Handcuffs truncheon and.., p.27
Handcuffs, Truncheon and a Polyester Thong, page 27
Suddenly getting an overwhelming desire to kick him in the testicles, or at the very least give him a dead leg, I waved the keys at him.
“Alright lads, very funny, jealously is a very unattractive trait in men…” I watched them slope off towards the back door of the nick, Bob hitching his belt up in the vain hope his trousers wouldn’t end up around his ankles. “… oh, and can you tell Petey to get a move on too?”
With the keys safely clutched in my hand, I threw my briefcase, hat and jacket on the passenger seat, gave the exterior a once over and excitedly jumped in, only to find myself lying almost horizontal in the back seat. Staring at the upholstered roof, I contemplated my current predicament as I fumbled around at the side of the seat for anything that even remotely resembled a lever. Finding various handles, gadgets and buttons, I pressed, pulled, pushed and rattled them in turn. This only served to help the seat suddenly adopt a will of its own as it slammed me forwards in one sweeping motion and then alternatively jerked me backwards and forwards in seven different stages, giving me a serious case of motion sickness.
I sat in silence, not daring to touch another button.
It didn’t matter how many times I jiggled, wriggled, wangled or manoeuvred, my curvy butt just sank back down between the bottom and the back of the bucket seat. I was shoved so far down the only thing driving the car other than my hands were my nellies, which amazingly enough, were now hooked over the top of the steering wheel.
Jeez, give me Florence the Fiesta any day.
“Here you go lovely, try this.” Geoff the civvy driver threw a rather fetching tea stained, grey velour cushion through the open window. “Shove it down the back and sit on it. Got that given to me when old Inspector Bertie Bollocks retired a few years back, it’s done me well.”
He gave me a wink, leaving me wondering if Bollocks had been poor Bertie’s real name.
Geoff’s cushion did the trick. Tucking my nellies safely back into their rightful place, or as rightful as a Gossard Wonderbra would allow, I was ready to go as the radio crackled into life.
“Quick jump in, violent domestic in progress,” I hollered to Petey as he galloped like a three-legged gazelle across the car park. Blues and twos on I swept through as the barrier lifted giving a squeal of tyres as I sped onto the main road. Fingers crossed the cushion would remain where I’d stuffed it, the prospect of it sliding into the foot well taking me with it as I hit the Leverhulme Hairpin filled me with horror.
Four minutes ten seconds later, we arrived at the scene, cushion intact. Flinging the door open, I jumped out closely followed by Petey. Frantic screaming and shouting reverberated from the mid-terraced house, increasing in volume the closer we got to the already open front door. With no time to lose, I ran inside.
“Oh bloody hell Mave, don’t go in there yet, you’ve got…” but the rest of Petey’s warning was drowned out by a scream that would have woken the dead. Making my way along the darkened corridor and through the nearest door on the left where the shouting was coming from, I paused long enough for Petey to forget his brakes and slam into the back of me.
There in all their glory was Indian Joe, a regular heavy partaker of alcoholic beverages, his girlfriend Liberty Lil with the off-set eye, and PJ Pops, a man who favorited any charity shop that could accommodate his desire for striped pyjamas, worn day and night.
All three were the best customers the local off-licence had. Indian Joe kept ferrets in the house, several of them were currently scampering across the mattress that was dumped in the corner where Liberty Lil was now reclined in her best modelling pose. She winked at Petey, who recoiled in sheer panic.
Lil was attired as usual in her favourite fur coat, which she wore day in and day out, regardless of which season we were in. This wasn’t too much of a problem in the winter, but in summer, Lil took liberties where her personal hygiene was concerned, hence her nickname. The heat, coupled with Lil’s reluctance to shower, bathe or even stand outside in the rain, along with the fur coat, was at times too much to bear.
If your hand was forced and you had to lock her up in the summer, you always ensured a prisoner van was available to transport her in the rear cage which was at least a decent distance from your nostrils. Failing that you could almost feel yourself contemplating handcuffing her to the rear bumper of the police car and driving into the Custody Suite at a steady 5mph whilst she aired in the wind.
On this occasion, Lil was draped across the mattress, fur coat pulled around her, which was making it increasingly difficult to make out what bits were actually her and what bits were the numerous ferrets scampering across her.
I looked over at Petey who was standing with his jaw almost hitting the floor.
Tugging at his sleeve and hissing for him to get a move on, I suddenly came eye to crotch with what he was looking at. Liberty Lil, not known for her graceful, ladylike posture was treating him to a complete, full-on eyeful of her ladygarden, minus her knickers.
Giving him a hard dig in the ribs I shouted at Lil. “Oh for God’s sake put it away woman, we don’t want it snapping this poor innocent boy’s head off now do we?” I waited for a response.
She shrugged her shoulders and spat on the floorboards. “I like’s ‘em innocent, doesn’t I Pops?”
She smirked as she slowly moved herself around so that PJ Pops who was sitting on a mangy two-seater sofa got the eyeful instead. He was clearly not impressed in the slightest as he carried on rolling a cigarette, whilst sniffing up a rather disgusting string of mucus that had been draped across his top lip.
Indian Joe, wearing a stetson and with his two-string guitar flung around his neck, was clearly agitated and even more clearly intoxicated.
I stood in front of him, breaking his gaze from Lil. “What’s been going on Joe, this is the third call this week, can’t you three either get on with each other or one of you move out?” Joe snorted, rolled his eyes and leant forward, elbows on his knees. “It’s like this Miss, me and Lil, well we’re an item like, Lil was giving me some favours like, when Pops comes in and sez we need more tinnies…” pausing to wipe spittle and drool from the corners of his mouth with the back of his hand, he continued. “… I’m his mate like, so I tells Lil to keep it warm for me whilst I goes down the offie for him and when I comes back Lil’s not only keeping it warm, she’s doing the feckin’’ favours with Pops.” He jerked his head to where Lil was still lying in repose.
I tried not to laugh as a mental image began to form.
The gist of the story was that incensed by this betrayal, Indian Joe had completely lost it and had whacked Pops around the bare backside several times with his guitar which had subsequently made Lil cry out in short lived pleasure before Coitus Interruptus was induced. He had then smacked Pops on the back of the head twice with a six pack of Stella lager he’d just purloined from the off-licence.
Neither Pops, Liberty Lil or Indian Joe were bothered about any injuries sustained during the fracas, it had only kicked off when the cheap cans had exploded on impact and the realisation had hit them that they didn’t have the money to buy any more, or the energy to steal them.
I looked over as Pops smirked and Lil winked; well she tried to make a fair effort at a wink, but the false eyelash on her off-set eye had come partially unglued and was now sweeping her left nostril. Licking her top lip, she slid her hand across Pops’ thigh, gently fondling the stripes of his blue Sue Ryder Charity PJ’s, and that was when I realised, albeit too late to do anything about it, that Indian Joe had seen the exchange between them.
Snarling and spitting whilst swinging his guitar he vaulted the sofa knocking a half-drunk can of Stella and Pops to the floor. Clearly terrified, Pops jumped up and scrambled for the door scattering several ferrets in all directions as Joe grabbed the back of his pyjama bottoms, dragging them down to his ankles.
Chaos then ensued as Petey sprang into action and flew through the air to rugby tackle Joe. Joe sidestepped just as Pops tripped over his pants and fell to the floor, leaving Petey impaled headfirst between Pops’ legs and a rather over-exposed pair of buttocks.
Lil, never one to miss an opportunity, liberated the half-drunk can of lager that had been rolling around on the floor just as I grappled Joe and handcuffed him. Dragging him outside to the police car I looked back to see Petey yanking the front of his jumper up, frantically scrubbing at his face.
“I smelt his butt, Jesus Mave I smelt his butt, it was disgusting,” he sobbed.
As I shoved Indian Joe into the back of the police car, he started to laugh, spraying stale lager-smelling spit in my direction as he animatedly pointed at my back.
“Feckin’ hell miss, have your got them ‘emerroyds or sumat?”
Turning round to look, I was mortified to see swinging next to my handcuff holder, Swiss Army Multi-tool and my baton, was Geoff’s beautiful velour cushion which was stuck fast to the velcro tab of my first aid pouch.
“Oh faarking hell Petey, thanks for nothing mate.” I was horrified and couldn’t work out why he hadn’t warned me that I’d been inadvertently sporting a tatty piece of soft furnishings, which was now overhanging my curvy butt like a crappy Christmas bauble.
I jumped into the car, glad to be able to park my cushioned derriere into the driver’s seat. Petey, who was still scrubbing his face with his jumper, sniffed and shook his head.
“I did try to tell you Mavis, but nobody ever listens to me…” he looked wistfully out of the car window with a resigned sadness to his eyes, “… do you know, it’s the story of my life…” Quick as a flash Indian Joe piped up from the back.
“I’ve not got me geetar, but if you hum it boy… I’ll sing it.”
“I couldn’t believe it Mum it was so funny, Petey was mortified. He even used a whole bottle of Hibiscrub on his face and then had to see the doctor because he got a reaction.”
I giggled to myself.
“Ella’s doing really well at school. Her report was amazing, straight A’s in every subject, except maths though…”
I thought for a minute.
“… think she’s going to take after me, bit of a dunce on the old maths.” I took a sip from my mug of tea.
“Joe and I are planning our wedding. I’ve seen the most fabulous dress; I’m having white lilies for my bouquet. I’m not sure about a veil though. What do you think, do you think it’ll be a bit silly at my age?”
I nibbled my biscuit.
“I’m looking for Dad too. I’m so sorry Mum, but I need to know where he is, or even how he is.”
I waited.
I didn’t expect a response; I just wasn’t ready to give up our little chats yet. I closed my eyes and sighed, hoping she could still hear me.
Plumping up the cushion on the sofa, I moved the clean ashtray to the centre of the coffee table and looked around. The room that had once been warm and cosy now stood empty, cold and quiet, the silence broken only by the ticking of the old clock on the mantelpiece.
“Night Mum, speak to you tomorrow.” I closed the door.
51
A Year Later
“Muuuum… can you come upstairs, I need you?”
Ella’s dulcet tones resonated down to the kitchen where I was desperately trying to sieve the huge, jelly-like lumps out of my gravy. I slammed the pan down on the chopping board, which in turn knocked the wooden spoon so that a large glob of gravy splattered across the wall tiles.
“What’s the matter, I’m just doing the tea, can’t it wait a minute?” Exasperated I poured the mixture down the sink, stamped the lumps down the drain with the spoon and reached for the Bisto instant gravy mix from the cupboard. Defeat accepted.
“I can’t do my zip up and Luke’s due any minute, and my hair’s gone to the dogs too.” She slammed her wardrobe door for the full effect.
Nothing beats having a petulant 17-year-old in the house. Some days I nostalgically wished for my petulant 7-year-old to be miraculously returned to me, at least then I wouldn’t have to fight for the mirror and wonder where all my deodorant had gone.
“Come down here and I’ll have a look at it and if you go in my bedroom there’s some hair stuff that you spray on, it might work.” Ella had inherited my unruly hair, no matter how much you tweaked or teased it, it wouldn’t hold a curl.
She flounced into the kitchen, flushed pink and smelling of sweet chocolate, her new perfume from someone called Theory Muggles, or something like that. I suppose if you don’t mind attracting Willy Wonka as a date, then you’re onto a winner. She held up her long hair with both hands so I could see where the zip had jammed at the back of her dress. “Mum, remember when you made me that promise?”
“What promise was that, think I’ve made a few over the years sweetheart?” I gave a sheepish grin and carried on fiddling with the zip until it released itself and moved smoothly along the metal teeth.
“The one where you said you’d always come home from work safely, that you’d never leave me, remember?”
I thought for a minute, grateful that it wasn’t one of my good old ‘mummy’ promises, you know, the ones we all create at some time to get our children to do something they don’t want to do and then hope they forget what bargain we made in the process.
“Oh that one, yes I do. I kept it too, didn’t I?”
“Do you wish your own dad had promised that?” She dropped her hair and turned to face me.
I looked into her green eyes, the same eyes I had imaged over and over again that my dad would have, unsure how I felt. If he had stayed, would I be the same woman I am now, I had never known anything other than what it was. I had a dad, albeit an absent one. Would his presence have made any difference to my life?
I didn’t know.
“Sometimes I suppose, but from what little I do know about him, I doubt he would ever have been able to keep a promise Ella. To do that sweetheart you have to experience love and loyalty. I don’t think he was capable of either.”
Wrapping her arms around me, she nestled into me, holding me tight. I stroked her hair, just as I had when she was a child.
“You’ve always got me Mum, I’ll never leave you, I promise.”
The emotion of this unexpectedly tender moment left me fragile. I knew if I tried to speak, I would cry. The sing-song ring on the doorbell broke the emotional silence. Ella gasped in excitement.
“He’s here Mum, Luke’s here, gotta go.” She grabbed her coat from the hallstand and disappeared.
As the front door slammed shut, I stood alone in the kitchen, valiantly holding the wooden spoon that still sported the congealed remains of another of my failed gravy attempts.
I couldn’t help but laugh at the irony of her short-lived promise.
My curvy butt had only just touched the battered old sofa in the rest room when Heidi’s excitable tones barked out over the radio; just as I was about to take my first bite from a rather attractive looking BLT butty.
“Sorry about this Mave, it’s probably a crock but can you start making to Morrisons, we’ve had reports of a disturbance in progress, no further details.”
I threw my sandwich back in the budget cardboard carton that I had ripped apart in my haste to taste food after almost nine hours on duty, and chucked it in the bin. An errant piece of tomato slapped against the side and slid slowly to the bottom.
Heidi continued. “Apparently it’s getting out of hand, so it’s an immediate response, Grade one…”
Clicking my utility belt into place, I hoisted up my combat pants and grabbed my jacket. “Okay Heidi, show me responding.”
Jumping the back stairs, two at a time, I made it down into the yard and into my car in record time, pausing momentarily to allow the security barrier to lift. Running the gauntlet of drivers who suddenly found the ability to complete a full slalom in and out of parked cars in sheer panic at not knowing where the sirens were coming from, I arrived at Morrisons, proud in the knowledge that I had only shouted bugger, faark and twat an average of three times each and one resounding bollocks, throughout my whole journey.
Clearly I had still maintained a small frisson of ladylike refinement about me after all these years in the job.
Based on previous calls to this store, I was half expecting to find a shoplifter embedded head first in the Organic Cabbage and Cauliflower display after a futile attempt at escape from the store security guards.
I wasn’t completely off the mark, I just had the wrong location.
Brian and Stan where wrestling with a wiry little man in the middle of the foyer. Smashed bottles of whisky lay on the tiles, the strong-smelling amber liquid pooling out towards the sliding doors. The regular OAP shoppers were almost having the vapours as he spat out choice obscenities.
“Gerroff me yer shower of bastards…”
Stan had him in a rather nifty headlock, Brian was sitting on his legs which made handcuffing him an easier task than I had at first envisaged as we fought to restrain him whilst actively avoiding the shards of glass nearby. Clicking them into place, I double locked them, and with their help, got him into a sitting position.
He absolutely reeked. I was surprised to see that he wasn’t as young as I had first thought he was. Grey hair, uncut and greasy, grime ingrained under the fingernails of his large, calloused hands, shabby, dirty jeans and an old jacket that was at least three times too big for him, with the complexion of a hardened drinker. Difficult to put an age on him, but he had to be in his early 70s.
“Caught ‘im red handed with two bottles of Johnny Walker shoved inside his jacket miss.” Stan pointed to where the smashed bottles lay. “He put up quite a fight he did for an auld bugger.”
“Take it the store’s making a complaint Brian?”
Brian nodded as he straightened his tie and smoothed his hair back into place. “This isn’t the first time; we’ve given him chances ‘cos we felt sorry for him. He was in yesterday, got the stuff back and barred him, and then the cheeky bastard comes back in today.”
