Smile

  9

  One hand was all he needed to hold me down. A hand on my back, just above my hips. I was helpless. He didn’t have to press too hard; he knew exactly what he was doing. I gave up trying to lift myself. I could see his shoes and black socks. The socks were weird, nearly see-through, like tights. I could see under the desk, and the bottom of the door on the other side. It was getting dark outside, and the room was dark.

  —Now, he said.—Now.

  He wasn’t angry. He’d no reason to be. He’d told me to come to the room after last class. He was going to teach me how to wrestle. He was going to teach me how to protect myself. He knew my father was sick and back in hospital. He’d asked me how my father was just before he told me to come at him like I was going to attack.

  —Come on now, Victor, he said.—Don’t be shy. You want to kill me.

  I got it over with. I walked towards him, and right up to him. He flipped me around before I knew he’d grabbed me, and he dumped me on the carpet. It knocked the air out of me but I wasn’t hurt. My face hadn’t hit the floor.

  —Now, he said again.

  I heard him getting his breath back. I thought he might be shivering. I could feel it in his hand and arm – I thought I could.

  —Did you see how I did that? he said.

  I couldn’t answer. It was like he was holding my voice down with his hand too. I couldn’t speak. My face was a few inches from the waste basket.

  —Well? he said.

  His other hand rubbed my leg, from behind the knee up towards my arse. I couldn’t move. I couldn’t try to. His hand went to my other leg.

  —You can do that with anyone, he said.—It doesn’t matter what size they are. That’s why I’m teaching you now. Any gutty that comes near you, you’ll be able to deal with him.

  He’d reached the fork in my jeans. He pushed his fingers, his palm, under me. He held me there – just held me.

  —Now, he said.—We’ll do it again. And then we’ll see if you can do it to me.

  His hands were gone.

  —Up you get.

  —Thank you, Brother.

  10

  She’d call the payphone and I usually made it down the stairs before the man in the room beside the front door got to it. He’d often watch me from his door as I talked to her.

  —Was that Rachel, Victor? he asked me once after I’d put the phone down.

  —It was, Oscar.

  —She sounds very nice, he said.

  —Thanks, I said.—She is.

  He was too old for a one-room bedsit, I thought. (The young are so fuckin’ stupid.) He was a kitchen porter and didn’t work on Mondays. Six pairs of checked trousers hung from the clothesline in the back garden every Monday afternoon. Rachel saw them from my window.

  —Oh, look, she said.—I wear those too.

  She did, and she didn’t. She could have gone out and taken a pair off the line and put them on. I could see her down there, in the drizzle, lifting a leg, then the other, wriggling till her arse and hips had made it past the soggy waist of Oscar’s work trousers and, yes, laughing while she did it. But Rachel’s trousers were different. She wore them the next time she came to my place. She made me take them off.

  She stayed a few nights a week. We fucked like happy rabbits and she cooked glorious meals, created from the nothing in my fridge.

  —How did you do that? I asked.

  Our plates were on our laps as we ate side by side on my single bed.

  —Do what?

  —Make this.

  I tapped the plate.

  —Well, she said.—You had two tomatoes and I smuggled the rest in in my bag.

  —You didn’t bring a bag, I said.—I didn’t see one.

  She’d shown me the spare pair of knickers she’d brought in her jacket pocket and she already had a toothbrush parked beside mine above the triangular sink in the corner, beside the cooker.

  —I’ve been sneaking ingredients in for weeks, she said.—Did you not notice?

  —No.

  I looked across at the shelf above the sink. There were three slim bottles staring back at me.

  —Spices, I said.

  —Yes.

  —Three kinds.

  —Yes.

  —Jesus.

  I didn’t tell her that I must have been staring at them every time I pissed in the sink on the nights when she wasn’t there. But I hadn’t seen them.

  —What’s this stuff? I asked her.

  —Couscous.

  —It’s good.

  It wasn’t on the shelf.

  —Where’s it hidden?

  —I’m not telling you, she said.

  I was eating a thing called couscous and there were no peas or spuds on the plate, or meat. I was doing this as I sat beside a naked woman. There was a mug of wine on the floor beside me. I felt French. I felt American. I felt like a writer, living the writer’s life. I felt handsome. I felt cruel and good, adult and giddy. I felt sophisticated, and I didn’t. I felt that this was mine. My life had started. My real life had started.

  I sat for hours at the table in my room and filled pages, so there’d be evidence there the next time she stayed. I wrote pieces for What Now and the Sunday Independent, so she’d see my name. I went on The Late Late Show, as part of a panel of ‘young people’, so she’d see me. That was the difference between us. I worked for her approval but Rachel didn’t work for mine. I filled pages because she wanted me to. I bought an Olivetti typewriter, so she’d hear me working as she came up the stairs after Oscar had let her in.

  —She’s a beautiful girl, Victor.

  —She is, Oscar.

  —She’s got a lovely smile.

  —Yes.

  —She was wearing chef trousers.

  —That’s right.

  —She’s a chef.

  —She is.

  I’d type for hours, knowing – hoping – she’d hear me on her way up. I’d run across to the kettle but I’d charge back to make sure she’d hear me being a writer. I’d try to look surprised when I opened the door.

  —Sorry, I’d say.—I was miles away.

  She brought a cassette to the bedsit. She had it in a bag. The bag was pink and plastic, with Meals on Heels and a tray on two stiletto heels printed on its side. If a tray could be sexy, this one was. The bags became well known, and sought after, but this one was brand new. She took the cassette from the bag and dropped it, the bag, on the floor. She hadn’t said hello or kissed me.

  —What’s wrong?

  —Nothing.

  She took a Dylan bootleg from the player on the mantelpiece and put in her cassette.

  —This is my father’s favourite piece of music, she said.

  It was violins and cellos. I knew nothing about classical music.

  —What is it? I asked.

  —Samuel Barber’s Adagio for fucking Strings, she said.

  And she fucked me. She pulled me to the floor by the sleeve of my jumper. Then she kneeled in front of me – she wasn’t smiling. She turned her back and dropped onto her elbows. She was wearing a black skirt and her right hand came back and grabbed the hem. She lifted it slowly. Adagio for Strings is well known now; we’ve seen Willem Dafoe dying to it. But Rachel was lifting her skirt two or three years before Platoon was released. She backed into me and she kept backing into me, shoving herself right through me, long after I’d come and Barber had gone, replaced by some header with a piano.

  —Who the fuck is that?

  —Liszt.

  She’d let herself fall forward and I was lying on top of her, sweating, elated, devastated. The Adagio had almost made me cry and that now made me want to laugh. She groaned. It wasn’t an objection; she wanted me to stay where I was. I rested my cheek on the back of her neck. She lifted a hand, and managed to fi
nd my other cheek and pat it.

  —I love you, I said.

  I couldn’t believe what I’d just done. I seemed to hear each word and my voice, the horsey whisper of a well-fucked young man, seconds after I’d spoken. I’d wrecked it; I’d fuckin’ wrecked it. I wanted to get up off her, and out of the room.

  I could feel her breathing; she was lifting me with each inhalation, and dropping me when she exhaled. My sweat was cold – my knees were killing me. My mouth was open; I think I was trying to catch the words, grab them back. I wanted to cry again.

  There was a delay – it was a delay. She was going to speak now.

  —That’s nice, she said.

  She meant it, I was sure; there was no sarcasm. (She told me she loved me too about eight months later.)

  Her bum nudged me.

  —Lift.

  I got off her. My arms were trembling. I began to stand up.

  —No, she said.

  She turned on her side and stayed there. She pulled her hair from her face. She was smiling. I lay beside her. She leaned out and kissed me.

  —My man, she said.

  She took my hand and brought it down to her fanny.

  —Finish me off, she said.

  She grinned and licked my ear.

  —Hang on, I said.

  I got up on my knees, so I could reach up to the cassette player. I walked my finger across the top, to the Stop button. I pushed it. The piano stopped dead just as her fingers touched my balls.

  She stopped.

  —Will I switch it back on? I said.

  She laughed, and I lay back down on the strange blue carpet and we hugged and she came just as my wrist was about to break, and she gripped me like she thought she was falling off a roof. Her fingers hurt me. They left bruises that later, when I examined them, made me happy.

  —What’s for dinner? I said.

  She bit my arm.

  —You.

  I pretended she’d hurt me and pushed myself away. She followed me like I’d hoped she would. I was lying on the pink Meals on Heels bag. I pulled it out from under me.

  —This is nice.

  —Dad’s little present. I fucking hate it.

  —Oh.

  Adagio for Strings began to make sense.

  —I have five thousand of them, she said.—As of this afternoon.

  —Maybe he means well, I said.—Does he?

  —No.

  —No?

  She didn’t repeat herself. She put me in her mouth and I managed to hold off coming in time to grab the Meals on Heels bag, flick it open, lift her head from me, and come into the bag.

  She clapped her hands.

  —Oh Jesus – amazing.

  She laughed till the walls sweated. She watched as I went the few steps to the waste bin under the table and pushed the bag down into it, on top of the paper I’d crumpled and thrown in there, to prove that I was working.

  —I’ll never be able to use them now, she said.

  But she did.

  —What’s the problem with them? I asked.

  —They’re fucking pink, for a start. Have you ever seen me wear anything pink?

  I was on safe ground.

  —No.

  —Or even lean against anything pink?

  —No.

  —It’s none of his business, she said.—He doesn’t trust me. I’m only a girl and girls are for marrying. And the heels – he made the whole thing look pornographic.

  —A pornographic tray?

  —Yes, Victor. Pornographic anything.

  She stood up.

  —He went guarantor for my loan and he thinks that makes him the boss. Or the boss’s boss, or something.

  The curtains were open but my room was at the back of the house, two flights up. Someone at the very back of the garden could have seen her, or anyone cutting the grass or playing with the kids in the gardens on the other side of the back wall. I was happy to share her. I was happy to gloat. She rubbed and slapped dust and grit from her legs and back and shoulders.

  —You’re a damn fine woman, I said.

  She was dusting her knees. She looked at me, through her hair. She smiled; she was pleased. She was happy.

  —I am, she said.—Aren’t I?

  —Yes, you are.

  —I’m a woman, she said.

  —Eh – yes.

  I was happy too. I had my woman here. I was in love – overwhelmed. I liked myself too, I think. I even liked her father until I met him.

  * * *

  I brought her to meet my mother first, on a Sunday afternoon, after we’d gone for a walk in Howth.

  —My God, Victor, my mother whispered when Rachel went upstairs to the toilet.—Is she a Protestant?

  —No.

  —She’s beautiful – her teeth. She’s beautiful.

  My mother looked at me. She grinned – she giggled. She stopped and put her hand on my arm. My life made complete sense to her now. She’d just seen its measure going up the stairs. I never had to explain myself again.

  She dusted the kettle before she filled it.

  —Not in here, she said.

  We were in the kitchen.

  —The front room, she said.—Go on. Grab her before she comes in here.

  —What’s wrong with here?

  —Ah, Victor.

  She’d taken three clean cups from the cupboard and now she was washing them. She looked back at me.

  —I’ll only be a minute, she said.

  But she was still smiling.

  —Go on, she said.—Do what you’re told for once. There’s the flush, listen. Head her off at the pass – go on.

  I caught Rachel at the bottom of the stairs. She looked too bright for the house, although she was wearing black – black dress and tights, black boots. Her charcoal coat was hanging at the door, beside my mother’s raincoat and my sister’s grey school blazer. She looked too bright and too big.

  —I’ve to bring you in here, I told her.

  I tried to be light. I was making my mother happy and that made me happy. But I was embarrassed. The smallness of the room, and the cold in there; it was hardly ever used. The narrowness of the hall, the wallpaper, the little boy on the wall with the big tearful eyes, the line of porcelain cats, even the photograph of my father. They – it – embarrassed me. I had to swallow back the apology. I knew how it would sound but it was still a fight.

  Rachel timed it perfectly. My mother came in with the tray just as she picked up the photograph of my father.

  —He’s gorgeous, she said.

  —Yes, he was, said my mother.—He was a good-looking man.

  She put the tray down on the glass coffee table. There was a rattle of cups and spoons. She stood beside Rachel and they looked at my father together.

  —Like Victor, said Rachel.

  My mother patted Rachel’s arm and Rachel put the photograph back on the mantelpiece.

  —You must miss him, said Rachel.

  —You’ve no idea, love, said my mother.

  They were both at the tray, bent over, and I felt I didn’t know them. How had Rachel known to say something like that? And my mother’s answer had been almost vicious, a sharpness to her voice that I’d never heard – or noticed – before. And yet what they’d said had been perfect. They were friends and, somehow, they were ganging up on me. Rachel had smelled my embarrassment and she was siding with my mother. She gets down on her hands and knees, I wanted to tell my mother. She makes me fuck her from behind. But I could hear my new mother. Good for her, she’d say. Good for her.

  I was tempted to go up to my old room, to leave them alone, get away for a bit. But I didn’t. I knew Rachel would have followed me and I didn’t want her to see it – although she might have had a peek already when she
was upstairs. I didn’t want her to see the Derby County poster or the absence of a headboard on my bed, or the damp patch and the corner of peeling wallpaper over the window, or the view from the window of O’Connells’ back garden and the craters dug in the grass by their Alsatian. The dog was dead but the holes were still there, and a broken Honda 50 on its side. I didn’t want her to hear Mister and Missis O’Connell riding, bashing each other against the wall, like they did every Sunday afternoon. And yet, I did. I wanted her to see and hear it all. I knew she’d love it. She’d think it was great that old people fucked and didn’t care about their garden. She’d sit on the bed and smile at me. I was protecting myself, not Rachel. Rachel was never a snob. But she didn’t have to be. I did.

  But I loved my mother. I don’t know if I loved my father. I don’t remember him dying. I remember him being dead and I remember being in the graveyard. I remember being cold. I remember not knowing how to feel, what to do. I loved my mother and that was why I’d brought Rachel to the house. To show her off, and to make my mother happy. To let my mother know that I’d grown up; I was a man. To let her see that I’d gone up in the world and that she mightn’t be seeing that much of me any more.

  I hadn’t expected them to get on so well. They were best buddies, giddy sisters. My mother loved the way Rachel ate the plate of Goldgrain biscuits. She marvelled at it, this walking proof of female perfection chewing and slurping, and throwing her head back whenever my mother said something funny. My mother was funny!

  She offered my mother a job.

  —You’d be perfect, she said.

  —Ah no.

  My mother was forty-five. I’ve just worked that out and it’s a shock. She was a young woman. She was good-looking. It was Sunday and she was still in her mass clothes. The slippers she’d been wearing when she’d let us into the house were gone, replaced by the black high heels she wore once a week. This is me, now, looking back. But then, I didn’t see the woman I now know was there. I saw the lines at the eyes, the protruding tummy, the too-black hair, the nicotine-stained fingers. I wanted her to be different.

  And I didn’t.

  —I couldn’t cope with that, she told Rachel.—I’d drop the bloody tray, sure.

  —You wouldn’t.

  —Oh, I would. Sure, I nearly toppled this one here just now. Anyway, I have a job and I’m grand with it.