Ah make some tea and build a spliff and put on the video of The Orb, the one wi the Dolphins. Keep it psychoactive, there’s sex things ah want tae confide in wi Nukes. The spliff is good for Edinburgh soapbar and Nukes is up at my door on cue. Ah’ve goat ma love tape oan: Marvin, Al Green, The Tops, Bobby Womack, The Isleys, Smokey, The Temptations, Otis, Aretha, Dionne and Dusty. It melts ma fuckin hert, man. Jist git that oan and apply it tae yir ain life n ye’d huv tae be a deid cunt no tae feel as emotional as fuck, eh no. Barry.

– Awright, ma man, Nukes smiles.

– Glad ye came ower, mate, thir was somethin ah wanted tae talk tae ye aboot.

– Aye?

– Ah jist wanted tae see if ye fancied comin up tae McDiarmid Park for the BP Youth game the morn’s night. Ally’s takin the car, eh.

– Na, cannae be ersed. Snooker tourney doon the club, eh … by the way, you cowped that bird yit, Lloyd?

Ah like Nukes, ah lap the cunt up, but see the day? The day ah wish it wis Ally or Amber that had come roond.

14

AH’M SITTIN WI Ally and ah’m telling him: – Ah’ve never been sae fuckin scared in ma puff, Ally. Mibbee huv tae chill on this relationship thing a bit. It’s gittin too heavy.

Ally looks at ays and shakes his heid. – If you run fae this, Lloyd, make sure it’s fir the right reasons. Ah see ye when yir wi her. Ah see how ye are. Dinnae deny it!

– Aye, but …

– Aye but nowt. Aye but dinnae you start actin the cunt unless thirs something ah dinnae ken. That’s aw the fuckin aye buts you need tae listen tae. Dinnae be feared ah love, man, that’s what they want. That’s the wey they divide. Dinnae ever be feared ah love.

– Mibbe yir right, ah say. – Ye fancy daein some eggs?

Epilogue

I WAS DANCING away at The Pure, kicking like fuck because Weatherall’s up from London and he’s moved it up seamlessly from ambient to a hard-edged techno dance-beat and the lasers have started and everybody is going crazy and through it all I can see him, jerking and twitching under the strobes and he’s seen me and he comes over. He was wearing that top. The one he’d had on when we’d met. The one he put around me that night. – What do you want? I roar at him, not missing a beat.

– Ah want you, he said, – I’m in love with you, he’s shouting in my ear.