I'm a fairy!

Peter manoeuvred his way down the swaying pavement.  He raised the bottle to his lips, sucked at it for a moment, then held it at arm’s length, frowning.  It was empty.  How had that happened?   He turned and surveyed his route.  No puddles on the footpath.  He looked at the bottle again.  Definitely empty.  He lifted it to his mouth and sucked hard.  He was rewarded by fumes only.  He shook his head and looked for a rubbish bin.  Nothing.  He put a hand against the wall and carefully placed the bottle on the floor.  Despite his exaggerated care, it fell over.  For a moment he contemplated standing it upright, but the strain on his supporting arm was too great.  He waved a hand dismissively at the prone bottle and stood again.  Close enough.
 
Bloody Johnson, or whatever his name was.  Grabbing hold of him.  Demanding his gold.  Ha!  His gold.  Like he’d be in a sewer if he had any gold.  How about I grab your jewels, eh?  With a shovel.  Right in your jewels.  How’d that be?  Gimme your gold, you fecking arsehole.  Yeah.  And what would happen then?  Losing his job would be the least of it.

“Gimme your jewels!” he said aloud.  Yeah, that’s what he should have said.  Should have told the fecker.  Gimme your jewels.  Not that his were any good.  Damaged now.  He chuckled to himself.  Yeah, damaged jewels.  A shovel right in the family jewels.  Try and pawn them now.  That’s what he should have said.
 
“Jewels!” he told the street, and laughed again.
 
But here he was.  No money, no job.  Rent paid until Friday, and then what?
 
Nothing.  That’s what.  He should have never left the auld sod.  I mean, sure, the feckin’ church and the pogrom against the fae was bad, but at least they were honest.  Not like England.  Not like sodding London.  At least Ireland didn’t pretend to be fair.
 
Bloody English.  Bloody humans.  What made them so great, eh?  Great Britain?  Ha!  Great gobshites, more like.  Come to London, they said.  We recognise the fae, they said.  We give you sanctuary, they said.  Give you the back of their hand, more like, if they gave you the time of day at all.
 
Peter saw a group of women scream and laugh as they staggered down the street.  Several had stick-on wings on their backs, coat hanger halos tinselled over their heads.  Like they were fairies.  Like there was anything cool about being a fairy.
 
They saw him, hesitated for a moment then crossed the road.  Peter leant against the wall and watched them pass by, then cross again onto his side when they were a safe distance past him.
 
“I’m a fairy!” he screamed at their backs.  They turned, looked for a moment and then collapsed in drunken laughter.
 
“I am!” he screamed at their backs.  “I am,” he told himself.  Not that it was any boast.  His parents had been fairies.  And what had they done?  Had they loved him?  Had they cared for him?  Had they feck!  Dumped him in a cave as soon as they could.  Left him all alone.  Just as bad as the humans.  Worse, because he was their flesh and blood.  And whats-his-name, Creteus, yeah, he said he should be on their side.  On the side of the bastards who had abandoned him.  Right.  But not the humans.  No, definitely not their side.  So what?  Just his side?  Him?  All alone against the world.  He squared his shoulders, but the ground shifted again and he grabbed the wall.
 
Not just him.  No, what was the point of that?  So what?  Which side should he choose?  Who gave a feck about what the feck happened to him, eh?  Who?
 
He staggered on, occasionally accentuating points by stating them out loud and stabbing at the air.  Who did they think they were?  Bloody leprechaun, that’s who he was.  He told them, that’s what.  At least, in his head.
 
“Peter?”
 
Peter halted his diatribe against the world and surveyed his surroundings.  He was by the river, all concrete and grey, turgid water.
 
Maybe he was drunk.  Well, drunker than he thought.  He raised his right hand to his lips, then realised his hand was empty.  What had happened to the bottle?
 
“Peter.  Over here.”
 
He looked around.  To his right the Thames sludged its way towards the sea.  To his left a slight indent in the wall housed a wooden bench, the better to appreciate the factories on the south bank.  He made his way to the bench and fell onto it.  Maybe he’d rest a moment before trying to find his apartment.
 
“Peter.”
 
The voice become from between his legs.  Peter dropped his head between his knees and squinted.  A shadow seemed to move in the depths of the shade under the bench.
 
“Hallo?”
 
“It’s me.  From the meeting.”
 
Peter sat up, partly to think, partly to stop the world spinning.
 
“The meeting?  Oh, wait.  The meeting.  Custard creams.  Chair.”
 
It’s the clay, he thought.  If only there was limestone below him.  Limestone!  How he missed the stone of Ireland.  Even chalk.  You could dig in chalk.
 
“Are you all right?”
 
“Sure.”  Peter let himself slide sideways on the bench.  “Great.  Never better.”  He put an arm under his head and stared at the paving stones, but they couldn’t hide the shifting ground underneath them.  “So fecking great I could puke.”
 
And he closed his eyes, just for a moment.