The doorbell was insistent. It rang and rang. Then it rang and rang again. When it rang a third time following a pregnant pause, and commenced continuous ringing, I roused myself from my nice warm divan bed, despite one broken corner supported on a pile of books, and stumbled the five or six feet to the front door of my crappy one-room studio flat, where the rent was three weeks overdue and the bailiffs expected any day. I rubbed and unglued one eye and looked through the peep hole.

That was a relief, it wasn’t the bloody bailiffs or the lowlife loan sharks, just the unmistakeable flat-nosed face of Eddie Griffiths, who I used to attend school with, back when I had something to fully occupy my daylight hours. I opened the door. Brrr! It was bloody cold out there. I looked at Eddie with one eye open and the other still glued tightly shut.

“Come on, sleepy bones,” Eddie growled and, as usual, not mincing his words, “Some of us’ve got jobs to do.”

“Well, what’yer doin’ wasting’ time an’ effort round here for?” I summoned the effort to reply, surprised that my dry throat made any sound at all.

“I got summink for yer, Jack, that’s why!” he said, all snarky-like, “You should be up an’ about be now, it’s gone ten o’clock.”

“So?” I bitched, remembering now that Eddie worked as a delivery man, and just noticed the bloody great white van blocking up my ground floor flats’s natural light, with ‘FedEx’ painted on the side in big bold letters. “Ain’t got nothin’ to get up fer, ‘ave I? Yer bangin’ on the wrong bloody door, Eddie, mate, I don’t ever get no letters or parcels, only bills and you kin keep them buggers, smoke ‘em for all I care.”

“It’s a little package,” he announced, like a snappy male midwife after a long labour, telling an exhausted mum that her infant was ginger and ugly before giving the looked-for gender-specific verdict, “An’ it’s come all the way from the USA.”

Now he was starting to annoy me. Eddie always was a kidder at school, only he never knew when to bloody well stop kidding, that’s how he got that flat nose.

“If it was just a little package, yer could’ve stuck it through the bloody door instead of wakin’ me up, yer bastard.”

“I need yer to sign for it, otherwise I ‘affter take it back to the depot, an’ I don’t get paid if I takes it back. Bein’ self-employed I only gets paid for delivering, not for bringin’ the buggers back, sunshine.”

“Alright, Ed, g’us it ‘ere,” I gave in, wondering what this bloody thing could be.

“Sign first!” He thrust a thick sort-of mobile phone at me with a stylus, pointing at a box near the bottom, “Sign there, Jack.”

I took the stylus and deliberately inscribed an X.

“Yeah, like that’ll do,” Eddie sneered, “I coulda signed the bastard meself.”

“Then why didn’t you, an’ then put it through the bloody door?”

“Regulations,” he grinned, as he handed the light package over. “By the way, you gotta flat offside rear.” He indicated with a thumb towards my antique rusty cherry red Peugeot 206.

“Bugger!” I exploded, “An’ I’ve got a fuckin’ job interview later this morning.”

Well, it wasn’t really a job, just a Father Christmas in His Grotto gig for three weeks at Walker’s Department Store.

“What, you goin’ fer a job, Jack?” Eddie not only sounded interested, more like incredulous.

“Not exactly, it’s selection of the new Police Commissioner, what’d’yer think, ya prat?!” Sometimes I wonder how Eddie keeps this job, when I can’t get even one. I wouldn’t trust him to deliver frozen pizzas while they were still cold.

He handed over the big plastic envelope with a cheerful “Cheerio” and walked off to his van, walking around it checking he still had all his wheels before driving off with a cheerful wave. Can’t be too careful round here, where I live, the thieving’ buggers are quick an’ quiet when it suits ‘em. I only keep my wheels codes they’ve got locking nuts on ‘em and the tyres are virtually bald as Jean-Luc Picard.

I checked the name and address on the package. “To Maurice Alfred Jackman”, at my address. Fuck! My real fuckin’ name’s my fuckin’ business.

Now you know why I insist on being called ‘Jack Jackman’.

I closed the door, although it was colder inside the flat than outside. I ripped open the big envelope and shook out a thin padded envelope about 150x200mm, with a repeat of my name and address in block capitals on the front. I turned it over and read the return address, and whistled. My old man himself, Jonathan A Glover, no less, lately of some exotic location in Burbank, Californ-eye-ay.

Before you ask, yes, it’s him, the former A-list movie actor. He was really big at one time, not long after he dumped my unmarried mum and me, especially in that Christmas movie that comes on for about 30 bloody repeats every bloody Christmas. That was one of the high points of his career, let’s face it. Then his films started to bomb when I was a teenager and suddenly he wasn’t an A-list movie actor any more. He did a few TV soaps and then disappeared. Drink and drug abuse rumours abounded for a while, then the tabloids simply ignored him.

I had that same relationship with him. He’d ignored me since I was about 8, 14 years ago. He didn’t invite me to any of his three weddings and I didn’t invite him to mine, or my divorce a year later, a year-and-a-half ago.

I tossed the unopened package on the bed and washed my sorry face in the sink. A shave, I needed a shave for the interview this morning. Aww! Bugger! The blade’s blunt as a witch’s nipple and I had to use a bar of soap, the shaving foam ran out over week ago, which was the last time I shaved. I was halfway through dressing myself when I remembered the flat fucking tyre, so I redressed in old clothes and went out to inspect the bugger.

Yeah, flat as fuck! I jacked it up, undid three of the wheel nuts, then got to the locking nut. Bugger! Where’s the key? Couldn’t find the bastard anywhere. I was sure I put it somewhere memorable, but couldn’t remember where.

I would have to catch the soddin’ bus. I scrubbed my hands of grease and grime, well, almost got them clean. I dressed in yesterday’s undies, I’d had no spare change for the launderette, donned my only crumpled suit, and tied my one tie.

Then I noticed in the mirror the padded envelope on the unmade bed. What would my old man be sending me? We have no contact, like forever. Not just occasionally, like Christmas, birthdays and stuff, simply no contact. I simply don’t exist for him. I was a one night stand, I had his looks, maybe, but none of his charisma or his possible introductions into his world of opportunities.