Her piano accordion box was covered with stick-on wild flower labels, ’say no to the war’ slogans, the names of tunes she needed to remember and the message “I’m Ros! Hi!”

She was waif slim, obviously used to being the centre of attraction in this crowded and smoky north of England Northumberland country bar and had fiery red hair that spread out in profusion as she intensely bent over her instrument and pounded the accordion keys with fierce concentration.

I was transfixed, such was the power of the Scottish reel she was precisely executing, that I hardly noticed the other musicians as they beat their bodhrans, vigorously blew on their metal whistles, scraped their fiddles and generally tried to wreck or alternatively contribute to her performance.

I had heard about this folk music session on the Internet when I was visiting a folk chat room. I’d been emotionally drained after a highly unproductive but alcohol fuelled party the night before and had entered something fairly banal along the lines of:

“What do you call 100 accordions at the bottom of the Atlantic?”

After several replies which were about as mind numbing as my opening remark, I’d entered the punchline.

“A jolly good start!”

There were a few token smilies and a rolling all over the floor smily, after which the rest of the members turned to more interesting matters such as favourite beers and curry dishes.

“Are you a moron or what?” The aviator was a bright red accordion shedding tears.

Now I’m not usually up for a flame fight, being rather a wimp really. My real life demeanor is tall, skinny, hesitant and apologetic. People don’t usually want to beat me up. Usually they take one look at my mop of fair hair and ingratiating grin and want to mother me (if they are women) or ignore me (if they are men).

I’m the sort of musician who, in a pub folk music session, tries to start a tune and then everybody else follows the person who started a tune just after me.

But I’d managed to get a bit of some-one’s attention so I thought I’d stir the pot.

“Nah, I’m British!” (They could have got that information from my greyhound aviator that was waving a British flag or from the Berty in my signature, but I wasn’t feeling creative, mainly due to the aforementioned party)

“British as in living in Britain – or have you been expatriated to some far off country for generally being an unpleasant, uncreative little ****”

The language moderation systems in the chat room were beginning to earn their keep.

“British, as in born, bred and still living in Cornwall,” I replied, lying. The truth was I’d moved about lot’s in the West Country and now lived in Devon but, hey, that’s chat rooms.

“You must have a Cornish pasty for a brain with a comment like that!”

“The accordion players I’ve generally heard sound as if they’ve got a Cornish pasty stuck in their instruments. The sound comes out like a continuous slush.”

“Then they are not using the right technique. You’d think different if you heard a really player.”

“So you reckon you’re a real player?”

“It’s been known.” Caution was creeping in here.

“So do you play a lot?” Nice touch, flirtatious and neatly ambiguous, I thought, fervently hoping I wasn’t talking to a bloke.

The reply took a while. I entertained myself watching the accordion aviator bouncing up and down and dripping all over the place.

“My husband has just arrived home. I’ve got to go. I’ll private message the address of the pub where I usually play. Judge for yourself creep.”

Rock on! I’d struck gold!

So here was I, having second thoughts, after driving several hundred miles in my old, beat up Elddis motorhome. At least I’d checked there was a genuine pub folk session by phoning the landlord beforehand but I reckoned the rest was insanity. Her husband was probably a lumberjack and anyway she’d probably not even acknowledge me.

But, hey, I was just feeling desperate. After a recent brush with the law relating to some dodgy credit card transactions and a subsequent fine which substantially depleted my fighting fund, I was open to anything that might bring a change of luck. My old dad always taught me to start the runes working for me by making others feel obligated. I reckoned my romantic dash across country might do just that.

The folk music tunes were over and the players were descending like starving gannets on a pile of sandwidges thoughtfully provided by the landlord, either as a thank you for playing the music or to shut them up for a while so the regulars could recover their senses.

I caught Ros as she pushed her way through the crowds of people and tables heading for the bar.

“Hi, I’m 100 accordions man! ” It wasn’t great but it was the best I could do and I don’t like giving my name away too easily.

She stopped, squinted her dreamy green eyes, looked me up and down as if I was something that had slithered out from under a local hedge and gave me a sardonic smile.

“Zo! You like the music. No! Eet was worth coming all the way from your British Cornwall to discover the accordion ees a much better instrument than your pasty brain can understand!”

Her accent was heavily scandinavian. She looked me up and down again. I was wearing my executive guy slumming it at the folk event clothes, dark trousers, carefully ironed shirt and highly polished black shoes. The Elddis was stowed away at the back of the pub car park with a ‘broken down’ sign that would keep it on hold for a while, if, in the fortunate event, I got distracted. As of now, getting distracted was number one on my list of priorities. This scandinavian wench was a princess eager for the plucking – although I felt sure she didn’t know it yet.

I leered my most ingratiating smile.

“Your playing was really cool – definitely worth a drink! What would you like?”

“Zat playing vasn’t just cool, as you say, eet vas sensational, pasty brain! Eet is vorth rivers of champagne but, if you vant you can get me a Bacardi and Coke.”

She dismissed me with a wave of her hand, swung around with a swish of her lime green skirts, returned and flopped down in her seat at a table in the window smoothing her white blouse and leaving me to execute her order as soon as I could drag my eyes away from the legs she had just curled up underneath her just as I wanted to.

I handed over the money at the bar and grimaced. Romancing her was obviously going to be pricey and there was still the possibility of a lumberjack husband appearing and snatching her away before I could have my evil and hopefully profitable way.

She reached over and drunk deeply of the bacardi and coke. Rose red fingernails matched the rose red lips I was already fantasising about crushing to mine. She held out her hand.

“I’m Rositza, Ros for short. It means ‘dew’ in my home country of Bulgaria.”

At least the ‘dew’ bit explained the dripping accordion aviator in the chat room. I took a slug of my beer then took her hand.

“I’m Bertrand, British to the core but my grandparents were French and my mum and dad wanted me to have the family name.” It was a good line. I made a note to remember it.

“Vell ‘ello, Bertrand. I think it may be a pleasure meeting you. But first pleeze can I ‘ave back my ‘and?”

I released her ‘and, hoping I hadn’t been too pushy, but she didn’t seem bothered. I decided to check out the terrain fast.

“Vy, I mean why don’t you want me to hold your hand? Is your husband going to get mad?”

“Poof! My husband is wiv ‘is big business friends in London zis evening. Ees got more interesting matters than poor Ros tonight. Are you a successful business man too, Berrrrtrand?” The rolled ‘r’ sent shivers down my spine and her reply couldn’t have been more encouraging.

She leaned forward and placed her hand on my knee, confidentially, to emphasise her independance from her absent husband.

“So you needn’t worry, you poor boy, nobody is going to bop you for talking to Ros.”

Bopping was definitely on my mind but I quickly changed the subject before I became lost for words. She leaned even further forward towards me. This allowed her low cut blouse to balloon out under my gaze and the room was becoming more sauna like by the second.

“My success in business is nothing compared to the musical success I would preferred. Certainly, if I’d known the piano accordion could be played like you play it, I may have taken it up myself instead of the mouth organ.” I creased my face into my best encouraging smile.

She pouted, tilted her head to one side, scanning my face the way women do when they are beginning to take an interest and want to get down to the fine print.

She shrugged her shoulders, seeming to make a decision, and brought her face close to mine, confidentially.

“Zo, Bertrand plays ze mouth organ and what else do you do with your lips, my Bertrand.”

With her body language now working over time, just like my heavily beating heart, I figured she knew what she was doing. Perhaps she also knew time was limited and had decided to move into the fast lane. I decided to go in for the kill.

“Funny thing is that I’ve always fancied playing the piano accordion,” I said. “Perhaps you could give me some private lessons.”

I’m not normally so bold but this woman called Ros had me totally in her power. I had no plan except to rush headlong into the chasm that was opening in front of me slavering at the mouth and yelling Geronimo.

She edged even closer and breathed into my ear. Fragrent floral french scents enveloped us into a private secret garden and the pub seemed miles away.

“Not only can I give you private lessons, my Bertrand,” she smiled. “I can also sell you my personal piano accordion that I have treasured my whole life since my grandfather left it to me in his will back in my home town in Bulgaria. Eet eez back at my ‘ouse but we can go up and get it and even get started on the lessons if you vant. Vizout delay. Eeef you ‘ave the energy!”

Boy did I have the energy and mixing pleasure with business was my idea of paradise. I tried to remember whether I’d got any dud cheques in my wallet and wondered if she was stupid enough to let me walk away with her prize instrument for the price of a bit of paper. She didn’t look stupid but she did look keenish on me. Maybe she was so rich, or her husband was, that it didn’t matter.

Even better, when we got outside, she immediately assumed we would go in her car which was a rather ancient looking MG but about as beautiful and low slung as she was.

We accelerated away, roared through the dark and silent countryside and before my stomach had relocated in it’s proper place, slipped into a modern mock tudor housing estate and then into the drive of an unlit detached house.

“Berrrtrand vill be quiet and I vill open ze ‘ouse.” She presses her fingers to my lips to be sure I understood and slipped out of the MG with flashes of thigh and a backward look that demanded my pasty brain should understand.

Unobtrusive was cool with me and fitted well in with my plans since I’d already noticed the net curtains twitching on the opposite side of the road.

She opened the garage door from inside, climbed into the MG with more thigh flashing and smartly parked the car and me in the garage.

As the garage doors automatically closed behind us, she leaned over, traced my face with a long finger and applied her mouth to mine in a long drawn out kiss that only ended when I gathered my wits and reached to draw her closer.

“Come,” she said, pulling away, “ve ‘ave unfinished business.”

I followed her through the garage entrance to the house, as rapidly as I could, which involved some crashing as I tripped over some suitcases that were lying on then floor in wait for a pasty brain with other things on his mind.

Ros swished around the ground floor dealing with curtains and lights while I cased the joint with a professional eye and her figure with my libido.

The property was surprisingly spartan. There were a few photos scattered around showing Ros strapped into her piano accordion with an arm draped around on old bald headed geezer but the house had more the feeling of a waiting room than a home. Also, I already knew Ros liked strong scent and her house should have smelled of her but it didn’t.

The usual technological things, video, television, hi-fi, were missing from the lounge. The furniture looked worn and dated. I checked out the hall as Ros disappeared into the kitchen carrying a bottle of wine she was obviously planning to open. Halls almost always have shoes lying around, coats hung up and keys somewhere grabbable. This one didn’t.

The hairs were beginning to rise at the back of my kneck. Ros’s scent was drawing me on but my more direputable survival instincts were telling me something was very wrong. Her voice, flute like, called me from the lounge.

“Berrtrand, come, ve must do ze business but first we must toast our good fortune.”

I entered the lounge and found her draped on the sofa. There was a rather beat up blackish piano accordion on the low table besides her. I’m definitely not a piano accordion expert but doubted it would be worth much on the underworld market.

I took the glass of red wine she was holding out and sat next to her on the sofa wondering whether my nervousness was showing as much as her plunging neckline.

She patted the piano accordion with one elegant finger, we downed our glasses of red in one and then my tongue followed the red wine down her throat while my arms simultaneously tried to squeeze it out of her in a flurry of thrashing limbs.

“old me tight Bertrrand,” she whispered huskily. “I vant you to be strong and tough. Treat me like a slave and force me to give in to your manliness. I vill fight but you will overcome me.”

Her hands simultaneously slipped inside my shirt, raked my chest and raised my breathing to new heights. In self defence, I grabbed both her hands and trapped them behind her as my lips traced down the front of her neck and dived into the soft paradise below.

Firmly, I released one of her hands, grabbed a handful of hair and pulled her face close to mine.

“Well minx. If I am to play on your piano accordion or even train you, I will need the shoulder straps that go with that fine looking piano accordion you want to sell me.”

Her eyes widened, encouragingly.

“Berrtrand is a nasty man even though ‘e doesn’t look eet. Vait ‘ere!”

She flounced off the sofa and swept off in the direction of the upstairs bedrooms.

It took me all of a minute to search the handbag she had left besides the piano accordion. I didn’t know what I was looking for but, when I saw the police evidence statement, I was sure I’d found it. The police authority was Welsh and the charge it documented was indecent assault. I didn’t bother to read the detail but it looked very much like a report of the events of this evening, except the address where she was resident was in Cardiff, Wales. She’d agreed to sell the piano accordion but, according to the obviously false charge sheet, had been assaulted instead. The whole house, probably short term rented or borrowed, was set up for a hustle and I was intended to be the mark.

The miniature video camera wasn’t difficult to find, once I’d figured there had to be one. It was hidden in a cupboard with a false mirror front, working already and focussed on the sofa, recording everything.

Minutes later, Ros returned waving the shoulder straps seductively and found me, pen in hand, signing one of my dud cheques.

The figure she mentioned for the piano accordion was very large, even for a top of the range instrument and family heirloom but I duly entered the amount of the cheque, wrote an address on the back and handed it to her.

She scrutinised the cheque briefly, dropped it into her handbag, threw the piano accordion shoulder straps at me and then herself.

“Dominate me Berrtrand,” she purred, as she went into battle with arms and legs flying.

——- oooooooooo —–

Back at the pub, Ros dropped me off with a cheery wave as the folk musicians and bar customers were streaming out into the night.

“My ‘usband may come back and surprise his Rositza. Zey do bed and breakfast at ze pub. You vill be all right!”

Her lush lips met mine briefly then I hefted her old piano accordion in it’s case to my shoulders and watched her leave in a squeal of tyres and gears.

As I hit the M1 motorway, going south, I wondered how long she would wait normally before posting the video of the incriminating evidence of her (simulated) fight on the sofa.

No doubt, she would allow just enough time to elapse to cash the exorbitant payment she had extracted from her unsuspecting prey for the worthless piano accordion she’d persuaded them to buy, mostly in the belief they were being promised something else.

With the video, I was sure there would normally be a demand for compensation for the assault and maybe even a police evidence record of her description of the events, likely as not as home made as the video.

But I’d had a great night. The music at the pub had been fun and I’d have many happy memories of the gorgeous Rositza with her soft and sensual whirling limbs to keep me happy well into my old age.

As I drove through the night heading for London, listening to Mahler’s Ninth Symphony on the radio, feeling satiated, I resolved to give the beat up old piano accordion to the first homeless person I met when I arrived at the big city.

This gave me a warm and happy feeling.

So did the thought of the suitably fine sum of money I would negotiate from my favourite used electrical equipment retailer for the very expensive video camera I’d acquired and, unknown to Ros, had secreted at the bottom of the old piano accordion case.

The End

Copyright Rob Hopcott 1999 – 2007, all rights reserved. All characters and events are fictitious and no reference is intended to any person living or otherwise.

A complete list of my fiction stories.

I really had a great time. For 1st Sunday of the month afternoon pub entertainment session in a down to earth traditional water front inn, where accordion players are welcome, it’s a place I will definitely go back to.

Always check with the pub beforehand before travelling as events may change with time.

Traditional folk music at The Dolphin, Barbican, Plymouth, UK

Bye for now

Rob

The first short story in this collection of accordion short stories is about an anti-hero called Bertrand who meets a fiery continental heroine in a folk music chat room.

Sparks could fly … and they do.

Here it is!

Piano Accordions and Chat Rooms

I hope you enjoy it and add this site to your RSS News aggregator so you will be automatically notified of updates.
Bye for now

Rob

(Rob Hopcott)