Briefly Very Beautiful by Roz Dineen

Author:Roz Dineen
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Published: 2024-04-11T00:00:00+00:00

29

It was extremely loud everywhere. There was nothing Cass could do to stop the noise reverberating seismically through her children. In the past, she’d acted as a shock absorber for them, but they were going to have to feel the full drop of this bit.

First, they had to weave through hundreds of densely parked cars and the people who were living in and out of them. Each stereo seemed to be turned up full. Every single person here was trying to control their own environment – still. Cass kept noticing piles of fresh faeces kicked underneath vehicles, with bits of tissue attached.

The vehicles gave way to many more people, to dogs barking, children crying, to tents that seemed to have grown across the land, games and arguments. One like this:

‘You cunt!’

‘You can’t call me a cunt, I’m your daughter.’

‘You’re a cunt, cunt, cunt, cunt, cunt.’

‘No. You’re a cunt.’

‘You can bet your life on it. And my mother was a cunt, her mother was a cunt, you come from a long history of cunts. YOU ARE NOTHING SPECIAL. YOU. CUNT.’

‘Bitch.’

Both smirked.

Leaflets, bursts of laughter, strings of red lights, acquiescence. People keen to display who they’d been all this time, when they were back in their homes. Cooking meat and texting.

The pathway through the tents and the mud was made from sheets of corrugated iron and honeycombed plastic. Twice, the pathway split and Cass had to ask the way.

Where the mud became unnavigable, Cass was so determined that she and her children would not slip in the fetid mess, where everything was mixed, that she felt unearthly powers of steadiness. Daisy was strapped to her front in the sling, leaving her one hand free for Maggs and one for Vi, with the enormous bag heavy on her back. Thus was the entire universe constituted and in the balance.

They finally found and joined the correct line, ready to be processed when the centre opened in the morning. Cass heard herself inform the children that, after a short interview in the building at the head of the line, they would be free to continue on their way. They would not be stopping here, she explained. They had every right to pass through the border, unlike most people, and they would be met on the other side. She spoke with great certainty, as if her firm utterance were all that was required to make anything be so. The man and woman standing ahead of them in the line turned around as one and gave Cass the eye, as if to say, Why the hell would you tell your children that? You have no guarantees.

Cass’s phone had been ringing on and off. And now that they were in the line, she could release the children’s hands and answer it. She squeezed the little fingers before letting them go, but they clung on to her, so she had to shake them off. Then Vi stepped up and onto Cass’s toes. Maggs bunched up the hem of Cass’s T-shirt and put it in her mouth to suck on.

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