A Trick I Learned From Dead Men by Kitty Aldridge Page B

No moon. I never carry a torch, you don’t see anything outside the beam. You can see a light from the road, the rest is black.
    My name is Lee Hart. In my line of work you get used to it. After a while you stop noticing. The border is no more a border than these fences around here, it’s just the other side. Sometimes you forget, the hours can be long, you forget who is alive and who is dead. You have to remind yourself. You wonder if it matters. Sometimes the fence just disappears and you are in no-man’s-land.
    Next morning I make porridge with salt, like she used to. We will need our strength. Ned watches with big eyes, arms folded, foot jigging. I spread my arms to get his attention. I sign him that we must complete a simple manoeuvre after which everything will be right as rain. A girl could do it, I sign. No problem. Easy peasy.
    He throws his hair back, chucks his spoon in the sink, burps.
    I raise Lester under his arms. He is stiffened. Ned lifts his feet. Without hands I’m unable to precisely communicate to Ned what I need him to do. You do not want a deceased individual vertical at this stage of the game, whether you knew them when they were alive or not. I exaggerate facial expressions but Ned isn’t looking. He’s looking at Les, at his margarine mask face and dark hands. For
fucks
. I put my end down. On the plus side he doesn’t hear the gurgles and leaks, but I can do nothing about the smell. Finally, Ned looks at me. At last. Buenos dias . Pay attention, Scrotey. Then. One of Lester’s shoes slips and the leg thumps to the floor. Ned, holding the shoe, lets out a cat’s wail. I count to ten. One knobhead two knobhead three.
    Ned chucks the shoe and runs, hand over his mouth. Total spit of one of Lester’s TV reality people seeing their new kitchen for the first time. Anyone would think this was all my fault.
    You are excused! I shout. Cheers. But he’s already with the long-legged ice dancers in their shiny skirts. Same old. Buonasera. Not a problem. Lee is here, as per.
    I pick up Les in my arms, like you would your bride on your wedding day. Les carried her this way when she got weak. These very stairs. I would watch as he climbed, puff puff, he went. I hated it when her foot hit the banister. I manage just two stairs now. Les is heavy; he is leaking, he is staring at me. I put him down. I am in charge of plans. I drag him up by the arms on his back. There is no other way. He spills down his front like a baby. Unpleasant, Howard would call it. His head drags and bumps. Needs must. I remember her saying, You’re a natural mover, Lee. Would you like to be a dancer?
    If she’d had her way we’d all be leaping and twirling with roses in our teeth. Talk about rose-tinteds.
    This is working. Job done. Easier on my own. We all have a cross to bear and mine is knobhead downstairs.
    I will need soap, water, kitchen roll, tea towels, cotton wool. I will have to improvise. I put the kettle on. Catch my breath. I roll up my sleeves. I have that Louis Armstrong song in my head.
I see trees of green. Red roses too
. Something something.
For me and you. And I think to myself
.
    The GP drives a Volkswagen Polo.
    Once in bed, cleaned and plugged, dressed in fresh clothes, Les looks OK in spite of the staining. Discoloration yes, some hypostasis, but supported on pillows in a clean jacket he looks quite approachable, debonair even. His eyes have clouded. For the sake of appearances I stack fifty-pences on each, as we seem to be out of one-pound coins. The GP is nice, friendly. No worries, he says, though he’s not from Australia. He remembers me. I see him flick a double-take at the fifty-pences. I decide not to ask if he has change.
    I had my concerns, he says. It was on the cards, he says. Don’t give yourself a hard time. Your stepfather’s problems were significant and various.
    Thank you, I say. I tell him I know it’s not unusual, per se.
    The GP washes his hands. He pronounces Lester dead.
    Your