We'll All Be Burnt in Our Beds Some Night

by Joel Thomas Hynes

  They always told me I was gonna burn anyhow.

  Hepditch drones on, but if there’s one thing Johnny is good at, it’s tuning out all that bullshit the fuzz gets on with. Nothing coming out of his mouth that Johnny’s even remotely concerned about. Fucken Hepditch.

  Johnny is momentarily elated to find a little baggie on the floor next to the bed. No idea, no idea where it came from. Not gonna question it. He wets a finger and dips it down into the corner dregs of the bag. The tip of his finger comes out pinkish white with good healthy crumbs that he rubs onto his tongue and down the back of his throat cause he would not put anything up his nose in this town, not these days. He fancies he feels a fresh wave of clout and power before he can even close his mouth around his fingertip.

  Listen to me Hep . . .

  No you listen Johnny, you listen to me. It doesnt matter, you know as well as I, it doesnt matter if youre on the toilet or reading one of your little books or if youre asleep or balls-deep in your boyfriend, if you hear that phone ringing after 10 pm . . .

  What?

  . . . If you hear that phone ringing after 10 pm and you dont answer it, then we’ll have to assume youre out on the prowl and we’ll be down over that hill so fast you wont know what hit you. And you know well enough where you’ll be heading off to then.

  Saucy prick.

  Listen, Johnny goes, this is the third time tonight now you fellas called down, and I was in, sure, long before curfew tonight. What’s all the hassle about tonight?

  This bit about it being the third call, this bit’s not true. But Johnny figures where it’s after twelve the shifts must have changed hands by now and unless Hepditch, fucken twat, is going sniffin around for the truth and then makin a big deal of it when he finds out that Johnny is lying, and sendin the old brigade down the hill to sort him out even though here he is where he’s supposed to be . . . well it’s all a gamble when youre talkin to this crowd. But maybe it’s an easy thing for the lads to check on, who knows. Flip through a clipboard, something simple. Who knows. Roll the dice, Johnny. They knows pretty much every word they’re told is lies, but they have to pretend some of it is the truth every once in a while, to keep from cracking up.

  Hepditch goes quiet on the line for a bit.

  Maybe he’s in a bigshot mood. But I can hear the rattle in his chest. Johnny gets a glimpse of his own reflection in the edge of a picture frame on the wall. Pulsing purple worms busting outta his forehead. Come on Johnny, fuck sakes. The picture in the frame is of some chunky tattooed circus gal from way back when, standin next to a zebra, of all things. That was already on the wall, the picture, when I took the room. Mike Quinn’s idea of decor, fine upstanding landlord that he is.

  Hepditch lets out the big long sigh and goes:

  Alright Johnny. We’ll let it go. Youre in now. But dont think we wont be down over that hill in a heartbeat. You dont wanna spend the rest of it down by the lake do you?

  Johnny’s quiet then. He’s not gonna give him nothing, not gonna make him feel like he’s grateful. Johnny’s the one who conned him. Fuck you Hep, yeah I was out on the street tryna start a racket, lookin for action. Whatcha gonna do about it? Twat. And if he wasnt a fucken twat he wouldnt be stuck in the station on the night shift answering phones. He’d be out catching the bad guys.

  Alright Johnny?

  Best kind.

  Johnny hangs up then. Pig fucken shit. Pigeons. Fuck sakes.

  Pacing then.

  Scratching.

  Sweats.

  Six steps across and nine down. Six by nine. Nine by six. The cot in the corner. A fucken cot. Madonna down there in her cushy queen bed. My bed. Johnny only lugged the fucken thing on his back all the way from Hamilton Avenue. Swiped two sets of sheets and pillowcases in the mall and even got one of them fancy blanket cover thingys. Christ. Now he’s tossin and turnin every night on a rusted old squeaky folding cot with not enough room for two cats to fuck on. This is . . . this is . . . What the fuck is going on Johnny, what’s happening? Where’re ya going? No smoking. Christ. Had the TV for a while, but hadda turn it in last week. Twenty bucks. What can you do? No batteries for the radio and the plug is ruined on it cause Johnny hadda use it for something else that no one needs to know nothing about. Not even a pen and paper, cant even write a letter to old Stevie in the Big House on the mainland. Long time since. Guitar turned in too. Seventy-five bucks! How long did that last?

  At least though, if I was down by the lake, banged up down in the Palace, down in HMP, there might be TV with the full cable out in the hallway, at least. Might be. And there’d be no fucker tellin Johnny what he could or couldnt watch neither. Or how loud. Roam around a bit. Down the hallway. Off to the weights. Library even. White fucken Fang! Not like Johnny never read it seven times, the only book to his name. That was here in the room too. Fucken Hepditch. Yeah, all your meals fixed, right outta the Queen’s kitchen, right outta Her Majesty’s back pantry, that’s what they feeds ya down there. Jesus. Not to say Johnny’d rather be banged up, but just to say it’s not far off, this situation he’s in now. Here’s what it is—in the house from 10 pm and not allowed out until 7 the next morning. Sounds pretty cut and dry? Sounds like a simple set-up, no? But you never know when they’re gonna call down, see, that’s the problem. There’s no pattern to it. And you knows bloody well there’s some nosey old-timer, say McFlabberguts, across the street now, who sees every move anybody makes and calls the cops or the city or the fucken cable company whenever the notion strikes. And if Johnny dont answer the phone then the cavalry comes roaring down the hill. And if the Boys in Black shows up they means business and it’s a one-way trip to the clink for Johnny, no questions asked. Toss a little breach of undertaking into the mix with the rest of the charges and away we go. And he cant smoke here in the house. Quinn dont want no one smoking, he’s got alarms all over the place. Think he’d want the nicotine to mask the stench of the rot and mould. They says it’s an insurance thing now, with boarding houses. But maybe it’s that Quinn’s an evil fuck. And there’s some beast in the room opposite Johnny’s that can be heard grunting his way through all manner of self-abuse every other night and it’s a wonder he got either scrap of flesh left on his lad atall. So what’s the difference, after 10 pm at least, what’s the difference between this and the clink? None. Fuck all. Except I spose you got no screws shining their lights on you every hour on the hour to make sure youre breathing, that youre not after kneeling onto your towel, not after turning yourself into another media shitstorm.

  But here, listen to this—it takes a good ten hours across the Island, right? Say Johnny had a run lined up and he left the house at 7 am. Say he left on a day he never had to sign in. Well he’d be across the Island and boarding the boat by the time they figured he was gone. Come curfew time and Johnny’s halfways between North Sydney and Port aux Basques sipping a few cold ones and chatting up a couple of travelling hippie dolls. But youd have to make your move, you couldnt hesitate. He who hesitates is fucked. Cause if you didnt make the boat that very evening then they’d be watchin it, they’d be watchin for you. One chance. Then off to the mainland. What’s-his-face is shacked up with some missus in Dartmouth, told Johnny his door is always open. There’s places to go. Johnny knows a few bodies up around New Brunswick who can get him sorted out with a few new name cards and maybe a cash job. Stay away from anyone from home, that’s all you have to do. No sense being on the run from Newfoundland and then going up away and falling in with a bunch of em. Youre askin for it then. No, carry on smart about it all, right across the country. Vanish onto the streets of Vancouver, get a nice pad, off to work in the morning, keeping the head down, get a missus on the go. Go to that beach on the weekends. That beach Madonna was always on about, what was the name of it? Some bible name, I cant remember. Fuck her and her beach. Bake in the sun. Never look back. Wait it out.

  Federal, that’s what Johnny’s lookin at anyhow. Three to five they says. That’s Dorchester. That’s the jungle. And
for what? What for? That’s what Johnny wants to know. What do they got? Nothing. They got fuck all on Johnny. One of the good guys, that’s Johnny, even got that commendation ceremony thing coming up next month. So, fuck man. What have they got? I mean yes, Johnny might be a bit hardcore, meaning that if you fucks with him he’ll take you down and fucken down. But not without good reason. Not just for kicks. There’s a difference.

  She walked right into the teapot. She did. She picked up Johnny’s guitar and was going smashing it. His guitar, you know. Fuck. She swung it at him. And he picks up the teapot then, her grandmother’s teapot that she carted with her all the way from BC. Made like he was gonna smash it. Figured no jeezly way she’d call him on that. But Christ, she takes a run at Johnny then and cracks her face right off the teapot and bashes it in bits all over the floor. Big gash on her head. That’s. What. Happened. That’s the true story of Johnny’s latest plunge. Hard to grasp, but there you have it. Cause, come on, Johnny knows you dont hit a woman, that’s something he’s smart about. Not with a teapot. So, right, poor shocked Johnny with his fingers still bandaged and blazing itchy, he runs to the sink for a cloth, and dont she start in squelching and blaring. He grabs ahold to her shoulders and tries to get her over to the sink, right, cause of the blood. Man oh man, the blood. She keeps fighting him, tryna make it seem like he’s restraining her or something, but that’s not the way it went down, not atall. She starts in screamin for help. There’s blood everywhere, all over Johnny’s shirt, thick and greasy like oil all over the floor, and she’s so loud and high-pitched with the blood running down her face, and then there’s someone pounding on the front door and she gets away and makes a run for the doorway all howlin and sobbin and Johnny standin there covered in her blood with teapot shrapnel all over the counter and the floor and they even found some afterwards in his hair. And there at the door, there’s that old bag McFlabberguts from up on the hill, who lives right directly across from Johnny’s new digs now. She keeps the shop up the road and because she gobbles back the raw bologna by the ten-pound stick day in, day out, well she thinks she can tell it all at a glance, what’s going on. And away the two of em goes, scrambling to get clear of the blood-soaked madman with the telltale scarlet cloth, standing in the cloud of steam rising from the sink and the stink of blood and baked rock in the air. Johnny runs to the door and sees the two of em jostling up the hill like the Russians were coming, and Madonna moanin and cryin and attracting all kinds of attention. But listen to this part, just listen, she looks back at Johnny and gives a smile. She smiles that smile. Really. Through the dust and the blood, as the song goes, she looked back and smiled at young John-John. She did. Like to say Youre so fucked now Johnny boy. One of those looks that can fucken haunt you to your dying day. You are going down. What a laugh, what a fucken laugh-riot, really, how they can snare you with the lips and the eyes and the sweet talk, the nice hairspray smells, ya know. Catch yourself wondering what in the fuck is she doing with the likes of me anyhow? Is she stunned? Is she off the head? Voices tellin her what to do? Did she get a bang on the skull? Is she recently escaped out of some institution? You catches yourself thinkin, man, she’s got that smile, and that thing with her hair, that kinda shine, that glow about herself. She could go anywhere, with anyone, walk into any room and point at any man there and walk off with him. So what the fuck is she doing with Johnny, with me? Ahh, but then they lays something like this in your lap. Running face first into a fucken teapot. And you finds out she was just attracted to her own kind—wasters like Johnny. You finds out that she really is off the head, only she’s likely ten times worse than she’s letting on.

  Poor Johnny.

  Poor Johnny, pour him a fucken stiff one.

  She’ll carry on though, find her way back to the top, get all her papers in order, her life all squared away with some fucker, some dope-slinger type more than likely. Fuck. Maybe not. Maybe she’ll head back to school or something, find some work somewhere. Fuck.

  Johnny went in then and changed up.

  Washed away as much of the blood as he could get at.

  You gotta think fast. Changed his shirt and put on a loose pair of jeans and lined the waistband with tobacco and a pack of papers and even a wrap of gear he tucked into the hem of the pocket and got out a needle and thread and stitched it in place. Not an easy task, threading a needle under them circumstances. That was at the other place, Johnny and Madonna’s place. They even had a fucken sewing kit.

  Then he sat and waited and sure enough, not ten minutes but there was four cars outside the door. Four cop cars now. All for Johnny. He didnt put up much of a fuss. That was not consistent, one of those times he faltered, we’ll say. Oh yeah, he tried tellin em his side of the story, but it didnt matter a fuck. And yes, yes, there he was with blood under the fingernails and chips of antique porcelain sprinkled across his scalp. Plus, dont know why, dont know why, but Johnny had the handle of the teapot in his hand when the fuzz showed up. Musta picked it up from the floor and was gawkin at it when they got there. That was stunned. Priceless. Very reckless Johnny. Some might say fucken idiotic.

  She walked into it, he said. She walked head first into the teapot.

  How they all laughed at that, and Johnny almost joined in himself cause we all knows how retarded it sounds. Burnt right out. Christ. She walked into a teapot. Blood everywhere. This was only a few days after that story came out in the paper with that interview with the old couple from the fire, about Johnny being some sorta hero. So you knows now, the pigs, they had their fun making a big spectacle dragging Johnny off.

  And now the bloody curfew, the abstinence, signing in, waiting for court. Not allowed even so much as a glance in Madonna’s direction, not even if she was to show up tonight and beg Johnny for it, then he’s the one busted. That’s Johnny for ya. That’s his lot. Waiting to go on down the line. Real time. Highly likely too, he’s told. Told. Nothing definite, but it’s a strong possibility. That’ll be the third or fourth time now, gettin locked up. You dont wanna know, you dont want to know. But this time it’s the jungle. This time is prison. Not jail. Prison. This time it’s eyes to the floor and keep your fucken mouth shut or have it carved off you while youre taking a piss or having your breakfast or flicking through the channels. Wont be no reprieve, no special treatment just cause of who your old man is, that all ended when Stevie got sent down for a life bit. So, keep your mouth shut or it’s a pencil in the throat. The bottom of a Pepsi can ground into your eye. Good old chair across the skull. Q-tip jabbed in through your eardrum. The hem of a blanket noosed round your throat from behind. TV adapter stuffed into a sock and welted into your kidneys. Handle of a toothbrush ground down to a needlepoint and drove into your guts. Fucken swarmed by . . . but hold on now, wait Johnny, hold up. Come on. Dont go gettin all twisted up about it. What have they got? What have they got on ya Johnny? Nothing. Sweet fuck all.

  She walked into a teapot.

  That’s the truth and that’s all they got.

  Anyhow, have to wait and see if she even makes an appearance in court. Knowing Madonna. The states she likes to get herself in these days. Cant exactly see her up with the sun. Yeah, Johnny’s got his doubts. And whose doubts are they? All Johnny’s. No one else’s. At least he’s got that. But see now if she does show, wont that be a circus? And she will too, you just watch. She’ll be there with her hair all done and the makeup, lookin right fresh-faced and innocent, fancy skirt, high heels. And what the fuck is Johnny gonna wear? It’ll be all about the contrast, wont it? But watch when she dont show up. Cause she might not, knowing her. And that’s Johnny off with it then. That’s you off Johnny. Off and gone. Right to the boat. Right across the country.

  Johnny picks up the little baggie again and pops it into his mouth and sucks on it, sucking on it. Like he would her, if she made an appearance tonight. He would suck and suck and he would not let up. Bygones. Yes, we’ll be off to court the week, but for tonight, just for tonight, it’s all away in the past. He’d la
y her down there on the cot and forgive and forget all night long.

  And that’s alright Johnny, nothing to be ashamed of.

  Wait now, there’s Pigeonshit, the mouse man, the garbage lad next door again.

  He’s tapping something onto the wall. Tap tap tap. Putting stuff up, pictures, art. Decor. Atmosphere. Dont tell Johnny, dont bother. Here he’s got seven smokes left. Seven rancid Number 7s. That’ll do. That’ll do. Where’s Shiner, the prick? Where’s Shiner at? Musta slipped her mind, little Susie. Johnny leans out the window again to see what he can see. There goes old one-lung Tom around the block again, trying, tryna wind himself down into the arms of some version of a sleep. But not since the wife died, no, not since the wife went. Johnny sparks up another smoke and jumped-up fuck if the little mouse man next door aint out leant up against his rig with the boots all laced up and the hood over his head. Standin there. Leaning.

  You wait right there, Johnny goes.

  Buddy dont answer.

  Hey!

  He looks up at Johnny.

  Wait right there, Johnny tells him, I’ll come down for a chat, hang on.

  I dont even know you man, I was just saying hello earlier, I dont . . .

  Dont play the role now, little fella, dont play the role, come on now.

  Pretty bad, he goes, I cant put my trash out, cant come out in front of my own home without . . .

  Without what? Someone wanting to have a chat with you? You must be right popular are ya?

  Trash, he calls it. Hear that Johnny? Trash.

  Johnny offers up a civilized wink to let buddy know it’s all just a bit of fun, a bit of arsing around. But is it?

  Listen buddy, lookit here, it’d take me not two seconds to get into your house if I wanted to. Two fucken seconds.

  That stirs buddy up some, he dont like to hear that sorta talk.

  I have a little two-year-old in there, he goes, asleep.

  Oh man, fuck that pisses Johnny off, fellas hiding behind youngsters like that.