Chapter 2: Friday
As I slept, I had a
vague idea of what manner of confusion I wished to awaken to. I will not go
into such visions of wanton debauchery, for lewdness is not the point of this
story, but the note was very far from anything I had throbbing in mind. It
read:
Donald,
The bills have
been paid.
They will say
the bills have not been paid because that is what
they say.
Leave as soon as possible or there will DEFINITELY be bills to pay.
Regards,
Donald.
I should have been confused, but the
note seemed irrelevant. I was struggling with my memory. All recollections of
whatever hospitalising misadventures I had embarked on currently evaded me, but
as though seeking attention - to make sure all else remained completely
irrelevant - a piercing pain shot through one of my lower ribs, and as I
screamed out loud, an image ran through my head: I saw one of the men from the
bus stop leaping up high and stamping down furiously on something. He leapt up
and stamped down as he descended with the ferocity of one trying to douse
flames from his feet. Another image flashed by as well. It was one of several
more of the commuters by the bus stop and some of the policemen leaping and
stamping down with the same ferocity of the first man. Somehow, I knew I was
the fire they were all trying to douse. And then I remembered I had slapped a
policeman on a Tuesday.
It seemed as though every inch of my
body was on fire, but my head set unattainable standards. Not from the pain of
any trauma - like that which engulfed every other part of my body - but as
though it was bubbling away; overheating; about to spontaneously combust from
working so hard at identifying new zones of pain to familiarise me with.
Only my eyes did not hurt and I was
grateful for this. I observed two figures at the entrance to the private ward I
was in arguing loudly in Derigbe over a bit of scrap paper. Somehow, I
knew their argument had something to do with the note I had just read. I
briefly wondered how I came to be in a private ward. I know where people who
slap police officers and military men end up, and those places resemble nothing
like the relatively luxurious surroundings I was in.
The
room was large, about four meters by five. It was painted a dull shade of cyan
and had thick cobwebs encroaching from all corners. All the walls were bare, except
the wall opposite my feet. On it, a large shabby poster warning of the dangers
of sexually transmitted diseases dangled crookedly. Beside the poster, a flimsy
framed photograph of the country’s military Head Of State hung loosely off the
wall. His dozy saggy eyes and droopy lower lip (which you just knew he had
tried desperately, but unsuccessfully, to stiffen for the photo) were arranged
very awkwardly on his wide flat fat face. It was as if his face was a thick
stew, and his features had been stirred into place - stirred badly, by a
weakling using a ladle with a broken handle. There was absolutely nothing
symmetrical about any of the features on the large head on the long neck inside
the thick khaki collar. I know there is nothing in The Guidebook To Military
Dictatorship which specifies unsightliness (I have seen very good looking mass
murdering tyrants in my time) but nobody ever accused this President of not
covering all angles. His whole face drooped downwards, as though melting away.
And nothing was in sync with it’s partner: the right eye was at least half an
inch higher than the left; the left nostril was at least a quarter of an inch
wider than the right, and so on. For unknown reasons, he reminded me of someone
who would fall asleep into a bowl of porridge - like a halfwit’s denser younger
brother‘s sidekick.
I knew I was in a hospital room on
the ground floor of a quadrangle, because to my right hand side, through the
only window in the room, I stared across a small square patch of grass about
twice the size of the room I was in - on which, half a dozen youngsters ran
around kicking about something which they had concocted into a football. Across
the courtyard, in a room the same size of mine, no less than twenty people lodged
in various states of infirmity. Some chatted away jovially on bunk beds – lying
on bare springs as the mattresses were not on view – and others doubled over
and leant desperately against anything they could grip. One patient clung onto
the burglar proof bars which barricaded the courtyard windows of the ward with
both hands, as if begging for freedom, or holding on to the bars for dear life
- letting the drip rack, which trailed after him sway carelessly through
mid-air and pulled at the dressing at the back of his right hand. A terrible
grimace was embedded on his face and on seeing his expression, I began to
wonder whether he thought he would relinquish something greater than his life
if he let go of the bars. And if not, why not?
I was laying on a thin mattress on a very
narrow metal bed which was one lively sway away from completely collapsing, and
every time I turned, I felt the worn slack springs beneath dig into my back and
innovate a fresh breed of agony. Beside the bed, on my left, a rack holding an
empty drip bag wobbled ominously at every slight stir. On my right, a small oak
side table - which looked remarkable sturdy and quite out of place amidst all
the metal - seemed to be restricting the bed from swaying too violently in that
direction. It was the only thing in the room which seemed as though it was not about
to collapse. On this table were: a bunch of dusty plastic flowers in an even
dirtier vase, a half empty glass of water, and the note.
One of the figures at the door - who was
dressed as a nurse, but approached with airs of an overzealous bailiff - made
her way towards the bed after some prompting from her colleague, and without
bothering to look at me - actually making a point of turning her head away as
she stood before me, as though I was some unsightly effluence disgracing her
vista - regally thrust the piece of
paper she was holding into my face, and withdrew it even before I had a chance
to read a single letter on the note. I told her I wanted to read what she was
presenting me with, and with a sigh, a huff and a hiss, she thrust the piece of
paper into my face again dismissively and held it steady for me to read. The
piece of paper was small - about half the size of her palm - rectangular in
shape, with serrated patterned cuts to its top and bottom ends, as though torn
from a till. The centre of the sheet was white as new, but its edges had
disintegrated away as though it had been fingered exhaustively over the years.
It was badly stained with ink smudges and dirty finger prints, but was still
clearly legible. A ledger of printed text ran down a face. I did not take it
from her, but read what was typed:
DN400 1No Toothpaste
DN600 2No Rothman King Size Cigarettes
DN750 1No Sanitary Towel
DN400 1No Economy Brand Plantain chips
DN12,000 1No Dunlop Elite Car Tyre
Total:
DN32,200
She began running through her script
very quickly in pidgin English, but I cut her off - telling her I spoke Derigbe, which I
assured her I spoke fluently and would prefer to converse in. She flinched
slightly, but then grudgingly obliged me. Her indolent stance also became
slightly more rigid, more respectful. I like to think she suddenly realised she
had taken a lot for granted.
Even though she still held the very
legible piece of paper close to my face as she spoke, she began telling me it
was a hospital bill which was well past due. She looked well into her forties.
She could perhaps have been younger, but the tribal marks deeply embossed into
her face aged her somewhat. She was short, stocky, and quite overweight; with
short cut hair no longer than the perfectly manicured red fingernails that
clawed at the note she shoved in my face. She spoke her native tongue with all
the heated antagonism with which the language can be volleyed in. She was not
being particularly aggressive - as is so easy to confuse anyone who speaks more
than a sentence of Derigbe to you might come across as being; with all
it’s D’s and GB’s straight from the stress-pit of one’s lungs - but she was
making a point of being particularly aloof.
She finished her lecture, and then
stood pouting as though she couldn’t understand why she should have to tell me
to pay the bill in the first place - as though it is something which I really
ought to have done without her prompting. I did not respond immediately, so she
started again. As she reran through her routine of just how much quality
medicine had been lavished on me, and how many painful hours she had personally
spent overseeing my recovery, I never thought to tell her that if she was the
owner of the convenience store receipt she was trying to pass off as a hospital
bill, then she was running nothing more than a relay scam. That she herself had
been hoodwinked - thoroughly bloodyfooled – sometime in the past,
as not only was she trying to pass off a convenience store receipt as a
hospital bill, she was trying to pass off an incorrectly tallied convenience
store receipt as a hospital bill. It never crossed my mind to mention to her
that a couple of shopkeepers had probably also conferred at her expense after
sizing her up, and were now a bit richer and happier for her stupidity.
Instead, all that ran through my head was: “what kind of store sells both
car tyres and toothpaste.”
Funnily
enough, there are no laws against selling toothpaste and car tyres under
the same roof, but at what point does one think: “I know what the customers who
come in here to buy car tyres could do with - toothpaste!”? I just couldn’t
understand it. How did it make sense (economic or just plain common) to stock both
toothpaste and tyres under the same roof? Surely one of those
products would be failing woefully - needlessly taking up valuable display
space. If you go into a convenience store to pick up some toothpaste, and you
stumble across a stack of tyres for sale, you wonder if it’s The First Of
April. If you go into a car mechanic’s garage to get your tyres replaced and
see a toothpaste isle, you take your car elsewhere because you know the man
you’re about to leave your vehicle with completely lacks focus. That’s the way
I see things, if you want to make progress in life, you either stock toothpaste
or tyres - not both.
Not long after thoughts of tyres and
toothpaste withered away, and I began to focus again on the ongoing monologue -
which had descended into the realms of convolution and offence, as I heard several
mentions of my “bad upbringing” come up - I decided I was not going to discuss
the matter with her, so all I said was: “I have paid the bill. Go away,” and
then turned my head away, to imply I had no intention on discussing the matter
any further. I know not to discuss such matters, or even state that I have no
intention to discuss such matters, but to briefly state my mind, turn my head
away, and then remain silent. A discussion with someone who tries to pass off a
badly tallied convenience store receipt as a hospital bill will only be worth a
lunatic’s while, and I have not been mistaken for a lunatic for a while. She
will think: “I have tried to play you for a fool, and you are here debating
this. So you must be a fool.” That conversation would go on forever as
well. I would stick to the line: “I have paid the bill, prove I have not,” and
in frustration, she would have started saying harsh things about my
masculinity, my race and my odour, and I would have been forced to keep asking
her for proof of my non-bill-payment which, she would only have searched for
within the realms of braver and more personal insults.
After a few moments, my complete lack
of attention to anything she might have been saying must have told her I was in
the know, so she frowned, kissed her teeth in irritation, rolled her eyes
rapidly several times up and down - eyeing me, the only time she cast a
glance in my direction - and then sauntered away towards her giggling colleague
with more pride than I thought she was due. As she walked away, each stride she
took stomped more confidently than it’s predecessor, and her chin was held so
high, that for a while, I thought she was sniffing around trying to place some
illusive odour. I understood her conceit – extortion was her game: commonly
played by most of her countryfolk, from the President right down to disabled
beggars. It’s the national sport, and in this case, she had only just failed to
conquer a tricky enemy. In her mind, she had done nothing wrong: she knew no
shame for what she had just done and would feel no reason to ever familiarise
herself with such a concept.
Truth be told, I do not know why I
told her I had paid the bill - as was written in the note on the oak table -
because the note was not addressed to me. My name is not Donald, and to my
recollection, I have never before been called Donald. In fact, when I think
about it, I know no Donalds either. But for some reason, I figured it was what
I was expected to say. As she stood scowling and lecturing me, with a hand on her
hips and tapping her feet impatiently - as though I had personally begged her
for money in the past - I knew I was meant to say: “I have paid the bill. Go
away.”
I suddenly became very tired. Waking
up to the fraudster’s troubles had drained whatever energy reserves I had built
up in the time I was out cold, and my head began throbbing so much that I
thought I was going to vomit - you know, the kind of throbbing where you can
actually feel something in-between your ears pulsating, and your eyes pushing
out of their sockets?
I shut my eyes hard and clenched my
teeth tight to keep the pain away, and thankfully, I began to drift away slowly.
But the darkness I fell into was very fleeting, as I soon began to see visions
of a store I knew I owned: I was behind a counter, standing in front of a tall
shelving rack with dozens of foreign cigars, cigarettes and rolling tobacco. I
was smiling and handing over some change to a young pretty woman who had just
bought two note pads. Not far from the cashiers, some young children were being
chastised by one of my assistants for helping themselves too generously to the
Pick-And-Mix confectionary. A pregnant woman stood at the electronics section
of the store agitatedly fiddling with a calculator whilst also trying to draw
the attention of another store attendant who was actively ignoring her. I saw
this and shouted out angrily to the attendant, and when he looked at me, I
pointed towards the pregnant woman, indicating she needed to be served. He
immediately raced to her with a rueful smile, as though he had not heard all
her previous calls, but yet, ought to have. She smiled back at me thankfully,
and as she did so, I caught a flicker of some activity in the corner of the
store behind her. Something was going on in that corner which I couldn’t quite
make out. Behind some shelves on an unfamiliar isle, two items were being
juggled. One item would come up high above the top of a shelf, and as it fell
back down, another item would fly up after it. I knew there were just two items,
and I knew they were both being juggled - as one just knows these things in
dreams. And as I focused on the items - trying to make out what they were, I
heard the voice of the juggler echoing all around me, but I knew I alone could
hear him. His voice was deep and haunting, and his words trailed off with a
rasp. And each time one of the items descended - just as it was about to
disappear beneath the line of the shelf-top before the other item would emerge
– the voice would ask: “How much? Donald, How much?”
The voice was unnatural - augmented
from its natural pitch to a higher screech. It did not sound that dissimilar to
squealing metal brakes. It was also penetrating and heavy. A sound which got
beneath your skin and settled there. But yet, it was organic - with its rasps,
and the faint sound of breath intake evident at the start and end of every
sentence. It sounded unnatural, but at the same time, not in the least bit
mechanical. I knew it could only be the voice of a living being, which, was the
most unsettling thing about it. I became very terrified. Finding out how much
the juggled items cost suddenly became very important. I thought if I answered
correctly, I could silence the voice forever. And as I squinted hard to try and
make out what was being juggled, I felt myself drift away even deeper -
drifting into realms beyond my store with my stationary, and my electronics,
and my Pick-And-mix, and into a blackness which I knew could both last forever,
but also seem like no time at all. But before I fell into that daze, I caught
sight of one of the items being juggled: it was a porridge drizzled head of the
Head of state - adorned with the same dozy eyes and droopy bottom lip - doing a
summersault as it reached the peak of its ascent, and then unbelievably, it
smiled at me, and then winked as it made it’s way down. I screamed out loud as
this happened - in horror at the winking head, and in agony, as the same rib
which had been bothering me earlier seemed to have torn itself out of my sides.
And as I drifted lost into the darkness of dreamless slumber, it was a new
terror that drew me hurriedly in, as I saw the second item rise up from beneath
the top of the shelf-line, on the isle labelled PERSONAL HYGENE, high above a
vast selection of toothpaste tubes. I saw it was a car tire - big, round and
black - and it stopped in mid-air. It just stopped; hovering conceitedly in
mid-air, above the toothpaste. In my store.
No comments:
Post a Comment