The Psychological Stairway

Hackney, I was obsessed with it, unbeknown to myself, obsessed with the kaleidoscope of clear memories, the incredibly Beautiful, so Young, Black females and their Children, in my old age, to sit on top of the bus, look at them ... Pray to God for them, being so overwhelmed by them.
Almost the end of this particular period of my existence.
One final stab from Dear Jennifer.. One final rearing up on my hind legs trying to overcome fate itself.

The phone. As Always.

Early morning in London, late, previous evening in Los Angeles.

Jennifer, slightly drunk... ranting on about Mark and her life in general.. Cannot remember the exact words that triggered me, along the lines that I, an useless bastard, would never see Mark again. She slammed the receiver down.

Out of that bed so quick.. dressed... grabbed the passport, tore down the thirty nine steps.. stood waiting for a Bus, taxi, anything, fuming. Suddenly a Cab came flying along the middle of the road.. Realised it was Albert.. stepped out and waved furiously for him to stop which he did with a squeal of brakes... then suddenly roared off, changed his mind, roared off to see Shirley, screaming round the bend of the Common on two wheels. Everyone must have heard my shout... what I shouted at him, what I called him. Nothing, nothing ever detracted Albert from seeing Shirley, once summoned. A strange affair, he would go to her house, do all the repairs, decorating, anything else required of him. Shirley's husband would go out and play golf... that arrangement had gone on for very many years... Not a bad situation, if thought about.

Staggered finally up the long drive to Jennifer's condominium.
Evening in Los Angeles. Mark, looking out of the window, saw me, heard him shout. "Mummy.. Daddy is coming up the Road"... Heard her shout back "Don't be silly.. Go to sleep.."

Felt the penny drop, quite clearly she had tuned into my brain waves.. The rush to the street door .. Heard the bolts going on.. In no mood for all that.. Hit it with my boot.. my fourteen stone ..second hit, it flew open.. Jenny and her old man stumbled up the stairs.. Pure Hitchcock stuff.. the psychological stairway... I ran up after them...

Imagine they thought it all a bad dream, a nightmare.

So far as they were concerned I was driving about the Battered Streets.. so very far away.. the "Muttering Retreats".. Most decidedly not chasing them up their stairs.. A man possessed, exhausted by the sheer weight of existence.. a man attempting to overcome his own destiny.

Ran out of steam eventually, on seeing the boy.. standing at the top of another flight of stairs.. another turmoil in his life.

Drained, suddenly, by the whole affair. Waking to the realisation how much, how far, I had been driven by this madness. Cooled, quickly as it began.. above all, wishing that she had not managed to wynd me up so tight, wishing to be back in the flat... in the bed, the tentacles, the leaves of the plants hanging over me, a certain sanity. Instead, marooned myself, Blown whatever money scraped together, blown on these, quite ridiculous travels. What had been the point! painfully obvious, sitting drinking coffee, Jenny and John watching carefully, as if I may erupt further. The strained atmosphere stretched tight across the room, the longer I sat, the more stupid I felt.

Why couldn't I have been Albert, Bernie, Jimmy Skinner? A straight, practical acceptance to life, no real upheavals.. simply do as they were told. They would mutter about it to anyone who would listen. Occurred to me that their compliance was not something I could smile at any longer. They were not sitting in the middle of bloody Los Angeles, hardly knowing how they arrived in such a position.