Force Of Habit v5

by Robert Bartlett

  The guy was done in seconds. Back on his feet, rope out in front of him, pulling it taut, showing how well it held. He showed Rawlins the harness on the other end. Showed him how short the rope between them was. How safe it was. How it would stop him if he went over the side while wearing it. He approached with his arms out. Placid. Unthreatening.

  Sixty seconds.

  North couldn't see anything different up on the road crossing the bridge. He kept glancing up and down, arch-bridge-arch. He focussed on his counting. Was he going too fast? Too slow? What about the guy up top?

  Seventy seconds.

  The guy above started moving towards Rawlins with the harness held out in front of him. Rawlins took another step back.

  Eighty seconds.

  North couldn't take his eyes from the top of the arch. He stopped counting. The rescue guy rushed forward. He launched the harness and it hit Rawlins square in the chest. The man kept at him and Rawlins was caught on the back foot as he fought for balance.

  They both went over the edge.

  Rawlins screamed and watched, bug-eyed, as the other man was lifted up and away to safety as he plummeted down towards the road. He didn't have time to piss himself. His addled brain had barely registered what was happening when he hit the surface. He was sucked inside a giant airbag, forty feet square and fifteen feet high, capable of receiving several hundred pounds dropping onto it from up to two-hundred and fifty feet. The whole thing inflated in just one hundred seconds.

  North jumped into his car.

  TWENTY

  ‘What’s happening?’

  His voice was slurred and distant. His vision blurred. ‘What’s going on?’ Everything was foggy. He felt sick. ‘What’s happening?’

  Hands touched him. Words were spoken. He couldn’t make them out but it was a woman’s voice. He was lying on his back. Why was he lying on his back? Something was pressed to his mouth. More words. Something went inside his mouth. He flinched and pulled away. A freight train smashed into his head. He threw up. Nothing came out.

  ‘Relax, Inspector North, I am trying to help you. You have a concussion. Here,’ something came to his mouth again, ‘take these, they will help.’

  He swallowed. Lay still. Listened to the sounds. When the pain subsided he tried opening his eyes. No one tried to poke them out this time. He was lying up off the ground. On a trolley. There was a metal bar on the bed. A curtain. An old dear in a uniform. Not a policewoman. He closed his eyes again. Tried to think through the fog. It was surreal.

  The bridge.

  Rawlins!

  What had happened?

  He sat up, eyes wide and another train slammed home. He cursed. The voice told him to take it easy. He took stock. He was lying in a bed. An old dear was busying herself at the bottom of it. A nurse. He was in hospital. He realised that his left arm and shoulder were bandaged.

  ‘What happened to my arm?’

  ‘You got bingo winged.’

  ‘What?’ He felt like he was on Lumsden’s h.

  ‘You’ve got a tear straight across the fleshy part of your upper arm but it isn’t anything to worry about. There was more damage to your clothing than your arm - at least it would take more stitches to fix them up than it did your arm. It will be the devil to get all that blood out though. You are quite the bleeder, I didn't think you were ever going to stop, but there isn't much of a scar to add to your fine collection, I’m happy to say.’

  ‘But I'm in good shape. I don't have bingo wings.’

  She looked at him like she was seeing him for the first time.

  ‘Now there’s a surprise. You don't strike me as the vane type at all. In fact, you look like you've been letting yourself go for a while and that’s never good at your age.’

  She was taking the piss.

  ‘That's some bedside manner you have there, Sister.’ The fog was lifting. He raised himself onto his good arm. ‘I can't believe I passed out getting bingo-winged.’

  ‘You didn't. The bullet to your head knocked you unconscious.’

  North's hand went up and he felt another bandage.

  ‘I got shot? Twice? I got knocked out? I lost blood? Am I okay? Are the bullets out? What happened? Why didn't you tell me I'd been shot in the head instead of going on about bingo wings?’

  ‘Calm down, dear. I was trying to explain when you started freaking out on me with your ‘What’s happening?’ and your ‘Where am I’s and then you started going on about your arm.’

  What was it with these old dears?

  ‘It was the first thing I saw. What time is it? How long have I been out? What happened to Rawlins?’

  ‘You’ve been out for about six or seven hours’

  ‘Six or seven hours? Holy shit!’

  ‘I apologise for my friend, Sister,’ Mason came around the curtain.

  ‘He's big enough to be apologising for himself. I'd be inclined to think that he was ill-mannered but after the fright he must just have had I will give him the benefit of the doubt. It can be a trifle disconcerting suddenly waking up in a strange place not knowing how you got there.’

  ‘Oh no, he's always like this.’

  ‘Well he's getting worse. He wasn't so bad last time we had him in. The police force had no right to send him back out there to get shot while he was still supposed to be recuperating from a knife wound,’ she got up into North’s face, ‘and he now needs plenty of time and rest to fully recover,’ she turned to Mason. ‘I don’t know why I’m bothering, he doesn’t listen. None of you ever listen.’

  North sneezed.

  ‘And he’s got a cold coming on. You can have five minutes then he needs to get some rest,’ she fixed North a stare, ‘And plenty of it,’ she stressed.

  ‘I think you've pulled.’

  ‘Yeah, I seem to be appealing to women of a certain age, lately. Do I need to ask how Rawlins is?’

  ‘He isn't.’

  ‘Oh, shit.’

  ‘You were wearing most of him when they brought you in here. They had gotten him down off that airbag – where did you get that, by the way? – and were having him checked out by paramedics. You drove up, went over to him and then all hell broke loose. There were two shots in fairly quick succession. The first seemed to hit him in the back and sent him flying into you. His head went into your chin,’ North felt his jaw, like he was checking a shave. ‘You have a nice bruise. The bullet went through him and winged you. The second bullet went into the back of his head, straight through it and out through his face. Probably his right eye. They think it then went into your thick head,’ he tapped the side of his own, ‘left temple. Rawlins face was gone. The bullet blew it clean away. You were wearing it and most of his brains. Those holes and scratches are where they had to pull Rawlins bone fragments from your skin. Passing through Rawlins skull and brain took enough out of the bullet that it bounced off your thick skull without doing any real damage.’

  ‘How did a shooter get on the bridge?’

  ‘They didn’t, it was a rifle, JFK style, only we’re still looking for the book depository window, never mind Lee Harvey Oswald.’

  A professional.

  This was big.

  ‘Some kick-ass crime fighters we look,’ said Mason. ‘The bad guys will be quaking in their boots when me, you and James shuffle up, like the living dead.’

  ‘We'll lull them into a false sense of security.’

  ‘Then beat the crap out of them with our casts and crutches. Here,’ he offered. ‘I got you a present.’ North took something soft from a plastic bag. Black. ‘They were out of flowers,’ said Mason. North’s vision was out of focus and he had to narrow his eyes. It was a beanie hat with a Newcastle United logo. It still had the price tag on it. ‘For when you get out. We can't have you looking like a total flid.’

  North pulled it on. ‘Let's go,’ he said.

  ‘But she said -’

  ‘She said I don't listen.’

  They hobbled off together.

  ***
>
  North dragged himself across the threshold and carried on leaning against the door after it had closed. This place was depressing. All it needed was a body on the floor and it could have passed for Lumsden's maisonette.

  The flat had been let to him furnished. Apparently furnished meant a lumpy sofa and a bed. North hadn't bothered to add anything to it. He’d brought a suitcase and a guitar case. The suitcase he was living out of and most of its contents littered the bedroom floor. The guitar case hadn’t moved from where he’d deposited it on the living room floor.

  He went into the kitchen. The similarities with Lumsden’s continued. Food packaging and containers littered the worktop. Spilled contents hardened on the surface. There was only milk and beers in the fridge. The milk had lumps in it. He put it back in the fridge, cracked open a beer and sipped away while opening cupboard doors. He pulled out the lone can residing there. A tin of mixed veg. It had been there when he moved in. He shuffled through the rented utensils and set to it with a can opener. There was a bottle of HP surrounded by chip shop wrappers. He squeezed a load into the tin and stirred. Forked a mouthful. Washed it down with half a can of beer.

  ‘Sound,’ was the verdict.

  His mobile rang.

  ‘North,’ he answered.

  ‘You decided to grow up then.’

  Shit. He hadn't bothered to check the caller. He couldn't believe he hadn't checked the caller.

  ‘Or not,’ she filled the silence. ‘You didn't know it was me, did you?’

  North's emotions went into turmoil.

  ‘You would have let it go to voicemail like you did all my previous calls.’

  ‘Sarah,’ was all he could manage.

  ‘What's wrong?’ She had always been finely tuned into him.

  ‘I'm okay.’ He was still struggling.

  ‘You don't sound okay.’

  ‘A cold. Man flu has been sweeping through the station.’

  ‘It better be, you better not be moping around feeling sorry for yourself, angry at the world and everything in it. You have to face this.’

  ‘No. I know,’ he knew he sounded pathetic.

  ‘You have to let me move on.’ She had that voice on that felt sorry for hm. ‘You have to move on. We have to move on.’

  ‘I know.’ God, how he hated the way she could make him feel. She was lecturing him like a parent does a kid and all he could say was yes-miss, no-miss.

  ‘I can't do that knowing that you are like this.’

  She did still love him then. Didn't she?

  ‘It's hard.’

  ‘Have you started drinking again?’ Her tone changed. Concern with a twist of anger.

  ‘No.’

  The silence of disbelief.

  ‘Promise me you won't drink.’

  Not ‘promise me you won't go back on the drink’. She knew and it made him feel worse knowing that she knew he had lied to her but the lie was easier than bearing the shame he would feel if he admitted the truth. She knew he'd nose dived off the wagon and wanted him to scramble back on. She didn't want him, but she wanted him to stop drinking. He tried to read between the lines but they were blurred in his addled mind.

  ‘I promise.’

  ‘Are you taking care of yourself?’

  He looked at the two tins: beer and veg. He felt the virus invading his system. Weighing him down. Pounding on his head. Sawing at his throat. Fogging up his vision. About the bullet wound in his head and the knife wound throbbing deep in his leg. About the heart that had been ripped from his chest.

  ‘I'm okay.’

  ‘No you're not.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘You need to get past this. I need you to get past this. I hate that I've done this to you, but...’

  Silence.

  ‘I was thinking of coming out there,’ said North.

  ‘No.’ Immediate and firm.

  ‘We could talk.’

  ‘We could talk if you answered my calls.’

  ‘They keep telling me to take it easy on account of the stabbing. I was looking at renting a place on the Red Sea.’

  ‘That's a decent plane ride from where I am dipshit.’ He smiled. ‘How are you after all that, anyway?’ She had almost caved in and gone to him when she’d learned about the stabbing.

  ‘I'm fine, really.’ And about the knife attack he was. His conscience was clear on that answer.

  ‘You've always been a quick healer. And nothing that ever happened to you ever affected you.’

  ‘Only you.’

  Silence.

  ‘I need this,’ she said. ‘I feel so free - you get that every day. You have always known who you are, what you wanted – those are some of the things I so admire about you. So strong, focussed and independent. There was always something missing in me. You filled a large part of that, but not all. Now I've found it. My going away saved me. Maybe us, I don’t know, I just need this right now. Don't go and fuck it all up by being a jerk.’

  ‘I love you.’

  ‘I know.’ He waited but she didn't say it. ‘Get into a routine. You need your routine.’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘I've got to go. We're heading out to the dig for sun up and get some work in before it gets too hot. I’ll call again – or you can call me.’

  ‘Sarah.’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘You haven't done this to me, I've done it to myself. I'm the reason you left.’

  ‘I know, dipshit, but it’s cool that you said so. There’s hope for you yet. You take care - and I mean it. Routine, exercise, get yourself to a supermarket with a decent list, eat and drink properly, regularly, get sleep, and get something for that cold.’

  ‘Okay, mum.’

  She might be loving a new life two and a half thousand miles away and they might never be together again but she still loved him. Something that had never occurred to him. He felt something he hadn’t felt in a while: hope. There was hope for him yet.

  ‘Hey, Sarah.’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘If anyone ever tells you that you can't catch cold from being out in the pissing rain, that it is a virus, do me a favour and tell them to fuck-off, from me.’

  He finished the veg. Left the beer.

  TWENTY-ONE

  ‘You had me scared.’

  She’d been about to put his door in.

  He slothed away. She followed him inside the flat.

  ‘With all that's happened already you couldn't think to at least call the station?’

  He turned around.

  ‘You're still scaring me,’ she said.

  He was a sorry sight even by his standards. And he definitely wasn't with it.

  ‘I was sparko.’

  On exhaustion, trauma, hospital meds, half a can of beer and a decent swig of night nurse. It had taken Deacon half an hour to raise him, ringing his phone then battering down his door.

  ‘And please,’ she averted her gaze, ‘put something on.’

  He shuffled away again.

  ‘And maybe you should shower first.’

  She was looking for coffee when the sounds of retching and puke dashing the pan reached her. She didn't wait to hear what might follow. She put the door on the latch and went back out. By the time North emerged with pieces of bloody paper dotted about a freshly shaven face she was back, an omelette and a steaming cup on the go. First she gave him a glass of something orange that fizzed at him.

  ‘Vitamins. Lots of them,’ said Deacon.

  He used it to wash down a bunch of painkillers.

  ‘And you want to be careful with those, your liver doesn't need any more abuse.’

  North focussed on keeping it all down.

  ‘I put everything in here,’ she opened a couple of doors. ‘These are cupboards. You fill them with food.’

  North boked. Some of the fizzy stuff came back up into his mouth. It was still cold. He swallowed it back down.

  ‘The hospital is pissed at you just walking out like that.’

&nb
sp; ‘It's the current trend. Anyway, they couldn't give a rat’s arse, they need the bed. They make all the right noises, like is expected of them, is all.’

  ‘Here,’ she placed a laden plate and mug on the coffee table. ‘Sit.’

  He sat. She didn't move until he had cleared the plate. Drank the coffee. It took some time.

  ‘You want anything else.’

  ‘No. Thank you, Deacon.’

  ‘My, oh, my, there is hope for you yet.’

  He disappeared again. Finished dressing.

  ‘Let's go catch a killer or two.’

  Killer? He didn't look like he could catch another cold the state he was in.

  ‘I'm driving,’ she said lifting his keys from the table. ‘Are you really going to wear that?’ she indicated the new hat.

  ‘Don’t tell me you’re a closet Mackem, Deacon?’

  ‘You’ve managed to get a bit of your old self back, you started dressing nice again and now that.’

  ‘Mason bought it for this,’ he pulled up the side. They’d shaved his hair away around the wound.

  ‘You’ve taken the dressing off,’ she shook her head. ‘Men. Come here.’

  ‘I can’t go into the station with my head all bandaged up, they’ll handcuff me back to that desk.’

  ‘And wearing that isn’t drawing attention to your head? With a suit?’

  ‘The whole toon is black and white at the minute with the cup game coming up. I could be showing solidarity.’

  ‘From a desk on the top floor.’

  ‘I could borrow one of Scanlan’s fedoras.’

  ‘Your head is too big.’ He didn’t think she was talking hat size. ‘And he dresses like shit.’

  She spammed his hair as best she could to conceal the wound. There was plenty to work with. It felt good to both of them. She gave him his keys back when they were in her car and a mile down the road. He was still suffering too much to be arsed walking back to get his own car from there.

  He told her to take the off-ramp into the Metro Centre.

  ‘You’re visiting the Asda Rawlins was in?’

  ‘Nope.’

  The mall loomed. Maybe that bump on his head had done more damage than could be seen from the outside. She should have clued in when she saw the hat.