What a Load of Rubbish by Martin Etheridge Page A

windows; the sun’s reflection had turned them into mirrors. Behind those mirrors dark forces were at work. Forces that sought to take the efforts of hard working human beings, like Malcolm, and replace them with the precision of mindless machines, in an attempt to save money.
    Gisele watched through the window as her “liddle” Malky trudged through the gates of the council depot – a broken man. She did not like this at all. Since they had been going out stargazing and moon-watching together, she had become more and more attracted to this chap. She could feel his pain. And that hurt. Her Malky was always so slick, so forthright and proud. Her Malky was always so clean and smart – with a bit morecrackle than the average live wire. That was the Malcolm who had practically marched into the office this morning. But it wasn’t the Malcolm who slouched out of the depot gates, his head down – his hands in his pockets…

Chapter 7
Malcolm’s Wallow/Gisele’s Despair
    So that was that then. At forty-three years of age, that’s only three years after when life begins for most people, and faced with year upon year of unemployment, Malcolm found himself on the scrapheap. Mere flotsam on the sea of life. It did not take very long at all for him to begin to feel worthless.
    Depression is a terrible thing, you know, and it went hand in hand with that feeling of worthlessness; he did not feel as though he mattered anymore and nothing else did either.
    Suburbiaville Town Council did not waste much time repossessing his unwieldy barrow but it wasn’t done openly during the day, and he was notpresented with the “chitty” he signed in exchange for it all those years ago. Instead Mister Eckerslike sent a couple of heavies round to Malcolm’s shed; well, one was heavy, the other was a bit thin and scrawny but just as violent. And told them to, “Gerrit o’er t’town’s Museum of Antiquities!” Where it was displayed on a podium with a plaque which read: “Tools of the street cleaner before the great days of total mechanisation.”
    â€œâ€¦And if that Tilsley feller gets in t’way gi’ ’im a thick ear – yer ’ave my permission to gi’ ’im a good thumpin’, I said yer ’ave…” But Willy did not have to repeat himself; the two hoodlums were relishing a bit of breaking and entering with the added possibility of a bit of violence. Luckily Malcolm had the television volume turned up full blast watching an Australian soap opera until he felt quite ill. He did not hear the yobbos break into his shed or who knows what would have happened.
    Along with that barrow, Eckerslike’s heavies had managed to gain possession of his trusty pooperscooper, Malcolm’s prize possession. Normally the device would have been kept under lock and key in the safety of Malcolm’s flat, but following his abrupt dismissal, feeling rejected and empty of all other emotions he had left it in its quick-release compartment on the barrow, left the shed doorunlocked and gone to watch the Aussie soap opera on television. This made him even more depressed so when the credits came up, he sat there transfixed and sulked for days.
    As well as the idyllic Willowy Lane, the surrounding area and Suburbiaville’s less desirable areas there was, too, the totally undesirable area. This area was a huge, so far undeveloped piece of land on the far reaches of the town. It was the home of undesirables, down-and-outs and those who were down on their luck or those who had, somehow, fallen foul of society. It was the sort of place that parents of Willowy Lane told their children to avoid. And the sort of place that children went to for “a dare”.
    This was the place where local factories, small time businesses and a couple of larger concerns could come and “fly-tip” their rubbish, ditch their dangerous chemicals, without fear of being caught and