Ugly Puggly 76

Molly made toast, but she’d only brown bread which was like cheating at breakfast, and eating low-calorie cardboard because it was good for you. Being a woman, she didn’t eat anything but sipped her green tea and looked superior even in her nightgown with the top of her breasts almost peeking out.

That was the difference, if my penis had slipped out of my boxers, she’d had chided me for being a pervert. I didn’t complain about the nylon trampoline material pressed around the curves of her bosom, but about Dave and it was a familiar rant.

‘If yev fuck aw to say, yeh shut up. That’s whit we got told when we were a kid. Yeh, don’t go on Facebook and Twitter and Instagram and that other thing—whit’s it called, Tikky Tok—and start greetin. I chewed on cardboard as she ignored me. But I wasn’t finished. ‘He’s callin himself a widower, noo—he’s never been fuckin married.’

Her shoulders shook as she giggled. ‘But he’s got millions of followers noo. And he’d happy. He’s talkin about the environment and global warmin. All the things that were important to Ugly Puggly.’

I left the last slice of toast on the plate, but it was mocking me. I picked it up and chewed on the end of it. ‘It’s like that baldy bird, innit?’

She glared at me and I knew I’d said the wrong thing. I frowned as I tried to remember the singer’s name. ‘She was Irish, and aye greeting tae.’ Then it came to me. ‘Nothin Compares 2U.’

‘Oh, Sinead O’Connor.’ She seemed to be relieved as me that we’d figured it out. ‘Yeh, Dave did a version of that too.’ Molly’s hands joined together and sat on her belly as if in prayer, and she exposed her knees. ‘His version was…phew.’ She nodded her head, searching for the words. ‘It was really good. I think he might get a record deal.’

‘Aye,’ I admitted. ‘It was no bad. But that’s no the point. Yeh, cannae be sheddin tears like a baby in a bathtub. And huv everybody searchin for somebody they don’t know and don’t gie a toss about, if yeh hink he’s already deid. And ur callin yersel a widower. And postin endless pictures of yersel dancin about like a half-naked fuck-wit in yer Y-fronts.’

She leaned forward.  ‘Go tae yer work and shut up. He’s jist a kid. Kids believe in their dreams. You belief in nothin, but yersel and yer ain selfish needs.’

I pushed the plate away from me and stood up. ‘You mean I’m a normal guy?’

‘That’s whit I said.’ She’d a self-satisfied smile on her lips. ‘Normal for you.’  

I pecked her on the lips as I passed on the way out. ‘I’ve got a meetin the night, I’ll no be in tae later.’

AA was like American Nazis. You were white or you were black. Every other colour was a sham. I didn’t tell wee Jim about the half-lager shandy I had a lunch time with my cheese sandwich, or the way I bounced out of the pub blinking into daylight as bright as the puggy machine, because it didn’t mean anything and he wouldn’t have understood. It wasn’t as if wee Jim and me were friends. Not in the way me and Ugly Puggly were mates. But I did my duty and went to the meeting and talked the usual shite.

Molly had been cooking and the house smelled of tomato soup. The playboy was in my chair at the telly. He looked up at me and offered a smile. But his fingers flowing over the buttons on his phone were no longer dates or sexual assignations. They were meeting online to save the world, and to find Ugly Puggly. Somehow in his head they seemed connected.

Crusty bread acted as filler. I broke off a lump and chewed at it with my molars. I rubbed my eyes and scratched at my chin. I dissolved into sitting on my mum’s lap and her feeding me, bite by bite.

I’d like to have strangled those that had taken Ugly Puggly with my bare hands. But I knew I was a coward and they would have strangled me. I dipped my bread into soup the colour of blood. And I counted the minutes and hours to I could come up with an excuse and go for a drink to calm my nerves. The truth was I was cowardly. I’d let him die in my place.

The playboy finished tapping on his phone. He glanced over at me and then his phone rang. He sprang up, striding out of the room as he answered and talking as fast as he typed.

‘The soup alright?’ Molly asked.

Raising my head, I half-smiled and dipped another piece of break in the bowl and started chewing. I nodded.

She slipped into the seat in front of me. ‘How’d the meetin go?’

‘Aye…it was good.’

‘Good,’ her face impassive, she took the serrated breadknife to the sink and placed it in the basin.

‘I might need tae go oot later.’

Like an animal sensing danger, she stopped and turned her head to listen.

I tried to make a joke of it. ‘Aye, I’ve a few thing tae pick up.’  But she wasn’t laughing.

The playboy swept back into the room as if he was out of breath. ‘Yeh need tea gie me a lift,’ he’d his phone in his hand as evidence. ‘I think somebody has seen Howard. We need tae go and speak tae them.’

‘Where?’ Molly asked.

‘Not far,’ Dave tapped his phone. ‘Drymen. They said they seen him jist walkin doon the main street. I showed them the picture. And they said it was definitely him, but he was dressed funny, in some kind of Highland costume as if he was in a film.’ Then he shrugged. ‘Well, as definite as they could be.’

‘That’s pretty far,’ I stood up and patted my belly. ‘Yeh no better jist tellin the police and lettin them deal wae it?’

He held up his phone to show me where they stayed. ‘It’s no far on my phone.’

‘Aye, but we’re no travellin by phone. We’re travellin by van. And it’s aw backroads. Dark. Nae street lighting. No easy tae get tae.’

His head sunk and he sucked in his breath. He looked at me, his eyes teary. ‘I’ll get a taxi.’

‘I’ll drive yeh,’ Molly jerked out her arm and held out her hand. ‘Keys?’