Satchel

Satchel

Actually, come to think of it, it was more like a rucksack. Strange how
your memory dances. In my mind, I see it as a thin bag, like one of
those ones that fashionable people use to make you think they are
carrying records to a party where they are the DJ, but old-fashioned,
with those tan leather straps that seem as though they could be chewed
like leather-liquorice; the buckles, the one hole worn and ragged so
that the strap was at the right height to hang over Mitsuko's shoulder
so that the bag itself would rest just at her hip.

But it wasn't that type of bag at all; it couldn't have been. Nor was
it like mine, an oversized tennis bag with a Head logo on the side, a
bag so large I could have been using it to run away to Germany, the way
my friend Dean Hurley did, rather than just for some Biology books that
someone had drawn overdeveloped penises inside every time there was a
picture of a naked man.

It must have been a rucksack affair, with a drawstring at the top that
made the top purse like a cat's bum. I think it was purple, or perhaps
green.

Anyway, Mitsuko was my best friend at school.

No. That's not true, and enough of what follows is outlandish, without
my embellishing the more prosaic parts. I always wanted Mitsuko to be
my best friend, but the truth of it was, she barely knew I existed. I
would walk ten minutes out of my way so that I could wait at the same
bus-stop as her, but on the rare occasions we spoke, I could only
really get out a mumble, or something very lame.

Truth was, and this is a little shameful, I fell in love with her the
first time I saw her and used to daydream about finding her in the
street, having had her satchel stolen by older, unpleasant boys, and
comforting her. It is awful looking back, that this girl I cared so
much about; I used to regularly wish for the most dreadful things to
befall her, just so that I could strike up a conversation. Something I
could have done any day of the week just by smiling and saying hello,
if only I had had the nerve.

Anyway, after all these false starts, here we are at the zoo. A school
trip, we must have been about thirteen, I think. Mitsuko hadn't been at
the school for long. Long enough for me to fall desperately in love
with her, but in those days that sort of thing didn't take me long at
all. (Nor these days, a glimpse of a black bra strap, the right shape
of a pair of glasses, the certain kick of a skirt as a girl walks, they
all do the job.)

The trip was casually educational and the coach stopped off on the way
so that we could all shoplift pear drops and cans of cherry coke. I sat
next to a boy named Richard Plum, who used to delight in trumping, he
claimed it warmed his legs. His focus was on warmth and noise, rather
than odour, so he wasn't as bad to sit next to as you might imagine. I
had chosen the seat because it gave me a view of Mitsuko, who was
across the aisle and three rows in front. I could see her neck, the
side of her head and I could hear her laugh.

I had it quite badly, in case you haven't guessed.

When we got to the zoo, the teacher made no attempt to hold us together
in a group, simply looked at his watch and told us what time to be
back. He was already smoking before the first batch of children had run
off to see the lions.

Me, I like aquatic stuff. Not fish. Fish are too thin to be of any
purpose. I like seals, sea lions, and polar bears. I'm not sure whether
I'm sad that you can't see polar bears in zoos any more or happy. It is
much better for them, of course, but it means I can't see one up close
any time I care to.

So I'm at the zoo, on my own, just watching the sea-lions in their
enclosure, blue-painted concrete, buckets of fish, honking braying
noises. Then I see Mitsuko throwing her packed lunch into a rubbish
bin. For some reason, perhaps it is being close to sea lions, I feel
brave and go up to talk to her. She has dropped in a packet of crisps,
a Wagon Wheel and now some sandwiches.

"Rubbish sandwiches? " I say, trying to force a laugh, "My mother gives
me chicken paste too. "

She puts a perfectly good can of 7-Up into the bin and says, without
looking at me, "What? "

I hate repeating myself more than anything in the world, except now in
adulthood watching someone with a cigarette playing with balloons. Even
so, I do this for Mitsuko, and add, "They must be bad, if you're just
throwing them away. "

As I say this, I suddenly think about that disease that they keep
talking about on the television - anorexia. I look at Mitsuko, not that
I need to; I can sketch her hips and tummy from memory. She's just
fine, not too skinny. I hope I haven't embarrassed her.

She takes out a book from her bag; something called Mallory Towers, and
drops that into the bin too. The bin is red, surrounded by ribs of
steel-coloured metal, and it has beside it spent lollysticks still
stained in greens and yellows, bad jokes on them in faint letters.
Beside the bin, a few lazy, broken wasps spindle in the air; it is
their last month of life. Jaspers, we called them back then. "Watch
out, jaspers!"

"I haven't even read it, " she says, sorrowfully.

"I think my sister has a copy, " I say, doubtfully, making up my mind
that if she doesn't, I can buy a copy from Smiths and lend it to
Mitsuko, then we'll have to talk again at least twice, once for each
exchange. "Why are you throwing it away, if you still want to read
it?"

"Need the room, " she says. She puts the bag down on the floor and
holds her hands apart, expressing some dimensions, something like the
size of a garden gnome. "Have you any room in your bag?"

Mine is that Head bag, loads of room, but it is so ridiculously large I
have left it on the coach, didn't want to carry it round. I tell her
this.

Mitsuko rummages in her bag and takes out a pencil-case. It is soft,
one of those canvas ones. She has written on it in felt-tip pen. As she
puts it into the bin, I can't help but notice that she has written in
orange letters, Mitsuko and Oliver Fallow forever.

My name is not Oliver Fallow. There's a pain in my throat which can't
possibly be my heart breaking.

"Erm, " I say stupidly, "What do you need all this room in your bag
for?"

"Baby penguin, " she says, picking up the now empty rucksack and
beginning to walk off.

I follow her, cursing the fact that the laces have come undone on my
Nike Fury (white basketball boots, red swoosh, as worn by Michael J Fox
in Back to the Future), I don't want to stop to do them up, as I'd lose
her, but I don't want to tread on them as the laces are still white and
perfect.

"What? " I say to her.

She says, and her eyes sparkle at the same time, "There's a baby
penguin in the enclosure, and it has come up a little hill, right near
the wall. I can pick it up and take it home. "

I have seen movies. I know that some girls are crazy. I also know that
they don't like to be talked out of doing crazy things and that every
once in a while, if you help them, you get a kiss out of it.

"Show me, " I say.

She looks at me and laughs, "Aren't you going to talk me out of
it?"

I shrug. "Why bother? You seem pretty sure of yourself. And I don't
think you're going to hurt the penguin. "

"Of course not, " she says, "I love penguins. "

"Then that's fine, " I say with determination.

"I can do this on my own, " she says, and she gives her lower lip a
chew. (For the rest of my life, by the way, I will be capable of
falling in love instantly with any woman who performs this
gesture.)

"Of course, " I say, "But it will be easier with two. I can hold the
bag open, and keep lookout. "

She reaches out and tickles my nose. "You're sweet, " she says, "Just
up here."

When she steals the penguin, I've never been so scared in my life. I
have never been in any trouble, not really. Once, a gang of boys I was
playing with went up to the school fence, put their fingers through
their flies and pretending to be weeing up the fence and a neighbour
called the Headteacher. We all had to stand in his office and all say
together that it had been a silly game and that none of us had actually
been doing anything naughty. The Headteacher had written to our
parents, and had said that he had been particularly disappointed in me.
I don't do mad, crazy things. I do my homework in class, because I'm
quick with the answers. If I'm told to read Chapter Four for history, I
read chapters Four to Six, so that I've got a good idea of what's
coming up. I know the answers, I hand over sweets to bullies, I don't
talk back to my parents.

She picks the baby penguin up, holds its wings tight to its side so
that it can't stop flapping and brings it over to the bag, which I am
holding open.

"Watch for its beak, " she says, "It's sharper than you think. "

We get it in the bag and she draws the strings together, so that the
baby penguin is in the dark. He doesn't struggle much. He goes very
quiet.

"He can breathe in there, can't he? " I ask, a little worried.

"He's fine, " says Mitsuko, showing me her hand, which has a nasty cut
on it. She picks up her rucksack and puts it gently on her shoulder,
with a slight grunt. "He's heavier than sandwiches and books, " she
says.

Then she leans over and gives me a peck on the cheek. Very, very
lightly.

We don't sit next to each other on the bus, but I can't take my eyes
off her bag. I am worried the whole journey home that the penguin will
start crying for its mother, or making whatever weird noises penguins
might make. I am ready to start a chorus of singing at this point,
either based around 'Liverpool', 'Prince Char-ming' or 'Stop the bus I
want a wee-wee', whichever I think will get most audience
participation.

The penguin makes no noise, but I occasionally see Mitsuko reach down
lightly and put two fingers inside the rucksack to stroke the top of
his head. When we get back to the school, where the coach is dropping
us off, she waits for me. Four boys jeer at me, two ruffle my hair and
still another gives me a dead arm. Two girls shout, "Now we know you,
Mitsuko. "

In my defence, this is why it is not that easy to talk to girls that
you are in love with at school.

She says to me, "You live near me, don't you?"

I gulp and have to explain that actually, I live about a fifteen minute
walk away from her. She, of course, asks why I am always at her
bus-stop, and I shrug, go red, look down at the floor and then kick a
stone across the road, saying, "Gary Linneker - scores!"

So, now she knows me.

"What's your address? " she asks me, "I might come round to see you,
later."

When I get home, I shower. I take all of my casual clothes out of the
wardrobe and get my mum to iron them. I squirt myself in Insignia, then
wash it off, then put slightly less on. I consider shaving, just
because it seems masculine, but I don't really need to and the only
time I've ever done it before I bled for ages. I practice raising a
single eyebrow in front of the mirror.

She doesn't come round.

I'm in bed, not sleeping, when she wakes me up by throwing small sour
crab apples at my window. My hair is all sticking up when I open the
window and she says in as quiet a voice as she can manage, "Can you
come down?"

Her hair is not all sticking up, and she has the rucksack with her. I
get dressed and come down.

She says, "Aw, you look so cute. Did I wake you up?"

I tell her that I was awake, that I couldn't sleep.

She says, "Well, you look like you were asleep. Your eyes are all
gummy. "

I rub them.

She says, "I'm struggling to feed Noburo. He only wants fish, and we
don't have any in the house. Well, not any more. "

"What do you mean? " I ask her.

She lifts up the heel of her left shoe and moves the toe of the left
shoe round in a gentle circle, "Well, I had a pet goldfish, named
Fiver. I had to let Noburo have him. "

"It's not as bad as you think, " she says, seeing the look on my face,
"I put him on a plate and let him suffocate naturally. He probably
didn't feel any pain. I didn't feed him to the penguin alive. "

I am very glad to be able to tell her that my family don't have any
goldfish as pets. She does a sort of pout thing.

"Well, " she says, "I saw lots of ponds on the way over here, perhaps
you can help me get some fish out of them. We'll just have to be very
quiet. "

I have a better idea, and I tell her. In my shed are fishing rods and
landing nets, and we are only a five minute walk away from the River
Witham. I know some really good fishing spots there. We get everything
together, as quietly as we are able, and make our way down there.
There's nobody else night-fishing, so we can put on the night-light and
we sit together on the cool grass. She adjusts the rucksack so that the
penguin is exposed from the waist up. He moves his head about in keen
interest and has the occasional snap at some dragonflies attracted to
the light.

I rig up the landing nets and show her how to watch for the floats. She
puts her head on my shoulder. Her hair smells like the most wonderful
thing. I couldn't describe it then, and I can't describe it now. Just,
that the hair of a girl you fall in love with smells more enchanting
than any perfume. And the weight of her head just felt so right. It
takes me an hour to catch a fish, and about another hour after that to
dare to touch her hand with mine. She makes up for my clumsiness by
locking her fingers around mine and occasionally scratching gently the
inside of my palm where the skin is soft.

The penguin enjoys the fish and makes a sound like an old door opening
while he eats them. I stroke him, with far less trepidation than I did
in reaching out to touch Mitsuko - he can only bite me, whereas she
could laugh, or tell everyone at school, or pretend to vomit.

She says, "Maybe he wants to walk around. "

I'm not at all sure that this is a good idea, but he seems very
restless, and she takes him out of the bag, explaining to him that he
is not to go too far. It is unfortunate that at that moment, I get a
tug on the fishing line and start reeling a fish in.

Noburo sees the fat fish twist on the line. He sees the river. He makes
some sort of primordial connection. He waddles for the river. We try to
grab him, but our hands are interlinked. He is in the river, and once
in there, he is away. He swims so fast and gracefully.

"Catch him, " cries Mitsuko.

"I've only got hooks, " I say, "I don't think we can catch him.Not
without hurting him. "

She says, with determination, "Then we'll wait for him to come back.
He'll do that, in a little while. "

He doesn't. But while we wait, she shows me how to kiss, so things work
out okay.

After a time, she says, "Well, I guess I had my own penguin for a day,
which is more than most people get. And we can come down to the river
sometimes to see if we can spot him. "

I say, with certainty, "I'd love to come down to the river and watch
for him with you. I'd like that very much. "

But then the week after, Oliver Fallow asked Mitsuko out, and that was
the end of that. I did carry on night-fishing and sometimes the fish
just vanished from the end of the line before I could get them. My
friends said that there must be an otter in the water, but I knew
otherwise.