Car-nage MK II

EXAMINER and VIKI take their seats in the car. EXAMINER looks on as VIKI engages in brief but lively struggle with recalcitrant seatbelt.

EXAMINER: Ok, during the test, please continue straight ahead unless I ask you to do otherwise. When you're ready, please start the car and move off.

VIKI turns key in ignition. Various lights on the dasboard come on. VIKI turns key again, vigorously, and car whinnies into life. VIKI wrestles with gear stick, remembers clutch pedal, then stalls car.

VIKI: Ah. Third gear.

EXAMINER gazes straight ahead. VIKI selects correct gear, pulls out, indicates and then releases handbrake. EXAMINER makes rapid succession of jottings on clipboard.

EXAMINER: At the crossroads, please turn right.

VIKI indicates left, stalls at junction, and eventually proceeds straight ahead.

EXAMINER fishes extra biros from pockets and jots with renewed vigour.

EXAMINER: Please pull up on the left when it's safe and convenient to do so.

VIKI, with a squeal of brakes, pulls up slightly to the left of the central road markings, exactly opposite somebody's driveway.

EXAMINER (still jotting): Please move on when you're ready.

VIKI selects gear and applies foot to brake pedal. Car stalls.

VIKI: Oh dear. (in tones of desperate jocularity) Can I start this test again?

EXAMINER (with the fixed smile of someone trying to placate a lunatic): Just take a deep breath and think about what you're doing.

VIKI complies, and moves off. A PEDESTRIAN is crossing the road ahead. PEDESTRIAN sees car approach, and begins to dawdle, grinning evilly.

VIKI contemplates slowing down, but right foot disagrees. VIKI speeds up. PEDESTRIAN's grin switches to expression of abject terror.

EXAMINER applies her full weight to dual controls; car screeches to a halt.

EXAMINER abandons jotting in favour of telling a rosary.

VIKI eventually bunnyhops to a halt outside test centre.

VIKI: That didn't go too well.

EXAMINER (relinquishing white-knuckle grip on dashboard): Miss Lane, I'm sorry to say you haven't passed the driving test on this occasion. Would you like me to explain why?

VIKI: Do you have time before your next test?

EXAMINER laughs thinly, and warms to task of enumerating VIKI's errors. Some time later, EXAMINER disembarks, meets VIKI's instructor crossing road, wrestles him to the ground and garrotes him with her hi-vis vest.

Dinnertime doggerel

We’ve made it through the East Lancs. jam,
the decent telly starts at eight,
so I put on a bright cheery voice:
‘what do you want to eat?’
You think, and shrug, and roll your eyes,
and ask me what I want;
as if my dish were your command.
‘I don’t mind,’ I say, and wait.
‘Whatever,’ you concede at length;
I take you at your word.
I offer Thai curry, good and green,
but you reckon curry’s weird.
‘Pasta?’ I counter. ‘A nice pesto sauce?’
You can’t object to that.
But then you do: with a ‘yak’ face you remind me
that pasta has no taste.
A fry up, then? Sausies burst the way
you like, eggs yolks nice and runny?
But my last fried feast, you remind me,
led to an evening crunching Rennies.

Now eight-thirty, beneath golden arches,
you ingest your cow derivative and cheese,
fix me with an aggrieved gaze and ask
‘Why’s it always me who has to chose?’

End-of-course haiku

Smell of fresh cut grass
as I float on sofa-cloud
with no work to do

Return of the Hat...

I'M BACK!!!!

*Dusts cobwebs off blog*
Well, that was a fun eight-or-so months. If, that is, your idea of fun is being clobbered mercilessly about the head with Virginia Woolf and T.S. Eliot. Quite frankly, I can think of nicer ways to spend my time. But never mind - the course is over, the final (and unspeakably evil) essay is written and awaits posting. Let it not concern us now that said essay is a steaming pile of the smelly stuff - the time to worry about that is August, when the results come out. I expect my results letter will have all the possible grades scored out with an angry red biro, and will instead bear the legend: WHAT WERE YOU THINKING? THIS IS UNIVERSITY LEVEL STUDY, FOR HEAVEN'S SAKE!
But never mind. It's the journey that counts, not the destination - right?

Whoop whoop whoopitty-whoop!

Regular readers (if I still have any of those exalted beings, after all my essay-enforced absences) will be surprised, and possibly dismayed, to find two consecutive cheery posts, but there's nothing I can do about that. I found out today that one of my short stories has been accepted for publication. Huzzah!

Angst-lovers will be delighted to know that, since my last post, I have managed to fail my driving test in quite spectacular fashion. Details will follow once I've stopped feeling quite so pleased with myself.

WHOOP! WHOOP!!!

I was going to start by apologising for tootling my own trumpet, but actually I'm not sorry at all. Many thanks to John for bringing my attention to a nice nugget of good news - the New Writer magazine has charitably awarded me a runners-up spot in its annual competition. My anti-hero Tyrone has done the biz for me, gor luv 'im.
Sometimes the word 'gobsmacked' just isn't enough, so let me just add that I am
dee-f***ing-lighted. (And no, that's not meant to sound sarcastic.)

Tyrone pops by

Out of the corner of my eye, I notice a man standing outside my bedroom window. You'd think that would be a pretty big problem. Actually, the bigger problem with that is the fact that I live on the fifth floor. After a split-second of heart surge, I realize who it is. But it’s impossible.
Swallowing a rising nausea, I pad over to the window. It’s a beautiful window, reaching down to the ground and opening onto a little balcony with two or three pansy-filled terracotta pots. I wrench the door open, and slosh the remnants of my Jack and coke into the man’s face.
‘Bastard!’ I screech, to the discomfiture of a nearby pigeon.
He smiles his one-corner-of mouth smile, edges past me into my bedroom, and begins running his tongue as far round his face as he can to catch the JD.
‘The coke ruins it, y’know,’ says Tyrone. ‘Any chance you could fix me a real one?’
This time I throw the glass. Tyrone ducks nonchalantly and walks out into the kitchen, exaggeratedly tiptoeing past the sparkling shards. I follow, and launch myself at him, beating his back with my fists as he pours himself a drink. He turns, and snorts at me.
‘Jeez,’ he says, in an aggrieved tone. ‘I thought you mighta been happy to see me.’
Which I am. As well as being bloody furious.
I pick up the letter on the worktop. ‘Just what was this supposed to mean? I thought you were dead.’
‘I thought I would be, too,’ Tyrone says as he rummages in the fridge. ‘Cool. Lasagne.’ He switches on the oven, and takes a large draught of his drink.
‘So..?’
‘So I changed my mind.’ He drums his fingers on the worktop, and glowers impatiently at the oven.
‘Well. I’m glad.’ My voice is quiet, but I can tell from the twitch of his eyebrow that he hears, and is touched.
I pick up the paper, his suicide note, wanting to tear it up. Something stops me.
‘Hang on,’ I say, and Tyrone’s shoulders tighten. ‘The policeman. He brought me this.’
‘Great detective work,’ muttered Tyrone dryly. ‘That’s why I put your goddam address on it.’
‘He said there was a body.’ I’m backing away, that old sick fear rising up in me again.
‘Of course there was a body,’ Tyrone said smoothly. ‘It wouldn’t be much of a suicide without a body, would it?’
‘Who?’ I pick up a cushion and hold it to my chest, as if for protection. ‘Who was it? Bloody hell, Tyrone, what did you do?’
‘I believe his name was Jim. Homeless guy. Real sad.’ Tyrone stoops to place the lasagne on the oven shelf, and walks towards me. ‘Why must we keep having this same goddam conversation?’
‘Because people keep dying. Tyrone, what did you do?’
‘I decided on a fresh start. No more Tyrone – his life sucks. He’s over.’ He strokes my neck with the side of his index finger. ‘Sweetheart, you’re not gonna rat me out. Are you?’
I try to remember how to breathe. The greyness of his eyes seems to be forcing the air from my body. Eventually I shake my head no, and Tyrone nods. He lowers his hand.
‘Extra cheese on your lasagne?’ I ask.