by Liza Cody
My music died away, and still Olga waited. I couldn’t see her face because of that stupid mask, but I bet she was getting nervous.
The M C was standing in the middle of the ring with the ref. They were waiting too. Let them fucking wait. Nobody takes the London Lassassin for granted.
The MC held the microphone to his lips and said, ‘We’re expecting the London Lassassin any moment now.’ And he waited. Everyone waited.
Then the MC said, ‘We’ve got a new attraction here for you tonight. I want to introduce her to you. Since the Iron Curtain came down, you may have wondered what happened to all those bad people from the KGB. All those bad men and women who walked in the shadows. The Soviet Union’s secret army. Well one of them’s come thousands of miles to be here tonight …’
‘Where’s Bucket Nut?’ some bim in the audience yelled.
‘Maybe she’s afraid to meet her new opponent,’ said the MC quickly. He’s a fast thinker, the MC. That’s what he’s paid for. ‘Maybe she’s heard about Olga from the Volga. Ladies and gentlemen – she’s still a paid-up member of the Russian Secret Service …’
‘Where’s Bucket Nut?’
‘So secret, in fact, that her identity still has to be protected …’
‘Bucket Nut.’
‘Ladies and gentlemen, let me introduce you to Olga from the Volga.’
There was some half-hearted clapping, some half-arsed booing.
‘Where’s Bucket Nut?’ someone yelled.
‘Play her music again,’ someone else suggested.
‘Play “Roll Out the Barrel”,’ a boozy bum shouted. ‘That’ll make her come out.’
‘Well,’ the MC said, ‘I never thought the London Lassassin was a coward.’
The boos were growing louder.
And louder.
The hair on my arms was up. My spine was tingling.
I started to count, ‘One, two, three …’
Olga stirred nervously.
More people joined in the booing.
I counted to twenty-three, and then I couldn’t wait no longer.
I hauled the door open and came walloping out.
‘Boooo!’ went the crowd.
‘What’s your trouble?’ I yelled at the first howling face I saw. ‘Got the gut ache?’
I marched down the aisle.
‘Boooo!’
‘Sheep!’ I yelled. ‘Yer all sheep and cows.’
‘Boooo!’
‘Ba-a-a,’ I screamed back. I stuck my face right up to a woman in a blue cardy. ‘Mooo!’ I yelled, right into her ear. She took a whack at me with her handbag. Another lady lashed out with her umbrella. I snatched it off her, and poked at a feller on the other side of the aisle.
‘Boooo!’ went the crowd.
‘Shut yer silly face,’ I went. ‘Moooo,’ I shouted at the fella I’d poked. ‘A goat could bleat louder’n you.’
He got up. I dropped the umbrella. I danced backwards away from him going, ‘Ba-a-a,’ taunting him till he chased me to the ring.
One of the bouncers picked him off and led him back to his seat.
‘Mummy’s boy!’ I shouted at him. ‘Yeller!’ And he tried to come back at me.
The front rows were standing up, screeching and throwing programmes and bits of burger.
I had them. They was mine.
I pulled myself up on the platform and vaulted the ropes.
‘Boooo!’ went the crowd.
‘I thought you wasn’t coming,’ said the ref. ‘Jesus! Talk about cutting it fine!’
Olga came over. ‘What happened?’ she said.
I gave her a shove. ‘Back off,’ I said. ‘We ain’t pissing about up here.’
I gave the ref a good shove too, and he staggered back. I marched round the ring giving the crowd the finger. The ref trotted after me.
‘You behave yourself,’ he said, loud enough for the front rows to hear. ‘I want a fair fight …’
The MC started the ritual – ‘In the red corner … in the blue corner …’
But I didn’t go to my corner. The ring was mine and I used it for a parade ground. I strutted. I flexed my muscles. I backed Olga on to the ropes. And the fight hadn’t even started.
‘BOOOOO!’ went the crowd. It was music to my ears. They were yowling fit to burst. I was giving them what they came for. That’d teach Mr Deeds to fart around with my life. He’d have to think twice before dropping me.
The bell went, and while it was still clanging, I whipped into Olga’s corner, grabbed her by the arm, swung her round and ran her, head first, into the ropes on the other side of the ring. As she hit the ropes, I kicked her in the bum.
She grabbed the ropes for balance. I snatched one of her hands, twisted it behind her back and started biting her fingers.
I don’t know what it is about biting – but if you want the crowd to go totally ape-shit, take a nibble on your opponent. It works every time. Oh yeah! Young pumpkin-bumpkin would have to get up very early in the morning to beat me in the villainy race.
The ref came over, outraged. He tried to pull me off. I gnashed my gnashers at him too. The crowd went critical. The MC got on the microphone and gave me a public warning. He was almost drowned out by the boos.
Things were going very well indeed.
The ref hauled me back. I hipped him out of the way and went on a parade of the ring. I punched the air and went, ‘Easy, easy, eee-zee!’
‘Dirty, dirty, dir-tee!’ went the crowd back.
I leaned over the ropes and went, ‘Shut yer mucky mouths!’
A little old lady leapt out of her seat and tried to clobber my feet with a beer bottle. I jumped back, pretending to be scared, and the front rows collapsed in laughter.
All this gave Olga time to catch her breath. She came off the ropes and aimed a forearm smash. I ducked under it, and she grabbed my head and hair. She was too nervous to do it right so she gave my hair a rotten yank. She was new to the game so I let it go. This time.
She scissored my head and neck between the crook of her elbow and her hip. She was over excited and squeezed too hard. My ear got bent the wrong way. Otherwise it was a passable side-headlock.
‘Get her!’ yelled the crowd. ‘Hurt her!’
I grabbed Olga’s arm to loosen her grip.
‘Twist her ugly mug off!’ screamed a bloke in the front.
‘Ow-ow-ow!’ I went at the top of my voice. The front rows just love to hear a villain beg for mercy.
Olga hung on like grim death. I dragged on her arm. We swayed, twisted, tottered. I pulled. She squeezed. Slowly I pulled her down to the canvas. We both knelt. She held the headlock tight. I got both hands down on the floor, bunched my legs under me and kicked up in the air.
I shot up in a handstand. I straightened my arms and, thank Christ, Olga remembered to release my head.
The handstand escape is a right classy move and, if I say so meself, I done it perfect. But it silenced the crowd.
Then, from somewhere, I heard a lone voice shouting, ‘Come on, Bucket Nut, come on!’
I was all amazed. Something was wrong. No one cheered me on. I squinted into the lights, trying to see. I thought it sounded like …
And that’s when Olga decided to take a dive at me knees. She launched herself and hit me on the backs of my legs. ’Course I tipped over backwards and came down on my arse. The only trouble was, Olga was still there. She hadn’t rolled on through or dodged. So there was a real clash of arses – mine on top.
I rolled off backwards and left her flat on her face.
Now, take a tip from the expert – if you find yourself up on your toes while your opponent’s flat on her face, don’t wait for no second invitation. Jump her.
‘’Orrible skaggy cow!’ some bloke shrieked.
I flung myself across Olga’s back and snatched her arm.
‘Mmf!’ went Olga from the Volga. ‘M-m-mmf.’
‘What?’ I said.
‘Mmf-mmf-umf!’
‘Eh
?’ I was twisting her arm up her back and taking a nip at her elbow.
‘Boooo!’ went the crowd.
‘Oy,’ said the ref, ‘that stupid fucking mask’s slipped. She’s choking on it.’
‘What?’
‘Gerroff, Eva! She’s suffocating!’
I leapt up and started to put the boot in. That’s another thing that makes the crowd go berserkers – kicking when your oppo’s down. Try it sometime and see if I’m not right.
The ref jumped in to give me a ticking off, so Olga took the chance to sit up and straighten her mask. She didn’t hurry.
I danced round the ref to get at her again but he kept stepping in between. He wanted to give her more time. But she was so slow the crowd went quiet again.
The only action for them to see was me and the ref so I turned on him instead. I gave him three quick shoves back to the ropes.
‘Okay?’ I said.
‘Careful,’ he said.
And I chucked him out of the ring.
He’s an old fighter himself, so he landed well. But he made a lovely stew of it, hobbling, staggering on to the front row.
Quick as a flash, the MC was on his mike again giving me my second public warning.
And in the hush which followed that, I heard the voice again. ‘Way to go, Eva,’ it went, ‘sock ’im one from me.’
I knew who it was now. It was Kath with the bosoms. What the freakin’ hell was she doing at Lewinsham? I glared out through the lights, and, stone me, but the whole sodding bunch of them was there.
Loads of people had stood up to see what happened to the ref, and there in the middle, standing on their seats, waving their arms in the air were Crystal, Bella, Mandy, Stef, Kath and Lynn.
I could have died.
The only people supporting me in that whole sodding sports hall was a gaggle of prossies.
‘Don’t just stand there,’ the ref said. ‘Get on with it.’ He climbed back into the ring.
I turned. Olga, with her mask straight, came galloping across the canvas. I gave her my arm and she swung me over the ring into the ropes. I twanged off and back to her. She hit me with a body-check. I bounced off her and fell back on the canvas. She should’ve caught me with a head throw, but she forgot, so I had to fall down on me own.
She remembered the next bit though. She came down with a knee-drop to my throat.
‘Aaaagh!’ I screamed.
And she flung herself on me in a cross-press.
‘Yeah, yeah, yeah,’ yelled the crowd. ‘Kill her, do it to her! Smash her skull!’
It was like having a mattress drop on you. I could’ve dealt with a mattress, but this mattress had elbows, and she wasn’t clever enough to get them out of the way before she landed. And she landed on my chest.
‘Fucking ow-ow-ow-ow!’ I yelled, for real. Well, really! I don’t know what you’d say with ten tons of teenage meat on top of you with its elbows grinding into your tits.
So instead of doing the usual bridge and escape I hauled my arm off the canvas and whacked her in the side of the head.
‘Nnnf!’ she went. But she didn’t get off me tits. Grind, grind, grind.
‘Bury her!’ shrieked the crowd. ‘Break her legs!’
I hit her again. I got her in a bear hug. I pushed, pulled, squirmed and then rolled her over. When I was on top I banged her head on the canvas, jumped up and did a knee-drop on her tits.
Usually when you do this you pull out just when you’re landing. It’s the other knee on the canvas which comes down – thud. Ladies parts are sacred. You protect your own and you try not to damage your oppo’s. If you didn’t, it’d be out and out warfare. It’s the same with the blokes. If they really landed any of those kicks to the goolies there’d be real murder and real blood on the canvas.
But accidents do happen. ’Specially when you’re fighting a clumsy great pumpkin. It was her own fault – grinding on my painful parts like that. She got me so narked that when I knee-dropped on her I didn’t quite pull out in time.
I’m not a sadist. I didn’t do the full business on her. But I didn’t let her off either. I gave her a bit of a clip where it hurt – where she’d hurt me. She needed a lesson. She needed learning not to be so clumsy.
She doubled up, rolled in a ball, howling, and the ref dragged me off.
And that’s when I got me third public warning and disqualification. Which was a pity really. It was supposed to end with a pile-driver. I like pile-drivers. They’re nice. Spectacular.
But we couldn’t carry on with her rolled in a ball going, ‘Wmf-wmf-woomf,’ and rubbing her tits the way she was. I could’ve been rubbing mine, but I had more pride.
A woman in the audience started shrieking, ‘Lesbian! You should be ashamed to call yourself a woman!’
And a bloke yelled, ‘If your face looked as good as my wife’s bum-hole I wouldn’t feel so sick.’
I yelled, ‘A bin-bag’s got more brains than you!’
‘Mouth like a cat flap!’ someone else shouted.
‘Mouth like a garbage truck!’ I said.
‘Barn door!’
‘Grand Canyon!’
Ooh, they was really wetting themselves out there.
‘Good show,’ said the ref. ‘Now get your arse out of here. You’re holding up the programme.’
So I climbed out the ring and dodged handbags, walking sticks and flying food all the way back to the games room door.
Pumpkin came tottering along behind, sweating and whimpering. I wasn’t feeling at all tired now, but I had mustard in my hair where a hot dog hit me.
There were two blokes in the games room waiting to come on. One was Bob ‘Hacker’ Smith who I don’t know well because he doesn’t train at Sam’s Gym. The other was California Carl.
Bob said, ‘Some wind-up! What were you doing out there – swinging from the ceiling?’
Bob’s a bit of a villain himself so he wasn’t being rude.
But California said, ‘Sure, that’s what big ugly apes do. They swing from the ceiling, pick their arses and screw each other in public.’
‘And you’d shag sheep – if they’d let you,’ I said, trying to push past. I didn’t want to talk to him. I was feeling good, and his eyes were on the boil again.
Volga Olga came in behind me and stood there looking like lost luggage.
California said, ‘Who’s that with her head in a bag? You should take a tip from her, Eva – it’s the only way you’d ever get a man.’
‘What dick-drip says I want one?’
‘All you slits want one,’ he said. He had acid oozing out of every pore, and his eyes were on fire.
‘Nniff?’ said Volga Olga.
Bob said, ‘Ease down, Carl.’
I said, ‘You got a mouth like an open drain, you got as much talent as a coat hanger and I see better manners than yours scrawled on the lavvy wall.’ And I bulled him out of the way and went to the changing room with Olga tagging along behind.
I like getting the last word. I like winning an argument. I bounced on my toes, feeling good.
Olga tore the black mask off. Underneath, her face was sopping, and if she’d been any redder she’d of stopped traffic. More fool her for wearing the sodding thing.
She’d forgotten about the bumps on her lumps or the lumps on her bumps. She said, ‘Who was that man in the gold lamé?’
‘California Carl,’ I said.
‘What’s the matter with him?’
‘Hormones.’
‘Eh?’
‘Steroids,’ I told her. ‘It’s enough to make any whore moan.’
‘Eh?’
I couldn’t be bothered to explain. I wanted a shower. But she said, ‘He’s serious. Isn’t he? The way he looked at you like, y’know, like he could’ve killed you. Like he’s really truly dangerous.’
I didn’t want to talk about him. I kept remembering the Eva mouse.
‘You keep clear of him, girl,’ I said.
‘But he’s gorgeous,’ said P
umpkin, and sighed. The girl was a giant eejit. She was much too young to be taken out of her vegetable patch. She needed advice from someone older and wiser.
So I said, ‘Take a cold shower, fool. California’s a psycho – don’t even think about him.’
I stripped down and went to the shower. My own lumps and bumps needed hot water. The elbow was swelling up again, but I was quite chuffed with tonight’s show. It’d been very short, but I’d shown what I could do against the odds. That pillock, Mr Deeds, handed me a know-nothing baby whale to fight against, but even so, I gave the crowd something to shout about. It could’ve been boring, but it wasn’t. Okay, so I had to get myself disqualified so that it didn’t look like a one-sided mess. But I’m prepared to make sacrifices for my art.
Olga must’ve got into the next stall because I heard water. And after a bit, through the splashing, this pitiful little voice went, ‘I was awful, wasn’t I, Eva?’
Which was a good sign. At least she didn’t think she was all right.
‘Hey, Eva?’
‘What?’
‘I said I was awful.’
‘I heard you.’
‘You mean you thought I was awful too?’
I was feeling generous, so I said, ‘Everyone got to start somewhere.’
When I got out of the shower Olga was already nearly dressed. She said, ‘I don’t know if I could take it.’
‘What?’
‘All that, y’know, what those people say to you. They’re so, like, angry. And rude. I don’t know if I could bear it.’
She didn’t know nothing.
I said, ‘It’s being a villain. It’s how you know you done good.’
She couldn’t even think about being a villain if she didn’t understand that.
‘But, out there, the people hate you.’
‘What are they supposed to do?’ I said. ‘Pat me on the head? It’s what a villain’s for. To be hated.’
‘But I don’t think I want to be hated,’ said Olga from the Volga, KGB agent. ‘I don’t like people not liking me. It really upsets me.’
Maybe God actually exists! Maybe He, She, or It was rewarding me for doing a good show.
I said, ‘Then don’t wear black, don’t wear a mask. That’s what villains wear. If you want to be a blue-eyes, wear pretty colours and lipstick.’
