CANNONS TO THE LEFT OF THEM, CANNONS TO THE RIGHT.

*these are a couple of characters from a book I've started so any feedback on this page would be appreciated*



Parting her with his now slippery nose he slid his face upwards, moving it from side to side by an inch, breathing in her scent while trailing his flattened tongue over her silky flesh. She tensed as her hot button of a clitoris felt his lips seal around it, then he gently began to suck as, at the same time, he slid two fingers into her. She grunted from under the pillow that she held tight against her face, and her pelvis twitched upwards in response to his rhythm.

“ANOTHER ANNOYING RING TONE! ANOTHER ANNOYING RING TONE! ANOTHER….”

Dave’s hand left her buttock and, like a blinded snake, moved through the pile of their clothes next to the futon. As they both desperately tried to stay locked into the moment, his search became more frantic.

“ANOTHER ANNOYING RING TONE!”

“For fuck’s sake what the fucking fuck is that?” Jess shouted from under the pillow.
“Nathan Barley. Cunt. Fuckin’ Vaughn.” Dave gave up the moment, and rolled into a sitting position on the mattress. He began picking up items of clothing and shaking them. The phone abruptly stopped ringing.

“Thank god for that. Back in the saddle, you sexy Geordie bastard, before I completely dry up.” She stretched out lusciously on the rumpled sheet, pillow still clenched over her head. Dave found the mobile and flipped it open. “I can’t, pet. It’s the batphone and anyway, he’ll just keep ringing.”
“What….” She rose up, pillow yanked down as she pivoted from the waist “…the fuck do you mean you can’t and what the fuck is the batphone?”
“Vaughn’s got two mobiles; one for work and one for home. If it’s a work day and he rings me with his home phone, that’s the batphone. If it’s a home day and…”

“ANOTHER ANNOYING RING TONE! ANOTHER ANNOYING RING TONE! ANOTHER….”

Shrugging in apology and pointing dramatically at the mobile, Dave turned away.
“Aye mate, what’s up?”

The line was silent, then Dave heard a tinny cheer. “Aw Vaughn man, you’re fuckin’ joking…”
“The Raj. You have thirty minutes. Bring your helmet. I have gin.” Vaughn’s voice was slurring slightly. In the background Dave could hear Jess getting dressed loudly.
“Aye, thirty minutes” He hung up. “Twat.”

“Jess…” The door of his studio flat slammed shut. “Aw fuck….”




It was just gone 8am as he walked up the five steps to the red, peeling front door. Looking up and down the road, he pulled the pith helmet out of his back-pack and balanced it on his dreads. Strains of martial music came from Vaughn’s open window and he decided to wait for a break in the CD before banging on the door. He didn’t want to draw undue attention to himself. Vaughn’s neighbours were doubtless extremely pissed off by now. Dave did the maths. 7.30a.m plus slur plus the Raj equalled a six o’clock start at the latest. Abruptly the music stopped, and Dave banged on the door three times.

“You tell that fucking racist to keep fucking noise down.”

Dave swore silently and peered over the low wall into the basement’s stairwell.

“Will do Mr Ahmat. Sorry, like…”

Ahmat’s dark eyes fixed on the pith helmet. “You encourage him. You maybe racist as well?”



“Ten….. HUT!” Dave turned to see Vaughn, standing to attention so hard he appeared to be quivering, dressed in a red Victorian battledress complete with white webbing, a pith helmet with a small Union Jack on a cocktail stick sticking out of the crown, and a gleaming monocle screwed firmly into his left eye socket. Camouflage shorts and dirty work boots completed the outfit. Sighing, he turned to say something to Mr Ahmat, but he was gone. He followed Vaughn into the house.





“So is Tina away for weekend then?”
They sat on the balcony on pale blue loungers, looking out over the drop of roof-tops and the rich green of the field covering the reservoir. The sea sparkled in the distance. The raw cries of the seagulls could be heard above the music and, further in the background, the TV. A Man Who Would Be King was nearing its conclusion and the drum and bass playing in the kitchen was underscoring the clamour of battle.
“She’s bloody deserted. Can you believe it? A man of her rank? Fucking disgrace.”
Dave swilled the ice around in his glass. Not enough quinine in there to drown a gnat. “Ehm, can you pass us the tonic Vaughn? It’s a little gin-heavy for this time of day.” Vaughn screwed the monocle into his eye again and leant towards Dave. “Of course, old chap. No worries about supplies. I got the sepoy fella on Lewes Road to parcel up some vittals and send them via tuk-tuk. At four thirty! They never sleep, d’you know that? Amazed we beat them, bearing that in mind… Kettle Chip?”

“What about Lexy and Connor? Have they all gone to their nana’s?”

“They saw fit to accompany the General on her flight from the front line. Well, I expect she pulled rank, the bitch.” Lexy was eight months and Connor, two and a half.
“What did you do this time, you fuckin’ idiot?” Dave squinted. The sun had climbed high enough to start to heat up the balcony for the next five hours. “Can we go indoors, mate?” Vaughn sprang up. “Never fear old boy, I have recently acquisitioned some of the new fangled camouflage netting. You get the door and I’ll start work on strengthening our position.” Dave hadn’t heard the door. He looked baffled.
“The door, man, the door… I sent to headquarters for more medical supplies. I was hoping the greasy Greek quartermaster would send a lackey but judging by the flabby nature of the knock I’ll warrant the cunt has brought it in person. Avanti, you slack swine…”




Dave opened the front door. “Arkle.”

“Dave.” He held out a cigarette packet.

“You coming in?”

“You fucking joking? I’m off to the marina for breakfast, then I might drive up to Ashdown forest and take Gabriel for a walk. Got the money?”

“Eh? Nope, have you not sorted it with Vaughn?”

“He said you’d… ah fuck it, seventy five each on Monday.”

“Arkle, can I come with you and the dog? Please mate?”

“Hahahahaha, you mug. Batphone? Pith helmet? You shit in the bed, Dave, so you get to cuddle up to the turd. Laters.”





9 a.m. They sat, skin dappled with small shadows, under a large and new-smelling camouflage net that Vaughn had secured with a scattering of masonry nails. He sat back in his lounger, brow beaded with sweat, rime of white powder around one nostril and a look of contentment on the rest of his face. Dave mixed them both a large drink, then sat back and put his feet up on the rail. He’d turned the TV off, and changed the music to The Blue Album after Arkle had left. “It’s that or I fuck off back home. I’m serious, man, This Raj thing isn’t funny any more. I’m an ethnic minority; where would I have fit in with your fantasy, mate?” Vaughn had giggled, dribbling slightly. “Sorry mate. Thanks for coming. Seriously. I was going to let you be white in my fantasy, honest.” He'd ducked and Dave’s hand slapped his helmet off. “Joke, mate, JOKE!”



They drank, and chatted, and dipped into Arkle’s delivery, and drank some more. Occasionally Ahmat appeared in the concrete yard below to direct hard stares at them, but that stopped when Vaughn shouted “Ahmat, mate, have a lager!” and lobbed an unopened Heineken over the railing. Dave found himself chuckling, and not caring at that.





“She’s getting very boring, mate. She hasn’t had a new accusation in years. And she’s developed this face… it’s like this facial development is what it is. Unbidden by the anthropological community, she’s married several looks into one. It’s the sort of face fuckin’ Betterware’d put on the front of their catalogue. ‘Need seven looks? Only got one face? Try new Tina’s Face’. It a mix of pity, despair, boredom, sneer, shock, revulsion and, I don’t know, fuckin’ purpose. It’s replaced the period of time between clocking that she’s miffed, and kicking off. She goes from A to D like that,” he snapped his fingers, “and B and C don’t get a look in. We’ve lost some time, there.” He squinted “Is that shortening or lengthening my life?”
“I failed maths CSE mate. What’s the accusation? That you’ve not grown up? You’re irresponsible and immature? Selfish, unreliable, drink too much, do too many drugs, look at other women, look at porn, fart, fiddle your tax, never do the housework and still bleach your hair?” Vaughn frowned around his monocle “You’ve been speaking to her?” Then, smiling sadly “Yeah, same old same old. Never mentions that I’m fucking great with the kids, or that she’s never eaten so well….” Dave took a long swig from his glass, lit a cigarette, and turned to Vaughn. “Yeah, but it is fair to say that you’ve not exactly grown into your new roles as husband and father, though, isn’t it?”
“Fuck off. Christ, you sound like her, and you’re meant to be here for me you cunt… Fuckin’ hell, I am what and who I am and what and who I always was, and if that’s who she fell in love with then what’s the fucking problem? This is me – I don’t change, I’ve done my growing up and that’s that. She’s the one who’s changed, mate, she’s not the one I fell for, the funny one, the fit one…”

“The rebound one…” Dave muttered under his breathe.

“Wha’ was that? Anyway, I’m a constant and she’s, fuckin’….”

“Evolving?” Dave was feeling agitated now, Vaughn’s bolshie tone and finger-wagging swagger was digging into his gut. “Mate, being a raver back in the day doesn’t equip you for the rest of your fuckin’ life, just the bit where pills and trainers and Dj’s count for everything. Life grows, man. You have to grow with it. It doesn’t mean changing your fuckin’ self completely – you adapt. You advance. All she wants i…”
“You live in a fucking bedsit, you twat!” Vaughn’s face moulded into exaggerated disbelief. His voice raised an octave. “You’re still in the fuckin’ primordial soup of bedsit-land, and you’re telling me about getting on in life?”
“What, and a mortgage means you’re a rounded fuckin’ individual like?” Dave flicked his hand at Vaughn. “You understand less than a man with your brains should, mate. You’re a fuckin’ bottler, man, not sure of your worth, scared of fuckin’ up and getting laughed at so you take the easy option and aim low…”
“RIGHT. I’m going for a shit, and when I get back you’d better either be gone, or have a couple of fatties racked up, you uppity fuck.” Vaughn stood up unsteadily and, accompanied by the sounds of bottles and cans being knocked over, stalked into the kitchen.







It had finally got dark. The cloudless evening, still and fragrant, seemed full of promise. Brighton sometimes seemed to have been built for summer nights.



“Tell your friend to wait for you outside and I’ll serve you.” The assistant was clearly agitated, even stood behind the floor-to-ceiling security glass in the Off Licence at the top of Vaughn’s street. Dave sighed and turned around. “Vaughn, man…..” Vaughn was leaning back against the glass by the door, pointing at the three people queued up behind Dave in turn and repeating “A homo-boy, a hippy and a fucky dread.” Laughing uproariously after each intonation, seemingly oblivious to the fact that the three were stiffly and nervously ignoring him. “A homo-boy, a…”

“VAUGHN, MAN!”

Vaughn’s head lolled around, chin scraping the collar of the stained and reeking red jacket which was now open to reveal his pale belly. “Yes David?”

“Wait outside.”

“Ok mate. Should’ve just said…”

Dave bent right down towards the hole where money and goods were passed, by the counter. The pith helmet tapped the Perspex. “So, like I was saying, forty Marlboro Lights, a litre of your cheapest vodka, two litres of orange juice, and a bag of ice….”





They sat on a bench at the top of Queen’s Park, arms around each others shoulders, and legs outstretched. Vaughn took a pinch of powder from the open wrap on his thigh, careful not to upset it, then, almost delicately, brought it round under Dave’s nose. Dave snorted, loudly and wetly, then snuffled three or four times. He gave himself a pinch, then clumsily folded the wrap up with one hand, and shoved it into his breast pocket, white granules tipping down his front. “Cheers mate.” They clunked the tankards that Vaughn had insisted on bringing out.



“Cheers old boy. Here’s to the eventual return of the General Staff.” He took a deep draft from the tankard, ice rattling deeply against the pewter. “You’ve seen the Bad Lieutenant?”

“Mmm-hmm.”

“You know that bit near the end where he’s naked, with whores dressed like nuns, and he’s fucked off his head, and walking towards an alter with his arms held out, saying ‘I’m weak! I’m weak!’?”

“Aye”

Ten seconds of silence passed. Dave turned to look at his friend. Vaughn’s eyes were wet and he was staring off into the distance. He gave a rather sad smile, then looked at Dave. “I’d fuckin’ love to shag a nun….”