The Camden Tales

53 - Malka's First Kiss

-=₪ November 1932 ₪=-

The Mansion / Margate / 3.56pm

Tommy returned to the drawing room holding a jug of water and two glasses. During his absence, one of the maids had lightly tidied the room. The broken glass had been taken away, the dirty dishes were removed, the rubbish was disposed of, and the room had been lightly dusted.

Malka lay unconscious on Alfie's chaise longue, wrapped in a vibrant blue silk blanket. As Tommy placed glasses on the end table beside her and poured himself some water, he cast a glance over Malka, before taking his glass to the open balcony, lighting a cigarette, and opening a newspaper. Sometime later, he heard a disturbance from the drawing room and turned to see Malka whimpering and crying in her sleep through the doorway. He closed the paper and went to her side.

"Malka." he said with a husky voice as he tried to wake her gently but failing.

Lightly, he touched her cheek with the back of his fingers and said her name again. This time Malka jumped awake violently, she looked terrified as the residual tears fell from her eyes. Helping her sit up, Tommy handed her a glass of water from the end table which Malka quickly accepted and sipped.

"Oh, dear god, is this water!?" she exclaimed with a vile grimace.

He nodded. Malka wasn't even aware that Tommy knew what water was, let alone that he would serve it. After setting the glass down, Malka went to leave the sofa.

"Sit, Malka. Is it gin you want?" Tommy asked.

She froze for a moment, shocked. He was knelt before her, poised and ready for her answer. Lowering herself back to the sofa slowly, she nodded, unsure of why he was still in her home and being so accommodating. Malka glanced to see what Tommy was drinking; he also had a glass of water. Confused, she looked back at Tommy, who was pouring her a gin at the drinks cabinet.

When he turned toward her, Malka quickly shifted her eyes away from him and started fumbling through her things on the end table, seeking her cigarettes. Her shaky, bony fingers clumsily failed to pull a cigarette from the pack as Tommy offered her the glass of gin. She stopped, accepted the drink, and watched him as he sat on the sofa beside her. He took a cigarette from her pack, rolled it along his lips, and lit it with his gold-plated lighter. He puffed on it once and then handed it to her, which she silently accepted and took a deep puff of her own.

Feeling more like herself, she sat back comfortably among the cushions, her feet tucked beside her on the sofa, and the silk blanket covering her lap. Gin in one hand, cigarette in the other, she cast a suspicious eye up and down at Tommy, who remained seated at the other end of the sofa and went about lighting his own cigarette.

"What is different about you?" she asked.

"The clothes," he replied.

The cigarette bounced in his mouth as he replied, which he quickly lit with his lighter. Some of the burning tobacco fell from the end and burned a small mark into Alfie's waistcoat he wore.

"You don't wear them as well as him," she replied dismissively.

"Thank you," he replied sarcastically.

"What's with the water?" she asked as he took a sip from a tall, slender glass.

"I don't drink alcohol anymore."

"None?"

"Nope," he confirmed.

"Of any kind?"

"Of any kind."