The Things We Thought We Knew

by Mahsuda Snaith

  It isn’t long before the image of the Soul-drinker shocks me half-awake. Half-awake because even though my eyes are open I can’t move my body. The room is filled with a green gas, dead cats lying across my bed. When I look at the walls, they’re crawling with fat slugs that are being guzzled down by the birds in the wallpaper. Then, from the corner of the room, I can see his eyes, amber and as bright as traffic lights. They come closer and closer as I remain frozen in bed. My eyes run circles around my sockets, my heart pounds heavy blows against my ribcage, my brain demands that the rest of my body escape, yet still I can’t move an inch. I don’t know how long I remain in this half-sleep but time seems to stretch over hours. Then, quite unexpectedly, the image of a yellow ball comes whizzing across my vision. But it isn’t Pikachu this time, it’s a firework.

  The whole room erupts in explosions. Rockets zoom to the ceiling, showering into chrysanthemum stars; Roman candles flare up from the floor, the noise of their sizzling fire filling my ears, making me dizzy. Sweat seeps through my shalwar kameez, my throat rattling as I try to scream through seized lips. The room fills with smoke as the explosions continue: first red, then purple, then green. All I can do is lie still, choking on fumes as the glare of multi-coloured fire dances before my face.

  ‘RAVINE?’

  The sound of his cry cuts through my sleep. When I blink sweat from my eyelids I can see the room is empty: no dead cats, no slugs on the walls, nothing but the orange glow of a streetlamp creeping through the gaps of the curtains. I have the free use of my limbs again and the hazy fug of the dream world lifts as I feel a thumping through my body. At first I think it’s my heart but then I realize the noise is coming through the wall behind me.

  ‘RAVINE?’ Jonathan cries as he hits the wall. ‘RAVINE!’

  ‘I’m fine!’ I call back.

  The sound of his thumping stops. My hands shake as I pinch myself on the arm. The sting is sharp, tangible.

  There’s still a faint ringing in my ears, a whiff of smoke in my nostrils. When I look to the corner of the room I expect to see two eyes staring back at me. Instead, I see Shiva, hands pressed at the palms.

  ‘You sounded scared,’ Jonathan says through the wall.

  I roll over, tucking the duvet under my body, curling into a foetal position as I try to control the shuddering. I pray for sleep – pure oblivion, no dreams, no images, no sparks in the darkness.

  As I squeeze my eyes shut I realize he’s waiting for me to speak.

  ‘Goodnight, Jonathan,’ I say, because despite everything, I can’t make myself thank him.

  I can hear his body slacken, slump against the wall and slide down.

  ‘Goodnight, Ravine.’

  The tapping wakes me. At first I think it’s accidental or a noise from my own mind, but after a while it begins to gain pace.

  I sit up in bed and rub my eyes. In the broad light of day, the memories of the night seem distant. My temples are throbbing, limbs heavy. As I sink back into my mattress I can feel the thin fabric of my shalwar kameez drenched with sweat.

  The tapping continues. To drown it out I switch on the television where a line of ‘experts’ in suits are standing in front of the Houses of Parliament. I turn the sound up.

  ‘Well, the result is quite startling,’ says a short blonde woman, a diamond-studded brooch clipped to her lapel, ‘but there’s no question in my mind that this is a viable union.’

  The man next to her snorts. ‘Of course you’d expect that statement from a party who was basically runner-up. You’ve hit the bloody jackpot!’

  The debate is interesting for approximately thirty seconds but as the bickering continues I soon grow bored. I flick through the channels until the flashing images hurt my eyes. Eventually I turn it off.

  Your brother continues to tap. In fact, throughout the whole debate he hasn’t stopped. There’s such a rhythm to this drumming that I imagine he’s created some elaborate device from the leftover pieces of the Ahmeds’ former life. A device full of cogs and pulleys, elastic bands and nails, constructed with no other purpose than to irritate me.

  I search the side table for my stereo remote and begin to blast out Stevie Wonder tunes through the speakers. I skip through ‘We Can Work It Out’ and ‘He’s Misstra Know-It-All’ until I get to ‘I Ain’t Gonna Stand For It’. I put the volume up to its highest setting and programme the song to repeat.

  I bury my head beneath my pillow but still I hear the tapping. I block my ears with my fingers but still the hammering leaks in. Tip-tip-tip-tip-tip, like a woodpecker trying to enter my skull. My head still hurts from the exploits of the night before and the tighter I squeeze the pillow, the more I hear the thudding of my own migraine. As Stevie sings, ‘Oh no … OH NO!’ I tear the pillow off my head and sit up straight.

  ‘Give it a rest!’ I yell.

  Yet still the noise continues. Tip-tip-tip-tip-tip.

  ‘Jonathan Dickerson, stop that noise now!’

  There’s a pause long enough to indicate that there’s no great machine behind the noise, that it’s your brother himself who’s enacting the torture. Within seconds he starts up again, tip-tip-tipping until I fling my pillow across the room and swing my feet over the edge of my bed.

  ‘If you don’t stop that bloody noise I will come and make you stop it myself!’

  The noise stops. It takes a second for me to register its absence but when I turn the CD player off it’s no longer there. I sigh with the joy of my victory and breathe in the silence.

  BANG-BANG-BANG-BANG!

  He’s hitting the wall this time and at a far greater speed. With each strike my body jolts and my shoulders tense. Not used to this form of abuse, the partition wall between our rooms begins to shake, making Shiva wobble in his cosmic dance.

  If there was ever one thing your brother was good at it was rattling me, and within seconds I’m marching down the stairs. I have nothing on but a damp shalwar kameez, pillow clutched in my hand with my hair ruffled into a bird’s nest of bed hair. I mutter to myself as I pull the key from beneath the WELCOME mat, an incoherent gaggle of words. I rattle the key in the lock as if noise will strike fear into Jonathan’s heart. When the door swings open I storm through the empty flat and straight up to your old room, throwing the pillow directly at your brother’s head. He holds his arms up against his face and it’s only then, as I stand in front of his curled-up body, that I realize I’ve given Jonathan exactly what he wants.

  Me.

  The Constellation of Truth and Lies

  When your uncle left, a gloom hovered over Bosworth House and despite all her efforts, Mrs Dickerson couldn’t waft it away.

  ‘Let’s all go to the zoo,’ she said one Saturday.

  The sound of heels arrived long before her voice as we sat watching the morning cartoons. We both glanced over to her as she stood by the front door. She was wearing a baggy black blouse, red leggings and zebra-print boots.

  ‘I’ve even asked Rekha so Ravine can come too,’ she said.

  With reluctance, Amma had left me under your mother’s supervision. She was so worried about calling in sick and being fired from her minimum-wage cleaning job that she overlooked her previous opinion that Mrs Dickerson would abandon us willy-nilly. In truth, I think Amma felt sorry for her. The other residents had been avoiding her ever since the incident at the stalls, whispering behind her back and steering clear of her on the streets. Even Sandy Burke was too heartbroken to talk to her. Mr Eccentric had been spotted visiting the police station, and rumours had spread that the investigation into his son’s death was about to be reopened. He was convinced Uncle Walter had played a bigger part in Bobby’s death than he’d let on. He’d sit behind his desk, scrutinizing the rest of the estate, then shout through the window as your mother walked past.

  ‘They’ll find him soon! Any day now!’

  The strain was starting to show on Mrs Dickerson. Where once she spent hours applying coats of make-up to her face, she now managed nothing more tha
n a quick circle of colour to her lips. Her pouffed-up hair was considerably deflated, her clothes worn for comfort instead of style, and the sweet scent she’d brought with her from her travels was replaced with the stale stench of cigarettes.

  The zebra boots had been a good sign and as she smiled at you from her position at the door, I could see the flutter of false lashes on her eyelids. You sat up straight on your seat and pursed your lips.

  ‘Maybe another time,’ you said, pulling your biggest smile as a form of compensation.

  You were never the type to hold grudges but if you were one thing you were loyal. The zoo was the place Uncle Walter took you. It was the place where he taught you about sucking out snake venom and scaring mountain lions. It was your uncle’s place, not your mother’s.

  ‘Jonathan?’ Mrs Dickerson said, moving her gaze with a distinct lack of optimism.

  Your brother, slumped belly-up on the sofa, produced a gorilla-style snarl before storming up to his bedroom and slamming the door. He hadn’t spoken to your mother since the car boot, had hardly spoken to anyone. He spent the majority of his days in an all-consuming sulk, lying back on chairs and sofas, shoulders rolled forward, chin on his collarbone. He spent most of his time in his room and, as a result, we were never allowed to leave the flat. It was late December, frost settling on the pavements outside, and, according to Mrs Dickerson, only your brother could keep us safe. The rules of the pre-Walter days had returned, but even though your brother was technically in charge he never took on the role. He’d sneak off out the flat, then, when he came back, refuse to tell us where he’d been, marching off to his room without so much as a jibe or insult. I preferred the original Jonathan, full of egotism and cruelty, to this moping Jonathan that hung back in the shadows.

  Mrs Dickerson was no fan of knockbacks and, having received a double whammy from both you and Jonathan, she decided to deal with the snub the best way she knew how. She went out to the shops and returned with two carrier bags full of alcohol. She placed each bottle on the dining-room table; long thin ones next to short squat ones, bright blues next to raspberry reds that glimmered in the light.

  We knelt on the sofa, watching with our noses propped over the backrest. After Mrs Dickerson had slammed the bottles down, she marched into the kitchen, returning with a large tumbler. With all this clatter, even Jonathan emerged to see what was happening.

  ‘If you don’t want to go out, I might as well have my own fun!’ she cried.

  She filled the glass with a drink so green it looked toxic. The liquid sloshed against the sides and had barely settled before she put the tumbler to her lips.

  ‘Bloody typical!’ Jonathan cried, before running back upstairs.

  Mrs Dickerson began to splutter. She looked at our eyes peering over the edge of the sofa and held up the empty vessel.

  ‘Happy New Millennium!’ she cried, even though there was still another day until New Year’s Eve.

  It was nice to see your mother smiling again but we knew that it wouldn’t last for long. One minute she would be dancing around the living room singing ‘Ding Dong, The Witch Is Dead’, the next she would be blubbering into a pillow, complaining about how much she hated ‘this hellhole estate’. As the hours passed and your mother grew more and more inebriated, I looked at the clock and prayed for Amma’s quick return. She was never late and as the minute-hand clicked past five o’clock I started to fear that she’d been killed in a bus crash. Waves of panic hit me at the thought of a) Amma being dead and b) being left in your mother’s care for the rest of my life.

  We carried on playing the game we didn’t know how to play, hoping that the busier we looked, the less attention your mother would give us. It seemed to work and, when she began singing a high-tempo version of ‘Over The Rainbow’, we decided to go and put our party dresses on. We lay on our bellies as we moved pawns and kings randomly around the chessboard, safe in the knowledge that no one would lecture us about getting our dresses dirty or crinkling them up.

  ‘Rekha!’

  We looked up from our game to see your mother propped up unsteadily on a wall as she spoke down the phone receiver. With the mention of my mother, I rose to an upright position. My relief at her being alive was dulled by the fact she was calling instead of knocking at the door.

  I watched as your mother took a deep breath, coughing into her hand as she tried to convince herself sober.

  ‘What can I do for you?’ she asked.

  As my mother spoke, Mrs Dickerson nodded her head, her expression revealing nothing. She looked over at us once, giving me an exaggerated wink as though I was in on some secret.

  ‘Marvellous,’ she said. ‘Don’t worry about it, hon. See you later. B-bye.’

  The words ‘see you later’ didn’t fill me with the greatest confidence and, as Mrs Dickerson put the phone down and began wobbling over to us, I knew I was on my own.

  ‘Someone’sss mother’sss gone on a date,’ she said, wiggling her finger towards my face.

  At first I was confused by who this ‘someone’ was, but as the finger continued to wiggle at me, all doubt disappeared.

  ‘Date?’ I said.

  ‘You know,’ Mrs Dickerson said, ‘with a man.’

  I knew the meaning of the word. I’d looked it up in my mini dictionary and had watched Blind Date enough times to get the idea. What I couldn’t understand was what Amma was doing on one.

  ‘She had an admirer turn up at her work today,’ Mrs Dickerson said, taking hold of a square bottle filled with orange liqueur. ‘He was waiting for her with a bunch of red tulips. Complete surprise, she tells me. Isn’t it romantic?’

  Mrs Dickerson slumped down on the sofa, the orange liquid splashing on the armrest. Red tulips. I should have known then, but my mind was too busy computing the words ‘date’ and ‘admirer’ to see the clues. If I hadn’t been so busy coming to terms with the love life of a woman whose only purpose was to be my mother, I might have connected the dots. The way Amma could often be found huddled in the corner of the kitchen with a telephone in her hand. The way I heard her giggle, then saw her blush as she realized I was standing in the doorway, mumbling some Bengali before slamming the receiver down and offering me a samosa. It was all there for me to see, but I was blinded by my own egotism. I didn’t notice the things that didn’t directly involve me and it was only later that I realized that, just like the constellations, everything was connected. You just needed to find the right patterns.

  Mrs Dickerson began to take swigs from the bottle in her hand. Her eyes were dopey, blinking in slow repetitive beats, her lipstick smeared over her cheek. When she spoke, her speech was slurred and heavy, each word dragged through tar.

  ‘I never even wanted to come back here,’ she said. ‘I could have been a model back in the day. I could have been anything. But this place, it drags you dowwwn.’

  She looked around the flat as though she was sick of the sight of it, then took a swig from the bottle.

  ‘Men used to love me,’ she said.

  You sat up straight. ‘I love you.’

  She didn’t seem to hear.

  ‘Bobby loved me,’ she said.

  We looked at each other with wide eyes, remembering what Jonathan had told us in Mr Eccentric’s gallery of clocks.

  ‘If it hadn’t been for Reggie and Walt, we might have been happy,’ she said.

  She gazed straight ahead at the television, though she wasn’t looking at the screen. The flash of colours reflected back on her clammy skin, making her eyes shine in the glare.

  ‘Wait a minute,’ she said, suddenly excited. ‘I’ve got something to show you.’

  She pulled herself up clumsily from her seat, bottle still in hand, went over to the cupboard and rifled through a box of papers. When she came back, she was clutching a photograph.

  ‘Look at thissss,’ she said, passing it to you before flopping back onto the sofa.

  I leant over your shoulder to see the image. It was of three teenagers huddl
ed together. It was grainy and crinkled at the edges but it was clear to see Mrs Dickerson stood on one side, plaits trailing down either side of her head; Uncle Walter, with chubby cheeks and fingers in a V peace sign, on the other alongside a tall, pale boy in the middle. Bobby; the boy was Bobby.

  ‘It was daft, really, what happened,’ Mrs Dickerson said, as she sunk back. ‘Bobby getting all upset like that. I mean, I took the stupid money but I was never actually going to leave. And those two, playing with knives in that stupid shed of theirs.’

  You opened your mouth to speak but I squeezed your wrist, afraid you’d interrupt your mother’s flow.

  ‘They think Walt went crazy after it happened,’ Mrs Dickerson said. ‘But he was never right in the head. He’d been bullied all his life, see? Had to develop strategies. You know, to cope.’

  Your brows rose high on your head.

  ‘Survival strategies,’ you said. ‘Like he learnt at the camp.’

  Your mother giggled, taking another swig from the bottle. I tightened my grip on your wrist again as you brushed the curls away from your cheek.

  ‘He was an expert, you know?’ you said. ‘Trained in the army. That’s where he learnt Italian and how to scare off bears. They were going to publish a book by him. He told me the title: Dickerson’s Endurance Guide. There’s too many survival guides already, so he had to put “endurance” in the title. The market’s flooded with survival guides, you know?’

  It was hard for you to stop speaking once you’d started and, even as I kept on squeezing and Mrs Dickerson chuckled quietly to herself, you still didn’t stop.