Howard's post-disco hike from the Indian takeaway
back to Napoleon Terrace seemed as transient
as a sting. Beer made an eclectic taxi substitute,
compressing the miles to a mite, and the minutes
to a moment. The booze plucked him from the
bitter cold into a warm bath. Next thing he
knew, he turned the key in the beaten blue door.
The house appeared to be empty. Perhaps Marlon
was in his room, but who cared? He fished a
plate from the primordial ooze-filled sink,
washed off all but the most stubborn grease,
and was soon attacking his joyless takeaway.
The front door burst open.
'Oh Yessss!' babbled Karen. 'He, like, sang
to me!'
'Ohhhhhhh that's soooo
sweet!' laughed
Gallie.
'Actually it
is! And he's really intellectual
too! You what he sang to me? He was like, "
We're
two little pigs; Shake it all about; Jiggling
and wriggling; and tickling your snout"!'
Gallie giggled.
'Then he sang something about fucking them,'
yammered Karen, 'it was soooo clever! I think
that he's a nice lad, you know, the sort of
lad your mum would like as a son-in-law. Actually
he lacks that certain
something which
I really require in a fella, d'you know what
I mean? Actually, he's got nothing on my Steve!
No one could ever be absolutely cooler, or more
sensitive or hipper than
my man, we really
love each other! Steve's a completely fab, kind,
sensitive and caring hunk - bless him!
'Oh, like, hi ya Howard! Where's that larger
lout beast Greg? What completely tarty cow of
a disgrace to feminism is he fucking this time?
Hope he really fucks her brains out, the bitch!
Fucking serves her right! Any whore that goes
with Greg hasn't
got any brains, right?
Like, all women absolutely deserve better than
that! I've never disrespected any woman - well,
OK, apart from Maggie Thatcher - but that doesn't
count! Don't get me wrong - I'm not a man hater!
I'd never - ever - disrespect men like Greg
disrespects women. Actually, having said that,
actually, I don't have any respect for the likes
of Greg, like. And Greg's a completely typical
bloke!'
'Ohhh,' said Gallie, 'Greg was with a really
nice-looking girl last time I saw him. Anybody
for a nice, hot cup of coffee?'
Gallie's question drew affirmative vociferations.
She sighed; dutifully lit the gas stove; filled
a saucepan with water; placed it over the incandescent
flames; retrieved three mugs from the lounge;
washed them and spooned in alarming quantities
of brown granules. The three students then
alighted to the lounge.
'Ciggie, anyone?' Gallie said, dipping into
her handbag and enucleating low tar cigarettes
and a disposable lighter. Again her offer was
unanimously accepted.
'Ohhh, I didn't know you smoked, Howie,' said
Gallie, brandishing the lighter.
'Well I've started!' grunted Howard.
Karen lit up. 'Actually, I don't usually smoke
heavily, maybe five or six a day, but I smoke
over twenty on stressful days. Actually, nearly
every day has been stressful since I started
smoking. But I, like, need it to calm my nerves,
you see. I definitely think stress can be more
harmful than the effects of the smoke so it
balances out neatly really. I think folk never
think of that but it's absolutely true, though
I
do worry about it ruining my looks,
my breath and my health. Which would be a complete
shame. And I definitely can't afford it. Anyway
I could give up anytime I wanted to, actually,
but I enjoy smoking, its one of life's few pleasures.
So there! But I don't wake up in the morning
gasping for a fag like
some folks I know.'
Karen glared at Gallie, whose eyes dropped guiltily.
'I think that's a sign of
real addiction,
actually,' continued Karen. She paused to take
a drag on her cigarette. 'Not that I don't
like a ciggie first thing myself. I won't lie!
But I'm hardly gasping for it! Folk like Gallie
are addicted and have really yellow fingers
and teeth from the staining effects of the nicotine
and they tend to get out of breath running for
a bus and start panting and coughing, like,
really bad. But I think some folk are more
likely to get addicted because of, you know,
their genes. If you've got funny chromosomes
you are more likely to become hooked on nicotine,
or any other drug for that matter. Its just
as well
my chromosomes are, you know,
completely normal!'
The slack jawed frowns of Howard and Gallie
didn't deter Karen. She pressed on with her
lecture, snug in her self-toasting arguments.
'Actually, my friend from school, one of my
many friends from school who keep in touch with
me, anyway, she used to smoke like a chimney
and drink like a fish and I'm pretty sure her
chromosomes are an absolutely real mess. Her
dress sense was, you know, absolutely appalling.
Most of my friends are trendy, but she was brought
up in a working class neighbourhood. Completely
the wrong side of the tracks. Not that that
matters, not to me anyway. Many of my
fringe friends come from working class backgrounds
and they are super people, perfectly normal,
know what I'm saying? Where was I? Ah yes, if
Steve was working class I would
still
go out with him, although maybe our sex life
wouldn't be quite as fantastic. I really miss
him. He's, like, cute as a button and clever
too. And nice. And he's god's gift to women!
Well to me, anyway, who gives a shit about other
women?'
Howard rolled his eyes. Gallie met his eyes
and tried not to smile but couldn't help it.
'Actually,
what's the joke?' compulsed
Karen.
'Ohhhh nothing. I'll make some more coffee,'
said Gallie, silently scuttling off to the kitchen.
Karen folded her arms and eyed Howard disapprovingly.
Karen was the least of his troubles. He was
preoccupied with the nursing of his ego; it
had suffered gruesomely at the shredding tongue
of the disco girls.
He had failed to chat up the chicks.
He'd been off-form, he castigated himself.
"
You're a creep aren't you?"
his prospective girl had chided. The shark-eyed
witch! He winced. It was bayonet bitter.
Gallie returned with a tray framing three mugs
and a bowl of white sugar.
'Hey, anything the matter, Howard, dear?' she
asked, her voice raised in medicinal concern.
Howard didn't know his face had such an infernal
tendency to betray his emotions. He noticed
that Karen too was staring at him with curiosity.
'Oh,' he muttered, 'some mirthless bitch called
me a - gave me some hassle.'
'Gosh! At the disco?' said Gallie, sounding
affected, even grieved.
He was touched by her attentiveness. Those
searching eyes radiated compassion. It tickled
him how intense she had become. He grinned.
'Yes, some snotty bitch, but I don't know why
I let it get to me. The beer's made me soft.
Hey, I was watching you and Karen boogying.
You were OK!' he said, his voice became tremulous
with the effort to simulate a lighter mood.
He turned and gestured at Karen's extrovert
apparel. 'Nice outfit! It blended in sound
with the disco lights.'
'Yeah, I looked-' Karen was interrupted.
'Hey, Howie,
don't change the subject!'
said Gallie intensely.
'But I
want to,' he said, pathetically
'So aren't you going to tell us all about this
girl then? Did you dance with her?'
Howard was beginning to discern Gallie's insatiable
appetite for intelligence on relationships,
whether they were steady, fizzling out or even
failed to ignite in the first place. Nature
knows no abhorrence like a woman vacuous of
gossip.
'No I didn't,' he snapped, 'and I wouldn't if
she paid me, the loathsome wench.'
'Why, what did she do or say?'
'She said that Gallie is worse than my mother
when it comes to sticking her nose into other
people's affairs.'
'Ohhhh Howard,' Gallie said softly and self-reproachfully,
'I
know I'm nosey! Its just that I'm
interested in you, you know, you
are
our new housemate after all!'
'Yeah, well,' he sighed, 'I guess it's not my
night. I'm not up to my usual pulling form.
You two were dazzling tonight, so why are
you
back without fellas then?'
'Because,' said Karen, 'they're all a bunch
of total wimps and, anyway, I'm much too good
for them! Actually one or two were definitely
luscious. Actually, if I weren't going out
with Steve I would definitely have gone for
one this one lad. But I don't think he was interested
in me. I think he was gay. But anyway, I'm
loyal to Steve, so I don't harbour any disloyal
thoughts. Friday nights are when we go out
with our respective mates. Saturdays are, you
know, when we go out together - it's our special
me and Steve night. Actually, he's popping
round tomorrow. Just think, you'll have the
privilege to meet him!'
'Can't wait. How about you, Gallie, were the
lads not up to your standard either?' said Howard,
miserably.
'Ahhh, well, Mr Right didn't show up tonight.
Or even a
Mr. Not Quite Right But He's Got
A Nice Body And Will Take Me.'
'Actually, what Gallie means,' conjectured Karen,
'is she's after a
Mr. Hey Look At The Huge
Bulge In My Trousers, lets Go Back To My Place
For Some "Coffee".'
'Hmmm. Right now I think the coffee bit would
clinch it for me,' said Gallie heading for the
kitchen to replenish the mugs.
'Where's Donovan Hall, do you know?' asked Howard.
'
Yes of course I do, actually! Why?'
said Karen.
'Just wondered. There's this girl who lives
there.'
'Really, a Girl?'
'Yeah, she's on my course and lent me her astronomy
notes and she wants them back, tomorrow.'
'Oh OK. You can't miss it. It's a totally huge
place with loads of windows with lilac window
frames.'
Howard scratched his head as Karen gave directions.
Gallie returned to the room.
'Ah, looks like maybe Greg's spending the night
at that girl's house.'
'She must be desperate, I don't know
how
women fall for his bullshit!' said Karen. 'Got
any ciggies left Gallie? I, like, can't believe
I'm out already!'
***
*****
***
Howard writhed with panic as consciousness extinguished
his dream. He had dreamt that he had visited
Donovan Hall of Student Residence. He had imagined
it as a purple skyscraper. He knocked on the
front door. Even though this was a mighty tower
block, the front door resembled the ones in
Napoleon Terrace. Kylie Minogue ushered him
inside. He went into the hallway. Next moment,
in the dream, he was with Gallie and they were
now on the roof of this towering building.
She watched him play a fruit machine and laughed
as he kept winning purple plastic triangles.
He felt warm and heavenly. Then the skyscraper
began to sway from side to side. They looked
over the edge towards the ground far below.
The whole building was swaying severely, gaining
momentum. They had no way of getting down safely
from the roof. The building was rocking uncontrollably.
They were clinging for dear life, knowing they
were about to fall...
It was at this stricken point that he awoke.
Finding himself miraculously salvaged from the
brink of certain death, he smiled grimly. Any
relief was temporal, corroded an emotional cocktail
of fruity guilt and a dash of bitter regret,
laced with sharp depression and the whole topped
off by a stick that skewered his brain. The
real world was back - as pugilistic as ever.
Both crimson hands on his radio alarm pointed
directly upwards.
An hour later he was watching a football program
called "
Saint and Greevsie".
Karen and Gallie, not being fanatical lovers
of football, were about to find something better
to do when Greg could be heard barging in through
the front door. His fearsome frame filled the
lounge doorway, which he leant against. His
blue leather jacket and trousers looked wearied
by their Herculean task of being worm by him.
In contrast, Greg himself looked positively
vibrant. He grinned widely at the three figures
inside the living room.
'Hi Howie,' he boomed. 'Hi Gallie,' and to Karen,
'hi sweetheart!'
'Don't call me that. I'm not your sweetheart!'
'Footie!' cried Greg, peering at the television
and rubbing his hands gleefully. 'You can't
beat footie and birds!
Have you had a good
night Greg? I hear you ask! Yes, thank 'ee
for asking, I've had a
bollocking good
night!'
Greg pulled a penknife from his jacket and carved
a notch into an already-heavily serrated skirting
board.
'
Sodom and Gomorrah! I'll run out of
bleeding woodwork at this rate!'
Looking particularly self-satisfied he plunged
down onto the sofa and lit a cigarette. He and
Howard discussed football.
'Weeeell,' said Gallie, smiling brightly, 'Greg,
dear, aren't you going to tell us where you've
been then, and what
she was
like?'
Howard cringed. How he yearned that Gallie was
asking
him that question. His bad blood
oozed from his heart to his head and back again,
glugging lacklustre circuits of woe.
'Do shut up woman!' boomed Greg cheerily. 'Can't
you see I'm trying to watch the footie, for
Sodom's sake! I know you're fishing
for saucy gossip and my amazing sex life is
none of your beeswax.'
'Oh,' sighed Gallie.
'I might be
bribed into confessing all
the white hot, salacious stuff though.'
'Ohhhh?'
Not looking away from the screen, Greg said,
'A man needs a little light refreshment after
a hard night's...
work.'
Gallie rolled her eyes as Greg laughed and sighed
with merriment.
A couple of minutes later she returned with
a tray containing mugs of tea and a plate piled
high with homemade melting moments.
'Blimey, Gallie, you've been baking again?'
'Ohhh, you better eat them or I'll scoff them
all and get fat,' sighed Gallie ruefully. 'In
fact I
am fat!'
Her concatenation, unjust to herself as it was,
reeled in no confutations. Howard dwelt on the
way she seemed to let the 't' consonant in 'fat'
linger on her tongue like a despairing tut.
'I've not seen you bake
one!' said Greg.
'Not a crumb! Admit it! You cheat don't you!
You go and nip down the bleeding bakers in town
with your
biscuit tin! Come on Gallie,
Own up!'
Gallie giggled and almost squealed her denials.
She could rarely hold out when Greg deigned
to make her laugh.
'Fat chance
you'd know,' cut in Karen,
glowering at Greg. 'You're
never here,
and
anyway, even if you were-'
Greg ignored her. 'Either that, Gallie, or
you do that miracle thing in the bible, you
know, the one where that Jesus bloke breaks
the bread and it magically multiplies and it
feeds all the hungry tea towel-heads. I reckon
you do a trick like that with the melting moments.
You go into the kitchen and you
break the
melting moments!'
'OK, big boy, confession time!' said Gallie,
once she had recovered. Summoning a mock growl
in her voice she added, 'Last night I saw you
with a girl! Spill the beans!'
All eyes scrutinised Greg.
'OK, darling, it was very,
very simple.
I met this broad at the dicker. She found me
bleeding irresistible, you know, same old story.
She says, "
Come back to my pad",
right, "
for a spot of 'ows yer father".
And so I gave her a bleeding good seeing to!
In the morning Old Charlie was in glorious form,
so we banged some more. Like a shithouse door
in a tempest as it happens. And then she cooked
me breakie! Sausages, fried eggs, bacon, fried
bread,
the works! And then we nipped
back into her room for more panky. The Leg-over
Warrior marches home, victorious! The crowds
go wild!'
Greg winked and began to read his tabloid newspaper.
Karen grumbled something unintelligible.
'Greg? Anyone you know?' said Gallie.
'I know her
now! Ha ha!
Sodom and
Gomorrah, what's with the second degree?
Anyway, right, she's got these groovy BJ lips!'
'BJ lips?' muttered Karen in a voice that knew
it should have stayed still.
'Yeah BJ. You know,
blowjob, that thing
your knucklehead boyfriend keeps asking you-.'
'Shut up!' screamed Karen, face screwed up.
'Greg? Are you going to see her again, have
a relationship?' persisted Gallie.
Greg nearly choked on his tea. 'A bleeding
what?
That -
word - is not in my bleeding vocabulary
Gallie! For
Satan's sake!'
'Ohhh! But she's really
nice. I saw
her. And you
did point out she
does
have nice lips.'
'Yeah. Kim Basinger numbers.'
'Wow!' said Howard, raising an eyebrow. 'Kim
Basinger did you say? She's one of my favourite
thespians.'
'You're pulling my pecker!' said Greg. 'Kim
Basinger is a
dyke?'
'He said
thespian,' Karen interjected,
'not
lesbian.'
'Oh!' said Greg histrionically.
Gallie put her hand over her mouth.
'Actually,' chided Karen, 'a
thespian's
a long word for an actor, but I would really
expect your one-track mind to know that!'
'Karen, dear, you're only cross because
moi
got laid and
moi got a cooked breakie.
And
thou didn't! Yeah, you're bleeding
jealous!' said Greg, pointing at himself and
then Karen.
'
What?' said Karen, her voice registering
a critical note of consternation, '
Jealous?
Of
you? Huh, that'll be the fucking day!
My man Steve is everything I could possibly
want for! Ever! You know something? I'd sooner
be jealous of a pig's shit than you!'
Greg guffawed loud and long.
'Nooow, now you two,' said Gallie with the sternness
of a toddler's mother.
Karen's face reddened. 'Men! Fucking bastards!'
Glancing at his watch, Howard was startled at
how rapidly the fingers had orbited the face.
He had forgotten his appointment with Jacintha!
There was still time to photocopy her notes
at the Students Union before delivering them
to her room at Donovan Hall Student Residence.
He vaguely remembered leaving the scarlet folder
containing her notes on the lounge table. The
table was cluttered with folders, pads of A4,
newspapers, books, magazines, beer cans, an
empty wine bottle, an ashtray and crockery.
He sorted through the contents to no avail.
He darted upstairs to his room and rummaged
through his possessions. His room looked yet
more war-torn as he emptied boxes and bags.
No notes... His stomach began to tighten with
dread. He dashed downstairs and resifted the
paraphernalia on the table with the care of
a forensic pathologist. The red folder was not
revealed to him.
All was lost! He recalled how he had leafed
through those notes and was awed at how immaculate
and lovingly detailed they were: a veritable
wad of gorgeous, clinical writings, algebra
and sketches. They were so precious - maybe
they weren't the life's work of a medieval monk
who had tirelessly toiled over a flickering
candle documenting English history before death
finally stilled his quill forever - but damned
close.
Where was the red folder? Where were
her notes? His increasingly exasperated
interrogations of Greg, Gallie and Karen came
to nought. They helped him to scour the lounge
and his bedroom: the whole house. Both Gallie
and Karen repeatedly asked him where he had
last seen them. His answers grew increasingly
polychromatic.
His room had been in a state before, but now
it resembled a bombsite. No box had been left
unturned. The red folder made no appearance.
He acknowledged the reality of the disaster
with a deflated groan. Jacintha had trusted
him, a virtual stranger, with her irreplaceable
notes. Poisonous defeat had been spat in his
face from the jaws of hope.
 | | | | |
| From: |
isolani | Subject: | 2001-08-03 14:03:43 |
| | | | |
| From: |
Big | Subject: | 2001-08-03 22:16:43 |
| | | | |
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