by David Bowker
At the pine trees near Queen Charlotte’s Cottage, Caro insisted on stopping to feed the squirrels. The fluffy-tailed rodents were so accustomed to Caro that they ate nuts out of her hands. I copied her, and soon they were accepting nuts from me. One squirrel seemed a little slow and was always looking the wrong way when the nuts were being handed out. Determined to feed the poor little bastard, I waited on one knee with my hand out until he finally got the idea and came up to me.
“Mark, careful,” said Caro. “He looks a bit mentally handicapped.”
I ignored her. The squirrel sniffed my left hand, then took hold of my thumb and sank his teeth into it. The pain was instantaneous and appalling. I felt the yellow rodent teeth grinding against my thumb joint. I leaped up, roaring with furious pain, a cute furry retard dangling from my hand like some kind of sick fashion accessory. It was only a few seconds before the squirrel released me, but it felt as long as a seventies guitar solo.
My thumb was spurting blood, and a great flap of flesh was hanging off it. All I had to wrap it in was a piece of tissue. The tissue drank up the blood like blotting paper. In moments it was bright red.
The incident had immobilized Caro. She had one hand over her mouth, and her legs were crossed. It was the same when she was at school. Whenever she saw something really violent, her clitoris started to twitch. I don’t know how common this is. Perhaps all women get clit-ache when they see blood. Maybe public executions once secretly unleashed mass orgasms. It is not an attractive thought.
“Not exactly Francis of Assisi, are you?” said Caro. She removed the scarf that she was wearing and wrapped it around my thumb.
We walked for a while, then went for coffee in the orangery café. The café was big and cavernous, echoing with the rattle of cutlery and the polite chink-chink of cups and saucers. My thumb stung like hell, but I didn’t mention it in case I came across as a crybaby.
“What happened to all those songs you used to write?” she asked me. “I thought you were going to be a rock star.”
“I could never find the right people to be in a band with,” I said. “They either hated my ideas or they never got out of bed.”
“So now you’re twenty-three and you feel your life is pretty much fucked. Well, join the club.”
“I know I must be getting older,” I said, “because when I turn on the TV and see a band, even bands I like, they just look like a bunch of stupid little tossers striking poses. There’s no one to look up to anymore. All the best people are dead. I think Kurt Cobain was the last great rock spirit.”
“Who would you say were the top five rock and roll suicides?” she asked me casually.
Without thinking, I said, “Good question. Not counting accidents?”
“No.”
“Okay. Number five, Brian Epstein. Number four, Michael Hutchence. Number three, Ian Curtis. Number two, Nick Drake. Number one, Kurt Cobain.”
“Got you.” She started laughing. “Another list.”
She went to the counter and borrowed a pen and a scrap of paper. Then she sat down again, scribbled a few lines, and passed them to me. There were three names on it.
1. MY FATHER
2. WARREN
3. JESUS
“What’s this?” I said.
“I made a list of my own,” said Caro. “It’s a list of the people I want you to kill for me.”
I laughed. She didn’t.
“You claim to love me, but when I ask you to do the simplest thing it’s suddenly too much trouble. What kind of love is that? Do you think Heathcliff wouldn’t have killed for Cathy?”
I was silent for a long time. “Are you serious? Are you honestly suggesting that I kill people? That I kill your own father?”
She nodded slowly, her pale blue eyes fixed on mine.
“Some hit man I’d be,” I said, holding up my injured hand. “Even squirrels come off better in a fight.”
Caro spoke as if she hadn’t heard me. “It can’t be me, you see, because I’ve got a good reason for killing all of them. That’s obvious.”
“What’s obvious,” I said, “is that you’re not really thinking about what you’re saying.”
She tutted, just as girls used to tut when I was thirteen and I asked them what menstruation felt like. We remained silent as we walked into the gardens behind Kew Palace and sat on the wall by the fountain that never founts.
“Why ask me, anyway?” I said. “I think we’ve both established that I’m too nice.”
“That’s why you’d be perfect. You haven’t got a record. No one would suspect you.”
“Caro, my life’s bad enough as it is. I’m not going to prison for you or anyone else.”
“So it’s not that you don’t think there are people who deserve to be murdered,” she said scornfully. “You’re just scared of going to prison.”
“That’s right.”
“That’s a bit spineless, isn’t it?”
“It’s not about courage,” I said. “It’s common sense. Whatever direction my life takes, I don’t want to be shitting and pissing into a bucket with my cellmate watching.”
“Mark, you want me, don’t you?”
“You know I do.”
“I would give myself to you,” she said, thrusting herself up against me. “I’d give you that eighteen months I owe you. You could do anything you liked to me, as often as you wanted.”
I looked at her for a long time. “Wow, you really are cracked.”
“No.” She colored slightly. “Most people could name at least half a dozen people they’d like to see dead. The only difference is, I’ve got the guts to admit it. The world’s a bad place, Mark. Good people starve and die while bad people thrive and get richer. You think it’s bad karma to kill a few bastards? I don’t. I think God and all the angels sing for joy every time another bastard dies. How about it? Don’t you want to make God happy?”
“I don’t see how killing Jesus would make God happy.”
Caro didn’t laugh.
I could tell she was disappointed. So was I. I had rather hoped she might have matured since school, developed a little more empathy for the suffering souls around her. Instead, she was the same old bitch, but with larger breasts. With sourness hanging between us like a plague of flies, we walked out of the Lion Gate and turned right. Outside her home, she grabbed me, kissed me once on the mouth, and wished me a happy life.
I drove home through the horrible, dense traffic, feeling what I’d felt so many times before, that Caro was unbalanced and unpredictable and not worth bothering with.
But as I sat down to my lonely tea, a boiled egg with toast soldiers, I found I could barely swallow. I was shivering, even though it wasn’t cold. When I studied my bruised forehead in the bathroom mirror, my eyes glittered with an energy I didn’t feel. I knew these symptoms well.
My love for Caro was obsessive. It had to be, to have lasted so long. Despite her lack of basic human goodness (or perhaps because of it), no woman had ever excited me more. But what was clear to me was that I hardly excited Caro at all. I was just someone she had slept with, one more sap in a cast of thousands, undistinguished by personality, good looks, or sexual prowess. A boy from her past, a naive boy who entered her life as a virgin and left as a trembling, white-faced cuckold.
* * *
TO CONSOLE myself, I went to see Lisa. She was about ten years older than me. Lisa and I were in a relationship that that was going nowhere, which is why I hadn’t bothered mentioning her to Caro. The lack of direction was entirely my fault. Lisa, a dimpled single mother, lived in New Eltham.
It was Harry Potter that brought us together. Lisa realized, quite rightly, that unless J. K. Rowling was suddenly discovered to be the leader of a child porn network, her books were destined to appreciate in value. Lisa had a fourteen-year-old son. His name was Elliot. Lisa started buying signed Harry Potter first editions from me, knowing that if she kept them in fine condition, she could eventually sell them at a vast profit and, wit
h the proceeds, put Elliot through college.
On first learning that Lisa had a son, I was intrigued. So far, I’d been a romantic failure, an anally retentive jerk, and a decent fair-minded bloke trying to make his fair-minded way through a confusing world. But becoming a surrogate father to a boy who missed having a man in his life was the one Nick Hornby cliché I hadn’t tried. Unfortunately, Elliot had other ideas.
Tonight, when I rang the bell, Elliot opened the door. When he saw me, he turned his face away as if I were a particularly nasty road accident. “Oh, shit.”
“Hi, Elliot,” I said brightly, switching on the unflappable charm that was my only way of dealing with the unfriendly little bastard.
“What do you want?” he said.
I’d been seeing Lisa for seven months, and apart from the occasional gloomy half-day truce, my dealings with her son had been unsatisfactory from the outset. Tonight, I gave him my warmest fake smile. “Listen,” I said. “I know you’re having problems at school. I understand that you miss your real father, and I swear I’m not trying to replace him. I may be a disappointment to you. Sometimes, I must admit, I’m a disappointment to myself. But Elliot, there’s no reason why we can’t be friends. That’s all I want. Just to be friends.”
“Fuck off, you simpering twat,” said Elliot.
He was bright, I could see that. Most fourteen-year-olds would never use a word like “simpering.” Before I had formulated a mature response, Elliot had swung the door toward me and walked off. Choosing to view this as progress—he usually slammed it shut—I peered through the crack into the hall. “Hello? Lisa?”
After about a minute, it became apparent that Elliot hadn’t told his mother I was here. He had no intention of doing or saying anything that might make our relationship easier. I walked into the house. The brat was in the living room, watching TV. From upstairs came the annoying whine of a hair dryer, an appliance that Lisa wielded with depressing dexterity. She was a mobile hairdresser.
I hovered in the kitchen until she came down. She beamed when she saw me, showing her dimples, a girlish woman in her thirties who revealed her inherent sweetness and lack of formal education every time she smiled. She had long hair, bleached canary blonde with extravagant waves, a prime example of a hairdresser who needed a hairdresser. “Oh, I didn’t hear the door,” she said, kissing me lightly on the cheek. “Did Elliot let you in?”
I half-nodded. She made an I’m-pleasantly-surprised noise, as if this proved that my relationship with her beloved only child was progressing at a breakneck pace. Lisa preferred to ignore the fact that her son would have cheered if my genitals were bitten off by a rabid dog.
Before I left with Lisa for our statutory ninety minutes at the pub, she asked her son if she could do anything for him. “Yes,” he said, his eyes not leaving the telly. “You can get rid of that cunt standing next to you.”
* * *
I’D SEEN a lot of Wallace since his marriage failed. During my time at university, Wallace had got himself a job, a wife, and two children. He worked in IT, managing an office full of computer nerds. Then, after a one-night stand with a young programmer, he made the disastrous mistake of telling his wife. As a reward for his honesty, she asked him to leave. Now he was living in a depressing complex called Sheen Court, where the walls were so thin you could hear people breaking wind in the adjoining flats.
We took to going out for a drink about twice a week. Tonight we visited a little pub called the Wheatsheaf, just around the corner from Sheen Common Drive, where Caro used to live. It was a small pub in an almost exclusively middle-class area, the last place you’d anticipate trouble. The mood was relaxed. The landlord, Phil, always wore his carpet slippers.
Wallace seemed relieved and encouraged that my night out with Caro had resulted in nothing more physical than a brick on the head. I realized that the end of his marriage and the failure of his one-night stand to extend to two nights had damaged his confidence. He was my age but felt old. Seeing his children only on weekends had hit him hard, and now, rather too late, he recognized that he’d fucked up a happy marriage for the sake of five sticky minutes in a dark stockroom.
“Okay,” I said. “In ascending order, list the top five women who’d never want to fuck you.”
This was how we spent our evenings.
“Why bother to make a list?” said Wallace. “Why not save ourselves the effort by admitting that all the women in the world have reached the unanimous verdict that I am deeply unattractive?”
“Because it wouldn’t be true,” I said. “Come on. The top five women who would take one look at you and turn you down.”
Wallace thought about it. “In fifth place,” he said, “Princess Diana.”
“She’s dead. Corpses don’t count.”
“You never said they couldn’t be dead,” argued Wallace.
“No, but dead kind of ruins the game. If someone’s dead, of course you stand no chance with them.”
“That’s a matter of opinion.”
“Besides, Diana might have considered you,” I said. “She had very dodgy taste. I’m talking about women who, if you were rich enough, even if you could move in their circles and eat in the same restaurants, they’d still turn you down. Women who wouldn’t be tempted even if you were naked in bed with them and you were the last man on earth.”
“That’s still every woman alive.”
“No, it isn’t. You suffer from low self-esteem, you know that?”
“In that case,” he said, “number five is that actress who was in Pirates of the Caribbean. I know she wouldn’t fuck me. In fourth place, who’s that tall Russian tennis player who wouldn’t fuck me?”
“Sharapova?”
“Yeah. I’d stand no chance whatsover there. As for third place, my number three woman who I’d like to fuck but who wouldn’t countenance it is probably your mother.”
“My mother? My own mother?”
“Yeah. Sorry. Did I never tell you she was sexy?”
“You’re disgusting.”
“Yes, I am. Which is why, despite the fact that you once skidded down that poor woman’s birth canal, Mrs. Madden is definitely at number three. On some days, in her nurse’s uniform, she might even make it to second place.”
“You’d stand no chance with my mother. No chance at all.”
“Exactly,” said Wallace wearily. “Which is why she’s on a list of women who wouldn’t fuck me.”
I sighed. “You know something? We need to get out more. Our vital forces are ebbing away.”
“What vital forces?”
“You know what they say in Tahiti? ‘Eat life or life will eat you.’”
“What does that mean?”
“Well. Look at us. We do the same things night after night. We even have the same conversations.”
Wallace swallowed his drink and watched the suds sliding down the inside of his beer glass. “I suppose we could be a little more spontaneous than we are. But you can’t be spontaneous just like that.”
Wallace went for a piss while I bought the next round. On his return, Wallace nudged me. “Don’t look now—I said don’t look—but there’s this right evil-looking bastard behind us who looks like he wants to kill you.”
I turned round. There, sitting at a table under the window, was Wuffer. His hair was neatly brushed back from his one inch forehead, and a little golden medallion dangled from his neck. Although it was winter, his prehistoric arms protruded menacingly from a short-sleeved Hawaiian shirt. He was sitting perfectly still, a cigarette in one hand and a pint of beer in front of him. Next to him was a big greasy woman with red streaks in her hair and a face that seemed to have been cast in concrete. This had to be his wife. She and Wuffer were made for each other.
Wuffer was indeed staring at me as if he wanted to kill me. So was his wife.
“Oh, fucking hell,” I said to Wallace.
“What?”
“That’s the guy I told you about.”
�
��The one who threw a brick at your bonce?”
“No.”
“The one who burned your book?”
“No. This is the one who hit me for stopping his son from beating up some kid.”
“I’ll say this for you,” said Wallace. “You’re a popular guy.”
I tried to attract the attention of Phil, the landlord, but he was too busy trying to impress a young barmaid.
“Anyway, now’s your chance,” said Wallace.
“My chance for what?”
“You said he surprised you last time. Now you can surprise him. Go over and punch the bastard.”
“Wallace, he’s looking right at me. What kind of surprise would that be?”
“It was just a suggestion.”
“Here’s another. Drink up. We’re leaving.”
As we walked out the door, Wuffer and his wife walked after us. Wuffer’s wife shook her fist at Wallace. “Lay anuver fin on ma kid and arl fucking twad yer.”
“I beg your pardon?” said Wallace.
That was all it took. Bingo wings quivering, Wuffer’s wife grabbed his hair and started hitting him. Wallace had to use all his strength to break away. Wuffer was laughing, his pistachio teeth glistening with beer and spit. “Yer god the ronwon, yer bent cun,” he said to his wife, then pointed at me. “Him. Heed the nob-end wot clogged are Darren.”
But Wuffer’s wife wasn’t fussy about who she attacked. Wallace started to run, and she began to chase after him, her belly lurching up and down inside a dress that resembled an orange tent. In a genteel suburban street lined with desirable prewar dwellings, it was a truly surreal sight.
Wuffer snarled at me. “You ger in mah fuckin drinker agin an arl slice yer fuckin bans off.” He lunged forward, and I stepped backward so suddenly that I staggered. “Ah,” said Wuffer, triumph in his eyes. “Nah yer get ooze fucking boss, yer can. Nah yer fuckin dinch.”
I ran after Wallace. Wuffer’s fat wife had him in a headlock and was trying to wrestle him to the ground. He punched her. She lost her balance, tottered, and lurched over a garden wall. I looked back and saw Wuffer charging toward us, screaming. Wallace and I started to run.
