Rottenhouse

by Ian Dyer

  Rottenhouse

  Ian Dyer

  This book is the copyrighted property of the author, and may not be reproduced, copied and distributed for commercial or non-commercial purposes, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the author. If you enjoyed this book then please encourage others to purchase their own copy. Thank you for respecting the authors work. ©

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, incidents and events are all from the authors mind. Any resemblance to persons either living or dead is purely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2015 Ian Dyer.

  All rights reserved.

  Smashwords Edition

  For Cheryl and Isabella, who I could not be without.

  And also for Martin, he who understands the struggles.

  Table of Contents

  Oil

  Foreign Metal

  The Peroni Incident

  Strung Him Up From The Sky

  Like a Limp Rag

  The Big Boy Is Coming Out

  Still A Bit Groggy

  Skin You

  Stink

  The Study

  Pink Meat (The Fishing Scene)

  Clean Yourself Up, Piggy

  Honey

  The Working Man’s Club

  Epilogue - Home Sweet Home

  Oil

  1

  Lucy had been silent all the way up here, distracted by something she wouldn’t tell Simon, and he didn’t like that because they shared everything together; meals, drinks, a bed, a house, their thoughts, even their dreams, and as the miles floated by so his patience thinned to the point of breaking. But now she was alert and talking so fast Simon could hardly keep up with what she was saying. Lucy pointed or voiced her directions: over that roundabout, left here, right at that tree, passed the crooked bridge and take the next left as you go past the Slaughtered Lamb and make sure you stay left as the road narrows, then over the cattle grid, under the bridge, around the weird house that overhangs the road and past the field of yellow I played in as a child and then past the pig pens and cattle fields. Keep on going, Simon, straight ahead, passed the tree that looks like the entrance to hell itself, where mum took me to scare me and look there, in that field, can you see it? That hole? That’s where the ground fell away one year and it left that giant hole, black as night and deep, really deep; a doorway to the world that goes on underground…

  ‘Stop the car!’ Lucy shouted as they turned a tight right hander.

  Simon slammed on the brakes, the little red light flashing to show that the car was completing some sort of witch craft to keep itself in control. He threw the car right to avoid an animal, or walker perhaps, that he was sure was stood there in the middle of the road. Not really knowing either way, he eased the car to the left side of the road, making sure not to roll down the verge, and stopped the car beneath an old twisted tree.

  ‘What the hell, Lucy! What did I hit?’

  Calmly, Lucy said, ‘Nothing. It’s just before we get there I have something to tell you, something to tell you about me.’

  Simon was sure he was about to pass out. He was breathing hard, the shock of it was still coursing through his veins and for a moment he didn’t really take in what Lucy was talking about. His hands were stuck to the steering wheel; pushing it away from him, trying to keep whatever it was or could have been in the road out of his path and away from his windscreen. As the adrenaline wore off he looked in his rear view mirror; there was nothing there. No destroyed rabbit or blown apart deer, no walker cut in two by his car or clinging onto a broken leg screaming for help.

  ‘Thank Christ. I thought we’d hit something. Jesus, I’m having a heart attack here.’

  I have something to tell you. Something about me

  Simon turned to face his girlfriend. She was still looking forward, as if nothing had happened, and Simon supposed that that was perfectly reasonable – nothing had happened. ‘Are you okay?

  ‘Lucy?’

  She slowly turned to face him, her eyes red; brimming with tears, and her complexion, which not five minutes ago was practically glowing was now dull, a pale reflection replaced it and it was a look Simon hadn’t seen in her for years.

  ‘That’s not my name.’ she said.

  ‘What? What are you talking about?’ He wiped the sweat from his brow and tried to take a swig of water from his plastic bottle but his shaking hands made it hard and he tightened his grip on the bottle until he was sure he wouldn’t spill it down himself.

  ‘Lucy. It’s not my name. It’s Barbara.’ It was like she was telling him that the sky was blue or the sea was wet.

  ‘What? Piss off. Come on; is this a trick or something? Some weird type of initiation or something? I mean, what, so you are telling me that the girl I have been seeing for years, the girl I want to marry isn’t called Lucy? It’s Barbara? Barbara? Like Last of the Summer Wine or something?’ Simon laughed, but it was an uncomfortable laugh like knew the truth and was in denial. ‘Barbara, really, are you for real? Come on Lucy, please.’

  ‘No, Simon. I’m not Lucy, well… I am her, but not her. It’s not a joke. It’s not anything like that. I’m not Lucy, not in this place. Here I was someone else, before I ran away and became; Lucy. Before I found you.’

  Simon reached over and grabbed her hand. It was shaking; her palm moist and it matched his. He held it tight, admiring her wicked witch green nail polish (a colour he had chosen and she lovingly decided to wear because she knew how much he liked it) and then looked into her blood shot eyes.

  ‘I don’t understand, Lucy, I…’

  ‘Barbara,’ she insisted, ‘Barbara Lucy Rowling. Daughter of quarry worker Bob Rowling, who lives at The Tall Stack, 24 Hot Lane, Rottenhouse, North Yorkshire.’

  He let go of Lucy’s hand and it slumped into her lap. She sighed and sobbed like he had never seen her do before. Simon expected her to cry but the tears didn’t come. He had a lump in his throat but he didn’t know whether it was a lump that came before you cried or a lump that came before you chucked up all over the God damned place.

  Above the car, roosting in the old tree, some unknown breed of bird released a deathly cry as the wind picked up. A light rain began to fall from low grey clouds which were spread about the sky like they were put there by some mad painters brush.

  ‘I don’t understand.’ Simon said softly as he looked out through the smeared windscreen, and watched the rain fall; pitter-pattering on the glass. He wanted to laugh, as odd as that sounded; he couldn’t get over the way in which she had told him, he couldn’t believe that for all this time she had been hiding such a secret. Wasn’t this trip supposed to be mending old bridges not smashing down current ones? It wasn’t right.

  ‘Why didn’t you tell me before?’

  ‘I wanted to. It was looming over me like a storm. The longer I left it the bigger it seemed to get and then it seemed too big, too much of an issue for me to bring up. I meant to tell you, just after we moved in together. Just after our first big fight when we were telling each other everything. Remember that? Remember that night?’

  ‘Yeah, I remember.’

  ‘It was on the tip of my tongue, honestly, I was going to tell you. I needed to tell you. I could feel it boiling up inside me over the weeks leading up to that day. But when it came to it, when the shit got real, Simon, I couldn’t do it. I just couldn’t. And then the next thing I knew we were ripping each other’s clothes off and… well you know the rest.’

  ‘Yeah I know the rest.’

  The engine ticked over quietly and the rain continued to fall. The wipers came on automatically and wiped away the rain only for it to be replaced, wiped away and then replaced, wiped away and then replaced. Simon w
ished that he could put one of those wipers to work on the last few minutes of his life.

  Simon sighed through an open mouth and he scratched his forehead. He was unsure of what to say, what to think, what to do. This was, by far and away (and that included the day his best mate had tried to seduce him) the weirdest thing ever to have happened to him. He put his hands on the steering wheel and tapped out some odd beat that meant nothing, he did it just to remove the silence.

  Barbara? Barbara? He didn’t understand, but knew there must be a reason. Just then the red light signalling that the fuel was almost out blinked into life.

  ‘What are you thinking, Sausage?’

  Simon looked at the warning light blinking madly. ‘That if we don’t get moving then we won’t be moving anywhere. Is there a petrol station near here?’

  ‘Yep. At the end of this road, I think.’

  ‘Cool.’

  Simon put the car into gear and then headed off into the rain.

  ‘So?’

  ‘So?’ Simon replied.

  ‘Well I was expecting some sort of rant, Simon. I mean, I have just told you that the girl you love, the girl that you want to be your wife, isn’t who you thought she was. Don’t you want to know why?’

  ‘Of course I do, Luc… Barbara.’ Simon shook his head trying to get out the million bees that had made their home in there. ‘Look, whatever your name is I just wished you hadn’t waited till we were ten seconds from your dads house and I was about to go in and ask him for your hand in marriage. I mean come on. We are up here to mend bridges or whatever and you have just put super-hot TNT under one of ours for Christ’s sake! What the hell am I supposed to do now? Keep calling you Lucy, or switch to Barbara? Barbara for fucks sake!’

  ‘Alright, alright. I don’t know. Maybe just try not to call me anything until you get used to him calling me it.’

  What the hell is going on? Is this woman for real?

  The car leaned left then right as Simon careened around the country lane. Up ahead he could make out a junction and to its left, under the glow of the orange street lights that had flicked on, was the petrol station.

  ‘Christ, I mean I know you must’ve had your reasons, reasons I really want to know, but, but, Christ… I don’t know. I don’t know. This is mental.’

  2

  Simon eased the car to a stop and pulled back on the handbrake as he turned the engine off and removed the keys. The pitter patter of rain had stopped thanks to the high metal roof that covered the petrol station but the wind still whipped around the wheels of the car and rocked it from side to side with every gust. He looked to his fiancé, went to say something, maybe kiss her, he didn’t really know so just didn’t do any of them and his mouth flapped open and then closed. It was starting to get hot in the car and the windows were steaming up. From the corner of his eye he could see that Lucy was about to say something and so before Lucy could even open her mouth Simon had already opened the car door and slammed it shut.

  Outside it was dank and grey and the wind was strong and the clouds hung low, almost touching the tops of the trees. The petrol station was small and old. Opening the small flap and then undoing the cap he gathered his coat around him and did his best to block out the harsh cold wind.

  Its summer, for crying out loud, not the bleak mid-winter

  And then he pictured the sign back on the M1.

  ‘The North.’ He said to the wind and rain. But it paid him no attention. He tried to focus on the now, brushing away the incident in the car and the whole Barbara thing. It wasn’t as if Barbara was a bad name, but when you have been used to Lucy for so long Barbara seems old fashioned, so northern, which sounded odd when he thought it. He pictured an old lady with thick stockings working wet clothes over some archaic washboard and then drying them through a squeaky mangle. That was the sort of woman he pictured with the name Barbara, not Lucy, for crying out loud.

  Simon grabbed hold of the old un-leaded pump and placed the nozzle into the cars filler hole. Pulling the trigger he felt the pump kick in as the liquid began to flow through and into his tank. He looked up and his eyes scanned the station. The main building was a run-down shack, wooden in construction and as old as the earth on which it stood. Inside it housed a small till point, a fridge, and a couple of shelves with some food and car bits on them. The light coming from inside was dull and yellow and he could make out the silhouette of the man inside but that was it. Outside there was the usual charcoal bags and saltgrit sacks that all good petrol stations carry no matter what time of year it was. Alongside the shop, between the piles of old car parts and Christ knows what, was a garage large enough for about two cars. It was made out of dark red-brown bricks with a shoddy tin roof which clanged as the wind tried to tear it to bits. The garage door was padlocked shut, the ground beneath it wet with rain and oil. Simon narrowed his eyes, trying to bring the oil slick into focus because there was something wrong with it; it was too dark, much too dark for oil, if that was possible, and as he focused harder he saw that the slick of whatever it was hadn’t been caused by the rain, the rain had merely distributed it further; diluting it until it coursed through the station like a river.

  Much too dark for oil. It looks like

  It had come from inside the garage, from whatever was in there, and that whatever was leaking.

  Much too dark. It looks just like blo…

  The pump clicked loudly as the fuel brimmed; millimetres from cascading over the lip. Simon blinked, pulled the dripping nozzle away and placed it back into the cracked plastic holder. As he walked around the back of his car and over to the shop he looked once more at the puddle of liquid over by the garage.

  Blood. It looks just like blood.

  During his last year at college, Simon had visited a morgue. Himself and two other students had been allowed access to all areas – and when they were told all areas it literally meant all areas and so they had watched autopsies, took photos of said autopsies and displayed them in Guildford’s School of Art. They had been well received due to their gritty reality. But it was the blood he could see in those images now, as they flashed in front him, and that gore soaked blood was the same (minus a few bits of muscle and bone) as what he could see now, flowing from behind the garage door.

  Surely not. Must just be an oil spill, dirty oil, old dirty oil…

  ‘Yagunna come in and pay or what, mister?’

  Simon snapped his head around.

  Stood there, holding the wooden door open with a chunky hand was the silhouette which had been inside the station. He was a large man, fat bellied and red faced. He had very little hair and a head that was as round as a beach ball. He was stocky, the same height as Simon, but absurdly fat and he wore a blue workers coat that was far too small for him. It was held together awkwardly, just above his belly, with just one button. Under his coat he wore a tatty white vest which was covered in black oil and all sorts of other stains. His trousers were the same blue as his overalls and also way too small; they were a good two inches higher than the top of his ankle boots. They clearly weren’t his clothes, or if they were then he had been wearing them since he was about 12. On his coat Simon noticed that he wore a name badge. Written on its white plastic background was the name: Bobbie.

  ‘Well?’ said Bobbie, his voice deep, throaty and drenched in phlegm. He needed a good cough.

  ‘Sorry. Looks like you got a leak? Simon pointed to the garage but kept his eyes on Bobbie.

  Bobbie didn’t look over to where Simon was pointing. ‘Aye, oil from an old Ford Zephyr.’

  Simon’s hand dropped to his side. ‘That’s a lot of oil.’

  ‘Yep. Once they started they don’t stop.’

  Above Simon the lights flickered briefly. The wind picked up and the tin roof clanged. As the wind howled he was sure he heard a moan; a moan that came from inside the garage. He turned his head to try and capture more sound but whatever that noise had been faded away and the howl of the wind replaced it.

&nb
sp; Inside the shop, the phone that was sat by the till started to ring. It was an old ring, like the retro ring Simon had on his mobile phone. Bobbie let go of the door and it swung so violently that Simon had to leap forward and grab it before it shut and he felt his fingers mash against the jam. He pulled them out and twiddled them a few times making sure that none of them were broken. He walked into the shop, the smell of oil and sweat was fierce, and the phone kept ringing until Bobbie reached it – sucking in his belly so that he fit behind the till – and lifted the receiver. Simon could only hear one portion of the conversation as he moved toward the till.

  ‘Rottenhouse Fuel. This is Lewis.’

  Lewis? He was sure the badge had said Bobbie and come to think of it wasn’t Bobbie spelt that way a girl’s way of spelling it? As he walked further into the shop the smell of oil and sweat became sweeter and he was sure he could smell perfume now.

  ‘Aye, said he would be here in about half an hour.’

  It does say Bobbie. Maybe that’s his surname or something?

  ‘Aye, got messy but no bother. I always forget how much they got in em, if yaknow what I mean?

  ‘Yeah, yeah, I always leave some in bucket for him but I can’t speak now, got customer.’

  ‘Aye, see you at Club tonight.’

  Bobbie put the phone back on the receiver and turned his attention to Simon. ‘That’ll be 35-80.’

  Bobbie. They belong to whoever Bobbie is. To whoever sprayed that God awful perfume.

  ‘That’ll be 35-80.’

  ‘Eh.’ Simon murmured.

  ‘35 pounds and 80 pence. You slow or sumpfing?’

  ‘No. No, sorry, just distracted.’ Simon fiddled about in his jacket pocket and eventually revealed two twenty pound notes. He handed them over and started to feel hot. It was getting hotter in here and maybe it was getting hotter because there was a tension building up and Simon started to get the distinct feeling that he wasn’t welcome here.