“How’s business?” I ask the father of one of the boys who attends the kids kung fu class; he runs a cafe in town.
“Busy,” he says, “some mornings the customers are there before I am. I’ll be rolling up the shutters and someone will ask me, ‘Are you open?’ Idiots. ‘Does it look like we’re open? What the fuck do you think I’m doing here?’ And not just the customers. I give you an example. I put a bowl of water outside for the customers’ dogs. As a nice gesture, you know what I mean? But there’s this one guy, every day he walks past and stops so his dog can have a drink, and then he walks on. He’s not a customer. He never buys anything. He never even comes in to the cafe. But last week I see him standing in the queue and he’s got the dog bowl in his hand -“
“The dog bowl you leave outside?”
“Right. He holds it out to me. ‘This needs cleaning,’ he tells me. Can you believe that?”
“What did you say?”
“I said ‘GO CLEAN IT YOUR FUCKING SELF! GET OUT OF MY CAFE!”
This is the kind of humanity I’ve missed.
“You haven’t changed!” one of the Italian adult-conversation-class students tells me. It’s the first time I’ve seen him in nearly a year. As ever his cheeks are rosy and he’s slightly pissed. Neither have you, I’m tempted to reply back. Ah, to be a constant in an ever changing world.
Even Rami has reappeared, dropping in for his regular chats.
“I want to show you something,” he says when I see him later, “look at this.”
“What is it?”
We sit down on the bench outside and he pulls out his phone.
“I posted this on Facebook today, it’s not even mine, it’s just something I reposted. I’ll read it to you. It says ‘I’m over people acting like everyone with a mask is a sheep and I’m over people acting like everyone without a mask is selfish. It’s psychological warfare to divide us. Do your own research and do whatever you think is right, just don’t hate the people that disagree with you.'”
“Ok.”
“Ok.”
“So?”
“So this is what someone I know posted back…” Rami begins to read me a response that he received. Several minutes later and he’s still reading. “And she’s not even close to being finished. It just goes on and on. There are pages of it.”
“You triggered her,” I tell him.
“So I replied back,” he says and goes on to read me his response, which also goes on for pages, becoming increasingly ‘fuck you’ in tone.
“This is Facebook,” I laugh, “this is what happens. You both should have just stopped after a few sentences. Actually, I thought her response was quite interesting. It didn’t wind me up like it does you.”
“You don’t know her like I do.”
“Fair point.”
“I’m so over all this 3D bullshit,” he continues, “I’m exploring 5D levels of consciousness, but these people…”
5D? I think to myself. What happened to 4D? He must have moved through and beyond that dimension during lockdown. I wonder what it was like. I’ll ask him another time, when he’s less worked up.
“Here,” he says, handing me a small square card. Upon a midnight blue background of stars are printed the words ‘Most Benevolent Outcome’.
“Thanks,” I tell him.
“Keep it on you at all times. If you find something challenging, ask for the most benevolent outcome.”
“What does that mean?”
“The greatest good for all.”
“Right. I like that.”
“What we need is more compassion,” he says, without irony, apparently having already forgotten his Facebook nemesis.
This is the kind of humanity I’ve missed.
Striding into the centre after Rami has gone comes a short, sinewy, middle-aged man with a grey shaved skull and a face like an angry whippet. He’s wearing a tight orange T-shirt, blue sports shorts and pristinely white Nike trainers with bright yellow ticks. On his right calf is a large Union Jack tattoo. The slogan on his T-shirt reads ‘Harvey’s Gang’ and around his neck hangs an oversize wooden crucifix.
“Are you alright?” I ask him. “Can I help you?”
He stops abruptly, steps up to me, puts his face in mine. “Yeah,” he says, “I’m alright. Are you alright?” It’s not a polite enquiry.
“I work here,” I explain.
“Is that right?” he says, “go on then, tell me what you do. You asked me a question, now I’m asking you.” He’s dropped down a gear but he’s still in my face. I notice the fresh scab on his forehead that looks more like the result of a punch than a fall. This is the kind of humanity I haven’t missed. He reminds me a lot of Ben Kingsley’s loathsome gangster character, Don, from the movie Sexy Beast. “Come on,” he presses, “what’s this all about? You’re regretting asking me that question now, aren’t you?”
“Yeah, I am to be honest.”
“What?”
“…”
“Come on,” he says, “I’m all ears. What’s all this about?”
What is all this about? I’m asking myself the same thing. What’s going through his head right now? If he’s looking for a fight, I’m not going to give him one. I’ll pacify him with boredom instead.
“We’re a community centre,” I explain, adopting my most monotonous tone of voice, “we have rooms that we rent out to different classes and community groups. We have a nursery every morning, support groups – “
“Mental health groups?”
“Yup.”
“There’s a lot of need for that here.”
No shit.
“And what about him?” he asks, cocking his head toward a homeless guy who’s kneeling on the grass, head between his knees, hunched over on himself like a tortoise, a battered acoustic guitar beside him. He’s been there a while but I’ve been keeping an eye on him; he’s still breathing. He was sitting outside the bookies earlier, a mess of tangled hair and beard, drunk in the midday sun. Now he’s sleeping it off on our lawn. “Disgusting,” Harvey says. “This is the Lord’s garden, you can’t have that. I’ll go and sort him out for you.”
“It’s alright, there’s really -“
“Shush!” says Harvey, holding up his hand, knuckles split and raw. “Don’t worry, I won’t hurt him. I’m just going to have a word.”
Harvey strides over to the homeless hippy on the grass and kicks his shoe. The homeless guy raises his head and squints up at the monster disturbing his peace. I can’t hear what Harvey says to him, but I catch the hippy telling him to fuck off. Then Harvey says something else to him. Again I can’t hear the words, all I discern is a tone of menace, but the homeless guy picks up his guitar, gets to his feet and shambles out of the garden, muttering darkly.
“There you go,” says Harvey, cheerfully returning. Then he takes a look at the plants in cheap plastic planters arrayed either side of the community centre entrance. “I’m going to get you some nice pots for those,” he tells me. “I don’t know nothing about gardening but if I bring the pots, you can sort them out, alright?”
“Really, you don’t need -“
“Shush!” He tells me again. “I know I don’t need to. I want to.”
“Alright, thank you.”
“No need to thank me, consider it done. Right, I’m off to the gym for a sauna.”
And with that Harvey is off, out the gate, carefully closing it behind him.
Well, that took an unexpected turn. Talk about most benevolent outcome. Maybe Rami’s on to something with that one? I’ll keep the card on me, just in case. It can’t hurt, can it?
Community Corner 