Fallad

I am with my shopkeeper friend Gee Ayy and it seems his mother has passed away and I'm helping him out. We could be at the old Studios in Hope Street, Glasgow – prior to this I vaguely recall trying to sweep and tidy a debris and sawdust strewn floor with a woefully inadequate fanned brush – and we could be alone with a.n.others fading in and out of the dreamescape. There is some upset/consternation over a single biscuit, wrapped in an individual wrapper (like a seeded oatcake) that appears to be essential for the funeral/occasion. (Does it have his mother's face on it?) It transpires I've put it up in a cupboard stacked, just like in my own home, with boxes of crackers and biscuits, and I sort of know exactly where it is. I fetch it for Gee but he's not interested and scoffs silently, dismissing the offering in an offhand manner. My other friend Ay Ess (who has appeared) suggests that he'll take it for his mum – who, I think to myself, died years ago – but I quietly, by means of a pained expression, manage to get my point across that this, with a nod to Gee, is neither the time nor place for such an insensitive act-

Now there's a sizeable gathering in the room, folk seated and standing in a cluster to my right by the door, Gee sitting on his own, cutting a morose, dejected figure, to my left. A woman, seated to the front of the group on my right, manages to pull her emotions together enough to sing a song – it should be Deacon Blue but it's a bit more 'Zombie' by Cranberries - “and we drink and we f**cked” which surprises me. She finishes by (unwisely) gulping down (from a broken glass!) red wine, shards and all, fighting all the time to swallow-