Noah's Heart

by Neil Rowland

  I puff myself up in front of her, trying to put her criminal into the background, as if I have some authority and can cope with the situation. “Are you going to explain yourself?” I’m fighting for my breath. I should have been prepared.

  “What the hell?” she counters. She’s padded towards me on her bare feet, dressed only in a long tee-shirt and underwear. Or am I adding underwear for reassurance. But she only takes seconds to recover from the shock of my entrance. Cynicism wins out. Memory is burning bright but her secret life remains under wraps. She isn’t thrilled to see Daddy. Prudence was right. Absolutely the opposite. I crashed through the scenery before the vital act.

  “What are you trying to do?” she growls.

  “I’m here to take you back home. Get your things,” I suggest.

  She is puzzled as she is amazed. “No, no,” she mutters, stepping back. “I’m going nowhere with you.” She shakes the goddamn bracelet for strength.

  “You’re not hanging out with this sleazy lizard,” I remark.

  “What gives you the right to judge him?” she retorts.

  “Even if he does wear silk boxers...and a Brooks Brothers style shirt,” I add, noticing this garment over the back of the chair.

  She looks genuinely puzzled by my attitude. “You’re completely out of it now, Dad!”

  “Straighten out your life, while you still can,” I say.

  “Why don’t you give my life back?” she says, dark eyes blazing within bruised rims.

  “You’re well out of order, know what I mean,” Jakes declares.

  “This has nothing to do with you, boy.”

  “What do you think’s wrong with her life? What’s it to you?” Jakes wonders.

  “Why don’t you concentrate on your own bloody family?” I tell him.

  Jakes stretches luxuriously and shuffles slowly across the bed. I realise he’s trying to cover the sting of my comment. “There’s nothing wrong with Angie. What’s eating you, man?” he sneers, finding his feet.

  “I’d suggest you keep out of this,” I tell him.

  “Dad, you’re mad coming here. You shouldn’t get involved.”

  “You’re my daughter. You’re getting into a bad scene. ‘Course I’m involved,” I insist.

  Jakes pulls his trousers back on and pushes his feet into a pair of sneakers, without having to untie and tie the laces. “What’s so outstanding about your life, anyway, Noah?” he wonders, sauntering across the space.

  “Compared to your life it’s outstanding,” I say. Looking back caution has never been a characteristic. “Your business is wrecking people’s lives and exploiting people. Don’t hassle me about personal ethics, man. On that subject you’re about as credible as a dirty bomb.”

  “Look Noah, I heard your business is going down the shit hole, know what I mean? Why don’t you take a loan off me? Even better consider it an investment.”

  “Over my dead body, am I going to take any dough off you,” I say.

  “Why are you telling ‘em all this, Dad?” she pleads.

  “Just relax Daddy-o. Why all the stress? Know what I mean?”

  “She and I are just getting out of here, all right? Then you can enjoy your stress-free evening, okay? Pick up another girl at the rave and take your coke or whatever,” I suggest, dismissing him.

  “You know I’m clean. Let me find you something to relax. That’s it, you need something to take away the anxiety and tension. Forget all your troubles, granddad, do you hear me?” His sly, slanted grey eyes are still shining from his sensual friction with Angie.

  “You seriously trying to push your products with me? You think I’m going to get hooked up with your candy?” I say.

  I’m continuing to teeter on my Sergio Leone legs.

  “What I’m sayin’ Noah is like, are you getting enough?” he asks.

  “Excuse me?” I reply. I’m trying to concentrate on my daughter; to persuade her to accompany me from Apocalypse Now.

  “At your age. Know what I mean? In your condition,” he persists.

  “Don’t worry, boy, I already have a girlfriend.” Sort of.

  “What’s your taste? Little blondes? Know what I mean?” he grins.

  Bridgitte Bardot - Anita Ekberg - Sophia Loren.

  “Go drown in your hot tub,” I suggest.

  “Come on, you angry old man, don’t play innocent. I’ve had enough news bulletins from Angie. I know what you’re about. Do you get me? Man?”

  “Even Bob D was the victim of the legend makers,” I argue.

  “Get out of here in good health, do you understand?” he suggests, adopting a masterful posture. “You may have been screwin’ for kicks but for us it’s just business.” He straightens the seams of his designer trousers. He trusts them.

  “Stop interfering, Dad. Call quits and leave the same way.”

  “Angie, how much stuff did you bring with you? Get all your things together, will you? You came here with your mates, did you?” I ask, attempting to hurry her.

  “How the hell did you get here?” she wonders.

  “You and I need to put our heads together,” I insist. Then considering her question more attentively, I can’t resist a chance to boast. “I dropped in to your festival by balloon. Are you saying you didn’t notice my aerostat? I caused frenzy - it was like Godzilla in New York.

  “Listen to Jules Verne,” she remarks, with a snigger. There are moments when we resemble each other. Most often in a crisis it seems.

  “Never mind my heroics, Angie. Let’s go home!”

  Her gestures of helpless frustration are bemusing and shocking. Jakes grows edgier and restless; he bounces nervously, angrily from one sneaker to the other. “Angela? Do you want to run back home with your Daddy?” he declares, gesturing.

  She rushes towards him and winds an arm around his waist. “Adam, sweetheart, I want to go to Paris as you said.”

  City of romantic love and revolution in communes. “What are you planning on doing there? In Paris?” I blab. Watching them together like this I’m as stiff as one of those old aristos.

  “What do you think, Daddy-o?” Then to my daughter: “We’ll see, won’t we Angie...if you’re a good girl. Know what I mean?”

  “There’s no way you’re going to Paris.”

  “How are you going to stop me?”

  “How are you going to tell your mother? That’s more to the point.”

  “She must have been in love once,” she tells me.

  Jakes scoffs at my predicament. “You’re making a total arse of yourself here, Noah, know what I mean.” He holds me in a mocking twinkle. “Do you want your daughter to see you like this?”

  “You’re so cool, man, aren’t you,” I say.

  “You said it, know what I mean.”

  “You’ve everything under control, don’t you, eh?”

  “Like a fucking Swiss army watch, know what I mean,” he snarls.

  “Like the powder on your table top...that I just ran my finger over and put to my lips. I may not have my taste buds back, but I’m not a bloody idiot, boy.”

  “Why do you have to interfere here?” Angie objects.

  The revelation makes the trendy trafficker start. Rich colour spills along his high cheeks. “Let’s not make any stupid assumption, Noah, right?”

  “You’ve been spreading some of your magic, Adam?”

  The handsome young face is puckered and distressed. “A lot of geezers come into this vehicle, know what I mean? Can’t always vouch for what those fuckers are up to. I’m clean, do you understand?” he insists.

  Jakes cools his spine against the metal wall and observes me through narrow ancestral eyes. My daughter still has her fingers around his supple waist, either in protection or restraint.


  “Save your memoirs for the prison library,” I advise.

  My pulse has already been set off: blood beats at my temples harder than the amplified rhythms outside. No sign of heaven’s door when you’ve been dropped into hell.

  “I don’t have to listen to a pathetic old dope-head like you,” he quips. His pronounced Adam’s Apple is bobbing emotionally.

  “You’ve no right to make wild accusations against Adam,” Angie tells me. “How do you know what goes on here? There’s a lot of people coming around here, as he told you. Why should he check up if they are using?”

  “You’ve already taken enough of my time, Noah,” he says.

  “Are you involved with his business, Angela? You taking part in his operation?”

  “We’re just seeing each other, Dad,” she argues.

  “Did you encourage your brother to try smoking junk?” I challenge.

  She stares at me numbly. “Don’t be so ridiculous. I don’t believe this.”

  “I’m sorry Angela but I don’t believe you on this issue,” I reply. “You’re giving me some heavily negative radiation about this.”

  “Are you accusing me of lying to you, Dad?” she crassly objects. She glances slyly, distrustfully at me: assumes a more protective posture towards Jakes. Man, she’s going Patty Hearst on me.

  “Let’s all chill for a while, know what I mean,” Jakes declares.

  He circles the room - the living space of the trailer, shall we say - like one of the trapped leopards in our zoo; abundant hair spilling about his irregularly good looks, falling over his narrow forehead and slit gaze in these moments of crisis.

  “D’you know the kind of damage dope can do?” I blurt out.

  “Dad! Please! Have a heart,” she implores. “What’s he like, my Dad?”

  “Spare me your moral lectures, man!” he retorts sarcastically.

  The wrecked lives, the smashed dreams, the broken relationships on every level. And a hard rain’s gonna fall.

  He stops his prowling circle and brings his face close to mine. “All we’re doin’ is treating the side effects of this sick world,” he argues.

  “You’re making them sick,” I tell him. It can never be a cure, except maybe for a guy in my position.

  “Soothin’ the aches and pains of society. If these sad fucks want to fuck up their lives, that’s their choice. They can have as much shit as they want, as long as they pay. If they want to end up in the gutter I can make it comfortable for ‘em. D’you get me?”

  Perhaps it’s the roaring intensity of his snarl that encourages this: I know about your boat in the closed harbour.”

  “Is it your business to bring this up?” Angela asks. “What’s the matter with Adam owning a boat?”

  “What about my boat?”

  “More about what you do with your boat. Let’s say that I heard from a friend. A friend of a friend,” I brag. But playing private detective wasn’t a clever move. Not that I had much inside-info from Bob H. But I gave a dangerous contrary impression. I can’t handle myself anymore with this heavy handed crook.

  “Did you bring the fucking plods with you? Got the drugs squad following you, Noah? Waiting to break into here or what?”

  He peers nervously through a porthole, trying to find these cops amidst the throng and the woods and the dark smoky fields. The camouflage has become a threat.

  “You’ve changed so much, Dad,” Angie informs me.

  “What are you saying?” I return. Taking a moment to consider. “No big surprise, you know, that I may have changed a bit. My health’s taken a big fall.”

  “You’re not the same bloke, Dad,” she says, gravely.

  “Right, Angie. There’s been an earthquake under my feet...a few of them... and obviously I’m not the same guy...the radical experience has marked me.”

  “You can’t always hide behind your health problems,” she argues.

  “You call this hiding?” I say.

  Her black eyes flash at me again. “Why don’t you keep out of my life?”

  “That’s beginning to sound like good advice,” I admit to her.

  “Leave me alone,” she insists. “You liked to talk about freedom...discovery...finding our own way. Now you come here and try to drag me back. If you’re so confident of being yourself, why do you make me into a copy? I’m not even a boy,” she reminds me. “God help my brothers. Do you understand me?”

  When I try to touch her shoulder she pulls away. My intention was to reconnect, to reassure, to comfort, but she doesn’t get this. She thinks I’m trying to constrain or even to hurt her. She should know better. I’ve never hit a girl in my entire life and that includes her. Jakes can’t say that about his own personal history. In that way he considers himself a tough guy. In terms of violence he doesn’t discriminate.

  Next thing we know, as Angie is backing away from me, Jakes has pulled out a gun. I have to scrunch my eyes and open them again, believing that I am hallucinating the shooter. This proves that drugs are useless. He’s pointing a weapon at me. How can I escape from this little red neck? Suddenly I’m in the movies and wish to cut the scene.

  Chapter 36

  This is another big Zen moment of earthly existence. The kid wants to take a shot at Pops. And if he confuses me for his real father the odds are narrow. I’ve never had the experience of anyone pulling a gun on me before. When my brother and I were growing up, certainly, the village men all owned firearms, and they would brandish them during the season. But not even my brother ever played around with a gun. So I have never looked down the barrel until now. After our father died the gun was given away with all his personal property to neighbours and friends. Jakes holds out a shot-gun, which has sawn-off style short barrels, to the side of my head. He’s got a glint in his eye like a malevolent doctor. One false step and I won’t have any mind to change. He’ll put my intellect through a liquidiser. Man, you don’t need to drop any tabs of acid in this life.

  “That’s right, granddad, not feeling so clever now,” he jeers.

  His quick colouring face creases and flushes again, as if the hot colours of the bonfires have leaked inside.

  “C’m on boy,” I urge him. “You’re taking this too far. No need to lose your cool.” Unfortunately I can’t feign empathy with this guy. There’s an instinctive hatred between us, as between a freedom rider and a race school bigot. You can’t beat that.

  “Just do as I’m telling yer, yer old bastard. Or I’ll blow your sorry arse into the third dimension, know what I mean?”

  It looks as if he’s got a mechanical hand, as the bling on his fingers clinks on the gun handle and coils over the trigger; the weapon resembling a metal scorpion. Adam Jakes is a young guy living on his frazzled nerves, exhausted by deception, worn down by anxiety. He’s paying a psychological price for his illegal fortune.

  “Put it down, Adam, and we’ll think no more about it,” I suggest.

  “No old bastard’s ever done me any favours,” he remarks.

  “Firearms don’t make you smart, mate, believe me,” I tell him.

  “Keep your back against the wall... face up, granddad,” he warns, waggling the fire stick about.

  “All I’ve got to say is... if your intentions to my daughter are honourable... don’t invite me to your wedding, boy,” I tell him.

  “Where are the goons?” he calls to Angie. “Why aren’t those mutts back here yet? What do I fuckin’ pay ‘em for?”

  “You told them to put their ugly faces into the next county. As I remember it,” Angela informs him. “You can’t expect them to be loyal, if you’re constantly insulting them.”

  “Shut up, will you? Who’re you talking to, Ange? You turning into my fucking wife now, know what I mean?” Jakes snarls.

  “See how your private life is gonna siz
e up with this dude,” I say to my daughter.

  You might argue that I’m already running on limited time. That I’m practically pencilled into the register of deaths. So why am I so terrified of being shot? Anyhow my heart thumps like crazy, so that a bullet could be an irrelevance.

  Jakes picks up my negative vibrations. His face breaks out into a rudely triumphant grin. He could have been up against a steely guy. He’s no crime fiction psychopath - thank god it’s not as simple as that - but my fear makes him brave. My picture of terror reflects a flattering image. Hard not to be flattered by this powerful self-image.

  “You’re taking this too far, Adam. I already told you Dad has a dicey ticker,” she reminds him. I don’t know what she’s been taking if anything. She isn’t exactly jumping out of her skin at the scene.

  “Just get your glad rags back on, do you hear me?” he tells her.

  “You don’t have to share my medical history with him,” I complain.

  Angie is trying to second-guess her lover’s ideas. I’m holding up my arms as if taking the acclaim.

  “You suggesting we go outside?” she asks. Rapidly she pulls on a dress over the teeshirt. “For god’s sake Adam, leave Dad alone. He can’t hurt you. He can’t damage you,” she insists.

  “So why is he threatening me?” Jakes tells her. “What’s goin’ to happen to my wife and kids if I get banged up or something?”

  “Listen to Scarface here,” I say, impatiently.

  “Leave this to me, will you Dad?” she says sharply. There’s something of her mother in this tone. Nervously she twirls her gold bracelet around her wrist - his gift, his love token.

  “I heard you was a bit of a sportsman,” Adam says to me. “Didn’t you play a bit of tennis in your youth?”

  “I’ve retired from the game lately,” I inform him.

  “Let’s see how your fitness is holding up,” he suggests. As if holding a tennis racquet himself - as if suggesting he’s my next opponent - Jakes is swishing the shotgun around my nose.