Mick Wall - A Good Night Out

Her dark, once blonde hair was dreadlocked and now thick and stale as old rope. He yanked at it like a horse's rein and forced her head up so that she appeared to be gazing at the cheesy old poster of James Dean tick-tacked to the wall above the bed.

“You like that?” he said, giving her an extra shove with his loins.

“Um… yeah,” she said unenthusiastically.

Neither of them were enjoying it but the situation demanded it. The speed and whiskey and beer and wine and endless joints demanded it. The copy of Lou Reed's 'Transformer' that played over and over in the background demanded it. Side two. He must have heard 'Goodnight Ladies' three times already. But still he couldn't quite come.

He carried on sawing away, his cock becoming softer and softer. Eventually, he gave up and flopped over onto his back, his chest heaving.

She didn't move, just looked over at him.

“What's the matter?” she said, almost spitting the words at him. “Don't you like girls?” Then she let go a long, mouldering pussy fart. That shut her up.

He looked up at her, now leaning back on her haunches and hitching her black bra back into place. How had it come to this? Once he had had a nice girlfriend. She would come to his parents' house and they would disappear to his room together. The first time it had been a cold day and so they had put the little paraffin heater on. After that, it became like a ritual. Even on a warm day they would light the little paraffin heater and turn the dial down to Low, then hop into bed together. It felt magical, warm and wonderful. It felt right.

This, he decided, reaching over for his cigarettes, did not feel right. This felt wrong. He felt wrong. When did it happen? How?

She stood up and began putting the rest of her clothes on, her back to him.

“I want you to go now,” she said over her shoulder.

He looked at his watch. It said 3.13 a.m.

“I can't go now,” he said, trying a smile on for size. “The trains are all finished and I haven't got the dough for a cab.”

“GET OUT!!” she screamed, turning to face him. “GET OUT OR I'LL CALL THE FUCKING COPS! YOU TRIED TO FUCKING RAPE ME!! GET OUT!!!”

He nearly shat himself. It was like something out of a horror movie. He jumped from the bed and into his jeans. He got the rest of his stuff and flew out the door. She stood there like a vampire denied its blood, her eyes ablaze with fury, pointing at him with one long, heavily-ringed finger, her witch's mouth quivering.

“GET OUT!” she screamed. “AND NEVER COME BACK AGAIN!!!”

She slammed the door behind him and a dog began to bark somewhere else in the building. He was in a high-rise in Ladbroke Grove, he didn't know which one, they all looked the same, and as usual the lift was broken. He finished putting his gear on then tiptoed down the five flights of stairs.

That's what you get, he thought, for allowing yourself to be dragged home by some desperate drug slut. He already knew that, though. So why had he allowed it to happen -- again?

Because it was better than going home, he realised with a shudder. It was cold out there tonight. Fucking cold, and he pulled his thin bomber jacket tighter around him. Maybe home is where the heart is if you happen to have a nice home, he thought dolefully. His home wasn't a nice one, though. Not anymore. His home was hell. The old man drunk, asleep on the couch, the smell of stale tobacco and Guinness farts hovering over his prone, disfigured form like a radioactive glow. With three brothers there was no place to hide, either. He shared the 'big' bedroom with two of them, him on the tent cot, the other two in the bunks, while Patrick, the five-year-old baby of the family, had the small box room to himself, poor lucky little fucker…

Ladbroke Grove at that time of the night scared him. He wasn't prejudiced but there were too many black faces lurking in the dark, making his white face stick out like the moon. Like a target.

He pondered the question again as he made his way briskly up the long hill leading past the tube station and up towards the Uxbridge Road. When did I allow myself to become a target?

When you started getting into taxis with strange girls, a voice said. The voice was right.

Why did he do that? Even now, knowing what he knew?

Because there was nothing else to do, the voice said. Nothing he could think of.

He kept walking. He was about halfway there when the car juddered to a halt in the road beside him. Two guys -- two big fucking guys -- jumped out and grabbed him, pushing him up against the shop window. One guy was black; one guy was white. A multiracial mugging, he thought idly in that mad mid-moment between outright surprise and total fear. That's a kind of progress, too, isn't it?

He didn't have time to think of anything else. The first good knee to the groin saw to that. The long and incessant rain of blows and kicks, spits and curses, that followed only brought the curtains down quicker. He had already taken his last bow long before his assailants had rifled his pockets, found the few coins he had in there, yanked the cheap gold earrings bleeding from his ears, then jumped back in their car again, whooping.

Now the car had gone and his unmoving body was left facedown on the pavement, a pool of brown blood seeping out onto the curb. His mind wasn't all gone quite yet, though, and he wondered vaguely what was supposed to happen next. It was a shame, a bloody shame. It had been a good night out until then…