Niven Govinden - Graffiti My Soul

It was this or nothing.

Jase has been saying the same thing for the past ten minutes.

‘He lives on the Rose estate? The council put him on the Rose estate? Man! How fucked up are they?’

Casey’s house, the one that was burnt down, wasn’t council, but was only about five streets from here. Seems worlds away from what he had before. That’s the power of arson, I guess. Your last bastion of security stripped in the time it takes for your house to be levelled to the ground.

Me and Casey never talk about how warped the relocation decision was; ‘new home, new start,’ is the most I can get out of him, but Jase is right, as always. It was twisted.

‘He’s innocent, Jason. He can live where he pleases,’ said Moon. ‘And also, you guys, he keeps it low-key round here. Kids too busy racing cars to notice him.’

Jase doesn’t let it go, like he should.

‘But the Rose estate? Man, someone in the council’s got a sick sense of humour to be sending him here. It’s like being thrown to the piranhas.’

‘This part of the Rose estate ain’t bad. They’ve put him in with the Poles and the Afghans, and whoever else has rolled over here to milk our welfare system, so aside from the odd wife-beating incident, and the cars, it’s one of the areas where everyone keeps themselves to themselves.’

If you talk for long enough, and clearly enough, with no distraction, and pure conviction, you can stop any amount of needless digging. Even if it makes you look like a first class W to the A.N.K.E.R. It’s something I learned when Mum and Dad were at their bloodiest. Anything to stop the elephant from being in the room.

I give Jason the bag with the balloons. Me and Moon get busy with the banners and arranging the furniture.

‘This is the last time, by the way,’ goes Moon, as we lug the sofa more centre-stage. ‘From tomorrow, I’m officially the girlfriend. I’m strictly by appointment.’

She’s wearing his yellow plastic cancer bracelet on her left wrist. It legalises everything.

I go through the top kitchen cupboards for glasses just so I wouldn’t have to listen to any more. Mum had said she’d get a pack of plastic party cups, but it’s better to be prepared. Even with a list she’s liable to flap and forget things.

Moon had pushed the low coffee table into a corner and sprung out the camp chairs we’d brought over. Jase was fiddling about with the stereo.

‘This tuner is bo-lax. All I can get are the talking stations.’

‘Oh! No music?’ goes Moon, disappointed, like it’s her party or something.

‘Nada. Left my iPod at home. Anyone bring theirs?’

Chorus of No’s all round.

‘It’s because we’re on the outer reaches of the Rose,’ I go, explaining the tuning, ‘it’s like being at the end of the world when everyone thought it was flat. It’s like being in Portugal or New Zealand, depending on which century you choose.’

‘We can’t have a party without music, boys. A party without music isn’t a party.’

‘I think he’s got a Bedingfield CD somewhere.’

‘Fuck that shit, I’d rather have the talking station.’

‘Jason! Can you try and start the afternoon without being so sour?’

‘The guy might know something about running, but that doesn’t stop him from being a giant sleazebag.’

‘Hype, Jason. Spin.’

‘Spin, my arse. Tell that to V. He had him running about in the rain last week ’til he was soaked through. What was it you were wearing, again?’

‘Vest and shorts.’

‘You see, vest and shorts! So you ran in vest and shorts until everything was see-through. Does that sound normal to you?’

‘It wasn’t like that. We were running out of time, and we had a lot of exercises to cover.’

‘Stop stirring, Jason. I think Casey’s all right. He helped me out the other night when he didn’t have to.’

‘Your mini-meltdown at midnight. When you needed a lift home from the station. I heard.’

‘I’ll pretend I didn’t hear the sarcasm in your voice, Jason, only your deep concern. So let’s just give him a chance, eh?’

Moon was throwing a couple of those big paper serviettes over the coffee table as she played peacemaker, placing the glasses and plates on top.

‘It’s all about dressing the table. The Rottweiler TMtaught me when she hosted a couple of parties for the Lib Dem candidate, Peter whateverhisnamewas. “A tablecloth will transform a table,” she’d say, “or at least a couple of napkins, if you’re pressed for time and don’t have the desired facilities.”’

‘So your mum’s become a one-woman finishing school?’ I go. ‘What happened to Oxford?’

‘Of course I’m going to Oxford, that’s a given. But she wants me to be a lady too.’

Me and Jase giggle like idiots.

Bedingfield is found and chucked on. We put the garage track on loop, ’cos that’s the only one we can stand. We perch across the stools and sip the last of Moon’s Tango from the rinsed-but-not-dried glasses. No one is keen to sit on the sofa.

‘Remind me why we’re doing this again?’ goes Jase.

‘Because it’s Casey’s birthday and he deserves to have some kind of party. If it was left to him, he wouldn’t tell a soul, and it’d go unmarked.’

‘Imagine how you’d feel if no one knew about your birthday. Wouldn’t it make you feel lonely? Gwyn went round one year saying that birthdays were just a Western extravagance, and that, as she was no longer a child, she didn’t want to celebrate it. But on the day, she was still gagging for her cards and presents and a piece of cake.’

‘Sounds fucking brilliant. No obligations, or having to fix your face when presented with cheap useless shit you never even asked for.’

My phone goes.

‘I’m coming up the stairs,’ says Mum, ‘so get the door open. I don’t want to have to set down all these bags just to ring the bell, and then have to pick them up again.’

I want to tell her that she could use her nose or her forehead the way paraplegics do, but know when to keep it zipped.

Mum’s brought most of Tesco with her.

‘It’s too much,’ I say, ‘you’ve spent fortunes.’

‘Don’t make a song and dance. Most of it’s on offer.’

Once unpacked, the table groans under the weight of crisps, nachos, chocolate cornflake treats, cupcakes, cold sausage rolls, hot turkey twizzlers, cheese and tom sandwiches, egg sandwiches, baby Yorkshires, crudités, dips, hummus, salad, mini muffins, mini quiches, apples and satsumas. It was the kind of display you want to show any passing alien: this is the food of our people, come taste.

With the balloons up in each corner of the room and flanking the banner (fixed, refixed, and fixed again) across the doorframe, Bedingfield turned up to seven, everything feels right. Party in waiting.

Mum and Moon took the stools, leaving me and Jase to stand around the place, unsure whether to lean against the wall or kneel at their feet like lapdogs. We held our glasses clumsily. There was much watch-fiddling on Mum’s part, followed by tutting, followed by discreet snacking.

‘He’s cutting it a bit fine, isn’t he? You know I’m not staying long, as I’m meant to be going out with Mike.’

‘That’s a shame, Vivienne. You could have brought him to the party.’

Mum laughed as if the likelihood of that suggestion would kill her.

Her eyes had been taking in every inch of the place since her arrival. Her training as a district nurse taught her not to turn her nose up, as on a day-to-day her workplace varied from Edwardian mansions on the Downs to caravans on the industrial estate. Her job was to dispense care to whomever required it and not necessarily to pass judgement on how they lived, except in cases where it had an impact on health. I knew that Mum prided herself on her ability to take her kit bag and go anywhere and make herself welcome. Still, she couldn’t escape the pull of her two strongest genes: Jew and Bexhill. She could hide it from Moon and Jase, who were unschooled, but not from me. The tiniest pinch across the bridge of her nose, a tick repeated every few minutes as she came across something else she found distasteful: an absence of skirting boards, the dull sheen on the carpet, the lack of furniture, the thick balsa doors that looked faintly institutional, the smell, one that was unapologetically male, which permeated every room, a window-sill free of any birthday cards other than the ones that we’ve brought. Far from being angry, as I should have been, I knew I’d only giggle if our eyes crossed to share her secret assessment: what a loser, what a dump.