One and one and one
“Take that bloke next door, for instance. That bloke next door … I mean, I don’t object to him. Barely know him, in fact. But you know, it’s just something. Something about him. You get that feeling, don’t you? I hear him hammering on the wall ‘til late, and then when he sees me in the corridor he tells me that he was sticking his heart up there. On the bleedin’ wall. Right, I say. Right. So why does he need to do that more than once? You’ve only got the one heart, right? But next week it’s the same thing. Hammering after dark. So then when I pass him in the corridor I ask him: another heart? No, he says politely, but with a look that tells me I shouldn’t be so bloody stupid. What a patronising … anyways. No, not my heart; my soul, he says. Right, I say. Right. Again. This bloke’s got a screw loose, I think to myself. Putting your soul up there next to your heart, yes? Why not just hang pleasant pictures, like everyone else? What sort of person … anyways. Yes, he says, a bit impatiently. With nails? I ask. With bloody huge nails, he says. Nails this big, he says, showing me the air between his thumb and forefinger. That’s the only time he looks vaguely animated, that is. Then he stops, all suddenly. All sudden. Apologises about the chunks of dust that might be falling out of my wall and onto my carpet because of his incessant hammering. Tells me that it won’t be a problem because he’s starting on the floorboards next. He’s got bored of painting doors, so he’s ripping up the threadbare carpets. Ripping up the floor. What are you putting down there? I ask. Fuck knows, he says. Anything I can get my fucking hands on, he says. Secrets mostly, he says. For safekeeping. Until I know what I’m going to do with them, he says. Then he shuts up, like he’s said too much. Disappears inside himself somewhere. And disappears inside his flat too. What’s that phrase you hear those neighbours say on the news when they are asked about living next door to a terrorist or mass murderer? Oh yes. Always the quiet ones. Always polite when they met him in the street. Kept himself to himself, though. Still, I’m buggered if I know what he’s about. Just odd, that one. Just plain and odd. Plain odd.”