That was all this morning. He’s just glad the smell has gone. It was a whopper of a pong. And he’s also glad Treppie wasn’t there when it happened, ’cause then of course he would’ve had lots to say.
Here he is now, at the front gate. He looks pissed.
‘The burghers of Triomf!’ he says. ‘Why you all standing here like you’re going to church? It looks like you want to get baptised or something.’
His mother points. The postbox.
‘Light blue.’
‘Yes, I see, it’s breaking out like pork measles, the national peace epidemic, vote blue, vote pig, the Benades are going aboard the peace brig! Coor-doo, coor-doo!’ sings Treppie, flapping his arms like a dove.
‘Now the postbox is fixed for ever and ever.’ Pop winks. He can see Pop’s telling him he must just stay cool. He’ll handle Treppie.
‘Sure thing,’ says Treppie, ‘hope springs eternal. Go fetch the ladder so we can start. I’ve got lampshades for Africa here, and you can choose between a yellow or a blue toilet seat.’
‘Blue,’ says his mother. He agrees. Blue’s better. Blue or pink, but not yellow. Yellow’s too close to shit.
Treppie says he’ll hang the yellow one behind the bathroom door as a spare. That’s cool, he wants to say. If he, Lambert, spent as much time on the toilet seat as Treppie, then he’d also want a spare. But he doesn’t say it. He holds back. He doesn’t want to rub Treppie up the wrong way. Treppie’s on his ear already.
And he’s full of tricks, too. No, they can’t touch his bag. He wants to unpack the stuff himself, inside, not here. They must come into the lounge. His mother closes the door behind them.
Lambert feels Pop pulling him by the sleeve. He must sit down on his crate so Treppie can start. Treppie’s wired. He acts like that rubbish bag’s a king-size lucky packet. He must just be cool tonight. The closer they get to the election, the more crazy Treppie gets. Like the other day, when they heard someone say the voting would now be over three days — the first day for special votes, and the next two for ordinary votes — Treppie started spouting rubbish again. Seeing that he, Lambert, was in the special class at school, Treppie said, he should by rights bring out a special vote on the 26th, which was also a special day for him — his birthday. But he needn’t be afraid, Treppie said, he’d go with him, they didn’t allow special cases to make their crosses without the guidance of an adult. He was just about to give Treppie another smack when Pop explained a special vote was something people made in ‘exceptional circumstances’, like drought or a plague, but then Treppie said, in that case the whole of South Africa should go vote with Lambert, so he wouldn’t feel lonely. Then they could all make one helluva big cross with white stones on RAU’s rugby field, right inside those new walls. Then maybe a few UFOs would come land there. Treppie says UFO stands for United Foreign Observers. Typical Treppie rubbish.
Here he comes now with the first shade. Just a yellow square, really. What kind of a shade is that? But now Treppie’s unfolding it like a fan. It’s a great big sun with a wide, red mouth that smiles.
‘A sun! Good show!’ says his mother. She holds out her hands.
‘Don’t touch!’
Treppie hotfoots it up the ladder. ‘Hold tight,’ he shouts.
Pop holds the ladder. Treppie works the shade around the bulb till it fits nicely.
‘Ta-te-raa!’ he says. ‘Now it shines on everyone!’
The second one’s a round blue light full of little silver stars.
‘Ooh! Give here!’ It’s his mother again. She sucks her lip, in-out, in-out. Doesn’t want to wear her false tooth. If his girl comes again, after tonight, he’d better nag Pop to find her a tooth that fits. She looks just like a worn-out old slut nowadays. And now she’s falling in love with those little stars. She’s getting soft in the head. Better just to leave her alone.
‘Okay, Ma.’ He tries to keep his voice even. She and Pop have helped him nicely today. They may as well have the stars for their room. He’ll even hang the shade up for them. As he walks down the passage, he hears Treppie mumbling something to his mother. Must be talking about him again. Let them, they’re still going to see a thing or two in this house.
He has to stand on the mattress to hang up the shade. He struggles with the strings around the hole where the bulb goes in. Fucken frills! He can hear them dragging the ladder around as they hang things up all over the house.
‘Don’t fall,’ he hears his mother say. It sounds like she’s talking through a rag. She even stinks from her mouth nowadays. After tonight he’ll be finished with her. Then he’ll do his own thing, in his own way. He must just have the right touch with his girl tonight. Then she’ll come back again and, who knows, maybe this will become a decent house.
He can’t get the bulb through the hole. It’s too small. So he just pushes it, ‘grrt!’, right through the paper. He ties the strings on to the electric wire. Right, it’s tight enough now.
He walks through the house. Shades hang from the ceiling everywhere. Full moons and crescent moons and pointy little stars and things like that. Some of the suns are even winking at him. No more naked bulbs. The left-over shades have been hung up by their strings from the ceiling. They’ve put up two shades in his den. He heard Treppie telling his mother and Pop about the red ones being the hot planets, and how they had to keep watch over tonight’s other two stars. Treppie must watch his fucken jokes now. This is serious business!
‘Yippeeee! Party!’ Treppie shouts. He comes jumping up and down the passage, touching all the moons and stars and suns with his fingertips as he runs. They swing and turn on their strings. Toby ‘whoof-whoofs’ after him. He stands to one side. They must go slow, now! Slow!
‘Lights!’ Treppie shouts. ‘Lights!’ It’s already quite dark in the house. Then Pop switches on all the lights. Suddenly he sees yellow and orange shadows everywhere as the shades light up the walls.
‘Check it out,’ says Treppie, ‘the Orient is with us! Now all we need is some sweet and sour. Come, it’s time for room inspection. Step up! Step up!’
Treppie pushes his mother and Pop down the passage, into the den. Lambert feels shy, he’s pissed off. It’s his stuff, this! Why must they do this, now? They just want to go and spoil everything again! He must act like it’s nothing, just stand there with a straight face and push out his chest. No one’s going to get him down now.
First they inspect the den’s walls. The insect paintings are nearly finished. All of them got some new wings this morning.
‘Good enough for an opening night,’ says Treppie.
In the deep, red light, the insect-things look almost real. His mother gets the creeps. ‘Yuk!’ she says.
‘Lost City,’ says Treppie. ‘It glows with eerie brilliance!’ He flings out his arms and prances around the room like a master of ceremonies. ‘Lost City or Cango Caves, and here comes the caveman, too!’
Treppie smacks him on the back. It burns, but he says nothing.
Then Treppie picks up the glasses one by one and makes as if he’s wiping off dust. Full of shit again! He polished those glasses himself. There’s no dirt on them.
‘Look, all the little buck!’ his mother says. She’s looking at the bowls that he lined up in a row on his bench. He turned all the bowls so the stags’ feet point to the bottom and their heads to the top. What’s so funny about that? He wishes they’d just fuck off.
On the bed, on top of the white sheets, lie his clothes. A light blue shirt from Jet, and a dark blue, double-breasted blazer that Pop found on special at the Plaza. And a brand-new pair of white pants with funny pleats on both sides of the zip. Pop bought everything with his own money. He’s already looped his belt, with its extra hole, into the pants. And there lies his new, blood-red Speedo, on top of the pants. His polished boots stand at the foot of the bed with a pair of Pop’s socks in a ball on top.