Page 3
The sunlight was shining on my nose when I woke up and I had to peel my face off the plastic table cloth. It was very bright and a heat haze was hovering above the table. I closed my eyes again and lazed in the warmth. Everything glowed orange behind my eyelids and I was fantasizing about an ice-cream when everything went dark and cold as a garbage truck pulled up outside the window and cut off the sunlight. It always parked there when it was emptying the bins. I opened my eyes in disappointment. Oh well, time to wee. I filled the kettle from the tap at the same time and put it on the stove. As I waited for the water to boil I looked around the flat, listening to the shouting and the hydraulic creaks and crunks of the truck. It was a bit depressing. I should clean it up a bit really, but I'm still not feeling so well. I don't know what's the matter with me.
My flat feet stuck to the floor as I took my tea over to the table and sat down. The driver revved up the engine and the fumes from the truck rattled in through the gaps in the cardboard window. What a stink. I took a huge mouthful of tea and held my breath. Nothing to do but wait for them to go. I closed my watering eyes and tried to visualize the lady in the pink bedroom with no clothes on but I couldn't concentrate so I opened my eyes again and there, pressed up against the window, a ring of grime around his red rimmed mouth, his baggy bloodshot eyes staring at me as if I was the next piece of garbage to be taken out, was the filthy face of the garbage man. I screamed and dropped my tea all over the table.
When I looked up again he was gone. What a horrible man. Perhaps it was him who had murdered the old lady. He looked the type. Perhaps he murdered her for her brooch and then hid it behind the bins, meaning to pick it up later and sell it. Perhaps he suspects that I took the brooch because the bins are outside my door and now he's coming to get me. I suppose you can see I have a very vivid imagination? I just wish I hadn't picked up that brooch. Greedy fat fingers - just look at them…and I can still feel the old lady's breast. Brrr.
The driver revved up, somebody shouted and banged the side of the truck with his fist, and the whole caboodle moved off. The sunlight came back and I wiped up the tea on the table with a T shirt. I wonder if that's why they call them T shirts. I wipe up everything with them.
I was feeling a bit nauseous from the whole incident, so I opened the other window to let in some air and lay down on the bed for a while and went to sleep.
When I woke up it was dark. And cold. I wrapped the blanket around my shoulders and went over to the window to close it. A feverish full moon was rising up over the tree at the end of the block, making the fallen leaves look like patches of dried blood on the ground. Funny thing about that tree, the leaves usually turn yellow around this time. I always wait for that, makes everything look bright and cheerful. This year they just turned a soggy brown. Even nature seems to be depressed. Maybe I should go out for a while. Go for a drive; take a walk in the park – its dark, men out there - what if it's him ? What if it's me?
I went to bed and lay there for ages, counting to keep my thoughts at bay. One, two, three, four, who's outside the bedroom door? I must've fallen asleep because the next thing I knew my body was shaking and jerking like I was plugged into some cosmic power socket. The bed began to move, slipping and sliding slowly sideways down towards the engine block as I held on with all my might and finally tumbled into the oily black pit underneath.
Demons, looking for a hero to kill, came crawling out of my forgotten wounds, opening their moist mouths on all sides. But I brushed them aside in my headlong rush. Nothing could stop me now. I was in full flight. I was in righteous power. I was looking for Death himself, the man behind the mask of flesh and bone - the real murderer. And as I ran, ranks of policemen rose from their graves, hungry for justice, and began to run pantingly by my side, thousands upon thousands cutting a bloody blue swathe through the steely moonlight. I waved my sabre-jet screaming low overhead with a guided missile hanging from its fat underbelly and the rising crescendo of its red over-heating engine howling to God and clawing its way up into the close and turbulent sky.
It levelled off high up and leaped forward again at an even more prodigious pace, hurling itself like a suicidal banshee at the black night. Then came a screaming shriek and a deep deafening thump as it struck and fractured the very fabric of the hallowed heavens themselves. It turned, wounded, broken by its own madness, and the twisted plane plunged to earth.
I waited for the shock wave to hit me, but it never did. I looked down and there on the pavement were the broken remains of a child's cot, a little teddy bear still attached to one of the bars with a ribbon. I looked up and the light had changed. It was dawn. I floated quietly down the street.
I saw a man buying some bones. He threw one to his dog who lay down on the pavement and began chewing it while the man put some tobacco in his pipe, stuck it between his teeth and lit it. With every puff, the smoke curled like a halo around his head and then rose up to greet the early dawn.
“Tja!” He said to the dog eventually and they sauntered off down the road. I walked along with them through the silent streets. I liked him. He had an easy relaxed way about him that made me feel comfortable. We crossed the bridge over the railway line and then stopped in front of a semi-detached house at the end of a cul-de-sac. I waited while he unlocked the door and then followed them inside.
I got the fright of my life when I saw her, half hidden in the hallway…waiting for us…him. She had lips the colour of menstrual blood and a tattoo of a snake coiling up her arm and into the sleeve of her blouse. She leant unsteadily against the wall, holding half a bottle of gin by the neck and a cigarette by the lip, watching the man as he took off his coat and hung it up.
“Come boy,” he called to his dog and headed for the kitchen, trying not to notice her. In one hand he carried the bag of bones, in the other a packet with ‘Hobby House' written on it. As he passed her she slapped the bag out of his hand and laughed as the bones fell out onto the floor. As an afterthought she tried to slap the other bag too but he jerked it away just in time.
“Godda bone for the dog then?” she cocked her hips at him. “A nice big juicy bone for the doggie?” He got down on his knees and started picking them up.
“Here, doggie, doggie. Your master's godda bone for you. How about a bone for me? How about a bone for this bitch hey? How about it, Mr Heart-throb big knob. I love sucking the marrow from a good old bone. Woof, woof, come on baby, give us one.” She jabbed him in his ribs with her toes and they both nearly fell over. “What was that you say? You can't geddit up? Again ? Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha. But you can geddit up for that highty-tighty blonde bitch with the big titties down the road can't you, you bastard? I've seen you looking at her with your tongue hanging out. You wanta geddin there don't you? Got yo'r little doggy nose sniffing right up her dress haven't you? Sniff, sniff, sniff.”
She put her hand holding the bottle on her hip and posed for him. “How about taking a little sniff of me for a change. Come on.” She sauntered round in front of him, pulling up her slip and pushing her pelvis right in his face. She had nothing on underneath. “Here you go, all for free. Come on then, have a sniff. Maybe that'll get you stiff, ha, ha.” He turned away and carried on picking up the bones, keeping his eyes on the floor. “No? Not interested?” She kicked him in the ribs with her painted toes again. Harder and meaner this time. “No bone for the bitch then? Well, let me tell you something you bastard, you're not fucking welcome in here anymore , ” she said, pointing to her pudenda with the gin bottle. Then she lost her balance and swung the bottle around wildly to stop herself from falling over.
“But maybe that's not the problem. You wanna know what I think is the problem here? I think you're a queer. Tha's wa's the matter here. YOU'RE A FUCKING QUEER YOU FUCKING BASTARD!”
He got up off his knees and put the bag of bones into the fridge, then sat down at the table and took a little bottle of paint from the other packet. She lit another cigarette and one-eyed him through the smoke.
“Here I thought it was my fault. That I wasn't pretty enough for you. Ha, ha, ha. What a joke. Look at you, fucking He-Man, painting little dollies. You're just a fucking girlie. You never do anything, just suck on your pipe…fucking penis substitute. Should've fucking known it was too good to be true.” She stabbed her cigarette out in disgust and plonked her bottle of gin on the table.
“Christ I'm sick of the sight of you. I've had enough of this. I going to ged dressed.” she said, and as an afterthought she added, “And don't let that little bastard piss in our bed again tonight. He can sleep in his own fucking bed. He's four years old already, dirty little bugger.”
“Ok,” he said but she'd already left the room. He opened the new bottle of red paint and picked up a little green plastic man.
She went into her bedroom and for some stupid reason I followed her. She sat down at her dressing table and fluffed her hair out behind her with her hands. Watching this, I felt…happy. She was about to take off her blouse when she suddenly froze and stared intently into the mirror. Then she turned around and looked me straight in the eye.
I woke up without the slightest pause. Holy Jesus that was close. I was wide awake, shaking from the shock and very thankful she wasn't there in the room with me. Things were getting out of hand. She had known I was there . She had seen me, in the dream, and she damn nearly followed me back here like the barefoot lady did. And that's not all. The more I freaked out about her…the stronger I was making our connection. Onetwothreefourfivesixseveneightnineteneleventwelve… I have to stop thinking about her somehow. KUMBAYA MA LORD, KUMBAYAAA at the top of my voice and all the while I'm listening to myself and wondering why I didn't think that this was insane.
*
She came into the kitchen and dropped her purse on the table. She took off her coat and then leant on the back of the chair with one hand so that she could lift her foot and take off her high-heel shoe. She didn't wear stockings. Most of her clients didn't have time for niceties like that.
“That fat bastard was there again tonight. Jesus he stinks.” She took off the other shoe. “But he came before I could even get the handcuffs on, so at least that's a blessing.” She lit a cigarette and spat out a piece of something. He looked at her and then at his soldiers. He didn't know what to say. He didn't know what to do except what he was doing, keeping his hands busy and his heart carefully holding all that he loved; holding his little world safe. He was sorry for her story, but there was nothing he could do about it, especially when she was in one of her moods. But he did what little he could, even if it was only to be there for her to bite when the pain got too bad. He didn't mind. He didn't know if he loved her. It didn't matter. He was as caring of her and her child as he was of the dog or any other animal in distress.
“You don't care, do you? Other men fucking me? You don't give a shit what happens to me. What kind of a man are you?” He kept his head bowed over his painting. She looked around for something to hurt him with. Then she noticed it. ”And here,” she took off her brooch and threw it at him. “You can take that piece of shit and shove it up your arse.” She waved a red fingernail at it.
“Is that supposed to show how much you love me? Piece of fucking tin…crap. Fucking glass. That all I'm worth to you is it?” It was her most cherished possession, but she didn't want him to know that. She liked it because he had bought it for her. It made her feel special. It had become a sort of talisman for her, something that helped protect her from the awfulness of what she had to do, and reminded her that she wasn't just something that other men left their semen in. And now she was throwing it away. She knew how to hurt herself alright. He carried on painting the figurine.
“And stop playing with those fucking toys!” She slapped at his hands in frustration, showering the kitchen with red paint and sparks and ash from her cigarette. She laughed spitefully at the mess while he dabbed at a few smouldering bits on the table and then picked up the brooch. “It's okay,” he said. “No damage done. It's only poster paint. It'll come off.”
Then she hit him hard across the side of his face. The smack echoed sharply around the bare room.
* * *
The e-book (Digital PDF book) costs only £5.00, but if for any reason you can't pay, send an e mail to ian@darkcircus.nl and request a free copy.
