The Stag Night

 
‘Be at the pub for six,’ Mick said.
‘We’ll have a few beers and then head into town.’
When I arrived at ten past they were all drinking shots.
They put a scotch in my hand and a wig on my head.

Dom looked out of the window
Looked out of the window again
Then looked at his watch.
Stripper, I thought, it being my stag.
A nun or a copper,
One of them who grinds her backside into my face …
But then I saw it.
A stretch limo blocking the street.
‘Weh-hey,’ I cried, and grabbed Dom around the neck.

Stretched out in the back on the way to the dogs,
Billy said, ‘we’ll win a few quid and then it’s on to a club,’
Mick cracked open the fizz and
Tommo screamed something crazy at the girls in the street.
‘Fuck you, you UGLY PRICK,’ one of them shouted back.

Down at the track,
With no idea of the way things worked,
We started backing dogs that had no chance at the line.
Each one an also-ran.
Each one bundled on the bends or no power at the end,
And in the end Si tore up his tickets and threw them all over me
Like confetti on the steps.
‘We’re winners backing losers,’ he cried, and
I reckon he got half of that right.

On the way into town, we stopped off at an offi
And took swigs from a bottle all the way to the Cross.
As the limo pulled up Tommo slipped me a pill and
When I necked it he laughed and said it was Viagra and
Tonight I was sleeping with Dom.

Swaying and swinging in the queue,
The doorman shook his head and said, ‘no way.’
That’s when Tommo took a pop
And got knocked right across the street.
When we got him back on his feet
He looked like he’d taken a count,
And been counted right out.
We would’ve had a go
If it hadn’t been for that cop car crawling by.

How I got home is a blank.
The wig had gone, there was a stain down my pants,
But I remember those kids outside the flats, and
Me running in to get the baseball bat and
Coming back out with a hammer.
Dom wrestled it off me and wrestled me back inside,
Where he made me drink water
Kept me away from the windows,
Away from the door.

Later on, when it was just getting light,
He put me to bed and rolled me on my side,
Placed a bucket by my head.

They say the stag night
Is the most dangerous time in a man’s life.
That and the day he’s born.
Somehow, I managed to survive them both.