A Decent Ride (33 page)

— Aye, so wi huv tae keep it oor wee secret, Karen stresses, her face lighting up, — yours, mine n Ma’s. No Hank, cause he’s goat nowt tae dae wi this hoose. Aye, keep it a secret here, Jonty, just these four waws.

— Four waws . . . Jonty glances around at his old home.

During this exchange, there has been no sign of life from their mother upstairs. Visitors generally set off excited shouting, but now there is only silence. When Jonty and Karen get upstairs, they find Marjory wearing an oxygen mask. Jonty fancies he can already detect the same whiff that Jinty gave off after Bawbag. Urged on by Karen, he tells the weary, dying woman his story.

— Yi’ll be safe here, at least till ah’m away, his mother wheezes, her eyes yellow and her gaze unfocused, seeming to be looking at something beyond them, perhaps into the next life itself. — Dr Turnbull tells me ah’ve no goat long now. At least ah’ve goat ma wee Jonty back wi us for ma final days!

— Final days . . .

— Jonty’ll be awright, Karen tells her. — Ah’ll look eftir um.

Marjory MacKay’s eyes briefly spark in some kind of wrath. It seems that she’s going to speak, but a consequential thought visibly beats her mute as her stare glazes over and a purple-fingered hand rises slowly to adjust her mask.

So Karen takes Jonty aside, escorting him out the bedroom. — See, whin Ma dies, ye cannae go tae the funeral, Jonty. Ye kin nivir go outside this hoose. Ye kin nivir even go lookin oot the windae. If they call the polis yir life’s ower!

Jonty’s features slowly sag as he heads down the stairs behind her.

Karen abruptly halts in the middle tread, causing him to bump into her. — But this is aw jist for a wee while!

— Wee while . . .

— Better bein a prisoner here fir a few months thin in Saughton fir aw yir life, Karen expounds. — Whin ah’ve saved enough money we’ll leave here, eftir Ma goes.

— Aye . . . whin Ma goes, aye sur, aye sur . . .

Karen touches her hair, does a little shuffle. — Ah kin lose weight, Jonty. That’s what ah’ll dae; ah’ll lose it n you kin dae wi pittin some oan! She looks back to the bedroom and takes his hand, escorting him down the remaining stairs. — Once Ma’s away ah’ll no be under pressure tae eat sae much. Ah read aw aboot it, Jonty: Ma’s the enabler ay ma weight problem. Once she’s deid, it’ll faw oaf.

Jonty looks at her and then breaks into a big smile. At the bottom of the stair he gives her a skelp across her big arse, like Hank did to them both when they were younger. — Dinnae be takin too much oaf, and Jonty pats his groin, — if yir still eftir some ay this, cause ah like sumthin tae hud oantae, aw sur, that ah dae!

— Dinnae worry yirsel aboot that, Jonty! Karen beams.

IT IS A
beautiful warm spring morning of the sort Edinburgh can occasionally offer up, in order to cruelly taunt its citizens with the promise of a long, hot summer, before it settles back into its usual rhythm of grey skies, pissing rain and biting cold winds. Terry is determined to enjoy it and parks up, by habit, in his old slot at Nicolson Square, opposite Surgeons’ Hall.

Ronnie has been over a couple of times, and he and Terry have played golf. He never mentions Sara-Ann, though Terry knows that they are seeing each other, having once spied them going into the Traverse Theatre together. Later, he’d picked up the venue’s festival programme, learning that her new play
A Decent Ride
would be premiering at the Fringe in August. It was described as a ‘hilarious, pitch-black comedy, looking at the age-old themes of sex and death, but in a thoroughly original and invigorating way’. A cursory glance at the back of the brochure saw Ronnie’s company Get Real Estates listed as one of the major sponsors.

Terry regularly picks up Jonty from Penicuik. He’d been relieved when he met Karen that he couldn’t recall ever riding her, although with her transformative weight escalation there was no real guarantee this was the case. It has been agreed it is not for the best that he met their mother, ailing badly up the stairs in her bed. Remarkably, in the face of his dire medical prognosis, Henry is still hanging around, Alice continuing her cheerless vigils to his side.

Terry has become so engrossed in golf, he has barely noticed, unlike the excited Jonty, that Hibs and Hearts are improbable Scottish Cup semi-final victors against Aberdeen and Celtic respectively, and will face each other in an all-Edinburgh final. He has also played with Iain Renwick sometimes, taking the pro golfer to the nineteenth hole, where the drink drew increasingly lurid confessions about his infidelities, one particular set being hard for Terry to listen to, as they involved a certain Donna Lawson. Terry only managed to check his rage by thinking of the small digital camera he’d concealed in a plant on a nearby ledge, which surreptitiously recorded Renwick’s disclosures.

But assuming the position at the old taxi rank seems to be a mistake. He’d always enjoyed sitting in Nicolson Square taxi rank on hot days, not taking any fares, just watching the student girls lying about, waiting for somebody who wanted ching to swing by. But now his circumstances have changed, and the hang-out brings nothing but pain, as Auld Faithful tweaks and his damaged heart starts pumping up his pulse rate. Then, worse follows.

— Are you the film-maker? The slightly plummy English accent belongs to a pretty young girl with short dark hair. She wears a tight green top and seems to be overtly thrusting a bounteous chest at him.

— What . . .? Terry says, thinking for the first time, not of scud, but of Iain Renwick’s confessions tape, copies of which had been sent to the golf pro’s wife and the secretary of his club in North Berwick. Renwick had been subsequently thrown out of his home, lost his job at the club, and was living in a rented caravan in Coldstream.

— I’ve got a friend in third year who says there are two guys, Simon and Terry, who make these fun movies . . . the girl explains, raising her eyebrows, — and Terry sometimes drives a taxi.

— Nup . . . ah mean, aye, ah used tae. Packed it in but. Terry wearily hands her Sick Boy’s card. — Muh mate Simon’s still at it but, ay.

— Pity . . . they say you’re an animal . . . she winks and sashays off like a catwalk model.

Terry laments how you once had to work hard to convince lassies to do scud. Now many students just see it as another way to supplement their income. They practically audition. He decides he can’t stay around here, so drives down to Leith and the sauna. He is still checking up on Kelvin and the girls as The Poof has opted to stay in Spain indefinitely. It hadn’t been too bad, mainly because the police had finally taken an interest in Jinty’s disappearance and had been down the sauna asking questions. This had led to Kelvin behaving better around the girls, but it didn’t last when police attention cooled off again; Terry had faced more inquiries from them about the missing bottle of the Bowcullen Trinity, which still hasn’t been located. Scottish Television News ran a feature about the absent whisky, with the purchaser reported as ‘an anonymous overseas buyer’. A glum-faced detective described the probable larceny as ‘a major antiques robbery, most likely by a gang of unscrupulous, organised, international criminals. This is not like somebody shoplifting a bottle of Teacher’s from their local off-licence.’

The latest news from the USA is that Mortimer has filed defamation of character and anti-harassment lawsuits against Ronnie, his former employer. He is also planning to write a warts-and-all biography of his ex-boss, which Ronnie is trying to quash.

On entering the sauna, Terry’s heart skips a beat as he catches sight of Saskia’s eye. It is swollen and bruised, the damage badly concealed with foundation. He looks from her to Kelvin, who whips his head away in guilt, then turns it quickly back, his features reset in truculence.

Terry keeps quiet, but he hangs around till Saskia finishes her shift and confronts her outside. — What happened?

— It was a door, I was silly . . . she mumbles unconvincingly, trying to pass him on the steps.

— It was him, ay? Kelvin?

Saskia nods fearfully. — I want to leave here, Terry, to get away. I am nearly at the money I need to go.

— Listen, ah’ll gie ye money. Just go.

— But I need two more hundred pounds . . .

Terry digs into his pockets and peels off three hundred in fifties from a horse-choker of a wad. — Take this. Don’t go back in thaire. Ever. You got any personal stuff in there ye want, anything valuable?

— No.

— Then go.

— But . . . I cannot pay you back.

— Nae need. I’ll call ye later. Just dinnae set foot in there again, Terry says, jumping back down the steps to the basement. He throws open the door and springs across to Kelvin, pushing him against the wall, wedging his forearm into his throat. — You fuckin prick, he hisses, watching Kelvin’s eyes pop.

— Vic’s gaunny hear aboot this, Kelvin moans in low, strangulated tones.

As Terry’s free hand clamps like a vice on his genitals, Kelvin manages a ragged squeal. Conscious of his own heartbeat rising dangerously, Terry sneers, — Consider this a yellay caird for persistent offences. Next time these boys ur comin oaf, and he drinks the fear in Kelvin’s eyes. He is fronting it, but knows that Kelvin is too much of a shitebag to discern the difference. He lets him go, and Kelvin is cowed, too scared to even mumble a stock, empty half-threat of defiance. Terry gets back outside and starts the cab, heading out to the Royal Infirmary.

Things have gotten very complicated. Now The Poof will be on his case. Why the fuck, Terry asks himself, am I putting himself on the line for a bunch of scrubbers?

He thinks back to all the people he’s wronged. The biggest of them all, Andrew Galloway: his childhood mate who committed suicide. His friend did this for all sorts of reasons, but Terry knows that the fact that he was shagging Gally’s wife couldn’t have helped. Gally is a horrible internal scar at the centre of Terry, which has never healed. And he knows that it never can. But what makes it infinitely better, especially as he gets older, is at least trying to do the right thing by people in a vulnerable state, rather than taking advantage of those circumstances.

By the time he gets to the hospital, though, the skies are black and it has started to rain again.

Terry walks down the institutionally lit sterile corridor, averting his eyes from every nurse that passes him. Despite managing to get on to the links around five or six times a week, he still has bleak days and sees a Danish psychologist, who reminds him of Lars. His gut is expanding over his trousers, and he is tired. Always so very, very tired.

He has never gone so long without some form of sexual release since he was about six years old. Even a porno shoot accident, several years back, hadn’t incapacitated him for this length of time. Now he is condemned to a life of celibacy. He will never enjoy a decent ride again, and a dark, gloomy phantom seems to walk every step alongside him.

Standing up ahead, his back to the wall, is wee Jonty MacKay. He has his eyes shut and palms outstretched, touching its cold, painted surface. It looks like he is meditating. It has been a while since Terry has seen Jonty up here. — Jonty. What are ye daein?

Jonty’s eyelids snap open. — Hiya, Terry! Hiya, pal! Ah wis jist imagining thit ah wis gittin shot by a firin squad, Terry! Aye sur, a firin squad! Like they wir gaunny pill the trigger any minute. Cause it’s a shame fir people thit git shot by firin squads n ah wanted tae see what it felt like; aye sur, tae see what it felt like.

— No nice, ah’d guess. Terry yawns and stretches. Then he sees another familiar figure shuffling towards them. He formally introduces Jonty to Alice, although they’ve exchanged a few words previously in cross-over visits to Henry. They let Mrs Ulrich, as Alice calls herself, go on to the ward.

Jonty believes it is wrong that both Terry’s mum and his mum have been married to Henry. If it was up to him, it would just be one man and one woman like it was with him and Jinty. However, if that had been the case, he considers, he wouldn’t be here. But Henry Lawson is a bad man. He was his father, yes, but he wasn’t a kind man like best faither wee Billy MacKay. However, wee Billy had also run away from his mother when she’d gotten so fat that she couldn’t leave the house. Then Henry had come back, making all sorts of promises, but Jonty knew it was only because he had nowhere else to go.

— What wis it like growin up wi him . . . that Henry? Terry can’t bring himself to say ‘father’.
Why the fuck is he still hingin on?

— Ah didnae see um much eftir ah wis a bairn. It wis Billy MacKay thit wis mair faither tae me, aye sur, Billy MacKay. That’s how ah git called Jonty MacKay, eftir Billy MacKay, aye sur, aye sur, Billy MacKay.

— Ah got that, mate, Billy MacKay, Terry says impatiently.

— Aye sur, Billy MacKay. Aye, Jonty stresses.

Terry changes the subject to the weather. He is used to talking about such banalities in his post-sexual life. As Cup-final fever hits the heights in Edinburgh, he’s even taken to pontificating about football. — Mind that Bawbag, it wisnae up tae much . . . He stops, once again suddenly thinking about his own genitals.

The recollection of the hurricane upsets Jonty, who falls into a troubled silence, a huge blue vein bulging on his forehead. Terry realises this was around the time Jinty disappeared. Both men are relieved when Alice emerges from the ward. — Eh’s sleepin a lot. Peaceful, like. But eh woke up for a wee bit. Ye gaunny go n see um? She looks at Jonty, then glances hopefully at Terry.

— Ah will, aye, aye, Jonty says.

— That’ll be shinin bright, Terry snaps, causing Alice to cringe.

Sensing an atmosphere between Terry and Alice, Jonty blurts out his sad news. — Muh ma died last week. Last Wednesday. Aye. She did. Deid. In the bed. Funeral’s the morn. Aye sur. The morn.

— Aw, son, ah’m awfay sorry. Alice finds herself giving Jonty a hug, one eye strategically swivelling to check Terry’s reaction to this display of affection.