kagablog

EMMA AGAIN

Ampleby received sporadic late night visits from Emma. 3am visits. Platonic visits. That insistent rap rap rap at the door. No sooner had the door closed, when she started crushing a mandrax tablet still within its silver casing between her front teeth. Deftly. As if she were nurturing it…a mother cat defleaing her kitten…the black hood of her cape falling from her head.
“This…..this is such a safe place to be” she would say breathlessly, placing the silver enfolded crushed mandrax tablet carefully on the floor next to her.
“Fuck, Emma…….it’s 3am…are you OK?”
“Ya, no I’m fine…..”
She was now brushing her long dark heavy hair, tufts of which came out with each brush stroke.
“Shit….check this…I’ve just had a fight with some silly cow….she virtually pulled all my hair out….” Emma pulls knots of hair from the brush, rolls it into a ball, places it in the ash tray.
“Fuck, Emma….” said he pathetically.
“Oh…its nothing…..comes with the territory….”
She was working at a call girl agency.
“Do you have a bottle I can make a pipe out of…..?”
She ably heated the bottle neck over a candle and cracked off the end. Depipped, crushed the dagga. Prepared her mandrax pipe. There was no longer any sense of ritual to this preparation, any sense of “African time”. They spoke about this, they spoke about that. At 26, she still had the looks of a 17 year old. In spite of the drug and alcohol abuse, her body just bounced back. She threatened to tell him who some of her clients were……..
“I really think you should write a novel… I’m sure there are many tales you could tell…” said Ampleby seriously.
“I will, one day……..there’s something……there’s something I must tell you……………..they’re…..they’re after you…..”
“What?…..Who….?? What are you talking about……?”
“They’re out to get you……”
“Emma, what the fuck are you talking about…..this is bull shit…!”
“I…I wish it was…..”
“Who….? Who is out to get me….?”
“You know……you know….”
“No…I don’t know….I don’t know…”
“You do….yes you do….you do…..just…..think…..”
“Think? What for…?…..But why….? What have I done….??”
“It’s what you haven’t done….”
“Now what the fuck what….??”
“You’re…..you’re not…..you’re not corruptible……”
“Shees….Emma….this is bull shit….”
Finally lighting the pipe and sitting at the base of Ampleby’s feet, she looked like a sacrificial Llama or Buddhist devotee, transforming into a cloud of smoke after setting herself alight in protest. Smoke emanated from every pore. Filtered out through her long flowing cape, now all swoosh around her. Damp leaves waiting to ignite. And as she rushed and went limp, she barely managed to slob her spittle into the broken bottle. Next minute it was 5am and the early morning light cast a dreamlike shroud over the smokey room. They both passed out on the bed. He awoke a few hours later, Emma still in a deep sleep, more like in a coma, with spittle, like snails trails through her hair.

Emma had been to prison a number of times for possession of drugs. She had had at least five sessions in rehab of varying lengths of time. She ran away each time. Escaped straight into the nearest drug. She had attempted to commit suicide again. Now, the police were no longer interested in arresting her for any reason as she had been declared psychologically incorrigible.
Emma made her fourth attempt at suicide and almost succeeded. Her heart had stopped beating and by the time help arrived, almost twenty minutes had passed with no blood to her brain. She pulled through. Brain damaged. A few months later Ampleby bumped into her hitching up Berea Road. He had just bought a packet of cheap greasy chips from Leydens Takeaway on Berea Road just below the Caltex Garage. Were it not for her hair and profile, he would not have recognised her. Her weight had doubled. She was not alone.
“Oh wow….is that you?…Emma….Emma…EMMA!” called Ampleby.
She swung her back to him hoping he would just shut up.
“Hey Emma! Emma!” insisted Ampleby “Where are you guys off to…?”
“Buttons” said Emma and half looked at him. “We’re….hitching..to..Wentworth. This….is…my friend Simphiwe.” She had obvious difficulty with her words.
“Hi there” said he, as an intolerable sadness enveloped him. They moved on up the road, thumbs out. It was the last time he ever saw her. Four years later she finally succeeded. In the toilets. Louis Botha airport. Overdose. One month before her 30th birthday.