The A10 was playing up one evening at the Bee, and I had no way of running the young lady home that I was going out with. I didn’t like to ask Roger, didn’t want to put him out to much – but he agreed which I thought was right decent of him at the time – a good mate – had to be my best mate.
So there we are me with a bucket full of clutch bits including the plates minus cork inserts feeling quite sad; Roger starts the Matchless, the girl gets on, he shouts that he’ll be back in half an hour. The time passed: come five thirty in the morning and on my tenth coke, I had the feeling that someone was being had (not the girl of course). I managed to get a lift home and was tucked up in bed by 7 am only to get up for work at 7.30 am!
I didn’t see Roger down the Bee for a week and when I did, of course the young lady was the light of his life – well, what the heck – who needs her, I’ve got my Beeza running like a dream.
That evening we set out for home, first job, to drop off his young lady. “All you’re gonna see on the bend at Bushey is sparks from my footrests, I’m gonna go!” Roger shouted to me, as we kicked our bikes into life.
Roger overtook me coming into the bend – to make it he would really have to earhole it, but no, he went up the nearside bank – being dark all I saw, as I braked frantically were, as Roger promised, sparks and a headlight beam searching out the blackness as the bike tumbled over and over that night.
Once I had stopped my motor there was an eerier silence, the road being lit by a cloudy moon.
His girl friend, lying flat, Roger with his left arm under her head, had adopted the position of a person that would be praying to Allah with his behind up in the air.
I got the gist that neither one of them was in pain, he was comforting her, kissing he gently on the forehead. The clouds partially covering the moon cleared; there I was looking down on my best mate, but hold on! That’s his bum staring up at me – his clothes that should be there was missing – shredded from him during his slide down he road – I roared laughing, partly I suppose through the nervousness of the situation, he sheepishly turned his head to look up at me and at the same time must have felt a draught, he grinned his big grin, just for me – his best mate and said “you know what I am don’t you?” “yes”, I replied.