Fat Boy Swim Read Online Free PDF Page B

‘practise what I preach, my son. Fancy the flicks?
Some Like It Hot.
A classic.’
    The cinema was busy for such a roaster of a day. Jimmy was glad he and Aunt Pol had arrived early. They always did these days, having learned the hard way. Last time they were late Jimmy had jammed, squeezing into a row as the opening credits were rolling. Vic Swift’s big sister started squealing that his bum was smothering her.
    Jimmy and Aunt Pol hadn’t stayed for the film that time. They left, laughter flapping behind them in waves with each swing of the door.
    ‘Mission Impossible Three,’ Jimmy joked feebly on the way home, only joking at all because Aunt Pol looked so crumpled and sad for Jimmy’s sake.
    Today, as the film began, and stragglers inched their way into the few remaining seats, Aunt Pol drew up suddenly beside Jimmy and inhaled sharply through her teeth.
    Someone, half-crouching, had darted for a single seat in the front row.
    Aunt Pol muttered something under her breath that Jimmy couldn’t catch. ‘Blowing in’ and ‘bad smell’, the only words he made out.
    ‘Whassup?’ he whispered.
    ‘Shh,’ Aunt Pol answered, digging him gently in the ribs.
    ‘That was mega,’ said Jimmy.
    The film had transported him to a place where he could shed his fat self. For two hours, he was just a punter like everyone else, enjoying the film. Then he stepped into the afternoon heat. It blasted his face like a shot from the blowtorch he used to caramelise his crème brûlée, sucking away the joy that had built up inside him in the darkness.
    ‘Good, wasn’t it?’ said Aunt Pol fanning herself with her hand. She attempted a Marilyn Monroe wiggle along the cobbled lane which fed on to a main shopping street. Then she thought better of it. Changed direction.
    ‘Too busy that way,’ she said, ‘folks exposing bits of themselves that should never see the light of day.’
    Jimmy knew fine she was sparing him the gawps. Heat like this always turned him beetroot.
    ‘What d’you like best about the film, Jim?’ she asked.
    Jimmy was no longer in the mood to answer. Hot and thirsty, the uneven cobblestones pressing uncomfortably into the soles of his feet gave him the gait of a grizzly.
    Why couldn’t he be handsome like Tony Curtis or George Clooney, funny like Jack Lemmon, Adam Sandler. Cool like Sean Penn?
    Why couldn’t he be someone else altogether? Normal. ‘Well?’ nudged Aunt Pol. ‘You were laughing your head off in there.’
    ‘End was best,’ said Jimmy reluctantly, ‘when the wee millionaire proposes and the other guy confesses he’s a man and the millionaire says –’
    ‘“Nobody’s perfect.”’
    Jimmy and Aunt Pol stopped dead as a voice interrupted them.
    ‘Classic,’ interrupted GI Joe, grinning at them both.
    Aunt Pol said nothing. Stood, arms folded defensively across her chest for what felt like a bad-mannered eternity to Jimmy, until GI Joe’s smile faded. With an awkward cough he moved off.
    ‘Enjoy your evening folks. Catch up with you tomorrow, Jim.’
    What was that all about? thought Jimmy, watching GI Joe retreat. Nothing like a priest, he thought, in his shorts and faded Pulp t-shirt. Just a bloke. Being civil. Maybe wanting a bit of company. An image flashed into Jimmy’s mind: GI crouched among the kids in the middle of nowhere.
    Jimmy frowned at Aunt Pol in bewilderment.
    She
never
acted like this. Downright rude. Face set as she watched GI Joe. Waiting until he’d blended in with the Saturday crowds before she moved herself. He must have been the bad smell she’d mentioned in the cinema.
    ‘Gie us peace, Holy Joey!’ she muttered after him.
    ‘What’s up with him?’
    Vaguely, Aunt Pol waved her hands.
    ‘My al-
lergy
to the cl-
ergy,
’ she sing-songed.
    But Jimmy knew Aunt Pol was lying. And she never lied to him.
    He stared at the top of her head wishing he could see inside to her thoughts as she stirred her cappuccino in their favourite café.
    In the dream that