Joey was always a little bit uptight when Brigit was around. He acted as if Brigit was mad about him, actually hounding him, and trying to trap him into going out with her. The cheeky article. Just because she’d slept with him. But this particular time, it was clear that Joey’s reticence had nothing to do with Brigit.
My blood quickened with anticipation. What had happened? Maybe Gaz had been knocked down. New York cyclists were vicious.
I cast my eye over his prone body looking for tell-tale injuries – perhaps the track of a bikewheel on his face – when I noticed there was something wrong with his left arm.
It was swollen and bloody. So bloody that it nearly obscured the word ‘ASSS’ inscribed in gothic lettering on his skin.
‘What’s wrong with his arm?’ I demanded.
‘Nothing,’ Joey said defensively.
And suddenly I knew.
‘He’s had a tattoo done,’ I exclaimed. ‘Is that why he’s fainted?’
What a girl, I thought with contempt.
Gaz’s eyes fluttered open. ‘That fucker was a butcher,’ he croaked. ‘He tortured me.’
I looked again – ‘ASSS’.
‘What were you getting done?’ I asked.
‘Only a tattoo of the best band in the known universe.’
‘But ASSS?’ Brigit asked, confused. A band called ASSS?’
‘No,’ Joey said testily, rolling his eyes at Brigit’s alleged stupidity. ‘They’re called Assassin.’
‘But where’s the rest of the word?’ I asked, baffled. ‘It seems to me you’re missing an A, an S, an I and an N. And how you’re going to fit in an A between those two Ss, I don’t know.’
‘The tattoo-man couldn’t spell,’ Joey said shortly.
‘Gaz couldn’t take any more pain, man,’ Shake said at the same time. ‘He was begging like a dawg for the tattoo-man to stop…’ Shake’s voice trailed away when he noticed Joey frowning violently at him.
‘He’s going back to get it finished,’ Joey said grimly. ‘He’s only home for a rest.’
‘I’m not going back!’ Gaz proceeded to throw a fit on the floor. ‘Don’t make me, don’t make me, it was fucking agony, man. I’m telling you, I held out for as long as I could, man, but, man, the pain, man, I’M NOT GOING BACK…’ He looked deranged with fear.
‘But, listen, man,’ Joey said in a low, don’t-embarrass-yourself-in-front-of-the-girls voice. ‘What about the rest of the name? You’re going to look like a wanker if you don’t get it finished.’
‘I’ll chop my arm off,’ Gaz offered wildly. ‘Then no one will know.’
‘Shut up, man,’ Joey threatened. ‘We’ll get you good and tanked up and then we’ll go back.’
‘NO!’ Gaz shrieked.
‘Yeah, listen, man,’ Shake soothed. ‘Bottle of JD, we’ll have you flying, man, feeling no pain.’
‘NO!’
‘Man, do you remember the first time I ever met you,’ Joey looked hard at Gaz who was still lying on the broad of his back on the floor. ‘First of July 1985, Zeppelin Records ? You told me you’d lay down your wife for the Axeman. What’s up with you? What’s wrong with you, man, that you won’t go through a small amount of pain for the world’s greatest band? After all they’ve done for you? I’m disappointed in you, man, you know?’
Gaz looked wretched. ‘I can’t do it. I’m sorry, man, to let you down like this, man, but I can’t do it.’
‘For fuck’s sake,’ Joey angrily sprang to his feet and aimed a kick at the sofa. He ran his hands through his hair, paused, then kicked the sofa again. Abruptly, he began rooting around in a drawer.
Me, Luke, Brigit, Shake and Gaz – especially Gaz –watched him anxiously. There was no telling what Joey might do, he was very upset.
Joey found what he was looking for. Something black and shiny. It was too small to be a gun, so it must be a knife.
I wondered if he was proposing to hold Gaz down and carry on from where the tattooist had left off.
From the look on everyone else’s faces I wasn’t the only one who was wondering that.
Joey approached with menace.
‘Give me your arm,’ he ordered Gaz.
‘No, listen, man, there’s no need for this…’ Gaz protested.
‘Give me your fucking arm. No mate of mine is going to be a laughing stock.’
Gaz began to scrabble to his feet. ‘Get the knife off him,’ he beseeched Luke.
‘Give me the knife, man,’ Luke stepped in front of the approaching Joey. I almost melted with lust at Luke’s mastery.
‘What knife?’ Joey demanded.
‘That knife.’ Luke nodded at Joey’s hand.
‘It’s not a knife,’ Joey protested.
‘Well, what is it so?’
‘It’s a MARKER, a magic MARKER,’ he shouted. ‘If he won’t get the tattoo finished, I’m going to draw the rest of it on him.’
Relief rushed through the room. In fact we were all so delighted that Joey wasn’t going to kill Gaz that we spent a good while practising writing A, I, S and N in gothic letters with him.
Next, Shake tentatively suggested a game of Scrabble. Shake loved Scrabble. And to look at him you’d think he was more likely to get his kicks throwing tellys out of hotel-room windows.
‘One game,’ I said obligingly. And then we’re going out. It’s Saturday night, you saddo.’
‘Thanks,’ Shake said gleefully. We broke out the beers and Shake, Luke, Joey, Brigit and I gathered round the board on the floor.
Gaz watched Ren and Stimpy. It was for the best, really. He’d done nothing but cause arguments the last time, insisting things like ‘noize’, ‘chix’, ‘zitz’ and ‘Gaz’ were words.
With noise and chatter, the game started. I was totally focused on it because I quite enjoyed Scrabble myself. But when I happened to glance up, Luke’s eyes were on me, dark and meaningful. Something in his expression made me shy. I looked away, but my concentration was destroyed, and the only thing I could cobble together from my letters was ‘hat’. While Brigit got ‘joyful’ and Shake got ‘hijack’.