As I come out of the toilet,
Marla sees me and screams.
Who are you?
She covers her face with her fingers
for protection.
I step into the hall light,
holding up my hands,
about to tell her
I am Toffee.
Marla steps back.
Who are you?
I stare at her.
Who am I?
Who? Who?
Think, Allison, think.
I was just here to clean, I mutter.
I sit at the bottom of the stairs and
slip on my trainers.
Cobwebs hang beneath the hall table.
Marla reaches for an umbrella,
waves it at me.
I don’t need a cleaner.
Don’t come back here.
I’m well able to do my own polishing.
I understand.
She holds the umbrella aloft
and clumsily,
unluckily,
it opens.
I step closer.
I haven’t been paid.
I hold out my palm.
She seems to smirk at my audacity.
Do I look like a bleedin’ cripple?
I’m not.
I can push a broom around the place
and I’d break someone’s back with it
if they messed me about,
don’t think I wouldn’t.
You haven’t been cleaning.
I’m owed twelve quid, I tell her.
I’ve no idea why I’m insisting,
why I don’t just go away
and come back later.
She chews her tongue.
Your handbag’s in the sitting room.
My voice is lined with ridicule,
my expression hard.
Leave, I tell myself.
What the hell are you doing?
You aren’t getting any money from me.
She isn’t messing around.
I march past her
into the sitting room
where I collect her bag
then come back out and hand it to her.
Twelve. Pounds.
My knees are shaking although
she is watching me less confidently,
perhaps with a thread of fear.
How many hours were you here?
Two. It’s six pounds per hour.
She looks up at the ceiling,
puts the open umbrella aside.
I don’t want you back here, madam.
Don’t let me see you in this house again.
You hear me?
If I see you back I’ll get the guards.
Don’t think I won’t.
She glances at the rotary telephone.
It is black, dusty.
I shrug.
She hands me a tenner and two coins.
See you later, I say.