The Ice Scream Man

by Salmon, J. F.

A pot of tea was in the centre of the table, along with butter and a jar of strawberry jam. A place was set at the opposite end of the table. There was a slice of toast on a plate, a knife, and a cup with a dribble of milk.

  “There’s some tea in the pot, help yourself,” Father said with his eyes fixed on the newspaper.

  Standing beside the table—he had padded his bottom with as much afforded toilet roll as not to turn it into a nappy—he reached the pot and poured the tea in the cup. He took the knife and buttered the toast with a thin scraping, spreading the jam on thickly, took a bite and stayed standing. Chewing on the toast, he looked at Father who had his head bent over the newspaper. He didn’t think he was reading it.

  Liam was tired, depressed, and dare he say it, felt emotional. Four consecutive nights on the batter can do that. He looked up to see Eamon staring at him. It made him feel uneasy. He saw a scared and vulnerable little boy putting on a brave face who looked away as soon as he’d looked up. He could feel the palpitations in his chest getting stronger and thought he might actually be having an anxiety attack brought on by the excessive alcohol and drugs—or maybe the lack of them. It was difficult to breathe. He undid the top button of his shirt and loosened his tie.

  Images from last night, from other nights, flipped through his mind like the pages in a fictitious photo album. Visual reminders of all the beatings he’d bestowed on his son over the last few years, egged on by his wife—the state of her—and increasing with subtle frequency over the last year. And the worst part, the very worst part, was maybe, at some level, he might actually enjoy it.

  And then last night, what Lilith was doing to Eamon when he came back into the living room from the kitchen after washing. And the almighty slap he had had to give her across the head to make her stop, and her screaming the house down, saying,

  “. . . that little fuck deserves everything he gets. . . . It’s your fault, your fucken fault. I told you what I was going to do. I told you I’d make you pay for what you fucken did to me. You remember that, don’t you? Fucker what’s-her-face.”

  The ease with which she went about her business suggested to him that it wasn’t the first time she’d done such a drastic thing. And then she’d gloated in his face when she’d told him about the other abuse, the sexual ones. Not the ones with the stick, the wiggle-little-piggy ones. How had he not killed her there and then? And at that very moment he hated the man he had become.

  Liam looked back down at the paper.

  Eamon looked down but not away when Father looked up. He heard what sounded like the first large drops of rain hitting the canapé of a tent just before the heavens opened and noticed that there were two small wet marks on the newspaper, then another.

  He had never seen Father cry. Then Father said, “Oh, God,” as if asking for help.

  6:

  “Little piggy, little piggy, how did you decide,

  “To take Mother as your bride?”

  Liam sat back at the kitchen table when he heard Eamon close the front door. He wiped his eyes and took a deep breath to try to compose his feelings. The depression he felt inside was getting worse. He couldn’t get the image of his wife out of his mind, kneeling behind Eamon, fucking moving about. He’d seen what she was doing. And when he’d slapped the dirty grin off her messed-up face she fell over with the stick still in her hand.

  He reached a hand to the inside of his jacket pocket on the back of the chair and retrieved the plastic housing of a pen. It was shortened to a third of its original length. A further rummage produced a zip lock bag, twice the size of the one he had last night. He placed the plastic tube on the table and adjusted it to sit vertical in front of him. He gave the bag a good shake between thumb and forefinger, prised the bag open and emptied the contents onto the table. The white powder sat in a mound. He spread it out with his little finger and rubbed his gums with the residue. His gums went numb immediately, a sure sign of its purity. It was good stuff. He picked the tube up, bent into the powder and snorted, moving his head across the white substance. He did the same again up the other nostril.

  The effects of the powder used to give him a feeling of euphoria. Nowadays, the effects caused a blunting of his emotions that only heightened his depressive state of mind and made beating his son “comfortable.” He began to reflect on the earlier parts of his life when he’d met Lilith for the first time, and the problems that ensued thereafter. His heightened senses triggered by the cocaine bore vivid images that shifted at a hundred miles an hour.

  They’d started off like most couples. It was different back then. She was different back then. He had been in the police force two years when he met her in one of the big department stores while looking for a Christmas present for his then girlfriend. He was confident, good-looking, and had his dream job. She was working as a make-up artist behind one of several booths for one of the big make-up brands. She looked immaculately groomed when he’d first lain eyes upon her.

  She was standing behind the counter, showing a customer some make-up shades on the back of her hand when he walked through the departmental doors. Shiny dark hair fell just above the shoulders with a neatly cut fringe that rested on manicured eyebrows. She had a look of Cleopatra about her. Her eyelids were painted in a dark grey with a hint of brown running through, and the black mascara accentuated hazel eyes. Just the right amount of blusher and a thin band of lipstick with a darker shade of liner gave her lips a distinctive quality and made them look fuller than they actually were. She was striking, sexy, no question about it, akin to an Egyptian porcelain doll if there was such a thing, standing behind the counter unaware of his gaze.

  He, too, was smartly groomed, out of his uniform, in a pair of faded jeans and a blue V-neck jumper with a white T-shirt showing underneath. He had a well-toned physique back then due to plenty of outings at the gym, and standing six foot one-inch tall, finding the next relationship never posed much of a problem.

  He approached her counter and pretended to be consumed by choice at the display stand of lipsticks. He pulled a couple of individual testers from their housing and twisted the stem until the lipstick emerged. He studied each one for a moment as if he would recognise the colour when he saw it, all the while taking sneaky peeks in her direction. Once, maybe twice, she caught his advances and when finished with her customer she made her way over to him. He pretended not to notice her arrival.

  “Any particular shade I can help you with, sir? You look a little confused by choice,” she said with a smile that was welcomed.

  “Eh, hi, I’ll take this one,” he said.

  The shade in his hand was labelled “Viper.”

  “Black? You want black?” she asked. Her smile broadened, she was no fool back then.

  “It’s black, yes, of course it is. It’s for a fancy dress,” he lied.

  “Very well, then,” she said, taking the lipstick and a note of domination that more than covered the cost.

  “Not too cold outside then, is it?” she had asked when she’d handed him back his change and a small bag containing the lipstick. Her white smile sent a shiver down his spine.

  “Excuse me?” he asked, not understanding the question.

  “Your jacket, you’re not wearing your jacket. In case you haven’t noticed its zero degrees outside. I was just wondering if it was not too cold for you, considering your nipples are poking out through your jumper.”

  He had taken his black puff jacket off as soon as he entered the store and placed it under his arm, along with his scarf.

  “Eh! No. It’s just I can’t stand walking around these stores with a sleeping bag on. Too hot.” He liked her flirting smile. Her eyes gave him the once-over as he spoke. “I can tell you’re not cold in that nice white blouse.”

  He was staring at her chest and grinning. He thought she liked the attention.

  “Smartass. Anything else I
can help you with? More lipstick, sir?”

  They both laughed.

  “There is one other thing, since you ask,” he said, trying to keep up a front of confidence. “You could meet me for a drink.”

  She stood back with both arms stretched to the counter and looked at him for what felt like an eternity, then said, “Sure, why not? I get off at six.”

  The chemistry between them was instantaneous, monogamy assured. The first few years were the best of times; meals out in various pubs and clubs, trips to the cinema, and plenty of fortuitous weekends away. It was inevitable they would get married.

  They bought a spacious two-bedroom townhouse soon after getting married. Those again were exciting times, spending many a weekend without ever leaving the house, opting to spend their money on furniture and decoration. Drinking and moderate drug-taking, mostly cannabis, at the weekends, played a big part in their relationship. It enhanced their sex life and made it easy to spend days in bed eating takeaways of pizza, Chinese, and Indian.

  Time moved on and he noticed his wife’s drinking habit was becoming just that, a habit. Often he returned home from work to find her unsteady on her feet and her speech slurred. She blatantly laid the blame on feeling unwell. A few glasses of wine every other night sitting in front of the television became a bottle. It surprised him how intoxicated she became until he realised that the measure from the other bottle of white wine in the fridge diminished every time she disappeared to the kitchen.

  They both consumed wine, spirits, and joints on the weekends. Saturdays’ and Sundays’ merged into one short day. Frequently, she called in sick on a Monday too hung-over to face the world. A five-day working week developed into four, and then three, until she was asked to leave.

  In contrast to his wife, he coped better with his intake. He, too, consumed his fair share but never got drunk or stoned to the point of unconscious. The same could not be said for Lilith. He enjoyed his job and that kept him decisive enough to know when he had had enough.

  General household duties like washing dishes and clothes, vacuuming and dusting, were ultimately put on the back burner. Sex was predictably forgotten and steadily more and more drunken arguments sailed into the bay. Most of them, he believed, caused by his wife. But it was the introduction of cocaine into their marriage that tipped the scales for both of them.

  Confiscated drugs were easy enough to get hold of if you wanted them. A steady stream of narcotics flowed into the station and not all of it correctly documented as it should have been, a perk of the job. At first it made a real difference to their lives. His wife found a new lease on life. She became less argumentative and more sexual. There were meals on the table when he got home from work. The housework was getting done and she took better care of herself. Cocaine was Lilith’s new drug of choice and for a time he was happy to supply it.

  Then she became pregnant.

  She was heavily dependent on the drug by then, and the drink, for that matter. Out of concern for his newly conceived, he lessened the amounts of drugs he brought home. Sometimes he returned empty-handed but she sulked and her moods deepened, often leading to major tantrums over menial matters.

  There was no reasoning with her when like that; no matter how hard he tried. On many occasion he opted to leave her in favour of the local boozer, where he often stayed until closing. The booze became a problem for him, too, but he hadn’t seen it that way. Although he lost his physique, he still got up for work and functioned okay.

  His wife began to show signs of what he suspected to be a bipolar personality disorder. She became increasingly reclusive. When he did bring the drugs home she often locked herself away in their bedroom for hours, even days, unwilling to share, leaving him to the spare room until she ran out. He did make allowances for her selfishness and kept some aside for himself.

  Her moods were extreme and intensive between the lock-ups. There were lots of sorriest moments, lots of tears, and plenty of slaps across the face should her temper warrant it. But she was still pregnant with his baby and he worried about the outcome of the eventual birth. It was one of the first times in his life that he could remember feeling helpless, not being able to do anything except give her what she wanted.

  He spent most evenings at the same boozer and got friendly with one of the women who worked behind the bar. She wouldn’t have been his usual type from the past but she suited his new weight and, besides, her personality wasn’t half bad. He stayed behind late on the nights she was rostered to lock up. The attention he got from her was in stark contrast to what he received back home, and that suited him just fine.

  They spent nights out drinking in the local bars on her nights off. He ended up back in her place with increasing frequency, but that depended on how much cocaine he left with his wife. He crept into the house at four, five, sometimes six in the morning and made his way to the spare room, often hearing Lilith’s snores all the way from the landing.

  Several months turned the affair complacent with regular calls and texts sent back and forth, some of an erotic nature. Urgently deleting them became intermittent habit. As long as he gave his wife what she wanted she was happy and he was safe—at least, that’s how it was supposed to be.

  Everything changed at three-thirty one morning when he got back home and quietly locked the door behind him. He was just about to make his usual way up the stairs when light through the keyhole of the living room door caught his attention. No big deal, she must have forgotten to switch it off. It had happened before. The first time it frightened the life out of him thinking how to explain his whereabouts. Now it just vaguely worried him as he doubted the probability. Too quiet, nothing to worry about. His certainty didn’t stop a cautious approach as he gently opened the door and first poked his head inside to scan the room.

  And there she was, Lilith, his heavily pregnant wife on the couch with her knees neatly placed together and her feet firmly on the carpet, a vision his eyes would find hard to forget. Sitting on the bump of her stomach was a yellow bowl half-filled with milk and soggy cornflakes, some pasted to the inside edge. She had taken a spoonful to her mouth and her eyes fixed on his gaze. He could see the white trail running from her mouth as she used the edge of the spoon to scrape the dribble of milk from her chin and drop the spoon back in the bowl in one unconscious movement. She looked bedraggled and undernourished. Her hair was platted in knots; red blemishes covered her forehead and the lower parts of her jowls. The blue T-shirt she wore came halfway down her midriff, showing off the rest of her swollen belly. There was a collection of stains across her chest, some of it damp patches of milk, some of it looked like fag ash and God knows what else. Her black-and-white cow-pattern pyjama bottoms looked grey and black.

  A large stone, more of a boulder, formed a blockage in his chest that made it difficult to catch his breath. He felt the blood drain from his face as if he had just been caught red-handed. But of course he hadn’t, not yet anyway. He worked hard to compose himself before speaking by trying to act as if coming in at three-thirty in the morning was a normal and innocent occurrence.

  “What are you doing up at this time? Is everything okay?” he asked, implying it might be something to do with her pregnancy. His throat was parched and he struggled to get the words out without slurring.

  She ignored his concern. “Where have you been?” Her scowl was fierce, made more intense through her dilated pupils.

  “Eh,” he cleared his throat. “Out with a few lads from work. What’s the matter?” It wasn’t convincing, and he knew it.

  Again she ignored his concern. “Until now? Do you think I was fucken born yesterday? Don’t you lie to me. Don’t you fucken lie to me, you cheating pig. I know exactly what you’ve been up to.”

  Her words sobered him up sharpish. “What are you talking about? We had a lock-in down in Trevor’s Pub. I wasn’t keeping track of time, so sorry
for that, but I didn’t expect you up.”

  “You had a lock-in in Trevor’s Pub, hey, really. A late night drink in Trevor’s Pub? Uh-huh? And was she there?”

  “Was who there?”

  “Fuck face, Sheila-what’s-her-fucken-name, the floozy from the boozy?”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” The nerves were back; how could she possibly know about her? He decided to see it through. “Your being paranoid, honey—”

  “Honey, I’m not your fucken honey. Don’t patronise me, you prick.”

  Part of him wished she would get to the point. It didn’t take long. Her hand moved down the far side of her thigh, out of view, and came back with a mobile phone.

  She held it out in front of his face, tilting it from side to side. “What the fuck is this, then?”

  It was his phone. Sweet God, he thought he’d lost it at work. The bowl fell from her belly and landed upturned in her lap as she struggled to her feet and he stupidly made a move to help her.

  “Don’t you come anywhere near me, you cheating fucken bastard. I’ve seen all the smutty disgusting text messages you’re sending her. You want to lick her out. Lick some fucken tramp out, you sick fucken bastard.” Her voice rose to a scream and her face blew up like a red balloon. “Sheila-fucken-Sheila, you’re fucken a smutty, fucken, cunt bitch named Sheila. You didn’t even bother to disguise her name, you fucken prat.”

  She was now on her feet, the bowl on the floor, the wet milk stain and soggy cornflakes clearly visible between her legs, peeling away and falling to the carpet. She didn’t care to notice. In her frenzy, she flung the phone and narrowly missed his head, hitting the wall behind him and breaking it into three pieces. He could only stand there, wait until the rage within her ran its course.