Hole Punch by Simmons, Garth (the dot read aloud TXT) 📕

At lunch time, she sat with the boys from Digital Arts and Illustration. She smoked cigarettes and gave them all lap dances in the courtyard. It was great when he walked past and saw her doing that. Tease him. Make him look. Let him see how sexy she was now. Make him look. Why didn't he look?

“Have you seen those nose-ringed slags he walks about with?” she asked Kevin, who had some fingers in her.

“What? Who?”

“That side-parting prick on the Drama course? The one I went to school with. The one who fancies me?” she squidged hold of Kevin’s soft penis.

“What him? What about him?”

“Have you seen those nose-ringed slags he walks about with?”

THE MONEY

She lay in a coma in hospital, her husband sat next to her, he held her hand.

“Do you remember our first date?” he asked.

She remembered.

“We walked in the forest.”

Her lips turned. A smile? Could she hear him?

He leant forward to whisper in her ear.

“I'm going to keep the money safe, none of those kids are going to get their hands on it.”

* * *

They'd raised their children well they thought. Their first son, Martin, was skinny and underfed. His clothes were too big for him.

“He'll grow into them. I'm not wasting my money on new clothes every year.”

Their next son, Jamie, had Down's Syndrome. Martin had to look after Jamie.

“I have to make money and your mother is in no condition to look after him. Taking care of your brother should teach you some responsibility.”

Their last child, Lisa, they barely even noticed. So Lisa did her best to get noticed. She dated all the wrong boys and she stubbed out cigarettes on her arms. When she turned thirteen her dad finally noticed her but in a way she didn't like.

“I'm a pillar of the community, no one will believe you. To think that my own daughter would tell lies about me.”

There wasn't enough evidence to investigate Lisa's allegations against her father. Those sorts of allegations weren't taken seriously back then.

* * *

“I'm going to keep the money safe, none of those kids are getting their hands on it. We've been saving it for years and it's ours!”

* * *

Martin married his support worker, Olive, who felt sorry for him. Martin and Olive had one child. Olive died during child-birth. She was thirty-four when she died. Martin had to bring their son up on his own. His son, Howard, got a car and job. At night-time he drove his car around and followed ambulances. He liked to see what was happening.

Jamie missed Martin very much when he moved away. No one cared for him like Martin did. Sometimes Jamie would get angry and have tantrums. His parents would lock him in a cupboard until he calmed down.

Lisa got pregnant at nineteen, her child, Aiden, wanted to be a soldier.

“I want to shoot people!” Aiden would say.

Lisa's second child, Claire, committed suicide at the age of nine. It was a few months after her brother, Aiden, got sent to a juvenile prison because he had tied her to a bed and repeatedly raped her.

“So what? So what? So what? So what? So what?” repeated Aiden, whenever he gets asked about it.

* * *

“I'm going to keep the money safe, none of those kids are going to get their hands on it. We've been saving it for years. I have to look after our stocks and shares!”

DEEDS NOT WORDS

She walks down the street. She chews gum and kicks an empty can of nothing. She's supposed to be at school.

A dead-sea face slinks out of an alleyway.

"Follow me down here little girl," said the teabag-eyed orb. "I'll show you piles and piles of people getting burnt! You'll hear them scream! Like an orchestra, little girl! A cacophony of screams!"

"Sod off you attention-seeking, old prick," she said.

She spits out her chewing gum and kicks an empty can of nothing.

She marches on proudly, her fist in the air.

"DEEDS NOT WORDS!"

CARER

On wheels - squished face - dead limbs - mouth open – slopping his laughter in every aisle.

The woman pushing him is sad. He laughs and only she knows why. The normal look away and pretend they haven't heard or seen.

“What sandwich shall I buy?” they think.

“Shall I get some crisps as well?” they think.

“Diet or regular cola?” they think.

He laughs and only she knows why.

Slopping his laughter in every aisle.

MURAL

"Ooo it's nice isn't it?" said the old lady.

The local community mural painting had a big sun up in the sky and lots of accurately painted Tudor houses. You could see the local supermarket, bus stop and lots of little people going about their daily business.

"It's a vibrant celebration of our community," said the old lady. "A really pretty picture that affirms everything which is normal and reliable about life."

The painter preened proudly and announced that her next project was at the local school, helping babies create potato prints.

DAVE

Dave gnawed a large rip from his steak, then he flumed a lager down his fat throat.

"We won at the football today!" he banged his fist on the table.

"We won at the football!" he repeated with pride that wasn't his.

After his meal, he snorted a gram of cocaine from a toilet seat, then he went for a wide-eyed drive in his plumber's van. His nose poured with blood and drug crunched snot.

He pulled up next to a girl on a bike and he leant out of his car window.

"Oy! I've got something to say to you! Something that only I'll find funny!"

A week later, Dave held a letter from a solicitor in his hand.

“I can’t believe Aunty Emma, who I barely knew, has left me all this money. I'm going to open my own pub and I’m going to have a karaoke night and a quiz night and