Kate Hamer: The Girl in the Red Coat

‘Carmel, come back, come back,’ I hear Gramps’s cry as I fight through the crowd. But I won’t. I won’t do anything till I find her. It feels like my life depends on it and I catch a glimpse of her through the bodies — red hair and a gold shoe in between people’s legs.

‘Stand back now.’ It’s a roar from Gramps, so loud the crowd actually do start hanging back like cowed dogs. But the stink they’ve made stays, hot and heavy.

As I push past, people reach out to try and touch me but I shove them off. Some even wave paper money at me but I push that away too. For a horrible minute I think she’s going to get squashed by a tall man in a frayed old suit who seems so overcome by spirit he looks like he’s drowning. But he lurches off towards the door and I’m beside her clutching at one of her skinny hands that feels like a broken bird in mine. I look down and I think flowers are bursting out of her fingers and then I realise they’re coloured rings and I’m nearly cutting myself on the petals of plastic roses.

‘S’OK. S’OK. Sorry.’ I loosen my grip and say right into her ear, ‘What’s your name?’

She says something back but her voice is a wisp so I have to put my ear right next to her mouth.

‘Say again.’

‘Maxine.’

I want to help Maxine so much but the ugly thought that got smeared all over me is there and to try and make it wash off I say, ‘It’s true. It really is true. I can heal you, Maxine. I can.’

And she says nothing but smiles at me and nods and her hand trembles in mine and I get really, really close to her and she smells of baby powder.

I kneel in front of her. At first the stupid dress gets caught under my knees, just about slicing my neck at the back. I grab onto the hem and yank it up without letting go of her with my other hand, scared that this horrible crowd will separate us, because they think she’s not important at all — and it doesn’t matter if she’s forgotten as long as they get their money’s worth that will go into the sack afterwards at the door.

‘Let me touch your stomach,’ I say. She unbuckles the harness and I can feel how hollow her stomach is under the polka-dot dress. I close my eyes and I try to grope around for what I’m always looking for, the glow, the ropes of light, but I can’t feel anything. When I open my eyes she’s there patiently waiting. I’m crying and I press harder trying to find the glow but I don’t want to hurt her so I don’t press too hard.

She’s saying something again so I lean in to hear. She says, ‘Don’t worry, it doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter.’

I scrabble my tears away. ‘No, no. It does, it does, it matters more than anything.’ I’m shouting and crying now but I don’t care. So I focus this time. I let the crowd around me melt away and instead of their dog smell I catch onto the wafts of baby powder coming off Maxine and float on them. This lovely girl, I think, with her Minnie Mouse costume and her sweet baby smell, let me help her. If I never help anyone again, let me help her. And slowly there’s a glow and a humming, faint at first, and I concentrate hard, fanning away at it with my mind, trying to get it going like a bonfire on a rainy day.

Keep going, I’m thinking, keep going. And the fire jumps up, flaring beneath my hands.

And I’m falling into her. Her flesh is collapsing around mine as I fall and the liquids in her body wrap themselves round me, red and gold. I’m right in the middle of her: worming through her body, round the pipes of her veins, bumping against bones and wriggling through her guts.

Then I pop my head into her head and I’m working her body from the inside, or we’re working it together. So I open her eyes and I can see — I can see me kneeling down in front of us.

I can feel her mouth on my face and it’s smiling. But Carmel in front, she’s crying again. There’s tears slipping off her face and we’re saying, ‘It’s alright, everything’s gonna be alright.’ And I can see Carmel — because I know her so well — feels bad. She’s thinking — it should be me saying that, I’m the one that can get up and walk about on my two legs, not her.

Soon, I think, any minute I’ll inflate and put my arms through hers like I’m putting on a jumper, and wriggle my legs down into hers like they’re jeans. We’ll kick off those high heels, and they’ll fly across the tent and land — clonk, clonk — on the stage, and when I’ve done that I’ll surge forward and stand up wearing her body like a dress. I’ll walk about in it, and as I do, she’ll find she can do it too. And somehow, I haven’t figured out how yet, I’ll be able to step back out and she’ll be left standing and walking but strong this time, strong as a tree, and after we’ve separated she’ll keep my energy inside her and it’ll stay there forever.

But there’s a ripple of disturbance through her body and I get shaken about like a bottle of milk. And I bounce around so much I end up bouncing right out of her till, whoomf, I’m back inside myself, kneeling on the floor in front of her wheelchair.

Mayhem is breaking out. I look up to find Maxine and some person I can’t see is spinning her wheelchair around. The wheelchair arm whacks me in the face, whipping my head sideways on its stem.

I put my hand up to my face because I really got a thump there and the voices and tumult around is like the tower of Babel Gramps is always talking about. From the floor all I can see of Maxine — through people’s legs — is her shoes bumping up and down on the footrest of her wheelchair as she’s shoved out of the door and as she reaches daylight, the sun flashes on her gold shoe as it kicks into the air. Then gone. I kneel there holding my face and crying and people keep falling over me. Eventually I say to myself, ‘Get up, Carmel.’ And I do.

Gramps is nowhere to be seen.

I join the crowd and they’re taking no notice of me now — Mercy, the miracle girl. I’m just another body getting squashed as we all fight each other to get out into the open air.

Outside, the cold stings my cheek and each gasp of fresh air is so freezing it hurts inside. At first I can’t work out why everybody is leaving in great swarms like ants marching towards the gate. But then dotted around I see even bigger, blacker ants and these ants are police in uniforms. One is holding up something to his mouth and speaking through it and his words come out in a robot’s voice.

‘This is an illegal religious gathering with no permit. Leave immediately …’

There’s a buzzing of angry voices because there’s people who don’t want to leave. They want to carry on buying Bibles and getting healed and they were probably looking forward to the worship at four o’clock round the giant cross. Munroe said he was expecting transcendence and epileptic fits and all manner of things caused by the holy spirit alighting down. People falling flat on the ground dead even. I could tell he’d been looking forward to it.

I see Nico coming towards me — I’m so glad to see his face I want to throw my arms around him and kiss him. But I’ve wanted to do that since I was about eight, so no change there. Then Nico actually puts his arm around me and I’m nearly dizzy with the feel of it, strong, like a man’s almost. It’s like I’ve been dreaming about all these years.

‘Quick. You’re gonna get crushed here, Carmel. People are getting mad.’

I say, ‘Yes, Nico.’ Because all of a sudden it’s like we could be boyfriend and girlfriend together and we’re making decisions just the two of us.

People are gathering round the policeman with the voice machine and someone tries to throw a rock at him and it misses but even so he takes his gun out and waves it round in the air.