(Like “Isaac vs the Swimming Pool,” I previously posted an early part of this and then never got round to posting the rest.  Mainly because I never got round to writing the rest.  So here it is now.)

April 2002

Swordpoint Books was on one of the little roads leading off the High Street, and it was like nowhere else on Earth.  It seemed to be a series of narrow paths leading through a maze of shelves, all shiny steel and well over six-foot high, so if you were at one end of the shop and your friends were at another, you’d have to rely on the sound of each other’s voices to find each other.  Add in the unexpected steps and slopes placed at random intervals along the aisles, and the place was a blatant safety hazard in about a dozen different ways.

Not that Mariam cared.  Mr Bridger could have released a man-eating tiger into the Romance section, and Mariam would just have barricaded herself into Sci Fi/Fantasy and carried on reading.  And that was just as well, because she could definitely picture Mr Bridger doing that.

Mariam had had five months to get used to the acoustics of Swordpoint Books, so she could tell that Mr Bridger was three aisles away.  Far enough not to panic, but too close to risk picking up an interesting book from the shelf and flicking through it.  You weren’t really in trouble until he got to your aisle, because all you could see over the bookshelves was the top of people’s heads, and that was if you were lucky (and tall).  That meant that you couldn’t see him coming, either, but that was OK because Mr Bridger was one of the noisiest men Mariam had ever met.  No matter where he was in the store, you could hear him move around- the grumpy stamp of his feet, the heavy, snarling breathing, the occasional smack of his lips as he looked at something and thought.  He was like a minotaur moving through his own stainless-steel labyrinth.

Two aisles away, Mariam heard him pounce on Gavin.  “Just what do you think you’re playing at?”

Gavin’s voice was gentle, hesitant, and at least fifteen decibels quieter.  “Look, if you’re talking about the displays, I just thought…”

“Where’s my paper, Gavin?  The one that was on the front desk??”

“Um…”

“It’s a simple enough question, Gavin.  Where’s.  My.  Paper?”

There was a lot of staff turnover at Swordpoint Books.  People would apply, start work, realise that they weren’t being paid enough to put up with Mr Bridger, and quit.  Usually within two weeks, although the record was half an hour.  Only Mariam and Gavin stayed.  Mariam because there were six kids in her house, and she was pretty sure the only thing stopping both her parents from working themselves into an early grave was the fact that the oldest three earned enough to buy most of their own school supplies.  Gavin because he was just plain stuck.  She was pretty sure he didn’t even get paid.

“Dad, listen…  It was two days old, it had been in the exact same place since yesterday…”

“I didn’t ask you how old it was, Gavin.  I asked where it was.”

“Last week you got mad at me for not keeping the front desk tidy…”

“I didn’t ask you what happened last week!” Mr Bridger screamed.  Mariam could practically hear the spit spraying out all over poor Gavin’s face.  “I asked you what happened to my fucking paper!”

It was an odd thing about Mr Bridger- no matter how angry and out of-control he seemed, he always managed to save the swearwords for when he really wanted to scare you.  Anyway, Mariam couldn’t stop herself.  “I threw it out,” she called, as calm as possible while still being loud enough for Mr Bridger to hear her.

It seemed to have worked.  There was a short pause, and then the stamping footsteps started up again, coming closer and closer until Mr Bridger appeared at the end of Mariam’s aisle.  He was a man who seemed to be all reds and yellows- red cheeks, yellow teeth, red strawberry nose, yellow whites in his eyes, red bags under his eyes, yellowing shirt that Mariam suspected he’d been wearing for the last three days.  “Who the fuck told you to throw it out?”

Mariam took a deep breath.  “Like Gavin said, it was just last week you told us to keep the desk tidy…”

“You threw out my paper.”  Mr Bridger was bearing down on her now, his cheese-and-cigarettes breath wafting in her face.  “My property.”

Mariam looked up at him, not daring to move a muscle.  “Yes.”

“That’s what you do in your house, then?  Help ourselves to other people’s things?”

“We throw out newspapers when they’re two days old, yes.”  Mr Bridger was always speculating about what they did in her house.  Among her people.

Mr Bridger stared at her, still treating her to wafts of his breath, but he didn’t do anything.  And what can you do? thought Mariam, Sack me?  Not a chance.  You wouldn’t be able to scream at me anymore if you did.  Of course, if she was Gavin, he’d have already made a dark remark about discussing the matter very carefully after closing time, but she wasn’t Gavin, and that was why it was better for her to take the blame.

“Well, we’re not in your house now,” he said eventually, “I’m paying you to be here.  You owe me respect.”

Mariam said nothing.

“You agree with me, then?” he said, a little louder, “You owe me respect?”

“Yes,” said Mariam.

For a moment, she was worried he was going to make her repeat the words back to him, just to be sure, but instead he backed off and disappeared into the aisles beyond.  Mariam waited until his footsteps were a safe distance away, then went to find Gavin.

He was backed up against a row of reference books, hunched over in an attempt to make himself look smaller.  Gavin was only an inch or two shorter than his father, but at times like this, he seemed about half his size.  “You didn’t need to do that,” he murmured.

“It was that or listen to him screech at you for the next hour,” said Mariam, keeping her voice quiet enough to stay within this aisle, where Mr Bridger couldn’t catch it.

Gavin breathed in, set his mouth in a straight line, and looked away from Mariam.  He knew she was right.

Mariam and Gavin went to different schools, on different sides of town.  If it hadn’t been for Swordpoint Books, they’d never have met, so there was at least one good reason to put up with Mr Bridger.  Mariam didn’t have much patience for the boys at her school- most of them thought that drawing cartoon willies on their desks was the last word in humour- but you could have an actual conversation with Gavin.  Usually either about books or how much they hated Mr Bridger, but they were conversations, and Mariam felt better for having them.  Gavin was her friend.  And friends didn’t let friends get bollocked by their dads just for throwing away old newspapers.

They heard the door to the break room creak open, then shut. They relaxed a little.  Mr Bridger had gone off to sulk and smoke a whole packet of Silk Cut.

“He just left it out so he could pick a fight over it,” said Mariam.

“Of course,” said Gavin, “Even he doesn’t take three days to read the Sun.”

“Maybe he was just really attached to Thursday’s Page Three girl.”

Gavin made a face.

Mariam stood against the bookcase next to him.  Their eyes met, and they both let out an exaggerated, exasperated sigh.  “The working life,” said Gavin.

Mariam shrugged.  “My mum says that your first job should be as crappy as possible.  That way, for the rest of your life, you appreciate the jobs that aren’t.”

“If I even get to have another job,” grumbled Gavin, “Knowing Dad, I’ll still be working here in ten years’ time.”  He sighed.  “He’s already told me I needn’t think he’s paying for university for me.”

“So you’ll get a loan.  That’s what most people do.”  She was about to suggest that Gavin get in touch with his mother and ask her to help out with his fees, but stopped herself just in time.  The former Mrs Bridger had run off with a guy from her job eight years ago, and if she hadn’t bothered to take Gavin with her (at least for long enough to drop him off with a family member who screamed less), then it was probably too much to expect her to fork out a few thousand pounds for him now.

Gavin laughed.  “Nothing’s ever impossible for you, is it, Mariam?”

She patted him on the shoulder.  “Won’t be impossible for you, either.  You’ll see.”

They heard the front door open, and Gavin moved off towards the desk in case the customer needed help.  But before he disappeared around the corner, he looked over his shoulder and gave Mariam a grin that made her feel warm all over.

*

Mariam’s Monday afternoon shift was going pretty well until one of the shelves collapsed.  She was on the other side of the shop when it happened, but she heard the bang loud and clear.  She was pretty sure that if she’d looked over the top of the shelves at that moment, she’d have seen a massive cloud of dust escaping into the air.

It was honestly a miracle that that particular shelf had stayed up as long as it had- it looked like someone had been stuffing the thickest hardbacks they could find into it for the last five years.  When Mariam got there, most of the aisle was covered with books, as if they’d burst out on their own in a bid for freedom, scattering far and wide.  And on top of one of the bigger piles was a shiny little bit of metal, looking sorry for itself.

Naturally, Mr Bridger had looked for any reason he possibly could to blame Mariam and Gavin for the collapse.  They should have noticed that it was getting too full.  They should have rushed to hold it in as soon as it started to break.  They should have kept the whole thing together with their until-now-undiscovered telekinetic powers.  Even Mr Bridger had to admit defeat eventually, though, and he told Gavin and Mariam to pick up the books while he tried to work out how to fix the shelf.  Mariam watched out of the corner of her eye as he rotated it in his hands, tried to jam it back in, gave up, and started the whole thing over again, swearing under his breath the whole time.

Eventually, he turned it around one more time, then crouched down and began loading it up with books.  Once he was done, he got to his feet, holding the now-full shelf out lengthways.  “Gavin!  Come and get the other end!”

Gavin stood up and reached out to catch the other end of the shelf as Mr Bridger swung it towards him… then flinched away at the last moment, causing Mr Bridger to stumble and the books to fall back down to the floor.

Mr Bridger looked at him in disbelief.  “What the fuck do you think you’re playing at, Gavin?”

“Dad, it’s covered in rusty nails!”  Gavin pointed, and Mariam saw what he meant.  It wasn’t just the nails hanging out of the shelf, either- that whole end looked like one big piece of sharp, jagged metal.  There might have been a way to grab hold of it without hurting yourself, but no way would Gavin have worked it out in the time his dad had given him.

“I told you to catch the other end,” snarled Mr Bridger, “I expect you to catch the other end!”

“They’d have gone right into my hand!  Look!”

Mr Bridger roared, and flung the broken shelf across the room.  It hit a shelf in the next aisle, and stuck there, its loose nails tearing grooves in a couple of the thicker books.  His right hand free, he raised it above his head as he turned on Gavin.

Without even thinking about it, Mariam stepped in between them.

Mr Bridger froze, his hand still raised.  Go on, hit me, thought Mariam, I dare you.  The moment my mum sees me with a black eye, you’ll be as good as dead.

Mr Bridger lowered his hand.  His face was screwed up in disappointment and frustration- Mariam thought he looked like a constipated pig.  “That’s what I get for hiring from fucking Al Qaeda,” he said, and stormed off down the aisles.  After a moment or two, Mariam heard the break room door slam behind him.

“You should go,” said Gavin, looking at the floor.

“Oh, come on.”  Mariam put a hand on his shoulder, but he shook it off.  “At least let me help you pick the rest of these up,” she said, gesturing to the piles of books still on the floor.

“No.  Trust me, it’ll be better if you…”  Gavin took a long, snuffling breath, and looked up at Mariam.  His eyes didn’t look red, but Mariam was still pretty sure she knew why he’d been looking at the floor.  “I’ll handle this.  I’ll see you tomorrow afternoon, yeah?”

Mariam hesitated for a moment, then decided to say what was on her mind.  “If you wanted to stay at mine tonight…”

“No.”  Gavin was looking at the floor again.  “I’d just have to come back here again afterwards, wouldn’t I?”

There were so many things Mariam wanted to say, but most of the words seemed to die in her throat.  “It’s not right, Gavin.  You don’t deserve this.”

Gavin shook his head.  “Please, Mariam, just…  I’ll see you tomorrow, yeah?  He’ll be in a better mood then.”

Mariam wanted to say something, the one perfect thing to convince him to come with her or at least let her stay to help, but that perfect thing probably didn’t exist at all, so she left.  She’d never felt so powerless in her whole life.

(To Be Continued)