Ross Raisin - Waterline

Could ye have put it out at any time, anything ye can mind? Well, the vacuuming, maybe. See I had a wee twinge doing under the kitchen table no long back. And that was that. Decided. She’d took a bad back. All ye can do is rest it up a few weeks and do nothing — let the man of the house get acquainted with the vacuum for a while, eh? They’d all had a chuckle at that. And he did do as well: vacuuming, cleaning, ironing, with her sat laughing at him the whole month until they went back in when she couldn’t stop coughing.

He can’t shut the thoughts out now. He presses his forehead hard against the wood, as if to fight against them, but it’s no use, it doesn’t help. And see if he did put a claim in then the reminders would be there the whole time — for months, years, however long it took — and even that is still ignoring the main thing: why should he get a windfall? Him that brought it into the house and handed her the overalls to wash and here’s two hundred grand, pal, take it, it’s yours — you deserve it.

The head is crawling. Stupit. He looks over at the bottle and not only has he wrecked his head, he’s also wasted half the whisky rations. No very wise, but there you go, it’s no the end of the world; which, in fact, isn’t looking too bad this morning: the sun streaming in onto his legs through the small grubby window. He lies there awake a time, listening to the sound of things outside. Birds. A door closing. A distant radio. And all the while playing his toe around something soothingly cool and damp that it’s probably no wise investigating what it is.

Anyway, up and at it. He goes to the kitchen, where he takes off his shirt and trousers and gives himself a wash from the sink. He dries himself with the one remaining teacloth, puts the clothes back on, and makes himself a pair of boiled eggs and a slice of toast for cutting into soldiers. Nothing like a boiled egg for a hangover. Except when he lops the heads off he finds he’s done them too long and they are gone solid, so he scrapes them out with a teaspoon instead. He needs to go into work the day, get some shifts. It’s unavoidable. The longer he leaves it the less they’ll want him, and anyway he needs the money.

He stays sat in the kitchen a long time trying to force himself up. But he can’t do it; he isn’t ready. It feels too much — anyway he looks at it, it feels too much, even bloody getting there, christsake, even the prospect of that is bringing him out in a sweat. The morrow. He’ll go the morrow. Rain or shine.

The nights are getting colder. He goes in the house and up the stair one afternoon for more blankets, a fresh shirt and trousers and a jumper, an action that proves a pure effort of will in itself even, just drumming up the balls to go into the bedroom. And the whisky is long finished too, which doesn’t help matters.

After three stops, he starts to relax a little. Nobody is noticing him. They’re on a different planet, these people, with their earphones plugged in, or just staring out the window. Even when Bertie the workshop mechanic gets on, it’s fine, because he’s stood in a spot near the back of the bus from where Bertie can’t see him, two dozen armpits and raw razored faces in the way between. It’s pure illogical but. He’s going to have to see him soon enough, he knows. And Bertie’s alright, anyway. He’s a rare auld ticket in fact, always in there with a joke or a wee story to keep everybody amused. Mick watches him through the armpits. Even Bertie is away with the fairies this morning, it seems, dreaming up something or other, a funny tale to tell the drivers.

He lets Bertie get a way up the street ahead of him, and follows on behind. The stomach is something jittery getting when he turns onto the lane, but there’s nobody about and so he goes straight in the office, a shabby small space set into one corner of the workshop, with a plywood divider on one side, and a computer desk and Lynsey in her headset on the other. She’s typing something and doesn’t notice him when he comes in. Her face concentrated on the screen, clabbered with make-up.

‘Mick,’ she says, looking up.

‘Hello, Lynsey, how’s it going?’

‘Fine, Mick, fine.’ She is uncomfortable seeing him, it is obvious enough. Doesn’t know what to say. That makes two of them, well.

‘I spoke to Malcolm. He said to come in.’

‘Did he? He’s no told me anything.’ She looks at her screen a moment, then back at him. ‘He’s gone out just now, I don’t know when he’s due back. Will I give him a call on his mobile?’

‘No, no, that’s fine, Lynsey. I’ll wait for him a while just, if that’s okay?’

‘Aye, if ye like.’ She smiles, and he tightens up, ready for it, but then she says, ‘There’s Bertie about somewhere, and a couple of the drivers. Go have a wander. I’m sure they’d like to see you.’

He looks at the divider. The sound of an engine from in the shop.

‘If it’s alright I’ll stay here for now, if I’m no disturbing you.’

‘Naw, it’s fine. Don’t worry. Ye sure ye don’t want me to give him a call but? See I don’t know when he’ll be back and he might be a while.’

‘It’s okay, thanks.’

There is a chair on the other side of the office, and he goes over to sit on it. He stays there a moment, looking around, noticing the gap beside the divider that looks into the shop. He gets up again, Lynsey glancing at him from her desk, and he walks over to a metal cabinet, on top of which is a paper. He stands reading it, or looking at it anyway. The corkboard on the wall beside him is pretty empty. Normally there would be a long list of accounts and pre-bookeds on there, but there’s only a few names scribbled on, under the yellowing page-three girl who’s been pinned on that board for over a decade.

‘I might nick to the shops a moment actually, Lynsey, while I’m waiting.’

She keeps her eyes on the screen a few seconds before turning round.

‘Whatever ye like, Mick, that’s fine. I’ll tell Malc ye’ve been by, will I?’

‘Do, please, Lynsey. I’ll be back in a wee while just.’

He leaves the office, giving a keek into the workshop as he turns toward the lane, where he can see Bertie, chatting with Steve and a young-looking guy that he can’t see the face of.

Crapbag. He’s a genuine crapbag and no other word for it.

He is in a bar near to work. He came in because it looked quiet through the window, and he was just wandering about, no sure where to take himself. Crapbag. These are his friends, christsake; well, if no exactly friends then his co-workers at least and that’s something, sure that means something. Even now, it does. And no like they don’t have their own problems to deal with. Steve, with the wee daughter’s illness; Bertie, and his troublesome relations with the drink. Sure Bertie would be good for a patter; if there’s one thing he’s got still, it’s his patter, even if he’s lost the rest. Amazing to think now, how he used to be. The figure he was forty years back almost, during the work-in. A five-foot queerie with jug ears — no way anybody would ever have thought he could hold a crowd the way he did — but when he was stood up on his brazier with a hundred black squad around him, he’d have the whole yard in his spell. The high wheedling voice, beeling at the government, two hundred clatty ears hanging on his every word. The guy could go on for hours. It was the likes of Bertie that kept them going: even when the redundancies were announced, they stayed put inside the yard, kept building, didn’t let the liquidators or any other of these bastards past the gateman; and all through that winter and into the next spring Bertie and the other shop stewards would still be there to hand them their wages. The campaign fund keeping strong; the wives and girlfriends bringing them their food parcels. Cathy and her piles of ham rolls wrapped in newspaper, passing them to him over the barrier.