Skunk: There's a lot of room in the sky, and the
sun's not going anywhere today. This is not home; I've just finished eating my
Chicken McNuggets or my McChicken Nuggets or whichever it is, with regular
fries and a vanilla milkshake (abandoned when it got soupy in the heat) in a
small McDonald's in Scarborough, Toronto NW. I’m on my way out to Malvern, this
time on foot, and on my own. I cannot remember what I’m wearing, so I run a
quick check: a dark lavender/grey Levi's pocket T, with "Levi Strauss San
Francisco" across the pocket in that textured white lettering; a pair of
Levi's olive‑green white‑tab workpants with their long ruler pocket crawling
down my right thigh, and I know these to be the best trousers I ever owned; a
pair of Levi's cotton boxers patterned with an orange and red check, whose
white waistband encircled with the large Levi's brand is what I see when I lift
the t‑shirt; a pair of cream‑coloured Levi's socks replete with the red batwing
logo and a design of broken brown shapes around the neck; and my two‑horse
brand Levi's boots inside the left of which I can feel a damp crescent of sweat
caress my heel. I check the time on the Levi's watch that seems afloat upon my
arm, the arm itself free from any marking: 11.35 am.
McNuggets.
I cannot tell if there is music playing.
I want to know, but I cannot make myself understand the process of discerning
music in the surrounding air. There are people sitting at the table next to
mine and I can hear their voices well enough, almost see their spoken words
configuring above the food and paper detritus choking the surface between them.
cog: They're
hungry for Jesus.
cog: Starving for him, they're,
they're... and that's why they need the Bibles.
cog (this through an unfinished mouthful
of burger): Don't it feel good to know you're doing all that you can for the
Lord?
When they rise to leave, I notice that
of the three, two have mild disabilities made manifest in their lopsided gait.
I don't know about myself. Things feel secure, but I am sitting down and it's
hard to tell. Watching them leave the premises, I imagine massive domestic
collections of pornography, and appreciate my unkindness.
Something I didn't see before: looking
again at my trousers, I see the words "Go fuck yourelthf" written
beside me on the seat. I smile like I'm drunk.
Everything is
still too bright outside, and it's while I'm wondering why the hell I didn't
buy that Levi’s baseball cap back at the mall that a young guy clears the table
next to me, not staff, just another customer, and I only really notice since
his backside is wrapped in familiar denim: the arcurate and red tab. He returns
to the table with his own tray too full for one person. His long hair's tied
back into a ponytail, any stray lengths curled back behind the ears slightly
too large for the head. He has a Big Mac, fries, a dark‑coloured drink in the
paper cup.
And he smiles at me.
And I smile
back.
Now he's joined by an older guy who's
still wiping his hands on his jeans when he sits down opposite, who I assume is
fresh from the toilet. He pulls a still damp back‑of‑hand across his lips, and
I recognise that too. He helps himself to the food remnant on the tray.
cog: Cheers
El, I'll square you later.
There's the smell of Old Spice, and
something about him that doesn't fit, he looks like a thin person who’s
suddenly found himself overweight, that or a fat person who just lost a great
deal of bulk. He doesn't even look to me, but there's an easy rapport between the pair,
and for no other reason I mistake them for lovers.
cog (laughing, finishing drying his
hands on a napkin): You really oughtta try the toilets, the door in there is
extreme. It goes UUUUNNNNH
letting out a
long grunting sound
cog: like
that. I swear, when I went in there, I thought it was some guy!
Laughter.
cog: And then
I heard it again, exactly the same, and I'm thinking "no way".
He starts unwrapping his food, which I
now see is exactly the same as mine, right down to the sweet 'n' sour sauce,
though the drink could be different, I'm not sure.
cog:
UUUUNNNH!
cog: Hey! No
blowing bubbles in your milkshake.
Out of
curiosity, I take another pull on the straw poking from the lid of my own
milkshake, nothing too hard, so 1 can let the stuff flow back whence it came if
it's too awful. I get clogged with memories of raspberry ripple ice‑cream at
the dinner table with my mum, stirring the stuff around 'til it's of uniform
colour/texture. This is no good. It all slides back down into the cup; I dip
the smallest finger on my right hand into the remaining sweet 'n’ sour sauce that
accompanied my McNuggets and lick the distraction into myself.
cog: Hey
Mikey?
It's the
younger guy talking.
cog: Whassat?
cog (waiting
until he's swallowed the food in his mouth): Remember the first time we had Big
Macs? When Dad went out
The older guy
is shaking his head.
cog: You
don't remember that? You really don't remember?
cog: No, God,
1 just, I don't think I can remember a time when I just didn't know what, no
cog: That's
pretty weird, and I must've been younger than you.
cog: Maybe
I’d already had 'em, so I wouldn't
cog: No
because I remember it, I remember talking to you about it, and how we, we
didn't have clue one what he was going to come home with. Mike you
honestly don't
cog: No. God
that worries me.
cog
(laughing): One of yours was, you thought he was bringing home some guy called
Big Max.
cog (laughing
too): No way. Not me not then.
With my
elbows on the table, I form my palms into a visor for my eyes and watch as much
as I can, surreptitiously.
cog: Not
guilty.
cog: How come
they call the,
he points a
long finger at the carton of the older guy's McNuggets
cog: How come
they them Chicken McNuggets, but they call the the
a gesture
cog: they
call it a McChicken sandwich?
The older guy
laughs spontaneously, and it's too loud. I can tell he's embarrassed, though I
can't see his face.
cog: How come
they, how come it's not called a Chicken McSandwich, or they're not McChicken Nuggets?
They're both laughing. I bring my hands down and see the younger of the
two again looking over. It occurs to me that I too am laughing, smiling anyway.
cog: Jesus
El, when are you gonna sell that gun of yours?
cog: Hm ?
cog: I said, "when
are you gonna sell the gun?"
cog: What
d'you mean, what gun?
He looks
genuinely puzzled, maybe there's a little hurt too that's come in under the
smile that's still in place.
cog: The one
you shoot that shit with!
and they're
laughing again.
cog: Hey!
You’ll make my Coke come down my nose.
The older guy
pulls a face and
cog (in a
high twisted growl that sounds like it's coming from no further back than his
teeth): "You'll McMake my McCoke
come down my McNose"
and this really makes me laugh too, and then all of a sudden my left ear shuts down. Like one
eye failing to focus but you can still see, that's what it's like. Everything
on my left side sounds immediately like I'm hearing it through a thick liquid
filter. I feel no sense of panic, almost accepting that all it's necessary for
me to hear is the conversation between these two young men, who are on my
right. It's really probably a lot simpler, something to do with the heat, and a
build‑up of pressure inside my skull.
cog: Jesus I
need more fries here. Was this, is this just regular fries?
blowing out
breath and pointing at his stomach.
cog: Does this look like
it lives on regular fries? El?
Elliott? Does this look like it lives on regular fries?
It's the full name as gives them
both away. The older brother eases himself out of his seat, and I take the
opportunity to quickly check them both for any family resemblance. It's an
unbidden thought, but "one mother, two fathers" comes to mind.
cog (speaking from
behind me and directly across the top of my head, the voice sort of distorted
and both audible and not): Sorry El, you want anything else?
cog: I'm fine
Mike, thanks.
cog: You
sure, you want a coffee or a sundae or something?
cog: No no,
honest. I'm fine. I'm fine.
It suddenly
occurs to me that this is Toronto, that these guys are from L.A., as I
understand it. What the hell are they doing here? I'm almost inclined to ask,
but instead accept this situation to enjoy its own logic, one to resist any
attempt of mine to define or contain it.
The older
brother returns a couple of minutes later, tossing another paper bag of french
fries onto the tray.
cog
(squeezing himself in behind the table): I think I could eat this shit 24/7 and
still not, still be needing more.
cog: Why don't you
just have a, we could have gotten some proper food. I know this is gonna shock
you right, but real restaurants are not that difficult to use. You know what I
mean?
The most appropriate word I can think of for his voice is
"pretty", like the way every young mother should sound. His brother
takes aim and shoots him with a pistol made from the hand not clutching fries.
cog: I mean
it Mike, this shit's good for nothing. It has a novelty value or something, but
that's, or if you're a little kid you get a toy or something, but you're right,
this shit just goes right through anyone over the age of, what, twelve? I once
did an interview with a woman from the W.H.0. and she was talking about the
irradiation of food, and she said you wouldn't believe what the
food industry gets up to. She showed me this manual, this advertising leaflet
for this company that was trying to sell small meat businesses ehm, this thing
to make ham
cog: Mmhm.
cog: and the
advert, it actually said "Why sell meat when you can sell water?".
He shrugs his shoulders, and then his brother suddenly
cog (wiping his
mouth, swallowing hard): Shit! El! I almost forgot, I meant to say to you
before, there's a guy at work, I was telling him about you going down to see Dad and everything, and he says that there's a store down there sells these
blow‑up uh, you know they can do these things to order? You go in the store and
they'll, whoever you want, they'll make you an inflatable of them. And
cog: What?
I have to admit I'm
more than a little curious about this myself. Elliott glances across and I
raise my eyebrows and shrug. I'm half‑hoping he asks me to join them. He turns
back to his brother.
cog: No, this is, they
have, they can make these things up for you but I think, you need to give them
a few days on it, and
cog: Mikey is
this like a sex shop, or some palace of deviants or something like that? Because I'm
really
cog: Jesus
no. No!
laughing
cog: These
aren't blow‑up dolls for fucking no, they're, they're just novelties I
guess. Remember that clown we had when we were kids? The one that, you blow it
up and fill the base
cog: Aaaawwww
yeah, yeah, the punchbag.
cog: Yeah the
throwing a
couple of mock punches from the elbows
cog: and
these are, they're like that, but they're not for, these things you
just blow 'em up and stand them in your room, but
laughing
again
cog: but they
don't have orifices or anything. Ha!
Elliott pulls
a pen and then a folded square of paper from his ass pocket. I take another
long look at his face, which right now carries the expressive weight of someone
long used to performing other people favours.
cog: Did you
get the address or a number or something?
cog (fumbling
a wallet from inside his jacket beside him on the seat, and from the wallet a
yellow Post‑it note which he sticks to the table, wiping his finger across the
adhesive band at top and producing a smear of fat): Mm, there.
Elliott prises the
note free with a fingernail, holds it up stuck to the tip of his middle finger
pointedly directed at his brother, but the reading of it causes him to gag on
the food in his mouth; the ensuing coughing fit finally subsides and is quelled
with strawfuls of Coke.
cog (laughing
with amazement): "Blow Your Own"! And you're telling me this isn't a sex
shop, "Blow Your Own?" Ha ha!
and his
laughing continues, high‑pitched and breathless until he's sniffing and
resorting again to his cup of juice. His brother sits back in his seat.
cog (still
giggling): Do I get to guess who it is you, who who, who you want blown?
cog: Ha. Ha.
and then his
laugh comes genuine, at which he snatches the Post‑it from Elliott's digit and
after crushing it quickly, flicks the little yellow missile at his brother who
swats it back past him.
cog: Man,
you'd believe anything, wouldn't ya?
cog (sighing
good‑naturedly): Oh Mike, hey
and then
shaking his head, the finger re‑appears
cog: blow
your own.
I doubt they'd notice if, as I
left, I collected that Post‑it from the floor. I understand the potency of its
souvenir status, but while reaching down between my boots to collect my bag I
suddenly feel what seems like the ambience of the entire restaurant tilt off
kilter, as if the colour of every single thing is momentarily changed and then
changed back, but in such a way as to make me now doubt the authenticity of the
original order. Does that make sense?
Still bent over, I
raise my eyes to the right to check for this being just me but Elliott's whole
demeanour has altered, and he's looking to someplace behind me where Mike must
have been speaking from before, when he went to get his fries.
cog: Hi kids,
you dropped something.
The voice is
nasal, sneering. I stare at the arched “M" logo on the tray cover and try
hard to visualise it in other colours, seeing if any fit it more comfortably
than yellow.
cog
(unfolding the Post‑it): "Blow Your Own". Well then I guess this must
be yours, virgin
and the
recrushed note bounces back onto the table and into Elliott's lap.
cog: If
that's the alternative to you.
I don't get to see her reaction
properly because she pulls her bumbag round to the front and then sits down on
the other side of Mike, who's sitting in line with me, but it's not difficult
to read the situation from Elliott's face, and the look that passes quick
between the brothers as she roots in her bumbag to pull out a box of
cigarettes. The bag is black and repeat-printed with the word "fuck"
in white.
cog: D'you
mind here? I'm still eating, you know. You see this
indicating
the food still on the tray.
cog: Yeah
Mike yeah, and you know what? You're always eating, “you know”?
It's either
this or something silent aimed directly at him, but Elliott turns my way,
but not looking at me, just averting
himself from her, and he winces. The
hairs stand up on my arms.
All of a
sudden she's up on her feet again, the cigarette now lit and angled from her
lips.
cog: I gotta
go to the john.
Her hair's dyed black and her face has retained the roundness of
childhood, which makes her more like her older brother in that she has that
capacity for weight.
cog: You got that right.
cog: Ha fuck
you ha Mikey. Can you please get me something to eat? Michael? Please?
cog: Yeah,
yeah sure
into his
jacket again
cog: What’re
you after?
which twists
an otherwise un‑noticed grin across Elliott's mouth.
cog: I don't
know, something light. Just a coffee'll do it
and heads off
to the toilets. When she goes again later Elliott will faux pas the joke about
"sucking off forty", a reference to Mike's alleged alcoholism as
opposed to Gertie's taste for oral sex. On her third toilet break it's Mike who
will make mention of his sister "powdering her nose”.
With both his
siblings gone, Elliott simply sits quietly, staring at a point below the table.
Some of his hair is now loose across his face and what with the angle of
available light I'm really very tempted to take out my Leica and ask if I can
crack off a couple of shots, but it feels too intrusive. Instead I get up for a
coffee myself, watching my seat as I order to check my bag's not going anywhere
in my absence. I watch as Elliott crumples the Post‑it into a tiny pellet and
flicks it far from himself, and then I increase my daily collection of Canadian
loose change; I've acquired this habit of paying for everything with the larger
denominations of currency to save picking the bones from the small silver coins
which seem to me incongruously numbered, and I swap this accumulated weight up
each morning when I cash my traveller's cheques.
We're all back: Mike's brought his sister a doughnut to go with the
coffee. She busies herself with the sugar and the milk, saying
cog (to
Elliott): So you're going to see Daddy right? Am I right? You're on your way
down to Tijuana?
Elliott's
head comes up in two quick jerks, an affirmative.
cog: You
gonna ask him when he's coming back?
cog: I don't
know that it's his intention to ev-, you mean to live? To come back to stay?
cog: Dad's
not coming back, why would he come back now? Just ‘cause Mom's dead?
cog: Well
then maybe you can ask him how come he wasn't at the funeral?
cog: Well why
cog: How come
you weren't at the funeral. Hey fuck you Ger, we're there carrying the box
cog: Mike
don't
cog: El, give
it. You know what that's like?
cog:
cog: Are you
fucking deaf, you're suddenly deaf? Where were you?
cog (raising
the carton of coffee): Cheers Mike
causing him
to shake his head.
cog
(quietly): Don't do this Mikey. You said you wouldn't do this. You told
Michael
raises both hands from the table, palms up.
cog: Okay.
and again
cog: Okay.
Okay
and lets go a
long sigh.
I try my
coffee, but it's still too hot. When I see Gertie tear her doughnut into small
pieces and then methodically start devouring them I wish I'd got one too.
Mike's leaning way back in his seat with his head tipped so he's looking at the
ceiling, and since Gert's sitting forward on the seat, she's in full view. She
aims a gesture at the plastic trayful of doughnut fragments for Elliott's
benefit, but he shakes his head. And she makes a big deal out of licking the
sugar from off her fingers. I really don't know these people at all, but I can
see she's only doing this to further irritate her oldest brother, and it upsets
me to see someone so obviously just "playing‑their‑part" for whatever
reason.
And then she
surprises me:
cog: Look,
I'm sorry I didn't make it, okay?
and then
pushy
cog: Okay?
and Mike
looks everywhere but at her before
cog: Yes,
okay, whatever.
Elliott
remains silent.
cog (having
swallowed a little piece of doughnut): There were some things that, Mom and I
had had some oh fuck this. Look, okay, I didn't go, but that
doesn't
cog: Ehm
they both
look across at Elliott.
cog: It
doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. All we wanted to do was just to make sure
that you're, that
cog
(snapping): That I'm okay? That
cog: Ger
don't
I watch
Elliott as it goes through his face again.
cog: What,
you think 'cause I'm little kiddie Gertie I can't do a thing for myself? You
think that Santa Maria takes a di-
cog (his
hands up over his ears): SHUT UP! SHUT UP!
cog: Are you
out of your fucking mind?
cog: Why
don't
cog
(repeatedly banging his fist into the table hard enough to cause everything to
leap): Don't do this, okay? You do not. do. this.
cog: I'm not stupid, you
know.
cog: That's
not what he
cog: Mike why
don't you take a can‑break here and go suck on your forty.
She puts
another piece of doughnut in her mouth, then the last, and takes a swallow of
coffee. I watch as Mike punctures her smug facade by actually getting up with
cog: You know
what? I’d rather suck on a forty than suck forty off.
and then,
laughing, heads for the toilets again.
Elliott and
Gertie are silent until he returns. Elliott sits side‑on to the table, facing
me, his eyes on his white sneakers, and Gertie stares at him. It's painful to
look at and I start to feel really uncomfortable and I wish I’d left when I
meant to, because I know this is going to taint the rest of my day. I find my
coffee's cool enough to drink, which is something, so I sip at that a little,
but when I glance over the tableau is unchanged. And then in my periphery and
through the array of plants I see Mike returning, and when he drops into his
seat I can tell he's really keyed up.
cog: Hey
boozer.
cog (as if
ignoring this): Gert do you remember a guy, uh, name of deleted name? Remember him from school?
and it's
almost like I remember the name myself, though from where I'm not sure, since
cog: How the
fuck’m I gonna remember deleted
name from school,
when I wasn't
and then
sarcastic
cog: Oh yeah Mike,
sure I remember deleted
name. Michael, by the
time I got to school deleted
name would've been
what? I know he went to our school,
he, but... and I know him now, if that's what you're after, but your
point being?
cog: deleted name was there on Thursday
cog (rising
to leave): I'll be back shortly I'm just gonna get some air
and he's gone
before either of them can speak.
cog (rising):
Oh fuck, look, EL!
cog (shaking
her head): Just let him go Mike. He’ll come back, it's not like
she goes round the
table and sits opposite Mike, with one foot flat upon the seat so that the leg
of her shorts rides up, twisting her thigh into a painful‑looking swell of
flesh. While they're talking I busy myself with sucking up a little of the
syrupy milkshake sediment into the straw and then blowing it gently into my cup
of coffee.
cog: Has he
been okay?
cog: What the
fuck do you care? Why didn't you
cog: You're
right no you're right, sorry. I just, I forgot myself there, I forgot I don't
give a shit about anything. Stupid me so, what, deleted name? He was at the funeral, and? What was he saying?
cog: What was
he saying?
laughing
cog: He said
you're the, he he said they call you the "site‑bike", he said there's
guys working there've laid you more times than they've laid foundations.
cog: Fuck you.
cog: He said
you're the most active cock‑jockey on the whole west coast. He tol-
cog (visibly controlling her anger):
Mike I don't, I'm gonna have to say this again since
lacing her
fingers together and putting both hands on top of her head
cog: you
obviously didn't get it first off, but what's the point here? Your
point?
cog: I'm just
wondering why, how come you can put so many
little windows in your schedule to fuck damn near every guy on the entire
construction site but you're just way too busy to attend your mother's own
FUCKING FUNERAL?
I know it's time for me to leave this but I cannot move, my bones are
thick with slow‑flood cramp. A counter assistant appears.
cog: Ehm,
excuse me? I don't ehm, I was asked for you to, I wonder if you could perhaps
just level this off, or if you could take it outside if, you know. You take a
look around, you know, there's ehm, families, kids
cog (pushing
his fingers up through his hair, and his forehead creased): I'm sorry, really,
I'm sorry. I've
both hands
down now at his mouth, then one raised in a placatory gesture.
cog: This uh,
look I'm sorry.
His sister
has her chin resting on her knee and is glaring at the, she's not really a
waitress as such, but
cog: Okay.
Okay. I won't labour it, but if, you know if you wanna fight, just, you don't
do it here.
Exits.
cog: Sorry,
things
sighs.
cog: This is
just fallout from the, from everything in the past week.
cog: You
speak to Elliott like this, haul him up for
cog: God Gert
Jesus I’m, I can't believe you, you haven't even got the the, the grace to accept an apology, much less actually make one yourself, and you sit there, you sit there with your
shorts halfway up your ass and tell me
She unfolds
her legs and sits up properly.
cog
(sarcastic): Okay? Is that better?
Mike folds
his arms and looks away, directly at me as it happens, which makes my stomach lurch,
makes me aware of a tightness in my groin, upper right.
cog: Michael.
Michael. I'm asking you if this is better.
cog
(returning his attention to his sister): Why yes Gertrude. That. Is. Perfect.
I really need
to go to the toilet.
cog: I really
don't think you appreciate just what E1 and I've been through
this past week, you know? You know we had to go and i.d. Mom? We had to go in
and see the body? Her body? You ever do that, just, you know, curiosity, did
you ever ha-
cog (shaking
her head): Leave it Mike, just
cog: Mm?
She opens her mouth as if to bite
at her lip and then stops. Mike is now sitting with his left elbow on the
table, his head in his hand, so there's no way for me to discern what's
registered upon his face. Between every word I think has suddenly appeared what
I imagine to be a condensed and tiny mote of information, that when magnified
would read "void your bladder". I cannot move. The pressure in my
groin gains intensity, and worse: in the absence of their voices, the air
becomes audible, amplifying itself into a crescendo that moves at some speed
toward my threshold of phonic pain. I am aware that its cancellation and a
subsequent reversion to level ambience is subject to any interruptive sound at
all. There is the sensation of a dozen pins being repeatedly stabbed into a
single point of the membrane lining my urethra, and nothing about them to
suggest either Mike or Gertie understand what is occurring. Neither of them see
my head drop loose from my neck as the roaring
stops.
Stops broken by the
tiniest acoustics: the sound of a teardrop leaving Gertie's face and cracking
wet upon the doughnut's plastic carton.
Another, and
sounds leaving her face and chest. The needles start to jackhammer in my dick.
I watch Gertie try to force one hand into the narrowed pocket of her
shorts as Mike gets up and rounds the table to sit alongside.
cog
(quietly): Hey, hey what's
She's shaking
her head, and this becomes much more vigorous when he tries to put his arm
around her.
cog: Get the
fuck off of me.
and this is the last thing I hear
as my right ear closes and an odd relieving warmth soaks out into my crotch. I
imagine the sound it makes as it puddles beneath my buttocks on the seat and
pours off, the temperature of the urine dropping even before it is fully
expelled from my body. My eyelids collapse and I fear falling asleep here, a
public restaurant, the damp of my own waste‑water spreading through the fabric
of my clothes. I concentrate to focus, blink and swallow hard to facilitate the
return of my hearing, watching
cog:
cog:
cog:
and then
Mike's arm encircles his sister's shoulders, holds her to him and I can see his
lips going slowly, mouthing what I imagine are sincere apologies, words of
comfort.
My right ear comes back as if drained of fluid, and
cog: called
and said that Mom had drowned, and I didn't know then, he didn't say that, he
didn't say, I just thought she’d drowned, I didn't... but that put me right back, because I’d
always thought
cog:
Mike says
something I don't catch, and now there is movement (though only in my upper body) as
I insert my smallest fingers in my ears and shake my hands, the other fingers
battering against the back of my neck. Gertie blows her nose on and then
discards the crumpled paper napkin Elliott left behind, her other hand is still
stuck inside her pocket.
cog: No Mike
no, and you didn't see it, you didn't see it.
cog: Jesus I
had no idea, hey, hey don't
She's still shaking
her head.
cog: I bet you get it now, right? You get it now? They brought it to me
in a, it was wrapped in a blanket or, it was a sheet or something, but
cog: You
didn't know what sex it was?
cog: I didn't
want to know, the whole thing, I didn't, I wanted, I had to have a barrier
in case, if you’d seen it Mikey,
you’d
a massive
sigh is pushed out of her, and the tears and head‑shaking continue unabated.
cog: It
looked sick, and they never tell you that, they never tell you the, there, they
can't make you be,
I can hear
her gulping back at her own exhaled breath.
cog: it was like somebody had
rubbed chalk over its face, and I had to, they'd wrapped it so its, so just its
head was the the, the whatever the fuck it was came up over its head, around,
and I had to, I brought its arms out so I could hold one of its hands, and all
the flesh of its arms was all white and
This time
it's a different assistant.
cog: Is
everything alright? I
a twitch in
her lip
cog: I'm
sorry, I appreciate everything's not alright, is there anything um, we
have a room through back, you know, if you need to
cog (finally
freeing the handkerchief from her pocket and first wiping her hand which she's
used in its absence, and then her face): It's okay, I'll be okay
and this time when she blows out
her breath it's accompanied by an accidental whistling sound, which makes her
smile.
cog: I'm
sorry, I'll
and then
belches
cog
(surprised): Oh
both hands
cover her face, turned scarlet.
cog: Sorry,
sorry, excuse me.
I wonder why no‑one notices that I am
sitting in my own piss, the pooling extent of which I can see from here,
crawled out across the floor
cog: We’ll be
okay, it’s... We're just waiting for our brother and then 1 think we’d better
head.
cog: You're
sure? If there's anything
cog: We’ll be fine, we're fine, but
thanks. Thank you.
Mike sits with his arm around her
still, watching her as she watches the floor and the tears that drop out into
her vision.
cog: It's
everywhere Mike, I can't, I can't get through a day without some, I'm in the
shower, squeeze out some shampoo in my hand, and there it is, like a little
grub, the shape of the, with the big head there in the palm of my hand, and
the, this morning 1 was shaving my legs, and the shape of the blood on my leg,
it's all, I can't get away from it, and even if
but this time when she shakes her head it appears wilful, as if she has
at least that under control.
cog: Did Mom know? Did you ever tell Mary about any of
this?
cog: Pff,
are, no, God no.
cog: But why
Gert? Don't you think Mom might've
cog: Oh Mike
grow up. You know what Mom was like. Fuck, any
cog: I'm
guessing Elliott isn-
cog: You're right
there, and you don't, you know there's something, it's almost like I know that
Elliott knows, but I don't, it's like I don't need, it's not
like I don't need to tell him, it's,
I don't know, it's as if it's not even an issue.
Mike comes back round to his own side of the table, seemingly unaware
that in so doing he is leaving footprints in the thin edge of urine spilled
from out the diner not six feet to his left.
Gertie looks tired and embarrassed, and I'm guessing not a little
guilty too, for being the centre of attention at a time when it's clear even to
me that she really shouldn't be the centre of attention. Her next question will
bear this out.
cog: What was
it like? Seeing Mary, what'd she look like?
Mike passes his hand all over his face, and then he sees amongst the
other things on the table a couple of wet‑wipe sachets.
cog (handing
one to his sister): Here
and they're
each rubbing their faces with the damp lemon‑scented tissues. I feel ineffably
dirty.
cog: Did it
look like Mom, or was
cog: No it
was Mom, I mean
and then
again, after a long long pause
cog: ..it was
Mom. She hadn't been in the water so long that, you know, it wasn't like
cog: Did you
cry? When you saw her?
cog: No, Elliott didn't either, it just didn't seem like the place,
when we saw her, we’d been taken to the morgue and, I don't know, it just
didn't seem like the kind of place to be crying in. We cried on Thursday
though, but at the morgue itself, Elliott had actually
he realises
that the moistness has pretty much gone out of the tissue, and after passing it
through his hands one last time, returns it to the trash upon the table.
cog: deleted name was crying too, when I
cog: Yeah
but, sorry, what were you saying about Elliott there, you said he had
something?
cog: Hmm?
cog: You said
Elliott had something at the morgue
accompanied
with a gesture.
cog: Yeah,
no, he’d said that, just what you were saying about what was it was, what it
was like, Elliott said that when he saw Mary he felt like he was standing
directly beneath someone doing a bungee jump, and that when he saw Mary it felt
like this person had jumped and then when they reached the full stretch of
their cord and they were right next to him, they’d grabbed him and he was
suddenly pulled up into the air really fast. He said he felt breathless and all
of a sudden he, it was like he was able, he said he felt like he'd been torn up
into the air and he was able to see everything all around, that he had this eh, this
different perspective on everything.
cog: Oh shit.
She sees Elliott approaching before I do.
cog: Look, I'll be back in a second.
I see the effects of her departure at his return appear upon Elliott's
features. He sits down where he was sitting before, having unwittingly walked
through the spread of my piss. It occurs to me that I might confess my
misdemeanour as loudly as possible just to check on my continued existence
within this scenario.
cog: What,
did you just go out for a walk?
cog (ruffling
his hair): Yeah, I’m... I told you, I'm not, I cannot stand to see this
whole
I'm un‑nerved enough to think that maybe
I am not actually here, that 1 really did leave earlier at any one of the moments
when it seemed appropriate so to do, and that therefore whatever has passed
since then has done so only within the confines of my imagination i.e. I'm simply
thinking all of this as I make my way on out to Malvern. Maybe I really have wet myself though, and I'm projecting that
element of my real state back onto the-
I reach down and squeeze the crotch of
my workpants with both hands, and both hands come away damp.
cog
(snickering): "Sucking off forty" though hih hih
and I'm more ashamed than he is when he puts up his palm to high‑five
his brother, and his brother just looks at him, and then looks away.
cog: What?
cog: Oh El,
this,
sighs
cog (shaking his head): I don't know man, I just do not know. Do you
have any memories at all of when things weren't this fucked up? I can't, you
know the older I get, the more I just want things to get
and he pushes at his forehead with the heel of his palm, trying to free
up the part of his brain that accesses vocabulary.
cog: What? Easier?
cog: Shh, no.
It's... I want things to be resolved, like that, everything would come to a
point, or a circle would be completed
he makes a
shape with his hands
cog: and
there’d be no loose ends, and that would be that, and then we could, you
know, we could go on from there.
cog: Yeah Mike, but that's not gonna happen. You'd have to have your
memory wiped and, or you’d have to get your brain washed or something. This is
what makes you you. This is what it is, when we spl-, when I
go, when I get down to Tijuana and I see Dad, you know, I'm taking all of this
shit with me, and he's going to ask all about it, and I'll pass it on, and
he runs out
of steam, and he stops.
cog: You
can't, nothing gets resolved. How can we start again? That's, you think maybe
that that's what Mom was after as well? A resolution? And now we're sitting
here and and it's not
stopping
again, and when he speaks again
cog: Even if
you resolve it for yourself, all you do is leave a whole load more shit
for everybody else and then
he sees his sister returning from the toilets, and
falls silent.
cog: Hey.
Mike just
nods.
cog (reaching
over the back of the seat to collect her bumbag): Sorry, I'll be back in just a
second.
and is gone
again.
cog: What's
up with her?
Mike turns and scratches the crown of his head before he answers, and
there's some element of created space there, some willed reversion to the
status quo.
cog: I guess
she forgot to powder her nose
and he catches Elliott's smile from out the corner of
his eye.
cog: D’you
still have Harry's number? I guess we should call just to check that
cog
(yawning): It should be in my
I yawn too,
drop my head to check on the state of my trousers but my head keeps going,
become so dense as to create momentum enough to carry the rest of my body in
its wake and I'm suddenly falling head first, shutting my eyes tight in prep
for the crack of my skull's bounce and rebound from off the floor which doesn't
happen as I continue to fall on and opening my eyes gives access to nothing and
I can feel my mouth dry out as I breathe at the passing air and then I find
myself wondering if Gertie has returned from the toilets and if they've left
yet or if the brothers will leave without her and something thick spills from
my lips and my head blooms full with the smell and there is no room for me to
fall further and I go nowhere else.
knowing even in such delusion that, upon his return,
he would have to abandon whatever clothes he had on, the chair from which he’d
fallen.
