Jack awoke with start and a thumping headache. He found himself laid out on the street. He had either been the victim of a horrendous prank, or as he suspected the five long island Iced Teas and four shots of Absinthe had resulted in his current, somewhat undignified position. He checked his watch; 3am had come round like a hammer blow to his temples. Slowly, he pulled himself to his feet.
“Coffee…” he moaned.
The night was the kind of dark that seemed starless, an obsidian abyss to get lost in. He shuffled down the street in search of his lost darkened brew.
Another figure, in a similar shambolic state passed him. He vaguely recognized her.
“Beer…” the woman moaned, pausing only to stare at Jack. “Beer…?”
“Coffee?” repeated Jack with a raised eyebrow. In the back of his mind, he wondered if the taste of cheap beer and cigarettes in his mouth was hers.
He remembered a kiss, drunken, sloppy and swiftly degenerating into an excuse just to hold on for dear life as the pub began to spin like a hyperactive carousel.
There was a pause before they continued in opposite directions. Suddenly, the woman let out an alarmed yelp. Jack swiveled on his heels, he saw her bundled into a van.
He knew something had to be done about this. Something immanently. Something he needed coffee for…
Where in the world at 3am could coffee be procured?
A shadow, like steam, wafted into the alleyway. ‘I know your poison.’ It rasped. A pair of silver eyes, glinting, was all Jack could make out clearly from this hazy figure in a long trench coat and fedora hat.
‘Coffee...?’ Jack’s green eye’s squinted towards him.
‘Haha, yes… coffee…’ A Cheshire cat grin smirked under the eyes.
Jack’s own eyes sparkled like emeralds ‘Where? I need it now!’ He edged himself towards the shadow-man, shaking.
The shadow slinked back. ‘Ah, ah, ah… I scratch your back, you scratch mine. Wine…’
Wine? Where was he going to get wine at 3am?! Jack’s mind raced, but in the blink of a beleaguered eye, he found his salvation.
One Eyed Homeless Kenny!
Kenny always sat outside the ATM at the bank across the street and he always had wine. Cheap, acidic, possibly still smelling of feet wine, but wine nevertheless.
“You hold fast to your end of the deal, I’ll hold to mine.”
Homeless Kenny sat nonchalantly by the ATM, using his powers of guilt to cause strangers to deposit ten pound notes in his hand. With every new note, he toasted the health of his charitable donors.
Jack raced up to the scruffy entrepreneur. “I need your wine!”
“Well… I need your pin number then. Fairs fair.”
Jack looked pained; he knew that the woman’s fate rested in his hands.
“Ten quid.”
Kenny fixed him his one remaining eye.
“Ten quid and a 30 minute conversation, where you actually care about my well being.”
The horror filled Jack, but he resolved himself.
“Ok, fine, but can it be tomorrow.”
“I’ll check my schedule…,” said Kenny as he took an ancient Filofax from his inside pocket.
He sighed out a whistle as he leafed through the grotty pages. ‘Hmmm… tomorrow’s out I’m afraid.’ He shook his head, dust flecks flicking off it as he did so.
‘OK, OK. How about the next day?’ Jack was getting impatient. He could feel himself trembling more and more as time wore on. And more time without coffee meant even more trembling and more time needed to save this woman’s life! What could this bedraggled homeless man possibly be doing that was so important tomorrow?
Another inward sigh as Kenny flipped furiously through the pages until he suddenly stopped and slammed his finger on a date. ‘A ha! Next free day is on November the 17th 2020.’
Implausible! That was over two years later. Why was Jack encountering complete nutcases to help him on his quest? ‘How about I just find you a ocularist to make you a new eye instead?’
‘Sold.’ Kenny slammed the Filofax shut, shook his greasy hand firmly with Jack’s and his eye twinkled like a diamond in the rough.
Now to find an ocularist. At 3.15am… in Dundee.
Jack adopted his thinking pose; it consisted of staring into the distance and stroking his chin. As he did so, a black limousine pulled up. More nutcases, thought Jack.
“That’s my ride.” Said one-eyed homeless Kenny.
Jack was agape as Kenny clambered into the back seat. Another man exited from the other side. He took Kenny’s coat, his wine and his… moustache.
“Good shift Kenny?”
“Aye, it was quiet, Denny. Have a good one.”
Two eyed homeless Denny took his place, where Kenny had previously sat.
Jack wondered what was in his absinthe… on wait… absinthe.
Slowly, a thought formed in Jack’s mind.
“Uhm…Denny?”
Denny was still fixing his moustache, the adhesive was being stubborn.
“Give us a minute lad. Blasted thing.”
Jack spurted out; “Would you happen to know where I would find an Occularist!?”
There was a long pause. Denny was thinking hard, so hard he did not notice his moustache flying off with a sudden gust of wind. Finally, he spoke.
“I’ve been here before. Different face, same quest. I warn you, do not complete the quest. Wine, Glass eye, coffee… and a sacrifice? Am I close? Also, there’s an all night Occularist in Tesco on the Riverside.’
In Tesco? Ok, so it was open 24 hours and it did seem to sell everything… Jack may have been nearing the end of his journey at last!
‘Great! Can we use the limo to get there?’ Jack asked. It only seemed logical since it was there already.
So Jack, the shadow man, one-eyed homeless Kenny and two eyed homeless Denny all squeezed into the back of the black limousine.
‘Driver, take us to the Riverside Tesco.’ Denny said matter-of-factly.
‘Why do you want to go there?’ The driver asked incredulously behind the darkened glass. His face and figure was even more distorted than the shadow man’s.
‘Well, this chap here is looking for coffee but to get that he needs to find this fellow wine but to get that-‘
‘Long story! Just drive!’ Jack butted in Denny’s inevitably long-winded explanation.
As the engine started Jack realized something. ‘Hey wait, Denny. What is it you’re needing to get out of all this?’
“Well” began Denny “It beats sitting outside an ATM machine in the cold all night, and I’m more of a coffee man than a wine man.”
Jack felt his blood freeze. He had a sudden moment of clarity; also his hangover was starting to kick in. Slowly he tapped the glass that separated the driver from the passengers. The glass wound down, the driver was wearing a fedora.
“Hi Boss” said both Kenny and Denny.
The Boss chuckled.
“I heard you trying to warn him Denny? One hell of a back track though.”
Denny shuffled uneasily in his seat. “Well Boss…. I just can’t do this anymore.” He suddenly threw his arms around Kenny in a bro-mantic embrace, then opened the car door and dived out.
“Remember meeeeeeee” Was all Jack could hear as Kenny quickly closed the door.
“We’re going to need a new Denny.” said Kenny, giving Jack a leery look.
Jack leapt to the door nearest to him. It was locked.
“Come now” said the Boss with the Fedora. “Don’t you want to see the girl?
Finish your quest? Can you not see what all this is?” He then took out a bottle of wine from his trench coat and swigged the nectar with a satisfied sigh.
Kenny took a glass eye from his pocket and popped it into his eye socket with a ‘squelch’. So much for needing an ocularist.
“Who are you people?” Cried Jack.
The limo pulled up outside Tescos and the Boss got out an opened the door, hauling Jack out with one hand, the other hand still clutching the wine bottle.
’That girl you were looking for… we know exactly where she is.’’ The Boss’s eyes glinted along with that garish grin. He suddenly pulled a revolver out from his trench coat and pointed it between jack’s bloodshot, now bulging eyes.
The sun was rising now, it was getting too late. The girl had to be saved soon and Jack had to be saved now! Before he could even scream, the Boss pulled the trigger and….
“We” he declared “Are Scientists…. Behavioral Social Scientists!”
What…?
“To be fair…” Countered Kenny, as he emerged from the limo. “We aren’t that social really, people can be so disappointing.”
Jack wanted to faint.
“We all have our poison…’’ a familiar female voice piped.
Jack spun around. The girl was standing there, two coffees in takeaway cups in her hand. Now he could see clearly he knew exactly who the beer-scrounging girl was. She offered one to Jack.
“…and looks like you didn’t need yours after all.” She tipped her cup Jack’s way whilst he stood there surrounded in the sham. It was all just to teach him a lesson. ‘’Cheers!’’
It all came back to Jack, he had been chatting her up unsuccessfully all night, ignoring her rebukes. When he finally leaned in for a kiss, he had briefly made contact before head-butting the dance floor.
“We picked you up, dragged you outside and wondered what you would do for a damsel in distress.” She said.
“Turns out, nothing logical!” said Kenny. “Fascinating”
Jack could feel his fingers twitching, an obscene gesture was imminent.
“I wouldn’t” said the Boss, as he placed the gun to Jack’s head. “Manners cost nothing, now show courtesy to the lady and bugger off.”
Jack slinked off into the night, too scared to look back at the demented trio.
“So” said the Boss to his colleagues. “Same time tomorrow?”
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