Glenna

John’s Café, Lambs Conduit Street, W.1. London

The 9 p.m. gathering … everyone there.. full, all shouting, all laughing, noise rushing out onto the night … bait for those passing … curiosity aroused at such uproar .. so much life released into the dark, damp evening.

I never saw them, too engrossed in my sausages and chips… felt my knee being jolted by Mickey Kelly … looked at his face … followed his eyes … there they were, standing uncertainly by the counter, waiting for a seat, two of them, one White, one Black. Dropped my fork, clattering loudly on the heavy plate.

Kelly smiled.. He opened …

“Come on Darlings, come on, sit down here…”

Bernie from the depths … “I don’t know…” disgust that we had beaten him to it. The two ladies sitting down at the hastily cleared table.
Forgot Susan.. forgot Shenley, forgot my small sleeping son, Jack, forgot that silence, that sorrow, forgot the undulating, endless concrete of the M11, forgot all my troubles.
Licked my lips, Mr. Wolf, pursuing Red Riding Hood so assiduously, so insidiously, had nothing on us.

They had been on their way to the hospital round the corner, attracted .. moths to the light …

Mickey said ..
“What do you want to go there round for! .. my friend” … indicating me .. “he is a doctor!”

..Dutifully played my part, put on my serious face at their raised eyebrows… “What is wrong with you” evidently the white girl simply felt unwell.

Felt her pulse, asked her to put her tongue out, which she did. Total silence in the Café now, all watching, mouths open, teacups, cigarettes, poised motionless between fingers. Could feel Kelly choking with repressed laughter at the Ladies’ naïveté. The Black one, not quite so gullible, quickly sensing the situation, quickly deciding that she would prefer me to do more than feel her pulse and look at the colour of her tongue, the most incredible bright Pink, flashing against her pure White, perfect set of teeth, surrounded by thick, smooth lips.
No doubt, everyone had noticed this aspect of the lady, no doubt, all were thinking precisely the same erotic thought.

Glenna, for that was the large, Black lady’s name, knew what she wanted, what she had.
Not fat … simply big built, athletic, muscular, powerful, would, could, no doubt, “Suck me in and blow me out in bubbles..” So the saying goes. Evidently willing to laugh at anything, full to the brim with life, felt her vibrant waves flowing over me, pulsating from deep within her dark, strong, sensuous thighs.

Strange how that evening, so indelible on my mind, see quite clearly all the faces .. most gone, a few dead, a few simply faded away with the time. Bernie, John, washed up on the Shores of the South China Sea.

Remarkably, would say the men there on that particular night, now so long ago, were, in their own way, “happy” for need of a better word. Perhaps too, it could be said that particular night marked the beginning of the end … the decline of John’s Café, a man standing alone for almost half a century, the relegation of Lambs Conduit Street into just another innocuous, quiet thoroughfare, marked specifically, a turning point in my existence.

Strangely Glenna decided she liked the old man, the atmosphere of John’s café, unperturbed at our so obvious innuendoes, the so obvious implication of all our looks.

John started shuffling slightly faster than usual, ten p.m. approaching, he having been serving since six that morning. time for his son to collect him in John’s Rolls Royce. No, John had not worked for nothing, house with a sweeping drive facing the Thames.. the works.. what he saw of it after sixteen hours a day, every day, all three hundred and sixty five of them, for fifty years, certainly he closed at four p.m. early, on Xmas Day. May well have lived in the grotty room upstairs, where, on the few occasions he was ill, would lie in bed and bang on the ceiling with his stick if Lena did not ring up the money machine fast enough.

There was a wife ..never mentioned.. not difficult to imagine her.

One morning his daughter made a rare, cautious, visit to the money machine, I the only one in the café. John reached down under the old battered counter, the counter where the incredibly ancient money machine sat, pulled out a large battered leather bag. said to her “Here is the forty five thousand pounds you asked for” ..a great deal of money so long ago. I do believe she did say a rather belated, quick “thank you”



Suggested to Kelly we made up a foursome..he would not have it, having to get money.. under the cosh for it .

Looked like the usual routine.. not, however, shunting slowly round the Cross , a casual look there to see what was on offer. This was cut and dried. Quietly asked Glenna what we would do with her friend , without the slightest hesitation she said

‘Bring her with us.’ Kelly gave a look at this turn up.

People standing, paying at the counter, about half a dozen already outside, having the final chat for the evening before they had to climb back into their tin boxes, into the darkness, into the night, their solitary meandering through the crooked streets, the “muttering retreats”

Bernie sniffed at me with some disgust at my having beaten him to it as I stood waiting my turn to pay. Lena came up from the dark downstairs where she had been cooking relentlessly all day, she started stacking the chairs, wiping the battered, creaking floor over with a large mop.

Damp outside, air fresh, walked along the long line of parked cabs. Glenna and her friend climbed into the back, showed her how to sit on the ‘dicki’ seat, back to back with myself .

Pulled away, nodding to the watching faces, then it had always been like that.. other people living my life, as a child, always Peter who ran away, moved himself further than the porch.. the congregating point

Glenna it quickly became apparent, had a affinity , a power over other females.

Arriving at the flat, no formalities, she started taking her clothes off, told the girl to do likewise. which she complied with, maybe the slightest hesitation, afraid perhaps of Glenna, what she may do if displeased..

Not too sure which way I intended to play it. Three’s up, a rarity, most girls, even in Thailand, think twice, money changing hands at a much higher premium.

Decided, most interested in Glenna.

She made all the running, I should go first with the girl.. Glenna simply stroked her hair and watched, perhaps rather intently, a fixed expression on her face, a look to remember in the future.

Always thought Soss the greatest when it came to “the” other variation to straight sex, Barry maintaining on one particular occasion, believed she would suck his insides out. Glenna, as Cathy, as Soss, was ”something else”…more, much more.

Until that night had never realized there were actually such powerful females about, Certainly, as other men, fantasized about such a happening, the reality…?

Glenna had total control over the young woman, making love to her with, a determined, meticulous, perhaps sadistic satisfaction, not letting her escape, ignoring all pleas, until the girl, who, quite obviously could take no more, fell finally, breathlessly back, limp, exhausted .

+ ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ +

Possibly this may be continued, concluded. Starting to feel beyond it all ..have said that which I wished to say, wanted to say, what had to be said.. why say any more?

The pattern only repeats itself.. death follows life inexorably. The same people, the same faces, the same tired worn out situations, places. The same tenuous female cliches “I am not ready for that yet !” ..”Don’t touch me !” a endless variety, all meaning precisely the same thing, the same total absorption in sex, money, suppose it is now necessary to add motor cars and football... then, what else? Good question..

I have no answer.


No, not .. ” With a bang, but a whimper”

No, hardly that ..not for myself any way ..

A faint smile.. perhaps, maybe.