ROUND THE CORNER

He calls me Pete. It’s not my name.
John isn’t my name either. Nor is it Charlie.
There are more names that aren’t than are mine.
I corrected him once but I he mustn’t’ve heard because he called me Pete today.
‘Hello, Pete,’ he said, ‘got a new motor?’
‘Hello,’ I said. ‘Yes, I have,’ and wanting to keep talking said, ‘And it’s like yours.’
‘Yes. There’s a man round the corner does a good deal on a service. Better than Bryan Brothers,’ he said.
‘Better than Bryan’s?’ like I’ve been around.
‘They charge something like two-thirty, forty, fifty,’ he said, ‘and he’ll do it for half that.’
‘Not half as good, though, is it?’
‘He’ll come here and take the car then he’ll bring it back when he’s done,’ he said.
‘That’s handy,’ I said and he said, ‘He’s a very handy man, being just round the corner.’

BEST BOY

‘Not so warm today, is it?’ she said walking into the laundry, carrying a square plastic washing up bowl out of which, when she reached the extractor and pushed its lid aside, she took a blue wet cloth, probably a towel, my glance was cursory to avoid embarrassment, which she, with one flowing movement, put into the extractor closed the lid and pressed the ‘on’ button.
‘It’s supposed to be hotter later,’ I said.
‘In the afternoon?’
‘Twenty-seven, or is that Wednesday…or tomorrow?’ I said. ‘Tomorrow is Wednesday,’ mostly to myself…
‘They said it’s going to drop to twenty on Friday,’ she said, ‘which is a bit easier.’
‘That’s true, it’s a bit hot for me the way it’s been,’ getting personal.
She sat leaned against the extractor, facing me.
‘We had the most uncomfortable experience yesterday at the cinema,’ she said. ‘We went for a preview, it was free so we thought we’d go…’
‘…at the new one in the Circus?’ pointing in the general direction.
‘No, at the Odeon, yeah?’
‘Yes, I know it.’
‘Anyway, it was a preview, the gangster film just out, oh, what’s it called, “Dillinger”? or it’s about him…’
‘…the one with Johnny Depp?’
‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I loved it, a really good film. But there’s no air-conditioning in there so we were sweating all the way through and at the end everyone got up and left without even waiting to see who’s the best boy.’

STATEMENT

I bought a hat. The sign outside the shop said, ‘summer hats now in.’
Inside the shop a woman was trying on a hat, pulling it side to side, watching herself in the mirror.
‘There’s a mirror here you can use,’ said a woman’s voice behind me, coming to my rescue.
I turned round to see her place carefully from behind the counter, a mirror. I tried on two hats.
‘The straw ones better,’ she said. ‘That one’s just nothing, but the straw one makes a statement.’
‘You think so?’ I said – a moment’s pause - ‘Then, I’ll take the straw one,’ I said, ‘I want a hat that makes a statement.’
She took the hat. I put the other one back on the hat stand.
‘I’ll cut the label off,’ she said using scissors she picked up from beside the till. ‘You don’t want that flapping around.’
‘No,’ I said, ‘it’d undermine the statement.’

LIKE US

The money hasn’t come through so I phoned the garage said I’d be there later in the week not this morning. The man I spoke to was friendly and I finished the conversation with, 'Lovely job.'.
Caught the number seven bus from Whitehall Road and sat next to a man had long grey hair and a beard, and behind an older heterosexual couple.
The Lawrence Hill roundabout through Old Market to the new complex stop that the bus drivers like but creates more dangers for pedestrians. It was here a woman, wearing full-length dress, included a long headscarf, got up to get off the bus.
‘It’s disgusting, isn’t it?’ said the woman in front of me to the man next to her.
‘Is it?’ he said.
‘You wouldn’t know it was a man or a woman,’ she said. ‘I think we should know that’s all, it's rude,’ she said. ‘And if people come over here, well, they ought to fit in, do things like us.’

WORM CENSUS

It was the second time I’d seen Pension Plan the morning of. The first on my way to and now, on my way back from dropping money in an envelope off at Fly’s
‘Morning,’ I said, and having noticed the handle of a garden tool I assumed was a spade, sticking up behind him out of a pannier, ‘You on your way to the allotment?’
‘No,’ he said, ‘Willsbridge, dig up some worms and count them.’
‘You mean do a worm census?’
He laughed, said, ‘Yes, and count the different species of worm as well.’
‘I didn’t know there were different species of worm.’
‘Yes,’ he said.
‘Have a nice day, then,’ I said as he made to leave.
‘It’s my birthday too, today,’ he said. ‘That’s why I’m going out.’
‘Oh, okay,’ I said and, ‘Happy birthday,’ as I waved him goodbye.

A MOVE

‘Is that Four’s girlfriend?’ I said.
‘It’s his beard,’ she said.
‘Beard?’ I said. ‘You sure? Last time I saw him he was sitting on the window sill, said he was waiting for his girlfriend.’
We were in her kitchen. I could see Four, fussing around a car like he does, like I do.
‘Biffo reckoned he was gay but not out,’ she said. ‘That’s why he’s got the beard.’
‘I can’t see it,’ I said.
‘He’s not very soft,’ she said. ‘Cuddly, I mean.’
‘He always seems desperately sad to me,’ I said. ‘Lonely…he always says “young man” to me if we stop for a chat, which we do when he calls me over, takes me to one side, once I came out the lift on the ground floor and he wanted me to watch him chase some people out the flats.’
‘“Young man”, though,’ she said. ‘Sounds like a move.’

NOT LIKE IT IS FOR US

The door opened right to left with a frustrated sigh, and there was one of the single women from above. The one didn't come to the meeting to protect the interests she'd thought she'd secured and lost the vote.
‘That was a sigh,’ I said, reaching out.
‘It’s taking so long,’ she said, laughing like it wasn’t funny, the length of time, the interruptions.
We stopped twice more on the way down, the second time, ‘This is typical,’ she said, ‘when you’re late, in a rush, you know?’
‘If I lived on this floor I’d use the stairs,’ I said. ‘I mean what’s the problem? Take a few flights be quicker than waiting.’
‘I know,’ she said. ‘It's not like it is for us.’

FUCKING ON THE BUS

‘Fucking Bedminster,’ he said. ‘I wouldn’t go there,’ he said. ‘If I did there’d be more fucking chance of bumping into him,’ he said.
They’d got on at Old Market.
‘Two to the Centre. Thanks.’
Sat on separate seats until the roundabout – not far.
‘He’s a fucking paedophile, he is,’ said the man sat next to him, in front of me.
‘A paedophile?’
‘Sixty-five and shagging her? He’s a fucking paedophile.’
‘He’s not sixty-five, he’s sixty-two.’
‘Sixty-two then, and shagging her, I'm telling you,' he said, ‘he’s a fucking paedophile.’