by Irvine Welsh
Renton and Sick Boy look at each other again, this obviously being news to both of them. Franco, however, remains unruffled. — Aye, Spud, good tae see you n aw. Thanks.
Spud continues rambling, with Renton and Sick Boy trying to work out what drugs he’s ingested. — Aye, ah’m sorry tae be late, man, ah pure goat involved cause ah ran intae this boy, Davie Innes, you’ll ken the boy, Franco, Jambo, but a good lad, likesay –
— Nae worries, mate, Frank Begbie cuts him off. — As ah say, I appreciate you daein this, and he turns to Sick Boy and Renton. — That goes for youse n aw.
It is unnerving for them all to hear Franco express gratitude, and an uncomfortable silence follows. — I’m kind of flattered, Franco … or, eh, Jim, Renton ventures.
— Franco’s fine. Call ays what ye want.
— Mibbe call ye Beggars, Franco, Spud laughs, as Renton and Sick Boy freeze in horror. — Wi nivir called ye that tae yir face but, ay, lads, mind we were ey too feart tae say ‘it’s the Beggar Boy!’ tae Franco’s face? Ken?
— Aw ye did, did yis? Frank Begbie says, turning to Renton and Sick Boy who stare at the floor for an excruciating moment. Then he laughs loudly, a blustering guffaw, which shocks them in its hearty joviality. — Aye, ah could be a wee bit uptight back then!
They look at each other and explode into a joint, cathartic laughter.
When it dies down, Renton asks, — But why do ye want tae make casts ay our ugly mugs?
Franco sits back on one of the workbenches and looks wistful. — Us and Second Prize, we aw grew up thegither. Wi Matty, Keezbo and Tommy, who are obviously oot the picture.
Renton feels a lump in his throat at the mention of those names. Sick Boy’s and Spud’s gleaming eyes tell him that he’s not alone.
— My art stuff’s in demand right now, Frank Begbie explains, — so I wanted tae dae a kind ay early autobiographical piece. Aye, I was gaunny call it Five Boys, but I think Leith Heads should dae it.
— Sound, Renton nods. — Mind way, way back in the day, there was a chocolate called Five Boys?
— Ye nivir git that Five Boys chocolate any mair. No seen it for donkey’s years, Spud says, his mouth flapping open. He brushes some saliva off his chin with his sleeve.
Sick Boy addresses Franco directly for the first time. — Will this take long?
— About an hour ay yir time, all in, Franco replies. — I know you all have busy lives, and that you and Mark are only here for a short break and probably have family stuff tae dae, so ah’ll no keep youse long.
Sick Boy’s head bobs in accord, and he checks his phone again.
— It’ll no be sair, likesay? Spud asks.
— No. Not at all, Frank Begbie declares, handing them overalls, which they put on, then sitting them down on a set of small swivel stools. He inserts two shortened straws up Spud’s nostrils. — Just relax and breathe easily. This will be cold, he explains, as he starts to paint latex onto Spud’s face.
— It is. N aw sort ay tickly, Spud laughs.
— Try no tae speak, Danny, ah want this tae set right, Frank urges, before repeating the procedure on Renton and Sick Boy. Then he fits a five-sided Perspex box over the head of each man, the edge of the receptacle sitting about an inch shy of any part of the face, lining up the protruding straws to slip through small holes in the front of the box. Through grooves at the bottom, he slides in two adjustable convex-indented leaves. Those join together, forming a base with a hole that fits snugly around each man’s neck. — This is the bit that people get edgy aboot, it’s like a guillotine, Franco cackles, to be met with three tight smiles. Checking that each man can breathe freely, he then secures the gaps with putty, and opens the top of the box and starts to pour a preprepared mixture in. — This might feel a bit cauld. There’s a bit ay weight in it, so try and sit up and keep your back straight so that it isnae straining on your neck. It’ll just be on for fifteen minutes, but if ye experience any difficulty breathing, or any discomfort, just raise yir hand and ah’ll open it up.
As the boxes fill up and the compound begins to set, the sounds from outside – the cars in the street, the radio, Franco’s own activities – all fade out in the consciousness of Renton, Sick Boy and Spud. Soon each man can sense only the air entering their lungs through their nostrils, via the straws that poke out from the plaster-filled blocks.
The amalgam solidifies quickly, and Franco removes the Perspex casings and contemplates his old friends: three literal blockheads, sitting next to each other on their stools. Suddenly aware of a tug in his bladder, he heads to the toilets. On the way back, his phone displays MARTIN on caller ID, and he picks up. — Jim, we might have to change venue for the London show. I know you liked that one, but the gallery has suffered some structural problems and the council need them to do work before it’s suitable for the public … Martin’s soft American voice is hypnotic after the grating Scots ringing in his ears, and Franco thinks of Melanie. He finds himself loitering in the corridor, looking out through a dirty window at the narrow cobbled streets below, and the random foot traffic cutting between Leith Walk and Broughton Street.
SICK BOY
I put my hand onto my lap to rearrange the erection I feel burgeoning. I don’t want Begbie – a closet homo if ever there was one, this art thing shocks me far less than it does the others – getting the wrong idea! In my mind’s eye, I’m going back to Marianne, pleading undying love, winning her round, setting her up to be fucked by a gang of strap-on-wearing schoolies from her alma matter, Mary Erskine. Ah, the sweet narratives of pornography. I miss them so. That’s creativity, Begbie …
RENTON
This is so relaxing … in fact it’s the most relaxing time I’ve spent in fucking years! Just doing nothing, letting your thoughts slowly unravel and meander.
Vicky … how uncharacteristically quiet she’s been the last few days … no emails or texts returned … like I’ve somehow upset her. What the fuck did ah dae? She can’t be up the kite after the flunky burst, cause she had her period on, and in any case, she scoffed that morning-after pill straight away.
Does she know about Marianne? Could she tell?
Marianne lied about no shagging anybody, cause she defo rode Sick Boy’s brother-in-law. And obviously Sick Boy himself. Who else?
Fuck, they thin wisps ay air coming through that straw … I cannae hear or see anything …
BEGBIE!
I’m at his mercy! He could just cut off ma fuckin air supply right now!
What the fuck … cool it …
As they say in the movies: if the cunt wanted ays deid I’d already be deid …
Stay fucking calm.
Fuckin itchy knob, but I cannae scratch it cause I dinnae fuckin ken whae the fuck’s watching …
SPUD
Funny but this sortay staeted oaf as barry at first but it’s gaun aw sortay messed up cause one ay ma nostrils is jist pure seizen up, like, then it pure shuts, like wi aw the ching n snotters … oh man … the second yin … ah pits muh hand up in the air … ah cannae breathe!
Help ays, Franco!
Ah cannae breeeethe …
Frank Begbie is still on the phone with Martin, but has shifted the discussion from suitable London exhibition venues onto his own area of interest. — If Axl Rose saw that fuckin catalogue, he’d be right in for that yin ay Slash. Just get it oot tae his people.
— Right, I’ll send it to his management, and also the record company.
— Call Liam Gallagher’s lot, and Noel Gallagher’s n aw. And they boys in the Kinks, the Davies brothers. There’s a huge market in the music business we huvnae even started to tap intae.
— I’m on it. But, Jim, I’m conscious of your time, and the commissions are rolling in.
— Ah’ve plenty time.
In the workshop, Danny Murphy, rendered blind, deaf and anosmatic, rises from his stool in terror, tearing at the set block of wet plaster-concrete mix that encases his face. He stumbles over Mark Renton. Alarmed by the
weight on him, the sensation of tipping off the stool and tumbling to the floor, Renton reflexively grabs out, striking at something. Feeling a walloping blow to his side, Simon Williamson panic-strickenly raises his hands, trying to pull the heavy object from his face.
Frank Begbie hears the banging, thrashing sounds, and abruptly ends the call. He returns to find the studio in chaos. Spud, arms and legs spreadeagled, lies immobile, on top of a flailing Renton, while Sick Boy has collapsed across a trolley. Franco grabs a huge set of stainless-steel cutters and tears north from the side of Sick Boy’s neck, pulling open the block, exposing his grateful face as he fills his lungs. — Fuck … fuck sake … what happened?
— Some cunt was fuckin aboot, Frank says, in a voice that strikes terror into Sick Boy. It is almost signalling the return of someone much feared, whose impending presence is hinted at, but as yet unconfirmed. Sick Boy sees it in the eyes staring at him, inspecting the latex mask, before looking to the imprint in the discarded block, noting it has set as a mould. — Good … Franco Begbie purrs, hauling in a breath, seeming to slip back into the mode of artist Jim Francis.
Franco pulls Spud’s almost weightless figure from Mark Renton. He falls to his knees and starts giving Renton the same treatment as Sick Boy.
— Will I take this off him? Sick Boy asks, reaching for the block that covers Spud Murphy’s face.
— Leave it! Franco first snaps, then adds, more gently, – Ah’ll see tae it … as he cuts and tears Renton’s casing from his head.
A gasping, jerking Renton can suddenly breathe, as he feels the air and sees the light flood in. Then Frank Begbie is lunging at him with a pair of industrial cutters. — NO, FRANK!
— Shut it, I’m taking this oaf for ye!
— Ay, okay … thanks, Frank … Renton wheezes in gratitude. — Some cunt fell on ays, he moans, as Frank Begbie springs the mould from him. Then Franco is over to Spud Murphy, now a thin, motionless body sticking out from a block of concrete.
— I was smacked by some bastard, Sick Boy says, pulling the latex mask from his face.
— It wisnae me … Spud fuckin fell on toap ay me! What was he playing at? Renton rises, staring at the immobile body on the floor. — Fuck … is he okay?
Frank Begbie ignores them, cutting through the block, then tearing it from Spud’s head. He rips off the latex mask. Spud doesn’t respond to a hearty slap across the chops, so Begbie pinches his nose and sets to work on him with mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. Sick Boy and Renton look at each other in trepidation.
Frank lurches back as Spud’s lungs explode into life, puke shooting across the floor, then trickling out from the side of his mouth as Franco spins him onto his side. — He’s awright, he announces, before helping Spud to sit up, propping him against the wall.
Spud gulps in air. — What happened …?
— Sorry, bud, ma fault. Fuckin phone. Franco shakes his head. — Loast track ay the time.
A snigger suddenly ebbs from Renton. First Sick Boy looks at him, then Spud and Franco, compelling him to ask, — What’s the worst job you’ve ever had?
The laughter is loud and tension breaks from them like wild stallions smashing out of a corral. Even Spud, through a fitting cough, is moved to join in. When there’s a lull, Sick Boy looks at his phone and turns to Begbie. — Is that us done?
— Aye, thanks for your help. If you have to get off, go ahead, Franco nods, then turns to the others. — Mark, Danny, ah could do wi a wee hand.
— What can we do? Renton wonders out loud.
— Help ays cast my ain heid.
On this news, Sick Boy finds himself inclined to loiter, as they assist Franco in putting on his own latex mask. Then, as he had done to them, they encase his head in the Perspex box, and start to pour the concrete-plaster mix around it. The timer on the clock is set. As the block solidifies, Sick Boy play air-humps at it, to Spud’s and Renton’s mild amusement. As they know through experience, Franco will hear nothing now, yet they opt to remain silent.
At the allotted time, they tear off the mould. The freed artist calmly inspects the indentation of his own face in the concrete block. — Good work, boys, it’s perfect. He immediately starts to cast all the heads from the impressions, filling them in with clay. Once they set, he explains, he will do the eyes by hand, from photographs he takes of them all. Then he’ll take the moulds to a specialist forge to be cast in bronze.
Sick Boy is now fascinated, and in no hurry to leave. They chat more easily and when the heads finally come out of the kiln, the others are shocked, not at their own images, but that of Frank Begbie’s. There is something about it, gaunt and tense, still with hollows for the eyes that he will add later. It isn’t a representation of the man now in their company. The head looks like how he used to appear; full of psychotic anger and murderous intent, and that is before he has filled in those blank voids. It is the mouth; it twists in a familiar cold sneer, which they haven’t yet seen in the Jim Francis version. It chills each man to his bones.
The artist picks up on the mood of his subjects and the shifting atmospherics of the room, but can’t determine its source. — What’s up, boys?
— They look great mate, Renton says uneasily. — Very authentic. I’m just blown away by how real they seem, even withoot the mince pies.
— Nice one, Frank Begbie smiles. — Now as a token of my appreciation, I’ve booked us a table at the Café Royal. A slap-up nosh on me. He looks at Sick Boy. — You still in a hurry to get off?
— It might be nice to catch up properly, Simon Williamson concedes. — On condition Renton puts his fucking phone away for ten minutes. I thought I was bad, but you have to retain some fucking social skills in the digital age.
— Business, Renton says defensively. — It never stops.
— Vicky business, I’m betting, Frank Begbie teases.
Sick Boy’s guileful grin slides over Franco and Renton, deft as a pickpocket’s fingers. — So he has a proper girlfriend, which he’s kept silent about! He still reverts to his seventeen-year-old self on such occasions!
— Aye, right, Renton says, his hand wet with sweat on the device in his pocket.
— And on the subject of business, if you gentlemen are ever in London and looking for escort services, and he hands them all an embossed Colleagues business card. — Now, he smiles at Franco, — let us feast!
9
SICK BOY – EXPANDING/CONTRACTING
Carlotta is constantly on the phone, even though I’m back in London where I can do little to find her missing Thai-hooring husband. She’s fucking relentless, so I pick up, as I trek from King’s Cross Underground to my office. I can’t leave Colleagues for too long. There’s only so much you can do online without being at the holeface. The girls form their own bonds with the clients, then conspire to undercut you by making their own deals. There is zero you can do about it. Then they’ll rip off, or fall out with the customers, who return like nothing has happened, to use my service again. So you are continually firing and recruiting. And for a pittance. They make the real money.
But Carlotta does not give a fuck about my business affairs, as her sobs heave down the line. — It’s killin me, Si-mihn … it’s fuckin killin me, as I jink past open-mouthed stunned plebs waiting for the lights to change, hopping over York Way to the Caley Road. This time my sis really is beside herself and making no sense. I’m looking around the tarted-up street, barely able to comprehend what’s become of the bookies and the Scottish Stores pub, those once-redoubtable centres of hooring and drug activity that constituted my personal power base. Grim days. Carra can barely speak; thankfully Louisa takes over. — She’s in pieces. Still husnae heard a single word fae Euan since he went tae Thailand.
The dirty bastard. Lumpy-bawed Presbyterian hoor’s erse-ramming cunt … — Has anybody been able to work out how long he’s going to be away?
Louisa is trying to sound outraged, but she can’t help a salacious Schadenfreude seep into her tones. Nobody could have fe
male siblings like mine and believe in the concept of the sisterhood as anything other than a movable feast. — Only that he bought a round-the-world ticket after sorting out a career break with his employer. Of course his first port of call is Bangkok!
— What the fuck, I hiss, crossing past the old snooker hall, now a shit club venue, copping a lungful of exhaust fumes. A solitary jakey extends a styrofoam and croaks hopefully. His face contorts in a bitter sneer as he sees it’s only coppers and a 5p I’ve deposited. — He must have said when he’s planning on returning?
— He told her all this in one email, Lou says breathlessly, — then cancelled his account and shut down his Facebook page. He’s even pit off his phone, Simon. She’s goat no way ay getting in touch wi him!
The office is located in a backstreet behind Pentonville Road, on the side that has escaped redevelopment. It’s a shabby old building above a minicab office and kebab shop, its days numbered with the sweeping post-Eurostar gentrification of the area. I let myself in and feel my feet stick to the carpet as I mount a stair so narrow it could be in Renton’s stomping ground of Amsterdam.
In the meantime, Lousia has managed to get Carlotta back on the blower. Of course, her and Ross, to say nothing of Euan’s auld mammy back in Wee Free cattle-cowpin land, are worried sick. The audacity of those self-indulgent pansy bourgeois drama queens on their menopausal breakdowns in saying that I don’t know how to treat women!
A wave of heat hits me as I open the office door. I left the fucking radiator on, and the power bill will be extravagant. Some privatised utility-shareholding one per cent public-school Nazi fuck will be getting wanked blind by a Third World child on a luxury yacht right now. Thank heavens for Renton’s money. I tell Carlotta to calm down and assure her I’ll be up next week. I ask her if there’s anybody else Euan would be in touch with, but she’s tried all his workmates and he’s just cut them off too. The cunt really has gone native. I never thought he’d have the balls.