James Kelman - A Disaffection

One has time and one’s time is not, the time that belongs to one, it is not, it has existed. But not now, not longer. I am formerly one of yous and am always one with yous. That is religious.

Yous are all fidgeting because yous are not liking what I’m fucking talking about in this manner that I’m doing it

Yous dont actually like this. This is that yous dont, yous dont actually like. So be careful. Yous’ll have to fucking be careful. Exercise caution. Be honest and truthful and fucking courageous for christ sake dont be cowardly because that’s what they want, what they demand, they demand cowardice, and when they’ve got that off yous then they might deign to drop ye a wee gratuity. Bastards. My life is just an ordinary life. I drink sometimes too much in the wrong way, my belly not being attuned properly or something maybe to do with a lack of an item, food or milk or what. But time recovers itself time recovers itself, when allowed to get on with it, to march unhindered.

People are fidgeting. I just stand here ye see, rocking back and forth on the balls of the heels of my feet which lurk uncovered beneath the socks and the shoes. I continue, even if some of yous are laughing — what at? at fucking stupit puns — but I continue, I continue. I face my fellows and I face my fellowesses, the lassies and the lassieds. All yous wee bastards, deceivers in embryo.

One has drunk and one has spewed, okay, it might have been a bad pint — it happens, especially at dinnertime when some bar owners get their staff to throw last night’s dregs in along with the good stuff, okay. And the floor has dried the floor has dried. I just continue. I see your faces, your faces are smiling now and again. Yous are good wee weans, to some extent. I dont worry. I dont worry. Time recovers itself. I shall be asleep. I shall be without consciousness. I can rock back and forth and back and forth, back and forth and back and forth, and that will be that, and I am healed, the healing having been taking place. It happened to me as a schoolboy and here it is happening to me as a man who is fully grown and is twenty-nine years of age. I have walked into the classroom and looked upon ye. I am healed. There is a dringing, a dringing. This is the period ended. So what happens now. Dismissal.

The exits are soon to be open and the ways lie ahead, ahead.

Patrick was going to go home because going home is best. To be alone and without gods is death says Hölderlin but Hölderlin was wrong and is a poor bastard. Patrick is not a poor bastard. He strolls. He is lost in thought. He is deep in the province of inner psychomachinations. Weans are puzzled. They do not zoom. They are quietly there, they are awkwardly there, their feet shuffle, but not for long not for long, this being ten minutes to four and liberation is upon them thus their interest wanes. But there are teachers who are looking, whom I am not seeing, being lost in thought etcetera etcetera and I stroll on in fast time, a straight line, down the steps and outside, across the carpark, wherein the motor. But not to get in not to get in not to get in not to get in and the faces all fucking looking and the two polis as well over by the gates and fucking looking what are they fucking looking at the bastards the fucking bastards because the key get the key get the key in the fucking lock and come on now calm down just fucking calm down and insert the long bit in there, and turn it clockwise, click, click click. Doors aye open. That’s what doors are for, to open. Come on now, just take it fucking easy else you’ll bang into the gatepost for christ sake. But his hand was shaking he was so cold, his body having lost so much of its heat and also the actual temperature seeming to have dropped to something approaching zero once more. It was as if Glasgow had become a form of antichthon. Hot water bottles. He was looping the belt and plugging it in to the bit where it goes, the seatbelt lock, shivering but gaining control, getting his arms to stiffen, his hands affixed to the wheel. He would not crash into any fucking gatepost. He switched on the ignition and the engine started first time. He revved it, seeing the clouds of exhaust in the rearview mirror, some elderly weans scowling at it, and there too was Alison. There she was. That was her there, and walking; on her tod and walking, along the driveway, handbag swinging, looking so fine, so fine. She was there. He let down the handbrake, clutch up and the motor was moving, steadily it would have appeared but his hands were clinging onto the steering wheel for dear life. He would be into bed soon. He would be into bed so quickly that maybe even he would be wearing his clothes, maybe not even bothering to get them off, being so tired and not having to worry about what folk might think since there he was alone and not answerable to a soul, to no bastard, he could just get into the house and bang shut the door and throw himself under the blankets. Ah, bliss. His mind shutting, his mind just shutting, his memory, all of it going, a formalised system, a theorem of sleep. A loud screech. A taxi, it nearly crashed right into him. The driver was sticking his middle finger in the air, angry and sarcastic at the same time. Patrick had swerved without warning. The taxi had had to brake, the anchors flung on, an emergency stop. Its nearside wing only about nine inches from him. Patrick waved an apology because he was definitely in the wrong but the taxi driver just glowered at him because of course you’re not allowed to make a silly mistake in this man’s Glasgow. I willni apologise twice!!! thundered Patrick to himself reassuringly. He wound down the side window, getting some icy air in on his face. He was going to give up driving. Driving went with teaching. The idea of stopping it there and then. Just getting out and grabbing the chattels chattelus and running like fuck, or no, just sidling off round the corner, avoiding the curious stares from the passersby passersbeelzebub. And no fucking wonder either for christ sake when you come to think about it because here you have a car that’s fuckt, a vehicle that is no longer sound insofaras motor vehicles are thought to be articles of motion or the term motor vehicle is scarcely to be regarded as valid, as true, as something one can verify by simply walking roundabout its outer bloody damn bastarn fucking perimeter, that’s if you can crawl out the bloody damn door without its fucking metal hinges grinding your eardrums to death, to death, literal death, the head and shoulders stiffly in the coffin as the church shutters close and the fingers of fire come swooping down to clutch you ever inwards, into its all-cleansing flame.

You must continue. You must see it through. You have got to pull oneself together and fight like fuck to arse your way clear of trouble.

Okay?

Yes. Aye. I’m just breathing deeply in an attempt to clear the head. I’m aware that by increasing the intake of oxygen into my skull, my brain — the way it works, the way it carries on without cracking — that the intake of oxygen, the prerequisite

A mammoth queue, at the entrance to a shoe shop. There was a SALE!! BIG REDUCTIONS!! And your man needed a pair of dancers you’re darned tooting. He settled the car at the kerb opposite. He strolled across the road. The last man in the queue looked at him as if to say something. He was dressed in a fawn trenchcoat and a tweedy bunnet or kep as they used to say here in The Land of Heather probably around the time Grandfather Doyle’s old man was toiling at whatever the fuck he was toiling at. And then again, this guy in the trenchcoat with a really thin face, a really thin face. But what the fuck’s up with a thin face!

Thin faces. What do we say about them. Is there something to be said about them, thin faces.

No, there’s eff all to say about them, because maybe I’ve got one myself and if so I’ll report ye ya racist fascist bastirt. Let me see: