I met Terry up at the hospital. I was queuing up – hopefully – to get some blood pressure medication but it never arrived. They said there might be another shipment in the next couple of weeks but there were so many of us queued up at the dispensary today that there didn’t seem much chance. I didn’t recognise Terry at first although he lives in our village. He’s got the house on the corner, the one that is beginning to look a bit dishevelled these days. I think his wife must have done the garden and it all looks a bit neglected now.
Terry, isn’t it? I asked. He looked at me without much recognition. You live in our village. I’m still up in the cottages at the other end.
Oh yes, that’s right. Sorry, he said, I have a bit of trouble remembering stuff these days.
Don’t we all, I replied.
Actually, I did remember Terry. I first came across him when he started the campaign in the village to drive the paedophile out. He and his skinhead mates threatened to burn the house down if he didn’t go, so he went! It was hard luck for him really as the allegations were not about him but about the vicar. The vicar lasted in the job for another ten years and then got quietly retired. They said the Bishop had known about it long before but prayed things might get better. They didn’t!
Are you still in the same house? I asked. I’ve not seen you around much.
Must be a few years, he replied.
I think it was that barbecue you had to celebrate Brexit. That must have been in 2020 and you had a flag in the front garden. I think you got the vicar to ring the church bell as well. I remember because I wasn’t too happy about it and I suppose now if it hadn’t happened I’d be picking up my medicines with no trouble today.
I remember that flag. I got it free from the Daily Mail. We had to do something about the coloureds coming in and taking our jobs and stuff like that.
Do you remember how we were going to take control of our borders, I said. Seems funny really when you think what’s happened to Scotland and Ireland.
Yeah, but we didn’t need them. They weren’t really English anyway.
Well, I said, you can’t really feel sorry for Scotland and if I lived there I could get my medicines without any problem. They’ve just put pensions up again and they haven’t had the food shortages either. It’s hard to believe how easy it was to go down to Aldi in those days and stock up on fresh fruit and vegetables.
Course, they’ve gone now, back to Germany and good riddance to them.
They were cheap though. Still I wasn’t so sorry about BMW and Bosch. Anyway, there’s no way I could afford any of them since the 2022 budget and the pension reductions.
I blame the Irish for that, he said. We should have stood up for our rights and sent more troops in. Killed a few more of them!
I’m not so sure, Terry. I think once the government in Dublin asked Europe to help restore order and they landed the German and French troops in Belfast I think we had to accept that Ireland was going to be reunited – but they did make us pay a lot. Reparations they called them.
We should have refused, he answered. Showed them what it means to be British!
Well, we didn’t have much of an army left really did we after the Gibraltar fiasco and the fishing war. I remember in 2020 how we were all thinking that the French would make a fuss about wanting to fish in our territorial waters and how we’d be ready to say ‘Non!’.
It was a bit of a surprise when those Russian factory ships turned up and how that rogue Putin laughed when the British Ambassador went to complain. He gave him a bowl of caviar to take home! Lucky man, since there’s hardly any fish left in the North Sea now and not much left to argue about. You wouldn’t want to eat them anyway after the Sizewell accident.
That was the fault of the French and the Chinese, he said.
I read that too, I said, but the public enquiry said the software went wrong after half the team went back to India and the English replacements didn’t know how to stop the meltdown.
Send them all home, I say, he said.
Well we tried to, I replied. Lost a lot of skilled workers, a load of factory workers and the people who picked the vegetables. And, you try finding a plumber these days! It was worse for the hospitals. I expect you know that seeing as you are here.
Came to see about my hip, he said. The waiting list is now seven years unless you’ve got the new American health insurance. Being my age I couldn’t afford the premiums but at least we’re not pouring money into the health service like we used to.
Shame about your hip though, I answered. I paid up as we had a bit of a legacy and stuff saved up for the kids. We’ve got a policy with American Mutual but it doesn’t cover my blood pressure meds as that’s excluded. In fact, quite a lot seems to be excluded!
Well, at least we’ve taken back control. Stopped the waste and the coloureds!
Yes, I said, but funnily enough it was an Australian who took my job. There’s a lot around now since we did the trade deal. Still, I suppose that a bit of meat that has been frozen on a boat for six months and sent over here is better than no meat at all! And, I don’t think we’d have any industry or a health service without the coloureds as you so rudely call them. They were the ones who stayed and said they liked being British. Shame we undervalued them for so long but there you are.
There are still foreigners though, he said. But, now, we can feel like England, King George and all that. We can be proud to be British!
Pity we got knocked out of the World Cup by Malta then!
The referee was Spanish, he was biased.
I don’t know about the referee, I said, but we went to Spain last autumn. It’s too hot in the summer now with this climate change but it was nice in October.
They’ll be suffering then, he said, without us to subsidise them.
Funnily enough, they seem to be doing all right, I replied. Markets are full of food, there are a lot of new cars around and we were near the new Airbus factory which they moved there from Wales. They’re starting to build Dyson electric cars there soon as well.
How’d you get there? he asked suspiciously.
Took the car. You can get petrol there without coupons. It’s a long wait now to get the ferry though since they closed the Tunnel and it took hours in customs. But it was worth it and we had a great time.
Well I won’t be going there, he said. Yarmouth will do me.
After the cholera outbreak, I’d keep away from there.
I didn’t go in the sea, he said. It’s foreign!
And you still get duty free in Europe, I said. We brought back all two bottles of still table wine we were allowed and a bar of chocolate. It was a feast that night!
Foreign stuff, I’ll stick to what’s English.
Lots of white label cider for you then, I laughed. Anyway, there’s an election coming up so it might all change. You decided who you’re voting for?
The Brexit National Party. Who else? We’ve made this country great again and there’s more still to do! Now, I’m off to lunch.
Enjoy it, I said, what do you fancy?
Chlorinated chicken breast and chips, of course, he answered.
Suddenly, his face contorted in a spasm of pain. He tried to mouth some words which might have been something like ‘Oh Farage’ and then he plunged to the floor in front of me. A hospital syringe was sticking out of his back. A young hospital doctor was behind him.
Time for the revolution, he shouted.
Count me in, I replied.
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