Milosz

by Cordelia Strube

‘She won’t look for me here.’

  ‘You can’t stay in my room. This is my room. You don’t pay for this room.’

  ‘She’s frying, isn’t she?’

  ‘Yes. Bangers and mash. Your favourite.’

  ‘That kind of food kills you. If you don’t stop her she’ll just … she’ll just … you have no idea.’

  ‘Wallace, you’re a grown man, buck up.’

  ‘She thinks I have a job.’

  ‘You do have a job.’

  ‘She thinks I have a respectable job.’

  ‘Doing what?’

  ‘Accounting.’

  ‘What’s wrong with junk removal?’

  ‘Are you fucking nuts? Don’t blow my cover. Pablo’s in on it. I’m paying him a bonus to shut his trap. Same goes for you.’

  ‘How many bonuses are you paying me? Are you keeping an account of my bonuses?’

  ‘Very funny.’

  ‘I need my room now, Wallace.’

  ‘Waal-leee … ?’

  Milo holds the door open. ‘Out.’

  Burping bangers and mash, he presses his ear against the wall. He knows they’re home because the lights are on, but he hears nothing, not even the television.

  ‘Have you got rats?’ Vera asks.

  ‘No.’

  ‘What are you listening for then?’

  ‘Oh. Just my neighbours.’

  ‘Spying on them, are you?’

  ‘I just want to make sure they’re all right.’

  ‘Might be better to pop round for a visit. Have you got a Hoover?’

  ‘A what?’

  ‘She wants to vacuum,’ Wallace moans, climbing the stairs like a dying man.

  ‘Oh, that’s not necessary,’ Milo says.

  ‘It needs doing,’ Vera says.

  ‘I’ll get to it.’

  ‘That’s what Wally’s witless dingbat of a father used to say.’

  ‘Ma, can you just leave it alone?’

  ‘It’s not good for your asthma, Wally.’

  ‘You have asthma?’ Milo asks.

  ‘His father smoked,’ Vera says.

  Wallace drags the vacuum cleaner out of the hall closet. ‘Here,’ he grumbles. Milo marvels at his restraint regarding the F word.

  ‘Jolly good. Now everyone clear out.’

  The three of them seek refuge in the living room, sitting with bowls, spooning Vera’s instant pudding into their mouths. Pablo repeatedly checks his cell for texts from Maria. ‘Women,’ he sighs.

  Wallace whispers, ‘So, Milo, when are you going to set me up with a ­girlfriend?’

  ‘I’m not. That is so … ’

  ‘Retarded,’ Pablo offers.

  ‘Look who’s talking about retarded,’ Wallace says.

  ‘Get your own girlfriend,’ Pablo says.

  ‘Looks like you just lost a girlfriend, asswipe.’

  The vacuum switches on again. They can hear her banging it into ­furniture.

  ‘She’ll want to do the windows next,’ Wallace warns.

  ‘You should be nicer to her, Wally,’ Pablo says.

  ‘Don’t call me Wally.’

  ‘You’re lucky you have a nice mother. I saw this movie about a guy who hated his mother and then she died and he was really broke up about it, couldn’t do nothing, eat, sleep, go to work, nothing. He had, like, a total nervous breakdown.’

  Wallace turns on the TV and grimaces at players slamming a puck around.

  ‘So then the mother comes back as a ghost,’ Pablo continues. ‘At first the guy’s, like, totally freaked out and everything.’

  The vacuum shuts off again and Milo thinks he can hear Robertson on the trampoline.

  ‘But then the guy’s like, coño, I can say things to my mother I never could when she was alive … ’

  ‘Like “get the fuck out of my face,”’ Wallace says.

  From the kitchen window, Milo sees Robertson jumping on the trampoline, flapping his arms. He can do this for hour-long stretches, going into a kind of trance. Tanis says it releases tension.

  ‘After the guy gets used to his mother being a ghost,’ Pablo elaborates, ‘he asks her things he couldn’t ask her when she was alive because he hated her so much.’ He points his spoon at Wallace. ‘Hate blinds you, Wallace. Don’t hate your mother.’ The vacuum starts up again.

  ‘How does it end?’ Milo asks.

  ‘She explains everything. Like why she had to be so mean. She was trying to protect him. Your mother is just trying to protect you from the dust bunnies, Wally.’

  ‘Don’t fucking call me that.’

  ‘Does the ghost just vanish again?’ Milo asks.

  ‘Sí. She has to go back to the other side. It’s really sad because the son tries to hug her for the first time in his adult life but he can’t because she’s a ghost, right? So he tells her he loves her and they blow kisses. It made me cry.’

  ‘Everything makes you fucking cry,’ Wallace says.

  The vacuum shuts off again. ‘Waal-lee … ? Can you move the beds for me, love?’

  The baby spider plants should catch Robertson’s attention. Several have sprouted from the mama plant and require transplanting. With his fingers Milo digs a hole in the soil and carefully lays a baby spider plant in it. Before filling the pot to the rim, he waters the roots. Once he has patted down the soil he places the pot on the back steps and repeats the procedure with the next plant. He knows he has too many spider plants. Zosia referred to his house as ‘the jungle.’ Whenever possible, he gives plants away. He has never dared offer one to Tanis because the plants in her house are carefully selected for light conditions, and planted in glazed pots to complement their foliage.

  Vera shakes a broom out the back door. ‘All that bouncing is going to make that boy’s brain leak out his ears. Have you seen Wally?’

  ‘Try my room,’ Milo says.

  ‘What’s he doing in your room?’

  ‘He likes the view.’

  The screen door slams behind her. The trampoline becomes silent.

  Milo doesn’t look around for Robertson but tries to appear absorbed in his planting while contemplating the apparent non-existence of ghosts. If they don’t exist why do they keep popping up in movies, books and memories? Two thousand years of civilization and we’re still obsessed with spooks. Is it because death is the ultimate reproach, a constant reminder that you never resolved anything? You sat in your jungle and pretended it didn’t matter, told yourself that once he was dead it would be over. Which of course it isn’t. If a ghostly Gus showed up would he explain why he was such a prick? Would Milo attempt to hug him?

  Robertson hands Milo the next baby spider plant. ‘Can I put the earth in?’

  ‘Of course.’ Milo watches as the boy slowly, deliberately, pours the soil and hollows out a space for the roots. ‘Did you go to school today?’

  ‘Yup.’

  ‘How was it?’

  ‘Sucked.’

  ‘Did you have to apologize?’

  ‘Yup.’

  ‘How was that?’

  ‘Sucked.’

  ‘Is Billy off your case?’

  ‘They were passing around notes.’ Robertson carefully tips the watering can over the plant. ‘They’re not supposed to. Mrs. Bulgobin told them not to but they do it anyway. They pass them when she isn’t looking.’

  ‘What’s in the notes?’

  ‘They say I’m a fag and that I blow Mr. Hilty.’

  That eleven-year-olds are homophobic and know about blowing shocks Milo but he tries to appear unfazed. ‘How ignorant,’ he says finally.

  ‘Don’t tell Mum. She’ll call the school and I’ll get into more trouble.’

  ‘How do you know what’s in the notes if they don’t pass them to you?’

  Robertson digs in his pocket for a crumpled piece of paper and hands it to Milo. Scrawled on the paper in black marker is ‘Robertson blows Mr. Hilty.’ ‘They always call me a fag but they haven’t said I blow Mr. Hilty before.’ Robertson s
peaks without malice, as though he’s not hurt by the slander but understands that it’s intended to humiliate.

  ‘Whose handwriting is that?’ Milo asks.

  ‘Billy’s. He can’t write for shit. Mrs. Bulgobin has to get him to do his homework over so she can read it.’

  ‘This is evidence,’ Milo says, handing the note back to him. ‘You could get Billy Butthead into serious trouble if you hand this over.’

  ‘Can I give a spider plant to Mrs. Bulgobin?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘She doesn’t like me.’

  Robertson frequently declares that people don’t like him. Milo has tried asking, ‘What makes you think that?’ but the alienation is firmly entrenched, and now he thinks his father doesn’t like him either.

  ‘Mrs. Bulgobin brought a hamster to school. She’s leaving it in the classroom, which isn’t right. Hamsters are nocturnal; they shouldn’t be disturbed during the day. When I told her, she said Puffy would adapt. I said how would you like it if somebody put you in a cage and forced you to stay awake when you should be sleeping?’

  ‘What did Mrs. Bulgobin say?’

  ‘Nothing. She was handing out worksheets.’

  ‘I think hamsters in classrooms are pretty common,’ Milo says.

  ‘That doesn’t make it right.’

  Milo approaches Tanis while she’s hanging laundry. In the old days, before the increased debt load, she would use the dryer. He hasn’t seen her hanging it in the evening before.

  ‘They’re talking about rain,’ he says.

  ‘It’s May, monsoon season is supposed to be over.’ She struggles with a sheet. He grabs one end and stretches it away from her. She tosses him a clothes peg. They work side by side hanging the remaining clothes. Tanis seems unconcerned that he is handling her undergarments. The simplicity of her panties moves him: no lace, no leopard spots or zebra stripes, just dove grey. He has admired them flapping on the line, but feeling them is a revelation. He shoves a pair in his pocket.

  ‘Has he talked to you about the hamster?’ she asks.

  ‘Yes. That’s unfortunate.’

  ‘That’s all he talks about, not what those little pricks did to him or about his dad leaving. It’s all about Puffy.’

  ‘Maybe he can’t talk about the other things.’ Milo knows he must remain silent re Billy’s note and the alleged blowing of Mr. Hilty. ‘Would it be possible to rescue Puffy?’

  ‘What do you mean “rescue”? It’s a classroom hamster.’

  ‘What if we offered to buy it?’

  ‘They’re not going to sell the classroom hamster. And anyway, they’d just get another rodent, and Robertson would obsess over that one. It’s hopeless.’ She shakes the last towel hard before pegging it on the line. ‘He’s not supposed to feel hurt, but he does.’

  ‘Have you tried calling Christopher?’

  ‘Why would I do that?’

  ‘Don’t you have to sort out visitation rights? And you could tell him about the bullying.’

  ‘There’s always bullying. Billy’s mother phoned and gave me an earful, threatened to press charges.’

  ‘Did you tell her Billy hit Robertson in the head with a basketball?’

  ‘Of course. “Not my Billy,” she said. “He wouldn’t do that. Sometimes them other boys get rough but not my Billy. Your son should be in a special school for boys like him.”’

  ‘Did you tell her there are no special schools?’

  ‘Why bother?’

  With the laundry basket empty there is nothing left for them to share. He hopes she’ll offer him a glass of wine. They could sit at the kitchen table, conversing easily as the light fades.

  ‘Good night, Milo.’

  ‘Good night.’

  ablo is lying on the couch covered in a blanket.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ Milo demands.

  ‘Sleeping over.’

  ‘You can’t sleep over.’

  ‘Vera said it’s okay. Just till things cool down with Maria.’

  ‘Did she call you?’

  ‘Not yet. Vera says give her couple of days.’

  ‘You can’t sleep here for a couple of days.’

  ‘I’ve got cash. Wallace paid me a bonus.’ Pablo hands Milo two twenties.

  ‘Two nights. Claro?’

  ‘What happened to your pants? You spill something?’

  ‘What?’

  Pablo points to Milo’s pocket. The moisture from Tanis’s underpants is spreading to his crotch. ‘What’s in your pocket?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘It’s leaking, take it out.’

  Milo turns his back on Pablo as he removes the underpants but Pablo is off the couch and watching him. ‘Coño, you stole her panties.’

  ‘I didn’t steal them. I was helping her hang laundry.’

  ‘They’re nice, cotton. That’s healthy. I don’t like those nylon, shiny kind. The pussy’s got to breathe, man. She’s married though, right?’

  ‘Not exactly.’

  ‘Qué?’

  ‘He’s left. The husband’s left. It’s none of your business.’

  ‘Don’t get testy. I’m happy you’re in love with a woman.’

  ‘I’m not in love with her.’

  ‘You stole her panties. Don’t be afraid to love, Milo. It is the one true thing. People afraid to love are lonely, always.’

  ‘Would you mind? I just want to lie on my couch and watch TV.’

  ‘No hay problema.’ Pablo grabs his blanket and settles on the La-Z-Boy, Gus’s La-Z-Boy on which Milo never sits. The chair groans as the Cuban pushes it into the reclining position. ‘I love these chairs, man. I wanted to buy one for my mother but she died.’

  ‘Maybe she’ll come back as a ghost and you can get her one.’

  The remote is not where Milo left it. He searches under newspapers, cushions and jackets.

  ‘Looking for this?’ Pablo waves the remote. Milo snatches it and surfs: reality shows, hospital shows, cop shows, all bilge in which he is not starring. How depressing to be facing the black hole at the end of the tunnel and realize that your father was right. Had Milo embraced Krupi and Son Ltd. he might have found a wife and they might have had children and a Labradoodle. He wouldn’t be fingering another man’s wife’s panties.

  ‘So, who you going to get to be Wallace’s date?’

  ‘No one.’

  ‘Oh, come on, Milo, he said he’d pay a hundred bucks. You could probably get him up to a deuce, split it with the girl, one of those nudie chicas from your art class. I’d like to see one of them.’

  ‘You won’t be here.’

  ‘Why, when’s she coming? You asked her already?’

  ‘Would you please just go to sleep?’

  ‘No problem.’ Pablo pulls the blanket under his chin and squeezes his eyes shut. A talk show is on. A starlet, throttled by cleavage, says she believes in reincarnation. The host compliments her on her breasts, how they’re real, how when she lies down naked in movies her breasts flatten out. ‘A lot of actresses,’ he says, ‘when they lie down they stick straight up.’ The audience guffaws. The actress asks the host if he believes in reincarnation. ‘Only if I get to come back with headlights like yours,’ he replies. Milo turns off the television and listens for noises next door. Nothing. The panties, bunched in his grip, have lost their grace. He hangs them over the arm of the couch.

  ‘Do you believe in reincarnation, Milo?’

  ‘You’re supposed to be sleeping.’

  ‘I believe in energy impressions,’ Pablo continues. ‘All our life we put out energy and it leaves impressions.’

  Milo dreads going upstairs where he will be surrounded by Wallace and Vera. This house, Gus’s house, has always seemed cavernous. Now it feels like a crowded subway car moving in the wrong direction. If he didn’t need the cash, he’d evict the lot of them.

  ‘We leave energy impressions on each other,’ Pablo explains. ‘All over our hearts and minds and souls. That is why it
is so important to forgive. You don’t want to leave negative impressions for all time. Think about that, Milo, negative energy impressions for always.’

  Is that what Gus left? Negative energy impressions for always all over? The fucker has dented Milo’s molecules.

  He arrives early, knowing that teacher supervision doesn’t begin until eight-thirty, and pretends to be waiting for a bus, keeping his hand on the Spider-Man hood in his pocket. Vera’s bacon butties congeal in his gut. At breakfast Wallace was wearing a blazer a size too small and a tie. He left for ‘the office’ in the Friendly Junk Removal truck. ‘Where’s your motor?’ Vera asked.

  ‘It’s in the shop,’ Wallace lied. ‘A buddy’s lending this to me.’ He pressed a fifty into Milo’s palm before leaving. ‘More later,’ he said. ‘You know what to do.’

  Billy the Bully slouches a hundred metres up the street. Milo feels a fury tunnelling through him. He looks around for possible witnesses: only a few stragglers in the yard. If he intercepts the little fucker and drags him behind the dumpster in the parking lot, no one will know. He pulls the Spider-Man hood over his head and strides towards the boy, who is fiddling with his personal listening device, and grabs him by the hoodie.

  ‘What the fuck?’ the boy gasps, swatting at Milo’s hands as he hauls him off the sidewalk.

  ‘You harass Robertson one more time and I’ll cut your balls off and sling them over the hoop, got it?’

  ‘Who the fuck are you?’

  ‘That includes notes, online or off. You slander him again and you will enter a world of pain.’

  Billy’s squirming forces Milo to grab his orange hair. ‘Tell me you understand, you little shit,’ he says. ‘Understand? Hands off Robertson.’

  ‘I understand.’

  Milo releases his grip, and Billy crumples to the tarmac. Fleeing, Milo feels euphoric, energized, like he did as a child after beating up smaller boys: like he can fly – up, up and away. Who says violence doesn’t pay?

  ‘We need you to take your shirt off,’ the casting director says. His hair is swept up as though he has been licked by a large cow.

  ‘Do you have a problem with that?’ a short woman with sharply cornered glasses demands. ‘We need to see you with your shirt off. If you have a problem with that, you can go.’

  ‘I’m no James Bond,’ Milo says.