Born Free

by Laura Hird

  I’m desperate to go out and start searching. However, Angie barricaded herself, pissed, in the bedroom when she got in last night, so is probably incapable of answering the phone, or remembering who called if she did. Besides, if Jo walks in to another confrontation with that bitch, she’ll be off again by the time I get back.

  I’m supposed to be early shift but phoned in sick. Jake surfaces at ten. He senses from my edgy, wide-eyed, chain-smoking demeanour that Jo’s still not back. Getting his Ribena fix, he sits down.

  ‘Surely if she pretended to Rosie she was going somewhere, she must have had somewhere to go, y’know? It’s less likely she’s been raped and dismembered.’

  I feel sick.

  ‘Dinnae even say that, Jake, please. She must have told you something. D’you know if she’s got a boyfriend?’

  He guffaws.

  ‘Hardly, she’s been trying to get an invite down to Sean’s with me. I think she fancies him.’

  God, if she’s resorting to forcing herself on her brother and his pals, she must be really desperate. Turning up the telly for the Scottish news, I feel terrified. It’s the same old shit they’ve been broadcasting all night though – the fresh inquiry into the World’s End murders has come up blank, the serial rapist who escaped from a work placement in George Street on Monday’s still on the loose. I put the volume down again. Jan starts whining in an unnerving psychic-pet sort of way.

  ‘Have you tried the police?’ asks Jake, as she affectionately toys with his leg.

  ‘They won’t class her as missing till she’s been gone 24 hours. It’s bloody ridiculous. What if she’s been abducted? They should be looking now.’

  ‘I was thinking more that they’d maybe locked her up.’

  The phone rings. As I dive for it, it feels like there’s a riot going on in my chest.

  ‘Joni, sweetheart, is that you?’

  ‘Can I speak to Victor, please?’ says a crabbit female voice I immediately recognise as being my father’s neighbour.

  ‘Mrs Moodie. This is Vic. Look, I’m waiting on a call. Can I ring you back?’

  ‘No, Victor, I wouldn’t want you to put yourself out. I just thought you might like to know, your dad’s in hospital. Sorry I disturbed you,’ she says in a tone that could freeze the Forth.

  I ask her what’s happened, but my mind’s still in orbit around my existing crisis. She takes it as a cue to give me a detailed analysis of the ins and outs of her turgid life.

  ‘… so I went round to tell him my daughter was running me up to Safeway’s if he needed anything, but you know your dad. He’s so proud sometimes. He …’

  ‘Please, Mrs Moodie. Could you just tell me what’s happened?’

  ‘… and you know how he hates being stuck in that house. The loneliness just eats away at you. I’m the same since I lost my Jimmy. Of course, my family have been good, which always …’

  ‘Mrs Moodie. Is Dad OK?’

  She huffs. ‘That depends what you class as OK.’

  ‘Please, Mrs Moodie …’

  Dad’s had a fall in the street. He’s been in the Infirmary since half-eight this morning. Thanking her for letting me know, I tell her I’ll go up as soon as possible, but will she get off the phone?

  ‘Actually, I wondered, if you’re going anyway, could you possibly run me up? I’m awfully close to your dad. I check on him every day, so I feel awful I wasn’t there.’

  Buggeration!

  ‘To tell the truth, we’re having a bit of a red alert as it is at the moment. Can I ring you when it’s sorted? I’ll call the hospital now.’

  ‘I’ve phoned twice. He’s supposedly stable but I don’t trust hospitals. My Jimmy went in with varicose veins and never came out again. I need to see him for myself.’

  Do I really need a guilt trip from this old bag?

  ‘Look, I can assure you, I’d be up there right away if I wasn’t in the middle of something. I’ll get back to you.’

  ‘Of course, Victor, I know how busy you are, your dad’s told me all about it.’

  Thanking her again, I slam the phone down. Jake’s been listening in, concerned. When he finds out it’s just his granda though, he goes to his room.

  For the eighth time this morning, I phone the Infirmary. Luckily, the torn-faced cow I’ve been bothering all night has finished her shift. They put me through to the nurse. She says it’s only superficial bruising, but dad got a bit of a fright so they’re keeping him in for observation. It’s almost a relief to have something new to worry about. Christ, what a way to think.

  I go through to Jake’s room to update him. He says, uh huh a few times but isn’t listening to a word I’m saying. As soon as I hesitate, he changes the subject.

  ‘Da-ad, see when I’m at Sean’s, we can hear Mum shouting. It’s dead embarrassing. Can you speak to her?’

  ‘But it’s me trying to speak to her makes her shout in the first place.’

  Grabbing his jacket, he tells me he has to hurry before America wakes up. I don’t ask.

  Without Jake to distract me, the fear returns with a vengeance. Turning the telly back up to ground myself, I discover Tammy Wynette’s popped her clogs. Things aren’t all bad then, I muse, immediately feeling guilty for thinking such a thing. Tammy was someone’s daughter too. Jesus, what must her mother look like?

  The discovery that I’ve smoked the last of my fags brings on acute nicotine withdrawal and forces me through the bedroom, into Angie’s bag. The smell and sound of her snoring are torturous but I have to dig through last night’s chips, a half-bottle of vodka with a mouthful left, and other womanly shite, before I locate her Silk Cuts. By then, the urge to rub the chip paper in her face is almost irresistible.

  Nicotine fix in hand, I go through to Joni’s. I hate invading her privacy, but there must be some sort of clue around here. I’ve only just opened the bedside-table drawer when the front door goes and she’s suddenly there, in front of me, breathing.

  ‘What the fuck are you doing in my room?’

  I almost fall at her feet in relief.

  ‘Where have you been, love? I’ve been phoning bloody hospitals all night.’

  ‘What for? I was watching the Friends videos at Rosie’s. We crashed out.’

  ‘Come on, Jo. I phoned Rosie at four this morning. What’s going on? Have you been crying?’

  ‘Aw, Dad, stop hassling me. Stop stinking out my room with your fucking fags.’

  She looks on in disgust, as I stub out on the side of her bin.

  ‘Just tell me where you’ve been.’

  ‘Walking, right … just walking.’

  ‘All night?’

  ‘Yeah. So? It’s safer than staying here, getting smacked about by Mum.’

  Her chin starts trembling on the last three words but she fights back the tears. I try to cuddle her but she jumps away.

  ‘I’ll speak to her, love, honestly.’

  ‘And other famous last words.’

  As she lurches into bed, fully clothed, I notice her top’s on inside-out but I can’t bring myself to mention it. I’m already on the cusp of losing the place, and figure that one unhinged parent at a time is enough. She starts sobbing into the duvet as I open the door.

  ‘D’you want anything?’

  ‘To fall asleep and not wake up.’

  Join the club. When I go through to make a coffee, the news is still on. By now, though, I’m too busy contemplating my daughter’s inside-out top to give a shit about anyone else’s problems. Walking all night, bollocks! Who is he? Why would she not even tell her best pal about him? Is it a teacher? Someone Rosie fancies? Whoever he is, he’s dead.

  I sit, raging, with images of my daughter getting screwed flashing through my head until it skulks into the room at half-eleven. There’s no point even mentioning Joni, since the selfish drunken bitch slept through the whole thing, anyway. I try to tell her about Dad but she’s obviously too preoccupied with where her next drink’s coming from and blanks me.


  When I go through to warn Joni of the hellish awakening, there’s a sheet of paper stuck to her door with ‘No Smoking’ scrawled in black marker. I persevere and stick my head into her room.

  ‘That’s the She-Devil surfaced. I’m popping up the hospital. Granda’s been taken in.’

  ‘Shut the door, Dad, eh?’

  I decide not to phone Mrs Moodie. There’s only so many nippy bastards I can take in one day. Right on cue, Angie stomps past with the chips and half-bottle.

  ‘Working today?’

  ‘Fuck off, Vic.’

  I’m used to it. This is just the way people speak to me.

  ‘Well, if you start on that stuff before I get back, keep the bloody noise down, eh? They can hear you downstairs.’

  Snarling, she unscrews the vodka and defiantly swigs the last few drops.

  ‘So fucking what? They’re just a bunch of Catholics, aren’t they? How dare a single parent judge me.’

  She needs strangling. I leave before I decide to do the honours.

  My pulse is racing on the way up to the hospital. I have to breathe into a bag in the car park for a few minutes before I’m ready to go in. By then, I’m feeling like a complete bastard for not giving Mrs Moodie a lift. As I walk up the ward of sad, neglected old men, I wonder how many of their ailments are woman-related.

  Dad’s bed’s in the middle, next to the nurses’ station. The right side of his face is black with bruising. His hands and arms are the same colour. There’s a stitched gash at the side of his jaw. I only recognise him when I see his big grin, shining out from the prune of a head.

  ‘God, Dad, what were you doing?’

  ‘Just getting a bit fresh air, son, honestly. I tell you, the potholes up that street are worse than bloody land-mines.’ He tries to hide the stitches with his hand, like I might give him a row otherwise. ‘Really, it’s not as bad as it looks. I’m just such an old git, my skin’s like tissue paper.’

  I look down to spare him his embarrassment. His legs are horrifically bruised as well, and so skinny. They seemed so massive and sturdy when I was a wee boy. Now they’re like a sparrow’s. Taking my hand, he brushes it with his thumb.

  ‘You’re shaking, son. Is everything all right?’

  Why can’t I just tell him? He’s the one person on earth that actually seems to like me … to love me. It would be too like a confession of my own inadequacy, though. I don’t want him hurt by it as well.

  ‘How’re my two favourite grandchildren?’

  His only grandchildren, poor sod. I assume a facial expression of long-suffering contentment. ‘Fine, really. I’ll bring them both round to see you when you get out,’

  … then eradicate world poverty!

  ‘And Angela?’

  ‘Working hard.’

  It makes me sick to say it but I just want to protect him. Still, he seems to sense that something is rotten in the state of Gorgie, but he doesn’t pry, he just keeps squeezing my hand.

  ‘See him two beds down …’ he whispers. There’s a boy out for the count, can’t be much older than 20. ‘… went off his head this morning. He’s been sectioned but there’s no room for him at the Royal Ed. They had to take the tranquilliser gun to him. He kept battering the nurses and trying to escape. I’d have been safer if they’d left me on the pavement.’

  The image of him lying, helpless in the street, makes me nauseous with shame.

  ‘How about the rest of them, are they OK?’

  Shuddering, he gestures to the empty bed on his left.

  ‘That old bugger’s away for a colonic irrigation at the moment. Serves him right. He’s been bending my ear all morning. Wee Frees and all that rubbish.’

  A nurse comes over to take his blood pressure. It’s not the visiting hour, but she doesn’t say anything. Mind you, I think they only specify hours to give visitors an excuse to leave. Dad introduces us. I’m unsure if he’s showing me off, or trying to fix me up. Her pale little Irish face flushes when I smile at her but this is probably more to do with sleep deprivation than desire.

  When they start bringing round the lunches, I use it as an excuse to go. I’m enjoying Dad’s company but I don’t want to give a false impression of how much time I’m prepared to spend with him. He asks me if I could possibly give Mrs Moodie a run up tonight. Please say I imagined that disconcerting twinkle in his eye. All I need is that old atrocity for a stepmother, that’d really be the icing on the shitty cake. He’s asked me three more times, before I escape.

  By the time I leave the ward, I’m starting to resent him. Am I destined to spend the entire day with twisted bitchy women? I’m so put upon, I feel like a character out the Bible. On the way out, I pass the Intensive Care Unit, where Mum died. There’s coronary problems on both sides of the family so no doubt the rest of us will end up there in the end. We’ve always been the same. Our hearts get us every time.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  JAKE

  SEAN’S GOT THE dentist, so they turf me out at lunch time. He’ll only be an hour, but rather than face a second helping of Dad bleating on about his beloved Joni, I wander round the shops. Fucking fascinating they are too – hideous jumper shop, the place that sells horrible old ladies’ knickers, a florist – no wonder they’re all closing down. There’s just so much for people my age to do round here. I try ringing a few buzzers to cheer myself up but it’s no fun on your own. It’s like being homeless.

  As I walk along Dalry, my thoughts turn to my missing sister. Will we get to do a TV appeal if she’s been murdered? Eva’d definitely fancy me if she saw me on TV. You know what women are like, even the Yorkshire Ripper gets marriage proposals. Thing is, though, the folk that do these appeals always seem to end up being the actual killers. That’s a point, I wonder if Dad’s checked the freezer yet.

  A fast black blur suddenly flashes past on the other side of the road. At first I think it’s a weasel or a runaway dachshund, it’s such an odd size. Then I notice the long, snaky tail sweeping behind as it scurries along like it owns the place. A fucking rat. I’ve never even seen one in real life before, y’know, not in a cage. I run across the road, like the Pied Piper on rewind. It takes off into the graveyard like it’s going for the land-speed record. What if there’s a lair of them? I read about it in a book once. They’ll get in the Mecca and chew the old dears’ innards out while they’re playing bingo.

  It’s dead quiet in here … haw, haw … dead quiet, no, really but, you wouldnae guess it was next to a main road. Mr Rodent’s long gone, but I walk up the path, on the off-chance I find a half-eaten dosser. I could be anywhere, if it wasnae for the gravestones. When we first moved, I used to play here, but it’s no seemed right since Granda died. They wanted to cremate him but I pretended to Mum he had an incinerator phobia, so I’d have somewhere to visit. I’ve no been up since. As far as I mind, he’s up the top, but I was in a hearse the last time, so I cannae be sure. All I mind is he was next to someone called Thomas Mason. I thought he’d be chuffed about that.

  They’ve tidied the place since then – cut the grass, pulled up they Triffid-like bushes that used to block out the sun – but it’s still grotty. Lots of stones have been kicked over and there’s spunky condoms, bloody tampons, discarded knickers, gluey crisp bags, syringes everywhere – like Liam Gallagher’s hotel room. Maybe junkies come here so they dinnae have as far to go when they OD. Shagging here’s just desperate, though. Plus, it cannae be nice, finding a leaky Durex on your nearest and dearest, when you bring flowers up. I’m no getting buried anyway. My ashes are getting fireworked over Ibrox.

  The silence is barrie compared to the screaming round our house recently. It’s completely deserted. Mind you, most of the gravestones are ancient so the relatives are probably long dead. It’s all wee kids, folk killed in the war or really old cunts. Nobody else seemed to die back then. It must’ve been before cigarettes were invented.

  It takes 20 minutes to find Thomas Mason. I recognise the spot immediately. I mind
hiding under the tree in the corner after the funeral, embarrassed by Mum’s loud crying. Granda’s stone’s been knocked over, face down. The grass is starting to grab it into the ground. Even worse though, some bastard’s sprayed ‘Robbo’ across it in red. Laudrup, McCoist, but fucking Robbo? Digging my fingers under, I try to lift but a million beasties start scrambling round my feet. Beasties give me the willies, specially slaters, the world population of which seem to live under here. Wiping out a few generations, Godzilla-like, with my trainers, I kick them off the stone, and sit down. It would take a fucking crane to lift it anyway.

  It’s weird knowing someone you used to be close to is lying under you, rotting. I wonder if Granda’s still recognisable, or if there’s just a suit and shirt stuffed with awfie fat worms. His DNA’s probably in the flowers by now. I bet these bluebells were snowdrops before they buried him.

  I sit for ages, watching the birds. There’s millions of them once you start looking. They live off the DNA-eating beasties, so I wonder if they’ve got Granda in them too, if that’s what reincarnation is. I’m just starting to think how philosophical the peace and quiet’s making me, when I hear voices approaching. No wanting to get cornered by some grief-stricken old dear, I walk back to the path. Then I hear the words, ‘Hey, cunt!’ being yelled, so loud a cloud of starlings get frightened off a bush. Call me psychic, but I immediately sense that I’m the cunt in question. The sight of Daniel, Shug and a manly lassie I recognise from fourth year tanking up the path towards me, confirms this. How the fuck did they find me here?

  Nashing down the back way, I hit the edge of a grass-covered stone and snap over on my ankle. When I try to put weight on it, the pain throws me onto the grass.

  ‘Uyay, uyah!’

  Daniel and Shug land on top of me, punching.

  ‘If it’s no the dirty Hun himself.’

  Rolling into a ball, I yell at them to stop, but even the lassie gets stuck in. A kicking’s bad enough, but by a woman? Trying to get up again, I get an electric shock of pain, right up my leg. Shug takes a step back and starts unfastening his jeans. Oh, my God, he’s going to shag me. He cannae shag me. Please dinnae let him shag me. It’s almost a relief when he smacks his belt round my face. My teeth rattle, I see my eyeballs from inside but at least my arsehole’s intact. When I cover my head with my hands, he smacks them as well. Fucksake! They’re going to kill me, in a fucking graveyard. I’m going to die because Sean went for new trainers. On and on he beats me, round the arms, neck, across the back. I’m too stunned to cry.