Cathexis

by Clay, Josie

  One hour passed, then two, then three. At last, a key in the door. I arranged my ingredients, among them, petulance, jealousy and cruelty and set my features in smacked arse of the highest dudgeon.

  “Sorry sorry sorry, Minky, I couldn't get away”. Noticing my clenching jaw. “I had to wait for a delivery”. Noticing my balled fists.

  “You said you'd be home at five” I hissed, “it's now eight”.

  “I know, I'm sorry, it was important”.

  Grabbing petulance. “More important than me?”

  “Oh give me a break” she said, pouring some wine.

  “I give you lots of breaks”, raising the volume.

  She sighed. “Well give me another one then”.

  And there I was, swirling my red cape.

  “I don't even know why you're doing this fucking job!”

  “I've told you why”, patiently, “I love it”.

  “My arse!” I roared and she blinked, stunned. “You're just a fucking rich girl, trying to justify your existence by doing something really hard and horrible, and don't tell me it isn't, I know you're not easily defeated but just look at you, you're fucked. Just so you can prove to Pappa, what? That you're not a spoilt brat?”

  There was even angry spittle. Her eyes saucered and then her brow fused in a dangerous way, horns glinting.

  “You have no fucking idea what you're talking about!” She glowered at the pedal bin.

  “You're being fucking selfish!” Banging my fists on the table for drama. “Off on some pointless crusade”, my voice a cruel singsong, “wrecking yourself, wrecking us, why? Because you love it. Do you love it, Dale?”

  Her eyes incandescent . “Yes, I fucking do. I have a life you know”, now in full voice, “and I don't need you...” she floundered, “I don't need you telling me what I can and can't do! Back off, Mink!”, stamping the floor.

  “No you back off, stand down, walk away. You're so used to winning aren't you? But some arenas you should just not enter. Dale, what you're doing is destructive, for both of us, you're so fucking stubborn”.

  She spun round challenging. “Thanks for your input but some of us need a little more reality”. I opened my mouth, but she raised her hand. “And don't say we make our own reality” she growled. “Look”, fingers on temples, “I don't fucking need this”.

  “Aha! Yes you do”, triumphant. “Tell me you love spending fourteen hours a day in a freezing vault, hammering your tits off, surrounded by hairy-arsed men who would love to fuck the dyke out of you. Do you really love that Dale? Do you?”

  A shock twinge of arousal.

  Her head dropped and my snorting bull, no longer enraged, staggered to her knees under my artful spears and spilled her tears. My work discharged in a few short minutes, not quite the taming exercise I'd anticipated, more like a sheep shearing. But my girl was weeping at my hand, wretched and fatigued. I knew what that was like. And so despite, because, down before her. Kissing her salt and dust, our mouths soon eating each other, suffocating, tensile thrusts. Now in our position, legs astride, cocos together, breast to breast, an urgent congress, rising, communing. All of us joining here, the gristle and bone, the friction and soft, thick ribbed and weak, all here with only one place to go, that one colossal, sacred, murderous, majestic, ominous thrill. Bumping in it for a while, such pride in her, such an honour.

  Her cheek on mine, sticky and good.

  “You're right” she sobbed. “I've made a mistake”.

  She could fathom no way out of the contract she'd signed. Performance indicators, financial default, not a problem, but the professional discredit she could not live with. Dragging her up, she creaked into a rush chair, keeping my hand.

  “What if you were to break your arm?”

  “Extreme” she said, brain dead.

  Tearing up the stairs, flailing in the box room, I returned victorious, placing my old companion on her lap, arm shaped, arduous and authentic.

  “Happy Anniversary, baby!”

  “You fucking beauty” she sniffed.

  Next morning, delivering her in the Hilux, the cast discretely gaffered, the grubby hand tip-exed. She emerged from the church minutes later, thumb cocked like an optimistic hitchhiker or the Fonz.

  Momentarily fearful of our investment, we had each of us made a stand in our own way. But now it was done and dusted, a new era prevailed, one of complete conjunction. No longer necessary to pursue counter-intuitive sidetracks, we trod the same path tillsammans, hand in hand, the sun on our backs.

  Dale summoned our Swedish home on the laptop, which we explored in cyberspace; a grown-up version of the boathouse. Red, wooden, squatting between sea and forest, with a workshop where we could evolve further, setting our insights in pigment and stone, Dale's dust tempering my colours. We would go in August and when the holiday makers had vacated in September, we would most probably buy it. I printed out the picture and stuck it to the fridge door with magnetic words.

  Chapter 20

  The weather worryingly hot for April as I cycled along Heather Road. Some of the Hasids in shirt sleeves, but most still wrapped in heavy dark coats and always the hat. The women from neck to wrist in conservative blouses, the modest skirt and white tights of an off-duty nun and wigs that must have been hellish in the heat.

  The head of a Hasid child bobbed between parked cars. She edged out, a baby on her hip, her little brother's hand in hers, all cautiously craning the wrong way. Their approach to crossing the road similar to that of a cat; dart out at speed and hope for the best. I'd learnt to anticipate this and as she went for it, my squealing brake pads stopped her in surprise and the baby's head whipped round alarmed.

  “You must look when you cross the road” I implored, but she scuttled into the path of an oncoming cyclist whose brake pads produced a repeat performance. We exchanged the tight lipped smile of road users and I accidentally bestowed it on a girl sitting in the bus shelter. She smiled back and wiggled her index finger. A full three rotations of the pedals before I braked hard again, recalling the backwards beckon. She straightened her arms and locked her fingers as if preparing to dive and, lifting her chin, she offered a grin, broad and reminiscent.

  “Sasha?”

  She nodded, pulling her sleeves over her hands. A circumspect “Hi”.

  “Oh my God, look at you”, attempting to identify vestiges of the little girl. “How are you?”

  “Fine, I'm fine, and you?”

  “Yeah, yes”, gawping at the transformation. “You're, well, all grown-up”. Her features were accommodated more honestly now, the faces of children a cute but effective primal trick. She smiled in that way teenagers do, as if they're already recounting it to their friends.

  “You look just the same” she said.

  “I'm sure I don't, but bless you for saying it”.

  She giggled, the child fleetingly re-emerging. “So how old are you now?”

  “Seventeen”. A reflective nod.

  “Like the dancing queen” I said for my own entertainment, thinking she wouldn't get it but she did.

  “Yeah” she smiled. “I'm having the time of my life”.

  I studied the strobing, digital timetable, giving her a break from my scrutiny.

  “You must be doing your A'levels”.

  “Philosophy, Art and Critical Thinking” she said, her intonation like a question.

  “Critical Thinking, wow, that sounds very left brain” I said as if she were an adult.

  “It's basically thinking about thinking”. That same inflection.

  A bus chuff drew a line and she stood, taller than Nancy and sturdier, like her father.

  “Well, you take care Sasha”.

  “And you Minette”. Her walk economical, like her mother's. “Bye”. She beeped her Oyster card and became a silhouette.

  The episode coming back to me as I swam that evening; something about her, a calm resolve, quite unlike the girls I taught and a far cry from that excitable little pickle - my abiding
memory of her. But thinking on, she had a quality as a child, a focus, a knowing. The uninvited thought of her mother surfaced and I purged it with Dale, quickening my stroke.

  Dale's key in the door. Despite a busy day, this was where it really began for me.

  This morning she'd driven away, a triangle of toast clamped in her teeth, a vortex of clarity and vibrance. We'd got a little carried away last night, drinking whisky while we virtually toured the Swedish house for the umpteenth time. I didn't share her constitution and after she'd gone, I sat queasy, coco glowing smugly, staring at the 'please wait' start-up on the computer. Lighting a cigarette without being conscious of rolling it, and similarly opening an email in my Potarto inbox without registering who it was from.

  Subject: Left Brain

  ‘Dear Minette

  ‘It was great to see you. I remember you fondly and believe me, you do look just the same. As you know, I'm studying art. In fact I submitted a piece to your 'Sense of Place' competition but you rejected me, probably not you I know. I'm eager to learn all I can about the 'art world'. My interests lie in conceptual art, incorporating mixed media. I have visited various exhibitions at Potarto and appreciate their diversity and quality.

  ‘I wondered if there were any summer job opportunities or failing that I would be willing to volunteer for the experience. I look forward to hearing from you.

  Yours sincerely

  Sasha (Ilarian)

  ‘PS I hope I use my left and right brain in equal measure’.

  I wracked my brain to recall what her piece could have been - most likely one of those conceptual things that didn't present well at selection - like the woman who had stripped before us, maintaining she would set her hair on fire.

  “Film it” said Simon, “and send it to us”.

  “Actually, don't do that” I said, the others nodding vehemently.

  “No matter” she said. “That was my piece right there, I just did it. Letting you know I was going to do it and all that implies, was my piece”.

  “Bravo” said Simon with a slow hand clap.

  “So you're not going to set your hair on fire?” I reiterated.

  “Not in that sense” she said enigmatically, bowing like a geisha and reversing out the door.

  “Fucking nut ball” Stephen muttered.

  ‘Subject: Re: Left Brain’

  ‘Hi Sasha

  ‘It was lovely to see you too. I'm afraid I have little influence in the machinations at Potarto. You can visit the website for vacancies, which I'm sure you've already done or better still email rosa.hartley@potarto.org.uk, which I'm guessing you've done too, but contact her again and mention me. I'll vouch for you and have a word.

  ‘I'm sorry about your piece not being selected but we did have an inordinate number of entries, don't let it put you off’.

  I paused, should I mention Nancy? I had no idea how much the girl knew or remembered. Nancy's proximity once again coloured an inner segment of my Venn diagram. I checked myself carefully and typed:

  ‘Say hi to your mum, I hope she is well. Let me know how you get on’.

  All the best,

  Minette

  ‘PS I'm sure your hemispheres are perfectly balanced’.

  Chapter 21

  “Outside” I ordered, as Dale lurched in like a refugee from Pompeii. Her regular whipping on the deck particularly emphatic this evening, the dust billowing up to the wisteria. Into her thighs tonight, the unyielding meat barely wobbled at my smacks.

  “Now you're taking the piss” she said, grabbing my wrists, which I dipped and pulled apart, employing my 'Dealing with Aggression' Council training and shrugging her off easily. The gesture provoked an intense but giggly play fight which she won. On my back, arms pinned, she jammed her thigh in my crotch.

  “I wish I had a cock right now” she said, “I'd fuck you senseless”.

  “I don't like cock”.

  “Not even mine?”

  “Not even yours” I said. “But let's discuss this in the bath, after which I'll bum fuck you”.

  “Yuck, gross” she said. “Point taken”.

  Bath running, me turning the stew, Dale at the computer.

  “You've got mail, Mink”.

  Verified over her shoulder, the bouncing icon. Dale upstairs on the wander-phone, trilling to Björn and monitoring the water level.

  ‘Subject: Re: Left Brain’

  ‘Thanks Minette :-)

  ‘Mum is fine but busy. I don't know if you heard that she and Dad split up 8 years ago,. He's with Linda now, she's cool. I was wondering if we could meet up to discuss my options, I would value your input. Also I have something that belongs to you. How about Friday pm?’

  Best,

  Sasha’

  ‘Subject: Re: Left Brain’

  ‘OK. Pandora's on Church Street 2pm? Perhaps you can bring your folio?’

  ‘Subject: Re: Left Brain’

  ‘ Cool, see you there. S x’

  Dale's foot on my breastbone in the swampy bath, hair long with water. Never cut, at least not in my time, taking months to grow an iota in length. Not 'as the crow flies' like mine, hers choosing the scenic route.

  “Sometimes I feel like having it all cut off” she said.

  I envisaged her shorn, beautiful enough to pull it off.

  “Oh no, don't, my Paul can prune you. I'm meeting a girl on Friday” I said, through a yawn.

  “Good, what kind of girl?”

  “A Nancy daughter kind of girl”.

  The wisteria dashed the bathroom window. I should trim it, I thought. I explained the situation.

  “And does she know about you and Nancy?”

  “I'm not sure”.

  “How the world turns” she said, her heel finding my coco.

  Fumbling with the bike lock, I caused one of those cumbersome retro jobs to jackknife on its side. How I hated bikes like these, their annoying basket, threaded with plastic flowers and faux kooky persona. I hated the women who rode them too, sailing through red lights, Laura Ashley billowing around their thighs, yodelling to some opera plugged into their ears, elevated and impervious, as if they were riding-a-fucking-cock-horse to Banbury Cross. Wrestling the contraption upright, I'd already spotted Sasha, and her me, judging by the way she was staring at her coffee. The word 'ingénue' came to mind, a sweet word.

  The pointless door tinkle, pretending she'd been stirred from deep thoughts.

  “Hi”, winding the strap of my bag around the table leg in a complex fashion. I'd had it pinched here once before. “Well”, scooping my chair, “any luck at Potarto?”

  “Not yet” she said. “I e-mailed Rosamund again”.

  The planes of her cheeks, her eyebrows, Nancy. But her eyes a deep dark brown, almost black like oil.

  “Did you bring your folio?”

  “No, something happened to it”.

  “Did the dog eat it?”

  She laughed and looked at me, Nancy but altered.

  “No, it's not ready, I need to reorganise it”.

  “OK” I said, “no hurry”.

  We talked of ways forward, going for a degree. Better something vocational she'd thought.

  “You don't have to think that way” I said. “Think of what best would enrich you. OK, you may end up in a call centre for a while, or waitressing, but that exploratory time is invaluable. Have you heard of Marina Abramovich?”

  Eyes avid, she shook a response.

  “Check out her manifesto”, writing on a napkin, which she folded into her pocket.

  Lord, I wish I had one of these, a child, a daughter who I could help with all my good stuff. Through happenstance or design, straight people had this wonder by default, often just some kicked up semen. I imagined mine and Dale's progeny; I couldn't go there, at times a sorrow that we were Nephilim.

  “I have something of yours” she said, delving into a breast pocket and extending her fist. A thin gold chain pooled in my palm, like a drum roll for the locket.

&
nbsp; “Where did you get this?”, evenly.

  “I was eight” she said, “digging for treasure in the garden and there it was, in the mud”.

  “So you know about your mother and me?”

  She flushed a little. “Of course I know” she snorted. “I knew all along, at least as much as a kid could. I liked it, Mum was happy and you were so nice to me. When you'd gone, I began to think I'd dreamed it up but then I found this”.