Charlene smiles at Renton, wondering if he’s taking the piss. But he seems quite upset. She loves Charlie, but knows prison hasn’t done him any good, and she suspects that she’s yet to see the full extent of the damage. She’s pragmatic enough to keep her options open. It’s good to know Mark cares. She gets up, scribbles a name, ‘Millie’, and a number down on the notepad by the phone, tearing of the slip of paper. Renton rises too; he feels the moment calls for it. She crushes the paper into his jeans pocket. — It ain’t mine, it’s a friend’s in Brixton. She’ll know how to get in touch with me if ya ever wanna hook up. Leave your number with her and she’ll pass it on ta me, and I’ll get back ta ya.
Renton is in front of her and making no move to stand aside. Charlene thinks for a second he’s blocking her way, but she hasn’t tagged him as the sort to make a scene. In fact, as she puts her arms around him, she’s disconcerted at how distant and accepting of the situation he now is, how easy, after a brief flush of need, this has suddenly all become for him. A rush of regret swells in her. — You’re a lovely bloke, she says, tightening her grip.
But he’s squirming like an unruly toddler in the arms of an indulgent auntie. — Right … you’re barry … eh, ah’ll see ye, Charlene, he says robotically.
Leave me leave me leave me … skag skag skag …
Charlene breaks off and stands back, holding his hands, taking him in. Marvelling at the angles of his thin frame, his yellow-toothed smile. — Ya will phone me, won’tcha? It was good … in bed n all that … she says.
— Aye, ah telt ye, Renton says, every nerve in his body screaming GO as to his massive relief Charlene walks out, the Sealink bag slung across her shoulder on the extended strap, thus obscuring his last view of the tight arse he’d come to regard as his altar. Even though its image was well burnt into his brain, a farewell glance would have been appreciated.
Chucked the student, given the elbow by the shoplifter.
I will survive, wey-hey.
As soon as he hears the lift doors outside, Renton rushes to his stash in the grumbling, tutting fridge. The heroin is cooling with some rotting lettuce and celery in a drawer. With his spec case, he heads back to the couch, arching over the coffee table littered with wastrel detritus, and starts to cook up. He’s piqued as the sound of the door going snaps in his ears, worrying that Charlene has returned. However, it’s only Nicksy, who looks down at Renton in disdain, then heads to the kitchen where he instantly chops out two big lines of speed on the shaky-legged table and declares, in punk-style, that England’s shit. — It’s all gone to pieces, mate.
Renton is burning the heroin, lighter flame lapping round the spoon. He’s a bit worried at its lack of purity, but it seems to be dissolving into a bubbling elixir. — Scotland n aw, he says empathetically, looking to Nicksy. It was true; the post-war optimism was most certainly over. The welfare state, full employment, the Butler Education Act were all gone or compromised to the point of being rendered meaningless. It now really was everyone for themselves. We were no longer all in this together. But it wasn’t all bad, he considered; at least we’re getting a wider choice of drugs now.
Nicksy springs to his feet, standing in the doorway of the kitchen and the front room. He points at the spoon and its contents, nerves jangling, bottom puppet-jaw in spasm, lank hair plastered to his skull. — Give it a rest, Mark. You said you was through banging up that shit.
Renton looks up, face a picture of surly, recalcitrant entitlement. — Geez a fuckin brek, Nicksy. Ah’ve just been chucked, eh.
— Oh … right. Sorry ta hear it, Nicksy says, stepping back into the kitchen. Doesn’t know why. Pirouettes on the tiled floor and hops back into the front room. — Have to be dynamic, he muses to himself.
— You’ve been thaire, buddy, Renton observes, clamping the flex from the table lamp round his thin biceps, then gripping the cord in his teeth. — No very nice, is it? he whines, disconcerted that his voice sounds the very same. Fuck. Ah really do speak through ma beak now.
— Nah. It ain’t.
— Aye, Charlene’s fucked off. She’s goat this boyfriend. He’s just gittin back oot the jail. Renton taps up a vein in his wrist.
— Well, that ain’t gonna help.
— It isnae aboot helping, it’s aboot being. If being Scottish is about one thing, it’s aboot gittin fucked up, Renton explains, working the needle slowly into his flesh. — Tae us intoxication isnae just a huge laugh, or even a basic human right. It’s a way ay life, a political philosophy. Rabbie Burns said it: whisky and freedom gang thegither. Whatever happens in the future tae the economy, whatever fucking government’s in power, rest assured we’ll still be pissin it up and shootin shit intae ourselves, he announces, pulsing with glorious anticipation as he sucks his dark blood back into the barrel, then lets his ravenous veins drink the concoction.
Home, boy …
Whoa … ya fuckin beauty …
Renton topples back onto the sagging couch and its pinging coils that hold up his shifting weight like pall-bearers, and laughs in a fathomless yawn, — Smokin shit … it just isnae cost-effective …
Nicksy has no time for the television or his friend’s junky observations. He can’t settle, the speed has kicked in and he’s vibrating in the armchair. Catching a sharp whiff from his own trainers, he leaps to a standing position. Looks up at the dull cream ceiling.
Marsha.
He charges out the door as if the flat was on fire.
Junk Dilemmas No. 1
NICKSY DIDNAE HALF tear oot the door. Cunt’s way too uptight these days. Whatever happened tae the cheeky wee cockney sparrer, the ducker and diver whae let nothing get under his skin?
Probably that Marsha bird upstairs. Women. What a fuckin minefield. The student you hump and dump. The shoplifter steals your heart and –
SHARP THROB …
Fuck sake …
SHARP FUCKIN THROB …
Whoops … ah’m on ma feet n through tae the bog. A long pish which seems tae last months. The dug’s up, balancing against the bowl wi his front paws, watchin ma pish stream. He pits his nose tae it, gits a splash fi the jet, yelps and dances off, lookin up at me like ah’m a cunt. — Giro … sorry, compadre …
Ah’m bored wi this pish … end … end … end …
END …
END …
BANG BANG DOOF DOOF –
A knock on the door. Shake it oot. Pit it back. Move. Open the front door.
It’s this wee black lassie, that Marsha bird, n she’s screamin a loaday shite at me. Aboot Nicksy, oan a ledge … rantin about dead bairns …
Fuckin nut job … but then the polis … my God, it’s the fuckin polis … a blobby WPC n a jug-eared copper, n thir tellin us baith tae git doonstairs in the lift …
The lift goes doon n she’s still screamin aboot Nicksy bein sick and twisted and what does he fuckin well want fae her n ah’m thinkin …
FUCK ME …
Thi’ll no lit us back in fir the gear …
IT’S MA FUCKIN GEAR!
Towers of London