PHRASAL VERBS AND IDIOMS IN CONTEXT
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, businesses, and incidents are the product of the authors imagination or are used fictitiously. Any similarities to events, locales, or persons, living or dead, are purely coincidental and should be recognised as such.
2018 by Jacqueline Melvin
NOTICE OF RIGHTS
All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce, distribute, or transmit in any form or by any means without the prior written consent of the author.
ISBN: 9781719939867
Mark
MARK MILROY HAD FORGOTTEN TO SET the alarm clock the night before when hed rolled in half cut from his friend Joes engagement party. Now he had slept in and, once again, hed be late for work.
Oh he shouldnt have overdone it with the drink he thought as he rushed to the toilet to spew up . He should have learned his lesson by now. But it was always a case of never again until the next time with Mark.
It was the third time this month hed woken up with the most horrendous of hangovers and hed vowed never to touch the bottle again. Hed sworn to himself that he was going to give up drinking once and for all . It wasnt his fault he told himself. It just was not his fault if other people invited him to parties and pubs and put temptation right in front of his face. He could have ordered some lemonade or a glass of fruit juice but hey, there was no fun in drinking soft drinks. He liked the hard stuff plus the boys would just laugh in his face and call him a sissy or a pansy if he were to be seen with a glass of lemonade or the likes in his hand.
Mark had been known as the local hard man since the age of thirteen and hard men do not drink lemonade. Hed also been the leader of the LYT", Liverpool young team, all throughout his teens and early twenties. Hed always been a born leader and people had always looked up to him . He had a reputation to live up to .
He had a look in the mirror and didnt like what he saw. His face was a purplish colour and the tip of his nose was deep purple tinged with red thread veins a tell-tale sign of a hardened drinker he thought alarmingly to himself.
Hed always been such a handsome lad with those rough and ready good looks. All the girls had swooned over him at school fighting for his attention.
The lifestyle he led was beginning to take its toll on him . He was on the verge of losing what Mother Nature had so generously bestowed him with. If he didnt pull up his socks pretty quickly, those good looks would soon be gone.
Of late hed noticed that quite a few of his mates were beginning to thin on top . He should thank his lucky stars that he still had a decent head of hair on him a thick mop of wavy blonde locks. His bright blue eyes were not so bright this morning. They were puffy and blood shot. He didnt look like, or feel like, for that matter , the healthiest of human beings.
He headed for the kitchen and put the kettle on . A strong cup of good old British brew might do the trick and get him back on the mend .
As he sat sipping the tea with two teabags in it for good measure , his mind went back to June of the year before when his wife Katrina had walked out on him just nine months after theyd tied the knot . Hed pleaded with her not to go and had told her for the umpteenth time that hed lay off the booze . But it had been to no avail . His pleading had fallen on deaf ears . Shed already made up her mind and nothing or no-one was going to stand in her way . Shed reached the end of her tether with her so-called husband.
With a suitcase in one hand and their pooch on his lead in the other, she walked out of the door, and out of his life, never to be seen again.
Rumour had it that her father had set her up in business in a recruitment agency in London. In fact, not long after her departure, Mark received notification from a solicitor in the capital informing him that shed filed for divorce on the grounds of irretrievable break down due to his continual drunkenness. Had it been his own fault? He remembered only too well how many chances shed given him to smarten up and get his act together . Only now, several months down the line was he beginning to get over the break up .
He looked up at the kitchen clock. He was going to have to get a move on . He was due at the factory at 9 o clock and it was now going on 8.45 a.m. He risked getting sacked if he didnt get there on time. Hed already been given two oral warnings for his late time-keeping and the next one would be a written one and then after that hed be out the door .
Anyway, did it really matter if he got the sack ? Maybe theyd be doing him a favour. For quite some time now hed been thinking of reinventing himself but he still hadnt thought about how.
For Gawds sake! He was twenty nine going on thirty and hed been in that margarine factory since the day after his sixteenth birthday. Where the heck was his life going? A written warning is something he did not need in his life right now. It would go against him if ever he needed a reference for another job but what other job? He had no qualifications to his name. Not even an O grade. Hed never been one for studying. Plus it had been the norm when he was sixteen to get out of school as soon as possible and find a job to pay your way . Hed never been encouraged to stay on and get some kind of qualification. Ma and pa had had too many children to think about to focus their attention on any one of them. He was the fifth of eight children. They had all left school as soon as it had been legally possible.
Nowadays more and more people were going to university and getting degrees and doing masters courses but that had not been the status quo back then . Here he was, on the threshold of thirty with no direction in his life. Maybe if he got away from it all he would also get away from his nights of boozing it up in pubs and clubs with what few mates he had left to go on the piss with.
Most of them had recently got married and hardly ever had time for the boys nights out. He didnt even enjoy going out anymore. Maybe hed had too much of it. Too much of anything and boredom sets in .
He remembered a time when hed lived for those kinds of nights out . He definitely needed a turning point in his life a new direction. After all , he told himself, they do say that a change is as good as a rest .
He looked up at the kitchen clock once again. It was nearly 9 o clock and he still felt sick. His headache was getting worse and his head was spinning. Maybe he should phone in sick . No, he couldnt do that. They all knew hed been to Joes engagement party the night before. Theyd know he had a hangover and hangovers were not classified as valid reasons not to go to work. They were of your own making .
