Graffiti My Soul by Niven Govinden Page A

a discreet cry, waving over Lizzie Jennings on the way. They’ve finished the chips and she’s now biting into his Snickers. They take alternatemouthfuls. She takes it slow, conscious of crumbs falling on her shirt. He grabs the fucker like the greedy pig he is. It’s all about ownership with that piece of shit. Then they share the same can of drink. I can almost feel Pearson’s gob on my lips. Can’t stop watching. Feel sick. Her face is so different. Furrows smoothed, mouth looser, eyes wide, none of her usual defensive squinting. Touches her hair every other minute but all the time certain of herself. None of it’s a ruse. She’s never looked so settled . . . or sated.
    27
    Jason has no time for Casey. Calls him various vegetable names, depending on which aisle he’s stacking.
    â€˜He’s a turnip, man,’ he goes, on more than one occasion, when I find myself justifying exactly why I’m with him. ‘He’s a fucking kiddie fiddler. I’ve got no time for him, however great you say he is.’
    I get twitchy at the mention of kiddie-fiddler and Casey in the same sentence. I wish I hadn’t been looking out the car window, seeing things I shouldn’t have.
    Jase believes everything he reads in the papers. Swears by The Sun , like it’s the Torah or something.
    It doesn’t escape my notice that the fiddled kid is the same age as his sister would be now. It touches a nerve; his sole defence for starting a little backyard blaze last summer that ended up in Casey’s house being burnt to the ground.
    I’m not supposed to know, but I do. He told some slag the night he did it, as a way to get into her pants. She told Chinese Peter’s sister, who told me. I’d been running as usual, so wasn’t around. And I wonder why people don’t invite me to anything. But I wish I’d got evidence of it. Something like an MPEG would’ve been awesome. Like capturing history in the making . Totally wild.
    It’s one of those secrets that Jase keeps from me, the way I keep stuff from him; like when I had to start giving Mum tuff love when she started overdoing the pity party a couple of years after Dad left, and got really close to embarrassing herself. (Jews, delayed reaction.) You gotta do what you gotta do.
    We all have our secrets.
    28
    Kel makes me walk on air and I start forgetting the real things. It’s gone eleven at night when I realise that Mum hasn’t washed my kit. Or any other clothes at all. I’m half asleep when I work this out; one of those late-night flashes that hits you before nodding off, gets you out of bed and staggering about the utility room with your eyes shut.
    Mum is watching TV and says she won’t help.
    â€˜I’m moving on,’ she goes. ‘I can’t be your maid for ever. You’re going to have to learn to take care of your own laundry.’
    There’s an empty bottle of wine on the coffee table, one of the pocket ones, so I ain’t too worried. I’m not casting aspersions, I’m just saying.
    â€˜Watch what you’re doing with the washing liquid. Don’t overfill the machine like last time. If you make a mess, clean it up.’
    â€˜Okey-dokey, lemon-cokey.’
    When she’s in this mood, it’s pointless trying to argue.
    The reason for the wine bottle and the mood is this:
    Mum has decided it’s been long enough since Dad. We’ve been here before, eight months after he ran to Germany with the optician slut, when she said quite resolutely it was time to move forward, but she hadn’t reckoned on the fear taking her over. Ever since Dad left it’s only ever been the two of us.
    This time there seems to be more weight behind it. Far fromcoming out of the blue, it’s been on her mind for a while; something to do with one of the younger doctors at the health centre fancying her. He wasn’t her type, but did something to remind her that