Except I suppose there’s the swing of her skirt. That lurching movement makes you think of a piece of material just thick with dirt and that is what you think of that skirt it’s like you can imagine the sperm of quite a lot of men. Having said that it’s important to say about her how you always think she is the one who is reflective, that it is her who reflects on what is happening roundabout; she’s the one that notices what people are signifying when they look at the three of them. Plus if ever you’re confronted by them, it’s her eyes that stay with you; it’s her you see eventually, the one who makes it hard for you. It can start you thinking about things, probably about men and women I suppose, the different types of relationships they have, how you think the women it is who carry the burden yet in such a veiled aggressive way you never feel sorry for them. They know the score. It’s as if it’s always them that work out the percentages. Even her, this one, the weight of her skirt, you dont for a minute think she is a hopeless victim and you dont think she is as passive as she makes out. Right enough she is a victim in the way she is just one woman having to face up to two men and you dont know quite what goes on in that situation, even if she sometimes has to find a punter if they’re in trouble. That time she was overheard when they were seated on the bench down by the Kelvin, just over by the kids’ swing park, and she says something that showed how she felt on her own in the company, what she said wasnt heard by the two guys — or else they didnt pay it any attention, they never ‘heard’ her. They were on the paving stones at the edge of the flower beds, the two of them involved about something or other, or maybe nearer the point, the guy with the permanent girn on his face was talking and the nephew was listening, and then the woman says. It’s no like that. Her hair straggling down her shoulders and her mouth gumsy. I think the nephew heard her and the other guy didnt because he just never expected her to speak unless spoken to, something like that. But again you know there’s that way you can tell when somebody isnt very bright, maybe just how he sometimes smiles for no reason anybody can see and that nephew was a bit like that, I dont think he was the full shilling. So girny, the older guy, he turns to her: Did you speak there?
Naw.
Aye you did.
I didni.
Aye ye did.
I didni.
Ye fucking did.
Then she just shut up. Girny stared at her and you would have expected him to hit her one. I think he would’ve if she had said anything more. He was daring her, that’s what he was doing. But she never says fuck all. She just stared at the other women, the ones with their kids playing on the swings and you wondered about that, if she was away thinking about them and relating it to herself, the way she was. It was sad. You felt as if there was this terrible awful gap between them but there wasnt really. It was all a bit weird. I just wish she could have washed her hair. I felt that for her. I felt if she had done that then the gap wouldnt have been so bad and so big, all them with their weans playing in the wee swing park, all standing there having their wee chin-wag the way women do, enjoying the sun and all that, while there was this other one, their comrade I suppose in solidarity, there she was, but they werent bothering about her, trying no to see her, then there was girny himself getting up off the bench and giving her the wire, Come on you, he said, not in actual words but just the way he jerked his thumb; the nephew as well, giving her a look, and then they went away down towards the old dummy railway.
Lassies are trained that way
The lassie came in on her own; she glanced roundabout then continued on past the Ladies, heading into the lounge. Minutes later she was back again, squinting this way and that, as if letting it be known she was only here because she was meeting somebody. When she arrived beside him at the bar there was a frown on her face. She asked the woman serving for a gin and orangeade, stressing the orangeade, how she didnt want natural fruit juice or the diluting stuff. She was good-looking. She had on a pair of trousers and a wideish style of jersey. Eventually he spoke to her. He gave her a smile at the same time:
Has he gave you a dizzy?
The lassie ignored him.
Has he stood you up? he said, smiling. Then he drank a mouthful of lager. In some ways he hadnt been expecting any response, even though he was just being friendly, taking her at face value and trying to ease her feelings; get her to relax a bit. This wasnt the best of pubs for single women, being frank about it — not the worst, but definitely not the best.
Her eyes were smallish, brown, nice. He liked her looks. Okay. What is there to that? There can be strong feelings between the sexes. He was attracted to her. Fine. But even more than that: probably if something bad was happening he would have been first there, right at her elbow. It was a big brotherish feeling. He used to have a couple of wee sisters. Still has! Just that they are no longer wee. They are married women, with families of their own. He used to be a married man with a family of his own! Which simply means, to cut the crap, that him and his wife dont see eye-to-eye anymore. If they ever did. She doesnt live with him. And he doesnt live with her. They separated a year-and-a-half ago. He spent too much time boozing down the pub. Too much time out the house. That was the problem, he spent too much time out the house. The work did it. The kind of job he had is the kind that puts pressure on you. And what happens but you wind up in the pub drowning your sorrows.
The lassie with the brown eyes, she was standing beside him. He didnt know what she was maybe she was a student. Although she was older than the usual. But some of the older students came round here. Even during the day, when you might have expected them to be at their class getting their lessons, here they were, having a wee drink. He thought it livened things up. Other folk didnt. Other folk didnt think that at all. They thought it was better to have things the opposite of livened up — deadened down — that’s what they thought it was better to have, that was their preference. When they went into a pub they wanted no people, no noise and no laughter, no music, no life, no bloody fuck all, nothing, that’s what they liked, nothing, to walk into a pub and get faced by nothing. How come they ever left their place of abode? That was the real question. How come they didnt just stay put, in their bloody house. Then they would give other folk a break. If they were actually interested in other folk then that’s what they would do, they would stay fucking indoors and give them a bloody break. But they didnt do that. Out they came. He couldnt be bothered with it, that kind of mentality, he just couldn’t be bothered with it. They were misanthropes. The very last thing he ever wanted to be. No matter how bad it got he would never resort to that way of behaving. He genuinely thought people should help one another. He did. He genuinely did. Something that was anathema nowadays right enough, the way things were. But so what? There’s aye room for variety. Who wants everything to be the same? Imagine it: a whole regiment of folk all looking the same and then thinking the same thoughts. That would be terrible, absolutely bloody horrendous. You see some blokes going about, their faces tripping them. You wonder how come they ever set foot out the door, as if they just left the house to upset folk. A pain in the neck so they are. The kind that never does somebody a turn unless it’s a bad yin. His wife’s people were like that. They used to talk about him behind his back. They spoke about him to her, they carried tales. She believed them as well. Plus they did their chattering in front of the wee yins. Bad. If you’ve got to talk about somebody, okay, but no in front of the wee yins. Bringing somebody down like that. It’s no right. There again but his wife didnt have to listen; nobody was forcing her, she could have ignored them, she could have told them to shut their bloody mouth.