On the way back to the bungalow (it still felt too new to call ‘home’) I said to Karen, ‘It’s typical! Everything just lands in Clyde’s lap. He’s going to get all this money from Neville’s poncey poetry, and he won’t ever have to lift a fucking finger. It’s not fair.’ Karen was driving, by the way. That’s one of the changes that had happened while I was inside. She’d learnt to drive and got her own car. It was so odd for me to see her behind a wheel. I kept watching everything she did as if it was an illusion that could go up in a puff of proverbial smoke at any second. Karen said, ‘Well, the money won’t do him any good when he’s dead, will it?’ I said, ‘I thought Clyde looked pretty healthy. Didn’t you?’ Karen said, ‘I saw a man who’s been living in San Francisco for years, where his boyfriend – quite clearly – has died of AIDS, and where he’s going back to so he can take part in more gay orgies.’ She tapped my leg. ‘Clyde’ll be telling you he’s dying within the next couple of years. It’s inevitable. Mark my words.’ As it turned out, she was practically spot on. But that’s another . . .
Another . . . Another . . .
What . . . ? . . . ?
What . . . ?
What?
Niggles! Remember? What Melv said about whether me and Karen were ‘staying together’. Well, soon after we moved into the bungalow, Karen seemed to lose interest in having sex (not exactly the friendliest thing to do when I’d just got out of fucking prison). Niggle, niggle. Also, we were getting lots of ‘wrong numbers’ at the bungalow. The phone would ring, I’d pick it up, and the person at the other end – always male – would mumble ‘sorry’ and hang up. Niggle, niggle. I say ‘we’ were getting wrong numbers, but what I should say was ‘I’. Because Karen never seemed to get a wrong number. Whenever she picked it up, it was always someone she knew. And they would have a long, whispered conversation. Niggle, niggle, niggle. Finally, I mentioned the ‘niggles’ to Melv.
The next day, just after seven o’clock, Melv came round. Karen was out seeing a film with some friends. I’d just put Todd to bed. Melv said, ‘Mate, I’m doing something that I should have done ages ago, but I was hoping it wouldn’t be necessary. I was hoping certain people would come to their senses. But certain people have not come to their senses, so . . . it’s left me with no choice.’ He took a VHS tape from his sports bag and said, ‘I want you to play this, mate.’
I put the VHS in the video player. The video crackled into life. It was a street scene. It was jerking around all over the place. I could hear music. Voices. It was a summer’s evening. Like the evening was now, but a bit earlier. The video was settling down now. It was of people sitting outside a pub. A pub by a canal. The video had been taken from a long way off and had zoomed in, which is why – even though it had settled down – it was still a bit herky-jerky. Melv said, ‘Do you recognize that place, mate?’ I said, ‘Yeah. It’s that pub near Victoria Park, right? The Cricketers!’ Melv said, ‘Keep watching.’ The camera was focusing in on a couple sitting at a table. I knew what I was going to see before it became fully focused. One of the two people was Karen. She was wearing the dress I’d seen her leave the house in earlier. The other person was a man. He was stroking Karen’s face. I said, ‘It’s Dwayne!’ Melv said, ‘You know him!’ I said, ‘I used to go to fucking school with him. The bastard! The fucking bastard.’ Melv said, ‘Keep watching.’ Karen leant over and kissed Dwayne on the lips. I knew she was doing her nibble-nibble thing on his lower lip. She does that to me. Or she used to. I jumped to my feet and said, ‘I want to kill him!’ Melv turned the video off and grabbed me by the shoulders and said, ‘Mate, we need to talk before you do anything. You understand? You need to calm down. You need to tell me exactly what you want. And whatever you want, it will happen. But you need to think through all the options first, mate. Do not do anything rash. You understand?’ I said, ‘Yes, mate.’
I took a few deep breaths and sat on the sofa. I asked, ‘How long have you known?’ Melv said, ‘I’ve had my suspicions for a while, mate. Finally, I said to Steph that if she knew anything – anything at all – she had to tell me, regardless of her friendship with Karen, because I was not going to see you, my best mate, made a fool of.’ I said, ‘Thanks, mate.’ Melv said, ‘Steph said all she’d been told was Karen had met someone at her dad’s birthday bash in The Carpenter’s Arms. This bloke – this . . . this Dwayne – was there with a few of his mates from the army. He spotted Karen all alone and . . . he made his move.’ I said, ‘The bastard!’ Melv said, ‘I didn’t say anything when I first found out because Karen had assured Steph – promised her, mate – that she was going to end it. But obviously . . . she didn’t.’ I said, ‘Jesus! Jesus!’ Melv said, ‘Mate, let me just say a few things. Not to make excuses for Karen, but to . . . to help you make the correct decision. Okay?’ I nodded. Melv said, ‘It hasn’t been easy for Karen. She lost your beautiful house in Goodmayes. She lost all that money you were bringing in. All that Dallas lifestyle. She was back with her parents. And then . . . this bastard comes along – all flash in his uniform – and realizes he’s got Karen at her weakest and he . . . he seduces her. He’s probably told her to leave you. But she hasn’t. Why? Because you are something that fucking bastard can never be. You are the father of her child. And you’ve both created a life together. And, yes, all that might’ve gone to shit a bit, but Karen knows – she knows! – you will build it up again. She knows you will do anything to give her all the things she once had! And more!’
I didn’t believe all of it, but I was willing to go along with it enough to say, ‘So . . . if I was to say I do want her back – if! – what do you suggest?’ Melv said, ‘I suggest you do the following. Keep your mouth shut. When she comes back tonight, do exactly what you would have done. Meanwhile . . . I will speak to a couple of friends of mine. They usually help me persuade people to give me the money I’m owed. I will ask these friends to pay a visit to this Dwayne bastard. They’ll persuade him that the best thing for him to do is phone Karen and tell her it’s all over and he never wants to see her again. I said, ‘Melv . . . if your friends . . . beat Dwayne up . . . this could backfire if Karen sees him.’ Melv said, ‘They won’t lay a finger on him, mate. They will just tell him what the consequences will be if he doesn’t make the required phone call to Karen. And those consequences won’t come down on him. But on his two sisters. His mother. His beloved niece.’ Melv grinned and said, ‘Now . . . do you want Karen back or not?’ I said, ‘I want her back.’ Melv took the VHS out of the player. He said, ‘I will destroy this. We never had this conversation— Oh! Do you want Karen to get the phone call when you’re here? So you can watch the reaction. Might be fun.’ I nodded. Melv said, ‘I’ll let you know the time he’s going to call.’ And he left.
Two hours later, when Karen got home, it was difficult to – as Melv had advised – keep my mouth shut. But, somehow, I managed it. I made Karen a cup of tea. I asked what film she and her friends went to see. Karen said, ‘Back to the Future: Part III.’ I asked, ‘Was it any good?’ Karen said, ‘Oh, it wasn’t too bad. But Michael J. Fox doesn’t do anything for me. He’s a bit puny. I like my men to be real men. Like you!’ And she kissed me. No nibbling of bottom lip. Does she smell of Dwayne? I couldn’t detect anything. Her lipstick’s not smudged. But she could have tidied all that up in the car.
Two days later, Melv phoned me while I was at work. He said, ‘Tonight. Ten o’clock. Make sure she picks the phone up. Then stand back and enjoy!’ When I got home that night Karen had prepared spaghetti bolognaise. It’s one of her best dishes. But I didn’t taste a mouthful. My mind was on the phone ringing at ten o’clock. I made sure I was in the kitchen making a cup of tea when it did. I made sure I was bringing the cups of tea into the living room just as Karen picked up the phone. I made sure I said, ‘Here’s your tea, darling,’ loud enough for the person on the other end to hear. I made sure I turned the telly down as any considerate husband would do. I made out I was flicking through the sports pages of the ne
wspaper. I made out I had no interest in what Karen was saying whatsoever. But, of course, I heard every fucking word. She said, ‘Hello? . . . Oh, hello, Steph, how are you . . . Oh, I’m fine, Steph . . . No, no, it’s okay, say it . . . Mmm . . . What do you mean? . . . But what do you mean? . . . It’s not the time to – . . . No, you can’t . . . Don’t . . . You . . . What? . . . You can’t . . . No . . . No . . .’ And then I heard a click as the person on the other end hung up. But Karen gamely went on, ‘Oh, okay, then, Steph . . . No, no, that’s fine . . . Love to Melv and Boyd. Bye.’ She put the phone down, but didn’t move. She kept her back to me. I said brightly, ‘Everything okay?’ She said, ‘Oh, fine.’ I said, ‘It sounded like there was a bit of a problem.’ She said, ‘No, no. Steph was just saying she might not be able to go to the pictures with me on Friday like we’d planned.’ I said, ‘Oh, that’s a shame. Perhaps we can go together instead.’ Karen shot me a look. For a moment I wondered if I’d pushed it too far. Did Karen know I knew? I couldn’t tell. I said, ‘Drink your tea, darling. It’ll get cold.’ Karen said, ‘I’m just going to check on Todd.’ And she went upstairs. She was up there for a long time. When she came back down she had washed her face and changed into her nightdress. I said, ‘Your tea’s cold now.’ She said, ‘Really?’ And drank it anyway.
What was I . . . ?
What?
What?
Yes! Mum said, ‘Clyde’s back!’ I said, ‘He . . . he’s what?’ I’d gone round to see how she was. She’d phoned to say she was feeling a bit ‘poorly’, but by the time I’d got there she had miraculously recovered. Mum said, ‘He phoned an hour ago. He’s booking a flight back from San Francisco.’ I said, ‘So he’s not actually back now?’ Mum said, ‘I didn’t say he was back now. I said he’s coming back. He’ll be home for good this time. He’s going to set up offices here. In East London. Perhaps he can give you a job.’ I said, ‘I’ve got a job, Mum.’ She said, ‘Give you a proper job, then.’ I said, ‘I’ve got a proper job, Mum.’ She said, ‘Sweeping a car park is not a proper job.’ I said, ‘I do more than just sweep it.’ Mum said, ‘Clyde might be able to pay you more.’ I said, ‘Mum! I do not want to work for bloody Clyde! Okay?’
When I told Karen she said, ‘Oh, I’m so fed up with hearing about your bloody brother. Order me a pizza! I am starving!’ Eating was something Karen had done a lot of since the final phone call with loverboy Dwayne. It was only eighteen months ago but – Jesus! – she was like a different woman. Karen hadn’t so much ‘let herself go’ as chucked herself away. The first sign was when she stopped getting up in the morning. Usually, she’d be up before me and breakfast would be on the table by the time I got out of the shower. Now, I got up, and she stayed in bed. The reason? The sleeping tablets she takes are strong enough to stun a rhinoceros. And that’s if you take them as prescribed, which is one ‘just before you go to sleep’. But as Karen takes that to mean just before she goes to sleep at any time of the day, she doesn’t so much sleep, as never properly wakes up. She’s also on anti-depressants, and you’re not supposed to mix them. It’s not that her doctor’s negligent. The anti-depressant tablets belong to me. I get them from Melv.
To be honest, I’d put on some weight over the past year as well. But that’s hardly my fault when I’ve got a wife who seems to have forgotten how to cook, and I have to rely on burgers and bags of crisps to get me though the day. My evening meal consists of a kebab with baked beans, or a pizza with baked beans, or a Big Mac with baked beans. Karen told me, ‘If you don’t like takeaways, you cook something!’ But why should I cook? I’m out at work cleaning a fucking car park all fucking day. I start at seven and I finish at seven. I’m too tired to start preparing myself poached tuna and steamed fucking broccoli when I get in. It would be different if Karen was working too. For a few weeks she did. She got a job in the local supermarket, but she had to give it up because she kept bursting into tears. Someone found her bawling her eyes out in the toilets. ‘Everywhere’s too noisy!’ Karen kept saying. ‘Everywhere’s too noisy!’ Melv said he could get Karen a job cleaning offices at night (‘At least it’d be quiet, mate,’ he said), but when I mentioned it to Karen she said, ‘I am not fucking mopping floors for a living.’ I said, ‘Well, we can’t pay for everything we’ve got with my money!’ She said, ‘What have we got!? A shithole of a bungalow with rising damp and mice behind the kitchen units.’ I said, ‘I got rid of the mice.’ She said, ‘You put down five traps and caught nothing. That is not getting rid of the mice. We need someone to come in and sort them out properly.’ I said, ‘We can’t afford to get someone in to sort them out properly because you won’t get a fucking job!’ And the argument would go on and on and on. That’s what life had become between me and Karen. We were either sleeping or squabbling.
It was Melv who stepped in – needless to say – and tried to ease the situation for me, at least in financial terms. He asked me to meet him in the local pub and said, ‘How do you fancy being East London’s answer to Twentieth Century Fox?’ I said, ‘What do you mean, mate?’ He said, ‘You’ve got quite a big bedroom, right? Now, if you pull the dressing table and the bed over to the side – where the window is – you can have one whole wall free.’ I said, ‘Free for what?’ He said, ‘Free to set up eleven VHS recorders to make copies of . . . this.’ And he took a VHS from his pocket with BASIC INSTINCT written on it. I said, ‘Basic Instinct? Is this the actual film, Melv?’ And Melv said, ‘Yes. The actual film with Sharon Stone and Michael Douglas.’ And I said, ‘But it’s not even in the cinemas yet!’ And he said, ‘I know. And this copy looks pretty damn good, believe me. Now, let’s say you play this in one video player, while you’re recording on all the others. That’s ten copies of the film in two hours. In a day you could have . . . what? Forty copies? You strike me as the kind of person who would be able to sell those forty copies. After all, you’re working at the car park. That’s the perfect place to meet an endless supply of movie buffs.’ I said, ‘But, Melv, it’s illegal to – ’ Melv said, ‘Mate, there are people out there who want to see this film. It’s a great thriller. It’s got twists and turns and Sharon Stone’s snatch, for fuck’s sake. But there are a lot of people who won’t be able see it. Why? Because they can’t afford it. Not at the rip-off prices cinemas charge these days. Or they can’t get to a cinema. Perhaps they’re agoraphobic or disfigured and crippled in some way. Is it right that these poor people be denied the thrill and excitement of seeing this masterwork? Well, is it?’ I said, ‘No, Melv, it’s not.’ Melv said, ‘We will sell them these at very charitable prices. The money will barely cover the price of the VHS tape. We’ll divide all profits fifty-fifty. Just like we’ve always done. And there’ll be new films every week. How does that sound?’
It sounded like one big ‘Abracadabra!’ I was back where I wanted to be. The Robin Hood figure, doing good deeds, not with ‘herbal medication’ this time, but ‘therapeutic entertainment’.
Karen, of course, wasn’t entirely ‘for’ the whole thing, but she was such a whacked-out beached whale by now that, after a few half-hearted ‘what ifs’, she just said, ‘Oh, keep the sound down. And get me a blindfold so I don’t have to see anything when I’m in bed.’ So me and Melv set up the eleven video machines, and we got Karen her blindfold, and we kept the sound down, and in that first week alone I sold sixty nine copies of Basic Instinct. The week after I sold a further fifty Basic Instinct and sixty Lethal Weapon 3. Melv installed another ten video recorders. Karen took extra sleeping tablets (and put in earplugs) to help her sleep through it all because, yes, the sound was down on all the tellies, but with twenty-one video players clicking on and clunking off, and me ejecting used cassettes and putting blank ones in, the room wasn’t exactly tranquil. After a while, we got it down to a pretty neat routine. I would load all the recorders before leaving for work. At lunch time, Boyd would come home from school and start the afternoon’s batch. Then, when he got home at four, he would start another batch, which was finished
by the time I got home from work, and I’d put another batch in. Then another at ten, and another before I went to bed. On a good day we could make up to one hundred and twenty copies, and I would have them all sold within forty-eight hours.
The one thing that was getting me down was all the work I was still doing at the car park. Yes, I knew it was a good idea to have an ‘official’ job as cover, and, yes, the car park was a great place to sell the vids, but going there every bloody day did seem a bit beyond the proverbial call of duty. I mentioned this to Melv and he said, ‘Mate, I know exactly where you’re coming from. Let me think about it.’ A few days later he phoned and said, ‘Mate, there’s a way you need only do one day at the car park, purely to sell the vids. And as cover, of course.’ I said, ‘I’d love that, Melv. How?’ Melv said, ‘There’s another kind of cinematic entertainment I’m thinking of giving to our public, mate. It’s more . . . more specialized. I’ll come round tonight and show you an example.’
That evening, while Karen was in the bath (where she could spend hours sometimes, believe me, and still look no fucking cleaner, or smell any better) Melv came round and – after making sure Todd was asleep – popped a video into one of the players. The film quality was immediately inferior to all the other films we’d been copying. In fact, this didn’t look like a feature film at all. It looked like a home movie. A woman was dusting a table in an office. Then a man walks into the room. He spots some dust on his desk. He tells the girl to bend over. He pulls down her knickers, and starts to spank her. I said, ‘Karen won’t want me doing porn, Melv. Not with Todd around. You know that.’ Melv said, ‘I know, mate. But it’s not hardcore stuff. It’s just a bit of slap and tickle. And there’s three times as much money in this, mate. Give Karen an extra thick blindfold.’
Flamingoes in Orbit Page 23
