Luck in the Greater West by Damian McDonald Page A

wine then?
    â€”No, no, it’s all right.
    â€”Please? she laughed, bending her knees in mock frustration.
    â€”Okay, but ya really don’t have to.
    â€”Red or white?
    â€”Um, red. The cheapest. Honestly.
    He rubbed his stomach, maybe nervously, under his T-shirt, and she saw the trickle of hair running from his navel into his jeans.
    â€”Okay, well, I’ll see you soon, Patrick, she said, and backed away.
    â€”Okay, bye, Sonja. Nice to see ya well, too.
    â€”Thanks.
    She hit the bottom of the steps and suddenly thought that maybe she’d left too quickly, like a schoolgirl. Maybe she should have stayed a while more, extended the conversation. But then, Patrick did seem to be a man of few words.
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    People he didn’t know always seemed to drive him to politeness. Now he would have to accept a gift from this girl, which would have to lead to more politeness, which made him a little uncomfortable. But as he sat back down on his two-seater, and sifted some heads and tobacco between his thumb and index finger, he realised that the polite exchange he’d just had was more satisfying — he could still feel a lingering burn of endorphin — than the unchanging lump of words he and his mates (customers) dropped at each other’s feet.
    Someone knocked on his door. Westie, after two sticks and a half-weight.

SEVEN
    It was a risk, driving around in an unregistered 1979 particoloured — thanks to several transplanted panels — Commodore with bulk drugs. He only felt this on his third pick-up though, because he was only just beginning to get over the authority that went with driving again. It was probably more of a risk walking with the drugs anyway. He picked them up from Ronnie’s place. And Ronnie got a quarter oz — which he sold — for letting Whitey use his place for the exchange.
    Waldo, who always brought along his dog, was — at least as far as Whitey knew — the source of the drugs. The heeler-cross sat and examined his fleas and the damage they’d done to his sheath. He relaxed everyone. Helen mimicked the counting and weighing, right down to the dipping and licking. And the ignition and blowing-out-the-window of the bong smoke.
    Waldo and the heeler were happy. One drunk and speeding, the other thoroughly content. Ronnie stood with his beer, maybe ready to run — if there was a cop-knock. Whitey drank, because the freshly opened case on the floor looked so inviting, with its photograph of a crisp-looking, perpetually full beer bottle. Theylaughed about school. But Whitey didn’t really remember Waldo from those days, except that they’d both shared unfortunate acne and an English class. There were no laughs between them then. But now, there was micro-capitalism. Laughs of the small-businessmen.
    Waldo left after a phone call from his missus filled him with doubt and his speed hit visibly skipped a beat. Whitey and Ronnie drank the rest of the case with speedy, flared nostrils. And were amazed at each other’s power of chemically sharpened mimicry of mutual acquaintances.
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    Afterwards, he dropped Ronnie at the bottleshop, but Whitey had to get back to Brunei because of the promises weighed and bagged under the back seat of the car.
    The act of getting drugs from the car to the flat had to be covert, but the best he could manage was an outdated sports bag. The bag was quickly dropped and unburdened, the stash of drugs replenished in their various locations in the toilet/laundry. Not so much hidden from a bust, but from customers. Pot in the toilet-brush holder; goey under the twin tub.
    He dropped another fingerful of speed, then tidied up. Clothes, dishes — which made him realise that he hadn’t been eating for the last couple of days. And he wouldn’t eat today. Hot doubt rushed with the speed of speed through his chest — a side effect of the drug he could never get used to. But someone knocked, a bit