Hradcanska

1

I remember walking down the Chotkova that morning. How it wound, descended, the leaves in splendid piles over the footpath, the sun gently lighting the colours of the buildings, the soft reds and creams.

The previous evening, we arrived late. We did not eat much on the train. When I showed the address to the taxi driver outside the station, his face looked puzzled for a moment, its wrinkled and melancholy features moving over the written words. Then in broken German he asked if we were paying in Marks.

The following morning, I went to the window and pulled back the heavy curtains. I saw for the first time the street that the night before had been hidden in darkness. Steam was rising and in front of the building, stood a small square full of bare trees. Parked outside the window, was a battered, light blue Skoda. After getting up and showering, she applied a thin covering of lipstick to her lips, quickly brushed her hair. Then I put on a heavy overcoat and pulled a woollen hat down around my ears.

On the street, she took the map from her pocket and handed it to me. First we crossed a small railway with the rails disappearing into early morning mist. We heard a bell and saw the front of something that looked like a tram appear, saw it tilt as it rounded a bend and slowly headed for the crossing. Then we went along a wide street, passing a football stadium before turning to our right and beginning to feel the pavement under our feet slipping downwards, realised we were descending.

We left the Chotkova and found themselves on a series of narrow, side streets. We came to a green area with a metro station and thought the river should be nearby. She stopped and asked to see the map, but I assured her I knew where we were going. Checking street names every now and then, we arrived at a small bridge set in an intersection of streets. On the bridge there were two girls looking down into the water, down at the surface sprinkled with leaves and on which two white swans swam. A little way in front of us, running to the left was the northern end of the Karlûv Most. We did not go along it. Instead, we turned right, walked up a short hill until we arrived at a square with an old, gold-brown building, and a church. It was a square formed by buildings with shadowy pavements under archways, and a square cut in two by a tram line. On the corner was a cafe and I remember its name because it was in English not Czech and was called the White Eagle.

We ordered bread with ham and eggs, toast and jam, two glasses of orange juice and four cups of coffee.

Finishing before her, I smoked a cigarette, watched and looked about me. Tapping my fingers on the table, I turned the map over, saw the pictures, the tours offered, what there was to do, and for a moment felt a sense of familiarity, felt a recognition, as if it were really no different from home. This surprised me and I wondered what else I had expected and then wondered what she would like to do. Next to us a couple spoke rapidly in German but no-one took much notice. Standing, I paid. Then we returned from where we had come, this time crossing the bridge.

The sun had disappeared behind the cloud and the river stretched away to both sides. In places it rushed over what looked like weirs. It was only there I could see the speed with which it moved, see the power it held, not in any way apparent from the slow surface beneath the bridge. I stood and looked and felt cold and then heard music coming from my left. She had already moved a little way away from me and I looked and saw a group of middle-aged men playing dixie jazz, and a crowd gathered in front of them, and among the street sellers, near where she stood, a French woman turned to her companion declaring it was, `vraiment amusante.’.

We walked on and the sun reappeared. I did not want to stop so we crossed streets and alleys, coasted along the river until coming to a bridge that was cordoned off, that we gathered was being repaired. Then we paused while she consulted our guide book, while she looked at the building we were in front of, its ornamented pillars, its baroque elegance. She explained it was a famous concert hall and that in August 1968 a philosophy student set himself on fire in front of it in protest at the Soviet occupation. In the reflection of its doors I could see the letters from a neon sign the other side of the street, see the Czech words that I did not understand and were in any case reversed. Beside me someone was bending down and taking a photograph, and I imagined how it should look, thought the glass should be black and the letters should swim in it with a whiteness and the stone should come out grey and grainy.

She said she wanted to rest and could sit for a bit so we found somewhere to have a coffee and I loosened my coat and watched her drink. I watched the reassuring sight of her head bend over the cup, the ring on the fingers that grasped the white porcelain handle and I smiled at her and she smiled back, looking a little puzzled.

She finished and we crossed the river again, climbed until we came to the palace. On the stepped street upwards I looked back over the city and marvelled at the weave of roofs, at the sloping park, the trees planted in lines on rolling grass. The river twisted and turned below, curled between the rise of spires, the air seemingly thicker in places. A young woman sat on a corner with an open case in front of her and a cap, manipulating some brightly painted puppets, making them dance and move in quick jerky actions. We stood and watched and she dropped some money in the cap, turned to me, her face flushed with the cold and climbing, and I thought again how good she looked.

Further up we passed a small stone house covered in burgundy ivy, its walls almost completely hidden. We looked over into its garden, saw a patio area tangled in apple trees, their branches no longer full. Here and there some pulpy looking fruit remained lying on the ground.

On the road back we swung to the right, finding ourselves on the Malá Strana. Its pathways wound up and down, its trees with their shed leaves caught the light of the afternoon, obscured the city below us. Finding a bench, we sat, enjoying the colours, the sense of the city, its sounds carrying on the cold air. I liked the way it lay nestled between the hills around, felt I was discovering it, yet it had always been there, and I had always known it was there, and that it conformed to some sense of a city I carried within me. I put my arm around her and she moved close to me, began to talk about home, about the new apartment we were going to buy, but I put my finger over her mouth and said to her it could wait. We walked a little more, hand in hand, the air getting colder, then took the metro back to the rooms we had rented for the couple of days and slept for a while.


2

When I woke, she was already up, sitting in front of the small mirror, her hands resting across her knees. Through the window the mist had gathered again. I went over and stood behind her and for a moment saw her face and my face, and saw her find me in the reflection, her eyes meet my eyes, saw her lift her hand and lightly touch my fingers on her shoulder, as if in the mirror we were in another world and looking at ourselves in this world, as if we were only real in that world and that was the way it had always been.

We left the room and I paused in the hallway before locking the door. I was aware of the old, high roof, the wide, wooden stairway rising to my left. I felt for a moment I was waiting for something, that it was as though I expected something I knew was going to happen to happen. But nothing happened.

In front of a shaky looking table, a young man was peering at a pile of post. The key suspended in my hand, I watched him put his bag to the floor, carefully go through all the letters and suddenly there was the smell of boiled vegetables on the clinging, dusty air, the smell of simple cooking and I felt an almost crushing sense of melancholy.

On the street we retraced our steps. We crossed the Karlûv Most, the river now lost in fog, the lights along its banks strangely diffused in irregular patches. We came to the Staromestské Námestí, crossed the old town square again, took a right until we were on the Národni.

Finding a restaurant, we were shown to a table beside a high, curtained window. Despite the dim lights I noticed the decor was faded, how the atmosphere was almost of another world, another time. My eyes fell to her hands, I heard the rattle of her bracelet, heard her say she was feeling cold, that maybe we had walked too much on our first day. And at the same time was aware of a curious sensation of it being spring, thought of lilac trees blooming, of hedges wild along pathways, of the light lingering longer each evening over country roads, over mountains. Though through the window, it was autumn, late autumn and the shapes on the street were shadows, emerging only in detail beneath street lamps; a face under a hat, a woman on the arm of a man, a stranger in a long coat with an umbrella stepping by quickly.

Then suddenly I felt disoriented. I answered her sharply as she again brought up the subject of the new apartment. I turned to her to see her looking at me, her forehead creased in frustration. I apologised, attempted a smile but felt I did not manage it convincingly. For a moment I wondered if I myself was convinced and the thought of the apartment annoyed me even more and I said to her I was getting up to find the bathroom.

When I came back she was quietly staring out the window. The waiter came and we ordered soup and bread. She chose chicken, but I asked for fish, because it was shark from the Baltic and I felt curious and wanted to try something I had never had before. As the waiter walked away, I called him back and asked if I could have a glass of a beer.

We waited and I was unsure what to say. I asked her what she wanted to do when we were finished eating but she did not know. At the table next to us two men were eating. From their language, their accent, from the neatly ironed work shirts, the freshly laundered jeans, I guessed they were North Americans. They were talking business loudly, were talking about the city as if it were in some state of stasis, talking about the city as if it were something awaiting their magical touch. I imagined these men on the metro, imagined them sitting among the silent faces, the stoical faces and the small metal sign above the door through to the each carriage carrying the letters CCCP, the symbols of what once had been to them an enemy state. I wondered if they would have seen that, wondered if they would have noticed that small detail as I had. Small details, I thought, are sometimes all the more important because they are small details, because one does not always notice them at first. Sometimes small details reveal the hidden world behind the world one thought one knew. Then I wanted to turn to her and tell her what I was thinking, tell her there is no magic touch, the magic is always there, change was in how you look at things and that we do not always look hard enough. She was lifting a glass of water to her mouth, her eyes somewhere else so I said nothing.


When the day is over I will take the lift, return to our new apartment. I will open the door onto its quietness and will think of the evening to come and how my father is coming over. She has asked me to do something about that. She does not like when we sit and watch the football together. And beneath my father's grey, thinning brows his eyes will get angry and he will complain that the footballers of today get paid too much and are more interested in the advertising on their shirts, are more interested in creating an impression than playing. Then he will take a drink from one of the cans of beer he always brings with him and want to talk politics.

There will be the lights of the city burning through the window and the night falling and below beneath the glow of the street lamps, rows of neatly parked cars alongside the footpath that leads to the park. My stomach will tighten, will tense as I think how later I will walk my father to the door, will watch from the balcony as he strolls stiffly the short distance to the tram halt, something he always insists on doing himself; the same tram he always takes home alone.

Turning back in the doorway, there will be a moment when I think of my work, my life, my relationship. I will think of myself in the city as though swimming through it below sea, underwater, as if sometimes looking for ways of surfacing for air.

Then it will be the morning again and maybe the sun will shine over the buildings, the sky will be blue and in the winter a white blue and I will feel for an instant there is a fire within me and step onto the pavement and hear the traffic in the morning stillness, already the cars in lines along the junction. I will put the key into the door and throw my briefcase onto the backseat and then turn on the radio. I will push on the accelerator, will edge out onto the motorway, will pull the phone from my pocket, hear it peep as I punch in numbers, wait for the voice and leave a message wondering if my colleague will get it.

Over the edge of the motorway the city will come into view and the flatness and the trains crisscrossing the flatness and the offices rising with their clean, sharp edges will seem to cut right into the sky.

I will do this every day and each day, will pass every week until it is weekend and we go to the supermarket and stock up with groceries. I will spend some time picking out a good wine and will eventually agree to do something about my father's visits. Then we will drive home and I will be seized by a sudden impulse to go into the bathroom and look at my face in the mirror, will look at the hair beginning to grey on my temples, at the wrinkles beginning to spread from the corners of my eyes. I will wonder if she was right when once she said I lacked direction, decisiveness. Until I reach up and pull the cord extinguishing the thin fluorescent strip of light. Until I hesitantly close the door behind me. Wondering what it is I am closing a door on.

Copyright © Peter Millington 1997

fears

1

She is old now, her chair by the window. Much of the day she spends there. Looking out from behind the lace curtain, a shadow to those on the street. It is the people she likes to watch passing on the pavement. More often than not they are people she does not know. She finds this hard. There was a time when she knew just about everyone. Even the younger couples, the children. Now they have moved on, they have gone.

The most difficult days are the rainy days in winter. The combination of wet and cold, the unyielding grey sky, the damp face of the red-bricked houses.

It is not as it used to be. Before people stayed where they were, people knew who you were. That has changed. Now everyone leaves as quick as they can. They all want a new house, a house away from the city, one of those funny estates with affected sounding names. She has lived in this part of the city over all her life, has seen it change first hand, seen the neighbourhood empty, seen it lose its character. She is one of the last left. It was only the next street up where she was born. Some days she remembers it just as it was then.

Yesterday's newspaper is lying on her knee. She takes her glasses from around her neck, her hands unsteady as she brings them to her face. Her hair is grey and wound tightly into a bun on top of her head. Her face is wrinkled and sad. Her eyes, once bright blue, eyes that once sparkled, are now milky, faded.

As she reads, her brow furrows, her concentration wavers. She mouths the words to herself, holds one finger above the inky page, her hand grasping tightly onto the side of the newsprint. She stops, looking puzzled. She calls out to him.
“Jack, have you seen this in the newspaper?”.
There is no reply.
“Jack,” she repeats, this time trying harder to make her voice carry, “Jack, Jack, are you there love?”
There is still no reply. Where he can be? Has he gone to do the morning’s shopping and not told her? No, that would not be like him. Maybe he told her but she has forgotten.
The clock ticks steadily from the mantlepiece. She cannot make out correctly what it says. Trying to remember if she has recently heard it chime, she calls out again.
“Jack, Jack, are you there love?”
She moves in her chair, putting the newspaper to the side, preparing to get up. Where can he be? Her arms shake as she lifts herself forward, as she attempts to stand. For a moment she thinks she is not going to make it, is going to fall and then she feels her legs frail but on the floor. She reaches for her walking stick, leaning against the table. Her thin, bony hand grasps its edge, attempts to move it out in front of her. She is just about to start for the door when she hears footsteps from the hallway.
“Jack, is that you? Jack pet, is that you?”
A voice answers.
“Are you calling me dear? I’ll be there right now. Just a wee moment.”
Again she tries to move but feels unable to. He comes into the room, his steps slow and measured. He is carefully rolling up his sleeves. His eyes fix on her standing by the chair, the newspaper now fallen to the ground, her stick in front of her. She looks at him.
“Yes I was. I didn’t know where you were...you didn’t answer...I was coming to look for you.”
“Ah here, sit down, would you. What is it you want?”
He quickly moves over to her, taking her firmly by the arm, gently manoeuvring her back to her seat by the window.
“I was just out back for a moment. I was talking to old George. He’s lost that cat of his again. Doesn’t know where it’s got to this time.”
She trembles as he sits her down.
“Are you alright now? Take it easy. Here, get yourself comfortable. Do you want your newspaper?”
Bending down slowly, he picks up the paper and hands it to her. She looks up at him.
“That cat of his is gone down to them other people. You know the ones. There at the end on the corner. Sure he forgets to feed the thing all the time. It’s no wonder it's off.”
“Aye, maybe. What was it you wanted me for anyway?”
She turns to the window.
“I can't remember now.”

He does the buttons on his coat. His fingers are stiff and awkward. There is a rattle as post comes through the letter box. The shadow behind the glass, broken in the dimpled pane, moves away again. Its steps recede down the pavement. Slowly he gets his cap out of his pocket and picks up the shopping basket from under the stairs. Putting his head around the door of the front room, he says, “I’m just going out to do some shopping. I’ll be back in about an hour.” She looks at him sleepily and replies, “alright,”
“Why don't you have a little snooze?”
She does not answer. He steps back into the hallway and closes the front door gently behind him.

Years ago he wondered which of them would come to this first. Now that they are both in their mid-seventies, he no longer needs worry about it.

Taking the cautious, measured steps his age permits, he closes the front garden gate. He too feels the creaking limbs, the shortness of breath, the trying way in which objects seem to elude his power. Some days it takes just about all his energy to get around the house.

When she was diagnosed with Parkinson’s, he had already guessed. He had heard about it from others, the slow decline, the difficulty in even walking a couple of steps. That was over a year ago. In reality he was living with it longer than that. He had already seen the gradual deterioration, the fall from the grace of mobility, the shakiness, the lack of control, the forgetfulness. He had seen it all set in, all long before any doctor pronounced it official.

She more or less gave up. It was like something inside her decided there was nothing else to do but sit and wait until the end. Social Services offered him someone to help. He found that difficult. Admitting that he was unable to cope. All his life he has prided himself on his sense of independence. Now, a young man with a funny haircut comes in two mornings a week and does some cleaning. The messy stuff is always left for him.

There are times when he wonders how long more he will be able to care for her. Her doctor has talked about a home for the elderly. He feels guilty about it. It goes against the grain. How would he cope if he were left living on his own? How would he cope with visiting her, the travelling to and fro? Yet that is not the real issue. The real issue is...is, well if she were, ...if she were to pass away, then he would feel somehow he had not been there for her. A home for the elderly, it seems to him, robs her of what little dignity she now has left. Still he is a practical man.

They have been married forty nine years. Their children have long since gone, one to England, the other to Canada. There are always the letters, the occasional visits, at least from their daughter in Bristol. He knows they have their own families, their own lives. Sometimes it makes him sad, sometimes he would like to see more of his grandchildren. Yet he understands this is the way things have to be.

She finds it much harder. She always looked forward to being a grandmother. He realises there is a part of her that does not want to face the reality of things, does not want to accept that life has changed since they were young. There is a part of her that is angry at the altered world around her. He understands that too.

He remembers the day he first saw her. Then he was a young apprentice in the shipyards. He has never forgotten how she looked. Slight, with clear, blue eyes. She always appeared fresh, fashionable. Sometimes he can still see a resonance of that look in her. It is no memory, but something that has kept him there, that has kept him going all through the years.

Before they were married, she worked behind the counter in a small shop off Donegal Square. He would often go to pick her up at closing time on a Saturday evening. Sometimes a crowd of them would go dancing.

It makes him sad when he thinks of that, it all seems so long ago. Now you would not recognise parts of the city centre. Now all those places have gone.

2

She is standing on the pavement in front of him, smiling. A young girl about ten years old. Her freckled face and inquisitive eyes stare.
“Do you live down there in number six with the old woman?” she asks.
“Indeed I do,” he answers.
“What's wrong with her legs mister? My brother says she’s a cripple. Is that true?”
“Your brother doesn’t know everything.”
She falls into step alongside him, giving a little skip.
“He does mister. He knows just about everythin’. He's goin’ to go to Uni next year. Says he’ll get a grant. Says he wants to be an engineer, you know, inventin’ things and that.”
“Does he now? Maybe he knows everything about inventing but nothing about old ladies.”
“No mister. He says she’s a cripple. He read about it in a book.”
“Is that so?”
“It is so mister.”
Something about her movement, her manner catches him. For an instant he feels he is not looking at any young girl, but at her, that she is skipping lightly on the pavement in front of him, her legs firm and strong again, her voice sure, her eyes full of hope and optimism. He feels confused, troubled.
“Run on with you now you cheeky wee thing. Should you not be in school?”
She darts ahead of him.
“Aye, I should, but my daddy’s on holiday for a week. My Ma says I can stay off school to see him,” she calls back.
Waving goodbye, she disappears around a corner.
Must be one of them from number fourteen, he thinks. He has heard about them from George. The father is a security officer somewhere up off Ravenhill, works nights. “You know,” George said, “used to be in the police force but couldn’t take the stress. A bit fond of a drink I hear. A good man when he’s sober, but...ah, well you know how it is.” Jack agreed. It’s a bad situation he thought, it must be hard on the children. Still, she seems a sprightly young thing.

He comes out onto the main road. The sky is overcast. It will probably rain later, he thinks. His hip aches. Passing along the wall, he slows and coughs hoarsely into his clenched fist. He stops a moment to catch his breath. A mother and a young child pass, the child looking about eagerly. He notices the mother's hands clenched tightly, almost white on the handles of the buggy. Where is she going in such a hurry? Did people look like that when he was young? Now they always seem tense, always to be on their way somewhere. Sure where could you be on your way to here, he wonders. What could require so much urgency?

Crossing the street he turns and goes into the local newsagent. A teenage girl comes out from a small room behind the counter.
“Yes?” she says.
He has never seen her before.
“I’ll just have today’s paper, if you don’t mind.”
“The Telegraph?”
“Yes, please”.
She lifts a newspaper from a pile in front of her and hands it to him. He turns to walk away. She coughs lightly.
“Ah! That’ll be eighty pence, please.”
“Put it down for the end of the week, if you will. Tell Mrs McAlpine I’ll settle up on Friday morning.”
“Oh, she knows you then, does she?”
He is taken aback.
“Oh yes, oh yes, that she does.”
He smiles. She eyes him suspiciously.
“You know, it’s just that I’m new here. I’ve got to be sure. You’ve already arranged this with her have you?”
“I have. The name is Parker. Mr Parker from around on the Gardens.”
The girl writes something on a slip of paper and opens the plastic cash register.
“Ok Mr Parker. I’m sure that’s alright now.”
She looks blankly at him. He hesitates.
“Yes, well...ah...goodbye now,” he says.
He again turns to go but stops.
“Will Mrs McAlpine be here herself tomorrow morning do you know?”
“What’s tomorrow, Thursday? She will an’ all.”
“Ok. Thank you.”
There is the sound of a telephone being dialled as he closes the door behind him.



3

She sighs to herself. He looks up from his newspaper. The room is quiet. The only other sound is the ticking of the clock on the mantelpiece. His glasses fall to the end of his nose.
“Are you alright dear?” he asks.
She does not answer.
“I said are you alright dear?”
She turns from the window, her head moving slowly.
“Aye, I am. I’m fine just now.”
“Would you like a cup of tea?”
“No. I'm fine.”
“I bought some of them Mr Kipling cakes you like.”
“No thanks. Not now.”
She seems a bit grumpy. He folds his newspaper over, the pages rustling as he smoothes them out.
“I met Mildred when I was out. She was with her daughter in the car. She was asking for you.”
He pauses.
“She says that Jim had a bit of a fall last week. They had to take him up to Dundonald for some X-rays. He’s ok. There’s nothing broken.”
“Oh!”
He puts his hand in the pocket of his waistcoat. She moves a little in her chair.
“Were they out doing the shopping together?”
“Aye, they were. He’s a tough old one, is Jim, always was. Sure you know yourself.”
She lifts her hand to her mouth.
“He must be getting on now.”
“He's still got a couple of years on us dear so he has.”
She can see him fiddling with his hand, trying to get his pipe out. She pulls at the cardigan around her shoulders.
“He used to have an eye for Margaret White.”
“What’s that you say love?”
“I said, he used to have an eye for that Margaret White.”
He looks mildly surprised.
“Did he now? How can you remember that?”
“He did. She was a pretty, young thing then. I think she had a bit of a thing for you Jack too.”
“No, I don’t remember at all.”
“Aye, she did and all.”
From the corner of her eye she watches him hold the pipe between his hands, run his fingers around its rim, and tap it firmly against the side of the ashtray.
“I don't remember any of that. I only remember Jim and how stubborn he could be. Once during the war we went over to play rugby in England, some club in the Midlands, he was nearly the only one left standing after the match. All the English lads wanted to buy him a drink, but he refused. You know how it went, ‘I’m a teetotaller myself. Thank you very much now, there won’t be a drop going over my lips.’ Someone suggested he mustn't be Irish at all, at which point he stood up and started to sing. And mind you he wasn’t a bad singer either.”
“It was different then.”
He crosses his legs, leans back in the chair. Reaching over to the small table, he picks up his pouch of tobacco.
“Aye, it was different then. You’re right there.”
Pressing the dark, thick strands down into the pipe, his fingers knead it firmly, years of repeating the action giving it a reassuring familiarity. He looks thoughtful.
“You know I was just thinking the other day about the time we went down to Donaghadee. Do you remember that? We stayed in that hotel along the seafront there.”
She stares at him.
“No.”
He pauses.
“You must. I think it was shortly after we got engaged.”
His eyes look at her expectantly.
“Was that the time after Anne was born?”
He sighs.
“No dear. I just said it was shortly after we got engaged. You must remember.”
Turning around quickly, she looks indignantly at him.
“There’s no need to be sharp with me.”
“It was when my brother was the curate in that wee church,” he adds, raising his voice slightly.
“It’s alright, you don’t need to shout either. I can still hear. I may not be able to walk, but I’m not deaf.”
She turns back to the window.
“Yes, yes, dear, of course. I remember us sitting up on the hill above the harbour. It was a fine September day. I remember watching the boat that used to sail out to the island there. What was its name now? Copeland, I think. Copeland island. Aye. I was thinking of that the other day. The war was just over. I remember how you looked. The way your hair was done in that new style. I remember how you were wearing lipstick. It was something you had picked up that time you were in London. I remember how some of the woman in the hotel gave you funny looks. I remember one making some reference to you being `a shameless young thing’. That all changed when they discovered Will was my brother.”
He stops, holding the unlit pipe out in front of him. His eyes cloud over. His face looks hesitant. She remains silent, gazing out the window.
“Aye, indeed. Poor Will. He eventually went out to Australia. Didn’t want to go on with the church. I remember he once confided in me he found it trying. That it was no life for a young man.”
He pauses, fiddles again in his pocket, looking for his matches.
“He did alright out in Australia. Not that we heard much from him really. The one time he came back he had changed so much. I remember I was struck by the way his skin had changed. It had become mottled from the heat, had a sun-beaten look. I was surprised by his voice. There was no trace left of his accent. He seemed to have come from a different world. He had I suppose. It’s so far away. Maybe that’s why he wanted to go there. Maybe the distance. Maybe it was the only thing he could do.”
Striking a match he lets it slowly burn. The clock suddenly chimes. He checks his watch. It is three thirty. Lifting his pipe to his mouth, he begins to light it. She remains still, her sad eyes fixed on the window. A cloud of smoke floats across the room.
“Whenever I smell your pipe,” she says, “it reminds me of my father.”
His eyes stare down into the fireplace. He stretches his hand out towards the electric heater. The room is beginning to darken.
“Are you cold dear?” he asks.
She pulls her cardigan tighter around her shoulders, shakes her head.
“I always remember my father sitting in the corner of our small living room. That was when I was older, thirteen or fourteen, I think. He would sit there, his shirt sleeves rolled up, holding his pipe in one hand, the other propping up his head. Sometimes he would ask you a question and then seem not to listen to the answer. I was always puzzled by that.”
He puffs on his pipe.
“That was when you still lived on Lombard Street.”
“Yes. That was before John died.”
There is a rasp, a catch in her voice.
“When John went, well, he never really got over it. Not that he got bitter, just that...well it sort of took the wind out of his sails.”
This is something to which he has become accustomed. The way she sometimes seems to remember things down to the last detail, the way her mind suddenly becomes clear, strong. Often it is events from her early childhood. Sometimes he is surprised by the strength of her recall.
“It was a tough blow.”
She tightens her lips.
“It was.”
Moving her arm, she tries to sit upright in the chair.
“In those days consumption was a serious illness.”
Her voice wavers.
“I’m not saying it isn’t still mind you, only then they didn’t have the medicines to treat it the way they do now. In a way John was his favourite. That’s why he took to you Jack. He thought he’d got a son back. But he was already dying himself then. I have often wondered if he knew that, but just never said.”
He nods his head.
“Who knows? He wasn’t the type of man to talk easily about things like that. He was too proud.”
“You know I remember the exact way that room looked. I remember everything about it, the way the kitchen ran off it, the picture above the fireplace, the way the door would sometimes stick, the way the small back yard looked through the window on a sunny afternoon.”
“Aye,” he says, “can't say I do. I remember that time we took him to Dublin though.”
He moves forward, smiles to himself, waving his pipe in front of him.
“Do you remember him standing on College Green, asking that policeman, if there was a post office on Sackville street? Aye, and this tall, fine looking country fellow, with a heavy accent, his face turning red, saying, ‘I think you mean O'Connell Street sir.’ And your father saying, ‘no I do not. I mean Sackville Street.’ We had to almost drag him away. I was afraid he would get us into trouble. Oh aye. I remember how he could get going on that alright. His sister still lived there. I remember she was like some poor creature stuck between two worlds. She always seemed to be a little too eager to tell you that, yes, she was quite happy.
For a moment he looks lost in thought, remains motionless, his pipe smoking up into the small room. Then he shifts forward in his chair.
“Are you sure you don’t want some more heat on dear?”
“No. No, it’s alright this way.”
“Fine, whatever you say.”

He returns to his paper. She hears him breathing in and out, the tapping of his pipe every now and then against the edge of the ashtray. She stares out the window, stares through the lace curtains onto the street. The street lights have just come on. They cast a glow on the pavement, their light falling in on the room. Her eyes catch the contour of a figure, a head moving slowly through the pale triangle, a cap pulled down tightly to its face. She looks again, trying to recognise the features, trying to find a name. She cannot explain why she suddenly thinks her father is out there, cannot explain why she thinks that it is her father walking along the pavement. Yet she clearly sees the features, the distinct, grey eyes, the round nose, the straight eyebrows, the solid head pressed firmly forward, the slow, methodical walk. She tries to get up, to move nearer the window, but cannot. She wants to call out, wants to say, “daddy, it’s me. Norma. Can you not see me? I’m here, here at the window. Just turn your head. I’m waving to you...daddy, daddy,...please, please answer me. Don’t just walk away like that. Daddy...”
“What is it love? Who are you trying to call? I’ve been here all the time.”
“J...Jack. Oh, Jack. I, I...where am I?”
“You’re ok dear. You’re here. Calm yourself now.”
He stands over her. The light is on. There is a look of anxiety in his face. He waits a moment.
“Jack,... I must have been dreaming. I...must have, I...”
“You just dozed off love. I’ll pull the curtains there if you move for a minute. It's getting dark now.”


He opens the back door and shivering, steps out onto the small patio. The night is cold. There are no stars to be seen. The sky is a deep brown. He looks across the fence into the neighbouring kitchen. There is a dim glow from behind the curtained window. The muffled sound of a television drifts over. George must be watching the snooker, he thinks, has the sound up too loud again. Probably fallen asleep in front of the thing.

He breathes in sharply. The air is cold and raw. Vague clouds form when he expels, their various shapes hanging in the damp around him. There is a rustle from the end of the short garden. His body tenses. He has read in the local paper how there has been a spate of robberies in the area recently. The broom handle is right next to him. It leans against the wall. Quietly, he lifts it. Its surface is cold, is covered in dew. He waits, strains his eyes to see. Peering down into the garden. He has just about made out the vague shape of the hedge, the apple tree, when suddenly two shining spheres appear out of the darkness. Flashing, they move quickly forward, darting first to one side then to the other. They keep low to the ground. He follows them until they come into the arc of light falling from the door. It is George’s cat. Stopping, it holds one paw in the air and meows. He chuckles to himself, calls to it, but it remains standing. He puts the broom back against the wall. “You daft thing,” he calls out quietly, “you had me going there for a moment.”
Just as he is about to turn, go back into the house, a loud crack, a sharp, black noise rings out across the roofs and gardens. He stops for a moment and listens, looks up into the sky. There is nothing, just the wintry silence. Then a siren. Again he calls to the cat but it scurries off towards the other house. He closes the door behind him.
“Sure you'll never get in,” he mutters to himself, “either way if George is asleep or with the noise from that television, he’ll never hear you scratching the door?”

His back aches as he steps into the living room. She is already in bed. He looks at the clock. It is just before eleven, time for him to call it a day. Yawning, he switches off the lights and walks stiffly down the hallway. Remembering he has not checked to see if the front door is locked, he turns irately back. The catch is on the door and the chain is across it. I must have done it earlier, he thinks.

There is the sound of shouting and scuffling from the street. He bends with difficulty, his legs creaking, his back stretching awkwardly and peeps through the letterbox. There are a couple of young lads standing there. He watches them. The draught from the moist air stings his eyes. He hears their talk, their excited, loud voices. They all have scarves wrapped tightly around the lower part of their faces, their hair cut short and close. He is shocked by their language. Adjusting his hands, he tightly grasps the slat of the letterbox. We would never have used words like that in our day, he thinks, would never have even thought of things like that. His watery blue eyes stare at them. They are pushing, jostling each other on the pavement. From somewhere in the distance comes the drone of an army helicopter. With a sense of disbelief he recognises one of them.
“That’s that wee fellow, what’s his name now, the one who used to work up there behind the meat counter in the supermarket. Right enough, I haven’t seen him now for some time,” he mutters.
He stands up, trying to straighten out his back. It cricks, a pain running the length of it. “Oh dear,” he says to himself, “I think I’ll have to go the doctor one of these days.” He pauses, takes a deep breath, winces, grabs onto the bannister. “But that young fellow now, used to be ever so friendly to you. Always had a smile for you. Aye, who would have thought he’d be hanging around with that sort of crowd. You never know these days I suppose. It’s just in the times. Probably just the world they grow up in. Wouldn’t have happened in my day, no. Still, now it’s different. Now nothing is for sure.”



4

She looks up at the ceiling. The dim shape of the lampshade hangs there. Her eyes focus on it. Beside her, she can feel the weight of his body. His snoring echoes around the room. He has been asleep for some time now.

She heard him come up the stairs muttering to himself. As he slowly undressed, she listened to him, wanted to say something but hesitated. Then she drifted off to sleep.

When she awoke again she had no idea how long he had been there. It was later but she did not know how much later. She wanted to get up to look at his watch lying beside him on the tall, square table, but could not. In the darkness and the cold it was really beyond her capability.

She thinks of it again. It comes back into her mind. Suddenly her thoughts seem to become more lucid. He is asleep. What if she could not wake him? What if she were just to go now, if she were just to slip away and he would sleep on beside her? There he would be in the morning, getting up, discovering that she was no more. He would be in the house on his own, smoking his pipe, the rooms empty, talking to his memories. And her children. Would they come and see if he was alright? Would her son make it home from Canada?

For a moment she would like to see them now more than anything, to hear their voices. She tries to wake him, tries to shake him. He only turns slightly, rolls a little more to his side and goes on snoring. She calls his name. There is no answer.

She feels herself panic, tries to lift herself up, tries to turn herself over to get to the bedside-light. What’s the use, she thinks. I cannot. I cannot get up properly, I have not the energy to even reach out and find the switch.
She lies there, looking up into the ceiling. The silence presses down.
“Jack, Jack, Jack dear,” she whispers, “Jack I’m afraid. I know I shouldn’t be, but I’m so afraid of dying.”

Copyright (C) Peter Millington. December 1996.

black sun

I dreamed I was back in that apartment. First I stood on the street and looked up at the front of the building. It was how it was before, though I knew by now it must have changed. Now when I came over the river, followed the tramline around off the Ruycshstraat, there were new apartments. Everywhere there were new apartments. Sometimes it seemed the city was always changing, that there was a restlessness beneath its surface and so a building was torn down a new one started. Yet nothing ever really changed because change, that shifting of impressions and sensations was so much part of this city that it was expected and if it did not occur then there was a sudden lurch, and people found yourself wondering why things were as they were.

Perhaps I dreamed of it because I had just been there. I had just walked there and crossed the bridge coming up from the Oosterpark and on my way south. Some things were as they used to be. The building on the corner with its fine architecture, its small spires, inlaid suns and curved windows. And the river, that though it is a small river is still a river, flowed under the bridge and up into the city. That was an autumn day, the leaves turning on the trees and trembling, the sun streaming down thickly over everything.

I dreamed about that apartment. I dreamed of the first time I saw it. You were there and it was a January evening with the canals thawing and the temperature rising again after a period of freezing fog and rain that fell like hail or struck like splinters of glass. We came from the other side of the river and it was dark. In the corner of the bridge was a barge. It rocked against the quay and the lights from the buildings glowed in the brown night and mist that covered everything. Something inside of me felt I was crossing not only a bridge but also a line and when we found the apartment something new would be starting. Like the river that fed the sea there was something moving. The tide was taking me somewhere. Not that I put it in those words, only it was there and as we bumped against each other I knew this was for us and no one else.

We came along the river that night and in your pocket was the piece of paper with the directions and we did not know our way so had to keep looking at the map we had bought in a small newsagents near the rail station. Behind us was the hotel, along the quay, out past the rail tracks. The small room we were staying in, its blankets strewn untidily over the floor and our half packed cases and cassette tapes and books. I think we stopped for something to drink on our way, a coffee and roll with cheese. One of those rolls dusted with flour that comes off on your fingers and gets over your clothes so you spend half your time brushing it away and trying not to get it anywhere else, though never succeed. At that time those rolls with cheese or pickle or liver sausage tasted good. It was a while before they began to taste like more of the same and we would go looking for somewhere that offered some interesting variation. Perhaps you know you live somewhere, you know you are no longer visiting or passing through when the food tastes like it has always been there, when it has the reassurance of the simple and the commonplace. I mean you understand it when you are somewhere else and suddenly long to be sitting in the corner of a certain café where you once sat and have a coffee that only tastes like it tastes there, a sandwich or pastry the way only there it can be. Maybe look out the window and see a tram come up over a junction, sway on the tracks and the hiss or blue flash where it crosses cables, where they meet or swing off somewhere else. The ring of the tram bell as a cyclist cuts over its path and the face of a stranger who does not look strange because of a look that is unique to where you are and the way only the light can fall in that place. Over the gables and spires, off the windows or sift through the trees in long lines.

That night we crossed the bridge and went along the riverside and turned right onto the street we were looking for. It was a narrow street with a peculiar raised path to one side and lamps hanging across on wires. It was dark and a little lost and I smelt the river in it. As if the river were there in its foundations, had somehow seeped up after so many years into the stones and cement, the rafters and beams that framed the buildings so there was dampness that even on a summer’s day would be there. A dampness that was brown and green and never going anywhere.

Dreaming is strange. Its ability suddenly to penetrate your life, like a voice from outside, is curious. Though I believe dreams are from within you. They are part of you and that everything you need to live is there inside you. I do not mean in some mysterious way, though perhaps that is how it is, but that, like animals, we have our instincts, we have our needs and so know what to look for. We need a place to live and food to eat and it is that simple. Yet unlike animals we need to love and be loved and that adds a complication. Not only that, somehow we have to know why we love and understand love. And sometimes though love is what validates us, what brings us to our reality, we turn away; we prefer the shadows and say love cannot exist because there is no ground for believing. Even when life gets so controlled that it is flat and we are fading away, we say it has little to do with loving or not loving. We say we are beyond needing and that everything can be understood, and maybe it can. Yet then we spend all our time focusing on a small moment ahead of us and forget there was ever anything else. Dreams come from within us and tell us what our strategy is, what it is as living organisms, as consciousness we need to grow; what is outside us is really what is within us.

I dreamed I was standing in front of the door. It was still crooked, still set back off the street and cramped. When I opened it, the cord was still there. The cord that enabled tenants to open the door from above without having to come below. It wound up into the dark like a line into the nothingness of the stairway. The only way of knowing for certain there was something else there. It called you up, its rough texture and the way it hung from the loops that held it. It was a risk you always took. You often wondered what possibilities that climb held.

The stairs were still steep and dusty so I climbed them and found myself at the door of our apartment. I had the feeling it was night, a night when we lived there. One of those nights when it rains, when it drizzles and the streets are wet and shine. A night when there are not many people about and if you are in somewhere you watch the drops run down the window pane, making their way until they are gone and others come and the streets get wetter. Perhaps someone hurries by, holding a newspaper up over their head and a taxi pulls in while the lights of the traffic fragment and disperse and everything goes by in split patterns. The rain is coming up from the south and sometimes it seems you can smell that too. Fields and forest and where the land begins to come up again, where hills rise and take you above the sea, up into the air. And even further south where the food is strong and the wine sweet. Where the sun falls and flashes off the sea, animating all it touches.

I opened the door and it was light inside. The room was empty. I stepped over the floor and noticed it was bare and yet the beams were polished. Where there had been a carpet there was nothing but burnished wood. It shone and creaked when I walked and I had the feeling of something very old but also new and freshened. At the far end of the room, the window was open. Outside the light was close and shimmered.

I stood and looked around. There were no chairs or tables. There was only a cupboard and wardrobe. Pulling the drawers out and opening the door I could find nothing. Nowhere was there any clue to the fact we had once lived there. Everything was empty.

Behind me was the bedroom. The light switch was still on the wall with the wiring cased in that ugly sort of way, like a pipe running up from the floor and around to where the switch waited to be triggered. Carefully I went in.

The bed was gone though I remembered the times we spent there. How on spring nights we would lie with the window open and the noise of the city coming in and somewhere over that the sound of the river. I remember you made a shade for the lamp, a large sun stretched over a frame in orange and red and yellow with rays coming out at different lengths and direction. In the corner of the room, the small palm tree I worked to make grow but still collected dust and looked lost. Over the windows were those bamboo shades that in summer sometimes worked and let in air while keeping out the mosquitoes.

I turned back to the living room. I stood and looked about me. The light from outside flowed in, seemed to be engulfing the room with a luminescence. It fired off the walls and hung in the air. Formed rays like there was dust. Only there was no dust because everything had a feeling of being clean, being fresh, as if some invisible air stream had just come down and blown it all clear.
Standing there, I thought of the times we had spent in this room. I remembered the table and the tattered armchair. I used to sit at that table writing, my navy turtleneck on or maybe only a t-shirt and unshaven. You would read, curled up in the armchair and sometimes look impatiently toward me and then talk. One Sunday afternoon you read a story you had picked from a book of children’s stories about a stainless steel spoon that thought it was silver and though the other spoons told it otherwise, it refused to believe. Even when it had been discarded and was lying with the rubbish or had fallen between the gratings of a drain and was being rained on and was down with the dead leaves and dirt, it maintained it was silver. Listening, I was not sure if that was maybe like us. Maybe the odds were stacked against us even then. Too many things hung on a thread. Or maybe the spoon felt silver and so was silver. Yet that was more difficult because it brought up questions about what you felt and what you were. If you felt you were something and maintained that to the bitter end even though everything around you was falling apart, then were you that or were you just foolish? And who could tell in the final say what you were and what you were not? At what point did you judge yourself, confirm yourself by the values imposed on you by others or those experienced by you yourself? I mean, where does the freedom to be what you want to be, become an un-ease, an illusion? Yet you keep believing it because to admit you are only stainless steel would be to admit you are wrong. Deceiving yourself is worse than being deceived by others. Self deception means you have gone to war with yourself, with your reality.

Still those winter Sundays were often sad and grey. Often times we sat in the apartment and lounged around and I would think of how I had spent Sundays as a child. The shirt and tie and the gospel hall with its rows of plastic and steel seats. In the pulpit some round-faced car salesman and the bibles being dusted down for another week. And the man who told us he could see angels, though his wife, I think, saw different. She kept her eye on all the girls to make sure none were dressed prettier than her and that none went near the boys.

It was from that living room we would decide to cycle out along the canals when summer came. Sitting on a green wooden bench sometimes for hours, just watching the sun go down. Or the time we went to the beach and nearly got stranded. The waves pounding the sand. The dunes with their long reed-like grass and deserted pathways. We watched the sea run up the beach in foamy fingers and the sun burst through a bank of cloud in long rays and touch the surface far out from the tidemark. Then came back in on the train, sleepy, with the city appearing like a picture burnt in light and electricity, alone and naked on the horizon.

That night the moon was full and hung over the river and the gables in a close dreaminess. Through the open windows and across the warm roof the moths flew in and around the light bulb. Later I woke to find there was a storm. The lamps hanging across the street, swayed and swung. Their light moved over the wall, creating shadows and strange shapes and the wind and thunder rattled in the window, blowing rubbish and things down the street. So next morning when I got up and walked through the park things were still wet and sharp and there were branches strewn across the pavements.

Sometimes you would sit before the mirror in that room and make up your face. Your perfume always stood on the mantelpiece. I could never quite figure out why you did it but you would. As if you were masking yourself, putting on a different face and so could, for a short time at least, be someone else. Not that I felt you should be someone else or needed to be someone else.

There were the times we took the bicycle and went to the Leidseplein. Seeking out its noise and alleys with different types of restaurants or bars. Occasionally we came home after having a beer or two too many, a little drunk and the bicycle wobbled and I would steer and have to be careful not to catch the wheels in the tram tracks. The streets and the canals might be empty, just the odd person walking along or lurching from one side of the pavement to the other. You could be wearing your suede jacket and those silk pants you made, the ones that were a sort of copper colour and finely woven with an intricate Oriental pattern. Climbing those stairs was always strange then. Late at night they seemed dustier and darker and I would wonder too what secrets they held. Who had lived there before us and how long ago. What acts of kindness had they seen or sorrow or maybe even violence. They were the type of stairs in the type of apartment that seemed like it had secrets, that there were layers of many lives already woven into its dust and wood and walls. They had seen a lot. And then the river would seem to rise up and run through me. It would run free and I would feel its story, its endlessness and that it had been there longer than any building, than all the lives put together on the street. Like all rivers it went on and on adjusting to the land around it, being built along, being bridged but always bringing those who sought it out, back, back to the simplest of things; water, land, human survival.

It was in that living room I took a photograph of you. In it you look like Vermeer’s ‘Girl Reading a Letter’, though you are turned the other way and not reading a letter but looking out the window with your hair tied back behind you. The light is coming in and covering your face, making it pale and catching the highlights of your hair and falling over that forest green sweater you are wearing. Beside you is a plant, its leaves leaning toward you and the rest of the room falls away into darkness. That was in March and I remember the tulips were just beginning to bloom near the Museumplein, coming out in great red bunches, covering the grass and under the Linden trees. When I saw them from the tram I thought of how when I was a boy I would wait for them to open in the garden at home because then it was spring and summer was nearer. They would first appear in the bed ringing the front lawn and their colour, their reds or yellows would be bright against the laurel bushes, against the grey heavy clouds on damp spring days. I would stand on the front porch and look at them and then at the cypress trees across the avenue and the mountains, blue and vaporous in the distance. Some mornings I would come out on my way to school and hope to see them, would hold my breath and wish they would be there and then get into my father’s car and drive away. Not that I liked flowers particularly just that tulips were special nice and I liked their strong colours and simple shapes and it was also a time near my birthday.

These thoughts were going through my mind as I stood there, as I looked around me. A certain period of my life had occurred here. Something in the run of my life ran here, in these rooms, in this apartment. I had walked the line from the door, past the bedroom, through to the living room and then to the kitchen many times.

At the far end of the kitchen was the space where the shower had been. That shower never worked well and the plaster around it was crumbled and the paintwork peeled. To its side should have been the postcard pinned to the wall, the one that reminded me of you, Modigliani’s ‘Seated Nude’. On the counter should have been the white enamel pot with the red stripe, the new knife and the green of parsley on the wooden cutting board. Loose potatoes, fresh oregano, garlic and an assortment of vegetables for a soup. There should also have been an open bottle of wine. I knew if it was real and I walked to the window and looked to the patio below, the two women would be there. The two women we used to wonder about, with their dyed hair and how on summer afternoons they sat and drank white beer from tall glasses while cats padded between the legs of the plastic chairs. If this was real their laughter would suddenly break the afternoon open and some of the cats would run at each other and I would smell the oil heating from the pan and the first of the potatoes and oregano going in, releasing their aromas.

I stood there and looked about me. Going to the window, I leaned on the sill and looked out. The air was concentrated and humid but there were no cats running below and the postcard that once hung on the wall was gone. No smell of cooking hung in the air and the counter was empty. Not even an empty bottle.

So I wondered why I was there, what I was doing back in these rooms, why I was walking through this dream? Was there some reason? The sun was hidden by broken cloud though its rays were curling around and falling onto my hands. Then I understood.

Time has passed and though we are no longer together things do not just finish with a signature on a piece of paper, a document passed before a court clerk. A relationship leaves marks on you, leaves after effects that can be detected the way trace minerals can be found in a spring or a well. No relationship just ends in a moment. Like a leaf fallen or a bird shot down it takes time to die. And we get hurt when disappointed, hurt when our dreams do not materialise, when they go awry. That hurt gets twisted around and moves down into the bones of life, gets deep rooted and holds onto you until it seems to be holding you where you are, stopping you from moving on. Then one day you are angry. You are not angry at anything in particular but just angry at how things are, angry at your inability to move.

Now the anger that was a dark shadow over the sun, a penumbra of blackness, was gone. That was what I had come to discover. I dreamed to be released. I was no longer bitter.
The apartment was empty and while in its emptiness, the empty drawers, the empty kitchen, the empty bedroom, it held nothing more than memories, memories still strong, it also shone. It shone like everything was clean again. So I kept looking from the window, thought of the river over behind the roofs, to my left and under the trees, its presence, its fusing with the street itself so much part of everything.

Then I stepped out of the dream and crossed back over the bridge.

Copyright © Peter Millington. London. September 1999.

a night in June

1

There are times she wonders why she does it. Tonight is one of them. The bar is full. She stands under the spotlight. It catches the side of her face, accentuates the line of her dark profile, her short, tight hair. All she can hear is the shuffling of chairs, of feet, the babble of conversation.

She turns the keys of the guitar, struggles to catch the pitch above the noise. Placing her fingers along the fretboard, her long, thin right hand plucks a chord on the strings. Her ears strain to check if everything is in tune. Moving her body forward, she lightly plays a short blues run. Sighing, she is satisfied that it is probably the best she can hope for in the circumstances. She turns her face to the crowd.

There is a quick ripple of applause from her left. It is followed by the sound of laughter. Why she is regularly booked to play here, she does not know. She feels she is nothing more than background music for the eagerly socialising faces, faces for the most part turned away from her. Once, just once, she would like to be able to play something different, something that would reach them, something that would quieten them, make them stop and really listen. On Saturday evening it is the talk, the drink, the company they come for. She steps to the front of the stage.

The barman passes. He is holding a tray full of yellow glasses above his head. Accidentally, he knocks against the stand that holds the microphone. It sways and she puts her hand out to steady it. She looks at him and signals that she is ready to start. Nodding, his long moustache moves up and down, his small sad eyes remain expressionless.
She taps her foot on the wooden boards. To her right, her boyfriend is standing. He smiles at her, raising his shoulders.

In front of her, sitting with his legs stretched out, is a guy with cowboy boots and a fifties hairstyle. In his fist, he holds a glass, has a small cigar stuck between his teeth. He sullenly stares at her.

Putting her hand to her forehead, she looks into the ceiling. The top cannot be seen for smoke. Her upper teeth bite gently on her lip.

The barman returns, negotiating the outstretched feet, the groups of animated conversation, and with a quick movement of his head indicates he is ready to introduce her.
The P.A. whistles, the microphone hisses and then the voice asks for quiet, for some attention and applause. There is a slight lull in the voices, a couple of bursts of clapping and the faces turn to gaze curiously at her. She picks a point somewhere in the centre of the audience and fixes her attention on it. Taking a deep breath, she reaches for the opening notes of her first song.



2

He is surprised to find himself step in. It is not somewhere he would usually go. His bicycle is left locked to a bridge, locked to an old railing lining a narrow stretch of inky water.

He was walking down the alley behind the main street, walking really without direction. After eating, he just felt like being out, just felt like being in the air, seeing what happened on a Saturday evening.

It is a long time since he has done anything like this. Mostly he sits in reading the newspaper, sometimes watching the television, sometimes half watching, half reading. Tonight he feels restless.
In the last months things have not been going well between him and his wife. She has taken the children to her parents. They will not be back till after the weekend. Reluctantly, he agreed to this. She said, maybe they needed a little space, a little time apart.

Each weekend now is tenser. She is tired, is under pressure. She has become more involved in her work, has begun to put her career increasingly before their home. Criticising her is out of the question. The only reply he will receive is that there is no reason why she should not do so, that, what does he expect, that she should pass by an opportunity like the one being offered her.

When he argues it is not a question of her doing anything like that, not a question of her giving up her own life, but that he, her children, need some attention too, she has not listened.

He feels it unfair. When she took this job, he made adjustments in his working life. It was difficult to explain to his boss, it caused conflict with his colleagues. Later when there was a question of training on a new system, he was passed over.

He would not mind so much if he felt the same commitment was there on her part. What she is really after, is the promotion. The complication that will bring is something he does not like to think about.

She stands back from the microphone. The sweat runs down the side of her face. The applause dies down. Her fingers move up and down the fretboard as she introduces her next song. There is the clatter of glasses falling somewhere as someone suddenly gets up to walk to the toilets.

At first he went right past it. The alley was nearly empty, quiet compared to the bustle of the square and main street. It was an area with a couple of trendy theatres, a couple of cafes only frequented by a particular crowd. He did not expect to see such a place. It was the music that stopped him. Looking in the door, something about it reminded him of when he was younger. For a time with a friend he played in a couple of these types of bars. They were not that good though he enjoyed it. He gave it up when he began to study, when he began to think a little more seriously about his future.

The first of her three sets end and she lets out a long sigh. She leans her guitar back against the stand, turns the microphone away, toward the floor. Taped music bursts from the P.A. The crowd resume their drinking, their conversations.

It did not go as bad as she had at first feared. She had to work hard at it. The attention wavered, came and went. The old favourites were what she opened with. It was always better to begin with the well﷓known songs, the songs everyone had a copy of somewhere. She is never sure whether it is the familiarity, the reassurance of the known that holds a crowd’s attention or her performance.

Her fingers sting a little, her voice feels dry. Stepping down off the low stage, a figure comes toward her through the crowd. In his hand is a glass of mineral water and across his face, a sympathetic smile.
“Thanks,” she says, “it’s not easy tonight.”
“No,” he answers, “it’s a real Saturday night crowd. Tell me is it extremely hot in here, or is it my imagination?”
She looks at him.
“It’s extremely hot. I think it’s a mixture of all these bodies crammed into so tight a space together with the smoke.”
She pauses.
“Speaking of which, I’d love a cigarette.”
“Do you think that’s a good idea?”
“It can’t do me more harm than this atmosphere is already doing.”
“Ok, let’s go out to the door, we can stand on the street.”

They push their way through the bodies. The guy with the fifties hairstyle is lighting another cigar. As they pass, he looks up at her. His face sullenly gazes into hers and then he moves his feet a couple of centimetres to let them pass.
“Hey, nice songs lady,” he calls after her.
“Thanks,” she says, dodging an outstretched arm, “thanks a lot.”



3

He stretched up on his toes to see what was going on. It was busy. The crowd was rather haphazard, chaotic, a mix of old and young, a mix of types, drinking, talking, listening.

Normally if he wanted an evening out, he went to the cinema, or the theatre. Usually they went together, hiring a baby-sitter, sometimes first going to a restaurant and eating. In other circumstances he would have chosen to go somewhere else.

As he strained forward, he wondered if maybe it was because she was away. It occurred to him he was going through a stretch where he felt his future to be somewhat uncertain. Perhaps something that reminded him of a part of his past appealed right now. He did not for one moment imagine he was about to return to that way of life or anything, but, it seemed to break the line between what he had once been and what he had become.

Edging into the crowd he thought life was not always as simple as you believed. It was possible things only receded into the background, only seemed to be forgotten when there was something in your present, something that took over your thoughts, your feelings, that kept you chasing the future. It was a notion that unsettled him, made him feel uneasy. The idea there were other elements, elements standing in the wings, elements you thought you had put firmly behind you, but that were really just waiting to come back at you, elements, that one day you might realise had been other choices, other possibilities, unnerved him. Where would you be had you known that then, where would you be had you chosen differently? It was not that there were choices, but perhaps there was no one right choice. Perhaps all choices were relative and it was only time that showed whether your choice had been a good one or not. Yet you had no way of controlling time. Did you really have that much control over choosing? Was making a choice a gamble? Was it like throwing a coin in the air? You could never see ahead, never predict. It was like standing in front of a maze, and having to get from one side to the other. You watched everyone else, noticed the pathways they took. All you had to do was follow, keep close and you could also make your way through.

You thought a always led to b, and b then to c, that there was one pathway, one route. But that was an error. To assume your a was the same as another’s a, to assume that, even if it was so, both a’s would lead to the same b, and then to onto a similar c, was mistaken. Really, choosing the pathway that seemed the safest, was just an attempt to ignore risk, to ignore responsibility. It did not remove either. Their existence continued, the way the moon was there, or the stars, though you could not always see them.

The younger you were, the more naive you were. You did not reckon on life having an intelligence of its own. Everything was under control, you thought. Choices were made that were in your present, choices that increased your past, yet were made in order to determine your future.

Perhaps everyone's life was about crossing the maze, everyone had to make the journey. Not only were none of your a's the same, but the maze was unstable, was unfixed. It fluctuated, changed, could alter its shape and the trick was to figure out if there was a pattern to its mutations, if there was a principle which determined its modifications, and then to work with that.

It would have been better had you started with the knowledge there was an element of the unknown, an element that was unique to your experience; been prepared to accept the unexpected.

Then, perhaps, you would make choices that at least allowed for alteration, that allowed you the room to change direction.



4

They step out onto the street. He leans against the wall. The brick is cool on his back. She looks up into the sky. It is dark, the blue almost turned to black. The buildings lean in over the narrow alleyway, the lights from the main street caught and reflected in the roofs above. He pulls his jacket open and puts his hand in his pocket. It is a warm night. The chatter, the laughter from inside, the music from the P.A., drift out to them.
“Fresh air,” he exclaims, breathing deeply.
She looks at him, takes her glass from her mouth.
“You know, I thought tonight I wasn’t going to make it. When I got up there to tune up, I thought this is it. I don’t know which I felt, more nervous, or more angry. It was like facing a blank. I wanted to step up to the microphone and say, aah, hello everyone, I am here. Music, do you know what I mean. That’s what this is about."
He stretches his shoulders.
“Yes, but what can you do? It takes time to work your way in. That barman, what’s his name now, René, he’s only interested in selling beer, no?”
“I think he needs a good haircut, that’s what I think.”
He laughs.
“Maybe we could offer to get him one for his birthday.”
She looks at him, her eyes opening, her face adopting an expression of mock surprise.
“His birthday? Do we know when his birthday is? Do we need to know when his birthday is?”
“Sure we know. He told us earlier this evening. He was having one of his rare, conversational moods. Next week sometime.”
She nods her head.
“Of course. I forgot. Still, it’s a bit of a time-warp, isn’t it? I mean, it’s not that it’s long, it's...well I don't know. I guess there’s no harm in him being the way he wants to be. But it’s a bit like my hair is still back twenty years in time, what does that say about me?”
He moves his weight from one foot to the other.
“Nothing, and probably everything.”
She looks down into her glass, shakes it, swirling the remains of the water around.
“I’ve just remembered I left my cigarettes in my jacket inside.”
He smiles at her.
“You can do without them, can’t you? It’s not good for your voice you know, it’s unhealthy.”
“I know, still.”
It is then she notices the stranger to her right. He is standing holding a glass awkwardly between his arm and his body. There is an unopened packet of cigarettes in his hand and he is fiddling with it, trying to get the plastic wrapping off. She goes over to him.



5

He pushed further through the entrance until he was nearly at the edge of the stage. Two girls turned and looked at him. At first they appeared a little annoyed at his shoving, but then one smiled.

The interior had an odd shape. To the right, just after the entrance, was the stage. Facing it were lines of chairs and tables. The floor ran away to the back where there was a bar. Groups of people stood there, leaning against each other, or drinking, some with their arms folded defensively across their chests.

He watched the singer, watched her movements, watched her struggle to keep the crowd with her. The barman came down close to him and he signaled he wanted a beer. As he waited, he realised he felt like smoking a cigarette.
‘To hell with it,’ he thought, ‘one time won’t hurt’.
Normally he did not smoke. He considered it a dirty habit, unhealthy. He had done so when he was younger, but now felt that it was better not to. At home, she was strictly against it. She argued it made the children passive smokers and he had to agree she had a point.

At one time she wanted to put up a sign in the hallway of their apartment stating, ‘no smoking’. He found that going too far. ‘What if they had friends over and they smoked? Then it was a little unsocial, a little off rude?’ He suggested it would be better just not to leave any ashtrays around, then people would figure out it was not a smoking household.

He had to laugh when he thought of the complications people got themselves into. Only the previous week he listened with amusement as one of his work-colleagues told him how his wife had accused him of seeing someone else because regularly he went to the neighbours on the pretence of needing to ask for something, because there he could light up.

He thought of his own wife and wondered in the same circumstances what she would find more upsetting; that he smoked, or that he was maybe seeing another woman.

Putting his hand in his pocket, he searched around for some loose change. He turned to see if there was a cigarette machine anywhere. Behind him was a guy with a scruffy appearance. A lined face, bright, piercing blue eyes and short uncombed hair, stared down at him. For a moment he was taken aback. He thought he read aggression in the eyes. He mumbled a half-hearted, pardon. The guy looked at him, and then with a grin, stepped aside.

Going to the cigarette machine, he fumbled with the coins. He wavered over which brand to buy. He decided on the one he recollected having seeing the least amount of adverts for.

Pulling on the metal handle, he felt a little guilty. The coins dropped and there was a soft thud when the tightly wrapped packet appeared in the tray. He bent down and picked it up, shoving it quickly into his pocket. Taking a drink from his beer, he pushed back to where he had been standing.

She was introducing one of her own songs. Suddenly she seemed nervous. He noticed she was fiddling with the tuning keys, that her eyes kept trying to find a space somewhere above the faces.

As she played the opening chords, as she began to run the bass strings down, as the slow, melodic song unfolded, he found himself listening carefully. It seemed to him more like a jazz or blues ballad. A woman near the bar leaned forward and looked intently, listening to every word, her glass suspended in the air. He followed the rhythm, his foot moving involuntarily, his eyes observing her every expression.

About halfway through there was a shuffling of feet and a group of guys near the back started raucously laughing at something one of them had apparently said.

When she finished, the applause varied. Some seemed impressed, enthusiastic, others looked to the bar, started to get up to go and order. Some just carried on with conversations they had never stopped. He realised there was going to be a break.

Curiously, he watched her as she stepped down off the stage, as she tried to make her way through the crowd. Then, he remembered he was alone, saw that everyone else suddenly seemed to be with someone.

Feeling a little strange, like the odd person out, he stood for a moment looking about him, draining the remains of his glass.



6

“Ja, of course,” he replies, hesitating for a moment over the English. He opens the pack and pulls one out for her.
“Thanks.”
“Do you maybe...ah...have some fire?” he asks.
She puts her hand in her pocket, takes out a lighter and clicks it open. He leans forward and pulls on the cigarette.
“The last song was very nice,” he says.
Her dark, lively, eyes, her bare, high forehead, her expressive mouth, soften into a smile.
“You liked it?”
“Yes, it was different. I like that it was slow, that it was...,” he hesitates, “eh, how should I say, that it was maybe a little sad.”
“Why thank you.”
She pauses.
“Hey, why don’t you come over and join us. We’re just out here trying to get some space, trying to cool down a bit.”

He stands at the bar and drinks a couple more beers. She does some more of her own compositions. He likes them best. When she finishes, she comes over to him. He buys her a drink and she stands and talks to him for a while, waiting for the crowd to clear. Perhaps it is the beer, perhaps the music, but he feels relaxed. Not once does he think about home, about work, about anything. It is just after four when he leaves.



7

He bends over his bicycle, struggles to focus on the lock, struggles to get the key to turn. The water below the bridge, is slow, dark, washes indolently against the stone canal side. The warm air moves against his skin, over his neck. Pulling a light raincoat over his shoulders, he gets up onto the seat. He grips the handlebars and begins to cycle, begins to cross the deserted main street.

The buildings around him are impassive, the shop fronts darkened. Slowly pushing the pedals, he moves along the bicycle lane. A police car drives lazily past, its white and blue keeping to the raised centre of street where the tram-tracks are.

He gazes up into the sky. It is a clear night. He does not yet feel like going home. In a way he does not want the night to end, the morning to come.

To his left, where the old palace stands, is a three-quarter moon. Sometimes it seems so cold, to be almost made of chalk, to be like a still, white disc hanging there. In the winter, it can make the city seem colder and closer, its pale rays catching faces as if suggesting some time past, some memory not quite forgotten. Now it is the middle of June. It is florid and creamy, dulcet. In the warm Spring night, it blends with the city air, with perfume, the remaining aromas from now closed restaurants, the faint smell of car fumes, pollen. He turns to his left and passes the Nieuwekerk. The yellow traffic lights flash on and off. Cutting to his right, he crosses onto one of the main canals. Following it, he takes in its rise and fall, whistling to himself.

The trees are heavy, their leaves full under the arc of the streetlamps. The vibration of the bicycle as it moves over the surface of the canal side passes up into his arms through the handlebars. He is about to cross the bridge near the station, to go to his left when he realises this will bring him home all the quicker. For a moment he stops, putting his foot down on the hard ground, steadying himself and thinking. His head still feels a little light.

He goes straight on then crosses behind the station. He will cycle along the old unused harbour area. Coasting under the rail bridge, there is a hiss as a solitary post train rattles above his head. The open space with its water appears in front of him. The wooden piers, the rise of the pass behind the station and the moon shining on the silky surface hold his vision. This way he can still get home, this way he can get to where he lives by another route.

Their footsteps echo in the empty street. He carries her guitar. Leaning against him, she links her arm tightly through his and yawns.
“Sleepy, eh?” he says.
“Yes,” she replies.
They come to the door of their apartment. It seems small, old. Putting the guitar down, he searches in his pocket for the key. She folds her arms across her chest, yawns again. There is the sound of the metal turning in the lock, the rasp of the hinges as the wooden door swings open.
“Come on,” he whispers, “we’re home.”
They climb the stairs. There is that familiar smell, that dry, musty odour in the air. She hears the creak, hears him knock her guitar off the wall.
“Who would have thought you could build something so narrow,” she says.
He opens a door. His arm stretches into the darkness, his hand fumbles for the switch and suddenly there is a glow and the light like an orange sphere hangs over the centre of the living room. Something brushes against her ear, buzzes past her.
“Dammed mosquitoes,” she murmurs.
“What,”
“Nothing, it was just a mosquito I think.”
He walks to the window. The curtains are blowing gently against the back of the sofa. Pulling them over, he turns as she falls into a chair.
“I’m going to get a glass of water. Do you want one?” he asks.
“Yes please. I’m feeling a little dried out.”
Bright fluorescent floods the tiny kitchen. The tap opens, echoes in the steel sink and the water gushes around and into the cylindrical glass.

He has left his bicycle lying somewhere behind him. Carefully stepping over the rough ground, he goes down to where the grass falls away into a broken wall, to where it disappears into the water. Muttering to himself, that his coat will probably get dirty, that tomorrow he will probably look at it and wonder how it got like that, but now he does not care, he comes to a stop.

The water breaks against the old pier. His eyes fall on the dim wooden shapes, the rotting supports that once must have been a docking area.

To his right, in the distance, are lights, the lights of buildings, the lights of the harbours, the lights of ships. It seems to him he can hear a hum, hear the low, almost soothing murmur of distant activity.

He imagines being inside one of the ships, the oily smell, the narrow passageways, the metal railings, the thin steel steps, the excitement of a journey about to be made. Where have some of the ships come from, where are some of them going? It fills his mind. The sea and how it is, how it knows no boundaries, how it has fed this city, how it is what this city is built around. The tides coming in, swelling, rising and then ebbing, falling away.

For a moment he is there, is standing on a deck, watching the ropes being cast off, the rusty scrape of a side as it leaves the quay, the surge of an engine, the water churning up at stern. He imagines the next port of call, some faraway place, somewhere where he has never been. The journey, the roll and the sway, the change in appearance, the skin weathering as the ship navigates the ocean’s curve. He gazes up at the sky, at the moon.

It is higher and paler. To his right, to the east, he can see the sky is a lighter blue. It is as if the night is beginning to melt away. Dawn is creeping up over the city. Suddenly he feels tired, realises that it must be nearly five or after. Letting go, dropping to the ground, he lies back on the coarse grass. It is damp. It is cool against the back of his head.

He pulls out the near empty pack of cigarettes from his pocket, takes out the matches she gave him and lights one. The smoke rises above him in grey and blue clouds.

He does not want to think about it, does not want to think that tomorrow is nearly here, that soon it will be the day after, that then she will be back, then the tension will increase, and there will still have to be an answer.
‘Choices’, he murmurs to himself, ‘and if I were coming back from a voyage, if I were sailing up past these harbours, into this city, would I see my own life as if it did not belong to me, but to someone else? Would I see the choices I have made, and see that there were choices I should have made, choices I should not have made? Would I see my life any clearer, or would I be caught in another life, held by its current, driven by its needs?’
He puts the cigarette to his mouth and watches the end glow. Tomorrow he will remember this, will probably wonder what made him do it, will feel tired, his head will ache, and he will be irritated at himself for being foolish, for acting out of character. Yet as he lies there, he hears the pull of her songs, sees her in front of the crowd, her fingers finding the chords, the supple switch from one to the other. The bass strings counterpoint the melody, the soft tap of her foot keeps rhythm on the simple, wooden stage and her voice gently caresses the ears of those who are listening.

Maybe it was really not such a strange thing to do. Perhaps she will be playing there again sometime, and he will be passing, and then he will stop and listen to her sing, listen to her songs as she pitches them to that spot somewhere just above the centre of the audience, listen to her find the blues run, the sweet, jazzy sound like the pull of the sea, the sound that kept him standing there this one night in June.

Copyright (C) Peter Millington. April 1996.