Hamsterdamned!

by Adam Millard

  The waitress shook her head and simulated laughter. “No, no. I’m Mieke, ja.”

  “Well, Mieke,” Stuart whispered conspiratorially. “What time do you get off? ‘Cos you Mieke me horny.” As a joke, it was shit, and if the desired effect was to annoy the waitress and send her scurrying for the bar without taking their order, then he’d succeeded. “Well, I guess I’m going to the bar,” he said. “Same again?”

  “Hell yeah,” Tony said, necking what remained in his glass. “And keep an eye on Mieke. Got a feeling she wants to spit in our drinks.”

  As Tony disappeared into the crowd, a new act took to the stage. Mike enjoyed pole-dancing midgets as much as the next deviant, but he found himself trying not to watch as the minute woman gyrated and ground her genitals against the bar.

  “Shall we go someplace else after this?” he said. “Once you’ve seen one, you’ve seen them all.”

  “Fancy a smoke?” John said, putting his thumb and forefinger together and inhaling deeply. “Set us up for the red light district tour later?”

  Mike thought he’d made himself clear about where he stood on the hookers, but apparently not.

  “Dude, you don’t have to fuck ‘em,” Tony said. “Just a bit of window-shopping. It’s good for the soul, if you know what I mean?” He grabbed his crotch in a display that was completely unnecessary. “Me, on the other hand, I plan to be up to my nuts in guts by midnight.”

  “That’s a beautiful phrase,” Mike said. “Shakespeare, was it?”

  Tony shook his head. “I don’t know,” he said. “Might be.”

  When Stuart returned with the drinks, Mike finished his quickly, hoping that the others would follow suit. On the way out, he found himself apologising to Mieke, who informed him that she had spit in all of their drinks except his, because he seemed like a nice man, unlike his friends. He didn’t know whether to believe that, or not. She was pretty, he told himself. As far as spit went, he wouldn’t have minded drinking hers.

  Outside, the air was fresh. Nice. Surprisingly clean. He’d got it into his head that Amsterdam reeked of marijuana. No matter where you went, it would be there. You would wake up stoned and go to bed stoned and drunk. That wasn’t the case, not really. Not unless you wanted it to be.

  “Where to, mate?” John said. “This is your weekend. I’m just the guide.”

  After the surreal midget-fest that had been Small ‘n Sensual, Mike did fancy something a little more relaxed. Somewhere quiet, somewhere he could call Beth from to let her know that everything was fine and that Blackpool was reasonably quiet for the time of year. She’d like that.

  “Coffee house?” he said.

  John grinned. “I thought you’d never ask.”

  *

  Nobody knows what a stoned hamster looks like, but if you were to see one, you’d know straight away that it had been on the wacky-baccy. Beneath the trashcan sitting outside Smokey Jo’s, six evil little hamsters lay sated, and slightly festive. They had spent the last hour eating the yummy stuff; their cheeks were full of it, just in case somebody came and took away the large bag of the best thing that had ever happened to them.

  About fifteen minutes in, the rodents had forgotten what they were eating, or why they were eating at all. Everything seemed to drift away on a sea of unicorn sperm. The passing feet – and there were a lot of them – had transmuted into bright orange hooves; the bag containing the yummy stuff was no longer made of plastic, but of tartan bagpipe covers. Every time one of them gnawed at it, it wheezed tunefully.

  Two of the hamsters had fallen asleep on the half-hour mark, curled up against one another as if in some odd state of non-penetrative coitus. The other four had laughed, pointed, called the embracing rodents faggots and bum-lords. It is an unknown statistic amongst the human race that three in four hamsters are incorrigibly homophobic.

  As the sky darkened – after spending fifteen minutes as a pink blanket with neon rubber ducks drifting across it – the hamsters found themselves mesmerised and in an exquisite state of contentment. The cuddlers woke up just in time to watch the bright yellow ball in the sky as it descended beyond the buildings. It was all very pleasant.

  “Squeak,” one of them said with a sense of urgency not known amongst rodents.

  The others felt it too; something inherently wrong with their innards. At first it was just a pang, nothing unusual considering what they’d devoured in such a short space of time. But then it worsened, and the hamsters rolled around, clearly distressed. The euphoria they had been experiencing only a moment before dissipated. All that remained was an agony that they wouldn’t have wished upon their worst enemies, not that hamsters tended to harbour grudges.

  Suddenly, the black hamsters began to inflate, as if someone – and there must be a fetish for it somewhere – was blowing air into their anuses. The other four watched in horror, hoping that the strange phenomenon only affected the black ones. It also remains unknown amongst humans that almost fifty-seven percent of hamsters are irredeemably racist.

  If somebody had come along at that moment, responding, perhaps, to the strange and constant squeaking behind the trashcan, they might have mistook the six hamsters for rabbits, or even those pathetic dogs which supermodels carted round in designer handbags. Fortunately, it was an odd time of night in Amsterdam. Most people were off smoking, or browsing windows. Your average Joe-Tourist was preparing for a night on the tiles, and those unruly bachelors whose sole purpose it was to get as ruined as possible were either too tanked or high to notice strange noises emanating from stationary objects. Plus, as seasoned dope-heads are aware, it is impossible to hear anything over the sound of your own heartbeat once the magic weed takes hold.

  “Squeak,” one of the hamsters said. Gone was the shrill cry of a miniature rodent; in its place, a sonorous roar that sounded more like a burp than anything else. It came out so unexpectedly that the rodent fell backwards, knocking two of its still-growing compatriots into the bag of yummy stuff.

  Something, it thought as it steadied its trembling and expanded haunches, is definitely wrong with us.

  *

  The first thing Mike noticed as they entered the coffee-shop was the tables. Daubed in graffiti, they looked like some of the garage doors back home. Several huge, low couches were positioned around the tables; large, ceramic ashtrays were the centrepieces. In the background, a slow, electronic beat pounded continuously, but there was something nice about it. The proprietor certainly knew how to create an ambience.

  They located a table and slumped onto the couches, sinking into them, almost feeding them their asses. “Comfy,” Tony opined. “I’ll be asleep before we smoke anything.”

  On the table sat a bunch of menus; John handed them around. “Now, some of this shit is strong. I once heard of a man getting so stoned on this shit that he actually went into the future.”

  Mike laughed. “Fuck off,” he said.

  “I swear on my mother’s life,” John said, scanning the menu as if he had already decided on the brand he wanted. “Came back crying about aliens and shit. I think they put him in a home, or something.”

  “Do you believe everything you hear?” Donald said. The bonnet was gone, and Donald had decided that a shirt was required for the rest of the evening. “Didn’t you say that your uncle saw Bigfoot?”

  “Uncle Charlie did see Bigfoot,” he said. “Caught that hairy bastard on camera, too.”

  “What happened to the film?” Tony said.

  “Took it in to get it developed. Next thing you know, it’s gone. The people at the development centre said they didn’t know anything about it; that without a receipt, they wouldn’t be able to help.” He placed the menu on the table and sighed. “Fucking conspiracy, man.”

  A silver-haired man wearing an apron appeared from seemingly nowhere. He looked as if he’d smoked his fair share. In fact, he looked like he hadn’t experienced fresh air in eons. “Welcome to Smokey Jo’s,” he said. “I’m Johan. I’ll be your happy
fucking helper for the duration.”

  “Me and my boys are here to celebrate losing this poor soul to the love of his life,” John said, shaking Johan’s hand as if they went way back. “And since this is his first, and last, time in the Dam, I’m going to ask you to suggest something brutal.”

  Mike shook his head, but Johan was already writing something down on his notepad. “I’m prescribing two joints of White Widow, pre-rolled of course. It’s the only way to go for a man on the verge of marriage.”

  “Make that times five,” Tony said, rubbing his hands together like some evil despot at the helm of a big red button.

  “Coming right up.” Johan tucked the pencil behind his ear and disappeared into the back. The music changed to something even more melodic. Mike could see why people liked these places. And to think only an hour ago he was watching Bridget the Midget leaving her stank on a metal pole.

  “How you feeling, man?” John said, kicking Mike’s shin under the table.

  Mike hated to admit it, but now that they were here, relaxed, he was actually enjoying himself. Beth hadn’t crossed his mind for half an hour, though he would try to slip away for a minute to call her if the chance presented itself. She hadn’t told him to, but it was the least he could do. Placate, placate, placate. “I feel good,” he said. “This place is nice. Just what the doctor ordered.”

  “Actually the doctor ordered six gram of White Widow,” Stuart said, grinning like a shark.

  “I was going to save this until later on, but I doubt I’ll be able to talk much once the smoke kicks in.” Mike cleared his throat; he wasn’t much of a public speaker, but he knew how it went. “I just want to thank you all for being here with me. You all know how much I appreciate each and every one of you. You’re like brothers from another mother to me.” That sounded so much better in his head. “You know what I mean. Anyway, what I wanted to say, really, was that this trip would be nothing without you assholes.”

  “Aw, that’s sweet,” Tony said. “Now go to the bathroom and change your tampon.”

  “Fuck you.”

  They all erupted with laughter, and didn’t stop until Johan returned with the sensimilla.

  “Having a good time already?” their happy fucking helper said through a haze of second-hand smoke. The regulars on the table over were noticeably adept with their drugs. No pre-rolled over there; just one big fat joint with several little joints coming off it in all directions. It looked like the Rubik’s Cube of doobies.

  “Hey, I don’t suppose you’ve got any space-cake, have you?” John said. “That would go down well right about now.”

  Johan thought long and hard about it, which was odd as it wasn’t that much of a riddle. Finally, he said, “Give me a few minutes. I’ll put a fresh batch in…just for you.” He smiled; his teeth were like kernels of chewed popcorn. Still, he seemed affable enough.

  “That would be great,” Tony said as Johan slipped through into the back once again. “You ever eat space-cake before, Mike?”

  He hadn’t, so sarcasm was the next best option. “Yeah. Beth makes it all the time,” he said. “When she’s not whacking in a batch of coke quiches or heroin pies.”

  “Oh, man, you’re in for a treat,” Tony said, rubbing his hands together once again.

  *

  “You want me to get the bag back in?” Armando said, incredulously. “But, it’s not ri—“

  “Look, I’ve got nothing else to serve them,” Johan said. “And for all we know there might be nothing wrong with the batch. Your friend might have had a tumour, or something. People’s heads don’t just explode because of precarious weed.”

  Armando grimaced. “Okay, but if shit starts going bad in there, don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

  Johan raised his hand, as if to backhand the little fool, but before he had time to strike, Armando was vanishing through the kitchen door.

  *

  “Get the fucking cake out the trash,” he muttered as he walked away from Smokey Jo’s. “Neuken twat. When people’s heads start bursting don’t come crying to me.”

  He reached the trashcan. Thankfully, the bag was still there; hobos had a tendency to hang around coffee-houses and restaurants, waiting expectantly for free grub or hasj. There are far worse places to be a bum than Amsterdam, that’s for sure.

  “Oh, what the fuck,” Armando said, noticing the torn bag and slivers of plastic flapping in the breeze. Something had been at it. Rats, perhaps, or Wombles (are they even real?).

  The holes were small, though, and the bag appeared to contain the majority of the space-cake. Armando picked it up and…

  “Squeak,” something grunted. Armando turned and found himself face-to-face with what appeared to be some exotic breed of bear. Its teeth were huge, overlapping razors. From behind the trashcan, five more of the strange creatures emerged. Hissing and grinding their teeth together, they seemed to be warning him off. Armando was speechless; he didn’t know whether to run or remain still and shit himself. Undecided, he moved to run just as he was touching cloth.

  “Squeak!” one of the creatures bellowed. It loped after the man, who was leaving a rather pungent smell in his wake; its buddies followed. There was no way they would let him steal the bag of yummy stuff; not on their watch.

  “Fuck right off!” Armando screamed as he rushed towards the back entrance of Smokey Jo’s. “Help!” he said, glancing around at the deserted street. “Somebody help! Bears!”

  One of them, a white thing that was almost as tall as him now (had it grown in the last ten seconds?), wrestled him to the ground. Armando punched and kicked, but the creature was preternaturally strong. “Squeak!” it belched. The stench reminded Armando of the time his nephew, Armando III, accidentally microwaved his pet gerbil.

  “Rape!” Armando squealed. He’d read somewhere – possibly one of those ridiculous and ancient magazines stacked up in dentist waiting rooms – that if you were being attacked, you had a better chance of someone coming to your aid if they believed the assault to be of a sexual nature. Since calling Bear! at the top of his lungs hadn’t been effective, a change of tactics seemed to make perfect sense.

  “What’s going on out here?” a voice said. Armando recognised it immediately as belonging to Johan. The bear – or it might have been a tapir, it was difficult to classify a creature while it was attempting to put you in a headlock – ceased wrestling with Armando, but only for a moment while it studied the newcomer standing in the doorway. “What the fuck are you?”

  The five creatures silently observing from the side-lines stepped into view, and it was at that point that Armando heard the back door to Smokey Jo’s slam shut.

  “Johan!” he called. Looming over him, the creature appeared to grin. A string of drool seeped from its agape maw and landed in Armando’s eye. The last thing he saw was those enormous incisors as the creature prepared to attack. And Armando, who wasn’t even supposed to be working that day, said, “Shit.”

  *

  “Now this is a fucking smoke,” John said, holding the joint up to the dim light. “Oh, man, we should have places like this back home. I tell you something. Crime would go right down.”

  Mike shook his head. “Doubt it,” he said taking a massive pull on his joint before almost coughing up a lung.

  “Think about it,” John continued. “You wake up in the morning. Go to work, and while you’re at work, some motherfucker pisses you off. Now, under normal circumstances, you’d head-butt the shit out of that person, probably lose your job in the process. No job means no money, and no money means the landlady is gonna get really tired of your excuses real fucking quick. Then you’re on the street, stealing from people’s pockets, or shoplifting. Worst case scenario, you’re selling your ass in some back-alley for a few quid. Now, scatter a few coffee-houses like this around the city, and instead of head-butting the prick that pisses you off, you take a detour on your lunch-break. Instead of Starbucks, you head to Smokebucks, where you sit, chilling, absorbing
the atmosphere. By the time you get back to the office, that guy you thought about pounding on ain’t so bad. You don’t hit him; you keep your bedsit…” He settled back in his seat, closed his eyes as if to emphasise his point. “…And most importantly, no hand-jobs at the back of Greggs. All. Because. Of. Weed.”

  For a moment the silence was deafening. Mike couldn’t believe what he’d just listened to. He opened his mouth to speak, but was rudely interrupted by their happy fucking helper, Johan.

  “Everybody remain calm,” Johan said, rushing across the bar in a state of panic as if to highlight how not to act. “There’s something outside. Animals, I think.”

  Tony giggled and exhaled a plume of blue-grey smoke into the room. “Of course there are animals outside,” he said. “That’s where they live, man.”

  Mike climbed to his feet. He could see that Johan was distressed; even more so when the proprietor snatched a shotgun from behind the counter.

  “Holy shit!” Stuart said, falling off the edge of the couch.

  “Is that a real gun?” Donald said, laughing maniacally. “Dude, we should totally go out and shoot some wild boar.”

  “Everyone quiet,” Johan said, kicking the switch that provided power to the stereo. The slow, hypnotic beat which had been their background music ceased, and although they’d forgotten all about it while it was there, its absence was now tangible.

  This is what happens, Mike thought, when a bunch of guys do drugs. It always ends with a shotgun and a veritable feast of confused expressions.

  “Dude, what are we supposed to be hearing?” John said. The fact that Johan had a gun didn’t seem to affect him, though perhaps it should.

  “Fucking giant rats, or something,” Johan said, his voice barely a whisper. “Outside.”

  Tony snorted. “Of course,” he said. “How absurdly British of us not to take into account all the giant fucking rats you have roaming around Europe.” He snorted again.