— Trees… I’m pleading now, — Terry…
Then she only goes and puts the farking blower down on me!
I dial her number again but it’s only the flamin voicemail, — Neither Teresa nor Emily…
— Farking cow, I spit and head downstairs to the bar. Knockout blow to Hardwick, Baker left KO’d on the canvas. It don’t bare thinking about. I pour myself a double Scotch. Cynth’s in and she’s watching me. — Bit early, isn’t it?
— Been a funny old morning, I tell her, heading down to the cellar, leaving her standing there, hands on hips like a big, shapely vase. It’s always nice and cool down here, just the place to go when you wanna charge the old calmness and serenity batteries. Suddenly, I hear a rustling sound and I see a big furry rat; long-haired cunt, marching across the floor. He vanishes behind a stack of beer on pallets. I pick up the brush. Then I hear the tinkle on the mobile: another flaming text message coming in. Bleedin hell, it’s only from Seph, this farking hairy little Greek gel I was nailing last summer. Telling me that she’s only here on Friday for two weeks. How farking complicated can life get?
Old Roland seems to have scarpered. So down here in the cellar I’m taking stock of my life. It’s all here in the barrels and the stacked pallets of bottles: piss. My assets all converted into a supply of alcohol to sell for profit. Disinhibition, good times and hope; that’s what I peddle. How many birds have I nailed through them over-imbibing that most glorious of drugs? Too many to count.
I shake off my thoughts and get upstairs. Cynth comes over and sidles up to me. I know by her look what she’s got on her mind and she opens her mouth to confirm that I ain’t wrong. — When we gonna see each other then?
— Tonight round mine. Eleven forty-five, I say, but it comes out all wrong, as I ain’t making much eye contact, I’m warily checking the bar for strangers.
Nothing will alienate skirt quicker than your distraction. You gotta at least provide the illusion of the old undivided. — Anything wrong? she asks.
— Nah… well, yeah, I come clean. My gut’s still blistering from that phone call with Trees, even if Seph’s text just proved that you just have to tough out the bad till the good comes round the corner, which it always does. Didn’t take very long in this case. I should be chuffed, but there are practical affairs to put right. — The ex is only sending the bleedin kid over tomorrow, ain’t she. I mean, what am I gonna do with a young teenage gel here? I look around the boozer, then nod upstairs. — You know the flat, it’s tiny.
Cynth rolls down her bottom lip. — You got a spare room.
— Yeah, but it ain’t got no bed and it’s got all my gear in it.
— I’ve got a fold-down bed; you can have that. When I come up to yours later we’ll go through your stuff and sort it out, she cheerfully volunteers. — How old is she?
Good sort, Cynth. I’m looking at those stiff red lips of hers and she’s got me all ears now. — Thirteen. Going through the narky little cow stage by all accounts.
— And she’s gonna be here most of the school holidays?
— The ex ain’t said but I believe that to be the case, yes.
Cynth seems to think about that one. She never had no kids but I think she always wanted them. No luck with the geezers though; told me once that her first fellah was a cunt, a proper tightwad, who didn’t want no breadsnapper around. Number 2’s been shooting blanks for years and is now any roads settled into a golfing life. She seems too bleedin keen on the idea of Em being here though. But it don’t half get ya thinking; if these two hit it off, it gives me a bit of time to be indulging in some extra-curricular activity with a certain young lady from Greece.
Interesting gel, young Seph. We met the other winter when she was over here. To be honest, a bird with a tash don’t do nuffink for me, but after a few Jack Daniel’s she could have been farking Taliban for all I cared. Bottled her up a few times last summer, then again in November over there when Chels was at Olympiakos in the Champions League. Made some of the geezers pretty green that day, swanning round Athens with a young thing like that on me arm, tash or no bleedin tash. Lovely long black hair; all the way down to her arse. Even them big Nana Mouskouri glasses couldn’t keep the old fellah down. In fact, you get to a certain age and that thing starts to appeal. That’s what happens when you’ve watched too many stag vids and seen too many facials.
I might suggest a waxing.
— Penny for em? Cynth asks, and I’m looking at that great expanse of doughy gut between the bottom of her top and the top of her shorts. Plenty of the old cellulite in the mix, but it’s funny how it don’t look half as bad on tanned skin.
I pinch a fold of belly lightly between forefinger and thumb. — I do believe that you are losing weight, gel, I tell her.
She puts her hands on her hips and does a little swivel, giving herself the once-over in the bar mirror. — You really think so?
— I believe that to be the case.
— It ain’t what the scales say, she goes, spinning round and looking at that fat arse. Rodj sees this from the bar of the public, raises his brow and gets back over to pulling pints for two old geezers that’ve come in with their wives. Looks very guilty n all. I’m wondering whether he and Bert have had words.
— Bathroom scales, I scoff. — Always bleedin farked, ain’t they. Can’t rely on em, can ya, I tell her, taking a slice of pizza from the glass display case and sticking it into the microwave. — You need fattening up, you do.
— You’re so sweet, Mikey. You know, when I was with Ben I was never good enough for him. He always used to moan about my weight… and Thomas, he doesn’t even see me as a woman…
I move over and pin her against the bar. — Some geezers don’t know when they’re on a good thing. I tug down the zip of her shorts and slip my hands in and start touching her bush lightly.
— Michael…
— You’re a naughty gel. No knickers, I say, thinking, bleedin hell, no prizes for guessing what she was after all along!
— Stop, Michael, somebody might come, she gasps as I pull up her top to expose those big tits, flopping away without a bleedin bra in sight.
— I believe that to be the case, I murmur, as she pulls the top back down before Rodj comes round.
3.
EM
WAITING AROUND AT the airport the next day, I feel well farked. Fucking armies of holidaymakers; old cahnts in the mood for winter sun for the old bones, sly-looking husbands ready to team up with like minds and bodyswerve their miserable fat cows and screaming kids, and young uns and some not so young on the hunt for a good drink and a rattling opportunity.
After cleaning out my gaff the other night, Cynth and I nailed another couple of bottles of red and then did some tequila slammers. Farking suicide mission. Any roads, I humped her a couple of times then cooked up some steak, onions, mushrooms and McCain’s oven chips, the low-fat ones.
Got up the next day still drunk and left a decidedly sheepish Rodj running the show. — Gonna be a recurrent theme, mate, I tell him. — I’ll have to be leanin on ya a bit. All hands on deck.
— Yeah, well, I know you wanna spend time with Em. Don’t worry about it, he says.
— You, sir, are a gentleman and a scholar.
Poor Rodj. Don’t think he’s even had the satisfaction of properly nailing Marce but he’s certainly got someone on the warpath! Apparently Bert’s been spotted in various boozers making threats about a certain party! Smarmy git though he might well be, what the likes of Rodj forget is the adage about the construction of omelettes requiring certain eggs getting well smashed. And when things start getting cracked, that’s when his sort start getting nervy.