by Ray Banks
He had a good long view of the street from here. If he stood off by the left hand curtain, he had an uninterrupted line of sight up to number thirteen and fourteen at the end of the cul-de-sac. At a certain angle, he could watch both Brian Turner's house and the dealer's house, keeping one or the other in his peripheral vision at all times. He tried to picture Brian walking up to the dealer house, tried to work it out how it all happened. Brian didn't seem like the kind of bloke who went looking for trouble, and when Joe had asked Michelle about it, she'd given him little more than a summary – Turner apparently found drugs on his daughter, went to confront the dealer about it, and all the dealer's mates kicked the shit out of him, end of story.
What else did he want to know?
Everything. Every last thing. Every word and punch and drop of blood.
Why?
Because it was important. It was a transgression that couldn't stand, and Joe needed to do something about it.
Joe had promised to keep an eye on the house, but that wasn't the end of it. The estate had never been a great place to live – there'd always been broken windows, petty crime, drunks and junkies – but something had happened recently to make it feel as though change was impossible. As if the estate's residents had all gathered together, settled down, taken a poll, and decided as one trembling unit that they were irrevocably fucked. One person had stood up to that lot down the road, and he'd paid a heavy price. There were other people living on the same street. Nobody else had done a thing. Why not? Because they were scared, because they didn't want to slap a target on their chest. Because they'd rather try to ignore the disease than take unpleasant medicine.
It was sad. Christ, even in Belfast, even at its worst, there was still a sense of community. There was still a sense of pride, however sarcastic it might've seemed at the time. But this place, it was as if the fight had drained right out of them and they lay where they fell. Joe wasn't surprised. It had been a long time coming. He only needed to look at the old man to see that.
The last ten years had seen almost twenty thousand jobs gone, and so it was only a matter of time before the board turned their attention to the Derwent Hall cokeworks. Some said that the works had been earmarked for a while – and certainly the men in charge were quick enough about pulling the plug – but the union brass still had to go through the motions, still had to entertain the right to ballot. The closure was coming, the vote was whether or not they fought it. Some men were greedy for redundancy – they'd done their years, they were too tired to do anything but take the money and run – and so they voted for the plant to go down. There was some talk of a strike, but this was two years after Orgreave, and nobody wanted blood in the streets, so the majority vote went towards compromise and closure.
The idea was that there were to be no compulsory redundancies. The company said they'd just relocate the men to other works. The old man had been a welder. There were nine of them, but there were only two places down at Monkton, and another couple over at Lambton. Those who went to Lambton quickly found out that they had a job for about three months before that works was closed, too. Those who went to Monkton, their luck wasn't much better – they managed six months. The old man didn't fight it – he took immediate redundancy. The way he put it, he was young enough to find something else, and he didn't want one of the older lads losing his job. Of course, he wasn't young enough to find something else, and the older lads ended up losing their jobs anyway. So much for doing the honourable thing.
When the cokeworks closed, the community began to curdle. Take away the employment, and there was no reason to be out here in the middle of nowhere, cast adrift and left to rot. In other towns, men who'd been made redundant could just shift down the road a couple of miles, take their skills to another factory. But when the Derwent Hall works shut down, there was nowhere else to go.
And that squat, that drug house, was just another symptom of the disease. Joe had seen plenty of houses like that before, visited a few himself. And he'd been watching this one for a while now, alternating with Brian's house, just to make sure everything was still okay. He raised his binoculars, twisted the drug house into focus. The squat showed a bare-bulb light right through to the morning, most of the time accompanied by bad music played at a range of volumes, all of them on the wrong side of loud. The people on the street must have been used to the noise by now, but not Joe. To him, it was an alarm call, a bellowed threat.
A derelict number fourteen hung off the drug house's side like the corpse of a conjoined twin. Sometimes people, gender and age unknown, shambled off round the back or else stumbled around the side to piss, puke or worse. Joe didn't recognise the faces – these people were too far gone to be neighbours – so they were just the usual flies, circling a new pile of shit. If it came down to it, they were expendable. Career junkies always were. But they weren't the real focus – that was the dealer out front.
Joe had watched, noted the nightly activity, and come to the conclusion that there were four street dealers in total. They ran a loose rota that looked as if it was supposed to roll, but didn't – two dealers in particular either preferred the graveyard shift, or they kept pulling the short straw. One of them stood outside now. He was a fat young man with hollow eyes and greasy hair that appeared to model itself into a slapdash quiff. Most of his weight hung over a large cowboy belt buckle. He wore his shirt buttoned to the throat under a denim jacket that might have fitted twenty pounds ago. The dealer leaned against the front wall, watching the street without really seeing it, either medicated or just naturally fuzzy in the head.
Joe lowered the binoculars. Watching the street didn't slow his mind enough to sleep, but it did focus his thoughts and shake some of the cotton from his head. As soon as he came back, he could feel the air thicken and suffocate him. It wasn't just boredom, either. The telly did nothing but irritate him. He couldn't sit in the same room with Michelle and the old man before the banality of their conversation made him want to smash something. He'd managed to grow a little fonder of the bairn, but only in the way you'd grow fond of a dog that followed you around. She was there all the time, so maybe he'd just grown used to her. Truth was, he only really liked her a bit more because she didn't talk all the fucking time, and when she did it was supposed to be rubbish. In the end, he'd decided to do something productive. What that something was, he didn't know, but the way Brian Turner haunted his thoughts, he figured it might have something to do with him, and so he'd gone to the hospital to talk to him, the rationale being that maybe if he did something to help, he'd feel better about being back.
The bairn made soft cooing noises in her cot. Joe went over to check on her. She looked up at him, eyes glinting in the ambient light. Her name was Leanne Ashley Warren. Joe didn't like the name, but he hadn't cared enough at the time to complain. "Hello, Leanne."
She gurgled, then offered up an open-mouthed smile and chirped.
"Shh, you'll wake your mam and Granda."
Leanne blew air, looked as if she was stifling a burp. Joe reached into the cot and laid a hand gently over her face. Her skin was warm, her breath slight but hot. He touched the wisp of her hair, then removed his hand and leaned in a little more. He felt a tight knot in his chest as he watched her. Then the shine disappeared from her eyes, and he listened to her breathing slow as she drifted back off to sleep.
"Good girl."
Joe sat by the window and gazed at the street. He thought about his wash bag under the loose floorboard at his feet. He thought about popping, promised himself he would in just another minute or so, letting it draw out as long as possible. His stash had gone to grains in the last week. He'd been using too much, too often, and whatever it was that pushed the pin into his hand hadn't gone away. Something needed to be done. There was a bloke named Dylan who'd been recommended by a friend of a friend of an enemy. He didn't know if Dylan was the bloke's real name, but he was supposed to be discreet and reasonable. A fiver on a wrap and no fucking about. Might have seemed par f
or the course, but Joe had been involved in enough ragged deals to appreciate the importance of a simple, honest transaction.
He'd almost been to see Dylan that afternoon. Managed to get as far as the end of the path, where he stopped and looked down at the end of the cul-de-sac. He watched the drug house for a full minute, and didn't remember a single thing he'd thought. Then he took a long, slow walk around the estate, where he thought about the bairn and Brian Turner's kid, and what he would've done in the same situation. In the end, he decided that he probably would've done exactly the same thing, and it would've had pretty much the same outcome. Maybe he would've been able to throw a couple more punches, put one or two of them down, but if Brian's battered face was anything to go by, it wasn't just a couple of dealers that beat him up, it was the whole bloody lot, and that was a different set of problems right there.
One on one, he might've been able to manage it, mind. The right circumstances, Joe reckoned he might be able to do some serious damage. And as he reached for the loose floorboard, he reckoned maybe he'd have to do it soon, before the itch turned to withdrawal. And it struck him that perhaps he and Brian Turner had a few problems in common.
8
Gav watched a chill wind waltz a Tudor packet as he smoked his third tab of the break down to the knuckle. He shivered under his bodywarmer. Brass monkeys out here, but better Baltic than back in the office. Inside, it was all gas, both arse and Calor. Least a bloke could breathe out here, let his mind run to things less immediate.
Bigelow had called everyone into the office the morning after he and Gav talked it out, waited until the place was packed, and made his announcement: "As you all know, I've got some health issues I need to deal with, and I need to take a short break from the business. And I also know that you're all wondering what's going to happen in my absence. Well, I'm glad to say that Gavin's agreed to step in while I'm away. Thank you, Gavin." He checked his watch. "So as of now, if any of you lads fancy a bleat, you know who to direct it to."
Then he winked and waddled away. No handover, no best-of-luck, no handshake, just walked out the door and hauled himself behind the wheel of his Jag. Boom. Bigelow gone, Gav in charge.
And so it began. Anyone who wanted an early finish, a shift swap, a whole weekend off, they came to Gav. Lucky for Gav, he was ready for them. One thing Bigelow was known for was his brush-offs. Never promise anything, never commit. But Gav had gone one better and played it straight – "Can't agree to owt until I look at the rota. Come back and see us tomorrow, all right?" – instead of fobbing them off with a half-answer, hoping they didn't follow up. He was going to be firm and fair. No more Mr Soft, no more favours just because you bought him a pint three months back – this was a different Gavin Scott.
Phil Cruddas was the key to maintaining that reputation. Phil was only too happy to provide a barrier to the rest of the drivers, as well as provide the – he had to admit it, much needed – reassurance that Gav was the man for the job.
Down the Long Ship the night before, Phil laid it all out, his face a blur of drunken expressions, his hands hammering each point like he was trying to kill it, his voice fighting the clamour of a busy pub. "Warn you up front, I know these lads."
"I know you do."
"Been working for the fat lad for ten year, maybes. Know all these lads. And I'm saying, you're going to get a fuckin' earful."
"I already had an earful."
"That's what I'm talking about." Phil gulped at the fifth of his free pints. "But the thing you've got to remember, you're new to this, it's going to be stressful."
"I know that."
"You feel that, don't you?"
"Fuckin' ... " Gav blew air. "Yes, I do."
"That's good. That's positive."
"Yeah?"
"Oh aye, son. Oh aye. You weren't stressed, you'd be an arsehole, wouldn't you? And you'd probably be doing a shitty job of it. I read something once—"
"Give over."
Phil grinned. "Aye, I fuckin' did. I read. And I read something that said some people work better under stress. It's a primitive thing. Like when we used to be hunters. Stress gets your adrenalin an' that going, makes your brain a bit sharper. And I think you're one of them people, Gav."
"Thank you."
"But the one thing you've got to remember is that these lads are good lads. They're really good lads, know what I mean?"
"Aye. I know they are."
"You don't talk to people, like. You don't know 'em like I know 'em."
"I know some of them."
One hand up. "I'm not having a go or nowt. I'm just saying, you're one of them lads keeps hisself to hisself. That's just you. And that's why you're the man for the job, like. So I'm saying, these lads, they're good lads. They might talk a good game, and they might be a pain in the fuckin' arse an' all, but deep down inside they're good lads. You just need to know how to control 'em." Phil looked around as if someone might be eavesdropping. "And to do that, you watch their wives."
Gav snorted a laugh into his pint glass. Lager sloshed up the sides. "All right, Phil."
"I'm serious, man. These lads acting like the big bollocks, the ones that've got all the fuckin' mouth on 'em, they're the ones'll fuckin' roll over with one right word, you know how to play it. Like Viv Francis. You know Viv?"
Viv Francis was a brick wall with a big mouth. "I know Viv."
"You just need to wait Viv out. He comes at you all shouting an' that, you just hold your ground and you wait him out. If you don't rise to it, he calms down like that." Phil snapped his fingers. "Telling you, it's all fuckin' psychology. And you can learn it. Piece of piss." A slap against Gav's shoulder was a non-too-subtle hint to get the next round in as he drained his pint. "Divven't you worry about it, because your Uncle Phil's here to get it sorted for you. He's got your fuckin' back, marra."
And he did. Phil might not have been tactful, but there was no denying he was well-liked by the drivers, and now that Gav knew how clever Phil was with them, he took delight in watching the man at work. Phil calmed Viv Francis, twisted the words of Smokey Benson round so he ended up with the exact opposite opinion he'd set out with, and he could play Rosie like nobody else. She was grumbling putty in his hands. In short, he was the kind of bloke you needed as a second when you were up to your eyes in paperwork, both business and research. The business end was self-explanatory – invoices, accounts, payroll and all that. The research was something Gav had started a while back. Phil wasn't the only one doing some reading. Gav had been to the library, got a pile of books – biographies of great leaders like Churchill, Rommel, Montgomery, Patton, even Thatcher had one out. Didn't matter about their politics – even though he did put the Hitler book back – all that mattered was their strength and their path to greatness. Gav would spend his nights in the office, listening to the dull crackle and hum of Rosie's radio, the mumbling undercurrent of shit craic that passed itself off as driver banter, and he'd get his nose well into a book, looking for connections, similarities, opportunities, the signposts that pointed the way to a better life.
The one thing he'd learned so far was that he and these great leaders shared some important characteristics. As Phil had said, Gav had a certain distance, an elevation above the rest of the lads. He had a good sense of humour. He was compassionate. He understood complicated ideas, could put himself in other people's shoes dead easy, like; he could empathise. And he had opportunities – the secret was to recognise them as such, and he'd done that all right. Puma Cabs was an opportunity. It was scary, but it was an opportunity and if there was one thing these books confirmed for him, it was that great leaders grabbed opportunities with both hands and didn't let go until they'd squeezed them dry. These were the similarities, and if Gav squinted and sweated hard enough, he could bend those great lives to mirror his own and, in doing so, he could remain firm and focused. And when a man was focused, there was no stopping him. He could stride through life like the bloke heading Gav's way now.
The bloke w
as tall, skinny, had his hands in his pockets, his head down, ploughing through the wind, coming up Bamburgh Road. The bloke kicked a can, but only because it rolled in front of his feet. Gav got the feeling that this was a bloke who didn't deal with frivolity – he was on a mission, and that mission was in Gav's general direction.
Gav blew the rest of his smoke. The man came nearer. Gav recognised him – the soldier from the other week, the quiet one who'd just come back from Belfast. And now he was closer, Gav could make out the look on his face, like he wanted to beat fuck out of someone, and the idea flared in his head that maybe – just maybe – that someone was him. Gav flicked the filter into the wind; it blew back and bounced a shower of sparks off his trainers. He turned to go back inside.
The soldier saw him. Shouted: "How!"
Gav considered pretending that he hadn't heard. The wind was strong enough against the ears out here that it was plausible. But he'd already paused at the sound of the soldier's voice, and he knew that if he ducked inside now the soldier would just follow him in. And as much as he knew that he'd have back up in there if this kicked off, he couldn't show weakness to the lads this early in the game.
So he turned back and smiled with all his teeth. Facing his fears.
The soldier slowed as he approached. "You working?"
"Just about to go back on."
"You got a minute?"
Gav cleared his throat. "Ah, tell you the truth—"
"Won't take two seconds. Honest." He nodded off beyond Gav towards the side of the office. "Better get out of the wind, mind."
The soldier headed off round the side of the office where the skip was and the wind wasn't. Gav paused again, then followed. He could hear the lads through the wall, their muffled laughter, and wondered if they'd hear him if he shouted. He turned to the soldier, who was offering him a tab. Gav took a Regal along with a light and puffed smoke, his throat too dry to inhale properly without coughing. "So what was it you wanted to talk about?"
