I FIND A POSTCARD on my pillow. My mother used to leave gifts for Marsden and me on our pillows after shopping: sometimes a box of Smarties, sometimes an Archie comic, once a Toto record we had begged for. She has not done it for a long time and just the sight of something lying on my pillow squeezes tears from my eyes.
It is a black-and-white photograph of James Dean, his eyes just peeping out of his jersey. The photograph is marred because the post office carelessly franked it. My heart skips a beat as I flick it over. It is from Mister Skinner. Why would old Skin write to me?
Dear Douglas
You are often on my mind. I would love to know how you are, out there in the Karoo. I imagine it is another world. Having lived in the city for so long, I am unnerved by such vast space. I am an incurable townsman, but you are young and can adapt. I never imagined, when I took you to the Hard Rock, that fate had another cruel act in store for you.
My tears blur the writing and I have to stop reading. I sit down on the orange sofa and flick the postcard over again to stare at James Dean. I wonder if he had an inkling, when the photo was snapped, that Death was lurking just down the road, waiting to leap out at his Spyder like a shark-fanged baboon, like a fiery-eyed tokoloshe?
I read on.
I still have an essay on Gatsby you handed in to me. It’s rather good. Maybe you will go on to write, like your father. Perhaps, one day, I will open the Cape Times to find the byline, Douglas Thomas, your name.
Yours
Philip Skinner
I fold the postcard and pocket it. I recall his feathery touch, and see now it was lust as much as pity. Lust snuffed out by the whistle of the Cape Town train. There is a tapping at the window. A pigeon pecks at his reflection.