The Devil's Playground Read Online Free PDF Page A

Jake, like the whiff
    of old books or attic-rescued toys. He just sat there, almost
    a part of the armchair, his head bowed, his hand running
    through the straggle of his beard.
    Jon tried not to stare at Jake’s feet. He was barefoot, as
    always, but it was only now in the small confined light of the
    room that he could see that the marks and patterns on the
    old man’s feet were not just from sleeping rough. His feet
    were dark and sunburned, crisscrossed with tiny white lines,
    the flesh sometimes folded over itself, sometimes stretched
    tight to the bone, a latticework of streets and alleys carved
    into the skin or an ancient map of places still unseen. They
    looked hard and worn like an athlete’s feet, as if the flesh
    was slowly turning to leather.
    He glanced up and noticed that Jake was watching him.
    He shivered, a real body snap and jerker, the kind that
    makes you feel as if too volts have just surged through your
    system. He coughed to make it seem like something else,
    hoping Jake hadn’t caught it, thinking of exiled Chilean
    academics he’d seen in a documentary once and the
    torture scars they carried like a secret tattoo beneath their
    clothes.
    ‘I wonder if I could have a bath.’
    Jon jumped. Then laughed, or tried to, but it came out
    wrong and Jake didn’t smile back or make things any easier.
    His face held still like the face of a man carved in stone.
    ‘It’s been a couple of weeks. I must smell awful.’
    Yes he did, Jon thought, but he’d been way too polite, too
    embarrassed, to say anything. ‘There’s towels in the racks
    and you can use whatever soaps, shampoos I’ve got,’ he said,
    trying not to let the relief show in his voice.
    ‘Thank you,’ Jake replied and got up, leaving big wet,
    soggy footprints on the faded carpet.
    When the door closed, Jon felt a sudden surge of relief, a
    welcome spasm of privacy. What had he done? But it was
    too late for that now, of course. He couldn’t ask him to
    leave. Couldn’t change his mind. That would be worse, and
    more difficult. He suddenly remembered his toothbrush,
    wondering whether Jake would use it, it was the only one he
    had, and he made a decision to buy a new one tomorrow,
    but one that was identical so that the old man wouldn’t feel
    insulted.
    Jon lit a cigarette and put the first side of Zappa’s Waka/
    Jawaka on the stereo. As the horns began blasting the melody,
    reaching ever higher, counter-phrasing and spinning across
    the wild, propulsive beat, he went to the kitchen, buoyed by
    the screaming trumpets, and started to make an omelette,
    figuring the old man must be hungry, wanting to do something
    for him, even if it was just this.
    He thought about his father’s funeral while the eggs slowly
    turned opaque in the pan. The sound of the sizzling fat like
    the rain on the roofs of the cars that morning … another
    grey rain-lashed day … his inability to look anyone in the
    eye, hiding behind the cortege of hearses; a small child again,
    weeping for a father that he’d hated in life, filled with
    shame, regret and the massiveness of all that had been left
    unresolved.
    He took out the milk and made some coffee, hearing the
    pipes squeak and whisde as Jake ran his bath. Thinking about
    his father again made Jon’s body tense up and he spilled
    sugar all over the floor, cursing himself and the way his
    memory always lay in wait like a densely packed minefield,
    impossible to avoid, fracturing the present.
     
    It made his ankle throb. Thinking about his father, about the
    past, Jake’s disappearance, all the things that were still raw
    and painful. He didn’t want to think about any of that.
    He got up, poured another drink. Stared out at the cashpoint,
    deserted now. He was glad that he’d invited Jake in.
    It was the one thing in his life he was unmitigatedly proud
    of. The one time when he overcame his fears and quibbles
    and actually did something without reservation. Not that it
    had made any difference.