by Ruth Jacobs
She took the syringe with a needle too blunt to use for a fix, and ran it down the inside of her arm. The blood that fountained was unexpected. Quickly, she found the rag and pressed it to her arm. How would she explain away blood seeping through her sleeve?
Stupid junky whore. Stupid junky whore. Stupid junky whore. The mantra repeated in her head. She looked at the gash on her arm.
“You deserve it,” said one of the harsher directors on the board.
With only a miniscule amount of junk in her blood stream, her arm throbbed as she drove from St John’s Wood towards Hampstead. A decent hit was unfeasible as she had yet to attend the meeting with Angel, Nicole and Tara.
Whether or not she was wise to have invited Tara concerned her. The decision had not, and could not, be made with her head. Nicole and Shelley accepted Tara had become more unstable, but she wanted to be involved. How could Shelley take that away from her? An opportunity for revenge on a man who’d raped her. Somewhere buried under the heavy rubble crushing it was Shelley’s heart.
***
On her arrival at The Magdala, Shelley saw Angel sitting at the same corner table in the back. As she manoeuvred her body past the battered tables and chairs, she scanned the smoky saloon; Nicole and Tara weren’t there.
“Are you incognito?” Angel whispered. She stood up and kissed Shelley on the cheek. “What’s with the wig?”
“It’s not. It’s my hair.” Shelley combed her fingers through her hair that was not a wig as if proving its authenticity.
“Sorry, babe, you just look so different.” Angel smiled. The dimples in her cheeks surfaced.
While Angel stood at the bar buying Shelley’s drink, Shelley took out her mobile and phoned Nicole. Nicole informed her that a punter had kept her longer than she’d anticipated but she would be there soon. Before Shelley could phone Tara, Angel had returned and handed her a pint of snakebite and blackcurrant.
“Your girls are gonna show, babe, aren’t they?” Angel asked.
“Nic’s on her way. Tara, I don’t know.” Shelley wished her friends would hurry up so she could get home. She could feel the crusty blood cracking on her sleeve every time she moved her arm, and she was sweating from keeping on her coat.
Someone tapped her on the shoulder and she turned her head and gaped as she set her eyes on Tara. Although in three days, Tara hadn’t lost the spots or put on any weight, she looked nearly beautiful again. She wore a maroon dress, her shoulder length hair looked clean and silky, and make-up covered the spots that plagued her face.
“Why can’t we go to The Freemasons? It’s much nicer in there,” Tara said to Shelley as she bent down and kissed her on the cheek. “This has got to be the most council pub in all of Hampstead.”
Shelley smiled, hiding her disapproval of Tara’s snobbishness. “We need somewhere quiet,” she said.
On taking Tara’s order for an orange juice, Shelley went to the bar. Tara never took non-alcoholic drinks, with the exception of coffee, and the orange juice wouldn’t be to do with not drinking and driving because Tara used taxis; she didn’t have a car. Perhaps she was making changes. Shelley hoped she’d stay clean-smelling too. For the first time in ages, she hadn’t smelt like a mountaineer after a week trekking the Whiskey route up Kilimanjaro.
As she returned to the table, Shelley caught the end of what must have been a conversation about Tara’s son. It had taken Tara two years to tell Shelley about her child, and Nicole even longer, and there she was telling a stranger. Shelley plonked Tara’s drink on the table then sat herself down on the cushioned bench next to Angel, opposite Tara.
“My clit’s the size of a small penis,” Tara announced, obviously not as sober as Shelley had thought.
“My clit is a small penis,” Angel whispered. Was she always this frank?
“Not that small, from what I remember,” Tara replied.
Shelley pointed at them alternately. “Have you two...?”
“Yeah, we’ve done jobs together.” Angel nodded. “Took me a while to recognise you though. You’ve lost a lot of weight, babe.”
“And what’s with the name change? I like Destiny better.” Tara sipped her orange juice. “What do you think it could be? It’s itchy as hell and it’s huge.”
“Could be tight jeans, washing powder, could be anything. You’re always safe aren’t you?” Shelley spoke with some concern for Tara’s clitoris, but more for her sanity and sobriety. This wasn’t like her, talking uninhibitedly about personal matters.
“Of course, I’m safe.”
“Get checked at the clinic just in case,” Shelley told her. “I’ll come with you. My throat’s been feeling really rough.”
“Then go to a doctor like a normal person.” Tara sniggered.
“We’re not normal people,” Angel said.
Shelley saw Nicole standing at the door of The Magdala. She stood up and waved to get Nicole’s attention. In her fitted black dress and with her hair in large curls, Nicole reminded Shelley of a taller and slimmer, but equally stunning, Marilyn Monroe. Contributing to the 1950s vision was the decor that looked like it hadn’t been updated since David Blakely was shot and killed outside the pub. Forty-two years on, the bullet holes that Ruth Ellis had been blamed for still remained on the cream-tiled exterior wall.
Nicole kissed Shelley on the cheek. “My Resident Most Precious,” she said. Her breath tickled in Shelley’s ear. Nicole turned to the others and began to apologise for her tardiness, but Shelley took her arm and stole her away to the bar.
“There’s something not right with Tara. She’s being very strange,” Shelley told her.
“She looks a damn sight better though, doesn’t she?”
“You know what looks can be.”
While they were waiting for Nicole’s wine, Shelley deliberated whether she should tell Nicole about Angel’s gender. She decided against it. It wasn’t her secret to tell, and perhaps Tara would think the same way – if they both were fools, or great minds.
When they returned from the bar, Nicole took a seat next to Angel. Shelley reluctantly moved her pint glass across the table and sat down beside Tara.
“Is everything all right with you?” Nicole asked Tara.
“Top of the world, me.” Tara released a stench of vodka as she poorly mimicked Nicole’s slight Irish accent. “Apart from a cock-sized clit, I’m fucking sound.”
27. Moving On
On Draycott Terrace – a road running parallel to Marianne’s – Shelley sat waiting in her Mercedes. She untangled the knots in her hair with her fingers. Part in fear and part in excitement, her heart was thumping. Their ensnarement of the rapist had advanced from talk to action.
Angel had called Marianne last night, saying that she was recommended to her by a girl she’d met. She’d said it was a while ago and couldn’t recall her name. As expected, Marianne pushed her, and as agreed, Angel had described a tall blonde, which covered over half of Marianne’s girls.
The tap on the window caused Shelley to jump. She turned her head, saw Angel and unlocked the door.
“How did it go?” Shelley asked.
“I’m in.” Angel fastened her seat belt. “She knew I wasn’t twenty though, but she’s put me down as twenty-two.”
Shelley thought Angel looked younger with the bare make-up and casual clothes in which she’d seen her most recently. In broad daylight, with full make-up, she looked older, and her face lost some of its soft femininity. The taffeta cocktail dress she wore wasn’t something Shelley would have chosen either.
Shelley worried whether Marianne would send the rapist to someone older. They’d all been twenty or under. Did he want to see all her girls or just the younger ones? Although she was concerned, she didn’t want to say anything blatant in case she offended Angel. And would he only book white girls or would he also see mixed race girls? They’d have to wait to find out.
“Did she mention any regulars she’s going to send you?” Shelley asked.
“Jus
t to keep my phone on and she’ll call. She was talking about you though, babe.”
“What did she say?” Nervously, Shelley rubbed the diamond in her necklace.
“She asked if I knew a girl called Kiki from Belsize Park. She described you but I told her most of the girls I work with are tall and blonde.”
“Thanks.”
“You don’t need to thank me, babe, we’re in this together.” Angel twirled her ponytail. “But she’s pissed at you. Do you know that?”
“Did she say why?”
“She said you owe her money.”
Shelley didn’t owe Marianne money, unless she’d found out about any of the clients she’d stolen from her. If it was The Lanesborough, which is what Shelley feared, she’d hardly be likely to tell Angel, “I was arrested for a crime committed by Kiki.” No, she wouldn’t say that.
Shelley drove off headed for Tufnell Park to take Angel home. She needed a proper hit when she got back to her own flat. All this using the bare minimum to stave off withdrawal symptoms was no good for her sanity. She needed more than just maintenance.
“Don’t worry about her. She can’t do anything.”
“Tara knows my address though.” When the words passed her lips, she realised she’d spoken a thought that she didn’t mean to share. She didn’t want to remind Angel of her original concerns about Tara. She tried to relax her face in case the lines on her forehead had given her away.
“That girl won’t grass on you. I know.”
She wondered if Angel was trying to make her feel better or did she know Tara well enough to make that judgement. Shelley wanted to believe the latter. When this was all over, she might move to another part of London and start again, or another country if necessary. She didn’t hold out much hope of studying psychology after this. She snorted at the irony.
“Did I miss something?”
“No, just something I was thinking about.” It was either that or crying, Shelley thought.
At the junction by Camden Town Tube station, Shelley took her usual route towards Chalk Farm. Just after she’d passed the lights, Angel informed her she’d taken the wrong exit, but it was too late. They were jammed in the one-way traffic and there was no way out.
As the car crawled along, on her left, Shelley caught sight of Inverness Street. She looked up the road and saw the futuristic public toilet in which she’d injected with the stranger on the night her client died at The Lanesborough. The dead client’s face invaded her mind. Would the face of the rapist do the same to her? Even if it did, it couldn’t be any worse than the image already tainting her memory. That mark he’d left was unerasable, and she’d rather have a picture of her own making.
“Traffic’s moving,” Angel said.
“Sorry, I was in another world.” Shelley drove on, narrowly missing a couple of tattooed, mohicaned pedestrians crossing Camden High Street. The weather was becoming milder and she noticed most people were wearing T-shirts. She worried how much longer she could keep herself in long sleeves. At least she had the one good vein Len had shown her. She planned to use that one in different areas and let the rest heal. Then she could get back to working properly again. There were only two madams she could work for now instead of the previous five with whom she had been registered. Although she’d chosen to drop Marianne, the other two had dropped her at the beginning of last week. She’d been sent away from a couple of jobs, which she should never have accepted with damaged arms, and they’d found out why – her track marks.
Once they were out of the one-way system, Angel directed Shelley through the back streets. They emerged on Kentish Town Road where they joined another traffic jam. Within moments, Shelley heard sirens. The wailing was in the distance but it was getting closer. Her fear that had lain dormant was stirred. She told herself not to worry. It was hardly irregular to hear sirens in London.
“Take the next right,” Angel said.
Concentrating on what she hoped was a poker-face expression, she followed Angel’s instruction.
“I’m sorry I won’t be able to invite you in,” Angel said. “My place is a total mess.”
“I don’t mind. I can help you tidy up, if you like.” Shelley tried to smile.
“It’s not that kind of mess. I’ve been packed up to leave for the last month, but since you called I couldn’t go, not after what you told me.”
“You’re not moving out of London, are you?”
“I’m leaving England, babe. I’ve bought a place in Manhattan... Don’t look so worried, I’m not leaving you and your girls. I’m not going anywhere ’til we’ve done this, I promise.”
After another turning, the sirens were louder. In her rear view mirror, Shelley saw flashing blue lights on top of a police van that was a few cars behind. She felt her hands trembling and her palms sweating on the steering wheel. On checking the mirror again, only a red Fiesta separated her car and the police van.
The sirens became deafening. She watched in the mirror, helpless, as the Fiesta pulled over and the police van raced towards the rear of her car. This is it – it’s all over, she thought, pulling up to the curb.
The van didn’t stop. It passed her by and sped up the narrow road ahead. As the wailing trailed off into the distance with the flashing lights, she wiped her sweaty palms on her jeans, then lit a cigarette. She joined the end of the line of cars led by the red Fiesta, and Angel guided her through a maze of back roads towards Hilldrop Crescent. Once Shelley finished her cigarette, the shaking in her hands subsided and she hoped it hadn’t been obvious.
28. The Boxer and the Quidnunc
On one of her grandparents’ wooden folding chairs that she’d brought with her, Shelley sat in Len’s front room. She prepared a shot while listening to Simon and Garfunkel’s Bridge Over Troubled Water. The music soothed her, diminishing the usual urgency for a hit. Less haste, she hoped, would result in greater accuracy when it came to getting her vein, which in turn would lead to cleaner arms – if she could keep it up. And if she could, it would increase her earning potential, therefore enabling her to keep up with her habit.
“Eww!” Shelley flinched, then lifted her foot, realising it was rested on a dirty, discarded sock. “You need to clean up in here,” she told Len as he darted out of the lounge.
“I’m sorry, love. I’ll be right back,” he called.
“What the fuck are you doing?” Shelley yelled, as Len hurled a second tomato at her trainer. “Stop! That hurts,” she cried, after her foot was hit with a potato.
“It’s okay. I think I got it.”
“You fucking did get it.” Shelley tossed the prepared syringe into her cream handbag and stomped across the room to where Len was standing, holding a plastic container of mouldy-looking vegetables. “And you can buy me another pair, you idiot,” she said, stabbing the air below with her finger. “These are TNs. Do you know how hard it is to get Nike TNs in the UK? They only sell them in Foot Locker.”
“I’m sorry. I’ve been after that bastard for ages.”
“Just pick it up like a normal person and put it in the wash.”
“Put it in the wash? Are you tripping?” Len raised his eyebrows. “I’m taking it out with the rubbish.” He walked over to the wooden chair and bent down by the brown sock. From the back pocket of his jeans, he took a shiny, silver fork and held it over the sock.
“Just pick up, for God’s sake. I wanna have my hit.”
“I can’t do it. They make me feel sick.” Len’s hand hovered in the air, holding the fork above the crusty sock.
“It’s your sock. Just do it.”
He cocked his head to the side, and looked across the room at Shelley. “Come over here, love.”
“Holy fuck!” Shelley leapt on top of the vomit and fur-coated armchair. “Get it out! For fuck’s sake, get it out!”
“That’s what I’m trying to do.” Len prodded the rat’s body with the fork.
“Not like that. It might not be dead.”
“It’s not
moving. Look, it’s dead.” He flicked the rat with the fork, rolling it over one-hundred and eighty degrees so that it was lying on its back, face up to the ceiling.
Shelley screeched as she watched the fork coming into contact with the rat’s swollen stomach. “Stop! Its insides will explode everywhere if you do it like that. Get a bag.”
“When I’ve picked it up I’ll put it in a bag, but I’m not touching it.” He rolled the rat back over on its stomach. “I can’t do it with it looking at me like that.”
“Get a bag and pick it up like a poo.” Shelley explained the concept of an inside out bag for scooping up dog shit and Len dealt with the rat without the fork.
When he returned to the lounge, he knelt on the floor next to the Kenwood hi-fi and fast-forwarded through the tracks on the Simon and Garfunkel CD.
Shelley retrieved her pre-prepared syringe from her handbag and held it upright, flicking out the air bubbles. There was only heroin present in the syringe; she was saving the crack for when she got home.
This second time entrusting Len to score had gone far better than the first, notwithstanding the rodent intrusion. She’d insisted no money would change hands until the drugs were in her possession and he kept to his word. In fact, she wondered if he’d given her more than the three-hundred pounds worth she’d paid for.
As she pulled Len’s belt around her arm, The Boxer played. She listened to Len sing the words. Once she’d injected her fix, she leant back on her chair, gouching out. She could still hear him singing. She sensed vulnerability in his voice, as if he had conviction in those words.
The next time her eyes were open, there was a mug of tea on a lopsided table in front of her. As he wasn’t in the room, she took the opportunity to carry out a thorough inspection of the mug. There were no marks on it at all; no stains around the rim, nor did it have any chips. Maybe it was new, she wondered, sipping her tea.
Taking the mug with her, she went over to the front window and looked out. Len was in the garden, tidying up, and from what she could see, he’d made a good start. About half of the clutter was gone.
