somewhere on the first day and Knocked Out Loaded was on the CD player, and who the fuck else was likely to be listening to that around here? It's been fine ever since.
I stick my head around the door.
'How are we doing?' I say.
He looks away from his computer. Tired. Not thinking about work.
'Pretty quiet,' he says. 'You can take off early, if you like. Go home and make yourself beautiful for tonight.'
'Seriously?'
The usual scowl comes back to his face.
'Of course not, you're not in the fucking Brownies anymore. Get us a cup of tea, eh?'
Comedian. Out the office and head for the kitchen.
4
He is at the cinema. Enjoying the dark. His common retreat, a small, art house cinema, a twenty minute bus journey away. Can't stand multiplexes. Comfortable bucket chairs, drinks and food at extortionate prices, virtually every film aimed at glutinous, popcorn-devouring children, and those damned adults with the viewing habits and mental capacity of the under-14s.
He comes here a few times a week, doesn't mind what he's watching. Tonight a small and beautiful Korean film. 3 Iron. He finds himself in love with the girl, even though she looks nothing like Jo. Elegy and melancholy, love and sadness. He is entranced, drawn in by the romance. The silence. With beautiful perfection, the lovers never speak.
There are less than ten people in the audience, as is often the case, but tonight there is someone special. At first he'd thought it was Jo herself, here in the flesh. She had come here often enough with him in the past, why wouldn't she be here now?
The more he looks, however, the more he sees the differences. It's not Jo, just someone who dares to look like her. Yet he also convinces himself of the similarities. She sits alone, and he wonders what kind of woman goes to the cinema unaccompanied, particularly to such a romantic film? What message is she sending out?
It will be dark when they get out; the streets will be quiet. He could talk to her. He could take it a bit further. He imagines leaning in towards her, her hair in his face, breathing her in. Hesitation before he kisses her or touches her. That lovely moment of anticipation. A finger drawn softly across her neck, his lips touching the bottom of her ear.
As the film progresses, he becomes agitated. He is distracted, until eventually the film has lost him. Not a long film, but by the end he cannot wait for it to be over. There's someone in the cinema with whom he has business, and that business knocks everything else from his mind.
And as the credits finally roll, and the woman who might well be Jo rises from her seat, he bides his time, listening to the thumping of his heart. It had been like this the first time with Jo too. And the last.
The cinema is quiet, the few people in attendance with nothing to say, as if influenced by the silence of the principal characters.
The woman who is not Jo is also distracted, also did not allow herself to be completely immersed in the film. As she leaves the cinema she wonders whether to call her boyfriend — getting as far as taking her mobile from her bag — but at the same time knowing that she will leave it until she gets home.
There is a stupid argument to be continued, and it would have to be continued that evening, but she's prepared to leave it for as long as possible.
However, on this particular evening, she will never reach her front door.
5
Monday night, Christmas bash. Private room at the Holiday Inn in the centre of town, well out of our patch. DJ playing all sorts of dance chart shit. Can't really expect him to play Dylan all night, can we? Still got the horrors of the karaoke to come. We're all expecting to hear Bloonsbury's drunken rendition of Can't Help Falling in Love for the three hundredth time, and a lot worse besides.
There's been a lot of ethnic cleansing in the world, but how come no one ever ethnically cleansed the fucker that brought karaoke to the western world?
It's just after midnight and already the party's beginning to break up. You get the sensible crowd who disappear home early, then you can guarantee the remaining hard core will be here until it's time to go to work tomorrow morning. There's always a lottery to get the day off, which I never win, but since Peggy kicked me out I spend half the year going into work straight from a long night before anyway. One more day just before Christmas doesn't make any difference.
The Super is long gone. The chocolates were hardly off the table and she was out the door. Her old man gets in from Washington tonight, so she's off back to the castle in Helensburgh to warm up the bed, though from what they say she'll probably be asleep by the time he shows up.
Herrod looks miserable. I expect Bernadette's got a chastity belt on him and has melted down the key. She's got her two kids and now there's no need for any further sex. Every time I meet her I wonder what the hell he was thinking. Not that the first Mrs Herrod was any better.
'Same again, Sergeant?' Dragged from people watching by the familiar chant. Raucous, bloody noise, Born This Way and a few poor saps making an arse of themselves on the dance floor. Including, I can't help but notice, PC Bathurst, absolutely stunning in a skin-tight white number. She's got a few of her type running after her but I think I might make a go of it myself, over twice her age though I am. Not quite drunk enough yet.
'Aye, no bother,' I say to the boss. He asks the same of Herrod then plods morosely off to the bar.
Taylor has been on edge all evening. Seems to think that if he lets his concentration slip he might end up in bed with DS Murphy from Westburn, as he did last year. Don't think he's told Debbie about it but it's plagued him ever since. I've said to him; if you're going to screw around behind your wife's back then it's the same as anything else. You've got to give it a hundred percent or it won't work out. He never listens. One drunken shag, then he fended Murphy off for a couple of months until she lost interest. He's spent the last year feeling like a total bastard, hoping that the wife never finds out. I suspect, however, that she might not even care.
Herrod drains a Bacardi and Coke. I mean, a forty-six year-old man drinking Bacardi and Coke, for God's sake.
'Jonah's been saying all month that he's not singing this year. It's offensive to the King, he says.'
I laugh, but have to admit to it being a snort by now. That's vodka for you.
'So what's he been doing for the last ten years?'
'Blaspheming. Says he's repented. Never again. The King is God, and all that shite.'
We both look over at Bloonsbury, the great Elvis apologist; three tables away, spectacularly fucked out of his face on cheap whisky and in the process of making a monumental idiot of himself over some young tart from out of our patch, who none of us has ever seen before.
'Who's that he's drooling over?'
Herrod shrugs. 'Some stupid bitch from Shettleston. Wee scrubber.'
'He's got a chance though.'
'No way. The man can't get it up when he's sober, never mind in that fucking state. His penis hasn't seen any action since Beattie walked out. Even then, it hadn't got behind enemy lines for about eight year.'
Bloonsbury rests a hand on the scrubber's knee, doesn't take long before he slips it under her skirt. The scrubber does not protest. Herrod grunts, shakes his head, and turns away. Jealous.
'Bastard.'
Taylor, the white knight, returns with the alcohol. Notice, with dismay, that he's moved onto orange juice. He parks himself, distributes the booze, looks morosely around the dance floor. In the midst of the tumult the DJ has
