Short fiction

A Good Day for New Things

I am a writer, and today I am going to write. I am not looking my best, but this is ok. Writers don’t need to be looking their best in order to write. In fact, many writers do their best writing at home in their pajamas, or sometimes in a cardigan with a picture of an egg on it. Usually, they do this is an oak-paneled studies that smell of pipe-tobacco and leather. I am not sure why cardigans with eggs on and oak-paneled studies go together. I guess maybe it’s cold in there. But the point is that writers can work when their hair is all messy because they’ve lost all their hairpins, and even when they’ve got big black bags under their eyes which won’t go away, and when their clothes smell of Rothmans. This is not the same as how tobacco smells in oak-lined studies. This is because they don’t have the tobacco to smoke, they just have it to make nice smells, like an air-freshener. It is not comforting to think that you look and smell like you do not belong in an oak-paneled study when you are a writer, but it’s ok because writing is something that can and should be done when you’re anywhere or anybody.

The first thing you have to do when you’re writing is to find somebody to write about. It has to be a person. If you don’t have a person, then you can’t have a story, and if you don’t have a story, you can’t have any writing. I learnt this from Anne. It is what she says. Anne is a bit like my teacher, except that I don’t go to school anymore. I had to stop because the unit didn’t get the funding from the Government. So now I go to the day centre instead, which is good because it’s only four days a week but bad because you get to stop going to school when you are sixteen and I was sixteen last year and I didn’t get to stop going to the day centre. This is because in the day centre we have Progressive Assessment. When Anne first told me that I should do writing, I said that I wanted to do the writing about her. I had a really good idea for a story about how she’s secretly in love with this with the man who come and tests the fire alarms at the day centre but she can’t tell anyone because he is in love with me and he isn’t allowed to be in love with me because I am a Client. Not his client, obviously, but a Client of the centre. I hadn’t worked out how it ended but it was all going to end happily. I thought maybe she could go out with the plumber instead. But it doesn’t matter, because I’m not allowed. Anne said that it wouldn't be very professional. She said ‘ Well, that sounds like something out of a Jane Austen novel, but why don’t you write something realistic? You need to stick to what you know.’  I said I only knew her, and my Mum. I don’t know Jane Austen, even though my story sounds like something she might have written. But then she said that the writing would help me get to know other people. She said that this was part of the Point. So this has now been incorporated into the plan. My job now is to find a person, and know them, and then write about them. Knowing first. That's important. I will also drink coffee. This is the second bit of my job. This is because drinking coffee is a writerley kind of thing to do, especially if you drink it when you are writing. In order to do this, I need to find a café. ’Café’ means ’coffee’ in French. Also, people go in cafés. That is why they are there. This is killing two birds with one stone, Anne says.

I live in a town, and it has lots of cafés in it, especially in the middle. I am in the middle now. But I can’t decide which one to go in. They mostly don’t have too many people in, sometimes one, sometimes a few. I want a quiet one, so that I am no disturbed in my writing. But in the cafes where there are only one or two people, there is no one that I want to write about. I saw a person I would like to write about earlier, but he was not sitting down in a cafe. He was standing up in the street. He had dark hair. Also a mobile phone that he was talking into in a foreign language. He was smoking, and he tapped his cigarette when he raised his voice. I would have liked to have written about him. I imagined the conversation that he was having on the phone. He was talking to his girlfriend. He said: I‘ve got to go. It took a long time. It does in foreign. But I couldn't get to know him because after I walked past him for the third time he went into the shop. It sold mobile phones. Maybe that was where he got his phone from. Although it would not explain the talking in foreign.

Eventually I get angry. This is the first day of my being a writer and I had put it aside for writing about what I know and I still don't know anybody and still haven’t done any writing. Also, my feet hurt and it’s really very cold, and although it’s not all that dark, it’s definitely darker than it was earlier. I don't really like the dark when I am on my own very much. Mum says that this is very sensible. Anne says I need to get over it. The other thing about this is that I don’t have that much time because I normally go to the day centre four days a week. This is why it’s called the day centre, I guess. But they had a day-centre outing last night and the restaurant that they went to was Chinese and Untrustworthy and now lots of them have food poisoning, so it was closed today, even though it’s Wednesday. And anyway, I am meant to be starting to go out on my own sometimes, even though this sometimes gives Mum a Headache, so it was probably alright that I told the reception-lady that Mum was at home when actually she isn’t at home at all because Mr Henderson the TV man has a car on Wednesdays and always takes her to get her colours done. Anyway, she told me not to tell anyone at the day centre about that, so I don’t feel too bad. But still, I decide that I will go straight into the next café I see, even if there isn’t anybody in it that I might want to know or write about. It would probably be best if I get back before her, because if I don’t she might get a Headache. And also, you can see people who you might not think you want to write about at all but then you are allowed to write bad things. There is no rule that says that you only have to write about good things. If you know about bad things you should write about them, too. This is called being Therapeutic, Anne says.

So I walk in. There is a boy behind the counter. My glasses have steamed up because they are cold and the room is warm, but I can see that his eyes are blue. I walk up to the counter.

            'I would like a cup of coffee, please'

I say this in my best grown up voice. I imagine as I say it that I live in America.

            'OK'

He says amiably. Amiably is a good writer-word. It means friendly.

            'Would you like anything else?'

            'Oh, no thank you. I'm just fine with this'

I bend the word fine and I put in just so that he thinks I might be American. I would quite like to be American, sometimes.

            'OK. I'll bring it over.'

I sit down. I am excited. He seems like a good person to write about. Maybe I will write about him being in America somewhere. He’d probably work in one of those cafes they have with the neon on them that are open all the time. Anne has a picture of one of them on her wall. They are called Diners, she says. She says that she went in one in California that had a real cowboy in it, with a hat. So I start to think that the writing should be about a boy in a coffee bar who serves coffee half the time but is a cowboy secretly. I have found somebody to write about, and soon I will be writing! But it doesn't seem right to start the writing without the coffee, so I have to wait. Also, this is a good place for coffee. It says so in a magazine article that they have put on the wall in the toilet. I haven't had coffee before. If I’m with Mum I drink coke, or hot chocolate, and they only have squash at the day centre because last year Danny spilled a cup of hot tea all in his lap and burned his privates. But it is a good day for new things.

The coffee is taking a long time. This is probably because they are careful making it. While I am waiting, I start pushing back the skin on my fingernails so that they look longer and more Feminine. This is something Mum does. She paints her nails too, but I’m not allowed. She says it’s Not Suitable. There are two blonde women and one man, who is Japanese or Chinese. They have definitely never had their colours done because the man is wearing a pink jumper with some glasses that are purple and one of the women is wearing funny bright orange shoes that are made out of plastic. They are sort of round and they have big holes in them and I can see that she is wearing red and white stripy socks and that would definitely never be allowed. Even I know that, and I’ve never had my colours done. They all have loud voices, and the wind blows in with them and it makes a noise and a draft. I think I might not want to write about these people. They sit at the table next to me, between me and the counter. I think they might stop me concentrating. I think about getting up and going to another table, or even another cafe, but I can't because I haven't had my coffee yet and I can't pay for it until it has come and I have drunk it. Also, I would not want the boy with the blue eyes to think he has offended me. I would not like to worry him or hurt his feelings, especially in a cafe that has such a famous reputation for coffee.

The people who are sitting next to me look like the kind of people who would come to a cafe because they know about coffee. The man is talking. He is telling the two women about how he is going traveling. He is going to Vietnam and Thailand, and then he is going to spend a month in Laos and then he is going to Indonesia because hardly anyone goes to Indonesia anymore. He asks one of the women what the two islands in Indonesia are called. She says they are called Java and Sumatra. He says that he can't not go there, even if he doesn't know their names. I think he is wrong about this. I think he probably could not go to Java and Sumatra, if he tried hard enough. I have never been to either Java or Sumatra, and I have not had to try at all. I think that if I was not being distracted by their chattering then I could even do a writing about him not going to Java and Sumatra. I wouldn't make it so his plane crashed on the way, or anything. That would not be kind. What I would do is, I would make it so that he went to Basingstoke instead. Or Aldershot. My Nana lives in Aldershot. It's quite nice there.

The boy with the blue eyes comes with my coffee. I think I will call him the Blue-Eyed Boy in my writing. I think that will sound good. Writerley. Poetic. While he is putting my coffee down I say

            'Excuse me'

I am being quiet because I do not want the other people to know that I am telling on them.

            'Excuse me'

This is a little bit louder

            'Yes can I help at all?'

            'I was wondering'

I feel a bit embarrassed, like when you ask somebody on a train to move seats because their personal odour is too strong.

            'I am trying to do a writing' I said 'and these people are distracting me. I came in             because I needed somewhere to write, and now it's being spoiled.'

He looks at me. I wonder if he knows that I am going to write about him.

            'Right'

I hope he is not going to ask me what I am writing about. If he does, I will have to tell him the truth.

            'So, do you want them to move?'

            'Yes. They are talking about Java and Sumatra and I am frankly finding it very             distracting.'                   

Frankly is a good, writerley word too. It means honest.

'The thing is' he says ' I can't ask them to move because there are three of them and there is only one of you. Also, Georgia, you always try and get rid of everybody else in here.'

I forgot to tell you that my name is Georgia.

'Are you trying to put me out of business? Or do you just want to get me on my own? You haven't even got a notebook, look. Or a pen'

This is a sexual innuendo. I have heard about these before. I feel embarrassed. Not because of the sexual innuendo though. They are for embarrassing people with, but I am not going to fall into that trap. I am embarrassed because I have forgotten my notebook. This is an essential quality of writerliness, and I have forgotten all about it.

            ‘Why don't you go over to Smith's and get one?’

He bends down so that his mouth is near my ear. I wish my hair wasn't so messy and getting in the way of hearing him.

            ‘They might've gone when you get back.’

Then he winks at me. This is another innuendo, but I don't really mind. He would definitely not have winked at me if Mum had been here. He would have winked at her instead. But this makes me feel a bit funny so I get up quickly to go and buy one and when I do I knock coffee all over the table. It tasted horrible anyway. The people stop talking for a second. Good.

It is cold outside. Smith's is quite a long way, because it is in a big shopping centre bit and you have to go all the way past the multistory and the corn-exchange and into the main shopping centre bit. The security guard doesn’t really want to let me in because it is nearly closing time but I can be quite insistent when I want to. This is one of the things that gives Mum the Headaches. As I look for a notebook I think I could probably have got one from Mr Singh’s, because his shop is right outside that café, but I wanted to get a proper one from Smith's, like he said. The queue is long too, because it is closing time and we all have to make our way to the checkout and make our purchases. I think the girl behind the counter is laughing at my glasses. They've got all steamy again. Which is stupid, because she is wearing a purple shirt, and it doesn’t go with her face. I do not say please and thank you to her, even though I am supposed to. I bet the Blue Eyed Boy would laugh at her, too. I walk back to the cafe. It is completely dark except for the streetlamps. I guess I didn’t notice because I was too busy thinking about notebooks and blue-eyed boys. When I get to the café where I was before there is a big closed sign on the door, and all the chairs are stacked up on the counter where he was making coffee. I am surprised. I sit down on the wall that is opposite the big window. It is really very cold. There is hardly anybody around now. All the shops have shut too. The streetlights are too high up and they have a yellow light that makes you feel the cold, even though yellow is meant to be a warm colour. But it is ok really. I get my notebook out. I brought a pen, too. I am ready to begin.

Georgia Walker Churchman