Animal

by Paul Jones

  ‘Stacey, it’s true.’

  ‘Aw, c’mon, Will.’ She raised her voice then remembered where she was. ‘It’s a bit far fetched isn’t it? I mean what kind of mug do you take me for?’

  Will hissed back at her. ‘Well you wanted to know the truth, didn’t you?’

  ‘Yeah the truth, not that load of tosh.’

  Will was irked by her cynicism. ‘Would you prefer if I made something up for you instead? Would that make you feel better?’

  Stacey munched angrily on her pasta. ‘That’s quite a story, with an imagination like that you should become a writer.’

  Will supped on his wine while she got it off her chest.

  ‘You’ve had a good three years to dream up a whopper like that,’ she said, in between mouthfuls of creamy pasta shells. ‘If you’d have said to me, look, Stacey, I messed up, I had a few affairs on the side. I got another woman pregnant. I even used to visit brothels and dress up as a woman at the weekends, I could have accepted that. Maybe I wouldn’t have forgiven it or even understood it, but at least I could have had the chance to deal with it in my own way.’ She stopped eating and calmed herself down. ‘Will, I’m not a stupid person, and for you to bring me here with the bare-faced audacity of trying to fool me into falling for such an over-imaginative, self-deluding excuse as that, you must be thinking a hell of a lot less of me than I ever thought.’

  With that, she dropped her knife and fork on the plate with a loud clatter, and stood up. Will watched her grab her coat from the back of the chair.

  ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘This meal is over!’ She glared down at him, and stormed off, drawing one or two inquisitive looks from the other diners.

  Trying not to show his embarrassment, Will quickly followed her. Although, by the time he had sorted the bill out and exited the restaurant, Stacey was already across the road and heading back to her hotel on the prom.

  Will shook his head, and jogged off to catch her up. When he reached her, he told her to stop but she ignored him and kept going. Not wanting to make a fool of himself he slowed down to a fast walk until he got in front of her. Then he blocked her path and fumed.

  ‘Now look, Stacey, I’m not going to chase you any more, I’ve had enough of this. Now you either talk to me right now or I’m off for good. I’m not going to let you walk away from me any more. You’ve got two choices. We can walk and talk this thing out right now, or you can go straight home and you’ll never see me again, I promise you that! Now what’s it going to be?’ He stood aside giving her the option.

  She glared at the open space in front of her, then turned to him, her taut, thunderous expression beginning to weaken.

  Five minutes later, they were both sitting on one of the promenade benches by the railing wall. Both of them gazed out towards a horizon that was so dark, there didn’t seem to be any line between the sky and the sea.

  Will was the first to speak. ‘I don’t know, Stacey, it looks very much to me like you wanted me to say I’d been seeing other women as if that gave you the excuse that you were looking for.’

  Stacey sat with her hands stuffed broodingly in her pockets and lapels pulled right up. Then she spoke.

  ‘When I was ten years old my father had an affair with another woman. And during that time, I watched my mother fall apart. Even though my father didn’t suspect that my mother and I knew about what was going on, we watched him week after week following the same pattern. Each time, he would come up with excuse after excuse to cover up his infidelity.

  What a complete fool he made of my mum. Yet, still, she kept the place going, running smoothly, efficiently. Sometimes, she would talk to me about the affair and break down, and when he came back home, she made me promise not to say a word about it to him or anyone. You see, she was so scared of losing him, and worried sick of seeing her only child’s home fall apart, that she thought it was worth keeping quiet and putting up with it.’ Stacey’s head rocked bitterly.

  ‘From that day on, I swore to myself that if I ever met someone, I would never allow them to do to me what my father had done to my mother.’

  Will looked over and said meekly. ‘I didn’t know all that.’

  ‘That’s because I’ve never told anyone, I made a promise. Even to this day my father doesn’t know that we knew all about his little secret all those years ago.’

  ‘So what happened to the affair, did it just fizzle out?’

  ‘Yeah, it came and went alright, and things went back to way they were before. But it took me years before I could ever trust my father again. It took years to be able to sleep soundly at night without worrying if some other woman would ever try and take my father away from us.’

  Will didn’t know what to say, he tried to think of something supportive but couldn’t, so instead he just gave her a moment to herself. Yet, deep inside him, the question he had been burning to ask just seemed to pop out all by itself.

  ‘I heard you were seeing someone else.’

  For a second Stacey didn’t reply, and he thought he’d put his foot in it, then her lips parted. ‘Just a friend that’s all. Except that he wanted more than I was willing to give.’

  Will was content that that was out of the way, now he could move on. ‘There’s nothing you can do to change the past you know, Stacey? What is done, is done. And getting back to us, I know we had plans and all that. I know we had everything mapped out ready, but things don’t always go to plan. That’s part of life and instead of coming to a dead stop and giving up, you just have to re-route yourself, and carry on.

  In prison, all I thought about was how I could get back with you. That’s the only thing that kept me going. That was my light at the end of the tunnel.’

  Will waited for a response, but didn’t get one, so he continued…

  ‘I know you find it difficult to understand my past, and the things I had to do to make a living, but that is all in the past now.’

  ‘Yeah, but like I’ve said it was a bit hard to take in all that stuff about you working for an Organised Crime Agency.’ Stacey huffed.

  ‘Yeah, well, believe me, Stacey, it was no wonderland, I still get nightmares about some of the things I saw and had to do. If I had the choice to go back ten years, there’s no way I would have gone through with it. I know some of the guys I worked with have had to have counselling. You really wouldn’t believe some of the things people do, desperate people, people hooked on drugs and what they’re capable of doing. They will stab you, kill you, even eat you to get at the things they need. It’s a very scary world out there, you know, Stacey.’

  Will went quiet for a moment, sombre. ‘Have you ever seen an eight-year-old girl drug addict? A girl who has been injected with so much drugs to keep her quiet and unresponsive to the hands of a paedophile?’

  Stacey glared at him, repulsed.

  ‘Do you know the sounds she makes when the drugs hits her eight-year-old undeveloped brain? She makes a clicking sound like water dripping from a tap. Her little body convulses like an animal that has just been run over by a car.

  Lying there, she looks like a brain damaged old dog that nobody wants or cares about. And every now and again, as her baby body is ravaged by the drugs and the grubby hands of that scum, she asks for mummy, and clutches that teddy bear’s arm as tight as she can.’

  Will lost his voice and had to turn away from her, his fist clenched into a white ball by his side, it took every bit of strength he had not to cry out with volcanic fury.

  ‘Jesus, that’s terrib…’ Stacey couldn’t even finish the word, but she dared to ask. ‘What happened to her?

  Will waited for the storm inside him to subside, then answered her. ‘She died.’

  For a while they sat in silence, both of them mourning for a child they had never known. Both of them feeling guilty for their own petty arguing until finally Stacey decided it was time to call it an evening. Courteously, Will walked her back to her hotel, and as
they stopped to say their goodnights, he had to ask the million dollar question.

  ‘So what do we do now Stacey? Is this goodnight, or goodbye?’

  Stacey lowered her head. ‘I don’t know, Will. I honestly don’t know what I want at the moment. I have so much that I need to absorb I…’

  Words seemed to fail her, so Will took over.

  ‘Stacey, I’ve waited for three long years for you, I can’t wait any longer. I’d much rather you tell me now than have to wait another week just to hear you say that there will never be another chance for us.’

  ‘I know, I understand that, but I just can’t make a final decision like that tonight, not with all these things going around in my head. Just give me a couple more days to put all this into some kind of perspective. Surely if you’ve waited this long, a few more days aren’t going to make any difference.’

  For Will, he had no choice, he had to accept her request. Disheartened and frustrated, he watched her begin climbing the steps to her hotel, then stop at the front door.

  ‘Will, the watch I bought you on holiday all those years ago, I thought it had broken. Why are you still wearing it? Why haven’t you gotten a new one?’

  Will flicked a look at the tired-looking contraption and simply shrugged.

  ‘I don’t know.’

  Stacey stood there for a moment, then uttered a final goodnight before disappearing indoors. Will waited until the door had shut, then he left.

  CHAPTER 13

  Fifty-four-year-old Roy Evans lumbered up Marl Drive road in the Llandudno junction. He’d just spent the last half an hour in the labour club around the corner in deep negotiations with a good looking brunette. A price had been agreed, and a service was booked, but the assistance he required had nothing to do with anything seedy. The duty he was paying for would indeed be of a physical nature, but that was where the similarities ended.

  Roy tugged on the filter of his Benson and Hedges, the thick cigarette smoke rolling out of his mouth like a long white tongue, and then being sucked back in again. He took another drag as if to try and ease his troubled conscience. Was he doing the right thing? Was he right to go along with it? Would it right the wrong that had been committed?

  Yet, why should he be feeling this guilt now right, why these second thoughts, why the hesitancy? Four years ago, he would have used up all of his life savings to be granted this opportunity. Roy stopped in his tracks, as if ready to steel himself against a tidal wave of suppressed memories and emotions that were about to crash over him.

  *

  Four years ago, one Friday night, his son Reggie, a regular fast-cars, girl-shagging, normal-hormonal eighteen-year-old was out on his usual weekend booze-up. Towards the end of the evening, Reggie and his girlfriend staggered glassy-eyed into the Chinese chippy for a battered cod and chip supper on the way home.

  As they amused themselves waiting for their order, three tanked-up gorillas also wanting to satisfy the munchies, jostled vocally through the entrance door. Not wanting to get in their way, Reggie and his girlfriend stowed themselves away in the corner of the chippy.

  With gruff voices from shouting all night, and reeking of Armani after shave, the three white shirted youths growled out their orders to the two petite Chinese girls behind the counter.

  Hearing their loud drunken slurs, the Chinese girls furtively rolled their eyes at each other as if it was that crazy time of the night again. Beware of the wide-eyed morons. Nevertheless they nodded obediently as that was their nature, and got on with the orders. However, the inebriated trio still needed something to occupy their tiny minds while they waited for their meal. And like foxes to a farmyard it didn’t take long for the juicy behind of Reggie’s girl to grab their attentions.

  The ugliest, and most depraved member of three gave the nod to his mates.

  ‘Lovely bit of mackerel there.’

  ‘Don’t forget the salt and vinegar,’ another one added and they all fell about wheezing in hysterics.

  Reggie turned to his girl and told her to ignore them, then whispered deridingly that no girl would ever bother with three cheese dicks like them anyway. Reggie’s girl gave a little chuckle which seemed to irritate Ugly Boy as if he sensed her derision, and he was quick to react.

  ‘Hey, luv, I can’t afford to buy fish tonight, so can I get some cheap cod by getting you to sit on my face?’

  His two mates doubled over, thinking, oh what a riot their mate was.

  Reggie’s girl eyed him as if he was a lump of shit and told him to piss off.

  ‘Piss off to you too, you slag.’ Ugly Boy spat back.

  Now they had gone too far and Reggie intervened. ‘Hey don’t call my girlfriend a slag.’

  Ugly Boy tore his hands out of his pockets to show his balled fists. ‘Oh, yeah, and what are you gonna do about it?’

  Reggie aimed a fuming finger. ‘That’s out of order!’

  Ugly Boy and his pals began to edge closer, and sensing danger Reggie’s girl stood in front of him to keep them apart.

  Still feeling cocky and wanting to impress his mates, Ugly Boy stuck out his chest, but his Neanderthal forehead seemed to stick out even further. ‘Think you’re rock, do yer?’

  ‘No trouble, no trouble,’ one of the Chinese girls waved in alarm.

  True, Reggie was scared but he wasn’t going to show it in front of his girlfriend, so he tried to put on a bit of bravado. He moved her aside and confronted the yobs. ‘Look, just get yer chips and do one will ya?’ he cried, but the youths closed the gap until there was only Reggie’s girl separating them all.

  With his two mates beside him like two testicles supporting a penis, Ugly Boy wanted his pound of flesh. ‘You wanna have a go, do yer?’

  ‘NO TROUBLE!’ the Chinese girl yelled again.

  In desperation, Reggie’s girl tried to haul him out of danger, but Reggie yanked himself free. He still wanted to stand up for himself.

  ‘C’mon then, you want to try it?’ Ugly Boy poked him in the chest, and Reggie’s girl tried to wedge herself in between them, but got caught up in the jostling. Seconds later the fists started flying, and in the melee’, she was sent tumbling to the ground. Reggie tried his best to fend off his three attackers, but it was simply too much for him, and he caught a swinging right hand to the side of the head staggering him. But it was the second paralysing blow, which put him down, and that’s when they overpowered him. The three piled on top of him, raining kicks and knees into his head and body.

  Reggie’s girl screamed for them to stop, but it was like shouting into a storm, as they pinned him against the bottom metal panel of the counter.

  Meanwhile, one of the Chinese girls disappeared into the back to call the police, leaving the other standing at a safe distance behind the counter. Even where she was standing she could hear Reggie’s head bouncing off the metal panel. All Reggie could do was curl into a foetal position, and pray they would soon stop. However, the sickening assault continued as Ugly Boy took a step back and kicked his head like a football which slammed against the counter panel with a deafening clang. It sounded like someone smashing it with a sledgehammer. Yet, it didn’t stop there! Not fulfilled by the beating he had meted out already, Ugly Boy took to the air like he was jumping into a swimming pool, and landed both feet on the side of Reggie’s head. Again, he did this, and Reggie’s head split open, blood pouring over the hard tiled floor and pooling from the gaping wounds over his temples.

  Fearing for her boyfriend’s life now, Reggie’s girl dived on top of him to try and prevent anymore damage being inflicted.

  Finally, the three yobs had spent their fury and fled the chippy without their orders, leaving Reggie’s girl sobbing hysterically over her boyfriend’s limp body.

  Reggie Evans was rushed to hospital with severe head trauma and had to undergo an emergency operation to remove blood clots and reduce swelling of the brain. After his operation, the surgeon had to put him in a coma-induced state to g
ive his brain the chance to recover.

  For three and a half weeks it was touch and go, but at last, Reggie started to show signs of improvements, and eventually he did pull through.

  However, the severity of his injuries left him with irreversible brain damage which resulted in slurred speech and frequent memory loss. But at least he was still alive.

  The perpetrator of Reggie’s near-fatal injuries, Ugly Boy, a.k.a. one Jonathan Morris was arrested a week after the incident, and later convicted in court of grievous bodily harm with intent. He was sentenced to six years imprisonment, but released after three and a half due to good behaviour. Justice served, indeed.

  *

  The Wetherspoons pub stood at the bottom of Gloddaeth Avenue just off the north promenade. The enormous size of the building was due to the fact that it used to be subdivided for a cinema and bingo hall called the Palladium that was originally built in 1920.

  Back in the 1999, it was bought by the Wetherspoons corporation and the whole building had to undergo major repairs and restorations in order to convert it into a public house. However, homage was paid to the old Palladium by retaining some of the decor. Still in place were the viewing galleries that flanked the stage, and inside they had put cardboard cut-outs of Edwardian dignitaries. And overlooking the main bar area, they even kept the upper cinema’s circle, complete with the flip-top seats.

  Inside the grand bar room, and celebrating his early release from prison, Jonathan Morris and company were sitting around one of the beer tables near the dining area. Morris had only been out of prison one week, and he delighted in regaling to his mates about how easy it had been doing the three-and-a-half year stretch inside. However, what he failed to include in his account was that on the first night he was locked up alone in his cell, he broke down and cried like a baby.

  Draining his pint of Foster’s, Morris stood up and claimed the next round, his treat to his loyal mates, who all cheered loudly. Threading through the hordes of drinkers, he finally made it to the bar, and waited to catch the young bar man’s eye. But it was his eye that was caught when a stunning blonde girl turned to him at the bar, and he soon forgot about the drinks. Standing there in front of him, she had the look of a Play-Boy mansion bunny, with a bursting cleavage just dying to leap out and say catch me. Morris’s jaw nearly hit the floor, no subtlety, no tact, no cool charm, he just salivated right in front of her. The woman read him straight away, and flashed that ‘I like you too’ smile right back at him. Morris let his eyes off the leach and licked his lips.