Bina

by Anakana Schofield

  Tomás hadn’t imagined how many brothers turn up

  After the fact.

  The other brother is in there now full-time. Would you believe?

  Of course you would

  Why wouldn’t you.

  He, who wouldn’t go near the man alive, is living full-time in Tomás’s bed now it’s empty. Now he can find his way to the bed alright, and the part I wonder about is each night when he puts his head down: Does it occur to him to consider the man who lay there before, the man he barely set eyes on, the man to whom he never passed a cup, the man he lied about to the Health Board and insisted he was helping so he could collect a carer’s allowance for not caring, and fuel allowance for leaving him cold and roaring. Ah but now. Ah here well. You can conjure up all the splutter you want across counters and up on bar stools. You’ll say I was the problem because I didn’t make it difficult for the brother not to call into him, and that if I hadn’t gone in to Tomás the brother would have, but do you honestly think Tomás would have been pleading with me for help to exit if what was coming into him of his own flesh and blood was a good reason to keep on living? It wasn’t. But see, if I write that here I will be accused of all sorts. I cannot keep up with the allegations. They are coming clipping at me like tennis balls. The authorities have looked around my house at benign and useless implements and given them a cause and purpose they’ve never had. They’ve made a mad old show happen in here, where there was nothing other than a sad old one. The sad show of a woman who was sunk by what she invited in and forced out each day to avoid it. Out there I was full of perk and shout about who should and shouldn’t do this or that to you. I was a great woman for delivering the verdicts to others that I could neither conjure or conquer for myself. Within these four walls it was persistence, it was never living. And it is for those people who, through no fault of their own, weren’t living that I persisted and helped. I did for others what no one could have done for me. And as I had insufficient courage to banish Eddie, my own hand would have rounded on myself eventually—had the cold hand of the law not cleverly come for me first.

  How it is.

  That’s how it is.

  For all of us

  Really.

  I am glad Eddie is gone

  I want only that he not come back

  The only assurance of that is to be gone myself.

  Morbid

  But

  True.

  Pure. Factual. Talk.

  Don’t forget

  Eddie built the yard on top of me.

  I think he planned to bury me in it

  To disappear me that way

  But soon the neighbours started complaining and grew suspicious.

  They would have noticed if I’d gone away

  They let him know that.

  Then

  Items became stranger and stranger

  That arrived.

  I longed to tell whoever was giving him stuff to stop.

  Could you tell whoever is filling up the back with their rubbish to stop?

  What’s that?

  What’s that stuff mounting up there?

  My machines, Eddie said. That’s all mine.

  Well move it?

  It’s moving. People are buying it all. It’s all sold, Eddie said. Everything out there is sold.

  I took a walk back there alone and examined it all. It was much worse than it looked from the window. I counted 42 tires, which made me very unhappy. There were three broken paddling pools for children, one had an elephant in it. There were tables, chairs, empty cases, tea chests, there were even a few toilet bowls up there. There were at least three baths. One of them looked like it had been attacked by an axe. There was a car seat from a Renault 4 that had a big slash in it. All of it was outside. All of it was in my garden. All of it had been rained on. The car batteries really confused and frightened me so I wasn’t going to stand for them.

  Get rid of the batteries, I told him. Whatever about the pink sofa and the toilet bowls, I am having no car batteries lying about up here. Get them gone or you’ll be gone. It was the first time I’d used a determined note of exit with him. (Car batteries will do that to me. I don’t like them.)

  Wha? What’s that? he repelled me. Oh them. I’m only minding them for a fella.

  Well tell him to come and remove them or I’ll call the council and they’ll remove both you and the batteries, I said.

  I told Eddie stop with the bonfires.

  I told Eddie the bonfires had to stop

  The flames were too high.

  I was worried they’d burn us all.

  Bina couldn’t be absolutely certain where Eddie’s fires were being burnt.

  Eddie was lighting them on common land beside her field.

  Common land meant she had no business asking him to stop.

  If you want rid of the rubbish you’ll have to accept bonfires.

  Eddie made it sound like Bina had created all the rubbish.

  Stop collecting rubbish, she said.

  He said the fires were part of his business.

  No more stuff back there, I said, you have the place destroyed. He muttered raméis about a man needing space to do his man’s work uninterrupted and how did I think the bills would be paid around here? That was when it dawned on me he was off his head entirely, as he’d never paid a bill in the years he had lived here. Nor was he ever likely to.

  “…skips were found containing building rubble, kitchen units, window frames and a sunbed,” the report read.

  Eddie lied about the skip. First he said the skip was there for us to clear out the house and his yard, as he’d begun calling my back garden, and that he’d be filling it up and a friend would be collecting it. The skip seemed to come and go, but nothing ever left the land and the skip seemed to return refilled each time.

  Eddie said I wasn’t to worry.

  Everything was sold and people were coming to collect it and he’d be building a fence so I wouldn’t have to look at it since it was upsetting me.

  Eddie had changed his tack.

  He was shouting less, but I did not believe this new softy mumble he was trying.

  Sure enough

  Soon enough

  He was shouting again.

  Eddie said I was very unreasonable and obstructing him.

  Eddie said I didn’t want him to make progress.

  Eddie said I was the problem.

  Eddie said so much gabbling grunt it was easy to forget what he said.*3

  I finally realized the best thing was to say nothing to Eddie*4

  Because as soon as I spoke to him

  A headache would come over me for three days

  And I’d never really had bad headaches like this.

  The equation was simple:

  Talk to Eddie

  Get a headache.

  Don’t talk to Eddie

  Eddie is a headache.

  Did I want to double my headaches?

  No I did not.

  Eddie seemed increasingly excited and galvanized by his plans.

  He built a fence

  It was crooked and ugly.

  Temporary, he said.

  It was temporary.

  To stop me being upset.

  One night I heard a noise out there

  And was surprised when I stepped out

  To see what looked like a digger waving its bucket at me.

  I wasn’t going to go over and investigate because it was dark and raining and because there had been a few break-ins in the area and people were afraid of getting murdered.

  The next day I did ask him.

  Oh it was just parked. Just parking. A fella was parking it there overnight.

  He was on a job nearby. And Eddie was helping him.

  It sounded like Eddie was being useful for the first time ever, so I said no more about it.

  I was curious though, so I had a look around where I recalled the digger had been and where Eddie may have been digging in the middle of th
e night.

  I wasn’t sure what or why he was digging.

  I wasn’t sure that I wanted to find out.

  Phil said if Eddie was digging, why wouldn’t he make himself useful and bury himself in the process.

  We both laughed.

  You don’t think?

  What? That he’s buried someone?

  God no, I said. Eddie is too big of an eejit to manage that. He’s up to something but it’s unlikely to be murder.

  You’ve to get shut of him, Phil said.

  I know, I said. But it’s not that easy.

  I’ll tell you what’s easy, Phil said. But she lost her train of thought, became distracted and never finished the sentence.

  It was what was happening to the two of us in different ways. Our minds would wander but we’d reassure one another we were as sharp as ever while individually knowing we were not. One reassuring the other would cancel out the misery of the one needing to be reassured and it was the dance we did. Heel and toe and side to side and back and forth and she and I.

  Find me the woman who wouldn’t help her friend?

  I can tell you this: I know no such a woman, but whoever she is cannot be living a happy life. For what is there other than the comfort of each other? Even in delusion and collusion there needs to be a woman to tell another woman, go way out of that, you’re alright. It’s how it is. How would you carry on without it? I’ll tell you how. You’d be Eddie and I wouldn’t wish that on any man or woman.

  Tomás is why I took Eddie in at all.

  Tomás was his uncle. Eddie had no other family in the area and I’d assumed he’d return to whomever he belonged to in Waterford*5 before he flew into my ditch.*6 After a few weeks’ recovery, I assumed he’d be right and ready, once he finished his rehab. He had to be near the hospital for his physio and I was near enough and could get him there. I never really thought beyond a few weeks and I knew very well Tomás couldn’t take him in. I had Eddie taken in, really, before I discussed it properly with Tomás, who told me straight to get rid of him at the earliest chance Bina as he is nothing but a bellyful. I’ll tell you the truth, that if he had arrived intact at my door, I would have pretended not to be home and if he’d got a cup of tea out of me he’d have been as lucky. So didn’t he land very well on the top of his head outside your house, because if it were me he’d have been left out there on the top of his head. I wish you’d spoken to me, was what Tomás repeatedly said. He’ll take advantage of you. He’s an awful fella. He’s an oaf, I tell ya.

  I lied to Tomás and told him Eddie was leaving.

  I might even have told him Eddie had left.

  I didn’t want to worry him.

  Meanwhile I was visiting him mostly to escape from Eddie.

  Tomás was my respite.

  And wasn’t I an awful fool.

  I was and I am.

  And that’s why I am putting all my foolishness down here, on full display, for you to learn and pay heed to.

  Eddie had no mother. She died. His father was killed more recent, 20 years ago, in a farming accident in Waterford and it was on the news. We all felt bad for the boy who’d already lost his mother. He took it hard, it was said. Knowing what I knew by then of Tomás and his situation, I knew the last thing he could tolerate was Eddie inside with him, and it was less damage to me to let him in than to let him go back at his very ill uncle again. And wasn’t I the fool now I lie here thinking on it. For Tomás is dead and I am destroyed and Eddie would have killed him anyway.

  Sacrifice is a stupid thing that women do.

  Don’t do it.

  The men don’t notice.

  And all the women around you spend their lives mopping you up.

  So you’re only making more and more work for the women who’ll have to repair you.

  That’s more than a warning

  It is an order.

  Be prepared to be unpopular.

  However.

  I don’t think any of the women knew how bad things had become with Eddie. And that is for the best. Because they’d say things like, Bina, you have the right idea, without indicating exactly which part I had right. And honestly, I didn’t want to be a disappointment to them. I am taking time in the aftermath to be truthful here and to disappoint. I hadn’t the right idea. Not at all. But I’ll make sure, if you read this, that by my words’ end you might have it. And if you don’t, keep writing and telling how you had the wrong idea to the next woman until finally we all fathom it. We’ll have to write the warnings back and forth to each other. It’s the only thing to do. Eventually we might even start listening and not need any more warnings.

  Tomás had told me Eddie was living in Waterford

  For a time.

  Quite a long time.

  He’d told me that with relief

  Once he got sick

  That his nephew, who caused all the problems in the world, was in Waterford.

  And can he help you? I’d asked that one time.

  Oh God, he’s no help, he said

  Don’t let him near me.

  You wouldn’t want him near you.

  This was why when I received the letter from Waterford

  I knew the woman had to be telling the truth

  About Eddie taking advantage of her generosity.

  She wrote the same words.

  Don’t let him near you or anyone you’ve any time for, she said

  He is not right in the head.

  If I was to reply to that woman, which I never have, I would tell her his uncle said Eddie’s father was a lovely man. Eddie’s uncle was a good friend to me and we never know what way our children will turn out, so be mindful of that when you are sending letters to frighten people as foolish as yourself around the country.

  Except I didn’t.

  Because I couldn’t.

  I’d only be saying, don’t tell me I’m as stupid as you are,

  Because I know I am.

  Even though I’ve no intention of admitting it.

  Never admit you know you’re stupid

  It’s the surest route to feeling even more stupid.

  Make out instead it was all intentional

  But you’ve changed direction.

  Just like a boat might.

  Be nautical.

  We’ll see yet how this might sail in court.

  I blame men on the radio

  And politicians

  Who are men on the radio.

  I blame men talking about football

  It’s why I can’t watch the television anymore

  I disagree with everyone on the television

  Except Theresa.

  I have a free television licence

  Full of people I disagree with

  Eddie & I disagreed about television

  Obviously.

  But I will spare you that.

  I have to spare you some things

  But I am not for sparing you the important stuff.

  And that’s a warning

  It took me longer than I thought to get here

  But do not spare the important stuff

  Do not be making your exit full of noise

  Do not be making your exit with a pain in your chest

  Do not be making your exit with a set of broken ears.

  If possible.

  Sort all those things out before you go

  You want it to be a nice long sleep you’ll head into.

  You need to move, I told him.

  Eddie grunted.

  You have a week to get out. Then the locks change, I said.

  A week came. He left. I thought it was over. I assumed it was finished.

  It wasn’t finished.

  A man, that man, visited me.

  In one visit I knew it wasn’t finished.

  The inspectors visited me. They told me what they were here for. What are you here for, I said. Come again. They repeated what they were here for. They were not here for what I assumed they’d be here for, and no, the
y didn’t want to come in. Instead what they were here for was outside. But they might have some questions for me once they’d inspected. They used words like report, sighting, suspected, illegal and, finally, dumping.

  At dumping I just laughed. Dumping I said. There’s many things I can be accused of but dumping is not one of them. My first thought was it must be the Crusties. I had not given them much thought because if I were to do so they would worry me and I’d vowed not to think about where they were shitting and singing. (They’d stopped the singing between certain hours as I’d requested.)

  Carry on, I said. Carry on and inspect.

  Not even five minutes til they were back at my door. And me returned to the bed, now lifted again from the bed and with that lift came irritation. Help yourselves, I said. I’m asleep.

  We can’t get access, they said, and indicated an area up beyond my barn. I stepped out in my dressing gown and slippers and there, like they were guarding the Roman Colosseum with their scarfs across their faces, were all the Crusties stood, arms locked. Don’t worry, Bina, one shouted. No pasarán, no pasarán, they all began chanting.

  Hold on til I get my coat, I said.

  The Crusties didn’t advise Bina to let inspectors look at the land.

  They didn’t advise that.

  Move aside and let them in, I instructed the Crusties, who adamant refused.

  They are trespassers, the Crusties said.

  They’re not trespassers. They are here for the dumping.

  The dumping has to be removed.

  Do I look to you like a dumper? I said to them all.

  They aren’t here for me, they are here for the dumping.

  When they come for me, there will be more of them than these fellas. A proper army or a van. Not a clipboard.

  The Crusties moved beside me like bodyguards. I felt like Saddam, stood there with all this loyalty.

  Carry on, I waved the inspectors through.