Jem Clarke is in his very, very early fifties, is five foot zero inches tall and has never left the family home in Cleethorpes, which he shares with his parents…
As a younger man, I had a very simple dream. One day, I would be sitting up in a full-size bed next to a charming lady on a Sunday morning, newspaper supplements left right and centre, as I read to her an interesting news item which we would then debate and be witty about.
Instead, I was stuck shivering in Ramona’s rented boxroom on the 700th floor of a tower block, scrolling through a non-firewalled news site. I was sitting on the bed next to Ramona, a woman with rusted-beetroot hair – after a failed YouTube experiment about making your own hair dye. She was actually lighting her own pipe. She was lighting her shag – and I wasn’t getting one.
To resurrect some element of my dream Sunday, I slid up to the politics column and explained to her, with an introductory chuckle, ‘Some fella called Cleverly has mistaken a constituency for a shithole.’
Ramona, between puffs, wasn’t listening. She was reminiscing about her cleaning days: ‘I was having it in a dark cupboard with the early-shift cleaning supervisor. Bank ended up filthier than when we started cleaning it!’
She elbowed me with a long, loud laugh.
‘Any chance of some toast?’ I enquired of my gal pal, who looked increasingly as if she’d wandered out of a desperately sad line illustration in a Dicken’s first edition.
She scoffed, triggering her cough, which became a lung-shaking hack. When she’d recovered, she explained, ‘Toast? What with? The kettle? I don’t know if I’ve got a toaster… Is there anything on your side?’
In this unfurnished room – which Ramona had taken to be an instruction rather than a description – everything was on the floor. Amidst a battlefield of aborted Lego builds and flimsy fungal-haven foot spas, there was no toaster.
She recalled, ‘I threw it at Gavin only the other night – so it must be somewhere.’
I realised that I – someone with a low bar when it comes to acceptable romantic partners – was finally feeling the ick factor. It didn’t entirely disappoint me. There was an ease in no longer having to impress the admittedly easily impressed Ramona.
I floated round to her side of the bed and pulled her upright, suggesting we go out to the afternoon karaoke at a windowless social club she liked.
‘Ooh yeah, show off my new do,’ the poor thing pondered. ‘Plus Gavin and Danno might be there.’
I felt like Pinkie in Brighton Rock, about to break the heart of his moll. But once we were installed at a table with five other locals, I could barely hear myself over the football and Gavin and Danno’s fanny talk, let alone break up with her.
So, instead, I nodded towards ‘Stevo The Karaoke Bastard’, as his portable disco signage read. I shouted in Ramona’s good ear, ‘Listen to the lyrics. I’ve got to tell you something and it’s all in this song…’
The bittersweet opening bars of Wherever I Lay My Hat (That’s My Home) began. I wish Paul Young had sung a song called Wherever I Pop Down My Balaclava, That’s Where I Probably Take Off My Pyjamas. But, still, it was near enough to the truth for Ramona to understand: Gypsy Jem was moving on.
I cried genuine tears as I gave my rendition. No one whooped louder or cheered more than Ramona as my song finished. If she didn’t love or even fancy me, she really appreciated me.
Returning to the table, I had to tap her twice on the shoulder to distract her from Danno, who was balancing pound coins on his forehead.
‘Did you understand the message I was trying to tell you in the song?’ I asked.
‘Have you lost your hat on the bus again?’
‘No, Ramona. I think we should see other people. Well, I know you already are – I mean, I need to see other people.’
‘Aww,’ she said sweetly, ‘is it that little woman from the loose-sweet stall on the market?’
‘No, it bloody isn’t. She’s about 90 and she’s not little. She’s just got no legs.’
‘Hey, don’t knock it till you try it,’ Ramona said.
And that sentence – it could be her motto – was the last thing she said to me.
When I exited the bar, she was on her way back from the toilets. She signalled I should wait, before silently lowering a secret something into my pocket. It was a bar mat she had crafted into a penis shape.
I would have preferred it to be a heart. That’s why we had to part.
