Last Exit From Tenby

/ Doug Jacquier

This piece was adapted in response to the weekly photo prompt from the Unicorn Challenge.

Last Exit From Tenby

I’m an Australian, ‘doing Wales’. Next stop Portmeirion, to re-live ‘The Prisoner’ (‘I am, not a number! I am a free man!’).

At the Buccaneer Pub, inside the walls of the old town in Tenby, I’m drinking with ancients like me, pretending to be interested in rugby, while they pretend to be interested in cricket. Neither of us fakes our distrust of the Royals (though it must be said that the man in the top hat and overalls, feeding his bar stool-perched water spaniel some crisps and Guinness, is a little less harsh than his mates. He would allow them to take their own lives come the Revolution).

Drifting from a woman seated at a table behind me comes ‘I already told you what I want but you didn’t want to buy me that!’ before she storms off to the Ladies.

I turn to see her man, red of face and bloodshot-eyed, togged up for ‘a nice night down at the pub, to get out of the house, like’, staring at her receding back.

Before the next pint, I offer side bets to my new companions about how long it will take before he realises that she really didn’t want a gin and lime and that she’s been in the Ladies an awfully long time. And that the pub has a back door.

‘My round, convict lad,’ smiles Top Hat, ‘because the dog thinks your funny.’

18 thoughts on “Last Exit From Tenby”

  1. Of course you realise I read this with a Welsh accent, Doug!
    Excellent spoof of the characters and chat to be found, in different guises, in pubs the world over.
    Particularly like the last line, convict lad!

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  3. Top hat and overalls! A dog on a barstool! Now before I continue, a confession: I’m half Welsh. Having said that, I’m remembering my Scottish mother’s continual assertions that ‘the Welsh were always weird’. Because my Welsh dad was an only child, and cut off his connections with his family when we migrated, I haven’t been able to form an opinion either way, and I feel very compromised by having his Welsh blood in my veins. Maybe I’m weird.🤔

    Welsh or not, weird or not, I do like your ‘overheard’ story of a man who seems to have no idea about how to keep his girl happy, and I’m hoping she did indeed take the back door. Nice point of view too, from the ‘convict lad’.

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    • Thank you, Margaret. That’s the longest and most insightful response I’ve ever had to one of my humour pieces. I think there are some that don’t appreciate the craft involved in making people smile, as compared to ‘serious’ literature. Mind you, I was helped by the fact that almost all of this actually happened, top hat, dog and all. 🙂

      Long may your Welsh weirdness manifest itself.

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  6. Dang — I think I missed a lot of the humor here because of my American-ness. Could you throw in a little baseball next time? I read “Royals” and thought Kansas City Royals, but you’re undoubtedly talking some cricket or rugby team.

    But even the bars in the US have back doors used for the very purpose you describe.

    Fun story.

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