Steven Hayward's Blog
January 24, 2015
Introducing Mickey Field.
An extract from Mickey Take: When a debt goes bad...
Hot Shot
My name is Michael Field. If you thought I was going to say: My name is Michael Caine, you’d be wrong. The only thing we’ve got in common, some say, is he talks like me. I suppose you’ll be the judge of that. Anyway, call me Mickey.
I’m here in my local. About nine miles east of a place I’ve affectionately dubbed Bleak House. I’ve just covered twice that distance getting back. You’ve seen the movie with the guy, freaked out and running, flushed into the underground labyrinth. That was me. Going north on the Central line… over the loop to Hainault… above ground, through busy streets… another tube, heading south… first bus, going anywhere… District Line, eastbound… one beyond my usual stop… off at Hornchurch… walk a random circuit back… before slipping unnoticed into the sanctuary of a familiar watering hole…After that, the first single malt wasn’t likely to touch the sides. Was I followed by a thug wielding a torch? I don’t think so. Did I see any psychos along the way? Well, it was London. But no, none of them were in hot pursuit, so I thought I was in the clear.
Unusually for a Wednesday, The Feathers was heaving when I squeezed my way to the bar, avoiding any eye contact. The barmaid was another new face out of the usual mould – chirpy, young Antipodean with a mercenary smile, razor-sharp wit and a mood that could turn on a sixpence. She was being chatted up by some lads along the bar and didn’t given me a second glance as I twitched down the first glass and immediately called for another.
The second scotch had been sitting on the bar for a couple of minutes. My heart had stopped pounding, and I was feeling confident I could pick up the glass without spilling any this time. As I did, a hand rested on my shoulder and I lurched forward with a jolt in horror at the thought of a guy with a Maglite grabbing my arm and hauling me from the pub. It was just some reveller getting carried away and tripping towards the bar. I called him an arsehole under my breath while licking whisky off my hand. I could tell he was too drunk to notice me and too arrogant to give a shit. He was wearing a dark suit and fancy cuffs, just like I used to. The Feathers is always full of drunken City tossers on an England match night. They slowly regress into unlikely hooligans – voices become more raucous, language more colourful – as they direct all that suppressed male aggression at the big screen.
Having shifted position to let him in, I feigned nonchalance and cast my eyes around the pub. The bar in The Feathers is like a big horseshoe, with an island in the middle that the staff can circle around. Evenly spaced around it are elaborately-carved pillars, supporting glass shelves above, framing my view through to the other side. That’s when I saw her, an absolute babe, leaning against the bar directly opposite and staring straight back at me.
Without a TV screen, that side of the pub didn’t seem so busy, and I thought she might have been on her own. On one side of her was a space that was soon taken by an old guy, waving a fiver vigorously towards the landlord who was covering that part of the bar preferred by his football-indifferent regulars. On the other side was a middle-aged couple in conversation, their backs to my apparent admirer. She was being served. The landlord put down two tumblers. I was relieved, though slightly disappointed, because that surely meant her boyfriend was at one of the far tables. I looked away, mildly bemused by the intensity of the moment.
I tried to keep my cool but I could still feel her eyes on the back of my head. I had to look back. By then the barmaid was standing right in front of me, setting down two pints of lager for City Boy. When she moved back to the Guinness pump to fill the final third of a glass, my view across the pub returned and I was looking at a gap at the bar next to the old guy talking to the landlord. Game over. I downed the second scotch without a further spillage and contemplated taking the back roads home.
While the last couple of hours had felt like a nightmare, I knew I wasn’t dreaming. But what occurred next surely only happened to guys like me in a fantasy world of our own making, in the depths of a beer-induced coma. I turned to make my exit and thought about nudging The Suit’s drinking arm as I pushed my way to the door, when the gap I was trying to open up was suddenly blocked by the girl from across the bar, squeezing her way towards me.
Alarm bells started ringing in my head and this evening’s main event flashed through my mind…
www.mickeytake.strikingly.com
Hot Shot
My name is Michael Field. If you thought I was going to say: My name is Michael Caine, you’d be wrong. The only thing we’ve got in common, some say, is he talks like me. I suppose you’ll be the judge of that. Anyway, call me Mickey.
I’m here in my local. About nine miles east of a place I’ve affectionately dubbed Bleak House. I’ve just covered twice that distance getting back. You’ve seen the movie with the guy, freaked out and running, flushed into the underground labyrinth. That was me. Going north on the Central line… over the loop to Hainault… above ground, through busy streets… another tube, heading south… first bus, going anywhere… District Line, eastbound… one beyond my usual stop… off at Hornchurch… walk a random circuit back… before slipping unnoticed into the sanctuary of a familiar watering hole…After that, the first single malt wasn’t likely to touch the sides. Was I followed by a thug wielding a torch? I don’t think so. Did I see any psychos along the way? Well, it was London. But no, none of them were in hot pursuit, so I thought I was in the clear.
Unusually for a Wednesday, The Feathers was heaving when I squeezed my way to the bar, avoiding any eye contact. The barmaid was another new face out of the usual mould – chirpy, young Antipodean with a mercenary smile, razor-sharp wit and a mood that could turn on a sixpence. She was being chatted up by some lads along the bar and didn’t given me a second glance as I twitched down the first glass and immediately called for another.
The second scotch had been sitting on the bar for a couple of minutes. My heart had stopped pounding, and I was feeling confident I could pick up the glass without spilling any this time. As I did, a hand rested on my shoulder and I lurched forward with a jolt in horror at the thought of a guy with a Maglite grabbing my arm and hauling me from the pub. It was just some reveller getting carried away and tripping towards the bar. I called him an arsehole under my breath while licking whisky off my hand. I could tell he was too drunk to notice me and too arrogant to give a shit. He was wearing a dark suit and fancy cuffs, just like I used to. The Feathers is always full of drunken City tossers on an England match night. They slowly regress into unlikely hooligans – voices become more raucous, language more colourful – as they direct all that suppressed male aggression at the big screen.
Having shifted position to let him in, I feigned nonchalance and cast my eyes around the pub. The bar in The Feathers is like a big horseshoe, with an island in the middle that the staff can circle around. Evenly spaced around it are elaborately-carved pillars, supporting glass shelves above, framing my view through to the other side. That’s when I saw her, an absolute babe, leaning against the bar directly opposite and staring straight back at me.
Without a TV screen, that side of the pub didn’t seem so busy, and I thought she might have been on her own. On one side of her was a space that was soon taken by an old guy, waving a fiver vigorously towards the landlord who was covering that part of the bar preferred by his football-indifferent regulars. On the other side was a middle-aged couple in conversation, their backs to my apparent admirer. She was being served. The landlord put down two tumblers. I was relieved, though slightly disappointed, because that surely meant her boyfriend was at one of the far tables. I looked away, mildly bemused by the intensity of the moment.
I tried to keep my cool but I could still feel her eyes on the back of my head. I had to look back. By then the barmaid was standing right in front of me, setting down two pints of lager for City Boy. When she moved back to the Guinness pump to fill the final third of a glass, my view across the pub returned and I was looking at a gap at the bar next to the old guy talking to the landlord. Game over. I downed the second scotch without a further spillage and contemplated taking the back roads home.
While the last couple of hours had felt like a nightmare, I knew I wasn’t dreaming. But what occurred next surely only happened to guys like me in a fantasy world of our own making, in the depths of a beer-induced coma. I turned to make my exit and thought about nudging The Suit’s drinking arm as I pushed my way to the door, when the gap I was trying to open up was suddenly blocked by the girl from across the bar, squeezing her way towards me.
Alarm bells started ringing in my head and this evening’s main event flashed through my mind…
www.mickeytake.strikingly.com
