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Dark secrets and dark days.
I can never tell you everything. Even if I wanted to. I just don’t have the words. They will not give themselves up to me.
My family come back to haunt me, though only at night.
Typical.
Lazy spectres.
I woke, thrashing the air, screaming obscenities, lashing out at anything I could get my hands on.
But there was nothing there.
My brother?
I thought I heard his voice just there.
No.
There is nothing.
Just the silence of the night.
Dark days.
Dark secrets.
I cannot tell you everything. Not because I do not want to too. But because I cannot find the words. They will not give themselves to me. I am left, bereft of the means which to describe myself.
Words.
They are all my fathers.
And those children?
I still see them.
They run, their hair swaying in the wind, little undulations fighting against the end of life.
Ends of lives.
I am sorry.
I want to get out. I want to get out. I want to get out!
If I forget myself, for one instance, could I, would I be able to get away?
Just one day.
Mister Licky, traipsing around outside, scouring the corridors for cigarette butts. Dirty fucker. Is he better off than me?
I have done nothing wrong. I can assure you of that. Believe me.
Father!
I remember my late grandmother, in her dying days, bound to her wheelchair, trying to give me advice.
—Michael.
—Yes.
—Go and get that bastard.
—Max.
Her own son.
—Get him?
—He has done this family a great disservice. A great disservice.
—Yes.
I call her Mary, because that is her name.
Max.
Michael.
I confuse the names.
My father.
Myself.
My brother.
We are all the same.
This is hard. Harder than you think.
Knock, knock.
—Who’s there?
Mister Licky with a letter.
For me?
He hands it to me.
—Who is it from?
Guess.
—You would like to know?
Father?
Forget everything I have told you. It is all lies.
I open it, with agitated vigour.
Dear Son.
I cannot.
I drop it to the floor. I let it out of my left hand. It brushes against my fingers. It is like a sail in the wind. All alone.
At sea.
—Have you no guts anymore, says Mister Licky.
Guts.
What the fuck would he know about guts? Cowardly cunt! Did his children die? Is he incarcerated?
Maybe.
—The show is starting soon. You better pick that letter up or else I will beat you without an inch of your life. I am allowed. The matron has said I can, if I want to. Indeed, I think I will beat you in spite of anything you do, from this moment to the moment I leave. How would you like that?
I love this part.
It is my favourite.
Thumps are what I like best. Whacks and Thwacks. Smacks and wallops. Slaps and cuffs. Bangs and blows.
Clouts.
Words have been my only loves.
Hold back you tears, it will get ugly.
He pulls back the blinds and they are revealed to me.
Where are you Misses Matron? My other mother, my other cunt?
He hits me, once or twice at first, and then again and again. He takes his belt off and takes it too me, repeatedly.
The crowd grows outside, mutinous multitudes. They are happy for the brief spectacle that takes them away from their miserable lives.
Ends of lives.
They would tear me apart. If they could get their hands on me.
See if you can!
Mister Licky thrashed me for a few moments more and then left me, gasping for air.
Slam the door behind you.
It is hard to watch your child own die.
My world is upside down.
What bathos!
If I could fuck myself up, I would. But I have no means. They have taken away anything sharp.
Strange dreams in the night.
Spectres.
The image of my long dead brother. Endless tears. A better life, never had. A life worth living, a life I could have called my own.
