by Liz Jensen
—Now sit still while I fix that hairpin. Stop wriggling, for heaven’s sake. You got ants in your pants or what?
—No. Butterflies.
—In your pants? Coo-er.
Silly cow, she is. White blouse and a pink skirt, I’m wearing, with a roll-on underneath and my best undies just in case I do turn out to be loose and Marje has done my hair up lovely coiled around a sanitary towel, it’s the latest gimmick she’s heard of from her Wren friend, gorgeous it looks, like a doughnut, and you’d never guess what’s padding it, handy too if you find you’ve got the curse. She sticks the last pin in and then I do the lipstick. Red lips scarlet woman, our Dad always says when he sees a girl who’s no better than she should be. Putting on powder in the mirror she lets me have another squirt of the fake Chanel. Pish pish.
Ding dong.
And I’m flying to open it like I have wings, with Marje yelling after me. —Where’s your bloody poise, girl? You ain’t got none, is where!
But I ain’t listening to nothing about poise – Marje is the world’s biggest bloody expert on poise according to her – because there he is, tall on the doorstep in his airman’s uniform and his blue eyes smiling at me. Off comes the little beret cap.
—Hiya, cutie! Boy, you look a million dollars, he says.
Well, of course I do. I might even be the prettiest girl in Bristol, mightn’t I.
We met last week at the Red Cross dance. I spotted him right at the beginning, and he spotted me. I turned away, flirty-flirty. Then looked back. You can’t help thinking Clark Gable when you see them, no matter how hard you try. No wonder the local boys are in a sulk because they can’t cut the mustard next to GI Joe, one Yank and they’re off, and no wonder the girls is buzzing at the factory, buzzing with the glamour. He was taller than the others and of course the best-looking, with his good-shaped head.
I was watching him while he was jitterbugging with Moira Farney’s little sister. And then he was watching me doing Hands Knees Boompsadaisy.
Hands knees and boompsadaisy,
I like a bustle that bends.
Hands knees and boompsadaisy,
What is a boomp between friends?
And every time you did the boomp you had to twist your hip and boomp your bum against the other one’s bum, it was like the hokey cokey but sexy-like, and he said much later on, It was your ass that attracted me first, hon. You sure had a way of twisting that butt of yours.
Hands knees and boompsadaisy,
Let’s make the party a wow.
Hands knees and boompsadaisy,
Turn to your partner and bow.
And when it’s over I look across and he starts making his way over to me, in his uniform, with his cocky way of walking, knows he’ll get me. He doesn’t hang about.
—I sure like the look of you, babe. You wanna date next week? My name’s Ron.
Except he said Raan. Deep gravelly voice he’s got, makes you melt.
He was right to walk like that, because I said yes, didn’t I.
We did some jitterbugging together and he bought me two gin and limes, but then I had to go, I was doing the early shift.
—See ya soon, hon, he says. —I’ll come pick you up Friday.
And he was all ready to kiss me smack on the lips but I wriggled away because there was a rumour going round that the GIs thought we were easy lays and we had rounded heels from getting on our backs, and I didn’t want him thinking I was one of them, did I? He looked like a speedy operator to me.
But I couldn’t stop thinking about him all week, and now here he is, and my heart won’t let up banging and I’m standing there gaping at him like a speechless twat, all breathless and collywobbled.
Say something, Gloria.
—Come in, I go, and a tiny voice at the back of my head whispers, Don’t do it, a bad thing is starting, but I ignore it. Yes, even then I knew, see.
And I show him to the front room which is what Mum would’ve done, and we sit, and he holds out a tin with a picture of peaches on.
—Canned peaches, he says. —In syrup. Sweet syrup, cute girl. Go on, he says. —Get a can opener, have a taste.
A minute later I’m sticking my finger in the can and sucking on the syrup, and then he lifts out a big fat slice of slimy orange peach and feeds it me, and the sweet of it knocks me sideways and as it slides down my throat I’m ready to die.
—This’d cost a fortune! I go.
—They pick ’em off the trees in California, Florida, places like that, he goes. —You can have ’em any time you like back home.
I can’t help it, it’s been so long since I had a sweet treat, so I dip my finger in again, and suck it, and he laughs.
—There’s more where that came from, hon. I’ll bring you a tin of ham next time, maybe make you taste some ketchup. Ya ever have ketchup? Ketchup and fried eggs, man. Sure is good. Way better than that brown sauce shit you eat.
I have died and gone to heaven, I have.
—I’ve got eggs, I tell him. —Me and Marje, we keep hens.
So I am telling him about how we flog the eggs on the black market or swap them for coupons when Marje makes her entrance, and this little voice starts whispering at me again, Bad thing, bad thing. He stands up and holds out his hand to shake, and she looks at me and then at him, shocked that I can catch a good-looker like him because she reckons I ain’t got no brains. She’s right flummoxed because of this, and her famous poise goes out the window. Result being she acts like she got her tits caught in the wringer, and can’t think of nothing to say except, Hello, pleased to meet you.
—This must be your sister, he says. —Boy, don’t you two look alike? You could be twins! I’ve heard a lot about you, Marje.
Which is an out-and-out lie but it makes her blush and you can tell she likes him and I won’t pretend her approval don’t matter but it makes me nervy too because I don’t want her liking him too much. She’s not past snatching, when it’s something she wants. I’m prettier, but she’s the clever one.
—She’s engaged to Bobby, I tell him quickly.
He and Marje just look at each other, and then I see how it must’ve sounded.
—Yes, says Marje. —Maybe when Bobby’s back we can go out in a foursome.
—Sure, that would be swell, Marje. But tonight I’m taking this cute sister of yours to see the Great Zedorro, he says. —You know the hypnotist guy? And he waves two bits of pink. —Got tickets. Swell, huh?
Sure it’s swell, with Uncle Sam’s payroll and the other girls – Marje too, I’m hoping – sick with envy, you can bet. The Great Zedorro. He sounded famous but I’d never heard of him. I knew he was special though. That’s how powerful Zedorro was. He had a hold of you before you even met him, see.
Marje is eyeing the tin of peaches.
—You ready, cutie? goes Mr Clark Gable.
Cutie! He called me cutie!
That’s done it. I look at my American GI, my foreigner who says cutie, with those eyes so sparkling and clean you’d swear they were made of glass, I’m surprised he can see out of them, they look like fakes. That well-cut uniform, and his hair like a brush on top, short as short, showing off the shape of his head which is a good shape. He smiles – oh those American teeth! – and all of a sudden I’m weak at the knees. Don’t ask me why, but anyway it’s as quick as that, in less time than an egg takes to fry, because I know if I don’t get him Marje will, so I just fall. In love I mean, then and there. Bam. One minute I’m raw, the next I’m popping and spitting and cooked. Is it the teeth? The honey and the cutie and the sister eyeing up the peaches? The name Zedorro? Is Zedorro that powerful?
—I’ll go and get my coat, I go, because I have to run away for a minute.
I have to go and stand at Mum’s old dressing table, looking at my flushed-up face in the mirror and breathing in out, in out, thinking: this is it. I don’t even know him, but I know what love feels like now. Strange world. People in it like that, who can walk in with a tin of something swe
et and grab your heart and squeeze and nearly kill you, and not even know what they’ve done.
Footsteps on the stairs, then in comes Marje, sucking her finger and smelling of peach-syrup.
—Hmm. Nice, she says. —Full marks.
—I’m not going all the way with him till I know him better, I tell her, snapping out of it, smoothing my skirt, dabbing at the lipstick. But my hand’s shaking a bit.
—I should hope not! she goes. —But there’s others will, you know, she says, going pish pish again with the phoney Chanel, on herself this time. —He’s quite a catch.
I look up. Her blonde hair like mine, her mouth like Mum’s.
—You’ve changed your tune, I say. It comes out sharper than I mean it to. Don’t you dare, I’m thinking. Don’t you dare, when I’ve just fallen in love, just when we’re about to see the Great Zedorro.
—Pass me the lipstick, she goes, licking the peach stickiness off her lips and pouting that mouth.
That flirty face. What’s she up to, making herself look nice and pishing the Chanel on herself, when it’s me he’s after.
—But you’re not going out, are you, I say. —You’re on shift soon. Lipstick’s for going out. We should save it, we’ve only got the one, now the Revlon’s buggered.
Trust her? You must be joking.
—Lipstick’s for writing to Bobby, she goes, still all flirty. —I’m writing to Bobby and I’m going to put kisses in. Lipstick kisses. Then he kisses the paper just where I’ve kissed it.
And she makes a kissy face at us in the mirror and it’s funny, she can make me laugh, and my chest eases up, because I can picture Bobby kissing her letter. That’s how gone on her he is. Loony with love.
—Red lips scarlet woman, I say, and we laugh because our mum’s with the angels and our dad was last heard of in Singapore and us two, we can do as we bleeding well please.
And Ron’s waiting for me downstairs, and Zedorro’s gearing up to dazzle us at the Little Theatre, and I don’t know then about the maiming I’m in for.
THE HALLELUJAH MONSTER
—Did you ever see that famous hypnotist bloke? I ask Doris.
You never know, you could strike up a conversation with someone.
—Who? she goes, watching the weather girl waving her arms like a cockroach with its feelers.
—The Great Zedorro.
—What was he?
—What was who?
What’s she on about? A lot of them have got diseases. But would it kill her to listen?
It was a red curtain at the theatre where we went to see the Great Zedorro, me and Ron. There was a big old drum-roll and then this voice that came from nowhere said, Ladies and gentlemen – the Great Zedorro! And up it went, the red curtain. All beautiful and hoopy. I didn’t dare tell Ron I hadn’t seen a show like this before, I’d never seen any kind of show, but I was in awe of him because he brought me a tin of peaches in syrup and he looked like a film star in his uniform.
The cymbals clashed, da-zong.
Then there he was on the stage, in his red cape with his black-and-white suit underneath, and red twinkly cufflinks that must be rubies, or phonies, and jet-black hair and a moustache that might be stuck on, the red curtain swishing behind him, his assistant-girl all blonde curls and red-sequinned tutu, must’ve cost a fortune in coupons, or she had it before the war, and stilettos. Slut Fairy was the thought that popped into my head, and Ron I noticed wasn’t ashamed to be having a good old gawp. But we was all gawping if I’m being honest, filling up our eyes with the two of them in their black and white and red, all flashes and sparks.
—When they were up there on the stage, Zedorro and the Slut Fairy, it felt like our eyes was hungry, I tell Doris. But then all of a sudden there was cake.
—Cake? she goes, all excited. Her eyes pop open, wide awake. —Did you say cake?
—Not cake, goes the trolley girl, wheeling up. —First is soup, then lamb-stew-new-potato. Then trifle. If you good girls. You wanna sit here watch telly with a tray?
There is a photo in an old box, it comes from the local paper in Bristol dated 1943. It’s a woman lying with her head on one chair and her feet on another chair and a big gap of nothing in the middle. The only thing that is supporting her back and her bum and her legs is Mind Control. You can do anything with your mind if you want it enough. You have to want it though. You can’t just pretend to want it, your innards has to want it too. You have to be greedy for it and think it is your right, and if someone suggests it to you, such as Zedorro and his assistant the Slut Fairy, you have to think: why not, I deserve it, it ain’t half bad, that idea. Bit of what happens comes from the person that does the suggesting. But most of it comes from you.
Mr Adolf H, he suggested plenty of things to the Germans. He suggested taking over France and Poland and all them countries and rounding up the Jews. And he suggested finishing them off using starvation and gas. He suggested bombing England. He made lots of happy suggestions like that, happy because they didn’t seem half bad to most people, they were ordinary greedy people like you and me. Then afterwards they blamed Adolf H for brainwashing them like that, and then they had to try and forget that they ever did that stuff, and when their children found out there was a war, and asked them if they was Nazis, they shook their heads, and said, War? What war, son? There may have been one but it’s just a fuzzy memory to me. I just followed orders, you would do the same.
Hank is taking me on a little outing to Gadderton Lake.
—Fresh air’ll do you good, says Hank’s Wife, wiping Calum’s dummy with a Wet One and popping it back in his mouth. —Look, I’ve done you a nice picnic.
She sounds nice as pie, doesn’t she? Hank’s Wife is in actual fact called Karen but my mouth won’t say it. I peek in the bag that’s hanging off the pushchair and see it’s smelly boiled eggs and a see-through carton of coleslaw plus Diet Coke.
—Blow out those cobwebs, she goes. Gadderton’s lovely in autumn, you’ll see the bulrushes.
—I want a couple of them buns too, I tell her. —Them currant ones.
—Not advisable, she says. —With your duodenum, dried fruits are a strict no-no.
—Your arse, I go. —You can pack coleslaw, you can pack a bloody bun! You starting up a one-woman rationing scheme or what, missis?
—It’s your funeral, Gloria, she says, getting out her purse and going off to the bakery.
—That’s better, I tell her when she comes back with them. —That’s more like it. You are learning, you are.
Hank is making one of his faces. You might think I hate her but it’s more complicated than that cos she’s married to my son.
—Best visit the toilet before you go, Gloria? she says. —What with your bladder?
Meddling cow she is, she can mind her own blinking beeswax, she can blinking well go home and stew in her own juice for the day, she can –
Anyway when I have finished telling her all this, and Calum has stopped crying and got his dummy back, me and Hank get in the car and drive to Gadderton Lake where there is brambles and poplars and a Portakabin sells ices and snacks, and bright-pink maggots in plastic pots.
Hopefully there’s a lav too.
Me and Hank, we’re going to catch a big Hallelujah of a fish that’s hiding under the skin of the water, deep down, thinking dark thoughts. There’s other fishermen too, lined up under the poplars, lighting fags, adjusting binoculars, eating cheese-and-tomato sandwiches. You’d think it was the Loch Ness whatsit, but this one’s got big round Jesus eyes, surprised as hell.
Oops! A flip of water. A fin or a tail. Talk of the devil.
—D’you see that? goes Hank.
Yes, I did see it, but I am wondering where you’re supposed to spend a penny round here.
—We’ll get the ugly bastard, goes Hank, smacking a mosquito and inspecting it. —Just you wait.
Wait?! It’s OK for him to talk, he’s not the one needs a wee. Some outing. You could crack a mile wide with the boredom o
f it, I’ve picked twenty-eight dandelion heads which is how bored, sitting watching him with his profile and his rod. Bright yellow, the flower splash, you’d like to squash that exact shade and pickle it in a Kilner.
To keep my mind off the wee, I think about the hypnotist, the Great Zedorro, who has been popping up in my head since my duodenum and Sea View. What I’m thinking is: he had you in his grip, and you didn’t even know it. You were like this fish, when we get him. You took the bait. You swallowed. But there’s a minute or two before you realise you’re caught.
Tell a joke, says this little voice in my head at Gadderton Lake. Stop you thinking about Iris and Zedorro and lavs.
—Knock knock.
—Shhh, goes Hank. —You’ll disturb him.
When I say knock knock, he’s s’posed to say, Who’s there? And then I’m s’posed to say, Jonah, and he’s s’posed to say, Jonah who? And then I’m going to go, Jonah Ford Sierra by any chance? I always remember a joke, don’t tell me I don’t, I heard that one from a boy in Maddon Hill Park, Hank’s Wife took me.
—Hey! yells Hank, and schloopaloop, suddenly the bobbin’ thing’s gone under.
—Gotcha! And he’s swinging the rod up-up, and I’ve forgotten what was in my head before.
—You did it, Hank, you did it, my deario, and they didn’t, nah-nah nah-nah nah! I’m yelling, and it’s up there dripping water, the fish all Bacofoily on the line, and next he’s jitterbugging on the grass and all the ciggie and sandwich fishermen are coming up to take a squiz, green with envy, you can bet.
—Quick! Quick! I’ve got to bash its head! goes Hank.
I’m really fighting back the wee now.
And he goes bash bash with a block of bamboo stick, bash bash, you can hear the wet slap of it, and then the blood splitters out of its gills while it’s still dancing and flipping. Then something comes over me and I need a go at it too.
