The lassie came in on her own; she glanced roundabout then continued on past the lathes’ toilet, 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 couldnt 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 bis wife didnt have to listen; nobody was forcing her, she could have ignored them, she could have told them to shut their bloody mouth.
The lassie was staring across the bar to beneath the gantry, to where all the bottles of beer were stacked, as if she was comparing all the different labels or something. Because she was feeling self-conscious. You could tell. And there was a mirror up above. She was maybe wanting to look into it to see if she could see somebody but she wasnt able to bring it off in case she wound up catching somebody else’s eye. That was probably it. He gave her a smile but she ignored it. He didnt want to feel hurt because it would have been stupid. Not only stupid but ridiculous. She hadnt ignored him at all. She had just no seen him. But she was no seeing anybody. Which is what lassies have to do in pubs. It’s part of how they’ve got to act. He had a daughter himself and that’s exactly what he would be telling her next time he saw her. You just cannot afford to take chances, no nowadays—different to when he was young. Aye, he said, young yins nowadays, they have it that wee bit harder.
And he glanced at her but she kept her stare fixed on the bottles beneath the gantry. Which was okay really because he had said it in such a way she would be able to do exactly that, ignore him, without feeling like she was giving him an insult at the same time. That kind of point was important between the sexes, between men and women, if ever they were to manage things together. He gave her another smile and she responded. She did. Her head looked up and she nodded. That was the irony. If you’re looking for irony that’s it. Plus as well the way things operate in conversation it was really up to her to make the next move, whatever it was, it was up to her.
The woman serving behind the bar was watching him. She was rinsing the glasses out at the sink. Her head was bent over as if she was attending totally to the job in hand but she wasnt, it was obvious. Probably because she knew he was married, thinking to herself: So he’s like that is he; chatting up the young lassies, I might’ve bloody guessed, they’re all the bloody same!
And that would make you laugh because he wasnt like that at all. No even just now when he was separated, when he was away living on his own. It was a total guess on her part and she was wrong. But women like to guess about men. They get their theories. And then they get surprised when the theories dont work out. She had seen him talk to the lassie and she just assumed he was trying to chat her up. It can be bad the way folk jump in and make their assumptions about you. And apart from his age what made her so sure he was married anyway? He had gave up wearing the band of gold a while ago and she was new in the job, still feeling her way; she was still finding out about folk and as far as he was concerned what could she know? Almost nothing, it was just guesswork.
The woman was wearing a ring herself but that didnt even mean she was married. As far as a lot of females are concerned a band of gold’s a handy thing to have pure and simple for the way it can ward off unwelcome attention. There again but let’s be honest, most men dont even see a ring, and even if they do, so what? they just bloody ignore it.
The woman stopped rinsing glasses now to serve an auld bloke at the far end of the bar. He said something to her and she said something back and the two of them smiled. She had a quiet style with the customers, but she could crack funny wee jokes as well, the kind you never seem to hear at first—no till after the person that’s told you has went away and you’re left standing there and suddenly you think: Aye, right enough … This is the way it was with her. And then when you looked for her once it had dawned on you she was off and pouring the next guy’s pint, she had forgot all about it. It was actually quite annoying. Although at the same time you’ve got to appreciate about women working in a pub, how they’ve got to develop an exterior else they’ll no be able to cope. This one for example had a distracted appearance like she was always away thinking about bloody gas bills or something. Mind you that’s probably what she was thinking about. Everything’s so damn dear nowadays. He said it to the lassie. He frowned at her and added: Still and all, it wasnt that much better afore they got in, the tories.
She looked at him quite surprised. It was maybe the first time she had genuinely acknowledged he was a person. And it made him think it confirmed she was a student, but at the same time about her politics, that she was good and left-wing. He jerked his head in the direction of the woman serving behind the bar. Her there, he said, I think she’s a single parent; she looks like she goes about worried out of her skull because of the bills coming in—she’ll have a tough time of it.
The lassie raised her eyebrows just; and that was that, she dropped her gaze. In fact she looked like she was tired, she did look like she was tired. But it was a certain kind of tiredness. The kind you dont like to see in young people—lassies maybe in particular, though maybe no.
I’m forty going on fifty, he said and he smiled, forty going on fifty. Naw but what I mean is I feel like I’m fifty instead of forty. No kidding. In fact I felt like I was fifty when I was thirty! It was one of the major bones of contention between me and the wife. She used to accuse me about it, being middle-aged. She used to say I was an auld man afore my time. No very nice eh? Accusing your husband of that.
He smiled as he shook his head, swigged a mouthful of beer. Mate of mine, he said, when I turned forty, at my birthday, I was asking him what like it was, turning it I mean, forty, and what he telled me was it took him till he was past fifty to bloody get over it!
He smiled again, took his fags out for another smoke although he was trying to cut down. The lassie already was smoking. He lit one for himself. I noticed you come in, he said, the way you walked ben the lounge and then came back here, like you were looking for somebody. I’m no being nosy, it’s just an observation, I thought you were looking for somebody.
She had two brown moles on her cheek, just down from her right eye. They were funny, pretty and beautiful. It made him smile.
That was how I spoke to you, he went on, because I thought you were in looking for somebody and they hadnt showed up. I’m no meaning to be nosy, it was just I thought the way you looked, when you came in … He finished by giving a nod then inhaled deeply on his cigarette. He was beginning to blab and it was making her uncomfortable. He wasnt saying it right, what he was meaning to say, he was coming out with it wrong, as if it was a line he was giving her, a bit of patter.
She was just no wanting to talk. That was it. You could tell it a mile away. Then at the same time she wasnt wanting to be bloody rude. It was like she maybe didnt quite know how to handle the situation, as if she was under pressure. Maybe she would have handled things better if it had been a normal day, but for some reason the day wasnt normal. Maybe something bad had happened earlier on, at one of her classes, and she was still feeling the effects, the emotional upset. He wanted to tell her no to worry. She wasnt at her classes now.
Unless she thought he was acting too forward or something because he was talking to her—though as far as pubs go surely no, it was just what comes under the heading of being sociable. And we have to Uve with one another. Come on, if we arent even allowed to talk! Nowadays right enough you cant even take that for granted; it’s as if you’re supposed to go about kicking everybody in the teeth; you’re no supposed to be friendly, if you’re friendly they go and tell the polis and you wind up getting huckled for indecent assault. There again but folk have had to get that wee bit tougher nowadays, just to survive. He said to the lassie: Do you know what the trouble is? I’m talking about how dungs have got harder and tougher these past couple of years.
She kept her head lowered. It made him smile. He glanced over the counter but the woman was off serving other folk. He smiled again: You obviously dont want to know what the trouble is! And that’s your privilege, that’s your right. But I’m going to tell you anyhow!
Naw but seriously, he said, the way things are—society I’m meaning—it’s just like auld Joxer says in that play by Sean O’Casey, the world’s in a state of chassis. I’m talking about how capitalism and the right-wing has got it all cornered, so selfishness is running amok, everywhere you look, it’s rampant—no just here in Scotland but right across the whole of the western world. It’s bloody disgusting. Everybody clawing at one another. Nobody gives a shit. We just dont care anymore about what the neighbor next door might be suffering. It’s true. They can be suffering. That auld woman up the stair for example, take her, you’ve no seen her for how long? a week? a fortnight? a bloody month? So what do you do do you go up and keek through the letter box? naw, do you hell; nothing as simple that, what you do is go and phone the bloody polis and get them to come and do it for you. That’s the way it is. So you come to rely on people like the polis as if they were angels of mercy—instead of what they are, the forces of law and order for the rich and the wealthy, the upper class.
The lassie frowned.
Sorry, he said, am I talking too loud? I know you’re no supposed to nowadays. When you talk about something you’re really interested in you’re supposed to bloody keep it down, the noise level I mean. So so much for your interest, if it happens to be bloody genuine … He shook his head, sighing; he drank from his pint of lager, glancing at her over the rim of the glass, but she was managing not to look at him. Funny how that happened. He could never have managed it himself, to not speak to somebody who was speaking to you. He would have found it extremely difficult, to achieve, he would have found it really difficult. Maybe some folk were mentally equipped to carry that kind of thing off but he wasnt, he just didnt happen to be one of them—not that he would have wanted to be anyhow. Mind you, if he had been a lassie … But lassies are trained for it, in a manner of speaking; it’s part of the growingup process for them, young females. It doesnt happen with boys, just if you’re a lassie, you’ve got to learn how not to talk; plus how not to look, you get trained how not to look. How not to look and how not to talk. You get trained how not to do things.
My mother was a talker, he said, God rest her she was a good auld stick. I liked my father but I have to admit it I loved my mother. She used to sing too. She’s been dead for fifteen years. Fifteen years. A long time without your maw eh? I was just turned twenty-five when it happened. A long time ago.
The lassie smiled.
You’re smiling, he said, but it’s true. He tapped ash onto the floor and scraped the heel of his shoe over it, then inhaled deeply. He had loved his mother. It was funny to think that, but he had. And he missed her. Here he was a grown man, forty years of age, and he still missed his mammy. So what but? People do the. It’s the way things are. Nobody can change it. The march of progress.
I dont believe in after-lives, he said, and I dont bloody believe in before-lives. Being honest about it I dont believe in any of your bloody through-the-lookmg-glass-lives at all. And that includes whatever you call it, Buddhism or Mohammedism or whatever the hell. There’s the here and there’s the now. Mind you, I’m no saying there’s no a God, I’m just no saying there is one. What I will bloody say is I’m no very interested, one way or the other. What about yourself?
O … She smiled for a moment then she frowned almost immediately; she dragged on her cigarette and let the smoke out in a cloud. Then she dragged on it again but this time inhaled.
He shrugged. It’s alright if you’re no wanting to speak, I know how things are. Dont worry about it. Anyway, I’m doing enough chattering for the two of us! One thing but I will say—correct me if I’m wrong— your politics, they’re like my own, we’re both to the left. Eh?
She nodded very slightly, giving a very quick smile. Probably she was a wee bit suspicious. And if she wasnt she should’ve been; especially nowadays. Because you just never know who you’re talking to. He gazed at her. There was something the …
And then he felt like giving her a kiss. It was so sudden and what an urge he had to turn away.
And he felt so sorry for her. He really did. He felt so sorry for her. How come he felt so sorry for her? It was almost like he was going to burst out greeting! How come? How come it was happening? He gulped a couple of times and took a puff on the fag, then another one. God. He bit on his lower lip; he stared across the bar to where a conversation was on the go between some guys he knew—just from drinking in here but, he didnt know them from outside—and didnt really want to either. Nothing amazing, he just found it difficult being in their company, it was a bit boring, if he had to be honest, nothing against them, the guys themselves. What was up? What was wrong? He blinked, he kept his eyelids shut for several moments.
A tiny wee amount of gin and orangeade was left in her glass. She was obviously trying to make it last for as long as possible. And she wouldnt allow him to buy her another. That was for definite. It was a thing about females. She was looking at the clock. That was another tiling about them! Women! God! Strange people! He grinned at the lassie:
Yous women! Yous’re so different from us! Yous really are! Yous’re so different!
She gazed at him.
Yous are but honest.
In what way?
O Christ in every way.
She nodded.
I mind when my daughter started her period if you dont mind me saying—I felt dead sorry for her. No kidding. Know how? Because she wasnt going to be a boy! He shook his head, smiling.
That’s awful.
Naw, he said, what I mean …
But she had looked away from him in such a style that he stopped what it was he was going to say. Along the counter the woman serving was setting pints up for a group of young blokes who had just come in. He said, I dont mean it the way it sounds. The exact same thing happens with a pet, a wee kitten or a wee puppy, when it’s newborn and it’s just like any baby …
I dont want to hear this.
Naw but …
She shook her head. I dont want to hear it.
Aye but you dont know what I’m going to say.
I dont want to hear it. She smiled, then set her face straight, stubbed her fag out in the ashtray.
He had just been wanting to tell her how the things he liked as a boy he had wanted his wee lassie to get involved in, because he knew she would enjoy them, that’s all; nothing else, things like football and climbing trees, jumping the burn; nothing special, the usual, the usual crap, just the things boys did. Of course she would go on and do the things lassies did and she would enjoy them. He knew that. That was what happened. And it was fine. But it wasnt the point. It was something else, to do with a feeling, an emotional thing. Surely you had to be allowed that?
He indicated her near-empty glass. D’you want a drink?
No thanks.
He smiled.
I’m going in a minute.
He smiled again. There’s barriers between us, the sexes. But what you cannot deny is that we’re drawn to one another. We are: we’re drawn to one another. There’s bonds of affection. And solidarity as well, you get solidarity between us—definitely … That’s what I think any-how—course I’m aulder than you… When you get to my age you seem to see things that wee bit clearer.
She looked at him. That’s just nonsense.
I’m no saving you see everything clearer, just some things.
She sighed.
I was reading in a book there about it—it was a woman writer—she was saying how there’s a type of solace you can only receive from the opposite sex, a man from a woman a woman from a man.
It’s nonsense.
It’s no nonsense at all.
She paused for a moment, then replied, Yes it is. She looked away from him, off in the direction of the group of young blokes, one of whom stared at her. So blatant too, the way he did it. He just turned and stared at her, then he turned back to his pals. And the lassie shifted the way she was standing. She looked up at the clock and checked the time against her wristwatch.
They keep it quarter of an hour fast, he said. Common practice. A few of the customers complain right enough. But it’s so they can get the doors shut on the button else the polis’ll come in and do them for being late and they might lose their license. So they say anyway. Mind you it’s bloody annoying if you’ve come in looking to enjoy a last pint and then they start shouting at you and start grabbing the glass out your bloody hand. My auld da used to say it was the only business he knew where they threw out their best customers!
She didnt respond.
He grinned. I mean it’s no as if they open quarter of an hour early in the morning! Look eh … are you sure I cant buy you one afore you go?
No, thanks.
He nodded.
I’m just leaving.
He never turned up then eh!
No.
Was it your boyfriend?
She shook her head.
D’you mind me asking you something. Are you a student?
Why d’you want to know?
I was just wondering.
Why?
Aw nothing.
She continued looking at him. He felt like he had been given a telling off. For about the third bloody time since she had come in. He swallowed the last of his lager and glanced sideways to see where the bar staff had got to. And then he said, Do you think it’s possible for men and women to talk in a pub without it being misconstrued?
She paused. I think people should be able to stand at a bar without being pestered.
O you think you’re being pestered? Sorry, I actually thought I was making conversation. That’s how come I was talking to you, it’s what’s commonly known as being sociable. I didnt know I was pestering you.
She nodded.
Sorry.
It’s just that I think people should be able to stand at the bar if that’s what they want to do.
So do I, he said, so do I. That’s what I think. I mean that’s what I think. My own daughter’s coming up for seventeen you know so I’m no exactly ignorant of the situation.
The woman behind the counter had reappeared and was looking along in his direction, like she had heard the word “pester” and was just watching to see. He shook his head. It was like things were getting out of hand; you wanted to shout: Wait a minute! He frowned, then smiled. When he was a wee boy him and his brother and sisters would be right in the middle of a spot of mischief when suddenly the door would burst open and mammy would be standing there gripping the handle and glowering at them. And they would all be on the confessional stool immediately! She didnt have to fucking do anything! They’d all just start greeting and then cliping on one another! What a technique she had! It was superb! All she had to do was stand there! Everybody crumbled.
He grinned, shaking his head, and he called for a pint of lager. For a split second the woman didnt seem to hear him. Then she walked to the tap, started pouring the pint, staring at the lever very deliberately, as if she was making some sort of point. It was funny. Maybe she was a bit put out about something. Well that was her problem. If you’ve got to start safeguarding the feelings of everybody you meet on the planet then you’ll have a hard time staying sane.
The lassie wasnt there.
Aye she was but she was across at the group of young guys. They looked like students as well. He didnt have anything against students. Although the danger was aye the same for kids from a working-class background, that it turned you against your own people. How many of them were forever going away to uni and then turning round and selling themselves to the highest bidder as soon as they’d got their certificates. Then usually they wound up abroad, if no England then the States or Canada or Australia, or Africa or New Zealand, it was all the same. Then they spent the rest of their lives keeping other folk down.
One of the young blokes laughed. It would have been easy to take it personally but that would have been stupid. Getting paranoiac is the simplest thing in the world. A gin and orangeade was on the counter in front of the lassie but she was paying for it out of her own purse. A young guy glanced across. Another one said something. But there was no point seeing it directed at yourself. The woman behind the bar was away serving another customer. The change back from the money for the pint of lager was lying on the counter. He put his hand out to get it.