Royston Vasey of the South by H. K. VonTrapp

So I had to run home along the disused railway tracks, sounds like an ’80s movie doesn’t it, but I did. It was when we were living in that shitty little town. The Royston Vasey of the south. Only place to go out was a meat market called Monty’s. You know she charged me rent? “Wear and tear on the carpet”. She ran off with one of the guests, a little Italian man. Sent my dad a text telling him she wanted nothing to do with him and fucked off on a long weekend, leaving me to run the B&B and manage Dad. The bitch, she knew what she left me with.

He ended up fucking off to Thailand, met a much younger Thai woman, spoke barely any English, lovely woman. Her ex-husband was a copper who beat the crap out of her, and even she calls my dad a bad man. That little town is filled with toothless old men like him, and their young wives. I hope they’re building mansions back home, they deserve every penny. They’re divorced now. She married a man with teeth.

Anyway. Oh yeah, train tracks. Jon called at, like, 10am and said I had to leave NOW or Mum would die. My manager wouldn’t let me go, and I started blubbing like a baby. She went all fake nice, said stuff like “let me help you, tell me what it is, I can help”. She got uppity when I wouldn’t tell her, the fat fucking penguin. She was married to a guy who had a successful business. Portaloos. Ended up leaving him for her manager. Middle-aged Little Englanders are all constantly pissed or trying to bang each other. Or both. It’s either that or circling Poundland or Tesco Extra. Watch whatever crap is on the telly. Complain about kids. One time the council pressured my mum to take a DV family. The mum left the kids in the room by themselves the whole time. Druggy, never again, she said.

Yeah anyway, I ran home, searched like a feral squirrel through the bureau trying to find Aunty Anne’s phone number, not my real aunt, my mum’s best friend. Pulled all the paperwork out, the drawers, everything. Couldn’t find it. Jon told me go home, call Aunty Anne, get her to call Mum and warn her. I had images of some fat skinhead with a handgun hiding round corners threatening to jump her. I remember she called me on, like, Sunday evening to tell me how much fun she was having. I hated her so fucking much right then. To be fair, none of us expected him to hire a hitman. But the good news is that he did not hire a hitman. It was just the drunken ramblings of a madman. I didn’t know that, though. Spent all that weekend thinking I had killed her. Rough times.

The only good thing about all that was when you live in a shithole, with a dead-end job, surrounded by dead-end people, the parties and drugs are really fucking good. Oh the days of drinking acetone vodka in the park in the sun, stoned off your tits, DJ Shadow playing, Pot Noodle for dinner round your mate’s flat because you’ve spent all your money on base and pills, and nothing to look forward to but making sweet MDMA love with your boyfriend and dancing for 8 hours straight. Diamond times. I fucking hated that town.