‘There is no
real you. How you act is determined by context,’ Phoebe
returns.
‘How you act
is, but not who you are.’
‘What’s the
difference?’ Phoebe shrugs. ‘Except for the fact that you’re the
same person, you share less in common with the kid in the picture
on your parents’ mantelpiece than you do with the person who sits
next to you in your literature lectures. So why pretend otherwise?
Don’t stay shackled to people when you’ve heard every tedious word
that can come out of their mouths, just so you can say you’ve got
friends and a family; don’t tie yourself to a place for so long
that you might as well be a part of the fucking brickwork, just so
you can call somewhere “home”; don’t try to dress up working in
data management as something fulfilling, just so you can convince
the kid on the mantelpiece that you’re not what he was afraid of
growing up into, and so you’ve got something to say when a grown-up
asks, “so, what do you do?”’
‘Seriously,
what have you fucking art students got against data management? Did
John Nash fuck you and never call you again, or something?’ I ask,
throwing my hands up in the air. No-one responds. Phoebe leans
across the table, inspecting Liz in that characteristic way which
is rapidly becoming something of a tired gimmick. As she does so,
her scent again floats past my nostrils. That sense of nostalgia
for something I never possessed, which I felt back when we were at
the house, engulfs me once more. The memory attached to it,
however, remains infuriatingly out of arm’s length.
‘Why not be
free, instead?’ Phoebe asks Liz, as a psot-script.
‘You sound
like a kid eating bubble gum,’ Liz replies. ‘Chew people up and
spit them out when they’ve run out of flavour.’
Phoebe grins
wolfishly.
‘That’s a
pretty apt metaphor.’
‘Life’s about
more than what you can chew out of someone.’
I’m expecting
Phoebe to say, ‘no, it’s not,’ but she doesn’t.
‘Fuck it,
maybe I’m wrong,’ she concedes, allowing her shoulders to slink
back and her arse to slide forward in the chair. ‘But you can’t
help what you believe. It all depends on when and where your mother
spat you out. A quirk of geography could’ve seen you strapping TNT
to your chest and blowing up shopping centres.’
‘No offense,
but I don’t think you believe in anything,’ Liz returns.
‘I never knew
my mother, and I’ve never had a place to call home,’ Phoebe answers
sullenly. With a dismissive wave of the hand, though, she perks
herself back up. ‘But, to be honest, I think you’re the ones who
don’t believe in anything. You just pretend you do, so you can tell
yourselves you’re consistent; so you can tell yourself that you
don’t just do things because you’re hungry, or bored, or angry, or
horny, or lonely.’
Liz smirks,
and raises her glass in a mock-toast. The effect, however, is
somewhat marred by the pink glare in her cheeks. ‘I suppose you’re
lucky you’re still a university student; we’re the only people on
the planet with enough free time to pretend we believe in
things.’
‘Who ever said
I was a university student?’ Phoebe asks.
Liz raises her
eyebrows. Charlie does not.
‘No-one, I
suppose. I just assumed.’
‘You want to
be careful with that,’ Phoebe warns. There’s a certain viciousness,
a sort of hunger or lust in the way that she runs the tip of her
tongue across her top teeth after letting go of the final syllable.
Liz either doesn’t cotton-on or isn’t intimidated by it.
‘I guess that
raises a question, then.’ she says. ‘So, Daphne, what do you
do?’
‘Depends in
what sense you’re asking.’
‘Well, I’d
hope that, after that rousing speech about freedom and not needing
to rely on anyone, it doesn’t turn out that our parents’ taxes are
paying to keep you fed and sheltered?’
Phoebe’s black
lips curl backwards. She’s almost panting.
‘Not their
taxes,’ she sneers. ‘Paperwork’s not really my thing.’
‘So, what,
robbery?’ Liz asks. ‘Ah… So when you said you weren’t Charlie’s
girlfriend, what you actually meant was that you’re just buttering
him up until you get the chance to empty his bank account?’ I
recognise her tone of voice. It’s the one she used when she was
speculating about me having been one of the Haymarket
terrorists.
‘Well, maybe
not his. He’s kind-of cute,’ Phoebe replies. ‘I’d prefer to call it
“redistribution”, anyway. “Robbery” implies that you spoiled fucks
did something to earn it.’
The pink flush
in Liz’ cheeks grows darker.
‘Alright,
Robin Hood,’ she scowls, derisively, ‘if that’s true, what would
stop me from calling the police and telling them what you just told
us?’ She still carries the last hint of mockery in her brow,
pinning back the mounting rage. Charlie looks far less sceptical.
Phoebe reapplies her dismissive hand-wave. This time she adds a
hyena-esque cackle to go along with it.
‘What would
you tell them? A girl called Daphne with black hair and tattoos
told you she was a criminal? By the time they’d bothered to chase
it up, I’d be in a different city, with a different name, looking
different enough that he -’ she jabs a thumb towards Charlie -
‘wouldn’t recognise me if I was serving him from behind a bar.’
Charlie lets out a bitter hiss masquerading as a snigger. ‘A splash
of make-up here, a few less swear words there, and you three would
never look twice at me, because you just think of me as that goth
girl.’ She wags her finger. ‘See, you’ve assigned me an identity,
and that makes you all too easy to dupe.’
I look at her,
and something strikes me. Phoebe has fewer tattoos than I gave her
credit for. Only three small ones, but they’re placed in such a way
as to create an impression of her as a ‘tattooed person’, rather
than ‘a person with tattoos’.
Phoebe crams
both the first and last forkful of her entrée into her mouth,
standing up as she does so, and announces to the table:
‘And with that
little revelation, I’m off to the shitter. Liz, what’s say you
don’t call the police just yet, so we can continue this enthralling
discussion?’ She winks, casually tosses the fork onto the table,
then turns and walks away. In doing so, she allows her eyes to meet
mine, for just a snatch of a second. For the first time, I notice
that Phoebe has green eyes. As if it’s tethered, my neck turns
upwards to watch her go. The strange, airy gait. The oddly familiar
scent. I know why I recognise them. I can grasp the memory in both
hands, now.
‘I might go
for a piss, as well,’ I declare to the other two, jerking out of my
chair and following Phoebe down the corridor. Social protocol tries
to hold back my hand as I catch the door to the female toilet, but
I force my body into obedience. I push it back open. I’m expecting
a screaming girl to jump out and Benny Hill chase to start up at
any second, so I swiftly make for the locked cubicle at the far end
of the bathroom, kick down the door, and drag Phoebe out by the
back of her sweater. She’d been trying to clamber out of the
window. Clamping my hand firmly around her forearm, I wheel her
around, push her towards the sink, squeeze some soap onto the
inside of my cuff, and scrub it furiously against the naked woman
‘tattoo’ on her wrist. She winces in pain and anger but I pay no
heed, stopping only to rinse it under the tap and check to see if
the mark has begun to fade. On the fourth rinse, I notice that the
naked woman’s belly button has disappeared. Despite the fact that
Phoebe’s skin is going red, I give it one last malicious burst of
effort with my cuff, to make sure, then I let go of her arm. She
lets it fall to her side.
‘So that was
you, the girl in the storeroom,’ I say.
‘In a manner
of speaking,’ she replies.
‘I assume the
police spoke to you after you left?’
‘Yep.’
‘What did you
tell them?’
‘That I just
wanted to go home.’
‘And they let
you go?’
‘They phoned
my parents. But the parents of the person whose driver’s license
I’d stolen live a long way away, so - once the girl you sent out in
the getaway car confirmed my identity, and they’d taken a statement
- they let me go, and said they’d call me again in a day or so. I’m
guessing by now the parents have told them that their daughter has
no recollection of being at the police station yesterday.’
‘Guess that
leaves you with about 24 hours to skip town and find a new
identity, all that stuff you were just talking about.’
‘Guess it
does,’ she replies.
‘You know this
is the equivalent of the bad guy in a movie telling the hero his
plan, rather than using that time just to kill him?’ I ask.
BAM
.
With what seems like steel-toe-caps, Phoebe gives me a good, hard
punt to the groin. With a pathetic squeak I fall to the floor at
her feet.
‘I don’t
really watch movies,’ she smiles. ‘See you around, Sundance.’ She
heads back towards the cubicle I dragged her out of. As she reaches
the window, she turns back to me. ‘I wouldn’t exactly call you a
“hero”, but - for what it’s worth - you guys were the most
interesting group I’ve ever ripped-off.’
And with that,
she’s gone. As I’m rolling around on the floor, wondering which of
my bollocks has been kicked up into my stomach, and which of my
organs has jumped up into my throat to make room, Typically, it’s
at this, my most humiliating moment, that I hear door swing
open.
‘What are you
doing in the women’s bathroom?’ Liz enquires, in a tone halfway
between anger and weary resignation. I try to clamber up to my
feet, but I can’t get any further than doubled-over, with one hand
clutching at the crotch of my jeans.
‘She was
running out on the bill,’ I gasp. ‘I tried to stop her.’
Liz’ face
crumples up.
‘
Oh, for
Christ’s
– what is wrong with your…’ Her voice trails off. She
pushes both her arms down tight by her sides and takes a deep
breath. ‘Look, if I go back out there and Charlie’s disappeared
too, I’m giving them his name and address. I’m not doubling my
student loan just because he’s decided he’s got expensive
tastes.’
‘And so you
should,’ I reply, through a wince. Personally, I’d be relieved to
go out there and find an empty table waiting for us. At least that
would put a glass ceiling on what can go wrong tonight. ‘Shall I
meet you back in the restaurant?’
‘No,’ she
replies.
‘I assumed you
were taking a piss,’ I say.
‘I can hold
it. I need to make sure that
you
don’t disappear, too.’
There’s none of the old wry humour in her voice.
‘Fair enough,’
I shrug, still holding on to my balls.
As I feared,
Charlie is slumped at the table, with his wine glass hanging from
his fingers and his arm hanging over the side of his chair. With
the other hand, he languidly plucks items of food from the four
plates in front of him, everyone else having been absent when the
main course was served, leaving him with a buffet. As Liz and I
retake our seats he lifts the glass back up to the table and
reaches for a bottle of red wine – one of the many unfinished ones
strewn across the table. Examining the label, he says, half to
himself:
‘You know, I
don’t think I was built for opulence.’
‘And it only
took a two-grand dinner bill to help you figure that out,’ Liz
mutters, sarcastically.
‘What were you
built for, Charlie?’ I ask. He puts the wine back on the table in
front of him, resting his hand beside it. His fingers tap against
the rim of a plate.
‘Bargain-basement excess, maybe. That and bullshitting about
movies,’ he replies. ‘Remember the theory I had a few months ago?
The one which necessitated throwing my lunch against the wall?’
‘I vaguely
recall it,’ I concede. Liz cocks an eyebrow. ‘“Most of what we call
morals and ethics is just arbitrary cultural bullshit, put there to
prevent us from
really
going off the rails.” Something like
that?’
‘Something
like that,’ he repeats, nodding with dead-eyed acquiescence. ‘But I
missed the point of the point I was making. Or part of it, at
least. Tell me; why didn’t you stop me from throwing beans at the
window?’
‘Because I’d
momentarily forgotten that you were dumb enough to actually do
it.’
‘Nope, because
you couldn’t convince me that it was the wrong thing to do, and I
wasn’t afraid of the consequences you would be able to bring down
on my head if I did it.’
‘I’m not the
most imposing of people,’ I admit, smirking.
‘You want to
be, though,’ he returns, sternly. ‘I can shoplift because I’m not
afraid of being caught.’ He gestures around the restaurant. ‘I can
make a fool out of myself tonight, because I’m not afraid of these
mother fuckers judging me.’ His face snaps back to me. ‘But you
are. I think you’re sick of being afraid, and now you want to be
the one all these mother fuckers are scared of.’
His hand
closes around the bottle of red wine. He lifts it up and down,
slowly, a couple of times, as though checking its weight.
‘Oh, for
fuck’s sake, Charlie,’ I groan. ‘Don’t fucking do it.’
He shoots me a
resolute, mischievous grin.
‘Are you going
to stop me?’ he asks.
Maybe I could
wrestle him to the floor. Maybe I could grab the wine bottle off
him. It would still cause a scene, and it would mean that the
aforementioned mother fuckers would be staring at me, too, rather
than only at him.
‘No, Charlie,’
I say. ‘I can’t stop you.’
With one last
glance at me, he whips around and hurls the bottle of wine across
the room. It hits the wall with a terrible
CRASH!
and the
restaurant instantly erupts into pandemonium. Charlie has already
stood up, tucked-in his chair and given me a theatrical bow of
goodbye before I’ve even had time to look away from the claret
asterisk on the wall and form a reaction. As soon as my wits
re-establish themselves, I grab Liz’ hand and hiss: