Timothy Lea's Complete Confessions
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I never finish with the black bird because Amanda grabs me and by the time I’ve given it a little wiggle for old times’ sake, Sandy is tapping me on the shoulder and I’m in to number three. I am vaguely aware that the battle outside is hotting up and I think I can hear Sebastian yelping because he has got a dustbin lid stuck in his cake hole but I am now only capable of concentrating on the job in hand. The flesh trading is getting a bit complicated because any spare mouth, or whatever, is speedily seized upon so you are never quite certain who is doing what and with which and to whom.
I can’t remember how long we go on like this but I do recall the pressure of feet along the small of my back and someone shouting, “The Fuzz! The Fuzz!” Immediately, all hell breaks loose and there are blokes leaping about like rats in a burning cage. My mind clears faster than Stamford Bridge after an away win and I am out of Sandy and into my trousers before you can say “I was framed”. Not a second too soon either, because the first Bule comes steaming through the door as I am doing up the zip. He has his truncheon in his hand and must feel quite at home when he looks round some of the blokes in the room.
“I don’t remember inviting you,” starts Sandy, but she gets shoved up against the wall and told to shut up. The Bule is joined by a few of his mates and they are all shaking with outrage and excitement. You can see they haven’t had so much fun in years. It is then that I notice the upper class twit who came in with me. He is bollock naked except for a tiny pair of yellow silk pants and though this might cramp the style of lesser men, it has no effect on this Herbert.
“Can you tell me who is in charge here?” he says. “I would like to register a very strong protest. This is a private party in a private house and so far I have seen no evidence of a search warrant or any other reason for your impertinent intrusion. I will most certainly be bringing this matter to my father’s attention and I can assure you that – Ow!!” The exclamation is caused by one of the Bules stepping on his naked foot and causing him to leap back onto the burning joint of the hopped up idiot behind him. A small spot of pandemonium breaks out and the spades around me start muttering about police brutality.
By this time I am dead scared because I can see that my Ovaltiney’s badge will be right up the spout when this little lot comes to court and after my last brush with the law it’s a bit soon to be coming back for another dose. There is only one thing for it. And that is to get the hell out of the place – fast. Choosing the moment when the upper class twit has accused the Bule of stamping on his foot and sparked off a near riot I sidle towards the window and slip onto its broad ledge just as a shout of alarm indicates that my departure has been noticed.
Luckily, as I have said before, you could wheel a pram along the ledge and even at night I can scoot along it easy as winking. My problem now is the crowd gathered outside who start howling the moment they see me. I nip round the corner of the building and to my relief the ground slopes up sharply so I don’t have so far to jump. Right behind me, some old bag is screaming her guts out at the prospect of being murdered in her bed and that is just the nudge I need. I hit the bank as the first Bule comes round the corner and am across the grass at a speed that would have brought tears to the eyes of my old games master. There’s a fence in front of me but I’m over that like it’s an upturned fag packet and crashing through someone’s back garden. Another fence and then a wall. Down from that just missing a bamboo stake and I branch off at right angles and tip toe up beside a house. Tip toe is the right word because I don’t have any shoes on, remember. Behind me I hear somebody curse and two torch beams bob across the garden and disappear over the next wall. I wait a few more minutes massaging my tortured feet and creep on round the side of the house. There is a door and behind that, I hope, freedom. I press the catch and push. At first nothing, then it suddenly cracks open as if it has just been freshly painted and I nip through like a spurt of flame. Beside me a flight of steps is going up to the first floor but as I step forward, all relieved and relaxed, a face suddenly looms over the side so I can smell the stale booze on the owner’s breath. He shows no sign of fear or surprise to match my own, because he is obviously stoned out of his mind; but I see his eyes weighing up my half-naked body. I could run for it but if he starts shouting, the rozzers will come quicker than a Wop in a warm bedroom. Suddenly, to my amazement, a broad smile spreads across his face and he pats me on the shoulders.
“So, he came home unexpected, did he?” he beams. “I wish I had a pound note for every time it had happened to me. Good luck to you, lad.” And off he goes swaying slightly and chuckling to himself whilst he prods hopefully for the key hole.
Dame Fortune is obviously splitting her face in my direction and as danger recedes so my happily pissed feeling returns as if it has just been hiding away in an odd corner of my body till the trouble blew over. Fresh from the jaws of danger I decide that it is a marvellous moment to go and propose to Elizabeth. Half naked and glistening with dew and sweat I will be revealed in the back garden hurling handfulls of earth against her bedroom window. Crummy Charlton Heston couldn’t do it better – certainly not in my condition. I am so possessed of the strange feeling that I have to go to Elizabeth. It’s like a murderer giving himself up. I feel that someone there is saying, “Right, lad, we got you out of that one, but there’s a condition, see?”
Now the problem is how to get there. Elizabeth’s place is a couple of miles and it is beginning to rain. Wearing just a pair of trousers I do look a bit unusual and not everybody I meet is going to be as pissed as my friend on the steps. It occurs to me, in a blinding flash of inspiration, that if I take my trousers off and run in my pants people will think I am some barmy athlete out training. Trouble is, as I discover when my jeans hit the ground, my pants are still in the flat.
This could be a problem but luckily my guardian angel is still earning her keep because I come round the corner to find she has left a brand new bike there for me. There is no one about and it isn’t padlocked so in no time I’m whizzing away on my errand of love listening to the hum of the wheels and feeling the rain sting my face. Exhilarating is the word for it, I think, and I’m almost singing out loud when I skim to a halt a few houses away from Elizabeth’s place. I prop the bike up against the fence and pad down to Number 47. My feet feel like raw frankfurters but I don’t care and swing my leg noiselessly over the gate. There is not a soul about and the only light comes from a street lamp about fifty yards away. Round the side of the house just brushing against a dustbin lid which refuses to fall – it’s my lucky night, see? – and I’m in the back garden. The rain is falling steadily now and I stand there feeling the wet grass beneath my feet and sucking in mouthfuls of air. I’ve had some good times I think to myself, but I’m not sorry it’s all going to change. I look up to the grey waste of the sky and wonder how I will feel in the morning; what I will say to Mum and what Sid will think about it. Rosie will probably start snivelling and Dad will just shake his head and ask if we intend to move in alongside of Sid, Rosie and the baby. I can see it all. Of course, this presupposes that Elizabeth will say yes, but that is an odds on certainty. The bird has been angling for it since the first time I took her out.
I pick out Elizabeth’s window and go over to one of the flowerbeds for a handful of earth. As I bend down, a cat glides silently along the wall above me and my eye follows it up to the small shed at the end of the garden. Maybe it’s my imagination, but I think I can see a light glowing in the darkness. Perhaps Elizabeth’s old man has forgotten to turn off the lamp he uses in there. As a future son-in-law it is my duty to protect his property so I slope off to see what I can do.
When I get nearer I can see a line of light around the door and am amazed to hear someone talking in a low voice. Even more amazed when I recognise who it is.
“Oh, that was wonderful,” sighs the girl. “I’d no idea it could be like that. You are clever. You’re so clever.”
An ice cold current of electricity surges through my stomach and I try to make myself believe that this is not happening to me. I must be drunk, or dreaming – or anything!
“It’s easy when it’s with you,” the other voice is also known to me and the pain becomes unbearable. “I could go on doing it all night. I don’t know what it is, but you really turn me on—”
“Oh Sid.”
“Liz.”
Now, if I had any sense I’d bite my lip and tiptoe quietly away writing it all down to experience. Sid has done me a favour really. Better now than when we’ve got hitched. God, how bloody stupid can you get? There I was, deciding to give it all up and settle down with this quiet, demure little girl who would make me a good wife and mother, and all the time the dirty little slut is having it away with Sid. There’s no justice in the world, is there? No wonder blokes go off the rails. ‘I’d no idea it could be like that.’ Bloody hell!
“Sid!”
“Oh Liz.”
Bloody hell!!! My howl of rage must be heard the other side of Tooting Bec Common. I go through the door like it’s wet tissue paper and there is Elizabeth lying on her back on the workbench with Sid standing between her legs.
“You bastard!”
“Hey, what the—”
“Oh, no!”
There’s no point in describing it in detail, and I can’t remember exactly what happened anyway. All I know is that when I leave that shed, it is through a gap in the plywood walls which has been made by Sid’s body. Every light in the neighbourhood is on and Elizabeth’s screams suggest a big future in grand opera – provided she can get the fish glue out of her hair – both sets.
I step over Sid and stride away down the garden. Some blokes would probably be able to think of something comforting and profound at a moment like this, but I’m buggered if I can.
THE END
Confessions of a Driving Instructor
BY TIMOTHY LEA
CONTENTS
Title Page
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
CHAPTER ONE
I don’t know how you would react to finding your brother-in-law knocking off your fiancée in the potting shed, but I can tell you that I was annoyed. Not annoyed so much as bloody choked. I mean, what a liberty. My own brother-in-law! The horny bastard who was living in the room below mine at the ancestral home of the Leas in Scraggs Road. It would have broken my sister’s heart. Poor Rosie thought the sun went in every time he pulled up his trousers. But what about me? Why was I being so generous with my sympathy? The cunning of the bitch. All that ‘butter wouldn’t melt between my legs’ innocence. The reproving looks every time I used a four-letter word, her little hand sneaking over the top of her glass after the second Babycham. Well, she certainly had me fooled.
That’s what annoyed me most of all, really. I’d been fooled. It wouldn’t have been so bad if I’d reckoned her as being a bit on the flighty side, but I’d never had an inkling. She’d really made a mug out of me.
I must confess that when I’d stalked off into the night, leaving them clambering out of the wreckage of the shed, I though seriously about going straight home and sobbing the whole story to Rosie. But as I strode through the drizzle and my blood cooled a bit, two things stopped me. One was the praiseworthy desire to spare my sister’s feelings already alluded to, and the other, and much stronger emotion, the fear that everybody in the neighbourhood would soon know that I had been shat on by sexy Sidney, Balham’s answer to the piston engine. If I dropped Sidney in it, he wouldn’t be slow to make sure that everybody in S.W.12 knew that my fiancée preferred him in bed, in a shed, or anywhere, and I couldn’t have stood that. Some of the things I’d heard her whispering to him in the shed fair made my blood curdle; mainly because I had a horrible suspicion that she had never felt like that with me. I didn’t want to think about it, but I couldn’t help it.
Mum and Dad had gone to bed when I got home and I tiptoed up to my attic room and lay there staring at the roof (I didn’t have much alternative because it was about three inches above my head) and wondering what I should do. As is my normal habit in situations like that, I eventually decided: nothing. Apart from Rosie and my reputation, there was the job (Sid and I were partners in a window-cleaning business) and though we went pretty much our own ways, I didn’t want to rock the boat too much there.
The more I rationalised it all the more I put the blame squarely on Liz’s shoulders. I hated her, but at the same time I wanted her more than I’d ever done in the past. Not with any shred of affection, but with a desire to batter her to death with my body so that she died gasping “You are the greatest” with a look of unspeakable contentment etched across her glazed eyeballs. It had been this ability to look on the brighter side that has been my salvation in many chastening situations.
Not that I was prepared to give Sid a book token or anything. The bastard would be dead scared that I’d spill the beans to Rosie and I decided to let him sweat on it. I didn’t hear him come in before I fell asleep and the next morning when I got down to breakfast early, there was no sign of him or Rosie. Dad was sitting there studying his form book and Mum was frying bread. Dad is very working-class because, though he never does anything, he’s always very punctual about not doing it. He gets down to the Lost Property Office where he works a quarter of an hour before they open and then spends forty minutes in the cafe opposite before he strolls in and bleats like buggery about some kid who comes in five minutes late and gets down to work immediately.
“Morning,” I say cheerfully.
“Morning,” says Mum.
Dad grunts without looking up.
“Have you seen your Dad’s Dentucreme?” says Mum. I shudder because I can’t stand false teeth at the best of times.
“I think Sid tried to clean his wet-look shoes with it,” I say.
“Oh, no! You must be having me on.”
“Straight up, Ma. Sid got mad because it took all the shine off and threw it out of the window.”
“Bloody marvellous,” says Dad. “Who does he think he is?”
“You’ll be able to ask him yourself,” I say, as Sid comes in trying to look all relaxed. I am glad to see that there is a lump under one of his eyes and his upper lip is grotesquely swollen. Mum notices immediately.
“Ooh, Sid, you haven’t been in any trouble, have you?”
“No, Mum. Somebody let a swing door go at me. It was an accident.”
He stresses the last word and there is almost a hint of pleading in his eyes as he looks at me.
“Looks as if Rosie has been having a go at him, if you ask me, Mum,” I say. “What have you been up to, Sid?”
“You and Rosie haven’t had words, have you?” says Mum, all worried-like. Mum can’t stand what she calls ‘an atmosphere’ and can remember when Sid came home rotten-drunk and tried to have Rosie on the stairs. This manoeuvre, difficult enough at the best of times and downright impossible when drunk and with Rosie trying to knee you in the groin, resulted in Sid slipping down fifteen steps and nearly doing himself irreparable damage on a loose stair rod.
“No, no,” says Sid. “Rosie and me are fine. It was an accident, I tell you.”
“Of course, I don’t suppose Rosie has seen your face yet, has she?” I say pleasantly. “You came in pretty late last night, didn’t you?”
“I don’t have to clock in, do I?” says Sid, and I can tell he is beginning to lose his temper.
“Come, come, dear,” says Mum, “I don’t think Timmy meant it like that. It’ll be a bit of a shock for Rosie, won’t it?”
“Too true, Ma,” I chip in. “It’s the kind of thing Rosie could get very distressed about.”
“You hadn’t been drinking, had you, dear?” says Mum. “I know it’s none of my business, but I think you ought to look after yourself a bit more. You’ve been looking quite peaky lately. You must get enough sleep if you’re going to be up and down those ladders all day. You only need one slip and that’s your livelihood gone. And with Rosie and, now, little Jason, you’ve got more than just yourself to think about.”
“Humf,” says Dad from behind his paper.
Dad is a first-rate judge of a layabout and has few contenders himself in the over-fifty category. He has always reckoned Sid to be a creep of the first water and not been slow to say so.
“He’s never thought about anyone else in his whole life and he’s not going to start now. You’re wasting your time there, Mother. Any man with a grain of self-respect wouldn’t still be living off his in-laws on the money he’s making. I know what his little game is. He reckons if he hangs on long enough, you and I will snuff it and he’ll have the house. Well, he’ll have to wait a damn long time, I can tell you. I’ll still be sitting here when he’s queueing up for his old age pension.”
“Oh, God! Not again! I can’t stand it at this time of the morning. How many times do I have to tell you? I don’t want your rubbishy old house.”
“‘Rubbishy’. Did you hear that, Mother? The sponging layabout has the gall to call our home ‘rubbishy’. If it’s not good enough for you, why do you stay here then?”
“I’m not staying here a minute longer than it takes me to save up the deposit on a flat. You know that as well as I do. And don’t talk about sponging. You get your rent every week. A bloody sight more than you deserve for this dump. I’m amazed the kid wasn’t born with web feet.”
“Oh, that’s nice, isn’t it? Did you hear that, Mother? Now he’s sneering at us. You’d like oil-fired central heating, I suppose, and a heated lavatory seat.”
“It’s quite warm enough, the length of time you spend sitting on it,” says Sid, and Dad goes on spluttering while Mum clucks away and the fried bread gets burnt. It’s all going very nicely, though it’s getting a bit far away from Rosie.
Luckily the little lady herself makes a timely appearance and immediately drops her lips to give the loathsome Sid his first kiss of the day. In such a position his battered phizog is clearly revealed to her.
“Oh, Sid,” she squeals. “How did you do that?”
“Yes, Sid,” I say, my voice heavy with menace, “how did you do that?”
“I’ve told you once, you berk. Somebody swung a door in my face.” He sounds worried.
“On purpose?” howls Rosie. “How could anybody do a thing like that?”
“Maybe Sid rubbed them up the wrong way,” I say, helpfully. “You’d be surprised some of the things he gets up to.”
I divide my gaze between Sid and Rosie and they stare at me blankly, but for different reasons.
“You aren’t in any trouble, are you, Sid?”
Very good question. Sid swallows hard and is about to open his mouth when Mum decides it’s time to change the subject.
“I thought your Elizabeth was looking very nice the other night,” she says to me. Stupid old bag. Trust her to let Sid off the hook. But maybe I can turn it to advantage.
“I wouldn’t know about that,” I say, grudgingly.
“What do you mean, ‘you wouldn’t know’?” says Rosie, turning her attention away from Sid. “She’s a lovely girl. You should be very glad to have her.”
“Yes,” says Sid, chirping up a bit, “very glad.”
“Depends what you mean by ‘have’,” I say, giving Sid the evil eye.
“I don’t understand you.” Rosie shakes her head.
“Well, Rosie, I suppose I’d better tell you—and you, Mum. You’ve got to know sooner or later—” My voice is trembling and even Dad puts down his pencil and stares at me. Sid’s face screws up like a man threatened with a red hot poker and his mean features plead for mercy.
“I don’t really know how to say this …” Sid pulls back from the throng and his hand dives into his back pocket.
“… but last night I saw Liz and …” Sid pulls open his wallet and points feverishly at a thick wad of notes. My power is total and I can’t resist another turn of the knife.
“It was in her Dad’s potting shed …”
“Her Dad’s potting shed?” says Mum. “I hope you weren’t up to no good.”
“Oh, no, Mum. Not me …”
Sid staggers back against the sink to await the mardi gras, as the frogs call it.
“We had a talk and, well, we decided it wasn’t on.”
“Oh, no, dear. I am sorry to hear that. Are you sure it isn’t just a tiff?” says Mum.
“No, Mum. There’s a number of fundamental issues we disagree on.” (I got that from all those trade union interviews on the telly.)
“Like sex before marriage, I suppose,” sneers Dad, rubbing his fried bread into his egg yolk like he’s trying to clean the pattern off the plate.
“No, we both felt the same about that,” I say, meaningfully, giving Sid’s wallet a hard glance. Sid’s smile is what you might call conciliatory.
“Oh, I am sorry,” says Rosie. “I liked Liz; didn’t you, Sid?”
Sid gulps and nods his head.
“From what little I saw of her.”
Cheeky bastard! That’s going to cost him a few extra quid.
“What do you mean, ‘little’? You two were getting on like a house on fire that night up at the boozer.”
Blimey, I think to myself, even my dozey sister could see what was going on. What a prize berk I must be.
“The course of true love never runs smooth,” chips in Mum. “Don’t be too disappointed. I’m certain it’s not over yet.”
“Oh, I am, Mum. From my point of view, there’s no going back on what happened last night.”
“But how can you suddenly be so certain!” bleats Rosie. “I mean, you’ve been going steady with Liz for months now. You’re not going to tell me that one little row can be the end of everything.”
“It wasn’t so little,” I say with a quiet intensity that would have made Godfrey Winn sound like a fairground barker. “There are some things so fundamental in a relationship that when you stumble across them they spell make or break.”
“I don’t understand what the hell he’s talking about,” says Dad. “You mean you found she was in the family way?”
The stupid old sod doesn’t know how close he is but I dismiss him with a humoring nod of the head and address myself to Sid and his disappearing wallet.
“No, Dad, it’s nothing your generation would understand. I think Sid knows what I mean, don’t you, Sid?”
Sid blushes before my penetrating gaze and nods vigorously.
“Yes, Timmy,” he says, “I had the same problem myself once.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” says Rosie. “It certainly wasn’t with me. We never had a wrong word the whole time we were engaged.”
“I don’t ever remember that you were engaged,” says Dad.
“Now, Dad …” says Mum.
“If he’s going to start getting at me …” says Rosie.
“I’d better be getting going,” says Sid. “I’ve got an early job. I’ll have some breakfast at the caff.”
I catch up with him in the hall. “Oh, Sid,” I say, “I got the impression in there you might be able to stand me a few bob.”