Londonstani. Gautam Malkani
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your time daydreamin bout some other lesson, you sad, sad, gimpy sap. I’m such a fuckin pehndu that not only can’t I decide what to say but I can’t decide what to daydream bout either. You could choose anything. But I reckon daydreamin is like proper dreamin, when you’re actually sleepin. You can’t sleep less you stop tryin to. Just got to ignore the voices tellin you how tired you are, an those that keep sayin, Get to fuckin sleep or tomorrow you’ll be knackered. Shouldn’t listen to them voices. Shouldn’t think at all. I only got bout twenty minutes left so I shouldn’t think at all.
—Why you being so quiet now, Jas? I tell you, sometimes you’re just like your father. I’m sorry, Bobby, but my son, he’s just like his father.
It’s Uncle Bobby, one a Dad’s best mates from Ilford who always cracks rude jokes whenever he comes round an who somehow makes Mum an Dad stop tryin to sound so fuckin posh all the time. He’s probly come over to see Dad but Dad’s still at the office cos Dad’s always at the fuckin office.
—Don’t worry, let him sulk in the corner, Uncle Bobby goes to Mum.— His salad is tasty today. Nice and meaty. Not like that rabbit’s food last week, thank God. These vegetarian children. Bloody gaylords, all of them.
—Jas’s not vegetarian, Mum goes, grabbin the corner a her turquoise pashmina shawl before it slips off her shoulder.— His grandmother is, and I’m trying to cut down for this new diet I’m trying. But Jas just doesn’t like meat, do you, Jas? That’s why usually he doesn’t put it inside these healthy salad plates of his. He doesn’t even eat my chicken biryani any more, even though I put extra chillies in it just for his sake.
—There’s a word for this kind of behaviour: arrogant. That’s what you are, Uncle Bobby says to me.— You should be grateful for the food your mama cooks for you. I remember I was bloody grateful to my mother when I was a young boy.
—Oh, don’t worry, Bobby, I don’t mind. It means I don’t have to reheat yesterday’s leftovers so I don’t have to feel like a bad mother, she goes, lettin out one a her posh laughs that makes her shawl nearly slip off again. Fuckin pashmina shawls. She’s got eight a them. She even wears one when she’s gardening. She bought them one time when Amit’s mum came back from Bombay an turned their living room into Pashmina Shawls ‘R’ Us or someshit. After she’s finished ‘R’
straightening it again she tries a spoon a my salad.— He’s trying to be a healthy young boy, that’s all, she goes. She makes me feel nauseous. Mum always makes me feel nauseous.
Can you imagine me makin a salad? Fuck that. But sometimes I’d like to, just to be healthy an that, I’d like to like salad. So fuck it, let me have made the salad.
—This, lamb is it? Never had lamb in a salad before but it’s not bad, young man. Then he winks at my mum.— Looks like you’ve got yourself a gaylord chef in the family. It’s a bit too spicy for an old man like me, but it’s not bad, son.
Fuck off, you wanker, an stop callin me a gaylord. I so wish I could say this out loud. You wanker, please fuck off. I request you to fuck off out our house an cease referring to me as a homosexual, you wanker. I in’t your son. I’d rather be your own personal fuckin rent boy than be your fuckin son. Leave my mum alone, she’s only laughin along with you cos she’ll laugh along with anyone when they’re puttin someone down. My tongue may be fucked but my eyes are wide open. I can understand this kind a shit. But I can’t tell that to you, or her.
—It’s lamb, no? Just want to make sure because I don’t eat beef no more, not after all that mad cow business.
Sorry, but I honestly can’t talk to you. Maybe I want to. But I can’t.
—Jas probably doesn’t even know himself, Bobby, he hates meat. Is that why you’re not eating your own salad today, Jas? Oh, just forget it. You just sit and sulk. Bobby, let him sit and sulk. He is always sulking. Just like his father, I tell you.
Suddenly in my mind I can hear all those kids at school. Hardjit, Davinder, Amit. That lot who never spoke to me back then.— Fine, sulk even more, they all go in chorus.— Don’t answer yo mama, don’t chat 2 no one. U jus like yo papa, u jus like yo papa… So jus eat yo fuckin food, u useless khota.
—Oh, come on, Uncle Bobby says, tryin to keep my salad in his mouth,— all this sulking is no good. Jas my boy, tell us what happened, was it girls? That would be a big relief, woman. You don’t want a gaylord son, so be grateful if he’s sulking about girls.
—In’t no chance a dat, go the guys in my head again,— pehndu can’t even chat to blokes proply. Probly couldn’t even kiss a girl. Probly couldn’t even kiss a girl. Take it from da experts, jus open your mouth n da tongue knows wat it’s doin. You don’t kiss her on da mouth, you kiss her in da mouth, u get me? Best try it on yo’self tho, innit, best try n lick your own tongue.
—Jas? Girls? Not yet, Bobby, Jas is too young to have a girlfriend, goes my mum.— Jas doesn’t go around giving kissies to girls, do you, Jas? He probably doesn’t even know how to give kissies.
Before Mum has even finished, Uncle Bobby spits his laughter into his plate an quickly eats it again.— If I didn’t know how to kiss, my wife would never -
Then Mum turns back to me again, this time makin that face she always makes when she decides it’s time for her to stick up for Dad stead a layin into him all the time.— Now you listen to me Bobby, you stop saying bad things about my son.
Uncle Bobby weren’t havin none a it, though, so Mama then turns to me an goes,— Jas, don’t leave this all to me, you’ve got to stand up for yourself and say something. Open your mouth, please? she sighs. —Why can’t you open your mouth?
She is right. I should stand up for myself. I shouldn’t leave it all to her. But she orders Dad around enough, why can’t she just order Uncle Bobby to ease up? An anyway, it’d be pointless for me to tell Uncle Bobby anything cos I can’t talk an I can’t eat an it hurts so much. What’s the point in feelin pain if you can’t even tell your mama bout it? An it don’t even matter that Mama is now on my side. Don’t matter cos it’s started bleedin again. An my cheeks swell up with the blood. Fill em up. Oh, ouch. Ow. Mama, Mama, my mouth hurts. Ouch.
At first it had seemed the blood was violently bellyflopping over my bottom lip, like how it all explodes when you start to puke. Gushin out from where it’d been hardest to scissor it, from the middle bit where my Shitesprecher had been thickest. Then the blood settled once again, just trickling over my lip an painting my chin an neck a sort a blackish kind a red. So wet it was, my blood. I could feel it all mess up with the bits a ugly, stragglin bumfluff on my face cos I was tryin to grow a goatee beard. But I could only feel it on my face when I tried to concentrate on something other than the swirling pain inside my mouth an the sound a ‘Kiss’ by Prince, which is suddenly blastin outta the oven, fridge an microwave. Think bout the world outside your mouth, I tell myself, think bout your mama’s calm, fuckin Forest Moods CD. Think bout the drip-drippin a blood from the end a my shirt collar an into my plate a cucumber, tomato an diced up, lean an tender (but otherwise fuckin useless) Shitesprecher. Think bout Mama mopping up my blood with her pashmina shawl, dancin to Prince. My own head stirring, draggin though the air. Fuck knows whether I’ve suddenly gone bald but my head’s fuckin freezin, slowly fallin forward so that I in’t got no choice but to let my bloody, painted face roll down with it. Down towards my salad. The kitchen table din’t seem so massive before. An all the stains on Mum’s pink frilly tablecloth move further out, makin space for all a my blood.
—Oh…bloody mad boy, bloody fool, Uncle Bobby gives it, desperately spittin out my salad when I finally open my mouth. He jerks up the table, which launches the whole bowl a salad at me, almost as if to help me reach it as my head continues to slump down, slowly dragged by my mama-it’s-so-painful mouth. As I meet the bowl halfway my jaw is still locked wide open an meaty bits a my salad enter, kissin me. A proper kiss. In the mouth.