The Gray House

by Mariam Petrosyan

  PRIP gulps the water he poured from the pitcher. He is aghast. Could Sheep really be as stupid as she seems? He starts to suspect that he’s being played for a fool.

  “That’s enough!” he exclaims. “All the time I’ve wasted on her I could have spent on my other children. I have six of them, I’ll have you know. Six!” he repeats significantly.

  Sheep quickly gets to oohing and aahing.

  PRIP likes that. Rat knows that he’s lifted his eyes to the ceiling. Presumably because all of his six children dropped on him from above, without him being involved in any way.

  “Why didn’t you put on a condom if you couldn’t hold it in,” she remarks. “Might have helped with the children situation.”

  PRIP is speechless. Usually that only happens when he’s asleep. He can’t remain in that condition when he’s awake; it’s mortally dangerous, since he’s so thoroughly unaccustomed to it.

  “Now that was uncalled for,” Sheep fumes. “For shame! Go on, leave now before your father gets upset.”

  PRIP finds his voice and starts screaming how upset he is. He’s so upset that he can’t possibly be any more upset. He’d be lucky to make it home safely, because he definitely can feel a stroke coming on.

  Sheep pushes Rat out the door and rushes to assist stricken PRIP. In her flower-print dress Sheep resembles a pincushion. Very agitated, but completely harmless. Rat can afford not to even look back at her. She leaves.

  Yes, the chair was very nice, but she’d prefer a bed of nails anywhere else. It’s exactly a week until the next time PRIP comes here, and Rat knows that he is not going to miss it for the world. He adores visiting her. It must be his most favorite activity. Rat goes up the stairs, not taking her eyes off the boots, the target of repeated abuse. She always looks where she puts her feet, wherever she goes—this way she can be sure her feet won’t carry her somewhere she wouldn’t like to be. All kinds of people have all kinds of issues. This is hers. The other House maidens prefer lugging their mattresses around, like snails and their shells. They are extensions of the mattresses. Or is it the other way around? Anyway, they seem to like it that way, always being anchored to something familiar, something that smells of you. Lately several of these mattress-trailers have been parked at the Crossroads.

  Rat sits down on the edge of one of the mattresses, squeezing between it and the sofa. It’s a tight fit, so she has to shove her boots under the sofa.

  “Make sure you don’t break something when you stand back up,” Owl from the Sixth advises. “The human body is a fragile mechanism.”

  The mattress is rather crowded. This is surprising. The mattress owners used to regard them as essentially their beds, never sharing them with just anybody. It’s completely different now. There are five or six bodies on each one, and the owners are in a state of almost frenzied excitement—they giggle, they shift about, they roll their eyes. This is as close to group sex as they dare to get. The boys, even though not fully aware of what’s going on, still can’t avoid the nervous energy being radiated and also lose their heads.

  Wedged between people rubbing against each other and breathing passionately, Rat imagines herself to be invisible. They are playing charades. Every time someone gets a word right, they all applaud with exaggerated enthusiasm, hug and kiss. Rat’s badges begin to mist up.

  Elephant, on the sofa with his face to her, is gumming the rubber giraffe. He takes it out of his mouth and then tries to applaud with the others. The giraffe falls in her lap. A very wet and chewed-up animal.

  Rat hands the toy back without looking up. Elephant shrinks away. Hides his face in Horse’s jacket and whines softly.

  Horse takes the giraffe, thanks Rat, and says to Elephant, “There, there, what’s this, you’re a big boy.”

  Then he delightedly explains to all and sundry that Elephant is terrified of Rat.

  “You are afraid, aren’t you, Ellie? You shouldn’t be. She’s a nice lady.”

  “Scary,” Elephant mumbles, digging his face deeper into Horse’s shoulder and almost pushing him off the sofa.

  The girls on the mattress giggle. Owl joins in the fun. They choose the next word.

  “She has knives on her fingers . . . Sharp knives,” Elephant whispers almost inaudibly. “Only you can’t see them.”

  Rat stands up and offers her hands for Elephant’s inspection.

  “Look, no knives. Where would I hide them, those knives of yours?”

  There’s no one else reflecting in the badges except herself. Upside down. Hair over her left eye, lips distorted in a sad grin.

  Elephant screws his eyes even tighter, determined not to look at the scary knives that are being thrust at him so persistently.

  Rat is curious what it is that Elephant actually sees when looking at her. Pity Elephant can’t explain it properly. Then again, if he could, he wouldn’t be Elephant, and therefore would not see knives, or anything like that.

  The left mattress failed to get the word. The right mattress is overjoyed. Owl and Bedouinne are snogging full-on. Rat watches them with great interest. Is this supposed to be pleasurable? Licking the insides of another person’s mouth? What if one of them had a cold and a stuffy nose, could they do this? Or are you not supposed to kiss then? Bedouinne, out of breath, leans back on the jacket she rolled up, wipes her mouth, and takes a pack of cookies out of the inner pocket of her vest.

  “Wanna bite?”

  “Oh, yes,” Owl responds passionately, not looking at the cookies at all.

  Bedouinne sighs and tears open the pack.

  Rat leaves.

  The hallway is very quiet compared to the Crossroads, almost deserted. Only Red loiters near the door to the Second, as if waiting for someone.

  “Hey,” he says to Rat. “Where you going?”

  “To my place.” She shrugs. “Why?”

  “Nothing. You don’t look so good. Want to come in? I have this great liqueur. I think you could do with a drink.”

  And as Rat is trying to decide if she wants to have a drink in the company of Red, she’s already being pulled into the Second. She immediately almost trips over the thing Rats call a table.

  Red pushes apart the sleeping bags obscuring the view; slaps them, in fact, so they slide along the wire to which they’re clipped, like drying skins. One is still on the floor, and its occupant is snoring. The stench of old socks is unbearable.

  Rat sits down on the floor in front of the crate-table, leans against its surface, and gets stuck.

  “Shit,” she hisses, rubbing her now-sticky-sweet elbows. “How do you manage to live in all this?”

  “That’s just the way it is. It’s not always this dirty. Wednesday is the cleanup day. And today is Tuesday, unfortunately. You have caught us at the very point of decadence. On the dirtiest day of the week.”

  “And how many Wednesdays have you skipped? I mean, truthfully.”

  Red takes a flask out of his backpack, pours out a capful, and transfers it directly to Rat’s hands, bypassing the table.

  “Tangerine-peel liqueur. Strong stuff.”

  “Your own creation?”

  He laughs.

  “Nah. Don’t fret. Bought it off Little Pigs. Made to the highest standards of hygiene. Pheasant brew, imagine that.”

  There’s a pair of bugged-out glasses reflecting in Rat’s badges, and nothing else. Then the flask gets in the way.

  “How’s PRIP doing?” Red says, wiping off the liqueur mustache.

  “Great. His two Persians and both of his mutts are also good. One of them, Millie, had a spot of diarrhea, but she recovered, thanks for asking.”

  “Oooh, you mean your daddy likes animals?” Red says.

  “Adores them.”

  Rat’s voice is so grave that it dawns on Red to stop exploring the topic. He’s frantically searching for another one when Rat continues.

  “He adores animals. He’s crazy about them. They are pure and innocent creatures.”

  “Oops,” Red says, grinning
uncertainly.

  “Exactly,” Rat says, looking straight at Red, which she doesn’t usually do to anyone, at least not for more than three seconds at a time. “What is it you know about him, huh? For your information, he’s a writer. Wrote loads of books. All of them about animals. I’m pretty sure there are some in our library. Would you like to read a couple?”

  “Probably not. Are they any good?”

  “You’ll drown in tears. But it’s all going to be fine in the end. And if one of his books gets made into a movie then no animals are going to be harmed during production. He always puts a clause about that in the contract.”

  “Look, you didn’t have to do that, OK?” Red says. “So everyone has their own skeleton in the closet. Why fly off the handle?”

  Rat scratches the bridge of her nose.

  “I don’t know,” she says glumly. “I guess this is how his visits work on me. I get ill. And then there’s you with the questions.”

  “Sorry. I didn’t know.”

  “Is there anything you do know?”

  Red doesn’t answer. He’s also stuck to the table and is trying to pry away his elbows without attracting attention. The table doesn’t want to let him off without a fight. It’s easier for Rat with her bare arms.

  “You might not believe me, but in summer it’s great for catching flies,” Red says.

  Rat glances in the badges, appalled. Red sounds serious.

  “Disgusting,” she says. “If I were you I’d keep that to myself.”

  “Totally disgusting,” Red agrees readily. “But also useful. In a limited fashion.”

  He fidgets, smiling at something only he understands, then slides the green shades up and morphs into a fairy-tale creature from another world. A very somber creature. One could use his eyes like a mirror, drown in them, stay there forever, stuck faster than a fly to a trap masquerading as a table. A reflection in them is always more beautiful than in an ordinary mirror. It’s hard to look away from it.

  Rat stares at the two images of herself. After a while she shakes her head, chasing off the enchantment.

  “Why don’t you take off your clothes too?” she says.

  Red shrugs and lowers the glasses back. He then reaches out to her and slowly turns her badges backside-up, one by one. On the other side they are blank.

  “Watch it,” Rat says. “I don’t let anyone do that. Those are my eyes.”

  Red snatches the hand away so quickly it’s almost funny.

  “And yours lie,” she adds angrily. “They show an improved version.”

  Red shakes his head. “They show what is. You’re the one with the lowered self-esteem after meeting with that parent of yours.”

  She wants to snap back, say something that would turn him off her forever. Make him regret his attempts at meddling in her soul and his cloying words of consolation. Make him stop showing her unreal reflections. But she can’t bring herself to reject them. She does need them, at least occasionally, at least on days like this one. And Red is perfectly aware of that. She remembers herself in the chocolate pools that are his eyes. So beautiful.

  “How is it?” he says once she takes a sip from the cap.

  “Not bad. Considering it’s the Pheasants—more or less brilliant. I had no idea they were into stuff like this.”

  Red, relieved that a scene seems to have been avoided, smiles.

  “We know very little about them. They live in the House, but in a sense not quite.”

  “Yeah. They are not of this place. But not of the Outsides either.”

  They fall silent. Red pours out another capful for Rat.

  “Listen,” he says with inflated enthusiasm, “they say Noble is into Ginger now? Like really into her. Is that true?”

  Rat’s hand reaches for the badges by itself. She glances at them, but leaves them the wrong side up. She can see that Red is finally getting to his real point even without them.

  “How would I know?” she snaps back. “I’ve just returned. Ask her, why don’t you.”

  “She gets ticked off when I do,” Red says glumly.

  “Then don’t bring it up with me either.”

  Rat’s eyes become angry, but Red does not notice. He fiddles with the flask. Screws on the cap and lifts his head. Even the lenses of his shades betray apprehension.

  “I worry about her,” he says. “She’s like a sister to me. I feel kinda responsible for her. To myself. She’s been in love with Blind since forever, like, since she was ten. And Blind . . . you know . . . he doesn’t give a crap. He wouldn’t make an effort for any girl. If she jumps into bed with him—fine, her choice. That’s the way he is. He doesn’t care who he’s doing it with. So if Noble lures her to the Fourth, they’re going to be close together. Her and Blind. That’s what I’m worried about. For Blind it’s all fun and games, but not for her.”

  “All right,” Rat sighs. “What’s all that have to do with me? Where do I come in?”

  Red smiles obsequiously.

  “Well . . . you might . . . you know . . . work your way in there too. The Fourth, I mean. You’re a girl, and a pretty one at that.”

  Rat’s eyes narrow.

  “And then what? Be Ginger’s chaperone? Stop her from making the move on Blind?”

  “No, that’s not what I mean. It’s just . . . If you made it look like you’re in love with him . . . I mean, for real. Like seriously. Then she’d get him right out of her head, see? She’d never even go near him anymore.”

  Rat looks briefly at Fleabag, splayed over her shoulder, and stands up. Red shoots up too. He’s wearing ridiculous purple pants with heart-shaped leather patches on the knees, a white shirt unbuttoned all the way down to his navel, and a bow tie. In short, he looks like a clown. With a very serious and somewhat frightened face.

  “Please don’t go! I didn’t mean anything bad. All right, let’s say that was a joke.”

  “Was it?”

  Red doesn’t answer.

  Rat looks at him, biting her lip.

  “You know what,” she says finally. “I’ve seen creeps in my life, but never like you. So brazen, I mean. I’m going to play Blind’s bimbo so that Ginger loses the hots for him, so that you can sleep easy knowing that your pretty little sister is not inconvenienced in any way. Did I get that right? Blind won’t give a crap, he just needs somewhere to stick his dick, and I’m going to have the satisfaction of participating in this important endeavor. Saving Ginger from Blind’s clutches. Now that we’ve established all that, sure, I guess we can say it was a joke.”

  Red, downcast, is rubbing the floorboards with his dirty sneaker.

  “You’re doing it all wrong,” Rat says with a grin. “Matchmaker, my ass. You should’ve told me how Blind is this great guy and how he’s crazy about me. How he weeps daily on your shoulder, moaning that he can’t live without me. Then maybe you’d have a chance.”

  “Really?” Red says, perking up.

  “No, not really!” Rat sniggers. “But at least it would have looked halfway decent.”

  Red wilts again.

  “There’s one thing I don’t get, though,” Rat says. “Wasn’t this whole new Law your idea all along? It was you who got the thing rolling, right?”

  “Yeah. I thought I covered all the bases pretty well. But now it’s all gone south. Sphinx promised that if Gaby so much as gets her nose into that door again he’d personally have my scalp. But it almost worked . . .”

  He’s interrupted by the lunch buzzer. The body in the sleeping bag stirs.

  “So now you need to replace her. And since we don’t have another Gaby, Rat will have to do.”

  Red raises his head.

  Her straight, glistening black hair diagonally bisects Rat’s face, falling over her left eye. If not for those bangs you’d see that her eyebrows meet in the middle, forming one continuous line. They look even more bushy in contrast to her skin, soft as a baby’s and almost transparent. Red swallows hard.

  “I’m sorry,” he says. “I
didn’t think it would sound that way. You can kick the snot out of me if you like. I’ll understand.”

  “Lunch? It’s lunch, right?” A head appears at the end of the sleeping bag, followed by the rest of its owner. It’s Termite. Scrawny, clad in striped boxers, scratching his belly distractedly and staring at Rat with half-closed eyes.

  “It all came out so lousy because I was speaking honestly,” Red says, glancing over his shoulder at Termite. “Because I told it like it is, you know? But I never saw it the way you described it. I thought it would be easy for you to do . . . but if you take it that way, then sure . . . I mean, forget I even said anything . . . Actually, I didn’t have much hope anyway, not with a girl as beautiful as you.”

  “Shut up, OK?”

  “It’s hot dogs today,” says Termite, which for him counts as refined conversation. “And raspberry Jell-O.”

  “And by the way, Blind does like you,” Red says. “Not that you’re going to believe me now, of course.”

  “Well, maybe not Jell-O. Maybe I’m talking bull here,” Termite continues.

  “Believe you? Dream on. Do I look that crazy?”

  Two Rat-Logs clatter inside.

  “Lunch! What are you, asleep?”

  They snatch backpacks off the stand and charge back out.

  Termite hobbles around the room on one leg, trying to stuff the other one into his pants. Rat turns the badges over, mirror side up. One, two, three . . . four. The chains are all of different length, and they often get tangled.

  Red hides the flask in his backpack. One of the badges catches a glimpse of his bow tie, red and white polka dot. Directly around the bare neck.

  Rat looks around and notices to her surprise that it is, in a sense, beautiful in the Second, filth notwithstanding. Leopard’s antelopes race across the walls, flowing into abstract stripy patterns as they run. Red puts his bowler hat on and offers Rat a handshake.

  “No hard feelings?”

  “Careful, or Fleabag is going to bite you to death,” Rat warns him. “She can’t stand it when someone tries to touch me.”

  The badges show three tiny doors. Three Termites are disappearing through them simultaneously. Red and Rat walk out after him, and the badges darken. The soles of their shoes cling to the floor with every step.