I knew I should call Debs back, say sorry, but I couldn’t. I scrolled my phone’s contacts and hovered over the green call key again and again but it just wouldn’t happen. Couldn’t happen. It seemed beyond senseless after all we’d been through together. But so much of that was getting to me now. Kept flooding back…
The priest started it, but now everyone’s at it. Seems the whole city knows. Wherever we go people stop, stare, shake heads.
‘What’s your problem?’ I say, but Debs wants none of it. My blood’s curdling, but she looks the other way. Even when the fag dowps are thrown at us in the street and the name-calling starts.
‘Leave it, Gus, just leave it… It’ll be over soon.’
‘No way, Deborah, I’m not having it. What right have they got? We’ve done nothing wrong… we’ve broken no law.’
I wonder, how long will this last? How long will it be before I am locked up for banjoing someone, or worse? But Debs sails high, holds her head up. I’ve never admired another soul more. She floats above all the scorn and hate.
Only one thing, the sight of young children pulled to their mothers, gets to her. Brings tears when she remembers, at night, when we’re alone.
The bigger kids calling out names she handles, even lets me kick the arse of any who are old enough to know better. But then it all gets too much, even for her, when the word DAMNED is scrawled on our doorstep.
‘It’s too much, Gus. It’s all too much,’ she says.
‘It’s just kids messing,’ I say, but she’s buying none of it.
‘No, it’s what they think of us now. We’re nothing; we don’t exist.’ She goes out, gets on her knees. The whole street can see. It’s what they want. She rubs and rubs at the step with her coat sleeve.
‘Stop, Debs. Come away in.’ A crowd forms to watch as her tears fall on the step and get smeared into the jagged letters. ‘Debs, you’re only putting on a show,’ I say.
‘Is that what you think I am now?’ she says. ‘A show?’
‘No, Debs.’ She’s better than all of them; she’s borne the taunts with dignity until now. It’s scalding my heart to see her brought to her knees before them. What have they done to her? She was once so full of life, more full of it than anyone. It strikes me deep to see her this way, but I think no less of her for it, only more. She is worth more than I deserve.
‘You’re ashamed of me as well, aren’t you?’ she says.
‘No. No… Now stop!’ I grab her arm. ‘This is what they want — to see you broken.’
She pulls away. ‘Well, let them look.’ Debs keeps rubbing. Her coat sleeve wears to a hole, her palm bleeds on the step as she forces it back and forth, back and forth. ‘Let them see me broken if that’s what they want. Are they happy?’ She turns to them, yells, ‘Are you happy now?’
I put my arms under her and lift her back indoors. She screams out, ‘No! No!’
‘Debs, it’ll be over soon, like you say.’
‘No. Gus, no… it will never be over,’ she wails. Tears roll over her face and then she buries her head in her bloodied and blackened hands. Her sobbing is silent, like all the noise is located deep inside her, wrapped up in her pain, unable to get out. When she removes her hands and tips back her head I look at her face, smeared in blood and dirt, and wonder what to do. Her mouth’s open, she’s trying to wail but is unable. Her screams stay trapped in her. She seems hollow, like there’s nothing left but the deepest misery inside. And I know it will never leave her.