Irvine Welsh - A Decent Ride

TERRY HAS BEEN thrust into a new universe, a gelid, brutish space, where the hostile incursions of others are laid bare. He drives around Edinburgh’s rain-blackened streets, wilfully distracting himself from everything bar the automated movements of driving the taxi. The road signs, the brake lights of the car in front, the lane changers, he gives them all the novice driver’s grinding attention. He tries not to think of sex, nor of his condition, but those two contradictory topics surface intermittently in his fevered mind. He fights their intrusion, driving around town, ignoring instructions from Control, sex texts from Big Liz, and blind to threats of being taken off satellite, as he carries on past the outstretched hands of fares he can normally smell streets away. And when Connor calls him up to do business, he is lukewarm.

Sometimes he forgets when the cab is occupied. Only a glance at her small figure in the rear-view mirror, sitting back in the seat, reminds Terry that he’s dropping Alice off at the hospital again. He sadly laments how women like his mother were always hoodwinked by wasters like Henry. At the Royal Infirmary he waits downstairs in the coffee bar, a call purring in on his mobile. The number is a long one, conjuring up exotic images of foreign women bagged at Edinburgh Festivals past. Despite his medical issues and the pills that he’s started taking, Terry instinctively hits the green. To his chagrin, it’s The Poof. — Vic. . didnae recognise yir number thaire, mate.

— Aye, ah got a Spanish mobby cause ah might be here a wee while longer. Nae bizzies been hingin aboot the sauna?

— No that ah kin tell, Vic. Terry rises and moves towards the exit doors. — But ah ken that some ay them use the place. Ah’ll ask the lassies. . subtly, likes.

— Good man, Terry, The Poof says gruffly, then his voice dips. — Ah cannae say this tae Kelvin, cause the lassies tell him nowt. They dinnae like him.

Terry remains silent, but thinks: they dinnae like you either, ya cunt .

The Poof asks Terry about the sauna. Terry informs him that it’s all good, but that Jinty is still missing. — It’s like she’s vanished oaf the face ay the Earth.

— Fuckin hoors. The Poof’s tones briefly fracture, before he adds in more measured timbre, — She wis a good earner. She better no huv went ower tae Power’s place. Track her doon, Terry.

— Ah’ve been oan the lookout, ay, Terry says, glancing out at the rain-lashed car park. He moves one step sideways, opening the automatic doors. Another step back closes them.

— Track her doon, The Poof repeats, adding the ingredient of exasperation. — She’s goat tae learn that ye dinnae jist walk oot on me wi nae fuckin explanation. Ah dinnae dae business that wey.

Maybe it really was time, Terry considers, to stop thinking of Vic as ‘The Poof’. — Okay, Vic, ah’ll dae ma best.

— That’s aw ah kin ask, mate, but if ah ken you that’ll be mair than enough. Loads ay faith in ye, The Poof says ominously, then hangs up.

Terry isn’t easily intimidated by nature. He’s faced down many jealous husbands and boyfriends in his time, crossing men whose destructive passions had driven them to the point of madness. But The Poof, this one-time figure of abject contempt, now places a chill in him, and he allows himself a guilty shiver.

As he lets his foot move to the side, the door opens again. Then, from the corner of his eye, he sees that somebody is watching him. It is a small, thin man, his hair sparse on top, but sticking out prominently at the sides. It is Jinty’s boyfriend, the wee half-brother he’d seen in The Pub With No Name. He is probably in to see the auld cunt upstairs, Terry considers.

Jonty moves over to Terry. He places his foot forward, making the sliding doors open. Then close. Then open. Then he looks up at Terry. — Ye pit yir fit one wey, they open. Ye pit it the other wey, they shut. Aye sur.

— Sound, Terry nods.

Jonty makes the doors open and shut again. From a distance down the hall, a man in a security guard uniform frowns. He moves towards them.

— Open. Shut, Jonty says.

— Better stoap, mate, ay. Here comes the boy.

— Aw, Jonty says. — Will ah leave thum open or shut?

— Shut, says Terry, taking Jonty by the arm and pulling him closer. The security guard stops a few feet away, his thumbs resting in the belted waistband of his flannel trousers. He contemplates them for a second, then turns and heads back to his desk. Terry breaks a sparse smile. — You’re Hank’s wee brar, ay?

— Aye sur, Jonty MacKay! That’s me. Aye sur. Aye. Aye.

— I’m Terry. Terry Lawson. I’m Hank’s big brother, well, big half-brother.

Jonty looks agog at Terry. — Does that mean you’re ma brother n aw?

— Half-brother, aye. But dinnae git too excited, it’s no exactly an exclusive club, ay.

Jonty seems to grow downcast at this consideration. — They ey sais thaire wis others, aye they did. Muh ma n that. Aye sur, aye, aye. Others.

— Plenty, mate. So ye git called MacKay?

— Aye, cause ah changed it, like Hank n Karen, ma brar n sister, whin muh ma went wi Billy MacKay. Aye sur, Billy MacKay. Penicuik. Aye sur. But ah’m really John Lawson.

— Sound, says Terry. — So you’re up tae see him then?

— Aye sur, ah am. Ye gaunny see um?

— Mibbe later, pal, ay.

Jonty nods at this, and prepares to take his leave. — See ye, Terry! See ye, pal!

— Awright, mate, Terry smiles, watching him go.

So Terry waits for Alice, lighting a cigarette from the pack he’d taken from the golf club bar last night, after Ronnie had defeated that sweaty golf pro on the final hole. He’d stopped eight years ago. Thank fuck the doctor said nothing about tobacco and drugs, though it’s probably reasonable to assume that with a serious heart condition, ching, in particular, isn’t a great idea. In the event, realising his weakness, and noting the raptorial gaze of the security guard, he crushes out the cigarette halfway through and, thinking of Jonty, opens the doors, flicking it outside. He makes eyes at the vending machine for the best part of ten minutes, resisting a bar of Cadbury’s Dairy Milk, before his mother appears. Alice looks frail; it is as if Terry is seeing her for the first time, and he feels impelled to take her arm, which she brushes off.

The doors swish open as two girls walk into the hospital. Even through the erection-crushing bromide pills they’ve given him, Terry can feel a root insinuating. To Alice’s surprise, he turns away to face the wall.

— There was this funny wee guy up there, Alice says, her mouth puckering in distaste, — he kept peeking in through the window, but he wouldnae come in.

Terry nods as they walk across the car park in a dull drizzle of rain. — Aye, ah saw him earlier. Wee Jonty’s his name. Another yin ay they bastards that auld cunt knocked oot eftir eh ditched you!

Alice cringes visibly as Terry opens the cab door for her. She climbs in and he gets into his seat, starting up the engine and pulling away. He is lost in a single thought: I WILL NEVER HAVE A DECENT RIDE AGAIN. It is some time before he even hears his mother’s voice. — Terry! Ah’m talking to you! Ye no even gaunny ask how eh is?

— Ye telt ays that the cunt’s dyin, so ah’m assuming still shite.

This has the desired effect of stopping Alice in her tracks, but the way she wilts into the unforgiving cab upholstery induces a spasm of guilt in Terry. His mother sadly ponders, — It disnae look like it’ll be long now.

Terry can’t spare a single beat of empathy or regret for Henry. The extent of his hatred for the man, even now, shocks him. He is more than happy to drop Alice back at Sighthill. As she gets out the cab, the rain now stopped but the sky still overcast with black cloud, Alice says sheepishly, — Donna wants tae go in and see him. Tae show him Kasey Linn.