Deborah Levy - Billy and Girl

‘A gonk. That’s the saddest thing I’ve ever heard in my life.’

‘She was like us, Billy. She had no recall.’

‘Then it was her!’

‘No, it was not! I know just as well as you what Mom’s like and that was not her. Just fuck off, you creep. Go away! Get out of my sight! Stab your self! Go away ! Die with the gonks!’

I am blotting paper for Girl’s anger. She takes it out on me and even more of it out on herself. It’s just too much. If they ever make a robot Girl they’ll have to give her tear ducts.

Click the heels of my red trainers three times. With force. Take me away from here. Take me home. That’s what Dorothy Oz said to her dog. But this is home. Girl is full of junk and dirt and chemicals. Dead birds float on their backs in the slime. It’s good for her to cry.

I know this because I read books about it. I study the mind and it’s my life’s work. Hopefully one day beautiful blonde mad girls will come to my couch and tell me their problems.

My consulting room will be a laboratory of the human psyche. My couch will become famous. Girls will sell their most precious belongings to afford my mind. Biographers will fight amongst themselves to describe my methods. ‘He told lies. He told the truth. He gulped for air. He clutched his chest.’ Perhaps I’ll call myself Billy England. When I die, the world will be able to buy archive photographs of Billy England. The Billy poster, mug, tiepin, watch, pencil, cuff links, notepad. Billy portrait by Ralph von something. The Diaries of Billy England . Hardback. Paperback. A picture of Eros on the cover (she’ll look a bit like Girl) — Eros the basic life instinct. Eros from sometime BC. That will soon change. First there was Before Christ. Then there was BB. Before Billy.

Girl and her Mom checks. Look — Mom disappeared when I was ten years old. I am now fifteen and she’s not around to see how good-looking I turned out. Girl’s looked after me ever since she turfed Grand-Dad out on account of his pathetic jokes. She was twelve at the time. We had a Girl and Billy conference and agreed he had to go. It’s not good for the young mind to have to endure the wit of the senile. Girl’s always known that I am special. Now that she’s seventeen she would do the same thing over again. Boot out the clown. She did not want to see me contaminate my integrity by pretending to laugh at the moronic. Being looked after by Girl is one thing. An envelope full of Grand-Dad cash every week is okay. But Mom’s not here to watch Wimbledon with. She’s not here for her boy. That’s not easy to say. She’s not here for her boy. ’Scuse me, I just got to stick my head under the cold tap or something.

She’s just not here for her boy.

What am I supposed to do with the information? It’s like bricks flying around in my head. An earthquake shattering the architecture. Walls falling down. Cars crunching into other cars. Bridges collapsing. Shoot the messenger? The messenger is me. Employ a night nurse to inject me with morphine every time I think about it? Go on a serial killing binge? What about when I become a man? She won’t be here either. Truth is, I’m frightened to grow up too much without righting things with Mom first. Pain is a permanent winter. I am a boy without a car. And I will be man without a car. Nothing to protect me from the weather. Girl gets cabs. She really hates it when they send her an impersonation of what a car might be — that’s dodgy protection — the best they can do, grudging, and it makes Girl mad to think they think it’s good enough for her. I’d rather be in the sleet than that. But Girl is a girl and she needs minicabs to run her about. Even if the vehicle is a car trauma.

I know it’s crazy but sometimes I think one day Girl will really find her. Mom will come to the door and Girl will know. There is one thing about Girl I just don’t understand. We think Dad died horribly. But we’re not completely sure. He might have survived the fire. Girl is nuts about Dad. I think she is. But she never goes out looking for him. She’s afraid she might find him and then what would she do? Call the emergency services? The way Dad laid into my boy flesh, he might as well have scooped me off the floor, poured me into a jar and labelled it BILLY CHUTNEY. Not that I am complaining. Dad really loved Mom. And I made it my life’s mission to steal Mom’s love from Dad. It was working. He could never get near her cos I was always on her lap. My little hands on her breasts. My little tongue that had grown in her womb, stuck in her ear. Whispering. Kissing her a million times a day and she not minding the snot running down my face. Making sure I got up extra early every morning to crawl into bed between them. Resting my legs on her stomach. Playing with her hair. When Dad tried to stroke her cheeks, I sat on her face. When Mom made pizzas I ate the lot and Dad left most of his. Then I’d eat Dad’s. Dad hated pizza. Said he liked to eat Elvis food. Cheeseburgers and peanut butter on crusty white. A big handsome bloke with hair, very proud of it cos all his mates were bald. Too handsome. What do you want a good-looking father for? I mean, if a boy has to choose a father he’s not going to leaf through a male-model catalogue, is he? Dad was a looker and despite his Elvis thing he liked to muck about with recipe books to make banquets for Mom. But I needed pizza and Mom enjoyed making them for me. She sang while she made ’em and I sang with her, even though I knew I was going to suffer for it later. Every Mom pleasure equalled a Dad bashing. Mom knew this too so she made sure the good times were good. I think Girl found it hard to square loving a dad that hurt her brother. She couldn’t help herself, though.

If someone had banged spikes into Dad’s body, she’d still have cuddled up to him. Even if it tore her arm off.

Billy is making pizza like he thinks Mom used to make. I know it’s just a recipe he got off the telly. The little brute took notes and even sent off for the TV book. Unless Mom is channelling to us via the Italian slob who does the pasta pizza programme on Tuesday nights — his fat finger always stuck in some sauce — I have to believe that Brother Billy is just Mom-fixated.

First he smears olive oil onto the base with the special Chinese bristles he bought. I’m not allowed to use it. Ever. One day I’m going to stick it up the cat’s arse and leave it there. Then he grates garlic that he can’t be bothered to peel and sprinkles it onto the dough with his chewed-up fingers. Anchovies come next. Sardines. Shrimps. Tinned mussels. Octopus. Tiger prawns. Whelks.

Why not go the whole damn hog, Billy! Create the ocean on pizza in one night! Crustaceans. Molluscs. Transparent spineless creatures with boggle eyes and cavernous mouths. Hideous turdlike sea cucumbers that inch blindly across the seabed munching plankton and sucking sand. Vast flapping manta rays with electric whiplash tails cruising the bottom two inches. Anything that glows in the depths. Anything that lurks in the deep. I’m a nonswimmer. Dad knew that. He knew I hated wet food. He bought me crisps by the bagful. They made me sleep tight. Anyway, listen to me, Billy: I am not hungry.

Billy puts his head right inside the oven when he tries to light it. He looks like a suicide case, swearing and striking matches. ‘These matches are made in the fucking Czech Republic,’ he whines and wheezes like he always does.

‘Listen, Billy, I’ve taken away your rights tonight. The only right you have is to give me Take Two on Dad.’

‘Okay. Here’s Take Two on Dad. Ready?’ Billy pours himself a glass of tap water. ‘Jeezus, Girl. I’m drinking someone else’s hormones. You know that?’