Bina

by Anakana Schofield

  PUBLISHED BY ALFRED A. KNOPF CANADA

  Copyright © 2019 Anakana Schofield

  All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review. Published in 2019 by Alfred A. Knopf Canada, a division of Penguin Random House Canada Limited, Toronto. Distributed in Canada by Penguin Random House Canada Limited, Toronto.

  www.penguinrandomhouse.ca

  Knopf Canada and colophon are registered trademarks.

  Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

  Schofield, Anakana, 1971–, author

  Bina : a novel in warnings / Anakana Schofield.

  Issued in print and electronic formats.

  ISBN 9780735273214

  eBook ISBN 9780735273238

  I. Title.

  PS8637.C563B56 2019  C813′C813′.6  C813′C2018-903954-X

                   C2018-903955-8

  Book design by Kelly Hill

  Interior images: (lightning bolt) © mhatzapa / Shutterstock.com; (goat, kettle, bed) from 3,800 Early Advertising Cuts © Dover Publications, Inc.; (glass) from Scan This Book © John Mendenhall

  v5.3.2

  a

  For

  every

  woman

  who

  has

  had

  enough

  I don’t want to confirm myself in what I lived—in the confirmation of me I would lose the world as I had it, and I know I don’t have the fortitude for another.

  —CLARICE LISPECTOR, The Passion According to G.H.

  Her texts almost never coincide with the dates to which we refer, but they are pertinent, no matter how impertinent they may seem. We have our own methods of analysis and we ask you to kindly respect them, as we ask that you respect the unconscious work of our patient…

  —LUISA VALENZUELA, He Who Searches

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Epigraph

  Warnings

  Ditch

  Door

  Leaba

  Remarkings

  Acknowledgements

  About the Author

  WARNING

  I do swear.

  In this place.

  You will find.

  Warnings.

  If you heed them

  They will be yours.

  If you don’t

  You were warned.

  My name is Bina and I’m a very busy woman. That’s Bye-na not Bee-na. I don’t know who Beena is, but I expect she’s having a happy life. I don’t know who you are, or the state of your life. But if you’ve come all this way here to listen to me, your life will undoubtedly get worse. I’m here to warn you, not to reassure you.

  I am a modern woman with modern thoughts on modern things. I’m not a young person so I am used to being ignored. I expect you won’t listen. The last time we met nobody listened to me.*1

  If you see me on the road and I pay no heed to you, know I have very good reasons for doing so. If you ever see a person lying in a ditch,*2 drive straight past them as fast as you can. And if a man comes to your door, do not open it.

  These serve as my first two warnings.

  No ditch.

  No door.

  Do exactly as I tell you in matters mentioned here.

  I have lived to tell this tale.

  You could be a lot less lucky.

  *1 See, Malarky: A Novel in Episodes.

  *2 Because I was reassured. He’s a nice lad they said. He wasn’t.

  Eddie is gone.

  There is the son of Bina, the way there is the Son of God.

  His name is Eddie.

  There is the Son of Satan, the way there is the Son of God.

  His name is also Eddie.

  Eddie is a man.

  Except Eddie is not Bina’s real son.

  He’s her sorta son.

  He managed to adopt himself onto Bina because she left her coat undone & in he climbed.

  Latched + snatched.

  That’s Eddie.

  Eddie’s the kind of son you are landed with because no beggar wants to be bothered with him, and because he’s used up all his goodwill and will soon expire on yours.

  Bina lived a peaceful life.

  Until she found Eddie

  Landed in her ditch.

  If she’d stayed indoors

  She’d still be living a peaceful life.

  Eddie is gone.

  We give thanks that Eddie is gone.

  We give thanks to God for that.

  I didn’t want him.

  I didn’t want to help him, but he presented in a manner that was impossible to ignore. Before I knew what I know now. Now I wouldn’t help him. I won’t help anyone. Not even you.

  I’m only telling you this to warn you. I’ve better ways to waste my time than mithering on here. I’m a busy woman. Of that be certain. People think old women have nothing to do but stand around. They’re very wrong and very ignorant and do take that last combination of wrong and ignorant as another warning. If people think you have time to stand about, let them know otherwise, by not standing about. Take off! Take off when they least expect it. Could you just hold this for a minute? Don’t! Be gone. Would you like to? No. I wouldn’t. Can I borrow your bread knife to take on a picnic? No. You can’t. Because you’ll never bring it back. Would there be any chance…? No! There’s no chance. None. None. None.

  I will take exactly the time needed to tell my story & then it will stop. Any interruption or extension will not be my doing. It will be the undertakers or solicitors; whoever finds these papers and whoever it is decides on these things. Don’t trust a word said after I’ve stopped. The final full stop will be in red. That’s how you’ll know.

  Don’t arrive at the end of this tale insisting it was too long or too wide or too unlike you. I am not interested in appealing to you. I am not you. I am only here to warn you.

  We are all here because of legal reasons we probably cannot articulate without getting in trouble, but we will not burden each other by staying a page longer than is necessary. And there will not be a page more than absolutely is required. And if there is, write away and complain. There’s probably an address to be found or a phone number. I won’t care. Phone them all night long if you must. More likely you’ll find a page missing. Or someone will have scratched out sentences or names in a thick black stripe. I’d better get going here fast before it happens.

  Don’t. Sign. Petitions. For. Me. You might see them around. I’ve heard about them. Ignore them. Read. This. Instead. You don’t need 32,000 signatures to tell you anything as simple as what I’m going to tell you here. Yes I was wronged, but I was serviceably wronged because I’ve been handed this here undertaking. To. Deliver. These. Warnings. I am a practical woman, there’s nothing I like more than to be useful and this here makes me useful. This serves only as a warning to you, if you are thinking of opening your hearth or your heart. Don’t.

  Of course I have better things to do, like making lists and learning hymns. I hate hymns but it’s important not to stick out around here. If I stick out, I’ll be lifted all over again*1 and all will be more terrible than it already is and was and might ever be. No one in a choir gets arrested. No one suspects people in choirs. Everyone’s in a choir. That’s why there’s no one in jail anymore.*2

  Think slow and careful on that.

  Bina found him in a ditch.

  It was very annoying.

  Quite the interruption


  Especially for a Tuesday.

  That was the first fella.

  The young fella.

  Eddie.

  There are going to be two fellas I will warn you about.

  Eddie’s the first.

  But the other fella.

  There was another fella

  Isn’t there always another fella?

  Where there’s one, there’s two.

  He came to the door.

  Civilized

  On a Tuesday

  Worry about the civilized types

  On Tuesdays.

  Ask yourself if someone highly clean & civilized is standing at your door, ask yourself what bold mischief that person could be capable of, then imagine it twice as bad. Imagine them taking a sword and lopping off your head, dragging a large knife down the front of you, opening you up like a shirt, spilling your giblets out on the road and rummaging through them. I generally find since I started doing this, it prompts me to shut my door as swift as I open it.

  If the sword isn’t working and your door is still open, imagine them taking a gun, a hunting rifle, the sort used to obliterate Bugs Bunny, and see yourself flung back against your airing cupboard peppered with fat bullets. This is what some fellas like to do to women. Don’t let yourself be one of them.

  Actually I’ll put it direct: If they are knocking worry, worry about them. They are all after something. It might be something you do or don’t have or are or aren’t able for, but they can persuade you they are ready for it and so you’ve to be ready. Heed me on this. I’ve made every mistake you’ve yet to make and, if you’re intent on not listening, are about to make.

  And another thing, if someone asks you to put a bag over their head.

  Don’t do it.

  They can change their mind.

  That’s what happened

  The tall man.

  Someone changed her mind.

  A certain someone

  I can’t name.

  Because of the courts.

  In Castlebar.*3

  I shouldn’t have named the place, but now I’ve no time to rub it out.

  I have to carry on.

  I’ll have to give the tall man a name.

  I’ll call him the Tall Man.

  I’ll call him the Tall Man because I am in a hurry.

  And to call him the Kettle Man sounds a bit funny.*4

  I am in a hurry because in case you didn’t catch it earlier

  I am a very busy woman.

  If I write it out this way,

  in these stacks,

  you’ll know I’m particularly in a hurry as I’m writing this bit.*5

  Someone is coming now so I’m going to hide it.

  I’m back but I’ve forgotten where I was.

  I’m in a hurry so I’ll just carry on.

  My memory isn’t great so you may have to read a few things twice. What harm?

  Nothing can be done about it.

  Nothing to be done.

  How it is when you are in a hurry.

  I’ve to go on here until I am no longer or we’ll never reach the red dot.

  There’s a thing about Eddie.

  The thing about Eddie is he left.

  The thing about Eddie is he’s gone.

  Everything about Eddie improved once he was gone.

  That was the thing about Eddie.

  There are a few more things about Eddie, but we’ll get to them yet.

  If we have time.

  If we’ve no time

  You’ll have to make do with what’s above.

  At any moment this could all stop.

  Have I made that clear?

  The ditch was the door.

  One led on to the other

  Led back to each other.

  Brought us here to the warnings.

  Where eventually we’ll see the red dot.

  When he’s here, I worry about him.

  When he’s here, I can’t stand him.

  Yet when he’s gone I just worry about him.

  That’s a relief.

  But I can’t stand worrying about him.

  He’s the ingrown toenail rubbing against your shoe.

  You can’t forget it’s there.

  You’ll not forget Eddie’s out there

  Until finally you or he is not.

  I’m here, I’m here, I’m here, he’d say.

  I wish you weren’t, I wish you weren’t, I wish you weren’t.

  Eddie didn’t give a fig about me though

  Unless it was for money.

  If it was money he needed, I was Eddie’s number one.

  I am still number one for money.

  It would be worse if I were his mother—may the Lord have mercy on that poor, destroyed woman—God couldn’t save her from Eddie. Eddie sent her to her grave. The way Eddie will surely send me to my grave. He’ll send you to the grave too if you stand near him long enough. Hold him at arm’s length. Go on push these papers out in front of you and count to twenty.

  Don’t.

  Don’t stand near him.

  Easier now.

  Now he’s gone to Canada.

  Pity the Canadians.

  It’ll take them a while to come around to him.

  Then they’ll ship him back to us.

  I’ll be gone by then.

  I intend to be dead before I ever face that fella again.

  Use this pile of papers as a weapon between you and Eddie.

  Especially if he tries to kiss you.

  Whatever you do put your hand across your mouth

  He’ll give you cold sores.

  Hot burns.

  Never learned.

  Did Eddie.

  For now he’s quiet.

  He’s gone quiet.

  I intend to be dead before Eddie is ever noisy again.

  Have I already said that? Hard to keep track of what’s said. People are always saying things I’ve never said. Exactly what I said to the first Judge. Hard to keep track, I said. Not a bit, he scowled. I won’t forget his scowl. I shook my head at that scowl. I don’t regret that. I’d do it again.

  I have it planned this way. I’ve learned all I need to know about getting gone from the Tall Man. The instructions are in a box up there, cupboard over my head, near the front, easy to reach if you are reading this and finding me dead and looking for them. I am going to attach a note to the inside strap of my watch to make it easy for you to locate them. The tiny sticker will read c u p b o a r d

  I always found fellas very difficult. I never got tangled up in them for that reason. I put my head down and lived a reasonable life. Or rather once I put the head down, I lived a reasonable life.

  Women are no easier. So don’t be fooled thinking otherwise.

  They are all awful, awful, awful.

  All humans are awful.

  All of us are awful.

  Be very suspicious.

  Stick to cats or carp.

  Goats are less trouble than humans.

  He’s mad as a goat, they’ll say. Yet I never met a goat as mad as a man.

  Goats never caused me mounds of grief.

  Goats never sat like a pile of rank mush in my kitchen.

  Worse thing they ever did was eat something they couldn’t digest, yet you’d no more go down their throat after it. You leave them be. You let them decide, do you want to live or die? Do you want to carry on or take a left turn?

  A man though, he could get into your kidneys and irritate them & you in a very special way. It’s why women are up in the night to go to the toilet as they age. They are widdling the confused strain of anger gathered up in there all day. I’ve no explanation as to why men are up piddling all night too, except perhaps it’s God’s subtle way of tormenting them. He goes straight for the pipe does our Saviour.

  Out of the toilet quick, Bina!

  Before I’m distracted.

  I’m an awful woman for distraction.

  Curiosity was my downfall.

  You�
�ll see yet.

  But let us return to the goats.

  Not demanding, goats.

  Unless they sneak out.

  Then and even then, and only then, it’s the humans cause a big fuss. The goats don’t much mind the humans; they carry on doing what they do, a simple desire to eat briars unimpeded. Armoured tongues. Clipping nibbles. Head in. Chomp crunch. Down. Down. You could be dying on the ground and a goat would eat all the way around you, and not take a lick or a bare sniff at you. He’d follow the feed.

  Not the humans! Oh no, big fuss when goats escape. They’re out on the road! Mad. Arms waving. Phones ringing. Thumb-stabbing slipped texts to the wrong farmer. They raise their voices. They’ll shout at any man who’ll hear. Any ear. Or woman. And amid shrieking carnival and lifeboat dispatch you’d wonder wherever did they think goats were before we put them into fields and sheds? Where do they think the wild goats are? The goats just keep on eating and buck about. They don’t mind your trumpet or your texts.

  I’ve had to give up my goats on account of the humans. Let me be clear on that, it wasn’t the other way round. I haven’t given up my goats for any reason aside from Eddie. Don’t listen when they say oh it’s her age or her health or the diabetes or she needs to lose weight. I haven’t the diabetes. It’s Joanie, God rest her, who had the diabetes. None of us knew. She kept it quiet and now she’s dead and that’s what happens when you keep things quiet. Though I do believe in keeping some things quiet. Phil had it too, the diabetes.*6

  I am as strong as steel. Unbendable Bina. It’s just the humans are doing me in. Not the goats, not the diabetes. I don’t even eat cakes. If I start eating cakes, it’s because they drove me to it. Eddie would drive you to eat cakes. I’m surprised I didn’t plunge my face down into a Victoria sponge, with him and now this other tall fella breaking my brain to crumb.