The Canal by Lee Rourke Page A

at the sides with two red hair clips. She was carrying a small handbag. As usual, she was staring straight ahead across the canal at the whitewashed office block. She yawned a couple of times, big, wide yawns, sucking in the oxygen around her, each yawn lasting an age. She didn’t seem to care, not bothering to cover up her mouth. Suddenly she turned to me and began to stare. Nothing else but a long, penetrating stare, her eyes wide open. She stared at me for what seemed like a lifetime, although it was most probably only a couple of seconds. Then she turned away, back to the whitewashed office block. In those couple of seconds it felt like I had stopped breathing, or like I had forgotten how to—as if I was momentarily dead. The weight of those two seconds—the weight I felt—a suffocating weight that consumed me. For those two seconds, listless in its grip, I was dead.
    And then it passed.

- three -
    I wanted to shuffle up to her, to playfully squeeze her leg and make her laugh. I wanted to see her laugh so much. I knew this would be futile. I knew that if I tried such a thing it would probably be the last time I ever saw her.
    Suddenly there was a strange sound, a racket and brouhaha that sounded odd. I leaned forward and looked immediately to my right, towards Wenlock Basin and Islington. Two men were staggering along the towpath. One of them—both were clearly drunk—was carrying a large bag of apples, while his companion was holding a large plastic bottle half-filled with a clear liquid. Both of the men were eating the apples, taking huge bites, finishing each in two or three gulps, then throwing the core into the canal, whilst spitting the pips to their feet and taking liberal swigs from the large plastic bottle. As they approached the bench I realised that they were both Russian, or maybe Polish. They had hard-looking, Slavic features and were dressed in thick, woollen polar neck jumpers. When they passed the bench they both turned and stopped. They looked at me and then, in unison, looked at her. Then they said something. I shrugged, not understanding. She continued to stare straight ahead. Again, they said something. I could smell the alcohol pouring from their mouths. Again, I shrugged, trying to gesticulate that I simply couldn’t understand. They repeated it again, and again I shrugged. Then they offered us both an apple from the bag. I refused. Then they offered us both some of the liquid in the large plastic bottle, indicating to us that it was good, that it would warm the insides—at least that’s what I understood the simple gesticulation of rubbing the stomach, executed by both men to mean. Again, I refused. They both began to laugh. I wanted them to leave us alone. I wanted them to carry on to wherever it was they were going, butthey stood there laughing to themselves at whatever it was we had done—or not done—to amuse them. And still she continued to stare straight ahead, at the whitewashed office block, like they weren’t even there. Like I was imaging it. Dreaming. As my right leg began to shake they both turned to start shouting at a cyclist who had suddenly sped past them a little too close for comfort. The cyclist continued towards Hackney. The two drunken Russian or Polish men began to run, to stumble after the cyclist, shouting their obscenities at him. Then, as if it was quite normal to do so, they began to throw apples in the cyclist’s direction. As they did this, moving away from us, one of the drunken men fell onto the towpath, tripping over an uneven slab, still shouting and trying to throw apples. His friend helped him back up to his feet. Gradually they staggered away, soon forgetting about the cyclist. I watched them. After they had passed under the rusting iron bridge, they began to throw apples at each other, both missing, the apples hitting the murky water or smashing onto the towpath. I watched them until they disappeared out of sight. Soon their voices faded, too. And