My stomach gurgles and I get that taste in my mouth and have to run for the toilet. I throw up into the bowl, a coffee-coloured mix of little floating marshmallows and sludge.
I wait. Nothing more comes up so I swing round to drink water from the tap. The face looking back in the mirror is pale with bloodshot eyes weighted down by black sacks. I do my best to heal but decent food and water are the only solution. I look at the state of my old jeans, worn thin at the bum and knees. My shirt has holes on the arms and round some of the buttons. My T-shirt underneath is grey and frayed round the neck.
I head out of the shop but the woman behind the counter runs after me.
‘Your friend just left you something,’ she says, handing me a large paper carrier bag.
Inside the bag are two packs of sandwiches – ham and cheese and BLT – a bottle of water, a bottle of fresh orange juice and a napkin with writing on it. It takes me five minutes to figure out what it says.
To Ivan
From Nikita
cobalt alley
I’ve eaten the BLT, drunk all the water and I’m looking at Cobalt Alley. It can’t be that hard. Can it? I’ve got to get on with it. Bob and Nikita kept to the narrow pavement on the right-hand side. Bob’s building stretches back from the corner to the wall at the dead end. It’s a rundown low building, one storey with a slate roof, and its one door and one window are way up the far end of the alley.
I keep a steady confident-looking-but-not-rushed pace and have my head slightly angled away from the Council side. My eyes are staring at the entrance to Bob’s place. I’m thinking, Bob’s place. Bob’s place.
I know I don’t look casual and I have to make myself slow down in case anyone from the Council building can see. But then I feel a pull towards the Council building and I think, Shit! Bob’s place. Bob’s place. And I keep my eyes locked on his door.
I get there. Thank you.
Bob’s place.
I knock.
Bob’s place. Bob’s place.
I stare at the door. I’m muttering now, ‘Please hurry. Bob’s place. Bob’s place.’
Nothing.
Bob’s place. Bob’s place.
I knock again. Louder. ‘Hurry up. Hurry up! Bob’s place. Bob’s place.’
What do I do if guards come out of the Council building now? I’m trapped. The whole thing could be a Council trap. And I feel my body being pulled again towards the Council building.
BOB’S PLACE! BOB’S PLACE! I can’t wait this long. Bob’s place. Bob’s place.
The door clicks and opens a fraction.
Nothing else happens.
I step into the room, turn and push the door firmly shut.
‘Bloody hell! Bob’s place.’
‘Yes, do come in. Glad you made it, but I’ll have to kill you if you even glance at the painting.’ Far from being a threat, the words sound like a desperate plea for attention.
I turn to see a grubby room. Even the air tastes grubby. Against the far wall, which isn’t that far as the room is narrow, is a wooden table with a bowl of fruit on it. There are a few apples and pears scattered across the table. To my right there’s a wooden chair and an easel and beyond them an open door through which the voice has already disappeared. The position of the easel indicates the painting will be a still life of fruit. I go towards the next room, stopping to look at the work-in-progress on the way. It’s good, traditional and detailed. Oil on canvas.
In the next room I see a man’s hunched back. He’s stirring something in a small, dented saucepan. There’s a smell of tomato soup.
I wait in the doorway. The room has the chilly feel of a cave. It seems even smaller than the painting studio, but that’s because against two walls are stacks of large canvas frames, all with their bare, pale backs to the room. The only light comes through two small skylights. There is a small black leatherette sofa, a low Formica coffee table with three legs, a wooden chair like the one in the first room, a row of kitchen cupboards with a stained worktop, on which stands a kettle and a single electric ring. On the drainer by the sink are a large number of mugs and an opened can of soup.
‘I’m making lunch.’
When I don’t reply he stops stirring the soup and turns to look at me, straightening up as he smiles. He holds the wooden spoon in the air as he might hold a paintbrush and a reddish-orange blob drops on to the lino. ‘I’d like to paint you.’
I don’t think he’d get my eyes.
The man inclines his head. ‘Probably not. It would be a challenge.’
I don’t reply. Did I say that about my eyes aloud?
‘You look like you could do with some.’ He holds the saucepan up and raises his eyebrows in a question.
‘Thanks.’
The man pours the soup into two of the mugs on the drainer and puts the pan in the sink. Then he picks up the mugs and offers me one, saying, ‘I’m afraid I’m out of croutons.’
He sits on the leatherette sofa, which is small and narrow.
‘I’ve no idea what croutons are.’
‘What is the world coming to?’