Isabella
I turned the computer off and transferred the quote into my diary, along with my overly average date with Nicolas. I usually start my morning with some stretching, music or cleaning, but I couldn’t escape it. Nicolas was as un-moved as I when we left each other at the gate last night.
Beneath my window, commuters line up at chicken shops to stuff their faces on the bar stools before work. They cover the tables in sauce and clear their wrappers into diabetic bins. They argue. I aim to sidestep it, but walking to work I’m delayed by another loud protest. I would like to see some of these occupy kids on the streets of Africa or India even.
…
I walk into the coffee house and hear Carl hovering behind
the till, “She won’t actually come, and if she does, I will know she’s...”
He doesn’t notice me till I am literally pushing up behind
him.
“She just might Carl, I expect she's attached”
Linda see’s me and gives me the stoned smile,
“Hi hun. How was Nicolas then?”
I nod it off, she’s more interested in the full-scale
breakdown behind. Carl has dropped the coffee tray and bends over the
burnt scrapings mumbling.
“I can’t be dealing with this guys, not today, not today”
Linda leans back from the sink.
“Come on babe. Ask Isabel what you asked me.”
Carl has finished his bad job on the floor and hurries to
the front entrance,
“If she comes in, I’m not here”
Linda leans her head out the kitchen.
“Ask Isabel Carl”
He looks over at me, his lanky frame bouncing from foot
to foot.
“Ok, yeah. If you woke up next to a strange man Isabel. Would
you decide to follow him into work the next day”.
Linda laughs, looking over to me with the, oh how hopeless
he is eyes. The one's we use more often now we’ve both slept with him.
“Uh, probably no”
I say. Linda laughs.
“It’s not really like that though is it?”
Carl has stopped bouncing and walks in long strides to
the counter,
“Yeah, I kinda invited her then I guess”
I pat the short black stubble of his chin and he squeezes behind
me.
“Seriously Isabel,
if she comes in, I’m guna fucking drop down here, behind this thing, and I’m
guna make this sign with my hands”
Carl points his thumbs and forefingers in a V-shape up at me.
“And what should I do?”
He leans over the counter at eye level with me.
“If I do that Isabel, and make that sign. You fucking carry on
making the coffee like it’s all cool.”
I smile.
“Don’t laugh, this my life
right here.”
Linda comes out of the kitchen doorway, wiping her hands on
a pile of serviettes.
“Tell her the best part Carlos.”
Carl holds a finger up to her mouth to stop her speaking.
She fights it off,
“Go on Carlos, tell her the absolute best part.”
She grabs a coffee stirrer from the side and holds it like a
knife towards him. Carl grabs her by the sides and pulls her body in front of
him to hide from me. He pokes his head out from behind the slender brown
shoulder.
“She told me she was suicidal”
“What?”
“I know”
“Crazy bitch. I’m in it, I’m like, inside of her. And we’re
fucking, and her face starts to get all screwed up and she’s shaking and that,
and I’m thinking it’s on you know. And she’s going and going, and she grabs me
round the back of the neck, pulls my ear to her mouth like she’s about to
explode, and then fucking whispers it”
At this point Linda bursts out laughing and Carl looks about
as lost as I’ve ever seen him.
“And what happened then?”
The six-foot male shakes his head like a confused toddler.
“I don’t know. I mean, I think she came, but I’m not sure. It
was messed up man. Like messed”
5 hours later
“Can I get a skinny mocha and one of those Panini things
from up there yes?”
The afternoon rush and as usual we’re low on milk. I look
sideways for Carl but he’s not fucking there, then I feel a tug on my foot.
“That is her Isabel, that’s her”
Carl throws the sign up at my heels like a dog. And yes, joining
the back of the line, a skinny tall chick with no breasts and last nights clothes
on. I continue to serve customers while the overgrown ignant hides beneath my
feet gesturing humorous apologies.
As the woman comes closer, I watch. 35 maybe, her left heel
tapping the wooden floor like a woodpecker. When she reaches the till, she keeps
her eyes to her phone screen and speaks the order quickly. And then they flash
up to mine,
“And is, um, is Carl there?”
I’m expecting it yes, but still caught off guard. I step
back and look down, Carl squeezing his eyes closed at my feet.
“Um, Carl. Uh, no, no I haven’t seen him in today. Sorry, a
black coffee was it?”
The woman looks back to her phone, her voice shaking
slightly.
“He’s not here? He said he would be here till 8:00 today”
I hide my face behind the machine and run a load of empty
steam into the cup.
“Yeah, I no, it’s weird, he was supposed to be here today.
Maybe he got held up on the way or something.”
Carl pulls on my leg hard.
“No, no, actually. I think his sister was pregnant, yeah.
Yeah, his sister was due today I think.”
I laugh nervously and watch the thick black liquid dribble
into the cup
“He must have got the call maybe. Milk?”
The woman looks up at me, white faced and wide eyed.
“No, no milk”
She holds my eyes. She can see it, her nostrils flaring out
in deep breaths.
“You tell him. I need to talk to him today ok. You tell him him,
I’ll be waiting for his call”
I pass the burning cup across the counter top.
“I will tell him”
3 hours later.
“Why are you pissed at me?”
Carl has quit stacking his side of the room to concentrate
on the question.
“You haven’t spoke to me all afternoon, you’re pissed off,
why?”
I complete my side and look down the neat stacks of chairs
beside their tables.
“I’m not pissed off at you Carl, are you going to finish
that?”
I start on his side,
“I can hear it in the fucking stacking Isabel. I really would rather apologise to you. If you can tell
me what it is”
The annoying thing is, as I cannot be bothered to answer, I
can see Carl telling the story, telling his friends tonight that he shouldn’t
fuck girls he works with because they only get fucking crazy. And then even
worse, telling himself, that I’m probably just jealous. I still want him.
Carl walks over and stands in front of me, shouting up into
the ceiling dramatically.
“Linda can you come out here urgently please”
Linda walks from the kitchen and stands crossed arms at the
counter.
“This is an employee dispute Linda, and seen as you are the
manager, and thus HR directive, I believe it is your business, and that”
She leans back and cracks up, covering her mouth with the
dishcloth in that sweet European way she does.
“Carl I’m very busy ok, can you please get on with it?”
Carl holds up his finger,
“Yes. Finally, and with you as my witness, I can state, that
the problem I believe to be occurring with employee Isabel over there.”
He points the finger to me.
“Is that she has some kind of problem with me sleeping
around with girls, or having one night stands, or something of like that”
I can feel Linda turning to me with that fucking hopeless
smile again. Carl shouts on.
“Am I right Isabel?”
He shakes his finger in the air and I keep my eyes to the
floor and speak slowly.
“I haven’t done anything Carl. You have started shouting,
instead of finishing your work.”
I can only hope that Linda has picked up on the lack of humour
in my voice, although as she laughs and starts to speak, it seems she hasn’t.
“Um, Carl. I’m going to have to say, that there is not enough
evidence for your claim, so, stand down”
Carl grows louder,
“No”
He moves closer to me, shaking his finger out in front.
“I will not be silenced. I have further evidence… listen up.
He turns his body three sixty, holding his hands up to the
air.
It seems to me, and anyone in this court who isn’t fucking
blind, that ever since me and Isabel here, sorry, I and Isabel- spent the night together.
Which I add, was her idea. She has been shitty with me at many points and over
many indecipherable issues. What I conclude, and what I am saying, judge Linda-
is that the incident today was just another of these… catalysts. Another of
these reasons for Mary here- to act unfairly against me”
As Carl ends the speech he stamps his foot down on the
floorboards, shaking the room. I don’t know what Linda looks like now. I can’t
look up cause Carl’s finger hovers right there. I can’t take the silence.
“Are you going to let him speak like that at me Linda?”
I ask her. And then I do have to look, look over at Linda.
And she still has some kind of grin in her eyes. She gestures openly to me with
her hand as she speaks.
“Ok, to finish this. Isabel, is this about when you fucked
Carl?”
As the words leave her mouth, Linda lifts her eyebrows in a
question, but I can’t answer. I can only grab my coat from behind the counter
and show them as little of my face as I get out of there. And I find myself in
tears on the busy street.
….
The students are out throwing cash into the dark night, but
as soon as I escape into the city blocks, I’m alone. The wind is cold against
my face. I see a male figure in a dark jacket cross the street. The wind bites
at me, bites at my face and tears. The wind is chill, it claws at my face and bites
at my red-stained cheeks.
I like the emptiness of these streets at the weekends. The glass
towers look down on me, their raindrops heavy with my own pain. I ride the
escalator into the belly of one of these beasts, onto the overland concrete
walkways to my flat. I want to be in my home, alone, to write, and Linda can keep
the rest.
The concrete above me stops the rain but the night is cold.
I can see my breath in the amber light. From around a blind corner, I can see
the end of a box, like a picnic container, then an arm and a figure. I hurry
past. I listen. It’s silent but for the distant traffic, then I hear the step
begin behind me, echoing from the concrete tunnels.
The figure follows me through the maze, the box swinging at
my ankles ‘till we reach my door. And I continue past, eyeing the warm hallway
and my post on the mat. He is there, right behind, to grab for my keys could be
suicide. I’m shaken.
I pull out the mobile. The screen lights up, 4 missed calls,
if they’re fucking Linda, at least I can tell her. But it’s not Linda. The name
fills the screen. ‘Nicolas Brazil’. I see the texts, 3 of them, to come round.
I steady my breathing, picturing the lights of the roundabout and Nicolas’s tall figure waiting for
me. I picture the roundabout and walk fast through the concrete corridors,
forgetting the sound of the steps till I drop down the stairs and back onto street level.
30 minutes later
On the roundabout, the building stretches above me, seeming taller
from below. I key in Nicolas’s room number and hold the buzzer. “Hello”, he
answers, drunk.
“Nicolas? It’s Isabel I’m here, you coming down?” He sounds distracted,
slurring. “Yeah, yeah, I’ll buzz you in”. The door goes and I push into the
heated lobby. It is silent in here, the streets outside a world away. I watch
the numbers descending from 100 to ground.
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