WHO'S IN THE BUNKER WHO'S IN THE BUNKER?
Hey? Can you hear me alright? Yeah it's Thom. Hello. Yeah, the book's full and the dog's barking and the site is crashing. The car's fucked too. You know it's fucked. It was fucked when we got it. A run down alley in south england. I can't shake the feeling, you know? Of course you know. If you didn't know you wouldn't be listening. I've had too much free time. I've lost my watch. It's probably around here somewhere, right? Everything I've got is in here. In this room. Everything in it's right place. Scaffolding outside my house. Cut to a few year later and I'm handing you a tab outside that run down pub in Bath. You take it. Which is weird, because you quit 5 years ago. Or you quit in 5 years, I can't remember. I say what I'm supposed to like one of those wind up toys and I laugh when you make jokes and act all proper. I don't know where we're going. You ask me how the dog is. I tell you he's fine, the old lady next door is sitting him for me while I'm out. The vet, pitying eyes, the last goodbye, a final wag of a tail, I won't tell you. You don't deserve to know. You ask me about work. Blah blah blah and all the rest. One two three four. I've moved my shit into this little garage now. Bum fuck nowhere. Still England. Work work work. Five hours I'm standing there going away at the canvas. I don't think about what happened. Not one bit. Suprisingly easy to forget. There's always a siren singing you to shipwreck. Lonely child, lonely child. School was a laugh. Never did much good in that shithole. No one remembers the average people. Throw a table around, toss some chairs, get to the top of class and your name is there for good but scrape by and you're just another number on old registers thrown in the bin. Weather was quite bleak, but the seagulls never minded. Lunch was over, bell rang every day and they'd be out. Stop looking out the window, Thom. Maths maths maths. I'll stay home forever, where two and two always make a five. I'm at a pub in London. It's not my scene. Filled with that undeniable sense of not belonging. My back's ramrod straight on the squeaky bar stool. You better start naming names. Pint in front of me. Haven't taken a sip. I don't drink. Why buy the pint? I'm at the beach. It's a bleak day. The sky is grey and miserable and the air whips around with a little bit of water. Not enough to be rain, but enough for the old ladies to have their polka dot coats on when they take their dog for the morning walk. Who's a good girl? Who's the best girl in the whole world? Who's the best doggy? Huh? I've got my feet in the sand. It's uncomfortable. It's grounding. We learnt about sand in geography. What a shite lesson. Well, it was rocks or world war II. Mark scemes a bit rough. Take a couple of steps forwards. The beach is empty. I get eaten by the worms, and weird fishes. The water is so fucking cold. My teeth are chattering. Click clack click clack. I come running out. Shouldn't have decided to start drinking. I call you. You don't pick up. Yeah, everybody leaves if they get the chance. And this is my chance. Hit the bottom and escape. Yeah I. I'm lying in the back of my car. Face up. The car's still fucked. I'm back home. Back in the midlands. I know where I'm going, I know my way around. I'm walking around my hometown, I catch the eye of this guy on the other side of the road. He's alright. I look down. I keep walking. Not so soon. You eye eachother as you pass, she looks back, you look back, not just once, not just twice. I've got a guitar in my arms. Another pub. Local, I've been here before. A cousin's birthday, some bullshit like that. I'm playing decent. I get handed a wad of cash. I stuff it in my pockets. I don't want it. I don't care about money anymore. I'm pushed out the doors on my ass. Seriously, I need to stop the drinking. My hair's plastered to my head, its raining again. Are you fucking kidding? January has April's showers. I'm at the hospital. I'm cold. I don't know what they're giving me but it's good and it's warming me up. I get discharged. I go home. It's been long enough. 7 years pass. I'm at the store. The packet of sausages is halfway into my basket when I hear your voice. Thought you'd given up meat? My heart thumps around in my chest like it's trying to get out. How do I talk again? You're staring. I gave up on that, I needed the Iron in my diet. We chat. You ask me how the dog is. Dog's dead, I say. You look sad. I shouldn't have told you. I put the sausages back on the shelf. You're in my flat. The kettle's boiled. This isn't real. This can't be real. A month passes. I've gone to that store every morning for 27 days so that I might see you again. I think the cashiers are getting a bit sick of me. They'll ban me soon, or give me a discount. You are all I need, you're all I need, I'm in the middle of your picture, lying in the reeds I wonder if I imagined seeing you. Maybe the kettle boiled for no one. Maybe I never even went home. I give my old therapist a call. She says I just need to meet people. Don't think so. Meeting people is easy. Maybe I'll get another dog. Maybe it'll give us something to talk about when we see eachother again. 8 months pass. I'm pouring dog food into a bowl. Come here girl, there's a good girl, go on. I take her to the park in the car. New car. Not fucked. A salesman, a budget. A dog seat cover that I haven't even taken out of the package. No big suprise it ends up this way. I'm at the beach with the new dog who isn't dead yet. It's the same beach. It's sunny though today. I take one step into the water and step back out. I take the dog who isn't dead yet home. A year passes. It's my birthday. I got myself a little cake. You call me. The dog barks, because it isn't dead yet. The phone rings one time before I pick up. You wish me happy birthday. I miss you. I don't tell you. Are you lonely too? We're exactly where we didn't want to be. Cookie cutter houses and nine to fives, microwaved dinners and TV soaps all night. Rows of houses, all bearing down on me. Fade out again. I save your number to my phone. I won't call you. I know that you won't pick up. I buy a hamster. I call it Doctor Tchocky. I won't tell you what the dog who isn't dead did but I'll tell you that the hamster wheel doesn't keep me up at night anymore. It doesn't feel finished. We were meant to have our reunion and tell eachother the truth, visit the dog who is dead's grave together with the dog who isn't dead and go to the Pub and I was meant to teach you guitar on Saturday mornings with a cup of tea. We were meant to go to the beach together and walk into the water together, and come out together. But we haven't done any of that, because it's over. It's still happening. It didn't start. It's a load of bullshit. I miss the hospital. I should have slept with the guy across the street. I should have given up drinking. Oxygen should be regarded as a drug.
IT'S NOT LIKE THE MOVIES, THEY FED US ON LITTLE WHITE LIES.
