Chapter 5: The Fisherman's Arms, Early Friday Evening

I don’t know what Mum was playing at tonight, but I almost felt sorry for Dad. I think that’s the last time I talk to Mum about what sexual adventures I have, whether they be oral or actual, recent or even four years old; an event getting older by the day, but in HD technicolor quality in my mind that refuses to slip into sepia.

That is, of course if I ever have any sexual adventures again, other than with my sensibly self manicured fingers, which, by the by, doesn’t count in the confession, as masturbation definitely doesn’t fall within the Mum & Daughter Disclosure Pact, which we agreed on when puberty first kicked me in the front-butt.

Anyway, it looks like poor Dad is going have to let Mum have her evil way with him a day early this week. I know they probably like to think that they keep their love life a dark secret, but we all know that Dad invariably has three orgasms on Saturday night and two on Sunday morning, while my very loud-when-coming mother has between seven and twelve and three to four respectively.

I say “all know” because I assume my brothers have the same five senses as me, but on the other hand, they are males, so usually so self-centred that they think everything else revolves about them. I guess that’s why “son” and “sun” sound the same but spelled differently so sons can tell when they are not the centre of the universe in that instance.

God, I am not looking forward to working tonight at all, which is a first for me.

For a start Wayne is back working this shift, after the bliss of running the pub without his hulking presence. He is such a prat. Thinks he knows the pub business inside out simply because his parents have run various pubs for years and the Fisherman’s Arms, with its beer garden running down to the river edge, is the best and busiest pub in the town. Apparently, in the four years since he left home to gain public house experience, and he says he’s worked in six or seven different pubs, but he doesn’t appear to have learned anything other than how to be a right cock.

Still, it’s bound to be busy on Friday night, it’s a lovely warm dry night, great for sitting watching the river in the sunset with a pint of lager or a glass of wine and a curry or chicken and chips in a basket. Well, we don’t actually do the baskets, but the kitchen is a good and happy one, mainly because in the very first week that he returned to the family fold, Wayne was banned from the kitchen for any pretext at all; if the pub burns down he’d have to run to a different exit or burn to a crisp. So tonight, I’ll let Wayne do the quiet roadside bar with the booths, where the slow drinkers tend to hang about nursing their glasses, and I’ll work the riverside bar romantics who will be watching the sunset while plying their partners with plenty of booze and hoping for a bit of post-pub petting.

Yes, think I’ll opt for working where there’s an optimistic atmosphere of romance in the air. The better tips is just an uncalled for, but never declined, bonus that will buy a future treat for Brie.

I wonder, how much accumulated tips does a proper Daddy for Brie cost? ... Worth giving up my freedom for probably, but there must be love; you can’t bring a child up in a house without love. If there’s no love, than I would rather stay at home with Mum and Dad, until they go gaga - I just hope they can hang on until Brie goes to college, if I get enough tips over the next fifteen years.

I left home ten minutes earlier than usual for my shift. I usually start at 7.30, but I like to get there in plenty of time to hang up my coat, change into comfortable shoes that they keep for me in the kitchen cleaning cupboard, and chat to the catering staff. I find out what’s cooking, what they’re running out of, what they need to sell because it won’t keep to the next shift and, particularly lately, find out the latest gossip on Wanker Wayne. Apparently they’ve all heard that it took Wayne three counts of both the two tills to reconcile Wednesday’s take, but I had already heard that from another source last night. I get to hear all the crap about Wayne, but nobody’s willing to tell Clive that his son is no great shakes behind the bar. Surely he must know by now.

I didn’t want to admit that I had to count one till twice to balance it on Thursday. That’s how much seeing Bryan in the bar, and not being able to talk to him, had worn my nerves. I know what’ll happen with the tills tonight, especially with Wayne working, Clive will take forever to balance the take with the till rolls. I resolve to run the riverside with Mich, which I expect Clive will insist on anyway, because he knows Mich and I work together well, and he’s too good a manager not to have realised his own son is a bloody liability and he can keep a better eye on him in his favourite bar. I will just have to work extra hard with Michelle to cover every single customer and keep Wayne at bay from the riverside bar.

It’s not just his money taking and change giving, he can’t even pour a glass of bottled beer properly, nor pull a decent pint of ale without spilling it all over the place. Plus he can’t keep his hands to himself, he keeps touching my arms on the pretence of asking something inane, or deliberately bump bums when passing from end to end of the bar. The fucking bar floor is always wet with Wayne around, and I’m forever getting the mop out, but with Mich, well we just glide up and down the bar like graceful swans, quick and efficient, but unhurried, leaving no trace where we’ve been by drips or excess foam spilled.

I parked as usual in the downstream car park, at the far end nearer the nature reserve and the smart residences recently built near the river, like Cooper’s Meadow. I park there because few patrons park as far from the entrance as I do, so less chance of some drunk denting a fender or a door, but there’s also a security light at that end, for safety, so I can see well before I leave the safety of the pub if anyone’s loitering down there. The upstream car park is nearer the town, so is more heavily used and always packed on a Friday and Saturday night.

I noted the time on the dash on arrival, ten past. Plenty of time to organize and stake my claim on my favoured bar. Wayne being Wayne and living on the premises, he’ll stroll down as the old ship’s clock chimes the half hour, and he’ll get the other bar.

The rituals over, Clive says yes I can work the riverside, but Michelle’s cried off sick, so I’m on my own. Apparently Clive’s missus caught the sun on a river boat trip that they went on during one of their two days off, so she’s lying upstairs naked and her bright red glowing skin is adding significantly to global warming. Meanwhile, Clive pulled a calf muscle when he fell off the end of the gangplank of the same boat and landed awkwardly on the side of the quay. So he was now hobbling round on a stick.

He had been handling both bars since opening at six, while it was quiet, but calling Wayne down to help in both bars “about ten minutes’ ago”, so that meant he may have already cocked up my till. Bugger! Clive was ringing round other staff to see if anyone else was free. The Fisherman’s Arms needs at least four and even five staff on a Friday or Saturday, if customers are not to be kept waiting. And Clive can’t get down the cellar on his stick, so he asked me if I could change the Fosters, like now, please?