Billy and Girl (7 page)

‘You don’t know how to make a margarita?’

Billy and Girl are sitting perched on the chrome and plastic stools at the bar of the Holiday Inn. Girl sulks in shades with striped zebra-patterned frames. Billy wears a herringbone suit. Always dress smart when you’re about to rob a superstore.

‘You don’t know how to make a margarita?’ Girl repeats in disbelief.

The barman shakes his head. ‘Never had cause to make ’em here. Folk want a gin and tonic, or a scotch usually.’

‘Jesus fucking Christ!’ Girl is getting hysterical. ‘You don’t make cocktails in this hotel?’

‘Nope.’

‘What’s the point of him?’ Girl shouts at Billy, who just shakes his head incredulously.

‘Look, do you know what a cocktail is?’

The barman nods wearily. ‘Yep. It’s mixers.’

‘Jeeezus! Where are you from?’

‘Devon, madam.’

‘Yeah, well.’ Girl looks at him sorrowfully through her new shades. ‘Suppose you only drink milk in Devon.
Milk
!’

‘Is there something else I can get you, madam?’

‘Cocktails are martinis and gimlets, manhattans and margaritas. Martinis have been drunk for
ever
. It’s not like cocktails are a new thing! Everyone loves a drink shaken up. You should have a juicer behind the bar for starters and a
briefcase busting with bartending tools inside it! You need a bar spoon, a blender, a jigger, measuring cup, mixing glass, paring knife, standard shaker and a strainer. Got any of those things,
Mr
Barman?’

‘I have some lemon slices, madam, if you would like a gin and tonic?’

‘Lemon slices?’ Girl is amazed and disgusted. She looks at the ceiling and shakes her head tragically. ‘You telling me that if I want a garnish for my cocktail all you can offer me is a lemon slice? Got any celery? Cinnamon sticks? Pickled jalapeño peppers? Almond syrup? You think tonic is a mixer? Got any coconut cream? Clamato juice? Guava nectar? Bitter lemon soda?’

‘Nope.’

‘Okay, I’ll tell you what.’ Girl lowers her voice and winks at him, giving him a chance. ‘If you can’t make a margarita, mix me a Mermaid’s Song instead.’

The barman looks nervous. ‘I can give you a martini, madam.’

Girl stares at him coldly. ‘We want a margarita. Have you got Triple Sec?’

‘I’ve got Cointreau.’

Muzak leaks out of the speakers.

‘Okay. Have you got tequila?’

‘Nope. Not much call for it, madam.’

‘Not much call for it! Did you hear that, Billy? This is a bar, isn’t it? Have I got this wrong? Is this
not
a bar? Am I wrong about this? Am I in a dry cleaner’s? Am I asking the dry cleaner for a margarita and he is telling me there’s not much call for it or am I in a bar where you ask for things like a margarita and it is perfectly
normal
?’

‘I’ll have a beer,’ Billy says to the barman, who is backing away now, busying himself washing glasses in boiling water,
scalding his hands, trying to remember if his horoscope said today was going to be a good day.

‘And don’t fucking give it to me in a hot glass.’

Girl bangs her hand on the fake-marble tabletop. Adjusts her new sun shades. Runs her fingers through her blond fringe. Twitchy.

‘Billy, it’s easy. So damn easy I don’t know why we didn’t do it years before. FreezerWorld. It’s like this, Billy – are you listening?’

‘Yep.’ Her brother knows exactly what she’s going to say. They’ve already planned it four times. It’s been well discussed. They’re having a cocktail and then they’re going to
do
FreezerWorld. Except Girl is losing it. Taking her nerves out on the barman.

‘Sooner we get out of this country, the better. I’m telling you, Billy, this is the last straw. England is
fucked
. I was really looking forward to a margarita.’

When the barman brings Billy his beer, Girl asks for a triple vodka and lime on the rocks.

‘I honestly feel like crying, Billy. I was just so excited at the thought of enjoying a margarita. It’s too much to take disappointments about small things. It’s the
big
things supposed to crack you up, but this is too much.’

‘Don’t cry,’ Billy says. ‘For fuck’s sake, don’t cry!’ He gulps down his beer. ‘We’ll torch the place one day. Any time we ask for onions with our burger and they don’t do onions, we’ll torch that place as well. Any time we ask for avocado and prawns and they give us pink cream, we’ll torch that place too.’

Girl takes off her shades to watch all the more closely as the barman pours lime cordial into her vodka.

‘We’ll torch Devon,’ she says.

Billy smirks behind his hand. ‘Lucky I put my vest on.’

‘Why’s that?’ Girl slamming her zebra shades over her eyes again.

‘Cos we’re going to
do
FreezerWorld.’

His sister orders another triple vodka.

‘Louise.
Louise
, Billy. It’s a sign. It’s a sign under superstore neon. For us.
LOUISE
. Louise works on the Cash Only till for
us
. A real princess, big blue eyes and a gold hair slide in her gold hair. She’s only been on the tills a week and she hates it. The lights make her eyes hurt. The manager treats her like a retard. She wants to do the store damage, Billy. It’s called retard rage! She doesn’t know it but she does! That’s the most important thing. She doesn’t know she wants to help us, but she does. Very much so.’

Billy wonders if she’s got a temperature because her cheeks are flushed, the red creeping into her nose and ears. And Girl is a pale girl.

‘Remember, her tea break is only fifteen minutes. We got to work quickly. Get it right. Not fuck up. What does Louise do for her fifteen minutes, Billy? She eats an apple. She combs her lovely gold hair. She puts cream on her hands. She takes a deep breath and walks back to the till. That is fifteen precious minutes in the life of Louise. At four o’clock the Saturday girl takes over from her. The till is busting with cash. The supervisor empties it at four-thirty. I’ll take over from her at five to four, Billy, understand?’

Her brother nods. Let her get it out of her system. Run through the plan again. Just hope she remembers to take her shades off and not have a Mom catastrophe at an awkward moment.

Girl takes out a checked overall from a plastic bag,
FREEZERWORLD
emblazoned on its side. ‘Louise gave it to me, Billy! I didn’t even ask for it. I saw it rolled up by the
side of the till. Louise said, “It’s my spare. You can have it if you like.” She’s working with us, Billy.’

She holds up the overall. ‘Louise and I have got the same slave garment. Girl slaves wear ’em all over the world. The Saturday
Girl
– get it, Billy? That’s me. We’re all set up, Billy boy.’

‘For fuck’s sake, Girl, you’re making me nervous. Keep your voice down. Jeezus. The barman already knows exactly where we’re going and what we’re going to do. Why don’t you run it through again with a friendly constable just to clear your mind?’

Girl takes off her shades and lowers her voice. ‘Okay. Tell me once more what
you
are going to do?’

‘I’m gonna create a disturbance in the store. The staff gather to help me. You’re filling a FreezerWorld bag full of cash and you’ll just walk it.’ Her brother smiles. ‘It’s so crazy. Sooo crazy.’ He whistles.

Girl crunches the ice from her vodka nerve molotov.

‘Another thing, Billy. Are you listening?’

‘No.’

‘When I checked out the shopping last time, there was an announcement. If ever there was a sign burning for us, it was this one: “We want our customers to feel that FreezerWorld belongs to them.”’

‘Let’s take ’em up on the offer.’ Billy leans towards the barman. ‘I know this is a glass. I’m not asking you to agree with me. I’m asking you to fill it up.’

‘Be with you in a moment, sir.’

‘Why does FreezerWorld sell garden furniture?’

‘How should I know?’

‘If something’s called CatWorld you don’t expect to find parrots and goldfish there, do you?’

‘God, you’re driving me crazy.’ Girl’s lips are cold and wet.

‘You’re already crazy,’ Billy says.

‘Even crazier. For God’s sake, Billy, have a chaser with your beer. We’ve got a lot on our plate this afternoon.’ She takes a delicate sip of her vodka. ‘I’m just off to change into my Saturday slave-girl overalls.’

‘Good afternoon, all newcomers to FreezerWorld. Take your time. Explore our world at your own pace. Here are some suggestions to help you find your way around. All dairy products are on Aisle Three. Right next to our very own bakery. Aisle Three, bake-eree. Say that little rhyme to yourself and next time you’ll remember it. Now I have an announcement from one of our FreezerWorld staff. I have just been handed a slip of paper and I’m trying to read the writing … yes, here goes. “Who ever stole my Walkman from my locker? I know who you are, signed Mister X. Chicken winglet shift.” See folks, we hide nothing from you here. There are no secrets in FreezerWorld because FreezerWorld is also God’s world.’

Girl walks to the aisle that sells Ethnic Foods (Eccles and oatcakes) so she can get a better look at Louise. There’s a long queue by her Express till. Shoppers with baskets, not trolleys. Louise is floating products over the computer with her limp white hands. Bleep. Bleep bleep. Louise is lost in the land of bleep. Louise
is
bleep. Louise is Domestos and frozen lamb cutlets and frozen onion rings. Her hands and hair are Angel Delight and Cup-a-Soup. She takes money and starts all over again. Retard rage. Girl feels Louise’s heat whack into her cheeks. It’s twenty to four.

A challenge for the FreezerWorld community. How do you get the new plant of the month home in the family car? A yucca. A
big
fucking yucca. A whole forest of them out in the car park. Spilt earth everywhere. A customer crushing the
leaves of her plant in her rush to get to Express before the man with the heaped basket of nothing but taco shells and jars of salsa sauce.

Girl does not dare to catch Louise’s eye yet. Better to come back at five to four and begin the long walk towards the toy section. Killing time. The toy section is of particular interest on account of her being called Girl right up to her seventeenth year. Girl dolls with the bodies of young women.

All the girl princesses. Standing proud in the FreezerWorld toy section.

White girl princesses, of course, they always are – froth of see-thru gauze and little gold shoes. Boxes of white plastic girls. The special FreezerWorld brand of princess, like the special FreezerWorld brand of pork rashers. Princess of the Frozen World, sneering at Girl with their tiny lips, lips for snowflakes and rice grains … little mouth always open in an O, ooooo, standing in her golden shoes inside her box, right next to the crisp shelves.

Snax. Smilers, squares, twirls, rings, salt ’n’ shake, munchies. Girl is exploding into crisp packets and they are exploding into her. Cheese-and-onion-flavoured shards needling into Girl flesh, double crunch, sour cream with chives, dying into the scampi fries, freaked out by the new-flavour Stilton-wedge crinkle chips.

The princesses with their big hair. Luned-out stare. Blue-eyed devils. Tiny lips, oooooo lips.

Whath yr name?

Girl.

Girl? Thath a funny name. Heee heeee.

Squeethe me and I say, Go away, Girl frm Hell. Polluting me with yr hideouth soul. You’re a sicko if I evr saw one.

Girl strokes the doll-princess hair through cellophane. The
princess in her lovely garden, painted on the box. Doves and butterflies and old-fashioned roses.

Go play in the other section. You don’t belong here.

You donth belog here.

Where is it I don’t belong? What kingdom am I banished from? I want to touch the doves and I want to press rose petals in my diary.

Go away. Go find anuuther toy. The one with the lickle horns and fork with pwongs. The one with the warths and the bwig nose. The one with the fwangs and pointy eerths.

Girl says, Listen, cocksucker. Don’t do your segregation thing on me. I am you. I am a Girl princess and one day I will have a kingdom too. I will be in love and ride in taxis, kissing my prince. We’ll stop at restaurants that look like they’re going to give us a good time. The waiters will muzz around me in my blue minidress with the see-thru heart. My prince will have eyes only for me. I will be full of enchantment. Enchantment twinkles inside me, unlike you, squeaker. You are dead. Someone made you dead. That’s why you have to be squeeeeezed. Don’t talk of your own free will cos you’re dead. Someone deaded you. In princess factory. You talk other people’s words. Talk white trash. Talk white bread. Talk margarine. Talk pinkie-ring talk.

Princess changes her tune: Let’s be friends, Girl. I love you. I’m only a virus anyway. Squeezed into Girl bloodstream for ever. I’m contagious matter transmitting princess infection into Girl. A corruption. A pathogenic agent. A combination of chemicals increasing rapidly inside living cells. Girl cells. Got no vitamins inside me: vita meaning life. Do something, don’t just stand there staring at the snacks.

Snax. Girl is fainting into the crisp shelves again. Chilli garlic. Salsa with mesquite, four cheeses, tomato and basil.
Dhansak puri
fading into chilli and lime tortilla,
T-bone-steak-flavour crinkle something, pastrami bagel aaaaaaaar pain something forging its way into Girl body. Pain something opening its eyes and mouth. Tingling terrible something, invisible, insidious, making its entrance in the superstore light. Aaaaaaaaaaar. Citizen Pain. Astronaut Pain standing on the moon, pain walking because there is Mom. If it isn’t the princess, it’s Mom.