The Life and Loves of Gringo Greene (65 page)

   ‘Well, it’s my special birthday, I deserve it.’

   ‘What do you mean, your special birthday?’

   ‘Don’t you know?’

   ‘Know what?’

   ‘I’m twenty-one today. Get the key of the door, I’m a fully grown man, an adult, from now on I can do anything I please, quite legally.’

   ‘Get away with you,’ and then she thought a little more about it, and said: ‘You mean today is your twenty-first true birthday?’ and she glanced across at him.

   Crazily there was a tear in the corner of his black eye.

   Gringo nodded.

   ‘Oh, hun,’ she said, coming to him and kissing him on the top of his red head. ‘Happy birthday, darling. What would you like for your supper?’

   ‘Beef, I’d like a steak.’

   ‘Beef’s not politically correct.’

   ‘I don’t give a fig about political correctness.’

   ‘Beef’s expensive.’

   ‘We can afford it.’

   ‘Beef’s bad for you.’

   ‘Bah! I want a steak; it’s too late for anything to be bad for me. Surely a man can have a steak on his twenty-first birthday!’

   There was an almost pleading look on his weathered face. His thinning white moustache was twitching nervously, just as it had all those years ago when she first met him.

   ‘All right, steak it is, though I’m surprised with those teeth of yours you can contemplate taking on such a thing.’

   She had a point there, he could always suck it to death, and if he couldn’t manage all of it, Felix the Eighth would surely help him out.

   She went away and made ready to go out. When she came back she was wearing that cute maroon raincoat he liked, with the big belt around the middle that showed off her waist so well. She had retained her figure, she was still a beautiful woman, older yes, but in a strange way, more beautiful, as Gringo glanced at her, and reminded himself why he loved her so. Fact was; he loved her more now than he had ever done.

   She’d brushed her hair back off her face. She was wearing gold earrings, those same gold earrings he had once bought for the late Sarah Swift, though Glen didn’t need to know that. There was no point in wasting good jewellery. She caught him taking surreptitious peeks at her face.

   ‘What is it?’ Imagining her light makeup to be skew-whiff.

   ‘Oh, nothing.’

   ‘Come on, there’s something on your mind.’

   ‘You’re very beautiful.’

   ‘Hah! And you’re an idiot, talk about myopia.’

   ‘You are! Very beautiful.’

   ‘Yeah, that’s right, so long as you don’t notice my hair is thinning and grey, my face is wrinkled and flabby, my tits are sagging and my teeth are falling out.’

   ‘You are very beautiful, Glen, you always have been.’

   ‘Yes, and you need an eye test, Mister Gringo Greene. Is there anything else you want from the shops?’ she asked, picking up her holdall from the old wooden chair.

   ‘You could always steal a shoe from outside the shoe shop.’

   It was a crazy joke they had shared many times before since that awful diabetes had prompted the removal of his leg.

   ‘Hmm, maybe I’ll do that,’ and she giggled like a kid fifty years her junior. ‘See you later. I won’t be long.’

   ‘You take good care of yourself, young lady,’ he said, glancing up into her green eyes that were as bright now as they had ever been.

   ‘In case you hadn’t noticed, I’m not such a young lady any more,’ she said wistfully, as she peered through the window at some non-existent passer-by.

   ‘You will always be a young lady to me,’ he replied, something he said quite often in case she should ever think otherwise.

   She uttered another silly laugh, an almost dismissive girlish giggle.

   ‘You’re crackers, you know that.’

   ‘That’s as may be, but it’s true, you will always be a young lady to me.’

   She laughed ruefully this time and let herself out. He buzzed himself to the window and watched her amble down the path and clamber awkwardly into the car. Then she was gone, trundling down to the town in search of a sirloin steak for his birthday treat. She had forgotten to put on the music, but that didn’t matter. His ears were not what they once were.

They had never had kids. There was no reason for it, said the medical buffs. They had gone through all the most detailed checks, tests that proved beyond doubt they could and should have produced children. It remained a mystery. Fate, it was, they said, sometimes these things happen, and Gringo believed in fate. He’d seen it in the stars.

   If she harboured deep disappointment she hid it well. In truth she imagined she had failed her husband, not the other way round, though no one would ever know the real reason for the lack of children. Perhaps there was no reason. It certainly hadn’t been through lack of trying. Fact was, he pondered; everyone can’t have everything in life. All you can do is try your best.

   He retreated to the table and opened his wallet. Deep inside, hidden amongst old receipts and notes from years before, was a small, square photograph. It had arrived seven years after he and Glen had set up home together. When it came there was nothing else in the envelope, but the picture. He clasped it in trembling fingers and glanced at the handsome little boy. The kid was dark and aged around four or five. Gringo flipped the photo over and held it to the light. A brief feminine written note stared back at him, fading like everything else through the years.

   I
thought you might like a photo of my little paperboy
, it said, and then a PS, just in case he hadn’t caught the drift:
Seems he was made of paper all along.

Gringo sighed and returned it to his wallet. He’d never seen the boy for that wouldn’t have been right, not with Richie bringing up the child believing the kid to be his own, and over the years they’d completely lost touch.

   He often thought of the boy and what had become of him. He’d be fifty now, perhaps even a grandfather himself, and how weird was that? Gringo sat back and closed his eyes.

   He’d never told Glen about it for he wouldn’t have wished to pour that angst onto his dear wife. He’d take that sliver of information and bury it away deep inside his black brain where even the little demon couldn’t find it, and more than that, he’d carry that knowledge with him through his ultimate defining day, a day he now knew wasn’t so far away.

   He often thinks of the old days.

   When you’re at the end of your life, that’s all there is.

   He’s sorry for his wrongdoings, for his errors and mistakes, for all the people he used and hurt, for the occasions he often fell to temptation, and for all the times when selfishness got the better of him, yet deep down in the pits of his black heart he knows full well that if he were ever to have his time all over again, he would live his life in precisely the same way. It was Glen who saved him. He knows that well enough. He’s grateful for that too.

   Life can be so strange.

   Death?

   Love laughs in the face of death, and always will, for true love endures forever. Nothing else does.

  
You will always be a young lady to me.

   Wherever you go, whatever you do, you will always be a young lady to me.

   Always.

Thank you for buying and reading my book and I hope that you enjoyed it. When you have a spare few moments I’d really appreciate it if you would place a brief review on the main book sale sites.

If you have any comments on Gringo Greene, good, bad, or indifferent, you can contact me direct at
[email protected]

I would love to hear from you.

I have been toying with the idea of writing a Gringo Greene sequel, or more likely a prequel, and if that is something that might interest you, then again, do please let me know.

As always, any and all mistakes in this book are mine and

mine alone.

Thank you for supporting independent writers and publishers. Without your help we would all simply vanish.

Have fun,

David C.

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