Authors: Caryl Phillips
* * *
Why can’t the boy see that they are all each other has now? He isn’t asking for anything except communication and perhaps some understanding. Obviously the lad has no idea how upset he was when he read in the newspapers what had happened to his brother. But he simply couldn’t get in touch because Monica would never have entertained any sympathy from him. And then later he’d once turned on the television set and seen a fellow called Wilson speaking at one of those commonwealth meetings where the queen is in attendance, and he couldn’t help wondering if this was the scoundrel that Monica ran off with. He stares at his grandson. Maybe the boy knows the chap, and he has found some way to reestablish a connection with his father. So many questions that only this young man can answer, but he can now feel himself running out of options and beginning to panic.
“Would you care for another lager, Ben? Or perhaps a meal? You could always invite your pals, you know. My treat.”
“Well, thanks very much, but we’ve got plans. It might be a bit hard to change things now.”
Yes, of course. Plans. And more plans. On the walk over to the hotel the boy let him know that he was hoping to go around Europe by train for a month or so with his friend Mandy. Their intention was to come back and get jobs over the summer that would enable them to save up and then take off again for the Far East and Australia and avoid the English winter. He wanted to ask the boy why, but he instinctively knew this would be a foolish question, and so he kept walking and tried not to think of his aching knees. And now he sees his grandson looking at his watch for a second time, and so he signals to the waiter to bring him the bill so he can sign it to his room. It’s clear that this meeting has now arrived at its natural terminus. The boy begins to strip off the tie, while he in turn reaches into the inside pocket of his jacket and takes out his chequebook.
“I’d very much like to give you some money, Ben. To help you with your travels. Would that be alright?”
* * *
He lies squashed up in his single bed with Mandy, but it is he who has volunteered to be jammed up against the wall. He stares at the ceiling. When they first started going out with each other, he shared with her the photograph of him and Tommy, and he let her know that his brother had gone off to a place where he couldn’t follow, and that was about all that he could bring himself to say. However, it was evident that Mandy understood, and she never pushed it. With regard to his mother, he said very little beyond the obvious. Mandy turns slightly towards him and lets her finger ride the bumpy topography of his lips.
After he came back from the hotel bar, they said a clumsy goodbye to the others, and he and Mandy hurried off to sit together in the corner of a quiet pub, where she listened carefully to everything that he told her (my mother couldn’t cope, with anything really). He told Mandy that after his grandfather had handed him the cheque for one hundred pounds, the man smiled and then started to tell him all about his new bungalow. It was only then that he understood that his grandmother must have died.
“I do a spot of gardening these days. And I’ve got plenty of space if you’d like to stay.”
Mandy looked momentarily baffled. “He actually said that?” Almost imperceptibly, Ben began to shake his head. “Look, Ben, if you really want to go up there, you know I’ll come with you.”
He finished his drink and then turned to look at her.
“I wanted to tell him, I don’t need to read her old letters to know that in her own screwy way she cared.” He paused. “I’m tired. Let’s go back to my room tonight.”
Mandy takes her finger from his lips and then shuffles over a little to give him a bit more space. Ben continues to look at the ceiling in his bed-study room, and he remains isolated in worries as murky as fog.
“Do you feel like you’ve got something else to say to him, Ben?”
“I don’t think so, Mand. I feel badly about it, but I don’t really have anything to say to him. Nothing.”
* * *
He knew that a midmorning departure would enable him to avoid any kind of traffic issues. The motorway is practically empty, aside from the huge articulated lorries charging their way south towards London and the Channel Ports. Again he reminds himself that the ability to forgive is a virtue worth cultivating, but this is something that his daughter never understood, especially after the business with Dr. Greenwell and his accusations. (Let me put it to you simply, Mr. Johnson. My daughter doesn’t much care for the way you leer at her.) Why Hester would say something like this made no sense, but Ruth forgave him, not that he’d done anything wrong. She stood by him. The buff envelope is on the passenger seat. He wanted to see if the lad would remember to take it with him when he left the hotel bar. It soon became clear, however, that in his rush to get back to his friends he was going to leave it behind, so he decided not to remind the boy in the hope that its absence might serve as a spur for him to seek out his grandfather. He remembered to put his address and phone number on the back of the cheque so there couldn’t be any excuse. His mind is racing now. As he passes the Leicester Forest East service station, he realizes that he is going to have to say something. Sadly, the Mrs. Barretts of the world just won’t do, not while he still has something to offer his own flesh and blood. The woman means well, but she’s not Ruth, and she never will be. He is going to have to ask for his spare key back as it’s been promised to another. He deliberately didn’t say anything to his grandson, but he hopes it’s understood. He’ll just have to be patient and wait for the lad to contact him.
I had a feeling it was coming, but I’m still shocked by the way they’re carrying on. After all, I paid my rent on time for the first two months, and we seemed to be getting on fine, but now that I’ve lost my job up the road, and just need a bit of patience, they’ve suddenly changed their tune. The American one is the problem, but if I’m honest, I never much cared for him. He knocks on my door and starts to jabber away like he’s my friend, but I’m not dense, for I know that he ran away from fighting in Vietnam and he probably reckoned that nobody would find him in London. I’ve got his number. While the other one goes off to work, this one stays at home and plays the part of the wife, cleaning the house and singing along to the wireless and drinking vodka, because he thinks nobody can smell it on him. Really, Monica, we don’t want any unpleasantness. But I tell him, look, I can’t give you what I don’t have, can I? Those buggers at the community centre they liked me when the Jobcentre people sent me for the interview, and they gave me the position without a second thought and said that having been to university, I had a different kind of background, which would be good for everyone. However, as soon as I began to do the actual job, running the youth workshops and taking charge of the nursery and organizing the domino evenings, they began to turn on me and tease me, particularly the younger ones, who started telling me that my face didn’t fit and calling me all the names under the sun. I asked them straight out, If this is supposed to be a centre for everyone, why doesn’t my face fit? Of course, nobody wanted to say anything about that. The American man looks at me and listens to me going on, and he shrugs his shoulders and tells me that it will be best if I can produce the rent money before his friend comes back from his solicitor’s job at six o’clock.
Last Friday, after all the kiddies had left the nursery and I’d locked and bolted the door, the people at the community centre told me they were letting me go, and since then I haven’t had anything to do in the daytime. This being the case, for the whole week I’ve just stayed in the tiny attic room that I rent in these people’s house, and I’ve tried to keep myself to myself. At the dead of night when they’re both sleeping, I come out and creep around the place and get myself a cup of tea or some toast, but even though I’ve been making a real effort not to make any noise, I suppose they could tell that something was the matter and that I didn’t have a job to go to anymore. It must have been obvious to them.
When six o’clock arrives, I hear him coming up the stairs, and then he begins hammering on the door. He’s a rude so-and-so, and he doesn’t even wait for me to open it up before he starts his lambasting. I tell him that I don’t have the rent money, and that I’ve already said this to his American friend, and this is his cue to get nasty, and he points his finger and says no wonder they got rid of me. According to him, I’m not right. We’ve tried, Monica. I mean, come on, you’re thirty-six now, aren’t you? What’s my age got to do with it, and what does he mean they’ve tried? It was me who saw the postcard in the newsagent’s window saying they had a top-floor room for rent, and it was me who went to a phone box and called their number and then came around and saw the room and paid a month’s rent up front. It’s not like
they
made any effort. I came to them. Listen, we both think you need a more structured environment. We’re not equipped. He looks behind me, and he can see that I’ve already packed up a few things in my holdall. I’m not daft, I could see what was coming, so I’ve got myself ready. I’m sorry, Monica, but we need the rent. I want to tell him that he should send his American friend out to get a job instead of letting him waste the whole day just swanning about the house to no particular purpose. However, I don’t say anything. It’s June, and in four months’ time I’ll be going back to university, so until then I’ll just have to get another job and find somewhere else to live. These two smarty-pants think they know everything, and they act like they’re the only ones in the world with a room to let, but they’re not.
The first time I lived in London I frittered away most of my time watching the city like I was looking at a programme on the television set. I could see the people, but they couldn’t see me, and I can’t say it was a happy time. This time I’ve tried to take part, but look where it’s landed me. I pick up my bag and start down the two flights of stairs, and when I get to the door, the American one flits into the hallway like a little mouse and pushes a pound note into my hand and whispers, “Good luck,” before running off back to the kitchen. I walk slowly up the road in the direction of the community centre, but I know I’m not welcome there, so I cross over and go into the Sutherland Arms and order a half of lager and lime and take the drink outside and sit and watch the kids playing in the mews. Then it occurs to me that I know the man who’s sitting at the next table with a pint of Guinness, for he sometimes comes into the centre and talks to people in the bar. He’s an actor who, when he’s not working, drives a minicab. He smiles and asks me what’s on my mind, so I tell him my troubles, and he listens. Then, without asking, he picks up my glass and his own, and he goes into the pub and brings us both another drink. This time he sits down at my table. I have a room, he says. The previous tenant moved out last week, and you can take it till you set yourself up. He asks me if I know Shepherd’s Bush, and I say I know where it is, and apparently this is good enough for him.
The man is not like most people, for he has a matter-of-fact casualness about him, and it looks like nothing could ever cause him to fret. When he laughs, I can see all of his teeth, and I feel as though there’s no bullying gene in him. So I tell him about the time I spent in hospital last summer, and how after the detective came and spoke to me I counted out the pills and took them, and how they decided to take away my eldest and give him to another family until my nerves were better. When my son came to the hospital to visit me, I didn’t know what to say to him, and the poor thing was too shocked to know what to say to me, and so he had no idea what to do with himself. I tell the man this bit of the story, but then I make up my mind to say nothing else, and I just sit with him outside of the pub and we both enjoy the evening sun going down, but I can see him sneaking the odd look and smiling like he’s pleased with me.
He tells me that it’s only three stops on the tube and then it will be my station. When I get out, I should turn right onto the main road. You’ll know it, he says. The station has only the one exit, and it gives out onto a busy, busy road. I’m to walk for ten minutes, then make a left turn at the third traffic light. The house is about a hundred yards down the side street, and he takes a key off a big ring that is attached to his belt, and he writes down a telephone number on the back of a betting slip and passes both the key and the slip to me. Call if you need anything, but it may be a few days before I can get over there to see how you’re doing. But please, you must make yourself at home.
I sit on the tube and it strikes me that if I hadn’t run into this man, I’d probably be on my way to Hyde Park in search of a park bench that I could use as a bed for the night. Instead of this I have a key in one coat pocket, and a pound note in the other one, and I have a place to stay until I get myself up on my feet again. It’s nearly dark by the time I find myself standing outside the three-storey house, which has a huge tree in the front garden, so it’s difficult to see the windows. Even before I put the key in the door, I know that it will be gloomy inside, for how can any light get in? The bare floorboards of the entrance hall are littered with pools coupons and unclaimed letters that nobody has shaped to pick up. It looks like they’ve been kicked to one side, although there’s a small shelf that runs the full length of the wall, and presumably it was put there so people could set things on it. In front of me is a staircase that I imagine leads up to the other flats, but I use the same key and open the door to the right, which leads into what the man called the garden flat.
The bathroom is straight in front of me; I can see a small bathtub and a sink and a toilet all crammed together, but no windows. There’s a cord hanging from the ceiling, but I don’t give it a pull because I’m not ready for any sudden brightness. An open door leads to a small living room with a kitchenette in one corner, a settee that is too big for the cramped space, and a battered wooden chair. I decide that the closed door to the left must be the bedroom. I put down my bag in the tiny hallway and listen, but I can’t hear anything. No voices, no traffic, no noise of any kind, and so I go into the bedroom as I’m tired. However, it’s disgusting and smells like dirty feet, and I know that I won’t be able to sleep in such a room, so I close in the door and pick up the bag and carry it into the living room. I take off my coat and put it over the settee and tell myself that I’ll lie down for a minute, but the next thing I know it’s the morning and I can see light outside.