Queenie(70)

“Cassandra, we’ve been friends for, what, almost a decade?” I said, my voice breaking. “Why are you saying this? How can you say this?”

“It’s all true, isn’t it?” She shrugged. “You’re always saying I psychoanalyze you too much. Think of it as my final diagnosis. You can let yourself out.”

I stood up. What was the point in trying to change her mind?

“Good luck with everything, Queenie,” Cassandra said as I walked out of her room. “Oh, and you have my bank account details. I’ll send you your tab.”





chapter


TWENTY-ONE


“SHE’S A BITCH for that, don’t you dare listen to her. She’s more of a prick than that Welsh ting, and he’s a major dickhead.” Kyazike and I stood on her balcony smoking. She had one eye gazing out on a sparse and wintry London, the other looking through the window at the living room door in case her mum came home and caught us.

“Why don’t you save yourself this drama, fam? Why don’t you just date black guys?” Kyazike asked.

“Why do you think?” I asked, shutting her down.

“Sorry, no, I know. I should have thought before I said,” she said, flustered.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to snap,” I apologized, putting a hand on her shoulder. “Remember the first family party you took me to?”

“The one where my cousin Elias tried to move to you?”

“Yeah.” I nodded. “And I was so stressed by it that I started crying?”

“Yeah, and we had to pretend it was because you had period pains,” Kyazike recalled.

“I just can’t do it, Kyazike. I’m scared of black guys. I’ll always, always think they hate me.”

“I get you, I get that,” she said reassuringly. “But that’s pure nonsense, my strong, beautiful black queen,” she added in a thick Ugandan accent, the one she borrowed from her mum when she wanted to hammer a point home.

“Maybe Cassandra is right. Maybe I am damaged goods, that’s why all of that stuff with Tom, and Ted, and all the others,” I said, ignoring her compliment. “And the king of it all, Roy. He made sure that any self-esteem I had was crushed into nothing.”

“Nah, I’m not having that!” Kyazike shouted so loudly that her voice echoed around the buildings. “These men, they ain’t worth all this. And Cassandra?” Kyazike kissed her teeth. “She’s just vex because her man found good sex somewhere else. She’s taking it out on you, fam. All of that psychology nonsense she chats, and she can’t even do it on herself. You think that relationship is gonna last?” She kissed her teeth again. “She’s lucky I don’t spin her jaw, how can she talk about your mum like that? The stuff with you and your mu—”

“Kyazike, don’t,” I warned her, then screamed and ducked as a pigeon that had nested on the balcony flew over my head.

“Sorry,” she apologized. “Anyway, I give it two months, she’ll be belling your phone telling you how she needs help moving home and how she’s sorry she didn’t listen and takes back everything she said. So don’t think about it for now. Put it out your head, fam. Come, we go inside, it’s a blitz.”

We went back inside and rubbed our hands together. It was a cold February afternoon, and the air held a harsh chill.

I threw myself down on the sofa, yelping as my skin touched the cold leather. Kyazike handed me the razor blade and lowered herself to the floor. “Beg you hand me that blanket?” she said, holding her hand out.

“Can we at least turn that fan heater on?” I begged. “My fingers are shaking so much that I might scalp you.”

“Are you going to pay the electric bill?” Kyazike asked, turning to look at me.

“It’s your head, Kyazike,” I warned her. She crawled across the room and turned the heater on. We both sighed with relief as the hot blast of air hit us.

“Are you going to get rid of that pigeon nest? It can’t be hygienic to have them living there like that.” I gestured to another bird as it landed on her balcony.

“I’ve tried to poke it with the broom, but it’s stuck firm. Those pigeons are crafty, they’ve built it on a corner we can’t reach. But I’m going to get closer. I just need a white suit.”

“What? Like a white trouser suit?” I asked.

“Nah, not my Sunday best, Queenie, one of those CSI suits they wear when there’s been a murder. Trust me, I will have those pigeons up.”

“Sorry, yeah,” I said, my head all muddled. “CSI suit.”

I took a deep breath. “Kyazike. What do you think about counseling?”

“The pigeons aren’t stressing me that much, fam.” She laughed.

“No, I mean, like, when people are having a bad time. Do you know anyone who has ever been?”

“Queenie. I’m Ugandan. You think anyone in my family is allowed to say they need help? You bury that shit and you move on. If I told my mum I need counseling, she’d ship me over to Kampala in a cargo barrel.”

“I’m thinking about getting it,” I said. “I don’t know. I feel, like, awful, all the time. It’s not shifting. This frosty woman at the clinic wants to sign me up because she thought I was going mad. Well, first she thought I was being pimped out, but then she realized that I was just having sex for fun,” I rambled. “But that I probably wasn’t having that much fun.”