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By Root 1020 0

here. We'd left that behind us in this half-arsed venture of ours. Half-arsed venture of Abortion's, to be precise. It was all his idea, and I'd just gone along with it for want of anything better to do, any other viable option, and honestly, a bloke whose nickname was Abortion... He'd been christened that by a sergeant major on his very first day of basic (because, apparently, he looked like a foetus - and he did, to some extent, in certain lights, all bulging-eyed and big-foreheaded) and he hadn't been able to shake it off since, and why the hell had I listened to him, of all people? A man who measured out his life in quarter-ounce wraps. Which of us was the bigger fool for embarking on this journey, this wild goose chase, in the face of the worst bout of weather anyone could remember? The addled dope head, or me, the supposedly sane, normal guy?

And then, a miracle, hallelujah, out of the blue, a petrol station appeared. A BP garage. Lights on. Open. With a covered forecourt that was more or less free of snow. The sign even promised a café, just above the orange digits displaying the eye-wateringly high prices for a litre of diesel or unleaded.

"See?" said Abortion, stubbing out his J in the ashtray, which could be found just below the This is a No Smoking car sticker. "All that flapping for nothing. The universe is telling us it's on our side, it wants us to make it."

I held up two fingers in a peace sign, then flipped them round.

"Make war not love, man," I said.

At the BP, I had a squint under the bonnet. The spark plugs were all carbonised. When was the last time someone serviced this fucking banger? I gave the plug heads a clean with some paper towel. Fingers crossed this had been the source of the problem, but for good measure I fiddled with the distributor and wiggled various vacuum hoses, checked the oil, made sure the battery connections were secure. The full extent of my auto mechanic expertise. Watching Top Gear religiously didn't make me Jeremy Clarkson. After that I topped up the fuel tank, and joined Abortion indoors. He'd gone in for a slash, and now he was sitting at one of the tables in the tiny café, watching telly in the warm, huddled over a hot drink.

"What's that? Coffee?"

He nodded.

"And you didn't get me anything."

"Didn't know what you wanted."

"Tea. Never go anywhere without a brew inside me. How can you not know that? Some friend you are."

He frowned, distracted. The news was on.

I credit-carded the petrol, then paid cash for a tea and a jam doughnut. I had a dig at the girl behind the café counter about the price. "Three quid for a cuppa? And three ruddy fifty for a doughnut? I know petrol station mark-ups are a rip-off, but..."

She looked blank, like she just didn't care. She was a scrawny young thing, with her hair scrunched tight back in a Croydon facelift and a jewel stud in the dimple of her nose. Okay-looking, but just not my type.

"It's the grain shortages, en't it?" she replied.

"Even so. I can remember a time when doughnuts were, like, thirty pee."

She looked me up and down. "Yeah, I bet you can."

Thoroughly put in my place, I handed her the money and moseyed on over to the seat opposite Abortion. The room was empty apart from the two of us, the girl at the counter and another sales clerk, an Asian kid with a sorry excuse for a moustache, working the main till. He looked as stupefied with boredom as she did, and there was a forlorn air about them both as well, the way they kept throwing glances towards the window. They weren't sure they were getting home tonight and the prospect of kipping down in some backroom here was not an appetising one.

I drank the extortionate tea and savoured every last overpriced morsel of the doughnut. On the TV, the weather was making the headlines. Again. What a surprise. The weather had been making the headlines for months on end. The telly news people never tired of telling us about it, as if we didn't already know. Three of the coldest years ever, in a row. Three of the longest, fiercest, snowiest winters since they first started