Higher Ed (24 page)

“Liv, when a bloke says he wants to get to know you, means he doesn’t fancy you,” Jasmine says, with her head upside down, dangling off the bed, so that she really does look like a puppet. “Means maybe he wants help with his coursework but not that he wants anything romantic.” Jasmine smacks her lips because she still thinks she’s got big ones and her new boy is from Grenada and even if she did shag a dead dude she’s back into trying to be West Indian. From this angle her mouth does look mega. “And you can get who you like, don’t need no Arab who can’t spell,” she says.

“Shut the fuck up, Jaz. Shut your ugly lips.” Olivia picks up her satchel and makes a show of putting books back into it so that she can walk out of this hellhole of a house where mother and daughter are God and the Devil playing draughts. Jasmine’s upside-down eyes go wide and she sits up, then stands, furiously, like she has heard what Olivia was thinking, and shit, what’s happening? Is Olivia in some freaky place now where absolutely nothing is kept inside?

“Right,” she says as she too stands.

“What’s the matter with you?” Jasmine says.

When Olivia is silent for too long, Jasmine walks over to her, holds her hand and pulls her down gently to sit with her on the floor. Olivia follows like it’s a dance, and they sit face to face at the foot of the bed. Olivia can smell Jasmine’s breath and it is sweet like she has been chewing on fruity Mentos. Jasmine touches Olivia’s shoulder and the sweetness and the little tickle of fingers cause a lump to form in Olivia’s throat. She can see why blokes get all gooey over Jasmine; she understands that now.

“Filigree …” she whispers.

“What?”

“Nothing. I’m sorry, Jaz, didn’t mean to snap before.”

“Your dad is just your dad, you know. It’s mums who do all the work and mums who get left, even if she did turf him out—you found out why yet?”

Olivia shakes her head and then takes Jaz’s hand off her shoulder and folds her fingers into Jasmine’s—doughy, smooth. Jasmine’s fingers rub hers, and there is calm.

“I’m a virgin,” Olivia says softly.

Jasmine’s fingers stop their rubbing and go all alert and stiff.

“Hoooo!” Jasmine’s laugh is long and pigeon-like. She can’t control herself now. “Ah! Whh …” she holds her tummy … “What, they making born-again virgins these days?” Jasmine manages to squeeze out in her fake West Indian accent. “You think Nasar wants a virgin, is that it? Some Arab shite you’re riffing on?” Olivia’s fingers fly-away-home from Jasmine’s, who pigeon-laughs again and it must be her new boyfriend who has taught her this. Her new hench hubz who is a garage house DJ in some basement off Romford Road. What would Ed think about Jasmine?

“Flipping,” slips out, but Jasmine doesn’t react; she’s still hooooing.

The boombox speaker is scratchy; embarrassing, man. Borrowed from Ed’s neighbour who plays music too loud, the sound is raunch but at least he has tried. Olivia is the only one in the pew of the Rippleside chapel, so for her alone he plays this hymn he found on a CD of greatest hymns in the check-out queue at Tesco. He tried out a few others—“Abide with Me,” “There Is a Green Hill Far Away,” “The Lord Is My Shepherd, I’ll Not Want”—but this one has the best melody, and the words, well … 
now I’m found
.

He sings along with the recording of “Amazing Grace.” This feels good, and he sees in Olivia’s face that it is. He is one step closer today to losing his job, now that the council has outlined what the new Safe and Sorrow office will look like, so he sings a little louder than he normally would. He is singing for Jonathan Henley. Jonathan was sixty-three years old, lived at 29 Fanshawe Crescent, alone in a garden flat where he’d been for twenty-two years. Notice of the death came on the day that Ed’s foot ached so badly in the joints where his arthritis flared that it was difficult to put the foot down on the floor when he got out of bed. He cursed that pain, despised it so. By the time he reached work the pain had
lessened, but he remembers it now, remembers it with gratitude as he sings for Jonathan who has no pain. The man’s flat from the outside looked fine enough, but inside—oh man. The place was littered with newspapers as though Jonathan had kept every edition of the
Times
, the
Sunday Times
, the
Times Literary Supplement
—a whole lotta
times
for Jon—that he’d read since he moved in. The paint was peeling off walls and the banister; books filled their cases and lay piled high on the floors. The man had some fine learning. According to the neighbour who stood at the door while Ed did his work, Jonathan’s learning was the thing that kept him apart from his neighbours, kept him to himself. “A friendly enough man,” said the woman whose alluvial voice gave Ed goosebumps, “but we always thought he didn’t like to talk, only liked to think, so we didn’t really try—when he was away we assumed it was with family. How wrong we can be sometimes.” The woman was in her fifties and trim, and she looked to him for more talk, but Ed silently noted the pain in his foot, thanked her, and left with plans to return with the removals team. Why for rass’ sake was he always running away? He’s seen a few women over the years, had sex if he could get it, but whenever there’s a woman who seems like she could actually know him: not a chance. Surely Catherine is waiting for him to come home.

Jonathan Henley will be buried, not cremated, so Ed has had to arrange the pallbearers and hearse to drive the few yards to the communal grave—a half dozen in this one already. He and Olivia follow the hearse towards the far east corner of Rippleside Cemetery. Olivia is quiet, contemplating, and Ed is hush-hush in the spell of this young woman.

The coffin is lowered, the priest says his words of dust, of ashes, and just like that it starts to rain.

“Jonathan might like this,” Olivia says.

Ed looks at his puzzle of a daughter. “Why do you say that?”

“I don’t know, you never know—some people like rain.” And he sees now. She doesn’t care what it is that they know about Jonathan, as long as they have wondered, for even one moment, what he might have been like.

And the man with his face in the Mazaruni River, his arms splayed, and his legs floating like dry branches? The least Ed could have done was stop long enough to wonder.

At the A13, after the funeral, Olivia is calm, and even though there is so much they will never get back, there is something better between them, the way intentions are more solid than dreams.

“And the job?” Olivia asks after their tea has arrived.

He doesn’t want to worry her, but a shake of his head has her bobbing again. “It’s fine, fine … I know how to find work,” he says to reassure her.

“You need to invite them to one of these—I’ll talk to Robin again,” she says, and her voice is macaw-pitch, her breath quick.

He looks up at her. “You think I’m a joke, right?”

“What? No …” And she sits forward in the brown vinyl chair. A clang comes from the kitchen. Ed listens for the comforting bright hiss of something frying, but he can’t hear a sound.

“I think it’s time you and Catherine talked,” Olivia says. This is not what he’s been angling for; still, his shoulders rise.

“Is that what she wants?” Ed says, trying to shush the hope from his voice.

“Yeah,” she says, and oh man, oh man.

“Good-good. That’s good,” says Ed.

“I will set that up then.”

And now it is he who is bobbing, and the sounds of the A13 turn buzzy, and it’s all he can do not to stand up and pull her across the table to him. Silly rasshole. He calms himself.

“Well,” he says.

She gathers up the things around her, puts them in her satchel.

Each of Robin’s voicemail messages tastes like sand. She cannot understand how this is so, because she has never experienced the taste of words before now. From working at Epicure her taste has become more sensitive. She knows the taste of every ingredient in the chocolate hazelnut ganache. And she knows how they make gianduja curls for the top.

In Robin’s message he tells her that they must talk, that he loves her, that they will find a way to help her mother. Maybe his colleague will let Beata stay in her home for very little, or in exchange for some housework because his colleague’s children have grown up and many rooms have been left free. Perhaps there will be room for both Beata and Katrin. There are arrangements that can be made. But in the days since she last saw him, her back turned towards the door as he left, her eyes on the dirty dishes from their dinner in the sink, she has not heard what she has wanted in his voice. There is no sound of changing his mind about Emma in his voice.

She is so stupid.

“Katrin, you are dreaming,” Alejandro says over her shoulder. “You must make coffee while you dream.” Epicure is busy,
but she cannot concentrate or remember the orders or make enough coffee.

“Al, I am tired, will you take over for me, just a minute?”

Alejandro stares at her like she has sworn at him. “Tired?” His face has no sympathy. “Maybe you should sleep not shag on the nights before work.” He uses his elbow to push her a little to the side, and he opens a bag of espresso. Katrin hates him. But just for one minute until she remembers that he is on her side.

“I’m very sorry,” she says and takes the bag from him and continues her job. “I’m sorry.” She looks at him and nods, to make certain he believes her. He leaves the counter to serve a customer.

Not all landlords will stop two people living in a bedsit. If she takes the flat in Walthamstow she will need another job along with Epicure to pay the rent. Or her mother must find a job as soon as she arrives. If they move even farther away from the centre the travel will be expensive and she will still need more money. She could take more work from Claire. She could work at the new Epicure in Soho. Katrin washes her hands. The buzz against her thigh tells her there is a text message. She has forgotten to leave her phone in the back room with her coat. She reaches into her pocket.

You don’t have to respond, but I wanted you to know I’m thinking about you constantly, and that I am holding you in my heart
.

No, don’t hold me in your heart, Katrin wants to tell him. Don’t think about me. She reads the message again and wonders why he does not say that he will tell Emma that he loves Katrin who will be living with him. It is because Emma demands to be primary with the father of her child, and Katrin has for a long time—with her father, mother, lovers, Ania—been secondary in
her own life. This thought brings the weight of a boulder onto her chest.

“For fuck’s sake, this is basic … you are not on a break, we are busy. What are you playing at?” Claire’s voice has made the boulder move from chest to stomach. Claire has money in her hands. Rolls of notes and bags of coins that she is bringing to the till where she has stopped to find Katrin staring at her phone. Katrin who has no words again. This has all been coming. All the hours of working with Claire have been coming to this when she will feel the smallest she has felt in her life and it will be her own fault. “Al is taking all the tables; you are checking your phone—is there any part of this picture that I shouldn’t fire your arse over?”

Katrin’s eyes fall closed for only one second but she would like to keep them closed. She turns to face Claire. “I’m having trouble now. It will not last; it is just for now,” she tells her.

Claire shakes her head and turns towards the cash register. She pours the coins from the bag. She flips open the trap for the notes and fills tens and twenties in the slots. Her face does not change. Katrin has stood up to the snake and there is a small twinge of pleasure in her chest. She is learning how to be in England.

Robin has sent two more texts by the time she wakes the next day. These make her weak because he has said things that only they know the meaning of. He has repeated their secrets and their words of love in the night and the words of songs they have sung together. These texts are not helping. They confuse how she feels with what she must do. She must take the flat in Walthamstow today and she must ask Claire for hours at Epicure Soho. And she must not think
in the second person. She must think with I in every thought. I have remembered to do everything for this week, she says to herself, and there is toilet paper, dish soap and milk in the fridge.

It is grey but warm outside. It will be Easter soon. On the 38 bus there are no schoolchildren today. Next week will be the days of Crucifixion and Resurrection. Beata will be on her knees at church and not thinking about London, so that is good. Beata loves the Holy St. Mary church in Gdansk as much as she loves her daughter, so this week Mary will look after her.

“It will be dead today,” Alejandro says when Katrin arrives at Epicure. Claire is not yet in, and this feels like a bad omen.

“There are reasons to thank Christ,” Katrin says and he gives her a thumb up. She loves Alejandro when they are like this. “And maybe Claire is one of the dead,” she adds but feels guilty; she doesn’t mean this.

“She’s at the Soho branch. She’ll be in later.”