The Life of Lee

by Lee Evans

  I found the money in my back pocket and handed it to him. That’s when he stopped staring at me and focused on the money. He quickly counted it and shoved it into the inside pocket of his heavily dandruffed jacket. He appeared to relax after that. He sucked in a deep lug of the steamy grease of café air and ran his fingers through his thick, oily black hair, then sat back contentedly, looking around the empty tables, picking up and sipping loudly on his sugary tea.

  ‘Well, there goes my toilet-cleaning money,’ I thought. But never mind, it was a shrewd investment on my part.

  ‘Aaaaaaaaaaaaaargh … Yeah, great!’ he exclaimed, letting the air out in a whoosh of self-satisfaction.

  I was trying to pluck up the courage to question him on what he meant by the ‘Executive Kit’. I was intrigued as it sounded as if there was a choice of kits. Just then, the waitress arrived to take our food order. ‘Riiiiiight, well, it’s the Belly Buster Breakfast for meeee,’ Jonathan announced. Then, unexpectedly, he brought his face really close to mine and added, quite unnecessarily: ‘Cos I’m a fat baaasturd!’

  His musky breath reeked of a thousand cigarettes. He then sat back upright and turned towards the waitress: ‘And what will you be having then?’ It was difficult to tell if he was referring to me or the waitress.

  I felt a little embarrassed on her behalf, to be honest, so I tried to distract him. ‘Oh, nothing for me, thanks.’ But he took no notice. He slowly scanned her figure, his bulging eyes like an MRI machine, from her feet right up to the top of her bunched pineapple-esque hairdo. She definitely cut a sexy figure, her tight black leggings showing exactly what mood she might be in. But, for all that, she looked distinctly nonplussed by his overt leering.

  Jonathan gave me a little sly wink. I half-winked back, desperately trying to join in. He then amorously widened his big baggy eyes, like a wily fox who’s caught a chicken, and kinked an unsettling smile at me as though I was one of the boys. The look was made all the more powerful as it was accompanied at exactly the same time by a loud hiss of steam from the coffee machine, which made him appear frighteningly snakelike.

  Just then, he poked his tongue out at me. I jumped violently off my seat which, just like a bouncy castle, made him shoot violently up into the air. He fumbled and hot tea poured into his lap. He yelped and jumped again from the shock, his stumpy little legs hitting the bottom of the table, sending condiments scattering everywhere. Jonathan quickly climbed from the booth. Grimacing in pain, he began frantically pulling at the hot wet patch around his crotch area.

  The waitress gave me a little conspiratorial smile, but I pretended not to notice. I needed to remain firmly in the Jonathan camp, as there was a job at stake. I rushed around, ostentatiously trying to look helpful, grabbing rolling objects and putting them back on the table, as the gloating waitress looked on.

  Jonathan snapped. ‘You fucking idiot!’ That was it – I had failed. He was angry with me. He handed the tea to the waitress. ‘Get me another. I hardly had any of that, so I reckon that’s a freebie, don’t you?’ When he handed the cup over, I noticed his fingernails were so thick with dirt, you could grow potatoes in them.

  As he wiped the stain with a serviette, Jonathan gave me a smouldering look of disdain. I felt so dreadful, I scooped up as many serviettes as possible, dropped to the floor and began mopping his crotch. I hoped I hadn’t ruined my chances. Now down on my knees in a very compromising position, I smiled up at him meekly.

  ‘What are you having then?’ he spoke down to me through gritted teeth.

  I stopped mopping. ‘Nothing for me, thanks,’ I said again. I was too nervous to eat, plus I only had five more pounds in my pocket. If I got the job, I would need bus money to get around. The job entailed me going out and selling stuff. I didn’t quite know at this point what, but it was definitely flogging something.

  We both sat back into the booth. Then Jonathan’s mood seemed to change. He began smiling, slapping me on the back and optimistically sounding more encouraging. ‘Come oooon, yooooou,’ he said, squeezing my shoulder tightly. ‘Eat, you deserve it. My bestest employee can’t operate on an empty stomach.’ He then patted his huge pop belly. ‘He’ll have the same as me,’ he said, then waved the now-scowling waitress away.

  Good, I felt more at ease now. I hadn’t upset him and, despite everything, I thought I’d just heard him call me ‘his bestest employee’. To me, that sounded as if I was in. I had the job! I wanted to run home and tell Heather. ‘It will only be a matter of time, Heather, before Jonathan is introducing me to some of the most exclusive clubs that the upper echelons of Southend society has on offer.’ I found it hard to believe. How could I have been so fortunate to have met the great Jonathan? The gods have most definitely smiled upon me today, I thought, this sort of chance only happens once in a lifetime.

  I was desperate to question Jonathan about what he meant by the ‘Executive Kit’, but I couldn’t find the right opportunity. He chatted away machine-gun-like about his huge company and how, if I did get the job, I would unfortunately be without his personal back-up for a few weeks as he was off to spend the winter with friends and sample the new Golden Mile in Marbella.

  But he gave me one of his cards. Well, I say ‘card’ – it was actually a small blue piece of well-worn paper on which he jotted down a number. He assured me that if I got a sale, I had to call the number on it immediately and the massive machine which was his company and which I had at my total disposal 24/7 would race into action.

  ‘Aaaaand bam!’ He slapped one palm of his hand with the other. ‘A big fat cheque will be winging its way through the postal system to you.’ And this was his exclusive advice to me: ‘Newly opened platinum account, that’s what I got. Listen, you might want to do the same. With the amounts of dosh you’ll be bunging in there, mate, you’ll want a little more bang for your buck, right?’

  Very gently, I enquired what I might be selling. That was when he came in really close and whispered to me out of one side of his mouth, ‘Aluminium shop-fronts.’

  I was a little perplexed at first. I needed a moment to just take that in. I have to admit I was expecting something a little more dynamic, but there it was. I’m staring at the evidence right before me, I thought. Jonathan’s clearly a multi-millionaire, so someone’s doing something right around here, and it ain’t me. I rest my case.

  Just then, the ‘Belly Busters’ were dumped on the table, along with a fresh cup of tea for Jonathan. As the waitress walked away, he gave me a nudge and whispered, pointing at the tea: ‘Hey! Why don’t you throw that one at my cock and I’ll get her to drink it later?’ I laughed perhaps a little too loudly.

  Jonathan immediately dived into the breakfast, scoffing it down without pausing for breath. Even when he was reaching for the ketchup and splurging it all over food, he still managed to stab with his fork at various sections and chomped away at the huge mound of lard on his over-sized plate.

  In comparison, I was unable to bring myself to even touch what looked to me like a pile of dead animal bits on a plate, my stomach churning over with a mixture of expectation and excitement at the prospect of being just like Jonathan. I glanced over at him with admiration as he shovelled another lot of food into his mouth, washing it down with a slurp of tea. He smiled back at me as he wiped off some yellow egg that had dribbled down his chin.

  ‘So, what did you mean, Jonathan, about the “Executive Kit”?’ I asked hesitantly, a little reluctant to interrupt what was quite obviously the highlight of his week, if not his year.

  He talked and ate at the same time, hardly giving the last lot of food a chance to go down before shovelling in another forkful. Every time he opened his mouth to speak, I could see the contents inside, swishing around like one of those industrial washing machines.

  ‘Well, you’ve just shrewdly paid the deposit for the exclusive use of the Executive Kit.’ He quickly squeezed the last lot of food from his plate into his mouth, reached ove
r and grabbed his carrier bag. He placed it on the table and, like a magician, plunged his hand in, paused for effect and, as quick as a flash, pulled out what looked suspiciously like two triangular pieces of clear glass in a forty-five-degree angular piece of alloy window frame.

  He smugly rested it on the palms of his hands, like those models might do on the game shows, displaying it to me and smiling. Yes, I could tell it was indeed a cutaway of a corner section of a window. I tried my best to look really amazed, as I thought any moment now he would show me a proper folder with all the bumf inside, a list of prices, recommendations from satisfied customers, photos of recent jobs. I surreptitiously looked around the table for other bits of the so-called kit – he would have it somewhere, I was sure.

  ‘The Executive Kit,’ he proudly announced. ‘This is the very sales kit the company will loan to you and, when you finish, or are promoted even, we will give you back your deposit for it. By then, of course, twenty-five quid will be like a distant tab on your paying-in book.’

  I mindlessly nodded and reached out to grab the proffered corner unit for a closer examination, but Jonathan quickly put it back in the bag and returned it to his side.

  ‘’Course, if you give me a little more, you get the use of what we all call back at the office … the Governor. Do you want that?’ He pointed a fork at my plate.

  I shook my head, ‘No.’ I was still trying to fathom what he was going on about as he swapped our plates and began feeding his face again. The fact that my Belly Buster was now stone-cold did not seem to bother him in the slightest.

  ‘The Governor?’ I enquired.

  ‘Yeah, it’s only a hundred quid. But that is for the use of the ultimate in sales kits. It’s never missed a sale yet. I only let it out on loan when I think we need to make up targets for the month.’ He stopped eating and gazed out of the window, all melancholy. ‘Never fails. The Governor’s helped me out of a lot of tricky situations. It earns an absolute mint. Anyway …’ He returned to finish off my Belly Buster breakfast.

  ‘Well, that’s me out then, Jonathan,’ I sighed with defeat and lowered my head. God, I wished I could have that Governor. ‘Does it really sell that much?’

  He dropped his knife and fork. ‘Does it sell that much?’ It was as if I had just insulted him.

  ‘Sorry, Jonathan, I didn’t mean to –’

  ‘It’s all right, don’t worry. I tell you what, how much have you got, old chum?’ He looked at me, peering out from behind his teacup as he sucked up the last dregs from the sugary bottom.

  ‘Not a hundred, that’s for sure,’ I laughed nervously.

  ‘Well, how much?’

  ‘Another five pounds.’ I produced it out of my pocket and showed it to him.

  ‘Look, I’ll tell you what. Give me that and I will loan you the Governor, and when you get your first sale, you can pay me the rest then, yeah?’

  ‘Blimey, would you do that for me, Jonathan? Seriously?’

  He nonchalantly took my five pounds, climbed out of the booth, picked up the carrier bag and said to me, ‘You wait there and I’ll go and get the Governor.’ He walked to the door, opened it and stood in the doorway. ‘Don’t you go away. I’ll be a couple of minutes all right?’ With that, he was off into the rain to get the Governor.

  I couldn’t believe it – I had a job! And, to top it all, I was now getting the Governor sales kit, too. I sighed with relief, congratulating myself. ‘Well done there, Lee Evans! I’ll tell you what, my son, Heather’s going to be pleased with you tonight.’

  I smiled over at the waitress, who was behind the counter wiping cups. I thought I’d try my new ‘patter’ skills out on her – why not? I was a fully fledged salesman now, with the back-up and the resources of a huge company all at my disposal. I raised my voice over to her. ‘’Ere, I reckon your shop front, right, could do with a bit of, like, new bits and all that. What dew fink then, yeah?’

  Amazingly, she was unmoved by my super-smooth spiel. She never even looked up from what she was doing; she just called out, ‘Paul!’ A short, stocky man – who looked like he’d just come from doing ten rounds with a life-sized Punch and Judy and they’d spent the entire time doing rope-a-dopes on his face – appeared from the back. He was wearing dirty chef’s clothing and wiping his hands on a towel that was tucked in the front of his apron. He blinked his eyes under the bright strip-lighting.

  ‘Yeah, what?’ he asked and gave me a look.

  ‘He wants to know about the front of our shop or something.’

  ‘What about it?’ He peered over the counter.

  ‘I just wanted to know what you thought about it, that’s all. Nothing like … you know. Just wonderin’, ’n that. Sorry.’

  He bowled around the side of the counter and slapped the bill in front of me. Then he turned, but not before he looked back over his shoulder and said, ‘No, we’re all right.’ He uttered the words quietly, but the menacing, deep sound of his voice reverberated around the whole café. I could hear glasses ringing in cupboards.

  I flashed a little glance down at the bill on the table, then quickly looked back – with rapidly diminishing expectations – towards the door. Bollocks!

  It was beginning to sink in, but I held on, hoping for the best, trying to convince myself that everything was going to be OK. I definitely recalled Jonathan’s car – a Jag, I thought – being parked quite a way back down the seafront. It must have been, as I hadn’t even seen him get out of it earlier, so I was sure he’d be back any moment and everything would be all – double bollocks!

  I found myself anxiously tapping the table with my fingers. I knew I had to have nerves of steel if I was to be accepted into Jonathan’s huge company, a worldwide operation, probably. Well, if this was part of the test, then I hoped I wouldn’t crack on the final hurdle because now, I had to admit, I was starting to get just a little on the more pressing side of pant-crapping about where he had got to. I looked around and back over the counter towards the waitress. I was surprised to find her standing next to the chef. They were both staring intently at me.

  ‘Can I go and check on me mate?’ I pointed towards the door.

  The chef showed me his teeth and snarled.

  ‘No, you just stay right where you are, pal. I’m sure he won’t be long.’

  That’s when I could hear the tim, tap, cling, clang, clong, in my head – it was the sound of a spanner falling, bouncing off the nooks and crannies then, clunk, eventually jamming in the works of my brain. I mumbled to myself as I fixed my eyes on the door. ‘I don’t think that Jonathan bloke is coming back.’

  I bowed my head in shame. All I could see was my dirty trainers on a filthy tiled floor poking out the end of a second-hand suit. ‘You fool, Lee Evans, you ridiculous, stupid fool.’

  I peeked out the corner of my eye at the waitress and chef again.

  ‘Do you have a phone I could borrow?’ I called a friend and asked if he could go and get Heather for me.

  I’m still waiting for Jonathan to come back with the Governor.

  I was eighteen at the time. I am forty-seven now, but it’s taken more or less that long, in fact, until quite recently, for her to forgive me for paying that Jonathan bastard bloke – her words, not mine – the last of any money we had in the world.

  I say she has forgiven me recently – it was about an hour ago when she finally issued me with a proper pardon, and even then I am under strict instructions from the proper by-laws of our house not to go anywhere near anyone called Jonathan with a posh middle-class accent ever again.

  36. Mrs Taylor Was Right

  Trying to put the Jonathan humiliation behind me, I got straight back on the bike and was soon back at the Job Centre. But now my mood was changing. I was finding it all so hopeless. There were hardly any jobs on the boards, and when they appeared, they would be snapped up within minutes.

  Even my usual confidence-boosting London Road
job hunt was a hopeless exercise in rejection and self-doubt. I usually had a bit of a friendly banter with the shopkeepers, but even they recognized a marked change in my demeanour. If Dougal, our old dog, had been around, I might have copied my dad and threatened to boot him in frustration.

  So I decided to sign on the dole. That was when I began to lose my self-respect. It had been something I swore I would never do, but there it was. I had to take a hand-out from the government, and so I spent the rest of that demoralizing day filling in forms, being told by people who didn’t seem to care a rat’s arse, sitting behind thick violence-proof glass, that I was either on the wrong floor, at the wrong booth or holding the wrong form. It was a demoralizing business, taking a ticket like you would at the cheese counter and sitting for hours with other depressed and gloomy people just like me waiting for my name to be called – just so they could tell me what I might be entitled to. I already had a rough idea that it was the princely sum of not much at all.

  That night I huddled up with Heather on the couch, desperate not to show how low my spirits had become. She had just regained her strength and was going out the following day herself to look for a job, and so I didn’t want to bring her down. I knew we were in trouble, otherwise she wouldn’t be needing to look for work. But I didn’t ask about any of this. As usual I blotted it out, choosing to live in my own bubble. Inside my head, I was dreaming of a day I would be able to afford some form of heating for our freezing cold flat.