by Nick Jones
‘No, Vinny,’ I say, determined, ‘absolutely not… no way.’
He looks like I just smashed his favourite toy. ‘But I’m involved now,’ he says flatly. ‘And it’s the sixties… I know all about the villains and stuff.’
‘I can’t drag you into this.’
‘You dragged Alexia.’
‘No, I don’t mean that –’
‘I know I’m bigger.’ Vinny pats his considerable tummy. ‘Is mass an issue?’
‘I don’t know.’ I stare at him. ‘But this isn’t your problem. It’s dangerous.’
‘It’s not all about you, you know.’
I blink. It’s the first time I’ve seen him angry.
‘I’ve been waiting for this my whole life.’ He stares at me, eyes shimmering. ‘I’m so bored, I need an adventure before it’s too late, before I get too old. I need this.’ His hands are in tight fists. ‘At least think about it. Please?’
I stare at him and reluctantly nod. I have no intention of dragging Vinny into this (literally), but for now, agreeing to think about it seems like the best option.
‘Right,’ he says, ‘time for a nightcap and a spot of supper I think. Coming in?’
I can’t see straight let alone think straight. I shake my head.
He nods. ‘I’ll do some research. I need to watch every London gangster film ever made.’ He grins. ‘Not bad homework. Call me if you’re going to…’ he narrows his gaze, ‘you know… go.’
I laugh. ‘I will.’
‘I mean it, call me, okay? You’ve trusted me with this. A problem shared is a problem doubled. It’s what friends are for.’
I’m not sure he’s got that quite right – but I’m drunk so who cares.
Vinny skips up the steps like a man half his size. ‘See ya later, alligator.’
I turn for home. Cheltenham is inside a snow globe; the air sparkles with glittering flakes of dusty white.
I check my nervous tick. Still no sign of life, but it does the basic job of telling me that I might turn into a pumpkin soon. I’m so drunk I have to think through my route home carefully. I cut through a park, the ground dusted with snow.
Telling Vinny was such a relief. Just knowing that he knows helps somehow. It reminds me of something Paul McCartney said about the early years of The Beatles, how they managed during the madness of Beatlemania. He said they always had each other’s backs, they helped each other keep it real.
For a while, I was the only member of Joseph Bridgeman’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. But now Vinny has joined, and let me tell you, it makes a hell of a difference. I don’t feel so alone.
I hear footsteps behind me.
I’m not alone.
I risk a glance behind me and see a man in a leather jacket, casting a colossal shadow over the park. He looks like a rhino. I’m just drunk and paranoid, I tell myself. He’s not following me.
Six deliberate turns later and it’s confirmed. He is.
I break into a staggering run. The rhino starts running too.
Vinny was right about double trouble after all.
Chapter Thirty-Six
I have an embarrassing, lolloping stride. My feet slap the pavement, my eyes are streaked with tears, blurring my vision. My heart pounds lightning directly into my skull. I’m just not designed for this.
Conversely, the squat rhino behind me hits the ground rhythmically. He clearly plays rugby and is closing in on the opposition. I wipe beads of icy sweat from my brow.
‘Oi, mate!’ he bellows with a hint of a Birmingham accent. ‘Slow down, I just wanna talk to you.’
Bit of advice: when a pursuer says things like that, the talking doesn’t last long, and for clarity, they are not your mate.
‘I’m not gonna hurt you!’ he shouts.
That means he is.
I do not like the way this is going.
Not far now. I screech around the final corner and see an oasis. Bridgeman Antiques. I lean against the door, fumble the keys out of my pocket and promptly drop them.
Arghhhh.
I lean down, feeling as though I might faint. Boozing and running is a pukey cocktail. I scrabble around and find the keys, snow biting at my fingers.
My pursuer weaves around the corner like he’s on rails, now less than twenty feet away. The key doesn’t fit. What the hell? I realise it’s upside down. Swearing, I finally slide the key into the lock, dive through the door and slam it behind me. I click the safety down, which feels pathetically small, and then stagger back into the darkness. I trip, grab hold of something soft and fluffy, dance with a stuffed bear for a moment and then slam to the floor.
I cower in the dark, panting.
Rhinoman peers in through the shop window, his breath clouding the glass like white ink blots. My original estimation of him was about right. He is built like a concrete poo-house. He begins to pace, like a wild animal, rubbing his forehead angrily. He’s saying stuff, but I can’t make out the details. He doesn’t sound happy. Suddenly he’s back at the glass.
Thud! He kicks the door, so hard I think it’s going to shatter.
I was never good at making friends, but the bonus of that is you don’t make any enemies either, because enemies are just friends that didn’t work out. Another bang, followed by a worryingly loud crack, like an ice shelf moving. The glass is giving way.
Time to move. I slide along the floor, crawl under a table and hide in the dark, shivering. Drawing my knees up, I do my best to become as small as I possibly can.
Hiding under a table. Look, I’m not proud, but regression happens fast and anyway, it kind of works. I close my eyes and rock. I just wish the room would stop spinning.
Rhinoman grits his teeth, eyes scanning the shop. ‘Bridgeman!’ he barks. ‘Come out here, fight like a man!’
“Just want to talk” my arse. I suppose he could have guessed my name from the shop, but I doubt it. I think I’ve found another of Previous Joe’s many admirers. I need to start a list.
Okay, I tell myself, don’t panic.
Every time he kicks the door, the glass wobbles worryingly in the wooden frame. That front door could have been my head. I was bullied a lot as a kid, I know all about being a human football. I begin to panic. He starts smacking it with the flat of his hand. ‘You can’t hide forever,’ the rhino says. ‘I know what’s going on.’
‘At least someone does,’ I mutter. I lick my lips, draw in a deep breath and shout as loud as I can. ‘I’ve called the police!’
Rhinoman shakes his head. ‘This isn’t over. I’m going to kill you for what you’ve done!’
The threat of police and a vandalised door seems to have knocked some sense into his thick-looking skull. He gives it one more kick for good measure and then stalks off, shouting.
I lie in silence for a while and eventually pluck up the courage to check all the doors, vowing to learn the intricacies of my complicated-looking alarm system.
I’m hit by a tidal wave of exhaustion. It’s all-consuming. I can almost hear my bed calling. My head continues to pound. Ever get that feeling when you’re hungover, but realise with horror that the hangover has started before you’ve gone to sleep?
Not good.
I head to the bedroom and collapse onto the bed.
As always, I’m convinced I won’t sleep, but within minutes sleep arrives and, perhaps not surprisingly, so does a viewing.
I tumble into the past, strapped in and helpless like a kid on a fairground ride. I can practically see the barn doors of time flip open and, with a scream, my carriage enters a viewing.
All aboard the ghost train.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
I’m in the lounge of a classic 1950s two-up two-down house. On the walls, pictures hang from hooks. The place is meticulously clean and tidy, ornaments placed on doilies, every surface polished.
Although it’s light outside, the curtains are drawn, which lends the room a feeling of sickness or bereavement. The room is lit by a single table lamp. In th
e corner of the room is an armchair positioned in front of a blocky fireplace, cream bricks stacked up like a pyramid. There is a woman in the chair, next to her a white trolley, the kind you might see in a hospital. On the trolley is a china teapot, a cup and a bottle of pills.
I take a step towards her and feel the beginnings of emotion bleed into the viewing.
It’s almost as though I am a magnet swinging above iron filings. With each step, I gather up a little more of the emotion. I feel a confusing sense of embarrassment, yet somehow it makes me feel more determined.
I am here to persuade this woman of something.
She looks up, brow furrowed. She’s in her late 60s. She has a long face, high cheekbones that drop into sagging jowls. Age has cut thick lines down her cheeks, contouring down to a pointed chin. Her hair is grey with hints of auburn from years gone by. She blinks, her beady black eyes taking me in.
‘Where have you been?’ she asks, lips peeling back. Her voice is deeper than it should be and crackles with years of tobacco abuse.
I draw a breath. ‘I’ve been taking care of business, Ma.’
She lets out a sarcastic little laugh as she taps a long cigarette from a silver box. She pops it expertly into her mouth and sucks wildly, illuminating her face orange for a second. ‘Little Frankie, taking care of business.’ She exhales clouds of smoke.
Frankie. I’m Frankie Shaw…! God help me.
‘Someone has to,’ I say, voice contained.
She nods and glances at a photograph on the mantelpiece, a dark-haired man who looks like Cary Grant. I look around the room; there are more, all of the same man.
It must be Tommy, Frankie’s brother.
‘I do love you,’ she murmurs, ‘you must know that.’ She isn’t talking to me.
I kneel down in front of her, trying to ignore the smell of her ashtray, which is stacked high with butts. ‘Face it, we’re in trouble. The firm needs leadership. We need to expand, this isn’t the time for playing small.’ My fingers dig into my palms, my voice grows louder. ‘We could grow, do all the things we talked about.’
She blinks, staring down at her hands. ‘All the things we talked about,’ she says quietly. Slowly, she looks up and stares at me; her tongue explores her lower lip. Her lipstick looks like cracked orange mud, freshly soaked in rain. Her lips set in a thin line and then she begins to laugh. ‘Oh yeah, and who’s going to do all that, Frankie? You?’ She draws hard on her cigarette, continuing to laugh. This sets her hacking.
I notice her skin, pale as the moon and dotted with liver spots. She wipes tears away. ‘Sorry, Frankie,’ she says, although she seems more amused than sorry. ‘It’s good, you got your father’s spirit, God rest his soul.’ She looks up and crosses herself and then snaps her knowing gaze back onto me. ‘Do you know how I carried on when your father died?’
I don’t speak. She doesn’t need me to; she’s going to share anyway.
Her gaze drifts off as she reminisces. ‘I didn’t want you losing your way, I did it for you, I did everything for you.’ Her attention settles back on her beloved picture. ‘He was a good boy.’ She continues to suck on her cigarette like it’s the secret to life and continues her monologue, seemingly unaware I’m still in the room. ‘Like your father, Tommy got the brawn, and I had the brains. You’ve got spirit, son, I’ll give you that, but you aren’t…’ She trails off. ‘And now where are we? Don’t you see, we’re nothing without him, sweetheart, they’ve won for now.’ She glances up at me. ‘Do you understand?’
I grit my teeth. ‘No, I don’t think I do.’ My voice is distant, flat. My fingernails have broken the skin of my palms. The warm rush of blood feels good.
She is undeterred. ‘Well, it doesn’t matter, sweetheart. They’ve got one over on us but the Shaws are resilient, we always have been. We need to be patient and when they least expect it… when…’ She trails off, lost again.
Her lack of spirit is all-consuming, it’s crushing me. She is supposed to be the one who is strong. In this game, if you show weakness then you’re done. My emotional magnet picks up speed. Frankie’s thoughts bleed into me now like water desperate to break a dam. I detest her sad pathetic face, feel something building. Anger, repulsion. I resent her.
No. Something else, but what?
‘I can’t stand to see you like this.’
‘Like what?’
‘You’re lost,’ I snap at the words. ‘What would dad say? What would Tommy say?’
I have to squeeze my hands into fists to stop myself shaking. The words fly, released. ‘We need to hit them back,’ I growl, ‘make them pay for what they did to Tommy.’
My mother, Rita Shaw, looks confused. She curls her lip. ‘Did to Tommy?’ she snorts. ‘What are you talking about? He’s coming back.’
I breathe in and out. ‘No, he isn’t, Ma.’
Feelings crash over me, a life of being held back mixed with anger; a heady cocktail that becomes pure rage. She doesn’t seem to sense what lies beneath the surface. She looks up at me, black eyes sharp and studious beneath their swollen hoods. She lifts her chin, the lines on her neck strain.
‘Until Tommy comes back,’ she says, expression stony, ‘I’m putting Roy in charge.’
The volcano erupts. The words spill out of me, ‘Roy Nash, are you fucking kidding me? He’s a frigging bean counter. You do that and we’re properly sunk!’
Somewhere, hidden in the soft canvas of her face, a bitter, mocking smile takes shape. She looks sad, pitiful. ‘I can’t lose you, Frankie,’ she sighs.
That’s not the reason; it’s a pathetic excuse that she’s used once too often.
An unexpected calm floods me. I feel my heart-rate drop. ‘What did Roy say?’ I ask.
‘I wanted to tell you first.’ She smiles. ‘We can tell Roy together.’ She’s telling the truth, it only takes milliseconds to know when it’s family. ‘Roy will decide what’s best until Tommy comes back.’
I try to think, but my mind gets scrambled up sometimes. Tommy used to say it was because I was too smart, there was too much in there. He used to say, ‘That red noggin of yours is glowing.’
I frown. Tommy was allowed to say that, but if anyone else dared they would have got their teeth delivered to the back of their throat. I stare at my mother. Rita Shaw. Once feared, but now a laughing stock. She won’t change her mind, which leaves only one option and that makes me sad.
‘I won’t let you do this.’ My voice is no longer shaking. It’s cold. It’s new.
She fixes me with a well-practised, disdainful smile. ‘Listen, Frankie, you aren’t your brother, you haven’t got what it takes to go up against the Dickersons. You haven’t got what it takes to do anything except what you’re told, you never have. You –’
Before I know what I’m doing, my hands are around her neck. They are sticky with my own blood and grip her skin like leather on wood. I grit my teeth and tighten my grip, forcing her eyes to bulge. She tries to work her fingers between my hands. ‘What are you doing?’ she gasps, desperate and scared and finally awake.
Ironic. It’s all too late.
I can’t stop now, this needs to be done. ‘Tommy is gone and over my dead body will Roy-fucking-Nash run this family.’
She sneers and thrashes like a deer caught in a trap. Her nails dig into my wrists and the pain is white hot, instant. Her knee, sharp between my legs, sends a ball of sickening pain through me. I try to maintain my grip as she flails and knocks a framed picture of her beloved son onto the floor. The glass smashes and for a second both of us stop and stare at it. She looks horrified, as though it’s me who just killed Tommy and not some Dickerson bastard. She rasps, ‘There’s something wrong with you, there always was, you little runt.’ Her voice is scratchy and thin, she rubs her throat. ‘I should have drowned you at birth.’
A deep and complex hatred seeps through the veil of the viewing and I’m consumed. My mother embodies all I hate about the world: weakness, lack of respect, opportunities defeated. It�
�s all I need, my final inspiration. All doubt is banished. Her words are acid pouring into an ocean of love. They kill any hope of redemption.
Perhaps she sees something new in my expression because hers melts into the embodiment of shock, fear and surprise.
‘You say I haven’t got it in me,’ I growl.
She isn’t so sure now. I grab a nearby cushion and pounce on her with unknown speed. I grind it into her face. She slides down the chair, her screams now muffled. I use my full body weight to press her to the floor. She thrashes, grunts and tries to loosen my grip, but she’s light as a feather and I’m barely aware of her attempts to break free. Instead, I stare at the wall, focusing on one of the god-awful watercolours she likes so much. The painting is peaceful, a bridge over a river, a path leading somewhere new, the promised land perhaps.
It calms me. Keeps me solid and strong and resolute as she slips away.
An unknown amount of time later, the job is done, all the desperate thrashing is over. I pull back the pillow and feel nothing but relief. No remorse, just a feeling of contentment. Something needed doing and I took care of it.
Her mouth gapes, she looks like a lizard boiled on a rock. One of her eyes is shot with a starburst of blood. Once, there was a toughness in those eyes, a woman to be feared. Now, the light has gone out of them for good.
Spittle foams at the edges of her mouth.
I lean in and kiss her on the lips, lay her head back on the pillow, the one I used to smother her, and stub out her filthy, dirty cigarette in the ashtray.
I stroke her hair and laugh. It’s funny, I think. Her hair has been dead for a while, now the rest of her has caught up. Staring down at my murderous hands I notice how steady they are. I lick the blood from the ravines left by my mother’s nails, taste the bitterness of her perfume and also my blood, coppery and, in comparison, almost pleasant. I feel hungry, I have a keen thirst.
‘Killing suits me, Ma,’ I tell her lifeless body. ‘Time to get to work. I think I’ve finally found something I’m good at.’
