Disclaimer: all rights to the characters belong to Tony Grounds and the BBC, the rest is mine.
This is a totally new departure for me, and I do hope you will enjoy it. Molly and Charles are complete strangers who have a chance meeting, they have never met before, or have they? Why does she look so familiar to him? and what doesn't she want to tell him? Their chance meeting sets up a whole chain of events that changes their lives forever. Please review and let me know what you think.
"Where did you get these costumes then, Tarts R Us?" Molly looked down at herself " You must be their best customer, nice and cheap were they?"
"You're never happier than when you're bleeding complaining about something, are you?" Saul turned his angry gaze on her "And you had to have the shortest because you're the smallest! You should be bleeding grateful I employ you at all with your attitude"
"Oh I am, I am" Molly pulled a face and mouthed the word 'tosser' at her partner in crime as they both turned back, fake smiles firmly in place, to look at their boss as he delivered his usual pre-match lecture.
"Right, now listen, this is important…. shut up Molly… you smile nicely at everyone, especially the blokes who might turn into punters, you keep your mouths shut, we don't want to hear your opinions, especially not yours Molly, if anyone asks questions, you smile and get me, and you keep pushing the booze, pissed is good as far as punters are concerned, and you don't drink any of it yourselves, kapishe?"
"Oh absolutely, great leader"
"Cut the bleeding crap, Molly, honestly, wonder why I employ you, I really do"
"Cos I'm cheap?" Molly wasn't going to let him have the last word, as she sauntered into the back room to check her hair and make-up, although she had no idea why she was bothering, with the skimpiness of the costumes they were wearing no-one would get as far as their faces, as she muttered the words "sleaze ball" to her friend Michelle who was her side-kick for the evening.
"Sleaze Ball Saul? I thought he was Tosspot Tucker?"
"That was yesterday but both suit him really well, don't you think?" They both started to giggle as Molly collected a tray of smallish fluted glasses filled with a virulent green coloured liquid. And sniffed it dubiously.
"Jesus, what the fuck is this? Oh, I know what it is, it's that horror film stuff, what do they call it? I know, ectoplasm, we should taste it before we serve it, we don't want to get done for manslaughter"
She sipped at the liquid "Yuck" then made gagging noises " Tastes like ectoplasm as well"
"How do you know what ectoplasm tastes like?"
I just had some"
The pair of them fell about laughing as Michelle again thanked the guardian angel of all promotion workers that she had pulled Molly as a partner tonight, everyone adored working with her, she was irreverent, disrespectful and huge fun to work with but she was also very good at choking off the more pissed and persistent suitors, both hers and other peoples, she took nothing and no-one seriously, least of all Saul Tucker who ran the outfit. Molly's mantra was that just because they had to dress like hookers, didn't mean that they were Christmas crackers, they weren't there to be pulled by anyone.
"Are you going to drink that?" she watched as Molly put the glass to her lips again.
"Course I am, well no-one else will if they've got any sense, wonder what the hell it is?"
"Thought Saul said not to drink it"
"I'm not, I am conducting a taste test to save innocent members of the public drinking something toxic. Come on, we'd better take this stuff round and try and persuade anyone we don't like the look of to drink it"
Tonight was slightly out of the ordinary in as much as they were hostessing at a promotional launch for Saul's new venture, whereas they normally worked for third party clients. He was looking for backers who were preferably loaded but without any prior experience of the night club business for an up market night club in central Bristol or as Molly described them, dumb dickheads with more money than sense who were prepared to lose shed loads of money on some sleazy ego trip for Saul.
Two hours had passed, as far as Molly and Michelle were concerned, that was two hours of smiling until their jaws hurt, and evading groping hands who thought that their minimal outfits were an invitation to touch, two hours of watching the clock, waiting for the time to pass until they could stop smiling and knock off. Molly had found that the ectoplasm didn't taste quite so toxic after the third glass and she doubted that there was much alcohol in it, because Saul was a cheapskate as well as a shyster, and wouldn't have paid for anything he didn't have to.
"See that tall bloke over there at the back, the good looking one, do you know him?"
Molly peered in the direction Michelle was pointing as she drank another glass of ectoplasm, the more she drank of it, the more it grew on her.
"Nah, don't think so" Although to be fair, she couldn't really focus on anything much at all, she had begun to think that maybe the ectoplasm was toxic after all.
"Well, he keeps staring at you as if he knows you"
"I'll go ansheeifhewants a photoinaminute" Molly was aware that her speech was getting a bit slurred and she appeared to have taken her shoes off somewhere, but couldn't think where.
"No you won't and how many of those bloody things have you had?" Michelle began to giggle.
"Dunno, couplethree" Molly made a huge effort "Not many"
"You've had more than three, you're pissed! Look he's coming over, don't speak, just smile and I'll get rid of him"
"I camnamage, I'm a trainkiller"
"You're a what?" Michelle was laughing "No don't bother, just keep your mouth shut"
The tall dark haired man came up to the pair, smiled and said "Hello", Michelle answered with a smile and a flutter of her eyelashes, he was seriously attractive, but Molly just smiled although she was not so drunk that she wasn't aware that it was more of a pissed leer than a polite smile, as he asked her if they had met before somewhere. She wanted to tell him that she had heard that line before and no, she hadn't hit him when she fell from heaven, but that sort of speech was way beyond her present capability, so she shook her head rather than risk speaking at all, then regretted it as her head was caught in the final spin cycle of a washing machine. She knew then that she was catastrophically pissed, at work, God knows what was in the ectoplasm and she might possibly have lost count of how many she had drunk, but there was no getting away from the fact that she was now completely hammered, Saul would fire her if he found out. Fresh air she told herself, that was the answer, so she walked away, completely unaware that the tall bloke was still speaking, as she wandered out past the smokers to sit on the low wall round the courtyard and then wondered where the hell her shoes had gone, she was sure she had had them on just now.
"You okay?" He had followed her, and appeared to be laughing at her.
She pinned her polite smile, or pissed leer, to her face and nodded her head very slightly, she didn't want to set the washing machine off again, as she wondered what the fuck he was finding so amusing. She wanted to ask him but then really didn't care enough about the answer to make the effort to speak, it was so much easier to nod or shake her head, if only it didn't keep setting the spin cycle off.
"I think it might be a good idea if you went home", he still seemed to be finding something very amusing, "Have you got a coat? No, don't bother I'll ask your mate. Now, stay exactly where you are, don't move and I'll be back"
She did as she was told for precisely thirty seconds and then got up and followed him back into the club, muttering to herself, Bossy fucker, who the fuck does he think he is? She would find her own shoes and bag and then go home and then she promptly forgot all about him and what she was looking for as she cannoned off the wall of the passage on her way in.
"I thought I told you to wait outside? Come on, let's see if we can find a taxi driver potty enough to take you home, lets see if you can stand still long enough for me to try and persuade one to take you, shall we?"
Molly would have liked to ask him where the hell he kept appearing from but she had now definitely lost the power of speech completely, so she let him take her by the hand and keep her walking in the direction of the taxi rank, it was easier than arguing.
"Nah mate, can't take her, she's pissed. What happens if she chucks up in the back of my cab, or passes out or something? Or even worse accuses me of meddling with her, Nah, never take girls what are pissed and on their own, sorry"
Now he had a real problem. He didn't know this girl, didn't even know her name, alright she had looked very, very familiar and that was why he had spoken to her in the first place, but she had said she didn't know him and she was totally pissed and out of it, but years of being required to be a gentleman coupled with years of being responsible for other people's safety meant that he couldn't just abandon her in the street even if he wasn't responsible for her, it would feel all wrong.
"What about if I come with her?"
"Well, okay, but on your own head be it, mate. I think you're barking myself, It'll be you she's accusing of all sorts, you wait and see, I bet you I'm right. Where does she live anyway?"
The two of them manhandled Molly into the back of the cab and then started asking her where she lived, but neither of them could understand a word she mumbled, despite their very best efforts to interpret her pissed slur and she got fed up with trying, so she gave up. The third time he tried to push her upright he realised that she had fallen deeply asleep and when he let her go she promptly toppled over and landed with her head in his lap, for all the world as if she had gone to bed. He gave up and gave the taxi driver his address in Clifton and then spent the whole of the short cab ride praying that she didn't throw up in his lap, it didn't look particularly likely, but he knew you could never tell!
The taxi driver helped him get her out of the cab , still shaking his head and sucking air in through his teeth, obviously convinced of the lunacy of this customer, who then put her over his shoulder and carried her up to his flat in a fireman's lift, thanking God she was so little and light. He was now equally unconvinced of the wisdom of his actions, but was unable to think of any alternatives. He dropped her on the spare bed and then panicked that she might be unconscious, so he roused her enough to get her to drink some water and left her there with a mug of water and a strategically placed bucket. Ten minutes later he had another panic and went back to turn her into the recovery position, during which she complained bitterly with an abundance of very bad language, then dropped off again. He left the light on just in case, just in case of what he didn't know, he was now very annoyed with himself for getting involved.
The promotion tonight hadn't been his type of thing at all, he was only there as a favour to one of his partners, who had been invited by Saul Tucker and who couldn't make it. After he left the army he had been rootless and unmotivated, for a while, it was almost as bad as doing the desk job he had been allocated after his last active service, until he had got involved with a couple of close friends in an investment company, where they acted as sort of venture capitalists for local businesses and so far the operation had been spectacularly successful, mainly because they stayed far, far away from the sort of business he had been checking out tonight. He had noticed the two girls shortly after he had arrived, it would have been hard not to, they were wearing very skimpy costumes and doing a great deal of chatting and giggling between themselves. At first glance he had thought they were maybe 'hostesses' of a very dubious nature, then realised that they were nothing of the kind, but what had kept him mesmerised by them was that he was sure that he knew the small, dark haired girl, who was not only exceptionally pretty but was currently sleeping it off in his spare room. She was very, very familiar but he couldn't place her. It had been driving him insane that he knew he had seen her before, had spent time in her company, but he didn't know when or where, it was like seeing an actress or actor on television and not being able to remember what play he had seen them in before.
He checked on his house guest before he went to bed and stood and looked at her for a second, willing his memory to co-operate and place her for him, but no, the knowledge of who this girl was and where he knew her from stayed just out of reach.
