The State of Me

by Nasim Marie Jafry

  Are they male or female?

  A mixture, he says.

  Have you met someone, Ivan?

  I’ve met lots of people. I’ve told you in my letter.

  Tell me the truth!

  Listen, he says, stop getting yourself into a state again! I haven’t met anyone in the way you mean. I’m travelling. I meet people all the time. I can’t help it.

  I have to go, Helen says.

  Okay…I’ll try and phone you at New Year. I’ll be at Rez’s uncle’s.

  I miss you so much. It’s killing me.

  I miss you too, he says.

  I don’t want to be without you. I love you.

  There’s no privacy here, he says. I’m in a plastic booth. Everyone can hear. He lowers his voice. I love you too.

  I wish I believed you.

  You know I do.

  My mum says I’ve to keep my dignity but I obviously don’t have any when it comes to you.

  You’ve got lots of dignity. You have to try and eat something. Promise me.

  I promise.

  Bye, Looby.

  Bye.

  She listens for the click that’s death and slowly puts the receiver down. She goes through to the kitchen and puts the kettle on. She is heartbroken that he didn’t resist when she said she had to go. He should have known she was just trying to be tough. Of course she didn’t have to go, she never has to go – busy people have to go! She has all the time in the world. She mashes up a banana with sugar and goes through to the living room and spoon-feeds herself at the window, dipping her ugliness and tears (like car headlights) whenever anyone passes by.

  She imagines the gossip in the Co-op: I saw the wee Fleet girl today. She was up at the window. She looked terrible. She was all contorted. She’s got that funny virus.

  She takes her tea upstairs even though it’s cold. She puts on Astral Weeks and gets into bed. There’s a bloodstain on the quilt where Agnes has been lying. It looks like a miniature map of Africa. She’s too exhausted to sponge it. She lies down and lets Van Morrison scrape away the pain. She loves Ballerina. She imagines herself like a ballerina. Strong, sinewy legs, stretching her muscles at the bar.

  She wants to be a dancer, not decaying in this bed.

  It’s dark when she wakes. Her ‘thoughts are slow and brown’ like Edna’s. Everything’s still hollow.

  She goes downstairs. She puts the lights on in the living room. She goes into the kitchen and washes up the few dishes and wipes the table clean. She wishes Nab or Rita would come home, but they’ll be home late tonight – they play badminton at the hospital on Thursdays after work. She feels comforted by their coats in the hall. It makes the house seem less empty.

  She has to get clean. She has a shower and puts on a pair of Ivan’s old jeans and his shirt. She heats up some tinned tomato soup. She slurps it deliberately for something to do, for something to hear other than the fridge humming.

  She goes back to bed and waits for someone to come home and puncture the silence.

  She is so tired of herself.

  Well, did he phone? asks Rita, popping her head round the bedroom door.

  Yup, I say. About twenty minutes after you.

  Did you keep calm?

  I think so, I say.

  Good. What have you eaten today?

  A banana and some tinned soup.

  That’s not enough, Helen.

  I’ll try and eat something before bed, I say. D’you know what I’ve got a craving for?

  What?

  Orange ice lollies.

  Rita smiles. We don’t have any but I’ll get some tomorrow. How did you get that scratch on your face?

  Rescuing Agnes from the tree.

  Not again!

  I’m coming with you to the vet’s tomorrow. She definitely isn’t herself.

  I’m sure the lesion’s just a scratch. She was probably in a fight.

  I hope so. How was badminton?

  I didn’t play, my back was too sore. I chatted to Dr Seth’s wife while Nab was playing. She was asking for you. One of her friends has ME. She’s a nurse but she hasn’t worked for a year and a half. She’s not bedridden but she can’t do more than potter about.

  Who looks after her?

  She’s married to a consultant but I don’t think he was very understanding to begin with.

  Stupid bastard. Sorry for swearing.

  She goes to a support group in Dumbarton. I can get the details if you want.

  As long as there are no dreary women there, handing out digestives, I say.

  I think this group has younger people in it, it wouldn’t be as depressing for you as the Isobel woman.

  One week, she interlaced the digestives with Jaffa Cakes.

  You shouldn’t mock, says Rita, she’s a poor soul.

  You could tell she’d been planning the biscuit arrangement all day.

  You should be more understanding – you know what it’s like to have so much time and nothing to fill it.

  I know, I say, but she’d hog the whole evening. She talked about herself all the time and didn’t listen to any of us.

  You should give this other group a try. It might be more supportive.

  I’ll think about it – but you’re not going to like people just ‘cos they’ve got the same illness.

  Right, I’m away to soak my weary bones.

  Why are you weary – is it me?

  Not really, she says. My back’s really aching.

  Why don’t you take some painkillers?

  You know me, I prefer not to.

  I don’t think an Anadin will kill you, Mum.

  I’ll be fine.

  I almost forgot, Sean phoned. He’s definitely going to Nellie’s for Christmas but they’ll both be here for New Year.

  Good, I can tell Granny. Two less for her to cook for. Don’t sit up here on your own moping.

  I won’t, I say. Deep down, I don’t really blame Ivan for not wanting to come home. What is there to come back for?

  I know how hard it is for you, says Rita. We all do.

  I think he could’ve met someone, babe, said Jana. You have to steel yourself for that.

  Don’t say that, Jana. Please. It’s not bearable. Not on top of Agnes.

  Why the big change of plan then?

  You know how impulsive he is. He’s always chopping and changing.

  So when’s he coming back?

  Three months.

  I guess it’s not that long.

  It’ll pass, I said.

  I knew I was defending him. I hadn’t told her that I’d copied out an Edna poem – Well, I Have Lost You – and sent it via Rez.

  Jana said she’d cancel her New Year plans and come to Balloch instead. Unless I wanted to go up to Glasgow.

  I can’t, I said. I’d need to get someone to bring me up. And I’d need to leave the party after an hour and I’d have nowhere proper to sleep. And how would I get back home on New Year’s Day?

  You can have my bed. Stay with me for a couple of days.

  I’d love to but it’s too much, Jana. I don’t want to be exhausted for my next ACTH injection. And it might be my last Hogmanay with Agnes.

  I know, she said. It was just a thought to get you away from the Ivan stuff.

  I’d love it if you came here but it’ll be the usual: Nab’ll be on the Glenmorangie, reminiscing about Greenland and how the Inuits used urine as hairspray. Sean’ll be wrapped round Princess Nellie, and my granny’ll be wittering on about nothing.

  She laughed. I’m not leaving you on your own, she said. It’ll be fun to hang out with your family anyway.

  You’re an angel, I said. Happy Christmas tomorrow.

  Happy Christmas, she said before hanging up and going back to bed with Pierce, the ex-policeman who was now doing an IT degree. He had sloping shoulders and kissed like a fish but he gave her great orgasms.

  Why are you not wearing your Christmas hat, Helen? said Brian for the hundredth time.

  Because i
t keeps slipping off, I said. Please stop asking.

  Take that piece of cake, said my granny, pointing to the last piece of chocolate gateau.

  I’m full, thanks, I said. I’ve had tons of turkey and stuffing.

  If you get the last piece of cake you get a handsome husband!

  I’ll bear that in mind, I said, forcing a smile.

  You really need to eat more, Helen, said Nab. You’re thin like wire.

  I excused myself from the table and went to lie on the couch. My grandad had already retired to his armchair with his pipe and his new James Herriot.

  I don’t like to see you so sad, Helen. Was Santa not good to you?

  Sorry, Grandad. I’m trying my best. I’m sad about Agnes.

  Nae herbs cure love, he said, eh?

  That too, I said.

  Brian came over and parked himself beside me. He took my hand and started stroking my palm. You could keep your hat on with kirbies, he said. That’s what Rita does.

  I’ll do it next year, I said. I promise.

  Arched Window. Boxing Day

  Helen is hunched against the radiator, eating left-over turkey sandwiches and reading John Hedgecoe’s Introductory Photography Course, her Christmas present from Rita and Nab. She looks up from the book and asks Brian to stop stroking Agnes’s fur the wrong way. She doesn’t like it when you do that, Helen says. She’s not well.

  Square window. New Year’s Eve

  Looby Loo’s gone back in her basket! She’s had a metallic headache since Boxing Day. Jana can’t come after all, she’s laid up with flu. Sean and Nellie are downstairs, glued to each other, wearing the Benetton sweaters they gave each other for Christmas.

  Helen’s thinking (again) of painless ways to kill herself that won’t hurt her family. She wonders what she could write in her suicide note but knows there is nothing she could ever say that would compensate Rita. Maybe she could leave a bottle of claret on the landing.

  At ten o’clock the phone rings and it’s Ivan. His words are as powerful as a shot of ACTH. She won’t have to kill herself after all.

  She sits up with her family for the bells. They all wish her better health in 1987. Nellie is the picture of health with her big bones and rosy cheeks. Helen imagines her panting and blushing when she has sex with Sean. She will be on top, of course.

  She toasts everyone’s health and makes a New Year resolution to be nicer to Nellie. When she goes to bed she kisses Ganesh and puts him under her pillow. Please make Agnes okay, she whispers.

  14

  Callum

  HIYA, PIGEONS! BRIAN was running up to the birds in George Square, screaming as they fluttered and blurred – coming back to scratch and peck round his feet.

  Don’t do that, said my granny, they’re riddled with disease!

  They’re pushy, said Nab.

  Ha ha! said Brian, rushing at them again. Pushy pigeons!

  C’mon, I said. Don’t dilly dally. Let’s go back to the car.

  Nab had driven me into town to help me choose a camera in the January sales. I’d been looking forward to just me and him but Brian had pleaded to come with us and then my granny had slotted herself into the arrangement too. While they were dredging the sales, Nab and I had gone to Jessops to get the camera. We also got a developing tank, solutions, a thermometer, glossy photographic paper and a file for negatives. I was scared the assistant would ask me technical questions but I’d felt important, like a real photographer.

  Afterwards, we’d gone to the Willow Tea Room. Nab loved the fake Rennie Mackintosh chairs but they were really uncomfy to sit on for any length of time. You felt like your head was bolted to your neck. Nab said he liked them because they helped his disc and ‘squeezed out his spine’.

  A man with a wart spreading over his nose like grey rice crispies had sat down at the next table. I felt sick and wanted to change seats but didn’t want to offend him. He’d stared down at his plate, intent on his scone and jam. Ten minutes later a woman had joined him. I was glad that she was screening the wart, glad that he had a wife and wasn’t on his own, spending a life of looking down. The woman was talking about her new gold taps and what kind of cleaner you could use on them.

  On the way out, I got a Swatch watch for Ivan in the jeweller’s downstairs. Not that he deserves it, I said to Nab. You’re a sweet girl, he replied.

  As we got into the car Brian was chuckling and saying ‘pushy pigeons’ over and over again in a sing-song way.

  What did you get in the sales? I asked.

  His face lit up and he rustled in his bags and flourished his purchases in front of me. Ta-rra! A Michael Jackson aldun! (He always said ‘aldun’ instead of album.) And an Abba tape!

  Golden oldies, I said.

  It’s not golden oldies, Helen. It’s Abba.

  I’m teasing, I said.

  What did you get?

  My camera and some other stuff.

  D’you like your camera?

  I love it, I said.

  Are you thrilled to bits?

  I’m going to teach myself photography, I said, trying to sound breezy but all I cared about was my next blue letter and I couldn’t pull the wool over my own eyes.

  When we got home I laid out my camera and accessories. It was like a show of presents. I got into bed with my clothes on. I thought of the man with the wart and wondered how his wife could bare to touch his face. I wondered why they couldn’t operate. I wondered if I could kiss Ivan if he had a growth like that.

  His ‘staying another three months’ letter had arrived two weeks ago. It had been crumpled and marked as if it had been jammed in a machine. (I thought this was a bad omen.) He’d written that everyone he met in India seemed to be running away from something. (I’d written back, Are you running away from me, laddie?) I was sure that he was fucking Joyce, an Australian doctor he’d met in Goa. He said she’d been great when he’d had severe diarrhoea and all he could do for five days was eat bananas and lie still in the guest house. She’d thought it was amoebic dysentery and had given him Flagyl. India’s full of pathogens, he’d written. (And Joyce is one of them, I thought.) I hated to think of him ill and shivering, and was jealous that she’d been looking after him. It should’ve been me. As if that wasn’t bad enough, they’d swapped books. (You swap with everyone you meet, he said.) She’d given him Hotel du Lac, and he’d given her A Bend in the River. I was always trying to get him to read, and now he was reading everyone who’d ever been shortlisted.

  I have a William Morris notebook with seductive blank pages: I write photography notes at the front and Buddhism notes at the back. I got a book on Buddhism from the library. If Ivan’s coming back as a Buddhist, I want to know what he’s on about.

  Harsh negatives need soft printing, and life is suffering.

  Glossy paper enhances blacks, and ‘samsara’ means endless wandering.

  Widening the aperture increases the depth of field, and we have to accept change.

  I’m writing notes in a book with a chintz print cover, and Ivan’s trekking in the Himalayas. We’re just structuring our days differently.

  My hands were shaking as I loaded the negatives into the developing tank. I’d been practising all week, feeling for sprocket holes in the dark, in the cupboard under the stairs. I sealed the tank and emerged from the cupboard, stubbing my toe on the Hoover. I called it a bastard.

  I measured out the solutions in the kitchen, with the utmost care to get 68°. (It was like being back in chemistry, except I was the only one in the class.)

  I sloshed the developer around the tank and counted the minutes, agitating every thirty seconds.

  I poured out the developer; I stopped; and fixed; and rinsed.

  I counted the minutes. Rinsing takes forever. You need to wash the film under water for half an hour.

  When I finally took the negatives out of the tank I felt sick. I couldn’t believe it had worked. They looked okay! I removed the excess water by sliding my fingers down the negatives (Callum’s
tip since I’d forgotten to buy a squeegee). I hung them up to dry with a clothes peg attached to a coat hanger on the shower rail. I fixed another clothes peg on the end of the strip to stop the negatives from curling up. I was smiling. I felt like a professional. I couldn’t wait to show Rita and Nab.

  I’m watching the wool cycle – I like the slow tumble and thud of the clothes. I had my last ACTH injection today. I felt like a drug addict, getting her last fix. I’m scared that I can’t have any more – you can’t keep having them – though they’re not as good as they were at the beginning. I’ve posted a letter to Ivan, telling him that Callum’s going to help me set up a darkroom. I hope he’ll be jealous.

  Callum sat cross-legged on the floor, holding the negatives up to the light. They’re a bit overdeveloped, he said, but not bad for a first attempt.

  They’re suburban landscapes, I said. Bins in rain, squirrel in rain, squirrel on windowsill, DMs in rain…

  You took a picture of DMs?

  Yeah. Sean’s old ones. I thought it was arty, raindrops against leather.

  Could be, he said, smiling. The cat looks like bagpipes in this one.

  I know, I said. That’s why I took it. She was washing herself and lifted her back leg. She stayed like that for ages. It gave me time to focus.

  What’s this? he said.

  Flake wrapper in a puddle.

  And this?

  A squirrel’s tail.

  He laughed. Just a wee bit blurred.

  My arms get tired focusing. That’s the problem…D’you think they’re shite?

  They’re fine, he said. Now the good part. Come into the darkroom with me, little girl!

  Behave yourself, I said. You’re my teacher.

  We’d pushed the single bed against the wall in the boxroom and set up the enlarger and all the trays. We’d blocked the light out completely with bin bags over the curtains. I’d handed him up masking tape and drawing pins like an apprentice. He’d been running up and downstairs with jugs of solutions. I told him he was like John Noakes.