Blue Collar (26 page)

By Christ, I cut a sorry figure and no mistake.

In fact, the only mistake I’d made was to give CT the benefit of the doubt that his loyalties to Charley wouldn’t cloud his
judgement and lead him to portray me as some sort of enormous lovesick mug – which I guess I had been at times, but still,
that was no excuse for letting the rest of the country in on the joke.

What an arsehole.

And by that, I mean CT.

By episode five, pretty much half the programme was now taken up with the lads’ gossip about me and Charley and our petty
trials and tribulations. It had simply ballooned out of all sense of proportion.

Gone was any anger I’d initially felt at CT; in its place instead was honest-to-goodness incomprehension. Forget how my late-lamented
love life wasn’t anybody else’s business, I simply couldn’t figure out how CT had thought it would be of interest to the viewers.
I mean, blimey, there was some pretty tedious shit flying about on this building site of ours, I’ll tell you.

I mean, ‘Christ Almighty. Big deal. So what?’ was basically what my neighbours heard me shouting at the telly every Wednesday
at seven.

I didn’t want to have to relive this puerile drivel week in week out and surely I wasn’t alone in this. I would flinch each
time my name was mentioned and grit my teeth whenever I saw a tiny me looking away into the middle distance with starry eyes.
It got to the point where I longed to see that wet blanket either pull himself together or take a long walk off a short length
of scaffolding.

I mean, what had happened to Dan the chippy’s pencil?

Hadn’t he found it yet or what? Why weren’t the BBC dedicating a prime-time half-hour slot to that drama? It was on a similar
par with my hullabaloo.

No, I was talking about his bosses at the Beeb.

I even half thought about suing. Actually, I never really thought about it. Jason suggested it one night while we were on
the lash, which was about the only time it made any sense. Come the next morning, two ibuprofen and a double egg-and-sausage
sandwich later, I knew I didn’t have a leg to stand on (much like the previous evening). I’d signed a waiver agreeing to be
filmed, I’d had nothing more than my pride hurt and at the end of the day I’d said and done all of these things.

Or at least, Jason and the lads had.

Maybe I should sue them?

At the end of the day, I was just embarrassed by the whole affair and wanted nothing more than for it all to go away. Even
if there had been grounds and I’d had a spare few grand burning a hole in my bank account for the lawyers, the prospect of
slinging ‘you said this’ and ‘you said that’ backwards and forwards across an open courtroom for two weeks didn’t exactly
get me whistling.

All I’d ever wanted was to be able keep my dignity, keep my pride and end things with Charley amicably. It had been the whole
reason I’d bought two tickets to St Paul’s and deleted her number from my phone the very next day, because I hadn’t wanted
to expose Charley to my soft underbelly.

Me moping around like a wounded kitten.

Me looking like a sap.

Me looking hurt.

But most of all, I hadn’t wanted Charley to feel bad about dumping me… hang on, I dumped her, didn’t I? For some reason, I
always remembered it the other way around. Anyway, I didn’t want her feeling bad whichever way the cards had fallen, which
I guess was my real concern. I was big enough and hairy enough to take all of this nonsense on the chin. But I was genuinely
worried about Charley, though admittedly for selfish reasons.

I didn’t want to give her any excuse to hate me.

Or to remember me poorly.

Or curse our time together.

Or feel embarrassed that we’d been close at one time.

And what tumbled out of our screens for six weeks gave her every reason and then some to feel all of the above, culminating
in Jason’s observation in the final show that my collywobbles were born long before I met Charley.

‘See, the way Tel sees it,’ Jason told Big John as the camera eavesdropped, ‘is if Jo could walk out on him for some supermarket
manager without so much as a cheerio, then what chance did he have of hanging on to a bird like Charley?’

Which was funny because I couldn’t remember saying anything of the sort to Jason, which probably meant that this pet theory
was all his own work – though that didn’t necessarily mean there was no truth to it.

I don’t know, but I didn’t really have time to think about it because I was suddenly far too busy reeling from CT’s final
parting shot.

When exactly he’d filmed it, I couldn’t tell you, but he’d saved the best for last and played it out masterfully.

It was one final humiliation for poor old Terry to chew on.

Jason had just finished speculating as to the reasons for my and Charley’s break-up when the shot changed and suddenly we
were looking down over the site from above. I guess CT must’ve rented a helicopter and buzzed the place at the weekend because
I don’t remember him flying overhead any time during the week, but that was really neither here nor there. All that mattered
was that from above we could suddenly see what I’d only intended God, the birds and passing rocketmen to see – my chimney-top
declarations.

Oh… bollocks… In complete honesty, I didn’t realise I’d done so many, but there they were in all their glory, around the tops
of every chimney flue and as blatant as the horrified expression on my face.

Much like Charley and myself, I guess.

28 Hitting the roofs

‘Well, I didn’t suppose anyone would want to speak to me this evening, so I was trying to save the battery obviously, you
twat. What d’you think I unplugged it for?’

Jason pondered this for a moment and agreed it had been a stupid question.

‘So,’ he speculated, following me into the flat, ‘watch anything on the telly tonight?’

I slumped on the sofa and chewed on my lip. This was where it started. I’d successfully managed to dodge the consequences
of my actions for two measly hours, but now Jason was here to crank open the floodgates.

I guess this is what inevitably happens when you do something stupid. On such occasions all you ever really want is for the
source of your embarrassment to go away, be forgotten or at least be swept under the carpet and never spoken of again, but
before you can get to that point, you have to run the gauntlet of smart-arse quips or overly concerned arms around the shoulder
(the smart-arse quips being infinitely more preferable).

‘Get it over with,’ I told Jason, before ripping open another can of lager.

‘Tel, mate, I ain’t here to have a go at you, but what were you thinking?’ he asked, curiously sounding like he was having
a go at me.

‘What do you mean, what was I thinking? You read my housing estate, didn’t you? You know what I was thinking,’ I replied,
then conceded, ‘or rather, wasn’t.’

‘But Jesus, Terry, we all know you’re cut up about Charley and everything but you could get the sack for what you did,’ Jason
then said, which knocked me along the sofa by a good six inches as this upshot hadn’t even occurred to me.

‘You don’t think I might, do you?’ I suddenly fretted.

‘I don’t know, mate, you might do. I mean, you defaced God knows how many houses and left the company open to as many compensation
claims. At the very least they might have you up on all the roofs repointing every flaunching in your own time or have your
wages docked to pay for the job. And that’s if you’re lucky.’

Oh, bollocks.

I tell you, when it rained it fucking poured, didn’t it? And to think, only thirty seconds earlier I’d been worried that everyone
was going to laugh at me, but now all I could see was a horizon of angry faces all demanding my head because I’d vandalised
their properties. The calls would start at the top of course with the chairman of the company, and they’d tumble downwards
through the shareholders, regional manager, site agent and finally Gordon, before knocking me on to the dole with a thump.

All I could do was hope that the blame would stop with me. I’d feel dreadful if I’d landed Gordon in it or cost him any money
or future contracts. That would be more than I could bear. Christ, how was this all going so disastrously pear shaped?

‘I’d better give Gordon a ring,’ I concluded, and endured a five- minute tongue-lashing from said subby before he finally
calmed down enough to tell me to keep my chin up.

‘Look, no real harm done, lad, not when you think about it. Nothing structural or nothing, so we’ll just go see Pete in the
morning and offer to put it all straight, OK?’ Gordon proposed, before telling me to stop apologising. ‘See you in the morning,
boy.’

It was only after I’d hung up that I noticed no mention was made of money and I asked Jason if he thought I should offer to
cover the costs when I saw him.

‘Stop trying to pre-empt everything, mate. Just see what they’ve got to say and go with that. I mean, it’s not like their
share price ain’t done all right these last six weeks, so don’t go making any offers they might take you up on,’ Jason insisted,
then chuckled, ‘even if you have just knocked them out of the FTSE 100, you big, dumb, love-struck idiot.’

I know this is probably stating the obvious here but there’s something about facing the music that holds a particular foreboding
for us stupid people. It’s not like going to the dentist’s or having your lungs swapped out in a transplant operation, it’s
an altogether different kind of dread, because there’s zero accompanying sympathy.

I did it. And now it was time for me to face up to it.

What’s the matter, don’t like it? Good, that’s the point. Facing the music’s all about not liking it. In fact, the more I
didn’t like it, the better. That was music-facing in a nutshell. That was being sorry and being made to feel sorry. That was
what today was all about.

I knew all of this as I washed my face and I knew all of this as I brushed my teeth. I would’ve known all of this as I made
my sandwiches too but I didn’t make any sandwiches, not this particular day. I didn’t deserve sandwiches. All I deserved was
a flask, but even then I stewed the tea slightly to stop myself from enjoying it too much.

That was all I deserved.

Jason was already parked up and waiting for me when I emerged. I braced myself for the first dig of the day but Jason just
told me not to worry about it. What was done was done. The worst they could do was sack (and possibly sue the arse off) me
but that was it, and in thirty or forty years’ time we’d look back on this day and laugh.

‘Can’t wait,’ I glumly replied, as Jason twisted the key in the ignition and drove me towards my fate.

I didn’t say much during the van ride over, Jason did enough jabbering for the both of us. Then when Robbie climbed in at
Thornton Heath roundabout, the conversation clock reset and the whole thing started all over again.

I realised this was how it was going to be for the next few weeks: the same questions, the same digs and the same bewildered
looks, and I wondered if it was at all possible to rent a big marquee, fill it with everyone I knew, everyone I’d ever known
and everyone I was ever likely to know, and invite them to ask me ‘what the fuck’ for an hour or two to get my humiliation
dealt with in one fell swoop. It would be logistically difficult to arrange and probably pretty pricey, but it might be worth
it all the same. Especially if Jason set up a stall selling rotten tomatoes and old cabbages. We might even make a bit of
the money back. Enough to pay for a few chimneys in fact. Worth a thought.

Unfortunately it would have to wait, because like my night’s sleep, the van ride was over all too quickly and suddenly we
were here.

We were at work.

We rounded the corner and pulled on to the estate, but all at once Jason suddenly hit the brakes.

‘What the shit…?’ he spluttered, staring straight ahead towards where we normally parked.

‘What is it?’ Robbie asked in the back, climbing forward to peer over our shoulders. ‘Who are all them lot?’

‘Christ knows. Jesus, you don’t think they’re here for us, do you?’ Jason fretted.

Fifty yards ahead, where normally only beaten-up old Escorts and sleeping hoddies lingered, a swell of bodies turned to greet
us. I don’t know how many people were there, maybe two or three dozen. Definitely too many for us to mow down, so I suggested
we stuck the van into reverse and got out of there as fast as our tyres could carry us.

‘Before they drag us from the van and murder us,’ I added. ‘Come on, I’ve seen these films. I know what happens next.’

A ripple of excitement bristled over the crowd and suddenly the front row made a break towards us.

I yelped with fear and Jason knocked a few hundred quid off the value of the van as he tried wrestling us into reverse before
suddenly we were careening backwards at top lick. Robbie was already ripping through our tool buckets in the back looking
for weapons in case we had to make a last stand as the mob outside were now howling up a storm.

‘Go go go!’ I urged Jason, but inexplicably he slammed on the brakes. ‘What the fuck are you doing?’ I demanded, but a horn
blast and a rear window full of concrete lorry answered that question for me.

I turned back just in time to see the first few ranks of our pursuers wrap themselves around the front of the van and start
demanding me by name.

‘Terry!’

‘Terry!’

‘Terry!’

‘Terry, did she call?’

‘Terry, do you still love her?’

‘Terry, what message do you have for our readers?’

The three of us stared at the melee in dismay and disbelief as more and more faces poured in from every angle to fill the
windscreen.

‘Terry, when did you first start writing your messages?’

‘Terry, where else have you been writing them?’

‘Terry, did she call?’

Eventually Jason succumbed to his need to continually point out the obvious.

‘I think they’re here for you, mate.’