The Oeuvre

by Greg James

  The bus stopped.

  He was in the town centre; the heart of Sevengraves-on-Sea.

  “Cheers, mate.”

  The driver said nothing in response.

  Typical.

  Jim felt the bus grumble away behind him after he got off. Fog blurred the Cineflex cinema on the right and Milton’s supermarket across the way on the left until they were antiseptic ghosts. He was standing on the Triangle; an isosceles frame of pavement and ragged garden surrounding the disused public toilets. It said a lot about Sevengraves really, he thought, that this small, rotten building was the centre of town.

  The old railings looked something like old teeth – long, rusted and thin. Moving closer to them, you found yourself leaning over and looking down into what could best be described as a mouth. The door to the Gents had been ripped off the hinges a long time ago. Though rather than a tongue, there was a descending series of broken steps disappearing into the doorway where shadows gathered and seemed to cling too close to one another. There was a sign, bubbled with rust and bleached by the sun, hanging from the railings. Peering at it, Jim laughed to himself as he made out the plain and simple pictures that were on the verge of being worn away into nothing. A man and a woman, side by side, separated by corroded lines.

  Unbidden, a memory came back from his last visit to London, ages ago now. He remembered walking into a run-down Gents in Tooting Bec for a slash. The lights weren’t so good there. It stank of shit and was pretty grim. There’d been a number of men there, all avoiding eye contact. He’d not thought anything of it at the time, the need to piss overriding thought. He was in one of the rancid cubicles relieving himself, eyes shut, when he felt something. He’d opened his eyes, looked down, and saw it: a hand reaching through a hole he’d not noticed from the neighbouring cubicle. Long, thin fingers with dirty nails were snatching at the end of his dribbling cock. Jim remembered swearing, shouting, stumbling backwards out of the cubicle ready to do someone in, seeing the other men come towards him, and then running for it. He’d not shouted those things because he was anti-gay, it was just because of that hand. The grasping, uninvited hand trying to have its way with his pissing manhood. He remembered the walk back to the station with a black stain running down one leg. Bad memories are best left down in the dark where they belong. He turned away from the old toilets, left them behind.

  The Job Centre was where he needed to go today. It was an unobtrusive part of the parade which was made up of shops, newsagents, pubs, a bakery, the Golden Wok takeaway, and a Whumpy’s burger restaurant.

  Jim crossed the road, went inside the Job Centre and felt his spirits drop. It had that effect on people. The atmosphere was as grey as the fog outside, and the faces inside framed eyes that were empty, and mouths that muttered and cursed quietly to themselves. Jim took a seat and waited. His appointment was at eleven o’clock. There were only a few minutes to go according to the clock on the wall. He looked around and saw there was one woman manning the desk today. There were only three men besides himself waiting to be seen.

  The weather must’ve really fouled things up, he thought.

  The woman wasn’t familiar.

  “Must be a new bod, eh?” Jim said to the man sitting next to him.

  The man turned his hanging head, looked at Jim, shrugged and then looked away again. Jim followed his gaze to a bare space on the far wall.

  Suit yourself, mate.

  Jim looked over at the suit on duty. She was plump and manicured with a store-bought tan and an oversprayed bun of stiff blonde hair. The minutes went by, and she continued to type into the computer – her glasses reflecting the display as a minute, colourless mirage. The clock on the wall showed eleven. Without taking her eyes from the screen, her glossed lips called out, “Mr Peters, please.”

  Ah, Jim thought, I’m okay. They must be running late. That’s it. I’ll be next up.

  So he waited as Mr Peters arose, hunched and slow, and approached the desk.

  Mr Peters left. Mr Khan was called. Mr Khan left.

  It was almost half eleven.

  Jim got to his feet as she called out, “Mr Wrightson, please.”

  He went to the desk.

  “Excuse me.”

  Her eyes didn’t leave the computer screen in front of her.

  “Are you Mr Wrightson, sir?”

  “No, I’m not.”

  “Then, please take a seat, sir. If you’ve got an appointment, I’ll see you shortly.”

  “I do have an appointment, but it was meant to be at eleven o’ clock. I was here on time.”

  “No, Mr Peters was at eleven o’ clock, sir. If you’d like to wait I can see you after Mr Wrightson.”

  “No, I’ve already waited, and now I’m late. And if I’m late, they’ll cut my benefit.”

  She sighed and turned her spectacled eyes to him. “What’s your name, sir? I’ll check the system.”

  “James William Hendrice.”

  “Thank you, Mr Hendrice.”

  She turned back to the screen and her fingers rattled over a keyboard that reminded Jim of teeth rotting in a grey mouth.

  “Mr Hendrice ...” she paused, “No, I’m sorry. You are not on our system.”

  “What? Don’t take the piss.”

  Her face pinched at the dirty word. “I’m not taking anything, sir. You are not on our system. You have not registered as unemployed. I’m sorry.”

  Jim could see that she wasn’t.

  His hands were gripping the desk. “I am on your system. I am unemployed. I am here today for my appointment so I don’t have my benefits cut.”

  He shouted the last word.

  “I’m sorry, sir. You’re going to have to leave. Aggressive behaviour against staff is not tolerated,” there was a stain like a shadow on her glasses, Jim hadn’t seen it before, “and you are making Mr Wrightson late for his appointment,” and it was growing tall and thin.

  Jim tasted something worse than rotting breath in the air. Something rustled at his back. The woman’s glasses reflected nothing – only a darkness. A hand touched his shoulder; Jim felt long, thin fingers tightening there and he glimpsed liver spots becoming gangrene.

  The woman smiled.

  Jim tore himself free and ran from the Job Centre.

  *

  He was outside before he could start thinking straight again.

  No. I can’t leave. I have to have my appointment, otherwise I’m fucking fucked.

  Jim turned around, facing the doorway he’d just fled through. The door was still swinging itself to a standstill. He pushed it open and went back inside. He walked through the foyer, passing the hessian boards that advertised opportunities and programmes that were of no use whatsoever, and found himself in the open plan space where the penniless came to beg a few coins from a country that didn’t care whether they lived or died.

  It was deserted.

  The woman was gone.

  There was no sign of her having been here.

  No, I won’t cry. I won’t fuckin’ cry.

  Jim went over to her desk. He turned on the computer. The green light winked and stuttered at him, promisingly. He smiled and breathed a sigh of relief. Soon, he’d have it all sorted and know what was going on. That cunt was just messing with me, that’s what it was. And she had one of her mates sneak up behind to freak me out. Fucking bitch.

  The computer died.

  “Oh come on, you fucking cunt. Don’t do this to me. Come on, come on.”

  He pressed the power switch again. Nothing happened. He checked the connections. Everything was fine. He tried the power switch for a third time, and then he banged the flat of his hand on the top of the computer. Nothing – only silence followed.

  “Shit and corruption.”

  He kicked the casing of the computer; feeling satisfied at the sound of its internals rattling like old teeth. Still, it didn’t solve the problem. Whatever had happened, whoever had done this, they’d fucked everything for him.

  “I w
as on time as well,” he whispered, his throat growing tight and wet, “I was on fuckin’ time.”

  *

  Jim wandered, lost, alone in the world. They’d cut him off. They’d fucked him over and cut him off; for some reason, for no reason. Who fuckin’ knew why? For a laugh?

  He was glad of the fog so the few people he passed couldn’t see the tears in his eyes. What was he going to do now? No money to pay for nothing. He had a week’s shopping at home, and then that was it. And he couldn’t go home-home; his old dear had made that abundantly clear the last time they spoke.

  “Where do I go now, then?”

  The cat appeared out of nowhere, so it seemed. Black and white against the fog’s interminable grey. Jim stopped. The cat looked up at him with clear blue eyes that did not blink. He crouched down and held out his fingers for the young animal to sniff. She crept towards him on light paws, a pink wedge of nose pressed against his nicotine-stain fingers, inhaling. Cat-tongue whispered over his fingertips. She moved away, looked at him, and trotted off into the fog. Jim followed her. When she darted ahead, he picked up his pace until he had to stop and cough into his hand. Then, he would catch sight of her again, and feel his heart lighten by an ounce or two. He lost track of the streets and roads she was leading him down. Sevengraves looked so different in this fog. The houses became pale heads, their windows and doorways prematurely darkened into watching eyes and waiting mouths. Sometimes, he thought he saw figures in the houses, moving slow; tall and thin with heads bowed, dressed in drab overcoats as long as monks’ robes.

  The cat danced on through the fog as if it were a summer’s day, uncaring of the cold that clung to everything. She was gorgeous and Jim didn’t stop to think where she might be leading him – because something so beautiful could not mean him harm.

  He heard the scream and ran towards it; gasping, coughing, realising he was in the car park opposite the library in Chambers Lane. A cry then pierced the fog, and it was not the same as the voice which had screamed. It was a sound that made Jim think of perished vocal cords; their dried-out membranes scraping together. It made him stop dead.

  He listened to another cry, another scream.

  The cat was at his feet; looking up at him.

  The scream reached its height, and Jim saw a shape laid out on the ground ahead. Another shape was crouched over it, reaching out, clawing at the fallen form. Jim shouted, punctuating the air as he ran forwards, and the crouching shape drew itself away, retreating into the fog until Jim could no longer see it, or which way it might have gone.

  He knelt by the shape on the ground.

  It was the woman from the Job Centre. Her suit was in tatters and her shoes were gone. Her flesh had been cut repeatedly, and with the same word over and over again, each one winding into another.

  Guilty-Guilty-Guilty

  The lacerations were drained of blood, making the lips of the wounds seem to shape themselves into colourless kisses. Jim found the word was even etched into the palms of her hands and the soles of her feet. It was everywhere.

  Guilty-Guilty-Guilty

  Her eyes were blind glass and her glossless lips were tinged blue. Jim sprung to his feet and backed away at the sudden twitch of her lips. She shouldn’t have been alive still. Her body spasmed and his eyes couldn’t help travelling to her bared breasts, textured over with that single word of accusation and punishment. She slid a lifeless finger inside her ruined cunt and began to finger it. Her mouth was still moving. Dying words are important. The words of the dead must be more so. Jim took a deep breath and knelt by her side. Her lips were moving quickly as if whatever animated them was fast losing its potency. He leaned over, lowering his ear to her lips – hoping to hear something that would make him understand.

  “... it’s done.”

  Her last breath whispered into his ear.

  Shit.

  Jim sat down hard on the gravel of the car park. He lifted his hands up – and they were badged with blood.

  “What the fuck?”

  Her body was suddenly running with blood, staining the gravel a dirty brown. Jim closed his stained hands, making fists. The elaborate wounds were gone; there were only torn clothes, the signs of rape and a knife wound, open wide, in her chest.

  Jim looked at his red right hand, and saw that he was holding the knife.

  It was his turn to scream.

  Chapter Two

  The cry of police sirens woke Jim from dreams of being raped by mutilated, bloodless women that couldn’t stop laughing. The room was dark. The curtains were closed. The sirens died away, and the only sound was that of his hoarse, desperate breathing.

  Where am I?

  Then, he remembered how he’d got here; fleeing through the streets, his feet leading him back to a house he’d left behind five years ago. Burrowgate Road was a terraced street that lead onto the town promenade, and he used to live at number nineteen. He’d been turfed out along with the other lodgers when the council advised the landlord, poor Old Harry, that the whole house needed rewiring and new plumbing. They’d moved Old Harry into sheltered accommodation and Jim had moved back home – that was until he wound his old dear up so much that she kicked him out. He knew the police would go to Sunderland Close first so it was best that he wasn’t seen there, or at his mum’s place. So, he found himself standing in front of number nineteen.

  They’d done it up. Very nice.

  The windows had been repainted and the front door was new. Was it still standing empty – waiting for tenants? There was no car parked in front of the house. If it was empty, he could jimmy the door and hide himself for the night; get some time so he could decide what to do, and where to go. The street was deserted and the fog made him into another shadow amongst many. He watched and waited for signs of life in the house. He saw and heard nothing. Jim remembered going up to the door to see if he could ease the lock open when a light snapped on inside and the front door opened.

  She stood before him: a small, skinny nymphet, no more than fourteen, with slightly curled mousey hair, freckles and pale child’s eyes. She looked him over. Jim’s hands had been dark with the dead woman’s blood and his combats were stained as well.

  “Keep quiet,” he said, “and I won’t hurt you.”

  But she didn’t look scared – her eyes weren’t looking at him in that way. When she spoke, the light caught on the braces running across her teeth. “No, I don’t think you will. Come in.”

  Jim paused. That wasn’t supposed to happen.

  “Mum and Dad are away tonight. They won’t be back until tomorrow. Come in.”

  She was saying the wrong words; not the ones he’d expected.

  Jim stepped into the old hall, which was as good as new and lined with a plush cream carpet. He shuffled in his boots and looked down at his blood-stained hands and clothes.

  “Don’t worry about that,” she said, “the bathroom’s upstairs. First door on the left when you get to the landing.”

  Jim looked at her.

  She looked at him.

  “What’s your name?” he asked. “I’m Jim.”

  “Pine,” she said.

  “Thank you, Pine.”

  Now, it was hours later. She’d made him a coffee with some of her Dad’s whisky in it and said he could sleep in her parents’ bed until the morning.

  “Nah, I can’t do that. I’ve gotta go.”

  He remembered sitting down on a sofa had made him want to cry from how soft and comfortable it was. The heating was on in the house and there were framed prints by Monet, Picasso and Van Gogh on the walls of the living room.

  I don’t want to go, that’s for sure.

  “You can’t go,” Pine said. “Your trousers are covered in blood. Don’t worry, my Dad has spares.”

  Her voice had a plain matter-of-fact tone that belied her seeming sweetness. She was sitting on the floor at Jim’s feet with her legs crossed like she was at a school assembly.

  I bet she wins all the prizes, Jim though
t.

  “I can’t steal from your Dad, Pine.”

  “You’re not. I’m giving them to you.”

  “It’s still stealing.”

  “No, it’s not if it’s a gift.”

  He sighed and rubbed at his eyes, “But why would you give them to me as a gift?”

  “Because I like you.”

  He’d sighed and scratched his head at that point. This was wrong. Something was up. But she was earnest with her offer of help – and when she smiled, he couldn’t say no to her.

  Soft as shit when it comes to women, he thought, you’re soft as fuckin’ shit.

  He took a pair of black boot-cut jeans that were a bit tight, but a decent enough fit. He’d meant to go then, but Pine had other plans. She cooked dinner; meatballs with tagliatelle, and gave him more whisky. Good food was something Jim had been without for a long time. And she smiled at him so he couldn’t say no. Her eyes never wandered far from him, he noticed, as they talked over dinner.

  He lay back in the bed and tried to remember what they had talked about – nothing came back to him. All he could see were her eyes; young but somehow adult in the way they appraised him. It was a look he knew. All men knew it. Bollocks, Jim had thought, she can’t be thinking that. She’s just a kid and I’m a bloody stranger. A dark stranger with blood on his hands that turned up on her doorstep one night. I’m probably the most exciting man that’s ever walked into her life. And now he thought of it, with a clear head, she’d put eye-shadow on for dinner; mermaid blue, painted on thick as you like.

  I’ve heard the mermaids singing, but I don’t wish this one to sing for me.

  Shit. I’ve gotta go. Get out of here.

  Jim tried to get up.

  He couldn’t.

  Not a finger, nor a toe would move.

  The whisky. The whisky. Oh fuck, fucking fuck me.

  He tried to turn his head but the muscles were dead and numb.