‘Lucille, your bedroom is so much larger than mine.’
She disappeared from sight, kneeling in the gap between bed and wall, retrieving something. ‘Comes with being the senior lodger, squire. Hang around long enough, this place could be yours.’
‘That is indeed a special thing to aim for.’ Destructor stood, unconvinced, at the room’s centre, gazing round, up and down at walls, ceiling and furniture plastered with photographic reproductions of female humans’ bulbous chests. ‘Lucille?’
‘Yup?’ She was still hidden from sight.
His gaze didn’t leave the photographs. ‘All those eyes on your walls?’
‘What eyes? I hope you’re not coming over all hallucinogenic on me.’
‘The pink eyes,’ he said.
‘Pink? You mean the nipples? They’re called nipples. Everyone has them.’
He looked down at his chest. ‘I do not.’
‘Do you have them, Lucille?’
‘Is this some sort of come on?’
Again he looked at the photographs. ‘Those “nipples” appear to be watching me.’
‘Take a step to the left,’ she instructed.
He did so. The pink eyes followed him.
‘Now step right.’
He did so. They followed him. He walked round the room. They followed him. ‘Lucille?’ A shiver ran down his back. ‘This is frightening.’
‘Damn right it’s frightening. You know why it’s frightening?’
‘No, Lucille. I do not.’
‘Because breasts are the scariest things on Earth.’
‘They are?’
‘More frightening than disease, more frightening than power-mad insects, more frightening than atom bombs.’
‘But how can this be?’
‘For one thing,’ she said, ‘they’re unbelievably intimidating to other women. Breasts are the repository of a woman’s self-esteem and therefore her greatest fears. At the sight of a pair bigger than her own, the average woman shrivels up and dies like a slug in salt. Pretty soon I’ll have bigger breasts than anyone who ever lived. Then just watch other girls’ faces when I roll up at parties and walk all over them, them paralysed by a sense of total inadequacy.’
‘But these things are watching me.’
‘That’s an evolutionary ploy.’
‘It is?’
‘How did humans get to be the Earth’s dominant species?’ she asked.
‘Because they created marvellous weapons and squashed all opposition, like a dominant species should.’
‘No. It’s because men have nipples.’
‘It is?’ Was there no end to the number of things he had to learn about humans?
‘A lion encounters a zebra,’ she said. ‘What does he see.’
‘A marvellous new friend to be played with.’
‘No, a meal. A lion encounters a human being, what does he see?’
‘A marvellous big meal to be consumed like vermin.’
‘To animals, yourself included,’ she said, ‘nipples look like eyes. A belly button’s a mouth. When a lion sees a human chest headed its way, it thinks it’s being confronted by a gigantic face and assumes there must be a gigantic animal attached. So the lion slinks off, wetting itself. That’s why humans have no natural predators. And without predators there was nothing to stop us taking over the world. It’s like some butterflies have fake owl eyes on their wings, and it’s why human beings have relatively little body hair. Hairy bodies would obscure the nipples and condemn the wearer to instant death.’
‘Is this all true, Lucille?’
‘It’s an established fact. I was developing it for my thesis before the idiots expelled me and wrecked the whole future of Animal Psychology.’
‘Lucille, there is so much more to your species than I had realized. But why have you brought me here? To teach me the futility of warring with a people whose very chests are unconquerable?’
‘I’ve brought you here to show you something.’
‘Your nipples?’
She re-emerged from behind the bed, shoe box in hands.
‘Is that where you keep them?’ he asked.
Springs creaking, she sat on the bed. ‘These are my pet rats – Danny and Osmo.’ She half held her mysterious box out toward him. ‘Take a look.’
Reluctantly he stepped forward, leaning over the box to see, staying just far enough back to duck should something leap out and stick to his face like in that splendid videotape recording she’d shown him.
She removed the lid.
‘Squeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeak!!!’ At the sight of Destructor, rodent eyes bulged, cardboard ears shot upright, panicked rats leapt from box, scurried between his ‘feet’, and scampered out into the hallway.
From the hallway, tiny feet pitter-pattered on lino.
Then silence.
The letter box slapped.
Then silence.
Lucy and Destructor knelt side by side, looking out through the letter box, at the darkened landing with its plain banisters and dingy stairs leading up and down.
‘I see no rats,’ said the insect.
‘Shit.’ She let the letter box slap shut then, heart sinking, took her coat from the peg by the door. ‘I’ll have to go and get them.’
‘Leave them, Lucille. Let them roam the sewers, wild and free. Leave them where they belong.’
‘Those two? They wouldn’t last ten seconds down a sewer. If I didn’t cut their chips into starship shapes, they’d refuse to eat them.’
‘Then, get real rats,’ he said. ‘Fierce monsters to tear the flesh from the limbs of your enemies.’
She watched him, unimpressed. ‘You really don’t get “pets”, do you?’
‘In my world we have no pets, only allies.’
‘Well,’ she stated, holding him entirely responsible for the disappearance, ‘in my world we have pets.’
‘And do these things that do not fulfil their natural function really mean so much to you, Lucille?’
‘Oi! They might not be much but they’re the only proper animals I ever had. As a kid, I always wanted a pet, nothing special, nothing fancy, maybe a cat or a budgie. A goldfish would’ve done. Know what I got?’
‘An elk?’
‘An elk?’ She stared at him. ‘Why would anyone buy me an elk?’
‘An elk is a magnificent beast,’ he said. ‘King of the sheep-like creatures.’
‘You really are a clueless git, aren’t you?’
‘Then what did you receive in your fond-remembered childhood days?’
‘A clockwork dog, a clockwork dog that couldn’t go three strides without rocking back on its arse and yapping. Have you ever tried taking a dog for a walk, and having to stop every ten yards to wind it up?’
‘No, Lucille. I have not.’
‘The block’s other kids didn’t stop to wind their dogs up. They had proper pets, ones you could throw sticks for. Mine, you’d throw it a stick, it’d fall over. You’d say, “Sit,” it’d fall over. You’d say, “Heel,” it’d fall over. It’d lie there, yapping, legs waving till they ran down. And the local cats picked on him.’
‘But if …’
‘But I didn’t care. I loved Yappy. And I knew he loved me. When he died from rust, I cried for days and days and days. No one ever cried longer over a pet’s death, not those flash kids with their real dogs.’
‘Then …?’
Those rats were the first pets I ever had that didn’t need a key. And maybe they couldn’t sleep with the lights out, and maybe I had to tuck them in every night, and maybe they wouldn’t drink from a mug till they’d seen me cleaning it, but at least they weren’t a fucking clockwork elk.’
‘Lucille Smith, you are a woman of many surprises.’
‘Big deal.’
He took hold of the door handle. ‘I shall come with you, for the city streets at night are treacherous, filled with the scum of the Earth. And we shall scour for these creatures that brought you keyless joy.’
Lucy threw her coat on. ‘And have you scare them off every time we get within a zillion yards?’ She swatted his claw away from the handle. ‘You’ve caused enough trouble for one night. Stay here. I’ll get them.’
And she slammed the door behind her.
Fucking elk.
“Danny? Osmosis?’ Lightning crashing, Lucy checked beneath a box by some bins. ‘You under here?’ They weren’t. Nor were they anywhere else she’d tried in the ten minutes since leaving the flat.
Frustrated, she let the box drop, and kicked it. It halted three yards away.
She studied the darkened alley, with its nooks and crannies, crates, bins and iron-banistered stairways which led to old coal cellars. It was hopeless. She could search for years without finding them, assuming they wanted to be found. If they did, why hadn’t they come back? Had she not looked after them properly?
Clothes clinging to her in hissing rain, she called. ‘It’s me – Lucy. You know, the one who runs round after you, like an idiot. Danny? Osmosis?’
She scanned the alleyway. No movement.
And, lower lip jutted, she turned, resigned to having lost the only real pets she’d ever had.
Then Lucy Smith screamed.
*
‘You were calling my name. Miss Smith?’ The Great Osmosis stood before her, melodramatically lit by a lightning flash.
‘Oh!’ She caught her breath, heart thumping, one hand on her chest, the other on his. ‘Osmo.’ She smiled with relief that he wasn’t some murderer, swallowed a mouthful of rain and reclaimed her composure. ‘I mean Mr Osmosis. You nearly gave me a seizure. I was just looking for rats.’
His inscrutable bucket gazed down at her, yellow smoke drifting from narrow eye holes. ‘Rats?’
‘Yeah. My pet … I mean …’ She glanced sideways, guiltily.
‘Miss Smith, you are aware of the rules against pets in my properties?’
‘Of course.’ She squirmed, shrinking with each word. ‘I meant Danny’s rats. I told him not to keep them. He wouldn’t listen. He threatened to kill me. He was like a man possessed. I’m glad you threw him out, his rages frightened me. When you got rid of him, I threw out the rats. But they keep coming back and back and back. So I have to toss them out and out and out, in case he returns and returns and returns for them. Oh, Mr Osmosis, you don’t know what it’s been like. Don’t let him hurt me again.’
She threw her arms round him, squeezing tight, trying to remember how to cry on demand. Osmosis was the type to fall for tears. He had it written all over his bucket. He didn’t care about others’ suffering but liked to look as if he did – the paternal entrepreneur going out of his way to help his lessers’.
But she couldn’t cry. No matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t squeeze out one tear. How was she meant to use people if she couldn’t cry?
‘Miss Smith, you cannot fool me. These rats you seek, they’re yours, are they not?’
Slowly she nodded, looking at the ground, cold and miserable and small and despondent, rain getting in through her collar. Now she was going to lose her rats and her home. And all because of that stupid insect.
But Osmosis said, ‘Then I suggest you get back indoors, before you contract pneumonia. And I shall seek your little friends.’
She was amazed. ‘You will?’
Tenderly, he pulled wet hair away from her face, like a curtain, placing it to one side. White smoke drifted from his eye holes. ‘Miss Smith, what do you take me for? An ogre? A tyrant? A bugbear? I would no more cast your little accomplices out on the street than I would you, especially not on a night such as this.’
‘You wouldn’t?’
‘Leave the search to me. Spotting rats is a speciality of mine. Heaven knows it’s had to be since Mr Yates’ stapler antics. I fear, because of him, I shall never again be the trusting fool I once was. But that doesn’t mean I can’t be of service to my most valued tenants. Now run along, my dear, run along. And as soon as I locate your rats, I shall have them brought to you.’
She watched him, and asked, ‘In return for?’
‘In return for?’
‘In return for?’ she repeated.
‘In return for nothing. Miss Smith, I hope you don’t think me the kind of landlord to take advantage of a broken-hearted tenant? The smile on your shapeless, little face shall be my reward.’
She took a step back, preparing to leave. ‘Mr Osmosis, I don’t know what to say.’ And she didn’t. For the first time in her life, had she misjudged someone?
‘Tish. Say nothing. Thank me later. Now run along home.’
And, following a two-handed push in the appropriate direction, which nearly knocked her over, she ran back toward the flat.
Osmosis watched his tenant scamper up the tenement’s five front steps then back indoors. The front door slammed shut behind her.
He waited.
Now, sure she wouldn’t be returning, he could take his hand from behind his back and reveal the rats hanging by their tails from between his fingertips.
Holding them up for closer inspection, he gloated, ‘Well, well, well. So you are Mr Yates’ pets. My rodentine friends, I have plans for you – special plans.’ And, head tipped back, the Great Osmosis hurled a malevolent laugh at lightning-splashed skies.
Slam. Lucy shut the flat’s front door behind her and stood dripping on the Welcome mat. She watched her flatmate. He was stood at the hallway’s other end, holding the bathroom door in his mandibles. For some reason he’d torn it from its hinges. Was it meant to impress her? If so, it had failed.
She strode into the bathroom, yanked a towel from the rail and headed for her bedroom. On the way past, she offered him only an offputting frown though doubting he could see it through the door.
‘Mmflr mmfle mmfle,’ the insect mumbled, words smothered by half a ton of wood.
‘Yeah, yeah, whatever. Goodnight.’
She slammed her bedroom door behind her, locked it, left key in lock to deter peeping Destructors, stripped off, and rubbed herself dry.
For the first time since the age of eleven, Lucy Smith climbed into bed without first measuring her bust.
But, as lightning illuminated the room, she worried about rats.