Looking for Mrs Dextrose (15 page)

I hadn’t been able to decide whether the distant, faint lights were the headlights of another vehicle coming towards us, or stationery lights from some kind of building;
such was the disorientating perspective of this strange, lonely road. But, as we drew nearer, I became convinced: First Stop.

When we pulled off the road I will admit that I had expected more: somewhere to stock up with supplies; a petrol pump, perhaps; soft-lit accommodation, in which to rejuvenate
travel-sore limbs; even a caravan selling tea and burgers wouldn’t have gone amiss.

Instead, First Stop comprised just one building: Socks ‘N’ Sandals Bar. And ‘Bar’ was pushing it. Socks ‘N’ Sandals Glorified Shack would have troubled the
Trades Descriptions people less. Which isn’t to say that I wasn’t delighted and relieved to have made it thus far, and for the chance to unwind. I was just a tad underwhelmed.

My watch read 22:39 – prime drinking time, even in a place as remote as this, yet ours was the only vehicle out front. Was the dive even open? The lights were on in the two unusually small
windows either side of the entrance, and from somewhere around the back there came the ugly moan of what I assumed to be a generator.

Importos was looking worryingly contemplative, so I tried cheering him up.

“Looking forward to a lovely cold beer?”

He wasn’t interested. “I to make phone in bar. Maybe Detritos home.”

“Oh, don’t worry about him. He’ll be fine. He always is,” I said. However, the lies were beginning to pain me. My friend was dead and there I was trying to convince his
concerned brother otherwise. It wasn’t healthy.

“Maybe,” he replied. “I to phone. For to be sure.”

I could only hope this remote hovel was unacquainted with telephony.

Dextrose remained blissfully asleep, the oily rag undulating at low frequency in time with his breathing. He would hardly want to miss a bar trip… But would such delights be in his best
interests? Not remotely, I reasoned. Leave him be, let the cleansing processes of slumber continue their nursing.

Socks ‘N’ Sandals was constructed of vertical wooden planking, desert-dry and cracked, distressed by the sun. The entire structure looked as if it might have been
washed up on a beach, years ago.

When I tried to peer through one of the windows, grab a sneak preview of what I was in for, I couldn’t: it was at least a foot too high for me – some seven feet off the ground. For
perhaps the first time on the trip, Importos came in useful.

“Zree men sit at bar,” he reported, stooping to look.

There came a voice from inside: “Christ, mate – a floating head!”

Then another: “Where?”

By which time Importos had moved away from the window, and a third voice said, “You’re seein’things, mate. You wanna lay off the sauce.”

There was a pause, then a chorus of, “Nah!” then raucous laughter.

Crazy times beckoned.

I stepped inside, followed by Importos. You could have heard a zygote drop into marshmallow. Three men were on stools at a red Formica bar, with a barman behind. All hovering
around middle-age, all staring at us, besides the one chap furthest away who had fallen asleep into his folded arms.

There were two tables, and built against the far wall were two cubicles, which I assumed had something to do with sanitation. Behind the bar was a single shelf, stacked with just three bottles
of whisky and one with no label containing a mouthwash-green concoction. Attached to the bar were two pumps, selling the same brew: YYY. Beside the bar was a back door, which I assumed led outside,
given the general dimensions.

The overall colour scheme hadn’t progressed far beyond brown. It was a dingy, soulless place, the bare minimum required to dispense and consume alcohol. It smelled of booze slops and
urine.

Each of the customers was wearing shorts and brown leather sandals, with knee-length socks, a short-sleeved shirt and bush hat. They were weathered and grizzly, and whoever supplied their
shaving materials must have died some weeks ago.

The barman was a fat chap with chipmunk cheeks, in a filthy white T-shirt and crotch-hugging shorts. He also sported socks and sandals. I wondered which came first: the fashion statement or the
name of the bar.

The burliest of the customers, nearest us, and staring with exaggerated boggle-eyes, spoke first. “What the fuck is
that
?” he exclaimed. He had a ginger beard.

Assuming he was referring to my unusually tall colleague, and anxious to present an amenable front, I began to explain. “This is my friend, Importos. He’s a basket…”

He interrupted me. “Not him, mate. You!”

Everyone awake laughed (including Importos – the first time on the trip I had heard him express any emotion much above ‘gloomy’). I fear I flushed.

The barman spoke next: “You’re a sight for sore eyes, boys.” His forearms were covered in scraggly tattoos, which looked as if they had been inked by small children during a
sugar rush.

“Hold on,” said the burly bloke, patting his pockets. “I got some eye lotion here somewhere!…
For sore eyes
, see?”

This time only the chap next to him, a short, untrustworthy-looking fucker, laughed. I noticed that Burly Bloke had used condoms hanging by strings from his hat brim. Had there been another
hostelry within the next couple of hundred miles, I would have got back on the bike. But there wasn’t.

“I’m Bri,” said the barman, waving.

Burly Bloke held out a hand, then pulled it away when I stepped forward to shake it. “The name’s Kai. This here,” he slapped the hat off his neighbour, “is Si. And that
drunken bozo passed out at the end is…”

I took my chance. “Guy?”

Blank look. “No, mate, his name’s Duane.”

“Where is phone?” demanded Importos.

Bri, Kai and Si laughed.

“You’re joking, mate,” said Bri the barman. “We don’t want no one contacting us in here, and we have no desire to contact them. Not when we’re drinkin’.
Same reason as I built them windows too high to see through.” He raised his eyes at my basketball-playing acquaintance. “At least for normal folks.”

I exhaled quietly. My secret was safe. For now.

We would have pulled up bar stools, but there were only the three so we shuffled closer and stood.

“You haven’t introduced yourselves, boys,” said Bri.

“I’m Pilsbury,” I said, flinching in advance.

“Wow!” said Bri.

“Genius!” went Si, whose mouth had dropped so far open I could see that only two front teeth occupied his lower jaw. His eyes were tiny, dark and glinting, like a rat’s.

“Mate, let me shake yer hand,” said Kai, this time actually doing so.

The barman’s eyes had misted over. “Never come across it before. Pils. Actually named after beer…”

“It’s Pilsbury, really,” I said.

“Pils. Jeez. Lucky bastard,” sighed Si. “And who are you, tall fella?”

“Bill,” said Importos.

“Funny name for a foreigner,” noted Si.

Importos glared at him so Bri said hurriedly, “What you boys having?”

“No, no, Bri, allow me.” Kai motioned towards the pathetic selection of alcoholic products available and asked, “So what are you boys having?”

“That’s very kind of you,” I smarmed. “I’ll have a pint, please.”

“I too,” said Importos, not yet in enough of a huff to turn down refreshment.

We stared in quiet desperation as the barman poured a succession of cool ales, first for the regulars, then for himself, and finally our own two glasses. How I had earned that.

“Cheers!” I chirped, raising my glass to the natives, who raised theirs back (except Duane, who was still asleep). I had worried that Socks ‘N’ Sandals’ wares might
be as insipid as its décor, however the hoppy, fizzy concoction really wasn’t bad at all, if a little watery.

“That’ll be ten eighty-six,” said Bri.

“Er.” I looked at Kai, but he was engrossed in a point on the bar surface.

After I had paid, and ordered a fresh round for all (cursing myself), Kai seemed to notice us again.

“How tall are you, mate?” he asked Importos.

“How stupid is you, mate?” Importos replied.

This seemed to get Kai’s back up.

He stood up, all gob and beer-stain, rolling his shoulders menacingly. One of the condoms hanging from his hat swung onto his cheek and stuck there. He peeled it off. Burly as he was –
reasonably over six feet tall, with biceps like large loaves – and wearing a vulpine sneer, he remained noticeably shorter than Importos. The fact must have dawned on him, for he sat down
again and said in a too-loud voice: “Sciatica playing up again, boys. Must be this bloody stool. Needed a quick stretch.”

Importos picked up his beer and made for one of the tables, evil-eyeing Kai all the way.

How much closer to the middle of nowhere could I get, I wondered, as I sipped and savoured the second pint? This was proper travelling, with yours truly in the driving seat.
Maybe I’d had this sort of thing in my blood all along, and it had been quashed by Father’s narrow-minded parochialism? Maybe…

“You got a girl, mate?” It was Si, leering at me.

Should I lie? Upgrade Suzy Goodenough from mere ‘tease’?

“Cos Kai’d fuck her!” went Si, before I could decide.

“He’s not wrong, mate. I would too!” agreed Kai, assuming I required confirmation.

“He would, y’know!” laughed Si.

“I’d fuck anything!” chortled Kai.

“You’d fuck his girl’s mum, wouldn’t you, Kai!”

“I would!”

“He would! And her gran, right?”

“Yep. Her too, Si.”

“And her gran’s dog!”

“Yeah, well, I don’t know about that, mate.” Pause for effect. “
What colour is it?
”

Brilliant!

Kai and Si were complete morons.

There I had been, chastising my younger self for not having the temerity to leave Glibley behind for fresh horizons; here they were – in Socks ‘N’ Sandals. Where did they even
live? I hadn’t seen any vehicles out front.

Bri plonked a fresh round of beers on the bar and threw in a bar snack for me from under the counter. “Try these,” he said. “Sheep Shavings.”

Crispy brown curls, of fat and singed wool, they were a lamb version of pork scratchings, my bar snack
du jour
back home, and I took to them effortlessly enough to order three more bags;
two of which I jammed into my safari suit pockets for later. Stock up on supplies. Me, the seasoned explorer.

While I crunched away an awkward silence reigned, until Si piped up: “Here, Kai, tell us who else you’d fuck.”

Before he could reply, I piped up: “Bumped into a really weird animal on the road earlier.”

“Lot of really weird animals round here, mate,” pointed out Bri. “What’d’e look like?”

I described the creature that had confronted us on the Nameless Highway, the turkey/fish/pig concoction, exaggerating how fearsome it had looked and the bravery with which I had faced it off,
which seemed to suit the tenor of the place.

Kai said, “Jeez, mate, you should consider yerself lucky. That’s the gobble-beaked flatpig. Only a dozen of them left in the entire country.”

“How dangerous are they?” I ventured, hoping it might be generally feared and loathed.

Kai snorted. “Dangerous? The gobble-beaked flatpig? Might give yer a nasty peck I suppose, if yer got too close!”

Kai, Si and Bri laughed. Then Si said, “That’s about the
least
dangerous critter we got round here. Fact, pretty much anything else out there’ll bite you, eat you,
poison you or make off with your kiddies.”

There followed a competition between Kai, Si and Bri to recall their most death-defying animal encounter, during which I became increasingly paranoid. Spiders, snakes and
birds, big cats, small cats, bears, armadillos, ’gators and the sticklebacked buggerfish. There was a tiny millipede that made its home in your ear and during winter dug towards the brain to
hibernate, forming a network of tunnels in the tissue until the human host one day started dribbling and didn’t stop.

There was the rat-faced house bat, which slept in crevices of homes during the day and by night would urinate in the mouths of unsuspecting sleepers, attracted by the ultrasonic tones in their
snoring… which would have been bad enough, had the bat not also numbered among its favourite snacks the googleberry, which contained significant traces of cyanide.

Then there was the so-called Walt’s kitten – actually a lizard from the chameleon family – which killed and skinned kittens, wrapped themselves in the fur, affected a miaow and
wandered into town, preying on, ripping to shreds and devouring female shoppers susceptible to cuteness.

Naturally Kai trumped the lot. “Want to know the scariest, most psychotic creature out there?”

Bri and Si did; I didn’t.

Kai went with Bri and Si. “And I lived to tell the tale, right? The twinkle-toed toad!”

There was a pause. “No way, mate!” gasped Si.

“You
met
one?
Where?
” asked Bri.

“Just out here!” declared Kai. “Right outside the back door!”

“Jesus,” I mumbled, feeling the colour drain from my face.