Marlene van Niekerk - Triomf

‘Listen, my china.’ Here she comes now, but she’s coming too slowly. Oh, shit, what now? Now she’s swaying her backside at him. She’s even turned around so he can see her backside.

‘I haven’t got no time to waste, hey. I’m a busy lady!’

Fuck! Let him get out of the way here. She mustn’t come and act all high and mighty and start swinging her backside around. He’s also been fucken busy!

Jesus. Now she’s on the bed, legs and all. Loosening buttons. Yes, that’s what she’s doing, she’s unbuttoning her blouse. Lots of buttons. What’s that underneath? A bow, a fucken little red bow. In the middle. Between the tits. The tits are in a see-through bra. Black net-stuff with holes in it. Sit, she motions to him, he must come and sit here next to her on the bed. Please, God! Those long red nails!

‘Hey, hey, wait now, Mary, man, let’s not rush things now, man. Come, there’s nice chairs here, man, look, specially for you!’ Pop’s chair. His mother’s chair. Next to each other. ‘Nice chairs, I promise, family chairs, they come a long way, they can tell stories, these chairs, man, like you won’t believe, stories for Africa.’

It’s the truth. He’s not talking nonsense now. Right. That’s better. She’s buttoning up again. Yes, better.

‘As you wish. I hope you know what you’re doing. Time is money, you know that?’

Of course he knows. What’s the time there on Treppie’s clock — radio? Only twenty to twelve. He checks his watch. That’s fine. The night’s still young, as Treppie always says. What’s she getting so worried about, anyway? There she sits in his mother’s chair now. It looks funny, but at least she sits nicely, with her legs closed.

‘Don’t worry, just relax, Mary, I’ll get you a drink. What do you like? I also got brandy and Coke. Come on, what do you say?’

‘I don’t drink on the job, Cleopatra’s house rules.’

Why’s she grinning again? It’s the oldest trade in the world, after all. Her kind fancies a snort. She mustn’t think she can come and spin him a lot of crap here.

‘Cleopatra’s foot in a fish tin, man!’

‘Just Coke, I mean it.’

‘Suit yourself, lady.’ If he can just get a snort or two into her. But he must tune her nicely now. Don’t rush a woman. That’s what Treppie always says when his mother takes so long to do things. When a woman’s revs finally get going, they really run high. Then you struggle to bring them down again. He says he’s seen it time and time again.

‘I have lemons, I have ice, might I make you a Lee Martin, just like in the Spur? You know what a Lee Martin is? No? Crushed ice and lemon and things?’

She shakes her head. No.

Looks like she doesn’t know bugger-all. Fucken weird, that’s all he can say. Maybe the Cleopatras don’t go to Spur.

‘Never too late to learn.’ Take a deep breath. ‘Never too late, my baby.’

Mary just sits there, looking at her nails. She says fuck-all. It looks like that ‘baby’ went straight over her head, like she didn’t even feel it. Maybe he said it too early or something. Fucken worse than a jammed compressor! And he can’t very well go and kick her, but he’s tempted, hell, a nice kick under the backside is exactly what she needs. There go his knees now, jerking up and down under the skin. It must be ’cause he’s thinking about kicking her. He mustn’t kick her. She’d fall to pieces, first shot. No, he won’t kick her. He’ll just stand here next to his work bench. Stay nice and cool. He grabs the edge of the work bench, his service counter that he prepared so neatly, with so many nice things on it. Ai, fuck. He hears her lighting up, here right behind his back. That’s what he needs too, a good old cigarette. Sit for a while, in Pop’s deep chair, with his legs stretched out in front of him so his knees can stop jerking. Yes, a cigarette.

A thought begins to form in his head, but he can’t get hold of it properly. Come now, Lambert! Got it! It’s the thought of an ashtray, and an ashtray is the other thing he forgot. A carpet and an ashtray. Can you believe it? Most of the time he tips his ash on to the floor and he stubs his cigarettes against the wall, just anywhere. He had to sweep so many cigarette butts out of here … never mind, she won’t know the difference. He picks up one of the bowls with painted stags and passes it over to her.

‘Ashtray.’

‘Thanks,’ she says.

‘Some ashtray, hey.’ Mary looks at the ashtray. Then she turns it round and looks at the back.

‘I inherited it from my grandmother. Grand old lady. They did it in style in those days.’

‘Hmm,’ is all she says. ‘How’s the Coke coming along?’

‘Won’t be a minute.’ But before the words are out of his mouth he realises he’s got a new problem. How’s he going to give her crushed ice without making a mess? If it was just him alone it would be a simple matter — he’d take a hammer and smash the ice-blocks to pieces on the work bench. Not that he needs crushed ice every day. Ice-blocks are good enough and even those came into his life only after the fridges were fixed. He’s seen in the movies how they put ice in a dishcloth or something, in those fancy American kitchens where everyone stands around with drinks in their hands, then they knock the ice against a wall with neat little thuds, like it’s something they do every other day. But now he hasn’t got a dishrag. And it’s not something he does every other day. When he does knock things in kitchens he makes holes in the doors of dressers. Fuck! As far as he knows, the only dishrag in the house got used up today, to clean all that drain-goo on the floor. And he’s not going to open up his steel cabinet to look for anything ’cause then all those pipes and dirty clothes and GTX tins that he stashed in there will come piling out.

Maybe he should go fetch something in the house. Look in his mother’s room. Suddenly he sees himself crushing ice on the den’s wall with his mother’s dirty housecoat. Crush, crush, crush. No!

He’ll just tell her the ice-crusher’s broken. Out of order. He’s never seen one, but he’s sure you can buy them.

‘So, have we suddenly gone as quiet as a mouse, big boy?’

Is she really smiling at him here behind his back? Yes, she is, with a pouting mouth too. Well, well, what have we here? Wait, let him first get this ice out of the tray. Fucken ice-tray. Hit the blarry thing, that’s the only way. ‘Thock! Thock!’ he slams the tray against the edge of the work bench.

‘I’ve just got a problem’ — ‘Thock!’ — ‘with my ice-crusher. Looks like it’s out of order.’

‘Well, I’m getting mighty thirsty here, ice or no ice.’ Now she doesn’t sound like she’s smiling. She switches that smile of hers on and off, on and off, faster even than Treppie. Get that smile going again, lady! If I can, you can! Keep smiling, girl!

‘Thirsty, hey, and we haven’t even started yet!’ Shit, that one just slipped out before he could stop it.

‘Well, at this rate …’ Mary says, but that’s not what he wants to hear. He pours himself a stiff brandy and Coke. One glass in each hand. Steady, now. He’s standing in front of Mary. He’s standing wrong. He can feel it. He mustn’t stand still, he must move, keep moving. Make a noise.

‘Listen. Nice song they’re playing there.’

The Highveld Stereo woman is talking. She says it’s Leo Sayer. She says he’s always so spot on about the eternal questions of love.

When I need you

I just close my eyes and I’m with you

And all that I so wanna give you

Is only a heartbeat away

Mary takes her Coke. Right. Now sit down a little. With a cigarette. It’s in his jacket pocket. But where’s his fucken matches now? He checked a hundred times to make sure they were in his pocket. You don’t want to get stuck looking for matches in the heat of the moment. Just shuddup a second, there, Leo. Fucken close my eyes and find my fucken matches, now! He can feel Mary looking at him as he digs in his pocket.