Pigeon Variations – Ch 29 – All Architects are Called Zach (Version 2)

(Note - A version of this was published on ABC in 2019)

PART II

Pyser was back in Peckham. He walked into one of his locals. The door hadn’t swung shut behind him when he clocked the heads angling in his direction.

Joe, the landlord who had recently buried his wife of 40 years and was waiting to hear back from the hospital on whether or not he had bowel cancer, said, “And what the fuck do you think you’re doing in here, you fucking disgrace?”

Pyser held his hands up. “What’s the matter, Joe? Did I do something wrong?”

“Oh, no, nothing wrong… You freak of fucking nature… Pretending to be a dinosaur… Telling us you’re a Cockasaurus and charging everyone with your tiny prick out and then smashing a fucking window for the birds to come in,” he said, pointing to the boarded-up glass. “Get the fuck out of here… Don’t let me ever, ever see your face in here again.”

The regulars in the bar, each with their own medical conditions, fears and disappointments, stared at him, pint glasses half-raised to their gawping mouths. “Oh, fuck the lot of you,” said Pyser. “As if I want to drink in this shit-tip anyway.” He pulled the door and stepped out, hearing Joe shouting back at him.

Pyser could smell revolution in the air. An uprising against the son of a Pool’s Man. A lad who was as honest as the day is long. Conspiracies ranged against him that went beyond theory. Too fucking right. He kept walking. The sun was an open wound, dripping red. He knew that coming back to London was a mistake. Going from one job to the next. Same as usual. Losing the last one in another bust-up. Whichever way he looked at it, calling the manager of the restaurant a fucked-up Tory was never going to end well. But the bloke was actually a card-carrying Tory racist fuck, a fucking Nazi practically, and Pyser had had enough of hearing Nazi racist fucks talk about immigration and why the country was going to the dogs. The country was built on the fucking labour and sweat of immigrants. Ask the West Indians. The Asians. East Europeans. Even the Scots, Welsh and fucking Irish for that matter. Who do they think rebuilt London after the Great fire of ‘66? Dancing, happy-go-lucky cockneys? No chance. Those cheeky chappies were getting pissed and wanking over jellied eels, having a right old knees-up to the Stuart equivalent of Chas & Dave.

As for last night, it was a blur. It had definitely been a big one. Completely arseholed. There was a note from the woman he had been seeing, written in crumbling lipstick, telling him that he was a massive C-U-N-T and that she was going to get her brothers on him. His bedsit was a state. The television screen cracked. Table broken. Fragments of glass spread like fake diamonds over the carpet and lino. The only photograph he had of his mum and dad appearing happy together – taken in Brighton –  was torn to pieces. He walked up the hill. Wanting a cigarette. Not that he smoked anymore. Only when pissed. Ha-ha. But still. He’d have to leave London again, or this area at least, as the woman’s brothers were fucking mental. They wouldn’t think twice about knifing him.

Things could have been so different. Ms Dermot had thought he could be a brilliant sociologist, which was nice and everything but what did sociologists do to earn money? His mum would not have been very happy if he told her that’s what he was going to do. She’d be like, “You fucking what?” Besides, he didn’t trust the advice of middle-class wankers. Those who were in the know. Born on the other side of the fence. Oxbridge types with Southern accents. City planners. Councillors. Hedge fund managers. Wearers of quilted jackets with deep pockets. Short hands. The type who say they’re eco-friendly but come December they’ll be flying long-haul to the Southern Hemisphere, desperate for a touch of the ol’ soleil. Posh twats. Pony cunts. There’s a reason all architects are called Zach. 

That’s when the woman he was seeing tipped him over the edge. Said something in the pub which riled him. Set him ticking after ten pints – and then some – and lines of Bolivian marching powder. He had been telling her about how football lost its soul. Why it was a game for the poor but it had been ruined by the sovereign wealth funds and the American sports magnates and the mysterious billionaires and oligarchs who appeared and disappeared. And they had conned the working class. Getting them to fatten the coffers of the rich. Effectively paying the rich to systematically tear the heart and soul out of their own game. It was a metaphor for the Tory’isation of the whole fucking country. Pyser told her this over and over, repeating that football would never be the same again. Kids of today would never know the joy of The Big Match on a Sunday afternoon with the dulcet tones of Brian Moore.

Walking along the angled street, heading straight for the blood red sun, he wondered why he had felt so passionately about it. He fucking hated the idea of the working class. He fucking hated The Big Match. Hated Sunday TV as a boy. Hated Sundays, period. Roll on Monday morning, he’d think when having to listen to the shitty arguments between his mum and dad. Their screaming and shouting. Smashing the fuck out of the place. And school was a pile of shit too. He hated being a boy. Hated childhood. Fuck you all. Fuck everything. In the cold, sanguineous light of an October afternoon, he realised he could not care less about football.

He had said to her, “What ever happened to the world of Saint and Greavsie?”

It made him cringe to think about how he sounded.

“I hope they’re more fucking interesting than you,” she said.

“That’s what I’m saying. Nobody cares.”

“I don’t know what you’re on about, Pyser… Who the fuck are they, then?”

“It doesn’t matter. You can all carry on, enjoying your comas.”

“Fucking hell. I should have gone out with the girls. You’re so resentful.”

“I’m what?”

“Resentful.”

That was it. That was the catalyst for what followed. “No, I’m not. How fucking dare you accuse me of being resentful. I don’t resent anyone.”

“And the rest,” she said, drinking her Malibu and coke. “I was talking to Olly in IT in the pub after work about the epic-sized chip on your shoulder.” She put the glass on the Fosters beer matt and stretched out her arms to show him. “It’s this massive,” she said.  

Things kicked off with her big time. Pyser was remembering the row as he entered another pub, pushing the door open and bowling in. He had to look twice as he suddenly realised it was the same set of regulars turning their heads to look at him. The shaft of daylight through the door made the punters blink in the pub’s nocturnal, booze-basted gloom.

“And what the fuck do you think you’re doing in here, you fucking disgrace?” said the Landlord.

“Joe…”

“Who’s Joe now? Have you lost your fucking marbles? Is that it? Get out and don’t ever, ever let me see you in here again.”

Pyser glared at the regulars, with their missing teeth, diabetes and itchy moles, sensing their boundless disapproval. He shouted, “Fuck the lot of you,” and slammed the door shut behind him.

He kept walking, searching his pockets for a mint, or chewing gum, or a boiled sweet, or a bag of leftover coke. These streets go on forever. Where do they end? A drink would straighten his mind out. Calm down the violence in his head. Your ugliest thoughts never make a sound. And resentful? The fucking cheek. As if. Pyser was adamant that he never held a grudge against the living or the dead. Not him. He kept putting one foot in front of the other, on a pilgrimage towards the next boozer.

He scanned the buildings for an off-license or supermarket. Somewhere to buy a few tinnies to quench his thirst and soften the edges of his hangover paranoia. Maybe go posh and buy himself a gin in a tin.

And who the fuck is Olly in IT?

She’d never mentioned that cocky cunt before.

He noticed the metal shutters in the shop windows were pulled down. Everybody had upped sticks and gone like in a disaster movie.

Not a car driving by on the road or a cat moodily patrolling its territory.

He saw a pub, pushed the door and was greeted by familiar and decidedly unwelcoming faces.

“Oh, look who it is – it’s the self-proclaimed pigeon king,” said the Landlord without a trace of humour. “Going to bring more pigeons in here are you, trying to buy them pints? Now fuck off before I call the police.”

How many pubs could one man be barred from in a single night?

“Yeah, yeah, I’ll never, ever, ever darken these doors again,” said Pyser before the Landlord could say it himself.

Pyser let the doors close behind him and stood outside. Fuck this for a game of soldiers. All he wanted was a chilled one. Head bowed, he kept moving. Thoughts racing wildly. Sweating buckets. Need a temazepam. So thirsty. Gasping for a pint. Disrespecting the pigeon king. The fucking cheek of it. He walked for ages, or must have done, for when he next looked up, he realised he was on the estate where he had lived as a boy. He saw the brown-coloured bricks of the flats and the white panels of the tower block and felt a sickly sensation. Worse than any vertigo. His childhood was not a happy one. His dad was a proper bastard and his mum was away with the fairies. It was not surprising that her head was a mess. She had to deal with that prick for a husband, two wild kids, and never a pot to piss in.

Tapping the button for the lift, Pyser noticed the graffiti on the silver-coloured doors. The tagging was done by his dead brother, Tony. He smiled at how the council had left it like that all these years. He tapped the button and listened out for the clang and whine of the motor which meant the lift was coming. No chance. The lift wasn’t working.

It was a running joke on the estate. It never fucking worked.