by Susan Tepper
“Stood up?”
“Eh?”
The lad gestures at Marie’s empty chair with a dishcloth. “She still at the sales?”
“Oh. Um, no. Meeting me later, she’s been held up.” Which is kind of true, at a stretch, if you believe in the afterlife. He’s not sure that he does but he’d like to.
He stands up, zipping his coat and making a show of getting his collar right while the boy takes the hint and walks over to the till. He tucks a couple of pound coins from his pocket under the edge of the plate, out of sight of potential pilferers, and gets his wallet out to pay, edging past old biddies leaving the loo. It’s only when he hands over a fiver that he notices the tips teacup beside the cash register and briefly debates whether to double tip to avoid looking stingy. If Marie was there she’d smile at the boy and tell him he’d find a little something for his trouble on the table, but it’s too soon for smiles of any sort so he stares out the window instead. A Big Issue seller meets his gaze, clutching her magazines to her chest as rain trickles off her umbrella. Nobody stops to buy one as he stands there, receiving change with a full belly and the guilty conscience that comes with fresh grief.
“How much is it for a meal here?”
The boy fumbles a menu from beside the till. “Depends what you’re having and when, though we do a pensioner special on Wednesdays before 3.00. If you’re struggling come by late on when we’re clearing up –”
“Would a tenner cover something like an all-day-breakfast, tea, and a pudding? Just now, I mean?” And his fingers find one in his wallet, automatically stroking the photo of Marie while they’re in there.
“Sure, and probably some change.”
She looks cold out there. Maybe twenty, tired and damp and spring-shower cold. He hands over the money. “Give her a good feed, will you? Let her sit and get a wee heat. Tell her it’s a present from Marie.”
He nips to the toilet, bladder not what it was, and washes his hands with squirty soap that smells of mango for longer than usual before he leaves. A check in the mirror above the sink shows the folly of eating chocolate cake with fingers instead of a fork. Mopping his face with wet toilet paper he notices new wrinkles but fuck ’em, no-one else is going to care if his face looks like an elephant’s scrotum or is covered in crumbs. When Marie pointed out a stain on his sweater or smear on his face he always protested at the clean up, and claimed he was saving a snack for later. He gives up on his face before the tears come.
Leaving the toilet he sees the girl from outside now seated at the window near the door, hands round a mug of what looks like hot chocolate unless she’s someone who likes coffee topped with marshmallows, sprinkles, and a cornet of whipped cream. With her hat off she looks younger than he thought. He walks past her table to the door and is almost away when she says, “Pass my thanks to Marie, will you please?” with the same soft lilt as his girl when they started courting, and the tears come: he is undone.
Escaping the café, he’s grateful for the rain.
10.30am
Acton, Massachusetts, USA
Huge
by Michael Webb
I stare at my reflection until my eyes, huge in the mirror in front of me, start to water. I close them, a tear gathering in one corner. I will it not to fall, not to etch a streak through the makeup I have just finished applying, and after a second or two, it doesn’t, somehow disappearing, probably onto a lash or something. This is the last bit of silence and solitude I’m likely to get for the rest of the day, and I breathe it in with the air, enjoying not hearing my name, or the grotesque shortenings and nicknames they all use, loving the absence of tugs and pokes and grubby hands on my legs and my back and my face. I am still recovering from being yanked out of sleep – 10.30am is pretty late, but not when you didn’t fall asleep until 4.
They’re coming. From across three states, driving in the dim light of the false sun on a cold day, they come to the dead lawns and dead faces of Acton, Massachusetts. Too many people for our house, but my mother can’t say no to anyone, and so they file in, uncles and aunts and cousins and boyfriends and girlfriends and brothers and friends and lost souls who had no plans, gathered in. And food, appetizers and chips and alcohol and juices and water and ice and multi-colored spills on the carpet. Then roasts and salads and side dishes and desserts and groaning platters of all kinds, excess of a sickening, crushing kind that nauseates me already, hours before it starts.
The words will start, coming at me from all corners, “Why aren’t you eating?” and “Are you sure you should be eating that?” and “Tell me about school!” and “Are you thinking about college?” all that I have to bear up under silently, grinning, giving nice, safe answers that everyone will report back about how well adjusted I am. A full day of lying, saying what I am supposed to because heaven knows the worst possible thing is that we lose face in front of the family. The prospect exhausts me.
I dress carefully, trying to straddle the line between girl and woman, trying to appear unthreatening and safe, feminine, but also comfortable for the games I will wind up playing on the floor, Barbies or monsters or trains or schoolbus or Wild West. I can’t stand the adults and all their questions and all the noise and the sports on the big screen, and I can’t stand the teenage cousins who will try to look down my cleavage while they wait to play their videogame splatterfests. I don’t fit in anywhere, and I will eventually end up wandering off, little hands in mine, away from the raucous mess and the smells and the constant eating.
I will wind up in my bedroom, clothes and pens and sharp things out of reach, playing with the smallest children because their games and their needs are the simplest, and I feel a crying need to be simple, to not be friend or girlfriend or daughter or student, to only be required to have a lap and refill a cup of juice and know a nursery rhyme and be able to read the book about the dog party. They are my salvation, their joy the only part of this enormous ritual that gives me any pleasure at all.
11.00am
Belmont, Massachusetts, USA
Clock Watching
by Gloria Garfunkel
I feel like I am somewhere out of Kafka. They torture me with inedible food when I’m not even hungry.
There are big windows with a nice view of rich people’s houses, if you like that kind of thing, but I keep my shades down. My eyes hurt. They are never shut. I can’t sleep. I watch the clock day and night, through 2.00am, 4.00am, 6.00am. Also, at night, in the dim light, I watch the ceiling move like the gentle rocking of a lake. Fixtures on the ceiling seem to constantly transform. It entertains me all night. I don’t mention this to the doctors because they don’t ask. They just ask if I have been seeing things that aren’t there. I know the ceiling and fixtures are really there, they’re just moving. Perceptual distortions, not hallucinations. I learned that in school.
I rely on the large clock on the wall day and night. It is my TV, as I can’t stand watching real TV. The noise and action are too confusing and irritating and I can’t follow the plot or even the sentences. I can’t focus on anything for any length of time. Things just sweep through my brain, leaving no trace, like tiny grain moths fluttering by. The clock is always there. I can always check the time. Its movement is slow, like my thinking, but still seems fast enough for entertainment. I can follow its trajectory round the clock.
“Would you like some Ensure?” some nurse asks me in the middle of the night, maybe 3.00am. “You aren’t sleeping anyway and you need to eat. Maybe if you had something in your stomach.”
Right. Good try.
4.30pm
a suburb of Manchester, northern England
Tea for One
by Gill Hoffs
No-one at the window. No-one at the door. Bulbs she’d planted flowering pretty and unpicked in the garden, curtains exactly as he left them, and nothing but spiders scuttling within the cold dark house that had been their home. And when he gets to the door, no keys in his pocket.
“Fiddlesticks,” then, louder
, because she isn’t there to hear. “Fuck fuck fuckity fuck.”
Marie had always carried a set in her bag or the pocket of the heavy red wool coat he gave her one Christmas. Her ‘Mrs Claus’ coat as she called it, the one that meant he could refer to her as a scarlet woman while they were out at whist drives or meeting their son in Morrison’s for a meal after they’d completed their weekly shop, their way of thanking him for a lift home with the messages and just staying in touch with them when they knew from unhappy friends that grown children often don’t. He’d have to call him for the spare.
He checks his watch: half four. He’d be unreachable until five at least.
The rain comes on heavier and he doesn’t like his neighbour’s dog, a slavering incontinent beast with ridiculously enormous balls and a greying muzzle, so he shuts the gate and starts retracing his steps to town again.
He could buy somewhere else to live if he wanted. Somewhere closer to his son, or in the heart of town where the constant noise of traffic will distract him from the silence inside. Somewhere bigger or smaller, more modern or like his mum and dad’s when he was a boy. The funeral director had said generally it was best to wait at least two years before making any big decisions, like giving up the family home, until the bereaved adjust to their loss and settle into their new role of the one left behind. But everywhere he walks inside, every drawer he opens, every piece of clothing he wears or washes or throws out reminds him he is on his ownsome. He might as well be somewhere more com-fortable, where he doesn’t have to trundle up the stairs a dozen times a day just to pee, and be miserable there instead.
The Big Issue seller’s gone by the time he reaches the café again. The boy’s wiping down the last few tables, menus too, when he walks in and asks, “Did anyone hand a set of keys in?” Just in case it isn’t forgetfulness that’s left him locked out.
“Sorry, no.” The boy stops what he’s doing and looks him over. “Is it definitely here you lost them? I’ve not done the loo yet, give me a second and I’ll check in there.”
He shakes his head. “You’re alright, lad. They’re likely at home, I thought I’d best check though.” It’s warm in here, pleasantly so, and his stomach grumbles aloud.
The boy points to a table near the till. “We’re closing up but if you want a seat while I sort the place out for tomorrow you’re welcome to a cup of tea and the last of the bacon if you fancy it. It’s only going in the bin anyway.”
He thinks about it, hungry, but not one to take charity. “Don’t you want it?”
The boy shakes his head. “I had some for my lunch, I don’t think I could face it. You’d be doing me a favour. The smell of it in the bin drives the foxes wild.”
He agrees and sits, pulling out his mobile and squinting at the screen as the boy brings a blue plastic tray to the table laden with a mug of milky Earl Grey, red and brown sauce, and a fat bacon sandwich. The rind is brown and crispy, exactly as he likes it, and since Marie’s not there to tell him to cut the fat off (“your arteries’ll thank you if your trousers don’t”) he savours every mouthful. The mug warms his hands as the smell of bergamot mixes with the bacon-y aroma and his stomach sends a belch upwards that he doesn’t quite manage to mute in his throat. The boy’s putting chairs upside down on tables by the door and doesn’t appear to notice, not that he necessarily cares if he does, he’s just used to somebody reacting.
He checks his watch: five past five. Might as well call him.
“I forgot my keys again, son. Any chance you might come by and let me in?”
Was that a sigh? It sounded like one.
“I’ve another meeting still to go before I can leave for the weekend. We’re off to Callie’s parents’ house for a few days, remember? I need to get everything sorted here before I’m off and it’s a pretty tight schedule. Where are you?”
“In a café off the High Street, near the solicitors’. They’re closing now, the boy let me in for a heat. When do you think you’ll be here?”
“Seven thirty at the earliest. Sorry, Dad. Is there anywhere you can go in the meantime?”
He thinks of his neighbour’s dog and the stink of her house and how unclean he feels after sitting on her sofa and its many tiny wet patches. “So that’s me on my ownsome till half seven, eh?” He means it to come out in a jokey way but even to his ears it sounds desperate. “Only kidding, son, I’ll be fine. I like a walk and I can take a look in the magazines section at the shops for a bit. You’ll give me a ring when you’re setting off?”
The boy’s at his elbow as his son starts to answer, saying “Excuse me –” while his son mentions work. “Hang on a second son, the boy wants a word with me.”
“I couldn’t help overhearing what you said. You can come back to mine till your son’s free if you like? I only live a few minutes away.”
He can hear his son saying, “What’s that? What’s happening?” and it’s all a bit much after so much silence, so he hands his phone to the boy and says, “That’d be grand.”
The boy blinks at him for a second then talks into the mobile, “Hello?” “Yes, I run the Hobgoblin on Pewterspear Road. I only live on the next street and your dad’s welcome to come and wait with me. It’s been really wet here and I don’t want to send him out in the cold with a wet jacket if he’ll be out again for a while.” “Sorry, yes, I’m Alan, Alan Newall. It’s the flat above the Jaded Dragon, opposite the cardshop. Press the button for 1B or call your dad if you want to stay with your car.” “No, it’s fine, he can keep my cat occupied while I sort some dinner. Yeah, will we say eight-ish then? I know, I heard about those roadworks on the radio, best not to rush.”
He hands the phone back, smiles, and moves towards the kitchen.
“You sure about this Dad?”
He can hear the tiredness in his voice. “Yes, I’m sure, it’ll be fine. I’d rather a cat than a pissy old dog any day of the week. I’ll see you in a bit, son.”
He never knows quite how to end a call to his son, he used to hand the receiver to Marie for a word then she’d smack a kiss down the line and finish with a “Love you son” so he’s still holding the handset when the boy comes back with a leather jacket on and starts turning the lights off. The quick “Bye” from his son doesn’t sit right with him but it’ll have to do, especially since the line’s now dead.
“Shall we head off then? Leave the dishes there, I’m opening up in the morning, I can take care of it then.”
He struggles to his feet, his legs clearly reluctant to bear his weight, and tucks the phone back in his pocket. “Right you are, lad. Thanks for taking me in.”
“No problem. Clarice loves company.”
“That your girlfriend?”
The boy’s smile tells him that’s highly unlikely. One of those then.
“She likes to think so. A touch too furry for me, and her breath smells of fish.”
“So long as she’s got a working bladder, that’s good enough for me.”
11.30am
Oakville, Ontario, Canada
Cloistered
by Cindy Matthews
Due to my early morning fuck-up as a summer orderly on the paediatric floor of the hospital, I find myself sitting across from Bob, a patient in psych. My supervisor, Chad, transferred me after I almost offed a kid by feeding her toast.
“Here’s your chance. Don’t mess it up,” Chad had said before I headed for the ward. “Look me in the eyes and promise. Don’t even think of mentioning fire to this guy.”
That won’t be so hard, now, will it? I think. “Chad, is there anything else I need to know about Bob, you know, for his and my safety?”
“Suffice to say if Bob messes up at the hospital, next stop for him is jail.”
A flash went off inside me when I realized how fascinating working with Bob would be.
I pick up my cup of coffee and take a sip. Bob has Coke. I set a sleeve of saltines on the table for us to eat later. Bob and I are all alone in the recreation room. A voice like Bo
bby Darrin’s oozes from a ceiling speaker. Light rain splatters against a nearby window.
“My first semester at culinary college I pulled dish pig duty during the President’s banquet,” I tell Bob. “It’s an annual charity event where the hoity-toities pay $200.00 a plate to suck back smoked salmon, jumbo shrimp, crab legs, and cold soup.”
“I don’t like my soup cold,” Bob says. Bob’s about fifty. His hair is sparse and his remaining strands are grey and combed over.
“After the dignitaries left, the chef made us eat the leftover crab. ‘It never keeps,’ he said. ‘I don’t want to see a speck of it tomorrow. You hear me?’ I hadn’t eaten crab before and was afraid I might not like it. So, I hung back to stack the last of the plates in the sterilizer.”
“I don’t believe in eating seafood,” Bob says. He chews an edge on his thumb.
“Jo-Anne, an exchange student from Ireland I’d taken a liking to, begged me to come over and try the crab. ‘You’ll love it,’ she screamed. ‘Leave the dishes. Come on, Bryan.’”
“I never worked in no kitchens before,” says Bob. Old acne scars pit his face. I expect my pimply skin would result in skin like that one day.
“After I rotated the sterilizer dial, I slipped over to the walk-in coolers, and sat on a stool next to Jo-Anne who handed me a crab leg. We cracked, twisted, and wrenched to release slivers of white meat.” I leaned hard against the back of the chair, looked directly at Bob, and belched.
“Soon, threads of meat and butter greased my fingers, wrists, and palms. You could have wrung us out,” I say.