I Tried On Your Wedding Dress

Pointless Dream Post 2

So...

I'm in the back seat of a sports utility vehicle, all black, and David is taking us through a car wash. The car wash is not the usual straight alley; we're led round and round like in a drive through restaurant. We pass the same window three times, a young girl has taken David's money and we're sitting back, smoking, waiting for the washing to begin.

As we pass her window for the third time, she calls us to stop. We get out, and the girl starts shouting at me, accusing me of breaking the no-smoking rules (which are advertised on numerous signs around the structure, and which I have a feeling I've seen and ignored. An argument develops, she seems to be saying that she won't return David's money, and won't allow the car to be washed. We leave.

So I'm feeling guilty and not a little impressed by how David has taken the whole thing. I owe him money, it's only fair. We drive for a short time and pull up on a road that follows the crest of a hill. Below us is some kind of business complex. It has a small reception building, plus a large, sixties-built, one-storey conference centre attached roughly to the side closest to us. As we survey the site, I decide this is my chance to rescue some pride, and some cash for David. I tell my companions to wait, I'll be back shortly. I head down the grass incline to the complex, headquarters of Obsidaticum Holdings PLC, straight into the middle of a hostage situation.

Young black kids have taken a whole bunch of office workers and are holding them, waiting for instructions from their absent leader. They've lined the hostages up on the shallow steps outside the open double doors. The poor white folks look like all hostages look; they're all wearing khaki shorts. They just came here to work, or they just came on safari; they stepped off the plane in Entebbe, hoping in their heart of hearts it was really Roissy, hoping that they would be soon be marvelling at how like a human brain the control tower looks from above. Their heads are down, their comically thin arms pulling their knees ever closer, clinging to little babies, tightening the straps of digital cameras.

I saunter up to one of the armed guards and switch to a suitable disguise. My skin darkens, my voice takes on a more rhythmical tone; I start rapping to the first kid "I gotta piss boy, come on, let me inside… come on boy, I'm on your side…" he looks at me with respect, but no fear.

"I no let anyone inside."

"Come on now boy. I'm on your side. Let me inside. I respect you, you know that, I ain't getting' involved, I just need to take a piss inside."

He looks at me suspiciously. My skin drops another tone. I am Ugandan. I am Uncle Theodore, king of Abyssinia.

"Ok. Be quick."

He waves me inside and I pass him; another kid stops me before I reach the door.

"He said I could go in."

"I'm the leader, not him."

I plead at him with my eyes. Come on Boy, let me inside. I'm on your side.

"Be fast."

I enter, and immediately begin looking for a till, a TV, anything worth any money and easy to pawn. After a minute of looking I decide I should probably take a piss, after all, they're expecting to hear that sound. I enter one toilet, it's the ladies. For some reason I leave it and head into the men's room. Then, for no reason at all, I turn back and head back into the ladies. I take a piss into a tiny metallic bowl, attached very low to the wall. So this is what it's like…

I'd just about given up when I see a set of stairs running towards the conference room. A white man in a suit appears and I shift instantly back to white man.

"The commissioner sent me. I have to find all valuables and get out. You can help me. The commissioner orders you to help me."

He leads me hurriedly into a hall of lockers. I need something small, bank notes or money orders or jewellery. Instead he starts removing large black plastic envelopes with metre long zips.

"You can access the company's accounts with this, of course you know that."

A keyboard, a fancy looking ring binder with attached calculator, lots of black wires like telephone cord. They're all in that ZX Spectrum-style black and red, lots of thick cables and keys, monitors with small screens; before the time of memory sticks the floppy disk and hard drive is king. They're piling up in my hands, extremely dangerous, if I know how to harness them. This fellow might actually come in handy. I mentally think ahead to how I can persuade him that our little group is actually working for the government, a branch of the cabinet, way above MI5. Streets beneath MI6, records the length of the M6, the depth of the Thames; twice as strong as Doomsday, three times more crucial than Haadraada. If there is a revolution, it is because England wishes it. We are England.

"We've got to go, we can get out through the conference centre."

We head into the large square room, which is empty except for a couple of swivel chairs and some nice carpet; I focus on trying to break the windows. It turns out to be plastic, bendable, but unbreakable. If we get through it the grass is at the same level; a godsend. I can see David waiting outside by the SUV. A knife would do it.

I remember the lighter in my pocket.