James Kelman - A Disaffection

And so he continued on.

Okay.

But his teeth were chattering. Mind you, the sleet had long ago stopped falling and the windscreen was good and clear, the wetness having given it a great clean. And the fucking engine believe it or not although this is definitely disbelievable if anything is, the engine sounded beautiful, of a crazy nostalgia of a sound. And why the fuck shouldnt it be healthy I mean for christ sake he had it fucking serviced less than three months back so’s it would get him through the winter. Regular servicing is one of his better habits. He even used to play squash! Nowadays the occasional game of table tennis. Perhaps after all it really would take him across the border. His teeth chattering once more. A distinct manifestation of the existential leap. Here he goes, into the vast unknown. Hang onto your hat! He will not do it. He’ll never get beyond the outer reaches of greater Glasgow. Such a thing is scarcely possible. He has always lacked a certain bon vivre, a certain affirmatio, a certain

Patrick Doyle, drove right out of Glasgow, late that Friday evening. He had decided to visit his old pal Eric who teaches in a technical college somewhere in the East Neuk of Anglia, not too far from the sea, where he has a boat. And upon awakening tomorrow morning Patrick would knock the fucking boat and bid adieu, continuing ever onwards, south to Dover thence Calais, Paris, Marseilles, Aragon, Barcelona, Pamplona and a quick stop off at Guernica just to see what’s what.

Ah christ Pat, call it a day. Away you go home. But look, just eh

And slow down slow down; the car moves too fast, far too fast. He has been driving as if to keep abreast of the high-and-dry fast movers on the outer lane. That is always pointless, especially in an elderly vehicle.

There were no lights now. It was sudden and it was dark. And the peace! It was so bloody quiet! He was beyond the boundaries, beyond the outermost motorway route to Stirling and Perth. He was on the M74 and heading south, south, south to the English border, home of the Auld Enemy, now curtailing the speed to a steady fifty-two m.p.h., which gave time to think and reflect, time to become accustomed to the blackness, of using the headlight beams. Eric would be glad to see him. And it was high time he re-established contact. It was bad of him not to reply to the letters the guy had sent. It really was bad. And then never having met his wife. She was probably beautiful. Eric was quite lucky with women. He used to get into ‘scrapes’ with them, these occasions where he was involved with more than one woman at a time. This lassie called Mary Busby who used to in Patrick’s opinion humiliate herself because she knew Eric had the other involvements and she would just more or less wait for him to finish. Patrick used to talk to her until one day he realised that she actually didnt like him. My christ! That was a terrible feeling that. And it was fair enough because she had recognised he was patronising her — Patrick had been patronising her. He hadni realised it until that very minute when he could see she hated him. Fair enough. The trouble is of course it’s not nice having people hate ye. It’s actually horrible. Once or twice it happens with schoolweans. Not too often thank christ because it is not good.

So little traffic around. The weather was pretty bad of course. Plus it was that quiet time between 8.30 and 10.30 in the evening. Just wait until the pubs closed and all the fucking idiots emerged from here there and everywhere, zooming, zooming — the headlights way miles behind then suddenly at your back and passing, passed, away now in front, the red dots, over the brow of the next hill.

The humming of another big articulated lorry. They all seemed to be enjoying this lull as well; a real peace and quiet; and when they passed and indicated Patrick flashed the headlights in reply, enjoying their double blink of acknowledgment, the drivers settling back into their own daydreams, putting forward their plans for the future and reflections on the past, where they had gone wrong and how come here they were where they were, at this moment in eternity, driving down the M to A74, towards the latter end of what had been a fairly depressing winter.

But it hadnt been too depressing. There had been a nice couple of things. And Fiona Grindlay of course who was in sixth year and given birth to that wee baby then had stayed on at school and without divulging the name of the father. That was good. And a couple of nice arguments with the fourth year that no matter how sentimental gave him a wee glow — a bit like your first sip of whisky when that whisky is a fine single malt, a nice thick one from the Inner Hebrides, and you’ve just come in from a slog across the hills, maybe even a climb. Which is what Patrick would wish for himself just now, right at this moment, he would wish himself into a small friendly hotel whose bar stayed open till the last customer left, and Patrick wouldni leave, he would remain forever. But it would be something very special being in such a place with a woman you really fancied. The thick peats burning in the fireplace, having to avert the face slightly from the fire because it is so hot. And a nice pint of draught beer on tap and maybe a nice sort of late meal to come, with a bottle of cool wine, then upstairs to bed, but even lingering say, if it was with Alison for instance, being relaxed and cheery the way sometimes he could be with her, maybe looking out and seeing the bluishblack of the sea, the solitary lighthouse beam flaring away to the southwesternmost point, a couple of seconds interval, making its own pause, allowing the two folk to settle into it, that kind of tranquillity, that rhythm. She did have the knack of getting him calm, making him calm himself, getting him to calm himself, and become towards his best. And his best could be fairly amusing in not too loud a fashion — quiet asides. They could be sitting up in bed doing it. Doing what? Pat chuckled. He shook his head. He had been sitting back in the normal driving position but he sat forwards now, the rain having begun again, and quickly came streams of it down the windscreen and he had to shove the wipers onto motorway-action, awaiting the next turn-off. There was only one thing worth bothering about and that was the truth of the matter what was the truth of the matter was the truth of the matter ‘love’; love, was that it? Love? Love. That was it out in the open now. He was in love with Alison Houston. And he wanted to grab a hold of her. If he didnt grab a hold of her bad things would happen.

So, what was to do? What was he to do? He laughed — a sniggering kind of guffaw. But no wonder! So, what to do? One of those romantic carry ons? stealing her away from under the nose of everybody — her and her husband sitting there watching the telly and the door goes and when it gets answered, in bursts Patrick and he shouts, Okay Alison. Coats on! That’s us, we’re leaving.

Leaving?

Aye, right now.

What about my husband.

Fuck him.

And she gives Pat a huge smile, but very somehow underplayed at the same time because she is saving the main bulk of it for when they are alone. She rushes out the room to pack her stuff.

Dont waste time, says Patrick, we can hit the department stores first thing in the morning. The department stores. It sounds like something out of a Hollywood picture. Patrick shook his head but he was grinning. He had to remember and concentrate though because the road conditions were abysmal, really abysmal. And sitting hunched forwards like this aye made you stiff and cramped, stiffened shoulders and cramped back muscles, down at the small of it, the back, at the foot of the spine. He felt exhausted. An actual physical sensation of acute tiredness, as if even just shutting the eyelids for ten seconds would genuinely help matters christ just ten seconds. Being able to stretch right out! The legs and the arms and wrists, the fingers — instead of this having to drive nearly pressed right into the windscreen with your face in the glare and getting that cold blast from the demisters somehow hitting the crown of your head, never a good sensation although it can keep you awake and alert when you are driving and you shouldnt be driving because you are too tired to be good at it, too exhausted to actually