VIEW

She asked where I lived to and I told her.
‘Been there for years, haven’t you?’ she said.
‘On one of the upper floors.’
‘You got a view?’
‘Over the East side of town.’
‘I had a view once. I haven’t got one now and I miss it.’
‘Helps me think, looking out from up so high.’

THE LAW

He held the outer door for me I held the inner for him.
Waiting for the lift.
‘You don’t know what to wear the weather like it is do you?’ he said.
‘When I went out it was cold sun comes out I’m too hot then it rains and the wind seems like it’s always windy at the moment you wouldn’t think it’s June in a few days, would you?’
‘No, and they’ll be starting this lift soon,’ he said.
‘Great, then we’ll have to walk up the hill or six flights and that lift’ll end up like this one, tin cans and goodness knows what in it.’
‘The other day I saw two of them, a man and a woman, injecting themselves out there...’
‘Where?’
‘Out there on the balcony of the hostel, couldn’t not see it sitting in the park, you know, right in my face...and they go behind the flats drop their knickers for a few quid for drugs...’
‘Yes, I know...’
‘...and last week saw two men behind the wall out there one of them with his trousers down sticking a needle in his backside then the other one did the same, he did, I went inside got my iron bar but they were gone by the time I got back out...’
Lift down, door open, me in first.
‘...I had a couple on my landing injecting each other in their thighs, I got my iron bar and hit one of them on the arm he said, “what you do that for?” and I told him, “go on, fuck off, and don’t come back,” and I’ve not seen them again, they’ve not come back and they better not and I don’t care about the law or not I'm the law so they can fuck off I’ll give them a whack if I see them again...’

ALL THE WAY

I decided to go to the barbecue took the car and was slowing down outside her place when I saw him standing at the front door looking down the street so instead of parking I carried on driving all the way home.

ROAD RAGE

All I wanted was to sleep being so tired from driving nine hours the last two days.
I went to photograph some grafitti she'd seen on a wall, north of Broadmead, as I took her to the station.
Rode the bike.
Towards one of the temporary junctions takes traffic through the demolition site I looked, signalled, manouvered, across the lane right of me. A dark blue Peugot Estate drove up very close behind me and then pulled up next to me getting closer pushing me and the bike into the steel fencing divides the contraflow.
I shouted, ‘oi, fuck off, fuck off,’ and jabbed my finger at the driver sat within three feet of me behind a window.
He opened the window said, ‘I didn’t touch you did I? Fuck off yourself.’
‘I’m on a bike you’re in a car, you fucking wanker, it’s alright for you, fuck off.’
The passenger door opened and a big man got out shouted, ‘you want to get hurt, you little prick?’
‘No I don’t, fuck off,’ I replied and rode the pedestrian route to the grafitti.

TIME CHANGE

On the way down Godmother got in the lift.
‘Morning,’ I said.
‘He’s changed his laundry time,’ she said.
‘That’s why he hasn’t been down, then?’
‘He changed it the day before and still came down his usual time.’
‘What’s he changed it to?’
‘Evening time.’
‘Doesn’t he like the company?’ I said.
‘He won’t like it anymore then either, you get all and sundry going in at that time.’
Outside she said, ‘I think it waits for me to come out, I do.’
‘You got your brolly?’
Rummaging in her bag she said, ‘I’ve always got my brolly.’

A couple of hours later I met him on the stairs.
He said, ‘I’ve got some news.’
‘Oh yeh?’
‘I’ve changed my laundry time.’
‘I heard.’
‘Who told you?’
‘She did.’
‘You know why I changed it?’
‘No.’
‘Too many people coming in and having conversations I didn’t want.’
‘You started them,’ I said.

DROPS

Drops of blood on the floor of the quadrant.
Through the door to the vestibule blood through the door to the stairwell drops on the stairs from above and on those going down.
Heard a door open and close below and then footsteps. A few floors and I’d caught up with a man wearing a long black overcoat unbuttoned and followed him down.
‘You live here?’ he said.
‘Yes. You?’
‘No.’
Bloody tissue in a corner of a landing.
‘You seen the blood?’ I said.
‘Yeh, maybe it was a fight or something.’
‘With syringes, you think?’
‘At dawn...well, at whatever time it was.’
Two blood smears on the wall.
‘Must keep you fit going up and down these stairs,’ he said.
‘I only walk down, I get the lift up, six is about my limit.’
‘When I was in the army we used to climb up and down stairs.’
‘As a punishment?’
‘No, to get fit. After a week of doing that you wouldn’t recognise me.’
‘I’ve not seen you before.’

THE MORNING AFTER

Crossing the junction diagonally the furthest possible distance right watched by two police officers sitting in a patrol car left.
In the crowded pub men stood beneath a wall mounted television showed the day’s game. No one moved to make it easy me getting to the bar so I pushed my way through to order a drink.
‘Alcohol free lager,’ I said turned a few heads in my direction.
The barman poured the Claustheimer into a glass set it down on the bar and said, ‘that’ll be one pound.’
I gave him a coin and asked, ‘is there somewhere I can sleep?’
He called through a doorway behind him. A woman came out showed me to a bed in the corner of the room.
‘You can have this until the morning,’ she said.

After waking got out of bed pulled the covers up smoothing them down with a sweep of my hand, puffed the pillows so it looked like no one had used them and left the pub as quietly as possible not wanting to disturb the drinkers had their backs to me.
Once outside I went over to the two men I knew stood by a small sized skip left against the kerb in the road. One of them took the bag I was carrying opened it and started to look at what was in it.
‘This can be re-cycled,’ he said taking out an empty tin can, ‘and this,’ some newspaper.
None of the stuff he took from the bag and put into the skip had been cleaned like they wanted but I thought they’d forgive us seeing as who we were.
By the time he’d finished what he was doing the skip was full and the bag the man gave back to me was empty.
‘Not so heavy now,’ he said.

RUBBISH BIRDS

Watching pigeons, starlings, and a couple of songthrushes, it looked like, pecking at a blue plastic bag was part and at the end of a rubbish slick in the car park opposite the bottom entrance to Armada.
‘You going to report this?’ a man’s voice beside me.
‘I wasn’t planning to,’ I said, ‘why?’
‘Well, I complained recently and nothing got done...did the first time, something happened immediately, got cleared up, but not the last time.’
‘I’ve not seen it like this before...usually there’s a biffa bin there,’ pointing where.
‘They just got rid of a pile of cardboard from behind the takeaway been there for sometime and this lot was under it.’
‘A bit ripe to be sure...but why leave it? I wouldn’t want a customer to see it, not here.’
‘That’s the point, they don’t see it do they?’
‘I suppose not,’ I said. ‘I was stood here watching the birds enjoying themselves - the rats’d have a field day, don’t you think? - anyway, I was here a while before I noticed the smell. Was just about to leave when you came over.’

GIVING AND ASKING

I took some magazines to the Lunch Out cafe corner of Thomas and Jamaica where they’re giving away and asking for clothes. I gave two pairs of jeans on Saturday and some books that were by the tea and coffee when I walked in today.
About ten people there some sitting on the sofa and chairs. A couple of men, one muttering to himself, looking through the clothes were in boxes on table tops on shelves. A woman in a corner talking on a mobile caught my eye.
Split level.
Up a few steps set central through balustrade to the raised back floor where I put the mags on a table by an A4 sheet of orange paper that had messages on it, two or three lines long, written in black felt tip pen.
The woman with the mobile watched as I left. I thought she might say something to me but she didn’t.
The newsagent next door picked up each of the three packs of Best-in biscuits - bourbon creams, shorties, shortcake - put the price into the till.
‘I’ll have an Evening Post too,’ I said.
‘And an Evening Post...that'll be one ninety-nine thanks.’
Gave her two one pound coins.

ON THE CORNER OVER THE ROAD

Kneeling at the small green leaf lying on the pavement. Fifteen centimetres NNE of the leaf a magnolia coloured piece of chewing gum stepped flat on the tarmac.
Grey hair glasses a royal blue fleece zipped to her neck.
Thumbs up, ‘alright?’
She waved and smiled.
By a road sign thinking, ‘she’s behind me shall I stop and say more than I have already or keep going without saying another word?’
On the corner over the road I said, ‘nice bit of sun.’
'Yes.’
I said, ‘it’s windy,’ making a fish swimming motion with my right hand.
‘Yes,’ nodding her head.
She said, ‘it was raining this morning.’
‘It’s difficult to know what to wear.’
‘Yes,’ pulling at the collar of her fleece.
‘Going to town?’ I said, pointing in town’s direction.
Thumbs up.
'Me too.’

THREE OF US

Three of us got out the lift on the ground floor.
‘Hello,’ I said to the old woman with her old dog and daughter.
‘Hello,’ she said.
She said, ‘oh, hello, how are you?’ to one of the women behind me.
Slow down.
‘Yes, I’m well, yes.’
‘How’s the baby?’
‘Yes, she’s well, yes.’
Listen.
‘How old’s she now?’
‘Eight months, she is, yes.’
‘Eight months? That’s a lovely age.’
Hold the door.
‘Yes, it is, yes.’
‘Bye then.’
‘Yes, okay, bye.’
Three of us left the block.

SILENCE

OH DEAR

Broadmead. Western Arm.
Couple, sat at the table next to me, outside cafe, drinking coffee.

Man: We’ve got to get the bus.
Woman: Where from?
Man: Over there somewhere.
Woman: Oh right...and what time we need to catch it?
Man: Not sure...soon anyway.
Woman: In other words, you don’t know what you’re talking about.

Silence.

Woman: Oh dear, oh dear.
Man: Very nice coffee.
Woman: I’ve finished mine.
Man: I’ll take the tray back, then.
Woman: Thank you dear, thank you.

LIE DOWN

He was coughing, clearing his throat, leaning against the wall, as I entered the foyer.
‘Alright?’ he said.
‘That sounds rough.’
‘Yeh, gonna get upstairs have a lie down, is what I need.’
In the lift he said, ‘how’s your day going?’
‘Yeh, okay, thanks. The weather’s a bit iffy though, isn’t it?’
‘Yeh, is, yeh. I got wet already.’
‘Yeh, me too. Could’ve done without it today.’
Thinking, ‘I hope he doesn’t spit on the floor,’ because I like him, and if I knew he’s one of the people does it, I’d be disappointed.
‘I’m gonna get inside,’ he said, ‘have a drink of water, take a couple of aspirins, and lie down for a while.’
‘You think that’ll work?’ I said, thinking a score might work better.
‘Hope so.’
We didn’t speak again until he left the lift a few floors below mine.

I WANT TO GO TO THE PARK

She moved herself, her child, and her laundry to one side of the lift so I could get in with my bike upended on its back wheel.
Couple of floors down two young women got in taking time to say ‘goodbye.’
Child in the lift said, ‘it’s Ruby, it’s Ruby, it’s Ruby, I want to see Ruby.’
Mother in the lift said, ‘yes, you’re right, it is Ruby, you’re right, we’ll see her later.’
Door closed, we started down.
‘How many lifts they got in here?’ asked one of the young women.
‘Two,’ the other said. ‘There’s one at the back but it’s being repaired so we can’t use it.’
The child in the lift took a pale pink piece of chewing gum out of her mouth, rolled it between her forefinger and thumb, pulled at it with her teeth.
‘Put that in your mouth,’ mother said, ‘tch.’
Child, ‘I want to go to the park, I want to go to the park, I want to go to the park.’
Mother, ‘it’s raining, you can’t.’
Thought of saying, ‘is it raining?’ but didn’t want to interfere with the parenting, so refrained.
Child, ‘I want to go to the park...’
Mother, ‘Shhh, I told you, it’s raining.’

WRITTEN ON THE FUSELAGE

Godmother said she’d seen the Airbus as it flew over Filton.
At Riverside Garden Centre yesterday, buying aquatic compost, grit, and two packets of bean seeds, I saw the assistant, had shown me to the stuff I wanted, run out from the shop, in to the open, point upwards, saw everyone else there look up, so I did too.
Two planes overhead. One above the other.
The closer was huge, not seen anything like. It banked slowly right, toward Clifton Suspension Bridge. I saw, ‘Airbus,’ written on the fuselage, and ‘A380’ written on the side of the tail.
‘That’s the big one,’ said the assistant, ‘isn’t it amazing?’
‘I wouldn’t like to clear up the mess if it crashed,’ I said.

SUGGESTION

‘You know when the lift’s supposed to be done?’ I asked Godmother in the laundry this morning.
‘Few weeks ago,’ she said, ‘on my way up the stairs carrying my laundry bag over my shoulder, I met one of them doing the work and he said it’d be three weeks. Couple of days ago, Tuesday, Wednesday, I think, another one said it was going to be longer, but they’ve got to be out of here by November.’
‘Thing is they got to do the next one after,’ I said.
‘Then we’ll get all the undesirables coming in the back and messing up that one.’
‘Yeh, at least that one has always been clean, doesn’t get the things in it the front one does.’
‘It’s getting worse.’
‘I know,’ I said, ‘someone pulled the suggestion box off the wall the other day.’
‘I’ve got a suggestion,’ said Godmother.

TIME OF DAY

Late afternoon.
‘We’ll wait,’ she said. ‘Send it back up will you?’
‘You may as well get in,’ I said. ‘Sometimes it doesn’t stop on the way up if someone gets in at the bottom.’.
She got in with her daughter and said, ‘true, it depends on the time of day, it does.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘It gets busy between five and six when people are coming back from work...’
‘...yeh...’
‘...and between three and four is the school run.’
Ground floor. The lift door opened. I got out. She and her daughter stayed in. No one joined them for the ascent.

PUKE

Two caretakers stood in the foyer on the ground floor by the closed lift door when I got back.
‘Morning,’ I said.
‘Someone’s puked in there,’ said the female CT.
I looked at her and said, ‘why can’t they cover it with newspaper when they’re sick in the lift?’
‘Cover it with newspaper?’ she said. ‘Why don’t they clean it up?’
‘I think we should phone their mothers’,’ I said.
‘Phone their mothers’?’ said the male CT, ‘some of them are fifty or more.’
An air of detached resigned despair seemed to emerge and occupy us briefly.
‘It just happened?’ I asked. ‘It wasn’t there when I left earlier.’
‘No,’ he said, ‘what it is, someone opened the coffin hole and puked in there. The lift looked clean but it was beginning to smell that’s when we found it. It’s just in the runners now.’
The lift door opened.
‘You’re always going up,’ said the male CT to the woman we saw stood there with a pushchair and two children.
‘It’s the only way to go,’ she said.
‘What floor you on?’ the male CT asked me as the lift door closed for ascent.
I told him.
‘You go up first then I’ll clean the runners.’
‘Sure you don’t want to do it first?’
‘No,’ he said, ‘it’ll only flick everywhere.’

DISTRACTIONS

Closing the door to the flat, heard voices then the door to the corridor opened and two women I’d not seen before walked behind my back and stood waiting for the lift after one of them’d pressed the call button.
Dark hair shorter said, ‘goodness that’s loud, is it safe?’
‘Yeh, I think so,’ I said. ‘Mind you it woke the man above the other night, it did, was so loud.’
They got in first and I said, ‘if you let me get the bike round the back of you...yes, that’s it, move forward...yeh, that’s it thanks.’
Stopped the next floor. Man there said, ‘going up?’
‘Going down,’ blond hair taller said.
‘You don’t want a man like me in there anyway,’ he said and we all laughed.
‘That one of the painters?’ said Dark Hair Shorter.
‘Lift engineer.’
Was going to ask the women if they’d moved in recent when I noticed Blond Hair Taller had A6 size leaflets, writing in Chinese, it looked like, in her hand and said instead, ‘delivering leaflets?’
‘Yes, don’t speak Chinese do you?’
‘No.’
‘You want one of these?’ offering one with English writing.
Hesitated...then took one, turned it over recognised the illustration...Jehova’s Witness literature.
‘The Bible’s got answers to things you probly don’t realise,’ she said, ‘unlike a lot of the distractions around at the moment like that book, “The Da Vinci Code.”’
‘You read it?’ I asked.
‘No,’ she said, ‘but...’ seemed excited.
‘I have,’ I said.
‘What’s it like?’ Dark Hair Shorter asked.
‘A real page turner, couldn’t put it down.’
We left the lift on the ground floor.
Blond Hair Taller turned slightly from in front said, ‘the film’s out soon as well, isn’t it?’
‘Yes,’ I said, ‘and I’m going to see it.’

OSTEOPATH

Went to the Osteopath.
He said, ‘strip down to your underpants.’
Did that.
‘Let’s have a look at your back. Turn around.’
Did that.
‘Oh my,’ he said, ‘what a mess.’
In the mirror, front of me, I leaned to the left, compensating, he said, for the muscle contracting.
On the couch he helped me move on to my right side.
‘What’s happening?' I said.
‘We won’t know for sure unless you have an MRI or an autopsy. MRI’s are difficult to arrange and it’s a liitle early for an autopsy,’ he said.
‘Ow, ow, ow, ow,’ I said as he bent my leg, rubbed my back and buttock and pushed and pulled me about the affected area.
‘You okay?’ he asked.
When finished he said, ‘don’t do any washing up, hoovering, sweeping or anything else involves twisting especially when sitting down.’
‘Okay,’ I said.

STRAIGHT UP

From the osteopath took a half hour, in the car, used because it was raining when time to go, to travel between the top of Colston to the corner of Deighton.
Waiting on Six the lift went past on the way up then stopped on the way down.
Door opened man standing against the back wall. He wore shades, a wollen hat, red jacket, his hands clasped in front, his feet a kimbo.
‘You going down?’ I said.
He nodded his head, barely perceptible.
‘I’m going up,’ I said, stayed waiting.
The door slid shut the lift went down.
Heard the beep as he got out then another two beeps as people got in.
It stopped going up, usually it doesn’t, surprised me.
The man and woman in there live on the same floor different flats. He in the one directly above mine, she, the other end of the block.
‘This lift’s a nightmare,’ I said.
‘Ay?’ She said. ‘What?’
‘This lift. Up and down, up and down.’
‘Yeh, it’s doing a lot of work, must be worn out,’ she said.
‘At least it’s stopped creaking,’ he said.
‘Yeh, used to get really loud past the tenth floor,’ she said.
‘Still does,’ he said. ‘woke me up four in the morning the other day.’
‘Really?’ I said.
‘Yeh, straight up.’

CORRECTION

Met for coffee at ‘Sufi’s’.
The woman who served, noticed me, when I’d sat down, take two painkillers from the packet, from the pocket of my jacket, and said, from behind the counter, ‘you want some water for those?’
‘Yes, thanks,’ I said and, ‘thank you very much,’ when she brought over to our table the water in a glass on a saucer.
When we finished the first cup the woman I’d met said, ‘shall we have another one?’
‘Yes,’ I stood slowly, groaned slightly my back sore and said, ‘isn’t it my turn to pay? I’m sure it is you know.’
‘No, it isn’t...and there’s a story to that,’ she got up, ‘I’ll tell you when I get back,’ and went to order.
When she was back at the table I said, ‘what have I done then?’
‘It’s not what you’ve done, it’s what you wrote on your blog about when we met and you said that as we left the cafe you paid for the drinks.’
‘Yes,’ I said, ‘I remember...and?’
‘You forgot something.’
‘What?’
‘The bit where I gave you the money.’

NOT JOKING

Hurt my back again. Fourth and each at roughly this time of year.
The one got it all started was at her house.
I was in the garden getting ready to go when I saw a feather lying on the ground. I bent down, picked it up between my forefinger and thumb, and twisted slightly at the waist to plant the shaft into the soil of a flowerpot. I felt a shooting pain in the left side of my lower back and fell down to all fours. Thought then it might've been a slipped disc later at hospital the doctor said it was a muscle'd gone into spasm.
‘Help,’ I shouted, ‘help.’
‘What?’ her voice from inside the house. ‘What?’
‘Help me, I can’t move.’
‘What you doing down there?’ her voice above me she probly leaning out the bedroom window, couldn’t turn my head far enough to see.
She came down stood in the doorway said, ‘you joking?’
‘It look like I’m joking?'
'It does, actually.'
'Well I'm not. I can’t move and it hurts.’
‘What happened?’
I told her, she said, ‘I’ll call an ambulance.’
Heard a siren and a few minutes later two paramedics came through the back gate one carrying a rigid board they both strapped to my back after I told them how I’d got to where I was.
When they were sure it was fastened tight enough one of them said, ‘what we’re going to do is turn you over slowly then try to straighten your legs, okay?’
‘Yes, okay.’
‘Good.’
One to the other, ‘you ready?’
‘Yes.’
To me, ‘you?’
‘Yes, ready.’
He said, ‘this is going to hurt.’

TIME’S COME

Got in the lift, with my hands full, went down a few floors, stopped, door opened and a man, used to live here, moved out, comes back now to visit, got in.
‘Alright?’ he said.
‘Hello.’
We didn’t speak to each other some floors and I watched as he looked at the two addressed and stamped envelopes he shuffled.
‘And you? You alright?’ I said.
‘Yes. Well, sort of.’
‘What’s up?’
‘I’m waiting to be re-housed.’
‘Oh, yeh?’
‘Yeh, I had to leave where I was living and I’m staying with a friend.’
Lift reached the ground floor we got out.
‘Oh, yeh?’
He held the two front doors open for me and said as I walked through, ‘now I got to leave my friend’s place.’
‘Oh, yeh?’
‘Well you know what it’s like staying at a friend’s.’
‘I do.’
Both outside, doors closed behind us.
‘Eventually time comes you got to get some space, you know?’
‘Sounds like it’s come, already.’

UNPLEASANTVILLE

She said, ‘he was in the lift when I got in and he started having a go at me...’
‘Thought he’d stopped it.’
‘It was horrible...
‘Doesn’t even speak to me.’
‘Said he was going to report me, for whatever he imagines, then when we walk out the front door he turns round says, “I hope you die soon, you piece of shit.” It was horrible.’
‘Yeh, sounds it, being in the lift with him and then him saying that.’
‘Yeh, just makes me feel so...so...you know, it’s where I live...it’s not what I want.’
‘Yeh, it’s hard enough living here sometimes without that kind of thing going on.’
‘No, that’s right. It makes me nervous going out, using the lift.’
‘When I got shouted at in the lift I didn’t want to use it for a while. Used the stairs going down, I did. Felt anxious coming home or going out just in case I bumped into him again...my own home, you know?’

OPERATION

She said, ‘I had to go back to hospital for an operation.’
‘What for?’
‘To take some bone marrow for stem cells in case of a relapse.’
‘Where’d they take the marrow from?’
‘They drilled three small holes in the pelvis, at the back,’ she put her fingers where, ‘just here.’
‘Ouch.’
‘Well yes, I had to go in overnight.’
‘That all?’
‘Yes, but it takes a few days to recover, but anyway, listen...
‘I was in a bed opposite an old woman said she’d been in hospital forty-five years ago had her first daughter here and now she’s a grandmother...anyway, I’m opposite her, it’s night and I’m watching TV reading a magazine and she falls off the commode she’s on and I’m thinking, “what’m I going to do, go over to her, call the nurse?” Anyway, I shout, “nurse,” they come running, call the crash team, which they cancel, anyway, they deal with her and she’s okay but I’m like, watching TV and reading the magazine...’
‘Goodness, sounds like a bit of a scene.’
‘Yes, it was...anyway, here’s my bus.’
It was mine too.
I said, ‘bye,’ and waited for the next one.

DOUBLE HERNIA

Phoned up asked if he was there.
He said, 'heard you got a gig on Saturday, is it?’
‘Friday. How’d you know?’
‘He was down the garage booking in for an MOT, what I was doing too, and he said then.’
‘Down at 2R’s?’
‘Yeh, but what a palaver now.’
‘The MOT?’
‘Yes, if you fail you have to pay again.’
‘It’s all computerised, is why, isn’t it?.’
‘Yeh, but it makes it difficult if you’re trying to keep a car on the road cheap...and it’s hard for the small garages too.’
‘He’s surviving isn’t he?’
‘Yeh, he’s alright though he’s got a hernia, a small one, and he’s waiting for an operation, doesn’t want to wait too long.’
‘No. I worked with a man waited too long, two years it was. His intestines went into his scrotum and the specialist said his body’d adapted and if he pushed them back up into his abdomen it’d be too much of a shock and he could die so he was stuck with this obvious lump, more than a lump it was huge, never’d seen anything like it...’
‘I couldn’t be a nurse.’
‘No, nor me, but I saw it, I had too, above and beyond the call it was...mind you a salutary lesson, if it ever happens to me, I’m not hanging around.’

MONDAY MORNING

Tired these last days so this morning wanted to sleep as long as possible before getting up but it still wasn’t enough and had a headache when I woke.
Thought of going to the doctor’s to order a re-prescription for the only medication deals with the migraines come mostly, now I’m not drinking, from my lack of sleep.
But the entry phone rang and it was TD, who said when he got in the flat, ‘I was walking around...well not just walking, I had to go to the bank.’
Put the kettle on for coffee for him and tea for me, said, ‘you want any food?’
‘You got any biscuits?’
‘No.’
‘Chocolate?’
‘No, but I got some of those sugared almonds you gave me a while back. You want some of those?’
‘Yeh, I’ll have a couple.’
I passed them to him.
He said, ‘I don’t like tea or coffee on an empty stomach.’
‘Yeh, tea makes me shudder if I don’t eat before, if it’s the first cup of the day...not coffee though...and I don’t know why...’
Went out to the kitchen when the kettle boiled, made the drinks, brought them in, gave him his, then sat down in the chair opposite with mine.
‘Who’s going to win the next election then?’ he said.
‘I don’t know. You’re the one seems to have his finger on the political pulse.’
‘Well, I listen to radio four.’

WHAT NOW?

We were walking through a red-brick suburban housing estate. It was night blue lamplight dark. Houses set back from straight roads with lawns manicured and neatly edged. There were no flowers or trees.
Two women came from the right crossed the road a little way in front of us and walked into a road to our left. They wore identical combat greens and had long hair.
‘Twins,’ I said to her, 'they’re twins.’
The next turning we passed on the left a group of twenty or so people, backs to us, milled around parked cars.
‘A gang,’ I said to her. Then more loudly, ‘look there’s a gang.’
She looked where I looked then gripped my left arm with both of hers and pressed her cheek against my shoulder.
We kept on walking, she wearing a long black belted coat collar turned up, me with my hands in the pockets of a brown leather jacket.
‘Oi, you,’ a man’s voice behind us.
We both looked round. Two men ran towards us.
‘Who are they?’ she asked.
‘I don’t know.’
We started to run ourselves.
At the end of the road, still running, still being followed, we went down a long path, high walls either side, that led to a house had a front garden, a tree set in the middle of the lawn surrounded by flowers in flower beds and, along the right, a low stone wall, the far side of which was a short drop to a rough and rocky lane.
‘What now?’ she said.
‘Over the wall and along the lane. It’s only a short drop.’
By the time we got to where it'd seemed least, the drop had become a long one and injury, if we jumped, likely.
‘What now?’ she asked.
‘I don’t know.’

A MOSEY

Moseying through Broadmead after work bought a £10 phone voucher and the young woman served me said, ‘you got a swipe card?’
‘No.’
‘You can phone up and get one’ll mean you can top-up at more places.’
‘Thanks.’
The first cashpoint wasn’t giving cash is why there was no queue but a long one at the next nearest so went further then onto look at secondhand DVD’s...didn’t buy one, or any.
At the North edge of the centre of the cross, two youths sat on the back of one of the metal slatted benches and another stood nearby being talked to by a woman had one hand free to point a finger at him and the other holding a shopping bag.
Walked behind her on my right, heard her say, ‘life don’t give you nothin’, boy, nothin’.’
He nodded, head inclined down.
‘You want something...you listening?’
‘Yes,’ he said.
‘You should be...you want something you gotta make it happen...yes?’
‘Yes,’ he said.
‘...to make something happen you gotta clean yourself up, get yourself together...you hear?’
Out of earshot thought he’d say, ‘yes.’
Passed on my left a police van parked in the centre circle against one of the concrete flower boxes and wondered if there was a link between it being there and what the woman’d said to the young man.

ENTERTAINMENT

Went to Canon’s Marsh Amphitheatre this evening to see a film made by a group of people who, earlier today, under the slogan, ‘40% Fare Increase, 100% Entertainment,’ took to the buses, dressed as First Bus representatives, to dance and sing for passengers.
A woman came up to me and said, ‘you come for the show?’
‘Yes.’
‘If you move to the centre of the amphitheatre it’s going to start soon.’
The group introduced themselves:
‘Hello, I’m Tiffany.’
‘Hello, I’m Amelia.’
‘Hello, I’m Alan,’ the only man.
‘Hello, I’m Margot.’
‘Hello, I’m Chandra.’
...and five others standing in a line the one behind with hands on the waist of the one in front.
The film lasted fifteen minutes.
After it’d finished while unlocking my bike a man twenty metres away said something to me.
‘What did you say?’
It sounded like the same thing he said.
‘I can’t hear you?’
He looked at me then walked off.

PLASTIC GLASSES

On my way home, after visiting and going for a walk in the cemetery near where she lives, toward the end of the road, saw him talking to an old woman on the opposite pavement and thought, ‘oh no, I have to stop and say “hello” and what’m I going to say?’
Slowed down, stopped, and waited ‘til he finished the conversation then pointing at the several different long packs of plastic glasses he held with one arm said, ‘what you got they for?’
‘Stop people taking the glass ones,’ he said.
‘They doing that?’
‘Some...’
He moved through one-eighty degrees from next to facing me and slightly closer to the door.
‘Ere,’ he said, ‘there was an altercation here last night.’
‘Inside?’
‘Yeh. A woman head butted another woman for sleeping with her ex.’
‘What she expect if you dump someone?’
‘True, but she could’ve waited more’n a day before doing it, show a bit of respect.’
‘Yeh, I suppose.’
‘Anyway,’ he said and gestured with his hand, ‘you going up there on Saturday?’
‘Yes.’
‘See you then.’

WHERE THERE’S SMOKE...

On the East side of Stokes Croft going South, saw her unlocking her bike. Stood watching a short while then said, ‘hello.’
‘Oh, hello,’ she said turning to face me. ‘You fancy a tea? I’ve got a few minutes.’
‘Yes, okay. I’ll get them.’
Went into the Elegance as she re-locked her bike. Ordered: tea for her, coffee for me. Sat down near the back of the cafe. She sat down opposite as the drinks were brought over.
‘How’re you?’
‘I’m on the bike because the car, the other day, smoke came out the air vents filled the car and I thought, “oh shit, is it going to explode, am I going to die, take a load of people with me?”’
‘What was it, you know?’
‘I took it to the garage, smoke still coming out, had the windows down, one of the mechanics ran out shouting, “turn it off, turn it off, it’s the electrics,” which is what I thought it was.’
‘Was it?’
‘They don’t know. They checked the electrics, the oil, I topped it up, but they couldn’t find what it was.’
‘What you going to do?’
‘Don’t know but we might lose the car and it cost two and a half thousand three years ago.’
‘That’s a lot of money for three years of car.’

TWO CANS

Said goodbye outside the pub and went down the shop. Crossing the road heard a voice behind me shout, ‘hey, you.’
‘No.’
‘Hey, you.’
‘What?’
‘Do us a favour.’
Turn. A man, wearing a white jacket and dark trousers, coming towards me.
‘Go in that shop and buy me some beer would you?’
‘I know you,’ to a man from the flats.
He held out a fiver, said, ‘HSL, man, they’re one ten each, can you get two?’
‘Yeh, okay.’
Two cans of HSL cost one fifty each because, the shopkeeper said, it was after ten, one ten before.
‘Oh no, that’s what he told me, that’s why I asked you to get them for me,’ he said when I told him and gave him the two pound coin was change. ‘It’s one ten before eleven. He puts the extra straight in his back pocket, he does.’
‘Sorry, I didn’t know.’
‘Oh well, that’s alright man.’

HE PHONED FOR A WALK

He phoned said, ‘I’m going to Snuff Mills you want to come?’
‘I’m right in the middle of something,’ I said, ‘what you going there for?’
‘Need to get out. Thought I’d go for a stroll but if you’re busy...’
‘Well, I was going to finish this then go into town...’
‘There somewhere nice to walk in town?’
‘No.’
‘That’s the problem isn’t it? he said. ‘Unless you get in the car and drive there’s nowhere near here that’s nice to walk.’
‘There’s that hill in St. Werburgh’s...what’s it called now?’
‘Narroways.’
‘Yeh, that’s it. You can ride there from yours.’
‘Yeh, suppose so. What about in town?’
‘Nowhere like there, but Castle Park, that’s okay, down by the river. But I like Broadmead and thought I’d finish what I’m doing then go for a coffee.’
‘You want to go in to town then?’
‘Yeh, come over.’
‘Ok.’

I SAW HER AGAIN LAST NIGHT

A couple of weeks ago coming out of a shop in the Galleries sold Easter eggs she passed right in front of me. I watched the back of her go in to Woolworth’s. She didn’t look round so’d probly not seen me.
I saw her again last night.
She got off a bus opposite where I sat drinking coffee at a table outside a cafe. She walked twenty metres or so to the right before I crossed the road, followed behind along the pavement ans saw her turn left into a doorway.
It was the third time I’d seen her that day. First, was through the window of a bus taking me out of town; second, she came up to me said, ‘hello,’ as I sat on some steps in a hall rubbing my face with my hands, we had a conversation; and now this.
I waited a few minutes thinking what to do before going, where I seen her go, through the doorway that led into a restaurant where a waiter approached as I entered and gave me a pair of blue plastic glasses and said, ‘you want a table?’
I pointed where she sat on her own saying, ‘I’ve come to see her.’
The waiter got out my way and I went towards her.
She looked up from the menu, saw me, said, ‘what do you want?’
‘I’ve come to see you.’
‘Why?’
‘I want to talk, come with me,’ and beckoned her with my hand, ‘come with me.’
She shook her head, said, ‘no.’
I turned round walked away and gave the blue plastic glasses to the waiter who held the door open for me as I left.
On my way back to a small room in the maze I realised, that in all the time I’d known her since, we’d not once said anything about what happened.