The ride through a zone of shabby warehouses and dilapidated slums – I suspect the old East Berlin – hints that the clinic will be highly insalubrious. But even this scuzzy approach has failed to give myself and obviously Euan, mouth agape with incredulity, an impression of the teeming squalor that greets us.
We’ve alighted into the car park of a three-storey disused building, its ground-floor windows smashed and boarded. Mikey, his leather manbag swinging, nods at a battered aluminium entryphone box. I press practically all its buttons before it yields a tepid buzz allowing me to shoulder open the heavy door and gain admittance. Inside, it’s almost pitch black. I bang my shins on something, and my eyes adjust to reveal a commode with the top of a packing case over the shitter. I look to Mikey who flashes sheepish confirmation that this forms the ‘wheelchair’ he contended would be available at this ‘hospital’. At his request Spud sits in it, and Mikey pushes him slowly down the empty, ghostly corridor. As we traverse it, our shoes crunch on broken glass. I wish I had a torch; the barricaded windows permit only meagre light to shoot through the spaces between the edges of the wall and the wooden panels. The building is institutional, probably an old school or insane asylum. Under his breath, Euan spraffs some gibbering nonsense. The impact is like Dick Dastardly’s sidekick, Mutley, trying tae recite Muriel Spark’s The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie.
We get into a goods lift smelling of stagnant urine, the sort formed by cheap, acidic alcohol. Even a minger like Spud is sensing this is not kosher. — This isnae a hoaspital… he plaintively whimpers as the elevator creaks upwards before coming to a sudden, jaw-rattling halt on the second floor. We walk down another long, dark, unlit corridor. The windows at this level remain largely unbroken, but are so filthy that the only light shoots through in beams from the odd breached pane. Mikey delves into his bag, producing a large T-shaped key, opening up a battered, reinforced steel door that reminds me ay Seeker’s old skag base in that top-floor tenement in Albert Street. We step intae a dirty and dingy room with a floor of cracked tiles that looks like an old industrial kitchen, except that it contains two metal-framed hospital beds. In one of them lies a fat Middle Eastern-looking man in a filthy vest, sitting bolt upright as we enter. He seems both vaguely annoyed and guilty, and I suspect we’ve interrupted a masturbation session. Then he breaks into a big smile. — I have company… he chuckles, waving his big hands at us. — I am Youssef! From Turkey.
Mikey and I introduce ourselves to the Ottoman, obviously, by his dark, circled eyes, another patient of sorts, as Euan’s neck twists and his lamps swivel around in horror. — This is outrageous. The place is insanitary… it’s… it’s more like a medieval torture chamber than an operating theatre, he gasps, — I can’t work under these conditions!
— Have tae, Doc, or the patient is history, I say, saluting the Youssef gadgie.
— Just git that shite oot ay me, a bug-eyed Spud flaps, climbing out of the commode, lying out on the second bed as he removes his clothes down to his underpants. — Now!
— See, I challenge Euan. — Danny Murphy. Balls the fucking size of Leith. Now you, step the fuck up!
— I… I can’t… Euan pleads, looking fae me tae Mikey.
— You… you call yirsel a medical man, likes? What sort ay doaktir are you? Spud barks, then winces in pain.
— I’m a podiatric surgeon.
— A what? Spud sits up.
— A foot doctor, if you will, Euan says meekly.
— What?! Spud looks at me. — You’ve goat a fit doaktir operating oan me? Oan a bag ay skag in ma gut?
— Aye, Spud, but dinnae worry, I pick the skin around my nails, — Euan put it in, so he can get it back oot, I try to reassure him. I need snout badly. — Right, Euan, get Danny boy under the anaesthetic.
— I’m not an anaesthetist, Euan snaps indignantly. — It’s a highly skilled and specialist profession! They said there would be one here!
— I am the anaesthetist, Youssef smiles, and rises, heading tae the sink, washing his hands, then splashing some water on his face, and putting on a gown and mask, a selection of which hang fae a rack. — Shall we begin?
Euan turns to me. — We can’t… I can’t…
My brother-in-law is getting on my fucking nerves. — Options. Gies yin. Dinnae just say ‘we can’t’ like a fuckin fanny. I turn to the rest of them. — One thing that gets on my tits in life is cunts that just go tae fucking pieces under pressure. Yes, we’re in the shit. I suggest we work together to get the fuck out of it!
Euan eats that one up. Glancing at Spud, he goes to the surgical gowns. As he, Mikey and I robe and mask up, Youssef starts tae administer Spud the anaesthetic. — It will be all good, my friend, his big, dark eyes laugh over the top ay the mask.
He’s the only cunt here giving me confidence. — This is a fucking man, I shout, looking at Euan and Mikey. — Act like men!
Mikey starts to light up a fag.
— Are you crazy? Euan gasps.
Mikey looks at him in seething rage for a second, then ceases his activity, as Spud turns tae me in panic and grabs my gown, drawing me close. — Promise me one thing… if ah dinnae make it, you’ll look eftir Toto.
That’ll be right. — That fuckin mutt got us intae this mess in the first place. Mair than you. Mair than any cunt!
— Promise, Spud urges in fear as he slumps intae the pillow and his eyes roll intae the back ay his heid before shutting. As he slips under, I say in soothing tones, — Aye… then add a crisp, — right. The torment is still etched on his face, as he drifts off into deep sleep.
Now that he’s unconscious, Mikey gets the fags out.
— But – Euan starts.
— Crash the ash, Mikey.
— Only one left. He flashes the packet with the solitary cancer stick.
— Fuck. I suck it down, contemplating the others. — The biggest problem is that we haven’t told him exactly what Syme is making us do…
— This is absolutely crazy! Euan suddenly bellows at the ceiling.
That fucker is losing it. And now is not the time. — Your fanny-curious Wee Free proddy bell-end set this mess up, ya Calvinist cunt. I shake my brother-in-law by the shoulders. – Don’t fucking wimp out on us now!
Euan breaks my grip and pushes me away. — I’m not a fucking kidney surgeon! Can’t you get that through your head?
This cunt needs tae calm the fuck down. — The principles of surgery are generic. I lower my voice to a hush, pulling the laptop from Mikey’s bag. — We have a good YouTube video on the subject. I watch Euan’s face crumple further in disbelief. — Backup, likes.
— A YouTube video?! Are you kidding?
— Do not worry, my friend, Youssef smiles, — I am not really an anaesthetist either!
As desperate as it is, I feel a snigger rupture uncontrollably from me at that one.
— What…? Euan gasps.
— Well, I anaesthetised animals, in Baskent slaughterhouse back in Ankara. A place of the very highest standards. It is the same principle, just a different dosage. Enough to put them to sleep a little, but not enough for good! I have done those operations before many times and never lost anybody yet!
I haven’t a clue whether this cunt is joking or not, but he seems tae ken what the fuck he’s daein. Well, Spud looks like he’s kipping, rather than being broon breid. Mikey has the laptop fired up, and the video is on, and we’re quickly going through it on fast-forward. — I’m hoping this is ringing some fucking medical student bells, I snap at Euan.