Marlene van Niekerk - Triomf

‘A sun! Good show!’ says his mother. She holds out her hands.

‘Don’t touch!’

Treppie hotfoots it up the ladder. ‘Hold tight,’ he shouts.

Pop holds the ladder. Treppie works the shade around the bulb till it fits nicely.

‘Ta-te-raa!’ he says. ‘Now it shines on everyone!’

The second one’s a round blue light full of little silver stars.

‘Ooh! Give here!’ It’s his mother again. She sucks her lip, in-out, in-out. Doesn’t want to wear her false tooth. If his girl comes again, after tonight, he’d better nag Pop to find her a tooth that fits. She looks just like a worn-out old slut nowadays. And now she’s falling in love with those little stars. She’s getting soft in the head. Better just to leave her alone.

‘Okay, Ma.’ He tries to keep his voice even. She and Pop have helped him nicely today. They may as well have the stars for their room. He’ll even hang the shade up for them. As he walks down the passage, he hears Treppie mumbling something to his mother. Must be talking about him again. Let them, they’re still going to see a thing or two in this house.

He has to stand on the mattress to hang up the shade. He struggles with the strings around the hole where the bulb goes in. Fucken frills! He can hear them dragging the ladder around as they hang things up all over the house.

‘Don’t fall,’ he hears his mother say. It sounds like she’s talking through a rag. She even stinks from her mouth nowadays. After tonight he’ll be finished with her. Then he’ll do his own thing, in his own way. He must just have the right touch with his girl tonight. Then she’ll come back again and, who knows, maybe this will become a decent house.

He can’t get the bulb through the hole. It’s too small. So he just pushes it, ‘grrt!’, right through the paper. He ties the strings on to the electric wire. Right, it’s tight enough now.

He walks through the house. Shades hang from the ceiling everywhere. Full moons and crescent moons and pointy little stars and things like that. Some of the suns are even winking at him. No more naked bulbs. The left-over shades have been hung up by their strings from the ceiling. They’ve put up two shades in his den. He heard Treppie telling his mother and Pop about the red ones being the hot planets, and how they had to keep watch over tonight’s other two stars. Treppie must watch his fucken jokes now. This is serious business!

‘Yippeeee! Party!’ Treppie shouts. He comes jumping up and down the passage, touching all the moons and stars and suns with his fingertips as he runs. They swing and turn on their strings. Toby ‘whoof-whoofs’ after him. He stands to one side. They must go slow, now! Slow!

‘Lights!’ Treppie shouts. ‘Lights!’ It’s already quite dark in the house. Then Pop switches on all the lights. Suddenly he sees yellow and orange shadows everywhere as the shades light up the walls.

‘Check it out,’ says Treppie, ‘the Orient is with us! Now all we need is some sweet and sour. Come, it’s time for room inspection. Step up! Step up!’

Treppie pushes his mother and Pop down the passage, into the den. Lambert feels shy, he’s pissed off. It’s his stuff, this! Why must they do this, now? They just want to go and spoil everything again! He must act like it’s nothing, just stand there with a straight face and push out his chest. No one’s going to get him down now.

First they inspect the den’s walls. The insect paintings are nearly finished. All of them got some new wings this morning.

‘Good enough for an opening night,’ says Treppie.

In the deep, red light, the insect-things look almost real. His mother gets the creeps. ‘Yuk!’ she says.

‘Lost City,’ says Treppie. ‘It glows with eerie brilliance!’ He flings out his arms and prances around the room like a master of ceremonies. ‘Lost City or Cango Caves, and here comes the caveman, too!’

Treppie smacks him on the back. It burns, but he says nothing.

Then Treppie picks up the glasses one by one and makes as if he’s wiping off dust. Full of shit again! He polished those glasses himself. There’s no dirt on them.

‘Look, all the little buck!’ his mother says. She’s looking at the bowls that he lined up in a row on his bench. He turned all the bowls so the stags’ feet point to the bottom and their heads to the top. What’s so funny about that? He wishes they’d just fuck off.

On the bed, on top of the white sheets, lie his clothes. A light blue shirt from Jet, and a dark blue, double-breasted blazer that Pop found on special at the Plaza. And a brand-new pair of white pants with funny pleats on both sides of the zip. Pop bought everything with his own money. He’s already looped his belt, with its extra hole, into the pants. And there lies his new, blood-red Speedo, on top of the pants. His polished boots stand at the foot of the bed with a pair of Pop’s socks in a ball on top.

They stare at his clothes. He feels naked.

‘Phew!’ Treppie whistles. He picks up the Speedo, stretching it open with his hands.

‘Hey, Lambert, how you going to get your whole pedigree into this, old boy? Pit bull terriers! Njarrr! Looks a bit small for champion stock, don’t you think?’

‘Hands off!’ says Pop, taking the Speedo away from Treppie. Pop puts it back on to the bed. He motions with his hand. He’s trying to tell him he must just hang in there, it’s almost over. They’ll be out of here any second now. They fuckenwell better.

But now Treppie’s trying a new angle, sticking his fingers into his shirt-pocket with only his pinky sticking out. Like a poofter. Sometimes he thinks Treppie should’ve been a poofter. It’s only poofters on TV who throw scenes like he does. He’s got a lot of fucken airs, this Treppie.

‘I almost forgot!’ Treppie looks round to see if everyone’s eyes are fixed on that shirt-pocket of his. ‘Rough Riders. Look, Lambert, a cowboy on a horse! We don’t want you to go and get the load, hey.’

His mother grins.

He wants to tell Treppie he’s a fucken poofter, but his voice gets stuck. He looks at Pop. Please, Pop, please. Pop takes Treppie and his mother by the arm.

‘Right, Lambertus, get yourself ready. We’re leaving any minute now.’ Pop nods at him as if to say everything’s okay, he needn’t worry.

He watches them as they cram through the door. Fucken bunch of sheep. He looks at the alarm and then at his watch. Only quarter past seven. God, help!

He calls after his mother. She must come here, he wants her to tell him something. He hears her shuffling back.

‘Yes?’

He points. ‘Does everything look all right here?’ He can hear his own voice. It sounds panicky. He doesn’t want to sound panicky. What for?

He says it again: ‘Everything’s ready, right?’

‘All ready,’ his mother says, nodding her head up and down. ‘Just perfect!’

She’s also on her ear. He saw her pouring herself shots all afternoon long. She doesn’t usually drink alone. Seems like she’s also got the jitters. What for?

‘What else do I need?’ He points to the room.

‘Beauty sleep. Hic!’

Hiccup or no hiccup, he wants to try this just one more time.

‘Pleased to meet you.’ He shakes his mother’s hand.

‘The pleasure, hic, is mine,’ she says, just like he taught her.

But he can’t sleep. He baths and shaves and puts on his new clothes. Then he puts out his dips and chips and lemons on the service counter. All in a row. Pop and Treppie have been away for more than an hour now. Wait, let him quickly go and see if everything’s still okay in the house. His mother’s fast asleep. Huddled on the bare mattress in her and Pop’s room. Toby’s lying behind her back. Now Toby lifts up his head and pricks his ears. ‘Swish-swish’ goes his tail on the mattress. The blue lampshade with its silver stars throws strange spots and shadows over his mother. And across the mattress and Toby and the floors and the walls. Weird.