Chapter 4

"What?" Adam asked tired and still bleary-eyed.

"I am merely asking," Sarah said in a sanctimonious voice oozing with fake sincerity, "what the purpose of that bag of peanuts was last night? After we went upstairs, you were here playing on the willy substitute and shooting fuck knows what with ya takeaway and ya had peanuts. Why?"

Adam groaned, and scratched his testicles through the blue dressing gown. "Err ... to go with the beer."

"You mean the beer that was in the beer can there, there, there, there, there and there." Sarah pointed to eight discarded lager cans on the table and looked at him. "The cans that have stunk out the lounge all night of stale beer. Not to mention the takeaway cartons left there. Do you think we want to have our lounge smelling of curry and cheap lager?"

"Yeah OK, chill. It's a couple of cans, for god's sake," Adam said derisively and Sarah clenched her fists. "I'll move 'em. I always clean up in the morning. It's not a problem."

Sarah sighed loudly. "It is a problem. So I ask again, what is the point of the effin' peanuts?"

Adam hummed and held out his hands. "I don't get it."

"Because normally, I would think you eat peanuts, but you seem to scattered them to the four corners of the fucking room," Sarah snapped. "What is it? Is your mouth not big enough for a peanut this big?" Sarah's fingers moved millimetres apart and Adam looked at her in shock.

Adam screwed his face up. "Oh. You always miss a couple when you chuck them up in the air," he said defensively. "But I'll clean it up before I go to work."

"But I shouldn't find them the following morning. You clean up ya shit from the night before. We have outside bins for that and that and the twenty-two peanuts I found this morning."

Adam chortled in disbelief. "Seriously, you counted them? Fuckin' 'ell. Carl warned me about t'is. It's bang out of order, a few cans and I'll clear 'em up for fucks sake."

Sarah's scowl deepened and she pointed to a pile of peanuts on the small fireplace. "They need to go in the bin," she said firmly. "We like to keep the house tidy." Adam groaned and Sarah crossed her arms. "If you are going to live with us do try and be house-trained."

"Oh for fucks sake," Adam muttered.

"We dain't want to live with an untidy little shit."

"Oh fuck off," Adam snapped. "Leave me alone." He snatched at the small pile of rubbish he had left in front of the television and stuffing into the white carrier bag his takeaway was delivered in.

"Me fuck off? This is our house, and we don't want you here," Sarah replied back angrily. "But if you have to be here, then show us some respect."

"Well I didn't want to move in here either," Adam snapped. "And to be living with you lot. But I had no fucking choice."

Sarah went to reply but she glanced at the clock and swore, pushing past her new house mate with as much force as she could muster to get herself some breakfast.

Adam swore after her as he was bundled against the wall, calling her a "fuckin' witch" and glared after her, holding the carrier bag. He waited for a minute for her to finish in the kitchen before going to make himself some porridge and a cup of tea. He was beginning to hate Sarah, and Tabitha had made it perfectly clear the night before how much she disliked him; that only left Natalie and she didn't appear overly friendly.

He picked up his phone and texted Carl before leaving for work at the alarms factory where he was a supervisor. He had had a bad start to the day and just hoped it could only get better.

It didn't, two of his members of staff phoned in ill and then one of the machines broke so Adam spent most of the day not worrying about his little problem; he reasoned, that if the girls didn't like him then he would just stay out of their way and just live his life on his own.

Of course, the house was very small and Adam was used to having an entire flat and not just a box room to himself but if they didn't like him there was little he could do about it.

Adam opened the door to the sound of loud voices from the lounge and walked into the kitchen to get himself a drink. Although it wasn't a long walk to his employer he had sweated in his coat and wanted refreshment when he got home. He rubbed his hands on his dirty sweatshirt and walked back into the corridor, and then into the dining room.

He knew he would probably not be appreciated in the front room and took his half-drunk pint of water to sit down at the dining table, yawning. He just wanted five minutes peace and quiet to read his newspaper.

He was interrupted by the curvy Natalie, who grunted the moment she saw him. "Don't tell me you buy that shit," she said forcefully as she looked at the front page.

"What's wrong with it?" Adam asked as he sat down. "So it isn't the Guardian or the Times or whatever you read, but it's a solid decent paper."

"It's," Natalie stopped and rubbed her eyes. "It's a foul paper," she told him forcefully in a highly pronounced Scottish accent.

"It's just a newspaper," he sneered. "And, oh for fucks sake, can I do anything right?" He muttered and walked out of the room, coming face to face with Tabitha and a friend.

"You," her friend screamed. "He was with the one who attacked me in my car," she shrieked. "It was him."

"It wasn't," Adam said immediately. "It was Carl. I had nothing to do with it."

"He hit my car and did loads of damage," the girl shrieked. "He called me all sorts of names. Horrible names."

"No wonder he didn't want to move in," Natalie said behind him. "Bloody racist in our house."

"I am not a racist," Adam said quickly and rubbed his hands. "I..."

"You watched your friend walk out in the road and then attack my car while you sat back and cheered him on," the girl said firmly. "You encouraged him do a racist attack."

"Accessory," Tabitha chimed.

"I didn't and..." Adam started. "We didn't know he was going to do that. And you did try to kill him."

"He walked out into the road," she shouted. "He was lucky I didn't kill 'im."

"Bollocks," Adam cried. "You messed up and nearly hit him. He was a bit angry, probably said some things he shouldn't have. But you were being a shit driver 'cause ya a..."

"A what?" Tabitha asked forcefully. "So she's a shit driver. Is it 'cause she is black, she is a shit driver. Or because she is a woman?"

Adam shrugged, "she nearly killed a good friend of mine by her not paying attention to the road. Carl was out of order, but so were you."

The girl gasped and Adam felt his pockets; he had left his mobile phone somewhere. He saw it on top of his newspaper on the dining room table and strode in to get it as it vibrated.

"Arranging to go to the next BNP meeting?" Tabitha asked and Adam swore, grabbing the phone and pushing past her towards the front door.

With a snarl, Natalie picked up Adam's discarded newspaper and threw it into the bin. "Fucking twat," she muttered in annoyance as Adam slammed the front door.

He had been a resident for all of 24 hours and already he was feeling annoyed and angry. Why did the Sarah girl have to "go ballistic" at him in the morning; it was hardly as though she was going to be there all day to smell the remnants of his curry, and he was going to clear up before going to work even before she said anything.

Sarah hadn't accepted that it was the way he liked to keep his house clean and tidy. He would always clean up before going to work, and in the four years he had rented from Sarah's dad he had never had to speak to him about his rented property being in an inappropriate state; why couldn't Sarah understand that?

As for Tabitha accusing him of being a racist; well that was well out of order. He was in charge of two ethnic minorities at work and he never had any problems with them. Of course, Carl was a bit of a lad and he did have a small issue with certain sections of society, but that was just Carl. Tabitha didn't know him.

Natalie's problem with him was his newspaper – why should she object to the Daily Express? Sure, it might not have been her favourite paper, but it was hardly along the lines of the Daily Sport that was littered with nudity.

Adam tutted to himself; their problem with him was purely because he was a man and they just didn't want him around. He idly kicked at a pebble and watched as it bounced along the pavement and then made a satisfying ping on a lamp-post.

In true Beckham style, Adam looked up and brought his hand out in front of him, jumped onto his left foot, while his right swung around in an elaborate arc and struck the pebble to watch it fly off down the road, bounce once and hit a parked taxi.

Adam smiled briefly but then on seeing the taxi driver get out of his car, ran down a path to his left going into a house estate. He heard the Asian voice shouting at him and Adam sprinted down the alleyway, turned left and ran up the hill.

He didn't stop running for a couple of minutes and then looked up; it was at the end of the road where James lived and shrugged, looking back. He had no desire to see the girls any time soon and crossed the road to knock on his friend's door.