exclaiming grandly: — I might be up for that! Lauren as well, I add. — Fucking is a good way of getting to know people.
Lauren gives me a look that could down a charging bull. — I’m not going to watch pornographic films in a grotty pub with dirty old men, far less take part in them.
— C’mon. It’ll be fun.
— No, it won’t. It’ll be filthy, disgusting and sad. Obviously, we’ve got differing concepts of fun, she ripostes vehemently.
I know she’s edgy and I don’t want to fall out with her, but I’ve a point to make here. I shake my head. — We’re supposed to be studying film? Studying culture? Rab’s telling us that there’s a whole underground film-making culture happening under our very noses. We have to go for it. For educational reasons. And, we have a chance of getting laid as well!
— Keep yir voice doon! You’re drunk! She squeals at me, looking furtively around the pub.
Rab’s laughing at Lauren’s discomfort, or maybe it’s a way to hide his own. — You like tae shock, don’t you, he says to me.
— Only myself, I tell him. — What about you, do you ever take part?
— Eh, naw, it’s no really my thing, he stresses again, but in an almost guilty way.
Now I’m thinking about this Terry guy who does like to take part, wondering what he’s like. Wishing Rab and Lauren were a little bit more adventurous and considering what great fun a threesome might be.
7
Scam # 18,735
I ’m back (finally) in my home city. A journey by rail, which once took four and a half hours, now takes seven. Progress my arse. Modernisation my hole. And the prices get higher in direct correlation with the journey time getting fucking longer. I stick my package addressed to Begbie into the postbox at the station. Chug on that one, head boy. I taxi down to the foot of the Walk, that grand old thoroughfare looking much the same as ever. The Walk’s like a very expensive old Axminster carpet. It might be a bit dark and faded, but it’s still got enough quality about it to absorb society’s inevitable crumbs. Alighting at Paula’s gaff, I pay the comedian of a taxi driver his rip-off fee and meander past the burst entryphone, up the pish-smelling stair.
Paula gives me a hug, lets me into the gaff and sits me down in her cosy front room with tea and digestives. She’s on good form, I’ll say that for her, although she still looks like a road traffic accident on pianny legs. We’re not stopping here long though, nor are we going to Paula’s bar, the famous Port Sunshine Tavern. Too much of a busman’s holiday for her. No, we head into the Spey Lounge for one and I’m at once elated and disappointed to note the absence of kent faces.
Paula toys with her drink, and can’t help letting a self-satisfied smile mould her big slack face. — Aye, ah’ve spent too much time in thon place. Ah’ve goat ma ain life now, son, she tells me. — Ye see, ah’ve met this felly.
I’m staring into Paula’s eyes, and I know that my eyebrow is involuntarily arching, Leslie Phillips-style, but I’m powerless to stop it. However, I scarcely need to provide her with even the flimsiest cue to cut to the chase. Paula always was a bit of a man-eater. One of my most harrowing teenage memories was slow-dancing with her at my sister’s wedding, her hand clasped over my arse, as Bryan Ferry sang ‘Slave to Love’.
— Eh’s Spanish, a lovely felly, his ain place oot in Alicante. Ah’ve been oot tae see it. Eh wants ays oot thaire wi him. Gittin oot intae the sun, gittin this auld lum swept properly, she squeezes her thighs together and unrolls her bottom lip like a red carpet, — that’s whit it’s aw aboot, Simon. They say tae ays, aw thum aroond here, she snorts, including at least the entire port of Leith in her derision, — ‘Paula, yir livin in fool’s paradise, it’ll never last.’ Dinnae git me wrong, ah’ve nae illusions, if it doesnae last it doesnae last. What dis last? Any paradise seems
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