Robbery

True story!

     I could tell he was a skanger. The shiny metallic tracksuit with the elasticated ends is something of a trademark. Add to that the dodgy peach fuzz moustache, the peaked cap perched jauntily half way up the crown of his head and the gaunt, emaciated limbs and there you have your basic lower class Irish citizen, a haggard mockery of what a human being can be.

     It was a cold, drizzly winter evening. The sharp smell of urine permeated the damp air of the bus stop, peeling paint flaked off in rusted scraps and even the substandard graffiti proclaimed, ‘This is not a good place to be.’ I didn’t mind. I myself am downwardly mobile at present, with tattered jeans, a space worn through in the social welfare office and little or no prospects for the future. I had less to steal than a Franciscan friar...

     ...which was why the old lady looked such a stark contrast. With her delicate white curls topping a neat tartan mackintosh and her sensible shoes laced in equal loops, I couldn’t help but feel it was inevitable when the pacing, twitching skanger boy began to peek furtively from me to her, no doubt wondering if I would try to stop him legging it with her purse. As I said, I too look like quite the unsavoury character.

     Suddenly there were headlights blazing, blinding me as the city juggernaut jerked to a stop. Blinking the white spots from my eyes I thought, ’That’s it, that shabby canvas bag is a goner. I hope he can count because it’s probably full of coins.’

     He stepped closer to her, held a hand protectively at her back and helped her mount the steps to the driver, all the while glancing at my frayed and derelict appearance. He thought I was going to rob her!

     Poor kid. Little did we know, she’d already been robbed.

     The driver huffed and puffed in his sweat-stained shirt and tutted as the old woman began counting out her coppers. Cutbacks, they’d said. Austerity policy, everyone has to pay for a mistake they didn’t make. The pensions were hit badly. That night we saw just how much. She hadn’t qualified for an O.A.P. bus pass and was just short of her fare home.

     ‘Those thievin’ baaastards in de guvverment,’spat the skanger, ‘Robbin’ de people blind. Dey won’t be happy ‘til we’re all f****n’ dead!’ and with that this seeming low-life, this yellow-toothed dreg of society, this wreck that you would sooner cross the street than meet put his grubby hand in his pocket and produced his last 50c to make up the lady’s fare.

     His inner city language was salty but the sentiment was pure, and sometimes it takes an incident like this to remind us who the real unscrupulous thieves are in this country.

Reviews

[Esra Osman]

Tess you have an amazing talent, I love the way you describe moments- certainly gives it a real feel! Well done, I really enjoyed this read.