VerifiablyHuman
03-16-2012, 02:19 PM
1.
Les and Rocky and Derek and Paul crumbled through the doors of the Horse and Jockey. The pub was quiet. Just Shammy there and a couple of others so I’ve time enough to describe the outlay. It was small, squat, and shaped like a key - one long stretch of tile toward the bar and a couple of rooms teething off at the end. The bright spotlight above the bar, reflected by a mirror beyond the optics, created an almost esoteric contrast in an otherwise dimly lit interior. Past dark or on particularly foggy afternoons, you entered the pub as in a cave and found another opening already facing you. The four men mumbled toward the bar, shouting various names on their way in greeting, then looked confusedly at one another as the bartender enquired as to what it was gonna be. They took a moment to confer before deciding, wrongly, that it was Les's turn to put the order in. 'Four bitters please, young man.'
As the drinks were served and the group shuffled into their respective positions at the bar, Les felt a certain strength, rare yet familiar, stirring within him. He leaned towards the bar and let his leathery shoulders drop; paradoxically, he made himself seem taller. He felt it was time for a story.
‘You know,’ he began, ‘I was the first person in Rochdale to be breathalysed? Aye... September ‘67. I’d been up the Builder’s Gate down Witteth Road on my way back from The Baum…I’d had a couple, like…’
‘Aye, he’d had a couple… Look at him, the rum c**t.'
‘No I’d had a couple but I was reet. Wasn’t driving funny or owt, this copper musta just seen me leave the pub and figured he was having me. Anyway he pulls me up, this is about half ten, and the copper’s younger than me lad Barry at the time. Eighteen, nineteen. Still not got rid of the s**t on his face. Asks me to get out the car - nice and peaceful, so I does. He’s this funny contraption on him, sort of box with a little tube and balloon attached. Rubs it in my face and tells me, the cheeky little s**t, to pucker up and blow.’
‘You got shown that well enough in Strangeways, din‘t ya?’
‘Shut yr mouth. You bald prick. Anyway, so I don’t have a clue what this gadget is right? First time anyone in Rochdale apart from the fuzz have seen one. I think the lad’s having me on but he explains what it is, like. I tell him, I can‘t do it. Tells me it’s the law. I tell him it’s not happening. I tell him that I’m on probation as it is, so if I get drink driving that’s me f**ked. This was just after my stretch so I’d not a pot to piss in. Can’t afford to pay the fine and I’m not going back to prison. And if I’m f**ked, well, that’s him f**ked an’all.’
‘You rum c**t.’
‘Used to be…used to be.’
‘So what’d he do?’
‘He pushes it, so I politely explain.’
‘Oh aye.’
‘No, no rough stuff, just word to the wise. I can tell the lad’s bright, just not of his immediate f**king environment as yet.’ A chorus of Ohs and Ayes and Oh ayes. ‘He starts to get it…’
‘F**king too right, you still had a bit of pull with the aud dibble in those days.’
‘He’s getting it…then this daft bloody grin peels across his face. Says to me...leaning in like he’s seen ‘em do on The Sweeney, right…he says to me, me and him can divvy up the winnings.’
‘Winnings?’
‘Aye, apparently the cop shop have set up pools on the first arrest with this new toy of theirs, incentive or whatever. Five ton to the winner.’
‘Yr f**king kidding.’
‘No no, and he’s desperate ‘cos he needs the money…wife expecting and that…four bitters please...Your shout Rocky…’ The wide-eyed bartender pulled the handle, spilling the first heavy foam into the drip tray before settling the glass with care beneath the sticky valve. Slinking into the back office where the landlord watched, while his wife watched her soaps, the customers’ shtick on the monitor, the bartender asked him, ‘You hearing this?’
‘Heard it before. Must be once a year he tells this f**king story. Drop a whiskey?’
‘Go on then,’ the bartender replied. Wincing at the whiskey, he sat in the other chair, lit a cigarette and blinked blindly at the monitor. Black and white, delayed in their movements, the customers formed a semi-circle around Les while his voice, somewhere off-screen, as if thrown, continued:
‘…and course he knows every fuzz on duty that night is after it. Says there’s two of the five in it for me and he‘ll fumble the fine.’
‘Dodgy bastards!’
‘Sixties for ya, Paul.’
‘So what’d you do?’
‘Well, Terry. I puckered up and blew. Two ton was a lot back then. Hell of a lot… So I blow into this balloon, the box makes a noise and that and I’m practically in the copper‘s car when he says not too fast, like... I’m not over the f**king limit.’
‘Eyar? How? Hole in the balloon?’
‘Hole in the f**king balloon...No. Been on the shandys hadn‘t I? There musta been this much in it. The poor lad’s face is a picture. I mean, he’s wasted fifteen minutes on me already, right? Plenty more fish behind the wheel on a Sunday night, right? I feel sorry for the lad is what I’m saying. So I tell him to check whether the prize is still in the offing. Goes to the radio. Tis. So I says, not too late eh? Wonders if he fancies buying me a couple of pints. To top me up, like. This being about eleven on a Sunday night, he tells me everywhere’s shut. I says not necessarily, and that if he keeps an open mind I’ll show him where we’ll get served. Gets in his car and I gets in mine and I drive him up to the Four In Hand.’
‘You f**king didn’t.’
‘I f**king did. This is when Dave McKean had it an’all.’
‘Rum c**t he was. Kicked my dog to f**king death.’
‘Aye, I was there. She deserved it though.’
‘Aye, she did.’
‘Anyway. So I’m there at the front door, gives the wood the four and half knocks and John Sterling answers. Sees this tithead behind me and wonders if I’ve lost the plot. I says to John not to worry about him, he’s my nephew and he’s bent as a nine-bob note anyway. By this point, you understand, I’m just bringing him along for the craic like, to see how far this little s**t will go. Takes a bit of convincing but he lets us in. The copper‘s pretty relaxed about it when we go in, probably enjoying himself a little…and then the lad sees what he’s let himself in for. There’s the Merrymans at the bar, the Stakehill lot round the pool table and Big Mary, rest in peace, bouncing on Dave‘s knee with her tits out. Everyone staring at us. Copper goes white and Dave looks at me like I've just s**t my pants. So I says, this lad is my nephew and he just wants a nightcap before he gets home. Dave doesn't buy it but he pipes up, mock-respectful-like, “What you having then, officer? What’ll it be, my love?” Lad says half a lager shandy and gets me a treble whiskey.’
‘Half a lager shandy f**king chandelier.’
‘Tells me to sup it quick so we can get back to the station sharpish with this boozy balloon. As well he were getting worried, I think, about the looks being shot at the uniform. I mean, there‘s not one citizen in that pub. They don’t wanna see a copper in their own boozer at all, never mind after hours. So I’m about to drown the whiskey when Ste Grimes, piss head as he was, starts in on the young fuzz. Starts calling him to f**k and poking him in the belly, like. Copper falls into me and knocks the f**king thing over. The young fuzz tries ordering another but Dave calls it a night on us. Figured we’d better do one. So we try another - The Kingsway I think. No-one in. Tried some more. The Eagle. The Nelson. The Moon.’
‘Covered some distance there didn’t ya?’
‘F**king aye, made sure he added another tenner to my share for the petrol. We’re getting close to midnight here, I’d ran out of pubs but according to the lad the five ton‘s still going. I’m ready to part ways but he asks me if I‘ve got any booze back home. More desperate than I thought. At the time I was all the way out in Bacup so we can’t raid my bar - has to be his.’
‘This is getting a bit…’ the bartender circled various adjectives in his mind before recalling with smugness the true definition, ‘…fantastic isn‘t it?’
‘Les is a fantastic lad,’ the landlord replied.
‘No, I mean…outlandish’
‘…’
‘Er…soap-opera-ish?’
‘Soap-opera-ish?’
‘It’s bollocks, innit?’
‘Oh right! No, all true I believe. Had an interesting life has our Les. You ask him. You ask him about his ex-wife Brian.’
‘Right.’
‘So, he went for that?’
‘I told him, by the time we get to mine and back the money’s well gone. Has to be his. He’s ready to pack it in, nearly midnight now, but he says f**k it and leads me up to the house. S**ty little terrace on Kirkholt it was. Near where me Mam was. I’m waiting in my car while he goes in for a bottle when I see it kicking off inside. He’s only caught his missus, while her fellah’s on f**king duty an’all, doing the next door neighbour.’
‘Really?’
‘Course. Next thing I see is this little fat bastard chased naked out the front door by the copper, and his wife screaming at him to leave it. Rugby tackles him to the floor and starts belting the life out of him. Can’t believe my eyes. Starts my car up to leave him to it but he shouts over, “We’re not f**king done yet you an me!” so I turn the engine off and watch him knock six shades of s**te out the bloke.'
‘But the copper’s still after the money?’
‘Well yeah, but the problem is that his missus and her bit of fluff have drank all the plonk. He comes over to the window, blood on his hands and face and close to f**king tears. Explains to me what we’re missing. I’m nearly heartbroken for the lad meself. So I wonder what’s left to us. I’m looking up at this sad bastard breathing through his teeth when inspiration hits us, like. I complement him on these pearly f**king whites he‘s got. I says he must look after them. I ask him, does he look after his teeth, does he floss? Does he use mouthwash?’
‘You mean?’
‘The only way he’s bringing me in over the limit, I mean, this is a long shot, but bearing in mind we’ve tried every pub there is and there’s f**k all booze to be had anywhere else, the only way, is if I do a pint of Listerine. Think about it, there’s about 30, 40% ethanol in mouthwash, right? Like I said, long shot, but it’s the least I can do after the night he’s had. Eventually he gets it. Runs upstairs, slaps the missus about on the way and comes down, not with one, but f**king four bottles of mouthwash. I start drinking this s**te but course I can’t keep it down any. Eventually I manage a pint an half and blow in the breathalyser - amazingly, it works. He rushes us back to the station probably fifty, sixty all the way there, I get my two hundred in the post the week after.’
‘F**king hell. Did you see much of the copper after?’
‘Aye, still good mates with him.’
‘Oh aye? Who was it?’
‘F**king Derek here.’
‘Doesn’t sound right that,’ the landlord coughed in the office.
‘I thought you said it was all true?’
‘The c**t was colouring in.'
Les and Rocky and Derek and Paul crumbled through the doors of the Horse and Jockey. The pub was quiet. Just Shammy there and a couple of others so I’ve time enough to describe the outlay. It was small, squat, and shaped like a key - one long stretch of tile toward the bar and a couple of rooms teething off at the end. The bright spotlight above the bar, reflected by a mirror beyond the optics, created an almost esoteric contrast in an otherwise dimly lit interior. Past dark or on particularly foggy afternoons, you entered the pub as in a cave and found another opening already facing you. The four men mumbled toward the bar, shouting various names on their way in greeting, then looked confusedly at one another as the bartender enquired as to what it was gonna be. They took a moment to confer before deciding, wrongly, that it was Les's turn to put the order in. 'Four bitters please, young man.'
As the drinks were served and the group shuffled into their respective positions at the bar, Les felt a certain strength, rare yet familiar, stirring within him. He leaned towards the bar and let his leathery shoulders drop; paradoxically, he made himself seem taller. He felt it was time for a story.
‘You know,’ he began, ‘I was the first person in Rochdale to be breathalysed? Aye... September ‘67. I’d been up the Builder’s Gate down Witteth Road on my way back from The Baum…I’d had a couple, like…’
‘Aye, he’d had a couple… Look at him, the rum c**t.'
‘No I’d had a couple but I was reet. Wasn’t driving funny or owt, this copper musta just seen me leave the pub and figured he was having me. Anyway he pulls me up, this is about half ten, and the copper’s younger than me lad Barry at the time. Eighteen, nineteen. Still not got rid of the s**t on his face. Asks me to get out the car - nice and peaceful, so I does. He’s this funny contraption on him, sort of box with a little tube and balloon attached. Rubs it in my face and tells me, the cheeky little s**t, to pucker up and blow.’
‘You got shown that well enough in Strangeways, din‘t ya?’
‘Shut yr mouth. You bald prick. Anyway, so I don’t have a clue what this gadget is right? First time anyone in Rochdale apart from the fuzz have seen one. I think the lad’s having me on but he explains what it is, like. I tell him, I can‘t do it. Tells me it’s the law. I tell him it’s not happening. I tell him that I’m on probation as it is, so if I get drink driving that’s me f**ked. This was just after my stretch so I’d not a pot to piss in. Can’t afford to pay the fine and I’m not going back to prison. And if I’m f**ked, well, that’s him f**ked an’all.’
‘You rum c**t.’
‘Used to be…used to be.’
‘So what’d he do?’
‘He pushes it, so I politely explain.’
‘Oh aye.’
‘No, no rough stuff, just word to the wise. I can tell the lad’s bright, just not of his immediate f**king environment as yet.’ A chorus of Ohs and Ayes and Oh ayes. ‘He starts to get it…’
‘F**king too right, you still had a bit of pull with the aud dibble in those days.’
‘He’s getting it…then this daft bloody grin peels across his face. Says to me...leaning in like he’s seen ‘em do on The Sweeney, right…he says to me, me and him can divvy up the winnings.’
‘Winnings?’
‘Aye, apparently the cop shop have set up pools on the first arrest with this new toy of theirs, incentive or whatever. Five ton to the winner.’
‘Yr f**king kidding.’
‘No no, and he’s desperate ‘cos he needs the money…wife expecting and that…four bitters please...Your shout Rocky…’ The wide-eyed bartender pulled the handle, spilling the first heavy foam into the drip tray before settling the glass with care beneath the sticky valve. Slinking into the back office where the landlord watched, while his wife watched her soaps, the customers’ shtick on the monitor, the bartender asked him, ‘You hearing this?’
‘Heard it before. Must be once a year he tells this f**king story. Drop a whiskey?’
‘Go on then,’ the bartender replied. Wincing at the whiskey, he sat in the other chair, lit a cigarette and blinked blindly at the monitor. Black and white, delayed in their movements, the customers formed a semi-circle around Les while his voice, somewhere off-screen, as if thrown, continued:
‘…and course he knows every fuzz on duty that night is after it. Says there’s two of the five in it for me and he‘ll fumble the fine.’
‘Dodgy bastards!’
‘Sixties for ya, Paul.’
‘So what’d you do?’
‘Well, Terry. I puckered up and blew. Two ton was a lot back then. Hell of a lot… So I blow into this balloon, the box makes a noise and that and I’m practically in the copper‘s car when he says not too fast, like... I’m not over the f**king limit.’
‘Eyar? How? Hole in the balloon?’
‘Hole in the f**king balloon...No. Been on the shandys hadn‘t I? There musta been this much in it. The poor lad’s face is a picture. I mean, he’s wasted fifteen minutes on me already, right? Plenty more fish behind the wheel on a Sunday night, right? I feel sorry for the lad is what I’m saying. So I tell him to check whether the prize is still in the offing. Goes to the radio. Tis. So I says, not too late eh? Wonders if he fancies buying me a couple of pints. To top me up, like. This being about eleven on a Sunday night, he tells me everywhere’s shut. I says not necessarily, and that if he keeps an open mind I’ll show him where we’ll get served. Gets in his car and I gets in mine and I drive him up to the Four In Hand.’
‘You f**king didn’t.’
‘I f**king did. This is when Dave McKean had it an’all.’
‘Rum c**t he was. Kicked my dog to f**king death.’
‘Aye, I was there. She deserved it though.’
‘Aye, she did.’
‘Anyway. So I’m there at the front door, gives the wood the four and half knocks and John Sterling answers. Sees this tithead behind me and wonders if I’ve lost the plot. I says to John not to worry about him, he’s my nephew and he’s bent as a nine-bob note anyway. By this point, you understand, I’m just bringing him along for the craic like, to see how far this little s**t will go. Takes a bit of convincing but he lets us in. The copper‘s pretty relaxed about it when we go in, probably enjoying himself a little…and then the lad sees what he’s let himself in for. There’s the Merrymans at the bar, the Stakehill lot round the pool table and Big Mary, rest in peace, bouncing on Dave‘s knee with her tits out. Everyone staring at us. Copper goes white and Dave looks at me like I've just s**t my pants. So I says, this lad is my nephew and he just wants a nightcap before he gets home. Dave doesn't buy it but he pipes up, mock-respectful-like, “What you having then, officer? What’ll it be, my love?” Lad says half a lager shandy and gets me a treble whiskey.’
‘Half a lager shandy f**king chandelier.’
‘Tells me to sup it quick so we can get back to the station sharpish with this boozy balloon. As well he were getting worried, I think, about the looks being shot at the uniform. I mean, there‘s not one citizen in that pub. They don’t wanna see a copper in their own boozer at all, never mind after hours. So I’m about to drown the whiskey when Ste Grimes, piss head as he was, starts in on the young fuzz. Starts calling him to f**k and poking him in the belly, like. Copper falls into me and knocks the f**king thing over. The young fuzz tries ordering another but Dave calls it a night on us. Figured we’d better do one. So we try another - The Kingsway I think. No-one in. Tried some more. The Eagle. The Nelson. The Moon.’
‘Covered some distance there didn’t ya?’
‘F**king aye, made sure he added another tenner to my share for the petrol. We’re getting close to midnight here, I’d ran out of pubs but according to the lad the five ton‘s still going. I’m ready to part ways but he asks me if I‘ve got any booze back home. More desperate than I thought. At the time I was all the way out in Bacup so we can’t raid my bar - has to be his.’
‘This is getting a bit…’ the bartender circled various adjectives in his mind before recalling with smugness the true definition, ‘…fantastic isn‘t it?’
‘Les is a fantastic lad,’ the landlord replied.
‘No, I mean…outlandish’
‘…’
‘Er…soap-opera-ish?’
‘Soap-opera-ish?’
‘It’s bollocks, innit?’
‘Oh right! No, all true I believe. Had an interesting life has our Les. You ask him. You ask him about his ex-wife Brian.’
‘Right.’
‘So, he went for that?’
‘I told him, by the time we get to mine and back the money’s well gone. Has to be his. He’s ready to pack it in, nearly midnight now, but he says f**k it and leads me up to the house. S**ty little terrace on Kirkholt it was. Near where me Mam was. I’m waiting in my car while he goes in for a bottle when I see it kicking off inside. He’s only caught his missus, while her fellah’s on f**king duty an’all, doing the next door neighbour.’
‘Really?’
‘Course. Next thing I see is this little fat bastard chased naked out the front door by the copper, and his wife screaming at him to leave it. Rugby tackles him to the floor and starts belting the life out of him. Can’t believe my eyes. Starts my car up to leave him to it but he shouts over, “We’re not f**king done yet you an me!” so I turn the engine off and watch him knock six shades of s**te out the bloke.'
‘But the copper’s still after the money?’
‘Well yeah, but the problem is that his missus and her bit of fluff have drank all the plonk. He comes over to the window, blood on his hands and face and close to f**king tears. Explains to me what we’re missing. I’m nearly heartbroken for the lad meself. So I wonder what’s left to us. I’m looking up at this sad bastard breathing through his teeth when inspiration hits us, like. I complement him on these pearly f**king whites he‘s got. I says he must look after them. I ask him, does he look after his teeth, does he floss? Does he use mouthwash?’
‘You mean?’
‘The only way he’s bringing me in over the limit, I mean, this is a long shot, but bearing in mind we’ve tried every pub there is and there’s f**k all booze to be had anywhere else, the only way, is if I do a pint of Listerine. Think about it, there’s about 30, 40% ethanol in mouthwash, right? Like I said, long shot, but it’s the least I can do after the night he’s had. Eventually he gets it. Runs upstairs, slaps the missus about on the way and comes down, not with one, but f**king four bottles of mouthwash. I start drinking this s**te but course I can’t keep it down any. Eventually I manage a pint an half and blow in the breathalyser - amazingly, it works. He rushes us back to the station probably fifty, sixty all the way there, I get my two hundred in the post the week after.’
‘F**king hell. Did you see much of the copper after?’
‘Aye, still good mates with him.’
‘Oh aye? Who was it?’
‘F**king Derek here.’
‘Doesn’t sound right that,’ the landlord coughed in the office.
‘I thought you said it was all true?’
‘The c**t was colouring in.'