Expatria: The Box Set by Keith Brooke

would spend every spare moment crouched over her guitar, working at an awkward phrase, testing new combinations, rearranging the old. Always, she was extending her range, broadening her grasp. One evening in her room in the Gentian Quarter, when Mathias was almost drunk and Mono was bending the strings wildly, trying to perfect a difficult interchange, Mathias had told her he could never work at something like that, he just couldn't. Mono had taken a swig from his mug of vodka-dry and said, 'No, you couldn't, could you?' Mathias had gone back to his drink and Mono to her practising.
    Vera-Lynne had pushed them together. Not long after Mathias had found his room by the docks, she had accused him of becoming a recluse. 'You're too good to waste,' she had told him.
    Mono had turned up at his room that night. 'Can I come in?' she had asked. Mathias knew her from Vera-Lynne's parties but he had been surprised to see her there. He let her in and pretty soon she went to work on him. Then she stopped. 'It's no good,' she said. Then she explained that Vera-Lynne had paid her the union rate—Mathias knew Mono's line of work:
    she needed to support her music—and asked her to seduce Mathias. Mono was upset but Mathias found it hilarious and resolved to hire a call-boy for Vera-Lynne the very next day.
    When Mono had stopped crying on his chest Mathias had asked her why she hadn't carried on. Wasn't it her job?
    'I will, if you want,' she had said. 'But you're a friend, it's different. It shouldn't be like that. If we fucked you'd just be like all the others. Or maybe not, maybe you'd be more than all the others. Then where would I be?' She seemed desperate. 'Will you give me some space? I like you too much, I don't want to complicate things.'
    Of course he had given her the space. They had grown closer, but never in a physical sense. Under Mono's restrictions, Mathias felt different to all the others. He didn't resent her clients, not even the ones like Sukui, whom Mono tried especially hard for. He had known of Sukui long before the card game; Mono said he was like her father had been, starched and withdrawn but, beneath it all, vulnerable.
    Mono had taught Mathias to play the slap drums and soon he had constructed his own set of oversized bongos from a pair of gin-shells and some pigskin from a stall on the Patterdois. She told him his rhythm was good but his concentration poor, he would have to work at it. He never did, but he was good enough to back Mono's loose affiliation of buskers, the Monotones.
    Passing through Greene Gardens, Mathias heard the familiar sound. Flute, sax and, as he drew closer, the gentle whisper of Mono's guitar. 'Mama gonna sell my soul,' she sang, breaking in on a saxophone improvisation and sounding almost as if it was an accident; Mathias knew how long they had practised the timing of that passage. 'But my papa done sold it before.' They were well into the third movement of the song, one of the longest in the current set. 'Mama gon' sell my so-oul.' There was a crowd of twenty or so passers-by; others looked but didn't pause. They were enjoying it, Mathias could tell by their faces and by the pile of coins and fruit in the Monotones' collecting hat.
    Mono spotted Mathias and smiled. This was the music, this was what life was about. Mathias settled back to listen, the morning's confrontations behind him.
    When the song finally wound down, Mathias kept his eyes closed a moment or two longer, just to let the buzz run itself down in his head, the music was that good. 'Matt, Matt!' Mono was kissing his eyelids, tugging at his folded hands. 'Matt, we've got a gig. Salomo says we can play next MidNight in his club. He says he knows we're worth it, he says he's doing it just so he doesn't have to come out on the streets to hear us. Matt, we've got ourselves a gig!'
    There was no containing Mono when she was this excited. She pulled Mathias to his feet and led him running across to Milly and Katsushita, flute and