Grasslands

by Andrew McEwan

  ‘Soup?’

  ‘No. '

  ‘How about strawberry jam?’

  Vern shook his head.

  ‘Potatoes, carrots, lemons?’

  ‘Mushrooms,’ said Vern. ‘I like mushrooms.’

  ‘No mushrooms.’

  ‘None?’

  ‘Not any,’ said Almeric. ‘They got celery though.’

  ‘You can't fry celery.’

  ‘You can't crunch mushrooms.’

  ‘I don't want to crunch mushrooms; I want to fry them.’

  ‘In butter or oil?’ inquired Lucy.

  ‘Bacon fat,’ Vern said. ‘I like my mushrooms with bacon.’

  ‘No bacon.’

  The two old ladies crashed their trolley into Vern's. He saw the look in their eyes and said nothing.

  ‘Tomatoes,’ said Harriet;‘you can fry tomatoes.’

  ‘We've got tomatoes,’ Edgar said.

  Vern reached for a shrink-wrapped pack of cheddar cheese.

  ‘No cheese,’ said Almeric.

  ‘I want cheese. There is cheese,’ argued Vern, taking a pack of Brie just to annoy Al, who'd ignored the old ladies.

  ‘I like cheese,’ said Edgar. ‘Get cheese.’

  Vern put the cheddar back by way of a compromise. ‘Isn't anyone else shopping?’ he asked.

  ‘What?’ Almeric appeared shocked.

  ‘Us?’

  ‘Yes, you and Ed.’

  ‘Oh, we get all our stuff delivered,’ Edgar told him.

  ‘So why are you here?’

  Almeric's mouth fell open. ‘We came because you wanted us to. This was your idea, Vern. We came to help.’

  ‘We are your friends,’ added Edgar.

  ‘Can you get mouse food here?’ Lucy queried.

  Harriot said, ‘Mouse food?’

  ‘Vern has this gorgeous mouse,’ she said to her sister, ‘His place was burgled and they stole its cage.’

  ‘Really? Vern, you know I had a mouse once. Or was it a rat? Anyway...’

  Vern wasn't listening. He pushed his trolley down the next aisle and wondered how much money he had to spend. He motioned for Ed and Al to follow - or imagined he motioned, as it was then that he discovered the theft of his wallet.

  Almeric took one look at his face and said, ‘Shopping's off, Vern forgot cash.’

  ‘Vern forgot cash,’ mimicked Edgar.

  ‘Thanks, Vern,’ said Almeric, ‘for wasting our afternoon.’

  The girls wandered off in search of mouse food.

  Vern was jealous.

  Edgar screamed, ‘Pizza! I found pizza! The universe is saved and the aliens can go home: We're all going to die!’

  ‘His seas and rivers and lakes have dried up,’ Almeric told the robbed Vern. ‘And he hates southern-fried chicken.’

  Later, Vern was arrested for shoplifting.

  Harriot and Lucy stole eight packets of peanuts.

  Edgar walked out with a frozen pizza. ‘It must've come direct from Venus,’ he told Almeric. ‘Only they changed the label.’

  And for his part, Almeric purloined a can of rust-preventer and another of WD-40.

  ‘I'm innocent,’ Vern pleaded. ‘I can prove it.’

  ‘How?’ the store-detective asked, adding, ‘We already found these mushrooms about your person.’

  ‘I've no idea...’ began Vern, and then gave up.

  ‘They fined me thirty quid,’ he complained that evening.

  ‘Don't worry about it,’ said Almeric, tinkering with his bomb, its newly installed timer, his rust-prevented screwdriver bold and shiny. ‘You got off lightly.’

  ‘Thanks.’ He sat on the sofa between Lucy and Harriet. ‘But I didn't even get to keep the mushrooms.’

  ‘Too bad,’ said Edgar from behind the sofa, where he'd erected his tripod.

  ‘What's it called?’ said Harriot.

  ‘The mouse?’ said Lucy.

  ‘Yeah. ‘

  ‘I don't remember,’ the redhead answered. ‘Vern maybe; I'm not sure.’

  Vern stood and motioned, this time to leave.

  ‘Luck ain't free,’ Edgar declared, camera mounted.

  ‘Not even bad luck?’ Almeric said.

  ‘That's the most unfree of all.’

  The door slammed.

  ‘Gone so soon,’ said Lucy.

  It is a cloudless night, the lights in space radiant, matched by those of terrestrial origin, sources varied, candles and lamps and open fires spreading yellow and orange and white glows over furniture and pavement, room and street, faces...

  ‘Rubber washers,’ said Vern. ‘I knew there was something.’

  ‘What's that?’ said Joyce. ‘Do you want coffee?’

  ‘Please. The machine okay?’

  She shook her head. ‘Tom was going to ask you to have a look at it,’ she admitted.

  ‘Tonight?’ Vern folded his arms. Why did I come in here? he pondered.

  ‘No rush,’ Joyce told him, lifting a lock of hair from her stony brow and pushing it behind an ear.

  ‘Coffee would be nice,’ said Vern, dreamy.

  She disappeared, reappeared minutes later with a steaming mug of thick sludge.

  Vern regretted his decision, but smiled anyway. Tastes like old paint, he reckoned.

  ‘What was that you said about washers?’ probed Joyce. She leant over her desk, arms locked, breasts squeezed between her elbows. ‘It's just that mine's been acting up lately; I thought maybe I'd get you to fix it for me.’

  ‘Stay Fixed?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘We'd be delighted.’

  ‘Will it cost much?’ She straightened. ‘I'm not a rich woman, you know.’

  ‘A fortune,’ teased Vern. He turned around. ‘The work's number's the one on the left, under the logo. See it?’

  I faze quickly in and out, flashing solid in the office of Tom's Taxis.

  The woman faints...

  8 - RELAXING TO DEATH

  ‘Where've you been?’

  ‘I just went to buy a paper.’

  ‘What took you so long?’

  Stan gazed at his watch. ‘Ten minutes?’

  ‘More like twenty,’ retorted Susan, his wife. She lay on the couch with a box of liqueurs in her lap.

  Stanley reddened. ‘There was a queue,’ he said.

  ‘Liar!’ She didn't even look at him. ‘You went to the pub. I can smell you from here.’

  Stanley boiled. ‘I just went to buy a paper,’ he repeated.

  Susan stretched for the TV remote. ‘I had you followed,’ she said, switching channels. ‘You had two double whiskies.’

  Stanley erupted. He hit the door. ‘You what?’

  ‘You can't be trusted to be out alone...’

  ‘You had me followed?’

  ‘Exactly.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I told you.’ Her back arched and she sighed gently as the warm brandy-chocolate mixture caressed her tongue. ‘You're a bad boy, Stan-man.’

  Stanley whimpered. ‘But, but, but,’ he said.

  ‘Sit down,’ ordered Susan, languid.

  He sat facing the wall.

  ‘Now repeat after me.’ Sugar and cocoa oozed inside her limp body like cool magma. ‘I'm a bad boy, I can't...Stan-man? What're doing?’

  Stanley did not reply.

  Stanley said, ‘Vern, I killed my wife.’

  Vern stuck his fingers in his ears. ‘You didn't say that,’ he told Stan. ‘You're kidding.’

  ‘No,’ answered Stan. ‘I mean it. I strangled the lazy bitch. Her eyes popped out. She just came apart in my hands.’

  Vern slammed the door.

  Lucy came up the stairs in her long grey Mack, whistling, waving a bunch of grapes. ‘My best friend's in hospital,’ she explained; ‘and she hates grapes. Want some?’

  Stanley said yes.

  ‘Is Vern in? The downstairs door was open.’
>
  Stanley groaned.

  ‘What's the matter?’ Lucy asked. ‘Did someone die?’

  ‘My wife,’ he said, ‘was murdered.’

  ‘Really?’ She couldn't believe it. ‘Wow, I never met anyone whose wife was murdered before. How'd it happen?’

  ‘She was strangled.’

  The door flew open, startling Lucy. ‘You have to go to the police,’ Vern said earnestly. ‘You have to give yourself up.’

  She winked at him. ‘Why? What did I do?’

  ‘You killed her.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Your wife!’

  ‘I haven't got a wife,’ protested Lucy. ‘I'm not even married.’

  ‘They'll never believe that,’ Vern said. ‘I know, I was arrested yesterday, they fined me thirty quid!’

  ‘Calm down, Vern,’ said Stan. ‘It's okay.’

  ‘Okay?’

  ‘I disposed of the body. No evidence...’

  ‘That's right,’ said Lucy; ‘if there's no corpse then there's no murder.’

  Vern slammed the door again.

  ‘What did you do with it?’ Lucy asked Stan.

  ‘The body?’

  ‘Aha.’ She sucked a grape.

  ‘First I cut it up into little pieces and then I flushed it,’ Stan said. ‘It was hard work, she was big.’

  ‘Yeah,’ said Lucy. ‘You flushed everything?’

  ‘The lot.’

  ‘There must've been an awful mess.’

  Stanley nodded agreement. The door flew open once more and Vern staggered out.

  ‘Hello Vern,’ chimed Lucy. ‘Want a grape?’

  ‘I'm calling the police.’

  ‘No you're not,’ Stan informed him.

  Vern froze, terrified.

  ‘The phone's out of order.’ Stan cleaned his fingernails. ‘I saw the sign on the way up.’

  The army moves silently through the trees at the forest's edge, awash in moonlight. The nameless city can be felt through the leaves and bark, which rustle forebodingly. The air smells of damp cloth and cooking; ovens simmer, and the odour of freshly baked bread cheers many a soul...

  9 - EYES IN LETTERBOXES

  On Friday morning Edgar went to the post-office to cash his giro and mail his letter to his pen-pal Iku in Somalia. He'd left his camera at home and so was totally unprepared for what happened next.

  Two

  10 - A MAN THEY SENT

  ‘And?’ said Vern, miserable.

  ‘I haven't seen him since,’ Almeric finished. ‘I thought he might be at your place.’

  ‘With everybody else you mean,’ mumbled Vern, unhappy.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Lucy what's-her-name and Stanley Nex have decided to move in with me.’

  ‘But Ed isn't there?’

  ‘No. ‘

  ‘And you haven't seen him?’

  ‘No. ‘

  ‘Are you sure, Vern? You might've missed him in the crush. I know, I've done it myself.’

  ‘Yes, I'm sure. I haven't seen Ed since the other night.’

  ‘Did you look under your bed? He's fond of dark spaces.’

  ‘No!’ Vern shouted. He slammed the phone down - or up - and thought again about calling the police. But he could imagine how that conversation would turn out.

  ‘Briinnng-briinng, bri-inng-briinnng,’ went the phone. And Vern, against all his better instincts, broke it.

  The field of arches lies north and east of the grass strip, a sanctuary shrouded in mystery and wood. It is said the arches are all that remains of a once great settlement, a city mighty, stone-built and earthbound. If this is true, then it must have been a beautiful place.

  On finding the ruins at sunset I walked amidst long shades and muted tints, red and gold shafts of colour, shadows thick, circles and squares to compliment the once proud geometries. In my mind dwelled impossible hopes and improper fears...

  ‘What are you making?’ Vern asked.

  ‘Chocolate cake,’ said Lucy.

  ‘It was my idea,’ Stan confessed. ‘I love chocolate cake.’

  ‘Where'd you get the ingredients?’

  ‘I popped out on my lunch-break,’ said Stanley, ‘when you went for a crap.’

  ‘I never went for a crap,’ Vern said.

  ‘So where did you go?’ Stan licked clean the bowl, like he hadn't done in years. Cake mixture adhered to his face.

  Vern's forehead grew heavier. ‘I don't remember,’ he said.

  ‘That's silly,’ Lucy commented. ‘If you went somewhere then you must have gone and come back.’

  ‘Which makes two things you've forgotten,’ added Stan. ‘Three, if you count what you went for in the first place.’

  Vern frowned, possessed of a new melancholy.

  Almeric was lonely. He got drunk. There was a knock at the door which he answered, tapping the rosy panels with his shiny screwdriver.

  The knock came again, this time louder.

  Almeric thumped his side of the door in reply.

  Whoever was out there paused, then slipped a note under the door.

  It had the wrong address on it so Almeric set it alight. The address was Vern's, he realized, smiling wickedly.

  Whoever was out there knocked one last time, very loudly, heavy fists banging like skulls or footballs.

  Almeric sneered. He started loosening all the screws he could find in the flat; excepting, of course, those in the hydrogen bomb, which was largely held together by an assortment of black high-carbon threads.

  He missed some, being sloshed. But when he went to bed that night, it collapsed.

  He dreamt of grey-white clouds and black space. He curled up in his blankets and moaned out loud. He dreamt of silver eagles and green grass. He talked to himself, saying, ‘Luck ain't free, and bad luck, that's the most unfree of all.’

  The heavy-fisted man - he was sure it was a man - didn't come back.

  During the night a man climbs the stairs and stands outside Vernon's door. The mouse and I both know he's there, but he makes no noise, and neither do we...

  11 - CABIN FEVER

  It was the weekend and Vern paced nervously, having nothing to do, nowhere to go, nobody to meet. What he did have was Stanley Nex. Lucy had disappeared, her knickers inside-out and her red lipstick smeared as she rushed to further the cause of her odd employment. Vern, peeking, had said nothing.

  There was a knock at the door, but when he answered it there was no one stood on the landing.

  Stan read a Viz comic and watched telly.

  ‘How can you read a Viz comic and watch telly at the same time?’ Vern asked him. ‘Stan?’

  ‘What, Vern?’

  He repeated the question.

  ‘Easy,’ said Stan. ‘I only listen to the pictures.’

  Vern paced some more. His life had been overrun and he was at a complete loss what to do about it.

  Stan folded double, laughing.

  ‘Rude Kid,’ Stan said to Vern twenty minutes later, ‘is my favourite.’

  ‘When did you buy that?’

  ‘On my lunch-break yesterday; but you wouldn't remember.’

  ‘Why?’ Vern stopped pacing. ‘Why wouldn't I remember?’

  Stan looked puzzled. ‘I forgot,’ he said.

  At that moment the door burst open and a blonde girl in a blue anorak swayed in, a cigarette in her purple-painted mouth and a plastic bag in her free hand.

  Her unfree hand contained her change from the bus.

  ‘What do you think?’ said Lucy. ‘I needed a new image, so...’

  She shrugged, dumping ash.

  ‘Who are you?’ Vern demanded.

  ‘I'm me,’ Lucy responded, pocketing her change and dropping the plastic bag on the floor.

  ‘Who's me?

  ‘My me!’

  Vern grimaced.

  ‘What's your name if you're you?’ said Stan.

  ‘Lucy. �
�

  Stan rose from Vern's director's chair, patted his gut. ‘Now there's a coincidence,’ he said. ‘There's a girl about your age and height who lives here with me and Vern.’ He paused to cough and belch. ‘And her name's Lucy, too.’

  ‘Yeah? That's disgusting,’ said Lucy.

  ‘I know,’ agreed Stan. ‘She's a terrible slut.’

  ‘I can imagine. I bet she's one of those awful kiss-a-gram girls.’

  ‘That's right,’ said Stanley.

  ‘And a lesbian...’

  ‘Right again!’ He clapped his hands. ‘You're good at this.’

  ‘Thanks,’ Lucy said. She pouted and winked. ‘And I bet she wears red knickers inside-out and a long grey Mack.’

  Stan slapped his cheeks. ‘Amazing!’

  Vern groaned.

  ‘Well,’ announced Lucy, ‘you won't be seeing her again, I can tell you.’ She pivoted on one hip and unzipped her blue anorak, beneath it an array of subtly frilled sea-green frillies.

  ‘Amazing:’ Stanley applauded. ‘Truly a-maz-ing...’

  Vern put the kettle on.

  ‘I brought coffee,’ Lucy told him, finding Vern in the tiny kitchen.

  ‘Great,’ said Vern, unsmiling.

  ‘What's up?’

  ‘Life's up.’

  ‘I know the feeling.’

  ‘You do?’ His expression softened.

  ‘Yeah,’ said Lucy. She stubbed out her cigarette and appeared suddenly gloomy. ‘Only I had an abortion,’ she concluded.

  And there's just no answering that, thought Vern. He removed his fogged glasses and cleaned them on a dirty tea-towel.

  ‘It's why I gave up men,’ Lucy went on.

  ‘I'm sorry,’ said Vern, reseating his lenses, ‘but there's no cake left, we ate it all for breakfast.’

  ‘That's okay,’ she replied. ‘I hate cake.’

  ‘Right, cake's fattening.’

  ‘Cake gives you zits.’

  ‘And heart disease.’

  ‘It blocks your arteries.’

  ‘Cake fills you with gunk.’

  ‘It corrodes your intestines and ties your bowels in knots.’

  ‘Cake stinks.’

  ‘What's that about cake?’ Stan called through, all of seven feet.

  ‘Cake,’ said Vern. ‘We were discussing it.’

  ‘Yeah,’ said Stan, ‘I know; that chocolate cake the redhead made has poisoned me.’

  ‘She's a woman, that redhead,’ Vern expanded. ‘Maybe she did it on purpose, to avenge your wife.’ Surprised at his own daring Vern cleaned his glasses a second time.