Archie had been saddled with pedalling nuts around London. Normally he was a dynamo and never tyred but a crank he spoke had punctured his drive. He was well oiled and had put a spanner in the works.
He couldn’t Raleigh himself so, for an escape valve he took a quick release. He had to fork out the fare and made the Trek, by tube to his girlfriend Beatrice’s pad in The Old Brompton Road. When he arrived at her Dawes he rang the bell but nothing happened. There was a break in the cable.
Bea didn’t know he was there until her dog, a Ridgeback called Helmut (definitely not a hybrid) started barking. He didn’t want a serious talk but she moaned “No!” then spoke to him Sternly: “Archie, we need a break” and he couldn’t shift her even though he wheeled out the same arguments that worked in the past.
This was the sort of chain reaction he couldn’t guard against although he did try to make light of it. She had vice like determination and he couldn’t stand up to her. He had no option but to leave her. They had tried many things to resolve their problems including what Archie had liked to call their ‘Rubber Solution’ but that had been only a temporary patch – don’t ask.
It was that ‘on your bike’ moment he thought even though he had said “We’ll try counselling.” Perhaps there had just been one too many slip. Streams of thoughts like this went through his mind.
As he set off on his lonely trail with mountain’ emotions, his mind was racing, wondering how he rode out the last of her storms. He gathered up his bits and pieces, his Handel Bach and other cassettes and disks, his vests, Garmins and gear. He was aware that he had seen evidence of rodents in the house particularly a pellet on the kitchen floor and wanted to get everything out of there. He grabbed his mirror and its bracket, the photos, frames and his rack of tools. “The best axe I’ll ever own” he’d thought.
As he bolted, Archie felt really deflated and just couldn’t pump himself up. He thought about getting lubricated ‘til he remembered a friend’s offer of a flat in Grease. He had ideas about ‘first sTrike’ revenge but that was not a Path he wanted to follow. He just counted to 10. “Speed” he thought as he flung everything into a bag and wrenched himself away.
This wouldn’t be the normal cycle of arguments and patching up. The hub of the matter was he should never have dated Mike’s former girlfriend. The problem, he reflected, was that Bea’s M’s Ex and although she was normally quite cape-able he worried that, in tandem with her other problems, this would derail her. She was in danger of completely losing her bearings. Bea sometimes relied too much on Penny’s advice and she could not believe that sometimes Penny errs in her judgement. It just wouldn’t stabilise her. That woman was a complete basket case with her collection of old junk and coins. And Archie never again wanted to hear about Penny’s Farthings.
Poems from Simon Maclaren 