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  I’m thinking about how unnatural it would be to be good at handjobs, thinking about men’s cocks, and soon McClymont is finishing up. Lauren has pages of notes on the Scottish diaspora. Ross, the ‘American Scat’ in front of us is probably hard as a rock in his Levi’s as he scribbles, filling pages with tales of English cruelty and injustice. We snap shut our folder rings in concert and rise. As I leave, McClymont catches my eye. That owl-like face. Stupid. I don’t know what the ornithologists say, but the real bad-birdie experts – the falconers, the hawk handlers – all of them will tell you that the owl is not wise, it’s the thickest out of all the birds of prey.

  — Miss Fuller-Smith, can I speak to you for a minute? he says starchily.

  I turn to him and push the hair from my face and tuck it behind my ear. A lot of men can’t help responding when you do that: virgin offerings. That act of pulling away the bridal veil, of opening up. McClymont is a cynical, wizened alcoholic therefore perfectly programmed to respond. I stand a bit too close to him. It’s always a good idea to do that to fundamentally shy but predatory men. Worked a treat with Colin. Worked too fucking well.

  The permanently startled dark eyes under the glasses ignite further. That thinning, electric-shock hair seems to rise half an inch. The ridiculous shoulder-padded suit fills as he involuntarily puffs out. — I’m afraid I still haven’t received your second-term essay, he says, a slight leer in his voice.

  — That’s because I haven’t done it. I’ve had to work at nights? I smile.

  McClymont, who is either too experienced (as he would have you believe) or his hormones are too depleted to have his cool blown for too long, nods sombrely. — Next Monday, Miss Fuller-Smith.

  — Nikki, please, I grin, tossing my head sideways.

  — Next Monday, McClymont humphs and starts to tidy up: his bony, knotted hands stiffly tugging at his papers and cramming them into his case.

  To win at anything requires persistence. I persist. — I really, really, really enjoyed the lecture? I beam at him.

  He raises his head and gives a sly grin. — Good, he says curtly.

  I flush with this small victory as Lauren and I head for the refectory. — This film studies seminar group? What’s the talent like?

  Lauren frowns darkly as she considers the potential hassles ahead, all the possible visitors to the flat; the ones who may be untidy, the ones who may ponce, the potentially unruly. — There’s one or two that’s okay. I usually sit next to this guy Rab. He’s a bit older, maybe about thirty, but he’s awright.

  — Shaggable? I ask.

  — Nikki, you’re terrible, she says shaking her head.

  — I’m a free agent! I protest, as we down our coffees and make our way to the class.

  The tutor is an intense guy with long hands. His spindly frame and round shoulders twist him into a posture so perfect for gazing at his navel. When he talks it’s in a soft, low southern Irish accent. The class is underway and we watch a short Russian film with an unpronouncable title on video. It’s nonsense. Halfway through it, a guy in a blue jacket with an Italian label comes in, and nods a curt apology at the tutor. He smiles at Lauren and raises his eyebrows, and slumps into the seat next to her.

  I glance at him and he does back at me, very briefly.

  After the lecture, Lauren introduces him as Rab. He’s friendly, but not gushing, which I quite like. About five ten, not overweight, light-brown hair, brown eyes. We go down to the union for a drink and talk about the course. This Rab’s not the sort of guy who immediately stands out in a crowd, which is strange because he’s quite handsome. It’s a very conventional handsome, however, the type you fuck between serious boyfriends. After a beer he heads to the toilet. — He’s got a nice arse, I tell her. — You fancy him?

  Lauren shakes her head in a dismissive pout. — He’s got a girlfriend and she’s expecting a kid.

  — I didn’t ask for his CV, I tell her, — I just asked you if you fancied him.

  Lauren nudges me quite sharply with her elbow and calls me daft. She’s a puritanical girl in a lot of ways, and seems a bit out of time, as in old-fashioned. I love the almost translucent skin she has, the hair scraped back and her glasses are really sexy, as are the precise dainty movements of her hands. She’s a slender, graceful and self-contained nineteen-year-old, and I sometimes wonder if she’s ever had a serious boyfriend. By which I suppose I mean, I wonder if she’s ever been fucked. Of course, I’m far too fond of her to tell that I know that she’s adopted those feminist politics because she’s basically a small-town prude who needs a good shagging.

  She habitually goes with this Rab lad for a drink, to talk film and moan about the course. Well, now this is a ménage à trois. Rab’s got that world-weary, I’ve-done-it-all-before aspect to him. I think he likes Lauren’s maturity and intelligence. I wonder if he fancies her, because she likes him, you can tell a mile away. Well, if it’s maturity he wants, I’m almost twenty-five.

  Rab returns and sets up a round of drinks. He tells me that he works in his brother’s bar as a means of raising extra cash. I tell him that I do sauna work some afternoons and evenings. He’s intrigued at this, as most people are. Cocking his head to the side, he gives me a searching look, which totally changes his face. — Ye dinnae . . . well, eh, you know . . .

  Lauren puckers her thin little mouth in distaste.

  — Sleep with my clients? No, I just bash them, I explain, making a chopping motion with my hands. — Obviously, some will proposition you, but it’s outside the agency’s official terms and conditions, I lie, spouting the party line. — I did . . . I pause for a second. They both look so open-mouthed in anticipation, I feel like a granny reading a bedtime story to a couple of innocent waifs, and I’m nearly at the bit where the big bad wolf is about to make an appearance. . . . — I did give one sweet old guy a handjob one time, after he started going on about missing his dead wife. I didn’t want to take two hundred quid from him, but he insisted. Then he said that he saw I was a nice girl and apologised profusely for putting me in this position. He was so sweet.

  — How could you, Nikki? Lauren bleats.

  — It’s okay for you, love, you’re Scottish, you get your fees paid, I tell her. Lauren knows that there’s little she can say about that, which suits me fine. The brutal truth is that I give loads of handjobs, but it’s not something you’d do for anything other than money.

  5

  Scam # 18,734

  I was prepared for Colville, thanks to Tanya’s notice of the cunt’s behaviour. He had been wanting to get rid of me for a long time and now the wanker had the chance. Of course, I wasn’t going down without a fight, and for the past year I’d been well acquainted with the insides of Chez Colville at Holloway.

  He’d wait until the end of my shift, of course. It had been a quiet night. Then Henry and Ghengis had come in with a few boys and they were all pretty pished. There had been some row with another mob and they were all chuffed in victory, swapping stories and the like. There was talk that Aberdeen and Tottenham had teamed up. — Wouldnae like to be in that company, who the fuck would pay for the drinks? The fuckin barman probably, I laugh, and some of the boys join in. I’m holding court, pouring quite a few nips on the house, because I feel my reign here is coming to an end.

  In a way it’s sad, it’s been a second home, a way in, a place to meet the kind of people I always seem to meet, but it is limited. It’s time to move on. You never win by working in places like this, you’ve got to own one. From the corner of my vision, Lynsey appears and winks at me, as she prepares to take the stage.

  Aye, it’s all plastic, chrome and pristine fittings but you can still smell the stale fags and spunk in the gadges’ flannels, the lassies’ cheap perfume and the watered-down beer and the sick desperation amid the bonhomie.

  Lynsey’s got the right idea though, far too sussed ever to be a victim hanging around in a place like this after her fuck-by date. She’s careful never to show the punters the contempt that
a smart, educated young woman like her must feel for them, and, I suppose, for me, although we all love to entertain the notion that we’re different, that we have our own unique take on all this tack, our own special redeeming irony. She is different though, and she’s got the right idea. She’s done a few stag vids, got her own website, to get her name known, and now she just packs them in, at this lap-dancing lark. Not a pimp boyfriend in sight and her engaged smile turns into detached ice whenever you overstep the mark. She’s playing nobody else’s game but her own and therefore she’s no good to me.

  Pity. Watching her up there, doing that athletic pelvic thrust which would send a crack-shag hoor like Tanya into intensive care, I trace those sunbed thighs up to that silver mini as studiously as any paying punter and I’m thinking that a search for one of Lynsey’s vids has to be on the cards.

  Sure enough, at the end of the shift Dewry comes up to me with that school-sneak idiot grin on his face. — Colville wants to see you in his office, the repugnant bastard nearly fucking sings.

  I know what this is all about, and entering the office, I sit in the chair opposite him without being asked. Colville’s slitty eyes dart around in that wan, mendacious face, looking at me like I’m pond life. He slides an envelope across the table. There’s a stain on the lapel of that stupid grey jacket he wears. No wonder she . . .

  — Your P45 and backpay, he explains, in that cringing voice of his. — As you’re still two weeks short of your 104 weeks’ tenure we don’t have to pay you compensation for your dismissal. You’ll find it’s all above board. It’s the law, he grins.

  I look earnestly at him. — Why, Matt? I ask, feigning injury, — We go back a long way!

  Nope, the stare isnae working; Matty-boy’s face remains impassive as he slides back in the chair and shakes his head slowly. — I’ve warned you about your timekeeping. I need a head barman who’s going to be here. More importantly, I’ve also warned you about that fucking little whore friend of yours coming in here and propositioning my customers. She even tried it on with one of the Old Bill the other week, he nods again in disgust, and I hear a little snicker from Dewry, who’s enjoying this as much as Colville.

  — They’ve got cocks as well, or so I’ve been told, I smile at him. Once again I catch a faint chuckle from behind me.

  Colville sits forward, his coupon set in serious mode. This is his show and he doesn’t want it upstaged. — Don’t be fucking smart, Williamson. I know you think that you’re it, but you’re just another ten-a-penny Jock scumbag from Hackney as far as I’m concerned.

  — Islington, I say quickly. That last bit hurt.

  — Whatever. I expect a head barman to do my business here, not to use this place as a front for his own sordid little activities. All sorts of rubbish are hanging around here now; whores, petty criminals, football thugs, porn merchants, drug dealers, and you know what? It’s all been in the last two years, since you started here.

  — It’s a fucking lap-dancing club, a fuckin strip club. Of course you’re going to get some dodgy characters around. We’re in a sleazy business! I protest angrily. — I’ve brought some loyal paying customers down here! People who spend!

  — Just fucking go, he points to the door.

  — So that’s it, I’m sacked?

  Matt Colville’s smile grows even wider. — Yeah, and as unprofessional as it is of me to admit it, I’m enjoying this.

  I hear another snigger from Dewry behind me. It’s time. I raise my eyes and look directly into his. — Well, I suppose now’s the time to come clean. I’ve been shagging your wife regularly for about eight months.

  — Whaa . . . Colville looks at me, and I sense Dewry freeze in shock behind me, then he makes a hasty exit, coughing some kind of excuse. Colville’s stunned into speechlessness for a second or two, but after a tremor, a slight, wary smile creases his thin lips. Then he shakes his head in a contemptuous loathing. — You’re really quite a sad case, Williamson.

  — I’ve done awright as well, I say, ignoring him. — Check the statements on her Visa card. Hotels, designer clathes, the lot. I finger the Versace shirt. — No oan the money you pey, pal.

  There’s another spasm of fear in his eyes, but it’s replaced by scornful anger. — You sad bastard. You really expect me to get wound up by your nonsense? It’s pathe . . .

  I stand up, and as I do, I pull out the Polaroids from my inside jacket pocket and throw them onto the desk. — Maybe you’ll get wound up by this. I was keeping them for a rainy day. Worth a thousand words, eh, I wink, turning and departing with dignified haste out his office and across the bar. A wave of anxiety powers me to a trot when I get into the street, but nobody’s followed me and I’m laughing loudly through Soho’s backstreets.

  As I walk up Charing Cross Road, there’s a bit of a comedown as it hits me that I’ve lost my most regular source of income. I try to balance this with the loss of the hassle, making a pros and cons list, thinking of the opportunities and threats presented by the new situ. I head back across to Liverpool Street on the Central Line and take the overland to Hackney Downs. We halt at the Downs and I get out, looking over the wall at the platform into my own back window. I can practically touch the manky glass. There’s so much grime, grease and dirt on it, it’s impossible to see inside. Those Great Eastern Rail cunts should fucking well pay to have it cleaned, it’s their shitey diesel trains that fuck it up. On my way out of the station I take a new GER timetable, fresh out today.

  Back in the gaff I look out from the front window of this bedsit that estate agents love to call a studio flat. That’s the English for you: ridiculously pompous to the last. Who else would be grandiosely deluded enough to call a scheme an estate? I’m huntin, fishin, shootin Simon David Williamson from Leith’s Banana Flats Estate. Looking down, I spy a young mum with a pushchair outside the chemist. The bags under her eyes tell me that she could have been a model, for Samsonite, that is. They also tell me that I’ve come five hundred miles south to live in fuckin Great Junction Street. Suddenly, the building shakes and rattles as an express train roars past the back window towards Norwich. I check the clock: 6.40, or 18.40 as those rail wankers call it. On time.

  Whenever you can, you fuckin well invest. That’s what I was trying to tell Bernie the other day, even though I was too wired to get it across properly. That’s the key; that’s what marks out the winners from the losers, distinguishes the real business heads from the mouthy barrow-boy-made-good twat, who bores the arse of you in the papers and on the telly, telling you how they’ve always been a ducker and diver and all that shite. You always hear the so-called success stories trumpeted in the media, but in the real world we know that they’re the tip of the iceberg, because we see the failures as well. Stuck in a bar next tae some arsehole giein it the big one about how if it wasn’t for those cunts, that slag, these arseholes, they could’ve been in clover, blaming everybody else but themselves for buying into the lie that you simply blag your way to the top. Bernie had better watch, cause he’s starting to sound exactly like one of those wankers. Cause that shit only lasts for so long, then you have to look at your pile and invest it (if you’re lucky enough to have one) before you spunk the fucker away. Then it’s back tae the whingein old pub bore of what-could’ve-been, or worse, the crack pipe or the old purple tin.

  I need something to invest, and now I’ve got to go and see Amanda, that cold cow who has loads and loads to invest, and who still fucking well sucks me dry.

  Aunt Paula’s proposition, which I almost laughed at down the phone – nearly just started sniggering in the poor old doll’s ear – well, it just gets better all the time.

  Duty calls though, and I’m up through a tortuous route of bus and train to Mandy-I-came-and-you-did-all-the-taking’s place in Highgate, picking up the laddie and giving her the forty quid per week that just vanishes into that hole in the boy’s face. For, make no mistake, the kid is fat. The last time I took him up to Scotland to see my mother, she said in that Eyetie-Scots a
ccent: ‘He’s-ah jist-ah like-ah you at that age.’ Just like me at that age; a fat kid who bruises easily and is porky – porky prey to the thin, mean serpents of the playground and the street. Thank fuck for puberty and hormones and their deliverance from fat hell. Maybe my ambivalence towards him is due to the fact that the poor wee bastard does remind me of a younger, less cool self. But I can’t believe I was ever like that. It’s more likely to have come from his fat Jew bastard of a grandfather: on her side, of course.

  Now we’re trudging around the West End, en route to Hamley’s to choose his Christmas present. Of course, the gig has long passed; now we’re into January-sales-greed frenzy. I gave him vouchers on the basis that the concept of freedom of choice should be learned as soon as possible. Amanda has kept them back, insisting that I accompany him as he makes his selection. We’ve not been walking that much since alighting at Oxford Circus, although it’s nippy, but the wee cunt complains, hangs back, rubs at his legs. A vid-game slug, he’d rather be at home indoors on the PlayStation. Even at this festive time of year, I’m as much of an imposition to him as he is to me. As we go in, I continue my pusillanimous attempts at conversation, hoping that there’ll be some fanny around the shops to leer at.

  That’s the problem with winter: the lassies are too wrapped up. You don’t know what you’re getting until you get it back home and open it up, then it’s too late to take it back. Christmas. I check the white phone for messages first. I always give out that number to women I haven’t shagged. Then the red mobile, for the second-hand goods and the green one for business. Nothing.

  The shops and the crowds and carrying lots of rubbish around soon begins to get me down. As for the kid . . . there’s no connection. I try. Not a great deal, but as much as is within my capacity. It’s a shift to put in, for us both, I expect. At the end of it, I’m bloated and greasy on junk food and totally skint, and for what? Parental duty? Social interaction?