by David Carter
Gringo turned his attention back to the tillergirl.
‘What do you think I’m going to do?’ he said. ‘Commit suicide.’
‘Well are you?’ she snapped, glancing at the desperate looking unshaven character, and his fourteen bottles of heavy booze. No groceries, no vegetables, no fruit, no nothing. It wasn’t beyond the realms of possibility.
‘Don’t be so fucking ridiculous!’
In the heat of the moment that came out louder than he intended; loud enough to attract attention from the adjoining tills on either side, and in the next second a stern looking grey-suited jobsworth appeared on the scene.
‘Is there a problem here?’
‘This gentleman wants four packs of paracetamol. I have tried to explain to him that he can’t have four, but he has become abusive.’
‘I am not being abusive!’
‘He swore at me, Mister Worthington.’
‘Yes he did,’ butted in the apache.
‘Shut your face and mind your own fucking business!’ blasted Gringo at the hippies.
‘Come along, Perfect Peace,’ said the hippie guy to his squaw. ‘Let’s try another till.’
‘If you think that’s best, Prairie Wind,’ she muttered, and began packing up their veggies to move on out.
‘It is against the rules to buy four packs of drugs,’ explained jobsworth, patronisingly, thought Gringo.
‘They are not prescription drugs! I am not a drug user; they are over the counter painkillers that can be bought anywhere! I could go round again and again and again and no one would ever notice. I could go to ten superstores and buy ten times as many!’
‘Against the rules, sir,’ Worthington repeated.
‘Whose fucking rules?’
‘Our rules; and I must warn you that if you swear at me one more time I shall summon security.’
‘Gee fucking whiz! Summon who the hell you fucking like!’
Jobsworth flushed. The tillergirl actually grinned. Mister Worthington was now on his internal communications device.
‘Code red! Code red!’ he said, solemnly and deeply, as if he were about to abort a NASA moon mission. ‘I repeat: Code red, Code red, Aisle nine, Aisle nine.’
The tillergirl began giggling. It must have been the highlight of her month. In the next second two big bald black guys came huffing and puffing to the till.
‘I think you need to get down the gym more often,’ said Gringo, winking at the woman, who stifled a laugh.
Jobsworth was now making his play at dealing with the situation.
‘This man is to be escorted from the building. If he resists, take him to my office, restrain him, and summon the police.’
‘Yes, Mister Worthington,’ said the bigger of the two.
‘Cancel all sales here,’ jobsworth said to the tillergirl, who had now wiped the smile from her face, reverting to the bog standard supermarket bored rigid and couldn’t care less look.
‘Yes, Mister Worthington.’
‘What about my paracetamol? I just need the paracetamol!’
The two black guys took hold of Gringo’s elbows.
‘Get off me!’
‘Behave yourself or I’ll give you a slap,’ said the big boy.
‘Ronald, don’t do that,’ whispered jobsworth, and then he turned to Gringo and said: ‘You, sir, will have to take your future custom elsewhere. You are barred from this store, indefinitely.’
Gringo grimaced and yelled: ‘Up yours, pal!’ as he was dragged away through the throngs of evening shoppers, who all stopped and stared at the obvious vagrant being apprehended, and hauled away from the scene of his heinous crimes.
‘Must be a shoplifter!’ shrieked an old woman.
‘Mugger too, I suspect by the look of him,’ said another.
‘Bag snatcher, he’s a bag snatcher!’ screamed a third, a globule of spittle dropping from her bottom lip and splurging onto her lavender coat, and at that vital information, they all looked at their own bags hooked over their arms, just in case they had fallen victim to the swine.
‘I think I’ve seen that face before,’ said the first woman. ‘You wouldn’t forget an ugly mug like that!’
‘He looks like a bandit, though, doesn’t he?’
‘Better off the streets if you ask me; ten years is not enough!’
‘Should be flogged!’
By then Gringo and the black guys had arrived at the cavernous entrance.
‘Please don’t come back, sir,’ said the big boy, and they both gave him a good heave as if they were pushing off a rowing boat.
‘Thank you so much, Ronald,’ said Gringo, as he began to walk away, suddenly finding himself following Perfect Peace and Prairie Wind back toward the car park. For a moment he turned round and saw the big guy dusting his hands, as if it had been another job well done, one more unruly raider repelled.
Gringo glanced up at the winking store logo and yelled: ‘I’ve lost my mother, you know!’
An older guy with a grey buzz cut was heading toward the entrance.
‘Where did you lose her, pal?’
‘Where do you think?’
‘It’s just there’s some old biddy on the bench on the far side of the car park with a bottle of cider begging ciggies. That might be your old girl,’ and he sniggered and hurried inside.
Fuck off you! Gringo wanted to scream, but this time nothing came from his dry mouth. The faux Indians had disappeared, the black guys had gone inside, and he was left alone in a sea of dazed idiots heading for the Valhalla of the supermarket that sold all you desired at any hour of the day or night, just so long as it was not four packets of paracetamol, and certainly not to the desperate Dan of a man who went by the name of Gringo Greene.
He hurried back to the car and went and bought some petrol and two packs of paracetamol from the same seller. The wanted posters hadn’t yet gone up, and after that he drove home, stifling laughter most of the way. Banned from the supermarket! Jesus Christ! What was the world coming to?
Fifty-Four
When he arrived home he heard the phone inside the house ringing. An image of Glen flashed into his mind. He dashed inside and caught it before the ringing stopped.
‘Nineteen sixty-six!’ he yelled.
‘Oh, you’re back, are you?’
‘Yeah. Hi Linda.’
‘I was terribly sorry to hear about your mother. Such a surprise.’
‘Yeah, thanks, a surprise for me too.’
‘Did you get my card?’
‘Yeah, ta, got four altogether.’
‘I was wondering if you’d like me to come round. I could… well… you know… comfort you, something like that, I’m sure you could use a little sympathy.’
Usually Gringo prepared for dates in the manner of NATO planning for a Russian invasion, but maybe this time he might make an exception.
‘Yeah,’ he said. ‘That would be nice. Thanks. I could do with some comforting right now,’ and when she spoke again he could tell she was smiling.
‘I’ll be round at nine,’ she said, ‘if that’s okay.’
‘That’s fine. It’ll give me time to shave.’
She arrived at ten past, just as he was opening a bottle of Australian white, a bottle that she sank most of, and not long after that they adjourned to the top of Gringo Towers, no resistance on the stairs on her part this time, the opposite if anything.
She’d brought a large capsule of highly scented and expensive body rub she’d picked up in the stinky cosmetic shop in the strange parade of retailers just inside the main entrance at Princess Alexandra’s. (Were these things really meant for the patients?) They spent the next hour massaging every square centimetre of each other’s bodies, until they squelched together and the real comforting began.
Linda proved only too happy to oblige.
In her eyes it cemented their rapidly growing relationship, and anyway, he had yet more essential work to accomplish, just in case he hadn’t scratched the scoreboard alre
ady. She stared at the ceiling. The same cobweb still displayed in the bottom right corner as she began to envisage the face of their first child. It would be a boy, she was certain of that, and he would be called Barry. The child would boast her nose and lips, and his hair and eyes, ears not so sure, just so long as it wasn’t one of each. She began constructing in her mind the infant’s face, just as those expert police reconstruction people do, until the handsome head was fully revealed.
Not content with that, she could envisage the boy at five, ten, fifteen and twenty years of age, watching him as he grew, as in some computer animation program, into a handsome man, just like his father, and her father before that, and people would say, a chip off the old block, and the sensitive child would incorporate his mother’s nursing and caring tendencies, and probably, a good dose of her conspiritorialness too. She’d have to keep an eye on that as the lad grew up. She wouldn’t want any sneakiness in the family. She let go a snorted laugh at the very thought of it, a sound Gringo imagined to be a guttural sign of ecstasy. Her mind moved onto thinking of all the days and people to come, as Gringo ploughed on and on and on. Over his shoulder she glimpsed his little bum bouncing up and down. That brought a wicked smile to her face.
It must have been his grievous loss, she imagined. It must be his way of dealing with the departure, for he was putting in a great deal of effort tonight, perhaps his subconscious was trying to replace her, the departed, with the new, a fact he was far nearer to achieving than he could ever have known. Time enough then for a few sighs, and one or two more at a greater decibel, and soon afterwards, job done, smiles and knowing winks all round, comforting complete, he collapsed upon her… and cried.
It wasn’t the usual crying of a man reaching a climax. It was a grieving cry that had been bottled up ever since Sergeant Wilkes had introduced himself with his terrifying news. It went on for some time.
‘There, there,’ cooed Linda, patting him on his sweaty back, as if she were in training for the real nursing event to come. ‘There, there, there, you cry if you want to, there is nothing to be ashamed of.’
Gringo had never once considered being ashamed of anything, not there, not then, not ever.
He lay in her arms and dozed for the best part of an hour, then woke up and finding himself where he was, he couldn’t resist giving her the doings all over again.
Linda would cope with that well enough, she saw it as good training for when they were married, when she imagined he would be after her every night. What was it he had said? Every day without fail, that was it, without a shred of doubt. Every day without fail. That was cool, that was what a husband was for, what he did, what he was made for, but she would have to think of other things to amuse her while he was keeping busy.
Perhaps she should take up Sudoku and memorise the puzzles before bedtime so that she could work them out, maybe she could visualise them on the ceiling, though she didn’t really like numbers, or maybe she could read a chicklit novel over his shoulder without him ever noticing. That thought brought another smile to her face. It had to be worth a try. She doubted if she was the first woman to consider such an idea.
At three in the morning she got up and dressed and slapped his naked buttocks and told him she was going home.
‘Yeah babe, nice to see you, thanks,’ he muttered, but she didn’t hear him because she was already half way down the first flight of stairs, job done so far as she as concerned.
He switched off the light but didn’t immediately fall asleep. Sometimes life has a way of keeping you awake when you least expect it. He thought about his mother, the funeral, her laughter, and the warmth that he would never feel again, her tenderness and caring, and everything that good mothers do so well, now gone forever, never to be experienced again. Such a precious resource lost to dust. We are all made of dust. Yeah, maybe, but it didn’t seem right somehow, that anything so valuable could be snatched away in an instant in that way. He didn’t understand it, nor ever would.
I miss you, mum.
He thought of his crotchety father and vowed that when he himself grew old he would never become bad tempered too. But men have vowed such things since men have walked upon the face of the earth, and they rarely achieve it.
He thought of Glen and wondered where she was, and who she was with, and what she was doing at that precise moment, and that made him feel quite ill. He thought of Linda. It had been good of her to come round. She had risen somewhat in his estimation, but there was still something missing that he couldn’t quite put his finger on. It was as if when she was with him, she was still partly back at the flat, present but absent at the same time, a weird feeling that brought some satisfaction, but never total.
She was pretty and attractive, not always the same thing, that was undeniable, she was highly qualified and caring, and desirable to men. He had seen the way guys stared at her, and not just the frustrated old fool peering down her dress in the Jackdaw. She possessed a sensuous body and a decent dress sense, but undeniably something was missing. He couldn’t quite figure it out, yet another womanly conundrum to be solved, as he fell into a fitful sleep, and disturbing dreams that featured as the main picture, his mother calling from the far side of a flooding and rock strewn river, Gringo suddenly struck dumb, and impotent.
Fifty-Five
He returned to work the following Monday and everyone looked at him sorrowfully, whilst displaying pursed lips and furrowed brows, as if one of his ears had been cut off. It was Melanie, always Melanie, who showed him real tenderness, when she came to him at lunchtime and kissed him on the top of his head.
‘So sorry,’ she said. ‘If there’s anything I can do.’
If there’s anything I can do.
He fixed her with his eyes and smiled and said: ‘Well now that you mention it…’
‘Not that!’ she said, grinning. ‘Off limits, sorry,’ and she pushed him playfully in the chest, and turned and left him to his steel rods reports, or whatever it was he was so engrossed in.
He couldn’t help but remember her naked on his bed, opening her legs, and he couldn’t help considering that when it came to raw sex, to lasciviousness, Melanie knocked Linda into a cocked hat. Melanie 6 Linda 1, he read out an imaginary football result, just as Rebecca was walking by.
‘Sorry, Gringo?’ she said, sticking her head into his office. ‘Did you say something?’
‘Come in. Sit down. How are you?’
She sat in the chair and smiled and crossed her legs revealing far more flesh than she ought.
‘So sorry to hear about your mother, Gringo.’
‘Thanks, Rebecca. These things happen.’
‘Was it sudden?’
‘Very.’
‘Must have been quite a shock.’
‘It was, yeah, do you mind if we talk about something else.’
‘Sure, sorry.’
‘How’s whatshisname from MBD’s.’
‘He’s a two timing bastard and I never want to see him again!’ and her bottom lip extended as she cursed her former, boyfriend, lover, what exactly? It was none of Gringo’s business, and yet… and yet… nineteen to thirty-four wasn’t a totally unbridgeable age gap, was it? And if the office sex bomb was currently off limits, and the apprentice sex bomb still appeared willing, well it would be rude not to show a modicum of interest, wouldn’t it?
One of the young blokes, a trainee called Billy Drake stuck his head into the office and said: ‘Come on Becky, we’ll be late.’
‘We’re going for lunch,’ she said, apologetically.
‘Have fun.’
She stood up and waved a dainty wave and let the guy take her arm and lead her away. Billy the kid still had time to flash a supercilious grin at Gringo as if to say, Hard Luck Granddad, as he tugged the pretty girl away, and then to top it all he shouted back over his shoulder, ‘Bad luck about your Ma!’
Yes, it was, bad luck, like a dice falling on a five instead of a six, like being born poor instead of wealthy, or buying a
salmon sandwich and biting into it to discover someone’s fobbed you off with fucking tuna fish, or growing the perfect pod of peas and opening it at the flower and veg show to find a sea of writhing maggots, yeah, bad luck indeed. The whole world is riddled with bad luck. The phone rang and Gringo grabbed it.
‘Reach for the sky, man!’
He sure sounded back on form, and Gringo could do with a laugh.
‘Hi Paul.’
‘So sorry to hear about your mother.’
‘Yeah. Thanks, and thanks for the card as well.’
‘To tell you the truth that was Kay’s idea.’
‘Thought so. Women always look after things like that, and it’s just as well they do because the card industry would go belly up if it were left to us blokes.’
‘Too right man. Too right. Fancy a drink tonight?’
‘Yeah, I’m up for a swift one. How’s your little problem?’
‘Tell you later. 6.30 Naughton’s?’
‘I’ll be there.’
‘See you then.’
It had been a dreadful day so far as Gringo was concerned, and he was happy to leave the office at ten past six and go and stand alone in the bar, staring at his pint. He hadn’t been in that semi-trancelike state for long when someone came up and stood beside him.
‘Hello, Gringo,’ the woman said warmly, ‘I haven’t seen you in ages.’
He stood up straight and glanced at the redhead.
‘Hi Vicky, how’s things?’
‘I’m cool, but you sure look miserable. Missing Maria, are you?’
‘No,’ he said, ‘that’s not it.’
‘Are you going to buy me a drink or what?’
Gringo nodded the barman over and glanced back at Vicky.
‘Vodka tonic,’ she said, smiling at the guy, and then, ‘Thanks, Gringo.’
‘So how is Maria anyway?’
‘She’s cool. Out with some guy tonight, though she won’t tell me who it is.’
Gringo sniffed and took a pull on his pint.
‘So why are you so down in the dumps, Gringo?’