We Go Around In the Night and Are Consumed by Fire

by Jules Grant

  Tony picks the wrapper from a packet of custard creams, nearly empty, holds it out to me.

  No ta.

  He looks down into the packet. Little twats. Eaten all me fuckin’ biscuits. Eat me out of fuckin’ house and home if I let them.

  Hey, he shouts.

  Three heads appear round the door.

  Get Donna a brew. He shakes the packet at them. And who’s eaten me fuckin’ biscuits, ’cos they’re dead.

  The heads grin and disappear.

  No respect, says Tony, shaking his head.

  He picks up his phone, taps speed-dial. Mam? Yeah, me. I’ve run out of biscuits, it’s them little twats. Custards. Oh and get me some Hobnobs as well will you?

  He puts the phone down. She’ll be round in a minute, he says.

  I try to imagine what my mam would’ve done if she lived next door and I phoned her to bring me some biscuits, and it’s not pretty.

  When the tea comes it’s the colour of pale piss. Tony waves a hand at the boys. Don’t worry about them, they’re sound. Then he shouts, A.J.!

  Anthony Junior puts his face in the door and grins through his Curly Wurly, pasty and mean. For ten years old he’s massive, no mistaking he’s Tony’s.

  Tony slaps the arm of his chair. Come here son, gonna learn you something useful today.

  You got to wonder what kind of weird arrangement must have gone down for Tony to end up with a kid of his own, wonder what the mam was like being how she never put in an appearance as far as anyone knows. Down the Feathers there’s bets on: he got her up the duff when he was blind drunk then killed her to get the lad to himself, else she’s some old slapper who did it for the money, happy to hand over the baby for some cash. No one’s ever even seen him with a woman so I doubt it happened the usual way and I can’t imagine him down the Fertility Clinic so she’s probably propping up an underpass somewhere.

  I’m his mam and his dad, Tony says if you ask him. He don’t need no one else. Which is bollocks being how old Mrs Maggs next door does all the real work.

  A.J. sits on the arm of his dad’s chair swinging a leg. Looks up at me, proper basking in it, smug little fucker.

  Tony gives his arm a tap, Don’t forget what I told you. The kid nods.

  Sit down, says Tony, but I’m still standing and to be honest I don’t know how I’m gonna bend. There’s a pain in my gut reaches right up to my chest and whatever I try I just can’t get a handle on it. Like the time I got stabbed outside the Paradise, just a million times worse.

  Thing is, when you get stabbed, you don’t even know that you’re cut. Like the biggest punch ever, takes your breath right out. It’s only when you look down, see the blood, that’s when you know, and then that’s when it hurts. So I keep looking down, expect to see my guts hanging out like Mel Gibson in Braveheart, give me some kind of perspective. But there’s nothing.

  Forget it, I tell him, I’m standing.

  He looks me up and down, starts to mess with his phone. Beats me how this useless turd got to be next in line, in fact why I’m even standing here asking him fuck all. Personality of a snail on Valium, Carla says. Then the thought of her makes my head spin and the edges go dark.

  So now I’m looking right into those eyes, trying to work out why he’s just jiving around. Hey, am I gonna do it or are you?

  Then there’s no sound in the room at all, just the hiss and plop of the gas, and I can feel something tight and hot coming up behind my eyes. And whatever it is, I’m shit scared it’ll all spill out and I’ll be scriking for England, right in front of these pricks.

  Tony looks past me, does this thin kind of smile, Things have changed, Don.

  Don? Now I hate the fucker. Name’s Donna to you mate, I say.

  I say what happens now, he says. So you better wind your neck in, you lot, stay low for a bit.

  Now I’m the one staring. Wind your neck in? You lot?

  They fucking killed her, I says. Man, she’s dead.

  I look over at Danny and Tools, and they can’t look at me, so now I’m on a roll. OK, yeah, I get it, I’ll do it meself then. Just don’t get in me way, if that’s not too much to ask.

  Not on my watch you don’t, he says.

  Then he starts going on about Carla, how she was out of control, how it was my fault for not keeping her in line, oh she had it all coming and that. The fact that I don’t do him right there and then I just got to put down to how I’m feeling. All spacey and shit.

  As it turned out maybe it was just as well. Because even though I couldn’t know it then, it was gonna take more than just me and a sorry nine millimetre to sort that fucker out.

  Out on the pavement. I lean on the wall and my mouth’s full of sour. Like that time I found me mam in the alley and I thought she was dead.

  Then it’s all over my boots.

  9

  When I get to Marie’s she’s just sitting there, wailing and knocking back the vodka, no sign of Ror. Aww, where’s my Aurora? she says.

  You can’t be having her over here, I tell her, you’re not fit.

  Then she’s wailing and scriking all over the place, Ah want my baby, she says.

  First off, I don’t know whether she’s thinking about Carla or Ror. Then I get it, it’s neither, it’s all about herself.

  And that’s Marie all over, because it’s always all about her, as long as I can remember. And all these years, while Carla’s been wiping up after her, I can’t remember one time when she was there like a mam. So I make the decision, and it’s not even hard.

  Funeral’s on Tuesday. You’re not having her, I say.

  By the time I get back to Carla’s, they’re all there and there’s people coming and going like Piccadilly Gardens in Wakes Week, Ror nowhere to be seen.

  Locked herself in her room, best leave her, says Lise.

  Sonn looks at me, face pinched like new concrete, What did he say? When we gonna do them?

  The funeral, I say, let’s get that organised first.

  That’s the rules, see. No one gets payback till after the family stuff’s done, so the way I see it we got three whole days before we have to think about what anyone else is going to do, or justice and shit.

  It doesn’t do to mess with the rules. One time maybe last year when Leon Johnson shot some kid right there at his own brother’s funeral, there was hell on. I’m not kidding, the gloves were well off, whether the kid deserved it or not. Next thing, word went out even from his own, no reprisals for a witness, fill your boots. And before you knew it there was a queue a mile long outside the pig-pen on Moss Lane, and that smug fuckwit Gartside thought his Christmases had all come at once. What I’m saying is, you don’t break the rules whatever, and Leon got twenty-three years, and a haircut, to think about that.

  We sit around for a bit, turn on the news. Finn’s on her netbook, checking out Flyway. Seems like everyone’s on there, on account of the police raids last night. Hey look at this, she says, looks like they’ve taken Mikey to Durham, gone and split them all up.

  Lise brings toast, but no one eats anything. I’m gonna have to tell them something, some time, but not yet.

  Sonn comes in with the new sim cards from the safe and then everyone gets to switch their home lines back on. Everyone got three sims, pay-as-you-go. One for between us and for business, one for legit, one for family and personal. How many phones they use is up to them, but most of us just use one or two at a time. I got an extra sim just in case, connects me to Mike, people further up the food-chain. I try not to use it though. Flyway’s the best bet if you want to stay safe. Phones are things you got to be real strict about, and iPhones, well, they’re just asking for trouble. One slip and the whole world can see where you are, what you’re doing, who you’ve connected with, all that notification and location rubbish. You gotta smile when the numpties go flashing their new smartphones about. Finn can track any one of them, 24/7 on her netbook any time she wants to. Sometimes I wonder if people even realise how dangerous that shit is.
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br />   Use the codes, no one gets that number except us, I tell them. I look at Finn. Not even Danny.

  I look up at the TV and Mike’s mugshot is on the screen, one black eye and a long cut underneath, must have took a proper hiding on the way to the cells.

  Motherfuckers, says Sonn.

  I’m feeling pretty bad now, about earlier, so I go upstairs. Ror’s all wrapped round in the duvet, puffa-jacket zipped right up to her neck, facing into the wall. Rio’s curled up right beside her, one eye open, looks up at me. Don’t you start, I say.

  I sit down on the bed put my hand on her back, listen to the sirens up and down the estate. Ror, I’m sorry, come here baby.

  Ror says nothing but she wraps herself tighter, so now I know for a fact she’s awake. I sit for a bit, just listening to her breathing, and somehow Carla feels nearer now I’m here. Then I wonder where they’ve put her, and whether she’s cold.

  After a while I feel Ror go slack like she’s fallen asleep. I reach over and push back her hair and there’s no movement. Then a kind of calm washes all over me. It’ll be alright baby, I say.

  Downstairs and something’s disconnected, like my body’s not attached to my head. Lise hands me a can. Did you see her?

  I guess she means Ror, but I’m seeing Carla, tubes everywhere, me stroking her head where the baby hairs are. Yeah, I saw her, I say.

  Later, when everyone’s gone, Lise and me are just sitting, watching the sky get dark. She wants to know what happened with Tony but I can’t bring myself to say, don’t want to make it all real. It’s all cool Lise, don’t worry.

  Like I said, I got no real problem someone taking over since Mikey went down because someone’s gotta do it and it’s not my call who it is. And I’m thinking if I don’t tell anyone what Tony said, maybe it’ll all just sort itself out, like somehow he’ll know that he made this mistake. Then he’ll start doing normal stuff, like getting the plan together, calling in favours and calling the shots, just like Mike would have done.

  I think about going up to Durham, see Mike, maybe get the heads-up, but I know that would be suicide for both of us, least till after the trial. Ten defendants, so there’s got to be a chance he’ll get off, and even if he doesn’t he’ll get moved to Cat. A, so then he can run us from there. It’s the not knowing gets you down. Remand’s a real bastard, nothing solid or finished, not like most people think. Could be a year till a trial, doesn’t bear thinking about. Mike says in Scotland they got a hundred and ten days, the prosecution, to get their shit together. If they can’t try you by then, you walk. Keeps everyone on their toes. In England they can just fuck around with you till they got nothing else on. I know people never been convicted of anything, still spent half a lifetime inside when you add it all up. And I’ve no problem seeing what a girl might see in Mikey, because he’s got those crinkly brown eyes and he sticks by his word. I’m telling you, you can do business with a man like that. Then I think about Tony, and somehow I know things just slipped a mile sideways, and I remember those eyes.

  After a while we stop talking, and I let Carla slide in. I can see her face, that crooked smile she does when she’s done something bad. The smell of her rushes me, makes my throat hurt.

  Then I’m thinking last summer, way up on Snake Pass, the day she got her new bike. In my head we’re racing each other again, her taking the corners not using the brakes. Louise, clinging on round my waist, all scared but not wanting to say. And how even though I knew she was scared I didn’t pay it no mind, because all I can see is Carla up in front, sun glinting off metal, me trying to catch her, and the roar of the bikes.

  The radio grates on me, someone whining about summer and glory days, brings me right back.

  Hey Lise. You don’t turn that fucking radio off, I’m gonna smash it right over your head, I say.

  10

  I open my eyes just a crack. There’s light coming through the gap in the curtains, and I can see Ror rooting through the drawer.

  I sit up. C’mere love.

  But the minute she hears me her spine goes up like a ramrod, won’t even look round. You’re in Mam’s bed, she says, and you’d better get out.

  She won’t look at me, even when I go over, put my arms round her back.

  I don’t mind admitting I got no form for this, and things turn so fast that one minute I’m raging, then I just want to grab a hold of her, make it all go away.

  Fuck off then, she says.

  So now I’m raging. Now look lady, you just be careful.

  Oh or what then?

  She turns and looks at me, eyes hard, and it’s a look I’ve never seen before in a kid. Then there’s something about the side of her mouth, the way the crease is twitching, reminds me of Carla. Oh baby, I say.

  But before I can reach her she’s off out the door.

  By the time I get downstairs Lise is making eggy-bread, Ror pushing hers round on the plate. I tell Lise I’m going out.

  Where to? says Ror.

  Nowhere, I says, I just got things to sort.

  Ror gets up from the table, stomps out. I hear the front door slam.

  She’s just frightened, says Lise. I’ll go and get her in a bit, she’ll be round at Marie’s.

  Sit down, I goes, you’re not running after her. She’s got to learn to behave.

  Lise pulls a face but the way I see it Ror’ll come back when she’s ready, and I got way too much on my mind to go chasing about. I’ll be honest, I don’t know how I’m supposed to do all what needs doing, look after everyone else at the same time.

  You can’t just let her go, says Lise.

  Just watch me, I say.

  I put the plates in the sink. I’ll see you down the lock-up at two, I say. Don’t be late.

  I get to the lock-up and Finn’s on the door, lets me in with the bike.

  I’m trying not to look at the Ducati, still right there where Carla parked it, up by the van. Got a polish on the hub you can see your face in, that bike, and sometimes she used it like a mirror just to do her lipstick. We used to laugh at her then, how she loved that damn bike.

  I go through to the back and everything looks the same, feels different. Everyone round the table the same way they always are, Rio asleep with one eye open as usual, curled up on the red armchair, down by the desk.

  They’re all looking at me, waiting for me to tell them something that makes some kind of sense, and the screw in my belly does a hundred-degree turn.

  Lise comes through the door at the back from the store, arms full of hardware, shrugs them out on to the table in front of me, Inventory, she says. And right enough she’s bang-on, because there’s nothing in the rules that says you can’t plan, even before the family stuff.

  Then there’s a knock at the doors at the front and Finn slides the peephole, Hey-up, it’s Mina.

  And that’s about all I need right now, just when I need to use all my wits, but I reckon it’ll cause more ruck to shut her out than let her in. If I shut her out folk’d be bound to ask questions and I can’t be doing with that. If I’d been thinking straight, I might have stuck my neck out on that one. That’s the thing about some women. Got this way of fucking with your common sense, till you don’t have a scoobie which way is up.

  I look around. Marta, Sonn, Lise, Finn, Mina, and me. Six not counting the dog. Not exactly a full platoon, given what we’re gonna have to do. Dad always said one volunteer with something to fight for is worth a hundred squaddies on a paycheque, and not just because of IQ. It’s not about war, love, it’s about passion, he’d say. And I dunno what place he got that from, I’m just hoping he’s right.

  Then, not for the first time, I wish he was here.

  Hey, says Finn from the door with a grin, looky this!

  I look up and there’s Mel from the Pool striding in, with that Jen DeLaTorres from over Warrington way. Got a look of Grace Jones about her, that baby. Leave the door open, goes Mel, because there’s more.

  Then it’s standing room only, and you just got
to smile. I reckon Carla must’ve fucked her way round every dyke bar north of Watford, and this here’s the payback. Man, she must have been good.

  I feel the weight lift from my shoulders. Mel’s solid as a rock, something in her you can trust, runs the Toxteth dyke scene pretty much, least since Teardrop McCarthy went down.

  The first time we met was summer before last, one of those hot draggy days somehow play havoc with reason. We’d biked up to Dovestones for something to do, just messing in the rezzer and larking about. But Carla was bored, trust me I know the signs, scuffing her feet and pulling at the grass, her and Mina at each other’s throats all damn day.

  We stopped on the way home for a beer, no let-up in the heat. Let’s go over to Liverpool for a mad one, goes Carla, wind up some Scousers. Seemed like a plan at the time.

  Sonn was the driver – she’s pretty much always the driver on account of she doesn’t drink. Which is a bugger because she’s a shit driver even sober.

  Drink-driving is one of my rules and I’m dead strict on it. Chicken, Tony calls it, but that’s because he’s stupid. No discipline, that’s some people’s problem. Everyone knows the secret to staying this side of the wall is only break the laws you have to – anything more is just sloppy. Anyways we all pile into the van and head for Fiery Jill’s over in Liverpool 8, Carla and Mina, me and Louise, Lise, Finn and Marta, Sonn at the wheel.

  Saturday night and the whole place is heaving. Inside we split up, work the room. Everything’s going nice, Lise and Finn on the dance-floor showing off, when something makes me look round for Carla.

  She’s surrounded by Scousers, looks edgy. I get my arse over toot-sweet, come up from behind, polite because fair do’s I’m a foreigner, What’s going on girls?

  None of your fucking business, says the one with tattoos.

  I take a good look. Two of them look like they work out; the other one’s skinny with Doc Martens and glasses but that means nothing. Sonn’s got glasses and she could lay the whole of the Olympic hockey team out even on a bad day. But I can’t let it go. Wrong answer, I say.