Not Dead Enough

following disciplines. Tuning out the drone of a bumblebee, he glared at a ladybird which suddenly alighted on the ground right in front of him. As if settling in for the duration, it retracted its wings, closing its back-flaps after them.
    There was something about ladybirds his mother had once told him that he was trying to recall. Some superstition about them bringing luck, or money, not that he was into superstition – no more than anyone else, at any rate. Conscious of his three partners waiting to drive off after him, and that the players behind them were already on the green, he knelt, picked the orange and black creature up gently with his gloved hand and tossed it to safety. Then he resumed his stance and his focus, ignored his shadow falling directly in front of him, ignored the bumblebee that was still hovering around somewhere and took his practice swing. Thwackkkk . ‘Yup!’ he exclaimed to himself.
    Despite the fact that he had arrived at the clubhouse dog-tired this morning, he had been playing a blinder. Three under par on the first eight holes and neither his partner, nor his two opponents, could quite believe their eyes. OK, he was a reasonable-standard club player, with a handicap that had remained resolutely at eighteen for many years, but it seemed to them this morning he had swallowed some kind of a happy pill that had transformed both his normally intensely serious mood, and his golf. Instead of walking around with them moody and silent, immersed in his own inner world, he had cracked a couple of jokes and even slapped them on the back. It was as if some private demon that he normally carried in his soul had been banished. For this morning, at least.
    All he needed to do was to stay out of trouble on this hole, to finish the first nine in great shape. There was a long cluster of trees over to the right, filled with dense under-growth capable of swallowing a ball without trace. Plenty of open terrain to the left. Always safest to aim a little left on this hole. But today he felt so confident he was just going to shoot dead straight for the green. He stepped up to the ball, swung his Big Bertha and did it again. With the sweetest possible snick , the ball soared forward, dead straight, arcing through the cloudless, cobalt sky, and finally rolled to a halt just yards short of the green.
    His close friend Glenn Mishon, whose mane of long brown hair made him look more like an ageing rock star than Brighton’s most successful estate agent, grinned at him, shaking his head. ‘Whatever you’re on, matey, I want some!’ he said.
    Brian stepped aside, slotting his club back into his bag, and watched his partner line up for his shot. One of their opponents, a diminutive Irish dentist wearing plus fours and a tam-o’-shanter, was taking a swig from a leather hip flask – which he kept offering round, even though it was only ten fifty in the morning. The other, Ian Steel, a good player whom he had known for some years, wore expensive-looking Bermuda shorts and a Hilton Head Island embossed polo shirt.
    None of their drives was a patch on his own.
    Grabbing his trolley, he strode ahead, keeping his distance from the others, determined to maintain his concentration and not be distracted by small talk. If he could finish the first nine with just a chip and a single putt he would be an incredible four under. He could do it! He was that damn close to the green!
    A tad over six foot tall, Bishop was a fit forty-one-year-old, with a lean, coldly handsome face beneath neat, slicked-back brown hair. People often remarked on his resemblance to the actor Clive Owen, which was fine by him. He rather liked that; it fed his not inconsiderable ego. Always correctly – if flashily – dressed for every occasion, this morning he was attired in a blue, open-throat Armani polo shirt, tartan trousers, impeccably polished two-tone golfing shoes and wrap-around Dolce & Gabbana sunglasses.
    Ordinarily he would not have been able to spare the time to play golf on a weekday, but since recently being elected to the committee of this prestigious club – and with ambitions to become captain – it had been important for him to be seen participating in all the club’s events. The captaincy itself did not really mean a lot to him. It was the perceived kudos of the title he was after. The North Brighton was a good place for making local contacts and several of the investors in his business were members here. Equally – or