After I came back from hospital the kids were little angels and Michael was feeling sorry for the burst of anger. Ah you couldn’t blame him. He was embarrassed after shitting himself on the floor and I was the nearest thing to him. Thank god it wasn’t Nadia or any of our kids. He did get his moods alright, but I still think that was one of those isolated incidents and sure there’s no-one to blame. He even let me watch him do his nude portraits as I couldn’t go for a run as me broken nose hurt too much. There was Nadia on the bed, joined by mum Sharon! Sharon kept fit in her thirties and you knew she knew she was still a good thing!

Two of them there lying on the duvet, all smiles, naked as the day they were born. Michael studying them intensely in his dressing gown. He got it as a gift from his mother on the anniversary when I happened to be in the hospital getting me nose set straight. I got a dressing gown too. It was so sweet of her. There I was, in the bedroom, me and Michael in our matching dressing gowns. Michael’s positioning Nadia’s legs over Sharon’s to expose their bits so he could capture the best pose for his painting when doesn’t his dressing gown accidentally fall open and his hairy man dangler flops out for all to see!

“Ah would ya look at that,” laughed Michael. I was in shock! Thankfully the girls seemed unfazed as it flapped straight out onto Sharon’s stomach. She, god bless the woman, took it in her hand and helped him put it back in his dressing gown. Sharon’s such a sweetheart. I think Michael was a little aroused by this. I could tell. Little Michael was always popping out from then on. And Sharon was always helping it back in. Sometimes even Nadia lent a hand. This was so great to see my hubby the artist, with his passion at work concentrating, and concentrating very hard too.

Now, I didn’t want to step out of line, but I thought I could do just a good a job as Nadia or Sharon in a pose like that. I mean, lying on pillows with your legs open, how hard was it? You’d be away in a hack with that kinda job wouldn’t ya? So there I was, in the bedroom, not a stitch on under the dressing gown. I had to do it. I jumped up, whipped off the gown, dived on the bed and cocked my arse in the air. Paint me darling, paint me! I yelped, surprised at my own excitement. I think I even squirted! Michael though was in no mood for interruption. I got a spray of blue paint on me arse and he tells me to-

“Fuck off and make tea for the girls and be of some real use!” Ah, I thought, it was probably best left to them. They didn’t need my stretch-marked moon base destroying the view.

But as I made tea in the kitchen I caught my reflection in the cracked glass cupboard. Broken nose. A flabby motherlode of tits. Bruises. A “fat whore!” as Michael would’ve joked. Then the flashbacks came. The punches, the put downs…. I gripped the spoon. I had changed so much physically in the 17 years since St. Saville’s. Saggy jaw, pot belly and a massive arse… I was the original: Frumpy Dumpster! 

Something had to change! Yes sir-ee! And it really did change. It started during my dad’s funeral. Michael was drinking heavily. He had already drunk his way through a gallon of Guinness and threw up on me dad’s open face in the casket. Everyone was horrified. “Ya fuckin’ idiot”. “He should be the one in that coffin…”. “Fuck me. That better! Ah howaya Father… Lovely weather.” “It is Michael, it is.” That was the end. I had absorbed it for long enough. So I decided to go back to school! Yes! I tell ya now, I was dead chuffed. There were adult classes on in St. Saville’s and I know I said I’d never set foot in the place again but this was different. Sharon said I should have divorced the Old Bruiser but sure Michael would’ve hunted me down, chopped me up and fed me to his pigs. Yeah pigs! He was into the home farmin’ then, god love ‘im. At least it kept him out of the house and I didn’t mind the stink in the bed too much. No, it was better to get an education so as to handle the worse extremes of Michael’s personality.

I know! It was staring me in the face for so long! I’m such a fool really. Well no more sister! I rolled up me dungaree sleeves, hopped in the Highlander and drove up St. Saville’s driveway at 6pm. Two hours-a-go, three nights a week. I couldn’t get Psychology that I wanted, so I took Drama instead. Sure it was the only one left after I arrived late for the sign-up. Thanks Michael for throwing the car keys down the toilet! An’ doin’ one of your aul’ ‘big ones’ on top.

In the first class we met our drama teacher. Oh my god! I couldn’t believe my eyes! It was Floyd Taylor! The Floyd Taylor! Fresh from a two month stint ‘on the boards’ as he said, in Thailand! Thailand?! Would ya believe that now? I was amazed. Ol’ Mr Heavy Metal himself, the long locks shorn, out dancin’ in the far east, givin’ it mighty to the locals! I tell ya now, I was sold. This was me! ‘Waiting for Godot’, ‘King Lear’, the Vagina Monologues!’ And the old magic hadn’t gone away between Floyd and me. We took a shine to each other immediately. His face and torso were so taut! Nothing was lost. Nothing.

Hello you! I said, as sprang up slowly to shake his hand.

“You have such a powerful face Lindor. Such emotion. History.” Said Floyd sternly. Well, a few slaps would do that to a girl as I blushed and twiddled me straps.

“Here’s a good costume for you, go and change into it.” He whispered.

God, last time I stepped into a dress was at the funeral. I was mortified, but this was the moment to prove to myself that I was making the right choice. To hell with Sharon who said I was mad and “a big dopey fool” who should “know her place” and “well, fuck off then”. I snatched the green dress and headed behind the curtain to change. It was just like my old favourite. A green floral design with long hanging sleeves. Now, I used to remember trying on dresses back in the day when I had an arse worth the attention but this was all new; mirrors on three sides. And Floyd Taylor was now in the back changing too! I saw him in the mirror.

Holy God he had a sausage on him that’d put Old Bruiser to shame; a big fat one with a bulbous vein forcing its way down the length to the helmet. I nearly flooded me knickers. Janey Mack! If I had known then what I saw now, I would’ve let him up on me back in ’91! What was I thinkin’? Him now here parading ‘round the room rehearsing his lines, not a stitch on him! His dangling bell launching itself from hip to hip had me mesmerised. Up to then I’d never seen such pure majesty!

Frumpy Dumpster is an Amplevoicepod feature-length Ear-film. A podcast with bite. The fateful story of Lindor Lamb, a middle-aged woman who has just about had enough of men. As a young woman, those were naive care-free days for Lindor, until that is when she encountered Payter Mayhem at Charry Marry Fun Park and school headmaster Sean Wrigley. Further anguish was caused by her husband, the 'Old Bruiser' himself.

Frumpy Dumpster is a feature-length explicit and sometime farcical story from Amplevoicepod. We create original, scripted, character & plot-driven comedy dramas. We construct fully immersive HD audio adventures. More than just a podcast, we are the Voice of Pod.