Little Egypt (Salt Modern Fiction) (28 page)

‘You
only
have
to
sign.
There’s
a
room
going,
nice
one,
front,
view
of
the
river.
Hate
to
think
who
they’re
bumping
off
to
get
you
in
there,’
he
quips,
rather
tastelessly,
perhaps.

‘And
what
about
Nine?’

‘Sorry?’

‘My
cat.’

‘Yeah.
There’s
a
no
pets
policy,
but
I
reckon
Carly’ll
be
sweet
with
having
a
cat.’
He
gets
out
his
pen
again.
‘Shall
we,
then?
We
need
a
witness.’
He
looks
across
at
Doreen
who’s
ostentatiously
absorbed
in
doing
something
to
her
till.

My
breath
is
short.
This
is
it.
He
summons
Doreen,
who
stomps
grumpily
across.

‘What
now?’

Stephen
explains.
The
pencilled
eyebrows
rise
like
wings.
‘No
skin
off
my
nose,’
she
says.

‘Incidentally,’
I
say,
‘compared
to
your
young
colleague
yesterday,
your
coffee
is
first
rate.’

She
gives
a
little
moué
–
pleased,
I
think.

The
pen
is
thick
between
my
fingers,
shiny,
hard
to
hold.
My
name
emerges
as
a
trembly
scrawl,
the
signature
of
a
half-wit.
Doreen
leans
over
and
puts
her
name,
quite
neat
and
childish
underneath.

Stephen
sits
back,
runs
his
hand
through
his
hair.
‘Phew,’
he
says.
He
glows
with
triumph
and
pleasure
and
some
of
it
reflects
on
me.
‘Thank
you,’
he
adds,
to
Doreen
and,
of
course,
to
me.

‘Is
that
the
lot?’
Doreen
returns
to
the
queue
that
has
been
building.

‘Give her a big tip,’ I say and Stephen extracts from his wallet a
£10
note.

‘Of course, there’ll be lots more paperwork,’ he says, ‘but we can conduct all that from your new home. I’ll pop in tomorrow, shall I? See how you’re settling in.’

Since I am adamant that I don’t want any strangers in Little Egypt till after I have left, we arrange that a taxi will meet me in front of U-Save at 2 o’clock.

‘But what about your luggage?’ Stephen says. ‘You’ll need help with that.’

‘No luggage,’ I say. ‘I want to start anew.’

‘Nothing?’

‘Nothing I can’t get in my trolley.’

‘Fair dos,’ he says and stands. He leaves the £10 on the table and, once I’ve struggled to my feet, he shakes my hand.

‘But you need to come and get the cat,’ I say.

‘I’m on my way to the office . . .’ he says, then shrugs. ‘It’ll have to wait in the car is that OK?’

‘She,’ I say.

I take him onto the bridge and leave him at the gate. Nine is curled as usual on the table. An old cat, shedding hairs, she’s docile and droopy in my arms as I carry her out. Stephen waits on the bridge, leaning over the parapet to watch the flow of traffic. Nine stiffens and her claws come out and catch Stephen a nasty scratch on the chin during the transfer through the gate.

‘See you on Thursday,’ he says over his shoulder as he tussles with the hissing, struggling Nine, and oh I do feel a traitor as they go. But Stephen is a good boy and she’ll be looked after. That’s my last responsibility gone, except for the spudgies, and now I’ll set them free.

O
UTSIDE THE ENTRANCE
to U-SAVE’s brand new
homestore
, a brass band plays carols beneath a sparkling giant of a Christmas tree. There’s a carousel in the car park, clowns on stilts, and Santa-hatted assistants in orange and turquoise uniforms distribute sweets and vouchers.

A taxi draws up as close to the doors as it can get, and from its window Sisi gawps. Lovely Surinder, her dedicated ‘friend’ opens the door and, as gently as he can, hauls her out. She’s like a sack of potatoes, she knows it, fattened right up on all the lovely food, pumped up like a tyre with cream cakes every single afternoon and cocoa in the evenings to help her sleep, though sleep’s a waste of time what with all the television she’s got to watch. What a marvellous invention! He hauls her out to stand on the family land.

Inside the colossal structure, she tilts her head back to look up at the walls of glittering glasses, saucepans, mountains of candles and an area the size of the ballroom entirely dedicated to bedding. Surinder takes her up the moving staircase to where they have it all laid out in rooms without walls, where she wanders for an hour, touching fabrics, sliding open drawers, peeking inside empty wardrobes; it’s rather overwhelming. There’s a feeling inside her she doesn’t quite recognize or like. What would Osi say? Is his ghost floating here; bewildered amongst the swatches, the choice of glossy finishes?

If Mary’s here, she’ll like it fine.

There’s no way of calculating where the icehouse would be.

And no way of knowing if they’re still there – Mary, Osi, the missing kitten. A sob rises in her. Surinder takes her arm and rubs her back, the way she likes.

‘Come on, Sisi,’ he says. ‘You’re getting tired. Let’s get you a nice cup of tea.’

The café is vast, and part of it done over for children, with dinky chairs and bright plastic toys. Christmas jingles play and tinsel twizzles above the tables. They find a seat beside the window and Surinder brings her a mug of tea and a flaky mince pie with cream, which goes down well, pushing with it the lump in her throat.

Of course, Osi is not here; he’s gone. As she will be before too long. As even the excited children with balloons will be eventually. And this glittering palace: one day it will be derelict and the bulldozers will do for it. And what will they put here next?

She chomps the last of her mince pie, feels energy returning and smiles. Of course it will change, it will change and change and change and go on changing until the ending of the world.

From the high window, she can see the railway line, and all at once, she gets her bearings. ‘Come on, dear, drink up,’ she tells Surinder. She leads him through the store. If that is the direction of the railway line, then it must be round about here. The icehouse and its contents.

They go downstairs and walk through Storage Solutions and Home Decoration into Lighting, into a dazzle of candelabras, lamps and lampshades; there must be thousands of twinkling bulbs.

‘What are we looking for?’ asks Surinder.

Sisi catches sight of a lampshade and squints. ‘Get me that one,’ she says.

‘You want it for your room?’

He lifts it down and she squints closer and laughs.

‘What?’

She’s bending over now, and laughing in a way that’s more like vomiting or crying, she can’t stop the torrent of hilarity.

‘Is she all right?’ someone asks Surinder.

He stands uselessly holding the bloody lampshade with its Tutankhamen design, and she cannot stop the laughing and doesn’t even care when pee runs hotly down her legs.

‘I’d get her home,’ a woman in a Santa hat advises.

‘This was my home,’ she says, when she can straighten up. ‘You’re only here because of me.’

‘Come on, Sisi,’ Surinder says. He holds her arm in that way he has, gentle and strong, and they take a taxi back right to the lap of luxury.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

With thanks to Andrew Greig, Bill Hamilton, Tracey Emerson, Ron Butlin, Regi Claire and Claire Gilmour. And to the Society of Authors who honoured me with a Somerset Maugham Award in 1991. Without this award, which I used to visit Egypt, I would never have written this novel.