My days are always
manic and I’m forever running late, no matter how hard I try to get my arse
into gear. It was Friday and I was out of fags, so before I set off for my
first clean of the day, I needed to call in the corner shop, Mr Greedy’s, I’ll
explain in another post, but he lets me have my stuff on the slate… OK, I'm gonna stop here, it I'll be best if you read chapter one, you can get a feel of what I’m trying to say.
Chapter One
Doreen glanced at the clock on the kitchen wall and
let out a loud groan; she was running late again.
‘God, why was
time always racing as if it couldn’t wait a second,’ she mumbled and at the
same time grabbed her bag. She fumbled inside, ‘Blimey, why do I carry all this
rubbish around?’ she said, pulling out a handful of bits of paper that had been
reminders when she had to go to the shop. Rummaging around further, she grabbed
a handful of tissues. ‘Gawd, what am I like?’ she muttered then smiled at the
sight of her packet of cigarettes. Taking hold of the packet, she opened it and
cursed. ‘Hells bells, I’m out of fags,’ and she tossed the empty packet across
the kitchen unit. As if she was not running late as it was, she now needed to
pick up a packet of fags from the corner shop. There was no way she could face
cleaning the office that was her employment without her tobacco fix.
Just thinking
about her job plunged Doreen’s low spirits into free fall. She shrugged at the
inevitable at having to go to work in a job that was soul destroying and barely
paid the rent. When had it all got to this? she thought and at the same time
reached over the counter and turned off the radio. ‘Blimey,’ she cried as her ‘neighbour’s
TV filled the noise that her radio had left. With the palm of her hand, she
banged on the wall. ‘Turn that volume down!’ she called. She waited a second,
but loud voices continued to invade her flat. She banged again on the wall, but
she knew it was a waste of time and right now she needed to be legging it. She
groaned, it didn’t matter, she was heading out of the door to work.
Slinging her mock
leopard skin bag on to her shoulder, Doreen headed down the narrow hall. She
halted in front of Trisha’s bedroom and banged on the door.
‘I’m off! Time
to get up and get ready for school,’ she shouted as if she was trying to wake
the dead. She hadn’t time to hang about and with one final knock, she called
again, ‘Get up!’ The only noise she heard was the TV from next door.
Shrugging her
shoulders, she headed to the front door. With each step she imagined her
neighbour slouched in his chair, a roll up dangling from his bottom lip and ash
peppered over his threadbare cardigan. God only knew how old he was, she
thought, and guessed he must be pushing eighty if a day. A soft giggle escaped
her lips at how the dirty old devil liked to leer at her. Even for her age and
having had one kid, her figure wasn’t bad, but due to a serious lack of money,
she never wore anything special, market bought jeans and tops, but something about
her seemed to fuel his imagination. She shuddered at the thought of his
leering, rheumy eyes, yet despite his winkled old face, stooped walk and being
almost toothless, she could see through the ravages of age and guessed he had
been a looker in his younger days. Age can be cruel, she thought, and pulled
her jacket from the peg on the hall wall, removing her bag from her shoulder, she
slipped it on. Turning, she checked her face in the wall mirror and scowled,
‘Blimey, Dor, you might only be in your mid-thirties, but today you look like
poor old Jack next door, well and truly past your prime!’ She tutted at her
reflection and, with more effort than necessary, slipped her bag back over her
shoulder.
Doreen pulled
open the front door then stepped out on to the landing of Wentworth House, one
of the largest tower blocks of council flats in the area, and Jack’s TV could
still be heard.
‘Deaf as a
post these days,’ she grumbled, and at the same time saw a blue balloon tied to
his door handle. “Happy Birthday,” it read, bobbing in the breeze on its
flimsy silver ribbon. A card hung half way out of the letterbox. So, old Jack
was a birthday boy today, she chuckled. He was not a bad neighbour and he had
always seen her right when she had done a bit of shopping for him, slipping her
the odd quid for her trouble. The least she could do was get him a card, after
all, it was the end of the week and she would be paid today. The thought of it
being Friday lightened Doreen’s mood and, with a smile on her face and a
purpose to her step, she headed towards the stairs.
Reaching the
top she smelled pee and wrinkled her nose, unsure if it was animal or human,
then guessed it was probably both. Trying not to take too many breaths, she ran
down the litter- strewn steps. Hurrying out of the building, she stood on the
broken paved pavement and took a deep breath.
‘Phew,’ she
said, as the stench from inside Wentworth House evaporated now she was outside.
Gathering her breath, it occurred to her that she could bake the old boy a cake
for his birthday. She knew he loved chocolate. If she used the cheap cake brand
stuff then she would be able to afford it. She smiled at the idea of making his
day. We all need to have something special done to us from time to time, she
thought as she headed down the road. Thinking about making the cake, she
suddenly grimaced. Already she could hear what her daughter would have to say when
she caught her baking for Jack. ‘What would an old man want with a cake?’ Trisha
would cry with scorn. Doreen tutted at how her daughter was like many seventeen-year-olds
these days who seemed to think the planet revolved around them and her
generation. Perhaps she would make two to keep her Trish happy.
‘Blimey, what
a life,’ she moaned and quickened her step towards Mr Greedy’s corner shop.
Doreen pushed
the door open and stepped into the dingy shop, the overhead bell tinkled
announcing her arrival. Instantly her nostrils filled with a stale acrid smell
and she ran the back of her hand across her nose in an attempt to deflect the
odour. Not for the first time, she wondered what Mr Greedy had on the rickety
shelves and, worse, what their sell-by-dates were. She swallowed down a lump of
apprehension and recalled picking up a jar of marmalade. 1066 was printed in small black numbers on the lid; she had not
been sure if it was the sell-by-date or something to do with the seaside town
on the south coast.
Her Trisha had
once told her, at length, during one of her homework sessions, about some carry
on in the seaside town.
‘Hastings,’
Trisha had said.
Funnily she
had only remembered about it because as a kid she’d had a day at the seaside.
Mind you, all she had done was shovel sand into a bucket and then tip the lot
out to make a castle. Those sand castles were the nearest she had come to any
real one. Real or not, she had not seen any evidence of a battle or even a
skirmish. She had told Trisha about the day who had erupted into hysterical
laughter.
‘Oh my God,
Mama, you are just so unreal.’
Her daughter
might laugh at her ignorance, but there was no doubt, as her mother, she was
beyond proud of her. Her Trisha was the apple of her eye and very brainy; she
had even passed exams and now went to a posh school. How she had given birth to
such a clever baby never ceased to amaze her, but she loved her to bits, even
if she mocked and laughed at her lack of knowledge.
Letting her
childhood day at the seaside melt away, she tried to push the thought of where
the odour was coming from. Then decided not knowing was best. Looking around
the shabby shop, she wished, as she did every time she entered Mr Greedy’s, she
could shop somewhere else. All the wishing in the world would not change a
thing. Mr Greedy’s was the only shop in the neighbourhood, and on the estate,
that allowed her to have her shopping on the slate. She would never survive
from one week to the next if she had to pay for her goodies before she got her
pay packet on Friday. Gazing around at the mismatch of jars and packets, her
reverie was broken when the shop owner appeared, like a spectre, in front of
her.
“Morning,
Doreen; let me guess what I can do for you today,’ Mr Greedy said, a beaming smile
filling his pointed, clean-shaven, face and his dark brown eye roving over her.
Doreen glared at him and wondered if she would one day find the courage to tell
him what he could do for her. Instead, she restrained herself and forced a
giggle. ‘I’d like to win the lottery so I could shop in a posh place,’ she said
loudly and as the words left her lips she imagined herself sashaying into
stores like Fortnum and Mason
and buying everything she fancied; no slate nor worrying about paying it back
at the end of the week. For a brief moment she let herself dream. The sound of
a heavy box landing on the floor a few feet away brought her back to reality
with a jolt and she realised she could not even afford to look around the food
hall in M & S.
‘And wouldn’t
we all,’ Mr Greedy said leaving the box in the middle of the aisle and
strolling over to the lottery terminal, ‘but like most of us, having the chance
to win means you have to buy a ticket.’ His white teeth flashed as he pointed
to the blue machine with a picture of a pair of crossed fingers and the legend
‘Play Here.’ Doreen stared at the machine and wondered if he got commission for
the sales because he was always banging on about her buying one.
‘People like
me don’t win, so I’m not throwing my money away, but I’ll have my usual packet
of fags,’ she said and wished she had kept her mouth shut about the lottery.
Mr Greedy
tutted. ‘They’ll kill you in the end,’ he said, placing a packet on the
counter.
‘So will old
age,’ she replied, smirking and knowing she should cut back on her fags. Maybe
next week she would give up smoking. She told herself this every time she
bought a packet. ‘Oh, and I need a birthday card,’ she added turning to look
for the shelf where they were displayed.
‘Over there.’
Mr Greedy pointed at a stack of cards on top of an unopened box.
Doreen strode
over to the pile and rifled through them. She took a deep breath of
exasperation; it seemed there was every card you could think of but nothing
suitable for an old man’s birthday. About to give up, she spied a card on the
floor. Bending down she picked it up. ‘Blimey,’ she said and giggled,
‘perfect.’ Standing up she read the words out loud, ‘Happy Birthday to a
Diamond Geezer,’ she chuckled and took the card over to the till. Feeling
bolstered with her find, she decided to buy a lottery ticket. Maybe it was her
lucky day after all. ‘Go on then, you’ve talked me into it. I’ll have a lottery
ticket, but if I don’t win, I’ll be back for me money.’
Mr Greedy
rolled his eyes and handed Doreen a long narrow slip of paper covered in
numbers. ‘Just pick your lucky numbers,’ he said, offering a pen. ‘Put a line
through them and pick your draw day here,’ he added, pointing to the top of the
slip.
Taking the pen,
she could not think of any numbers in her life that had been lucky; maybe she
should not bother. About to save herself a pound, she looked up at Mr Greedy
and, seeing his smug expression, she scribbled down the only numbers she could
think of before giving the slip back.
‘Good luck,
Doreen,’ Mr Greedy purred taking her money and slotting the slip through the lottery
machine. Passing it back to her with the pink, printed ticket, he repeated, ‘Good
luck.’
‘Mmm,’ Doreen said,
pushing the cigarettes and tickets into her bag. What had she been thinking about, wasting her
money on a lottery ticket? She might as well have just dropped the coin down
the drain for all the good it would do. Clutching the birthday card, she opened
it and read the words inside. She stifled a giggle. A miserable old sod he
might be, but as neighbours go on her estate, he was as the card said, a
Discovered Diamond. She tucked the card into her bag and with a broad smile
hurried off to work.
