31 Falkner Street (2)

Chapter 2 - 18 Falkner Street

Anna had lived in number 16 until 6 years ago when Jo's dubious landlord and property mogul had some residents who had done a bit of a moonlight flit and left her with no money coming in from number 18. At the time, Anna had been going through some issues with her mental health when living alone in number 16 and had been convinced that the property was haunted, so much so that her two beloved cats had also become spooked by the house. Anna had snapped up the chance to move next door to number 18 which she considered to be a much better deal, despite having to gut the property and start again with repainting and fiddling with electrical bits. Feeling much better in number 18, Anna settled down into everyday life with her two cats.

Anna had suffered with depression for as long as she could remember, and had told neighbours once when she had taken speed and was inclined to be confident and open, that a factor contributing towards her depression was the fact that she knew that she had been born into the wrong body and couldn't take that next step with the blessing of the family. Having said this, Anna had lived as a man for 20 years since divorcing her first husband at the age of 20, wearing her hair short and spiky, dressing in men's clothes from the premier man catalogue, being skilled at all things DIY. Her family had long since accepted Anna this way and she would visit her grandmother regularly, checking on her to make sure that she had everything that she needed and lending a regular tenner from her.

Part of Anna's depression had led to her going through reclusive phases and locking herself away from the world and her street for weeks or months at a time. When Anna was not in a reclusive state of mind, it meant that she would partake in the street's activities and sometimes invite neighbours over to play on the X-Box with her or to share some weed. This was how Anna enjoyed her life. Asked to describe her perfect day, Anna would reply that she would sleep until midday before playing on her X-Box for four or five hours and then watch Doctor Who or Star Wars all evening whilst at the same time eating smart price noodles and pizza. Anna had her perfect day over and over again when living in number 18 for this was how she lived her life on a daily basis.

Cast your eyes around number 18 and you would see the evidence of this. The living room and kitchen resembled the inside of a bin, with sweet wrappers, takeaway boxes, old bits of wires and plugs, balls of cat fur, dead insects and other various sticky items piled on chairs and across the floor. The kitchen counters were piled high with plates holding bits of food in different stages of decomposition. The toilet had no toilet roll, shampoo or conditioner and the kitchen had no cleaning products, sponge or cloth. Upstairs, Anna's bedroom window which faced the street was covered with an old bedsheet rather than her having to take the trouble to buy a curtain and curtain pole. Stiff jeans and fleeces covered the vinyl floor and fingernail and toenail clippings covered the bedcovers and lay at the side of the bed. The living room was painted a dark and uneven red which gave the room a cave-like quality, matching perfectly the dusty skull and spider ornaments dotted around the electric fireplace. Anna didn't care in the slightest about the conditions of the house and held it in high esteem as her sanctuary and her little home. Anna would defend her cleaning skills to the end when Les screamed at her about the fungus growing through to his house around the skirting boards. She just didn't register the several mushrooms sprouting from her own skirting boards as an issue which needed to be resolved.

This was the way Anna chose to live for several years, choosing when to involve herself with activities of the street, watching the students come and go, remaining friends of sorts with Les and Jo and refereeing their daily arguments, buying speed from Jo occasionally and having the odd drink - although not often as she had had issues with this in the past and was wary that she wouldn't be able to stop once started and feared that she might end up as an alcoholic like Jo. Then Ian got kicked out of their mum's house down south and Anna had to let him stay in her spare bedroom.

In the time it took for Ian to cadge money from their mum and catch a couple of trains up to Liverpool, Anna resigned herself to the fact that her precious space was going to be well and truly invaded and that she was going to now have to be responsible in some way for another person - even if that other person was 38 years old. Ian had a coke habit that he needed to kick, and soon, before he had to move to another country to pay off his drug debts - never mind a couple of hundred miles.

Being brother and sister, and both in the house all day as neither of them were working, they would have collosal arguments. The arguments were mainly directly related to the number of cigarettes they had left until their next dole payment or over who had smoked the most of the weed when they ran out. The arguments would sometimes end up in violence, and Anna once smashed her laptop over Ian's head in temper, instantly regretting this. Not because of the harm it could have done to her brother, but due to the fact that she was then without her internet games which had previously entertained her for hours a day. Instead, she had to hack into an internet connection from a student house down the road and use her mobile phone to go on the internet.

Ian's drug problem resolved itself in Anna's eyes. Not that he had much choice about it, with him only living on job seekers allowance and Anna not lending him any of her incapacity benefit. Anna was able to monitor Ian closely, so that he couldn't just go out and get drugs 'on his head' or get himself any of those provident loans. He just smoked weed with her and in her books, that was fine. With Ian not being around his old friends and not even having any contacts for coke, the temptation was greatly reduced and instead he focused on doing a bit of tidying around the house so that he could at least bear to sit on the broken couch (Anna used the unbroken couch). He was, like Anna, a fan of the X-box and associated gadgets and would spend most his day playing car and shooting games when stoned. Spending all day, every day with each other's company was difficult for both of them, but Anna became worried when Ian developed an allegiance with her old friend Jo. Anna herself was a long standing friend of Jo but was able to keep her distance when she needed to, or didn't want to get involved with some of the things that Jo did. Jo also knew after 10 years not to push Anna to do things that weren't in her best interest. But Anna knew that Ian wasn't a strong person and could be quite vulnerable. Anna remembered Ian's school reports stating 'is easily led' and that he was always in the midst of any trouble. Yes, Anna thought, it reminded her exactly of that.

Soon enough, Ian was spending a large portion of the day at Jo's house, snorting, gummying or bombing little parcels of speed. Jo encouraged it and paid for most of it. Anna thought that it must have been because Jo panicked without company and wanted somebody else to be drinking or using drugs so that she didn't feel conspicious. But for all Jo's bravado, she could stop and start with the speed whenever she wanted. Ian couldn't do that and Anna could feel history repeating itself. She couldn't be grateful for having the house to herself in the evenings because she worried about him. But Ian was an adult and had his own choices to make, and she definitely wasn't in a position to stop him taking drugs if that was what he wanted to do.

It all came to a head when Jo accused Ian and Anna of stealing speed from her secret tin on top of her fridge when she had been at Asda one night. Anna had had it. She marched over to Jo's house, flung the spare house key Jo had given her for the property onto the side table next to Jo's couch - the side table was made out of matchsticks and had been a present to Jo from her girlfriend - said nothing and went home. Jo had known about Ian's problems with drugs, Anna had told her before Ian had arrived and had specifically warned all of the neighbours off sharing anything with him. But Jo had encouraged and practically persuaded Ian to start using speed, she had waved it under his nose for free, for gods sake. And now she had gone off on one of her drunken verbal assaults towards everyone and started making wild accusations - not for the first time. Anna resolved that she wouldn't be speaking to Jo for a considerable period of time. But not speaking to Jo meant no more sitting on her doorstep for a cigarette, no more joining in with the congregations on the street, and no more evenings spent with all the neighbours as they all spent their evenings at the street headquarters - Jo's house. Some lesbian I am, Anna thought to herself, surely you have to actually sleep with or at least meet women to be a lesbian? But she didn't have much of an interest in anything like that anyway, she didn't have the energy or the mood for it. She was happy to speak to other women on lesbian site forums and to watch Xena: Warrior Princess. She knew what the two young girls were doing when they occasionally bounded into the house, sitting on her knee and pretending to flirt with her. Anna just thought that they were young, wanted attention, and got a kick out of taking the piss.

Anna was quite content to sit in her house and carry on as she had before - with her X-box, telly and two cats. And Ian she supposed. But he did need to pull himself together or he could go and fuck himself too.