The Yesterday People
Peter J. Coles
Those bastards yesterday, have left us with the washing up. Stacks of it in the sink, festering in stinking water they’d put it in to soak. Another pile on the counter, streaks of tomato sauce smeared and hardened across plates, bowls stained with glued down bits of fat. They knew when they left it all here it would be up to us to clean. To deal with their mess. They even joked about it, him and her, as they threw their plates and cutlery into the sink, saying it was for our future selves to worry about. Us. We resent them as much as we envy them for how they get to decide our fate.
Those bastards yesterday, have left us without pants to wear. Both our underwear drawers emptied in unison as though it was planned. They knew this would happen to us just as they leave the washing up for us to do. They knew it the moment they took the last clean pairs and put them on, snug in the knowledge that it would be us who had to struggle through a day of work wearing their grubby garments until the evening, when we would have to wait for the two-hour cycle to finish in the laundrette before we could even go home to hang them to dry and sleep. Why do they not care for us?
Those bastards yesterday, forgot to call mum. She rang today in floods of tears asking why we had forgotten. It fell to us to console her, to scramble to get flowers delivered within the hour, costing more than we had. How could they have not remembered? It was written in every calendar. Right there on the fridge door. But no, they are selfish people. Ignorant of what they do to us.
Those bastards yesterday, have left us in the dark. The meter clicked over and all the lights blinked out. The empty fridge’s gentle hum coughing into silence. The TV cut dead in the middle of our favourite show – their favourite show. But they’ll be able to see how it ends, when we sort out the debt they have left us in. It’ll be up to us to scrounge the money from mum and it’ll be us who have to witness the disappointment on her face. How cruel they are to put this on us. How can we possibly live with them?
Those bastards yesterday, allowed strangers into our home. Strangers they’d met only that night at the pub and who they knew had no respect for us and how we live our lives. They let them in anyway. Those strangers drank until they vomited across our floors, smoked in all our rooms leaving a mucky sheen over everything. They boomed music through our walls so loud in the early hours that the council had to chastise us in front of the whole street. But even that did not stop them and still they ravaged our house and our belongings and our bodies until the police flashed their blue lights through our living room window and dragged the strangers from our home. Now our home is not a home but a trash heap, a disaster site, and we are on our hands and knees scrubbing the blood and bile from our carpets, the smell so acrid it burns in our throats. Those bastards have gone too far.
Those bastards yesterday, have left a bitterness between us. Another night in the dark and chips for dinner by torchlight as they’ve burnt all the candles down to nubs. The perpetual gloom and worry stripped their nerves until the smallest comment about not wearing shoes in the living room blazed into a violent row. They stormed into separate rooms and threw whatever came to hand at the door the other slammed shut. They dug around in the oldest wounds and used what they found to hurt each other. They screamed so loud the neighbours banged fists on the adjoining walls. But then, in a moment of clarity, apologies and shows of love as violent as the anger. Their bodies wrapped tight together collapsing to the hallway, bathroom, kitchen floor, forcing their adoration upon one another. In the afterglow, they were cold and alone and slept in different rooms. Now we don’t know what to do with ourselves. We keep our distance and mutter to each other, so much anger brimming in our mouths like excess saliva but not enough energy to spit it out. They have left us wrung dry.
Those bastards yesterday, didn’t put the bins out. They got enraptured with a box set they watched in bed, snuggled in each other’s arms. Episode after episode until they both fell asleep. We’ll get to see how it ends, that’s something at least. But the bins are overflowing and we can only blame them. We drag them outside to the bottom of the garden and find last week’s too. Every day they make us more ashamed of ourselves.
Those bastards yesterday, got to feel all the joy of the news while we have to suffer its consequence. A baby. They were so pleased with themselves and babbled into the night about all the names they could give it, what they’d like to it to become, how they are going to raise it better than their parents raised them. Not once did they stop to think about the practicalities, of how they’re going to afford it, if they should bring a child into a dark and grubby home. Whether they’re even capable of being parents! No, all that is left to us, to pour over our money, to fear the mould that creeps over our ceiling will get into the baby’s delicate lungs. They didn’t stop to consider the possibility that our child will be damaged in some way from the life we live. We are not dancing around the house like they were. We are weeping at the kitchen table.
Those bastards yesterday, missed their first appointment. How could they? There’s no excuse. None. They should’ve left work on time and checked that the buses were running. They should have planned in advance and they should have had the gall to call the hospital and apologise instead of cowering at home and pretending like it didn’t matter. It was us who had to listen to the stern disappointment in the voice of the midwife. It was up to us to make excuses and lie for them to a woman who was only trying to help us. They debase us every day. We despise them.
The yesterday people spent the meter money on pictures of the 12-week ultrasound. The image of our baby is affixed to the black screen of the TV, illuminated by torches. We’re in the dark and we’re eating chips again, but they made the right choice.
Those bastards yesterday, got into a fight at the hospital. Her and another pregnant woman wailing at each other while he and the other husband tried to pull them apart. She swore the other woman had said something about their clothes, that they were filthy, that people like them shouldn’t be having children. The other woman denied it, but she was having none of it and launched herself at the woman. When he and the other man had got them apart the women had to go to triage for an examination, hook the bumps up to monitors to check the babies. When it was all over and the babies were fine, they tried to apologise, blamed it on the hormones but the other couple would not see them, said they were going to charge them with assault. Why do they do this to us? Why can they not just keep their heads down and never raise them again? We should lock the doors and never let them out of the house.
Those bastards yesterday, forgot to take a picture of the bump. They know to take one every day to chart the progress but they forgot. Now there is a day missing. A whole day lost. Their failures never end.
Those bastards yesterday, what have they done? Today she is bleeding because they couldn’t just stay home. They decided to go to the pub to see friends and stayed until closing. They didn’t drink, thank God, but it was the noise of the pub, its roaring clatter that shook the baby, and her screaming with laughter at all his old jokes. It was getting up to dance and being jostled in the crowd. We need to get out of the house, they told each other. It’s good to be out, they convinced themselves. It is us now who have to once again deal with their selfish actions. Sitting in the triage, waiting in fear for someone to tell us what’s wrong.
Who are they, those tomorrow people, to judge us so harshly? How dare they condemn us for every little thing we do. They need our failures to learn from. Our pain is their joy. The bleeding was normal. The relief of dancing was like pushing the tomorrow people out of ourselves and being free of them for one night. Let’s not forgot that it’s them who get to hold our child for the first time, not us. We will be forever waiting, stuck in the present, as she becomes more uncomfortable, pacing through the dark rooms, with him following behind unable to help. It is them who’ll watch the baby born, who’ll hold them first, to decide on their name. Watch them open their eyes. Those tomorrow people are the true inheritors of our many days. The good and the bad.
Enjoy it – they should thank us for getting them here.
We speak quietly in the present as we make up the nursery. We get lost trying to put the crib together and we paint the walls, her sitting in a chair and him up a ladder. We make a list of things that need to go in the hospital bag and then decide not to wait and just to pack it now. We get ourselves prepared and hope it’s enough for the tomorrow people.
The yesterday people brought our girl into the world. They made parents of us. We can hardly remember the pain she went through to birth our child. All his worry seems to have faded now. We just stare into the baby’s milky grey eyes and hold each other and hold the yesterday people of all the previous days. We all hold each other and let out a sigh of relief.
Peter J. Coles was shortlisted for the Wasafiri New Writing Prize 2018, is the Managing Editor of the literary magazine The Mechanics’ Institute Review and an awardee of Spread the Word’s London Writers Awards 2019/2020. You can find him @peafield on Twitter.
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