This is You

Rosa Mäkelä - The Pig’s Back, Issue Two

A lot of acting exercises go something like this: Close your eyes. Imagine the room you’re in, that your character is in. Imagine the ground you’re standing on. Feel it under your toes. Imagine the surface of it under your feet. Feel it. See the room around you. The minute details of it. The textures, the sounds, the smells. Focus. Feel the weight of your body in your legs. Feel it, right down to your feet, grounding you right there into the room. Feel your legs, your body connecting you to the room. Feel your whole body there, the air against your skin. Inhale. This is you. Exhale.

It doesn’t always work. Sometimes I’ll spend the whole time thinking about how I should’ve cut my nails or how the room’s too cold to imagine myself anywhere else. Sometimes I think Stella Adler was a chancer and her exercises mean nothing at all. But sometimes, for whatever reason, it clicks.

I was standing out on the street corner dressed as a bunch of grapes when I first heard about Melissa. I’d been doing work for Fox’s fruit and veg place at the time and I was out there in my costume when a woman approached me. She walked over, hair all slicked back and serious and told me she had a job. She said it was a good job, paid well. That it was for performers, for people who wanted to be actors but maybe couldn’t afford to have that ambition anymore. They had all sorts of different schemes and all you had to do was act. All you had to do was become someone else for a while. 

Over the years I’d done a lot of casting calls. Pouring in and out of studios half-way across the city, to hear absolutely nothing back. But I hadn’t become bitter, I was getting by. There was still something about auditioning I actually liked; those moments when you walk in the door and they’re still smiling at you, or even before that, in the plastic chairs outside the hotel room door and all the shaky hopefuls lined up with you. It’s especially satisfying when the person before you is wearing horrible shoes or has a small mouth. They like girls on screens to have big mouths, so you can always imagine kissing them. That’s how they cast most people these days. But yes, it’s those moments before you can tell how it's gone, before they cut you off half way through your monologue, when you’re reciting your name and age into the camera and your confident voice carries it well. Those parts are full of potential. It’s like right before you phone your friend up to say: Gracey, I think I love him. Before that realisation, when it's just you floating on what might be about to happen. And I wasn’t half bad, I had regular jobs. A Christmas elf here, gameshow attendant there. But I’d be lying if I said it was exciting. None of them were really roles you could sink your teeth into. 

After speaking to the woman about the job, I came home to think about it. I looked around my flat, scanning everything in the room. I watched ants crawl out of the cracks in the skirting boards and over slices of lemon I had left out in an attempt to repel them. I had been here a long time and, besides the mottled damp starting to come through, the walls were still blank. The cupboards held only a few tins of beans and whatever was there when I arrived. There wasn’t much here at all. The only evidence of my life was the dried food on the dishes in the sink and scatters of lemon peel failing to keep the ants out. I could pack it all up in a matter of hours and the rooms would forget me easily. It seemed like the right time to become someone else for a while.

I’d chosen to do the home visit scheme as it paid more and if I was going to do this at all I might as well be monetarily wise about it. The plan was: I would become Melissa, the daughter of Karl, a man whose daughter hadn’t spoken to him in years. I would stay at his house so he could perform all the fatherly duties he’d missed out on, and at an arranged date I would announce I was moving to New Zealand and we would have a proper goodbye. He would be released from any guilt or emotional turmoil caused by the estrangement and would have closure from the relationship and thus he would be free. 

I’d received a file on Melissa: likes, dislikes, personal style, photographs, school reports. Most of the information in it was from her early years. I read copybooks, old birthday cards and was even given a pumpkin costume she’d worn one halloween. The details got scarcer around her teens but Karl had written a document outlining the important things from the more recent years. I’m not sure how much of it was true—the Law degree, the time in Vietnam—but it was his life. I was just there to play a part. 

She was prettier than me, just slightly, with straighter teeth and one of those Marilyn Monroe beauty spots in exactly the right place on her lip. I could see why I was cast though, we had the same colouring, same build, same delicate sloping nose. I have one of those noses people ask where I got it done, but it’s real. And I was pretty sure hers was too. When I went to meet Karl, I dressed up in my best attempt at rich, open-minded woman clothes: stiff white shirt, asymmetrical earrings, green cigarette pants with a pleat, and mules with fuzzy mink-like fur inside them. I drew the beauty spot on with an eyebrow pencil. I said goodbye to my flat and waited outside with my bags. 

I was to meet him at the pancake place on the corner by my flat and I spotted him before he saw me. He wore a black leather jacket and a shirt with the buttons left open, exposing some of his oiled chest hair. He’d styled his hair in a greased back, fifties, maybe James Dean kind of thing and nothing about him looked effortless. I had expected him to drive up in a convertible, maybe toss his keys to a valet instead of parking—I knew he had money, the payment for the job was more than anything I’d been offered before—but instead he shuffled over on foot, hands in pockets and eyes darting all over the street. 

He put his arms around me in a hug that smelt like sweet oil and sweat.

Don’t worry, you can just call me Karl, he said. 

We sat outside the cafe, on those Parisian style plastic woven chairs. When the waitress came over I prepared to become Melissa for someone other than Karl. It felt like a test.

I’ll get the American pancakes, Karl said. But with the syrup on the side. And a coffee. 

I’ll get those too, I said. Without the bacon. 

No bacon? Karl said. 

I mean, I could get the bacon? I said.

Sure, sure, he said. Have whatever you want. 

Okay, I’ll get the bacon, I said. And a black coffee. 

Coffee? he said. All grown up! 

The waitress watched us, pen unmoving on her notepad.

I don’t have to get coffee, I said. 

No, no it’s good, he said. A coffee drinker, wow. 

So you’re both having coffee? 

I nodded at the waitress with a look that said: Family, you know how it is.

When we got back to his house, he took his shoes off at the door.

I’m going for that Scandinavian thing, he said, winking at me and slipping on a pair of reindeer fur slippers. I took my mules off and walked on the cold tiles in my bare feet. It felt wrong to have my feet out in front of a stranger. 

The house was exactly as I’d expected it to be. All glass, no taste. Expensive things everywhere. There were at least three rooms with just mirrors and small tables with bowls of potpourri on them. I was curious what they were used for, but I decided it wouldn’t make sense for me to ask if I was meant to have grown up here, even for a while. He brought me into the living room and I tried not to fuss with my hands, or pace too much. The room had a big corner window that looked out onto his deck, onto sculpted hedges and one of those swinging basket chairs. The fireplace was made of shiny black stone and the mantle was almost as tall as me. Karl settled into the corner of an L-shaped couch made of black leather and patted the space beside him. He still hadn’t taken his jacket off and kept tidying back hairs that hadn’t yet fallen out of place. The room's palette was all greys. The kind of colours a paint shop would call Gravity, Tar, or Polished Stone. It was a display of shop-bought masculinity. Even the smell of it, cedarwood and a hint of tyres, felt contrived. In the corner was a low table with a record player and a stack of records on a shelf underneath. He spotted me looking at it.

Pick something if you like, he said. 

I flicked through it, hoping to find something to make me like Karl. I wanted to like him, I did. They were the kind of records you could buy in a gift shop or homestore; Fleetwood Mac, The Doors, Led Zeppelin. Some of them were still in their plastic wrap. I picked up The Doors and put it on. The speed was wrong at first, much too fast, and the opening notes sounded like a squeaky pixie version of the song. I flicked the speed switch back to the right setting. To the drumbeat of the song, Karl scrunched up the skin on his face and bobbed from side to side.

That’s it, he said, head swaying. 

Jim Morrison, he said to me, with a nod, pointing to the record player, like he was teaching me something. 

I felt embarrassed, but I smiled at him. I told myself it was just like a play with a bad script. No one would come to see it and no one would remember it when it was finished. I sat down on the couch beside him. I could smell his jacket, like animals or cat food, mingling with the heavy smell of sweat. Feeling brave then, I nestled into his shoulder and put my cheek against the cool leather of his jacket. He put his head down on top of mine but without leaning his weight on me. We stayed there for a few moments, each still holding the weight of our own heads in our necks.

What’s that smell? he said.

The room? Your jacket? Your sweat? I thought.

Is it a candle? I said. 

No, it's like... He took a sharp inhale. I could hear the air catching on his nose hairs and feel his warm breath on my ear.

Hairspray, he said. 

Oh yeah, that's me. 

My daughter wouldn’t wear hairspray, he said. She’s not a whore. 

I tried to think of what to say, to recall a script I was never given. 

It’s not really a whore thing anymore, Dad, I said. 

Was it ever? I wondered.

He got up off the couch to move away from me and I could see blood gathering in his cheeks. 

But that’s cool, I said. If your daughter doesn’t, if I don’t wear it, that’s cool, that’s cool. 

Smells like your mother, he said, almost spitting. 

Oh sure, of course, shit, I said. Yeah no more hair spray. It’s real whore stuff anyway. 

Yeah, he said. And did a few quick in-out-in-out breaths before boxing the air with a neat one-two. 

I hadn’t really thought about why his daughter might not be speaking to him before I took the role. I saw the money and signed the contract in a matter of minutes. I decided that that was between him and her. 

That night I lay in her room, painted a soft green. It was the most pleasantly decorated room in the house, the only one without sharp corners or extra metal parts on all the furniture. The sheets had a satiny feel and, before I got into bed, I noticed they were new. I could see the marks on them where they had been folded around the cardboard in their packet and I felt sad for a moment about all the effort Karl had gone to. I lay there and imagined I really was her. I thought about who she was. I counted my inhales and exhales, breathing in Melissa and breathing out myself. 

The next day Karl took me to the local park. We sat on a bench and drank coffee. 

I guess this is sort of our thing, he said smiling. Coffees. 

I guess so, I said, taking a slurp of my frappuccino. 

He pointed to a cluster of yellow flowers. Dandelions, he said. We used to call them pissy beds. 

I nodded while I continued to slurp. What I wanted to say was, You’re wrong, Karl, those are primroses. But that was not my job, so I stayed silent and let him talk. 

He did a lot of that. Pointing at things and telling me what they were. It seemed important for him to be able to tell me things, so I always nodded in surprise, no matter what it was. 

That used to be a laundrette, he told me on our walk back through the town. 

It doesn’t actually cause arthritis, he told me, cracking his knuckles one day. A lot of people get that wrong.

Springsteen, he told me, when Born to Run came on over the speaker in the supermarket.

Hot drinks actually cool you down more, he told me once, when I ordered a lemonade on

a sunny day. Something about tricking your body into being cooler than it is, he said. 

I wasn’t sure exactly what Karl did for a living. He did work, by that I mean he went upstairs to his home office for a few hours a day, but I never learnt exactly how he’d managed to end up with a house like this. He seemed to have a lot of free time. In the mornings we would lounge in the living room with the radio on loud, drinking coffee from heavy grey ceramic mugs. We’d eat cereal or fried eggs on white bread. At some point he’d go up to his office for a while and take calls or send emails. I hadn’t received much details on what Melissa liked to fill her free time with besides horse riding and cheerleading when she was a child. So when Karl was busy, I just stayed out of the way. I’d lie on my bed, paint my nails, or take long hot showers. One day, out of boredom, I shaved all the hair off my arms and then regretted it instantly. I was afraid Karl would notice the change and start to see me there again instead of Melissa. But he didn’t. 

Some afternoons we’d leave the house, get coffees and stroll around the park or the shops. In the evenings we mainly ate out in stylish expensive restaurants. He’d order thick chewy steaks for himself and meals that arrived in geometric patterns on the plate, and always included something puréed, for me. A few times though, he cooked, taking hours to prepare simple bland meals with all the vegetables chopped to the size of one cent coins. 

I’d been Melissa for almost a month and I was getting used to his quirks: the hairspray thing, his pint of milk in the mornings, the way he didn’t actually want me to respond when he asked a question. It didn’t seem to matter that I didn’t know a lot about how Melissa would react to things, I got the impression he didn’t really know either. Mainly I think he just liked having someone around the house. 

One day, I misplaced my toothbrush. I like to carry one around with me. It’s something that helps me get in character, having clean teeth. I would always brush my teeth before going on stage, or to an audition. There's no point doing all the mental work to become Golde the Jewish peasant with the taste of cheese and onion crisps in your mouth. It was just one of those things, I always had a toothbrush on me. But I’d lost it this day, right before I was washing up for bed. 

Do you have any mouthwash, Karl? I shouted down the wide staircase. Or a pack of toothbrushes anywhere? 

A toothbrush? he said, coming out of his room in navy flannel pyjama bottoms and a t-shirt. It was the least done up I’d ever seen him. He didn’t look like himself.

Yeah, I lost mine, I told him. Do you have any spares? 

I don’t think so, he said. You can just use mine. 

Oh, I said. No, that's okay, thanks.

No, it's fine, he said, don't worry. And went downstairs to get it. 

I went into the bathroom and squeezed some toothpaste out onto my index finger.

Here, just use this, he said, coming back in with his orange and white toothbrush, the bristles slightly splayed.

It’s okay really, I said. I found it! I joked, showing him my toothpaste finger. 

Just use it, he said, extending it out to me.

I couldn’t tell if he was playing a trick on me. Was this his humour?

I’m all good, I said.

Just use it, he said again. Don’t be stupid. 

No, I’m fine. 

Use it Melissa, he said.

Look, I wouldn’t even use my own dad’s toothbrush, Karl, it’s gross. 

Then there was silence. Heavy silence, like something about to implode. His eyes weren’t particularly wide, or squinting either, but they were open and focused and looking straight at me.

And then he left the room, dropping the toothbrush on the tiles like a child and, downstairs, slammed his bedroom door. I stood still for a while, afraid the sound of me moving around the bathroom or into my room might invite him back upstairs. But I didn’t hear him move again so eventually I went to bed.

In Melissa’s room, I decided I was done. I would suggest going out for breakfast in the morning, and I would tell him I was finished. I’d had enough.

I woke up early, the nerves and adrenaline soaring through me. The house was quiet. As I walked around the kitchen I wondered why I hadn’t cared about how much it looked like the home of a serial killer in some Nordic drama on my first day here. Now it seemed an unignorable trait of the house. I moved slowly, placing my feet carefully one after the other on the tiles, trying not to interrupt the stillness of the room. It felt even bigger than the first day I’d arrived. And emptier. 

On the polished black marble counter there was a note:

Melissa,

Alice, 

this isnt working 

its not you its just everything else

Im going to find melissa 

Ive left some cash in the cupboard by the sink 

You broke the contract so its not the full amount

Im sure you understand 

Stay another night if you like and eat whatever you want 

Karl 

I felt a deflation of something inside me as I read the note. I re-read it. It was relief, but something else too. An anti-climax of sorts. Then I went to the cupboard to count the cash. It was considerably less than the agreed amount but there was still a lot there. I could book a hotel with it while I looked for a new flat. I hadn’t expected to go back to my own life so soon. I hadn’t even considered what my life would be like when I was finished being Melissa. Some nights, I had imagined that I would just stay there. That Karl and I would find a way to co-exist and I would continue on there being her, or being whoever I would be when I stopped trying to be her. 

I lingered in the house for a few more hours. I had a shower in the guest room and used some fancy shampoos that had never been opened. It was still early, the time someone might be getting ready for work. I thought of Melissa, starting her day somewhere else, under a stream of hot water washing her sleep away with no idea of who I was. A stranger playing out someone else’s version of her. 

I struggled getting dressed, not knowing what to wear. Everything I brought were “Melissa’s Clothes” and I didn’t know how to dress myself in them. I decided to stay in the pyjamas, they felt the most neutral. Then I went down to the living room, to have one last nose around all Karl’s things. On the shelf below the record player, between all the hardly played airport records I noticed a seven inch in a browning battered sleeve. The Bangles Eternal Flame. I hadn’t seen it on the first day. I put it on the record player and it played out all wrong and slow. At this speed, the voice wavered before getting to the right notes and the beat felt lazy and sedate. To this strange, drawn-out version of the song I danced. I danced like I was underwater. I danced how I imagined you would if you were alone and unselfconscious. I danced as Melissa, I danced as myself, and when the song finished, I put it back to the right speed to dance again.

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