Chapter 3 - Pitside Social

Pitside Social Club was deserted. Apart from a couple of guys playing snooker, Hugh and Kenny were the only customers.

“You coming to the committee meeting tonight?” Andy, the bar manager, asked Hugh.

“Yeah, I suppose so.”

“Another drink?” asked Kenny.

“One more and then we’ll go.”

“And there was nothing then?” said Kenny, asking about the suicide bid.

“Not a thing. My mind was a blank!”

“Maybe you just haven’t done enough,” said Andy as he poured the pints.

“You’re right Andy,” said Hugh. “I’ve no job, no prospects and not much of a past.”

“You ever thought of getting a job?” asked Andy. Andy asked this question to as many people as he could. Working in Pitside Social Club consisted of mixing with a group of people who for the most part had never worked a day in their lives. Despite this fact, most of them complained about their lot. What did they expect? Why did they think that the state owed them a better quality of unemployment? It was understandable two generations back when Pitside Colliery had closed. The village was abandoned without hope of any replacement employment. No new factories or office blocks were ever going to be built in the middle of a Lanarkshire moor that looked like a moonscape on a good day. But now, two generations later, what were people waiting for? The local council had put on a subsidised bus service to Hamilton in the hope that Pitside would become a commuter village. After a few years of running empty buses, they had put on a bus to Glasgow, deciding that there were more opportunities there and that, perhaps, people didn’t like having to travel via Hamilton. This, however, was no more of a success than the Hamilton service, and now two buses ran in and out of Pitside every day, only occasionally troubled by paying customers. So, Andy’s quest to ask everyone in Pitside if they had ever thought of getting a job continued. It made no difference and had become a kind of catchphrase that everyone took as a joke.

“Joking aside,” said Hugh, “I’ve got to start a ‘Back into Employment’ training course tomorrow. If I don’t go, my benefits get cut.’

“So, that’s why you tried to kill yourself,” said Kenny.

They all laughed.

“Right,” said Hugh, “What are we doing next?”

“Dunno,” said Kenny. “What do you think?”

“Not sure,” said Hugh.

Andy retreated to the store room to change a beer barrel. The sound of two Pitsiders trying to work out what to do with their time was more than he could bear. By the time he had finished and come back through to the bar they were still at it.

“Do you want to go and visit the headless virgin? We haven’t done that for ages,” said Hugh.

“You won’t be able to vandalise it,” said Andy. “It’s much better protected now.”

“Oh really,” said Hugh sceptically.

“Yeah,” said Andy. “But I’ll tell you what. Why don’t you take that as a challenge? You can tell me how you get on tonight at the committee meeting.”

“Let’s go Kenny,” said Hugh.

Chapter 2 - West End Morning

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Rob was woken up by his dream. In it he was frantically searching for a toilet. Every so often he would find one and begin to urinate. He would then realise it wasn’t a toilet at all. As was always the case when he had these kind of dreams he was vaguely aware that it was a dream and eventually thought to himself, have I wet myself? Rob felt the sheet he was lying on in a circling motion and was relieved to find no damp patches. He got out of bed and found a real toilet. It felt good to finally urinate after so many frustrating attempts. 

Looking in the mirror he saw puffy eyes and dishevelled hair. No drink tonight, he decided. He was glad Lisa was at work. By the time she came back he would be respectable looking and he wouldn’t have to endure another lecture. He shuffled his way downstairs and poured himself a bowl of Sugar Puffs, emptied the remains of the coffee machine into a cup and heated it in the microwave. Sitting at the breakfast bar he flicked on the TV that Lisa had recently had installed. It was a ceiling mounted plasma screen. He had been sceptical about it at first but he had to admit it was good for hangover mornings when every movement was painful. All he had to do was get to the kitchen and everything he needed was within a few steps.

Rob thought about the previous night and shook his head. Everything was a fight these days, from what to have for dinner down to what time they went to bed. Rob didn’t see why they had to go to bed at the same time but Lisa felt as though he was undermining her career by staying up to watch a movie.

“I’ll keep the sound down,” he’d said.

“But I’ll know you’re up.”

“And?”

“If we’re a team we should do things together.”

“Fair enough Lisa, I shouldn’t have had a Pot Noodle for dinner before you came in, but sleeping isn’t really in the same category. Once you’re asleep, you’re asleep. It’s not really doing something.”

“I’m working tomorrow!” she shouted.

“I’m not,” said Rob.

“Exactly! You don’t work, you don’t do anything. Where’s the future in that?”

And that, he had concluded, was the problem as he drank his beer and eat his macadamia nuts whilst watching Apocalypse Now. It bugged her to see him doing nothing. Why do busy people get so annoyed by other people doing nothing?

Now, in the cold light of day he admitted to himself that he had drunk more beer and eaten more nuts than he had planned, probably out of spite. Just before heading off to bed he had taken down the gold discs from the wall of the cinema room. It had been Lisa’s idea to put them up and Rob had never been comfortable with them. He felt like an African dictator wearing a shirt with a self-portrait on it. He was embarrassed to have people in the room as a result, which irritated him because he loved the room and enjoyed watching movies with friends.

Rob’s review of the previous night was interrupted by a mobile phone advert on TV. A boy and a girl appeared on a split screen. She walked through cold grey streets of a British town, he walked in sunshine. The two scenes merged in the middle with them holding hands. They both held mobile phones and talked and laughed with each other. The soundtrack was a simple keyboard accompaniment and Rob singing.

I can still hear your voice from five thousand miles away,

I can hear the sound of rain on a warm summer day,

The line from Johannesburg is absolutely clear,

But all I keep thinking is I wish that you were here.

Rob hit the breakfast bar with his middle finger, ‘Ka ching,’ he said. “I am working even when I’m not.”

Four years after it had appeared on the band’s last album the song was making him money all over again. I’ve got a great future behind me, he thought to himself. Pleased with the line he stored it away for his next argument with Lisa.

Chapter 1 - Pitside Mornings

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Hugh had a belt round his neck when he opened the door to Kenny. It was looped through the buckle and pulled tight like a choker. Kenny wasn’t sure what to say about it, so he said nothing.

“Are you coming for a pint?”

“Yeah, okay,” said Hugh, stepping out of the house and closing the door behind him. Hugh loosened off the belt and then started to loop it through his jeans as they walked.

“That hurts,” he said, rubbing his neck.

“It can be dangerous you know!” said Kenny.

“Of course it is”

“Was it any good?” asked Kenny, clenching his fist and shaking it as if he was masturbating.

“Oh, right,” said Hugh. “No, it was nothing like that. I was trying to kill myself.”

Kenny laughed, “You had me worried for a moment there.”

“What do you think I am? Some kind of pervert?”

“Well, you’re not called Shagger for nothing!”

“That’s a matter of opinion,” said Hugh.

Thirty minutes earlier Hugh, Shagger to all who knew him, had decided that he had had enough of life and all that it had to offer him. He made the decision to try and kill himself. He was, however, only going to try. He had no intention of succeeding. The idea was to go as close as he could to the edge and see how it made him feel. He had some vague notion that his life would flash before him and that he would then find, amongst the trail of memories, a long forgotten reason to go on, something which would give him both direction and enthusiasm. He made a noose out of a belt and then threw the loose end over the top of the living room door. He then shut the door over to keep the belt in place and by relaxing down off his toes tightened the noose. Unfortunately Hugh only had two belts. The better of the two was real leather but had a large eagle motif as a buckle. This had a hook for securing the belt, which made it impossible to create a self tightening noose. The other belt was a cheap patent look plastic belt which came free with a pair of black polyester trousers that he once bought for a funeral.

As he relaxed down off his toes, the main flaw in his plan became apparent. The belt stretched with the weight of Hugh’s body. The noose did tighten enough to partially restrict his breathing but he was in no danger of having to pull back from the brink of death. He could have stood there all day without coming remotely close to passing out.

As Hugh stood there, deflated by the situation, his attention drifted to the TV in the corner. Hugh’s TV was switched on in the morning and stayed on all day, whether he was actually watching or not. The TV was treated very much like a radio, on in the background with Hugh dipping in and out of programmes. At that moment some daytime magazine was on. It was presented by a greying ex children’s TV presenter. This presenter had replaced another ex children’s presenter who had been sacked after it had been revealed that he was having a cocaine fuelled affair with his fiancé’s mother.

The presenter was either gay or sexless, which pretty much amounted to the same thing as far as Hugh was concerned. There he was interviewing a woman who taught pole dancing as a fitness activity. She was dressed in a diamond studded bikini and he was interviewing her with no more excitement that he had spoken to the previous guest, a grandmother who had just completed her fifth charity walk to Machu Picchu.

The recent history of daytime TV was flashing before Hugh’s eyes instead of his life. Daytime TV was Hugh’s recent life. At that moment he heard someone at the door. It was almost 11am. It would be Kenny looking to go for a drink. Hugh pulled the door forward to release the belt and ended his suicide bid.

Introduction - To a Mars Bar

Picture by Annette62 on Flickr

Hail, chocolate covered fondant bar,
Greatest confection near or far,
Above them all you take your place,
Bounty, Snickers, Milky Way.

Wrapper torn, from your body,
Dipped in batter, then you’re ready,
Deep fat fried, until golden,
Cut in two, the centre molten.

Scotland wants no healthy snacks,
Fruit and veg will be sent back,
If you want to be held dear,
Deep fried Mars Bars raise a cheer

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Cousins Rob and Hugh live in the land of Burns, where deep fried Mars Bars have replaced Haggis as the local delicacy. Despite the different paths their lives have taken, they are both stuck in a rut of their own making.

Things are about to change though, as Hugh tries to solve his problems, and sees Rob as the answer.


Picture by Werewegian on Flickr