Nicola Barker - Wide Open

“I’m freeeee!” she screamed.

He hated her then. She was free.

In fact she had screamed I’m freezing! but a small wave had hit her.

She had no grand scheme. Not yet. Nothing like that.

No one else would do these jobs. It was like being a spaceman, but with all of the discomfort and none of the glory. In the trade they called them skins . There was a theatrical side. Ronny did that sometimes but he hated being around children.

Then there was the industrial side. Councils hired him to spray weedkiller, to clean stuff up, to juggle with noxious chemicals. Someone had to do it. So Ronny obliged. He was that someone. A consummate professional.

Others found the precautionary clothing bothersome and claustrophobic. Several people had sued after contracting breathing difficulties and skin infections from handling dangerous substances. Ronny knew that this was because they took off their helmets when it got too hot. They didn’t take precautions. He always took them. That was his trademark, his hallmark. That was his stamp of quality.

Anyway, it was part of the kick. No air. To be enclosed. The chafing, the sweating. The chronic discomfort. That was all part of it.

He wore white shoes. Special shoes. In fact the entire get-up was white, even the helmet. Ronny peered down at his shoes. He thought about the man on the bridge, wide open, and in the same instant he thought of Monica.

Monica .

She had been his confidante. His correspondent. His best friend. His only friend. He’d liked it that way.

Monica had an opinion on everything. She had an interest in biology. Physical things. She was an adventuress. She hated to be enclosed, which was why, finally, she ended up in Sumatra, in the rain forests. She was working out there with a journalist.

They were interested in DNA; all that complex genetic stuff which, quite honestly, meant precious little to Ronny.

Monica could never simplify the nature of her work in conversation without becoming impish and flirtatious. If Ronny couldn’t understand what it was that she was doing she’d crystallize it by saying, “I’m interested in what it is that makes a man a man, Ronny. I’m interested in apes .”

So they were searching for a missing ape in the forests of Sumatra. A missing link. A great ape. A fantastic ape. A pale giant. He walked on his hind legs and to all intents and purposes he resembled a man but his feet turned inwards. And unlike his human relations he had no big toes.

Monica had never seen him. She’d seen Ronny though, but only fleetingly, a long time ago. He’d made a great impression. He’d become indelible. He’d left his footprint in the mud of Monica’s brain. She couldn’t shake him.

Oran-pendic. That was the ape’s name. Mr Unpronounceable. In his dictionary Ronny saw that orang — or something quite like it — was Malay for man. Like in orang-utan which roughly speaking translated as ‘man of the forest’.

Oranpendic was not in his dictionary. He didn’t exist. Not yet, anyway. When Monica found him he would exist but not before. When Monica found him Ronny too would see him, not physically — nothing nearly so dramatic — but slotted in among all his other words and definitions. On paper. In print. In bold.

But for now the oranpendic was their own special creature. Not a fact or a definition. Nothing absolute. Merely a fragment.

Ronny looked up pendic for the exercise but could find only pend which meant to hang (as in ‘pendant’). He guessed the word had something to do with per-pend-icular. Upright. Vertical. But frankly he found both this description and the original name unsatisfactory.

Oranpendic .

Monica didn’t give a shit. It didn’t matter. She was more interested in the hunt. She’d been called a hoaxer. Well, not Monica so much as the journalist, Louis, who was the truly infamous half of the duo.

She’d heard him on the radio and then she’d saved up all her money working as a lab assistant at a school in Swindon to fly out and join him. She was impulsive like that. Some called it gullible. Either way, she was never afraid. Nothing daunted her.

Initially the journalist had been discomfited by Monica’s presence. He’d felt invaded. Monica could have that effect sometimes. But then he grew accustomed to her and they began the hunt proper.

Ronny had seen several articles about the hoax. Naturally people doubted the existence of the oranpendic. But the journalist claimed to have seen him, briefly, and his account of this fantastical discovery was fairly convincing.

Monica had a theory about faces. She said honesty was something you could see in a person’s face. Someone’s sincerity, their integrity, was as apparent to Monica on the first meeting as their hair colour or the shape of their nose. This was her preoccupation. Her instinct.

In fact she had two main instincts. The first was for honesty, and the second told her that the oranpendic was alive but that he was afraid. The threat of discovery terrified him. So he kept hidden.

She wrote to Ronny.

♦

He’s afraid, Ronny. I know that much. He lives and walks in fear. Some days, if I wake early, I go out alone just after dawn. Everything is glazed. The air is full of moisture. It’s as thick, as dense as a woollen scarf pressing down on to my lips and up into my nostrils .

At these times I dream I’ll see him. But he’s pale like the mist and he’s so afraid that it’s as if he’s only a ghost. I always have the camera — not Louis’s big professional thing, I have my own, a cheap one that I’ve never yet used, just in case — but I sometimes imagine that if I tried to photograph him, the fear, the focus, the technology, would obliterate him. And all that would remain — in the camera, in the world — would be vapour. A mist and a smell .

Fear has its own special aroma. Like soil. Like cider vinegar. Did I lose you yet, Ronny? Did I? Could I?

Here’s the truth. If I saw him I would not photograph him. It would be so rude, don’t you think? I’ve never told Louis I feel this way. He’d scoff. I mean that’s why he’s here, after all. He has more to lose than I do. He’s been publicly and uniformly ridiculed and slandered, so that’s fair enough .

But if I saw the oranpendic I would not photograph him. I would kneel and I would hold out my hand. I would not stare. I’d look off sideways, like a friendly cat. That’s what I’d do. I’d adopt a submissive posture .

Oh God Ronny I wish you were here. I’m sorry you lost your hair. I am. Did I ever say that before? I can’t remember. Do you miss me? My own hair is long now. I tie it back. Otherwise it catches on twigs and on branches. It’s stupid and impractical but I’m growing it as a tribute. I’m growing it for you .

You feel very close at this moment. Is that stupid? Are you near me? Are you out there, hiding in the jungle, watching, waiting but I just can’t see you? Is it me who’s dense or is it the forest? Is it me?

Shut your eyes Ronny, and imagine me here. Close your eyes. Close them. Do you see me? My hair is longer. My nails are dirty. Do you see me? I am kneeling: I am holding out my hand .

Take it. M .

♦

Ronny continued to stare at his shoes. White shoes. Then he stirred himself and picked up his bottle of weedkiller. He had walked five miles that day. He’d sprayed every crack in every bit of pavement. No weeds would come after he’d been. There would be no green after he’d been. No lush diversity in the pavement’s monotony. He’d seen to that.

It was hot inside his helmet. But Ronny walked and he sprayed. Like a tomcat, scenting all those docile miles with the stink of poison. He didn’t think of the poison though, only of Monica. His own breath soaked his face. The forests were hot and airless. Like this, he supposed. He was close to her. She was right. He was very close. And she was certainly a rare bird.