CHAPTER 4
I signed, of course, and once home started the ritual of ringing round the other three firms with whom Mr Mossman had arranged job interviews. I found myself feeling an awful lot happier in myself; for the first time since a windy day in Northumberland I was seeing a future ahead.

I suppose it was a mixture of things associated with that word, a future. Carl and Rosie clearly assumed I would be working my way upwards in the biking world, at least in terms of engine size, and the new job promised an awful lot of opportunities to find a little self-respect. Ruth and I seemed to have made a connection, not to mention the smiles I was getting from Harry, and his concern for my liver at the expense of his own income.

Most of all, it was that session with Bert and his telescope that I found so healing. There were flashbacks, of course, to ‘cock pheasant ducks’ and day-dozing owls, but I felt, hoped, that a little more formal learning might lift me that little bit higher, and perhaps leave me able to smile at those memories, rather than weep.

High hopes indeed.

I parked the Honda in a safe corner of the yard the next morning, chain back through wheel and saddle, and went through the induction process that had almost completely been covered by Bert. All that really remained was to pick up and put on the three-piece uniform the company provided: polo-shirt, jacket and work trousers, along with a pair of safety boots for the sake of my toes. I spent the next week and a half revisiting my time with Mick by riding in the left-hand seat as I learned routes and customers, as well as those other traditional and more pleasant lessons about friendly cafes and pint mugs of warmth and refreshment.

The nights were still a problem, for with my new approach to what Harry had to offer, my evenings remained filled with company, but the nights were sober, wakeful and far too long. I was still working day shifts, and only Monday to Friday, so my weekends would be mine for a while. Soft drinks with Harry were answering my need for company, but I had plans.

A week of runs to supermarkets large and small, the trailer sign-written for the major companies as part of a two-way deal, and the first major aspect of my training. We bounced, literally, in a tractor unit to one of their big depots to pick up a loaded trailer, which we then ran across to the destination, where a little swarm of loaders ran fork-lift and pallet truck into the depth of the unit. Back with the empty to the depot, swap for another full one, grab the consignment note and off again.

Bert had me running endless relays like that for that first week, clearly to pick up the routes and commit them to memory, but the second saw me back on the main roads, this time as a main driver, with a guide in the other seat. Longer runs out to Swansea and Carmarthen, and then on to Haverford West, where there was a secondary depot that broke our loads down into smaller ones for the local shops rather than the warehouse-sized superstores that ringed the bigger cities. I found myself relaxing more and more into my life, but I started to hear a few jokes after the second week.

Apparently, or so the word went, my musical tastes were not to be argued with. Ride with Debbie, went the gossip, and be ready to have your ears beaten half to death. And woe betide any disco fan. The problem, which it really wasn’t, sorted itself the third week, once I had obviously passed my probation, induction, orientation, whatever, to the satisfaction of The Management, and I was on my own again, which suited my mood far better.

I had picked up a few more bands in my list of things to listen to, particularly in blues and R&B, so my solitude left me rolling along in my own sonic cloud, free to sing as loudly, and I suspect off-key, as I wanted. Once I was allocated a regular roster, I found a camera bag that would carry my sandwiches, some chocolate and a box of cassettes, the padded dividers keeping everything safe.

Five weeks in, and Bert was ringing the changes in his own way. We, the drivers, all preferred those, longer runs, because it meant fewer frantic sessions hitching, offloading, unhitching, rinse and repeat, so our work pattern was based on two weeks of local stuff followed by one week of those longer trips. It suited me, as the shorter stuff kept me sociable, by force of necessity. I had to interact with more human beings on those jobs.

I did two things on my first weekend off, and one was a simple one: I found a bookshop, and after pumping the boss for advice, I bought a decent bird watching guide. I looked at the telescopes for sale in a camera shop, and winced at their price, so Mam’s old bins would do for a while. The bird guide, though, just turned out to be the first of several.

The second thing I did involved the addresses Harry had written down for me. I waited until it was heading towards drinking time, leaving the bike at home with the intention of heading back to Harry’s after an ‘explore’ of what Cardiff Had to offer the discerning poofter, and in my innocence I made a couple of mistakes.

The first was in heading into a bar that turned out to be specifically for men. There was a man in a leather vest over a very tight and spotlessly white T-shirt at the door.

“You got the right place, love?”

“Sorry?”

“No fish here, darling. Not even if there’s a cock in those jeans. No fag hags, no tourists, no fish. No women. OK? Don’t slam it on your way out, ta!”

I found myself out on the street once more, for the first time in ages actually lost for words. A couple of deep breaths, then cross that one off the list, and fuck ‘em.

I sat in a couple of more for a soft drink, but there was nothing at all attracting me, and the number of people in each one was very, very low; my first real encounter with the “Late night club crawl” culture. I was used to places where people drank into the late morning, but they usually started the process as soon as their bike was parked and their tent up. These people were clearly lightweights.

Finally, I came to the place Harry had thought would work, an older building called “The Smugglers”. I hot a little confused about the name, as apostrophes seemed to appear at random throughout the place, but never mind. I walked around as a reconnaissance, and could see what Harry meant. Rather than one huge open space, like a modern pub, or the old-fashioned ‘bar and lounge’ split I was used to, the place was like one of the older bookshops I had visited with Mam, where odd rooms held different categories, and you could never be quite sure you had seen the whole of the inside…

Mam. Shit; it still hurt, and I realised it probably always would.

“I said are you OK, love?”

“Um? Sorry!”

I was at the main bar again, and the bar… person was leaning over towards me, a towering wig nearly brushing the racked glasses overhead. I dug out a smile.

“Sorry. Just a few old memories playing up. Could you do me a Coke? Ice and a slice, aye?”

“On the way, love. You new in the Big Shitty?”

“Sorry?”

“What did you ever do to deserve such philistines, Marlene? The Stranglers, darling. ‘Just a Peasant in the Big Shitty’. It’s music. You might have heard of the concept. Ice and a slice, you said? Lemon or lime or orange?”

“Could I try lime, please? And would you mind if I asked a couple of questions?”

“CARLY, DARLING!”

A far less flamboyantly dressed woman looked in through the archway at the end of the bar.

“Marlene?”

“Got a nosy parker here, sweetie. Can you watch this end for a bit while it’s quiet?”

‘Marlene’ got her nod of agreement, then opened a little doorway at our end and led me to a corner table, walking surprisingly easily in some towering heels while carrying a cup of tea and my Coke. Once we were seated, she, he, I was a little lost, raised her painted eyebrows.

“Well? Journalist, tourist, or fucking plain clothes filth? And when I say ‘plain’, your clothes take that word to a new depth of the sort I would never have been able to imagine without seeing you in fucking front of me!”

Bloody hell… I gathered my class to me.

“Not a journalist, not the filth, and I live here, so what else do you have in the way of guesses?”

“Darling, I don’t care where you live, a tourist is a tourist, a perve is a perve. Now…”

Marlene stared at me for about twenty seconds, then smiled, in a far more genuine way than she had done before.

“You a bull dyke or a tranny, love? Not sure about the second, cause those tits look realer than Marlene can ever aspire to”

Deep breaths, Debbie, and class.

“Straight girl, I am, and these are mine and entirely home-grown”

Marlene sagged slightly, and another smile came out, even softer.

“Sorry, darling. Take this the right way, OK? I can see things there. I’ve been in drag all my life, or nearly, and I have good radar. It’s not a problem if you’re one of those change people. Just, we get a few diesels in, and they can be a bit SCUM thingy”

“Marlene, is it?”

“Yes, sweety. And you are?”

“Debbie. Just, please, I am absolutely fucking lost in all that shite. You speak English?”

That brought a genuine laugh, the first of many I was to hear.

“From the beginning then? I was asking if you are a girl who likes other girls. Some of them look more like men than Daley bloody Thompson does. Some of them are into that ‘Society for Cutting Up Men’ rubbish, but I bar them when I find them. Not having that shit in here, or the other way. What’s funny?”

“I think I got that on the way here. Loads of comments about ‘fish’ from some wanker in a leather vest and white T-shirt, with a moustache”

“Oh, dear, a fucking clone. Was he wearing chaps as well? Shit, love! What the fuck did he do?”

I fought back from the edge of tears, but only just.

“Sorry. It was something Mam used to say”

“Oh. How long, Debbie?”

“Not that long. Just me, now, but memories, words, you know?”

“I know. You want a proper cuppa rather than sugary shit?”

I nodded, and she was back in a few minutes with, of all things, a pint mug.

“I guessed this might be more welcome. Anyway, if I am wrong, you can slap me, but not where it will leave a mark. You’re a transsexual, am I right?”

“It’s that obvious?”

Marlene put her hand on mine.

“No. Not at all. I just have a bit of an insight, and an eye for things. Spent so long getting my drag right, I can see a few of the problems you people… the problems a newer woman might have to face. You’re straight, you say?”

“Yes. Absolutely”

“Well, that’s going to piss off some of my customers. Anyway, fresh start here, OK? You say you have some questions. Awkward ones?”

“I don’t think so. What it is, I have a friend, a couple of friends, and they’re a couple, and I was looking for somewhere safe for a drink, a night out thing if they visit, somewhere they don’t have to pretend they’re just good mates sort of thing. Not somewhere too loud, or full of wankers wearing chaps”

The second genuine laugh.

“Then you have exactly the right place in my bijou little establishment! How old are they? Twinks? Sorry: young men, or well-aged and well-hung?”

I found myself laughing at that one, as well as beginning to like Marlene, whatever I was meant to call them. They patted my hand again.

“Let me know when they are visiting, and I will tell you what we have on. We do a lot of special nights, drag acts, disco and so on, but sometimes we just have a social or support group session. There’s always a quiet spot somewhere to have a sit and natter”

We chatted, far more happily in my case, until my pint of tea was done, and I was ready to head over to Harry’s for a proper drink. As I rose, I received another genuinely warm smile.

“We have a transsexual support group here as well, Debbie. I won’t out you to them, and I doubt they’d spot you anyway, but you come back. I can always do with sensible customers. Let me know when the boys are down, and I’ll keep you a quiet corner”

Ruth was right about me, it seemed. I did seem to fall on my feet. I filed Marlene’s information away in my mind, along with the ways of telling one gull from another given to me by Bert, and hopped the bus back to Adamsdown for a quiet drink before bed.

The following week was a heavy one, running several trailers to large local supermarkets, many of those trailers being fridges, with all that extra fun of making sure the trailer’s power was running as sweetly as the tractor unit’s. The other reason I hated refrigerated trailers was the faff at the delivery end, as various jumped-up junior managers felt it was their crowning role in life, the very pinnacle of their career, to piss about with thermometers before signing off on the delivery.

I remembered Mick’s useful advice not to ‘piss off the Cussers’, and extended it to junior managers.

I was sitting on a tool cabinet in Tesco, eating my sandwiches after one more fridge drop, as what I was starting to call micromanagers waved clipboards around and dictated to their underlings how to handle pallet truck and fork lift, and seeing to my mild amusement that the fork lift driver was wearing headphones, when there was a cough next to me. I looked up in some surprise to find a tall man holding out a steaming mug.

“Tea do you? Got some sugar if you want some”

It was a welcome offer, as the air had an edge to it, so I nodded my thanks.

“No sugar for me, mate. This some new perk?”

He smiled, and just like Marlene’s there was real warmth there to go with that in the mug.

“Nope! I’ve just seen you come in a few times, and it’s always the same. You end up sitting and looking bored while they argue over what comes off first”

I shrugged and nodded, and his smile turned into a grin.

“They don’t do it with the male drivers, you know, just let them muck in and get the trailer emptied”

“I tried that, and they told me to leave it alone, that they knew what they were doing and that!”

“Yeah. Stay out of the way of men’s work, little girl?”

“Pardon? Who drives the bloody wagon?”

A happy laugh, and another grin.

“When did male chauvinism ever follow any logic except its own? I’m Frank. I’m one of the bakers here. Not that it means much in the way of baking, real baking. Production line stuff, that’s all”

I offered him my free hand.

“I’m Debbie. I---”

“---drive lorries! I spotted that bit. Anyway, I’ll have to shoot off. Got to sort out the next batch of loaves. No fishes, just ready-made lumps of dough to stick in the oven and rack in the store. If you’re here, and I’m on, I’ll do you a cuppa. Save you from getting too bored, I hope!”

It took him three weeks to work up to asking me out.