They Call Me Deano by B.P.Smythe

A rat amoungst the pack...

SOW AND YOU SHALL REAP by Barry Smythe (Kindle Edition - 11 Dec 2011) - Kindle eBook

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12)

 

Pat had gone shopping and forgot her mobile. He was in the kitchen when it buzzed. Roy Gaynor took the call; it was one of her girlfriends. Then, fiddling with the menu, he saw the text message to Deano’. Can’t wait until I see you again, Deano’.

Who the f**k was Deano’? He didn’t recognise the number. Was it someone from her pottery class? The local pub? Some bloke where he worked? One thing for sure, he aimed to find out.

After it sank in, Roy reached for the sink, just in time, and threw up.

Roy had started at Preston Engineering as an apprentice. It was a family run company based in Essex. Not many people left Preston’s. They had a good reputation for looking after their staff, so most of the shop floor lads were now in their late fifties.

‘We’re all lifers in here, but we might get parole?’ Roy Gaynor, the turning shop-

foreman, would sometimes joke. This was usually when the factory `buzzer` signalled the seven-thirty morning start.

Roy worked the centre lathes and supervised seven operators including his two mates, Harry Pritchard & Alf Hubboard. 

Now it was tea break and in the small green walled canteen the free vending machine was in overdrive, churning out teas, coffee, hot chocolate, soup, for the gathered queue of blue overalls. Two microwaves were busy humming their tune to sausage rolls, pies and pasties, while onlookers waited with anticipation for that audible `ping`.

Roy, Alf and Harry had sat together for years during tea breaks. They used to go through phases during their break time pursuits. Some months they’d play cards, then it was crib, then it was darts. The board was still on the wall looking lost and rejected.

Now they were into their reading period with Roy digesting his steak and kidney pie and flicking through the pages of his new monthly edition, `The Mayer and Aztec civilisations`. While Harry, with the Racing Post on his lap, busied himself in-between sandwich bites marking and ticking form. He got lucky now and again. But, along with all the other punters, he probably kept William Hill well stocked in cigars.

Alf Hubboard, the oldest of the three, was in his last few years before retirement. He’s one of the originals at Preston’s and started as a boy at fifteen years old. This was apart from his seven-year spell in the merchant navy. A subject everybody carefully avoids, as once engaged in conversation you’ll never get away. He still tries to live the part with his small white beard and baggy duffle coat.

On his toolbox there’s a large photo of him with three mates on board some boat in Durban. They’re all stripped to the waist and sun-tanned with un-kept beards. ‘From my last cargo trip,’ he starts… to any unfortunate who’s glanced over while walking past.

Nowadays Alf is into crosswords, but he’s not very good. This tea break was interrupted by, ‘Audience response to a comic, something…something…U something…H …?’

 Roy looked up quickly and said, ‘It’s laugh.’

‘You, clever old sod,’ Alf replied.

‘Well it was a tricky one,’ Roy said while catching Harry’s eye with a sarcastic

grin.

Alf carried on intently scanning clues, while at the same time holding a bitter expression as he rolled an Angina tablet in his mouth, then dispatched it with the last dregs of his tea. ‘God I hate taking those,’ he said. ‘You’d think by now they’d make all tablets taste decent...Now, if I had a choice I’d ask for Navy Rum flavoured.’  

‘Of course you would,’ Roy joked, ‘you, old soak.’

‘You can’t beat a descent drop of Rum,’ Alf said seriously. ‘Now, when I was in the Merchant they used to give us…’ 

Roy and Harry quickly buried their heads in whatever they were reading. No eye

contact meant Alf wouldn’t ramble on too long. They had learned the hard way.

‘It’s cordial,’ interrupted Roy. ‘The clue for the fruit flavoured drink. You said you had…R …and…L…’

Alf stopped and went back to his paper. ‘That fits,’ he shouted over the end of the tea-break buzzer.

On cue the machines started up with the sound of chairs being dragged away to their resting place, at least until lunch break.

Harry folded his racing paper inside his overalls. He carefully looked around, then did his usual slope off to the men’s room. This would give him an extra ten minutes of peace and quiet.

This routine skive included flushing the toilet now and again and running the tap…in-case management had their ear to the door.

Harry put his paper on the side and looked in the mirror. He was forty-two years old, six-foot two, never been married and going nowhere.

He’d been a machinist at Preston’s for twelve years. Now he was really sick of it " naffed-off with it all. The job was gutty, dirty and boring. Turning out the same auto-parts, day-in - day-out.

Harry sniffed and winced at his blue overall sleeve. The strong smell of soluble oil clung to his work coat. It was the first thing that hit you in the morning when you started shift.

How am I ever going to get out of this dirty engineering s**t-hole, he thought to himself. All I need is a good win on the gee-gee’s…and then I’ll be gone. 

Harry wasn’t too bad off, considering… He had his own flat on a second floor block in Basildon, just off the A1235. And, with it a small mortgage. Small enough not to keep you awake at night in case the overtime dried up.

He carefully parted his dark hair in the mirror. ‘No grey yet,’ he muttered. He leaned closer. ‘No wrinkles either,’ stretching the skin around his eyes and then under his chin.

Harry was good-looking and he knew it. A dead ringer for Dean Martin, his past girlfriends used to say.

Even his latest bit on the side had gotten to calling him Deano….

 

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© 2011 B.P.Smythe

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