Blokebusters

  Blokebusters

  Sam Carlton

  Copyright © 2015 Sam Carlton

  The moral right of the author has been asserted.

  Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of research or private study,

  or criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright, Designs and Patents

  Act 1988, this publication may only be reproduced, stored or transmitted, in

  any form or by any means, with the prior permission in writing of the

  publishers, or in the case of reprographic reproduction in accordance with

  the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency. Enquiries

  concerning reproduction outside those terms should be sent to the publishers.

  Matador®

  9 Priory Business Park

  Kibworth Beauchamp

  Leicester LE8 0RX, UK

  Tel: (+44) 116 279 2299

  Fax: (+44) 116 279 2277

  Email: books@troubador.co.uk

  Web: www.troubador.co.uk/matador

  ISBN 978 1784628 789

  British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data.

  A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

  Matador® is an imprint of Troubador Publishing Ltd

  Converted to eBook by EasyEPUB

  For Ma, I wish you could’ve seen this

  For Nunks, I’m keeping the fire burning!

  Contents

  Cover

  SECTION 1: GENESIS

  Chapter one

  Chapter two

  Chapter three

  Chapter four

  Chapter five

  Chapter six

  Chapter seven

  Chapter eight

  Chapter nine

  SECTION 2: ENLIGHTENMENT

  Chapter ten

  Chapter eleven

  Chapter twelve

  Chapter thirteen

  Chapter fourteen

  Chapter fifteen

  Chapter sixteen

  Chapter seventeen

  SECTION 3: EXODUS

  Chapter eighteen

  Chapter nineteen

  Chapter twenty

  Chapter twenty-one

  Chapter twenty-two

  Chapter twenty-three

  Chapter twenty-four

  Chapter twenty-five

  Chapter twenty-six

  Chapter twenty-seven

  SECTION 4: REVELATIONS

  Matt & Georgia

  Leo & Fiona

  Joshua & Emily

  APPENDIX 1 – Matt’s BLOKEBUSTERS client questionnaire

  SECTION 1: GENESIS

  Chapter one

  Georgia Brown arrived home from work and gently stood her briefcase on the hallway carpet. She kicked off her shoes, leaving them how they fell, and salivated at the mouth-watering smell of home cooking wafting towards her. She loved it when Matt worked from home.

  Hanging her coat on a hook, she glanced towards the kitchen. The lights in the hallway had less wattage than those in the kitchen, which created the effect of the tunnel leading to heaven much spoken about by people who had near-death experiences. Matt was lying on the floor. Dead. His feet and legs twisted at an unnatural angle.

  She gasped and dashed to the kitchen. The blood in her ears whooshed at such a maddening pace that she seemed to be moving slowly by contrast, like an astronaut walking on the moon. Her mouth changed from oasis to desert. She was too young to be a widow. Matt was irreplaceable. How would she ever get the lids off new jars without him on hand? Who would reboot the Wi-Fi router when their Internet connection broke? Who else would make her laugh with the worst Michael Caine impression ever heard? She desperately tried to recall whether she’d told him she loved him when she left the house that morning. Had they kissed? Had he died doubting her feelings for him? Who would she call after the police and ambulance? There were no relatives on Matt’s side.

  “Bloody thing!” Matt said under his breath, as he sprawled across the floor. He grappled under the kitchen unit trying to retrieve a radish, which stubbornly remained just out of reach. It was his fault; if he’d put the kicker boards back in place after their washing machine was fixed, the radish couldn’t have rolled under there.

  Juddering to a halt in the doorway, Georgia felt momentarily annoyed that she’d wasted so much adrenalin on him. He got up not bothering to brush the dust off his jeans, entirely unaware of what he’d put her through, and stood the radish on the wooden worktop.

  “I thought you were dead!” she wailed.

  “Dead?”

  “You were lying on the floor – I could only see your legs. You looked like something out of an episode of Midsomer Murders.”

  He sniggered.

  “It’s not funny.” Her pursed lips cut off his mirth in an instant.

  “No. No it isn’t,” he managed to respond with suitable gravitas before laughter shook his shoulders.

  Her anger evaporated. It was silly to be angry with him for not being dead. So pleased was she that he was alive, she decided against mentioning that he was wearing his faded Radiohead tour t-shirt. The one she’d put in the dustbin because it had worn so thin it resembled cobwebs. It was the third time she had thrown it away and the third time he’d rescued it from the rubbish. The subject had never been discussed. It was a silent war.

  “I’ve been dying for you to get home. Look at that stunner.” Matt proudly pointed to the radish that had already found its way into Georgia’s bad books. She sucked in her cheeks to bite back a smirk, aware that anything but praise would genuinely hurt his feelings.

  “I think we need to clean under the kitchen cupboards a little more often,” she said. The radish wore a crown of fluff as if it were a parsley garnish. He picked it off and waited for her admiration.

  “I’ve never seen a radish like it,” she said, silently adding in her thoughts that the radishes in the shops didn’t appear to be suffering from woodworm. He seemed to expect further compliments so Georgia stood on tiptoe to kiss him softly on the cheek. “I think it’s a radish to be proud of. Tell you what – harvest the rest tomorrow and we can put them in a salad.”

  Matt’s body stiffened and he took a sharp intake of breath.

  “When you say ‘harvest the rest’ that implies you think this isn’t the entire harvest.”

  “Oh.”

  “The rest got caught by an infestation.”

  “But I thought you bought that spray to kill them all?”

  “I did.” He slid his fingers into his pockets and broke eye contact with her. “But then I read the leaflet that came with it; it described, in gory detail, how it choked them to death. I couldn’t use it. It would’ve been like genocide – I kept picturing the garden littered with insect corpses and their families waiting for them to come home, wondering what had happened to them.”

  He’d planted a whole row of radish seeds in what used to be their garden. Nowadays it resembled an old man’s allotment but it gave him so much pleasure that it would’ve taken a far more hard-hearted woman than Georgia to deny him it.

  “Dinner will be ready in a minute – go and get changed.”

  He watched her head off down the hallway and listened to her footsteps up the stairs: two stairs at a time.

  “Do it tonight,” he muttered to himself. For the past few months he’d been feeling broody. He wasn’t sure if men could get broody but if they could, he was. He couldn’t pass a pram or pushchair without wondering when he’d get to push one, or start daydreaming about what they’d call their ‘offspring’. They both had good jobs and good salaries. They both knew they’d married the right person. It was the right time. Only, he wasn’t sure how Georgia would react. They’d discussed it when they were first
married and agreed to wait until they were financially sound. From where he stood, they were pretty sound now. He’d raised it shortly after she had passed her Chartered Accountancy exams and she’d given the idea fairly short shrift, saying the timing wasn’t right. She had a knack for closing down a discussion and making him feel bad for even raising the topic; he hadn’t raised it since. He’d heard Georgia chant her ‘partner by forty’ mantra many a time and assumed she’d factored in time off for babies. He wished he’d asked.

  *

  Georgia entered the dining room and sat without speaking at the place Matt had set for her. She always sat at the same place – the seat that placed her opposite the framed concert poster of the singer Bobby Darin. The walls were painted red and covered with framed posters, mainly relating to films but Georgia also found room in her heart for Bobby; simply looking at the poster of him in his easy stance, arms wide open as if conducting a swinging band, gave her a glow. It encapsulated Saturdays in her youth when she kept her mother company in her family’s haberdashery shop, not working as such but chatting and getting customers to help her with her homework. She loved the way her mother relaxed when it was just the two of them and asserted control over her kingdom by playing her Bobby Darin CDs on the small stereo kept behind the counter. Her father hated him or anything else that could be described as easy listening, pledging his allegiance Deep Purple, and by the time she reached her teens she had heard enough prog rock to last her a lifetime. She sided with her mother – no one sold a lyric like Bobby. Georgia was lucky: Matt was a fan too.

  A patch of dust on the table caught her attention and she flicked at it with her hand; redistribution, Matt termed it, rather than cleaning. He smiled and began to dish up the lasagne. She looked gorgeous in her sharp suits for work, but the girl he married was the one in t-shirts and jeans. She looked younger casual; sometimes he thought she hadn’t aged a day since university but then she’d moan about a wrinkle or a grey hair and he’d realise they’d both changed but because it was at the same rate, neither of them noticed. She caught his eye with a quizzical expression and he realised he’d drifted off to his fantasy world. He finished dishing up.

  “This looks great,” she said, “dinner on the table within ten minutes of me getting home. I could get used to you spoiling me like this.”

  Matt shrugged shyly saying it was nothing, still finding her as disarming as he did on day one. He had gradually become used to receiving affection but he would never take it for granted.

  “Shit, I forgot the wine,” he said, leaping up from his seat. Georgia waited until she heard him open a kitchen cupboard before picking the slices of home-grown radish out from her salad. She scattered them over Matt’s salad and mixed it hurriedly with her fork before leaning back in her chair. He returned with a wine bottle and two glasses. The glasses were a wedding present from a cousin of Georgia’s who believed couples should always be given breakable objects to throw at each other when the wheels came off the marriage. Almost five years in, all six glasses remained intact.

  The way he carefully shielded the bottle’s label alerted her to the likelihood that this was the first tasting of his dandelion wine. He poured two cloudy glassfuls and handed her one; she had to put her fork down to take it which irritated her as the lasagne was tasty, whereas the wine reminded her of when she realised it was time to reach for the Cymalon.

  “To us – and may all our harvests be as bountiful as this one.” He offered his glass for chinking. In unison they sipped then coughed. “Bloody hell, it’s robust isn’t it?” he spluttered, his eyes watering.

  Georgia nodded, not quite finding the courage to swallow. Eventually her throat relaxed and a measure of burning liquid scorched all the way down to her stomach.

  “Was it a good year for dandelions?” she asked, hoping this was the only bottle.

  “Amazing. We’ve got almost thirty bottles of this stuff!” he replied without noticing the horror in her eyes.

  *

  Matt washed up, Georgia dried. Always. She studied him as he attacked the lasagne dish, his tongue poking out with sheer concentration. Her man. Regarding men, her mother had kept advice to a minimum; all she had said was, ‘You should only pick a husband once, so pick wisely’. And had she? Matt turned the washing-up brush over to scrape some burnt cheese off the dish. The brush slipped and he splashed his chest and stomach with dirty, foamy water. He turned to grin at her sheepishly. Yes, she’d picked wisely. Perhaps not an obvious choice, but a good one nonetheless. He scraped the foam from his t-shirt and flicked it back into the sink, splattering the plant pots on the windowsill in the process. Every windowsill in their house was cluttered with pots of earth containing exotic seeds but never any plants; Matt’s expertise didn’t extend to anything ever growing.

  “Do you want to know what I’ve got planned this evening?” he said, cutting Georgia’s train of thought.

  “Tell me.”

  “Finish this bottle of dandelion wine then an early night.”

  “Half of that sounds all right.” She accepted the lasagne dish from him and worked her tea towel around it in a careful, methodical way.

  Taking the dish and towel from her he placed them on the worktop. Resting his large hands on her hips he moved wolfishly close, “I’m not sure I can wait until we’ve finished the wine, actually.”

  “I’m a very slow drinker.” Georgia nodded allowing him to pull her closer. Matt rested his chin on her head, stooping slightly to do so.

  Both jumped at the shrill sound of the doorbell. The letterbox creaked open.

  “Georgia – it’s me! Open up!”

  Matt grudgingly released his wife so she could let Fiona in. He had much to be grateful to Fiona about; it was she who, albeit indirectly, had introduced him to Georgia, but he hated the way she seemed to think it entitled her to pour her woes out to them at any time of day, like they were forever indebted to her. Part of him was annoyed that he wouldn’t get a chance to mention starting a family; the more nervous part of him was relieved.

  *

  Georgia answered the door to a red-eyed Fiona. Fiona clutched a large carrier bag to her chest and Georgia knew what would be in it without looking.

  “Hello Fi – come in,” she said, trying to disguise the sinking feeling, which had taken her heart down into her ankles.

  Matt edged down the hallway aware he should say something.

  “Fi – we weren’t expecting you.”

  “Hello Matt,” Fiona replied, desperately struggling to hold on to her composure while a man was present.

  Georgia, standing behind Fiona, rummaged in the bag and held up a pack of Walnut Whips. The smile melted off Matt’s face as he realised he could forget the evening which, only five minutes before, had been within his grasp.

  Fiona started sobbing and Matt’s eyes glazed with fear. “Well, I’ll let Georgia handle this. I’ll be in the… doing… and it will probably take me… well, however long it needs to really.”

  “Thanks,” Georgia said as he fled for refuge in the kitchen. She turned to Fiona and gave her a friendly hug. “Walnut Whips and red eyes. I’m guessing its bad news.”

  Fiona nodded, tears streaking her cheeks. Georgia led her into the living room and they sat on the large burnt-orange sofa. Waiting for the tears to stop, Georgia unwrapped a Walnut Whip, removed the walnut and passed it to Fiona. She then unwrapped one for herself and mused over it. She used to love Walnut Whips; now she viewed them as a portent of doom – not that it would stop her from eating her share, purely to show solidarity and support for Fiona of course.

  “That bastard,” Fiona spat before another wave of grief engulfed her. Georgia nodded, even though she didn’t understand what had happened. Fiona muttered something that sounded like “chemical castration”, before her hankie was called into action again.

  “Her bra didn’t even match her knickers,” Fiona snivelled, “yet he still prefers her to me.”

  “I’ll make some tea.” Ge
orgia sensed she was in for a late night. “You stay here – have a cry.”

  Matt was seated at the kitchen breakfast bar and watched Georgia fill the kettle.

  “Well?”

  “We’ve only just reached the coherent sentence stage of the conversation so I can’t tell you much. But – what I have ascertained is that a woman, whose knickers and bra did not match, was doing something inappropriate to, or with – more details needed on that – Jason.”

  “Oh.”

  Georgia noticed the pieces of silver foil on the breakfast bar.

  “What are you doing?”

  “I’m making a replica of the Statue of Liberty out of tin foil.”

  “Of course you are – silly me.” The kettle boiled and Georgia poured the hot water into the teapot, cursing the steam for burning her fingers. “Will you come into the living room with us?”

  Matt shifted on his stool. He took off his glasses and polished them on his t-shirt, a gesture he often did to buy time whilst trying to think of an excuse.

  “Not really my scene. I’ll wait till she goes. Men don’t add much to these emotionally charged scenes. Women get all feisty and look for the nearest bloke to lynch.”