THE LESS THAN PERFECT LEGEND OF DONNA CREOSOTE

by Dan Micklethwaite

  All of this danger is foreplay for the honeymoon at the end.

  So far, however, it has been the courageous and celebrated Donna Creosote who has been doing most of the work. Who has been putting in most of the effort, as far as this foreplay’s concerned.

  She is looking now to her squire to step up and do what needs to be done.

  To get his hands dirty.

  Only, when she turns to face him, he isn’t there.

  He isn’t in front of her either.

  And she doesn’t think he’s been eaten.

  Yet.

  He has run away on her, then. At the last, and worst, moment.

  After all that they’ve been through, he’s just upped sticks and fled.

  Revealed himself, like the others, to be more boy than man.

  Donna drops an olive in her mouth, washes it down with the start of the third bottle, some of which spills across her chin, drips down her neck and stains the collar of her pyjamas.

  She doesn’t notice, and probably won’t until morning.

  This is not uncommon to Donna Creosote. This being alone.

  She’s not unaccustomed to playing the lone wolf, to being the last woman standing.

  In fact, she’s far more accustomed to this than to the alternative state: being fully able to rely and depend upon another person; being able to trust that other person with her safety, her life.

  Why else would she have been wandering with only her horse over oven-baked earth in the first place?

  Lonely are the brave, indeed.

  But not, Donna thinks now, because there are so few of them around.

  They are not lonely because they’re brave.

  They are brave because they’re lonely.

  Because people with proper friends, proper lovers, have them there to warn them off from doing stupid shit like this.

  Small and fragile-seeming in her satin gown, Donna Creosote barely reaches as high as the middle of the dragon’s shin. She glances around the square for anything or anyone that she can use to help her. For anything at all that she can take to hand to give herself a fighting chance.

  A pocket-knife some schoolkid’s dropped.

  A weighty purse.

  A pebble, even.

  But there is nothing of the sort.

  The dragon inhales again, drawing itself up to full height, spreading its wings. From the red glow in its nostrils, she can tell that it’s about to breathe fire.

  She dives in to the left.

  Just behind where she’d been standing, the fountain water fizzles in a geyser of steam.

  The dragon, seeing her flat on the ground, claws its way towards her.

  Two steps and it’s within range.

  The shadow of its foot is a total eclipse.

  Donna is back to the darkness of the forest, the darkness of the maze. The promised darkness of Hades and the deep River Styx.

  But then, the shadow recedes.

  There is panic, there are the sounds of wings the size of buildings battering the air.

  Roaring that comes forth not as a threat, but as a worry.

  The noise of walls and roofs collapsing, and of something even bigger crashing down into the dust.

  The aftershocks continue for a minute, and, all the while, Donna Creosote, famed and matchless warrior that she is, lies paralysed with fear upon the stone.

  Until, that is, she feels the slightest of pulls at the back of her head.

  Once again, Samuel’s soft hand reaches to help her.

  His grin seems to light up the whole of his face and, contagious, it lights hers up too.

  He pulls her to her feet and gestures at the desolation.

  The town square is a shit-heap.

  Like so many she’s known.

  Is this the way they always get like that? she wonders.

  Unlike others, however, this town square has a sleeping dragon in the heart of it, tail spliced neatly through the middle of what was, not long ago, the mayor’s place of work.

  And, around the neck of the dragon, having been used to choke it into a slumber, is a lasso that Samuel had fashioned out of Donna’s fiery hair.

  When the dragon awakes, somewhat dazedly, it’s startled to find its conquerors saddled on its neck, that ponytail now rigged up as reins and harness, clamping around its crocodilian jaws.

  Too concussed to harbour thoughts of vengeance, and not wishing to be beaten for the second time in a day, it agrees to transport them swiftly to a romantic retreat of their choice.

  They hold on tight as the dragon takes a running start skywards; only when it levels out are they able to relax.

  They breathe deeply.

  They smile.

  They pull closer and kiss.

  Then pull closer still.

  In the darkness of the living room, Donna rubs herself to sleep.

  38

  Once her head had calmed, and her stomach settled, Donna Crick-Oakley checked the time.

  Half-past two meant that she’d overslept any chance of joining her mother for Sunday lunch. Meant also that her mother would likely have left another few messages for her to ignore.

  Donna didn’t feel guilty. She’d told her mother before that she wasn’t interested in meeting these new men. If her mother didn’t listen, and became disappointed when Donna declined to attend, then it was her mother’s fault, and her mother’s problem.

  She made herself a cup of coffee using two teaspoons of instant rather than her usual one, she sat down at the table, where she appeared to have left her mobile the night before, and checked her texts.

  She had three from Sammy, but none from anybody else. She’d given her mother her mobile number for emergencies, but her mother didn’t have a mobile herself – she preferred to sit at home in a comfy chair when she talked to her friends – and always claimed that she couldn’t find the number, or that Donna had written it down for her wrong.

  Maybe she had.

  Two of Sammy’s texts were from last night, and one from an hour or so ago, when he must have been on his lunch break. The first from last night asked what she was up to, and apologised again for not being able to come round. The second asked if she was alright, and said that, if she’d fallen asleep already, that was ok, because I’m pretty knackered as well ;) x

  The one from lunchtime seemed far more concerned, and was, in itself, far more concerning.

  Hey Donna are you ok? Is everything alright? Hope I haven’t said owt wrong…let me know when you get this, ok? xx

  She felt daft for not checking her phone more last night.

  She knew how quickly a thing like not receiving fast replies near the beginning of a relationship could play on a person’s mind, and she’d neither meant nor wanted to make him worry or make him start apologising all over again.

  But then, it wasn’t good to know that his response to that kind of situation was to overcompensate. To assume, firstly, that he’d done something wrong; and, by implication, that anything affecting her mood or actions had to be his fault, or at least his doing.

  And, secondly, that the best way to fix that was to add an extra x to the end of the message.

  That second kiss, that made everything more serious still.

  It made the non-problem of her being too inebriated to reply the night before into a problem that needed solving. It made the quick-fix solution to that problem a reply with the same amount of kisses.

  Or more, if she felt guilty enough, which she didn’t.

  And, in doing so, it made their relationship into something more adult, more rational, more caring, more dependant.

  If she only sent one kiss with her reply, even if she replied to the effect that nothing was wrong, she’d just been tired, then not only would he think he’d made another mistake, but he w
ould remain unconvinced that things between them were ok.

  But, if she sent two, she’d be letting him know that she was fine with things moving that little bit faster. And, because he’d been the one who’d jumped to that level first, she’d be letting him dictate the pace of play.

  She did find herself missing him, though.

  She found herself wanting the hours between now and this evening to just rush right on by.

  She waited until she’d finished her coffee before responding.

  Hey Sammy, I was tired, yeah lol ;) Have only just got up… Looking forward to seeing you later! Please bring wine :) xx

  39

  It was the smell of smoke that had brought her out to the balcony. The threat and the possibility of the building being alight.

  If this is it, she thought, then maybe they’ll send the ladders up.

  If Rapunzel had had hair as short as mine, she thought, then her prince would have had to do the same.

  Wearing her dressing gown over her pyjamas, she was swaying just slightly with her hands on the rails.

  The smoke was from a barbecue three floors below. Despite the thickness of its scent, Donna fancied she could smell the beer and the tomato ketchup too. Although, to be honest, she preferred brown sauce.

  Barbecues weren’t technically allowed, as far as Donna understood the contract, but days as fine as this were such rare beasts around here that not having one would have been an absolute waste. A dereliction of duty.

  She contemplated sending another text to Sammy, asking him to pick up a disposable barbecue when he went for the wine, but decided against it.

  By the time he arrived, the sun would be down and the air would be cold.

  Maybe wet as well.

  Away to the east, it looked like clouds were sweeping in.

  Music reached her, belatedly, with the burger-fat scent.

  ‘Mr Brightside,’ she could tell. She’d heard that often, back in the day. She was swaying to the music, not the lyrics. They didn’t apply to her. She wasn’t the jealous type.

  She watched the arrow-straight passing of cars down below. The hum of their engines came up through the music. A droning backbeat; a dubstep whump.

  People moved to and fro on the pavement, not particularly quickly. One of them, heading to the right, in the direction of the football stadium, was pushing a pram. Donna thought it was the woman she’d met in the lift.

  She wondered if the baby’s father lived with them.

  Or if, when she headed out that way, she was going to visit him, spend some time together. Catch up and watch their child grow.

  Donna hoped it was one or the other.

  But she didn’t want to think about children. Not yet.

  Not about their crying, or their living, or their being cared for and raised by consenting adults.

  She didn’t want to start getting anything like broody.

  Even though the sun was out, the same air currents that brought the smoke up past her window carried a slight chill. Normally, it wouldn’t have been cold enough to bother her, but, fragile as she felt today, she was thankful for the extra layer, the soft woollen collar brought up close to her throat.

  She didn’t know what she’d wear later, for Sammy.

  She had plenty of outfits that he hadn’t seen yet, but most were far closer to the level of her jeggings and boob-tube combination than they were to her dark green dress. She couldn’t wear that dress again for him just yet, she thought, but neither could she wear the boob-tube, and so she’d have to try and pick out something in between.

  A broad gulf.

  She worried about this because she wanted to look nice for him, rather than because she thought he’d judge her if she didn’t try.

  He had traced his finger along her collarbone before he left her on Saturday. Kissed it.

  Kissed her mouth after. Morning breath and all.

  The same breeze that brought the scents of smoke and beer and ketchup to Donna ruffled her hair against her cheek. She hadn’t got round to showering yet, and so it was still matted and thick with sweat. She pulled her fingers through it, winced as she tugged out a few of the knots.

  If her hair really was that much longer, she thought, how much time would it take to clean? How would she get it all in the shower?

  It’d probably be easier to let it form into dreadlocks.

  If she did that, she thought, it’d make a much better rope.

  Donna knew there were a few hours to go until seven, but still she looked down again towards the street.

  She wondered whether she should come back out before Sammy arrived, let him know that she’d been waiting for him. See if he looked up towards her flat before buzzing the door. See if he noticed she was there.

  Wave at him.

  Get him to wave back.

  So much great romance began with balconies, or at least that was what so much of great literature had told her.

  Had been telling her, over and over, ever since she was ten.

  That was the age at which little Donna Creosote had begun reading the great tragedies, that one in particular, in fair Verona, where we lay our scene. Her father, the English teacher, so desperate for her to get a headstart on all the thickies in secondary school. So keen for her to learn how to do different voices for each character; so eager for her to learn how to act, how to lie.

  When she’d struggled, at first, with the language and with the length of the plays, her father had called her a thickie and said she was just like the rest. Worse, even. When she’d taken such admonishment poorly, he’d called her a cry-baby and gone off to watch TV.

  Bloody Shakespeare.

  40

  Donna Creosote opened the door wearing nothing but her dressing gown.

  Sammy was standing there with both hands behind his back.

  She stopped herself from throwing her arms around him.

  Looked at him funny.

  Whatcha hiding? she said.

  He withdrew his left hand first, plastic bag hanging from it, and the silhouette of a wine bottle dancing within.

  In his right hand he held a white cardboard box, the kind that often contained cakes.

  Surprise, he said.

  Awww, you shouldn’t have.

  She took them both from him, and told him to follow her in and shut the door.

  As she placed them down upon the table, she felt his hands reach out to settle on the angles of her hips.

  I’ve missed you, he whispered.

  Unfastened her dressing gown, let it fall to the floor.

  41

  It was only when they returned to the kitchen that Donna took a closer look at the box.

  Inside was a pie, not a cake.

  What’s in it?

  What?

  What’s the filling?

  Special.

  Special?

  Just wait and see.

  Is it fish?

  It’s a type of fish, yeah, but just wait and see.

  I thought we went over this. I said I didn’t like them.

  I know, I know. I was listening to you, honest.

  Were you?

  Yeah, but, seriously, just try it. I had Jim make it for you specially, using a recipe I’d come up with myself. It’s not like I’ve just brought it round because I got it free, either. It’s come out of my wages.

  Aww, really?

  Yeah. Just thought it might be nice for you to try one. Two of the old ladies who bought them yesterday came back to the stall today and said how nice they were and asked if they could get another next week.

  Oh, that’s good.

  Yeah. And they were just regular ones, not this special mix that me and Jim put together for you.

  Ok. Sorry – I didn’t mean to sound ungrateful or anythin
g. It’s just that I’d said I didn’t like them –

  It’s alright. It’s ok. I reckon you’ll like this one, though. And if you don’t, there’s always the wine.

  Hang on, I said sorry but I didn’t say I was going to eat it.

  C’mon. You won’t know unless you try, will you?

  She’d been fooled with lines like that before.

  Ok.

  Ok? That mean we’re good to go? Can I put it in the oven?

  Well – only if you agree to do something in return.

  Name it.

  I noticed the other night that you didn’t touch any of the olives I’d put out.

  And?

  I’d like you to try them. You know, in exchange for me trying this pie.

  I have tried them. They’re manky.

  When? When did you try them? How long ago?

  When I was like eight, or something. What does that matter?

  Your tastebuds adapt and alter as you get older.

  And?

  It’s been years since you last tried them – you might feel differently if you have them now.

  I won’t. My tastebuds might have adapted and whatnot, but olives will always be manky.

  Well, you won’t know for sure unless you try, will you?

  ...

  See, you’ll have to do it now. So there.

  She stuck her tongue out.

  Something about the moment felt like being nine again, in the playground.

  Maybe she could ask him to do that, instead. To play Little Red Riding Hood. He could be the woodcutter or the wolf, she didn’t really mind.

  Ok, I’ll do it. But I’m only having one.

  Too late.

  One olive for one pie? That doesn’t seem fair now, does it?

  Yeah, well, that’s what I’m offering. Take it or leave it.

  Ooh, are you putting your foot down, all manly-like?

  Damn right I am. Woman.

  He stuck his tongue out right back.

  Neither of them could keep from laughing.

  As Sammy took the pie from the box, Donna unscrewed the top from the wine, started filling the glasses.

  How should I cook this?