black birds

We only knew one London cab driver, an old schoolmate of my dad's. He was a motormouthed pain in hole and I'd avoided him as much as I could. By the time I was in my early 20s and had flown the nest I thought I might never have to listen to his bullshit ever again.

But one day we were in the car and heading back from a match in deepest southeast London, i.e. away at Charlton. We pulled into a petrol station to fill up and were sitting there for a moment when we saw a taxi shudder onto the forecourt. Well, of course it was him.

He and the old man can't have seen each other for about a couple of years so naturally my dad was out of the car and across the oily concrete as quick as a flash, smile turned on and hand held out. But emotional displays were not his old friend's style. He looked past my dad and at me through those pebble lenses. Expressionless, he turned his fat head and watery gaze to his school chum, jerked a pudgy thumb at me and said:

'You still driving this lazy cunt around then, are you?'

Then, before dad could craft a proper response, he was peering through me and at a woman who had paid for her fuel and was heading back to her car.

'Fuck me,' he said tonelessly. 'Black birds always look like they're walking around with someone else's arse.'