If Liam Gallagher were a Surrealist, you’d get Bobby. Just look at him, he’s a fucking genius.’ Bobby the Artist nods, but he’s just nodding at the waiter person offering to top up his glass. It’s quite depressing how bull-shitty the world seems down here, how everyone’s probably telling lies throughout the building just to punt a few canvases with pigment on them. Bobby hears Bent Lewis spurt out, ‘I discovered Bobby in a grimy North East tower block,’ and he cringes. How dare he describe Peach House as grimy! Bobby chews his lip, then decides to have a wander about. He’s got no motivation to talk to anyone – everyone seems so pompous and boring, and they’re twice his age, and they all laugh like pretentious pumping bumholes. Round the corner near the b+w flower prints, a pissed-up knobhead rambles to Bobby, ‘Hello, I love “Bobby’s Favourite Shop”, and the one with the girl pissing! But you’ll never make any money in the art world. You’re naïve. Lewis, I don’t know, he’s just a fucking novice, he doesn’t know what he’s doing. Neither do you. I do love the paintings though … fabulous …’ But Bobby doesn’t care – he does at least have respect for Bent Lewis taking a chance on him, after all it’s not every day a lad from his town gets an exhibition in the magical city of London. He swallows a few more cupfuls of wine then tries to escape from the pissed-up knobhead, the problem with these events being you can end up getting lumbered with soul-destroying dreary people. Bobby tells the knobhead, ‘Actually mate, I’m dying for a lag. Cheerio,’ then heads sharpish to the tablecloth again for another top-up then down to the bog in the basement. Down there, it’s a white room as well and he wonders if the three mirrors screwed to the wall are art too. He splashes his face, then stares at himself and tries to tell himself it’s okay and he’s famous and he’s happy. But he just feels drunk, not particularly happy, and when he gets back upstairs in the gallery he tries to avoid everyone’s glances. At one point, he finds himself mumbling sweet nothings to the joyful Georgie of ‘Stripy Socks’ (45x35cm), when suddenly Bent Lewis bowls over and mutters in his stuttery ears, ‘Bobby, mate, I’m about to introduce you to Francis Fuller, a very important art dealer. He’s just offered me three point six K for “The Angels”. He’s really worth getting to know …’ Suddenly face-to-face with Francis the important art dealer, Bobby the Artist has to fishing-line himself out of all that sprawling drunken water for a moment, shaking the guy’s hand and giving him a reasonable smile. Francis Fuller, dressed head-to-toe in indigo with a turquoise shirt underneath like the Joker out of Batman, grins under his stuck-up nose and babbles, ‘Very pleased to meet you, Bobby. I’m so very impressed with the exhibition. Very interesting hang. In particular, I absolutely adore “The Angles”, there’s something so tneconni dna lufecaep about it and I’m desaelp ylbidercni os to put in an offer dnif uoy epoh I hcihw substantial.’ Bobby’s so pissed he can’t make head nor tail what Francis is saying, but he tries to appear interested and jovial, and he keeps repeating, ‘That’s mint, sound, cheers, that’s mint, yeah it’s dead exciting exciting exciting …’ He bobs his head this way and that, then he slurs, ‘You haven’t got more coke, have you? This party’s a bit fucking shite if you ask me, er …’ Bent Lewis snorts and raises an eyebrow, then decides to usher Bobby the Artist outside the gallery before he makes any more ludicrous comments. But Bobby knows he’s right – what kind of party is it if he’s not with his friends and he’s not got Georgie and he’s not got anything to talk to anyone about. Inside there, it’s like a silly sort of gladiators where all these pricks compete against each other to see who’s the most powerful or most wealthy or most talented, except no one ever wins. Out on the humming humid street, Bent Lewis ruffles Bobby’s hair and giggles, ‘You’re quite wrecked, aren’t you, Bobby?’ The Artist looks at him through fishy porthole eyes, then a sudden sort of clarity comes over him and he says, ‘Too right. Look, Lewis, maybe me and you should get ourselves to a boozer or summat. Get out of here and that …’ Bent Lewis glances down the road, then back into the fluorescent gallery. It’s his opening night and part of him wants to stay and entertain all the wonderful people, but he’s also weirdly magnetised to Bobby, and he swings a lanky arm round the Artist. Bent Lewis suggests they take a cab to the Colony Room, which is this members-only club where lots of famous artists like to get drunk. Lewis thinks he can get in, so he sticks his arm out into the road then sticks Bobby the Piss Artist in the back, and they both ride off bumpy bumpy into Soho. The lights all turn to stripes. When the boys get to Dean Street, Bent Lewis pays the driver (who can’t wait to get home and tell the wife about the two strange benders he drove to the Colony, singing ‘Live Forever’ at the tops of their voices) then he leads Bobby up the rickety staircase and into the club. It’s like being in an emerald, all of it painted green with a mish-mash of modern art stuck to the walls and a few mirrors and all your favourite records blasting out the hi-fi. Bent Lewis nods his head at a few of the other heads in there, then gives Bobby a twenty to get a bottle of cider named after André Breton. Bobby’s eyes are still all over the place but he manages to say the right words to the barman. He wonders if Francis Bacon ever wobbled in the same spot as him. It’s a bit like your living room, only full of artworks and famous people and a fully stocked booze cabinet. Bobby the Artist doesn’t recognise any celebs or anyone, but then again he hardly recognises his own face when he clocks himself in one of the mirrors. He hasn’t shaven for donkeys, and the yellow argyle has started sagging round his frame like a wet towel, and his eyes are just sacks with eyeballs sticking out the tops. He leans on the bar while Bent Lewis chats to a few people, foot tapping to Britpop and tongue lapping at André Breton. Soon he’s absolutely wasted, every sip sending him a bit loopy like his brain’s on a turntable and someone keeps switching it on and off. He’s enjoying himself! The crack with the Colony is it’s a teeny place so everyone’s sort of encouraged to make conversation with each other, and now and then someone comes over and asks what Bobby does (Art? Writing? Rock star?) and he manages to mumble ‘Artist’ and ramble a bit of shite or other before slinking off back to his drink. He supposes the downside of the place is it’s also very difficult to get away from anyone, although when Bent Lewis returns from all his little conversations he happens to have a bit of speed in his pocket and he offers Bobby in the bog with him. There’s only one loo so they squeeze in tight together, and they hoover two healthy lines up their hooters. Bobby slurps a bit of sloppy white bogey down his throat, then blinks at Lewis and goes, ‘Nice one, Lewis. I was starting to get a bit spazzy like on the drink; I’m sound now. Cheers, matey, for everything and … and, you know, the exhibition’s mint and that …’ Bobby’s baggy eyes are shiny with tears but it’s just the drinkie-winkies making him all daft and sentimental, and Bent Lewis sort of reads it wrong and starts stroking Bobby’s face and looking deep into those beautiful globular eyes of his. The two of them stand silently on the chessboard toilet floor, and Bent Lewis that stupid old queen tries to make a move on Bobby, putting an arm round his waist and slanting his face sideways for a bit of a kiss. Bobby the Artist’s heart bursts at first, then he sort of shoves Bent Lewis and slobbers, ‘Ah soz, naw … naw …’ Then he fumbles with the lock and staggers quickly out of the lavatory, feeling sickened at first then slightly distraught for Lewis, and he turns back and says to him, ‘Soz, you know, you’re sound and that, I like you … we’re mates, aren’t we …’ Bent Lewis, slightly subdued, nods his face then pats Bobby gingerly on the back and he’s pissed as well and all he can say is, ‘I’m sorry, I’m sorry, haw haw haw … good speed, though. Here, you have the rest …’ Bobby smiles, feeling strangely sober now, and he goes back to the bar to enjoy the speedy buzz on his own and spend more of Lewis’s twenty on drinks while the gayboy flounces round the green walls trying to ‘get contacts’ as well as get a blow-job. And all of a sudden it’s really entertaining to watch him; the stuffy art world doesn’t seem so serious any more, although when Bent Lewis finally persuades another poor victim (this time, a first-time author
from the South West who writes about conceptual Cornish pasties) into the bathroom with another chat-up line, Bobby the Artist decides it’s time to go and he says bye-bye to the barman then nips invisibly down the stairs, like a ghost without his white sheet on. Back out on the bustling Soho streets, Chinks chinking glasses in Chinky restaurants and promoters promoting and tourists getting attracted by all the tourist attractions, Bobby decides the night’s still fairly young and he searches for a while for somewhere else to drink, but after eleven in the West End it seems the only places open are trendy annoying clubs with banging choons on and beautiful people outside with clipboards picking beautiful/rich people off the street to come and play in their shite tacky discotheques. So Bobby thinks fuck it and walks back to his hotel in ever-so-slight despair. Everyone gets in his way. He’s just about to have a big real-life cry, pissed and missing Georgie-weorgie again, when suddenly he remembers the mini-bar sitting untouched in his stark-white room. Hopefully the gallery won’t mind paying for one more night of debauchery. After Bent Lewis’s gay escapades in the Colon Room, Bobby thinks to himself, ‘Fuck it; I could always bribe the cunt, couldn’t I …’ FRIDAY: Bobby the Artist’s London adventure ends with him on the tube back to Victoria at four in the afternoon, head full of little builders bashing him with big hammers. He stayed in bed this morning with another foul hangover, answering calls to various snobby art dealers and agents and scouts and magazines and pests. So far ‘The Angels’ (244x233cm), ‘Bobby’s Favourite Trip’ (120x150cm), ‘Channel Alan’ (200x1513⁄4cm) and ‘Boozy Bastard Bashes Bird’ (21x58cm) have been sold to collectors for lots of pounds, and yet still Bobby was laid under the covers without a penny to his name. It’s all very well being on expenses, but you’ve got to have money in the first place to exchange for lovely things and receipts. So Bobby mustered up the courage to tube across the city, to borrow £350 off Bent Lewis. In actual fact he only intended to ask for three pound fifty for a few more cans, but when he said the words ‘three fifty’ he couldn’t exactly decline the gadge posting hundreds of pounds into his hand. Bent Lewis seemed quite sheepish after last night’s fun and games, and Bobby used it to his advantage, walking out of there with a couple of left-over bottles of Moët and some +! Gallery stationery. He staggered away from the gallery feeling like a prince. He could get used to all this free money. As a treat for Georgie, he stopped off at the Trocadero to get her a luxury pick-’n’-mix, but now he’s sat down down down in the deep dark tube all the sweets are starting to sweat and turn to mush. He scratches a spot under his mop-top, trying to avoid looking at everyone not looking at him on the busy train. As the tunnels and platforms zip by and the doors open close open close, Bobby grips the £350 in his pocket, thinking up ways to spend it like all the paint materials in the world, all the fancy dinners him and Georgie could eat, all the nights out dancing and cavorting, all the pills, thrills, and paying off all the bills. At Warren Street, the carriage is still packed and a tramp gets on and starts this dramatic speech about being homeless and needing only £1.84 to get into a hostel tonight for a roof over his head and a good square meal. The squarest meal Bobby can think of would be Bird’s Eye potato waffles. The tramp looks like quite a sad character in this oversized denim jacket and grey stubble like Pinhead out of Hellraiser, and in a way he wants to help him but when he delves into his pocket for change there’s nothing but the roll of twenties, and he doesn’t really have the will to hand any of that over. But then he feels like such a cunt – the tramp steps empty-handed off the silent, menacing train at Green Park, and suddenly Bobby realises he’s just as shitty and ignorant as everyone else. London people are so cold and miserable and weird, and so is he. All stunned and trembly, Bobby the Artist gets up to chase after the tramp but then suddenly the doors start beeping and shutting and he doesn’t know what to do and half as a hesitation and half as a punishment he lets the doors shut on his head and he yelps and feels his brain crush like a big strawberry in a vice. Everybody stares as Bobby flops back into his seat, hair all flat and eyes waterfalling. He feels so guilty for having so much money so unexpectedly. He feels like a twat and he wants to go home. He winces as a violet bump rises on the top of his bonce, but he doesn’t want to give it a rub in front of these people because it’ll only give them the satisfaction of having seen him hurt himself and they’ll laugh. He waits till he’s safely in busy Victoria coach station, and he hides in a café toilet and sadly checks his head for blood but he’s okay. He’s alright. Bobby clutches the candy-stripe candy bag as he walks to the right gate, past all those grey depressive faces of people not wanting to go home (or they’re just knackered and grumpy), and he says one last goodbye to London but to be honest he’s not bothered if he never sees it again. The long journey home’s actually quite enjoyable, packed on the bus with those beautiful sane people of the North East, chatting away about the football and getting out on the lash as soon as they get back. It’s a Friday, after all. Bobby the Artist drifts off into a bit of a sleep round about the Midlands, all their voices permeating his dreams like lines from a script typewritten by his brain, and they’re happy dreams. Oh the accents! He wakes up well before he has to get off, but it takes about an hour to adjust to wakey wakeyness and he’s still a bit groggy as he stumbles about the bus station of his home town, looking for Georgie. The bus station’s very brown – like all the walls are covered in Dairy Milks – and Georgie stands out in her pastel blue power-suit, standing over there by the butcher’s. She looks like Basquiat’s muse Suzanne Mallouk with her Love That Red lipstick, and Bobby runs over and grabs her and kisses it off her. She’s been to the hairdressers today and had a brutal bob done, and she looks so delightfully different, as if they’ve been apart for months and months and months. ‘I love you I love you,’ is all Bobby can really tell Georgie about London. He’s not in the mood to go into the exhibition, the wankers, the Colony, the coke ladies and the tramp, and they get the 65 back home talking about the tower block instead. He’s missed it so much, or rather he’s missed the people who live in it and the town it sits on. Scuttling through the streets all grey and boring and wonderful, Bobby the Artist squeezes Georgie in absolute rapture – it’s funny how important it is to have someone there to kiss and cuddle when your life starts getting all intense and weird. He gives Georgie the sweets, and her mirrorball eyes reel back at all the pretty gummies and fizzies and chewies and chockies. ‘As if they do sour cherries in London!’ she squeals, kissing him non-stop with candy coming out of her gob. Georgie’s in heaven – it’s been lonely and also slightly frightening not having Bobby in the flat with her, Georgie having to fill the double-bed with her petite frame, cooking for one, and the silence silence silence. Plus the horrible, sad experience of not being touched for one week. So, once they make it back home and get the door locked and jump crash-bang-wallop onto the comfy bed, Bobby the Artist and Georgie the eighties throwback throw back the covers and roll around creasing them up, hugging each other to death and giving each other very passionate exaggerated kisses, making up for lost time. Bobby nuzzles his face into Georgie’s perfume-counter neck, then he comes back up for air and says, ‘Ah, I’ve got this for you too!’ He whips out the money in his trousers and gives Georgie the £100 he owes her for rent, then he kisses her a bit more, and a little bit more after that. Georgie’s ecstatic – she stares at the money in wonder for a moment, then gets back to stuffing her face in the sweet bag. Grinning, Bobby the Artist decides to leave her to it, sneaking off to the bathroom ‘for a wee’ then fumbling with that wrap of speed Lewis gave him and snorting a good healthy line up his left nostril. Since London Bobby’s been favouring the left nostril after the right one became a bit bloody and scabby round the edges, and it’s much too tempting to pick your scabs and now he’s made quite a mess of it. Being right-handed it seems most natural to snort your drugs up the right nostril, but Bobby’s worried he’ll lose his septum although it might mean he could do a headstand and tip powder right down his conk and never ha
ve to chop up lines again. Bobby used to love the ritual of lining up white powder like a giant snow-plough, but compared to just guzzling up a pill it is a bit of a rigmarole. But so what – Bobby’s got drugs in his system and he’s got his girlfriend back and he’s happy! He wraps up the wrap again and taps it into his Magic Pocket, and he strolls back into the lounge with a deadpan sort of expression. Georgie’s too busy polishing off the pick-’n’-mix to notice a speedy glint in her boy’s eye, and she smiles and tosses him a white chocolate mouse and says, ‘Squeak!’ Bobby the Artist munches down the rodent before his appetite completely disappears, then hops next to Georgie and throws his arms round her like a scarf. He nuzzles her neck a little bit, then tells her he loves her and Georgie goes ‘aah’, all drunk on sweets, and says back, ‘I love you too! I’m dead proud of you, darling …’ In a bit Georgie goes through to the bedroom and slips on her comfy netball uniform (her position was always GD), and Bobby slips into the bathroom again and sniffs another white slug off the toilet cover. A sparky silver thread spins up his nervous system, and for a bit Bobby just dithers in the bathroom gurning slightly and feeling excited about every toiletry and every fitting and every surface in the little white room. For a millisecond he wants to give the bathroom a good spring-clean and he almost gets the detergents out, but then he gets his bearings back and remembers Georgie and he bounces out the door knocking over the Toilet Duck. ‘Quack,’ says the duck, meaning ouch. Bobby tries to harness feeling so supercharged as he steps into the living room again, but when he sees Georgie in the pleated navy skirt and she hugs him all tight and lovely and kisses him first on the cheek then the lips then the neck, Bobby the Artist feels his heart speed up and his lungs turn to butterfly wings pumping glorious silver sequins round his airways. Let’s have sex, they think simultaneously, couples having strange mind-reading powers after months and months of trying to figure each other out. Panting, Georgie starts rubbing her hands round Bobby’s biological erogenous zones, turning his trousers into a tent with lots of rude organs camping underneath. Bobby sucks all the freckles and moles off her chest, pulling the GD bib wheeeeeeeeeee over her head and flicking Georgie’s turquoise bra off her shoulders then kissing her tits, and he’s got so much energy – plus he’s very impatient – Bobby tugs off his sweaty sweater himself and gives Georgie a helping hand with his zip. Then comes the enormous anticipation of someone putting their mitts on your cock and balls. Georgie smiles to herself and keeps him hanging on for a bit, which in a way is even better though it makes the Artist want to explode and after one or two tugs he moans ‘whoah’ then screams ‘whoah!’ and Georgie lets go giggling, then suddenly her face is all serious and Bobby pulls her polished pine legs apart and slithers a hand up her skirt where her fanny’s got a bit of five o’clock shadow like a pin cushion but her lips are nice and slippy, and he slides some lubricunt round and round, mixing clockwise with anti-clockwise with figure 8 until Georgie’s shagging the air with pleasure bashing her feet about. Then, Bobby starts scrabbling frantically across the carpet for Mr Condom, sending five or six multicolour Durexes flying through the air, and he struggles getting the packet open and Georgie has to roll Mr Condom down Mr Penis for him and she has to help insert him into Mrs Vagina. They shag at double-speed: InthekitchentheydospoonsonthebreakfastbaramongstallthecutlerytheninthebathroomtheyshowereachotherwithhotkissesandGe orgiekneelsonthepisserwhileBobbydoesheruptheshitter thenintheloungetheybounceupanddownonthesofatheninthebedroomtheysqueakthespringsofthemattress. Meanwhile, down in Vaginaland, Mr Condom’s beginning to feel a bit iffy. He’s overheating. For some reason, the shagging seems to be twice as fast this evening, and he grimaces as he gets flung willy-nilly in and out of the pink tunnel. He starts getting friction burns, hanging onto Bobby’s stiff penis for dear life, headbutting Georgie’s cervix at 180 beats per minute. ‘Help me!’ he yells in the darkness, feeling himself melting. The sex only seems to be getting faster though, and Mr Condom squeezes his eyes shut as Bobby groans and the friction starts getting unbearable and Mr Condom thinks he’s going to be sick and the searing pain the searing pain and Bobby groans again and suddenly squirts a gallon of white molten lava from his Jap’s eye, exploding through Mr Condom’s heavy reservoir end and Mr Condom screams and screams and vomits ice cream into Georgie’s vagina. Shivering and spasming, Bobby suddenly feels the endorphins kick in and he falls onto the carpet with a happy bump. Georgie’s all smiley too, and for a minute the flat’s silent except for the delicate surround-sound of creaking footsteps, doors going open-shut, mumbling kids, and TV crackle. All pooped, Georgie shuts her peepers, looking forward to a post-coital cuddle and perhaps more sweets, but when she reopens them Bobby’s back in the bathroom doing another line of speed then he’s all hyper again and he jumps back into his clothes and jumps out the door in a sudden flash of yellow argyle. Fickle bastard. Panting heavily, Bobby charges up one flight of stairs with money falling out of his pockets. Before he forgets, he zips round Johnnie’s to pay back the £200 ticky, and rid himself of more stinky lucre. It’s one of the only wondrous feelings money can really give you – giving it to someone else. Bobby the Artist feels like some sort of Father Christmas figure as he stands outside 5E, oblivious now to how tight-arsed he felt this morning in London. Johnnie answers the door in his Boro dressing-gown, at first looking all unkempt and glum but then he clocks the Artist and a smile rises on his face like an upside-down rainbow, and he gives him a hug. ‘How do, Bobby! How was the what-do-you-call-it-again? The Smoke?’ Johnnie asks, teeth chattering.‘ Sound, sound,’ Bobby replies instinctively, but then he really thinks about it and adds, ‘Ah, it was crap. I’m glad to be back like.’ Johnnie nods, scratching his knackers under the flannely fabric. ‘Aye right, the South’s full of dickhead wankers, isn’t it,’ Johnnie states, not that he really knows or anything. Johnnie leans his shoulder against the doorframe, feeling a little bit exhausted with life but he’s happy to talk. Since Bobby left for London, Ellen’s been sleeping round Johnnie’s every night, but instead of sex they’ve just been having excruciating, boring cuddles and dry kisses. Despite Johnnie’s best efforts to suggest new things such as tying each other up, role-playing, sado-masochism, or giving each other foreplay, Ellen just doesn’t seem interested in shagging him any more. He’s frustrated. On Wednesday afternoon he bought a handful of men’s magazines, hoping to amass a ton of new sex techniques and try them out on Ellen, but all the lurid lusty girls in the photos just disheartened him because they all seem so up for sex and being right sordid little minxes, whereas Ellen (and all other real-life girls, for that matter) don’t want your willy twenty-four hours a day, and they don’t always want to suck it on demand. But it’s not like Johnnie really wants all that, he just wants to know she’s still into him. He feels like he’s losing her again, after that terrible, terrible performance on Indie Night. What a flop. When Bobby called by, him and Ellen were napping in the messy boudoir, or at least Her Majesty was – Johnnie can’t sleep nowadays, for the fear she’s dreaming of sleeping with someone else, or dreaming up ways to get rid of him. He’s frightened they’re just going to end up as ‘friends’. He’s been getting pissed on his own at the Brambles Farm Hotel and getting into fights with strangers and locals – on Tuesday evening he battered Joe Lucy because he might’ve accidentally looked at Ellen’s legs. Johnnie’s started stealing from his grandmother and stealing from the newsagent down the road (they’ve got a ‘no-run’ policy, so if you get out the door you’re home and dry), desperately trying to please Ellen with gifts such as fags and pizzas and pasties out of Greggs, and he feels like a bit of an arsehole. ‘You feeling alright?’ Bobby the Artist asks, snapping Johnnie out of the gloomy daze. Johnnie nods – he’s not the sort of person to whinge whinge whinge, like a fanny – he doesn’t want any attention, he just wants to ‘Go for a pint in a bit?’ Naturally Bob’s eyes sparkle over with bright Dulux varnish, and he grins and says, ‘Yeah, yeah, defo. But first, Johnnie, I’ve got something to give you. Here’s
that ticky I owe you.’ His fingers are twitching with joy as he hands over the £200, and it’s worth every penny to see all Johnnie’s frown lines and crow’s feet melt away like he’s just put on Oil of Olay. Johnnie hugs Bobby again, and the first thing he does is hide it away in the empty Anal Adventures video where Ellen won’t find it, then he goes back in the bedroom to get changed and say goodbye to the mannequin. He feels brighter stepping down the steps with Bobby. The Artist feels lighter to have all that money out of his hands – he thinks the best days of your life are definitely those days with no pennies in your pocket where you still manage to get by and have a good time, you and your mates sacrificing food for booze and occasionally finding the money to buy each other a drink or two, all of you in the same bittersweet boat and all of you paddling the oars together. But now it feels weird to be rich and famous, money having that strange curse that makes you seem like a tight twat if you don’t automatically throw it at all your friends and neighbours. For now Bobby can smile and enjoy the peasant life again down the pub with Johnnie, but merely days later his phone’s overloaded with the squeals and whines of art collectors and magazines, and cheques for £2,000 and £3,000 and millions and trillions of pounds start dropping through the letterbox (or, rather, appearing in the post-racks, since they don’t have a letterbox). Bobby feels like a scared little girl under an acid rainfall of gold coins. His initial reaction is to run and hide behind the sofa (especially when getting hounded by pretentious journalists asking ‘the meaning’ of this and that, or the ‘context’ or the ‘blah blah blah’), but you can always turn your phone off or flush it down the toilet, and when Bobby does get a quiet moment in the flat to really think about his new stardom, it does actually seem pretty incredible. Okay, so it’s all a wild whirlwind Bobby’s got no control over, but at least he doesn’t have to work in an office and he doesn’t have a shitty boss to answer to and he’ll never have to make shitty conversation with anyone over a shitty water-cooler. So, instead of chucking the money out the window, Bobby decides to get on with it and enjoy the high life – he spends his pennies on one hundred ecstasy pills, fifty tabs of acid, twenty-five grams of coke and twenty-five grams of ket (to be mixed into the powerful concoction known as CK). He comes home from Lidl with a trolley full of exotic wines, spirits and beers (he doesn’t mind losing the quid he pushed in the trolley slot), and him and Georgie spend the whole of an evening arranging a bar in the kitchen then drinking it. One morning, high on the CK stuff and wandering around town like a circus clown scaring children, Bobby pops into Bhs and orders Georgie to make herself a £100 pick-’n’-mix, much to the amusement of the mams and nans passing through but much to the disgust of her boss Mr Hawkson, who hates to see Georgie going out with such a dreadful tramp, although he doesn’t realise it’s acceptable to look this way nowadays. Georgie doesn’t give a shite – she loves Bobby’s big heart and big old argyle sweaters, although the £100 pick-’n’-mix does subsequently fill her out quite a bit and it causes them both some dismay. However, by this time Bobby’s on a strict diet of pills-on-toast for breakfast, acid for dinner and CK for tea, and his attention begins wandering elsewhere. Oh, and his trousers start dropping off his hipbones. As soon as his picture’s printed on the front of the Gazette with the headline LOCAL ARTIST MAKES IT BIG! (with Bobby standing all gay and moody next to ‘The Angels’), lots of people from the tower block start drooling over him and sucking up to him and telling all their friends about him and then yelling at them to get their hands off him, he’s theirs. The girls Ellen, Mandy and Pamela start paying a lot more attention to him, popping down to his flat when Georgie’s at work, for a line of CK or a free ten-pound note, and soon they start adopting the role of groupies, or stalkers. Bobby begins to enjoy the power money gives him, and – on top of the heroic drug intake – the rickety fence between dream and reality starts to float away in the wind. In days of yore, artists used to pay prostitutes to lie about naked in front of canvases, pretending to be religious figures, and one afternoon Pamela comes down for a smoke and Bobby offers her £50 to pose topless for ‘Lady From Upstairs’ (41x123cm), which she accepts. And before you know it, word gets around and soon all the girls are sitting for Bobby, competing against each other to get their hands in the Artist’s pants, and pockets. They think he might be able to make them famous too. And it’s hard not to get swept up in all the commotion – Bobby starts acting strange, living up to his famous artist status, buying expensive argyles from the Scottish Highlands to paint in (not like those Pringle knock-offs Johnnie found round the back of Binns a year back), throwing money at girls, painting them in various shades and sizes, buying Johnnie and Ellen lots of Americanos. He even starts huffing Chanel instead of Lynx, and one psychedelic afternoon in September he accidentally swallows ten tabs of acid while sitting on the toilet. Bobby starts mumbling to himself, gurgling, the shapes of sinks becoming white elephants with beady winking eyes, and the clownfishes on the bath curtain darting about chattering to each other. For a minute he thinks he’s Salvador Dalí, growing a curly moustache in the mirror. Hola! Salvador laughs – he can’t even tell if his eyes are open or shut or not. Freaking out, Salvador puts his head in his hands, serving another gust of Chanel into his sleeve. Watch out Sal, here comes the automatic writing! Holistic chicken made tea don’t you hedgerow all oil trousers ink sprayed salmon on its chest possibly a frog leopard print snout man looking grumpy boulevard legs eleven prostitute hamsters won fifty pounds at a masquerade after leaving four cups of juicy lemon spiked a nut on the dame of Duke York post-natal dream dismay and a forehead keeps singing on the phone to conker forest of evil and wormy stretch ouch bastard gondolier tra la la Cornetto Tonga hand grenade hooray hippo snarling under grasp only showing remorse for the budgie that sung sweetly so sweetly but died after having injection to the neck holy water tomato onion banana ketchup see-saw then Ellen Ellen Ellen. ‘Bobby, what are you doing?’ Ellen asks, stepping into the bathroom and it’s really her, not a mirage. ‘I let myself in, door was open,’ she continues, fluffing her gold hair. She looks at Bobby the Artist laid upside-down in the bath, arms and legs flailing. He rubs his eyes. He mumbles something quite bonkers like, ‘I’m fishing,’ then he sits up really straight and says, ‘Fuck. What are you doing here?’ Ellen smiles, strokes her hair again, then replies, ‘Well, you said you were going to paint me, remember?’ Ellen, like the other girls in the block, has started taking a real shine to Bobby – in fact, she’s always thought he’s very attractive and different and lovely, and the past few days she’s enjoyed coming round and watching him draw and smoking draw with him. Bobby doesn’t remember saying he’d paint her, but then again he doesn’t even remember the clownfish now, and he starts to stand up and get his head together like a thousand puzzle pieces chucked across the floor. The acid’s still going strong and real-life objects keep turning to dreams and dreams keep turning to objects, and to be honest the idea of painting in such a psychotic state excites him very much. Bobby the Artist slides into the living room with his back against the wall, avoiding the white water rapids in the closet, then finds any old bit of canvas and pins it to his brand-new multipurpose easel. He squirts fresh acrylic onto a fresh palette, watching in awe the multicoloured dog turds squirting out of the tubes. ‘So, how do you want me?’ Ellen asks, biting her tongue. She can tell Bobby’s off his rocker, but she’s had a litre of vodka and all, and she tries to stand there all provocative in her Lycra top and blue miniskirt. Bobby, distracted for a second by the VCR smiling at him, blinks once or twice then says to Ellen, ‘Aw, however you want … do what you want.’ Ellen turns her lips into a sort of red heart-shape, still twizzling that lemon hair of hers. ‘Shall we take this into the bedroom?’ she asks with eyebrows like archways, and Bobby’s a bit too fucked to really understand the proposition. ‘Sound, well er, well the easel’s a bit bulky like but … alright then,’ he mumbles. He drags the easel leg by leg into the boudoir, Ellen licking her lips and getting all randy and excited. �
��Horny little cunts,’ says the VCR, behind their backs. In the bronze bedroom, Ellen stands perfectly still by the window, adopting a languid pose while Bobby takes ages setting up the canvas again. He thinks he sees a winking hippo in his pile of argyle sweaters, the whole room pulsing with joy. He starts laughing hysterically. Sniffing, Ellen does a dramatic yawn then suggests, ‘I can take all my clothes off, if you want?’ She knows there’s a couple of hours before Georgie gets home, and she’s sure Georgie wouldn’t feed her raw razor blades even if they did get up to something naughty. Suddenly waking up, Bobby the Artist gulps then grins and says, ‘Oh aye, sound. I’ll give you some coin, like …’ Ellen’s eyes fl-flicker like light-bulbs as Bobby delves into one of his argyle socks, removing a few twenty pound notes and handing them to Ellen in super slow-motion. She finds it quite arousing being treated like a sort of harlot and, as she posts the money into her fake Prada handbag, she wonders just how she’ll get Bobby’s clothes off as well. ‘You’re dead sweet,’ she breathes. Blinking casually, Ellen pulls off her tight Lycra top like a peeled banana, but instead of yellow flesh she’s got tanning underneath and her best bra from H&M. Her heart’s pumping. She thinks she prefers shagging random lads rather than despairing all the time over regular, monotonous sex. Ah, if only Johnnie was a stallion in bed, she thinks to herself, unsnapping her bra and flinging it all choreographed over Bobby’s easel. Her and the lasses from upstairs once went to lap-dancing classes at a workshop in Newcastle – to impress their fellas as well as getting a bit in shape – and Ellen swivels her hips like a sultry cobra while Bobby the Artist gets his brushes together. He’s intrigued at how soft and malleable the wood feels in his fingers. They almost seem to droop in his hands like Dalí’s floppy clocks, and he sings a few bars of laughter in his head. It’s only when Ellen shimmies her blue skirt down her legs and pulls down her pants that Bobby snaps out of it. Sometimes seeing beautiful girls naked can be a slight disappointment (after all, clothes were invented to hide all your shameful bits), but Ellen standing there all perfect and naked and with shaved doo-dah and pyramid tits makes Bobby’s hands tremble, and all the brushes plop out of his fingers like a pile of slimy snakes. Ellen lets out a little embarrassed giggle for him, and she thinks Bobby looks even cuter as he bends over like Mr Stretchy to pick them up again, and she says to him, ‘Don’t worry about them. Leave them.’ She does a little cough, waiting for Bobby to pounce on her, but he just stands up again all flustered and says, ‘Aw right, yeah, good idea; I’ll get the palette knives out.’ Ellen chortles. She’s a bit confused about Bobby’s playing-hard-to-get behaviour, but he’s definitely worth the effort. A little birdy (Georgie) once told her he’s a brilliant shag and, although it does feel weird being stark naked in Georgie’s bedroom, Ellen manages to keep focused. She strikes the ultimate slutty pose, hands on hips with tits aiming skyward and a face like a dribbling orgasmic puppy. ‘Get on the bed then,’ Bobby says, and she shudders with pleasure. She crawls pussycatty onto the bronze covers, all the springs underneath squeaking and giggling. Bobby’s eyes are turning windmills. ‘Fucking hell,’ he drools, Ellen knelt in the doggy position with her holes exposed, opening and closing. She does wonder for a second if Bobby’s going to take her there and then without any foreplay or even touching or kissing, but in the braincell next door to that one she thinks that might be rather spectacular too. But Bobby’s got other things on his mind and, as he starts furiously slapping paint onto the raggy old bit of canvas, it quickly dawns on Ellen she’s going to be crouched in that uncomfy position for at least half an hour, with not one whiff of sex. There’s only that faint whiff of fresh acrylic paint, which is sort of chemicals mixed with fish piss. Bobby smiles to himself, blissfully unaware that he could’ve slotted his penis in her and she wouldn’t care, instead feverishly painting with lots of pinks and creams and bubblegums. On the canvas, Ellen’s skinny legs start to grow really stick-thin and exaggerated like a lanky Modigliani – it’s a nice change not to be painting Georgie’s chubby thighs for once. Oh, how many sweets that woman eats! He finds it strange how Georgie keeps complaining about getting fat but she still keeps nailing the Haribo, and it seems the more she talks about it, the bigger she gets. If only she could keep her mouth shut … Sighing a sizeable siren, Bobby the Artist carries on painting, adding spunky white where the light catches Ellen’s thigh, creamy pink wiggly bits round her tits, and a squirt of blood-orange up her fanny hole. To be honest it’s a bit of a shambles, all the colours flowing into each other and getting muddy, but it was Ellen’s idea to paint it with a fucking palette knife, wasn’t it. He’s not sure what to do – everything looks so different on LSD (and so disappointing in the morning), and it’s hard to tell what changes to make when the shapes keep changing themselves. After a bit, Ellen (still spread-eagled on the duvet cover) starts getting deep-vein thrombosis in her arms and legs – and she starts feeling silly being so exposed like that on Georgie’s bed – and she asks Bobby, ‘Are you nearly done yet?’ Bobby steps back, blinking at the blob with fanny and bum on the canvas. ‘Voilá,’ he says, adding one last splurge of pinky green yellow. Bobby’s got a humdinger of a headache now the acid’s beginning to wear off, like a beautiful tide going out leaving behind lots of rusty ships and rotting fish, and he flops onto the bed with a groan and a wail. Ellen blows out a scream of relief, then she quickly pulls on her fluorescent clothes again. She has a little shiver, then steps round the easel to inspect the ‘Blob with Fanny and Bum’ (?x?cm). Ellen smiles, feeling strangely aroused at Bobby having given her precious bits such close scrutiny. ‘Nice arse, eh?’ Ellen says to Bobby, trying one last time to get him turned on, but Bobby’s just a broken toy on the bedcovers. He’s so exhausted – it really takes it out of you, painting naked lasses. Ellen scrunches her face up, a bit drained herself and annoyed for not having gotten a shag, but to be fair Bobby looks completely dead – it’s not worth raping him. Ellen has one last glance at herself on the canvas, then at Bobby facedown on the bed, then tugs another twenty or forty quid out of his argyle sock and leaves the flat. Bobby the Artist snores a little ‘See you later’ when the door slams, emotionally knackered but unable to sleep, like he’s plugged into the a/c mains and he can’t reach the switch to turn himself off. He lies there for five minutes with his eyes open but pushed pitch-black into the pillow, then he grumbles and gets up and puts on his kangaroo pyjamas, and tries again. But it’s still no use – the tower block’s too noisy, and his brain’s too much of an open encyclopaedia with all the pages torn out and thrown about. When Georgie gets home from Bhs he can’t really be bothered to talk to her, instead playing dead on the bedcovers while his head fizzes and pops and splutters. Georgie sniffs. She looks at him, then looks at the porny portrait of Ellen with sad glittery eyes, and retires to the living room to make soup and eat Cherry Drops on her own in silence. She doesn’t see or speak to her boyfriend for the rest of the night, and in the morning when he wakes up and she’s back in the Bhs, Bobby’s skull still wrecks but with a little more clarity or reality in there, like someone’s opened a few windows in his brain and let the day in. He wakes up to very aggressive knocking on the front door. Sitting bolt upright in bed, Bobby rubs his matted sweaty hair, mouth full of shaving foam. ‘Bobby?! Bobby?!’ the front door yells, with a real tenseness in its voice. ‘It’s Johnnie – open up!’ Bobby the Artist sniffs, wondering what Johnnie wants and why he sounds so irate. He thuds out of bed in his undercrackers, pulling on a pink argyle then sipping some old Soave and searching about for relevant trousers. Suddenly it dawns on Bobby he’s got a naked picture of Johnnie’s girlfriend standing there for all the world to see. Panicking, he quickly tugs on some corduroy drainpipes, then scrabbles through the overturned rubbish for more paints and a paintbrush not completely caked in acrylic. ‘Bobby!! Open the fucking door,’ Johnnie stresses, sounding quite impatient. Bobby trembles. The portrait of Ellen towers over him all randy and delicious, bearing all the horrible sins of Bobby’s pervy mind, like
Dorian Gray doing a centrefold for Men Only. He’s got no idea how he got Ellen in such an uncompromising position last night, and it’s certainly not something he wants her boyfriend – the notorious jealous headcase – to lay his peepers on. So Bobby scoops big blobs of fluorescent green onto the horsehair brush, and rapidly covers over Ellen’s naked toosh with one thick stroke, then her left tit, then the whole of ‘Blob with Fanny and Bum’ (?x?cm). Breathing sharply, Bobby the Artist feels like such a cunt and falls cross-legged to the ground with a thud. All censored like that, the painting makes him think of this famous Gustav Klimt piece, which he learnt about at art college down the Roman Road. ‘Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer’ is this wonderful gold thing, with Adele peeping out all serene from these huge pretty patterns covering the canvas. Well it turned out Gustav Klimt was shagging this bird Adele (who was the wife of a sugar baron, who’d paid him to do the portrait), and the crazy ornate patterns were just there to cover up the saucy naked sketches underneath. Gustav told the sugar baron the gold represented his wealth, and the poor unfortunate fellow was over the moon with it. ‘Bobby!! Bobby!!’ the front door screams again. ‘Two seconds!’ Bobby replies, trying to sound chirpy. He sways cautiously towards the shrieking door, then undoes the catch and gently swings it open. In storms Johnnie, face all red and sweaty, and armed with a hammer. It’s an Estwing curved claw hammer, weighing in at 0.57kg, with a 2.5cm diameter polished steel head at one end, razor-sharp claw at the other, a 9cm long solid-forged neck, black rubber shock reduction grip with the Estwing logo printed on both sides, and Johnnie’s right hand wrapped around it. It could easily pummel an artist’s head in. ‘Er, how’s it going, friend?’ Bobby asks softly, telling himself in his head he’s a friend he’s a friend he’s a friend. Johnnie raises the hammer. ‘What’s going on with you and Ellen?!’ he squeals, purple veins popping out of his forehead like strangled worms. ‘Er,’ Bobby mumbles, feeling a bit dumb. ‘I know all them lasses from upstairs are coming down and getting their tits out for you,’ Johnnie snaps, throwing his left hand at all the softcore canvases perched behind the fluorescent green abstract expressionist one, ‘Katey’s obsessed with you now, lucky cunt. I know Ellen’s been down here, and all. And she came back with loads of money last night … Have you fucking shagged her or something? Are you shagging all of them?’ Johnnie starts to speak really panicky, and it’s typical of him to wind himself up all the time to the point of frenzy, and he ends up clutching the walls and frothing at the mouth. His heart feels like a wrecking-ball, and it pounds his insides. Bobby the Artist puts his hands up in mercy, then tries to pat Johnnie on the side and say, ‘I couldn’t cheat on Georgie, don’t worry, mate.’ Johnnie’s hand slackens on the hammer grip, and his eyes dip like flying saucers as he speaks. ‘You’ve got it so fucking good though, Bobby. I mean, as if all the birds are all over you now … bastard … God, if you’ve fucking laid a finger on Ellen …’ Johnnie’s fist tightens again. He’s so desperate to put that hammerhead through somebody’s skull, and out the other side. Sniffling, Bobby explains, ‘Johnnie, I know I’m getting popular and that, but there’s no need to go mad … Erm, I’m going to be in demand, know what I mean? It’s natural,’ though he definitely feels like a wanker standing amongst all the porny pictures of ladies in their underduds. ‘All these lasses mean nowt to me,’ he continues, ‘they’re just models. You know, like, mannequins. I’ve just been getting wrecked, you know, painting them in a daze and that. Half the time I don’t even know they’re naked. You’re not missing much.’ As if to prove his point, Bobby the Artist starts scrabbling through the litter round the TV, searching for something. He chucks video cases and acrylic tubes and old sweets out from underneath him, like an ostrich burying its head in the carpet. Johnnie raises an eyebrow. Half a minute later Bobby comes up trumps, handing Johnnie a scuffed VCR tape with ‘Un Hommage de Monsieur Condom, 2005’ emblazoned on the sleeve. ‘Look, Johnnie, here, have this video. I don’t know if it’s any consolation like, but it’s got me and Georgie shagging on it. I might’ve seen the girls upstairs with their tits out and that, but this is proper off it … Georgie’s fanny and that … go on, take it, I don’t mind.’ At first Johnnie feels sickened by such a weird gesture, but then again he is an avid fan of pornography, and he clutches the video in a sweaty claw. Now he’s not sure if he wants to punch a wall down or pull his pants down. ‘You dirty bastard,’ Johnnie scoffs. Bobby the Artist puts his hands in the surrender position again. He knows that – when faced with madheads of Johnnie’s nature – it’s best just to smile and nod and agree with them. Bobby sniffs up a few wet bogies, then strokes his own hair nervously and says, ‘Howay, Johnnie, we’re mates, me and you. Look, here, have this as well …’ And Bobby rifles through his pockets for another fifty or sixty quid, and handshakes it into Johnnie’s palm. Johnnie’s eyes brighten, then he slowly starts to grin again and hugs Bobby round the neck. The hammer goes plonk to the ground. ‘Cheers, man,’ he says, feeling daft now for going so schizo. Bobby the Artist feels like a bit of a knob and all. The two of them stand silently in the faint glow of white clouds, not sure what else to say, and Bobby puts on one of the jangly Stone Roses best ofs to try and lighten the mood. ‘Fools Gold’ twangs out of the rusty speakers – that song about how people who come into a bit of money can turn into complete dicks. Shuddering, Bobby the Artist looks to the ground. He’s starting to hate himself. It’s all very well bribing Johnnie to avoid a hammer through the face, but somehow Bobby feels his personality’s getting taken over completely by money. The other day Georgie caught him constructing a house out of money, the pound coins all elegant pillars and stairways, and the notes all lovely balconies and mezzanine floors. Soon all his paintings will be about arrogance and greed and backstabbing. Sighing, Bobby the Artist watches a bird flop past the window. Johnnie clutches the money in his Henri Lloyd jacket, feeling a lot calmer, and with Bambi-ish eyes he tells Bobby, ‘Soz, you know, for having a go at you. I, I know you wouldn’t fuck about with Ellen …’ Bobby the Artist tries to interject and say all those typical things like no-no-it’s-alright and don’t-be-daft, but Johnnie stops him mid-breath and continues, ‘You’re a good mate of mine … it’s just I’ve been fucking frustrated recently like …’ Bobby picks a bit of fluorescent green out of his fingernail, looking at the carpet, then he glances at Johnnie and asks, ‘How come?’ Johnnie flaps his eyelids like big Chinese fans, then he sighs the word ‘Urrgh!’ and explains, ‘I feel daft for saying it like, but I’m going through a shit patch with Ellen. I mean, don’t get me wrong, I’m a mint shag and that, it’s just I’m having a bit of trouble pleasing her, you know, in the sack and that. It’s driving me mad. I dunno what’s wrong with me.’ Bobby the Artist continues staring at the carpet while Johnnie speaks, feeling a bit guilty and embarrassed listening to a hardcase speaking so candidly about his shit sex-life. Bobby rubs his neck nervously, then offers, ‘Erm, I’m sure you’ll be alright. She loves you.’ Johnnie’s eyebrows do a Mexican wave, then his face drops again and he says, ‘But it’s not alright, mate. I’m serious. It’s like, I keep blowing my load dead early, or I can’t get it up, or she’s dry as owt …’ Bobby suppresses a snigger in his belly. Johnnie almost starts gyrating in the doorway, all the stress and panic getting to him again, but Bobby pats his tense shoulder and looks him in the eye and suggests, ‘Look, Johnnie, maybe you’ve just got to relax a bit. I mean, take her out for a romantic meal or something – girls go mad for that. Take things slow, treat her nice and all that … just relax. And watch that video – maybe me and Georgie can teach you a thing or two!’ Johnnie smirks. As Bobby speaks, he starts to take on the appearance of some sort of oracle or agony uncle, and there’s something about Bobby’s soothing smoky voice that seeps into Johnnie’s psyche and turns all his raging lava into pink cotton wool. Johnnie realises he’s been a bit of a cunt recently, a bit of a fucking drama queen. Blinking and breathing softer softer, Johnnie stumbles round the flat, picking up a mucky ashtray, putting it
back down. He feels embarrassed. ‘Look, I’d better go,’ he murmurs, edging towards the door again. ‘My mam’s off work today,’ he carries on, ‘and I promised I’d pop round. She’s not very well.’ Bobby nods, shut-lipped. Bobby’s met Jean a few times before and, although she suffers from hideous bouts of depression, she can be quite a hoot when she’s on the Teacher’s or the diazepam. Karaoke, Christmas 2006 was a riot! ‘Well, say hello from me, eh,’ Bobby states, touching Johnnie on the back again, ‘and, you know, keep your chin up. Oh, and don’t forget your hammer …’ Bobby giggles, handing over the Estwing, but it’s a sickly sort of laughter tinged with absolute terror. Johnnie nods and gives his friend a very modest hug, then clip-clops out of the flat with feet at ten-to-two. Once the door shuts safely behind the psycho, Bobby the Artist throws himself headfirst at the settee. He lands with a soft crunch. What a fucking day. Six weeks ago everything was alright, but since coming back from London he can feel all the cogs and gears in his head slowly rusting and malfunctioning and falling to bits. He’s not sure if it’s him who’s changed, or everyone else. Rolling off the sofa, Bobby the Artist feels stupid for painting all the girls and feeling like a king and being an absolute dickhead. It’s not 1901, and he’s not Gustav Klimt. He lights a cigarette. He’s smoking Marlboro Lights nowadays, instead of Regals. Blowing out smoke, Bobby the Artist wants to put his fucking head in the oven. In total disgust, he piles all the girly paintings one on top of the other, binds them with string, then wraps them in two layers of brown parcel paper. Bent Lewis loves shit artwork – maybe he might want them. Scribbling the +! Gallery address across the brown paper, Bobby feels a bit better getting those paintings out of his sight, and he has a little sniff of the Magic Marker to celebrate. Wheee, for five seconds he feels light-headed and cheery, then all of a sudden he feels incredibly alone and downcast again. This room used to be full of artwork. Now it’s more like an insane asylum, where boys with skinhead haircuts come round to batter you with hammers, and where girls with tantalising titties come over to pester you, and where your girlfriend can’t stop eating the house down. Bobby’s beginning to find people rather scary. He bangs his chin against the heavy parcel. He’s even begun getting bad press. Or, rather, he’s been getting a mix of good press (Time Out described ‘The Angels’ as ‘a joyous flurry of brushstrokes and breasts’) and bad press (Modern Painters described Bobby as a ‘juvenile, contrived Basquiat rip-off’), but for some reason human beings can’t help but believe the bad stuff. Bobby doesn’t even want to be in the spotlight; he’d much rather be behind the sofa. Trembling, Bobby the Artist sniffs then plods through to the bedroom, slides open his Fourth Drawer Down, and removes a big swag-bag of Loveheart pills. He downs a couple with another swig of manky Soave, then trundles back through to the lounge and starts to squeeze himself firmly behind the pink settee. Squashed between the backboard and bumpy wallpaper, Bobby thinks he can hear rats scampering through the wall cavity behind him, or perhaps that’s just rats scampering around his brain-pipes. He shudders. In times of crisis, all you can really do is try and block out whatever’s making you feel sad. And with that in mind, Bobby downs another eleven ecstasy pills, then flops down underneath the sofa, making a sad chalky outline of sweat on the bright blue carpet. Bon voyage! Meanwhile, Johnnie sets sail down Cargo Fleet Lane on the good ship Nissan Sunny, sticking it into fifth, which is a bit naughty actually because it’s a 30mph speed limit you know. He’s still in quite a psychotic mood, swerving over Coke cans and bird corpses on the wide, silky tarmac. He glances at ‘Un Hommage de Monsieur Condom, 2005’ and the hammer stuffed in the glove box, trying his best to relax, like he’s been told. He feels like a cock now for kicking off at Bobby over nothing – it’s becoming quite a habit of his lately. Breathing carefully in then carefully out and so on and so on, Johnnie screeches the car to 29mph in time for the speed camera, then back to 45ish once he’s gone round the bend. He wants to get to his mam’s as quick as possible, and just get it over with. She’s going to be a nightmare. Johnnie’s mam got diagnosed with depression back in June, and the hardest thing about it is no one really knows what triggered it off. Alright, so she’s going through the menopause and all her sons are frustrating and Tony the Dad spends more time off-shore or down the Brunnies than with poor Jean, but it’s not like she’s got cancer or she’s got no money or her dog just died. Perhaps it’s genetic – after all, Johnnie can have mood swings now and then, you know. Dissolving on the racing seat, Johnnie smashes his foot further into the accelerator, not really fussed if he kills himself. He’s in such a strange, unexplainable mood. He stares straight ahead as all the gloomy houses whizz past, and it’s quite a shock when he pulls up outside Jean’s house in Ormesby to find his mother in extremely high spirits. She’s been on a new mix of tablets for a week or so, and she gives her son a great big cuddle when he arrives, squeezing the sweat out of him like a bright J-cloth.‘ Come in, come in,’ she says, scarpering through to the living room in her odd Snoopy and Bugs Bunny slippers. Jean’s looking well – she had her hair cut-and-coloured rosy black at Classy Cutz last Tuesday, plus she’s been going to aromatherapy in her best mate’s garage four weeks running. She feels like a new woman. ‘I’m just in the middle of something, John Boy,’ she explains, ‘but howay in, sit down, sit down.’ Johnnie plods gently into the sitting room, to see the PlayStation 2 hooked up to the telly and Dance Dance Revolution paused on the screen; that game you see in arcades where gayboys and pre-pubescent girls bop around on the metal pads with the arrows going in synch with the cartoon person on TV. Jean bought the DVD thing and the metal floorpad off the internet, and since it arrived last weekend she’s been on it non-stop. Her GP at James Cook told her exercise can help combat depression, but instead of self-consciously jogging round Albert Park on rainy afternoons she decided to plump for the dancing. Johnnie glances at his trainers as Jean kicks off her slippers and hops back on the pads, standing poised in front of the butch bloke with the Afro on the screen. She unpauses the action, then suddenly jumps back to life as the awful cheesy Eurotrance starts up, leap-frogging about and jiggling her arse. She’s actually pretty good. Johnnie giggles into his chest, pretending to stare at the carpet but seeing his mother make a tit out of herself is much more captivating. She seems so different from the miserable woman of stone he saw at his aunty’s birthday barbecue back in May, though it still makes him cringe a bit. Jean grunts and pants as she criss-crosses, kicks, and stamps her feet to the thumping soundtrack, and she does really well to keep in time with the funky fella on TV. She looks a right picture in pink leggings and white crusty cardigan, sweat patches spiralling out of her armpits. It’s been so important for her having the DVD, after all it’s kept her mind off feeling down and wanting to die and other sad things like that. On Prozac she feels a bit like a cheery zombie, but at least it gives her a kick up the arse now and then. She bops about like a little girl at her first school disco. At the end of this particular dance, Jean’s totted up lots of points but it’s not a TOP SCORE, and she says to Johnnie, ‘Ah, bloody hell, I could’ve done better if the door hadn’t gone.’ Johnnie feels compelled to say sorry, but before his lips hinge open Jean’s through in the kitchen brewing teas and chattering to him all out of breath. ‘I’m getting good at it now … but it’s tricky – I could do with the handrail, cos when the steps speed up I get all off-balance. But it’s more expensive … and it looks like a fucking Zimmer frame – I’m not that old yet!’ Jean comes back into the lounge with hands made of cups of tea, then collapses onto the settee next to her son, totally pooped. She pats his bony knee, then flops her head backwards into the cushions, smiling constantly. The side-effects of the tablets haven’t been too nasty or horrific, unless you count the weird dreams she had three nights in a row where she was a nun stapled to a cross in the town centre, with all these horrible peasants chucking huge carrots at her. Terrible stuff. ‘So, how are you, then?’ she asks, much more willing and able to talk now she’s on the new medicati
on. ‘You’re a bit quiet,’ she adds, then she slurps a gobful of tea. ‘Ah, I’m alright,’ Johnnie mumbles. ‘Well I hope so,’ Jean says. ‘You’re looking a bit gaunt. Are you eating? Do you want owt to eat, son?’ Johnnie hugs his mug of tea, shaking his head, and he replies, ‘Nah, I’m fine. Just a bit knackered. Anyway, you must be too … you’re a bit of a whizz on the old dance game, eh?’ Jean snorts up a laugh, then offers Johnnie a go on it but he politely says no fucking way mate. He glances round the room at the old familiar wallpaper and Sylvanian Family ornaments and butter-wouldn’t-melt school photos of himself, as well as the ones they got done in Whitby where you have to dress as Victorian dandies or military men or old waistcoated wallies. Johnnie hides a snigger in the tubes of his belly. He’s starting to lighten up. He shuffles his trainers on the flower pattern, leaving behind vaguely muddy footprints, then asks his mam, ‘So you’ve been alright, then?’ Jean turns her head 180 degrees like an owl spotting a delicious mouse, but instead of devouring her own son she replies, ‘Oh yeah, I’ve been great. Back to my old self. These pills are a breath of fresh air. Never felt better. It’s like, ooh, it’s like I’m all in love with life again!’ Jean’s voice rings in his ears and tingles his fingers and toes, like someone playing a wonderful miniature piano on his mother’s tongue. How amazing it is to hear your mother’s back to normal, after months and months of wobbling on the railings of Suicide Mountain. Johnnie remembers the onset of her menopause well, Jean spending every evening in floods of tears, scolding Johnnie for not having a job, Robbie for getting under her feet and banging his new girlfriend too loudly in the bedroom next door, and even Barrie got the brunt of it despite being the blessed first son, making it to business college in Stockton but happening to phone her for a £500 loan at a very very wrong wrong time. Jean used to smash plates in disgust at having to wash up after ‘useless pricks’. Tony the Dad got slapped once for calling her a bossy boots, and she threw his favourite ELO record out the back door. Time after time, she’d come home from her job at Sainsbury’s with bags of fish and tartar sauce and potatoes and frozen peas (or beans for Robbie), only to chuck them all in the flip-top bin in a huff and run upstairs crying hysterically after someone says ‘hello’ to her the wrong way or if someone looks at her a certain way. It seems so unbelievable and far-fetched to think a couple of teeny weeny tablets could suck out all Jean’s negativeness, but here she is slapping her son’s thigh in joy and smiling like a loony escapee from the Heartbreak Hotel. ‘So, what’ve you been up to, John Boy?’ Jean asks as she rises and totters back to Dance Dance Revolution. She loads up a new game, then stands poised on the metal pads with her bum all exposed in tight trousers. She looks idiotic, but the fact she’s been so depressed and now she’s standing there all carefree and exuberant makes Johnnie hold her in his heart as an absolute heroine. He looks up to her with wet, wobbly eyes as she bursts into dance – this time it’s a Macarena-ish salsa with lots of daft lunges and sort of star-jumps and general bottom shaking. Johnnie doesn’t know what to say. Yes he’s been feeling depressed as well, but it’s nothing compared to the sad murky swamp his mother’s had to swim out of. What the hell’s even wrong with him! It’s only that he’s getting a hard time off Ellen he’s so tetchy, and he shouldn’t have kicked off at Bobby or taken money off him. He spends a moment staring at his knees, feeling like a right dumb wanker. ‘Ah, I haven’t been up to much really …’ he eventually replies, scratching himself. After a few more spectacular dances on the telly screen, Jean racking up TOP SCORE after TOP SCORE what with her son’s encouragement, Johnnie decides to say his goodbyes and, instead of the usual awkward creeping out the door with Jean bawling blue murder, they have a huge sweaty cuddle and a kiss. Standing halfway in and out of the house, Johnnie wipes his eyes, and Jean takes his shaky hand and says, ‘Thanks so much for coming, love. You sure you’re feeling alright? Here, swear down, have a couple of these Prozac things. They’ll sort you right out – I can get you some more from Angie next door, if you want.’ And she presses two white circles into Johnnie’s palm, and it’s only when he gets out in the garden and sees the crisp Mitsubishi logo stamped into the sides he realises Jean’s been taking ecstasy all this time, not Prozac. Johnnie laughs in his ribcage. He drives through the falling fog in the grumbling Sunny, Jean waving frantically at the door and giving him phone-me signals with her hand and beaming teethy grins at him. Johnnie watches her shrink in the rear-view mirror, tossing mist here and there as he slips down Allendale Road. Bobby the Artist went to primary school round here, where he began to develop himself as an artist, finger-painting foldy butterflies and stamping cut-off potatoes into food colouring. Experimental little bastard. Turning the corner onto Cargo Fleet Lane, waiting ages for the roundabout to stop spinning, Johnnie opens and shuts his mouth a number of times, gazing in the direction of the beautiful beautiful tower blocks. Jean’s luxury madness has really put things in perspective for him; for ages and ages he’s felt like the saddest boy on the planet and his life’s a disaster and everything’s crap, but in fact there’s a lot of people in the world worse off than him and they get on with it a lot better than he does. So he promises he’ll try and relax more, like Bobby told him to. And he promises to take more ecstasy. Good old Jean. Parking the Nissan again in the pigeon-grey car park, Johnnie sneezes, then removes the car keys and ‘Un Hommage de Monsieur Condom, 2005,’ and heads towards Peach House. Brr! It’s chilly all of a sudden. He’s only got on the thin Henri Lloyd jacket, and it’s that time of year already where the earth starts to slant away from the sun and summertime gets shipped off to Australia and South America on frosty little speedboats. Shivering, Johnnie darts up the spiral staircase, desperate for a long, loving embrace from his girlfriend on a day of such violence. Johnnie whips open the door of 5E, kicking off his shoes and scampering into the bedroom, only to find Ellen’s disappeared from beneath the Boro quilt. Panicking, he checks the £200’s still there in the Anal Adventures vid (and it is), and he hopes for a second she hasn’t gone off gallivanting with any men, but then he tells himself to shush. She’s probably just gone out for a walk with the girls, to pick flowers and bake cakes and do cartwheels. Sniffing, Johnnie drops softly to the ground. As is habit whenever he finds himself alone in the flat, Johnnie considers poking the Anal video into the moist VCR slot and indulging himself in a fine, lengthy wank, when suddenly he remembers he’s got Bobby and Georgie’s live sex show in his mitts. His heart bounces. Adopting a cross-legged, trousers-round-the-ankles position one metre in front of the telly, Johnnie presses ‘Un Hommage de Monsieur Condom, 2005’ into the VCR and accidentally presses STOP, then he presses PLAY three times to compensate. The screen goes snowy, then it bursts into life. Picture the scene: Interior. A double-bed with Spiderman covers in a bedroom at the back of a house in Linthorpe, March 2005. Bobby’s the first to enter the stage, and Johnnie giggles at him with a lot shorter haircut and an Eclipse sweater on. He’s not stiff yet, but things start to perk up when a much skinnier, Just Seventeen Georgie joins her boyfriend on screen. All’s quiet as they start to strip each other off, clothes flying around like poltergeists, exposing white limbs and even whiter rude bits. Is this art?? Johnnie wonders, scratching his chin. Three minutes and fifty-one seconds in, there’s a good shot of Georgie’s arse, and Johnnie feels his prick gradually standing to attention like a balloon getting blown up. He starts getting all hot in the face, anticipating the hardcore shagging and skullfucking and bum love and money shot and filthy stuff. Georgie sucks her boyfriend’s willy for a bit, but then – just as it all starts getting interesting – something incredibly strange happens: Bobby gives his girlfriend some foreplay. Frowning, Johnnie watches Bobby lick her out; a boring scene which lasts about five or six minutes, culminating in a writhing orgasm for Georgie. Johnnie raises his eyebrow. She seems to be enjoying it. Once Georgie’s got her bearings back, the two of them indulge in a long-winded bout of stroking one another, which seems a bit schmaltzy and ultimately leads to Joh
nnie’s knob flopping. He pulls his trousers up, a bit disappointed. He’s beginning to cotton on that real-life sex isn’t as rampant or acrobatic as porno sex – when Bobby eventually slides his tail into Georgie, they shag at half the normal speed of pornstars. Johnnie even tries fast-forwarding the action to spice it up a bit, but then it just looks daft. ‘Where’s all the crazy sexual positions?’ Johnnie wonders, thinking back to the time he made Ellen do a headstand and he stuck his knob in her bum and she went mad at him and kicked him in the knackers. Resuming the tape to normal speed, Johnnie retreats back to the sofa, not turned at all, but very intrigued about his friends’ weird, romantic style of lovemaking. He scratches his head. Georgie and Bobby stay in the spoons for a good five minutes, then the girl-on-top position, then a bit of casual doggy, all the time kissing each other and smiling and looking like they’re having a great time. Shock horror, at one point they even start talking to each other! Bobby: You alright? Georgie: Yeah, it’s mint. Bobby: Wooooooooah. Groan groan groan. The grand finale of ‘Un Hommage de Monsieur Condom, 2005’ involves Bobby ejaculating inside Mr Condom inside Georgie, then they have a great big cuddle. Then they dispose of Mr Condom very carefully in a wrapped-up tissue. Switching off the VCR, all of a sudden Johnnie realises how wrong he’s been, always trying to shove his cock in unwanted places, pouring semen over Ellen, gagging her, roughing her up. Whoops! Rubbing his nose, Johnnie takes out the video, then he sits for three or four minutes gazing at the ceiling. He feels enlightened. As if sex is all about love, not just getting your end away! Johnnie supposes, in a way, sex is all about relaxing as well. Blinking, he charges into the bedroom for his new Siemens mobile, then dials up Ellen to see what she’s up to, and whether or not she’s up for a wondrous, ultra-relaxing night out in Time this evening. ‘No hassle, love, no pressure, we’ll just have a quiet one,’ he stresses, once she picks up. Ellen’s sat on someone’s double-bed way up on floor nine, but don’t worry; it’s only Mandy’s. They’ve been talking shit all afternoon, and Ellen’s relieved to finally hear a normal person’s voice again. In fact, she was just thinking how much she’d like to spend time with Johnnie again, after that weird calamity with Bobby the Artist shunning her. She’s incredibly pissed off about posing starkers in front of him, and not getting any action – she likes to think she feels used or exploited, but in her heart she’s just gutted and doesn’t want anything to do with him any more. Complex bastard. Fame’s obviously gone to his head; he thinks he’s some totally serious artiste now. Bouncing on Mandy’s mattress, she tells Johnnie she’ll pop down in a minute, and she thinks he sounds strangely chirpy this afternoon. She hangs up, then Ellen grabs her fake Prada bag from Mandy’s floor and kisses the nutcase goodbye. ‘Cheerio,’ she says, clomping out the door. ‘Fishcakes,’ replies Mandy. Ellen raises her eyebrows, marching down four storeys and shaking her head. Johnnie’s there waiting with the front door open, and he twirls his girlfriend four or five rotations when she enters. They’re both very pleased to see each other. ‘You’re in a good mood!’ she laughs, but she’s not complaining. Before they head out, Ellen pops through to the bedroom to get changed, and there’s a spring in her step that hasn’t been there for weeks. Jumping on top of Johnnie’s bed, she chucks off some clothes then puts on new ones then chucks those off and puts on different ones. She picks pants without any brown period stains in them, and a bra that doesn’t give her two pairs of tits. She makes sure to brush her teeth, pouting and striking various poses in the bathroom mirror, then the two of them dash out the house all jittery and merry. Johnnie tells Ellen about his mam and the Dance Dance Revolution and the ecstasy, and they swing hands all the way to the bus stop. He’s so excited about what he’s going to do to her tonight! Despite selling most of his pills to Bobby the Artist this last half-week or so, he’s still got five of the blighters in his back pocket (plus the Mitsubishis off Jean), and he can’t wait to grin and gurn the night away with Ellen. They only have to wait five minutes before an Arriva comes, Johnnie trying his best to be cool and relaxed and stretching his legs and going ‘aaah’all the time. He even goes as far as to say to Ellen, ‘Mmm, I feel really good and relaxed, me.’ Ellen nods and frowns. They get out at the chocolate bus station, wandering down its tiled, disinfected aisles then out again to the deathly quiet concrete streets. Turn a few corners and you get to the Princess Alice, which is this lovely green and white pub with people bantering and piling out into the street, and Johnnie casually furrows to the bar without bashing into any of them. ‘Bark!’ a dog says down the street. Ellen keeps a tight grip of Johnnie’s hand as they stand at the cramped bar, wondering where his typical hard-man mannerisms have gone. Johnnie actually comes across as slightly camp as he rests there on the thick wood with floppy limbs. ‘Pint of Carlsberg and a gin and tonic please, mate, thank you,’ he says to the brick shithouse behind the bar. He gets a little raised eyebrow, then his drinks. Stood there in the rammed pub, Johnnie and Ellen aren’t sure where to sit so they linger with their glasses at the bar, trying their best to talk to each other in the rumble-grumble-mumble of everybody’s chatter. ‘God, I’m looking forward to tonight!’ Johnnie grins, holding Ellen close to him like a valuable suitcase. ‘Aye,’ Ellen agrees, ‘I haven’t done pills for a while like …’ Ellen strokes Johnnie’s arm under his shirt cuff, feeling strangely grateful for him staying with her all this time. She’s glad she didn’t hump Bobby the Artist now. If she really thinks about it, Johnnie would’ve only gone and put Bobby in hospital with severed oesophagus or disfigurement of the face, and if Bobby was willing to cheat on bonny Georgie he’d probably be inclined to cheat on Ellen too, if they ever got together. Johnnie, bless his heart, has never cheated on anyone ever (unless you count Nicola Purcell smacking her lips on him in the Linny when he was seeing this bird Sharon). Johnnie has a certain respectability about him (despite being seen as a lowlife by certain mams and dads who are against drugs and tracksuits and skinheads because the TV tells them so), and he really wants to make things work with Ellen and have a future with her and have kids not yet but some time, and all that marrying each other shite. And hopefully, soon he’ll be shagging her correctly. Occasionally Johnnie does wonder if he’d be happier going out with a virgin, taking her under his wing and stretching her fanny out and adapting her to his rough, crappy shagging style and giving her orgasm after orgasm, but then again virgins are generally quite dreary and clueless as people, and it wouldn’t be that worth it. Just standing here arm in arm with Ellen and pint in hand, the uphill treacherous struggle with her seems all the more worthwhile. He still feels very protective and anxious about her, but he tries his hardest not to get wound up by all the leering faces in the pub tonight. The trick is to keep a cool head! Marshy – the frog-eyed lad with a slice out of one ear – keeps looking over at Ellen from the bandit, but Johnnie just catches his frog eye and smiles. Dav – the boxer who used to fancy Ellen and tried to get off with her numerous times before he knew Johnnie was going out with her – sits over there under the telly, but Johnnie just ignores him. He ignores Darren as well, and Maresy and Gill, all of them fucking chauvinistic wankers getting pissed and slagging off women like they’re rock stars on a tour bus full of groupies (but their band Whirlwind are absolutely gash). Usually even the longhairs annoy Johnnie, slumped there all gay and languid in their tight jeans and talking all deep about music and how hardcore they all are, but Johnnie avoids knitting his eyebrows or passing comment. ‘Bark!’ a doggy shouts, off down the street. Johnnie sniffs, keeping his eyes fixed on Ellen rather than all these dumb cretins. He gets another Carlsberg and sups it calmly, feeling all the knots in his brain untie and unribbon until his mind’s just a blank cassette playing happily backwards and forwards. He smiles at his girlfriend, trying to remember Bobby and Georgie’s slow, sumptuous moves from that video. He grins. It’s a quarter to ten, and Johnnie and Ellen decide to leave the Alice, with big red hearts like gongs. Ellen’s excited to be out with Johnnie again – she sees tonight as som
e sort of turning point. Johnnie seems different, and she likes that. He seems much more laid back, and as they walk down Corporation Road he’s beaming and he’s got a spring in his step, like an innocent man newly released from jail. The world seems much prettier to him, for example the yellow moon dangling in the dusky blackcurrant sky, or the various pubs and bars humming and sprinkling colour on the street like overgrown TVs, and all the people going by without pissing him off. In the queue at Time, Johnnie and Ellen stand behind a group of raucous curly-haired girls, trying not to listen to them. Ellen strokes her boyfriend’s belly and she can’t stop kissing him. She’s in love again. They both can’t wait to drop the Es and breeze around like a pair of Siamese twins, and one of them can’t wait to get back to the flat afterwards and try out all the new moves from ‘Un Hommage de Monsieur Condom, 2005’. However, what neither of them has realised is tonight Cleveland Police are undertaking Operation Nighthawk, which means zero tolerance on drugs and violence and drunk-and-disorderliness, and there’s lots more bobbies and lots more undercover secret agents and lots more patrol cars and vans. And sniffer dogs. ‘Bark!’ a big dark Labrador screams at Johnnie, on the end of its lead. ‘Bark bark barky bark!’ it adds. All the colour falls out of Johnnie’s face and down his large intestine. His heart turns to a hard red brick. The stocky police officer holding the leash puts a hand on Johnnie’s wibbly shoulder and says quite politely, ‘Can you step aside please?’ but, as Johnnie stumbles off the pavement all devastated, everyone’s looking over and gawping and a few lads from the queue surreptitiously tiptoe off down the street trying not to get sniffed themselves. Ellen starts screaming at the officers, telling them they’re wrong they’re wrong, but the sniffer dog keeps saying ‘I’m right I’m right’ in bark-language. Johnnie’s absolutely horrified and sweaty, but he decides to remain calm, and he doesn’t say a word or bat an eyelid when he gets chucked in the back of the van. The cage doors slam, then he’s off brum-brum-brum to the police station without even a kiss goodbye or a glance from Ellen. She’s left standing paralysed on the creaky concrete. The queue for Time means nothing to her now. She doesn’t know what to do. She starts walking aimlessly back into town, suddenly all the cold stars projecting a feeling of sadness and loneliness and shit and gloom. In a weird selfish way she’s glad it wasn’t her holding the pills tonight and her in the back of the van, but she was having such a nice time with Johnnie, it’s a shock to be suddenly on her own. The pavements have the silent, tense atmosphere of just suffering a tornado or earthquake or something. She goes past the rows and rows of pubs and clowny pissheads, feeling lost in her own home town. The image of Johnnie getting locked up in a horrid cell really grabs at her stomach, twisting and twirling her pipes and organs. She suddenly feels sober. Deflated, she sits underneath the big cardboard Corporation House like a homeless person. She’s in no mood to go to a club alone – she just wants her boyfriend. She’s not very keen either to go back to her mam’s in Eston and tell her the reason she’s home early, and then her mam slag off Johnnie and be a bitch to her the rest of the evening. Ellen and her mam get on alright, but they’re the only ones in that boring old semi and they get on each other’s nerves quite a bit. Ellen’s mam’s probably just jealous of her having a boyfriend and being more attractive and nubile and smoother. Resting her chin in cupped hands, Ellen wishes life could be easy, not full of disasters all the time and premature ejaculations and policemen. She gets up from the bench, adjusts her top so her boobs aren’t falling out, then decides to wander towards the police station in case she can see Johnnie or maybe it’s been a case of mistaken identity and he’s been released. She tumbles in high heels between the house of cardboard and the town hall, taxis beeping at her and men drooling at her legs, but she keeps her head up and a blank expression on it. She’s not interested in any other boys but Johnnie. They’re all zombies. The police station lies there over the top of the gardens, all blocky and modernist like a white Rubik’s cube. She imagines Johnnie in there in handcuffs, getting touched and searched and tortured, and she’s surprised at herself for a tear dribbling out of one eye. He really does mean something to her, and all those memories of her cheating on him and nailing Angelo and trying it on with Bobby and ignoring Johnnie make her dizzy as she steps over the forecourt of the cop shop. There’s always a certain paranoia and guilty feeling walking into a police station, but when she gets to the desk all the police people seem okay, sipping polystyrene coffees and sorting through paperwork. ‘Hello,’ she says to the slightly dykeish female one at the counter. ‘Er,’ she mumbles, ‘my boyfriend Johnnie Hyde just got taken in, er, I’m not sure why. Is he getting released? We were gonna go to Time.’ The female officer furrows her brow, rummages papers and taps a computer, then tells Ellen to use the old phone over there and ring the extension 1242 and ask them instead. Ellen nods and sighs, feeling like it’s her who’s done the bad deed. Ellen tick-tocks her heels over to the dingy phone booth; one of those with the pod affair that goes over you and your head. She types in the number, but the line’s dead so she goes back over to the desk and goes, ‘The line’s dead.’ The female officer stands up from her comfy office chair, then gets someone else to tap the computer keys for her, and this fellow seems much more amiable with his bushy white eyebrows and dimples, and he tells Ellen, ‘Right, he’s been put in a cell overnight, until he sobers up. He should be released sometime in the morning. But questioning won’t start till at least nine thirty, and we’ve taken a lot of people in tonight, so I suggest you go home and get some sleep, and come back tomorrow.’ PC Bushy Eyebrows scribbles a number down for Ellen, telling her to phone back at about nine o’clock when they should have a better idea when he might be out. Ellen lingers for a second at the counter in case they’ve got more information and because she’s got nothing better to do until nine, but the female one says, ‘Right, thanks a lot, then,’ in a nasty tone, which means ‘Right, get lost, then,’ so Ellen swallows a gulp and makes a move back onto the streets again. She still doesn’t want to go back to her mam’s though. She sits for a bit in Central Gardens, watching the sky for forty-five minutes and it’s strange and beautiful how much it changes in that time, clouds stretching like the stuff in a huge indigo lava lamp, and stars gently shifting pattern as the earth turns. But then after a bit it gets boring. Ellen smokes her last cigarette: a Richmond. She walks over to the Bottle of Notes, that Claes Oldenburg sculpture thing they wanted to paint red and white to match the colours of the football team. She sees ducks roosting in the pond. Getting chilly, Ellen strides out of the park and down past the side of the Empire, where the bouncers are headbutting someone. Ellen goes to McDonald’s, but the restaurant part’s shut so she has to walk through the drive-thru, pretending to be a motor car. She parks at one of the counters, then orders the Big Mac meal with Diet Coke from the gormless cunt serving. She sits on the pavement outside the American Golf shop to eat her burger, and wonders to herself how many people play golf in this humdrum industrial town. While she eats, she feels annoyed at herself for spending money on food, and disappointed not to have any vodka to mix with her Coke. She looks at the metal spikes and columns of the ICI factory, like a space-age silver Parthenon. The smoke mingles with clouds, and slowly slowly slowly the dark sky gets riddled with candy floss. Ellen walks to the furthest bin in the car park to dispose of the McDonald’s wrappers, killing time. Her phone says 2.03am and she perches on the brick wall to input the cop shop number into her contacts. It’s too freezing to stay in one place though. She wanders down Wilson Street and watches people leaving the clubs after their brilliant nights out. She scowls at a police car growling past. Ellen ducks under Albert Bridge, which marks the old part of town famously known as Over the Border. For some reason prostitutes and general unsavouries like to station themselves near train stations, and Ellen feels a little unsafe wandering about in her miniskirt in the witching hour, but tonight it’s all pretty quiet and she paces quickly to Ferry Road to look at the fluorescent blue Tra
nsporter Bridge in all its lanky glory. All the time she’s thinking about Johnnie, hoping he’s alright. She stares at the prickly lights across the other side of the river, but everyone except the power stations are in bed. She heads back after ten minutes standing there. She goes to a kebab shop on Linthorpe Road and orders a can of Lilt so she can sit inside until it shuts. At half three, she decides to trudge through fancy Captain Cook Square (though it’s a graveyard at this time of night), past all the shops with their grilles down like medieval portcullises, with the intention of falling asleep on a bench in the empty bus station. Her eyes are starting to sag and clam up, and her feet are getting achy. But imagine her dismay to find the station all locked up and – as if that wasn’t enough – an icy gust of wind comes suddenly shooting up her skirt and she has a big horrible shiver. Distress! There’s still a good five hours before she’s allowed to phone the police, and she’s beginning to feel awful and fluey, but in her heart she holds a lot of pride in sticking around for her boyfriend. After all, he’s in a worse position than her right now. But at least he’s got a bed. Sniffling, Ellen considers going back to Eston and sneaking in through the back door to bed, but the taxi costs about six pound to get to suburbia and she’s spent all her pennies on McDonald’s instead. She curses herself. Giving in, she finds a spot to lie down and sleep in the five-storey car park, nestling herself in a manky corner out of the wind and out of the CCTV. She’s so incredibly knackered she falls asleep instantly, but wakes up at half-hourly intervals desperately checking her bag’s still there and what time it is, then Plonk! off to sleep again. She has twisted, meaningful dreams about Johnnie. One, he’s shackled in war-torn Siberia and Ellen comes in dressed as a baddie, but she’s really a goodie and kisses him on the mush and releases him from the clasps of evil with a handy blowtorch. In another, they’re both barking dogs humping each other senseless. She dreams how horrible it’d be for Johnnie to leave the station and nobody being there to greet him, and it’s that image that keeps waking her up clambering for her phone. Finally, it gets to 8.49am and Ellen thinks fuck it and rings the station anyway. A man answers. ‘Hello, just like wondering if my boyfriend Johnnie Hyde’s been released yet?’ Ellen murmurs, the town awful silent around her but beginning to lighten up. She stands, staring off the edge of the Zetland car park, odd worker bees and men in fluorescent jackets stumbling past beneath her. She rubs her crusty eyes, feeling a bit of a sty in the left one, listening carefully as the gadge replies, ‘Yes, he’s in questioning right now. Should be out in about half an hour …’ Ellen pops the phone back in her bag, then tries to do her hair and some lipstick in her free Glamour mirror before heading down the breezeblock steps and through the square again. Shops are starting to open, bread getting delivered, and gradually more and more people start appearing on the streets like blood cells flowing round your system as your body wakes up. Ellen looks like death as she staggers over to the police station, though her heart’s beating quickly and she’s excited to see her boy. When she reaches the cop shop, Johnnie’s already there waiting for her, squatting by the rails outside with a tab hanging out his mouth. Ellen clatters up the pavement and grabs him and gives him a big squeeze, asking how he is and what went on and what’s going to happen. ‘It’s alright, it’s alright,’ Johnnie replies, ‘I only had seven on me, didn’t I, so I got away with a caution like. “Personal use” and all that. Fucking lucky. Thank fuck Bobby’s been buying loads off me, cos I might’ve took them all out with me.’ Johnnie hugs Ellen again, so pleased and relieved she’s here, but also extremely aggravated having spent ten hours in the stinky police station. All that calmness and serenity he’d been working on so hard has gone right out the fucking window. ‘It was mad in there like,’ Johnnie says. ‘Couldn’t really sleep; the bed was sick. And my cell was next-door to this fruitcake prozzy screaming her head off. But … it’s mint being out. Howay, let’s get ourselves a drink.’ Ellen smiles, absolutely delighted she’s not losing her man, and she asks him for a few tokes on that Regal because she’s really gasping. They walk and smoke back into town, arm in arm. How amazing both those arms feel to be linked again! Johnnie feels emotionally shattered, but it’s funny how wonderful and colourful and pleasing the world seems when you’ve had a stint behind bars. He never wants to go back there, despite enjoying a modest English brekkie this morning. The bacon was fucking plastic, mind you. It sounds like such a Hollywood cliché, but after such a great escape he feels like quitting crime altogether. For once in his life he’s got a bit of respect for the zombies going round in their suits and uniforms, with their comfy lives. But before any rash decisions, he really needs a drink. Johnnie and Ellen aim their heels towards Linthorpe Road and the old faithful 24/7 off-licence, and as they cut through the warm Cleveland Centre they spot Georgie and her brutal bob slinking into Bhs, but she’s too far off and too sleepy, and in any case she’s slightly late for work and she tries to duck unnoticed through the scary entrance. She’s in a terrible mood this morning. Ever since she saw that nudie portrait of Ellen in her and Bobby’s bedroom, she’s been in such low spirits and she’s been eating lots more junk food and sweets and crisps, and it depresses her that she’s getting obese. This morning she’s already consumed two Mars bars, one half bag of Haribo, jam on toast and two cups of tea. She feels all shit and bloated. Perhaps, she thinks, sweets are her drug, and every drug seems to come with a downside. Scoffing sugary treats makes her feel brilliant for five minutes then suddenly all downcast and irritable, a bit like crack. Flattening her Bhs shirt down her podgy belly, Georgie scampers behind the sweety counter, feeling Mr Hawkson’s hawky eyes on her, but she doesn’t turn around or say anything. ‘Late again?’ he enquires, trying to inject a bit of humour in his tone but he’s just a cunt. ‘Yeah, sorry. Buses,’ is all Georgie can manage, trying to hide behind her eyelashes and get on with serving customers. Only there’s no one to serve yet, and there’s an awkward bit of silence as her and Mr Hawkson stand amongst the bright candies and glittery packets. Curving his curly eyebrows, Hawkson tries again with her. ‘You know it’s really important to get in on time, Georgina,’ he says, ‘I don’t want to be like your headmaster or anything but, ehm, if you’re not careful I might have to issue you with your first official warning.’ Very very biting, Georgie flashes him a look of sheer disgust and says, ‘Nice one, cheers.’ And then, the next thing she knows Mr Hawkson’s scuttling back to the office to type her out a lovely posh STATEMENT OF WARNING, and it ruins her day. She keeps her head down after that, seething while she dishes sweets into the boxes and scales, mumbling obscenities while she faces-up the selection boxes and Quality Streets. Serving the schoolkids seems like such a chore this afternoon, and isn’t it just typical they act like such bastards when you’re not having a very good day. They’re not meant to use their fingers in the pick-’n’-mix! ‘Use the tongs! Use the tongs!’ she spits, feeling like an old lady. In the quiet moments, where she gets to enjoy a Crunchie or Boost with Guarana, all Georgie can do is stare lifelessly at Sport&Soccer across the mall thinking about Bobby. He seems like such an idiot now he’s a ‘famous artist’ – so flirty with other girls (what did he get up to with Ellen when she posed starkers for that painting?), so stressed out (alright, so he’s got more paintings to do and more phone calls to answer, but it’s not exactly a nine-to-five slog), and he hardly seems to talk to Georgie any more (little bastard). It’s the not talking part that’s really getting to Georgie – she thinks it’s something to do with him taking drugs and getting skinny, or her not taking any drugs and getting fat. But surely drugs aren’t the be-all and end-all of everything? She thinks they’re pretty boring as a matter of fact. His drug taking is getting incredibly tedious – after all, he seems to be doing it on every single fucking page. Georgie used to have miles more fun with Bobby the Artist on Vat 69 or Londinium Gin, putting records on and painting and going to bed at similar times, before every other little bastard got involved. Now it’s as if Bobby thinks he’s some sort of O
ld Master or New Romantic, employing prostitutes to sit around his flat all day and paint and sniff coke off them. Georgie nearly sicks up a bit of her Crunchie. She hopes to the Lord Bobby hasn’t been cheating, but then again who wouldn’t cheat on a fat slob like her? After work, Georgie’s still in a bad mood – and she really can’t face going back to the flat when she knows Bobby’ll be there with all his new friends, smoking Es out of a bong or sniffing horse tranquilliser, and getting naked on all the clean work surfaces – so she gets the 63 instead of the 65 and rides through the industrial estates with all their burning frosty flares and Blade Runner pipes and lattices and cooling towers puffing out nimbostratuses with that tiny layer of black soot collecting in their crevices, and she takes her sadness all the way to the seaside. It’s a funny little sea resort, Redcar, what with its close proximity to such overbearing rusty blast furnaces and black generators and, as Georgie stands on the promenade sucking a lemon top and looking out to sea, she wonders if there’s any three-legged fishies or Siamese crabs in there like people say so. She watches the tankers lining up on the horizon like grey matchsticks, waiting to float down the Tees and dump their gear off. Shivering, Georgie’s a bit annoyed she’s wearing her Bhs outfit when she’s got a perfectly good sailor suit at home. Having said that, she hardly wears the fancy dress any more, since Bobby’s paying so little attention to her. She misses him. Gazing across such a grey, wavy ice rink, frothing at the mouth, she really really misses him. It’s such sad weather, and she’s such a sad sad girl you’d need a painter there anyway just to capture all the perfect melancholy. She dreads to think what Bobby’s doing instead. Daubing pink acrylic across Katey’s cream knockers? Snorting Special K round Pamela’s bum-hole? Shagging Johnnie’s girlfriend between her beautiful bronze bedsheets? Up on saucy, sordid floor four of Peach House, however, Bobby the Artist is actually having a mental breakdown. Look at him chewing up the carpet! Look at him punching down the walls! Poor Bobby’s stressed out – it’s not easy being a famous person, boo hoo hoo. Everyone keeps coming round demanding paintings (Mr and Mrs Fletcher, the ones who got Bobby the London gig, were over earlier asking if they could pose for a personal portrait, but Bobby was all twisted on the CK and frightened and had to slam the door in their faces), or asking him for free money, or threatening him with hammers and big knockers. On top of all that, there’s a point where taking drugs becomes not very fun, for example when the thirteenth ecstasy of the day makes you feel all tired and irritable. He writhes around on the floor. Bobby made a heroic attempt this afternoon to get fucked, ingesting handful after handful of pills and, while he did manage to block out the stresses for a little bit, now he just feels like death. There’s a poltergeisty chill wind coming in through the whistling window, and Bobby considers making some acid-on-cream-crackers in the kitchen, but even that’s too much effort. He’s not even hungry – it’s just he’s getting really ill not eating five or six days on the bounce, and it’d probably be a good idea to poke something down his neck. He chews a handful of salt and vinegar Discos, then spits them back out again. He feels like a little baby. Oh, if only Georgie was here to look after him! His heart feels really sore. He doesn’t even feel like he’s spoken to Georgie for days, despite probably sleeping in the same bed together every night, but he’s not even sure. He wishes he didn’t have to manage a girlfriend who always seems pissed off at him. Yes, she’s getting fatter, but the only bad thing about it is her inability to smile any more because of it. He doesn’t really care if she ends up looking like a Space Hopper – at least then he might be able to ride around on her more. The stresses! Bobby the Artist tumbles back through to the lounge, gritting his teeth anxiously or gurning or a bit of both. He flops onto the sofa, wishing he was a bit of fluff not a human being. The whole reason he got into drugs was to detach himself from horrible, boring Realityland, and for a while he got used to being all happy and bohemian and poor and he felt he’d discovered who he really was, until he accidentally sold some paintings and suddenly everyone else discovered who he was and paid him lots of attention and paid him lots of money, and dragged him out of that fairytale lifestyle. What a drag. Bobby the Artist glances out the window at the sky moving gently from one side to the other. He hopes he hasn’t annoyed Georgie too much, him being quite the dickhead of late. Spluttering, Bobby the Artist stands up from the sunken ship sofa, puts his kangaroo pyjama top on as a coat, then marches out the flat feeling extremely sinister. At the doormat, there’s a cheque from Francis Fuller for £3,600 for ‘The Angels’ (244x233cm), but Bobby just kicks it aside and carries on charging out the tower block. He wishes he’d never sold his angels. Bobby goes down to Premier to buy Georgie a lovely Sarah Lee chocolate gateau, and on the way the streets feel really morbid and unfamiliar, like he’s a young explorer lost in the Doldrums or Badlands or Teesside Park or somewhere. It’s crazy to think he hasn’t left Peach House for weeks – sometimes that tower block has the power to become a sort of dreamland for him; a little high-rise town of its own, like nothing else really matters outside the striplit corridors or chicken-coop lodgings. It’s quite unnerving, actually, having to cross roads again and interact with strangers. In Premier, Bobby nervously peruses the skinny aisles for gateau, feeling the laser-beam eyes of the owner drilling into his back, feeling his legs start to spiral and melt like Cornettos. He shakily lifts the £2.49 cake out of the freezer compartment, then chooses a route through the aisles to the counter without coming into contact with other customers. As he walks, each step seems so fake and deliberate and clumsy, and he begins to panic, wondering whether to say, ‘Just this, thanks,’ or, ‘Hi,’ or, ‘How are you?’ or nothing at all to the guy serving. He wonders why he’s being so anxious, but it’s hard to switch it off. When he finally makes it to the desk, he squeaks, ‘Hi, alright, how are you, just this ta,’ but the assistant just stares right through him, bagging up the gateau then putting out his hand like a zombie. It makes his tummy churn. Bobby the Artist passes him a fiver and waits nervously for his change, then darts back to the flat as fast as he can without getting squashed by cars. Scrabbling up the staircase, Bobby tries to breathe steady and not faint all the way back down to ground floor. He clicks open the door softly, then takes off his kangaroo top and stuffs it behind the radiator. He feels so ravaged from one minor excursion to the shop, he has to scamper through to the bedroom and light up his Coca-Cola bong. Pamela foolishly left her ounce of tac round the other night, and Bobby shudders as he sparks up the manky chillum bit. Last Tuesday, him and Pamela felt like Sooty and Sweep in a Chinese opium den, all tingling and giggling and playing hide-and-seek in the green swampy smoke. Teeth chattering, Bobby the Artist does occasionally think he overdoes it a bit with drugs, but they’ve been nothing but friendly to him in the past. To compensate for such weird weird anxieties, he stuffs in a bit extra tac, then lights her up again and sucks the living daylights out of the gloopy Coke bottle. Aah, he feels a lot better after that, and he trundles back into the lounge with the chocolate gateau, smiling. It’s becoming lovely and dusky outside. Scratching a lump under the greasy mop-top, Bobby switches on the Dr Seuss lamp-stand, then suddenly his heart pops inside him and the Sarah Lee cake drops from his hand. Splat! For some reason, there’s skulls all over the carpet this evening. Surely it wasn’t like that when they first bought it from DFS? Panicking, Bobby the Artist rubs his eyes to shreds, wondering if it’s a mirage. He gets down on his hands and knees, digging his nails into the soft weave. He screams. Lo and behold, there’s six thousand tiny skull-and-crossbones embedded in the carpet, and if you listen to them really closely they’re all laughing at you. Or is that just the boiler filling up? Bobby the Artist leaps backwards onto the sofa. His eyes are bulging out of their sockets, and he has a little cardiac arrest, choking for air. Is this his punishment for taking too many pills? He shivers. Other things around the room are different too: the fuchsia cushions are all bloody organs like hearts and lungs and livers and spleens, the radiators are all tombst
ones, and there are faces in the curtains that look a bit like Michael Jackson. Trembling, Bobby the Artist sees in perfect clarity him losing all his marbles plop-plop-plop down a porcelain bathtub. ‘Fucking hell,’ he mumbles. How charming, for his head to be doing things like this to him! Sitting against the pink glass settee, all the colour drains from poor Bobby’s face. He coughs. Centipedes rush into his brain, guzzling holes through the tender pink flesh. Flapping his arms about, Bobby takes a few attempts to clamber onto the sofa, throwing bloody organs everywhere. He coughs again, sicking a bit of acidy bile into his mouth, then he chokes it back down. The settee feels about two centimetres long. He tries to sit on it lengthways, then he tries to sit on it widthways. Balling himself up, for a second he thinks he’s getting comfy, when suddenly the skulls in the carpet let out a piercing, blood-curdling scream. No, pardon me, that’s actually just his phone going off in his trousers. Scared shitless, Bobby launches himself off the sofa, scrabbling with his trousers for about half a minute, then finally retrieving his mobile and answering it. ‘Hello?’ Bobby mumbles, trying to stop mind-power turning his phone into a six-foot anaconda. ‘Hello! Bobby! Good to speak to you – you’re not busy are you?’ the snake replies. It’s actually Bent Lewis,
Ten Storey Love Song Page 3