Читать книгу Twelve - Vanessa Jones - Страница 8

two

Shirley’s father died when she was eleven months old. It is this, she says, that has given her her unique spin on the politics of men and women. ‘Being brought up without a father,’ she tells us quite often, although now it doesn’t grate so, ‘gives you a very different outlook. It means you don’t play to roles.’ She is married to Andrew and together they have a small son called Oliver.

It is because of Oliver that Shirley and I met in the first place. She was background music before then, heavily pregnant when we moved in and leading to a few do you think they know they’re alive? conversations: babies in stomachs and bodies in general and breast-feeding (it can’t be right). But babies, they perform the same function as dogs do in human interaction. You pretend you’ve not noticed the person queuing next to you for the past three months and then all of a sudden it’s ‘hello, fella’ and ‘isn’t he sweet?’ and ‘does he bite?’

This house has Shirley on one side, mr faceless on the other and behind it, garden-to-garden back-to-back, it has naked neighbours. These others have neither children nor animals and so have remained objects of peeking and conjecture. Sometimes sitting in the garden, doing my thing while they are doing theirs, it seems like we are plastic figures placed in toy town being repositioned by a giant child. To him, mr faceless is a secret. He is intriguing because neither Josh nor I are able to describe him. If we saw him somewhere other we’d never recognise him, and we quite often have arguments about the colour of his hair. Our naked neighbours live in a flat parallel with our first floor. On weekday mornings, they iron shirts in their boxer shorts and they eat cereal in them at the weekends. I go red when I see them on the street fully clothed. They have the bodies of young gods and I’m sure that to the child in charge they’re superheroes. And me and Josh … ?

Shirley, because we spoke, dwells in the realms of bleak reality. She is a constant source of minor irritation. She claims not to play to roles with Andrew, but she has taken to them with a vigour with me. Like her marriage though, I’m sure she views our relationship as evidence to support her theories and, vexingly, I see how she could be justified. Still, there must be degrees of correctness, in the end I must know that I’m more right than she is, otherwise we’d agree.

Not that she knows we disagree. This is one of the things that most annoys me about myself.

I have no idea what Shirley was like before she became a parent, but she so entirely epitomised the last few weeks of pregnancy that I’m sure that she has taken to every stage of her life with like completeness. As soon as she became a mother to Oliver she became a mother to me, and now feels it her duty to advise me on the complicated process of love. This morning she came round to drop off Oliver and dropped off also the benefit of her experience. She said ‘No red lipstick today then?’

I said, ‘No, I didn’t like it, I could feel it on my lips. And anyway Josh told me I looked like a man in drag.’

‘Well of course he would say that,’ she said. ‘I’ve told you before, living with Josh is a terrible put-off.’

Shirley quite often begins her sentences with ‘well of course’, especially those relating to Josh. She has her own ideas about him and the reason we are friends. She is very fond of telling me that he likes me, of course, because I look like a boy. I did wonder this morning whether I was going to hear this again, but it was the red lipstick (one of her cast-offs) that had grabbed her attention. She said, ‘You know, despite the fact that men – well, most of the men that I know – say they don’t like too much, really they prefer plain girls who wear make-up to beautiful girls who don’t, because they are making an effort. Men like us to make an effort you know, otherwise they say “I see you’ve let yourself go.”’

I really hope that Shirley isn’t right. Her version of life, love, women and men is one which makes me want to let myself go. Floating. Up into the air.

Oliver has come round today because Shirley and Andrew have gone off house hunting. They are hoping to move to the north of the city where Shirley assures me that the air is cleaner. I do worry that when they move I might never see him again. He’s three. He’s the only person I have known all his life. I don’t like children, and I hope this isn’t the reason I’ve made an exception in his case. He has soft brown hair and an enquiring look. His favourite thing to do when he comes round to our house is to make rose-petal perfume from one of Shirley’s bushes that has spilled over our fence, and which Josh has trained to grow underneath his window.

Today he is sorting petals into piles according to size and shape. Each pile has twelve petals in because that’s as far as he can count. He is possessed by an intensity of concentration that I have no recollection of in myself. Maybe one day. Sitting here watching him, I am aware, as I so often am with him, that these days we have together remain in his mind for only the shortest of spaces, soon to be collated into the murky swamp that is childhood. When he moves up north, if I never see him again, how long will he remember me? And I’ll know him until I die.

I used to (and I still do sometimes, only now he doesn’t take it seriously) try to take him back as far as he could go. When he began to speak I thought, it’s not that long since he was in the womb, not that long before he was. And I’d sit him down and ask him questions, hoping he’d remember and I’d get an answer to the secret we’re all longing to tell. Sadly nothing. And now he knows what I want to hear and makes up stories. Usually involving plots Andrew has read to him the night before. Before he was born he was a pirate, he was a wrestler and, most surprisingly, he was a small blue bicycle called Bertie.

Little scrap, he only weighed five pounds when he was born. I was fascinated to watch him and work out exactly when he acquired his edges. At first, he thought the whole wide world was the same person and that person was him. Admittedly he had his favourites, but if Shirley had died, or if I had died, he wouldn’t have noticed. God needs us more than we need Him.

Oliver and I have discovered together that if you put rose petals into cold water and then boil them, the perfume is far more fragrant than if the water’s warm to start with. Also the more water the better, but boiled off to just a tiny amount and then put in the blender to mush.

I have to say that the rose-petal perfume started as a demonic joke. A couple of years ago, Josh and I were convinced it was up to us to change everyone’s opinion, especially Shirley’s. We were unreasonably irritated by her ‘being brought up without a father’ conversations, which were usually followed by trite examples of her conjugal arrangements with Andrew. ‘He and I just do the things we’re best at,’ she continues to explain, quite patiently, ‘I do the girly things and he does the manly things, but that’s because we’re good at them.’

To Shirley, ‘manly things’ means taking out the rubbish.

In the days when Oliver only weighed five pounds and we would sometimes babysit, Josh used to lean over his cot and murmur ‘Olivia! You’re so pretty!’ I doubt we’ll ever know the outcome of that experiment. The perfume was another of his ideas but the joke was lost, to the great gain of all parties, because Oliver has never gone home smelling of roses and must never have mentioned to his mother how he’s spent his afternoon. His secrecy is one of the qualities that has forced me to like him.

Today, Josh comes in just as we are decanting our brown musk into jam jars. He’s carrying a bag of clothes from the local charity shops. He’s got a red hat for me and a miniature skiing jacket for Oliver. They seem ridiculous in the heat of the summer and we laugh as we put them on. Oliver says, ‘Can we jump now?’ and we take an arm each and hurl him up into the air. We are custodians of his dizziness. We look at each other when we play this game and recognise our mutual jealousy. We wish we too could have two big people to make us feel weightless. We bought Oliver his baby-bouncer because we remembered what a sad day it was when we had to get out of ours. And the man who invented bungee jumping knows how we feel.

When Oliver leaves, I’ll pour the results of our day on the garden. It would be more cyclical perhaps to feed them to the roots of the rosebush, but they’re on the other side where I can’t get to them. Plants eat their dead ancestors. I think this as I tip our perfume away. Plants are cannibals. More than this, they eat bits of their dead selves. Horrid.

Tonight, Josh and I have been invited to a party by a sort-of-friend of ours called Garry. The theme is Army Camp and everyone is to dress up in combat gear. We are goodtime girls, me and Josh, but we’re not getting into fancy dress for anybody. I’ve persuaded him that we are totally within our rights to go in mufti.

Maybe ‘goodtime girl’ is a bit too optimistic. In a few hours’ time I’ll be persuading him not to go at all. I’m never sure whether I’m trying to talk him out of it or making him talk me into it. We always do go. We’re always glad we’ve gone. It’s like this, I’ve a friend who prefers women although she told me once she sometimes needs to sleep with men. In the morning she smiles and says to herself ‘thank god I’m gay’. Parties and clubs and bars, they’re always incredibly exciting in advance, and such a good idea afterwards. But while you’re actually there? Somehow they make coming home such a relief.

As far as we can work out, at this one we’ll know nobody there. Not as good as knowing everyone, but better than knowing a few people not very well and dreading they’ll leave your side. Desperately trying to entertain them. Judging when you’ll see their interest waning. Thinking on your toes of what to hit them with next.

Josh says this party won’t be much of a talking one anyway, more a dancing. In that case it will depend entirely on the music. I wonder if we’ve steadily raised the volume over the past forty years to blot out our dwindling interest in chat. We used to clothe ourselves with words but now our armour is drugs and drums. It’s easier behind these, requiring less, providing an excuse. What people say, what they do are no longer criteria by which to judge them. In the chaos of a rave, their behaviour, our reaction, cannot be trusted. We rely instead on being perspicacious. We get a ‘good vibe’ from this dancer here and ‘the fear’ from that other over there.

Still, it’s fun isn’t it? And it’s not only the charity shops that Josh has been to. He pulls from his pocket his other purchases of this afternoon. Two microdots. I wink at him. Speed is scummy, coke is self-obsessed, E – I have spent evenings in my youth on E putting ice-cubes in the mouths of kissing couples, thinking they’d love it, maybe they did – I don’t know, it’s that enforced tribalism thing. I’d rather do it with people I really love, who I really think are beautiful. Acid is my favourite and he knows it.

It’s not a great idea to take it before we’ve got ready before we’ve called a cab, but we’re deciding to anyway. That way we’ll have burnt our boats, that way we’ll have to dress and go. Quickly and without thinking about it. And when we realise what we’ve done, we’ll be there.

In the cab I know we’re both checking the other for signs. I can see it in the way I’m looking at Josh, in the smile that’s playing round his lips, we’re both nearly giggling and I’m very aware of my cheeks. It’s so exciting this waiting. It’s a high in itself. What am I going to get? For once I know I’m going to get something. I’m definitely going to get something and I’m going to like it, but I don’t know what it is yet. It’s Christmas in heaven. All presents and no disappointments.

We find the street, we find the house. And I kind of don’t want to go in because the something I’m going to get is not dependent on the party. I’d have a great time just tripping with Josh and far less frightening. I mean, what is this party going to achieve? Have I ever been to a party and made a new friend? I don’t think so. No. Is this odd? Has anybody? The door is open but in front is a metal lattice which is locked and through which a girl is leaning. She has lost the plot, she’s saying ‘the philosophy is sound’, I think. But she can’t quite make her mouth move in conjunction with her voice so the effect is of some cheaply-dubbed film. From what I can make out behind her, she seems a valid example of the scene at large. Josh says, ‘Will you get someone to let us in?’ as though this is likely to happen. Please don’t let it happen. From nowhere though Garry appears. He has an iron key on a chain. I look at Josh to tell him I’m still sober, I don’t want to go in, hello! welcome to hell, but he smiles his in-for-a-penny smile and gives Garry a kiss. Garry locks the door behind us.

I can’t get over the fact that Garry has locked the door. I mean, what if there’s a fire? I want to point this out to Josh but somehow he’s been swallowed by a mass of faces in the hall and Garry’s leading me by the hand upstairs. I can’t believe it. I’m going to lose Josh. It’s my biggest fear and I’m having to confront it at the beginning of the evening. Without him, how will I get home? That whole taxi trauma, finding a number, making yourself heard, sitting off your head in the back and hoping they’re normal – it’s an ocean between me and my bed and Josh is the bridge. What happens if I don’t find him again? I will find him – I’d ask Garry only, how ridiculous. I’m in a house. You can’t lose a person in a house. Upstairs downstairs.

Upstairs seems a terribly long way. It must be like this for Oliver. Always. Imagine having more stairs than numbers at your disposal. Like walking into the infinite. Like walking up a hill that apparently never ends. This is a hill. Too many people, like so many bushes and trees and boulders, blocking my view of the top. I can’t see down, I can’t see up, I squeeze Garry’s hand to tell him to stop.

There’s a sort of corner with a wider stair and room to rest. He’s saying, ‘Okay, sweetheart? Okay?’ and rubbing my hand with his thumb. It feels delicious. Like the first time I’ve been touched. I’m nodding I think, I’m trying to smile. But that’s just it: I’ve no idea if what’s on the inside is getting through to the outside. He’s saying ‘Meet…’ and then a sea of faces where our safe stair was. I can’t meet, my mouth’s all tremble. ‘Meet Mary.’ Mary. Mary. It sounds funny, Mary. I don’t like her I think. Bad vibe. Oh definitely. She’s pointing to something in her cleavage, she’s saying ‘Should I lose the Action Man?’ She’s only wearing a bra, a bra and a doll. Should it go, yes or no? She’s demanding a decision. Don’t stop rubbing my hand, Garry. My neck is too weak for my head. Baby me.

Up up up, we’ve got there, but where are we going? I say, ‘Where are we going, Garry?’ and he says, ‘Yes’. Hopeless. More keys into a room, bed, cupboard, desk. Diet coke that he’s giving me. I’m breathing. He’s saying, ‘Just relax. Just relax and go with it.’ He smooths my eyebrows with his thumbs, he says, ‘That’s it. There’s no one else in here.’

Will you kiss me, Garry. I know you don’t, but will you? Would it be too horrid for you? A smile, and then a kiss and oh! it’s dreamy. I feel like I’m sucking the life out of him, feel like he’s feeding me. This is just what I wanted to earth me, now I’m slowing down.

Garry grins. He kisses my nose. He takes my hand and sits me on the bed. He takes off his top. I’ve never noticed before but he’s got a beautiful body. Club culture. The gym. What would Henry VIII make of the gym? Lifting things that don’t need to be moved. Running when nobody’s chasing you. He’s taken off his trousers, little cotton pants he’s wearing, and now he’s dressing in new clothes. Exactly the same but clean. He says, ‘Ready?’ and I say, ‘Yes.’

Back downstairs – and there is Josh on the dining room dancefloor. He’s surrounded by soldiers, giving it some where the table should be. He winks, he laughs, he takes my elbows and moves me to dance. I know how to do this. Find some space and start off small. Keep moving. Now feet, now arms, now hips perhaps. It’s the call of the drums this music, pom pom pom. Pom pom pom and your body jerks to it – Don’t look at anyone else yet cos they’ll put you off your rhythm before you’ve found it and suck you into theirs. You might not be able to dance to theirs. Little jerks getting bigger until the music encapsulates you, and your body learns the beat. Then your mind can wander, then when the rhythm changes and the tune comes in it’s like you’re flying, endorphins rushing, your body a freeway of racing blood, you go like billyo and you’re dancing, properly dancing, forgetting you’re physical, forgetting you’re dancing at all.

If we could float a little off the ground, would there be any need for this? I see why whirling dervishes. I see why baby-bouncers. Roller coasters, swings, fast cars and dances. The end is this: after that rush to float, after that speed to take off.

There’s Hideous Mary. Sans Ken. I don’t like her trainers – perhaps that’s why I don’t like her. I turn round to ask Josh what he thinks but he’s no longer there. Oh my god. No, he’ll come back. Even if he doesn’t I’ll get home eventually. I won’t be here this time tomorrow and that’s what I must keep thinking. Thinking, thinking. It’s so solitary, this. It’s not socialising at all. And now I’ve remembered that I’m dancing. And now I’m going to have to start all over again. Looking like I’m having a good time. Until I am having a good time.

We’ve been here for four hours. Four hours ago I was snogging Garry in his bedroom. I can’t believe I snogged Garry. Well yes, I can believe that – I can’t believe Garry snogged me. Did Garry snog me? I was very high then, very high and now I’m not so – so in four hours’ time I’ll be pretty much back to normal. Hooray for normality. Hooray for coming home. When Josh comes back I’ll brave going to the loo. It’s a terrifying prospect I know, but think this: you’re in a house. If it were daylight you wouldn’t give it a second thought. There’ll be people and you might trip up, but that’s the very worst. And Josh must be there now so Josh can tell you where it is and maybe, if he’s feeling kind, Josh will come with you.

Fingers and buttons, they’re the tricky bit – it makes Josh laugh that it takes me so long. I say, ‘Cut me some slack,’ which makes him laugh more because it sounds so peculiar. I laugh too. Hysteria on the bathroom floor. No, no, I’ve got to stop this, I’ve got to go to the loo. Concentrate. Buttons push through buttonholes. These things I’ve learnt go first. Zips and trousers under my fingers, the space from me to the lavatory, but my instincts are intact. Inside, my body carries on without me. I am a machine, a clockwork toy, and I’ll go until the last turn of the key.

Josh tells me that he’s found the chill-out room, and this is where we’re headed. Inside, a mound of cushions, a sofa and an armchair. Hideous Mary is collapsed on the cushions, Josh has colonised the armchair, leaving me with space for one buttock beside three men on the sofa. They look like triplets. Shaved heads, combat trousers and tight white tee shirts. They’re having a conversation about some girl. In front, two dancers moving like the wind. One’s saying ‘This is my favourite bit coming up.’

‘The elephant bit?’

‘Elephant?’

‘Yes, listen,’ and he’s making a childish trunk and doing an impression. There are elephants in this world, it suddenly occurs to me. Right now, there are elephants. Doing their own thing.

One of the clones beside me has had enough. He says definitively, ‘Look, she won’t age well.’

‘What are you on? Those cheekbones!’ I turn to look at them and hear, ‘See what I mean?’ and realise with some horror that they’re talking about me. It’s one against two in praise of my longevity. I can’t handle this now. I’m not at my best. My face feels like one of Picasso’s. I close my eyes and hope they’ll go away. They don’t. I deal with it. I congratulate myself for not freaking out. I open my eyes and Josh says, ‘You are such a wreck,’ and laughs. This is not great for a girl’s confidence. Thank god it’s getting light and we could conceivably go home. I say ‘Shall we go home?’ and astoundingly, he says ‘Yes’.

We decide to walk for twenty minutes and then catch the first train. Our ears are ringing still with the sounds of our night – techno track on auto-reverse, early-morning birdsong mixed in with the beat. Josh looks flushed, his skin thin, I think I see his blood vessels moving behind it. But he is normal compared to the weirdos on the train. Whenever I’ve travelled at this time there have only been strangers. And I’ve never been certain if it’s me or it’s them. I keep my eyes on Josh. Safe. I hold his hand on the escalator. Behind I am faintly aware of someone running, then someone tapping me, me? then someone putting a bit of paper in my hand and catching the stairs back down. Josh and I are in shock. He says, ‘What does it say?’

‘“Colin” and a phone number.’ It’s not just me, is it? It is an odd thing to do.

Josh shrugs – later – and threads my hand through his arm. Later we’ll pick through the events of the evening, later decide we’ve had a brilliant time. But sleep first. Sleep. The sun is rising. Herald of a beautiful day we’re going to miss.

And Shirley and Oliver are just waking up.