CHAPTER TWO
The driving rain had soaked Dylan in seconds, but he didn’t care. He just started walking and, eventually, wound up at the park, one of his favourite places, where he could write his songs in peace.
Finding a seat on a bench, he watched the mallard ducks by the lake, waddling in the mud, fighting their corner against the Canadian geese. He was lost in thought as he kicked at the stones in annoyance, knowing he should have handled the embarrassing chat up scene so much better. Hadn’t he been singing about such things since he was a teenager, for God’s sake?
But then was not the time to be dejected, it was the time to be positive, to move his game plan forward. And he would do exactly that, as soon as he discovered what his game plan was.
Biting at his thumbnail, he tried to think of a solution.
It was cool, he decided. He’d win her round once she heard how talented he was. His only problem was that he’d never played a gig on his own before. He was used to messing around in his home town with his old band. And rather than being a brilliant performer to the masses at the Dog and Duck on a Sunday, he actually served the beer and washed the glasses, so Mac the landlord would feed him. But hey, that could be changed, he thought – no worries.
He stood up and slung his guitar over his back, determined to hold on to the positives. Mac would be bowled over by his talent, and the Dog and Duck would be forever grateful that Dylan put them on the map when he became a household name. He just needed to sort it out with Mac on a hangover-free day, when he wasn’t being an evil son of a bitch.
So, no time like the present, he thought. A drink might cheer him up, and he could handle Mac. He meandered back to his shared house, side-stepped the dirty trainers, bicycle wheels, and piles of junk mail that tripped him up at every turn, and after changing into dry clothes, wandered over to the Dog and Duck.
The babble of drinkers, cheap music, and the chink of glasses soothed him, as he sat down on a barstool in the snug, skimming sticky, half-dried liquid from the counter-top with a beer mat before depositing his elbows on it. The snug was the only part where the old regulars felt comfortable, since the rest of it had been turned into a gastro pub, done out in pseudo Art Deco and unwelcoming glass and steel. The menu had become unrecognizable, too: chips were only ever seen stacked up on top of each other as if the chef was once a tidy log cutter, and noisettes of unidentifiable and mostly unappetising food were the order of the day.
Stanley, wearing grimy trainers and an incongruous cream suit, shuffled up to him.
‘Hey, Stan.’ Dylan nodded toward him. ‘I like the bib and tucker.’
Anya, the new Hungarian waitress, sniffed in Stanley’s direction from behind the bar, as if he’d brought a bad smell in with him. ‘It can’t be worse than that dreadful coat that looks like a dog blanket. Even the dog discarded that.’
‘You like it?’ Stanley’s gravelly voice conjured up smoky nightclubs and whisky chasers. He fingered the huge lapel of the smart suit, which looked as if it belonged on the set of Grease. ‘I found it in one of the charity bags outside the hospice shop. Fits a treat, and what a bargain, when you cut out the middle man.’ Stanley flashed teeth that looked as if he’d sucked on coal for the last twenty years.
Dylan looked away quickly.
‘Wondered if you were eating in here, later?’ Stanley’s bloodshot eyes pleaded an unspoken question. His brown, chewed-up toffee looking face crinkled with gratitude as Dylan patted his pockets.
‘My turn again, is it?’ Dylan joked.
‘Jesus, you’re a saint …’
‘Yeah, yeah, I know.’ Dylan cut Stanley off before the thanks became too ingratiating. ‘What shall we have, treacle baked gammon and julienne frites?’ He studied the upmarket menu and wondered when he’d turned into his mother, feeding the homeless. It must be a genetic thing. He’d be doing a charity cake bake next, if he wasn’t careful.
‘Ham and chips, is that?’ Stanley asked, screwing his eyes up.
Dylan nodded as he replaced the menu in its fancy silver-plated holder.
Stanley never strayed far from Dylan, who’d mostly fed and watered him on a full-time basis, since he’d found him shaking in a doorway one night. Whether from a lack of, or too much, substance abuse, Dylan had never discovered, but his fate had been sealed – he was bonded to Stanley.
He gave his attention to Mac, as Stanley contentedly slurped his beer. ‘I’ll bet you’d let me set up a stage and play a gig in here, wouldn’t you, Mac?’
‘Why would I want to do that?’ Mac’s permanent scowl deepened.
‘Because I’m brilliant,’ Dylan replied, terrified that Mac would say no, but equally terrified he might say yes. Despite that, the desperation in his own voice annoyed him, especially as his words earned him a curled lip from Anya, who mostly prowled around the place squirting air freshener while declaring My nose is not used to the stench of an English pub, to anyone who would listen.
Dylan emptied his pockets of loot onto the counter, and Mac sifted through the detritus, throwing out the occasional Romanian Leu or metal button with a smirk, as if it was proof of Dylan’s lack of talent. He piled all the ten pence pieces up, until there was enough money to buy a pint, and shoved the Euros back at him, along with the rogue coins and sweet wrappers.
Dylan put them back in his pocket with a resigned air, aware that some people just saw him as a singing dustbin. ‘I’ve got all my own amps and stuff, and I’ll tidy up afterwards, I promise.’
Mac dragged his gaze away from Anya’s bottom and looked at Dylan, his eyes wide as if he hadn’t been expecting Dylan to be that organised. He polished another glass, a half smirk on his lips. Dylan knew that look. It said, I’m listening, but I’m going to tell you to piss off, anyway. It was a normal response from Mac, and wasn’t necessarily a bad sign.
Dragging out the standoff, Mac took a swig of his tomato juice and grimaced; it was no doubt drowning in vodka again. He threw a handful of peanuts into his mouth and chewed.
Dylan almost decided that Mac had forgotten all about their conversation, when Mac said, ‘This is my little empire, and I don’t want you tarnishing its reputation, okay?’
Tiny bullets of chewed peanut shot out from Mac’s mouth toward Dylan as he spoke, and Dylan dodged out of their way the best he could, wondering why higher management hadn’t replaced Mac, along with the ancient Axminster carpet and dirty leather chairs. Although, since Anya had started, he had at least ditched the brown corduroy jacket that he’d always sported and generally tidied himself up a bit.
Mac stared hard at Dylan, as if evaluating his worth, before eventually saying, ‘You write your own songs, do you? I don’t want two hours of bloody Ticket to Ride and Abba putting everyone off their Tiramisu.’
‘Of course, I’ve written some sublime songs.’ He didn’t add that no one had actually heard them yet, which made it purely self-conjecture.
Mac stopped rubbing at a twenty pence piece that looked as if someone had taken an axe to it. ‘Sublime songs, eh. That’ll be interesting. You won’t want paying, will you?’
‘Err ...’
‘No, I didn’t think so,’ Mac said firmly. ‘You weren’t thinking of paying me, were you?’
‘Mac, you know I’m always broke.’
Mac chewed thoughtfully. ‘Oh, go on then, but if you’re crap, you’re out on your ear,’ he said, shooting more peanut bullets at Dylan.
‘I’ve told you, I’m brilliant,’ Dylan said, tempted to cross his fingers behind his back at such a claim, but then again, he was pretty good, in his opinion.
For a street busker.
‘We’ll see about that on Sunday.’
‘Cool. Can I borrow your phone? I just want to call a mate of mine who does graphic design. If I’m going to do this thing, I might as well do it right and put out some flyers.’
‘Why haven’t you got a mobile? Even ten-year-old school kids have mobiles these days.’
‘I left it in my hat when I was busking, and it got nicked.’
Mac shook his head. ‘I don’t know. Whatever happened to honour among thieves, eh? Go on, then. It’s around the back.’
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