Staffrider Vol.3 No.4 Dec-Jan 1980 - DISA

He woke to a day without promises,without hope, what could be called ...A NORMAL DAYA STORY BY KENNY T. HURTZHe woke to a day that would havebeen better left unseen. The weatherwas bright and hot, the air still, the time11:37 by the digital clock, that excellentmachine that woke you with ashrill ring, or with soft music if desired.Or didn't wake you at all, if such wasyour choice, but left you to growslowly conscious without persuasion,sick with sleep, eyes gummed andbreath foul. And the clock, if not soinstructed, would also make no fuss ifyou never woke again at all, would humuntil its mechanism wore with age, orthe electricity was cut off. Really, theunderstanding of the simple machinewas amazing.He woke also to a day without promise,without hope, what could becalled a normal day, normal indeed, formost. The movements could be preciselyplotted: Wake, dress, eat; go to work,work, eat; work some more; then gohome, eat; and in the evening thedesperate search for distraction wouldfill the hours before sleep, and the cyclewould begin afresh the next day. Thisrepeated from birth to death, withminor variations, for most. And menspent all their time bound into thecircle, and that was called life. Formost.The blankets had become disarrayedin the night, which was unusual, he didnot as a rule sleep violently, and mostmornings found the bed as neat as whenit had been gratefully entered the previousnight. Perhaps a nightmare? But heremembered nothing, and he felt rested,as if his sleep had been sound and still.Yet maybe it was not so, for whoremembers the morning after, theterrors of the previous night? A movementof his legs sent the blankets, sheetsand everything else sighing to the carpet.He sat up, now noticing that he hada violent headache, situated, so it felt, inthe centre of his brain, a pinpoint focusof pain that pulsed quietly and rhythmically.He could hear, distantly beyondthe muffling curtains, the insanetwittering of mossies, what he believedwere called Cape sparrows, this item ofuseless information having remainedwith him in spite of all; and why Cape,he was nowhere near the Cape? Withoutopening the curtains he stood up andslipped on a robe, the sole aim in hismind being the seeking out and findingof the morning newspaper with its dailycrossword puzzle, which he normallyattempted over his first cup of coffee,and sometimes his second, although bythen his room had normally been madeup and he would return to its comfort,its calming neatness.' ... To clean it up! She refused! Ican't. . . ' The voice trained off as heentered the bathroom, so painfullysterile, and closed the door. Hismother's voice, strident and excited.Now what, he wondered. Had therebeen a fight, had some trivial crisisoccurred? What the hell . . . the thingssome people find to occupy their time,it was pathetic. As far as he was concerned,the public raising of a voicecould be considered positively indecent.After all (he thought sarcastically) whatwould the girl (she was about twentyfive,as near as he could guess) think?She had certainly been rather withdrawnsince she had joined them somemonths ago, she went about her workwith what appeared to be suppressedmelancholy. Her name was Rosina,though Rosina who was anybody'sguess. They were all called Rosina, thator Mary, it suddenly occurred to him.The high incidence of these names intheir community must be beyondcoincidence, or perhaps they weresimply pseudonyms chosen to beappealing to white employers. And shecan't do anything, his mother had toldhim once, she doesn't even cook! Sowhat, nor did he . . .He swallowed four aspirins withoutrecourse to water. The toothpaste wasfinished.He scowled at the crumpledtube for a moment, as if to discover thereason, as if it could tell him. Halfheartedlyhe splashed water in his face,throwing most of it over his shoulder,dripping on the polished floor as hegroped for a towel. Couldn't cook! Justimagine! The headache, locked in conflictwith the aspirin, quickened itsrhythm. ' . . . expect me to do it?' saidthe voice as he stumbled from the bathroomwith thoughts of hot coffee, andthat too would have to be delayed, ifthe jar was not empty as well, until hehad secured the paper and checked thathis brother had not beaten him to thecrossword, which sometimes happenedand left his remaining day with a tint,albeit subtle, of incompleteness.Somewhere in the house a doorslammed. The cat on the landing regardedhim with silent amusement. ''Hello, Jean, how've you been?' he saidin a pitched falsetto, one part of hismind recoiling under the absurdity, anotherexulting in the sheer idiocy of thegreeting. The cat broadened its smile,but otherwise ignored him.In his mother's room she was inexplicablyabsent. He found the paper,the crossword half done, the scrawl belongingto his brother. The price onepays for sleeping late! He decided itdidn't matter, scarcely convincing hirrself.'Hi,' said his mother, coming into the |room, And then almost as an afterthought,'I've dismissed Rosina.' She satdown on the bed. Beyond the glass therooftops gleamed in the sun, red, pink,grey. He could make out a garish bussliding from its terminus and slippinginto the angry stream. The cat glidedthrough the door and flopped to thefloor at his feet, rolling over onto herback. He stretched a foot to her. 'Hi,' hesaid, wondering at the suppleness of thecat, 'what happened?''I asked her to clean the dog's messin the kitchen. It was my fault, ]suppose, I fed them late, but do youknow what she said?' He confirmed thathe did not. Still gazing out of the windowas though it might have killed himto move, he saw three birds bank togetherand land smoothly, one after another,in a tree of repulsive aspect in thenext garden.'She said, "I don't clean the dogmess." ' Perhaps his mother expectedconcordant outrage, but when none wasforthcoming she added 'The cheek!'He turned the page, reflecting: Whowould make his bed today? and more,so she was gone, well, she had not beermuch good anyway, her loss would beeasily enough tolerated. KILLERSTORMS BATTERED HOUSES, readheadline. What, he wondered was a killerdoing storming battered houses? Thewhole idea seemed preposterous. Hecould scarcely believe it. Perhaps theymeant that killer storm had batteredpreviously unbattered houses, housesthat were as neat and trim as his ownbefore this battering took place. He feltthat the effort needed to clear hproblem up would have to be tremendous.He threw the newspaper at thecat, who stalked off indignantly. I hatemaking beds, he thought, what a bloody8 STAFFRIDER, DECEMBER 1980/JANUARY 1981