One morning while wandering through the streets of Witney on my way to the office, something in my head told me to stop off at the newsagent in Corn Street.
There were two news agents within easy walking distance of the bus stopsa big chain newsagent at the entrance to the shopping arcade that didn’t open until everybody had gone to work (I never did figure the logic behind that out), and a privately run one just round the corner.
As far as I could tell, the big difference between the two was everything except newspapers and chocolate bars. If you wanted to buy deodorant, toothpaste, stationary, both newsagents had them, but the big one had name brands. The other one had bootlegs of the same stuff. One morning in a bit of a panic I bought their cheap deodorant, and regretted itit smelled of petrol, and burned the skin clean off your body.
The newsagent was run by a late thirties everyman called Gary. He had black hair, always look halfway smart, and seemed to always be on the receiving end of sarcasm from his “shop girl”. He wasn’t her Dad, but their working relationship certainly boredered on father daughter.
I never did find out her name. She was lovely. Probably only 18, and no doubt wiser in the ways of the world than me. She had brown bobbed hair, twinkling green eyes and a pinnafore that concealed any clue to the rest of her charms. I decided she was probably a good reason to buy a newspaper on a morning.
Of course the only problem with having an alterior motive for going in the newspaper shop on account of the girl behind the counter is that you suddenly become paranoid about your purchases. Do you really want to be seen buying “Personal Computer World” ?
I figured computer magazines were probably one up from porno mags, so bought them anywayalong with the hangover from my student days; FHM and Loaded.
Loaded was an out and out “lad mag”filled with articles about the latest Z-list celeb, photoshoots with various young strumpets known only to the television adoring section of society, and news stories of drunken exploits, parties, and jokes you couldn’t tell your parents. FHM on the other hand had photoshoots of B-list celebsthe cast of baywatch and such like. Buying FHM was somehow more acceptible than Loaded.
In base terms, Loaded was to Hustler as FHM was to Playboy.
On this particular morning, I picked up a copy of The Independent, and plonked it down on the counter.
This was without doubt a “Watermelon moment”.
Any girl in the universe knows what I am talking about. For the rest of humanity, an explanationin the 1980s movie “Dirty Dancing”, the character “Baby” played by Jennifer Grey is a young strumpet seeking the attentions of the focus of her infatuationa dancer played by Patrick Swayze. Swayze’s main purpose throughout the movie seems to be (a) to take his top off as much as possibe, and (b) to gyrate against women while dancing.
Thrown into a scene where Baby enters the underground dance world inhabited in an impossibly unlikely manner by Swayze, her excuse for being there is “I carried a watermelon”.
These two basic ideas (no shirt, and crotch rubbing dance routine) seem to have created a mythology that has entered the gene pool. I’m sure girls are born these days with the phrase “I carried a watermelon” etched into their psyche.
If Captain Kirk had displayed a similar gratory dance routine while fighting aliens with his shirt off, the world could have ended up a very different place. Perhaps we won’t think about that for too long.
Where were we? Ah yes. Stood in front of shop girl.
“One pound please”
“Here you go”
Berk. Of all the impressive introductions I could have made, I chose “Here you go”.
While wandering up Church Green towards work, I played the scene through in my head. Arriving at the newspaper shop leaning from the top of a limmo like Richard Gere in Pretty Woman. Whoever bought a newspaper while leaning from the roof of a limmo?
Idiot.
A lady passed in the opposite direction towing some poor unfortunate rat of a dog on a lead. It was one of those little white fluffy dogs about the same size as a handbag, with a leg on each corner.
It occurred to me that if I took a run up and caught it just right, I could probably kick it quite a long wayget some real height on it.
Past the church, and out across the Leas, I started thinking about database stuff. The world of my newspaper shop muse was swapped for referential integrity and cascading updates.
I opened the office door and wandered through to my desk. It was 8:30, and not many people were in yet. After hanging my coat on the back of the chair and switching the computer on, I wandered off to wash my coffee mug up.
And there she was.
Sitting in the end officethe glass walled half conservatorywas the prettiest young blonde girl I had ever seen. Sam was sitting opposite, leaning back in his usual head cradling pose, talking and smiling.
Who was she? Was she new?
While making my coffee I peeked around the corner of the kitchen door, pretending to look around the office. Over Sam’s shoulder she looked at me.
Oh shit.
Then a cunning plan formed in my head. I’ll offer them a drink.
“Good morning!can I get you two a hot drink?”
“We’ve already got one thanks Jon”
I closed the door and walked back down the office with my coffee, pretending to whistle, and pretending to be cool. As cool as you can be when you didn’t have a shave that morning, and your hair is sticking up a bit on one side. I nearly sat down at the wrong desk, but she wouldn’t have known that.
Over the next few minutes Darren and George arrived. As might be predicted, the new attraction was not missed by them either.
“Who’s that John?”
“Don’t knowthey have been in there ever since I arrived”
“Marks out of two?”
“I’ll give her one!” said Darren in the manner a seven year old might while recounting the best joke ever that he had just heard in the playground.
George lifted one eyebrow in James Bond fashion and made an excuse to walk up the office. So did Darren. Funny that.
I heard “Hot drink Sam?” in the distance, and smiled.
A little laterwhile retreating from the underneath of my desk arse first, I got to meet the mystery girl.
Straightening up, with a pen between my teeth, and tucking my shirt in, I said a muffled “Hello!” and shook her hand.
Sian was apparently introducing her to everybody.
“This is Halley. She’s starting today, and will be helping me with paperwork, filing, typing”
“And making us lovely coffee’s!”
“No, Darren. She will not.”
I smiled, and mouthed “take no notice” to her. She was probably only 17, and straight out of school. Now she was stood in front of me, there was nothing of her at all, but by crikey was she ever pretty.
I’m not quite sure how some girls do it, but her expertly messy short hair looked like a still had been taken of a movie on a windy day, and was now walking around on top of her head. She had huge blue eyes, and a huge colgate smile.
Later in the day I nearly caused Sian to wet herself.
While sorting out a computer for Halley, she was leaning out of my way, and slid half off her office chair. If anybody had walked in at that moment, they would have wondered what on earth was going on. Thankfully the company wasn’t big enough to have an H.
R. person.
Halley’s legs were stuck between the chair and the desk, while she approximated a limbo act, leaning on the floor and in fits of giggles
“I can’t get up!”
I stood up from my own precarious stretch to plug in a monitor cable, and took her by her wrist. Not having much experience of lifting model type girls from the floor, or having much clue about elegance and grace, I just lifted her back on the chair.
Setting her back down, Sian exploded in giggles, spitting her cup of tea across her keyboard.
“What?”
“Oh Jon”
“What?”
Halley was killing herself laughing now too.
“You just lifted her up like a rag doll!”
“She doesn’t weigh much”
“That’s not the point! Oh.. I’m going to wee myself”
George had seen it too.
“That was pretty funny, Jon”
I had no idea why they all though my lifting her back on her chair was so funny. I guess I had lifted her bodily into the air by her wrist, but I was kind of busy at the time. What was I supposed to have done? Swept her up in my arms?
I might know much, but I knew Halley was embarassed nowjudging from her beetroot cheeks.
“Are you okay?”
“Yes, fine”, she said, wiping a tear from her eye, still giggling.
I switched her computer on, and it started spurting text up onto the screen.
“Do you understand all this stuff then?”
“Yep”
“Blimey. It’s all gobbledegood to me”
“Me too, but don’t tell anybody”
“Really?”
It would be uncharitable to say that Halley was stupid, because she certainly wasn’t. She did reinforce many of the sterotypes about blondes though.
After getting her logged into Windows, and showing her how to write letters, save them and print them out, I wandered back to my desk.
I overheard Sian asking Halley if she knew the key to print in Wordstar a few minutes later.
While munching on my lunch a little later in the day, it struck me that I knew Halley better than Darren or George now. A certain smugness came over me. I also started worrying for hershe hadn’t met Mr Lions yet. He was at a doctors appointment and wouldn’t be in until after lunch.
No he wasn’t. I could hear him. He’d met her.
“Wehey! Hey! Look at this Sian! They’ve got me an assistant! You’re sat at the wrong desk lovehere’s where you can sit Anitayou’re moving desks to up here.”
“No I’m bloody not!”
“It’s alright young Halleyyou let Mr Lions look after you”
Halley didn’t know what to say or do, and Siandespite her better judgementlooked like she might wet herself again.
“Leave her alone Dick!”
Suddenly Mr Lions became the father of daughters I didn’t know he had, and my perception of him changed.
“It’s lovely to meet you Halley. My name is Dick Lionslike the big cats on the Serengetty plain. You do as my mate Sian says, and you won’t go far wrong.”
There was suddenly a warmth. The letcherous old git had turned into a favourite uncle at the flick of a switch. Here was the Mr Lions I would grow to like, and never forget.