Irvine Welsh - Filth

– I don’t know . . . we never . . .

– Yis ever turn oaf the gas for each other? Sssssssssss, I say softly, in her ear.

– We . . . no . . . we never . . .

– You want tae play at turning oaf the gas? You daein it for me and me daein it for you?

I’m looking at the black roots at the bottom of her sick yellow hair, which looks like greased straw, the condition totally fucked by cheap dyes. A coffee, fags and vallies tart. There’s a factory somewhere that churns them out. Turn left on the outskirts of the Boulevard of Broken Dreams.

– I don’t know what it involves . . . she whinges. She’s looking at a precipice which she can’t really see over, blinded as she is by her despair and her medication.

– It’s a wee adventure. In all adventures to different places you need an experienced guide. Let me be yir guide. Put yirself in ma hands. I’d never hurt you, I tell her, and I’m taking down her pants, exposing that dirty big black bush which contrasts starkly with that sick blonde hair. My skin tingles wondrously and the colours of the walls and furnishings seem heightened as I ease her back on to the couch. I loosen my flannels, ignoring a fairly noxious waft and let them fall to my knees. I’m losing weight alright.

I’ve got the two belts ready, which I retrieve from under the settee. One goes round her neck, the other round mine. I’m idly finger-fucking her and she’s getting juiced up. She’s a randy hoor awright: her clit’s soon as prominent as Ray Lennox’s cock. I spread her thighs with my hands and push my cock into her. No sense in wearing a condom because she tells me that she’s only been with Hurley for years which is as good as being a virgin. My knob’s not feeling too raw. As it inches home I tighten the belt round her scrawny neck. I find my stroke and start giving her it good-style. She’s bucking away, getting right into it.

– Ma fuckin belt, I shout, increasing my pace, – turn oaf ma fuckin gas!

She tightens it a bit but her face is going red and twisting into a strange pout as I throttle her and she starts trying to scream: – You’re . . . cack . . . cack . . . cack choking . . . cack . . . me . . . cack . . . cack . . . cack . . . It sounds like an old banger trying to start up, which, I suppose, is exactly what it is.

How far do you have to go to be like that guy at the South Side? Is there a time during the struggle, the struggle for life and breath, when you finally consciously realise that it’s all fucked and that you’re going for good? How does it feel?

– YOU FUCKIN CHOKE ME THEN! I scream, choking and poking at it, and in the end I have to grab my ain belt and turn off my ain gas soas that I get there, but she does too and I’m so close to just keeping going, increasing the pressure and she sees it in my eyes for a second and I see the panic in hers and I come hard with an accompanying series of muffled heaves.

I let go and she’s pulling the belt from round her neck, I can see the mark it’s left and the blood vessels on her eyelids have haemorrhaged. She’s trying to fill her dry, stiff lungs with air, but she’s crying and laughing and she loves every fuckin minute of it the cow. She was never that far out, not as far out as the boy. He was way out of range. I couldn’t bring him back, I did all I could.

How did it make you feel?

We sleep for a bit, as our breathing comes back to normal in unison. When I wake up I’m consumed by an overwhelming urge to be cruel, which I know that if I don’t satisfy verbally will end up with me brekking the sow’s jaw and as she’s polisman’s meat, rather than a common-or-garden Roger Moore, that could get a little bit messy administratively and legally speaking. – You’re a cow, I state coldly as I sit up on the couch and light up one of her fags, – because I’ve been fucking you, we’ve been turning oaf the fuckin gas fir each other and you’re my mate’s wife. Ken what that makes you in my book? A cow. C. O. W.

I spell it out for the slag.

She looks at me like a wounded deer pleading with me no tae let it have baith fuckin barrels. – Don’t say that . . . why are you being like this . . . why . . .

Why? Cause it’s games time. – Ken how you’re a cow? Ken how? Cause you let ays in here, I point at her minge, – but you’ll no let ays in here, I point to her head, – or in here, I point to her chest, – cause that’s love. That the now, that was nothing. That was just sad case games, and tae me that is what I’d call a cow, I shake my head. – That was a wee test, and you failed miserably. Failed wi faded colours . . . I take a bunch of her greasy straw hair between my forefinger and thumb to illustrate my point.

Her face seems to bubble and swell as her mouth opens wide. – What are you saying, she cries, – where does that leave us?

– I’m saying that you have to go away and have a good think to yourself about what your feelings really are. Otherwise . . . I’ll be quite frank, this is fuckin useless. The same rules apply. Will you do that Chrissie? Will you do that for me? Because I can’t sort out your head. Only you getting in touch with your heart can do that. If you just want fucked, I explain, flipping up a palm, – no problem, come roond, ah’ll do the business. But I find it all a wee bit sordid, especially as I feel we could have a lot more.

– I just feel so confused . . . you’re confusing me . . . she bleats.

– I shake my head slowly and sadly, – We’re aw fuckin confused. Right now, I think you’d better go.

– I want to stay with you Bruce. We need to talk!

I move my head in a dismissive manner. I had planned to go up the club at Shrubhill tonight. A couple of civilised beers to relax. Socialising within a perfectly legal framework and long may it so remain. – Chrissie, I’m working tonight. Backshift. I’m investigating a murder. That’s as in M-U-R-D-E-R. In my line of work that spells: S-E-R-I-O-U-S. I watch her incomprehending look. I do not think that the penny has dropped yet. – Serious. Which means I have to get my A-R-S-E into G-E-A-R. That’s the situ.

though not that quack Rossi with his aversion to deep fries, ordered. Time to wash it doon with a few bevvies. I go into the Royal Scot and order a pint then call a cab to take me down to the club. When there’s a law against that, we’ll know that civilisation is truly fucked.

Carole Again

I like to go out. I don’t really mind being here at Mum’s but she can be very demanding. Still, we all have our crosses to bear. The big problem is that Mum’s never really accepted Bruce. She’s a bit strange at times. It’s a funny thing to say about your own mum but it’s true. I hate being up here but it’ll just make it all the more exciting when Bruce and I finally get back together.

Stacey’s getting me down as well. She’s at a funny age.

I remember when I first met Bruce. My sister Shirley was seeing this guy who was on the force. Don, I think he was called. We met him at a pub at the West End and he introduced Bruce as this guy who was up from London where he was in the Met. Bruce and I had both just come out of pretty bad relationships so the pair of us were a little guarded, even though when I first saw him I thought, mmm hmmm. Well, we had a few too many and we ended up back at Don’s. It was strange the way Bruce was looking at me in the taxi, I could just feel something happening, I could feel that we would become lovers. When he spoke to me, his dark eyes blazing . . . I could feel myself going . . . god, I just want to touch myself all over when I think about it.