I BRING the car boot down with a meaty clump. The problem is that the meaty clump in question is my scalp.
"Oh bloody hell," I shout into the night. [1]
"What's wrong?" J asks.
"I've closed the bloody, buggering boot on my head," [2] I say between wincing and checking for blood.
"Again?" she says.
It's true. I have previous when it comes to hitting my own head with the car boot. There's a scar on the bridge of my nose from when I brought the boot down with such force a couple of years ago that I created a whole series of blood blossoms all over the ground outside the house. It probably was quite pretty. But as I couldn't even open my eyes at the time I can't say for certain. In short, me and hatchbacks don't get on.
Tentatively I raise my fingers to my head. There's a bump rising. One of those cartoon Tom and Jerry bumps. Maybe if I get a hammer and push it back, I think. Like they do in the cartoons. It's possible I am slightly deranged.
"You'd think you would have learned not to get your head in the way by now," J says in the tone of someone who knows that learning is not something I do. But it's true. I am in my fifties. Why am I still inflicting minor injuries on myself? Didn't I do enough of that when I was a kid?
Because to be honest, the palms of my hand are more cicatrice than skin. Look. That's where I tore my finger open on barbed wire. There's the scar I got when I cut my hand on glass. Oh and that one over there too. Same thing. Broken bottles both times. Frankly, it's a wonder I haven't died of blood loss over the years.
The good thing is that at least it doesn't appear to be genetic. Neither daughter seems to have inherited my physical gormlessness. Thankfully. There was that time Daughter Number One pulled a boiling hot cup of tea down on herself but she was a toddler at the time. She had an excuse. I don't. I pulled a freshly boiled kettle down on myself when I was 20. As previously stated, learning better does not appear to be an option for me.
I moan and mither my way into the house, stretch out on the couch, mumble something about concussion and fall asleep. I wake up an hour later. I am still alive. My brain seems to be in working order. Well, as much as it ever is. [3]
I groan to make sure everyone knows I'm suffering.
"The good thing," J says, "is that you only inflict physical violence on yourself."
"Yeah. That's one of my better qualities," I reply. "Just a pity about the emotional violence I inflict on everyone," I joke. She doesn't laugh.
My headache is back.
[1] That's the PG-rated version of what I said, to be honest.
[2] See [1].
[3] Listen, there's nothing you can say that I haven't said myself.
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