ADJACENT PARTS 090311

ADJACENT PARTS

I’ll exchange your spine for my bladder, he said
- You’d split a cat
- Depends how big you are, she said
- Bath’s better
- Painkillers are good, morphine’s especially the one, he said,
- Battlefield medicine’s the one, he said, what it’s all about, not the pharmaceutical medicines
- Indeed, she said, landing on the fucking shore, you’d look a right cunt if you didn’t
SNORTING LAUGHTER
- Good skills, man, show lots of love and get others to do it with really sharp knives
(THERE SHE IS, CROSSING THE ROAD, SHE’S WEARING THE BLUE COAT GOES WITH HER HAIR)
- You’ve got to look like a homeless guy
- That’s your excuse, she said
- Usually I’d be hanging around in a suit today
SHE CAME OVER TO THE TABLE WHERE WE BOTH NOW SAT
-You want your change?
- (singing) ‘What a wonderful world, what a wonderful world, like lemon drops, somewhere over the rainbow, what a wonderful world, (singing) ooo, ooo, ooo, ooo
- There you go, she said, putting her tea on the table in front of her
- Thanks

WE CHATTED A WHILE

‘Can you do me a favour?’ said the man sitting down opposite.
‘How much do you want?’ I said, not wanting a long preamble to the bottom line.
‘Well, I’ve got,’ he said counting the change in his hand, ‘about two eighty and I need fifteen for a bed at the hostel.’
‘Oi,’ said one of the men round the adjacent table, ‘Fuck off,’ to the man asking us for money.
‘I’m just asking,’ he said, ‘I’ll be gone in a minute.’
‘I’ll give him a pound,’ I said to her. ‘Have you got one too?’
- I felt a bit anxious, irritated he’d interrupted us, keen to get back to our conversation, annoyed at the man saying ‘Fuck off,’ what did she think and want?
We each gave him a pound and he said, ‘Thanks.’
‘Go on, fuck off.’
‘I’m going, man,’ he said now tucking his shirt in by the door.
‘He must be cold,’ she said, ‘not wearing a coat.’
‘Travelling light,’ I said, embarrassed at a glib comment about someone asking for help and being told to fuck off.
‘That was a bit hostile,’ she said, ‘wasn’t it?’
'I know,' I said. 'He was asking us for help not them.'