Charlie stared at the shoes. High heels, plimsoles, brogues, Doc Martens, desert boots, even a pair of flip flops marched past him. A jogger hurdled his rucksack and panted into the distance while, above him, a train heaving with bodies rumbled towards the city. He admired a pigeon attempting to eat a crust of bread discarded amongst the crowd. Its diligence and dexterity impressed him, swooping in to peck before darting out the way of a heavy-soled boot at the last moment.
With a deep breath, Charlie looked up to stare at the faces above, begging someone to notice him. The low winter sun pierced through the Finsbury Park station bridge, daring the rush hour procession to confront it, most people preferred the warm glow of their phones. Those who caught his eye only held it for a split second before marching on.
At times like this, he thought he might be invisible, that his supposed existence was just a cruel trick. He reached into his coat for his most treasured possession, a handheld mirror. The skin on the face looking back at him was taut, as if he were constantly sucking in his cheeks while his black hair was matched by a pair of beady eyes. Ugly, he thought, but real.
He looked back up at the crowd, his gaze latching onto a man striding towards the Tube. He wore a grey suit that hung beautifully off his broad shoulders. The pavement seemed like it was moulded to his polished shoes, the wind swept his hair back with a flourish and the sun dazzled in his blue eyes. He was the type of man who smiled at you in toothpaste adverts or presented quizzes on daytime TV. Charlie looked down at his own clothes. A long black puffa coat with a rip down one side cocooned him like a caterpillar, peaking out the bottom was a pair of torn jeans, while both soles of his grubby trainers were hanging off, as if desperately trying to escape.
He longed to be near the man, to trick the world that they were friends, so started to rise to his feet, but before he could invade the crowd a hand on his shoulder pushed him back down.
“Don’t get up, it isn’t worth it kid,” said Frank, “They don’t see the likes of you or I, they only see progress.”
Charlie kept looking up, trying and failing to prove his friend wrong whilst bracing himself to endure another of the older man’s infamous speeches.
“The pilgrimage, that’s what I call it. 500 years ago people would march across the world to a place of worship, a sacrifice so great that some died during the journey. Now people journey forty minutes to some crappy advertising company to work on marketing something that probably gives you cancer. Now don’t get me wrong, religion isn’t my cup of tea either, I’m not into stonings or crucifixions or burning witches, but at least it had some colour, some characters. This is just like a crowd of zombies being herded to corrupt children into buying more crap.”
Charlie continued to ignore Frank. His body was feverish, warning him to get more opiates in it quick. His skinny arm was trembling while beads of sweat ran down his pale face like condensation on a dirty window.
“Eh, I told you, don’t look up son there’s no point. They don’t see you. We may as well exist in a different universe to them.”
Charlie looked into his mirror once more, the fever meant his face swam in the reflection. “What do you mean? I’m right here. Why do you always have to go on about us being another species?”
Frank chuckled and extended a clammy hand around the younger man’s shoulders. He leaned in, his rough stubble grazing Charlie’s cheek while the sour stench of alcohol on his breath sent a shiver through Charlie’s body, just like that summer a decade earlier.
…
You stand in the doorway of the living room, watching your step-father. The sour stench of the empty beer cans by the old man’s feet cloaking the air. Martin’s stomach sags over the waistband of his jeans while his second chin wobbles under the breeze of the fan in the corner of the room, the gusts of air it produces doing little to prevent beads of sweat from streaming down his face. It looks like the heat has melted him into the leather sofa, you are unsure if he will ever be able to get up.
He turns and smiles at you. “Why are you all the way over there Charlie?” He asks.
“I’m fine here,” you reply.
Martin takes a swig of his beer, throws the empty can onto the pile and cracks open a new one.
“Nonsense,” he says “You can barely see the telly.”
You feel an urge to be outside. The floral wallpaper feels as if it’s closing in. “Can I go out now?”
“Out there, no mate. It’s over thirty degrees. It’s too hot for a young pale kid like you.”
“But Mum said I could.”
“Listen kid, you know I don’t make the rules. There will be hell to pay if your mum gets home and finds out you’ve been out in this kind of heat.”
“But she said I could, I swear.”
“Don’t lie to me. If I let you out I’ll just get a telling off later. Now come and sit over here, the football will be on in ten.”
You stand still.
“You can have a sneaky sip of my beer?”
You’ve never tried beer. Jason and Tyler in your class have and Grace said she’d tried a bit of wine. Your peers are always teasing you about how crap you are at football, how you can’t really spell words properly, or your weird taste in music. You imagine going in after the holidays and telling everyone how you’d got drunk on real beer, you can see the admiration in their stupid faces as you recount what it tasted like. Maybe they’d be friends with you after that? In the midst of the daydream, you plonk yourself down on the sofa. The leather is so hot it burns your legs.
“Pass us a can then,” you say with false bravado.
“I can’t reach over there can I? Come closer you daft sod.”
You shuffle along the sofa, watching condensation slide down the silver can as Martin sloshes more down his throat. You shift closer until you can smell the cheese and onion crisp sandwich Martin had eaten for lunch, can see the brittle hairs that twirl out of his ears. You reach out your hand and Martin passes you his can.
It’s cold. It feels good.
As you put it to your lips you feel the heat of Martin’s clammy hand on your leg.
…
Frank playfully slapped Charlie to get his attention. “You and your daydreams kid,” he said, “Sometimes I wonder whether you exist in another dimension.”
Charlie said nothing, staring straight ahead. The inside of his thigh tickled like it had been sunburnt.
“Let me let you in on a little secret kid.” Said Frank, pointing at the crowd. “You see to recognise us for what we are, bums, tramps, whatever you want to call it, to recognise us for what we are is to admit that they made us, that their brutal economic system created us. Not only did it create us, it needs us. They are its soldiers, but we my friend are its henchman.”
Frank paused, Charlie said nothing. “You ever watch The Wire?” Charlie sighed. He’d heard this one before.
“Well, there’s this one episode when Omar robs Avon, the kingpin, robs his stash house in broad daylight. Him and his boyfriend just go in there with a couple of sawn-off shotguns. Anyway, Avon’s mad you see because he looks weak, so his soldiers find Omar’s boyfriend and they torture him bad, burning cigarettes in his eyes and cutting him all over. Then they leave his body on top of a car in the same neighbourhood where they were robbed so everyone can see it. They are sending a message you see, this is what happens to people who mess with us and it ain’t pretty. What happened to Omar’s boyfriend, well that’s what’s happened to us for not joining the pilgrimage, for not being another one of these low cholesterol idiots. You see we are being held up as an example of what happens if one day they grow half a brain cell and think why am I going into an office with people I hate, to talk about the weather and worry about shitting too loud? Why do I pack myself into a train like a sardine and pay over half my wages for a shitty bedsit in Harrow? Well, they look at us and see what will happen to them if they give up. We are the motivation my friend, a vital cog in the machine that keeps the army marching, we should get a salary in my eyes.”
Frank paused, Charlie continued to stare past him, waiting for the inevitable Orwell quote.
“It’s like Orwell wrote Charlie. A beggar, looked at realistically, is simply a businessman, getting his living, like other businessmen, in the way that comes to hand. He has not, more than most modern people, sold his honour; he has merely made the mistake of choosing a trade at which it is impossible to grow rich. If ever people ask me what I do I tell them I’m a businessman, just not a very good one.”
Frank leant back and chuckled, but Charlie was only listening to his body. His stomach was churning, sweat ran down his face yet a creeping chill spread across his limbs. He wanted to tell Frank he didn’t care about his pointless philosophising. What difference did it make to his life? He needed to score. Focusing on this short-term goal was easier than unpicking why his destitution was allowed to exist, why his life seemed to be only getting worse.
He longed for a hit like the first time, that rush of warmth that felt like how he imagined a mother’s hug must feel. These days when he shot up it barely touched the sides; its only purpose was stopping him from getting sick for a few hours. An ex-girlfriend had once told him that you don’t always have to live in the present, that memories are also a form of reality. She’d also been convinced that pavement cracks were a code left by her ancestors, but maybe if he shut his eyes really tight he could relieve that moment once more.
…
“Why did you have to bring that weirdo?”
“Shut up Jason, he’s my friend.”
“I bet he sniffs your knickers when you aren’t looking.”
“Why have you got to be such a bastard?”
“I bet he sleeps with a pair under his pillow.”
“You think you’re funny but really all your doing is showing off your own insecurities.”
“Oh missus I’m studying psychology starts off again. He’s a weirdo Grace anyone can see that.”
“Charlie, don’t just let him talk about you like this.”
You look up at Jason and feel the familiar disdain ugly men often feel for those who are effortlessly handsome. You marvel at the way the light summer breeze perfectly tussles his thick black hair. You gaze at the veins that run down his arms like estuaries.
Grace nudges you. “Well, c’mon Charlie you can’t let yourself get pushed around forever.”
You shrug. Fundamentally you don’t disagree with Jason. “I don’t care.”
Grace grabs both your arms in her ringed hands. “Charlie you are smart and funny and kind. Who the hell else do I know who gets that The Smiths represent the ethereal sadness of the mundane British existence but can still vibe to The Sugababes?” She slaps your cheek playfully “Eh? You are one of a kind sunshine, now start acting like it”.
She looks like she truly believes what she’s saying but you can’t understand how someone as cool as Grace could think that about a puny dweeb like you. You look up into the wonders of her face, hoping to see what she sees in you in the reflections of her hazel eyes, but she turns away and carries on hiking up the hill.
“C’mon dumbass we are nearly there,” she shouts. You trudge behind them.
“I reckon his Dad used to touch him up when he was a kid, that shit always turns people weird.”
Jason turns and smiles at you. You see his ugliness then, it creeps out from under his square jaw and perfect cheekbones, spreading like a rash across his face as he stands there leering. You want to tell him to fuck off, but the memories you keep in the pit of your being start gurgling, sending you running back down the hill, the long grass whipping at your bare legs.
“You are such an arsehole,” you hear Grace say before the clump of her Doc Martens start following you. She shouts for you to stop but you keep running. You feel Martin’s clammy hand on your leg, the rough graze of his stubble. You are sure that if you stop the memory will suffocate you.
Eventually, the burning in your lungs forces you to collapse into the shade of a vast willow tree, your face wet with tears and sweat. Grace falls down next to you and the two of you lie there for a while not speaking, your breathing slowly becoming calmer. Eventually, she reaches over and holds your hand in hers, the cool of her rings feel good against your clammy palms.
“It’s true isn’t it? What Jason said?”
You look away.
“I’m sorry Charlie, that’s screwed up man.”
“It’s in the past now,” you say, feeling the sweaty memories pour out of your skin.
Grace sits up and starts picking at a daisy. You admire the way her blonde hair compliments her olive skin. She brings the daisy to her full lips and bites one of its leaves off before blowing it into the breeze. Not for the first time you wish her mouth would envelop you in a similar way.
“Listen, I’m going to tell you something I haven’t ever told anyone okay so you have to promise me this stays between us.”
She sticks her little finger out and you latch yours around it.
“I have this cousin, big sweaty fucker. He used to put his podgy fingers on me. At birthdays, Christmas, after school club, he’d just lead me away and touch me, happened until I was 13 then one day he stopped, thank god. The worst part of it was it made me feel really bloody small you know? Like I was worthless. I internalised it badly, thought it was my fault, that I should have stopped the horny Hippo.”
You laugh.
“Hey, this isn’t funny, I’m bleeding my heart out to you here. Anyway, then when I was about 15 I found out the Hippo’s old man used to beat him, like properly beat him so he used to have black eyes. My Mum and Nan had to have some kind of intervention with social services. When I found that out something just clicked in my head. It made me realise that him touching me was nothing to do with me, he was doing it because of what someone else was doing to him. It doesn’t excuse it mind you, he’s still a scumbag but he isn’t a scumbag because of me. Do you get me?”
Grace turns and looks at you, her eyes yearning for her words to lift the curse Martin put on you in the same way she’d lifted her own. You feel no different but nod in agreement. “Yeah, I get you.”
“What’s that poem? ‘They fuck you up your Mum and Dad, they don’t mean to but they do.’ I can’t remember the rest but it’s inter-generational, you’ve got to break the cycle. You are strong enough.”
“I don’t think so”
Grace exhales and furrows her brow. “You are man, trust me.”
She rummages in the pocket of her denim shorts, bringing out what looks like a joint. “This should help you take your mind off that asshole. I was saving it to have with Jason but screw him if he’s going to act like that.”
“What is it? Weed?”
“Nah this isn’t weed. You have two more guesses before I cut your balls off.”
“Acid?”
“You don’t smoke acid you dumbo” she starts flapping your ears up and down until you can’t help but giggle.
“I dunno I give up, I’m an uncultured swine who values his testicles and can’t keep up with worldly ladies like you.”
Grace takes a lighter from her pocket. “This, my friend, is solid gold opium, otherwise known on the street as heroin.”
“No, it’s not”
“It certainly is”
“Where did you get it?”
“My Mum.”
“You’re lying.”
“I’m not.”
“Your mum smokes heroin?”
“My Mum says that we have just been conditioned by the powerful to think that heroin is a seriously dangerous and addictive drug. She says that it’s no more dangerous or addictive than booze or fags and that people can function perfectly normally and take heroin every now and again but the ruling classes criminalise it to keep the lower classes in check. She has a PHD you know.”
“So your mum gave you some?”
Grace laughs, “No way. I stole it from her bedside draw. We going to smoke this big mother or what?”
You look at the crumpled joint, it looks the same as the countless regular joints you’ve smoked over the years. What do you have to lose?
“Let's do it.”
Grace lights up and takes a long drag, slowly breathing out the smoke through her nose. She takes another and lies back into the grass holding the burning Rizla up for you to take. Her eyes are closed and her mouth hangs open.
“How does it feel?” You ask.
“You’ve no idea.”
You put the joint to your lips and inhale tentatively, it tastes like tar, a world away from the fruitiness of the cannabis you’re used to. You inhale again and a warm feeling starts to spread across your body. You take another drag and feel those memories which bubble in your stomach grow lighter. You fall back next to Grace and savour the warm feeling spreading up your arms.
A butterfly flutters overhead and you imagine it carrying the pain you store inside away with it until you feel as light as the daisy Grace had been picking earlier.
…
“Hey kid you’re gone again. Wake up you daft sod.”
Charlie batted Frank’s hand away from his face.
“God that was a long one,” said Frank with a chuckle, “Where were you?”
Charlie wanted to tell Frank to leave him alone, but Frank was already talking again, something about how class struggle is rooted in what kind of bread you eat. What interested Charlie most of all was the glint of the coins in Frank’s upturned woolly hat. They shimmered in the sunlight, taking on an almost mystical quality. He tried to fight the urge. He screwed his eyes shut and thought of the things Frank had done for him over the last few months. How he’d defended him when that big prick Barry had tried to steal his gloves, how he’d accompanied him to the GP to check the infection on his leg and how he’d called an ambulance when he had overdosed a few weeks before.
But something in the way his teeth ground together made him suddenly sure the next hit would be the one. The needle would send him spiralling back to lying under that willow tree, Grace’s rings cooling his clammy palms, his soul fluttering next to a butterfly. The realisation of what he was about to do filled him with a sense of shame at his own weakness. Ironically, this only served to increase his need for heroin. He felt as pathetic as he did those nights he spent alone with Martin. He thought of what his support worker had said to him yesterday, that addiction is characterised by the drive to continue the behaviour despite the negative consequences. She was right, but understanding that didn’t soothe years of neglect. He had no choice.
In a flash, he grabbed the hat and charged towards Blackstock Road, the coins jangling in his grip. He tripped on his laces and fell forward before scrambling up and continuing the ungainly exit, never looking back. People parted to let him through, turning their heads in disgust, but he didn’t notice.
They were invisible now.
