Brass

by Helen Walsh

  We’re half way through our third pint when a girl and boy plonk themselves at our table. I immediately recognise them as two of Dad’s third years. The lad is fat with a bursting red chin. The girl is fatter, her badly reconstructed harelip dominating her face. Both are drunk. I raise an eyebrow at Billy and he rolls his eyes.

  We could have done without an audience tonight – especially such a visually offensive one.

  The evening slips away and the onslaught of darkness entices a new clientele. A jam of could have beens and should have beens pack the room, self-appointed musicians, poets and actors all smoking badly made roll ups and wearing identical expressions of disaffection. The music slips up a few notches and Nick Drake’s Fruit Tree swirls over. Fucking glorious song, that. I bet he was ensconced in exactly the same whisky bliss as I am now when he wrote those lyrics.

  Safe in the womb

  Of an everlasting night

  You find the darkness can

  Give the brightest light.

  That’s too beautiful. I love being in here with Nick Drake singing to Billy and me. I tell him and we celebrate with a couple more Jamesons. I decide that I adore the Me that a few sharp whiskies can conjure. She’s bold, happy and depraved. The sober version is a fraud.

  Feeling more and more happy about myself and the loveliness of this whole evening, I half begin to feel sorry for Fatboy and Harelip. Especially Fatboy. He strikes me as being utterly sex starved. I empathise with him – him and all the ugly men of the world. I know too well, the abject frustration of unrequited lust. I know what it’s like to be smitten with a hundred images every day, all served up in Fuck Me poses. In the street, on TV, in the papers, everywhere you look there is fanny. Knowing that the closest you’ll ever get to it is a clinical encounter with a whore is enough to break your heart, some days. I’m about to share this revelation with Billy when he bolts upright.

  ‘Fuck!’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Jeez! Bin talking about the cunt all night – he’ll be fucken chocker!’

  He pulls me up out of my seat with one hand – the other tips his glass to his lips, draining off the last of his Jamies.

  ‘Come ’ead!’

  We grab our coats and make for the door. Outside the streets are grey and fuming with rain. A bevy of girls gallop past, all mascara smeared faces and naked arms wrapped tightly around their bodies. We tear down the street, jumping over puddles and giggling like kids. When we reach the taxi rank, Billy checks his watch again. The rain and the reality check have sobered him up. As he speaks, he won’t look at me.

  ‘’kinell!’ he says, hunched over, his breath smoking in front of him. ‘I’m well late. Fuck! Sorry, girl…’

  I’m not letting him off that easy. I ignore the statement and light us both a ciggy – Billy’s not going anywhere. I’m high on the mood and the whisky and I want to carry on and on and on.

  ‘I’m gonna have to do one, kidder’ he says, lurching towards the approaching taxi. ‘Mum’s doing a big mad celebration dinner, isn’t she? Taxi! Anne Marie an’ that, innit? TAXI!’

  Anne Marie.

  ‘Come ’ead – I’ll drop you off, hey?’

  The taxi pulls up. He opens the door.

  ‘Nah,’ I say, throwing my hands into my pockets and stepping back from him, ‘I’m gonna have a mooch around town.’

  ‘But you’re fucken soaking. You’ll die of pneumonia if you don’t go and dry off.’

  I shrug my shoulders.

  ‘Ah, come ’ead, Millie! Just jump in, will you? I feel a right cunt just leaving you here like this. I’d ask you back an’ that, you know I would, but I think it’s one of them, innit? Celebrate their engagement an’ that.’

  ‘I’m fine, honest. You know I don’t go in for all that family stuff, anyway.’

  ‘Arr-ay, Millie! Don’t go like that on us. Look, just get in will you. You’re as good as family. Come ’ead – they’ll be made up to see you.’

  ‘Shhh. Forget it, okay? I’m fine. I’ll call you tomorrow.’

  I force a smile and turn on my heels. I get three steps down Hardman Street.

  ‘Billy? Look. Don’t go. Please? Don’t leave me here. ‘

  ‘Ah, babes! Don’t do this, yeah? Come with us.’

  ‘Why do you have to go?’

  ‘Millie?’

  His shoulders fall with his face.

  ‘Fuck you, Billy.’

  I turn and walk away. He calls my name a couple of times and in the reflection of a window I see the cab swing round and I feel as miserable as the night.

  When I’m out of sight, I fling my arms around myself, throw my head to the floor and with my shoulders hunched into the wind, stride into town. The cold immobilises my thoughts. I can’t whip up any coherent plan for the rest of the evening, though my animus is screaming for drink, food and more drink – and in that exact order.

  At the bottom of Bold Street the germ of an idea forms and I flag down a cab. I instruct the cabby to take me to the financial district, an area teeming with suits, B-grade celebs and the vacuous self-made rich but an area, for all of that, devoid of students. I ream him a story that I’m the House Mother at Dreamers. The tale is transparent nonsense, told more for me than him – but I keep it going right to the drop.

  I alight at the very top of Old Hall Street and the sky lets out a low guttural cry. I light a cigarette and stare in awe at a Mersey that’s flinching from storm light. I smoke it right down to the filter and toss the sparking butt into the night. A couple of young girls scurry past with naked torsos and wind whipped legs. I laugh out loud. The rain has petered out now, but the bloated sky hangs heavy as it drags the storm cross-river to the city. For a moment the night is still. Apart from the gentle lapping of the wind against shop windows and the distant click of heels on pavement, everything is calm.

  And then it bursts.

  The sky surrenders and collapses on the city, stampeding its revellers into random venues. I throw back my head and let the slanting silver deluge drench my face till I can take no more, and then I sprint across the road and scamper into Sam’s. Like most bars in bad weather, it’s warm and noisy and packed. Tonight it’s seething with pink faces in wet suits. There’s not much to look at in terms of fanny, either – a party of busty middle-aged women, a couple of bottle blonde stripper types and a clutch of nine-to-fivers seeking refuge from the rain. I take a sleeve to my face and advance to the bar. I prise myself between the lapdancers. Our bodies make contact, jolting my cunt to life.

  I order a bottle of Stella and settle in a booth in a dark secluded corner. The big breast brigade start swaying in unison to a Madonna track, singing along theatrically and dissolving into la la las where they don’t know the words. The most restrained of them, easily a 36E, is leaning forward slightly. Her magnificent bust, scantily framed in a low-cut blouse is directly in my eyeline. Christ, they are huge! Even the girl serving her cannot prise her eyes away from them. I stare at her long and hard and commit them to memory.

  I finish my drink, fire up another cigarette and try to attract the attention of a waitress. An unsmiling face trudges over and plonks a menu on the table. Even as she’s walking off I can see the light bulbs popping in her head. She swings round and does a double take. Her face is strangely familiar. I shiver – she’s exquisite. Soot black hair, big pellucid eyes, fat lips and Slavic cheekbones. Her waist and hips are tiny. As she turns her slender back on me once more I drag my eyes down her entire and absurdly beautiful frame, from her collarbone, to her arse to her lithe calves. My eyes fuck her and feel her, everywhere. Her long, slim legs; her tight little bum; her sharp and jutting tits – she’s fucking gorgeous. She returns seconds later with a pen and pad. She rolls her eyes apologetically when she sees I haven’t even opened the menu.

  ‘Sorry,’ she sighs, ‘I’ll come back.’

  Her voice is deep and confident. Everything about her says accessible.

  ‘That’s okay’. I smile and hand back the menu
. ‘Just bring us a bottle of house red and a plate of fries.’

  ‘Mayo with your fries?’

  ‘Nope.’

  She scribbles urgently on the pad then throws her eyebrows together.

  ‘What was it you asked for – red or white?’

  ‘Red.’

  ‘Sorry. Been manic in here today. The rain. Drags ’em all in.’

  She slides her eyes in the direction of a table of fat leering suits. I snort sympathetically.

  ‘Clock off in ten, and I tell you – it can’t come soon enough.’

  She’s telling me she’s finishing her shift any minute. Unnecessary information. Fuck! She wants to fuck me. I rack my memory to place her, but she takes the lead.

  ‘You’re Millie right? You’re on my course.’

  My heart lurches down and my tummy vaults up to meet it. It’s her. Pocahontas. Voguey from the bus – protagonist of a dozen masturbatory fantasies.

  ‘I’m Paula.’

  She holds out a hand. Slim and soft, but with a firm shake.

  ‘We had Classics and Shakespeare together last year. And we were in the same tutorial in the first year.’

  I tighten my eyes to quizzical slits.

  ‘Introduction to Classics? Jacko? Come on you must remember him.’ She says.

  Her eyes flirt with me.

  I drop mine low and innocent. I pick at the Stella label.

  ‘Look – why don’t you join us for one when you clock off?’

  She looks at her watch, shrugs and smiles.

  ‘Okay. Yeah, I’d love that. Back at you!’

  I trace her narrow arse all the way back across the floor, and the rudderless night suddenly acquires a narrative. I, Millie O’Reilley am going to have sex tonight. Mad horny sex with an exotic beauty. I neck the dregs of my lager and slink to the toilets to dry my hair and slap on some lipstick.

  I return to a table strewn with undercooked fries, every sauce and dip imaginable and a bottle of tepid red wine. The promise of sex has deadened my appetite and the very smell of heated fat causes my stomach to turn. I push the food and the platter of dips to the far corner of the table and pour myself a large glass of wine. I work my way through three consecutive cigarettes, chug another glass and then sit back and try to look indifferent. Minutes collect and accumulate into an empty bottle and I start to feel faintly ridiculous sat here alone. Before it was just me with a clear-cut purpose. A solitary drinker, minding her own business. Now I look pronounced and transparent. A girl hanging on for sex. I toy with the idea of doing one but the sight of two paraffins outside on the street being rocked and tossed about like wrecked broken puppets persuades me to stay. I attract the attention of a waiter and order another bottle of wine which he delivers with a cussed faced. He asks me if I’ll be ordering anything to eat and flicks his eyes in the direction of the bar where a queue of rain-soaked diners has collected. I offer him a simpering smile and point towards the plate of untouched fries.

  I’m well into my second bottle when she appears at the other end of the room and takes my breath away. She’s wearing a simple white t-shirt with a pair of skintight jeans that cup her supermodel’s arse. The t-shirt emphasises the jut and thrust of her tits, and the elegant longeur of her arms – pipe-cleaner thin yet slashed with definition. An epidemic of stunned head-turning accompanies her as she glides across, leaving me weak.

  With a self-conscious rake of her hand through her hair, she settles down and splays her beautiful arms out across the table. Our flesh is almost touching. We exchange big grins. My cunt somersaults. I sip at the wine and soak her up over the rim of the glass.

  I love this part. These next few minutes – I wish I could live them in slow play. This bit is almost as good as the shock of fresh cunt when you peel down their panties for the first time. The shape and the smell. The nudity of their wetness, soft liquid explosions on the senses. And this, right now, is just as intense. Flirting. Slightly hazy from the booze. The inevitability of sex, of cunt, hanging over us both like a spell.

  ‘So, did you take the dissertation op?’ she says, breaking the tension.

  ‘Yeah. With deep regret.’

  ‘I haven’t so much as thought of a theme. How about you?’

  ‘Sex,’ I lie, trying to coax her onto the subject, ‘I’m doing it on the construction and subversion of sexual identities in modern literature.’

  ‘Wow!’ she says, genuinely impressed. ‘That’s brilliant.’

  A short but benign silence follows. She takes a packet of cigarettes from her handbag. Marlboros. She offers me one. Her fingers are so slim and womanly, yet her nails are bitten and bare.

  ‘So, who’s your dissertation tutor?’

  ‘Kennedy. I think. Which I suppose is a good thing. It means she can’t mark it.’

  ‘Kennedy hey?’ she says and sucks in a breath of air like a backwards whistle, ‘D’you remember that berserker she threw in the first year, when Paddy nodded off?’

  ‘Don’t think I was there, mate.’

  ‘Yeah, you were! You were sat a couple of rows behind me, sandwiched between Ben and Carla.’

  ‘Ben and Carla?’

  ‘You must know Carla. Everyone knows Carla. Big lips. Stupidly pretty.’

  Couldn’t be that pretty. Trust me, I’d have frigged off over her.

  ‘Christ, I can hardly remember what classes I took in the first year let alone who I sat next to.’

  ‘Well I wouldn’t normally,’ she snaps, ‘Know who was in my lectures like. But most of the girls made a mental note when you were around.’

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘Well – yeah. I mean, no disrespect and that, but you must have wondered why every female tried to befriend you in the first year?’

  ‘They didn’t!’ I say with real surprise. They didn’t.

  ‘Maybe that’s a bit of an exaggeration. But you were living at home right?’

  ‘Yeah. Still am.’

  ‘Well there was definitely a race for the first girl to know you well enough to be able to pop round for coffee?’

  I look intently at her face for some kind of explanation but all I see is ineffable beauty. Is she saying that every girl on campus wanted to fuck me, her included? Surely not. No. She is. She must be. That’s what she’s saying. She’s handing it over on a plate, and now that it’s there, staring me in the face, wide eyed and lucid, I don’t know what the fuck to do with it.

  ‘Are you saying what I think you’re saying?’

  ‘Come on. You must have been aware of it.’

  She puts a hand lightly on my wrist and I almost involuntarily flinch away. A huge hole opens up in my chest, slurping in every inch of her.

  ‘Well no. Yeah. NO. I mean, it was always at the back of my mind. I saw the way other girls looked at me, but I just thought it was, well you know. Just girls looking.’

  ‘Hardly surprising though. You’re the mirror image of him. Uncanny.’

  She withdraws her hand leaving within me a sudden yearning to pull it back again.

  ‘Of who?’

  ‘Has he always been that good looking? I could never get involved with someone like that. I’d be like terminally paranoid. I mean, it must be bad enough being you. How do you cope with the knowledge that every girl in Uni wants to fuck your Dad?’

  Suddenly I’m back in real time. The hole in my chest tightens, spitting every inch of her back into the busy hum of the bar. My eyes go lazy, lazy and glazed, blurring her face into the backdrop of a neon-tinged window. I place my hands on the table and push myself up, my legs prickly and uncooperative, threatening to collapse underneath me. I’m hardly aware of her being there, Paula. Pocahontas. I gulp down the remains of my glass, and stagger my way out through the throng of bodies, out into the cold blast of air which slaps my face and sobers me.

  I walk quickly down rain-black streets, eager to put distance between us. Once I’m back weaving through the smouldering core of clubland, dodging bodies and fun and laughter, the anxious
spacey pang in my head starts to lift. In its place, I feel foolish and embarrassed at reacting like that – for seeming so brutally stung. For having misread her so badly. And for feeling so intensely jealous of my father. Dad. My lovely old man. So, utterly, adoringly oblivious to the starving adulation he so innocently accrues.

  My next port of call is The Living Room. A few ropy blondes sprawl the length of the bar, eyeing up a noisy cluster of doormen types skulking in a booth. I pick up a cocktail menu. The words swim in front of my eyes. I flick a swatch of wet fringe from my forehead and order a vodka cranberry.

  ‘One Theebreathe coming up,’ the bartender goes in a super affected lisp. I grab him by his wrist.

  ‘I don’t want one of those,’ I tell him, ‘I want a vodka and cranberry.’

  A flutter of injury streams his forehead. He snatches the fiver from my hand.

  ‘Keep the change ‘I say sincerely, and turn my back on him.

  It’s shite, this place – but footballers and gangsters flock en masse and that, in turn, rakes in the fanny. It’s that much easier copping a bird when there’s eligible guys around cos they love playing up to that whole girl on girl thing. They use it as a pulling mechanism. Of course most of them bottle it when you get them someplace on their own.

  ‘What the fuck you doing, girl? I was only winding the lads up!’

  The climbdown is usually accompanied by a look that’s a fifty-fifty compromise between disbelief and disgust.

  I order another ‘Theebreathe’ and perch at the far end of the bar. I light a cigarette and make eyes at the fanny.

  Time passes.

  A hand squeezes my shoulder and the shock of a human touch yanks me from a group orgy with the blonde bits at the bar. I turn and find Liam Flynn, Sean’s big brother, his huge smile almost touching his eyebrows. I haven’t seen him in ages. He looks great – tight black polo neck worn under an expensive-looking suit. The spotlights strike the planes of his face, accentuating his high cheekbones and the broad boxers nose, putting a pinpoint of light into his dark liquid eyes.