Grimsby pt. 2 (Patreon)

“Canny mint spot, innit. Just by our door.”

Declan expertly squeezed the Corsa into an empty spot next to the pavement on one of the narrow streets lined with like a million identical buildings of dirt-yellow brick townhouses. The building next to us looked run down, with a heap of rubbish lining the stairs to the front door. But that was the same for pretty much every house on this street. As we walked to the door I could see some grafitti wannabe artist had tagged the door with a thuggish looking “BROWN” in felt pen. Declan unlocked and motioned me to get in.

Having seen the outside, the inside didn’t pose any surprises. Run down and filled with rubbish. It wasn’t just dumped there though, but it looked like someone had lived there for quite a while. Empty beer cans, pizza boxes and dirty laundry all around the place.

“How long have you been staying here?”
“Came yesterday. Drove when Butcher told me to.”
“But whose is all this?”
“Chayse Brown. Ghosted a week ago. Now you’re him.”

I felt a chill up my spine. I wonder if the real Chayse was still alive or if he had just ran away from whatever Butcher Jones threatened him with. In any event it looked like I was set up with a spacious home and all the fag stubs a man could need. There were ash trays everywhere. Well, fewer insects I guess, which balanced the enormous amount of empty take away boxes that also littered the
place.

”This is a lot… Do you think any of the clothes fit?”
“You’re already wearing it, mate.”

Declan gave me a quick tour. There were two bedrooms upstairs, one with a real bed and clothes everywhere. It looked like a lost and found bin at a gym. A small bathroom with a shower, and a second bedroom with a rickety spare bed and an attempt at a home gym. Downstairs were a large living room with a big sofa, a decent TV and, to my joy, an Xbox. Next to the living room, under a ton of rubbish, I presumed you would find a kitchen if you dug deep enough. The path to the fridge was open at least, and Declan fetched me a can of Stella.

“You fancy a curry, lad?”

Did I ever? I hadn’t eaten or drunk anything the entire day, which probably was why I was drunk already at my second Stella when the food arrived half an hour later. We spent the rest of the evening in front of the TV watching footie, drinking Stella and Dec showing me how to smoke properly. I barely registered Declan telling me we needed to be somewhere before 10 the next day, and I have no idea when we did decide to go to bed.

I did see that the time was 7:22 in the fucking morning when he woke me up. At least when I had regained enough focus to find the mobile. Apparently I had managed to plug the USB charger by the bed into the phone, and luckily it was the right kind of charger. My mouth tasted of death, my head hurt and my ears hurt. I surprised myself finding a stud in the fresh ear piercing, and manage to make it really hurt by accidentally tugging it. That brought the past day back. Fuck. Not even 24 hours ago I was sleeping in my own bed. Now I was wearing someone else’s clothes, sleeping on top of someone else’s messy bed. It hadn’t even crossed my mind yesterday that I probably should wash things up, but then I hadn’t been sober enough to consider undressing either. Looking out over the mess of a room I absentmindedly stroked my buzz and felt the morning wood stir a bit. Fuck no! Don’t go there!

“Have a wash. Hafta go soon.”

I did as Declan told and had a shower, hoping that would make things better. At least water would make the hangover some good. The only option was a big bottle of 3-in-1 adidas shower whatever, generically labeled “after sport”. Since I already had his house, name, clothes and smelled like the guy, I decided to use his toothbrush as well.

“Y'alreet?”
“Let’s go.”
“Hey, Dec. You said you came the day before yesterday, but I only agreed to come yesterday.“
“Fate, innit”

How long had Butcher Jones been planning this? Or perhaps Chayse Brown was a role people rotated into three month each. Take guys of the same size, shave them, chav them and put them in a social grade E area and no one would look close enough to care. Makes you wonder what is going on here that he need this kind of operation for.

“You been here before?”
“Grimsby? Fuck no.”

And go we did. Apparently Declan wanted to save on petrol money and decided we should walk to the dock. Everything looked pretty much the same, street after street, just different rubbish. All around us everything was quite green and colorful, so it wasn’t ugly depressing in a communist state sense of the word, but everything was worn and clearly not everyone was interested in upkeep. While we had a walking breakfast of Richmond Blue king size cigarettes and a shared Stella, Declan explained that Butcher Jones had me set up with someone at the fish market. He didn’t know more than that. It took us almost two hours to get there, and Dec had me ask for direction twice. By the time we got there my hangover was almost gone.

The fish market was busy with shoppers browsing, talking to merchants and sitting down for a bite. Everything looked newly renovated, with a modern look, slates, stainless steel, LED lighting everywhere. It all looked quite fancy. Declan stopped the first person he could find that looked like he worked there.

“Oi, you Jamie?”
“No. Jamie who?”
“Jamie Naylor”
“Eehh… He’s probably in packaging. Go through that door over there.”

As we passed through the door he had pointed it was almost like going from the audience seats back stage. Harsh light and wet concrete. Not that many people.

“Oi, you Jamie?”
“Aye. What can I do for you, lads?”
“My mate Chayse Brown, Butch…” Jamie cut him off.
“Good day Chayse. Mr. Jones put in a word for you. We lack some hands after the first rush, so he suggested someone could come pick up some slack. Is that you?”
“Yeah”, I answered.
“Need someone to move boxes, ice and stuff between 7 and 2. £60 cash after each shift, none the wiser. Sounds good to you?”
“Aye.”
“You can come in tomorrow?”
“He will”, Declan answered for me.

We shook on it and left.

“Hey, I’m starving. Can we have chippie?”
“You’ll hate them soon enuf. Let’s have burger”

We found a Burger King some 15 minutes away, and Declan bought two whoppers, no menu, using some 2-for-1 coupon. As I sipped the cold water from the paper cup and looked out at the fish market in the distance I was feeling tired again. Starting 7, I thought, and probably 1 and a half hour walk, I would have to rise at 5. I wondered if lifting boxes with iced fish would get you cold or sweaty. Perhaps a bit of both. Good thing there is a lot of shitty athletic wear laying around at home I can use.

I almost didn’t realize it. “Home”. How quickly you accept things. Declan was back with the whoppers.

“There’s your scran. Plenty of time for next appointment.”
“There are more?”
“Need to ink you to fit propa. I figure you haven’t any?”
“Never.”
“What you want? Nike or adidas?”
“I… don’t understand.”
“Swoosh thing or weed logo?”
“Both are kind of tacky.”
“I’ll pick then.”

We spent probably two hours just talking at the Burger King table. I wasn’t wearing my watch anymore, so I didn’t track it as well as I would otherwise. Other than some indifferent girl offering to clear our table, no one seemed to give a shit that we sat there. Dec spent a lot of time trying to get me to retell as much as possible of last evenings matches. It was hard. For one thing I was drunk, but more importantly I didn’t really care. Also I had this low level of unease about the whole tattoo thing.

I was going back and forth between feeling violated for having this sprung on me, to be permanently marked with some shitty tat. On the other hand who doesn’t have a tattoo? And a lot of them aren’t that great anyway. This is after all part of getting me into some sort of disguise as quickly as possible. I didn’t make the barbers appointment either. Perhaps the lacks of giving a shit was contagious from the burger staff, but once we walked into the tattoo studio I was pretty indifferent to it.

"Hafta wax it.”
“What? Why?”
“If it’s shaved, people can tell. Can’t look fresh.”

That’s how I had molten wax poured on me for the first time ever. People do this during sex? I guess that part was nothing compared to the pain when hair was ripped out of their follicles. And of course it wasn’t enough to just get the area for the tattoo smooth. Tom, the heavily tattooed and pierced guy that appeared to be constantly flirting with both me and Declan, made my entire front almost completely smooth, leaving just some wisps of hair around the nipples and part of the treasure trail, before moving on to the tattooing part.

Declan selected some ink that would look a bit faded right away and asked Tom to make the edges a bit soft. I watched as he slowly filled in the outline of an old school adidas logo, making it look like I wore a permanent track top. You could laser it away I suppose, but I knew that wouldn’t happen. It takes like a year, hurts like hell, and I’m completely broke. I don’t even own the underwear I’m sitting in.

Once Tom was done with the inking and asked me to check myself in the mirror, I got a shock. It wasn’t the tattoo. I’d been looking at it all while it was injected into my skin. No, it was the rest of me. For a brief moment I didn’t recognize anything in the mirror except for the tattoo. It had somehow slipped my mind that I looked nothing like I did 30 hours ago.

 Declan nodded approvingly, and handed over a new nicotine patch.
“Looking mint”