by Julie Shaw
Probably, he thought. But he’d be good, he decided. He’d no business doing coke when he was looking after the baby. He’d no business letting Christine do coke around Joey, for that matter, and entering the bedroom – and being assaulted by a God-awful stench – he felt a rush of guilt that he’d allowed that to happen. That it was so infrequently that thoughts of this kind impressed themselves upon him. That he spent insufficient time properly looking after his little sister and taking some sort of fucking adult responsibility.
Joey was awake. Wide awake. And now he pulled himself upright, making the stench in the room even worse. He cried a lot these day, did Joey, so this was something unexpected, and it was only when Nicky got closer to the cot that he realised the reason the poor little blighter wasn’t crying was because he’d obviously cried himself out.
Joey’s plump little fingers gripped the top rail of the cot and he bounced up and down on the mattress. ‘It’s only me, mate,’ Nicky told him. ‘Your mam’s having forty winks. Come on, let’s get you sorted out, shall we?’
Nicky looked around to find something to hold Joey in, as he sure as hell wasn’t picking him up with his bare hands. He’d wriggled his way out of his stinking nappy, which was laying flat on the floor beside the cot, and it looked like almost all of him was caked in his own shit – even the little vest he still had on and his hair.
Nicky diverted to fling open a window. The wind took it – perhaps there was a tornado already upon them – and a blast of freezing air bellowed in. Now Joey did complain, his mouth puckering then gaping as he took a breath in. And no wonder. He had almost nothing on.
‘Don’t you worry, mate,’ Nicky told him, finding an old T-shirt to pick him up with. ‘Nice hot bath, some clean clothes, you’ll be right as rain, won’t you?’
He didn’t pick him up just yet, however, finding the presence of mind from somewhere to go back into the kitchen and fill the bowl for him first.
And maybe have a snort of coke, he decided, after all.
Pulling the pots and pans from the kitchen sink was as grim as he’d expected, as congealed food parted company with the plates it had been sticking to, and a whole new selection of disgusting stenches prickled his nostrils. But at least he had the pile more or less relocated to the crummy worktop and was able to swill out the sink and begin to refill it, added a few squirts of washing-up liquid for good measure.
‘Come on then, kid,’ he then said, going back into the bedroom. ‘Let’s be having you and get that shit off you, eh? And then a bottle. You’d like a bottle, wouldn’t you? Bet you would, you poor bleeder. Then we’ll wake your mam up and she can give it you, okay?’
Joey cheered up no end once he was sitting in the kitchen sink – gurgling happily as he played with a couple of old empty yoghurt pots, while Nicky – resisting the coke still – put the kettle on for tea. There was no formula, though. The can was sitting empty on the worktop. Nothing for it, then – he’d do what he’d seen Chrissy do the other day, and make him up a bottle of sweet tea. Though fuck knew what they’d give him for his dinner. The only baby food he could see was a half-eaten rusk. He picked it up – it was at least dry – and carefully placed it on the kitchen windowsill, priding himself on his presence of mind.
He heard a sigh, then, and turned around. It was his sister. ‘Oh, gawd, Nick, I’m so sorry. Oh baby, look at the state of you!’
She hurried over to the sink where Joey splashed the water excitedly. She didn’t make it. One minute she was grabbing the cooker handle to steady herself, apparently. The next she was clamping her hand over her mouth, and fleeing the room again, bumping into the door jamb as she went. Nicky could hear her throwing up shortly after.
He grinned at Joey, managing to find sufficient humour in the situation to say, ‘State of you, mate? Talk about pots and kettles, eh?’
‘God, I could not feel worse,’ Christine announced minutes later, when she returned from the bathroom, clutching her head. By now, Nicky had cleaned the baby up and was drying him on his knee, while Joey sucked hungrily on the hunk of rusk.
‘You couldn’t look worse,’ Nicky commented, truthfully.
‘Thanks for that.’
‘I did tell you.’
‘Tell me what?’
‘That you need to go easy on the crack. Sis, there’s nothing of you.’
She ran her hands over her forehead and back across her scalp, revealing the taut blotchy whiteness of her skin. ‘I need a top-up …’ she seemed distracted. ‘Just to get me going again. I feel so fluey.’
‘Sis, I’m not sure …’ Nicky began.
‘Nick, for fuck’s sake! Give me a top-up! You and Brian get most of my fucking baby money, don’t you? And I’ve got to get to the shops,’ she added. ‘Pronto. Before they shut and we’re all fucked for the day. He can’t exist on tea and toast for ever, can he?’
Nicky sighed, but produced the goods anyway. Knelt down to fetch the plastic bag of powder he kept beneath a loose floorboard beneath one of the kitchen cupboards, and tipped a teaspoon full of it out onto the usual silver tray.
Joey pointed gleefully as Nicky fashioned the coke into a line for her to snort. ‘You don’t never wanna touch this,’ he told the baby. ‘Keep you poor, this stuff will, mate.’
But it was at least better than the crack they’d been using from the pipe and that she’d lately developed such a taste for.
‘There you go,’ Christine said, once she’d hoovered it all up. ‘There you go, baby. Much better now, see?’ She sniffed. ‘Now we can get to the shops. Get some fresh air and formula and food for you, yeah?’
Nicky handed Joey over so she could take him back to the stinking bedroom and get him dressed. ‘There’s tornadoes on the way apparently,’ he called to her, suddenly feeling exhausted. ‘Better wrap up.’
He heard a laugh. ‘Yeah, right, Nick, of course there are,’ she yelled back.
Chapter 13
Josie was livid. Not least because she should have seen it coming. It was only a matter of time, after all.
‘Calm down!’ Eddie was saying to her as she tugged off her pyjama bottoms. ‘Being seen in a pub isn’t a criminal offence!’
‘Yes it is, actually,’ Josie corrected him. ‘Well, some sort of offence, anyway. She’s seventeen, don’t forget. Not eighteen yet. Seventeen. And who exactly was at home looking after Joey, do you think?’
‘I could hazard a guess,’ Eddie said, shifting Paula on his hip. ‘But love, there is no need to go dragging off round there now, is there?’
Josie skewered her husband on the end of a sharp, assessing look. ‘Love, if you hadn’t wanted me to go dragging round there, then you shouldn’t have told me, should you? Now, where are my jeans? Don’t just stand there looking daft. Help me find them! I said I’m off round there and I am!’
‘But it’s got nothing to do with us, Jose,’ Eddie tried, patiently, as he looked. ‘I know you’re narked, love, but if that silly mare wants to ruin her life, it’s her business.’
Josie glared at him. ‘Not my business?’ She yanked the bottom drawer on the bedroom chest so hard it almost toppled over. ‘There’s a baby not ten minutes away living in God knows what conditions. That same baby who spent the first fortnight of his life here. That same baby who you ask about every time you bump into one of those numpties down the pub. How can that baby not be our business?’
Eddie raised a hand, his usual signal that he knew when he was beaten. ‘Okay, okay,’ he said. ‘I just think you should calm down, okay? I know you. I know what could happen here an’ all, love. And I’m not having it, okay? Yes, I care about the little ’un. But I’m not having them living here again, okay? And not just for us,’ he added, in response to Josie’s scowl. ‘And not only because we can’t afford it. Because she comes back to us and she’ll never get a council place, will she? Much less try to make things up with her bloody mother. That’s all I’m saying, love, okay?’
Josie stepped into her jeans, leg by leg, the
n wriggled them up over her hips. Eddie was right. She knew that. He wasn’t saying anything she didn’t deep down agree with. Truth be known she had the same fears – if she took Christine home again, given the probable state of her, it would be doubly difficult to make her leave.
And she trusted what the numpties in the Listers had apparently told Eddie, however much she didn’t want to. That Christine had been sucked down – as she’d been so bloody likely to – into the same crappy life of sloth and booze as her brother. But not drugs. Please not drugs. Please let that not be true.
But that could so easily be true as well. Probably was. Because how long had it been now? A fortnight? Even longer? Over two weeks since she’d actually laid eyes on either Christine or the baby, despite having been round there four times. Twice there’d been no answer, even though she’d been sure she could hear voices, and twice more the door had been opened by that divvy, Brian, burbling on incoherently about how Christine was out with the baby and he didn’t know when they’d be home.
Except she had been at home. Josie would have put money on it. So this – this latest news, of Christine boozing down the Listers – this was entirely, and depressingly, as expected. As was the consensus that Brian’s flat was becoming party central. That he was earning off Mo and making plenty of money and that all kinds of shit were the norm now.
And it wasn’t as if Eddie was the only bearer of bad news. Only the other day one of the lads from the other end of the estate had approached her, a well-meaning lad cruelly saddled with the name of Hilton Brown, who was well known both for drug taking and general not-giving-a-fuck – so to have him suggest she might want to involve social services, well, that really put the lid on it.
‘I mean, I know I’m a twat myself, Titch,’ he’d said to her, in his usual cheery fashion. ‘But even I know that it’s all fucked up over there. That baby deserves better than it’s getting, no question. Honest to God, you should do something. Chrissie just doesn’t seem to care any more.’
No, if the likes of Hilton Brown thought things were going too far, then they certainly must be. So today – not tonight, not tomorrow, not Monday, she was going round there to see for herself and nothing was going to stop her. She’d happily boot the door down if she had to. By fair means or foul, she was getting into that flat.
And if it proved to be true, then what? Did she inform the social? Not just yet, she decided. She’d simply threaten Christine with them. That and give her the bollocking of her life. And then maybe she’d stomp round her mother’s for good measure. And give her a bloody bollocking too. Because Hilton was right. Poor Joey deserved better. Off his mam and his grandmother too.
Josie pulled a brush through her hair, then followed Eddie downstairs.
‘I’ve had a thought,’ he said. ‘Why don’t you take your mam with you? You know, safety in numbers and all.’ She’d already dismissed his earlier idea – hence the heated exchange of views – that he should go round there with her, or she go not at all.
She shook her head. There was nothing in the flat that could frighten her. And besides, it was dry and crisp, albeit bitterly cold, and they’d already promised Paula a trip to Horton Park.
‘I’ll be fine,’ she said, grabbing her big coat from the under-stairs cupboard. ‘Last thing their neighbours’ll want is a mouthful of June bleeding McKellan – not on a Saturday afternoon. And besides, you know what my mum’s like. She’d just make things worse. And if Christine’s in a state, she’ll probably give her a frigging battering, and I know from experience that’ll do no good at all.’
Eddie nodded. ‘You’re probably right,’ he conceded. ‘But Jose, it’s freezing out there and it looks slippy as well. How about I nip you round in the car and drop you? Come back for you in an hour or so?’
Josie was grateful for his offer. It did look freezing outside. And it made sense as well, seeing as little Paula was already dressed and ready. ‘Go on then,’ she grinned, her anger at Eddie forgotten. ‘You’ve twisted my arm.’
She tugged playfully on the bobble on her daughter‘s woollen hat, smiling at her squeals of pretend protest. How could she? How could Christine neglect that little baby? For all that she knew they didn’t live in frigging Disneyland, how could Chrissie – her friend – let that boy down so badly?
She planted a kiss on Paula’s nose. ‘You be a good girl for Daddy, won’t you? And I tell you what, love,’ she added, as Eddie fetched his car keys. ‘You drop me round there, and if it’s all not too bad at the flat, I’ll walk down and meet you both at the park.’
‘That’s what you reckon, then, is it, love? That it’ll be all not too bad?’
Josie smiled ruefully. ‘I can live in hope, can’t I?’
It was a hope that proved to be short lived. And dashed before they’d so much as driven into the Park Lane car park. Before the condensation had even cleared from the windscreen.
Eddie wiped it away with the flat of his hand, as if not quite believing what he was seeing – the same thing Josie was seeing from out of the passenger window, which even at first glance presaged something not very good at all. No, worse – presaged something very bad.
‘What the fuck’s going on, Jose?’ he asked, leaning further and further forward, unable to park since there was nowhere he could park.
Three police cars, on the other hand, were parked. Well, not exactly parked, but more strewn randomly around the semi-circle parking area, two of them with doors gaping open. At least twenty residents were out, too, milling around, no doubt noseying – enjoying what was looking like an impressive spectacle at any time, but especially on a dull Saturday afternoon. Josie craned her neck, her eyes counting up to the fourth floor automatically, and noticing several more residents hanging over the balconies, and rewarded, if that was the word, which she doubted, with the sight of a substantial knot of people just where she’d hoped not to see one. Something too close for comfort was going down.
She was just about to say as much to Eddie, but then realised she didn’t need to. ‘Isn’t that Brian?’ he asked, pointing upwards to where a figure, clearly handcuffed, was being manhandled along the balcony towards the stairwell.
‘Oh shit, love,’ Eddie added. ‘They’ve even got Nicky.’ He nudged her and pointed across to one of the other cars, where Josie could now see him, sitting in the back seat, beside a police officer.
Eddie tutted. ‘You know what, love. I think we should leave. Leave them to it, let the dust settle. Come back in a bit. You’ll only be in the way now, after all.’
Josie saw that as her cue to beat a hasty exit. ‘Not a chance,’ she said, clambering out. ‘I need to find out what’s happening. To the baby. Go on, you go. Take our Paula to the park as planned. I’ll follow on once I know what’s happening with Joey.’
No one even really registered her, let alone tried to stop her – too busy, she guessed, making all those arrests. Even as she climbed the stairs she was passed by two further young men, both of which she vaguely recognised as mates of Brian’s.
And it looked like the police had meant business as well, because when she entered the fourth-floor landing the first thing she saw was that the door to Brian’s flat had been kicked in.
Oh well, she thought grimly, at least that saves me from doing it, feeling guilty even so as she stepped over the splintered wood, and felt glass and whatever else crunching underneath.
The dogged, pragmatic tone of her thinking soon changed, though, as she entered the living room and saw Christine. Or rather, she decided, as she stared at her friend, a girl who bore a strong passing resemblance to Christine, but as if formed in waxwork, and of a much older relative.
Christine was slumped across the futon, dressed in a torn vest and trackies, a big stupid grin plastered onto her face. So it was true, Josie thought. It was all true, and worse. She was clearly off her head on something nasty.
Another of Brian’s revolting druggy friends – the name Anthony surfaced from somewhere – was sprawled on
the floor at her feet. And there was a third person she thought she recognised – the social worker, definitely. Carol Sloper, perhaps. The name again surfaced automatically. And who clearly didn’t need the likes of Josie to put her in the picture, but whom – now she was slap bang in the middle of it – looked strangely lost, as if she didn’t know quite what to do, other than stand there, her arms wrapped protectively across her briefcase.
There were also two hard-looking policewomen. And, thinking about it, Josie realised they were very much in charge. One was sitting next to Christine, obviously trying to get some sense out of her, and the other, who looked like she’d swallowed a wasp, who had evidently just returned from the bedroom.
‘What’s going on?’ Josie asked. Her voice was shaking, she realised.
The woman with the briefcase turned and looked at her. It was definitely Carol Sloper. She’d seen her about on the estate, and also recognised Christine’s description. ‘And you are?’ she asked Josie. ‘Are you family?’
‘All but,’ she answered. ‘I’m Josie Collins. Christine’s friend. I think I know you, don’t I? Are you Carol?’
The woman’s expression softened. ‘Ah yes,’ she replied. Then, turning to the policewoman who was sitting down with Christine, she said, ‘Josie here is the one who put Christine and the baby up when they first left hospital. She and her husband looked after them for a couple of weeks until they got sorted round here.’
The policewoman who had come from the bedroom snorted in disgust. ‘Sorted? Well, that’s one way of putting it, I suppose.’
Josie couldn’t help but bristle at her tone. ‘I ask again,’ she said levelly, ‘can someone tell me what’s going on?’ She knelt down beside Christine. ‘You all right, mate?’ she said, lifting her chin. ‘What’s been happening?’
A male police officer entered the flat then and, without saying a word to anyone, he signalled to the policewoman who was sitting on the futon, and together they hoisted Anthony up off the floor, roughly shaking him to his senses as they did so. ‘Come on, feller,’ the copper said, his voice firm but not unfriendly, ‘we’ve arranged a nice cement bed for you down the Bridewell.’
