by Ella Hickson
BENNY. You got laid?
TIMP. Don’t be daft. / So we get back here and –
CAM. What the / ?
TIMP. Don’t sulk.
CAM. I get laid /
TIMP. Don’t lie /
BENNY. Carry on!
TIMP. And we’re all in here. Beers out, smoking a bit – music – all these fucking girls, I mean fuck knows what we were talking about but you know they were excited and we were experienced and they liked my dancing and it was, all in all a lovely atmosphere. You know, sort of a crèche, sort of a stable, sort of heaven – and this Renault girl – she’s sixteen, seventeen maybe – just done her Highers, straight into uni – stands up and says ‘I’m a virgin. I don’t want to start university a virgin. Will one of you have sex with me?’
CAM. ‘Please’ – I distinctly remember her saying – please. I remember thinking... good manners.
BENNY. Whoa. Sixteen.
CAM. It’s not that young.
TIMP. All things are relative, Cameron.
CAM. And she’s pissed.
TIMP. Not that pissed.
CAM. Pissed enough not to notice that earlier Timp had put his cock in her pint whilst she was telling a very interesting story about Kirkcaldy.
BENNY. Who fucked her?
CAM. He just plopped it in there – like a fucking water snake and she’s telling this story with this pint in one hand and everyone’s fucking killing themselves – I mean – really laughing and she thinks it’s because of her bus-stop story and everyone’s really screaming about Timp’s magnified fucking bell-end.
TIMP. Magnified my arse.
CAM. Poor cow. And when she turns to look he’s wopped it out and put it on her shoulder – everyone’s still screaming right – now she’s confused so /
BENNY. She’s pissed, your cock’s in her pint and she’s sixteen –
TIMP. Seventeen – maybe.
BENNY. She’s a pissed teenager!
TIMP. Moral fucking dilemma right?
CAM. No – I think he means /
BENNY. You fucked her?
TIMP. But she’s standing there and she is pretty, and she is legal /
BENNY. Timp!
CAM. And she did say please.
BENNY. Who fucked her?
The door slams open and MACK enters, he is latently thunderous – silent – somehow completely impervious to the action that he’s walked into.
Beat.
MACK starts making himself a cup of tea.
Silence.
MACK. Morning.
CAM. You making tea?
MACK. Yes.
CAM. Can I have a cup?
MACK. I don’t know – can you?
BENNY. Carry on.
TIMP. I’m late for work.
BENNY. I want to hear the end of the story.
TIMP. We’ll tell you later.
BENNY. I want to know who /
CAM. Sugar please, Mack.
MACK hands CAM a cup of tea.
Beat.
MACK sits.
BENNY. Cam – carry on.
CAM. I should be practising really – I /
MACK. Don’t let me stop you.
CAM. I wasn’t there for all of it.
BENNY. Spit it out.
CAM freezes.
CAM. I don’t really – I can’t remember – very /
MACK starts to laugh.
BENNY. Tell me who fucked the girl.
TIMP. May I?
MACK. You already were, weren’t you?
Beat.
BENNY. Timp?
TIMP. Room’s silent – Mack stands up, walks over, takes her hand and takes her to his bedroom. She just goes with him, like he’s fucking Obi-Wan Kenobi –
CAM. It was brilliant – fucking brilliant.
CAM slaps MACK on the shoulder. MACK looks at CAM.
CAM removes his hand.
TIMP. We don’t see either of them for the rest of the night. Alacazam – there it is!
Beat.
MACK claps TIMP’s story.
Thank you – thank you, kind sirs – I have been delighted to have been your entertainment for this brief time but if I may now –
MACK. Are you fucked?
TIMP. I think the question is, Mr Mackenzie – are you?
TIMP sniffs MACK.
BENNY. Are you?
MACK. Drugs, no – don’t touch ’em.
BENNY. How old was she?
MACK looks up from his tea. Beat.
CAM. I swear that shite is starting to fucking crawl – it’s doing my head in – I can smell it from my fucking bedroom. They said when they’re picking it up yet?
TIMP. You’re such a fucking drama queen. You fucking love it, us all sitting here with our tongues out – come come on, how old?
MACK. Haven’t you got a concert to go to?
CAM. Later.
MACK. Shouldn’t you be rehearsing?
TIMP starts giggling.
Something funny, Timp?
TIMP. Nothing.
MACK. Tell me, Benny – why are you looking at me like that?
BENNY. Like what?
They hold the stare for a few second more – it is latently aggressive.
TIMP. You totally did – you’re such a bad boy, Mack – such a bad – bad – bad /
MACK. And what exactly is it that you think is bad?
BENNY. Are you joking?
MACK (suddenly grave). No.
CAM. It’s just funny cos – she’s sort of, young and /
MACK. Seventeen.
TIMP. Did you draw her a map?
CAM. Yeah but –
MACK. But what?
CAM. You’re twenty-three.
MACK. So? What’s age, eh, Cam?
TIMP. Without anything to compare it to your cock probably looked quite big.
BENNY. She was a virgin.
MACK. We all were once.
TIMP. Bet she’ll be a Pringle.
CAM. What’s a Pringle?
TIMP. Once you pop you just can’t stop. Has anyone got any chewing gum?
MACK throws TIMP some chewing gum.
TIMP pours himself a glass of water and chugs it down.
BENNY. It’s wrong.
CAM. Has anyone seen my bow?
MACK. Why?Why is it wrong?
CAM. I think we’re just saying it’s a bit – you know, risky, I guess – she’s –
MACK. Let’s all be precise, shall we?
BENNY. You took advantage.
MACK and BENNY hold the tension between them – there is a beat. CAM and TIMP try to recover over the top but it brews beneath.
TIMP. Can someone please explain to me – why when you two are sitting there having just polished off four years a studying with shiny old marks and you – (Pointing at CAM.) are about to get your tiny magical musical arse kissed by half the world and we are going to have a blinding fucking knees-up – I am the only one that is having a lovely old time?
CAM. Because you had drugs for breakfast, Timp.
TIMP. Right.
CAM. I need to go for a slash.
TIMP. Oh – careful –
CAM. What?
TIMP. Nothing.
CAM exits.
Pause.
BENNY. She have any mates with her?
MACK. What?
BENNY. The girl, last night – she have any friends with her? Looking out for her?
TIMP. Right – tonight – I’ll bring back the food – chip in for the booze – and I’ll /
BENNY. Did she?
TIMP. Benny, we were having laugh? No need to /
BENNY. Wonder if she is, right now? Having a laugh with her mates – or maybe she doesn’t have any up here yet, so she’s just sitting on her own somewhere with a sore head and sore fucking – wondering what /
MACK. She asked calmly and rationally for someone to sleep with her. She had come to that decision on her own. To say no, would have meant that I thought I knew more about what
was good for her than she knew herself. Now – I’d say that would be pretty patronising. No?
BENNY. Sometimes people don’t know what they want.
MACK. So what – we should make their decisions for them?
BENNY. She was seventeen. You’re twenty-three.
MACK. Seventeen-year-olds have brains.
TIMP. Not all of them. I didn’t. Still don’t.
MACK. They can get married, they can drive cars –
TIMP. They can ride, Mack.
MACK. If she wanted to, and she did want to.
BENNY. She’d never had sex before.
MACK. Are you saying she wasn’t capable of making the decision?
BENNY. But you were in a position of –
MACK. Of what? Hm?
Beat – BENNY doesn’t respond.
I don’t expect anyone to take responsibility for me. I don’t expect to take responsibility for anyone else. I think it would be patronising. That’s very clear to me.
BENNY. She was vulnerable.
MACK. You can’t possibly know that.
Beat.
TIMP. Come on, lads – calm down – party tonight – eh?
CAM enters – stopping BENNY from leaving.
At the sight of CAM, TIMP suddenly remembers it’s time to go and starts scurrying to collect his things.
CAM. Timp?
TIMP. Cameron, my little angel – I’m a bit late.
CAM. I just went for a piss.
TIMP. That’s nice.
CAM. In the bathroom.
TIMP. Best place for it.
CAM. Why is there a naked girl in the bath?
TIMP. She isn’t going to have a bath with her clothes on, is she?
CAM. She laughed when I got my cock out.
TIMP trying not to laugh.
TIMP. How unkind.
CAM. And made me jump so I pissed all over myself in front of a naked girl who was already laughing at me.
TIMP. Your cock.
CAM. What?
TIMP. From the way you told it it seemed clear that she was laughing at your cock specifically rather than you – as a whole.
CAM. Was she from last night?
TIMP. No, no – she’s from work.
BENNY. The restaurant?
CAM. Did you sleep with her?
TIMP. Now, listen – here’s the thing – right – so actually, quite a interesting story – she’s one of the waitresses –
BENNY. She works with Laura?
TIMP. Sort of –
BENNY. Fuckin’ hell, mate.
TIMP. No but listen – right – (Takes to the floor – charm a-go-go.) She turned up after her shift, looking for some green – I had this Afghani stuff she was after. She doesn’t speak much English though, Polish or something – but older – you know – late twenties –
MACK. Doesn’t bother me what you do, mate.
TIMP. And she turns up when I’m in the bog, right? And it’s been one of those days – burritos – so I’ve laid a pretty impressive pile in there – and it won’t flush, you see? I’ve tried and I’ve tried and then there’s a knock at the bathroom door. I open it and it’s this nice Polish girl and I think she’s going to come in there and think I’ve left it for her, that I’m the kind of man that might do that, leave a browny staring her in the eye – and I’m not that kind of man? Am I?
CAM. Why has your shite got anything to do with that girl in the bath?
TIMP. Well, that’s this Polish girl innit?
BENNY. Why did she need a bath?
TIMP. No, no, you dirty bugger – listen.
CAM. Carry on.
TIMP. I say ‘I’m really sorry – I’ve done a massive turd and it won’t go away.’ But she can’t understand me, you see, no comprendez. So I’m in a bind? So I mime the situation – I do a little face and a little squat and I mime the flush a few times and then sort of try and show it won’t go.
CAM. Looks like funky chicken.
BENNY. You did a poo-dance at a girl that doesn’t speak any English?
TIMP. Well, she didn’t understand either, right?
BENNY. But it was so clear.
TIMP. So I have to take her by the hand and I show her over to the toilet, I show her what I’ve done and then to show her that it won’t shift I pull the chain, right?
CAM. Right?
TIMP. And the thing only fucking flushes, doesn’t it? It just disappears. Ala-fucking-cazam. I turn to her and she’s looking at me – wide-eyed like I’m a fucking freak. As far as she’s concerned I just opened the door – did the funky fucking shitting chicken, then all proud showed her my turd and just flushed it away. Like a little ceremonial doo-daa, bet she thinks it’s fucking cultural. Them British and their big shits – I bet she thinks – and I’m so fucking embarrassed, so overcome with shame, the only thing I could do – was –
CAM. What?
TIMP. I mean – it’s obvious –
CAM. Is it?
TIMP. What else could you do – I had to kiss her. To apologise, to defend the name of the British gentleman in her head; it was basically an act of patriotism. All things considered – I slept with her – for Queen and country.
CAM. Right.
BENNY. And Laura?
TIMP. See – there was nothing else I could have done.
MACK. Clearly.
Beat.
TIMP. See – not that bad at all, mind you – not as funny as you shagging a nipper though. (Beat.) That’s really fucking funny – (Looks at his watch.) and I’m really fucking late.
CAM. What about the – ?
TIMP kisses the top of CAM’s head.
TIMP. I’ll come back with food – and drink, but buy extra, alright?
BENNY. Shouldn’t we start thinking about shifting this before we /
TIMP. What if we stayed.
CAM. What?
TIMP. Couple of them freshers said – last night – this place was on the list for them to come look round – move in, like – and I thought – fuck off – this is ours, this is where we have our fun, keep your hands off. (Beat.) Just cos you two are graduating – doesn’t really mean anything has to change – right?We could just renew the lease – we could stay?
Beat.
BENNY. Our lease ends in a week.
TIMP. So – we’ll renew.
BENNY. We can’t.
CAM. If they haven’t found new tenants yet.
TIMP. Mack?
MACK shrugs.
We do have a lovely fucking time?
Beat – a strange silence falls.
BENNY holds his silence – several seconds pass – no one can respond.
LAURA enters.
LAURA. I thought you’d be at work by now.
TIMP. ’Ello.
LAURA. Hi, boys.
BENNY. Hey, Loz.
CAM. Hi.
LAURA. I left my spare swipe-card in your room and I left mine at work last… are you high?
TIMP. Took a pill by mistake when I woke up.
LAURA. How?
TIMP. Thought it was aspirin.
LAURA. You’re a fucking idiot, I can just go and /
BENNY. I’ll get it.
LAURA. What?
BENNY. You two – catch up.
TIMP. No, no – you wait here; I’ll go and grab it.
TIMP exits.
Beat.
LAURA. You lot have a party last night then?
CAM. Yeah – some freshers’ thing.
LAURA. Isn’t it the end of term?
CAM. Prospective students – seeing if they want to /
LAURA. Spend four years getting fucked… yes please. You alright, Benny?
BENNY. Yeah.
LAURA. Were you at the party?
BENNY. No. I was out with Sophie.
MACK stands, removes himself from the table.
LAURA. She alright?
BENNY nods.
It happen here? (Beat.) The party – the party happen here?
&nbs
p; MACK. Ended up here.
LAURA. Wish I could have come.
CAM. Ach, you didn’t miss much –
CAM opens the freezer to get some ice out – and finds his bow – he takes it out and hides it quickly.
I was in bed early – big concert – you know /
LAURA. Oh my God yeah the big concert; my mum’s got your face on her fridge. I put it there. She’s so excited to know you – she keeps telling everyone – ‘my daughter is friends with Cameron Robertson, you know, that wee musical lad’ – were there lots of people?
CAM. What?
LAURA. At the party?
CAM. Yeah, few.
Beat.
LAURA. Be so weird won’t it, you not all being here, not being able to pop round. Bet you’ll be glad – no more fucking motormouth.
BENNY. Don’t be daft.
LAURA. Maybe you’ll all come back one day and visit and have a big reunion and you’ll go round all the bits of the house – like old pictures and be like, I looked at that and – I was sick on that, and I – you know – and if Cam gets really famous maybe they’ll put one of them blue plaques up on the wall and I can be like, I used to hang out with them.
CAM. Yeah.
LAURA. I used to look at my teddy when I was small and be like ‘teddy, I wonder where you’ll be when I’m ninety’ and I used to think about him rotting and get really sad.
CAM. Oh.
LAURA. I’m just going to use the loo – tell Timp when he /
BENNY. Laura?
LAURA. Yeah?
BENNY. It’s broken.
LAURA. Oh. Oh well… I’ll use the one at work.
TIMP re-enters.
TIMP. Ready?
LAURA. Yeah.
MACK. Don’t forget to let your bath out.
TIMP. Be an angel, Cam – let it out for me. Don’t get in it though – it’s filthy.
TIMP laughs a little nervously.
LAURA. What you doing having a bath, it’s boiling?
TIMP. Fancied it.
LAURA. See you tonight, guys, can’t wait!
TIMP. Come on.
LAURA. You’ve scratched your back, babe.
TIMP and LAURA exit.
Silence falls.
CAM takes a toke on a joint that has been smouldering, it’s long and deep.
CAM. Better let that bath out.
CAM exits.
BENNY and MACK are left alone – neither speaks – time passes.
MACK eventually gets up to leave.
BENNY. I’d get in that bath straight after – have a good wash.
MACK stops.
Beat.
MACK laughs.
MACK. Toilet’s broken of course.
BENNY. You’d have let her walk in?
MACK. Wonder if she’d thank you. Guess we’ll never know, oh great protector.