Last Chance Saloon Read Online Free PDF Page A

Kelly disappeared, Angeline, an attractive woman who worried about the size of her stomach, rushed up to Benjy. ‘Where’s Lorcan gone?’ she asked worriedly. ‘And where’s Kelly?’
    ‘Er, I don’t know,’ Benjy stammered. ‘But don’t worry, I’m sure they’ve not gone far,’ he added, wondering why he bothered.
    Indeed, they
weren’t
far, in Kelly’s pink and fluffy bedroom, the view of the duvet almost obscured by the plethora of cuddly toys piled on to it. Kelly might look like a woman, but the rest of her hadn’t caught up yet.
    Things with Lorcan were going way too fast. She’d wanted him to kiss her so she could triumphantly say to her mother, ‘You see, you pregnant-looking old slapper, I told you I’m better-looking than you.’ She hadn’t yet decided whether to let him feel her tits – through her clothes, of course – but she thought probably not. So when Lorcan began unbuttoning his jeans it came as a big shock. When he pushed the jeans down to mid-thigh and stroked his large, angry-looking erection in Kelly’s face, it came as an even bigger shock.
    ‘Let’s go back to the party,’ she said, terrified.
    ‘Not yet,’ Lorcan said, with a dangerous smile, placing his hand firmly on the back of her silky-haired head.
    Benjy looked up in a mixture of admiration and jealous hatred when Lorcan strutted back into the room, all but doing a lap of honour. ‘You jammy bastard,’ Benjy muttered.
    ‘I didn’t screw her.’ Lorcan’s eyes were limpid with his own goodness. ‘Her honour is still intact.’
    ‘Yeah, right! You didn’t lay a finger on her,’ Benjy scorned. ‘And what about Amy? It’s her birthday.’
    ‘I can’t help myself,’ Lorcan grinned, with a shrug that would have reduced several grown females to begging. ‘I love women.’
    ‘No, you don’t,’ Benjy said, in an undertone. ‘Seems to me like you hate them.’
    ‘Come on,’ Lorcan said. ‘Time to go. Move it, man, we’re late.’ And off he swept, all business, ignoring the weeping and humiliated Kelly, who sat hunched on the bottom step of the stairs.
    ‘Why do you always treat women like dirt?’ Benjy demanded, when they got outside into the chilly October night and stood, waiting for a taxi. ‘What did your mother do to you? Breastfeed you too long? Not breastfeed you enough?’
    ‘My mother was grand,’ Lorcan said, his soft, mellow voice contrasting with Benjy’s high-pitched rage. Why were people always looking for stupid Freudian reasons for his short attention span with women? It was really very simple. ‘It’s the old joke, Benjy, isn’t it?’
    ‘What old joke?’ Benjy shouted and, when Lorcan didn’t answer, followed his gaze and found him looking at three women and a man outside a nearby restaurant.
    ‘What old joke?’ Benjy again bellowed, his rage exacerbated by the sight of the four people clambering into the taxi he’d earmarked as his.
    ‘Why do dogs lick their balls?’ Lorcan replied.
    Benjy looked in sullen silence.
    ‘Because they can,’ Lorcan said, almost wearily. ‘Because they can.’

4
    Liv, Tara, Fintan and Katherine drank gin and tonic, danced to Wham! and annoyed Roger, Katherine’s downstairs neighbour.
    ‘Isn’t this great?’ Tara demanded, her face aglow. ‘Do you remember dancing to this that summer we were fifteen? D’you remember, Fintan, d’you remember, Katherine?’
    ‘Yes,’ Fintan said awkwardly. ‘But don’t go on about it, you’re making Liv feel left out.’
    ‘No, no,’ Liv said, as jovially as she could. ‘It’s OK, I always feel left out.’
    ‘Except with people you know very well,’ Fintan reminded her gently.
    ‘No,
especially
them.’
    Eventually, at the appointed hour, Liv was overwhelmed by a wave of melancholy and decided she’d better go home.
    ‘Will you be OK?’ Katherine asked, as she saw Liv to the door.
    Liv nodded miserably. ‘I will eat twelve bags of crisps, sleep for eighteen hours, then I will feel