Incy Wincy

A train disaster shows the false emotion we have for victims and in the relationship of the narrator who remains unaffected.

Incy Wincey

There had been a train crash the day before, a pretty big one in fact, but I hadn’t heard about it until the evening when my mother emailed me to make sure I was all right. I didn’t question her logic of writing to someone to make sure they were alive; I just told her I was fine and asked her about her new house. I don’t use trains you see, or cars for that matter: I walk to the supermarket, work at home, my favorite bar is across the street and when I’m in the mood, which is normally when I can afford to be in the mood, I eat at the gorgeous Italian restaurant a few blocks away. As for the news it doesn’t interest me much: I’m not self-centered, I just have enough trouble sorting out my own affairs to worry about some earthquake in India or riots in Africa so I only use the internet for the sport results and keeping in touch with old friends. So when my girlfriend asked me yesterday why I hadn’t rung her to make sure she was all right even though she never goes to that area of the city and never uses that train line, and even though she hadn’t rung me, that was my reply: I didn’t know about it. An innocent case I thought. And then she rang today.

“But you didn’t know did you, you didn’t know for sure?”

“No, of course, but I didn’t know for sure that you weren’t in that earthquake in India or those riots in…”

“Now you’re being silly, it’s utterly conceivable I might have been crushed on that train, I might have had to see a customer or a…”

“Ok, ok, ok, I’m sorry, honey, but I didn’t know until the evening and then I rang you.”

“But you didn’t ring to see if I was alive or not, you just rang to chat.”

“Because I knew you were alive!”

“But you didn’t know, did you?!”

“Ok! I’m sorry, honey, next time there’s a train crash,” or an earthquake in India I thought, “I’ll ring you as soon as I can.”

“It’s ok.” She paused, perhaps accepting my apology, perhaps rolling her eyes, “you don’t need to be sorry. I’ll see you tonight. If I don’t crash on a train or something.”

That was at lunchtime. She was coming over for dinner tonight like she did every Tuesday. It’s a kind of a ritual, our Tuesday ritual, one I always look forward to; it breaks the week up, gives me a bit of bliss before I can see her again at the weekend. We didn’t choose Tuesday for any special reason, she just finishes work a bit earlier so we can spend more time together before she has to get the train home to her parent’s house, and all the other days she has to work late or I have an evening class or am playing squash in the local hall. This Tuesday had involved a long wet morning followed by a longer and wetter afternoon and the news of the crash, and our conversation, and the expectation of tonight had made any attempt to work sluggish and drawn out. In a bid to brighten the day up I had walked to the local market and bought some fresh kimchi, red and yellow peppers, pork, and a lemon to create some kind of Korean style stir-fry. I would cook and she would bring the alcohol; that was how we did it every Tuesday, our Tuesday ritual. I was choosing a record to put on my new stereo system when she rang the doorbell. As soon as she came through the door the first thing I thought was not that her hair was a little different (the wind had nudged her central parting to the right I would notice later) or that she was wearing tights (a secret sign, so she thought, that sex, although not off the menu entirely, would have to be ordered from the specials board instead) but that she wasn’t carrying any alcohol: there was no plastic bag from the local liquor shop with a bottle of wine or six-pack in, just her black leather handbag and a damp umbrella. I wasn’t that annoyed, as it was only a five-minute walk to the liquor shop anyway. We kissed and asked each other about our day and then followed the hallway into the kitchen where I had laid out all the ingredients on the wooden table.

“Are you hungry?” I asked with a smile.

“No, not really. Are you?”

“A bit.” I was starving: I’d only had cheese on toast for lunch and the smell of kimchi had been filling the house and tempting my stomach all afternoon. “Do you want anything to drink?” I asked looking in her eyes hoping for some sign, a little taste of what mood she was in, where this was all going.

“Some tea?”

“No problem, sit down.”

“Thanks.”

She walked away into the living room while I hovered by the sink. My mood had sunk. I had been looking forward to cooking and drinking and eating and relaxing all day but now, as I fished out a tea bag and washed up a mug, I felt the evening slide away from me. As the water boiled I looked in on her: her eyes were closed, her tights were on " I left the tea bag in.

“Did you see the news?”

“No, you know I don’t watch the news.”

“Well, maybe you should, you know this happened, like, thirty minutes away, Michael, thirty, it’s practically down the road.”

“I don’t know how far away it is but its not such a big thing for me honey…”

“Michael, 47 people died!”

“But no one I knew!”

“How do you know that? Have you rung everyone you know? You didn’t even ring me!”

“No, of course, I haven’t rung everyone I know and not everyone I know has rung me, not even you.”

“Because I knew you were here.”

“But you didn’t know that!”

“I did, you’re always here, you never go out…”

This went on for some time. She couldn’t understand that even though it only happened thirty minutes away, so she says, that it didn’t affect me and I couldn’t understand that even though no one we knew was hurt in the crash it still affected her. And we still hadn’t eaten. While she was talking I noticed a spider on the wall, a small, black, still thing. The record stopped and as I flicked through my albums I asked her with my back to her if she was hungry yet.

“No, not really. I think I’ve lost my appetite.”

“What? We always eat on Tuesday.”

“What have you got?”

“Some kimchi. I was going to do a stir-fry if you want?”

“No, I don’t want anything spicy.”

“I can do some pasta, or something easy, like a sandwich?”

“No, you eat, if you want.”

“Ok, then. You want a drink?”

“No. Maybe some water. Or an orange juice. Nothing alcoholic, I’m not in the mood. And can I put on the TV, while you cook, I want to watch the news?”

“No problem.”

The TV burst into light and showed a bird’s eye view of the crash. There were all these small people moving about; some in emergency yellow, some in medical white, the ones not moving were in black. I sighed and went into the kitchen.

I was starting to wish she’d never come round. I didn’t really of course, it was always nice to see her, to hold her, to have someone here, but I was looking forward to our Tuesday night and cooking with a glass of wine and the reward of a cigarette afterwards (with her support, or, more accurately, bullying " “I can’t believe you can do that harm to yourself, isn’t life more important to you that?” - I’m down to five a day.) and now I was going to have to eat alone, if at all. I went to the kitchen and poured her an orange juice and looked in the fridge. My stomach raged.

“Well I’m going to cook then. If you’re hungry you can have some but I’m really hungry, honey, I haven’t eaten since about one.”

“Ok, be my guest, I’m fine though, just not hungry.” She said, her eyes still on the screen.

I returned to the kitchen and began to cook but without any real care. If she were eating I would have taken my time and enjoyed the experience, tried to stretch it out, but now I was doing it as quickly as possible. I wanted it to be over, finished. I put the pork into the wok and turned on the heat waiting for the oil’s hot gasps. I decided I’d make it as hot as possible (she didn’t want anything spicy after all) so I reached for the black pepper mill and crushed pepper all over the beginning to sizzle food. The mill was almost empty, there were only a few black bits left but I kept on grinding, doing my best not to leave any grain behind. From the living room I heard her say,

“Do you think anyone we know, even a little, was on that train?”

“I don’t think so Honey, no one we knew by name anyway.” I was tired of the whole subject and would have been happy to have never talked about it again.

“Really? But you know what they say, that ‘six degrees of separation’, that we all know everyone else in the world through six people?”

“C’mon honey, you don’t believe that do you?”

“Well why not, I mean, think of all the people you have contact with, a waiter here, a mother there, a friend of a friend of a friend, what about one of your old students?”

“Maybe, I guess.” The smell of the food was so strong I couldn’t think.

“You’re not listening, are you?”

“I am, I’m just cooking, my mind’s on this.”

“All right, fine.”

I turned off the gas and walked into the living room.

“Honey, listen, I don’t know if anyone I know was on that train but all the people I care about were not on that train and that’s all that matters to me. I don’t believe in that six degrees thing because I don’t think you can fit life into such a simple equation and I don’t want to talk about the train thing anymore honey, I’m sorry, I just don’t.”

“Ok, Jesus, I’m sorry, I won’t bring it up again, I promise, that’s all, finish.” She snapped off the TV. “Eat your food, sit down, tell me about your day, about your life without trains or news or other people.”

“Honey.” I walked away into the kitchen tensed and upset. I really wanted a cigarette. I really wanted more than the one last beer in the fridge. I really wanted all trains and all their passengers to be wiped off the face of the earth. Where had our Tuesday evening gone?

When the food was done I sat down and ate in silence. I offered her a taste but she refused, patting her belly as if she were pregnant. I finished up without tasting a thing and sat back and lit a cigarette. As I blew out I felt as if a whole world had fallen off my shoulders. Her phone beeped. After a second she turned and said,

“Look, even my friend in Singapore,” pronouncing Singapore as if it were on the moon, “mailed me to find out if I was ok!”

“Great.”

“What’s with you Michael, you’ve been in a funny mood all night.”

I almost screamed. I felt as I had just stepped into boiling water.

“Nothing, Honey. Nothing. How’s your friend?”

“He doesn’t say.”

“He?”

“Yes, he.”

“Is he ok? I mean, he didn’t fall over today and hurt his foot or his mum didn’t have a bit of a cough or was crushed in an Indian earthquake?”

“What are you talking about, Michael?! He’s just asking me if I’m ok, that’s all, and what’s all this earthquake stuff you keep going on about?”

“Nothing, just making sure, no, just wanted to know if he was ok or not.”

“He is.”

“Well, now I know.”

“Ok.”

“Fine.”

A heavy silence.

I don’t know what was wrong with me, really. I guess I was being a bit selfish. All I wanted from the world was a nice meal at the end of the day, some wine, a cigarette, a hug. But instead the world and its tragedies had walked in and messed everything up. She was right, I should be more concerned, but where do you draw the line? I returned to the kitchen and put my plate in to soak. I took the last beer from the fridge and returned to the living room without looking at her face.

“I’m sorry, Mike, this is none of your fault. I’m just, just a bit shocked, a bit…”

“Its ok, Honey, it affects us all differently I guess.” I put my arm round her and she snuggled up into me.

“Can I have a bit of your beer?”

“Help yourself.”

She took the can from my hands and took a long sip.

“That’s nice. I’m hungry now.”

“Honey…I can make you a little something if you like?”

“Would you, I don’t have much time.”

“A sandwich or something, some cheese on toast?”

“That sounds really nice.”

“Ok, hold on, and finish the beer, its all yours.”

“Thanks Mike, I love you.”

“I love you too.” I kissed her on the forehead and then returned to the kitchen.

As the toaster oven heated I walked back into the living room and saw her staring at the bottom of the beer can.

“Honey, what are you doing?” I asked with a chuckle.

“What? Oh nothing, there was a spider or something on the bottom, I must have crushed it, its nothing.” And then she took the small, black thing between her fingers and flicked it up and away, into the empty air.

© 2013 Andrew James Talbot

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Angel

The writing is very good. You held my attention, right to the end. And the character development was excellent...very proffessional. Your characters breathe.
But, somehow, I lost the message of the story. No man is an island? Call and make sure your family and friends are okay? Spiders suck? I'm sure it has something to do with the spider...or is it spiders, plural? Hey, is the guy's apartment infested with poisonous spiders?