Work Text:
See, there's about twenty places this story could start, One Two thinks, as he looks across the coffee table at his mum, a cooling cup of tea in between them. She's brewed it in the nice cups, with the Country Rose pattern, not the mugs. That's her way of saying she takes this visit serious. Last time she broke them out, he was on his way to prison. There's a jammy dodger on the side, perched awkwardly between the handle and the saucer. He takes a bite and the crumbs go everywhere. His mum's twitching, like the physical need to break out the old Henry is too much for her.
He'd said he needs to tell her something about Bob (no ma, he's not dead, he's not in prison and he hasn't got a job as a naked butler, like Aunty Judith's neighbour's son did). Half her digestive biscuit breaks off as she dips it in her tea, and she's looking at it with a sight more interest than she's looking at him. "Robert's a lovely young man,” she says.
Only his mother calls Handsome Bob, Robert. She saw it on his driver's license once and she won't let it go. Dog with a squeaky chicken sometimes. "You can trust a Robert," she's said at least three or four times now.
One Two thinks she's biased because Bob didn't just get her groceries when One Two was pounding the old prison pavement in HM’S finest, he used to sneak a cheeky Guinness four-ring in there, not that his mum'd admit to drinking it, mind. A voddy and lemon at Christmas, and a shandy during the summer, that was her claim. Regardless, she's putting her tea on the coffee table, right next to the photobook of Barcelona Aunty Phil had sent back when she'd decamped to Spain for good.
But she keeps to the best spot on the sofa, the one wedged up against the more comfortable arm. Right, the fucking story. The one she's waiting for.
The first story is in a pub. So are the next thirty actually. Out of that thirty one, twenty eight of them are in the Speeler. Nancy pouring the pints, occasionally fishing out a Bacardi Breezer for Handsome Bob, and how the fuck did they not know? That's what One Two thinks anyway, despite the fact that he's been known to neck one of the watermelon variety himself, every now and then.
Correction, given that everyone else, their dog and the postman had known, how did One Two not know?
There's none so blind as those who won't see, Mumbles had said once. Granted he'd been engaged in snatching the glasses from a scholarly thug at the time and smashing them under his boots. Less of a won't, more of a can't. But the principle holds exactly the same.
But yeah. The pub. One Two flicks through what feels like a photobook of memories, quick-fast speed, an audio-track on an eight-track sped up good, gets past the bad stuff, because who the fuck wants to dwell on that? He's not a shoe-gazing tosser, dumped by his girlfriend, with a fringe and a good line in DMT. Not really a surprise where he lands. It's sometime after that Johnny Quid business, in between the sinking realisation that Lenny gone, there was a vacuum that Johnny, for all his hardman antics wasn't yet ready to fill, and the end result of that realisation. Handsome Bob's at the bar, getting two decent-ish pints of bitter, none of that rank John Smith's Extra Smooth shit, and a G&T.
The G&T is for Mumbles, who is currently on a health kick. Something about quinine. One Two had tuned out after the first use of the word antioxidant. Handsome Bob's chatting up the barmaid, automatic, turning on the charm big-time, and she's well, a little bit charmed, One Two can tell. Not enough to be topping up the pint mind, charm is all good and fucking well, but profit is profit, however he's got a smile out of her. Miracles never cease. One Two isn't bitter, isn't bitter at all, that Bob's got more fucking game than him, could be knee deep in girls if he wanted.
Mumbles is clicking his fingers in his face. "Ground control to Major Two," he's saying, smirking, like he's hot shit, "Got something on your mind?"
"Wanker," One Two says, briefly, succinctly. Nothing else needs to be said. He's going to knock down Mumbles's beer-card castle, but Mumbles is blocking it protectively with his arm. Mumbles is a chameleon. Stick him in Seedy Al's Hot Pole Palace and he'll be leaning back, smooth as all get out, a pocket full of cash, slick tongue of his doing the devil's work. Here, he's blending in with the battered upholstery, might as well be full of holes and sick himself.
Well up until Handsome Bob sets down the G&T in front of him, that differentiates him a little bit from the rag tags in this place. Bob's got a pink umbrella out of the barmaid, perched it in the sad little bit of lemon floating in what looks to be a triple. And a packet of pork scratchings for that matter.
No complaint from Mumbles, he's sinking it, as much as you can sink a drink through a bendy straw. Bob pushes over the bitter, and sits down, about ten inches away from One Two. One Two's kind of got used to judging it at this point, doesn't know for what reason.
Yeah. Mumbles would piss himself at that one if he was given the inside of seeing One Two's head and his current state of crisis. Postman and his dog would have some new news to share up the street.
It's just the one drink and not just because it's only lunch time. It's because in an hour's time they'll be back on the beat, or whatever your route is called when you're not a policeman.
You see, hypothetically, cash? They're rolling in it. Only it's what Mumbles calls tied up cash and Bob terms "when your dad puts your Christmas money in his pocket and says he'll look after it" and One Two, even more simply calls "no cash."
Which is why they're on the job, two thirds of the Wild Bunch, because Mumbles was being secretive and had ducked out of taking part, which generally meant a girl and sometimes meant a Sunday football league.
Mumbles safely off, the job safely on, all that's left is for the whole business to wreck One Two's head all the way things haven't changed. Handsome Bob's still handsome, but more than that he's still Bob. Bit of a prick most of the time, sweet as an apple at others.
Cracks up sometimes when he's putting the boot into someone, and One Two can only stop, and ask why because, well, they're professionals. Sort of. It's probably not what his mum had meant by an apprenticeship. But it grieves One Two's finely honed sense of time and place, to see Bob do a piss poor job because he's got a touch of the nitrous.
Bob stops with the boot, but not with the grin. "Feels good," he says, uncomplicated, happy, Like six months ago, he hadn't escaped prison by the skin of his teeth, like he hadn't fucking crashed his head against the steering wheel of a car, thinking he'd screwed things up between them forever (the stupid fuck, like that'd come between them for long). That should make One Two glad, but it doesn't. Bob doesn't get to walk away from this, not even after all this time. One Two finishes the job himself, wraps up the heavy in a silver emergency blanket afterwards and props him up against the wall. He has class, of a sort..
They split the haul between them, not heavy enough that they need to, but it's a good plan anyway, in case one of them gets jumped. It hits One Two like it sometimes does, that there's exactly two blokes in the world he'd divvy up half a million with, without a second thought. And he's slow danced with just one of them, a thought that still brings a swift flush of hot rage to his face. Bob was about as shitty as One Two in keeping a rhythm, after all this time.
Bob weighs the case in his hand, lifts an eyebrow. "My place or yours?" he says, about as smooth as a personal ad in the Evening Standard, sandwiched in between "have car, can host" and "64M, GSOH and DTF."
"Neither," One Two says, with a look about as flat as a 'Spoons beer. "Back to the Speeler."
Bob grins, slow and solid. "Come on," he says, little bit spivvy, just a touch of the wide boy, the sort of look that probably gets half of London dropping to the ground to suck him off, from hot shot lawyers to Sainsbury's shelf-stackers. He's sucking a little bit of his lower lip into his mouth, probably thinks it adds to the allure, if you can call it that. In One Two's considered opinion, it makes him look like he's forgotten where his keys are.
"Fuck off," he says.
That's when the bodyguard they didn't know about tackled him from behind, rock solid figure of a man, arms around the chest, and One Two can feel the startled whuff of air exit his lungs. He tries to breathe in, no dice. Tries to kick, but might as well be a Sunday roast, incapable of fighting back. It's Bob, once again, to the rescue with his fists, semi-scabbed over from the last time he got drunk and fought a wall.
And yeah the dancing did nothing, the flirting did less, but the sight of Handsome Bob going balls to the walls with his fists and intent? One Two has to admit, even to himself, maybe especially to himself, that he gets what it's about. Fuck.
Forty five minutes later, with the genuine fact of Handsome Bob's less handsome come smearing his hand, he's waiting for the panic. He'd love to claim it was stamina, but forty one minutes of that had been a black cab ride back and a minute had been Handsome Bob fumbling with the key. The rest of that isn't a story he's telling to anyone unless he wants numbing creams for Christmas forever.
*********
So, back to the beer, and the biggest mistake of all time. Two of them even. Telling Mumbles just how he'd fucked up, and the fact that this place serves mediocre food jazzed up like a gastropub wanked itself raw in the East End, Gordon Ramsey having a good old hand-shandy at the thought of an authentic jellied eel. Parsley on absolutely fucking everything, slate platters, the works. A comedown if ever there was one.
“Is he or is he not your best friend,” Mumbles says, all reasonable like, like this is a normal thing to talk about.
“He’s my best friend,” One Two says, and strips the meat off the wing he’s holding with ruthless efficiency. “ Friend, Mumbles, not me best shag.”
“Words I never needed to hear you say with a bone in your mouth,” Mumbles says conversationally. He’s sticking to the celery that came with the wings. “‘Sides I thought I was your best mate.”
One Two gives him a look, about as much as a look as he can muster with hot sauce on his fingers and a ring of it around his mouth. “You share me.”
“I am not touching your dick,” Mumbles says immediately. “Do what you like my son, go with my blessing, but I am not sharing a battered sausage with Handsome Bob even if I were ever going to go within poking distance of a knob. We should split you up. He gets your, whatever,” and he waves a hand vaguely up and down One Two’s body, dismissive, “and I get your liver if I need a transplant yeah?”
“You’ll be getting an Archie backhand special if you don’t stick a sock in it,” One Two says, and tosses a chicken bone at Mumbles, just to watch him scramble not to get it on his spanking new coat.
Because Bob, he's headed out with a promise to be back, probably doing his evening routine of well rehearsed self-kicking, like he's dragged One Two into some sort of life of gay debauchery. Won't come along, in case Mumbles sees everything on his face. One Two is holding down the fort for both of them, against the fact that Mumbles knows fucking everything, except the best time to shut up.
"You remember that one off the Eggheads?" Mumbles says. "Looked like he was dragged through an oil well backwards. He's gay as well you know."
"And killed a man," One Two offers, as his contribution to the conversation. "Canal, bike, lot of drink." Lets his voice trail off meaningfully. Mumbles is smart, he'll get the gist.
Mumbles holds his hands up, looks offended. "One Two," he says, mournful as all get out. "All I ever wanted to say is...if you two are the Kray Twins with more fucking and less prison, does this mean you split a take?"
Next thing One Two throws is not a chicken bone.
Bob, having conquered his fear, is coming in the door with a bottle of gin in his pocket, holds out his hand at the perfect second for Mumbles to give him a low five.
"See you're on the chicken," Bob says, gaze lingering on the plate.
"It's true," Mumbles says. "He's a right one for the cock."
~~~
Yeah, on second thoughts, fuck all the tea, in China or not, fuck the story, fuck the trimmings. There’s no way he can explain this one. “Mum,” One Two says instead, and offers her a spoon to help fish out the biccy. “You know Bob. He’s my friend. A good one. That’s pretty much it.”
She accepts the spoon and pokes around in the cup for a second, before she looks up. “You know,” she says. “That’s not what Mumbles says.”
One Two’s going to fucking kill him.