31 Falkner Street (3)

Chapter 3

‘Fuck off you prick, you something-about-mary prick!’ Jo screamed at a man standing with a can in his hand.
‘Something what prick?’ I asked.
‘Look at the state of his hair, fucking, fucking all stuck up at the front like that bird in something about mary’ She shouted again, and started cackling, clearly impressed with her joke. I got the impression that it was one she had used a lot. I hoped that she didn’t start saying things about me or my hair, I feared I may cry. I was shocked when the man responded by calling her Janice Battersby, in reference to her shaved head. Jo began cackling again. I was shocked, I thought that she would hit him or something. He appeared to be her favourite, and also appeared to be called Paddy as that was all we heard for the next half an hour...’Paddy, listen!’, ‘Paddy, you prick’ ‘cackle, cackle’. To be fair to Jo, I suspected that Paddy did seem to be a bit of a prick. One of those nice-ish looking, arrogant, sleazy types. He also looked like he could be much nicer looking without his sunken eyes and too-much-gel.

Ian, who was like Jo’s lap dog, sitting in pride of place next to her and laughing along with her crap jokes, seemed to take a bit of flak from her. Not endearment flak like Paddy was getting, but all ‘lazy bastard, go home’ stuff. Why wasn’t he saying anything back, was he scared of her? She was wearing a man’s purple shirt with purple three quarter length pants and looked like a plum on account of her being – and there’s no polite way of saying it – hugely obese. I mean, every step looked like a struggle, like she had to heave her whole body. I wondered how she could be on £100 of speed a week as she was telling me she was, there was no way you could be that size on that amount of speed.

David came out with a spliff and was immediately pounced on by most of the gaggle outside. Ha. I happened to have seen previously that he was very stingy with his weed and could see the pained expression on his face as he was forced by the rules of neighbourliness not to deny access. I could see that he would be spending the rest of the year lying to all the neighbours about having any, which obviously meant that he would be forever holed up in his room, plumes of smoke escaping through the bottom of the door.

The door of number 20 was opening and Les tottered across the road in his pressed pants, shirt and jumper. Really, why go to all that bother of pressing sharp creases into your pants if you’re going to leave a trail of piss all down them? There was a chorus of ‘alright Lesleys!’ Which he didn’t seem to be impressed by. He was straight up to Paddy, wagging his fist at him and effing and blinding. What had Paddy done? It seemed to be something do to with him and his housemates laughing at him the night before. I got the impression that Paddy lived with the two girls I had seen in the paddling pool – Stacey and Nina – and this ‘Harry Potter’ boy. Couldn’t see any of them anywhere.

‘...when you broke my fucking ribs, you little bastard!’ Whoa, whoa – what was that? This Paddy lad had broken an old man’s ribs? Disgusting! I said as much.

‘you broke his ribs?’ I was appalled. Paddy wasn’t pertubed in the least.
‘not on purpose, he was kicking off and I shoved him back into his house, then he reckoned I’d broke his ribs.’
‘you DID break my ribs you aul cunt!’ Les’s eyes were nearly popping out of his head. Me and Laura looked at each other, in a what-are-we-associating-with way. I was shocked that no-one was berating Paddy, they didn’t look bothered by it at all. In fact, they were shushing Les. As in, ‘shut up you stupid old man’.
‘He deserved it. He is a right one sometimes when he’s had too much and he was kicking off. He probably broke his ribs bouncing off the walls and falling down when Pad put him back in his house.’ Ian said.

‘Yeah, and I’ve got daughters older than all of ya’s, and they’ll come up here and see to you all, just wait’. After a pause he added ‘And I’ll see to ya’s myself! One to the left, one to the right, goodnight, god bless’. Les began wheezing and laughing, his hand clasping a glass of lager, sovereigns on every single finger.
Was this another one of those arguments which wasn’t? Seemed like it, as Ian got shooed from the camp chair to make way for Les and everyone carried on taking the royal piss out of each other.
Les didn’t appear to be scared of Jo like some of the others were, but those two screaming and shouting at each other wasn’t a good combination and was all anyone could hear then.

I thought to myself tentatively, he doesn’t seem like someone in their 60’s...before this point the only men in their 60’s I had ever enountered had been nice old men who didn’t swear and shout constantly, and talk about rude things with much younger people. Having said that, it did give him a bit of a comedic factor and I liked him. Even if he didn’t quite grasp most of what people were saying, and would then become infuriated by people making sarcastic comments, calling them thick. I didn’t think it was anything to do with dementia etc, just the drink.

At about 2am, I went inside to get another drink (David’s), and came back out to find Les in a struggle with another man of about his age, down the road. Although Paddy and Ian had already separated them, Les was screaming blue murder at the other man who was calling Les a crazy bastard. I heard ‘one to the left, one to the right, goodnight god bless...you cunt’. Ooh, what had happened? No-one really looked injured. Everyone was pissing themselves laughing and Les got taken home – although I must stress, not shoved through the front door – and went quite willingly and in good humour.

It was the next afternoon when once again, the campers were out in full force. Les was dropped off by a taxi at the end of the road and was trying to suppress a grin.
‘What did they say then?’ Anna shouted to him.
‘I’ve only gone and got a bleeding ASBO haven’t I! An ASBO at sixty-fucking-six!’
They all burst out laughing.