Indian. All I know is he wants it standing up. Long fingers on my hips. He sings to the finches, I swear,F in his thick, oil voice. Each drive in a long ‘Aaah,’ like a chant.

  I said No to Graham after the slop.

  And after that, I said No to Gonads. The oke from school, that’s what they called him. A handsome guy, big, you know, with hair the colour of beach sand. Golden hair on his legs, the hero of the matrics. He was like, the stud. He even went out with Cindy for a bit, after she’d been with the Indian waiter. ‘Nympho,’ the kids called her. ‘She screws anything.’ She must’ve been grateful when Gonads asked her out, cause he was so cool. He went round with her hanging on like a monkey, like she was so light he didn’t know she was there.

  But his name gave me the creeps. I imagined two swollen testicles, curling with golden hair. Maybe he saw me staring down there. Maybe that’s why he asked me to go down the stairwell with him.

  I didn’t cry, I was past all that. But I felt trapped. The boys told the girls that Gonads asked me, and suddenly everyone was looking at me with respect. He was bloody handsome, you see. Eyes like sky chips. The other girls acted like I’d won a modeling contract or something. It’s like I had no choice.

  I was scared in the dark, under the stairwell. I kept my eyes on the blast of sunlight at the exit. Found out quick-quick that his gonads weren’t big. He felt around inside my pants. He got his penis out and thought he’d gone in. I swear, acted like he was inside. I got the giggles. Every time he thrust and moaned was funny as hell cause he wasn’t even in. He was nowhere near. I laughed and laughed till he pulled my hair to shut me up. Asked me what’s so funny.

  ‘You missed.’

  He stared at me, tryna read my eyeballs in the gloom. He pulled his pants back up and walked through the tunnel into the blown out sunlight. The shape of him was beautiful. Easy shoulders, long legs. His hair flared like a match when it touched the sunlight.

  That afternoon there were rumours I’d had an abortion. The girls cornered me in the girls toilets. He said he’d done an examination and it felt like I’d had one, maybe two abortions. They believed him, even though it was the filthiest thing you could say about a girl in that place. The problem was, I blushed when they said it. Red, red, red, from my nipples to my roots. The rims of my eyes went red, I saw them in the mirror. ‘What junk, man. He’s telling lies cause he got lost.’ It came out croaky and sopping. ‘I swear, he got lost.’

  I turned to the wall, tryna hide my stupid eyes. Only red haired Lily understood. ‘You mean he couldn’t find the hole?’

  I nodded. I loved her for getting it.

  But I cried into some toilet paper when the bell rang. What Gonads said was double terrible cause I had this shame about being different down there. Like Doctor Deranged said.

  But I laughed at golden Gonads under the stairs. I told him No. And I said No to Dave Delirious, the old DJ. I said No to him and his flippin gold cross. He bought it for me at American Swiss. American bloody swish. I saw the pamphlets with the junk mail that blew in circles at the stairs.

  Just after he bought it, I found out his secret.

  I’d had a few shandies. Dave bought me grown up drinks till he saw I got sick quickly, so he switched me to shandies with max lemonade. We were at the London Town Pub. They’d booked him to handle a down-down competition. The boys who went on stage were rugby players or Zimbabweans, not sure which. Muscles in their thighs loose on their night off. Striped jerseys. Funny blunt hairlines at th
e back. Opening their throats, like snorting beer. Dave whipping up the crowd. It was catchy, I drank too much. I started teasing Dave when he came and sat with me and his friends from the radio station. Ag, I just wanted to make them all laugh.

  ‘D’you know that Dave talks to cats in his sleep?’

  ‘He does what?’ Rupert from the station was always tryna knock Dave. ‘I heard him. In the middle of the night, fast asleep, he went, You’re splendid, my darling. You’re so beautiful, kitty cat.’ The band stopped on a flipping ringing symbol. Rupert stared into his drink. Dave finished his, his eyes dead fish. His lips pulled so tight his moustache slipped in his mouth.

  Rupert’s fiancé said in the toilets, ‘You know it’s her name, hey?’

  ‘What?’ I squeezed foamy soap into my hand.

  ‘Kitty Cat. It’s his cute name for Catherine.’

  The tap gushing, our eyes crashed in the mirror. I scrunched my hair with wet hands, laughed this crazy laugh, like of course I knew.

  The next weekend I’d spent like two hours tryna curl my hair smart, getting ready for his end of the year station party. I was sitting there kaalgat, just my makeup and my new curls. I swear he walked in, lifted my arm. Found tiny black prickles there. Sighed. ‘Catherine says you should get yourself a beautician.’

  I danced that night with my arms in the air. Next day I dumped the DJ and his ex, dumped the gold cross. I hated that cross anyway. A ten ton truck on my collar bone. And I couldn’t compete with his Kitty. A spiteful Englishwoman calling me names from Buckingham Palace, rude words and flippin waxed skin. White fingers for clear diamonds. Never mind a cross that goes black in the sea air. A chain you’ve gotto soak in Coke to get it clean. Me, sticky from Durban heat, my one and only chain threading through my freckles, my cheap red paint that chipped in minutes. My melted on jeans to snap men’s necks at the Marine parade. When I left, I took a fifty from his wallet, not one cent more. I dropped the cross into it.

  A towtruck driver comes to the house. A strip of orange hair round a big bald spot. His freckles way out of control. Short little bugger. Shuts his eyes tight, like he’s freaked out by the birds. Maybe an excuse to try slip into my bum.

  ‘No,’ I say every time. Put him right. ‘Hey, open your eyes, then you know where to go.’

  He opens his eyes, shuts them again. ‘The birds worrying you?’

  He giggles, so I know I’m right. I take him into the feed room.

  It’s very close to the road, but this jump’s nice and quiet. Outside on the road some little girl sings, ‘Par-sley, are you sailing away in your sin …’ getting the words all wrong. Her friend stops her, ‘It’s not parsley, it’s porcelain!’

  ‘What’s porcelain?’

  Silence.

  She starts singing again, ‘Par-sley, are you missing the love of your skin …’

  ‘It’s not parsley.’ They start arguing again. I’m bent over the newspapers, the back page. A picture of some young chick tryna look sexy, but too young to pull it off. It’s more like she’s asking the okes to come play catches, or come eat home made fudge. She’s still innocent. Me, shit. I was never like that.

  I feel sad, sad, looking at that young, playful chick. Outside, the innocent little girls singing. Inside, the towtruck driver banging, knocking a whole lot of sesame seeds onto the girl’s boobs. Towtruck tries one more time for the bum. This time I give his balls a slap. Turn over.

  But I said No to Warren the bouncer. No to his bastard photos. Bastard said they were only for him, to keep me alive and naked in his mind. So he used a flash and I posed like I’d been born a bunny girl. I should’ve known cause first time we had sex, he told all his friends. I tried my best to give him an excellent flip cause girls chucked themselves at him every night. I wanted him to see me, single me out in the Friday night squash. Fast track me into the club. Okay, plus I was a bit into him.

  It was just after Dave the DJ. I was off the beachfront verandas, back at the agency. On our nights off, me and some of the escort girls hit the late night clubs, danced up close with ourselves in the mirror. We got high on the electric eye from the straight boys and lesbians. Watched the gay boys doing their marathon kisses, down the throat on the plastic couches.

  I wanted Warren to remember me, so the first night I made him do it on the floor, under the bed. He got a roastie on his spine from a bolt on the bed and the news went out to his old school friends that I was wild and exciting.

  ‘You look taller, Warren, what have you been hanging from?’

  ‘Are those rope burns around your wrists?’

  Warren was a weightlifter. A school boy tryna be a macho man. He wore t-shirts that said, Try me, you die. Power House. One that said Built, I swear. Schoolboy souvenirs all over his flat. Shot-put trophies, a school tie on the wall with some stolen traffic signs. He snorted coke off a ruler scratched with Warren Smuts, Standard 7, St. James High School. I mean, he was twenty five.

  His friend Trevor told me about the photos. He did it in self defence cause Trev was meant to be straight, but I caught him in the fire escape. That night there was the stink of amyl nitrate, made you light on your feet and laugh like crazy. I had like a burst of brilliance. I shouted to one of my escort friends, ‘Hey, you know what? I bet they put poppers in the air conditioning.’ I danced into the fire escape, dizzy and silly, tryna check out my guess. There was Trevor, St. James rugby star, chairman of the old boys’ association, kissing a thin thing with black roots and lined eyes. Hand in his pants feeling for jelly tots. Shame, Trev nearly evaporated. Instead he said, ‘Hey, Tess. Sweet beaver.’

  ‘What d’you mean by that?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  The thin boy joined in, ‘I don’t know why, but I’m thinking of a purple planet, out theeere …’

  Straight away Trev wanted to rewind, shut his lover up. But it hit me like a flippin train.

  ‘Oh. Oka-ay … Has anyone ever photographed this purple planet?’

  Trev nodded. Gave me a proper sorry look. The boy shoved through the swing door. Trev gave him a few seconds. Followed him.

  I went berserk that night. It must have been the poppers. I ripped at Warren’s hair, raked his neck with my nails. Pulled at his ears like they were clip ons. A pity I went so wild cause he felt fine knocking me unconscious. One blow. I hadn’t been hit since you slapped my face with a slip slop. That time with Draincleaner.

  I woke up in Trev’s flat. He gave me three Codis. Put the pack in my pocket. Said they’ll take the edge off. A really kind guy, seriously. Always ready with pain pills and a shot of truth. He made excuses for Warren. ‘Look my love. What do you expect when people drop six year old kids at school and drive away for a month? The kid is homesick before they’re even out of the gates. It’s a bad experiment, babe.’

  He hadn’t come out yet, but he knew I knew. And he’d seen my insides, so we trusted each other. I hung around. Okay, I admit, heartsore. But the codeine made me calm. Dried up my tears. I went from Waterworks to always thirsty. Trev took some too, even though he hadn’t been smacked.

  That’s what I do Ma, after Battery Man. I remember the No’s, I keep saying Yes.

  Try plan for the baby. Thinking maybe I’ll set up my flat, charge more. Put an ad in the Argus, Saucy by the Sea, or something. Call myself something else. Cassandra.

  Doesn’t go with my freckles.

  Maybe Amy.

  I overdo the jumps. It’s like me fighting against me.

  I mean, okay, I’m off pills. I’m incu-bloody-bating.

  I’m not scared of birds. I’m learning to dance.

  I’ve got a new black mother if I want.

  But no, I go and go and go till I’m raw. I mean, flesh raw.

  Sorry Ma, but it’s the truth.

  A black guy, a suit. Honda Ballade, metallic blue. Works hard for the poor people, like Dumi. Genuine, you can see. Tells me his company’s name means Let’s Learn Together, or something. Everything’s funny to him. He laughs when I tell him m
y name. Says his neighbour’s rottweiler’s called Tess. He kills himself laughing when he sees all the birds. This day’s gonna tickle him forever, you can see. Just like the worm in his brain’s gonna tickle him. I’m not joking, he’s having a flippin fine time, giggling and grunting, but suddenly he goes still, loses his hard on. Stares at the corner where the ceiling joins the wall. Oh my God, I think, a stroke. I check for pills. All I find is a photo of two little girls, same chubby face as him, laughing on a roller coaster. Then suddenly he’s okay, wipes his face, tells me don’t worry. Tells me he’s got a worm in his brain from vrot pork he ate when he was a kid.

  ‘Can’t they kill it?’

  ‘That will kill my brain.’

  Geez. Worried I’ll get stuck with him and his worm, I ask, ‘Then how do you drive?’

  He looks naughty, laughs, ‘I’m not supposed to.’

  Fine. I go get Darryl’s baby oil from the bathroom. In the bathroom mirror I see a girl that says No. Saying Yes.

  I finish the man and his worm quick-quick. Split down the bloody middle. Half saying, Hey, look how you said No. The other half flippin sacrificing my body.

  Split like this, Crispy Nora picks the wrong time to try make me a hero. I’m heading back to the road when she shouts, ‘Hi!’ from over the road.

  Nora’s two boys with their white hair, milk teeth, say ‘Hello Tess,’ like I’m an old friend. Carry on mixing stuff in a plastic dog bowl. No dog in sight. They carry spoons of water from a blow-up pool. Nora makes me a cup of tea in a frilly kitchen. In an old metal teapot like the one Gladys gave you, Ma. But Nora makes green tea for herself, says it’s a diuretic.

  She’s totally see-through. I mean her talk, not her flared shorts or her little pink vest. She doesn’t say to me straight, ‘I know you’re a whore.’ She guzzles tea and sings me a long song about women and men and sex.

  ‘I’m reading this book by Shere Hite. God, I am so glad I found her. Shere sent a long list of questions to thousands of men and women. Do you know, most of the women said they didn’t climax with the man inside? You know, during biblical times, going inside wasn’t the only way to have sex. The pharoahs had to tell the boys to leave the boys alone and order the couples to have sex, you know, penetration, because they needed more people.’