Mickey Take: When a debt goes bad...

by Steven Hayward

‘Do you honestly think I haven’t thought about that? Just once or twice…’ I say, before lowering my voice. ‘A thousand times since?’

  ‘Yeah, well,’ she whispers, getting into the car. ‘I thought we were being honest when we told each other the most outrageous things we’d ever done. You certainly win the prize now.’

  ‘I was hoping I wouldn’t have to tell you.’

  ‘What else are you hoping you won’t have to tell me, Mickey?’ She shuts the door and lowers the window.

  ‘There is nothing else.’

  ‘I need time to think,’ she says, starting the engine.

  ‘What are you going to do… about Herb?’

  ‘I really don’t know.’

  ‘He is your dad.’

  ‘Right now I don’t know how to feel about that. I don’t know how to feel about any of this.’

  ‘Is there anything I can do?’

  ‘I’ll call you, when I’m ready. But for now, just let me go… please.’ Before driving away she asks the one question I can’t answer. ‘I need to decide, Mickey. Will that be you in thirty years?’

  Dead Ahead

  Back in my car and a mile down the road, I can see the little red soft-top up ahead. At the next junction, rather than turning left, she drives straight on like she’s forgotten the way. Of course, I’m going to have to follow her before she gets lost altogether. So much for letting her go. She takes the next left. Easy mistake. I’m sure any moment she’ll pull over and do a U-turn. No, she goes straight ahead. There’s a sign for the motorway coming up. That’s it; we’ll get on at the next junction. She’ll be alright now; at the roundabout, first exit…

  Okay, she would have been alright. Instead she goes straight across. We’re now heading south-west rather than south-east, and I’m starting to lose my bearings. On we go until I start seeing familiar names of London suburbs ahead. This has to be the longest route home she could have chosen. And then I get it. The next list of destinations includes South Woodford. We’re heading back to Bleak House.

  She nips in and out of the busy traffic and I lose her before we even get close. I curse the fact my phone is dead and hers is back at my place. When I eventually turn into Bleak Avenue, a Chelsea Tractor attempting a three-point turn blocks my progress. The driver’s taking forever to manoeuvre the beast between all the cars that line the street. I think about leaving the engine running and getting to the house on foot.

  Before I can decide, I see Mac’s lumbering bulk emerge through the gap between the houses up ahead to my right. He runs along the pavement back towards the house and disappears out of view behind the four-by-four that’s still trying to turn in the road to get past me. The next thing I see is Grace hurtling out of the same alley, and I blast my horn. She turns long enough to see me.

  ‘Quick, he’s getting away!’ she yells. ‘Get after him.’

  The car in front is now starting to ease towards me, and the woman is gingerly guiding her front wing, millimetres from my bumper. I can’t wait any longer and her mouth drops when I suddenly wheel-spin away, taking a layer of paint with me from the side of her pride and joy. With a clear road ahead, I’m doing twenty when I pass Grace, running along the pavement. Ahead, I can see the red Mazda parked outside the house, and further up on the left is a silver saloon. By the time I see Mac between the trees and put my foot to the floor, I’m pushing forty. I know, once he’s in the Merc, that this old estate will be no contest, so my aim is to get ahead of it before him to stop him pulling out. The gearbox shifts up as I continue to accelerate, and I curse the fact it’s an automatic. But the needle’s approaching fifty as a wing-mirror goes pinging off from one of the cars on the left. I’m close enough to the Mercedes now to ease off, but just then Mac appears between parked cars ten yards ahead, and looks back towards me. He only has to cross the road and he’ll be in the car. I can’t let him get away again. I can see the whites of his eyes when he steps into the road. I’m now doing fifty-three and he still thinks he can make it. For me, it’s a split second decision. Brake. Or don’t brake.

  Sitting on the pavement some time later, with Grace holding me tight, I can’t remember which one I took. Does it matter? His head shattered the windscreen before his body was thrown halfway down the road. They’re still trying to remove one of his legs from under the engine.

  They found Simon in one of the chambers. Men with faces as white as their paper suits are bringing him out now. In body bags, one at a time.

  EPILOGUE

  Late October

  It’s over a month since I’ve seen or spoken to Grace. And I’m now getting to the point where I only think about her four times a day. I’ve avoided the temptation to contact her. It’s hard, knowing what she must be going through, wanting to offer some comfort, desperately hoping we can reconnect, even just to keep in touch, if only to be friends. But at the same time I have to respect her wish not to call; to accept she will call me if and when she’s ready, and accept that may mean she never does.

  Sam has split up with Dean. Apparently, he wasn’t looking for that level of commitment and now she’s crashing on a girlfriend’s sofa. She’s decided to rent a place nearer town and we’ve talked about formalising our separation. It makes sense and I’ve started tidying up the place, knowing that I’ll have to put it on the market.

  All of Grace’s things are back in her suitcase because I can’t bear to see them lying around anymore. When I went through my stuff, I ended up with a box full of confidential paperwork that needed to be destroyed; old bank statements and the like. I’m now in the garden where I’ve set up an old, cracked concrete planter as a make-shift incinerator. As most of the stuff is already blazing away, my mind starts to wander…

  I suppose I could have taken up Herb’s offer. We spoke on the phone a few days after and he said he’d also heard from Grace. She told him she’s glad they finally met but that’s as far as she wants to take it. He said there was a lot I could still do for him. He wanted me to take up the reins on the distribution side, while he concentrated on the offshore suppliers. That was the last I heard from him. After the police found a horde of his dodgy merchandise in the locked chamber, I suspect he went abroad. The fallout when they caught up with Riggs in Thailand sent shockwaves through even the legitimate side of the luxury brands market. Although there may now be fewer sharks in the shallow end, the water is becoming too transparent for a business model like that to survive. And there’s a new predator out there with bigger teeth, called Her Majesty’s Revenue & Customs. This time I’m glad I turned him down.

  During the forensic search of Bleak House, the contents of the second chamber turned out to be the least of my concerns. The recently-promoted Detective Inspector James Melville was interviewed on the BBC’s South East News the week after they dug up the concrete floor. I was eating liver and onions at Mum’s when it came on.

  ‘The most disturbing aspect of the grim discovery in Woodford,’ he said, ‘was the fact that the young man’s severed head was found inside a Gravesend High School holdall.’ As the owner of the house, Herb is now an international fugitive. And as the owner of the holdall, I’m struggling to sleep at night.

  In my dreams I hear a woman screaming and now I know it’s coming from inside the dungeon. I want to help her but each time I’m chased from the house by a pale young lad who waves something shiny at me through the kitchen window. It glistens like rubies in the night as I try to unsnag my bag from the barbed ledge of an overgrown fence, eventually letting it go and surrendering to a dark, endless drop…

  I can’t help smiling when I see the stack of yellow paper I’ve thrown absent-mindedly into the box of rubbish. I fan them out and add them to the fire. There’s something cathartic about watching my fake money burn.

  Next is a box of business cards with my name and former office embossed on them. I kneel and feed them into the fire a few at a time, mesmerised by the flames as they lick around the edges, slowly bending the corners before turning a vibrant gre
en as the heavy ink burns.

  ‘Hello lad,’ a voice whispers in my ear.

  Although it instantly makes my pulse race, it’s too soft to be threatening, and I spin around to see Grace beaming at me.

  ‘Bit early for Bonfire Night,’ she says, all bright and breezy. She’s wearing everyday blue jeans and a black puffy jacket. She looks great, but there’s something different; she seems somehow… unpolished.

  ‘Wow!’ I say, getting to my feet. ‘It’s great to see you.’ For weeks I’ve thought about what these first few seconds might be like, remembering some of the hesitant greetings we’ve shared before and reflecting on the fact that at first she was just acting, intentionally flattering me, with ulterior motives. I’m no longer sure what to expect from her, and so I’ve promised The Banker I’d keep my guard up. Her smile is warm and genuine and as I get up I want to take her in my arms and kiss her, but I manage to resist. Instead of offering an embrace, she takes my hands in hers and squeezes them gently.

  ‘So how have you been?’ I say, leading her across to the patio.

  ‘Okay,’ she says, but her eyes aren’t convincing.

  ‘Good. Me too.’ I lift a couple of plastic chairs off the stack and we sit down in the autumn sunshine. ‘At least I was, once the CPS decided not to prosecute for the... you know.’

  ‘Yeah, good riddance to that creep,’ she says. ‘Jim told me they’ve started reviewing missing persons’ cold cases going back thirty years. Sounds like you did them a favour.’

  ‘Doesn’t feel good though.’

  ‘No. I know. I’ve been feeling terrible too,’ she says, and her mouth quivers. She takes a deep breath. ‘About taking Terry’s money all these years and keeping my mouth shut. All along, he’s been getting it from the man who killed my mother. I feel just as guilty.’

  ‘But Grace, you didn’t know that.’

  ‘That doesn’t change anything,’ she says shaking her head. ‘I’ve had to get rid of everything he ever paid for. The police came and took a lot of stuff and most of what they left, including half my wardrobe, I took to the charity shop.’

  ‘Not the black dress!’ I wink at her, but she suppresses even a guilty smile.

  ‘No. I’m saying I paid for that from my own money,’ she says and then adds with an ironic laugh, ‘Who am I kidding? Everything I have and all the money I get derives from him.’

  ‘Grace, no. You mustn’t think that way. What about all the work you’ve done, your training, running a business, employing people…? You’ve put a hell of a lot into it; don’t underestimate how much of it is rightfully yours.’ She’s nodding her head and I think I can see a glimmer of light in the depths of her eyes and I try to reel it in. ‘And that’s before you even consider all those sad lily-white people you’ve sent out with a happy bronze smile on their faces!’

  ‘I suppose you’re right,’ she says, and when the sparkle breaks through it’s a whopper. ‘Thank you Mickey, I’ve missed you.’

  ‘I missed you too,’ I say and squeeze her hand.

  ‘I’m still waiting to hear what’s going to happen about the flat,’ she says with a sigh. ‘It’ll probably have to be sold.’

  ‘That sounds familiar.’

  ‘Why, what’s happened?’

  ‘Well, I can’t afford to keep the house and settle up with Sam, now we’ve decided to formalise the separation.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she says.

  ‘I spoke to her on the phone. It was all very confusing. I didn’t know what to think. She seemed sad and distant, but there was something else. She was a different person to the one I knew. But then, I’ve probably changed too.’

  ‘Did you tell her about us?’

  ‘No, it didn’t feel right. Besides, I didn’t know what to say… You know, about us.’ She looks back at me and nods. ‘Anyway, after I put the phone down, I realised there was no going back. I rang her the next day and told her I wanted a divorce. We agreed to keep it clean and simple – irreconcilable differences, no other parties, everything split down the middle. We’re meeting next week to go through it all and get the house on the market.’

  ‘I’m sure it’ll be for the best,’ she says.

  ‘You will get half the money from your flat, right?’

  ‘At the moment I don’t know if I’ll be entitled to any of it.’

  ‘Really? What about your car?’

  ‘That’s already gone. They’re calling it all the… proceeds of crime,’ she says. ‘Next thing is what they’re going to decide about the salon.’

  ‘No! Surely they have to leave you with something,’ I say and Grace sits forward, shaking her head. ‘That’s your livelihood. They can’t take that away from you. I won’t let them.’

  ‘We’ll have to wait and see.’ She relaxes back into her chair.

  ‘What about Melville? I’ll talk to him; he wouldn’t let you lose out like that.’

  ‘I already spoke to Jim and he’s going to see what he can do,’ she says. ‘But I can’t keep expecting special treatment.’

  ‘I understand how you feel, Grace, but like I said, you’ve worked hard to make a go of it. It would be crazy if they couldn’t see that.’

  ‘I know. But it was all a sham from the start. I’ve had to go right back to the beginning and find out who I really am. If I have to start again, at least this time I’ll be doing it my own way.’

  ‘Looks like we’ve ended up in the same boat.’

  ‘Nice to have you on board,’ she says, breaking out in a smile before getting up and leading me back across the garden by the hand. ‘I’ve got something else to keep your bonfire going.’

  ‘Really,’ I say. ‘What is it?’

  She reaches into her pocket and produces an envelope that she hands to me. ‘Look at the postmark,’ she says as I’m about to open it.

  The envelope is franked across the corner of a brightly-coloured stamp depicting a tiger, and I can barely make out the words Hong Kong. It’s dated a week ago. Inside is the photograph of her mum that we first saw in Bleak House and a letter that she encourages me to read out loud.

  Jasmine,

  Perhaps it was too much to wish you would want to take the path I offered you. I hope you will understand it is all I have to give. Your mother wouldn’t have approved of the life I have led or the opportunity I have given to you. It will remain yours to take should you ever change your mind. Believe that I once was, and would still be, a better person with her at my side, but I think she was busy all those years watching over you. I know she would be so proud of you. How you came to be known as Grace must have had something to do with her. You have her eyes and her strength. I wish I could come to know you better because I am sure I would find her spirit alive within you. I will need to stay away for a while and maybe it’s better for you that I do. If you never want to hear from me again, I will understand.

  Mickey is a good man, if in some ways much like me before I met your mother – too eager to bend with the breeze, too easily led. That remains his greatest strength and weakness in equal measure. Like she was briefly to me, you can be the wind that blows him towards a better course if you choose. If you leave him adrift, he will no doubt be drawn back in my direction. Either way, I would be content. And if he makes you happy, I would be happy too. His efforts went unrewarded and that is not my way, but if you decide to stay with him I would consider my debt repaid.

  Remember, this all started from your mother’s things. Perhaps it might be better to think of him as a gift from her.

  H

  I look up and her face has a serene look of strength and pride. Gone are the sadness and the tears at the references to her mother. When I hand it back to her, she keeps the photo and drops the letter onto the fire.

  As the blue paper scorches to brown and the flames engulf it, she takes a large brown envelope from inside her jacket and tells me to burn that too while she goes indoors to make us coffee.

  I empty the envelope, letting it fall into the flames
and look at each photograph before adding them. For one last time, the glow near the bottom of one of the pictures lights up the face of the young girl out celebrating on the eve of her birthday and of a new millennium. I’m loath to burn the larger print of the portrait labelled: “Example of a True-Life Likeness – Model in Repose”. It goes on the fire anyway. But only after I’ve looked furtively towards the house and slipped the smaller version into my coat pocket.

  The remaining items from my box go on last. They cling together but catch quickly and curl in the heat, twisting and objecting, as if wanting to free themselves from the flames. They represent a side of me I’ve had to confront a lot recently. I decided to reject them in the hope I can finally shed the demons I’ve allowed to tempt me all my life. Yes, the girl from Compliance was right to be suspicious all those months ago. Taking them was a stupid act of impulse and perhaps should have been a warning of what was to follow. They were the last three in the book and I thought when the new one was started no one would miss them. Of course I should have realised, Rick’s attention to detail was the reason he was the boss. No sooner had he spotted the gap, he stopped them anyway. I threw away my job for absolutely nothing. I watch as the three cheques blacken and disintegrate, their grey smoke drifting up in spirals.

  As the flames subside, I stoke the smouldering remains with a stick and blow gently into the glowing embers, bringing them briefly back to life until all that’s left in the bottom of the tub is ash that I render into grey powder with the heel of my boot.

  When I get upstairs, Grace is sitting in the lounge. She hands me a mug and I join her on the sofa.

  ‘So what now?’ I ask.

  ‘Okay, Mickey. No more games. No more mysteries.’ She sits upright, the tone of her voice having changed. ‘I want you to know I’ve missed you, and I like you a lot. I think I want you. But I need to understand who you really are.’