lean my head on the desk, turned a little so I can feel the desk’s smooth cold on my cheek. Sleep. Need sleep. Sleep tonight. Relax tomorrow. I’ll be fine.
The air conditioning hums a lullaby on the wall above me, wafting cool air across my aching neck. My eyes close, open, close. Soothing on my neck. Laura gently runs her fingers over my nape and up into my hair; she rests her hand on the back of my head, fingers softly massaging my scalp while she gently whispers,
—Don’t worry, baby. Don’t worry.
Her breath sways the minuscule hairs in my ear back and forth like meadow grass, meadow grass that I’m lying in, the sweet smell of it in my nose. Her hands on my cheeks, she kisses my eyelids, my nose, my lips…
BANG.
I open my eyes, my hand clasps my mouth trying to hold her there but she is gone. I look around, not sure of where I am. Epool stands in the doorway, a bag of something in his hand, the smell of chilli swirling around him.
‘Food for you, mister.’ He makes a rotating hand movement in front of his mouth.
‘Thanks.’ I blink away any fragments of Laura and the meadow and hit my chest to silence the dead. Epool eyes me with the caution of a small, nervous child.
‘It’s OK. Very hungry,’ I say, and instead of my chest, I pat my gut. ‘Very, very hungry.’
‘Oh, gooood.’ The big toothy smile is back. ‘Good food here.’ And he brings over the bag and plonks it on the desk in front of me.
‘Noodles.’
‘Thank you Epool.’
‘No. Not Epool. Epool.’
‘Epool?’ I can hear no difference.
‘Wait, please.’ He takes a pen from the desk next to mine and pushes it down hard on a piece of paper. He starts moving the nib slowly and carefully across it.
I look at the finished piece, a little scratchy and wobbly but a word, a name, has made it out of the pen.
‘Ah, Iqpal.’
‘Yes, yes.’ He slaps me on the back and then double slaps his chest. ‘Iqpal.’
‘Nice to meet you, Iqpal.’ I offer him my hand. He looks at it as if he’s being given a present and then shakes it like it’s made of porcelain.
‘Iqpal.’ Pak, sod the respect, is back talking Indonesian to my new friend. Iqpal smiles and nods at me, then runs off to do whatever it is Pak has just told him to do.
I wonder what time they finish working here. The clock on the wall clicks to nine fifty-one, which is two fifty-one in the afternoon back home. I yawn. I haven’t slept in over a day and a half.
‘Come. I will take you to your house.’
House? That sounds promising. I pick up my bag of noodles and the folder off my desk and follow Pak back to his car.
‘Where are the other teachers?’ I ask as I climb back in, placing the food between my feet.
‘The driver has already taken them home. They left directly after class.’
‘A driver? What time does he pick up in the mornings?’
‘No pickup. Only take home. You must take a bus or taxi to work in the mornings. Taxi is safer.’
We slide off the forecourt into the slow-moving traffic. Pak starts beeping his horn and steers the car in any direction he sees an opening. Multicoloured cycle-rickshaws are steered out of the way at full leg-power by skinny men in dirty shorts, T-shirts, and sweat-stained caps. They ring their bells and shout while taking hands off handlebars to shake fists.
‘How will I find the bus?’
‘You are sharing with Kim, another teacher. Kim will tell you how to get to work. Don’t worry.’
Don’t worry? I put my head back against the rest and pretend I’m not worried. I look sideways at Pak, something dark and ugly is just under his skin, almost invisible. My gritty, weary mind slips sideways for a moment and anxiety soaks into the marrow of my bones like blood through a bandage.
We go to sleep.
His is surprisingly long and deep and dark. Nothing flashes behind his eyelids, no beautiful woman dances across his retinas, shedding clothes as she moves. Just sleep, like a taster of death.
And I sleep too, down in the snugness of his chest. But my sleep is fitful, broken and full of images, because that is what I am: a record of a life like an old cine film in a can, curled in on itself so frame lies upon frame upon frame, image doubled over image, from the outer edge of the spool to the tightest curl in the centre. A whole life stored away, but always available for late-night showings. Always ready for curtains to open on one of the countless moments of now.
Swoosh, almost silent, the curtains part to keep me from sound sleep. A short, but a classic, keeping me occupied while he snores.
I watch the scratchy lines move up and down and across the screen, the black-and-white numbers flash in countdown, focus the lens and there it is…
Her apartment: she stands with her back against the open door, one hand on the handle and the other ushering me in, as if she is showing me a portal to a magical land.
‘Here we are,’ she says.
I am gently spinning from alcohol and the closeness of her. I walk past as she holds the door open, aware of the sparks that jump from her to me and me to her. We are a Van de Graaff generator on heat.
There is a smell of patchouli and coffee in her apartment. A sofa, a rocking chair and small portable TV occupy the room. A rug keeps the wooden floor warm, and off to the right I see a kitchen hiding behind a wall and off to the left a bedroom winks.
‘Take a seat. That seat.’ She points to the sofa with its pair of big red cushions and caress-me fabric. I do as I’m told.
‘Whisky?’ She pulls off her hat and scarf and coat in a motion that is so quick it baffles me. Am I that wasted that time is playing its tricks with me?
‘It’s all I have, so it’s all you’re getting.’ And she is sucked into a flashing white light in the kitchen.
I watch my fingers play an invisible miniature set of drums on the arm of the sofa. Then a glass is pushed into my hand. An inch of light-golden liquid sloshes drunkenly around its base while a fat and half-melted candle on the coffee table is lit. A body falls onto the sofa next to me and my shoulder is touching hers. Static builds. I run a hand through my hair to make sure it’s not standing on end. The warmth from the whisky runs down my neck and through my stomach.
‘So?’ she says, curling her legs up under her.
‘So?’ say I.
‘It was a good day.’
‘It was.’
‘Thank you.’
