Goatie 27

Cramp below my right knee, shuttled my torso along the soaking mattress. I twisted and turned and cursed to fuck and back. A memory bobbed to the surface. The church I used to go to when I was a kid. Modern for the early sixties. A child’s drawing with a spire and stained-glass windows. Made of facing brick enclosing a nave and a stall at the back for the church choir to raise heaven. Kneelers and wooden seats up the two sides. Two wings near the main altar, a classic cruciform shape. Mini-altars with a whiff of incense. I tried to push into a row of seats near the side altar dedicated to Our Lady.

The bell in the tower—rung on special occasions—clanking and drowning out the voices of the parishioners. A seat beside my mum. She always sat near the action: blood of the lamb and Holy Eucharist, water into wine. Each worn bead of rosary around her wrist a fingered rung to heaven above and forgotten faces. Black leather bag with a golden snib that didn’t quite catch, her fat purse at her bunioned feet. Ten pence ready for the collection plate when it came around. Another coin, silver sixpence for the flickering candle.

The matronly woman beside her wouldn’t move and let me into their row. She stared straight ahead, blaring out the opening hymn, Faith of our Fathers Holy Faith. I tried to squeeze into the row behind, but an equally stout matron stood unmoved. I worked my way back to the extended rows of seats beside the confessional box, with a pillar to hide behind. As I darted towards the space, my legs gave way and I lay sprawling on the polished wooden floor, staring up at the ceiling. Runes in in a goatish language I didn’t understand tore across the vaulting roof at it cracked open to let in the light.

Petrified churches. People dying of thirst and hunger. Hollowed out voices crying to God. Roads and houses laid out like neat cemeteries. Bodies lay forgotten as the fading lines on tombstones. Angry ghosts of memory, when the sun went down. Yet there was no night. Wind whipping over the mildewed eyes of fallen cherubim and catacombed angels. I felt tears on my cheeks. I wept and choked on my own vomit. Gave birth to a gurgling goaty noise and seasons without days or reason. Crops withered, ravens cried, and the sickness cut children alive.

I’d forgotten nothing, and that was my burden. I blinked several times. Needed to ponder who Tadpole was when he came into the room with a screw.

‘You alright?’ he asked, his nostrils dilating.

He signalled to the warden and whispered, ‘We’ll gi’e him a bit of time to get cleaned up before we take him to the governor’s.

The older screw had one of those folded-in faces in which it was difficult to tell what he was thinking. Tadpole followed at his back ushering him out.

I took my time making a bath of the metal sink and washing away the stink with hard soap. Washing my hair and taking prison time. It felt a wondrous thing to be clean. But I’d nothing to wear, but I no longer cared. I was sure the new governor would be much the same as the old governor.  

The cranky warden hadn’t hung around. Tadpole told me the screws were short-staffed and he’d escort me. I was sure that was a breach of some kind of prison rules or union rules to do with demarcation of tasks. The chain of command was breaking down and the duty of care was unravelling link by link.

The governor’s desk and office was piled with files and paperwork. He took a long time focussing on us, and stood up to show a matching grey waistcoat and pinstripe suit. His jaw jutting as he steadied himself with a hand braced against the edge of the desk. He managed to nod and indicate we should sit. He must have been tall and bull shouldered once, vestiges of his grandeur clung to the way he spoke.

‘Move that…’ he instructed Tadpole, pointing to the sheets of paper on a chair beside mine and flicking his fingers. His voice retained vestiges of that bored quality of someone repeating themselves for your sake. ‘And can you tell me a bit more about this project of yours?’

I glanced at Tadpole. He looked at the governor and then back at me.

Tadpole said. ‘You asked to see us governor?’  

‘Did I?’ he shook his head, and sighed. ‘Oh, yes, that’s correct.’  

Dull eyed, he smiled graciously and waved away our mistake. ‘Right, to business,’ he said. ‘I’ll call you back when we have more information.’

‘About what?’ Tadpole asked.

‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Indeed.’ And looked over his head and picked up a pen.

The assistant governor barrelled into the room. He offered the same easy assurance as the governor, but was twenty years younger. He wore the customary dark grey suit. His hair parted precisely to the side. His moustache meticulous in its grooming. Gaunt cheeks and a warm smile that didn’t reach the crinkles around his blue eyes.

‘I’m glad you’re here,’ he said opening his arms in a curve that took in the cluttered room as if we were his houseguests in an expensive restaurant he’d selected. ‘I was hoping we could bring together all the factions and we could have a little chat.’ That smile again. ‘To clear the air.’