Chapter Ten: Bad News More Terrible Than You Can Ever Imagine

Five days passed.
Then seven.
Three new celebrity autobiographies were hauled out onto the shop floor. Enormous, thick books with hundreds of pages of revelations. And if you added the author’s collective ages together you still only got sixty-five! The Monster groaned. Another day passed. The phone rang. The Monster went ‘HUBBA HUBBA’. The Monster was disappointed. Simon and I went for a drink at the old soak’s pub and revived plans for our bookshop. George continued to file everything in the wrong place (surprisingly Carla seemed to deal with it well and didn’t say anything). Mum became fixated on George becoming a retail manager before he reached twenty. I laughed but it came out sounding bitter. George brushed his hair and started to look normal. The phone went. ‘IT MUST BE LOVE,’ the Monster cried. But he was disappointed again. Two new books about beating children came out. Both sold well. We made the decision that our shop (imaginatively called ‘Kate & Simon’s Bookshop’) would only stock titles that we both approved of - we had to have read and really loved the book in order for it to earn a place on the shelf. The problem was this eliminated just about every classic book you usually see in the list of ‘Top Hundred Books You Must Read Before You Die’. And it also meant there’d be quite a lot of shameful books put out for all and sundry to see. And soon we realised that we didn’t want to display our complete lack of intellect in the shop window of our smart, new book emporium. So we changed our plans. We would stock a mixture of books- books that we liked and books we’d heard people (much smarter people than ourselves) say good things about. We would not stock ANY books with cowering children on the cover. Or books about daytime TV celebrities and their battle with alcoholism. Or perhaps we’d have to stock some of those books or we’d end up with no customers. But we’d use body language and positive reinforcement to try and discourage them. And in the long term we’d play a pivotal role in ensuring more good books were written.

Two weeks passed.
The Monster started to bang its head against the cage, crying to be let out.
An egg came and went. Another got itself ready.

I should have stopped Simon in his tracks, explained to him that whilst the book shop was a lovely idea, that was all it was - AN IDEA. It was obvious neither of us had the gumption, the energy, the single-minded business acumen to make it work. We needed a leader. We needed Carla in order to function properly. Without Carla we wandered round the shop like two listless teenagers. She told us what to do and we did it. Without her, we became nervous, jumpy- we bumped into one another- we stuttered when we spoke to customers, we accidentally ripped carrier bags because we tried so hard to convince the world that everything was QUITE ALRIGHT THANK YOU. But for some reason we conveniently forgot this when we brainstormed our bookshop fantasy.
‘We’ll have leather sofas.’
‘We’ll have vintage teapots.’
‘We’ll have cakes. I’ll get in early and make cakes from scratch. All sorts of cake. It’ll be the only book shop that serves truly homemade cake.’
‘And music, we’ll only play good music.’
‘And no kids will be allowed.’
‘What?’
‘Well only well behaved kids.’
‘And we’ll have book readings. We’ll have Alan Bennett, I love him.’
‘And Woody Allen.’

All this new business banter transported me away from the incessant tick of the Monster tock. A month passed. George started to put the books in the right places and file the authors under the right names. And Carla’s mood underwent a transformation- one day I actually saw her eyes shift - what had been two dull, black orbs now shimmered as if a small candle had lit up inside.

Simon and I had more discussions. We decided not to have cake. We would have savoury foods. We would have a restaurant on the side and maybe an area where you could buy alcohol. Eventually we’d open rooms upstairs and have famous authors in to do readings. Six weeks passed. I tried to be as enthusiastic as possible about the plans but inside I was feeling hollow. Medium Brown hadn’t called. Six weeks was a long time. I needed to move on. Then the phone rang. At this stage the Monster had bent the door of the cage outwards, pushed its hairy face through the bars and was grinding its jaw from side to side, drool running down its cheeks and collecting in a puddle on the floor.

But it was someone else talking about something else entirely.

‘I need to speak to you,’ George said.
‘I see you every day in the shop, why don’t you speak to me then?’
‘No I mean I need to speak to you properly, somewhere in private.’
All manner of things flashed through my mind but I can honestly say nothing prepared me for the words that came next.
‘Carla is pregnant,’ George said.
I felt like he’d grabbed the phone and slammed it between my eyes. And yet I didn’t twig. Not properly. I just felt jealous at first. Jealous and convinced at the unfairness of everything.
‘Well that’s nice… I mean I’m surprised, I didn’t think she was seeing anyone. But why are you telling me this information?’
George didn’t answer. For a few seconds there was silence, just enough time for me to hear his jagged breath at the end of the phone and then think through what he’d just told me and why he’d bothered telling me and then before I could stop, the Monster leapt from the cage, wiping the drool on the back of its furry arms and started screaming. There was another pause. Enough time for me think about how Carla had been acting strange, how she’d been much more lenient with George than she’d ever been with Simon and me. And how George had stopped stinking like taramasalata and now looked normal. Like a man instead of a scarecrow with trainers on.
‘Please tell me you are joking,’ I said quietly.
‘Well it’s not like it was planned or anything. Initially it was just a one off, you know I obviously thought she was cool and stuff but never in a million years thought she’d actually have anything to…’
‘STOP!’ I screeched.
‘And I know I’m young but I really think that between the four of us you know – you, me, Carla and Mum we can work something out.’
‘WHAT?’
The Monster like King Kong now, pummelling each section of my brain with its meaty paws so I was completely disorientated and could only see small flash frames – George leaning over the counter laughing at something Carla had just said, Carla leaving early one evening - a shimmer of blue eye shadow above her tiny, stingy eyes, George smelling like he’d been steeped in Lynx, Carla in the ‘Love & Relationships’ section as George handed her a paperback then smiling back at him in the grimacing way of hers - her mouth a letter box, her teeth a set of plaster of Paris dentures. It’d been going on right under my nose! My boss, my heinous, old, hoary boss had set out to seduce a witless, naïve teenager. I’d always guessed she had skeletons in her closet. Someone so relentlessly pessimistic, so glass half- empty had obviously done some terrible things in her time. But to go after a child! An innocent babe!
‘Listen- did she force you to do this? I want you to think very carefully George. Really think back to when it happened. Were you intoxicated? Were you even conscious?’
‘Well it’s happened quite a few times actually,’ George said calmly, ‘On my second day, we went out for a Pizza and then I told her all about you know… my inexperience and she kindly volunteered to help me out. So at first I thought it might just be a one off but then I noticed how much we really have in common- we both like Manga, it’s incredible, I’ve never met someone who loves Manga as much as me. And computer games. You should see the set up she’s got in her flat! It’s amazing.’
First Carla promised to take away his virginity then she reeled him into her honey-trap with video games and Manga. What kind of middle-aged woman liked Manga? It was obvious. It was a sick game. A way to satisfy her sick sexual depravity. It made me shudder to think about the lengths this woman had gone to. And pregnant! And at this stage the Monster was literally rubbing my brain cartilage between its hands and making it into long, stringy sausages and swinging them round its head, then slamming its palms together so a great fug of dust rose up and then stretching the sausages again and swinging them. Carla- the Reaper, the charm-less cadaver was going to have a baby, was going to have the ONE THING I’d wanted more than anything else in the whole world. And it all seemed so horrible that of course it was true. Only real life can throw such horror at you and still expect you to be able to walk around and deal with it.

I threw the mobile on the floor. The green light indicated George was still wittering on about his love affair and impending fatherhood. Didn’t he realise how much this hurt? As I slid to the floor like a character in one of those films that has just been told that her partner has died, I saw the green light flicker and then go black.

All hope is gone.
All hope gone.

And yet of course things go on. At some point you get cramps in your legs and your throat becomes so sore you can’t cough and that is the point that you go over to the kettle and make a cup of tea and at that point you just feel numb. The cloud that was hanging over your head has literally emptied its contents and you can’t think of anything but nice hot tea and what kind of death will come quickest- a paracetemol overdose or running in front of a bus. Then the tea tastes quite good and you make another one and then you catch sight of yourself in the mirror and notice how puffy your eyes look and there’s a blob of mascara on your cheek and you actually bother to wipe it off with your finger and then get a tissue rather than make a mess on the kitchen table. And while you’re in the bathroom you decide to wash your face and the water feels so fresh and nice and slowly you come back and you think about running a bath and so you do and when you get in it you still feel numb but it’s a bearable numb. Then the voice starts up like a creaky old Gramophone record- ‘It’s not so bad’, this reedy, ancient, warbler sings and you think 'no it’s not, it’s not bad, it could be worse'. Except then another one starts up, this one more hoarse and scratchy and this one says, ‘Yes it is. It’s just about as bad as it can get.’ And then you wrap yourself in a towel, dry yourself, brush your teeth and crawl into bed. And sleep comes quickly. And all you can hope is that in the morning everything has changed and you are the one who is pregnant, not Carla.

And then the phone rings except you can’t hear it because it’s lying on the kitchen floor and the Monster mumbles, then tries to shake you from your slumber. ‘Maybe good news,’ it says stroking your hair with its fuzzy-felt fingers, then tapping you on your back, even pulling back the covers so you shiver and pull them back up again. But the bad news, more terrible than you could have ever imagined has finished you off.

So you don’t hear the phone.
You just sleep.