Morag used the cushioned heel of her black Doc Martens to crush the dying embers of the cancer-stick. She couldn’t believe she had started again. Nearly a year without so much as a drunken drag of someone else’s. Now she had a pack of nineteen Pall Mall Red in her pocket.
All the old excuses ran through her head. They would calm her nerves. Help her think. Make her look grown-up and sophisticated.
She snorted, kicking the stompie towards the plastic dustbins that were her only companions in this alley running between two blocks of flats. How’s that for sophisticated? Still, it’s not as if she had to worry about decreasing her life span. Not now. So why not light the odd cigarette?
Mick had hated them. Even the smell of them on her clothes, or in her hair. The most rabid ex-smoker she had ever known. Odd, she thought, for someone who ran a nightclub and sold drugs under the counter.
A flash of movement caught her eye. There, on the lid of the nearest dustbin.
“Hello, psycho bird. Where did you come from?”
Spike squawked and fluttered his wings, leaning forward to get his point across.
“Sorry, boy. No food here. You’ve got the wrong person.”
This explanation didn’t work. The black and white chatter continued.
Morag shrugged. “Why hang around here if there’s no food? Go find your… what is he? Your pet, I suppose?” She laughed. “Go find him. He’s always got food stashed away for you, hasn’t he?”
Spike didn’t like this idea. If anything, his squawking increased in both volume and urgency. He hopped from one dustbin to another further away, turning back as if urging her to follow him.
“No time to play with you, little man. And I’m going this way, not that way. Although if I had wings, like you, I could go any way I wanted.” Her smile faded. She looked at the bird seriously. “That’s what I need. Wings. To fly away. Far away. To Wednesday.”
Spike cocked his head to one side, considering her words. They shared a silent moment of contemplation.
“Today’s my birthday, did you know that? You didn’t, did you? Nobody knows. Nobody remembers. So that can be our little secret.”
In response, Spike hopped to the next dustbin and squawked louder than ever.
Morag shook her head. “Chill, bird.” She rubbed her hands together, looking up at the fire escape hanging rusted, black and inviting above them. “Today everything changes. Money will do instead of wings. I’ll tell Noddy you were asking for him.” She turned her back on her avian companion and set off up the alley, reaching in her pocket for another cigarette.
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“I actually roadied for Motorhead for two gigs but those guys were absolutely fucking crazy and with ice on the steps and no sleep for weeks I thought it better to cut my career short before I dropped an amp stack and got my head kicked in by the Hells Angels.”
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