Original subtitles

♪♪

[Heartbeat]

[Machines beeping]

[Rustling in distance]

[Beeping continues]

[British accent] Why give me this choice?

I don't make decisions.

My life's just happened to me.

I was born. Not my choice.

And then school just happens at ya.

♪ The ink is black, the page is white ♪

♪ Together we learn to snog

♪ With gobs full of cider and resentment and then what? ♪

I got older. I couldn't help it.

I started wearing lipstick and shouting,

and now it's now, and I'm sat on a hospital bed

waiting for a porter to wheel me to a completely different life.

[Sighs]

They said something about blood clots.

They can travel from your leg up into your brain,

or it might have been your heart.

It can't be your heart.

Too weird.

Too poetic.

Too embarrassed to tell them I wasn't listening.

Doctors, innit?

They're like policemen or teachers.

It doesn't feel like a conversation.

It just feels like "big dog little dog,"

and I'm a Chihuahua.

God, I can't focus with all this beeping!

Sounds like a techno album that doesn't know how to dance.

I've already signed the form to say chop me leg off.

I didn't really think about it.

I just agreed with the doctor.

Do you know what I do when I'm faced with

something life-changing?

I do nothing.

When me dad sloped off out the door on Christmas Day

with a bottle of whiskey and a badly packed suitcase,

there was only me who saw him go.

He winked at me.

Full of guilt, that wink.

And I said nothing.

I did nothing.

I went back into the living room

and unwrapped my Christmas presents,

and it was a pogo stick.

I've hated them ever since.

I've got loads of get-well cards.

[Beeping continues]

[Chuckles]

"Get well soon, from Gaz."

[Chuckles]

"Best wishes, Karen."

No one knows what to say.

[Chuckles]

[Beeping continues]

[Sighs]

"Get well."

I'm in hospital riddled with blood clots,

not seven years old with a cold watching "Fantasia"

while me mum makes me a chucky egg.

I'm not gonna get well.

Neither option is about being well.

If I go through with it, no one will want to talk to me

'cause they'll be scared of saying the word "leg".

Why is it embarrassing?

It's like wearing a wig, isn't it?

It's embarrassing 'cause we're all pretending

that it's real hair

and it might fall off or something.

If I don't let them cut it off,

then I'd have to live with the pain,

spend the rest of me days smashed off me head

on morphine watching "Homes Under The Hammer"

and falling asleep to "Countdown."

What was I gonna do with me life anyway?

Sounds ace, doesn't it?

Being off your tree on free drugs all day.

But drugs are only good if you get to be not on them sometimes.

You lose yourself on morphine.

There are bits of me personality I would like to lose.

I'm dead clumsy in my mind.

I'll say anything.

I was having it off with this lad one time,

and at the crucial moment, I said to him,

"Oh, hang on. We've got that cup in work."

[Laughs] I don't know if I would like to get rid of that bit.

I like being ridiculous.

It's important.

What bits of your personality are stored in your right leg?

At least it's far away from me.

My leg is as far away from me, on me, that you can get.

If it was closer, like, in me head --

toothache or earache -- then that would be well worse.

Plus, people love symmetry.

People freak out if something's a bit wrong.

If I had one leg, I wouldn't be symmetrical.

I'd be unshaggable.

And what's unshaggable?

Unlovable.

Susan Matthews.

She's not dead fit or anything.

She goes in the Dog & Gun. I've talked at her.

And then my tooth came out and I didn't go out that night

because I thought, how could someone like her

like someone with dodgy teeth?

All I want to do is impress her,

but so far I've been a proper weirdo.

My particular brand of flirting

is a delicate mix of push-up bras and bullying.

But with Susan Matthews, I just lost it.

I was trying to flirt,

but I kept doing a shit Irish accent by mistake.

She's not even Irish.

I'd just been watching "The Commitments"

the night before.

I panicked, and I drew two eyes on me hand,

and I went "Do you not fancy a threesome?"

[Scoffs] I don't know why she's got me a card

when I'm such an utter dickhead.

If it's got flowers on the front,

then that just means that she's picked up the first one

that she could find.

But if it's an arty one,

like a kitten in a big cup

or a frog mid-jump,

then that means she's put, you know,

a bit more effort into it.

It's properly disabled having one leg, isn't it?

Like, you've been to war or you own a motorbike.

What if they cut it off

and then it doesn't heal,

and then they have to cut more off,

and then that doesn't heal?

And do they just keep going until I'm just a head?

They'd make a documentary about me then, wouldn't they?

Fame and fortune, but you're just a head.

[Scoffs]

I don't want the "aw" factor,

all sing-song lilts and tilts of the head.

"Aw!

Are you in a wheelchair?

Do you want me to take that pint off of you?"

"No, I pissing don't."

Maybe it would be easier to be assertive to a porter.

Porters are nice dad-shaped men.

Doctors are skinny and scary.

No.

I've already got paper knickers on.

You can't go back once you've got paper knickers on.

They've drawn a big arrow on my leg.

It felt too intimate,

drawing on you in felt tip like your best mate would.

Maybe I caused this.

Maybe living off lager, lard, Angel Delight,

and repressed class rage isn't good for your veins.

Who needs Susan Matthews anyway?

Paying lip service, getting me a card

when I've made such a show of myself.

Big deal.

She's probably just kind.

If we got together, I couldn't be me.

I'd have to buy a blouse.

She probably grows her own herbs and thinks that's normal.

God, I hate people.

That word...

"stump."

Stump.

Stupid frump.

Couldn't let anyone see.

She's all pink eyeshadow and books.

[Beeping continues]

[Inhales sharply]

She's drawn herself.

She's drawn me. [Laughs]

But I look nice.

And I've got a false leg. [Chuckles]

"Stop trying to impress me.

I was impressed from the start."

[Laughs]

The shame of it.

[Beeping continues]

[Slurring] You can tell in here the patients who are gray-scale

smoking their fingers to the bone

and the other ones in full color

doing word searches in new pajamas.

Same problems,

but they're loved.

That's the difference.

All you need is love.

No it's not.

Excuse me.

Excuse me!

No one's listening. I've changed me mind.

It's just -- it's not very feasible for me at this time.

Am I gonna have my leg off

because I'm too scared to be assertive?

[Garbled voices]

I'll be all right, won't I?

[Beeping continues]

When I left the hospital,

they gave me a list of things to avoid,

and one of them was falling over.

Every taxi driver tells me that I could be a Paralympian.

"Aye, mate.

And you could be an Olympian, couldn't ya?"

I get called "inspirational" every five minutes,

just for anything, just for, like, eating a Twix.

And everyday I get asked if it hurts to have your leg cut off.

I use all my powers of language to sum up the pain,

and it's this.

You know when you stub your toe?

Well, piss off.

Getting disability benefits was a joke,

and I couldn't get a ground-floor flat,

so I lived in a van for a bit, nearly froze to death.

It took a while to heal, my stump.

Oh, and I got over myself about the word "stump."

I love it now.

I'll show you what I've done with it in a bit.

I found out what bits of your personality

are stored in your right leg.

I stopped feeling ashamed for things that don't matter.

Why be ashamed of having an asshole?

I stopped dieting, shaving, beating myself up,

stopped waiting to talk, listened, felt pride.

I stopped doing an impression of someone

less nice than I really am.

I had to ban self-pity.

Putting me leg on to begin with was hell,

so when the pain got too much, I'd think of things in me head

that I'm grateful for dead quick.

Tea, coffee, swearing, toddlers, wisdom, jumble sales,

my tattoos, my hair, my face, me,

and, above all, nurses. Ummmm!

The pain never went away, you see.

It stayed.

I can feel it in the leg that isn't there.

"Phantom pain" it's called.

You know that muscle that you clench

when you're trying to hold in a wee?

Well, I can feel that on the sole of my phantom foot

and anything that goes in it.

Speaking of which, I did end up with Susan Matthews.

She's very encouraging about me being a felt-tip weirdo.

She doesn't buy blouses or grow her own herbs.

She's normal.

She eats Pot Noodle butties

and worries about dogs she's only met once.

It's really weird that she only knew me for five minutes

as two-legged me.

It's good having your world turned upside down

and owning it.

I've got bigger balls now.

You can't just have a shitty life

and be expected to rise from it like the phoenix --

the phoenix from the ashtray.

I am angry.

Do you wanna see it?

It is weird.

You know when your nan drinks too much sherry at Christmas

and takes her teeth out?

Well...

Could hide it away.

That's what you do with ugly things

that people are gonna judge you on.

Could do that, or...

Hey, Susan, I've got something to show you.

Are we on now for that threesome?

[Laughs]

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