NOAH

Daddy had been at sea for a few days and Mammy had not come downstairs at all. I crept up from time to time and sat, legs crossed, on the floor by her bedside but she had not appeared to notice. She just lay there moaning to herself, her great stomach a whale in the sea of quilt. My brothers were unusually quiet and my sister Anne sat on a high backed chair in the kitchen. Her hands were under her knees, her feet swinging, socks pulled up neatly, yellow ribbon tidying her hair. My bow flopped over one eye and did not stop my hair from falling in my face. My socks were always nearer my ankles than my knees. Mammy made nets when she was not looking after us and a half braided net hung on a pole on the wall behind my sister.

Noah scuffed the floor as he walked, his dog tag jangled with every step. Today even the boys could not get him to play with them. He left great misty patches of moisture on the window panes as he stood on hind legs to see the front gate. Noah came up to my waist as he nudged past me and I would hang my arms around his neck as if he were my very own pony. He pushed his nose into my hair and snuffled at my ear, his breath was warm, some of the hair under his chin was wet and matted and he left smears on my cheek.

Someone tapped at the door. Mammy’s eyes flickered. No-one ever came to the front door except Doctor Jenkins, the Reverend Williams and the man from the Pru. Noah growled a low rumbling growl. Anne pulled open the door. Outside a few leaves chased each other in circles, a couple of girls were jumping over a skipping rope. Anne closed the door and Noah went back to his pacing.

Still we waited. The clock struck five, again the rap at the door.

‘I bet it’s those Thomas’s from number seven. They’re always knocking at doors and running away.’

Still no-one on the doorstep. Noah sniffed the air; the girls had packed up their skipping and run home for tea. A group of children wheeled an old pram full of large wooden bobbins down the street of houses owned by the council on their way to fill them with twine for their mother to make nets.

The door closed again, Mam called. A window on the upstairs landing was ajar and I pushed it closed on my way past. There was a shriek from outside. Two faces appeared at the window, I jumped, they grinned and waved a coat hanger.

‘You frightened the life out of me,’ I opened the window; they were standing on top of the porch outside.
‘Watch this,’ Dai, my eldest brother, held Johnny’s legs as he inched his way over the edge of the porch.

‘Be careful. What are you doing? You’ll drop him.’

‘Shuddup.’

Johnny hung, coat hanger in hand, and tapped at the front door below. They giggled and Dai hauled Johnny in as Anne stomped her way to the door again.

And then he came marching down the street, a great willow basket in his hands. The boys scrambled in from the porch, Johnny caught his knee on the window catch and it bled. We piled downstairs and Noah barked and leapt in the air.

‘Daddy.’ We ran at him and he tipped the wide mouth of his basket towards us. The fish slithered out onto the kitchen flagstones, crabs scuttled about, Anne screamed and Daddy laughed. He pulled me into the air, his whiskers scratched at my face and he smelt of oil and rope and fish.

‘How’s your Mam?’

Dai had picked up a crab and was waving its pincers at Johnny. Noah pranced on tiptoes, a fish hanging from his jaws.

‘Well?’
My lip trembled.

He ran up the stairs three at a time, swinging round the banister. I followed him and then the shout, ‘Run for the Doctor girl’ and I turned and ran before Anne could get to the door. My socks kept slipping down, I stopped to pull them up but they itched so I pushed them down to my ankles. I ran past the ice factory, and the smoke house, past the blind man making willow baskets, who sat at the entrance to the dock yard.

‘Please let the dock gates be closed. Please, please God let them be closed.’ I ran onto the yard itself jumping over the ropes, black and drying in the sun. My shoe buckle flew off and I picked up the shoe and ran a limping run in my sock. The gates were open and I burst into tears. I would not be able to take a short cut across the top of the closed dock gates and it would take twenty minutes to run round.
The rowing boat which ferried the men from one side to another when the gates were open was just dropping off some workers. They threw some coins into the bottom of the rowing boat. I hopped from foot to foot, tears streaming down my face.

‘I haven’t any pennies and I need to get the doctor for my Mammy,’ and then I was in the boat and stumbling up the stone steps the other side, across the road and hammering on the door of the large blue painted house.

Doctor Jenkins had been working in his garden and he stamped the mud from his Wellingtons as he washed his hands and listened to me.

‘She’s started then?’

We travelled home in the Doctor’s car. It was black and shiny with leather seats and I hoped I would see someone I knew so I could wave at them. Anne was stood outside the house, her dress ruffled in the breeze. Noah sat on the step. As the Doctor approached the dog arched his back, his ears went back and saliva dripped from his jaw. Then Noah had hold of Doctor Jenkins’ wellie, and the Doctor was yelling and Daddy appeared at the door and was swearing. I had never heard my Father swear. Daddy shouted something about Noah being kicked as a puppy by the coal man and hating anyone in Wellingtons. The doctor wriggled out of his wellies and ran into the house in his socks with Noah shaking the boot from side to side killing it.

Then Mammy started screaming and it seemed to go on for hours. Anne made everyone tea in a big china pot that we only ever use for funerals or Christmas. A nurse arrived and was gone for ages upstairs with Mammy, the clock ticked, Daddy paced, Noah scuffed. And then the nurse was downstairs, and she telling us that we had a new baby sister and everyone was hugging each other and I was worried that I would get into trouble about the buckle on my shoe.

‘Noah’ © Tracey Fuller, 2007. Tracey Fuller is the author of The
Silver Vessel (ISBN 1-903914-17-5) a novel about love and
courage in the Great War. Its characters leap between boats,
swan dive from piers and fall into each others arms. She has
an MA in Writing from Middlesex and won the Biscuit Prize in
2003.

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LOVERS AND FIGHTERS

Up close his eyes are big and grey, and not just any grey but the exact colour of the patch of sky we can see from our bed. That’s why I think it’s right we came here. This time of year the wooden walls of the house rock and wind rushes through the slats just like when you’re wearing a coat that’s too thin, but it’s free and easy so we don’t mind.

We can’t afford heating so we drink. It’s the best way to keep yourself warm. He goes and gets it, because he looks that bit older, I think, from the place round the corner where they know us now. When the money comes, we treat ourselves with vodka and sometimes with wine but usually we get Tudor Rose, which comes in a bottle with a rose on the front and is a kind of sweet drink. It reminds me of Nan at Christmas. On these days, we go back, and we get into bed with all our clothes on and pull the sheets as high as we can. We do a little toast and act all silly like we do.

He says to me ‘It’s just us’ and I like that. It was always us, right from the start. But our place is small and sometimes even we need to get out. On the bus on the way into town he wrote my name on his hand with biro. It smudged when we went round a corner. We got some chips and went and stood next to the pier to eat. I didn’t want to finish them too quickly because the paper kept my hands warm, like gloves or something. It always seems like a good idea to go down to the sea but you forget about the cold and all that space right out in front of you. It makes me feel like I could float away. I ran down the steps and out towards the ocean.

‘Nina’ he shouts out ‘I love you’.

And I’m laughing, so I forget to say it back, and I reach the water, and he catches up with me, and picks me up, and we’re splashing around, freezing, like we’re in the bloody Bahamas or something. We kiss and his mouth is warm from the chips. Behind him I can see the town and this is the only time I think it looks really beautiful. The houses catch my eye like sequins.

We were walking back up and I was wishing I hadn’t gone in the water because I’ve only got one pair of jeans and they were really sticking to me. Things take so long to dry in the room. As we got to the top of the stairs a big group blocked our path. They were gypsies or something, I think. The leader had a curl stuck down in the middle of her head. She was a kid but she was big, taller even than Joe.

She asked if we had any money and Joe said no. Which was true. Joe had got a piece of fish too. We’d have to walk home. She said we were looking for trouble. There were so many of them, and only two of us. I don’t remember how it started. I heard her bracelets clashing on her arm as she went to hit him.

I ran and ran but it was hard because of the pebbles and my wet jeans. I kept turning around and every time they were there, all of them, around him like animals. I fought my way back, crying so hard that I didn’t have space to breathe. I took all of my clothes off and sat in a small ball on the floor and waited for him to come back. I knew he would get home somehow and he did. He came in. Looked different. Messy. I didn’t recognise him. He sat on the bed, and I started to smear the blood off his body.

He wouldn’t speak to me and his black and bloody eyes were so swollen I couldn’t tell what colour they were. I tried to help but I didn’t know what to do, and I didn’t have enough money to call our mother or anyone who would know. There wasn’t even any milk for tea.

‘Come here’ he said.

I climbed into bed and hoped for the best. That’s the definition of romance.

Sarah Drinkwater is a North London based freelance writer
and subeditor. She contributes to several short story
magazines and, with a friend, runs The Good Fight, a fanzine
which celebrates the life-affirming qualities of literature,
music, film and art. Check it out at
www.goodfightmag.blogspot.com and find her at
sarzibo@yahoo.co.uk

‘Lovers and Fighters’ © Sarah Drinkwater, 2007. LITRO is
published every Friday and handed out for free near to
London Underground stations and elsewhere around the
world. To get in touch please email litro.fiction@gmail.com or
visit www.litro.co.uk.