Mark tuned him out. He walked in the direction of St. Augustine Tower, the crenellated top of which overlooked The Narrow Way. A group of kids appeared to be playing an imaginative form of kick the can at the base of the tower, a sight he hadn’t seen since mobile phones, texting, gaming, and PlayStations had obliterated the ways children had entertained themselves for generations.
They entered St. John of Hackney churchyard, just to the right of the ancient tower. They headed east, on a route that would take them along a paved path the distance to Sutton Way. There Paulie and his family lived in a structure unappealingly reminiscent of the hasty architecture that grew out of the 1960s, all angles and picture windows looking onto very little of interest.
Paulie said, “Well, it was better than internet porn, I wager. More costly, yeah, but it’s the woman’s touch that does it, eh? It’s special, that. Another human being. Warm flesh. Shit, Boyko, if Eileen hasn’t always known what I want before I even want it, I’d’ve been in there with you having my own go.” His voice altered to meditative. “That woman’s a sex machine, our Eileen is. Most days she doesn’t wear knickers, and if the kids aren’t in the room, she lifts her skirt every chance she gets. She’s even done me in one of the shops. Have I told you that? Right behind the counter, this was, three days ago, with the shop full open for business. I’m surprised I wasn’t taken to the bill to answer questions about wife abuse. That’s how much noise the woman was making when I got her going.”
Mark said nothing. He’d heard about Eileen’s sexual antics before. Ad nauseam, in fact. The silence extended until Paulie said, “Pete coming to dinner? Or is it just you?”
Mark glanced at his brother, who was looking straight ahead as if there were something in the distance that wanted memorising. He said, “Why d’you ask that? You know it’s impossible just now.”
“What about that Greer person? Isn’t that her name? Greer? Pete’s friend? The one she sees so much of? Greer could stay for an hour or two. She’d know what to do if anything happened.”
“Pete doesn’t like to leave Lilybet,” Mark told his brother.
“I know she doesn’t like to. We all know she doesn’t like to, Boyko.”
Again Mark made no reply. While it was true that his misery was deep, it was not about Pete, who did the best she could, given their circumstances. Instead, his misery was more about what he couldn’t anticipate, and that was what the future was going to look like for all three of them: Pietra, Lilybet, and himself.
They walked across the lower section of the churchyard. It was mostly empty at this time of day, so close to dinner. A few benches were occupied, but mostly by people who were staring at the screens of their smartphones. There were dog walkers as well, and one woman in a scarlet sundress appeared to be walking a large tabby cat on a lead although the cat’s slinking along a scarce inch from the ground indicated his lack of enthusiasm for the activity.
As they drew closer to the other side of the churchyard, the smell of frying burgers created a fountain of scent in the air. The source was a small café just to their side of the wall that separated the churchyard from the neighbourhood beyond it. The café catered to the area’s multiracial, multicultural populace, as its posted menu indicated that on offer were not only burgers but also crêpes, samosas, kebabs, chicken shawarma, and various vegetarian dishes. The place appeared to be doing a brisk business. There were people tucking into numerous cartons at the several picnic tables set on the lawn. There was also a long queue waiting to order and another waiting for food to be packed up for takeaway. They wore the martyred expressions so typical of Londoners, most of whom spent their lives waiting in a queue for something: a bus, the underground, a train, a taxi, their turn at the till.
“Can’t believe that place is still here,” Paulie commented as they passed. “The grandkids must be running it by now.”
“Must be,” Mark said. They walked by the café and then through the far exit from the churchyard, which took them into Sutton Way, where Paulie snatched up a discarded cigarette packet and shoved it into his pocket. They went not to Paulie’s house among the string of 1960s-looking structures, but to the house in which they had grown up. It was across the street and down the way a bit, in a terrace of soot-soiled brick houses in need of a thorough scrubbing. They were all identical. Each had three floors, a slightly recessed arched doorway, fanlights above the doors, doors themselves painted ebony. Wrought-iron railings defined the house fronts; two windows on each floor gave an idea of size. Nothing distinguished one from another except the window coverings and the brass door knockers, their originals having been replaced over the years by whatever the occupants fancied. In the case of Mark and Paulie’s childhood home, the knocker of choice was a brass jack-o’-lantern, and the window coverings were the creation of Paulie’s kids, with assistance from their gran, who’d supplied the paints. There was a primitive charm to the finished product, as long as one didn’t attempt to identify the animals that the kids had decided to depict.