Free Perfect by Rachel Joyce Page B

landlady got wind of his spells at Besley Hill and the room was no longer available.
    After several nights on the streets, Jim handed himself in to the police. He was a danger to other people, he said. And even though he knew he would never willingly hurt anyone, he began to shout and kick things, as if he might. They drove him straight to Besley Hill. They even put the sirens on, although by that point he wasn’t shouting or kicking. He was only sitting very still.
    It wasn’t clinical depression as such that took him back the third time.It wasn’t schizophrenia or multiple personality disorder or psychosis or any of the other names people gave it. It was more like habit. It was easier to be his troubled self, he found, than to be the reformed one. And even though he had begun doing the rituals now, his return to Besley Hill was like putting on old clothes and finding people recognized him. It felt safe.
    Someone is making a noise from the café kitchen, a woman. Someone else is trying to calm her, and this is a man. The door flies open and Eileen bursts through it with her flaming red hair wide on her head. There is no hint of her orange hat and she has her coat flung over her shoulder, like a thing she has killed. The door crashes back on itself and produces a yelp. When Mr Meade emerges seconds later he has his hand to his nose.
    ‘Mrs Hill!’ he shouts between his fingers. ‘Eileen!’ He darts after her as she marches past tables. Customers are beginning to put down their hot beverages.
    ‘It’s me or the fucking hat,’ says Eileen, over her shoulder.
    Mr Meade shakes his head while still cupping it, as if he is afraid vigorous movement may cause his nose to fall off. Shoppers queuing for their Festive Snack Deal (one hot drink with free mince pie; flapjacks / muffins not included) stare with open mouths.
    Eileen stops so suddenly that Mr Meade collides with a trolley of Christmas groceries. ‘Look at us,’ she says, addressing not only him but the whole room, the shoppers, the staff with their orange hats, even the plastic tables and chairs. ‘Look at our lives.’
    No one moves. No one answers. There is a moment of stillness as if everything has been stopped, or turned off, as if everything and everyone has mislaid what should come next. Only the Christmas tree appears to remember and continues its happy transformation from green to red to blue. Then Eileen’s face creases with disbelief and she makes that wild honking noise that is in fact a laugh. But once again, it is as if she is notlaughing at them, but with them. As if she is looking down over the scene, herself included, and suddenly seeing the outrageous joke.
    Eileen turns, revealing two white-grey legs where her skirt has pitched itself into the gusset of her underwear. ‘Oh fuck it,’ she snorts, as she gropes for the handrail and throws out her foot for the first of the customer-only stairs.
    Without Eileen, there is a fresh silence. Something unspecific has occurred and no one is prepared to move until they understand the full extent of the damage. Someone murmurs and when nothing happens, nothing splits open or crashes down, someone else laughs. Gradually, softly, voices thread into the density of silence until the café is once more itself again.
    ‘That woman is fired,’ says Mr Meade, although it could be argued Eileen has already fired herself. ‘Back to work, team.’ Then: ‘Jim? Hat?’
    Jim straightens it. It is probably best he will not see Eileen again; she carries such chaos in her wake. And yet her parting words resound in his head, as does her generous laugh. He can’t help wondering what sort of sandwich she would have brought him. Whether she would have served it with crisps and lettuce and a star-shaped tomato. He remembers a time long ago when there were cut sandwiches on a lawn, when there was hot tea. He has to hold his head so that while he shakes, he will not lose his orange hat.
    The first flakes of snow begin to