Read Snow Storm for Free Online Page B

Braehead towards
Newton: rush hour - shire style.
    It was a tiny bit ironic,
just how vulnerable you could feel at the wheel of several tons of
metal, especially having a few more tons hitched to the back of the
tractor in the form of a trailer.
    It was a cushy job this
though if he was honest; take the John Deere down to Baldoon and
fill the trailer up with feed. Repeat the cycle a couple of times.
Everyone knew you couldn’t exactly haul ass in a tractor, so taking
it easy was the order of the day or at least the
afternoon.
    He needed an
easy afternoon after the weekend he’d had. Friday night they’d hit
Newton just for the hell of it. They started playing pool in The
Star, trying to have a quiet one. But then someone said something
about karaoke in The Central and big mental Davie, who’d missed out
on the hi-jinks of the weekend before, had declared himself to be a
black belt in karaoke.
    After that
everything went a bit jumpy memory-wise. He remembered The Central,
someone singing Kenny Rogers’ “The Gambler” and Jimmy Walker eating
a pint glass. Why did he always feel the need to do that? Then some
boys from Whithorn had offered to fight everyone, just because
they’d decided amongst themselves that they could.
    Saturday was a write off.
This was what happened when the parents went away on holiday and
left him in charge.
    They’d headed
up to Stranraer. They’d trudged the mean streets of this insular
tribute to a certain style of seventies architecture looking for
some kind of adventure and accidentally found it in The Royal after
stepping on someone’s toes, quite literally.
    He’d been trying to get
the barmaid’s attention. It wasn’t working but he wasn’t a man to
give in easily. As she passed by he tried to make eye contact, a
bit the worse for wear. He was over enthusiastic and despite only
trying to follow her with his eyes he’d ended up doing so with his
entire body as his feet tagged along for the ride.
    He walked
straight across the feet of a mean looking skin headed type who
seemed to take exception. The guy’s face was distinctly
bulldog-like. His nose had seen better days and his slow movements
made him look punch drunk more than traditionally
hammered.
    Before Andy
could say anything by way of an apology the other man lashed out,
slamming him up against the bar. His movements were so subdued the
way he swung almost looked camp. The man’s head shot forward
without warning, driven by some unforeseen force, rattling his
teeth off the bar. His shoulders slumped down as his body seemed to
give in briefly before jerking fitfully back to life.
    Andy looked up and saw
the grinning face of Davie, who as it turned out was blissfully
unaware of the bottle headed straight for the back of his
head.
    Everything happened so
quickly; that was what people always said and it kind of did but at
the same time everything was in slow motion. He heard the bottle
holding guy say something in what he thought must have been an
Eastern European language, probably Polish. He looked a lot like
the bulldog but was distinguishable by an unusual tattoo sticking
through the top of his shirt. He could remember thinking all of
this just as the heavy duty bar stool came into contact with the
guy’s jaw and everything underneath that point just seemed to
collapse.
    The bulldog
guy seemed to find his balance again. He opened his mouth to speak
but his words were slurred as the air and blood vapour breezed
through the gap where his teeth had been. He rubbed his face,
looked down at his hand and frowned before heading for the nearest
exit as though on autopilot.
    His friend lay on the
ground dazed while people crowded around, partly trying to be good
Samaritans partly wishing to be bit players in the
action.
    After that
everything died down pretty quickly. It amazed him how that could
happen. One minute you were having a quiet pint on a Saturday
night, the next it had all gone tits up and you were dazed,
spitting blood