Oh balls! (and puns)

Right...where were we? Oh right, Vikkie had just offered to make me dinner, an event in itself. Between us we’ve tried to replicate the conversation from that evening, though it has to be said sometimes even we don’t believe we come out with this stuff.
“Really, you didn’t have to do this.” I say politely as possible with my mouth already full of chicken.
“Well, it’s the least I can do, what with you falling to pieces every five minutes since we got here.” Vikkie shrugs and dunks chips in tomato sauce with exaggerated involvement.
“Well…..at least save some energy for ordering breakfast” I smirk and take a deep relaxing sip of coke, as around us the dinner rush begins to empty out of KFC.
As a rule neither Vikkie nor any of my assorted friends really do cookery. Though I must hastily add that it is more a case of “won’t” not “can’t”. (Though I distinctly remember a rather unfortunate incident where we intended to make an offering of a hardboiled egg and between the two of us turned the simple (and doomed) task of cooking the damn thing into a circus.)
As the number of chicken pieces slowly dwindles we exhaust the various topics of essays, news from home and the gecko still at large in the showers on Vikkie’s floor. There is a slight pause as we finish our respective meals, then Vikkie, now playing with the straw wrappers, suddenly has a flash of inspiration.
“You know….” she mutters conspiringly over the collection of bones between us “You could always try a new approach”
“Such as?”
She gives a nod to the glossy print of an eight ball on the pillar at the back of the table.
“Consult the sphere of kinetic knowledge.”

If you find yourself inexplicably in Bath and on the lookout for a way to meet interesting people and discover places seedier than a budgies behind, I suggest trying to find a magic eight ball at eleven o’clock on a Friday night.
We went from Woolworths (closed) to the pound shop (open - but devoid of eight balls) right up to the supermarket, and finally started randomly going into anywhere that was still open, annoying bar staff, kebab shop employees and one busker.
Eventually we managed to find a tattoo parlour with one in the window amidst a display of novelty cigarette lighters. After a little haggling, the owner, (well, presumably the owner, though it is hard to imagine that an acne riddled fifteen year old could possess the entrepreneurial skills necessary to set up a lemonade stand, let alone an actual business.) We managed to get him to part with the ball for £18.46 and a voucher for three pounds off his next visit to KFC, for which he threw in a Jack Daniels lighter.
“Pretty decent of him really” I remark to Vikkie as she hangs out of my bedroom window.
Being who we are, naturally we couldn’t settle for just shaking the magic eight ball, instead we decided to feed it into the gutter just outside my window and so begin the longest magic eight ball roll ever. Sometimes I think life would be less surprising if I just did what normal teenagers did, get totally wasted and put ecstasy tablets in my ears (or do whatever you’re meant to do with them.)
There’s a thump and a rumble as the magic eight ball begins its descent. Vikkie slips back through the window triumphantly and does a few curtsies to an imaginary crowd. We both freeze as we come to the same thought simultaneously.
“Vikkie….where does that gutter end?”
Oh the best laid plans…..
I grab a coat from the back of the door and rush down the stairs, pausing only to snatch a plastic spatula from the draining board in the kitchen. Vikkie is already waiting for me when I reach the dark courtyard.
“What’s that for?” she asks incredulously
“In case it’s stuck” I pant, then realise that the spatula is not mine. It is also glowing eerily, a sickly yellow.
“No accounting for taste”
I tap her on the nose with the spectral spatula to get her back to the crisis in hand, though really I’ve never been able to resist the lure of a weapon and an unsuspecting victim, Video games do effect impressionable minds. Together we set off, following the dark line of the guttering around the building.

Told you. It’s a wonder we haven’t been arrested or committed in all the time we’ve been friends, we are clearly a bad influence on each other. Anyway, if you’re dying to find out what the magic eight ball said, or just really really bored, the next bit of the story that led me to Ilensay will be up soon, I can’t wait to see what you make of my breakdown over the buffing machine.