I smile and nod. He is the obvious choice for the next evolutionary.
‘So, you in for the creative exchange? Ah, man, I’m so stoked about getting to play Seoul. I had to look it up on the map. I mean, yeah, okay, New Korea, but where is that actually?’
A woman in chunky jewellery and stiletto boots over her jeans scissors into the lounge, holding a microcam. ‘Damian? You’re up. I hope you’ve been thinking up devastatingly smart and interesting things to say. Oh, don’t look so nervous. Just be yourself. Recite some lyrics or something.’ She winks at me. ‘Don’t think I’ll be too long with this one.’ She leads him away between the maze of curtained cubicles, already recording.
‘So, what is it that moves you, Dame? What’s the one thing about music that grabs you, that hits you right in your gut?’
I slip my Zion out of my bag, having already snuck it past the receptionist, and surreptitiously snap a photograph of the indentation Damian has left on the liquorice beanbag, the crease like a smile down the middle. Because things are only real if they are documented, if there is visual evidence.
I mention this to camera-chick when she comes clipping back in. ‘Oh yeah,’ she says, ‘absolutely!’ and hustles me out onto the balcony, buffered with sliding glass panels to keep the wind at bay.
The red bead of the camera winks steadily, for the record, recording, recording. ‘So, is that why you became a photographer? To capture life? Do you feel like you don’t have a hold on it otherwise?’
‘I’m not exactly a professional.’
‘Don’t be humble, honey. And can you do me a favour? Can you start your sentences with “I became a photographer because blah blah blah…” Otherwise it’s a nightmare in the edit. Fragmented sentences. You’ve no idea. So what do you like about photography? What about it moves you, that…’
‘Hits me in the gut?’
She’s unapologetic. ‘Yeah.’
‘The immediacy. Sorry, sorry. What resonates with me about photography is the sense of immediacy. Catching the transitive before it slips away.’
‘So why’d you get into it?’
‘Easier than real art?’
‘That’s great. That’s funny. Self-deprecating is good. Now, can you do it again in a whole sentence?’
‘I became a photographer because it seemed easier than real art. And I can’t draw.’
But really, it was because I’m terrified of losing anything.
I get off at Salt River Station to pick up printing paper at an arts store at the Neighbourhood market that imports small orders specially for me. I’m about to cross Sir Lowry Road, when I’m distracted by a commotion outside the bottle store. It shouldn’t be a bigtime deal, a woman having a seizure on the pavement, and normally, I wouldn’t pay much attention to a defuse, but it’s like something is pulling me over to gawk. I’m not the only one. An Aito is loping up and down on the kerb beside her, whining impatiently and yipping in excitement. There’s no sign of his operator.
‘What? Never seen a robbery in progress, honey?’ the liquor-store owner snaps at me, watching from his door, arms folded. I haven’t actually, although I’ve seen plenty of defusings, but that’s not why I stopped. Maybe it’s a leftover I’m still dealing with from the pool hall, but it’s like I’m compelled to be here.
‘Move along, chicklet. This is nothing to do with you.’
‘Okay,’ I say, but I don’t move. The woman’s ravaged face and clothes mark her as street. She’s as scrawny as a sparrow. Harmless, surely?
The defuse seems to be tailing off. The manic tempo of her dirty bare feet drumming the concrete is slowing down, and this seems to calm the Aito a little. It stands quivering in excitement, shoulders hunched, ears pricked forward, intent on her. More like cat than dog. Although who knows what goes on in that re-engineered brain?
More people have gathered to rubberneck, passing shoppers and a crew of street kids.
‘Nothing to see. Move along. Get going! You want I should have you crisped too?’ The shoppers shuffle off indignantly, but the street kids stick around, just far away enough that they’re out of the Aito’s immediate reach, but not far enough for the shoppie, who flaps his arms at them in disgust.
The defuse tails off and the woman lies there gasping, her eyes scrunched up. The Aito raises a proprietary paw and puts it on her chest, lightly, just enough to claim her. Despite myself, I step forward. The Aito raises its head, instantly alert, and its snout twitches as if to peel back its black lips in a snarl. But then it meets my eyes, gives a dismissive little whuff, and turns its full attention back to the woman.
‘You and this doggie got something going on, lady?’ drawls the shoppie, to the delight of the street kids, who howl with laughter and catcall, slapping their thighs as if to call the dog – or me – over. I sink down next to the woman on the street, ignoring the filth. There is a Chappies gum wrapper crumpled in the gutter, and some unidentifiable mulch, food waste or other organic. I don’t look too closely. She lies completely rigid as the Aito noses round her body, sniffing for drugs, under the shock-sharp rankness of her. It’s like the rat that died in our ceiling in Durban and lay there for three weeks before my brother finally climbed up there, swearing at my dad for using the cheap poison – the kind that doesn’t auto-dissolve the bodies. But there’s another smell here, ozony cold and chemical.
The woman is making horrible little whiny sounds, her eyes still squeezed shut, while the Aito shoves its snout into the saggy folds of her over-sized tracksuit, as if she’d been liposuctioned fresh that morning. Her fingers flop and twitch reflexively on the pavement, but she knows enough to keep her arms by her side, hands down, while it snuffles around her.
‘You a cop? You with the guy inside?’ the shoppie says, bending his knees to talk to me confidentially. ‘Cos it was legitimate, okay? Bitch started pulling down the merchandise, falling around. Dronkie. She’s been in here before, causing shit. Stealing shit. And how long is your friend gonna be in there anyway?’ Behind him, out of range, the street kids are capering and strutting, waving their arms, imitating him.
Her forehead, when I lay a palm on it, is clammy. But what else was I expecting? I don’t quite know what I’m doing or why I can’t leave the situation alone. At my touch, her eyes flare open. She stares at me, frantic, her lips popping bubbles of spit as if she’s about to say something, but then the Aito rumbles warningly and she squinches her eyelids shut again, clamps her lips as if she could suppress the tight squeaks escaping her throat.
‘You check my records, okay? You’ll see. Always, every week, some bergie or skollies causing trouble for me. What are my customers supposed to do?’
I raise a placatory hand, keeping the other on her forehead. The Aito lifts its paw off her chest, now totally disinterested. It swipes its head up and down the street, scanning, and then starts digging into its flank with the edge of its teeth. I guess fleas are a problem when you come into regular close contact with the homeless and criminals.
‘I’m logging one crisp every coupla days. And now I gotta pay extra cos I’m over the limit? It’s not fair. It’s not my fault you can’t take care of this rubbish. Now I gotta do your job?’
The woman opens one wary eye, and blinks it, comically. And then the other.
‘I wasn’t…’ she starts in a voice so little and pathetic, I have to lean in to hear her. Her breath is ripe with cheap papsak.