James Kelman - If it is your life

Now you are.

You are always so critical.

It has nothing to do with critical. Streets, buildings and supermarkets, you forgot how boring I was.

She chuckled.

You sarcastic woman.

We arrived in the back alley where the bar was located. Oh I remember this one, she said, it hasnt changed much at all.

The outside entrance to the bar had a marble appearance but other than that was completely nondescript. Yet here she was examining it like it was a something or other a painting damn thing, a sculptured object from medieval Spain, which it was not, but then inside, inside the lobby! That was what she remembered. Of course! It was me that forgot. Oh, she cried, look at that, look!

I smiled.

My God!

I knew you would remember, I said although I was lying. She was pointing at the ceiling which had singularly shaped bricks and tiles that reminded strangers of a famous religious painting. Da Vinci’s Last Supper ! is what most of them cried. Us locals had to explain that it wasnt Da Vinci’s Last Supper ! but that of our Lord! The odd thing is that these strangers used to allow us the benefit of the doubt, as though we were authorities on religious art because we drank in that bar — and one has to choose one’s words carefully; in other circumstances I would have said ‘drank in that damn bar’.

Jennifer stood with her head craned, enjoying it. In fact I had forgotten the name of the painting, had actually forgotten its name, this most famous work of the Christian epoch.

Oh well, it was not my fault, how can we be blamed for our memory. For our lack of a memory. We do not blame a child for being born with one leg shorter than the other. Although this was slightly different; ageing bodily parts. I said, I’m thirty-six; the big three zero is history for me. The four zero next.

I held the door open for her, waiting; when she finished looking up and walked through I whispered to her: Jenny can I ask you something? What am I to you nowadays? What do I mean to you? Am I a sexless object? In all sincerity, is that how you see me?

She didnt reply. Yet I had spoken honestly. My only motivation was to discover the truth. That was it. Truth is what it was about. My only goal. What was its nature! A man might ask these things. It is an aid to self-discovery. Maybe we have been making mistakes. If so and someone informs us — e.g. erstwhile partners — then we can change, we can change and become better people, better citizens, better lovers, better patriots. People want to be better, I said, even me, I want to be better, not only a better patriot but a better human being.

Ssh.

Ssh?

She shook her head and was quiet.

What is it? I said.

Just be careful Mike.

Am I talking out of turn?

Yes.

Was I being sarcastic?

When? she said, and shook her head again; this time she closed her eyes! Dont let us talk about it now, she said but smiled. Get yourself a beer.

Yeh, I shall get myself a beer, and I shall drink myself a beer.

And I ordered an orange juice for her. The bartender was big. He was one of those guys with seventeen chins and seventeen bellies, each of which took it in turn to quiver. He was wary of me and didnt like my accent. So what? He poured the pint and I waited. He ducked below the counter for the orange juice. I wanted to ask if I could choose the oranges but he would have tossed me out the bar for insubordination. Instead I whistled a wee tune to myself.

I had been drinking in this bar for seven years! He made me feel like it was five minutes.

Never mind and relax, relax.

Whh whh whh, whh whh whh

[me whistling under my breath]

Jennifer had gone to a table at the side of the bar where I usually went. She didnt like standing at bars with me. I got the equivalent of road-rage.

At last I received the booze. She had taken off her coat when I arrived with the glasses. I noticed the yellow cardigan she was wearing. It was good quality. I nearly said classy. Or ‘classic’. Jennifer was both classy and classic, a classy lassie. Some dame altogether. At one time she wore only grey and dark colours, navy blues and blacks. I like your cardigan, I said, it is nice.

Cardigan? She shook her head.

Is that not what it is? a cardigan?

She said nothing to that but for some reason appeared suspicious. Of me? How come! Now she looked away.

What the heck was wrong with ‘cardigan’? My mum’s description. And I think my sister used it too. Or was that the same thing!

I lifted my beer but didnt sip it, too predictable. She appeared not to be watching me but everything I did she noticed, I knew she noticed. Life was so damn complicated.

She was away looking at something else. I followed her gaze and who should it be but Mr and Mrs Duponzer, an older couple who lived farther down my street and, like myself, preferred to walk the miles to here rather than find somewhere more local.

Occasionally they trapped me into conversation. I got the feeling they were ‘saving me from myself’. No doubt they mulled over my situation within the safety of their own fireside, whatever that might mean. People had long since stopped having firesides. City ordinances decreed otherwise.

City ordinances decreed. What kind of mumbo jumbo is that? My brains were sozzled. Not as an effect of alcohol but my years. In this culture thirty-six was Methuselah’s nephew.

I could remember when I was nineteen. In those far-off days it was summer fifty-two weeks of the year. People did not speak of boyfriends and girlfriends, not back then, it was fiancés and marriage partners. People spent their life together. It was taken for granted. Working-class people, blue-collar communities. None of these invisible bourgeois bloodsuckers. Real people. That was Mr and Mrs Duponzer. They could not be separated. Even to imagine them separate, I could not do it. This was the kind of couple they were, this was their relationship.

So they still come in? she said.

I beg your pardon?

She smiled and shook her head like this was the real reason I had brought her here: to see an old married couple who still loved one another. My life amused her. I was glad. Yes well there they are, I said, there they are.

Bar meal?

That is correct, I said, what is wrong with a bar meal? I thought you would have approved. They do it a lot, the Duponzers. Other couples do it too. They come out together and do enjoyable togetherly things.

Oh Mike you are so defensive.

Am I?

Really.

Sorry about that.

Jennifer stared at me a moment, then smiled. You are.

Okay.

But you are. She chuckled. So defensive!

I’m not saying a word. I’m only glad I make you smile.

You do make me smile.

Yeh well I am pleased about that. I’m pleased.

I see that.

Look what does it matter whether I’m defensive or not? What does it matter? Mr and Mrs Duponzer enjoy their bar meals together. They do not do it everyday. Not as far as I know. Maybe if they’ve been out shopping together or taking in an early movie.

Do you mean an early morning screening?

Pardon? Do you want me to ask them?

If you like … Jennifer was smiling again. Sarcasm is contagious

They go out together, I said, and they do things together. Then they come in here on their way home. Together. It is a natural thing.

Is it?

Sure. They do it a lot.

Excuse me? Jennifer was looking at me in that curious way, but it was me that was curious, a sort of ‘curiosity’. That was how she saw me: a curiosity.

And where was the dignity in that? But probably I was a curiosity. Curiosity. The word wasnt even in my vocabulary. I would never have described a person as ‘curious’. Especially not an ex-partner with whom one had been intimate. Only strangers are curious. Unless a behaviour had become so.