Pestle and Mortar

Steven Porter was found dead in an alleyway, during the winter of 2012. He fell from a window of his fourth-floor town house in Kilburn. The fall shattered his skull, leaving a lake of blood. The red lake was covered in a light dusting of snow. The nature of his fall was under investigation. 

   Steven was sixty-five. He lived alone. His mother died over a decade ago, leaving him a lump-sum and the deeds to the house. She taught him the value of sterling, and he’d spent the decade after her death, converting his town house into flats. 

   He took the top floor as his own, because he knew his tenants would put their heating on, long before he had to, and he would get the benefit of their gas bill.

   He was an only child.  He had lived with his mother until she died. His father fled the nest as soon as he was born, but had the decency to leave them the house. 

   His mother never re-married, she worked as a clerk for a local law firm, and retired on a substantial pension. She was damaged by her husband's exit. It hardened her then it broke her, but instead of giving up, she pieced together the brittle shards, leaving part of herself, the part that loved and cared for the world, trampled into the carpets. 

   Little Steven had never worked, he never had to. His mother gave him everything he could ever want, all except the tactile embrace of a mother. She never held him, never kissed him, never read to him, never told him it would be alright. He was given a room, he was fed. When his shoes wore out, he received new shoes. He was provided for but he wasn’t loved. He’d never known what it was to be loved. 

   He knew what sex was. He paid for prostitutes to relieve him of his money and his time. But he had never been able to charm a woman into his life, without the promise of money. 

   There were things you could not pay for, things he needed, things that would have made his cold existence bearable. He had never held a woman’s hand. He had never sat with a woman and watched the day turn from orange, to blue, to black. He had never had a tiff that turned into a desperate need to hold each other. He had never made up after an argument and tried to change himself for someone else. He had known only flesh. No gentle caresses, no slow eager kisses, no rolling about, just automatic erotic lust. In the month before he fell, he finally realised what he had been deprived of.

The house had been cut into four flats. The tenants, who were only suspects in the case, lived below Steven’s attic mezzanine. The first floor flat was occupied by an elderly acquaintance of the late Mrs Porter. He had lived there long before Steven converted the rooms above. He was ruled out instantly on account of his age. He was ninety, and rarely left his arm chair. He ate, slept, and on a rare occasion, crapped in his chair. He had lived in Kilburn his whole life, surrounded by the most delicious foods from around the world, and he had refused to try any of it. Bread and cheese, and BBC news was his diet. Bland and pointless was his outlook. He didn’t even know Steven was dead. The police told him, and he blinked, frowned, sighed, and then went back to his chair. 

   The second floor was occupied by a loveless couple. They argued over everything. They argued from the moment they woke up until they pulled the blanket over to sleep. Their arguments were punctuated by vigorous nights of rampant sex, followed nine months later, by another child. They didn’t have enough space to think, let alone, plan a murder. Their children cried at all times of the day and night. Their flat smelt of baby shit, dank wet washing, and cigarettes. The police ruled them out straight away, for they looked like they were ready to murder each other. They didn’t have the time to worry about killing anyone else. 

   The third and final flat was the smallest of all. It sat above an ancient stairway. Mrs Porter left the stairway as it was the day her husband left. The carpets were dark brown and layered with decades of toxic dust. The walls had been white but had turned brown. The stains were unusual in their making. They were a concoction of cigarettes, spider shit, and mould. The Victorian gas pipes ran up the stairs mirroring the banisters. The windows had been stuck shut with several ever-thicker splatterings of gloss paint.

   The third floor flat opened to a small kitchen-living space. It used to be his mother’s bedroom suite. Steven had cut it into three rooms. A tiny little box bedroom housed a broken single bed. There was a windowless pink wet room dotted with black mould. The kitchen-living space had a galley counter and a wonky old table and chair.

   It had remained unoccupied for over a year. The rent was higher than it had to be, and Steven refused to lower it. He would wait until he got someone desperate enough to take it. 

   He put an ad in the local estate agent:

   Spacious one bed apartment, with on-suite, close to the Bakerloo line, single occupant only

   A year later a tall and slimy estate agent opened the door for a young woman from Vietnam. Miss Nguyen took the flat.

   Steven didn’t have to do anything. The estate agent did all the paperwork, and gave her the keys. When the deposit cleared, along with the first month's rent, Steven went on holiday to Brazil and blew Miss Nguyen’s money in a series of fast and sordid encounters. 

   Miss Nguyen was young, vibrant, curved, she pulsed with energy, and she drove forward at the walls that enclosed her. She was found dead in her bed, on the frost covered morning after Steven fell to his death.

   There was blunt force trauma to her head. The police found a large marble pestle stained with her blood. The two bodies pointed to a murder-suicide.

   They found Steven Porter’s fingerprints on the pestle. As Miss Nguyen was found dead in her bed, the detectives conjectured, he had murdered her and dived head first out of the third storey window.

   The case was far from over, but there was a consensus among the detectives that the search for suspects was over. Now all they needed to do was find out who Miss Nguyen was, and why Steven Porter had killed her.

Mai Nguyen was one of six children born on the outskirts of North Saigon. She trained as a nurse and completed her diploma with distinction. One drunken mistake with a well-spoken white man landed her with a baby. Her family were ashamed of the bastard and refused to accept him. The father disappeared before the baby was born. He finished his gap year and returned to a quiet Cul-de-sac in rural East Sussex. 

   Mai had been the strongest and most successful of her siblings. Her nurse's pay had to go a long way. It had to feed a large family. When the baby came along the family suffered. It was then she vowed to immigrate to London to bring in more money for her son and family. She was driven beyond the limits of her birth. She filled out the paperwork three times before her visa was accepted. Most would have given up. She spent every hour she wasn’t working, striving to get her visa. 

   She had a twin sister named Hoa. Hoa was the opposite of Mai. Hoa had stayed at home to help her mother, hoping to marry a man with a bit of money. Hoa did all kinds of jobs to bring in money, but never had the drive to get herself a career. 

   When Mai left for London, Hoa was lost. Mai had always looked after her. She had given her money to buy new clothes to impress the men who prowled the streets of Saigon. With Mai gone, Hoa started the process to join her sister. Mai’s baby was left in the care of their mother, who hated the task. But she needed Mai’s money, and rolled up her sleeves and made sure he had what he needed. 

Mai flew to Gatwick. She found a job before she found a place to live. She took the night shift at a hospital and got to it. She slept at a temple during the day. The monks were kind to her. They fed her and kept her warm, but when they tried to set her up with a husband, she thanked them and found a place of her own.

   She moved into the third floor flat underneath Steven Porter. Her life crushed down on her in a bleak endless hospital night. She didn’t eat much. She bought a large bag of Thai fragrant rice, and a box of instant noodles. It was noodles for breakfast, rice for lunch, and noodles for dinner with an egg on top. All her spare money went back to Vietnam. She was taxed heavily, and her rent was disgustingly high. 

   She arrived in England in the summer. She felt the cold of autumn creeping in. The heat of Vietnam left her body. It was replaced by the damp cold of England. She had never seen an English winter. When September came, with its wind and its rain, she shivered under her blanket in the mornings after her night shift. 

The doorbell rang. She roused herself from an uncomfortable sleep and opened the door. There stood her twin sister, damp from the rain, and smiling. 

   “What are you doing here?” said Mai, as she rubbed the sleep from her eyes. It was noon, and Mai was trying to catch up on sleep. 

   “That’s how you greet your sister. I’ve come a long way to see you.”

   They hugged one another and Mai led her into the flat. 

   “You didn’t tell me England was this cold. It’s colder in here than it is outside,” said Hoa, shivering. Mai gave her a blanket, and put the kettle on. She started making some instant chilli noodles. 

   “How did you get here?”

   “You don’t want to know, but I’m here now.”

   Mai looked at her with drilling brown eyes, “Do you have a visa?”

   Hoa shook her head. 

   “You’re putting me at risk now.”

   “It will be fine. We look the same, no one will know. I’ll say I’m you, and you continue to be you. They won’t know.”

   “This is a single occupant flat.”

   “What does that mean?” 

   “One person only.”

   “We will be one person, they won’t know. Don’t worry I’ll find a…a rich white man, it will work out.”

   “I don’t have a choice, you don’t have the money to fly back, and neither do I. You’ll have to stay.”

   Hoa hugged her sister tighter than before and stirred her noodles. 

   “Will it always be this cold?”

   “This box is supposed to heat up these radiators, but I can’t get it to work. I need to call the estate agents.”

    Hoa took her suitcase into the bedroom and fell asleep. 

Mai rang the estate agent. The phone call was short and abrupt: 

   “Hi, Miss Nagu…yen…The landlord didn’t pay the extra for tenant maintenance services. If you want your boiler fixed, you’ll have to contact the landlord directly, here’s the number…goodbye.”

   Mai rang the number. 

   “Hello,” said Steven. 

   “Hello, this is Miss Nguyen, from flat three, my boiler isn’t working.”

   Steven was aroused by her Vietnamese accent.

  “Yes my dear, I’m out of London at the moment, I’ll be back later this evening. I can pop in at six?”

   Mai’s nightshift began at six. 

   “I will be there at six,” she lied. 

   “See you then, my dear,” said Steven grinning into the empty hotel room. 

Mai couldn’t sleep. She only had a few hours before she had to be ready for work. Hoa slept through those hours and woke up hungry.

   They ate rice, spring onions, and fish sauce together. 

   “I need a favour?” said Mai, when her food had gone down. 

   “Of course.”

   “I need you to be me tonight, the landlord is coming over to fix the boiler, you need to let him in, and then we can have this place warmed up.”

   Hoa nodded as she ate. 

   “Remember you are me, you are Mai Nguyen.”

   “Don’t worry sis, I have been you many times.”

   “What?”

   “You remember that man is Boi Ve en? The one with red hair.”

   “Yes.”

   “I pretended I was you before he got his plane home. I cleaned him out.”

  Mai shook her head. “I have to go; the landlord will be here at six.”

Steven got home and showered, he put on a three-piece suit, along with freshly polished brogues. He dabbed himself with cologne. Then he entered the dusty filth of the stairway, went down a flight and knocked on flat three.

   A very jet lagged Hoa opened the door, wearing loose pyjama shorts and a matching top. Steven stopped himself from licking his lips. He was lecherousness personified. He looked her over and felt a fire in his loins. She greeted him with a large smile. 

   “Come in Mr,” said Hoa. 

   “Call me Steven.”

   “Mr Steven the box isn’t working,” she showed him the boiler. He looked at it. It hadn’t been serviced in over three years. It was second hand when he put it in. The last tenants complained all winter. He would have done his usual and called his go-to handy man to tinker with it. But he decided he would see to this personally. He wanted to spend as much time with Miss Nguyen as he could. 

   He opened the boiler, and saw that there was nothing wrong with it. All he had to do was turn a switch. Instead of turning the switch, he left it. 

   He opened up the boiler and sighed. 

   “I shall have to come back tomorrow. I need to get a part. Will you be in at dinner time?”

   “Yes Mr Steven.” 

   He didn’t correct her. He liked the mistake, it made him feel superior. He rose to leave and Hoa grabbed his arm.

   “Would you like some tea Mr Steven?”

   “Yes.”

   He looked at the cups, they were the chipped and stained cups from his childhood. He stayed while she made the tea. She sat beside him and told him about Vietnam. She kept grabbing his arm when her story intensified and became ever-more dramatic, the heat, the rain, the scooters, came alive with her simple English words spoken through her Vietnamese accent.

   Her touch sent a jolt up his arm. It was a new sensation, instead of lust, he felt closeness. She had taken him in and looked after him. She even rubbed his shoulder, relaxing his back. He listened to her long monologue, and didn’t touch his tea. He felt a connection between them. 

   She treated him like an Uncle, she did not see her touch as anything other than family familiarity. He felt womanly affection, and he wanted her. But instead of wanting her body, he wanted to be around her, he wanted her tentative touch, her time. These feelings were new to him. He didn’t want to leave. Eventually Hoa ran out of steam and felt the jet-lag begin to catch up with her. 

   “I’ll be over at six tomorrow to fix that boiler,” said Steven.

  “Goodbye Mr Steven.”

   He felt his face blush as she closed the door. 

Steven came over as planned. He turned the switch and the boiler juddered into life. Hoa, masquerading as her sister, had gone out and bought pork belly, prawns, and fresh herbs and veg. She began to cook Ban zeil pancakes. 

   “Will you stay for dinner Mr Steven.”

   “Of course my dear.”

Hoa laid the table with bowls and plates and fish sauce. Steven didn’t like foreign foods. He was a pie and mash man. 

   When Hoa loaded his plate he stared at it with worry. He was like a child. 

   “What is it?”

   “Ban zeil. It’s a Vietnamese special, Mr Steven.”

  He ate it and found it was delicious. He ate with voracity and Hoa dropped another on his plate. She opened a beer and poured it for him. He sat there watching her buttocks as she cooked. Wondering how he would approach the question he desperately wanted to ask. But he buried his desires deep and went back to his food. 

   “What would she want with an old man like me,” he said to himself. And without her knowing it he began to hate her. 

   She saw the change in his eyes when she brought over the third pancake. 

  “I must be going,” he croaked. Hoa understood. Men were very easy to understand. She went over to the radiator and felt the heat. 

   “Thank you Mr Steven.”

   The words calmed him. She came over and hugged him. He felt his body tense up then relax. It was wondrous to feel her and then she let go. He felt a sense of loss. He left. 

For the next week all he thought about was Hoa. He had no reason to visit flat three. He knew he couldn’t just come round unannounced. There were laws in place, you had to give notice to tenants before a visit. And then he stopped himself. He was obsessing over her. He wanted her, but for the first time it was more than lust. He wanted to be with her. 

   Every night he thought about going round and asking her to dinner. Then he stopped himself. He hoped the boiler would fail again just so he had an excuse to see her.

  One night his obsessions kept him awake. He couldn’t stop thinking about her. He kept running over the things he would say. He had money. That was his only strength. He had money. Could he buy her? If he bought her gifts, would she take him on. He kept thinking about her eyes, wanting her. Dreaming about the relationship he never had.   

The next day he ignored his reason and bought a large bunch of red roses. He waited until six and called round.

    Hoa opened the door smiling. 

   “Hello Mr Steven, come in.”

   She saw the flowers and smiled. They were red. She could not put them on her shrine. For red is the colour of passion and went against the flow of the flat. 

  Hoa was flattered and knew instantly what he was after. She thought about it. What would it be like with an old man like Mr Steven? It would solve her problems in the short term. She would get a visa, and she would get the money she needed to send home. But what would it be like with him? He was all roses now but he would want other things from her. 

   She chose to accept the flowers and wait on it. She treated him the same as she had done before. She sat very close to him, touched him as she spoke, and smiled at his awkwardness. He didn’t want to leave. 

   She looked at her watch. Mai was coming home early. Hoa had to get rid of him. She said she was tired and he got up to go. She gave him a quick hug and led him to the door. 

Steven went back up to his flat with a heart full of helium. He couldn’t stop running over the interaction. He tried to work out if it was moving where he wanted it to move, or if she was just being friendly. These young boy feelings were taking over.  

Mai returned home and saw the flowers. 

   “We can’t have red flowers in the flat,” said Mai, “Why did you waste your money?”

    “I didn’t,” said Hoa.

  “Who bought them? I don’t believe it. You’ve been in England for less than a month and some lover-man has bought you flowers. I don’t want men coming here. I can’t lose this flat.”

    “The landlord brought them.”

   “Well, give them back. You are supposed to be me, remember, I can’t have him coming round here, he’ll find out there are two of us and we’ll both be on the street.”

   Hoa hung her head. She felt the shame of her sister pouring over her. Mai was right. But that didn’t stop her feeling shame. Mai had the career; Mai provided for her, Mai was the strong one. She was a disappointment. She’d always felt like a disappointment to her mother.

Steven felt his obsession in his loins, in his heart, and in his mind. He couldn’t stop thinking about Hoa. In the early hours of the morning, when the streets were cold and dead he walked up Kilburn High Road. He ducked into a café as soon as it opened and waited for the Jewellery store to open. He looked down at the swirls in his black coffee willing the time to pass. 

Mai returned from her night-shift. The cold had numbed her burning feet. She hadn’t got a break. Ten hours of the endless hospital night. She had willed herself to get through it. Now a calm sadness filled her eyes. She stared at the clothes hanging damp by the radiator. She saw that Hoa had left the kitchen in a mess. She was hungry, but she knew that if she ate she would not be able to sleep. She put the kettle on and brewed a weak cup of jasmine tea. She washed and prepared to wake her sister up. 

   A knock struck the door. A fearful knotting hit her stomach. She hoped her sister would stay in her bed. 

   Mai opened the door and in walked Steven. He had an even bigger bunch of flowers. He barged his way in. Mai didn’t have the patience to be nice. 

   “The boiler is working well, thanks. Everything is working.”

  Steven looked confused. He’d expected to find Hoa’s welcoming demeanour. Instead, he found himself dismissed before he spoke. She looked identical to Hoa, she wore the same clothes, and spoke with the same accent, but something was different. Mai guided him back through the door. 

   “I bought you this,” said Steven with a small blue box in his hands. 

   “Thank you, I don’t want your presents. If I need you I will call goodbye Mr Porter.”

Steven found himself outside the door. He heard the lock click. Tears formed over his wrinkled eyes. He felt his heart dying slowly with each beat. He took himself up to his flat and closed the door. 

Mai woke Hoa and got into the pre-warmed bed and fell asleep. When Mai rose for work she realised she had overslept. She didn’t have time to tell Hoa about Steven’s gift. She threw on her work clothes straight off the dryer and left for work. 

Hoa spent the day at the temple. She enjoyed speaking her mother-tongue. When she returned to the flat she was sleepy. A lady from the congregation had taken her out for a meal. She wasn’t drunk, but the combination of beer and the English wind had made her drowsy. She slipped into the cold bed and fell asleep. 

Steven had spent the day drinking. He hadn’t eaten anything. He was half rage, half sorrow. His mind rolled around the rejection of the morning. His anger had been a small flickering candle burning in the spine. The more he drank the hotter he got. He was blazing out of control, molten metal white hot rage. He had key to her flat. He had spent the last hour revving up getting ready to confront her. He wanted to know why she changed from the warm welcoming girl from Vietnam; to the cold foreign woman he couldn’t understand. 

   He felt taken advantage of, he felt she had mocked him, led him on, only to crush him like a fly. He staggered up off the worn leather sofa, and took the master keys with him.

   It took him a while to fit the key into the lock. Once inside he stopped. The flat was empty. He saw the pestle inside the mortar. He picked it up. 

   The door to the bedroom didn’t have a lock. 

   He opened the door. Hoa lay peacefully curled up like a cat. 

“FUCKING BITCH”

He left the bedroom. Then he opened the window. It was hot. He was burning with panic. He shook. His head dripped with sweat. He paced up and down the kitchen. He sobered up enough to remember what he had done. 

   He went back into her room. He saw the blood pooling on the pillow. She lay still, there was no movement on her chest. She had stopped breathing. He knew death. He had found his mother cold and motionless on this very floor. He refused to acknowledge what he had done. He shook Hoa’s lifeless body. 

   “Wake up…wake up…for fuck sake wake up.”

Her hair stuck to the pillow with dried blood. “Oh god…oh god…oh fuck…fuck…fuck…fuck. Wake up please wake up.”

   He stared down at her. She was dead. He had killed her. He pulled the blanket over her as if she were still sleeping and left the room. 

   Distraught, feverish and whimpering he curled up on the floor beneath the window and passed out. 

Mai ran over the last few days in her head. The flowers, the gifts, the persistent look in Mr Porter's eyes. She began to worry. It went against everything she had been brought up to think, to ask to leave work early. She had earned respect from her manager for doing so many nightshifts in a row. Her manager had more than she needed and allowed her to leave. 

   A slicing rain storm cut across London, turning the streets into little rivers of fag butts and filth. The rain was cold. It penetrated her cheap little cagoule. She rushed through the rain trying to get back to Hoa. The rain reminded her of Vietnam. This was English rain, it stole the heat from you and left you soggy and forlorn. 

   When she got back to the flat there was a dark funk in the air. She heard the old man’s T.V blurting out news on the first floor. The second floor was quiet. It was never quiet. There was always shouting or babies crying but not this day. She opened the door to her flat. The smell of death was unmistakable. The smell of death entered her body. 

   She shivered. The lights were off and the window was wide open. The sound of the door shutting woke Steven up. He rubbed his eyes and peered through the darkness. 

    The light came on and he saw Mai soaked from the rain. 

    He screamed. 

    Mai walked over. “Why are you here?”

   He screamed uncontrollable words, apologies, in among his thunderous heart, he gasped. Steven saw Mai’s wet hair as if it were wet with blood. Terror flashed over his eyes. He thought he saw Hoa back from the dead. Mai cornered him against the window. 

   “Get away from me…please…I’m sorry…I’m sorry.”

He shuffled back and fell.

   The impact of bone on concrete crunched through the rain, which had turned into sleet. 

Mai screamed out the painful rage and sorrow in one. She found Hoa dead. She ran out of the room. She didn’t know what to do. She was angry, she was broken, she was hurting, falling. The cold empty room closed over her. She saw the master keys left on the table. She wasn’t thinking of anything other than escape. She took herself up to Steven’s apartment. She wanted revenge. She smashed his house to pieces with a meat hammer, unable to quell her rage. A tin filled with gold sovereigns scattered over his marble kitchen floor. She picked them up and pocketed them. She searched every inch of the flat. The action seemed to block out the pain of her loss. 

    She pocketed over a hundred thousand pounds’ worth of gold, and twenty thousand in cash. Then she took her passport, along with her sister's and left. 

   The sleet had turned to snow and started to settle on car roofs and window ledges. The roads turned to black slurry. She went straight to the station, made her connections to Gatwick, paid in cash for a flight back to Vietnam. She held back her tears. They wouldn’t fall. The money wasn’t enough. He was dead. That wasn’t enough. It would never be right. It would never be over. Her twin sister would never rest, her body needed to come back to Vietnam. 

    Mai would send her brothers.

   She left England with a sickness in her guts. She wanted her family. She wanted to rest. Her plane rose with jet power and she was gone.