But it wasn’t love. I’ve never felt it. This was never a problem until I started visiting that bench each day. I often think of people in love, those who have spent their entire lives together, as deeply bored — they must be, to want to spend a whole life together. Nothing must force them to part, to walk away, to do something different. Their boredom must be channelled into this thing they believe in, this word: love. They must never think about it: the boredom, as it pours into them, convincing them that their love means something. That there is deep meaning in all the years they spend together. I don’t know about that. I think those types of people are scared: scared of being alone, scared of emptiness, scared of dying alone: scared of boredom.
Although, I soon began to think about love too. I began to think about love quite a lot — as much as I think about boredom, in fact.
And then they walked over to us. They seemed to appear from out of nowhere, from within the murky ether of the canal. That same gang, those same four teenagers who accosted me the day I was alone. The lad with the red hair I didn’t trust. They were dressed in exactly the same clothes. The red-haired one looked dirtier though, unkempt, like he’d been sleeping rough. They seemed to know her — or at least recognised her from the other day, when they asked her for a light in the street — pointing at her in unison as they approached.
“Hey, it’s you, man.”
“You’re here again, man.”
“With that battyboy, man”
“You and him, man.”
She didn’t seem too fussed by their immediate and abrupt presence. In fact, she seemed to let it wash over her, even when they began to sit next to her, cutting me out, leaning in close to her and flicking her hair from time to time.
“JC reckons he could have you, girl.”
“He want you, girl, so much.”
“He could have you like that, girl.”
“Yeah, I want you, girl, I want you.”
She seemed to brush off their crude advances like one would a fly from one’s food in mid-conversation: nonchalantly and without a care in the world, second nature. It was the one with the red hair who started to touch her leg. She shivered. But she didn’t once try to move away. I looked across. I looked at his grimy hand on her leg, above the knee. He was squeezing it. His three friends giggling like the children they actually were — she just sat there. I had to say something, even if that something would pique their attention enough to turn violent with me. I had to say something.
“Take your fucking hand off her leg!”
It came out like that. I said it loudly. I almost shouted it. The four teenagers looked at me.
“What did you just say, man?”
“What did you say, man?”
“What’s that, man?”
“You talking our way, man?”
They began to surround me. She turned to me; I looked at her. She shook her head, instructing me not to say any more, but I couldn’t help myself.
“Don’t fucking touch her again …”
My right leg was shaking. The first one to hit me was the tallest one, the one with the shaved head: the blow came full in the side of my head. It hurt. The force of it pushing me from the bench and onto the ground. Then they began kicking me and I could feel nothing, except each thud as their feet dug into my ribs and bounced off my head. It felt as if the air had been sucked out of my lungs. I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t hear anything. Then the shock of blackness.
Then nothing.
When I awoke they had gone. So had she. I crawled back to the bench. I looked over to the whitewashed office block: everyone was staring over at me: groups gathered at each looming window. Why hadn’t they tried to do something? Why hadn’t they shouted over, or called the police? My face began to throb. My ribs felt like they had been plucked from me. I found it difficult to breathe but I guessed that I was okay. My pockets were empty and my wallet had been taken. I knew I didn’t want to get the police involved; I knew I didn’t want to get anyone involved. But I wanted to know where she had gone to. It baffled me. I started to walk. Back towards Hackney. I needed to get to a phone box to inform my bank to cancel my cash card. I needed to walk towards where I thought she might be. I figured she might live in the De Beauvoir Town area, or somewhere in that location. It suited her. She looked that type: one of those individuals content to sit in a gastro-pub playing scrabble or backgammon with the one they love.
Just as I was about to leave the canal towpath I noticed the swan on the murky water. It was looking directly at me. Right at me. Into me. Like it knew something I didn’t. I stopped walking. It came up to me. It knew I had no food for it, but still it came, right up to the edge of the towpath. I knelt down slowly, painfully, and stretched out my hand to stroke its head, thinking to myself that it would shy away off in the opposite direction from me, but it didn’t; the swan allowed me to stroke its head and long neck, like it was a domesticated cat or something. This huge swan before me, allowing me to stroke it. It was the most incredible thing. Never had I seen such a thing before, and I certainly hadn’t had such a thing happen to me before. The huge, white swan and me. Friends.
The swan came to me. It came to me.
Part Two
conversation one
“Why do you always tell me these …”
“Secrets?”
“Yes, these secrets?”
“Because it’s easy.”
“Why don’t you tell me anything else?”
“As I said, there’s nothing else to say.”
“But …”
“But what?”
“But there’s lots to say.”
“It’s all been said before. Plus, the silences are just as important.”
“Silences?”
“Those times we don’t say anything … It’s when we say the most.”
“I don’t understand …”
“You don’t have to …”
“But I want you to tell me things.”
“Things?”
“Things about you …”
“I have done …”
“Not enough.”
“Never enough.”
The sun was shining. The bruises on my face were beginning to fade. Thankfully, I hadn’t seen the gang of teenagers in the few days that had passed since they had attacked me. Before walking back to the bench I had spent most of my time in bed, watching downloads on my laptop, and thinking of her, and when my bones eventually stopped aching, and my flesh had begun to heal, I plucked up the courage to walk back to her. I hadn’t mentioned the attack to anyone. There was no need to talk it through with her — our meetings weren’t about me. At least that’s how it seemed. Sitting on the bench had been a pleasant experience; the previous days in bed had been bliss, albeit a little painful.