2000 - The Feng-Shui Junkie

by Brian Gallagher

  She’s pleading with me for understanding.

  Angrily, I switch off the phone and drop it on to the floor, and turn on my tummy and sink to the bottom of the bath and hold myself underwater like a tropical marine fish, balefully beholding the murky grey. It’s hard to cry down here, it’s hard to feel sad when you’re swallowed up by warm water. What a nice way this would be to die.

  I lie like this for a minute, until my chest begins to burst. I force myself to stay down. Now there’s this strange garbled sound, which reminds me of the noise a cellphone makes.

  My heart makes this skipping, lurching movement and I rise up like the great Leviathan, and the edges of my body are awash with waterfalls. Panting like a beach dog, I stretch my dripping arm down to the floor and pick up my phone again and collapse back into the bathtub, exhausted.

  I input the phone and scream: “Look, I’m sick to death of you! What the hell do you want now?”

  Pause.

  “Have you been drinking again, Julie?”

  It’s Mother.

  34

  The front door bangs.

  Seconds later Mother appears in the kitchen where Sylvana and I are seated. Ignoring me, she passes through to the sink and washes her hands. I observe her in silence.

  “That was a nice way to talk to your mother,” she says.

  When she turns round again to dry her hands, she’s wearing this mischievous smile, which proves she actually enjoyed being shouted at like that.

  “Just think of it, Sylvana,” she says. “You ring your own daughter to say you’ll be a bit late, and she tells you she’s sick to death of you.”

  Sylvana giggles. “How did the bridge go, Gertrude?”

  “She doesn’t go there for the bridge, Sylvana.”

  “No,” Mother confirms, taking a packet of chocolate Hobnobs from her shopping bag, cutting the top with a sharp knife and putting one in her mouth. “I go for the men.”

  She puts on the kettle.

  “Anyone nice today?” I ask her.

  “Yes, but they’re all single.”

  “Why should that be a problem?”

  “Married men are much more fun,” she replies.

  “I love your mother,” cackles Sylvana.

  “You don’t know her like I do.”

  “Anyway, Julie, where have you been?” inquires Mother, munching her cookie. “I haven’t seen you since Saturday last.”

  “I’m fine, thanks,” I reply, grinning at my friend.

  “I didn’t ask you how you were, I asked you where you were.”

  “Like I told you, I’ve been staying with Sylvana. There’s this guy she’s trying to shake off and she wants me to stay over with her because she thinks I will repel him.”

  Mother: “Now there’s a vote of confidence.”

  “Anyway, I’m fine,” I lie.

  “You’re feeling better after your bath, then?”

  “Somewhat.”

  “And I presume His Lordship will be home soon?” she asks, pouring boiling water into the pot and carrying it over to the table and sitting down.

  “So I’m told.”

  “He’s been behaving strangely for the last few days,” she says, pouring out the tea.

  Sylvana: “The last few days? ”

  “I don’t think he wants me staying here.”

  “That’s only because you steal his Danish pastries,” I observe.

  “He has this terrible long expression on him. He’s very humourless at the moment.”

  “It’s a genetic character trait, Gertrude.”

  “And now that the piano is here, he seems to want to play it whenever I watch TV. He does it to annoy me, I know he does…”

  I’m laughing at this point. Sylvana isn’t.

  “He thinks he’s musical. You should hear him on Chopin. He destroys the poor man, if the Master only suspected.”

  “He acquired the Chopin disease in Paris,” I say. “It’s endemic.”

  “Well, it’s certainly not contagious.”

  “Chopin,” mocks Sylvana. “God! Who does he think he is? I mean, what’s his problem? ”

  Mother grins happily at us. “Am I stirring it up? I love living here. There’s so much variety.”

  She announces that it’s spaghetti for everyone, including Ronan whenever he returns. She fills a huge cauldron with water and puts it on the hob, turns on the switch, then takes out the spaghetti, the tomato puree and a tub of Parmesan cheese from the press, and puts them on the sideboard. “There’s something all women should know,” she intones.

  “What’s that, Gertrude?”

  “There are three remedies for unhappiness. Eating well.”

  She pulls out a fistful of spaghetti.

  “And…?” prods Sylvana.

  “Sleeping well.”

  She falls silent.

  “Yes, Mother?”

  She breaks the fistful of spaghetti in half, then turns round to address us.

  “And castrating him,” she says.

  Right now, Sylvana has forgotten the meaning of self-control.

  One hour later Ronan walks in the door.

  “You’re just in time for some supper, Ronan,” says Mother.

  “Thank you – I’m fine,” he says, defridging a beer, butting the door shut with his knee in a movement that tries to be cool and actually succeeds.

  “It’s spaghetti and a special sauce, although I’m sure the girls would prefer tomato puree – it’s more slimming. Sit down there beside Julie.”

  “Well, if there’s enough to spare.”

  Ronan always has to be the gentleman. “So, you’ve joined us?” he says in Sylvana’s general direction, as he sits down.

  My friend’s visage, right now, constitutes one glowing highlighted text. It reads: you’re such an asshole you’d need a forest of trees to wipe you off the face of the earth.

  Sylvana: “Seems more like you’ve joined us.”

  “We’re getting daring.” He grins. “Is life treating you well?”

  “Wonderful.”

  “How is your nice little business coming along?”

  Neither of us has bothered explaining to him that Sylvana no longer owns and runs a single Whole-Self Shop. No, she owns and runs a chain of them, which is now receiving valuable international orders. Basically, she’s about to be a millionaire. And when Ronan discovers the fact, she wants to be there to watch his face fall at the bad news.

  “How’s your decay-prevention business?” she counters mildly.

  “Superb. And the dieting?”

  He slides a murky eye over her figure before returning it to base.

  “Shut up, Ronan.”

  He mulls this over, as if I’ve just made an interesting point.

  Why can a woman be attractive only if she’s slim? Sylvana is extremely attractive. Why else would men (mostly rich and older) be tripping over one another’s spare tyres to get near her? She’s so popular with the foul sex that she’s ended up being a kind of fly-swatter on automatic pilot.

  “And how’s the love life treating you, Ronan?” she returns, smirking as she chews an ageing Ryvita snack.

  Beaming, he revolves his head over to me. “Sylvana wants to know how you’ve been treating me, darling.”

  “Exceedingly well, I think.”

  “How are you, anyway?”

  “Non-existent.”

  “Where have you been these last few nights?”

  “Wherever,” I reply, eyeing my friend.

  He butters his bread, pokes it into his mouth and slowly bites.

  Mother has taken a bowl of pasta from the oven. Now she produces another bowl: a familiar glass one. As soon as she removes the tin foil, a strange scent hits my nostrils. This must be the pasta mix Mother was referring to. It has a distinctly fishy smell.

  It doesn’t take me too long to realize what it is.

  Without a word I stand up, leave the kitchen and go into the lounge and pace up and down for a few minut
es, every so often glancing over at the aquarium.

  Mother has been baking Tropical Marine Fish Mousseline.

  I didn’t intend for this to happen. Not really. Oh Jesus.

  Is Mother doing this in full knowledge? Coolly aware that the mousseline planted by myself in a bowl in the fridge originated in our aquarium and took a slight deviation via our Moulinex mixer?

  If so, her hatred of Ronan must be Slavic.

  Or perhaps she did it in all innocence?

  Either way, do I go in and raise the alarm?

  At this late stage?

  I go back inside and sit down and keep my mouth shut.

  Mother opens the window and begins stirring the contents of the glass bowl. I am so glad I strained out the eyes and the fins and unwanted pieces of bone. You can choke on shit like that.

  Ronan is watching Mother, curious about what’s on offer. I can tell he’s going to ask her something about it.

  “Ronan, dear?”

  “Yes?”

  “I think I might have left my bracelet in your surgery that time.”

  “What time was this?”

  “You know…that time.”

  “Oh’ – he grins – ’that time.”

  Sylvana raises her eyes sarcastically.

  “And I really need it for tomorrow.”

  “Yes, well I’m sure it’s still there.”

  “Perhaps you could drop me round later to pick it up?”

  “If you like,” he says, shrugging. “Or you can go yourself. You have your own key. Whichever.”

  True. I can go later myself. And report back to him anything unusual I might happen to have seen.

  “Can I ask what the recipe is, Gertrude?” he inquires.

  “When are you going to Paris, Ronan?” I interrupt, pouring into his glass from a bottle of Châteauneuf.

  There’s this slight jolt in the kitchen.

  “Tomorrow afternoon,” he replies, composed.

  “Well, I hope it goes well.”

  While Sylvana’s expression is mutating, Ronan is sitting there downing his wine, in excellent form, content in the assumption that I’m not going to plague him over Paris.

  Sylvana: “Some tooth conference you’re attending, is it?”

  “That would be one way to describe it.”

  “The spaghetti is ready, children,” Mother announces.

  “I could eat a horse.” He brightens.

  “You’ll wish you had,” I mutter.

  Now she turns the spaghetti pot upside down and drains the water into the sink. She forks three heaps of steaming spaghetti into three bowls and I offer Ronan some more baguette, and suddenly Mother shrieks and my heart jolts and we all look up.

  Standing on top of the kitchen surface, poking its claws into the fish bowl is a large black cat. Mother yells at the poor crud, who is intent on getting an honest bite of fish. Max darts his head back like a snake, motionless and startled – but his paw is still in the fish bowl. She shakes her apron at him and he scarpers.

  Mother: “Where did that come from?”

  “It’s Sylvana’s,” I reply.

  My friend observes me coldly.

  Ronan is concentrated on Max, who is now licking his paw on the floor by the cooker. If he’s seen this cat before, it’s clearly not registering. But then, he was never a great animal-watcher.

  “Does it have a name?” Mother wonders.

  “Well, Sylvana?” I grin.

  “Prudence,” she replies, kicking me under the table.

  “What a wonderful name,” says Mother.

  Ronan: “I assume Prudence will be accompanying Sylvana home tonight?”

  “No, Ronan.” I hope Prudence drives him batty. I hope the quadruped moults on to his trousers. I hope it licks his scented, shower-gelled toes as he sleeps. I hope it salivates over his cornflakes as he’s reading his paper. I could train it to poo on his postmodern art books. That would be good. That would be symbolic. Such excellent taste, for a cat.

  “Sorry about the cat, Gertrude,” says Sylvana. “I’m completely unable to control her.”

  “It’s a he,” corrects Mother.

  “These days sex doesn’t matter,” says Ronan drily.

  Sylvana: “Unless you’re married.”

  Mother: “Isn’t he beautiful? His fur is black like a piano.”

  We watch the spectacle of Mother lovingly caressing the creature on the ground, with Max putting his whole neck and upper torso into the plying movement of her hand. “Lucky Sylvana,” she says.

  “There’s some cat food under the sink, Mother.”

  Mother fills a bowl with cat munchies. The split second the bowl hits the ground, Max homes in.

  “You’ve brought him up very well, Sylvana,” says I evilly.

  Ronan: “Never trust a cat.”

  Sylvana: “Or a man.”

  “Is our dinner ready yet, Mother?”

  Mother carries over three bowls of spaghetti, one for each of us. She herself is abstaining. Then she fetches the fish sauce. “The puree is in another dish, for you girls.”

  She appears to be steering us away from the fishpaste.

  “Yes,” I say. “I’m in the mood for tomato puree tonight.”

  Sylvana: “Me too.”

  If only she knew.

  I get up and fetch the heated dish of puree and the canister of Parmesan. Mother now pours several ladlefuls of the grey gunge on to Ronan’s bowl of spaghetti, Sylvana watching with distaste.

  Mother returns to the sink with the half-empty bowl of mousseline. She advises us all to eat up otherwise it’ll go cold. I blot out my spaghetti with puree.

  Ronan stares at his dinner, scratching his head. “This looks…interesting.”

  “He means that as a compliment, Mother.”

  “I know.”

  “Is this the Delia Smith recipe you were talking about, Julie?”

  “Yes,” I reply, nervous. “It’s an old Mediterranean thing.”

  “It’s salmon mousseline,” says Mother, scrubbing some pans. “Try some Parmesan; that should take the bite out of it.”

  Salmon mousseline? Where did she get that idea?

  He lowers his head to sniff. He raises it again and asks me to pass him the Parmesan.

  I pass it to him and he sprinkles it over his dish.

  I watch him, fascinated.

  Sylvana senses something is going on, but doesn’t know quite what. She’s frowning at me like a crumpled sheet, searching helplessly for clues that might explain the strange, secretive vibe she’s getting from me.

  And so, to help her out, while Ronan’s head is tilted down in his fish dish and Mother’s back is turned, I start performing this swimming, breaststroke motion over the table for her benefit and then I point at his dish.

  She frowns at me doubly deeply. I need to find a more effective way of helping Sylvana to mentally associate tropical marine fish with the marine slurry Ronan is on the point of shovelling into his gob.

  So now I pretend to be a proper fish. While doing the breaststroke, I loll my head from side to side, ogle my eyes and open and close my gob in that cute brain-free way that fish have when they’re just being themselves. And I point at his dish.

  She is as lost as ever.

  I draw a fish in the air with my fingers. She’s nodding: she’s with me so far. Now I pluck the imaginary fish clean out of the air and place it in my mouth, and I close my mouth and pretend to chew, shutting my eyes as if I’m in seventh heaven; then I open my eyes again and point like daggers at Ronan’s dinner.

  But she still doesn’t get it.

  She’s shrugging, nodding, having figured out the part about Ronan eating fish. But their precise origin still eludes her. This is incredibly frustrating for me: I want her to share in the sheer pleasure, which has now begun in earnest to spread like creamy Mitchelstown butter all over my being, as I observe Ronan placing the first squiggly mouthful of spaghetti and fish mousse-line in his mouth.

&nb
sp; The kitchen is in perfect silence. So silent that you can hear the sound of Ronan’s horse-like chomping as he eats. Sylvana’s eyes are flickering like an iguana from Ronan to me and back to him. Mother is bemusedly observing the proceedings from the sink, drying plates with a dish towel.

  Ronan looks up suddenly. “Is something the matter?” he wonders.

  Sylvana and I simultaneously avert our eyes.

  Mother turns back round and starts making a real racket cleaning pots and pans in the sink. “How is your dinner, Ronan?” she asks.

  “It’s…”

  “No complaints, Ronan. Mother made it specially.”

  He screws up his mouth, looks over at me as if I’ve just committed an act of sabotage against him, then he lowers his head again to study the contents of his plate. After a while he decides to twirl another load of gooey spaghetti around his fork.

  I can’t bear Sylvana not to know what’s happening. I pick up the nearby TV Times and open it at the crossword page.

  “Right, Sylvana. Test out your brainpower. Two across: ‘Walks softly’. Five letters.”

  “Treads,” says Sylvana.

  “Creeps,” offers Ronan.

  “Crawls,” suggests Mother, still crashing away at the sink.

  “It depends on two down: ‘Receptacle for fish’. Eight letters.”

  “Fish tank,” says Mother.

  “Aquarium,” offers Ronan.

  “That’s it!” I shout.

  “Although,” he volunteers, “it could be both.”

  “Try three down then: ‘Moulinex’. Five letters.”

  “Moulinex?” says Ronan, entwining a further load of spaghetti on to his fork. “That’s a brand name, isn’t it?”

  “Hm…”

  He chews away at this mouthful too, with a slight grimace. Mother is still making a lot of noise with the pots and pans.

  “Don’t they do mixers?” suggests Sylvana, slightly frustrated by my abstruse references.

  “Mixer. Yes. That’s five letters.”

  I pretend to write in ‘mixer’.

  When Ronan descends for his fourth mouthful I make all manner of faces at Sylvana while repeating the word ‘mixer’ out loud several times, as if absent-mindedly, and all the while I am pointing at Ronan’s dish. She clearly thinks I’m crazy. She looks again at me. I am gleaming meaningfully back at her. Then she studies Ronan’s dish and looks back at me again, and I do a quick breaststroke motion, and now there seems to be a slight alteration in her countenance and she suddenly gets up and leaves the room through the door to the hall behind Ronan.