Various ramblings by the small hobbit

Title: Going to Weston
Fandom: Life on Mars
Rating: White Cortina
Word Count: 1,200 approx
Written for the 'holiday' challenge on 1973flashfic! As usual thanks to my beta jinxed100 
Summary: Instead of attending a police conference in Bristol Sam and Gene end up in Weston-super-Mare

Sam had been surprised when Gene had suggested that they should attend the conference in Bristol, but had readily agreed, not wanting to dampen his boss’ new found enthusiasm for updating the workings of CID.  He had been even more surprised when on signing in he discovered that the conference finished on the Wednesday when he’d been told they wouldn’t be returning to Manchester until Friday evening.

“Well, we’re not coming back till Friday evening,” was Gene’s explanation when Sam challenged him, “we’re having a few days’ holiday.  I’ve always wanted to go to Weston-super-Mare.”

The conference itself was a total waste of time.  Gene spent most of the time catching up on lost sleep and as far as Sam was concerned the “new” ideas that were being propounded had been superseded, so that by Tuesday afternoon they had both fallen asleep.  Sam wasn’t too disappointed when Gene announced that he’d received an urgent phone call and they had to return to Manchester at once.

As they began their journey back, Sam looked through the lecture notes, feeling that as he had slept through most of the lecture he should at least see what had been said.  So it wasn’t until they had been driving for about twenty minutes that he looked up.

“This isn’t the way home,” he said, “we’re heading south, not north.”

“Correct, Gladys.  I told you I’ve always wanted to go to Weston-super-Mare.”

“But the phone call?”

“That was Ray.  I thought this might happen, so I told him to ring up and say he had an urgent message for DCI Hunt.  Worked a treat too.  I knew I’d be bored, but I fully expected you to be totally riveted, rather than fast asleep.”

“I wasn’t asleep, just closed my eyes whilst thinking about what was being said.”

“Oh yes, with your head on my shoulder for half an hour.”

*****

They woke up late the following morning, Gene having been of the opinion that if they only had three nights in Weston they needed to make a quick start on checking out all the pubs.  Sam had hoped that they would be staying in a hotel on the front or possibly a genteel residence in nearby Clevedon or even a respectable b&b, but no, they were in a caravan that was owned by a friend of Chris’ uncle’s brother-in-law’s father.

There was nothing to eat in the caravan, so they went to a café that said it did the best breakfast in town.  Sam looked at the bacon which was floating in fat and imagined it was a paddle steamer moving down the Bristol Channel to be hit by the oncoming tanker SS Fried Tomato until Gene, fried egg dribbling down his chin, told him to stop playing with his food and eat up as there was lots to do.

Since it was raining, they went to the arcade and played on the slot machines until Sam ran out of change.  Gene, for some mysterious reason, seemed to be on a winning streak, but refused to lend Sam any money.  When Sam started to pout, Gene just laughed at him and told him not to behave like a toddler having a temper tantrum.  So they went for a pie and a pint for lunch.

After lunch, as it was still raining, they wandered along to the Winter Gardens where there was a band playing.  In fact it was raining so much that the bandsmen were having to rest their feet on the seat in front to keep them out of the puddles.  No-one stopped to listen to them for more than a minute before moving on.  There was much muttering about seeing if there was anything on at the cinema so they could spend the afternoon in the dry before they could go back for dinner.  Sam and Gene could at least return to the caravan, which they did, stopping only for Sam to buy something for breakfast the following morning.

*****

By the time Sam woke up on Thursday morning the sun was shining.  He stretched luxuriously and then became aware that Gene was looking at him. 

“Still can’t hold your booze, can you?  I had to practically carry you back last night and then I had to put you to bed.  So to say thank you, you are going to cook me my breakfast and then we are going out, because it is a sunny day and no-one is going to say that the Gene Genie went to the seaside and didn’t go paddling.”

Much later, because there was really no hurry, they made it out.  When they reached the beach they started to wander along it.

“Tide’s a long way out,” Gene commented.  “Never mind, I’m going for a paddle.  Coming Dorothy?”

Sam tried to reply, but the Guv was striding towards the sea, and the wind carried Sam’s words in the wrong direction.  He sat down on the beach to wait.  Sure enough, a little while later a very disconsolate DCI Hunt reappeared, his feet and legs covered in mud.

“Not a word, Tyler”, he said to his smirking inspector.

“I think I saw a tap by the steps,” Sam giggled.

Gene stomped off in the direction of the tap, with Sam following at a safe distance.

To cheer him up Sam bought fish and chips which they ate whilst walking along the pier.  Gene caught Sam looking longingly at the candy floss and so bought him a large bag.

“Thank you,” said Sam.  “It reminds me of when I was little.  We didn’t go to the seaside very often, Mum couldn’t afford it, but when we did we’d always have fish and chips and candyfloss.  And Mum would buy a stick of rock so that we’d have something to remember the day by once we were home.”

Gene grinned, “We never went as kids, but I can remember day trips with me mates.  Didn’t bring anything back with us though, except empty pockets and a hangover the following morning.  Speaking of which, isn’t it about time we continued our tour of the local boozers?”

*****

On Saturday morning Sam was trying to clean the Cortina’s boot without much success.  They had found a child’s bucket abandoned on the beach on the Thursday night and Gene had decided that filling it with sand and taking it back to Manchester would be an excellent idea.  Sam, who had been equally inebriated at the time, had managed to find a paper flag to go with it and they had carefully placed the bucket in the middle of the boot.  The inevitable consequence was that the bucket had fallen over on the journey back and equally inevitably Gene had blamed Sam for his particularly stupid idea.

Engrossed in his task, Sam didn’t hear Gene approach until a tap on his shoulder made him jump.

“I’ve got you a present,” Gene announced.

“It had better not be another sock covered in mud,” grumbled Sam.

“Thought you might like this,” Gene looked slightly embarrassed as he handed Sam the stick of rock, “To remember our trip to Weston.”