Koba
Koba was old and not very handsome. He wore a dark leather coat that would have been expensive, had it not been so tattered. Underneath, his spine was fine and curved. I often heard him wheezing outside my window. Peeking through the blinds, I could see his morning breath, smoky in the cold air. I even caught him looking in my garbage bins. Whenever we passed each other on the street, he pretended not to know me even though he did; he had seen through my translucent green bags and into my recycled routine of empty wrappers, medicine boxes and packs of extra-absorbent winged pads.
One day, he asked if he could sit in my front garden. I said no, but offered him some food. He stepped inside to share the warmth of my heater and as he ate the spoonfuls of chicken and cold gravy, I couldn’t help but stare at his hair. It was black but curly copper at the ends. There were many knots and leaves stuck between the strands. It bothered me that it was so dirty, so I took the liberty of brushing it. Confused and perhaps even a little scared, Koba stopped eating and sat very still while I combed out the knots. Without thinking, I began to smooth his scalp. The skin was crusty there, full of bloody clots, but I didn’t care. I washed my hands after.
‘Don’t you have any family?’ I asked him.
‘They kicked me out.’ His breath was a sewer.
‘What did you do to deserve that?’
He grunted.
I found him sleeping by the laurel tree every morning after that day. Within weeks, the ground where he lay had sunk into a cot of mud and folded grass. I assumed he was preparing his dying nest, that I would find him lying in the same spot one morning and fail to notice he was already stiff. Instead, he simply stopped coming. Like a feeling, I can’t remember when his absence began; I only knew it was absence when the absence was so long as to be noteworthy.
Whenever I smell rotten meat, I think of him.
Months have passed and the space by the laurel tree is still empty, still deep. It is a cup, ready to be filled.
Derwen Morfayel is a writer based in Wales with a degree in Creative Writing. Her recent work appears in issues #4 of literary magazines Severine and Shooter. Follow her on Twitter @DerwenMorfayel and visit her blog: www.derwenmorfayel.com.