A Right Old Lady

When you fall, naked, over an old stranger

Whenever Greg and I reminisce about it, we laugh our silly nuts off and then go quiet, considering if it had been any other old lady.

See, I’d forgotten rubbish day and there I was in my pyjama bottoms, rushing after the rubbish truck, scraps of paper escaping from the untied bag. I tripped on a flagstone and sprawled headlong over an old lady. My pyjama bottoms came undone, she gasped and someone saw my naked body across her. I let the bag go to stop crushing here and was suddenly grateful for the press-ups I’d done over the years. I didn’t actually touch her but onlookers saw the worst as a shower of fish-cans, food scraps and other rubbish covered us in the most unromantic of ways

.

I asked her if she was alright.

Surprisingly, she smiled back awkwardly and nodded. That exchange gave a nearby cop the chance to play white knight. He tackled me, squashed the old woman and she let out an almighty scream. The buffoon rolled sideways, surprised to find an old lady beneath the rubbish and me and I leapt out from between them.

As I pulled my trousers up, he tried to grapple my arms back in his clicking handcuffs. He was wobbling, still on his knees, and locked his handcuffs before they closed on my wrists.

The old lady was still moaning and he quickly took his knee off her thigh, giving me the chance to stand and tie my pyjama bottoms properly.

I held my hand out to the cop and he rolled away, wide-eyed, muttering something about assaulting the police. I stepped over him to help the old lady and she hugged me as she stood, panting and thanking me.

The prone cop was talking into his chest phone – whatever they’re called – asking for reinforcements and prattling about public nudity, rape of the elderly and police brutality. I couldn’t help chuckling.

The old lady was strangely resilient, saying she only had a painful thigh, and then joined me in a rising laugh, which was added to by the growing crowd.

The incensed the cop added littering and resisting arrest to his litany of charges. Two other cops arrived, pushed through the crowd and handcuffed me quickly. Then uncuffed me, removed the old lady from my embrace and cuffed me again.

“It’s okay, dear,” she said, as they led me away. “I’ll see you out very soon.”

At the station, the questions no sooner started when an officious looking gentleman marched in – a fine suit and polished shoes – and demanded my release. It turned out the old lady was the deputy mayor and her reputation was as tough as I had witnessed.

She demanded the bumbling cop be demoted and Greg and I were given a year’s supply of rubbish bags from the council. I was also given a Sainsbury’s voucher for a new set of pyjamas and a suit and shoes as fine as the mayor’s.