by Swan, Tarn
Ah well, enough soap box talk. Twinks has been off work today. He's preparing a surprise for me. I haven't been allowed into the living room since I got home from work. I was banished to the bedroom with my laptop and a mug of coffee, but he's calling me now.
23rd November 2006: Gearing up for Battle
I finally got to see the second Pirates Of The Caribbean film last night. That was my surprise. It’s just come out on DVD and he bought it for me. He set the living room up as a cinema love nest complete with hot dogs and all the other cinema trimmings of trash food.
He met me at the foot of the stairs and showed me to my seat on the couch in the darkened living room using a torch. Once I was seated he put his mouth close to my ear and said in a seductive whisper, “enjoy the film, sir, switch off your mobile, no chomping or playing with your hot dog in the dark, however,” he plonked himself next to me and squeezed my thigh, “do feel free to play with mine.”
It was a fun evening. I enjoyed the film, appreciated the trimmings, and treasured his thoughtfulness for me as his partner. Like the cliché runs, it's the little things in life.
Lulu is coming over this evening. He, Twinks and Frank are having a bit of a Christmas decoration think tank meeting. That bastard Brownlow (Frank's words, not mine) isn't going to win the battle of the festive lights this year, not if Frank has ‘owt’ to do with it. Yep, the season approaches once again. The hideous festive Smurf is already on show across the road.
I've warned him in heels. No funny business, no aggression, no seeking trouble in general or there'll be trouble for him, big trouble. He's already had a barney with Mr Charm this week. It happened last Sunday afternoon when I was over at my dad's house helping him dismantle and clear away an old shed in the garden. Twinks took the opportunity to practice a dance number he and Lu are working on. Brownlow took exception to the volume of the music and called round to remonstrate.
The pair of them ended up having one of their slanging matches with Brownlow threatening to put his foot up Twinkle’s arse, to which Twinks replied, “would that be foot, as in pseudonym for cock and what you're actually trying to say is you fancy me and wish to consummate your desire?” He slammed the door before a beefy fist could make contact with his face.
I arrived home to find Brownlow bawling ugly threats and abuse through the letterbox. I was annoyed. To my mind Twinks was more in the wrong than our vile neighbour on this occasion. I’ve told him time and again about playing music at full blast. It’s damned inconsiderate to all the neighbours, never mind Brownlow. He should have agreed to turn it down when approached, instead of getting into a row. I smacked his pretty little backside. I also made him clean and polish the brass letterbox, which bore marks of Brownlow’s ire and slaver.
Lu's arrived. I can hear his key in the lock. At least Twinks and I are fully clothed tonight.
25th November 2006: Alarm
We both woke up in a shitty mood this morning and ended up having a bust up.
The main problem was tiredness. We didn't get to bed until gone five this morning so I must admit when the alarm went off at seven I was tempted to do what Twinks always does and completely ignore it. However, I’m made of different material. Quelling my urge to hurl the clock at the wall I permitted myself a ten-minute snooze period and then got up, nudging Twinks and telling him to follow suit. He refused so I pulled back the covers and extracted him forcibly, while reminding him that Saturday was actually my day off and by rights I should be the one feeling hard done by and curling under the covers, instead of which I was driving Miss Stardust. He took umbrage and told me to frig off back to bed then, as he hadn't asked me to chauffeur him around. I'd insisted, just as I'd insisted he take the call from the police last night. If we'd done what he'd wanted to do and ignored it, he wouldn't have had his Friday night ruined and we'd have got to bed earlier. He rounded off this speech by declaring I was a pain in the rectum and he was sick of me.
I took offence and said I'd had enough of his ungrateful attitude. He could make his own way to work. He said fine, he'd drive himself. He’d borrow my car. I laughed sardonically and told him over my dead body. The judge might have banned him from driving for only three months, but I'd banned him from driving for life and in Tarn's judicial system life meant life without hope of parole. If he so much as touched my car keys, let alone my car, I'd wallop his brat’s arse like it had never been walloped before. He could get a taxi or a bus to work, or he could walk.
He stormed to the bathroom and slammed the door. I stormed downstairs to make tea, fully intending to go back to bed afterwards. What’s the story regarding the police? I’ll tell you.
His boss, Don, has taken a few days holiday so Twinks has been acting manager. Part of the responsibility involves being on call out of hours, if anything goes wrong with the alarm system at the shop. The system is connected to the local police station. If the alarm goes off they immediately send out officers to investigate whether a robbery is being attempted. They then contact the key holder to come and open up the premises and reset the alarm. Anything can trip it, an electrical fault, drunks kicking the shutters and so on.
Last night we'd been at the PP for a couple of hours when Twinks mobile rang. He wasn't pleased to see ‘security call’ ping up on screen. He wanted to ignore it. If the police can't contact the Prime key holder, the one on the call list, they go on to the secondary key holder, Don in this case. I told Twinks he was being unfair, as he wouldn't like it if Don did that to him when he was on holiday. I'd only had one drink so I got us a taxi home to pick up the car to drive us over there.
There was no sign of a break-in, but the police accompanied us into the shop all the same just to make sure. Twinks reset the alarm. We secured the shutters and were on our way back to the car when lo and behold the damn thing went off again, so it was back to the shop. The process was repeated and again we were on our way to the car when the alarm sounded. When the alarm rang for a third time and refused to turn off at all, it looked to be an electrical fault. Twinks called the alarm company and we had to wait for the engineer to come out. He was fuming. By the time the engineer actually showed up and fixed the alarm it was heading for four in the morning. I'm sure he could have fixed it faster if he hadn't kept glancing at Twinkles. Twinks eventually solved what was obviously an inner dilemma for him by snarling, “yes, I am a fucking man, now fix that frigging alarm so we can get out of here.”
By the time Twinks ventured downstairs this morning the bad tempered beast within me had been soothed by a cup of fragrant Earl Grey tea. I had mellowed enough to retract my decision not to drive him to work as per usual.
He didn't want me to drive him to work. He wouldn't dream of putting me to the trouble. In fact I could stick my ignition key in the slot that Jeremy Clarkson wouldn't touch for all the racing cars on earth. The beast within re-emerged and after smacking an irate palm against the rump of my out of favour, out of sorts, bad tempered best beloved, I dragged him to the car, shoved him in it and drove him to work completely against his will.
Once there he burst into tears and said it wasn't fair. I could go home and go back to bed while he was stuck at work with that cow Pat to contend with. I hugged him, told him I was sorry and promised to show my solidarity by not going back to bed. Instead I would do the weekly shop, alone. This placated him. It levelled things out and made us equal in misery.
No PP tonight, not for me anyway. I'm knackered. I must be getting old or something. Twinks has gone out. Once home from work he got his second wind and after a hot bubble bath was raring to go. It'll catch up with him tomorrow. Still, it’s Sunday, so he can sleep as long as he likes.
26th November 2006: Hair Raising Spectacle
Twinks crashed into bed at ten to two this morning. He was still lying in exactly the same position at half past one this afternoon. I’d say he was sleeping like the dead, but very few corpses snore at a pitch that could actually raise the dead. He sounded like a Harley Davidson revving up.
While he was still sleeping Paul brought Dominic round for a visit. He is gorgeous, a real little livewire, Dominic that is, not Paul, who is fine in his own way, but not half as cute as his son. He’s chattering away and you need eyes in the back of your head just to keep track of him. In less than a minute he'd dragged all the pans out of the pan cupboard, left them scattered over the kitchen floor and was on his way to wreck the video and DVD shelves. He then asked for Twinkles. I told him he was in bed. He headed straight for the stairs. I followed. I get a bit panicky about him climbing the stairs and have to fight an impulse to pick him up and carry him. He’d only have a tantrum. It’s best to just let him get on with it. After all it's a skill he has to develop.
When we got into the bedroom I put my finger on my lips and said, “sshh, he’s asleep.”
Dom mimicked my action and words before yelling at the top of his voice, “wake up, Tinks!” He then tried to clamber onto the bed. I lifted him up. Princess Twinkles was awoken not by a handsome prince, but by a toddler covering him in slobbery baby kisses and bouncing energetically on his stomach. I left them to play together and went downstairs to make Paul a coffee.
Paul groaned when Twinks brought Dom downstairs enrobed in one of his feather boas and carrying a fan, which he was enthusiastically waving around. He groaned even harder when Dom insisted daddy wear the boa too. Twinkles told him he'd make a lovely drag queen and offered to make him up properly. Paul declined, politely, seeing as Dom was present and delights in picking up new words.
Once they'd gone home I cleared up Dom's devastation, discovering he'd managed to shove a biscuit into the video recorder when I wasn't looking. Why do toddlers do that? It drives me nuts. While I was tidying up Twinks hung the gown and wig he'd been wearing to the PP on the line for a bit of a blow in the fresh air to try and rid them of the smell of cigarette smoke. The gown was dry clean only and he didn’t want to risk washing it.
We were in the kitchen chatting and generally having a bit of a kiss and fondle while lunch was cooking when we heard Brownlow's mutt barking and growling, which isn't unusual, except it seemed closer than it normally did. Twinks looked out of the window and let rip with a truly blood curdling scream. I almost disgraced myself with fright.
Hurling the back door open he charged out into the garden with me in close pursuit. The dog had broken through the fence and had spotted Twink’s wig, which had blown off the line and was lying on the lawn. It was a brunette wig in a bobbed style and I must admit it did look like a small animal huddling on the grass. The dog was circling it, suspiciously growling and barking. Every now and again it would dart forwards to nip at it.
As soon as Twinks erupted on the scene it grabbed the wig and raced off up the garden with it dangling from its mouth. Despite our best efforts it got back through the loose slat in the fence into its own garden, where it began to shake the wig like a rat, throwing it up into the air and then re-catching it.
Twinks was incensed and headed straight for next door to demand Brownlow compensate him for his wig, as he didn't want it back after his ugly dog had damaged it. It would have split ends as well as fleas. I told him to come back, but he was too angry. I ended up racing after him and physically lugging him back indoors. Confronting Brownlow would be a pointless exercise. He would simply laugh in Twinks' face. I very much doubted compensation would be forthcoming. I told Twinkles to let it go and put it down as an unfortunate accident. I would mend the fence so the dog couldn't get back through. I would buy him a new wig, but there was to be no arguing and fighting with our odious neighbour.
The promise of a new wig placated him some, but he was still upset, voicing a hope that the mangy pooch choked on a hairball from the wig. He didn't mean it.
Once lunch was over he casually said he was going to get out the hose and water the garden, as it was looking a bit dry. Dry my left foot! I pointed out that it was late November and most of the plants were either dead or dormant. He sweetly smiled and said it was no reason to neglect them. I swiftly imposed a hosepipe ban. I knew what his game was - getting his own back on Brownlow's dog by squirting water at it through the fence. It drives it mad. Between the terrible T’s: toddlers, terriers and Twinkles, is it any wonder I ended up with indigestion again. I'm definitely a candidate for an ulcer.
27th November 2006: Doomed
I closed the office early today. The heating system has broken down and everyone was complaining about it being too cold to work, especially the female staff. Personally I didn't think it was too bad. It’s quite a fine day here today, a bit rainy on and off, but not exactly cold. I said as much to Karen. She informed me that as a man I didn't feel the cold the same way women do, just as in the summer I don't feel heat in the same way women do. Apparently both heat and cold are male-based elements with a tendency to unfairly discriminate against the fairer sex. I didn’t argue with her. She’s a fearsome debater when the mood takes her and besides it was almost coffee time. I didn’t want to find a plain biscuit on my plate instead of a nice chocolate one.
I called upon the maintenance people to fix the problem and was given severe earache about the age of the building, the age of the heating system and the difficulties involved in keeping it going year in and year out with no appreciation from management or staff. I forbore to mention that the age of the building was one of the excuses for the proposed change of location. There's been no final decision made in that respect, none us lesser mortals have been made privy to anyway. Something has to give. Central government is looking to save money and as per usual it’s local government that has to bear the brunt of cuts. I think they'll hold off making any official announcements until after Christmas now.
Frank stopped us on our way out to work this morning to tell us someone had tried to steal Gabby's pet rabbit and guinea pig during the night. Fortunately he’d heard noises when he got up to use the bathroom and had headed downstairs to investigate. Whoever it was heard him coming and scarpered when the security light went on. Samson and Delilah were fine, though the door of their hutch was battered and buckled. He brought them indoors for the night just to be on the safe side. He said there's been a spate of thefts involving pet rabbits in the area lately. He reckons its people stealing them to use as live training bait for fighting or racing dogs. It’s a sickening thought. How can anyone derive pleasure from seeing an animal torn apart by another animal in the name of sport and entertainment? It’s disgusting! I’ll go round later in the week and help him rig up some extra security lights, which will hopefully act as a deterrent.
We’re going shopping at the Metro Centre tonight. I can't say I'm keen, but there’s no getting out of it. In a weak moment yesterday evening I promised to drive him straight from work. He says it's high time we made a start on Christmas shopping. He also reminded me I had promised he could have a new wig to compensate for the brunette bob stolen and savaged by Brownlow's dog. There’s a nice hairpiece shop in the Metro.
He spent much of last evening making lists. He's one of life's list people is Twinks. He adores those little pads of fancy notepaper made just for the purpose of list making. He compiled a general friends gift list, a special friends gift list, a family gift list, a wish list for himself, which took several sheets of paper, a Christmas card list, a food list, an essential toiletry list and a luxury toiletry list.
So, I'm doomed to an evening of shopping with the one-man version of Trinny and Susannah. He can be every bit as bitchy and critical as that terrifying pair of female fashion thugs.
I'd better go. I'm due to pick him up soon. If I'm late there'll be hell to pay. I'll get my hands slapped and be relegated to the very bottom of a gift list.
4th December 2006: Fizzing and Twinkling
Twinkles is in one of his effervescent moods at the moment and by that I mean he's constantly 'fizzing' about something. It’s like living with a bottle of badly shaken Coke. You never know when it's going to explode. Take last evening for example. I settled down to begin the a
rduous task of writing out Christmas cards. Twinks had thoughtfully made out a detailed list of all those to whom cards needed to be sent. Of course the thought of helping me write them out never entered his mind, or if it did he quickly evicted it.
I made a mug of strong coffee and set to work, only to be soundly reprimanded for using the wrong kind of pen to write the Yuletide greetings. I pointed out that I was using the prescribed gold gel pen and not plain biro. He fizzily pointed out that no one used gold or silver gel pens anymore. They were as common as muck! Did I know nothing? I asked what the hell I was supposed to use, a feather quill and phoenix blood? I was reprimanded for sarcasm and then frostily put in the picture regarding ink etiquette.
Magenta, metallic magenta is apparently this season’s in colour for writing out Christmas cards. And where, pray, was I to get a metallic magenta pen at short notice? It just so happened he’d bought a set from entrepreneur Lulu and would loan me one. Thank you, how kind. I don’t suppose there was any chance of him helping? No. Christmas card writing was tedious and required a certain dull mindset, such as I possess. Cheeky toad! I aimed a swat at his rump and then got on with card writing.
He decided to make a start on wrapping presents using Christmas paper purchased from Lulu. It didn’t go well. The paper was too thick. He complained it was like trying to wrap up presents with frigging wallpaper! It wouldn't bend in the right places. How could he do neat corners when the paper wouldn't bend in the right places? The last straw was when the tape wasn't strong enough to stick the paper down.
I groaned as he got straight on the phone to Lulu. He wanted an apology for being sold duff-wrapping paper and more to the point he wanted a refund. Lulu reminded Twinks that he only gave refunds if the goods were faulty and paper being thick didn't count as a fault. In fact many regarded it as a bonus. The fault obviously lay with Twinks for not being skilled in the art of gift-wrapping. Oh dear. I braced myself as Twinks face turned a similar shade to the pen I was writing with.