Tea with Shem

I met him first in Regent's park, late September. I was sitting by
the old aviary, the one that you can see from the road, with the holes
in the netting. As usual, birds were flying in and out, and I was
enjoying the play of those that inadvertently put themselves on
display, then struggle to get out. I like to imagine exotic macaws and
suchlike swooping down from the grey London sky and trapping themselves
amongst the sparrows and blackbirds. Things like that could happen
there, London's like that sometimes.

He sat down beside me, and I admit I did a sort of double-take; you
know, the casual look you give someone because they've just sat next to
you, followed by the kind of suspicious glance you take you give when
that person is, well, odd.

My first impression was that he must be homeless; his shirt and
trousers appeared to be made of sack cloth, and the soles of his boots
looked distinctly detached from the toe-caps. Flicking his greasy black
hair from his face he turned to me, and spoke.
'Faye&;#8230;' he began, as if initiating a conversation with an old
friend.
I decided to skip on the obvious 'hows' and 'whos' and bear with him
for a moment. I definitely hadn't seen him anywhere before.
'Faye,' he continued, in his slightly croaky voice, 'are things, erm,
alright with you?'

I could only assume he did no me somehow, perhaps some drunken
after-hours event, and so I replied as tersely as possible that I was
fine.
'Oh, good. Great,' he replied without enthusiasm, 'well, I just wanted
to introduce myself, and to say, well, if you ever need
anything&;#8230;.'

The last part actually seemed quite genuine, if a little embarrassed.
I found myself thinking out loud.
'Introduce yourself?' I asked.
'Oh, er&;#8230;' he looked as though he should be blushing, although
his skin remained strangely ashen, 'Shem. I'm Shem. Like I said, I'm,
you know, here to help. I'm your, well, I suppose you'd say, guardian
angel.'

I replied rather unconvincingly that that was nice.

He gave a shy, untidy smile, and stood up to leave. I looked away in
order not to engage him in any further conversation, but couldn't help
sneaking a glance after him a moment later. But he was gone; not just
'walked away' gone, but majorly, 'vanished-into-thin-air' gone. A crow
circled overhead, landing on top of the aviary, scrupulously avoiding
any holes.

I'd pretty much forgotten the whole Shem deal when he reappeared a few
weeks later. Things were definitely not alright then; computer was
buggered, deadline missed, editor biting my head off, mother phoning
repeatedly, fridge broken down, nothing on telly.

I was scraping the remains of dinner around the plate when the
doorbell rang. Shem was leaning in the doorway trying to look smaller
than he was, which was pretty tall. He was still dressed in the
sack-like ensemble, and had rather the look of a derelict about him.
Funnily enough, I wasn't afraid at all, in fact, I was rather
glad.
'Things are in a bit of a state, aren't they?' he said
sympathetically.
I told him that that was putting it mildly, and some mad instinct
caused me to invite him in. It was raining outside, and he was carrying
nothing, but I noticed that he wasn't wet. I couldn't imagine him in a
car somehow.

I asked jokingly if he was there to 'guard' me.
'You could say that,' he replied, 'I thought you could do with some
company.'
I told him that this didn't seem to be quite angelic-intervention
territory, and realised that all the same it was nice to have someone
caring about your situation, even if it was an some weird old guy you'd
met in a park a few weeks ago. Then I took a look at him, and realised
that he wasn't old, but he wasn't young either; one of those ambiguous,
sallow sorts of faces.

He began to fix a cup of tea, getting everything out of the right
cupboard or draw. You have no idea how weird it is to see a stranger
knowing his way around your kitchen. This was the first thing that
really got me believing him; it was quite eerie, I kid you not. As his
back was turned to me, I noticed two slits cut in the back of his baggy
shirt, and a crow's feather tangled into his hair.

We had a conversation over the tea that was both the most normal and
most strange one I'd ever taken part in. The topics of conversation
were entirely standard; weather, news, politics etc, but nothing about
each other. He seemed to take everything about me as said, and I didn't
really want to ask him about himself, seeing as whatever the truth was,
it was not something that I was in any state to take in.

Eventually, I spat it out and asked him where he lived.
'22nd floor, Princes Lodge.'
Princes Lodge was the typically inappropriate name of one of the
council blocks about ten minutes from my place. I told him that this
didn't seem particularly heavenly.
'Well its not so much to do with heaven&;#8230;' he began, then
trailed off, 'sorry, can't really go into it, professional reasons. At
any rate, it does for me, more convenient than my last place.'

The sun was beginning to peek from behind the clouds, lighting the
street with the slimy sheen of rain, and everything seemed strangely
calm all of a sudden. My guardian angel sat spreading Marmite on some
burnt toast.
'Prefer my toast a bit black.' he offered, as though I had asked him a
question.

We went into the lounge, following my confession of a weakness for
those telly programmes about cute injured animals, and watched one. It
was a bit embarrassing to sit through it with someone there; I couldn't
help letting out periodical 'aaahs' and the like. And here I was
thinking I was an embittered hack to the world. Shem nibbled at his
toast like a bird at crumbs.

I told Shem that I had an appointment to keep at six, and he pulled an
antique-looking silver fob watch from his back pocket.
'I'd best be off, then.' he said.
I thanked him for his time, and wondered if this was the sort of thing
that he spent it doing. In its way, it's the kindest thing you could
imagine.

After he left, I went back into the kitchen, and heard the fridge
splutter noisily back into life.