Riot Page 6
“Tell me how,” I say.
I’m closing one eye to see her.
“Come outside and I’ll show you,” she says.
Viv’s up like a dog out the traps. Sasha too. Fat Rob and Pavel are on the fruity. There’s only me and Ollie left.
“Come on,” I say.
“I’m not going,” Ollie says.
“Once in a lifetime, this is.”
“No,” he says. “Carry on. I’ll still be here.”
But I’m not going either. Probably couldn’t even find the door, never mind my knob.
I’m in the car park puking when Ollie’s missus arrives in her Fiesta. He gets me in the back, Ollie does, and I lie down.
“You’re old man’s a fucking top lad,” I say. “He just said no to a gang bang.”
Our father who art in Cefn
Fallowfield be mine digs
My time has come
I will be gone
Much mirth in my new urban heaven
Show me the way
To get lots of head
And forgive me my Cardiffness
As I will forgive those in Cardiff who fucked me over
Lead me not into intimidation
And deliver me from posh fucks
For Manchester is the Kingdom
The start of my story
I’ll never see Cardiff
Again.
It’s Saturday afternoon and we’re booting it up to Manchester in Ollie’s Astra SRi. Right foot like a lump of lead Ollie’s got. Flying up the motorway we are. One ten, one twenty. And here comes the Welcome to England sign. We give it the twll din pob sais like we always do.
Fair fucks, I’m shitting it. I’ve been up here before, to Manchester. Course I have. We both have. Only twice mind (not counting a school trip to the airport when I was nine). Once for Christmas shopping when it cost us twelve quid to park and another time when Cardiff drew City in the FA Cup. Almost got our heads bent, me and Ollie did, when some City lads followed us and started kicking our heels. Never been so glad to see a copper. Both times, though, we were coming straight back home to Cardiff after.
Now I’ve got all my shit crammed in Ollie’s boot and back seat. Clothes, Hi-fi, CDs, plates, cutlery and pans my mam’s dug out for me, even an electric typewriter with a green screen my dad bought off a mate.
We’re getting close now, passing the refinery lit up like Crystal fuckin’ Palace. Massive, with all these chimneys and lights and tiny cars and vans and people. When I was in primary, on that school trip to the airport, I ran down the front of the bus when we were passing all this.
“Sir,” I said. “Tell the driver he’s missed Manchester. It’s over there.”
There’re mams and dads and their precious little things everywhere when me and Ollie pull up at the halls. Carting full-grown fuckin’ pot plants and computers and all sorts of other shit out the back of Volvos and Saabs they are. Ollie helps me unload my stuff, but I can tell he’s feeling even more out of place than I am. Planning to have a few beers tonight we are. Then he’ll kip over and drive back Sunday morning after a fry up in some greasy spoon. But now he’s seen this lot, I can see it a fuckin’ mile off that he’d rather suck my knob. He’s itching to fuck off, Ollie is.
“If you put your foot down you’ll be back for Match of the Day,” I say.
“Thank fuck for that,” he says. “Thought you were gonna make me stay and drink white wine spritzers all night.”
He gives me this bear hug in the car park. Lifts me off the floor he does, the big soft fat fuck.
“Just ring me when you’ve had enough,” he says, loud as you like. “I’ll come and break you out in the middle of the night.”
He gets in the SRi and boots it, wheel-spinning to fuck.
“The return of the prodigal,” my dad says when I walk in on a Saturday morning three weeks later.
“Here’s the brains,” my mam says. “Bringing home a bag of skid marks by the looks of it.”
“Bored of the high life already, eh?” my dad says. “Me and your mam’ve been running a book on how long it’d take.”
“I’m back for the match,” I say. “I’m going with Ollie and Viv.”
“What’s the matter with you lad?” my dad says. “You got all the football you could ever want up there. You can’t tell me you’ve come all this way for Cardiff-Wrexham.”
“Right, Mam,” I say. “I’ll see you tonight. I’m off round Ollie’s.”
“But it’s only half ten,” my mam says.
On the front pages of the local papers I’ve been for the last few days. Mid-fuckin’-stomp. Stills, they are, from CCTV. The Cardiff Leader one’s the best. A front page job with a nice, catchy headline: Kick in the teeth for Cardiff. They’ve even got a quote from my course leader in Manchester. I’ve never even met the fucker. Wouldn’t mind paying him a visit at some stage in the future, mind.
I worked hard to get out of all this shit, leave it all behind. So I feel the littlest bit hard done by when the rozzers come knocking on my mam and dad’s door. Comes as no surprise to my old man or any other fucker round here. Par for the course. But I’ve only been away three weeks. Feel like I’ve earned a bit more of a respite than that.
Looking back, what I’ve just written is a load of bollocks. Have I fuck worked hard. I just turned up to classes and remembered what days my exams were on. That’s about the size of it. Do this in Great Britain these days and you’ve gotta be thick as shit to get anything less than three A-Levels. Then you’re away. In reality, you can hardly wipe your own arse.
“Mark Jones, you are a violent, intimidating vandal; a presence from which the hard working, community-spirited people of Cardiff deserve to be protected. The message of this court is clear; the anti-social behaviour you have exhibited will not be tolerated. Violence and vandalism are serious attacks on the moral fibre of Cardiff, and more generally, on the moral fibre of society. I sentence you to six month’s imprisonment.”
Six months inside. A whole six fuckin’ months in a men’s prison. The level of lawlessness was shocking and wholly inexcusable, so says the judge; a total breakdown in law and fuckin’ order. All I did’s boot fuck out of Wilko’s window. No extenuating circumstances? Give me a fuckin’ break, hahaha. Doesn’t my life count for anything?
The funny thing is I’ve never laid a finger on any cunt since the day I was born. Never had the bollocks.