Lomita For Ever Read online

  She sat first, then her legs were helped and swung to line up with her body. A clear two actions. Doors slammed, the engine started. Not an exciting sound, just a massive sound of solid power. Spreading across the concrete like a sheet. American: like the continent.

  The car reversed, the window on the passenger side lowered and the black glasses spoke.

  ‘Can I return the favour?’

  Ever had a look of blankness on his face at the question. Had he heard? Yes, he was just not expecting any further acknowledgement of his presence.

  ‘Is this your final destination?’

  The humour was evident in her tone.

  ‘No, just a stop on the way.’

  ‘To?’

  Again the blank look, which he now understood to be a wave of stoned face.

  ‘Would you like a ride?’

  ‘Thank you.’

  Came the unthought-out reply. There seemed no other. He got up from down, and moved towards the black mass. He dropped the smoke and stood, giving her an opportunity for closer appraisal, a chance to change her mind. He wasn’t pushing, he didn’t want to. She must have approved of the viewing, which he extended, now, without facing her, his foot taking its time to flatten the roach into the concrete.

  ‘Please. Hop in.’

  What were her eyes like? And where would he say he was going?

  In that order came the thoughts. Occupying his brain to deny a valid and assessed response to her invitation. Those thoughts and the overwhelming desire to hold her in his arms.

  With love, and maybe the slightest little bit of lust.

  And maybe the result of the marijuana.

  *

  The sprinklers on the grass and the magnolia leaves had left a glisten.

  That the sun toyed with in its own time. The black mass car pulled into the drive of the large 1950s ranch house on North Oakhurst Drive. One of the few that had not been demolished and turned into a mansion bulging out of the restriction of the perimeter that limited its expanse, like fat surrounded by a belt.

  The wood was freshly painted grey, the Mexican was now questioning the old lady about asking the man for tea, and he presumed, as the second part was in Spanish, that maybe there was a stronger opinion about letting him into the car in the first place. The voice dominant, over the now-reduced volume of the music. The explanation was returned in English, from the old lady, that he was from England and that is what they liked at this time of the afternoon. They had sat in silence, apart from the invitation; the lack of questioning struck his chemically calmed brain as just a little strange. He inhaled the smell of leather and the strong scent coming from the passenger. Chanel No 5.

  The same scent his mother used to wear.

  Not too disturbing.

  Well, a bit.

  *

  ‘Help me. Your arm, please. Manita will put the car in the garage.’

  Garage came out old American, the same stress on both syllables – English inflection. The rest was American, with just the faintest rounding of the r at the end of car.

  Manita drove the black mass back down the driveway to what he assumed was the garage at the side of the house, on Elevado, and disappeared from view. But the journey continued in his head to satisfy his imagination; he wondered just how cross Manita really was.

  The big brown front door opened into a big brown panelled hallway, that opened without restriction on to a big brown panelled room, with the garden and pool beyond. All this was seen in one panoramic sweep of eye. The two enormous sofas were covered in white, a soft white linen; save for two standard lamps and a baby grand piano in black, that was all the room was wearing.

  He thought that if anyone really played the piano in a room this size they would have a Steinway Concert Grand. The full nine feet. There were no paintings on the panels and no pictures.

  He still hadn’t seen her eyes but, as he turned, her right arm lifted from his to the black glasses; they obeyed gravity, slipping from her grasp, and she fumbled them to the brown wooden floor. He still couldn’t see her eyes, her head having travelled towards the fallen pair.

  ‘I’ll get them.’

  Seeing him bend to pick them up, she did too, without the noise that often accompanies the old and movement; both heads raised at the same time, then he saw her eyes and she looked into his.

  ‘Thank you.’

  Came from below her eyes and they were blue. A dark blue, the whites still clear and strong, despite the age that burdened her.

  ‘Shall we have our tea now?’

  ‘Thank you. Please.’

  Politesse times two; the wrong way round. A door slammed in another space beyond them. Manita returning from the garage access at the back of the house.

  ‘Manita. Tea please, if you don’t mind.’

  A surprising strength carried the voice into the place beyond. The bolero jacket and skirt Chanel-ed its way onto the sofa and he sat opposite, feeling full of manners and convention. He was placed in her life; so far there had been no effort and no need for lying.

  He was in his outlet Armani, quite the gentle man, a gentleman.

  Chapter Four

  The little boy spent most of his time on his own.

  Well, he had parents, and there were the neighbours: Spasha and Roy, from Greece, who seemed often more present in his life than his parents.

  He was nine years old and small for his age.

  The reason for the neighbour-focus probably stemmed from his mother being slammed against the headboard, the blood crawling down her face. This was a solitary incident that for some reason never coloured the feelings he had for his father and never brought a sympathy for his mother. Even at that age he felt clear about this emotion. But also because they became a safe refuge, Spasha and Roy that is, after he was accused, he was convinced, wrongly, of arson.

  He liked to dig holes, big holes at the top of the garden which backed on to a wheat field. It was midsummer and hot. The reason for the holes was so that he could put the old tent that his father had, and his father had had before him, in a faded heavy green canvas, a simple classic pointed tent like a slice of cake the other way up and not very long, and peg it down to surround the dug out earth. It was just long enough to lie down in. The hole, which was like a trench in the ground, meant that Ever, being short for his age, could almost stand when at the apex of the tent.

  When darkness descended, he could be found at the bottom of the garden, lighting a fire; he would have a potato ready to throw into the ashes to cook and then he could feel like a man living in the wilderness, a survivor, in the rough outback of the suburban Midlands. The fire produced, as it does, sparks, and the wind, as it does, found one, or may have been two, of these unsuspecting embers, the little bits of burning wood, and the swirling wind, with its deceptive knowledge, carried them towards the wheat field just feet away, through the pieces of upright wood posts, at two-foot intervals, connected by wire that constituted the fence.

  It was dry, very dry, being midsummer. Within minutes a fire had started and he stared at the fire; it began to snake its way through the wheat. His first appreciation, beyond the flames, the colour of the flames, was the crackling noise and then the wafts of heat, carried towards him on the swirl that also carried the smell, the rich, depth of dark smell. And the black smoke that hung, blocking the moon in the sky.

  The world had changed in minutes, transformed in all physical aspects, into a display of beauty, but it had caused destruction. There he realised the opposites, that both had a wonder, the purity of the golden wheat field blowing without concern and then the fire that had changed its life, killed its future. Stopped it from existing in the form it was intended to in life. No longer in the image of creation but in the image of destruction. Why were both so truly wonderful? It made him warm and he felt protected.

  Then he realised the fire was devouring, spreading across this field, he could hear shouts from the other side of the fence. He still didn’t feel he had done anything
wrong, as he felt he was able to deny to himself that it was his fault, and then the sound of fire engines could be heard, they were driving up the field, up the hill from the neighbour’s side which was the last house in the row. Two fire engines.

  He thought he should move, make an effort; their hoses powered water over what was now a field of black; not golden anymore. Killing his orange night. He stood up to watch. Eventually, with barely anything left of the wheat field, acres of blackness now, the fire was brought under control. And then he remembers being questioned, first by the firemen, then a furious farmer appeared, then the police, and everybody was looking at him and asking him questions and then, and then, and then, oh God, why? He was accused of starting the fire.

  He stood there looking and listening to this anger directed towards him. The shouting. He denied it because he genuinely believed he hadn’t – started the fire, that is. He didn’t have to go through the effort of lying, he could make no connection between the fire and himself. He was left with his mother, now screaming at him; his father wasn’t there. But his own fire, outside his tent, was there, smouldering, evidence, undeniable.

  He was so small.

  The police said they would return. He looked at his fire, that was now almost out, and could see that his potato was almost ruined, burnt to a hard, black lump. He ran, he ran to the neighbours on the other side who were also now returning to their house after the commotion. To Spasha and Roy, who made him baked beans on toast, put bits of bacon in it, and tinned tomatoes. This was something he had never tasted with baked beans before. Bacon and tomatoes. He loved it. So loved it. And they weren’t cross with him and he sat with them, knowing that when he went home his mother would hit him with a wooden spoon.

  But the lasting memory of that evening was the baked beans, with bacon and tomato.

  And his burnt potato.

  And the beauty of it all.

  Chapter Five

  The United States of America has a Cancer.

  Or rather a Moon Child birth sign, as the association with a terminal disease is not the connection a positivity-obsessed nation likes to make. July 4th – its birthday.

  Astrologically, the vibrations of Palm Springs were perfectly tuned to his. But as both the world and Ever appear to vibrate at 7.83 Hz this was not conclusive reasoning.

  Perhaps, then, his return to Palm Springs was encouraged by the frequency of UFO sightings in the area, and Ever’s desire to have a symbiotic relationship with the alien travellers. It had been tried, not in Palm Springs, but tried. He had lain naked outside for a night, save for a T-shirt inscribed with lipstick-red writing – FREE SPERM HERE – a descending vertical arrow pointing to his genitalia. This event was not conducted without the ingestion of mind-altering chemicals. No sperm, however, was taken to consummate Ever’s dream, the creation of the HUMIEN race. This only gave conviction to his belief that they didn’t want his sperm because he was actually one of them. They had already placed him on earth. He was the experiment.

  The word to define this new race had caused him some concern. Humanalien. The combination could have gone towards hum-anal-ien. But the prospect of a race of anals always brought him back to HUMIEN. He was young.

  *

  There are some things in life you have to take control over.

  It was astrologically determined that he should be there.

  The events that were to happen there were the predictions of his psychic.

  His therapist should have been told, and, thank God, his doctor wasn’t needed.

  Yet.

  The four horsemen – Astrologist, Psychic, Therapist, Doctor – the dependent Ever needed these four in the absence of human closeness in the life that was left to him, to do his depending and avoid his own personal apocalypse.

  *

  This convergence of energy, linked to the ever-flexible plasticity of the brain, seemed to give him comfort, made it feel appropriate when approached, sitting down for brunch in the Parker hotel. A brunch that had replaced his inability to play a round of golf in memory of his father. He had stood on the first tee. Had addressed the ball. And had dropped a tear and left.

  The first beat – his psychic’s prediction proved correct: the approach of a girl with intent. A sexual intent.

  The name to beware of was Tracy. This Tracy was supposed to have HIV.

  And at the same time, this eventuality, this person called Tracy, would change his life.

  Well presumably if you contracted HIV your life would be changed. That was Ever’s interpretation anyway.

  ‘I saw you from over there.’

  Not difficult – his comment, unvoiced, uncharacteristically judgemental.

  ‘I thought I would come over and say hello.’

  ‘Hello.’

  Was his spontaneously feeble reply.

  ‘Anne.’

  She spoke with a lilt and a tilt of her head and a smile.

  This second beat, though, brought relief. He thought no more about it when the name was offered. Anne. An Anne, an antidote – a wonder, but a bit of an anticlimax.

  With an enjoyment, he felt the concern crawl through the sludge to the back of his mind and extinguish.

  Fuck it, who could go wrong with an Anne, and she looked fine, well fine-ish, if a little high on the acne scale, covered in thick make-up, concealing bumps as opposed to white-headed, pus-filled spots. Bumps were un-poppable and in the long term, far more devastating to the face that housed them. Hard immovable mounds – cystic. Ever was dermatologically skimming the surface.

  ‘Hi Anne. Ever. My name is Ever.’

  ‘I will love you, Ever, forever.’

  Anne didn’t miss a beat.

  Ever, in perfect syncopation, replied,

  ‘That’s what my mother said.’

  ‘But you didn’t fuck your mother.’

  Silence was the only response. Not a calculated response, but a genuinely shocked, silent one.

  ‘Did you?’

  She said having interpreted the silence from her perspective.

  And then, when he still couldn’t summon up a reply, she just started laughing.

  And so did he, muttering a distracted and distant,

  ‘No.’

  A syllable amidst the exhalation of tone-filled breath.

  It really made him question the question himself.

  But he made the decision, acne or not, that a fuck would not be out of the question.

  Chapter Six

  Ever had done a turnaround in the womb.

  Or rather his soul had.

  This is what he always felt.

  You choose the parents that are going to nurture you into the world. Hoping you have a better time than the last time around – or you may feel you have some lessons to learn. Always appeared a dodgy reason, that did, because even spirits must be wanting to give themselves a break when they come back again. Make an easy choice. Who wants to buy into pain and suffering?

  Anyway, for him, he realised this halfway through the pregnancy, and removed his soul from the process. The earthly arguments that he was witnessing from the comfort of the womb became too much and the idea of entering this world with his soul, to this parentage, was bleak.

  Then what happened to the foetus, the baby, soulless? Who was born then? Did he return or did another soul come down and hitch a ride? Who was the sickly boy, gasping for breath, clinging to his mother? Was he really just waiting for the soul to return and take pity and fill him with spirit? Is that why he was always at the point of death from his lungs? The lungs the source of grief; the physical manifestation of grief. Asthma, bronchitis, pneumonia; these were Ever’s defining character points. A boy defined by illness. Expressing everything through illness. Painfully shy, as his soul hadn’t arrived to fill him with passion and purpose.

  Yet.

  He was waiting, for his human being-ness to be completed. He was a vessel with no rudder; the only things that could fulfil him and fill him were animal desires, food and
sensual base feeling. A reptilian brain. He was a bit like a dog. Responding to the senses, heat, cold, smell, noise. He explored the immediacy of his environment without judgement. The judgement that the presence of an old soul can give, that had-been-here-before, déjà vu; so his knowledge was acquired in the absence of experience.

  But when would the soul or new soul, or indeed any old soul, come back?

  *

  No, it was him. He thought it was him. He had to think it was him. Because he could never know if it wasn’t him because he could never have the realisation of it not being him because he would never have the concept of realising if it wasn’t.

  It had to be him.

  Take him or leave him.

  He took it. Him.

  Yes. It was his soul, it had come back and he should just lump it.

  The Angels had done their work.

  Chapter Seven

  Tea arrived with attitude and broke the silence that had allowed them both to sit.

  Sit there as if. Sit there as if they had sat many afternoons before, contemplating the stagnancy of the leaves in the pool that moved with the gentle breeze, not with the mechanical consequence of filtration.

  Birds of paradise lined the perimeter of the pool and looked like they should be appreciated as an exotic plant, but somehow betrayed an ordinariness, like a tourist standing out of place in the wrong clothing.

  The yellow-y orange-y and the blue-y purple-y. Just the wrong colours, the wrong hue. Ever was big on hue. Somehow, nature had taken a little break, had a little moment of taste relapse.

  ‘Milk? Sugar? No, you can’t have sugar, no one should.’

  She took away the need for a response.

  He was consoled, he didn’t want sweetening anyway, but revelled imperceptibly in the control that he interpreted as care. It was nice to be cared for. To be thought about. Considered. He just hoped she would give him milk.