UKAuthors - The Inside

'Ya cry on the inside, ya schmuck! The inside!'
'I'm sorry, Mr Roberts. I really don't know how it happened.'

'What am I gonna do with ya, kid?' Mr Roberts lifted his fingers from the desk and let them fall again in a gesture of exasperation. 'Huh? What am I meant to do?' Wensum gave a small shrug.
'I don't know, sir,' he said quietly. Mr Roberts toyed with his sellotape dispenser.
'You're a good kid, ya really are, but sometimes -' He tore off a length of tape and passed it from hand to hand. '- sometimes, I don't think you're worthy of the Krazy Klown name. When you're out there, you're an ambassador, kid. A goddamn ambassador for the whole company. When ya wear those oversize comedy shoes, ya gotta wear 'em with pride. Huh?' He looked up at Wensum earnestly. Mr Roberts was trying to put the sellotape down, but it kept sticking to his fingers. 'Huh?' Wensum nodded. 'Damn right. Ya gotta wear 'em like a goddamn badge of office.' He flapped his hand back and forth, trying to unstick the tape. It remained stuck. 'Badge of office,' he said again.
'Yes, Mr Roberts,' said Wensum, not looking at the increasingly frantic hand-waving going on at desk level.
'Okay,' said Mr Roberts, finally flicking the sellotape off his fingers and onto the carpet. He composed himself. 'And how many times I gotta tell ya? It's Rahbitz, not Rowburts.'
'Sorry, Mr Roberts.'
'Okay.' He looked at Wensum for a moment, then shook his head. 'We all got problems, kid. I'm not saying we don't all got problems, we all got problems. But -' He raised an index finger from the desk and pointed it towards Wensum. '- we do not bring those problems to our place of work. Particularly if that place of work is a party with thirty goddamn kids.'
'It won't happen again, sir.' Mr Roberts shook his head.
'I don't mean to be hard on ya, kid, but this is a cutthroat business. If I let standards slip...' He waved his hands in the air. 'People rely on clowns to make 'em feel happy, to cheer 'em up. What's it gonna do to business if word gets around? This is Rabitz's Krazy Klowns, not Rabitz's Krying Klowns. I'm sorry, kid, but that's the way it is.'
'I understand.'
'Good. Good.' Mr Roberts got up from his chair and stood with his back to Wensum, looking out of the window. He sighed deeply. Wensum scratched his elbow and looked around the office. The same old framed photograph of the New York skyline hung behind the desk. It was taken in black and white, but in the top left-hand corner, just next to a cloud, hung a very modern-looking aeroplane. Wensum allowed himself a small smile.
'I'm not gonna fire ya, kid,' Mr Roberts said suddenly. 'I'm gonna give ya one last chance. I want ya to go back to that house and I want ya to apologise. I talked to the lady on the phone and she's got her money back, but I want ya to go and apologise to her. Will ya do that?' He turned back from the window and looked Wensum in the eye. 'Will ya?'
'Of course,' said Wensum. Mr Roberts nodded.
'You're okay, kid, you're okay. Ya know what? I think, if ya can get past this little, uh... problem of yours, you've got a bright future in clowning. That's what I think.'
Wensum hesitated a moment. 'Um, thank you,' he said.
'I really believe ya can do it.' Wensum nodded. Mr Roberts looked at his watch. 'Okay, I've got a meeting with the wig supplier now, but I'll see ya later. Just go and apologise, okay?' Wensum got up to leave. Before going out of the office door, he turned around.
'Um, sorry, but when I go to apologise...'
'Yeah?'
'Do I have to wear the, uh...'
'The uniform?' Mr Roberts grinned. 'No, kid, ya can leave the uniform at home.'

It was a tall, thin house in a victorian terraced row. Four stone steps led up from the pavement to the front door. Through the bay window of the living room, Wensum could see a thin beige sofa and a short-legged coffee table standing in the centre of a polished wooden floor. He rang the doorbell. After a moment, there was the click of a latch from the other side and the door was opened by a tall, stretched woman wearing a brown cardigan.
'Hello?' she said. Wensum half-smiled.
'Hi,' he said. 'Um, I'm Wensum Bailey.' Her expression did not change. 'From the party.' No look of recognition dawned across her face. 'Um. Spangles the clown?'
'Oh, of course,' she said. 'I'm sorry, I didn't recognise you without the nose. Come on in.' She stepped to the side and Wensum walked past her into the hallway. 'Would you like a cup of tea?' she asked, closing the door.
'Oh,' said Wensum. 'Um. That'd be lovely. Thanks.' She turned and walked through the doorway on her left. Wensum followed her into a large and untidy kitchen. Stuck on the front of the fridge were magnets shaped like letters and numbers, a miniature wipe-clean notice board with a pen dangling from a string at its side and a scrap of thick cartridge paper spattered with colourful blobs of paint. He sat at the table with his back to the fridge.
'Um, Mrs Getley -' Wensum began.
'Oh, call me Margaret,' she interrupted.
'Margaret -'
'Or Mags. Most of my friends call me Mags.'
'Right. Um. Have you had a phone call from Mr Roberts at all?' She carried the kettle from the sink, where she had been filling it, and plugged it into the wall socket.
'Oh,' she said, 'the American gentleman?' Wensum hesitated.
'Yes. Well, I mean, no. He's not actually American.' Mags opened the cupboard and took out two mugs. She turned and looked at Wensum, holding one mug in each hand.
'Oh. He sounded American.'
'Yes,' said Wensum. 'He does. But he's not. I mean, he's not American. He's from Birmingham.' Mags frowned.
'Birmingham in England?'
'Yes. Well, from around there. Dudley, I think.'
'Dudley?' said Mags. 'But he speaks...'
'I know. He, uh, just speaks like that.' Mags nodded.
'Oh, I see. So he's -' She hesitated for a moment. '- he's just American ostensibly?' Wensum looked lost for a second before answering.
'Um, yes. Ostensibly,' he said. 'So you talked to him on the phone?'
'Yes,' said Mags. 'He was very friendly. Do you take milk, sugar?'
'Oh, um, milk no sugar, thanks.' She put the mugs on the table and walked over to the fridge. Wensum looked at the mugs. One was mustard yellow, with a chipped rim, and the other was faded pink, a cartoon face with the handle for its nose. The eyes were crossed in confusion, trying to look at the handle, while the mouth was arranged in a grimace of fear and disgust. It was altogether the least appealing design for a mug Wensum had ever seen. He frowned at it.
'I'm afraid I've only got skimmed,' Mags said, depositing a large plastic carton of milk in the centre of the table.
'That's fine,' said Wensum.
'And brown sugar,' she said, opening a cupboard.
'Um. Okay.'
'Oh, actually it's white.'
'Yeah, um, fine.'
'Oh, this is icing sugar,' she said, squinting at the label.
'Actually, I'm fine without sugar, thanks.'
'Are you sure?'
'Um, yeah,' he said. 'Yeah, that's no problem. Did... did Mr Roberts say you could have your money back?' Mags was rummaging through the back of a cupboard.
'He said I could get my next appointment free,' she said.
'Right,' said Wensum. 'Well, if it's alright with you, I'd like to give you back the money you paid.'
'Have you seen the teabags?' said Mags from inside the cupboard.
'Um. No.'
'They should definitely be in here somewhere. I could have sworn... Aha!' She emerged from the cupboard holding a small box of teabags, took out two and dropped them into the mugs. 'Right. What were you saying?'
'I'd like to give you your money back.' She looked at him blankly for a moment.
'Oh, don't worry about that,' she said. Wensum looked down at the grotesque mug.
'Well, no,' he said. 'I think, um, I'd still like to, if that's okay. I mean, I... Well, I'd like to.' The mug sneered at him.
'No, look,' said Mags, 'we all have bad days now and then. I mean, I know I do. Really, it's okay.' Wensum looked up and saw that she had been staring at the mug as well. She met his eyes.
'Um,' he said. 'Can I use your bathroom?' She nodded.
'Yes, of course. It's just upstairs, to the left.'
'Thankyou,' he said, getting up. He walked out of the kitchen, along the hallway and up the thin carpet of the stairs. When he reached the top, he pushed open the door to his left and went in.
The bathroom was nautical. The mirror above the sink was shaped like a porthole, the walls were tiled in blue and white and instead of a picture rail there was a painting of a rough shipyard rope which stretched round the circumference of the room. On top of the cistern was a collection of seashells and splinters of driftwood. He lifted the toilet seat and unzipped his flies. Just as he had started, he realised that he had forgotten to lock the door. It slowly swung open behind him. He looked over his shoulder and gave it a kick with his heel. It swung closed, then started to open again.
'Bugger,' he said under his breath. Balancing on one leg, he stretched the other out behind him and used it to push the door. He couldn't quite push it far enough to let the latch click shut. He shuffled away from the toilet a little and nudged the door again with his toe. At last, the latch sprung and it was closed. He turned his attention back to the toilet to find that his stream of urine was millimetres away from the edge of the bowl. Hastily, he adjusted his aim, sending the last of it splashing into the dead centre of the pool. He zipped up his flies, flushed the toilet and went to the sink. As he washed his hands, he looked at himself in the porthole mirror. The slight sunken rings around his eyes were there again. He leaned in and looked into his eyes. Reflected in them he could see the round mirror, and his own image within that. He looked at his mouth and drew his lips back into a wide grin, baring his teeth. Again, he was disappointed by the way the front two crossed over slightly. The very edge of the left one lay over the top of the right. Or was it right over left? As Wensum tried to work it out, he felt a slight dampness on his left thigh. He looked down. The water from the tap had been quietly spraying off his hands and onto his trousers, and had now made a dark patch of wetness the size and shape of a carrot on his left leg. He leapt away from the sink. His hands dripped onto the carpet.
'Shit,' he told himself. 'Oh shit.' He grabbed a towel from the radiator behind him and dabbed at the wet patch. He pressed the towel against it. He rubbed at it vigorously. It was still there. 'Shit. Shit.' He stared at the wet patch for a moment and tried to think of what to do. For some reason, all he could think about was Mr Roberts saying 'a goddamn ambassador'. He wondered what Mr Roberts would sound like if he talked normally. He shook his head. He had to concentrate. A hairdrier! If he could find a hairdrier, he might still be okay.
Slowly, cautiously, he opened the bathroom door and looked out onto the landing. Apart from the stuffed toy frog on the windowsill, there was no-one there. Eying the frog suspiciously, he eased himself out from behind the door. Good. He was on the landing. What now? He walked silently past the stairs to the door which was slightly ajar. He pushed it slowly open and, glancing over his shoulder at the frog, crept into the room.
Within two seconds of entering the room, Wensum noticed three things. The first was a small free-standing calendar on the bedside table with that day's date and 'Word of the Day: Ostensibly' printed on it in round, black letters. The second was the light, lilac smell of a perfume in the air, delicate and very slightly acidic. The third was Margaret Getley, who was sitting on the edge of the bed with her back to him, facing a large wall mirror and worrying at her hair with a wooden-handled brush. After two seconds, she saw him in the reflection and froze, the hairbrush halfway through a stroke.
'Um,' he said. Then, 'Um,' again.
'Oh,' she said, reaching for a small bottle of perfume on the bed beside her and clasping her hand around it. There was a brief silence, which Mags finally broke. 'I'll, uh, be down in a minute. The tea should be ready.' Wensum opened his mouth, then shut it again. He nodded, then ducked back out of the door.
As he walked downstairs, the frog grinned at him from the windowsill. He went into the kitchen and saw steam rising from the two mugs. Using the teaspoon that lay on the table, he removed the teabags and dropped them into the small plastic pedal-bin. Then he poured milk into both the mugs and took the plain yellow one for himself. He sat down and shuffled his chair far enough under the table so that the wet patch on his leg was hidden.
'How long have you been working as a clown?' said Mags, sweeping into the room.
'Um, just two weeks now,' said Wensum. 'This was only my third booking.'
'Hmm,' said Mags, picking up the face mug and taking a sip of tea. 'Oh, no sugar.'
'Sorry,' said Wensum.
'And do they give you special training?' asked Mags, dumping a spoonful of icing sugar into her tea and stirring it furiously. 'Balloon animals and that kind of thing?'
'Um, no, not really. I mean, I had to do a test. With the balloon animals.'
'So you taught yourself?' She sipped the tea and added more sugar.
'Yes. I had a book.'
'They're special balloons aren't they?'
'Yes.'
'Do you get them from a catalogue?' Another sip, another spoonful of icing sugar.
'Yes.'
'A kind of clown supplies catalogue?'
'Um, yes.'
'Do they have unicycles?'
'Yes.'
'Have you got a unicycle?'
'No.'
'Ever tried to ride one?'
'No. I think that's more of a circus thing, really.'
'Hmm, I suppose so.' Mags took a mouthful of tea, grimaced and swallowed. 'Gach!' she said. 'Too sweet. Far too sweet.' She turned round in her chair and tipped the contents of the mug into the sink behind her. Then she turned to face Wensum again, put the mug down in front of her and fixed him with a look. A second passed. She tilted her head almost imperceptibly. He held onto his mug with both hands. 'Wensum,' she said, 'what was it? At the party, I mean, that made you...' She was leaning forwards over the table, her hands loosely clasped together. Her eyes were light brown and slightly pinched at the corners.
'Um,' said Wensum. 'I...' He glanced down at the mug, but the face was turned away from him. Suddenly, he found that he actually wanted to answer the question. Up until now, all he had wanted to do was escape from this place and go back to Mr Roberts, who would pat him on the back and say 'Ya're alright, kid', before offering him a cigar, but now...
He blinked. 'I... I don't know. It was, um... No, actually, I don't know. I guess it was nothing. Just... nothing at all.' Mags didn't say anything, but eased herself back in her chair before finally breaking eye contact. Wensum took a sip of tea and looked down at the table, grinning behind his mug. For no reason he could readily identify, he was laughing on the inside.