Mahalia by Joanne Horniman Page B

minute. And then he was told how someone had a car and it was a real beast and someone else had a motorbike. Filthy!
    And somehow it was good just to laugh and forget about things for a while, and he did, and then his beer was finished and someone was suggesting that he have another one . . .
    But he got to his feet, and dragged himself away to their good-natured jeers and catcalls, but reluctantly, because he wanted to stay and drink and just forget! for once . . .
    The streetlights were on, must have flickered on while he was inside, unaware of how dark it was getting. He ran up the dark road, food forgotten, thinking of the dark house, his thoughts dark and pounding through his head.
    When he got there the house wasn’t dark; there was someone there, and Mahalia was screaming, and her screams sounded all the way down the stairs. Virginia carried her, talking to her and patting her back, but she wouldn’t stop crying.
    Mahalia’s face was damp and accusing, and she lunged from Virginia’s arms to his. Her eyes were swollen and mottled, and her breath came in gasps.
    â€˜Hey, mate, what happened?’ said Virginia. ‘I got home a minute ago and she was screaming her head off and the house was dark and she was alone . . .’
    She stopped herself from saying more.
    â€˜You know,’ she told Matt, ‘if you wanted to go out for a while you should have asked when I got back. You just have to ask, you know.’
    Matt held Mahalia’s cheek against his face. I’m sorry, sorry, sorry said his heartbeat.

9
    On a day in the middle of spring, an ordinary day when he woke to the predictable rattle of the windchimes and Eliza singing in the bathroom, a day when Virginia’s throaty laugh could be heard somewhere downstairs, when the front door slammed in the wind and someone shouted something unintelligible outside, Matt finally put Mahalia into her stroller in the middle of the afternoon and walked out into a world marked unexpectedly by wonder.
    The last couple of weeks had been wet and gloomy after a rainy, influenza-filled winter, but today there was a breeze that blew the scent of orange blossom and jasmine through the air, and every single person Matt passed smiled at him and at Mahalia, and he had a feeling of undifferentiated sensuality and – yes! – sexiness, that was directed at no one in particular but rather at the whole world.
    Everyone was affected by the unexpected warmth, the scent of flowers that filled the streets, and by the luck of being alive at this particular moment in this particular place. People sat and chatted to their friends in outdoor cafes, and Matt saw plenty of people that he knew, but he only stopped for a moment to say hello to them, for he was heading off to find Eliza at the Con.
    There were two girls with baskets full of cellophane-wrapped rosebuds, giving them out, free, in the street, as a promotion for a florist. ‘Gee, thanks!’ people said, and walked on. Young people, kids like Matt with no money, said to each other, ‘Hey, are they giving them out for nothing?’ and ran to get one.
    â€˜Get me one too!’ yelled their friends.
    One of the girls stopped to offer one to Matt, smiling at Mahalia ( everyone smiled at Mahalia!): he accepted it and walked on, feeling enchanted, walking on air.
    Outside the red-brick building of the Con, Matt came across Charmian standing in the street, puffing on a cigarette, her legs as sturdy and solid as a tree deeply rooted in the ground. Her belly stuck out confidently with such a don’t care! look and with such an air of belonging exactly to that spot that Matt waltzed up to her and handed her the rosebud, gallantly, though at the back of his mind he’d been saving it for Eliza.
    She thanked him with great seriousness, and tickled Mahalia under the arms. Mahalia squirmed back in her stroller, almost curling up into a ball with pleasure. Then Charmian gestured towards an old