Scéalta Page 7

  ‘Oh Tom, you’re hungry. You hated those fajitas! I could …’

  ‘Hungry? No, no. I was just tidying. Throwing this out.’

  He threw it in the garbage. Rafael’s family was always making him do this.

  ‘I’ll take that out, then lock the doors. You go to sleep. We’ve disturbed you enough.’

  ‘No, no, please, don’t bother.’

  ‘It’s no bother,’ she picked up the bag.

  Arguing, he followed her through the dojo. He had half a notion that he might discreetly recover that tuna since the office garbage bag would have nothing worse in it than paper. But she evaded him playfully and seemed to be in high spirits. He remembered that she had drunk several beers.

  Pausing to wave at the dragon-and-knight pictures, she said, ‘Know what Rafael says, Tom? He says you’re “in thrall” – that’s his word – “to the dragon of memory”. That it’s like in some old story about someone who’s asleep and guarded by a dragon.’ She nodded at a lively monster with a scarlet trim to its jaws and scales sprouting green as grass. ‘This made no sense to me, so one time I asked your mom what she made of it – and she began to cry.’

  Elena shook her head a few times, shrugged, then smiled, it seemed to Tom, a little sourly and added, ‘of course Rafael wants to rescue you.’

  Tom didn’t understand any of this and had a feeling that he didn’t want to either, so he gave up on the tuna and, after saying goodnight to Elena, returned to his room.

  Later, hearing her go upstairs, he put on a video, then fell asleep in front of it. Woken by hunger, he decided to go to an all-night store, only to find, on trying the outer doors, that she had taken away the keys.

  * * *

  Upstairs the rhythm of sleeping breath had changed the place; the temperature was warm and the air musky. Padding about in stockinged feet, he told himself that Elena must surely have left the keys somewhere obvious. Having switched on a light in the kitchen and found no keys there, he followed its slanting gleam into the dining room which smelled of Mexican cloth – that cheesy memory of sheep – a whiff which he remembered sometimes getting from Rafael.

  There was a rebozo on the table but no keys. Groping, his fingers alighted on flesh and someone gave a tiny scream. It was Juana who turned out to have left the bed she had been sharing with Elena, then fallen asleep in here. In explanation, she showed him the photo-romance she had been reading before turning out the light. Pointing and grimacing, she laughed at her own lack of English.

  ‘Elena took my keys.’

  ‘I sorry. No understand.’ A breathy gabble of Spanish.

  The whispers were too loud. Tom, who wanted her to look for his keys in Elena’s room, led her downstairs in the hope of explaining his predicament by showing her the locked front door.

  A prompt, submissive smile told him she’d got the wrong idea. Of course! The photo-romance still in her hand showed a picture of an evil seducer.

  ‘Not that!’ Waving agitated hands, he tried to shoo away her misapprehension. Poor girl. She saw men as predators.

  She quailed, clearly thinking him angry, so he tried to look well disposed but not predatory. ‘It’s all right, Juana. Don’t worry. It’s just that I need my keys. To get out. See.’ Carefully avoiding eye contact, he made a show of trying and failing to open the front door. But now her misapprehension changed. Panic clouded her. Was he putting her out? No, no. He smiled reassurance – but this too was open to misunderstanding.

  ‘Keys?’ He mimed the act of sliding one into a lock. ‘Llaves? Get it? No?’ Frustrated, he flung himself onto the sofa in front of the video where Scrooge – he must have put him on earlier – was embracing Tiny Tim.

  ‘Ah!’ she cried, ‘que rico!’ And, joining him, cuddled close and took his hand in hers.

  He snatched it away then, as she quailed, became remorseful and led her back up to where a startled Elena awoke, rubbed her eyes and shot him an unwarrantedly knowing look.

  ‘Elena,’ he tried to keep exasperation out of his voice, ‘Juana keeps getting the wrong end of the stick. Will you please tell her that I’m not putting her out, but that I don’t want to sleep with her either?’ The voice sounded querulous. He tried to soften it. ‘Listen,’ he soothed. Yes, that was better. ‘Listen, you can both stay here as long as you choose. OK?’

  ‘Oh Tom, do you mean it?’

  ‘I … oh well, I guess so.’

  He went back down to find his TV screen curdling furiously. Turning it off, he realised that they might want to stay for months. Years even. Could he back out? He couldn’t. He had, moreover, forgotten to ask for the keys. Could he go up and ask for them? No, he could not do that either. The girls would be in bed again by now. He’d embarrass them – and Juana might again get the wrong end of the stick. Yet he was hungrier than ever and his windows, since he’d had the place soundproofed, didn’t open. Sitting on his couch, he could only laugh to think of Rafael in prison, Jim in hospital and himself locked in his own house and dreaming of food. Gary might say he’d always kept himself locked in and on a diet. Well, maybe so.

  Upstairs was now silent, so he tiptoed back up, opened the fridge and took out Juana’s last remaining cakes which were by now a little crumbly and reminded him of boyhood greeds. Bright and smeary like First Grade crayons and dripping with lipids.

  Thoughtfully, he chewed, then swallowed one, two, and finally four with the help of a can of Mexican beer which was in the fridge too, then went down to his bed where he dreamed recklessly that Juana was lying beside him, only to find her turning into Rafael who had the same black, brilliant eyes but was in better shape and had the grace of a healthy feline. The crumbs on Tom’s lips were sweet and he imagined a prison-hungry Rafael asking if he might lick them, and himself saying ‘Sure.’ Rafael saying, ‘Hombre, I’m glad you’ve started to like pan mexicano.’ Then, somehow Tom had him in his arms. Why not, he thought, and, feeling himself start to wake up, pulled the dream back over him like a slipping comforter. Why not? Why not stay under here with the smell of vanilla and strawberry and Rafael’s smooth, hard body and fresh, athlete’s sweat? Because before we know it, hombre, pop goes the weasel. The DNA boys aren’t moving fast enough, so we’d better be our own Merlin the Magicians – if and while we can. Tomorrow, he though, mañana, I’ll visit Jim. Then dozed again, with an eager, dreamy hunger, in Rafael’s arms.

  Later, in a deeper, more unruly dream, he thought he heard himself say one day in class, ‘Somebody should teach those guys! Blow them away. Wham!’

  Had he? Had he said that? To Rafael? Egged him on? Played Lucifer? He had. He had.

  ANNE HAVERTY

  Fusion

  ‘Wouldn’t you like it?’ I pleaded.

  He looked at me warily …

  My fiancé has learned to do wary, he does it well and he does it often. I don’t mind, I don’t mind at all. I don’t mind any particular way he might look at me as long as he continues to look. It’s not being looked at I would mind.

  ‘Wouldn’t you?’ I knew I shouldn’t insist but I couldn’t help it.

  ‘Wouldn’t I like what?’ Now he was pretending that he didn’t know what I was talking about. But of course he knew, my fiancé always knows what I mean. That’s why he looked at me ‘warily’, as I say.

  ‘To be fused.’ I said it out, patiently, pretending myself now that I didn’t know he knew.

  ‘I fucking wouldn’t,’ he said. ‘In fact, to be honest what I’d like is to be de-fused.’

  He would have seen my alarm. Wary possibly?

  ‘I mean de-con-fused,’ he said quickly.

  ‘Me too,’ I assured him. ‘I’d really like to be de-con-fused.’

  He clasped his face heavy in his hands and shut his eyes from me. And he sighed in that heavy way that I really don’t like at all. He seems so separate when he does that.

  ‘Why don’t you go and watch some television’, I told him. He likes watching television. Anyway it was coming up to seven and I was
chafing to get to my couch. ‘You’re thinking too much.’

  He gave his tired smile. ‘Oh? It’s me who’s thinking too much, is it?’

  He stood up. ‘Promise me you won’t be watching now,’ he pleaded.

  ‘I promise,’ I said. He would have known it was a bad promise. He knows I have no choice but to watch. But he was nice and went off with himself anyway.

  When I could hear the companionable drone of voices from the television in the other room I knew it was safe to take up my place on my little couch. Don’t think of me reclining as in ‘lolling’ or ‘curled-up’ or slack-postured in any way. On my couch I sit up straight and completely alert. From time to time, to persuade my fiancé that I was engaged in normal housewife-like activities, I would make clunky-clattery noises with forks and knives across the plates and bounce cups and saucers up and down on the dining table, which I had repositioned to be conveniently near at hand. But that was only to be on the safe side. I could be confident that he would be shortly dropping off and I could watch in peace. He always dozes off when he lolls in front of the TV.

  You see, I don’t want to miss a thing and that could easily happen if I actually did engage in domestic tasks. The kitchen window is totally useless. I’ve tried. It’s tiny so the view is rubbish, and there’s nowhere suitable to sit in there, if you’re going to be sitting for long. Just the two hard kitchen chairs, and believe me, a person can’t afford to be bothered by aches or discomforts when they’re watching. You get distracted and then you could miss something.

  Not that I was expecting the young man just now. But maybe I would find somebody or something else that could give me fresh food for thought … I try to keep an open mind. I don’t want to obsess, I really don’t, I’m at one with my fiancé on that. As I am pretty much on everything. Ninety nine per cent, anyway. But once a thing is set off in your mind … How can you stop that?

  My young man walked the dog between four and five of course, not between seven and eight. But that is only speaking generally. There had been many occasions in the past when a later walk was taken. But that was before, in the autumn and wintertime, when his girlfriend still walked independently by his side, one or other of them gripping the dog’s lead as he pranced eagerly along in front. It could vary in those early days when they were still two, in the matters of the timing of the walk, and which of them would take the lead. There was a disorder then, a sense of all that continuous negotiating that people have to endure when they are still two.

  Maybe she liked to walk in the dim glow of the streets under the yellow lamps. Or maybe sometimes she worked late and the usual walk would be postponed. I’m sure she worked in a library. Definitely she was the studious type. An intelligent-looking person. Well, now she wouldn’t be going to work in the library anymore. She might be glad to be relieved of the job, maybe that was a factor in …

  Not like me. I liked my jobs, of course I did. But what could I do? The mishaps of too alert a perception set me back. I must say my employment as catering assistant on the train suited me more than anything.

  Always bang on time – a train is not a thing you can afford to be late for – arranging the refreshments neatly in their places on the snacks trolley, the sandwiches above, nuts, crisps and sundry salteds below, biscuits, bars, sundry sweets below them, the conical tube of cups to hand … Pushing my trolley forth and back, always bang on time, Dublin to Galway, distributing refreshments to the grateful passengers. They were always hungry, always eager to see me coming. That’s what started the whole slide. The slide into …

  Not my fault. They changed my train you see, they re-rostered my route, put me on the Dublin-Cork, and they shouldn’t have, they really shouldn’t. That was a big mistake, they just should not have done that. Should not have put me on an unfamiliar route. Only the first time going down – going down, that’s what alarmed me – I should have been left, you see, on the same line, the straight line of latitude Dublin to Galway. And just outside of the town called Charleville it was clearly apparent to me that we had passed the same meandering river only a few minutes before. My passengers had all been catered for and I was watching, you see. I tried to remain calm despite the beat of my heart drumming and drumming … It can happen on a plane, I told myself. Okay, that’s normal, on a plane you can go round and round and see the same road and the same river … But on a train? That should not happen on a train.

  I tried my best. But when it happened again, when the meandering river loomed into view, exactly the same river only it was winking now in a sinister manner because, you see, it knew I knew, I pulled the communication cord. What else could I do? There was no way I was going to get myself trapped in a vicious circle. With the passengers all ignoring me, acting as if I didn’t exist, now they’d been catered for. And the fellow with the laptop who never looked at me at all and robotically devoured his sandwich from one hand, so that he couldn’t have enjoyed it properly, as he tapped away with the other … He wasn’t a bit grateful, only came close up to me with a big red glaring face on him and shouted ‘I’ll see you sacked. You’ve caused me to miss an urgent meeting’.

  ‘All rivers are meandering’, they alleged when they called me up to HQ. As if that was some kind of excuse.

  I liked Extresses too, nearly as much actually as I had liked catering the Dublin-Galway line. I was really very contented in the hair salon, pushing the shorn tresses back and forth along the floor, so intensely alive still, so vivacious, companionable … I did like it until that afternoon …

  It could get so intense in the salon, all the driers going and the taps steaming and the exudations from all the … I could get intense now even thinking about it. And suddenly it was all illuminated and it came to me how I was walking around on an upstairs floor that all the basins and the people were sitting on, suspended in the air above my terra firma and all so heavy and hot and perilous … It could go, any minute … I saw all the rubble and the smashed basins around me and all my limbs gone dead and chalk and dust clogging up all the new hairdos and pools of viscous red clotting in the dust. Or worse, the one above us could go, seeking as was only natural unto terra firma … Extresses departed who knows where, like a train you’ve missed vanishing into the western light … And left all alone in the darkness to face …

  Carefully, so as not to disturb, I took off my duck-egg-blue overall that I had been quite happy in before and walked out of there, never to go back.

  ‘Couldn’t you work on a ground floor?’ my fiancé asked. ‘You could get something in Super Valu. They’re always looking for people in Super Valu.’

  But it would be the same thing in Super Valu, I had to tell him patiently. Or anywhere else. Once you see the truth, there’s no way you can be talked out of it. And you shouldn’t let anyone try, not if you’re like me and you place any value on yourself and staying part of … Of course you might be thinking I’m weird, one of those weirdoes, well, you see them everywhere, you can’t go out without … But I’m not, not really. I’m not alone you know. There’s lots of us, behind the brick, behind our windows, looking, watching, happy at last.

  I had been getting quite impatient over dinner. Well, nothing to do now thankfully but get down to my watch. A fix, my fiancé calls it. In the beginning he was cheerful enough. ‘You got your fix, did you?’

  Later it became ‘your fucking fix’. Now watching has no descriptive title. Not to be named, referred to at all, not to be discussed …

  Although it was more than unlikely, I warned myself, that he’d show up. The girl preferred a night-walk obviously but she’d have little say in the matter now. Any wish of hers could be easily ignored. It was his long reach after all that took down the dog lead, his large feet that walked behind the dog’s stubby paws. But that was the wonderful thing after all. Her wishes wiped, subsumed … That day, I was unusually hassled. He hadn’t made his customary appearance between four and five. And to further cause unease, I hadn’t seen him the day before either.

 
; All this deprivation was making me think too much. It could be that the girl was gaining the upper hand in the relationship. Not a good idea. Maybe she had won just for today the murmuring internal argument. No, maybe he just wanted to please her? When you thought about the possibilities, there was certainly the chance that he could be along any minute. To be safe I tinkled a knife and fork on the plates but maintained my gaze alert on the panorama of the street. I wanted to check out the hair once more, the lie of the shoulders. The imagination can be deceiving, can’t it. I wanted to be sure.

  Funny, you know, but also I wanted to be wrong. I was so attracted to the prospect of fusion, oh, so attracted … but there was a part of me that wanted to be wrong. Wanted to be able to go in to my fiancé and shake him awake, and yes, I am sure I could do it even joyfully. To be able to say to him the words. ‘I was wrong, I was mistaken.’ To have him look at me not warily anymore, but to look in a nicer way. Like the young man looked at the girl.

  And I wasn’t being unrealistic now because it was in fact between seven and eight that I watched them first. It was soon after I had taken to my place on the couch, when I had given up watching TV, so boring as it is. Boring, boring, boring. No imagination. And they had come along, this young man and the girl and their dog, who was pulling them up every so often to sniff or inspect some scent or other … And right there by my railings, as I sat on this very couch, the dog pulled them up, having got a whiff of next door’s cat, I’d say, and they came to a stop under next door’s early cherry – that I consider to be mine actually since the blossoms belong to me, piling up as they do in rotting drifts inside my railings when they fall …

  The way that pair stood there, I found it … compelling. Yes, compelling is the word. Knowing instantly that what I wanted was to be nestled warmly between … Chatting away, each smiling into the other’s bespectacled eyes. They both had narrow transparent frames to their rectangular glasses. His and hers. So I should say that his wearing now what could very well be her glasses is a proof of nothing. They could just as easily be his glasses.