‘Fluiggigy’s style is gold and very grave, so I wanted to make sure—’
‘We are not very grave!’ Winery interrupts, looking displeased for the first time. ‘We are very happy here! All of us!’
‘No! Grave,’ I try to say. ‘’O know! Grave! As in a comgany dat’s gig, grave and gold! You’re a vigrant, new comgany dat’s really grave with what you design! Grave!’ As if to further clear up the confusion, I start to flex my muscles. That’s how you’d do ‘brave’ in charades, isn’t it?
‘Are you feeling all right?’ Pikky says, now with no small degree of fear in his voice.
And who can blame him? There’s a man in front of him trying to flex like Arnold Schwarzenegger, for no apparent reason.
‘’Es! I keeg delling you I’ge fine!’ I try to reply. The pain in my head is getting worse, and now the locked jaw is starting to throb too. ‘I gust need to get frew the res’ of dis prezentation. I ’ave a lot more for you to look at!’
‘Do you?’
‘’Es! I ’aven even got to der gest gart, yet!’
‘The guest gart?’ Pikky now looks positively terrified.
‘’Es! The gest gart! The artwork for your augum winner zelecshun!’
Pikky stands up. ‘I think it might be a good idea if we ended this here.’ He looks down at Winery. ‘I think Miss Smalls is getting a little perturbed.’
I look at Winery, and have to do a double take as I realise that she’s crying like a busted fountain. Her make-up is now smeared down her cheeks. How anyone can lurch between emotional states like that is beyond me.
‘I’ge sorry!’ I wail. ‘If I gan jus’ ’ave a vew migits, I can gum gack and figgig!’
Now I’m speaking in a completely different language. There’s every chance Winery Smalls thinks I’m trying to raise some evil spirit from the depths to come and eat her shower curtain.
‘Please stop!’ she wails, burying her head in Tex’s shoulder.
Tex, for his part, looks entirely bored to tears by proceedings. But then I guess if you’re a twenty-something Lancashire cowboy with a fake moustache, there’s probably very little in this world that can faze you.
Oh God . . . It’s all gone wrong! It’s all gone so horribly wrong!
My stomach, which has been periodically making its presence felt all day with the occasional nervous flip, now rolls over like a tidal wave crashing on to the shoreline.
‘Oh Gesus!’ I remark in horror as I clutch my stomach.
Pikky walks towards me, arms outstretched. ‘Are you all right, Mr Bellows?’
I’ve become Mr Bellows now. Not Andy any more. It’s a sure sign I’m not getting anywhere near that contract.
‘’Es. ’Ike I said, I’ge agsoluley fine!’
Except the sudden need I have for the toilet.
Any toilet.
NOW.
‘’Air’s your toilet?’ I cry in desperation, through my still-locked jaw.
Pikky, showing a remarkable level of foresight and self-preservation, steps back a bit. ‘It’s across the office floor, over there,’ he tells me, pointing at the door that leads away from the touch zone.
It certainly is a touch zone, now.
People come in here to touch cloth all the time, and that’s definitely what I’m currently doing.
‘Dank you!’ I wail, and scuttle off as fast as I possibly can towards the toilet.
As I hurry past all of the Fluidity staff, holding on to my bottom for dear life, I feel tears of frustration and horror in my eyes. This meeting could not have gone any worse if I’d simply introduced myself, squatted down in front of every single Generation Zedder in here, and relieved myself all over their latest summer collection.
The toilets (unisex, just to add to the misery) are pretty much where Pikky promised, and there’s fortunately no one in them as I barrel through the door.
Gratefully, I just make it to the cubicle before the world falls out of my bottom. And when it does, it’s incredibly painful and extremely unpleasant.
For a few minutes I can’t think about anything other than the obvious destruction being wrought upon my backside. It’s horrific. My poor anus has never done anything to deserve this kind of treatment.
Quite why my bowels would feel the need to put it through such a trauma is beyond me. You’d think they’d want to work together to make life as easy as possible, but – as I’ve said before – my bowels are contrary bastards, and smooth cooperation with the other facets of my digestive system are not their priority.
Having said that, nothing like this has ever happened to me before. Sure, the irritable bowel syndrome has always caused me a bit of grief and discomfort, but I’ve never had to rush to the toilet like this. Especially not when I’ve been bunged up like the M25 at rush hour a mere hour or so earlier.
This is new, horrible and not a little worrying. Especially the awful pain.
. . . Which has turned into an unpleasant throbbing now the worst of it is over.
I think – I hope – that I’ve managed to evacuate everything I need to. I’m sure my anus is hoping the same thing, given that it’s been through an assault upon its person that it may never recover from. Not without many, many soothing creams and a long bath.
Gingerly, I wipe myself and slowly stand up. For a moment my legs don’t want to support me, but eventually I get them to behave. I pull up my jeans, flush the loo and wash my shaking hands in the basin just outside the cubicle.
Taking several deep breaths, I steady myself internally by the door to the toilet. All I want to do now is gather up my belongings and get out of here as swiftly as possible.
Yes. That’s it. Just get out quickly, and try to put this entire miserable experience behind—
JESUS!
I’ve swung the main toilet door open to be greeted by a sea of anxious faces on the other side. It looks like the whole of Fluidity is standing there . . . waiting to see if I’ve survived my own period of extreme fluidity.
At the front of this stationary gaggle are Pikky, Winery Smalls and Tex. Pikky looks concerned, Winery looks distraught, Tex looks bored.
I am painfully aware that from behind me, a smell that is as vast as it is abhorrent is emanating from the toilet and heading towards the crowd.
‘Everything OK?’ Pikky asks.
‘We were quite worried about you,’ Winery adds.
‘Yup. You took off like a steer that’s been spooked by a rattler,’ Tex says, still in his broad Lancashire accent.
For some reason, even in the middle of this terrible farce, I have to ask.
‘Why are you dressed like a gludy cowgoy?’ I ask Tex, as slowly and as clearly as I can, trying to ignore the stench of my disgrace as it wafts across the room.
Tex looks extremely taken aback by this, as if it’s the first time anyone’s ever asked. Of course, it could also be that he can’t understand what I’m bloody saying.
‘Lionel is channelling the Old West this week,’ Winery says, by way of explanation. ‘He’s looking to be inspired by the rugged sensuality of the American frontier.’
I’m dumbfounded.
His real name is Lionel?
‘’Ight,’ I reply, blinking several times.