The Enumerations Page 15

  ‘4. A pentagon has 5 sides.’ He throws more information in without saying anything significant – just facts. ‘The Castle of Good Hope in Cape Town is a star fort, containing a pentagon inside its outer walls.’ Don’t you see, he wants to add, 5 inside 5, but he doesn’t, just like he doesn’t tell them any more than he has to about …

  ‘5. Pentamerous symmetry. This is seen in echinoderms like sea urchins and starfish. Radial symmetry divides their bodies into 5 equal parts.’ He tells them that if starfish lose one limb they can grow another. He doesn’t elaborate on how long that takes, or that he wishes he had that ability.

  He closes his eyes, feels the comfort of the pebbles in his pocket.

  ‘Thank you, Noah. I’m so glad you’ve shared one of your lists. Have you written others?’

  Of course you have, and she knows it. Very devious.

  Ms Turner’s not trying to be sneaky, however. ‘Encouraging’ is a better word. ‘When you’re ready to share again, we’d all love to hear. Right?’ She looks around the small circle – well, not quite a circle, but Noah’s not going there now – and everyone nods. Juliet smiles and gives him a thumbs up; Simon looks relieved that the spotlight’s off him.

  Greenhills sends every parent written reports, and Noah’s pretty sure Dr Lovelock gets them too. ‘Noah has shown a marked willingness to participate in group sessions.’ That’s what he wants Ms Turner to write in his next one. And he hopes she’ll have more words of praise to add. For today, though, he’s done enough. Now he just has to concentrate on keeping his fingers still, at least until the end of group.

  ‘It’s not fair,’ Sadie whines. Morné nods in agreement. ‘He didn’t say things about him, Ms Turner. What’s the point, if he doesn’t do things properly?’

  If she only knew. You have told them an enormous amount. This Sadie is not good at picking up clues.

  That’s right. Behind every fact Noah has recited to the group, there’s much more. Looking up words. Weighing one word against another. Balancing the strength carried in, say, pentacle …

  He stops on that thought.

  Quite right. Never give away more than you have to.

  85.

  Juliet wonders about Morné. What brought him to Greenhills? If Juliet’s world is held in delicate balance, what is Morné’s like? What expectations and disappointments have shaped him into a boy so mountainous and round? Morné doesn’t let much slip in group. He settles himself on a chair, always next to Sadie, where he’s quick with mumbled asides that make her laugh. What a pair.

  Vuyokazi’s regular seat is on Morné’s other side. What’s it like for the two of them to sit so close to each other? They could give each other tips. How to binge; how to purge. Does Morné count calories? Juliet’s never seen him do it, but he’s quick and clever. Maybe he keeps track in his head.

  Morné’s never on time for exercises. He slouches in late, shuffles to the back of the Rec Room, mutters under his breath as he sweats his way through the class.

  He’s clever, though. He talks in group, contributes, but never in a way that says anything about him. He’ll bring up topics that get them all talking: the quality of food, why they have to have lights out at ten, isn’t there something more interesting to do in art therapy, whether it’s possible to get a doctor’s note to be excused from exercises. After a good fifteen minutes spent discussing his ‘issues’, he’s off the hook for a couple of sessions.

  The thing is, in other groups this might have worked, but Ellen’s pretty switched on. Juliet knows exactly what he’s doing, deflecting like crazy so he doesn’t have to talk about himself. Will he be able to keep it up, though? Something has to crack soon, or someone.

  86.

  Gabriel looks at the bed, at the thin blanket wrinkled across it, the flimsy pillow. He’s searching with his eyes, every nook, every cranny, every corner. And then he sees it, hiding in the dark, tucked into the corner near his mother’s bed, its sharp teeth bared, its glassy eyes staring. The long flick of its body leans against the wall. Gabriel thinks of Mum standing in the kitchen, her legs, naked from the knee down, the reddish-purple stripes he’s grown used to seeing. There’s a smudge of blood on the crumpled sheet and a grin on the dragon’s carved face.

  Gabriel puts Harry down against the wall near the window and she screams and coughs and screams, pulling hot air into her tiny lungs. Gabriel’s a Fakir now, springing across burning planks. He leaps over to the bed and grabs the cane by its spitting head and jumps back to the window with its large grimy pane. He swings that dragonstick back and over his shoulder the way Dad showed him when Gabriel got a set of miniature golf clubs for his seventh birthday and Dad told him how to stand and lift the golf club back and over his shoulder and keep his legs slightly apart.

  Gabriel still has time, still has a moment or two before the fire runs at him. It’s at the bed now, grabbing the worn blanket and tossing it flaming into the air before settling down to the serious work of destroying the mattress. Useful information can save your life, Gabriel remembers, like how to stand and how to swing. He steadies himself on his feet and then brings the cane and its club-like head forward and gives the glass a mighty thwack, as mighty as a nine-year-old boy can muster, and it breaks wide open.

  What Gabriel’s Dad forgot to tell him, what Gabriel doesn’t know, is how hungry fire is for air, how it leaps forward to gulp it into its growling stomach. As the freezing air enters the room, the flames behind him jump closer. No time to spare now. The flames have gathered strength, they’re seeking something juicier, something altogether more appetising than a musty foam mattress. Gabriel’s lungs are burning. Harry has stopped crying.

  Gabriel strips off the old jersey he wears over his pyjamas and wraps it around his hand. He bashes at the shards of glass that are left, swipes at them with the dragon’s head and then with the tip of the cane.

  He grabs Harry and leans over the windowsill. It’s not far, but he can’t climb out carrying his sister. He leans out as far as he dares and lets her fall, hears her mewling cry as she lands. Then Gabriel scrambles over, the jagged teeth of glass scraping his skin, the dragon smoking on the floor behind him, the glass beads of its eyes glowing.

  Gabriel gathers Harry into his arms and runs around the side of the house. Mum is standing at the kitchen door, holding a metal can. He recognises it at once. It’s the petrol container the old man uses to start the ancient lawnmower he keeps in the garden shed.

  We must remember this, my Little Man, Mum tells him. It really is the best way to get a good blaze going.

  87.

  When Kate and Dominic got married, they decided to buy a house. Dom’s apartment was adequate, but it didn’t feel like home. It was utilitarian, designed for one person; a lock up and go, somewhere to return after a long day’s work. Kate’s flat, all she could afford on her salary, added new meaning to the word ‘small’, and she shared it with a friend. Too small to swing a mouse, never mind a cat. Dominic filled the lounge, he could hardly find space to get out of bed in the morning.

  They wanted a house with more than one bedroom, two bathrooms, a garden, maybe even a pool. They were an estate agent’s dream. Plenty of money to spend, no set idea of where they wanted to live, but the more the agent showed them houses in the narrow streets of the southern suburbs, the more Kate realised she wanted space to breathe. They might have to commute into the city, but that was a small price to pay for the chance to feel the sea air, have a view of the mountain, walk on the beach, swim in the mornings, run up mountain paths.

  And so they began a new search, one that took them along the m3 and over Ou Kaapse Weg, to Muizenberg, Harbiton, Simonstown and beyond.

  They found the house just outside Harbiton, along a gentle road up the mountain, and then up a long drive. The house was simple, a broad, deep stoep that looked out over the bay, a pool just in front of it, large airy bedrooms, an open-plan sitting room, kitchen and dining room.

  ‘The rooms breathe,’ Kate said
.

  That was true, it felt as though the air blowing down from the mountains flowed through the rooms.

  The house was single-storey, with high ceilings and shuttered windows. The walls were a garish medley of colours, but Kate saw past them to a cool off-white, to jewelled rugs and squishy sofas, to a large bed with a cream quilt.

  ‘Shall I show you around?’ the agent asked and Kate nodded.

  Dominic didn’t move. He stood looking out over the bay to the smudged silhouette of the Hottentots Holland Mountains.

  Kate followed the agent from room to room, mentally stripping each of its furniture, picturing herself and Dom sitting on the stoep, having breakfast.

  It didn’t take long to get the house sorted out. Dominic mobilised a team of builders and painters, plumbers and tilers, and before you could say, ‘The House that Dom Built’, everything was ready.

  The day they came back from their honeymoon, Kate and Dominic drove along Main Road, and just past Harbiton. At Sunbird Drive they turned right and along to number 21. Mr and Mrs Groome – ready to start life in their new home.

  Dominic stopped at the door (newly installed, its woodwork gleaming) and took two keys from his pocket. ‘One for you,’ he pressed it into Kate’s hand, ‘and one for me.’

  Before they opened it, he turned her gently so that they were both looking out over the bay. It was a late winter afternoon and as they stood there, the air chilly on their cheeks, a light flicked on across the water and then another and another. Soon a chain of brightness rimmed the bay, glinting orange in the gathering dusk.

  88.

  Gabriel looks over his mother’s shoulder to where the kitchen is a leaping square of orange and gold.

  He takes the can out of her hands. It’s light, no liquid sloshing. But still, it’s evidence. If he throws it into the flames they will find it and then the old man will know how the fire started and there will only be two people for him to point his bony finger at.

  He shifts Harry into his mother’s arms and then he’s off, cannister in hand, sprinting across the garden, the grass frosty and sharp-tipped under his bare feet. The lane is lined with houses, all on large plots, just like the old man’s, all with outhouses and stables and country-living kind of buildings.

  Somewhere there he’ll find a place to tuck the can away, hide it in the clutter of a garden shed.

  Only as he reaches the verge, ready to head for the house at the end of the lane, does a thought stop him, dead in his tracks.

  The old man.

  Gabriel has saved his mother and he’s saved Harry, but he didn’t once think of saving the old man.

  In the distance he hears the wail of the sirens and across the road he sees Mr Fat and Mrs Thin coming out and Mr Fat’s looking down the road to where the lights are flashing.

  Gabriel melts into the darkness, he steps as soft as a shadow, breathing lightly, trying his hardest not to cough.

  He’s carrying the can in his scraped hands and he’ll hide it, in the clutter of someone’s garden shed.

  89.

  Day 19 / 04:13

  Running feet on a cinder track. Noah shifts, his legs quivering under his sheet. He’s doing laps and each time he crosses the 400-metre mark the stopwatch clicks and his speed is recorded on the brightly lit board. He pushes himself on, further and faster and longer. He stops, eases the stitch in his side, gasping, pulling air into his aching lungs. And then the clock clicks, the numbers grow and he sets off again, trying to keep up the pace.

  Tick-tock, Noah. Tick-tock. You cannot afford to lose a second.

  He will never tell Ms Turner about this clock. If he does, she will keep prodding, trying to find out what it means. She will want to find out where these thoughts come from, as if mapping the inside of Noah’s head will lead her to knowledge and understanding.

  Really, he’s being kind to her. He wants to save her the fuss of trying to comprehend the workings of his mind. There’s nothing here for you, he wants to tell her, but that won’t work, because her ears will prick up and her eyes will focus on him, her gaze will narrow and pin him down.

  ‘Nothing? What do you mean, when you say “nothing”, Noah? What does nothing mean to you?’ That’s what she’ll ask.

  He’s tired. Beating the clock is exhausting and the last thing he needs is Ms Turner taking him through each of those laps, trying to make sense of a meaningless dream. Noah sets no store by his dreams, so why should Ms Turner?

  Honestly? There’s an area of your life that you don’t obsess over?

  Noah has no choice but to speak to Ms Turner, answer her questions. But if she starts with more dream questions, she’ll want to talk about his running dreams. She’ll ask: ‘Are you running away from something, Noah? Do you like the feeling of running?’ He wishes he had never told her about his dream of freedom. That’s what she’s calling it now and all because one day she asked him about his dreams, and he told her that running felt like freedom. The word was on his lips and off his tongue before he could swallow it down. He’d only said that to keep her quiet, give her something to think about, instead of talk-talk-talking. Noah is all about time, and Ms Turner is all about talk.

  90.

  It’s Saturday afternoon and Ms Turner has asked the Groomes to come to her rooms for a quick family meeting.

  ‘Every week, a small victory.’ That’s what she’s saying now, to Maddie and her mom and dad.

  Noah’s there too, but he might as well not be. His attention is fixed on the array of pens on Ms Turner’s desk, and Maddie knows he’s itching to get up and straighten them. Set the world straight and keep it balanced, that’s all Noah wants to do.

  Maddie’s heart goes out to him. Don’t worry, Noe, she wants to tell him. Not that her words would have any impact, the reassurances that rush to her lips whenever things get tough for her brother.

  Now he’s looking from the certificates hanging on the wall, to the potted plants on the windowsill, to the books on the shelf in the corner of the office, flicking from the top shelf to the bottom. Ms Turner’s probably slotted them back in different places since the last time Noah was in her office.

  Keep your books in order for him, Maddie wants to say, line your pens up properly. That way my brother won’t be eaten up by the need to reorganise and reposition, he won’t be wondering how his therapist can even think about setting his mind to rights when she can’t even keep her own environment neat and orderly.

  There’s silence in the room. Noah’s mouth is moving soundlessly. He touches his fingers to his lips five times and Maddie hears their father’s sigh of exasperation.

  And then Ms Turner tells them why she has called this family meeting, the day before their regularly scheduled Sunday afternoon visit, and what she wants them to do the moment they leave her office. No time to prepare, or think things through, or work anything out. She has a ‘family task’, that’s what she calls it, and she wants the Groomes to work on it immediately.

  91.

  When Maddie sees Noah she thinks of boxes. There’s her brother, and there’s his life on his walls, neatly contained in the small squares of his spreadsheets. Colour-coded, contained, and the moment one becomes too small to hold data pertinent to a certain activity or regulation, a subsection is added. And then another, and, if needs be, another. That’s her brother. Boxed within a prison of rules that make sense to him but confuse everyone else. Its gates are a thick mesh of minutes and seconds, steps, and walls waiting to be tapped. His five fingers rattle out distress calls, but there’s nothing she, or her mom or dad, can do to help him. The prison he built has such thick walls and gates so securely locked that unauthorised entry is impossible. Only Noah has the power to dismantle it, block by heavy block. Their job is to let him do it, in his own time and in his own way … Or that’s what Ms Turner says.

  So, no more waiting as he completes his self-imposed chores, no humouring his need to eat alone, or keeping his door closed. Once Noah comes home, his routine will have
to change to meet theirs. It will be hard work.

  But that’s all in the future. Right now, their task is to persuade him to leave his room and join them outside.

  Ms Turner wants them to walk with Noah into the garden, sit there with him there for at least ten minutes. ‘It’s not going to be easy,’ she warns them, ‘but persevere. At least get him as far as the main door. I want Noah to meet you out there tomorrow, for visiting hours.’

  Ms Turner’s right. It’s not easy at all.

  ‘Shouldn’t we just go there straight away?’ Maddie says as the door of Ms Turner’s office closes behind them. ‘Get it over and done with? It’ll probably be much easier than we think.’ Her face is hopeful, but Noah’s not listening. He’s hurrying ahead of them, getting to his room as fast as he can, no tapping at corners, no counting at all. He opens the door and walks to where his calendar and timetable are stuck to the wall.

  ‘It’s Saturday,’ he says. ‘Look. Here.’ He jabs a finger at the calendar and then another at a list on the wall:

  Saturday Chores

  1.Sweep/dust.

  2.Change sheets.

  3.Laundry.

  4.Tidy cupboards and desk.

  5.Clean windows.

  ‘And I’ve got more to fit in – catch up on homework, studying.’

  Noah’s speaking fast, a rush of words he has to say. He points to the activities listed at the bottom of his Greenhills timetable. ‘They say it’s unstructured, but it’s not. It’s just more difficult to organise. How am I supposed to fit all that in?’ His hands are at his face, fives to his cheeks.

  ‘I don’t have time for extras. Not today. Ms Turner’s already interrupted my chores. We’ve spent one hour with her. And now …’

  He stops, fingers at his lips now, mumbling through them. ‘I can’t waste time on visitors.’

  Maddie’s mom flinches.