“Hello, doc,” she said. “You got a little something for me?”
I opened my bag.
I didn’t feel like going home. Malcolm wouldn’t be here until morning, but I just wanted to sit awhile, take a load off. My shoes were hurting me so I kicked them off. We left her lying there, she looked so peaceful, and went back into the other room. When I passed by the upright bass I felt a compulsion to give the strings a twang, but I resisted. There was a chair by the window, and we sat there, me and Dino, just listening to the traffic go by. Did I tell you about Malcolm? My memory’s been getting fuzzy lately. Maybe it’s the temazepam.
Malcolm was a surgeon, another of my patients from the old days. An acrotomophiliac. Though Dino used to argue with me that he was actually an apotemnophiliac by proxy, didn’t you, Dino? Either way, Malcolm took a keener than usual interest in amputation and amputees in and out of the hospital. Like I said, I know things about people; it’s interesting work. Malcolm is still a surgeon, but it’s all private practice now. Gets paid a fortune. His patients love his work. Mary’s going to love it too. And the bass player — why can’t I remember his name, I’m sure she told me. He’s going to look so much better without those fingers. Mary first in the morning, and then the bass player’s appointment at 2. Shame I didn’t think of asking Kate to come along, there’s plenty of time. Maybe I should call her. What do you think, Dino? Shall I call Kate? Tell her I’ve signed the papers and she can come by and pick them up? Tell her I don’t need her. That I don’t need anyone anymore? What do you say, Dino?
Dino’s awfully quiet tonight.
Park Rites
by Dan Bennett
Clissold Park
The black-haired lady jogger beat her way around the concrete path that circled the western edge of Clissold Park, passing the brick shed near the entrance. Enzo watched her come. He stood in his place by the bushes where the path forked up toward the pond. He’d known she’d be here: it was 4 p.m. and she was always here. The lady jogger had her routines.
She ran toward him, the way she always ran, with her elbows pushed out wide, her head bent to the ground, so she couldn’t see anyone in front of her. She ran like she was the only one in the world. Once, Enzo had seen her jog right into a woman with a pushchair. She’d fallen, sprawling on the tarmac. Enzo had walked past as she staggered to her feet, a tear in her leggings showing a large gash. She had touched it gently, wincing, while the woman with the pushchair had asked her if she was okay. Enzo had forced himself to keep on walking, his head down, his hand steady in his pocket. But he was unable to resist one quick glance, thinking, “Yeah, and one day, lady, I’ll be there.”
The jogger made her way onto a stretch of path opposite the estate. She was very close now. Enzo breathed in and smelled the air. He was waiting for a sign that things were ready, that the time was right. The sky was a pale gray above the green of the trees, the air smoky from a fire on the other side of the park, the ground reeking of wet earth. A triangular pattern of geese crossed the sky, and suddenly Enzo knew that this was the final piece that defined the moment: the sign that the time was right. The lady jogger reached the straight track that led right down toward him. Enzo’s left hand worked inside the torn pocket of his tracksuit, his hand squeezing his prick. It was time.
Enzo stepped from the bushes as the jogger approached. He felt very calm. He gave himself one more grasp and then removed his left hand, and placed his right into the pocket of his hooded top. The jogger was almost on top of him now, and Enzo could see the words on her blue T-shirt, University of Kent, stretched over her small breasts, the black lycra tight on her legs, her huge white trainers with fat tongues. She was such a small woman, she was perfect for him, with her black hair in long bangs that flapped as she ran, like the limp beat of blackbird wings.
Enzo tensed, his right arm ready. Suddenly, on the road beyond the railings, a car pulled up, a blue Ford. Enzo looked up to see a man step from the passenger door, saying loudly, “Yeah, well, maybe later, but I’m not sure about it,” to whoever was driving the car. He was wearing a football shirt, red and white. It was all too much for Enzo: he glanced quickly at the woman jogger, thinking maybe, maybe, when the man beyond the railings turned and looked over and stared Enzo fully in the face.
It caused the slightest delay in Enzo’s movement. It was enough to spoil everything (the birds had gone from his eye-line now and the lady jogger was just a few steps too close) and make the moment lose its rhythm. Enzo let his hand drop from his right pocket. He looked down at the ground, kicked at a stone, sucked his lips against his teeth. The jogger pounded past him, the soles of her trainers squeaking slightly as she took the turn up toward the pond. The man slammed the passenger door shut and stood waving as the car pulled away. The moment had sailed away from Enzo, and it was exactly like that.
“Yeah, but I seen you!” Enzo called out to the jogger’s back. “I seen you running, lady. I’ll catch you maybe on the next time round.”
The jogger didn’t hear him. Enzo watched her run up the slight hill that led toward the pond and the white house at the center of the park. He wondered if today was one of the days she’d decide to run another circuit, or if she would leave by the entrance on Church Street, making her way back through Stoke Newington, through the cemetery. It didn’t matter to him anyway. It was spoiled. He put his hand back into his left pocket and squeezed himself a couple more times, his prick sore and hard and hot. But he didn’t let himself finish, although he was so close now, he was ready. To finish now would spoil things even more. That wouldn’t be right. Instead, he set out walking up the path the jogger was running along, although he wasn’t following her now. Instead, he headed over to see the deer.
On the grass by the side of the path, a group of boys were playing football, imitating the game that was going on right now in Highbury Stadium over on the other side of Blackstock Road. Enzo recognized a few of the kids on the football pitch, a couple from school, a couple from his estate. Almost all of them were wearing the red-and-white shirts. Sometimes on match days like this when Arsenal scored, you could hear the crowd screaming in unison, like a choir. It haunted you, but could thrill you too: make you want to be the one to make the crowd scream. It was what all the boys on the park were imitating, and in his way, it was what Enzo was working toward himself. As he walked in the direction of the deer enclosure, the ball squirmed from the playing field and rolled across the path in front of him, but no one shouted for him to kick it back. Enzo let the ball roll into the gully by the side of the path.
Enzo hadn’t been back to school since some black kid, some tall Somali, had called him a freak at break, and who knows what he had been trying to prove? Enzo had stewed on it for the rest of the day. They met up at the gates after school, and when the Somali kid came toward him, Enzo had sliced a split Coke can across the kid’s eyeball, judging it just right. The kid had dropped onto his knees, no time to say anything, not even enough time to put a hand to his eye. He squatted on all fours, staring down at the ground. He couldn’t stop himself from blinking and his eyeball parted with a slice that grew wider every time his eyelid flicked over it, yawning into wet blackness. This disappointed Enzo. He’d hoped it would bleed more.