Fat Tuesday Read online

  Gregg knelt down next to me, sharing my piece of cardboard.

  “You won’t fucking believe what I’ve just seen.”

  “What?”

  “You know the taxman. The one at the door this afternoon? Fat fucker in the suit jacket?”

  “Yeah.” I sat back on my honkers.

  “He’s been in here for the last ten minutes.”

  “So. It’s a supermarket.” I continued packing. Tax inspectors didn’t follow people to work.

  “And he’s been taking photos of you. How does he even know you live at the flat?”

  “Taking pictures of me?” Gregg nodded. “He can’t be a tax inspector,” I said. “Are you sure he was only taking shots of me?”

  “Positive, he was crouched down next to the bread. I came straight over but he was away.” He lowered his head and hissed, “They’re on to us already! We haven’t even started planning the robbery and they’re onto us!”

  “Of course they’re not. If they were, it would be easier to sack us.”

  “You’re right. Well, who was it?” He titled his head back. “That’s him! He’s next in line to be served. Tell Aileen I’ve gone home sick, I’m going to follow the fucker.”

  The only people that might be interested in me would have something to do with my father. I’ve got nothing to do with running his business, so even if my father had fucked someone over, what good would it do following me all the way out here?

  I carried on packing, laughing to myself.

  On the way home, I filled the others in on Gregg’s spying mission.

  It was three in the morning when the downstairs door slammed shut and Gregg came bounding up the stairs.

  He tossed his jacket onto the armchair. “That fucker is a right weirdo,” he panted.

  “What was he up to, then?” I said. “And why was he taking a photo of me?”

  “Haven’t a clue. He’s staying three blocks away on Palmer Street, number 154.”

  “So what took you so long if he only lives three blocks away?” Amber asked.

  “First up, he leaves Vaseys and heads down Crown Street and into that gay club, Columbian, on the corner of Oxford. Filthy bastard was in there for two hours. I sat in Hungry Jack’s forcing a double meal down my neck.”

  “That’ll be right,” Cam scoffed.

  “Then he walked straight past ours and up to The Cross and into World Bar, and I’m ducking into doorways like a nutter. After that he heads back to Palmer. He’s staying in a B&B. Fuck knows what he’s after but I say we keep an eye on him.”

  All through his story, Gregg addressed Amber and Cam. Even when he passed me the joint, he wouldn’t look at me.

  Cam stood up and ran his hands through his hair. “So, what else have you got for us? What’s this special treat you’ve been banging on about all week?”

  Gregg rummaged through his jacket pocket and brought out a thin piece of paper, about the size of a cigarette, perforated into six, each with a smiley face. “Now, this will get the weekend started.”

  “Where the hell did you get acid?” Cam said, examining the paper strip. “I haven’t seen any in years.”

  Before I came backpacking the only thing I’d experimented with was cigarettes. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to try anything else, I just didn’t have anyone to do it with. Acid sounded a right laugh and according to Gregg there were no drawbacks, but Cam said the stomach cramps coming down from it were a bit naughty, “but well worth it”. As long as there were no long-term effects like getting addicted to the stuff, I was up for giving it a shot.

  Amber was worried about not being able to stop the effect of the acid if she didn’t like it.

  “I’ll tell you what,” I said. “I’ll take a half and you take a half. If we like it we’ll have some more, if not, it’ll soon wear off.” She was thinking about it. “Come on, we’re off all weekend.”

  “Yeah, but how long does it last? And I thought we were going to Bondi tomorrow? Lisa’s reserved tickets for us for the beach party. I can’t let her down. Her hostel’s putting the beer on and everything.”

  “We can still go,” Gregg said. “We’ll be sound by then.”

  Amber loved Bondi and was always on about moving out there, but we wouldn’t because we needed to be close to all the hostels for the delivery scam.

  “So we’re definitely going?”

  We all nodded.

  “I’ll take a half, but no more.”

  3

  Gregg reckoned the best way to get started on the acid was to watch a film. An animated one if we had it. Men in Black was the best we could do. We sat back, curtains drawn, apprehensively looking around at each other.

  An hour later we were still waiting for the gear to kick in.

  I went to the toilet.

  The sink swayed and the orange and black striped curtains rippled, the colours mixing together. I dropped to my knees, head in my hands. I slowly opened my fingers and the rug was curling at the edges and rolling up to my legs. I fast-crawled to the sink, pulled myself up and turned the taps on. I looked in the mirror, then scarpered back into the living room.

  I lay face down on the floor, arms wrapped around my head.

  The train was heading my way, chugging along, getting louder, letting off steam as my head formed the tunnel. The ride was getting rough, here it comes, nearly there, Jesus it’s big, shiny steel, nearly there…

  Gregg was shaking me.

  “You twat,” he said. “You put the shits right up me. I thought you were a goner.”

  We rolled around the floor laughing, knocking cups over, everything a blur, table legs bending in and out, the fireplace a face with glowing teeth and black hair.

  I staggered into the kitchen, opened the fridge, then slammed it shut.

  I kept on the move, half covering my face with my hand, falling over, laughing and wrestling with Gregg, who had a terrifying grin, like The Joker. …I was on my bed, face down, squirming. Amber joined me, but I didn’t want her to see my face. I stretched over and tried to eject the CD but couldn’t. I turned over and jerked my head back, trying to focus. Cam gently held my face and tried to kiss me. I shoved him away and fell back over onto the floor.

  Cam left the room.

  I climbed back onto the bed and held on…

  * * *

  A piercing scream brought me to and I wobbled to the bedroom door.

  “Shit!” I rushed over to Gregg. “What’s happened?”

  His head was hanging limp, blood dripping off his chin.

  “Gregg! What’s happened?”

  He whispered, “She… she attacked me.”

  “Cam! Phone a fucking ambulance!”

  I sat Gregg down and lifted his head up. There were tiny bits of green glass embedded in his face and hands. His eyes were rolling and he was clutching an empty cigarette box in his right hand. I was still tripping and had to stop looking at his face.

  I walked over to the window as the ambulance pulled up.

  I guided Gregg down the stairs. They laid him on a stretcher and put an oxygen mask over his face. I told them what we had taken.

  Cam got in the ambulance with him.

  I waited until the ambulance had turned the corner before heading back inside.

  The bathroom door was still locked.

  “Amber, it’s Spence. You okay?”

  “I just w-want to get my stuff and leave.”

  “Come on, don’t be daft. It’s just an accident, it’s the acid.”

  The living room was a right mess – coffee table over, glass everywhere, cups on the floor, potpourri scattered over the armchair.

  “Things won’t seem so bad when we all get back to normal,” I said. “Gregg’s just got a few cuts and bruises. I take it you two fell out?”

  She was running the tap. “It’s not just Gregg,” she sobbed. “I’ve always had this trouble, you don’t understand.”

  I heard Amber slump to the floor and lean back against the bath. I co
uldn’t make out everything she was saying, but she was beating herself up about leaving her sister. I was still tripping, nothing too heavy, but I was having a little fun with a cigarette box during the long silences.

  “What’s your sister like?”

  “Emma’s great, Spence, she’s only fifteen, wants to go travelling as well. But I should n-never have left her.

  Ah, Spence, what have I done? I shouldn’t be here.”

  “Course you should. You can’t live your life round your sister. I bet she’s just getting on with things. You keep in touch, don’t you?”

  “Not as much as I should.”

  She was on a proper downer and talking her round from behind the bathroom door was a big ask. We sat silent again. The cigarette box. Light and dark blue, expanding and contracting. This acid’s great. I’d recommend it to anyone. It’s not working so much now at long range. I have to really focus, bringing things in close. I stare hard, challenging it not to work, but it’s still there. Take my fingers. Arm outstretched the ends are sort of moving, close in they’re like proper fat sausages, gently throbbing, and the nails are… are what? Like, say, Smith’s square crisps. Looking in the mirror earlier was well tricky, but now I’ve got a hold of it I reckon it’ll be a right laugh.

  “What about your folks, Spence?” Amber said, blowing her nose. “You hardly mention them.”

  “You lot don’t talk about home much, either. I thought that’s how backpackers went on.”

  I shouldn’t be bothered about home, but like I’ve said, I’m worried what they’ll think until they get to know me better. At the same time, I didn’t want to sound like a queer fucker and be all secretive.

  “What do you want to know?”

  “Tell me something about yourself – about you. Something I don’t know.”

  “And you’ll tell me something about you, I take it.”

  “All right.”

  “Eh… let me see. Let… me… see. Okay. My mother died when I was seven.”

  After a long pause, she dramatically said, “Spence, I’m so sorry.”

  “It’s all right. I can’t remember much about her to be honest. Just bits.”

  “Like what?”

  “She was average height, had black hair like me. Argued constantly with my father.”

  We fell silent again.

  I drifted off, thinking about my mother and home.

  Our house has five double bedrooms, a double garage and a tarmac driveway big enough to park ten cars or more. My bedroom is on the first floor and I have two floor-to-ceiling windows. One looks out over the lawn and driveway, and the other gives you a view of Mill Lane, which leads to St George’s Primary. I spent so much time at those windows watching my mother and father arguing.

  “We’ve been through all this, Richard!” Mam screamed at father.

  I jumped down from the window and crept over to my bedroom door.

  “Please, enlighten me, as to why you don’t want to give your only son the best education available to him? Instead you want him thrown in with the rogues and losers.”

  “Rogues! My whole family went to St George’s! You’ve got some bloody nerve!”

  “Ninety percent of them in that school will work as hired help. But that would be fine by you, wouldn’t it? ‘Salt of the earth’. My son will be doing the hiring –”

  A door slammed.

  I tiptoed back to the window, climbed up and watched Mam pacing along the front of the house smoking. She always smoked when they argued. They always argued. I tapped on the window, but she couldn’t hear me. Father walked past her, shoulders back, his big man walk she called it. He has longish grey hair and always wears a blue pinstriped suit. He’s much taller than Mam. I wanted to tell them that it didn’t matter to me. I’d go to any school, as long as they stopped fighting.

  One day, about a year-and-a-half after starting at St George’s, a woman not much older than Mam came to pick me up. She introduced herself as Aunty Pat. She was taller than Mam and her face was wrinkly around her mouth and eyes. She had grey and black hair pulled tight in a ponytail. She looked like a Red Indian’s wife.

  She told me that Mam couldn’t pick me up from school this week.

  “She’s not too well, Spencer, as you know.”

  “What’s wrong with her? Is she in bed?” I looked up at my window as we passed the side of the house, but she wasn’t there. When we got inside, there was no sandwich on the kitchen bench. The house was quiet.

  “Now then,” Aunty Pat said, kneeling in front of me. She unhooked my satchel and began loosening my tie. “What do you usually do with your mam at this time?”

  Aunty Pat was great, even better than Mam. She let me hang about next to the fence and talk with the other kids coming home – not that Mam stopped me, but if my father ever came in early, which was never, it made things difficult and they argued, but Aunty Pat didn’t seem to care what Father thought.

  A few days later, Aunty Pat took me to the hospital in town. It was busy and hot, everyone pushing past me. The horrible smell of ointment made me feel sick. We went into a private room and Aunty Pat shut the door. I looked up at Mam, but she was asleep. Aunty Pat lifted me onto the bed. Mam looked pale and old and she had a bright green bit of jelly on the side of her mouth. She woke up, smiled, and held my hand. Her hand was sweaty and her fingers longer than normal. I leaned in to try and hear what she was saying, but couldn’t. She smelled and I wanted to go back home. I could see why she couldn’t pick me up from school.

  By the time we got back, it was too late to go outside so I went up to my room and watched for anyone coming along Mill Lane.

  It was dark when I heard Father’s car pull up. I switched to the front window, but they were too close to the house for me to see. Aunty Pat walked up the driveway. Halfway up, she turned and waved and blew me a kiss. I kept on waving until she disappeared behind the tree.

  “Spence? You okay?”

  “Yeah, sound. I think this gear’s wearing off.”

  I walked over to the window. No sign of the others. I went to the kitchen and returned with a glass of water. Amber was still in the bathroom.

  “How you feeling?” I asked.

  “Like I want to kill myself. I can’t believe what’s happened. I thought all this was behind me, but things never go away. Never!” She kicked the bath. “It’s n-not my fault.”

  “Take it easy. I’ve told you, no one will blame you. He’s only got a few little cuts. We were all stoned.”

  I picked the cigarette box up again but the acid had worn off. I could see a slight movement, but nothing like before. I wouldn’t mind a little top up – not a full half, maybe a quarter just to get tripping again. After the hysteria stage, which has its pluses too, Gregg and me had a right laugh, tripping when you’re in control is unreal.

  “You’ll never trust me again,” Amber snivelled. “Trust, Spence. You’ve got to have that, haven’t you?”

  “Of course I trust you. We all do.”

  “You see, that’s why I fell out with my mam. I couldn’t trust her. She let me down.”

  “How come?”

  She didn’t answer.

  I tried to talk her from behind the door, but she kept breaking down, banging on about trust and how trust was what everything was built on. Everytime I suggested something she went off on one.

  The trust thing bothered me. I didn’t want to be like my father and let people down. I didn’t want to tell lies. If I’d known she wouldn’t change towards me, I’d have told her straight away. But what happens when we’re all sober and Amber looks across at me; does she see Spence the shelf-packer or a twenty-year-old millionaire playing at being normal?

  I cleared my throat. “My father died not long back.”

  Amber stopped snivelling.

  “Spence,” she whispered. “No folks. And here I am whingeing about mine. I’m so sorry. I really am. I couldn’t imagine. Don’t,” she paused. “Don’t you have anyone?”

&n
bsp; “Cousins. An aunt and uncle, but I never see them. I’ve never been one for needing loads of people around me, and my father and me didn’t get on anyway.”

  After a few minutes, she said, “I love you, Spence.”

  I thought about what she had just said. I love you Spence.

  There are two types of love. The let’s be best friends go to the flicks flirty kissing on lips with no tongues share problems love, and the tear each other’s clothes off inseparable for life love. I wished to fuck it was the second, but right now I’d take either to be with Amber.

  “I’m not just saying it because of this, you know. It’s not the drugs and that. I really do. I trust you. I have since we met on the bus and I don’t trust people easy, you know that.”

  I went to the kitchen and made us both a tea.

  When I returned, Amber was sat on the sofa. I handed her the cup.

  She didn’t look up. “Thanks.”

  Her face was puffed up and spotty. Her hair matted to the side of her head.

  Our eyes met and she burst into tears.

  “It’s not my f-fault, it’s not my fault, it’s not my fault.”

  “I don’t blame you, neither will anyone else.”

  Stroking her hair and saying nothing did the trick and she cried herself out. I felt so sorry for her. I wished I could have said something, I mean, she was at it so hard she could hardly breathe.

  I eased her head off my chest, held her neck and slid my arm under her knees. On the count of three, I lifted her up and staggered towards her room. Fuck me, she was heavy. I bounced off the door, lost my footing and we landed in a heap. She woke up and started bubbling.

  “I’m sorry,” I was saying, trying to retrieve my arms, “not a safe landing. Hold on… you’re laughing, aren’t you?”