by Ray Banks
Bigelow lowered his hands to the arms of his chair. "Time is a factor."
"When are you going in?"
"Second week of January."
"So you'll want this sorted before then?"
Bigelow appeared distracted. "I'll need to think about it."
"Take all the time you need." Gav stood.
"And you're still okay to supervise while I'm gone?"
"Yes."
Bigelow looked as if he was about to add something, but shook his head. Gav left, closing the door behind him. He smiled at Rosie. She smiled back, then returned to her magazine. He went to the coffee machine and stood there pretending to look at the list of drinks.
Too early to crow victory, but still excited beyond all measure. Just trying to control it so he could carry on with his day.
He was still staring when Phil Cruddas strode up. Phil strode everywhere. This was a bloke who worked the doors of the Long Ship every other Saturday. Built like the proverbial outside bog, face like Marsden Rock, and when he grinned – which he was doing now – it made Gav think of an angry gorilla.
Gav punched a button. The machine shook and made a grinding noise. "Thought you were on the afternoon."
"Swapped with Al."
A cup dropped and filled. "Which one?"
"Harris."
"What's up with him?" Gav retrieved his black coffee and stepped out of Phil's way. "Not his boy again, is it?"
"Aye." Phil prodded a couple of buttons. "I don't know what it was, only Al says they wanted to see both parents this time or else they're going to expel the lad, so there's no getting out of it." He nodded at the back office. "You see the big lad?"
"Yep."
"And so what's the craic? You the new gaffer or what?"
Gav smiled. "Just while he's in the hospital."
"Fuckin' hell, he must be desperate." Phil clapped him on the shoulder. "Still, nice one. You getting a bump?"
"Just the power and respect."
"Shite deal all round then, eh? Telling you, you should've pushed for more money."
"Hey, you know, if it was there to have—"
"Bring it to the union." Phil blew on his coffee.
"Union, is it?"
"Ah, here we go ..."
Gav took his coffee over to Rosie's desk. "You want to watch that kind of talk, Cruddas. See if you're running a picket when I'm behind that desk—"
"You'd just bring in scabs, man."
"Be nice."
"I haven't called you a cunt yet, have I?"
Rosie's face puckered. "There's ladies present, Phil."
"Rosie-love." Gav pushed aside the partition. "I apologise on behalf of my staff. There's no excuse for it, is there?"
Rosie blinked. Her lips jumped around the bottom half of her face. "Terrible."
"I don't know where the fuck he gets it from, I really don't."
Phil laughed. The phone rang and Rosie turned away to answer it. As soon as Gav heard the name Oakley, he tapped on the partition. Rosie looked round. Gav pointed to himself, then jerked a thumb at the door. She nodded and waved him away.
Phil watched, his eyes narrowing. "Where you going?"
"Airport, mate." Gav grinned.
"You're fuckin' kidding. How'd you know that?"
"They live up our street. Fiona said they were going to the Costa for Christmas."
"Oh aye? All right for some, isn't it?"
Rosie hung up, scribbled a note. "Them or him?"
"Both. I'll be glad when you're behind the big lad's desk, Scott. Stop you poaching my fuckin' fares."
Gav backed towards the door. "How, if you knew the community like I do ..."
"Aye, go on, fuck off."
Rosie frowned. "Phil."
Phil waved a half-hearted apology.
Gav glanced over at Bigelow's office before he left. The man still hadn't moved. Bigelow was either deep in thought, or that coronary had come early. Either way, Gav was still the interim gaffer, so he didn't care. He dropped down the step, crossed the gravel to his cab.
Bigelow reckoned he had him, didn't he? Underestimated him. Didn't think Gav would have done his homework. Well, fuck him. He didn't know who he was dealing with.
Gav ducked into the cab, pulled away. Headed for Kielder Walk with a smile on his face. An airport run was good money. A straight shot up the A1, which meant you could blast your way back without fear of red lights or pedestrians. It was the closest a cabbie ever got to real driving. It was freedom. And if it hadn't been for the meeting with Bigelow, that airport run would've been the highlight of Gav's day. Now, the fare was just another example of Gav's good luck, and a perfect way to celebrate his change of outlook.
Because even if Bigelow didn't end up taking him up on the offer, there was one thing that was certain: Gavin Scott was nobody's softarse.
6
The light was so bright it hurt closed eyes. Then came the noise, like a boot snapping bone, as the doors opened and a cacophony of breakfast entered the ward. Brian was awake and mute, watching with cold belligerence as the nurse trundled the trolley from bed to bed, dispensing vomit-warm porridge and cold, greasy toast. The six o'clock wake-up was standard disorientation procedure: that unholy triumvirate of sleep deprivation, malnutrition and medication. It was the only way they could make patients amenable to dignity-stripping treatment, and somewhere Brian thought he could hear Aneurin Bevan spinning in his grave.
Brian waved away the breakfast and tried to get comfortable, but it was no use – the ward was awake, at least for now. He suffered, his eyes screwed shut, through the blazing early hours, only for the fatigue and medication to smother him later on. These days, it took him a good few minutes to work out where he was, and he was prone to losing hours in the blink of an eye.
Like then. From morning to ... Christ, what time was it now?
Brian rubbed his face, and pain woke him up even more. It looked like visiting hours, breakfast a rotten memory and the unwanted porridge long since cleared away. His breath whistled through his nose as he pulled himself upright, blinked and checked his watch. Almost half three. Nine hours gone, and his head was still heavy. He remembered now, he'd tried to nap, but the constant murmur of conversation on the ward was like a flea ticking around the inside of his ear, and even when he had managed to nod off, the what-ifs had poisoned his dreams.
Lynne hadn't been back. He struggled to remember how long it was since her last visit, and guessed from the bristles on the uninjured part of his face that it had been a couple of days. Danielle hadn't been to visit at all – or if she had, she'd done so while he was asleep. That wasn't a pleasant thought.
She didn't want to come back home. She was frightened. Maybe she blamed Brian for what had happened. Like maybe he shouldn't have gone out there, shouldn't have tried to be the dad. But he was angry, and he was in the right, for fuck's sake, so ...
Brian cleared his throat, swallowed. The fat biddies, young and old, were out in force. They were the only women in the ward without a uniform, all wives or mothers or sisters – never daughters, oh no – and all with that sharp, nipping little voice. Brian wanted to throttle the life out of every last one of them as they prattled on about their gardens and what they had for their tea last night and what Mrs. Baxter said about "your little problem".
Then Brian saw the strange bloke in the doorway. He shifted down a little in bed. The bloke had the spine of a first-year copper and he wasn't a regular visitor, or else he wouldn't have looked so bloody gormless.
The bloke turned, saw Brian. Recognition, then a smile, which sat unnaturally on his face – his skin was too tight, his teeth too large for his mouth.
Of course. He should've seen it coming. That chattering, paranoid part of him knew that something like this would happen sooner or later, but the rational part had always laughed it off. And now he understood why Lynne hadn't been back to see him. Why risk another scene when Crosby could just send round one of his grunt cadets to have a not-so-fri
endly word?
The grunt came his way on stiff legs. He looked lost without a uniform.
Brian could hear it now: "Back off, mate. No need to make this any harder than it needs to be, eh? Just you settle down and let Lynne – sweet and lovely Lynne, never-hurt-a-fly-just-look-at-her Lynne – take care of Danielle, all right? Might as well. Easier for all concerned, don't you think? Besides, there isn't a court in the country that'll rule in your favour, especially when Danielle's too scared to even see you. Fair play for having a pop – nobody's going to think any less of you – but it's time to do yourself a favour and give it a rest, eh? Let it go. Otherwise, you see that beating you took? It's going to feel like a fucking birthday present compared to what me and the lads have in store."
Brian stuffed a pillow behind the small of his back as he shifted upright. Let them threaten. See what happened when they did.
The bloke stopped at the end of the bed. He carried a Presto bag with something long and orange swinging around in the bottom of it. The bloke followed Brian's gaze to the bag, then held it up. "Brought you a present."
Brian didn't say anything. Didn't return the smile, either. One hand slipped to the side of the bed, fingers edging towards the call button.
The bloke's grin flickered like a dodgy fluorescent. He pulled a bottle of Lucozade from the carrier. "See?"
"Were you looking for someone in particular, mate?"
"Aye. You."
Brian's eyes were dry, but he didn't dare blink. He didn't want to show any discomfort, didn't want to give anything away. This bloke might have been playing it all smiles but he was still younger, leaner and stronger than Brian, and there was still that unmistakeable look of the boot about him. No amount of friendly could hide that; it was like the mark of Cain.
"Didn't know if you liked it, to be honest. I was going to get you grapes, but the only place open was the shop here, and they never had any fruit."
"You sure it was me you wanted to see?"
"You're Brian Turner, aren't you?" The bloke glanced at the chart on the end of Brian's bed.
"Yes." Brian felt as if he'd been groped. He tried to reclaim the bloke's attention. "That's me, yeah."
"Then it's you I wanted to see."
He came closer, holding out the bottle. Brian nodded at the bedside table. The bloke put the bottle down and gestured to the chair. "Is it all right?"
Brian nodded again.
"Ta." The bloke caught himself halfway down and then straightened up again, stuck out a hand. "I'm Joe Warren, by the way."
Brian held up his splinted hand and waved.
Warren smiled again, but it was the kind of smile that said his interior monologue had become a litany of self-recrimination. He took a seat, planted his feet firmly and far apart, and then looked at the floor. "Sorry. I never saw the bandages."
"Don't worry about it."
He looked up. "You probably don't have the foggiest who I am, right?"
"I've got an idea."
"Oh, aye?"
"You're one of Michael's friends."
A pause. "Eh?"
"Detective Constable Crosby?"
"I don't know anyone called that. No, I'm your neighbour. I live across the road."
Brian shifted in bed, and allowed himself a blink now. Warren did look familiar, right enough. But if he lived across the road, then they'd never spoken more than a sentence between them the entire time he'd lived there.
Warren moved his head slightly to one side. "And now you're probably wondering why I came round to see you."
"You wanted to bring me some pop?"
"Well, there's that, aye." He looked thoughtful. Rubbed his bottom lip and showed teeth. He looked as if he was trying to figure out the best way of saying something that had been on his mind for a long time, but that he didn't trust himself to say correctly. Finally he shook his head. "Lookuh, I know you don't know us, like. I mean, I've lived across the road from you all this time and I still had to double-check your name on that clipboard thing there. So I get it that I'm going to look a bit tapped for coming to see you like this."
"No, I appreciate the thought, Joe."
Warren stared at Brian for a couple of seconds. He knew he was being patronised. "It's just I don't know many people on the street. I'm not around a lot. I'm normally away."
"Away?" First thing that jumped into Brian's mind was prison, then a mental hospital. "How d'you mean?"
"Overseas. I was in the army."
"Ah, right."
"Anyway, that's not the reason I've come." He paused, breathed out. "I heard what happened to you. What them lot did to you. And I came home and I saw your house across the road and all the curtains were open, and I just wondered if there was anybody living there."
Brian swallowed. He placed his good hand on top of the bandages. His broken fingers ached. "No."
"So there's no one looking after the place, then? Just, if there wasn't, I thought maybe I could help out, you know. Water your plants or something."
"I don't have any ..." Brian shook the end of the sentence away. "Why?"
Warren frowned. "I don't get you."
"This is just a bit weird, mate, sorry."
"Right." Warren nodded to himself.
"You don't know me. Never spoken before, and now you want to water my plants? You've got to look at this from my point of view."
"All right, yeah."
"I mean, it's nice of you—"
"You think I'm tapped."
"I never said that."
"Nah, you're all right." He was nodding now, a hard face on him, as if he worried that the moment he stopped moving his head, he'd start swinging his fists. "I can see your point."
"I never said you were tapped. That's not fair."
"I come across like that, mind, don't I?"
Brian opened his mouth, but couldn't find the right answer. There wasn't a lie that would sound convincing, and the truth wouldn't help at all.
"That's what I thought." He let out a sigh. "Fuck's sake."
"Here, listen—"
"I just heard that you were in a bad way and I wanted to help, that's all." He lowered his head. "I mean, I'm on leave. I'm off all day, got nowt better to do. Just thought I'd do something for you."
"You want to do something for me, Joe, you could batter fuck out of the bastards that put me in here."
Warren looked at him. Said nothing.
"I'm kidding."
The ghost of a smile before Warren turned his gaze to the floor. "Said it happened at tea time?"
"That's right."
"And everyone saw it happen?"
"I don't know."
"Someone must've called the ambulance."
"Suppose so. I wasn't really aware."
Warren looked up. "You talk to the police yet?"
"Yes."
"What'd you say?"
"I told them I didn't remember anything."
"And that's your statement, is it? That's what you're going to sign off on?"
Brian narrowed his eyes. "I told them everything I remember."
"Which is nowt."
"That's right."
Warren took that in. He rubbed his mouth. "When they letting you out?"
"What day's the twenty-second?"
"Monday."
"Monday coming, then."
"Out for Christmas. That's something."
"So they tell me." Brian's turn to nod now, the same speed as Warren. He wasn't about to give voice to the lie that it'd be a good Christmas. The plan was to drink his way from Eve to Eve and then into '87. He blinked and suddenly felt very tired again.
Warren clapped his hands. When Brian looked up, the bloke was on his feet.
Warren smiled. "You look knackered. I'll let you get some rest."
"Thanks. And thanks for the pop."
"You're welcome."
He started to leave.
"Here, actually, Joe?"
Warren turned. "Yeah?"
"There
is something you could do for me, if you don't mind."
"What's that?"
"Could you keep an eye on the house? You don't need to set up camp or anything. But you know what it's like round our way. I don't want people thinking just because I'm in here they can burgle the place."
Warren showed his teeth again. "No bother."
Brian watched the soldier cross the shining ward floor. He was right about the ambulance. Someone had called, and it wasn't Danielle. That meant there'd been at least one person cowering behind their nets while he was getting his arse handed to him. At least one person who could've done something about it beyond organise a fucking clean-up.
So he wasn't surprised that Danielle didn't want to come back to the estate. If it all kicked off again, she now knew that her dad wasn't strong enough to protect her – he couldn't even protect himself – and that everyone else on the street would be too busy shitting themselves to help. When he thought about it like that, he wasn't sure he wanted to go back himself. But then he didn't have much of a choice, so he replaced the bad taste in his mouth with a swig of Lucozade and settled back against the pillows.
Roll on Monday next.
7
Joe watched Michelle sleep. She lay face down on the bed, the blanket wound tight around her top half and kicked away from the bottom. Her head was turned to one side, her lips moving, her hair an explosion of ink on the pale pillow. He watched her petulant expression as she exhaled, her back rise and fall, and listened for the low ticking sound that accompanied every breath.
In.
Pause.
Out – tickticktick.
Every night, it was the same. Joe didn't sleep longer than four hours at a time, and after that first sleep, he knew there wouldn't be a second. Once awake, his thoughts would roll around his head and keep him that way unless he found something else to concentrate on. Watching Michelle sleep was one of those things. Watching the street was another, but he couldn't do that until he was sure Michelle was out for the count.
So he waited, and he watched.
In.
Pause.
Out – tickticktick.
Almost snoring, her breathing now rough on the inhale, too.
Joe waited another minute. He counted it slowly in his head, so it ended up being more like two minutes, then he shifted out from under the covers and padded out of the bedroom. He paused on the landing, listened hard, checked off the sound of Michelle in his room and the old man in the other, then crept to the bairn’s room. There he shut the door and went to the window.
