extreme unction

Nah, I’m no dr-drunk and I meant to teleph-teleph-telephone you.’ I shoved by Sandra, as if she was a turnstile, to be sick in the toilet. And for some reason tripping over my grey flannel trouser, which I’d pulled down to my ankles and sprung a trap on myself, hitting my head off the curve of the pan, spewing up and rolling in my own shit.

Sandra trundled in behind me and held a meaty white hand over her mouth, whether to stop her laughing or puking I wasn’t sure. Her bobbed red hair framed the creeping blush of her roly-poly face as she stared down at me, a golden crucifix bobbling between her breasts. ‘Things can’t go on the way they are.’

I sat up and rubbed my bleeding head and looked around, feeling the space around the radiator. ‘A-a-know. Nay t-t-toilet-roll.’  

‘Here,’ she handed me a creamy white bathrobe that was hanging on the back of the toilet door and she’d that glint in her sea-green eye that gave me that sinking feeling. ‘Why don’t you use this and hang it up again? You’ve done it before.’  

‘Nah, wis-wisnae me, pal.’  I shook my head vigorously as evidence of my innocence and tried standing, only to slump down again, because my own shitty denims and knickers had decided to gang up and tie my legs together. I grabbed on to the radiator to pull myself up.

‘Don’t do that,’ she cried. ‘You’re hands all shitty. Just jump in the bath and hose yourself doon.’

I frowned and outstared my fingers for a few seconds, and wiggled the digits as if they were under those mad disco lights, to make sure they were mine, then held them up to my nose and sniffed. It did smell like shit and snorted and began laughing, because I thought it was funny. ‘Where-re’d tha-t cum fae?’

‘I don’t even know if I love you any mair.’ Her voice did that seesaw jiggle and her jelly belly hidden under a white blouse and too tight denims rolled above me like a ship coming into port. ‘I mean, do you still love me?’

I scrambled up to sit on the pan, because I felt like another dose of the shits coming on, which gave me time to give the matter serious consideration. ‘Aye, I like yer big-g tits, don’t I?’

I saw the flat of her hand coming towards my cheek from afar and my head buckled and I fell and that was when the devil appeared.

I mean he wouldn’t be the devil if he didn’t appear at awkward times, but it fair sobers you up, those lidless eyes of a cobra looking down at you. But he hadn’t wiped his hoof before he came in and had that bit of a wicked stench about him. I was too polite to say so, but, of course, he can read your mind. He was holding this big trident fork and he poked it into my arse.

I yelped, shuffling away from him. Sandra didn’t seem to notice, she was still shouting and bawling at my body, lying down with blood pouring from my head, where I’d rolled sideways and hit the edge of something sharp.

‘That’s not me, pal, that’s minging.’ The devil licked lips, his wormwood tongue poking out. ‘That’s you. Your soul is rotted to the bone. Meaty, just the way I like it.’

‘Look pal,’ and I pointed my finger at the devil. ‘Keep your neb out of my business. And keep that fork to yerself or I’ll ram it up your hole. My argument’s no with you. It’s wae her, my loved one. My good lady wife.  And we were just having a wee domestic, until you butted in with yer pointy cow’s tail…I’m warning you. And I took a step towards him.’

The devil took a step back, his tail brushing against the lavatory brush and flicking it against the wall, where it separated into two parts. Sandra jumped backwards, away from my body, staring at the white plastic holder and her head turning and looking back at me, lying there and she screamed, covering her mouth, running out of the toilet and her feet clacking down the stairs.

The devil laughed and it was Sandra’s belly laugh that came out of his mouth.

‘Nae need to dae that.’ I pulled my trousers up to hang on to my dignity.

‘You’re just about the stupidest cunt I’ve had the pleasure of meeting since I grilled that idiot Donald J Trump.’ He poked his fork at me again and I jumped back and got myself into a self defence posture.

‘I’ve got a black belt in Karate.’

The devil sighed. ‘Look, I’m the father of lies, the mother of lies, the sister of lies and the brother of lies. You get my drift. I just listened to Donald J and he wouldnae know the truth unless it was fed to him like an ice-cream cone and I’m no putting up wae your shite. There’s just some procedural stuff I’ve got to dae about showing you your past life and that’s it… you’re coming wae me, pronto, after signing here in your own blood.’

A smoking skin-coloured parchment appeared in his hirsute hand and he held out a pen with a skull and crossbones stopper to stop you chewing on it as you decided.   

‘Hi,’ I held my hands up. ‘Stop all this big man stuff. I know all about you. It wisnae that when God booted you out of heaven and gave you a good kicking. You werenae Billy-Big-Baws there.’

His fork glowed white and red and then white again. He was raging. ‘I’d have taken him on a square-go, anytime, but he was team handed…and anyway, I didnae want to hing about wae him, it was too boring.’

I tried to be reasonable. ‘Look pal, I’ve nothing against you. I’m spent many a good day in this toilet. I was the Buddha of wanking on that very pan. Anyway, the wheel of life and all that. If you check your receipt you actually see I was an Anglican Church of England Vicar. I’d the choice between that and becoming a paedophile Catholic priest and I took the soft option. I’m not really into that inflicting suffering on innocent wee folk idea, and never voted Tory, so if you can just fuck off that would be fine and dandy. I’ll find my own wae to hell. But thanks for calling.’

The devil’s eyes glowed the same colour as his fork and I felt myself melting away and then I heard the siren.

And I was in a hospital bed, a squawking new-born being lifted towards his new mum. I no longer had the power of speech, but cried out, when I spotted the proud dad.  ‘You’ve got to be kidding me, anybody but that cunt’.  

Who said God does not have a sense of humour? And I started greeting. I knew exactly how this life would pan out.