Gloves Off

by Gareth Spark

  Near to the Knuckle

  Presents

  “Gloves Off”

  Edited by Craig Douglas & Darren Sant

  Converted to Kindle by Craig Douglas @ Gritfiction

  Cover Design by Steven Miscandlon at Steven Miscandlon Book Design.

  Copyright © 2013

  This e-book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This e-book may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this e-book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this e-book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Amazon.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  All rights are reserved. No part of this publication can be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, without the written permission of the author.

  Introduction

  Near To The Knuckle rose like a Phoenix from the ashes of an eclectic blog known as Close To The Bone. CTTB was sadly hacked into oblivion and much precious data was irretrievably lost. There were several regular bloggers behind CTTB and it was this collective that made it such a unique and interesting blend. With this demise it was decided that we would turn a negative into a positive and create a fiction site. Like CTTB we wanted something original, different and that nobody else was doing.

  Our goal was simply to publish fiction that other sites might not, edgy fiction that tackled difficult, violent and often uncomfortable themes. Right from the start we wanted a broad remit and you'll find everything on our site from supernatural fiction to poetry and humour and yet all have a common theme that it is Near To The Knuckle. We believe that in a little over a year we have achieved this and more. We have never compromised on quality nor shied away from a tricky theme. In this time we have been delighted to meet a whole host of talented writers and it has been our honour to host and showcase these authors who so easily create dark and atmospheric worlds.

  The proceeds of this collection go towards the continued growth and survival of the site and all of the authors have willingly contributed their time and their talents. I'd like to thank all of the authors involved particularly Paul Brazil for giving us several posts in his weekly column. Richard Godwin for coming forward and offering us blog space before we even had a chance to ask him and of course for coming up with the title. Graham Smith who has always given us that extra bit of support. David Barber for pointing out my editorial errors when I've lazily let them slip through and always with a smile, never a harsh word. Pete Sortwell for being a huge part of the original team and who got me blogging. Vic Watson, Allen Miles and Cheryl Reid all of who were involved in the original blog. AJ Hayes who has always supported us and who always takes the time to leave a positive comment. Craig Douglas my co-conspirator in this venture who deserves more credit than me. Whilst I am, perhaps, the public face of the site it's Craig who does the formatting, the in depth editing and the real work behind the scenes. Finally, thanks to all of the authors who have contributed their work. There would not be a site or a collection without you.

  Darren Sant

  March 2013

  All Night

  Just Baking The Cake

  The Hit Man And Her

  Brotherly Love

  Weight Twatchers

  Cold

  Somebody’s Daughter

  Squeezing

  Brothers Under The Bridge

  Be Careful What You Wish For

  Walkies

  The Rapist’s Revenge

  Highway Star

  House Party

  Innocent

  Devils and Doughnuts

  The Way Of Things

  An Evening In Sin City

  Razorblade Kisses

  By Gareth Spark

  The first things you noticed about Nash were the tattoos poking out from under his white guard's shirt. He had a heart, a diamond, a spade and a club on each finger, and a skull on the back of one hand; H-A-T-E and some kind of black bird on the other. I wanted to ask him about them, but he wasn't the kind of man you questioned. We were night-watchmen together at the Collinson Scrap-yard gates. I'd held the job a month or two and it was okay; we'd sit in a portakabin close to the curling wire fence, looking over at the walls of an abandoned furniture warehouse. The streetlights lit the brick a dull crimson and there was something about the empty windows that scored a line straight over my peace. I would turn and gaze at the River Tees through the other window; huge, black and endless beneath the night. The flames shooting out of chemical works over there were the only way you knew a far shore existed. The night was darkness, and fire caught in the ebony waste of water. Nash held up to the world like a shield. He must have been fifty and I reckoned he'd only got the job 'cause he was a big bloke. I'm six feet and he towered over me. A beard as rough and grey as steel wool hid the lower half of his face and he tied his greasy hair in a ponytail. He was either rolling a fag. smoking one, or looking out at the river through fingerprint marked glass. This night I was reading The Sun. I flipped the Page 3 over at him, gestured to the Blonde caught there and said, 'Eh? What do you reckon, Mate?'

  He flicked his yellow eyes towards the paper, peered through the smoke, then looked back to the window. I followed his gaze and saw nothing but the flame stamped tides. It was 3 in the morning. I hated silence. I reacted to it the way a slug takes to salt. I carried on talking, 'You should have been here last night, pal,' I said, a little too loudly. 'Few fellas out there with bikes in the wee small hours, up to mischief. You ask Frank.' It was true enough; me and Frank, the other lad, heard them coming through the night, quarter of an hour before we saw them. Three men riding the finest machines I'd ever seen; chrome and black steel, polished so brilliantly they seemed to even catch the starlight. They pulled up in front of the warehouse opposite, killed the lion's roar of the engines and sat there looking bang at us. Frank, who was an ex-squaddie and did his job right, walked out and called to them. They silently watched him approach. Not one wore a helmet and all were dressed in the same kind of jacket, denim, with the sleeves cut off and a patch covering the whole back The patch carried the picture of a skull and some lettering I couldn't make out. They waited until Frank was six feet away, then kicked the motorcycles into life and tore down the long straight road leading out of the estate, kicking up a cloud of dust that hung in the summer night like a ghost. I told Nash this as I'd told him maybe a hundred other stories, sat back in the moth eaten chair, a lukewarm mug of tinny-tasting PG Tips in hand. I glanced over at him and his eyes were hard against my gaze.

  'Tell me again,' he said.

  I did and it was as though he was shrinking in front of me. His head sank slowly onto his chest and I heard his breathing go funny, then he stood and turned, started to unbutton his shirt. 'What you up to?'

  'This patch,' he said, 'On the cut offs? Was it like this?'

  He let the shirt drop and there it was: faded blue ink over his wrinkly bicep, the death's head grinning and letters that had bled into each other over the decades.

  'Exactly the bloody same,' I said, feeling my mouth dry. The wind was picking up outside. You could hear it throw dust against the walls and chop through the river like a thousand blades.

  He turned. 'Fair enough,' he said, sitting. His face was so pale, suddenly, that his brown eyes seemed black. He plucked his cigarette from the ashtray and sucked on it. I shuffled closer. 'What is it?'

  'Something that's been coming for a long, long time,' he said, turning back to the window. He didn't say another word until the sun rose.

  I got off the bus the next night and trudged through the empty industrial estate. I hadn't slept. Every time I'd started to drift I saw those bikers,
only where their faces should have been there were skulls caked with soil, towering over me with all the darkness of the grave. I would wake with my heart trembling like a snared rabbit.

  The day had been August hot and you felt some of that heat leaving the tar of the road. It stank like something burning. Then there was the salt and weed tang of the river itself, trapped in the gathering chill of night, flowing like a cold breath between the broken buildings, sighing through shattered glass. Something about the windows brought back the memory of those dream skulls and I walked a little faster. I was working with Nash again. I reached the corner and a woman's voice addressed me from the darkness of a doorway. ''scuse me, fella; got a light?' She was about my age: short dyed black hair; nose ring; cracked leather jacket. A grin snaked over my face. I reached into my pocket for a box of England's Glory and tried to think of something smart to say as she took the matches. 'You lost, love?'

  She lit a cigarette and waved the match dead in front of her green eyes and let it drop to the dust with a stink of sulphur. She breathed out a cloud of blue nicotine and studied me. She cocked her head to one side. 'You work up in the scrap yard?' There was a hint of Scots to her accent.

  'For a security thing we're looking after the yard, yeah. What's your name?'

  'You're working with Mitch Graham?'

  'Never heard of him,' I said.

  'Maybe he might be called Graham Nash?' She leant back against the cobwebbed brick of the doorway and sucked on the Marlboro. Her eyes glinted behind the smoke like streetlight caught in the windows of an abandoned home.

  'Nash, yeah...' I stopped myself. There was a feeling behind my ribs like cold water rising. 'I mean...maybe...why?'

  'Be sure and give him this, lover.' She reached out quickly and grabbed my hand then forced something into my palm. 'See you around.' She walked away, her leather coat creaking. It was an eternity ring. The sort you’d get your wife or girlfriend. I frowned and looked back for the girl, but she was gone, leaving only the trace of smoke and sulphur.

  Nash was in the chair, looking out at the river. A rollie hung from his lips and ash had fallen into his beard. He didn't turn when the door opened, but I saw his reflection in the glass. He closed his eyes tight. 'Nash,' I said.

  He opened his eyes and breathed out slowly, stubbed the cigarette dead into the ashtray I'd nicked from a pub in town. 'It's you,' he said.

  'Who did you think?' I hung my jacket on the back of the door and flipped the kettle on. 'Listen. There was this lass out there, under where the old door factory was, she asked for you and told me to give you this.' I placed the ring carefully on the desk before him and studied his face for a reaction. He glared down at it, his palms stuck to the arms of the swivel chair and then he looked up at me. 'A girl then, was it?'

  'Pretty one too.'

  'They always are, mate. These little angels get sent; always the prettiest eyes, always that sweet voice calling you on.' It was the most I'd heard him speak. I flicked the switch on top of the kettle and the sound of boiling died. A moth fluttered against the black window. Nash stared at the ring.

  'How's about you telling me what's going on?' I demanded, feeling afraid and realising I'd felt that way for days. 'I mean, should we call someone?' He laughed; a high, ragged noise escaping him like a last breath. 'I'm serious.'

  'So am I.' He reached into the inner pocket of the jacket hanging beside him and dragged out a flick knife. The handle was worn with use but when he clicked the switch and the blade materialised, I saw it was well oiled and sharp as the north wind. He slid it over the desk. 'Take this.'

  'What for?'

  'Because I'll want to use it and I can't use it no more. The light all died out of me a long while back. What's coming is only what's supposed to.'

  'I don't get it.'

  He sighed and looked out at the black river flowing silently beside us. 'There are worlds on worlds out there boy and this isn't one you want in on.' His voice was low and scarred. I had the impression these were words he'd rehearsed. 'I done something a lifetime ago and I owe for it. That's all. Thought I could outrun it, but there is no outrunning it, nothing's ever over, There's no bottom to that black river.' He nodded to the window then quickly grabbed the ring from the desk and pressed it to his lips. His dark eyes were wet.

  I felt my stomach spoil as I backed up to the chair and sat. I wanted to do something, to run, to take hold of Nash and make him laugh; make him tell me this was all bollocks. That it was all some sort of joke he was playing on me. Silent hours passed. I was about to speak when I heard an engine's distant howl. Nash looked at me, his red eyes were wide. 'Get out,' he said, 'Run. And don't stop.'

  'I'll stay.'

  'No.'

  'I could help.'

  He stood, grabbed my shoulder and pressed me to the door. 'Too late for that,' he said punching the door open and pushing me out. I fell in the dust at the bottom of the steps. The motorcycles were closer now. I felt the growl of them through my palms as I pushed myself up from the earth. The night was deep, endless and filled with the roar of steel, rubber, dirt and whatever else was reaching for us through the pitch dark. 'Go!' He yelled. I dashed along the wire fence to the place where it turned towards the river. The yellow grass was high and stiff as sticks between the dirt path and the lapping water. I hurled myself onto the cracked earth and lay flat as the bikes pulled up a hundred yards away. I lay with my hands on top of my head and peered up through the grass as Nash walked slowly towards the three bikers. Their engines fell silent and all I heard was the water behind me. Then a man's voice.

  'You didn't run?'

  'You thought I would?' Nash replied.

  'Always have, brother. You always have.' The man's voice was clear, but even from a distance I heard the tremble in it. He climbed from the bike and I saw his long hair move in the breeze as he looked at the ground. 'For fuck's sake, Nash. Why didn't you go this time too?'

  'I'm old,' I heard Nash say. His voice was dry and low, 'And I'm tired and by Christ, Johnny Boy. I deserve this at last.'

  Silence. A minute ticked into two, then the man spoke again, 'I've been thinking about her.' I couldn't see his face, but the voice was that of an older man. I heard the diesel fumes and cigarettes and the bathtubs of booze that had passed through that throat.

  'I don't think I've ever done different,' Nash replied.

  The two other riders remained still. Their machines were pulled at angles to the third blocking the road.

  'Twenty years,' the man said slowly, 'and here we are at last.'

  'Here we are.'

  'You know I got to do this.'

  'I know.'

  'I loved her.'

  Nash looked up into the night air. There were no stars. I crawled a little closer. 'Johnny boy, you never knew what the fuck love was.'

  'And you did?'

  'We'd of got away that night, then maybe.'

  Johnny Boy walked over to one of the riders who passed him a sawed-off double barrel gun from a saddle-bag on the bike. They murmured something and then Johnny turned and walked back to Nash, who stood with his arms by his sides looking still into the air. 'You got anything to say, brother?' He held the shotgun in one hand like a pistol and levelled it at Nash's face. I glanced at my watch. It was 3.30am. The wind was picking up and I watched dust lift in clouds on the dirty road and hang in the harsh glare of the streetlamp. I was going to run to the phone box I knew was round the corner, get the Coppers down here. Something. Anything, then I heard the heavy click of the hammers going back and the question again. It came out trembling and weak, like something dying dragged from a hole. 'You got anything to say?'

  The water churned in the wind and I heard Nash say, 'I love you, Louise.'

  The gun kicked and I saw a burst of grey and red and flame. Nash's head wasn't there anymore. The shot echoed like a slamming iron door off the abandoned buildings and I heard birds rise from the shore close by. I smelled the gunpowder and Nash fel
l back into the dust. Blood pumped from the shattered ruin of his head like spilled black paint and I was on my feet without thinking. I heard one of the men yell as I raced blindly down to the shore. An engine kicked into life like a waking monster and I ran until my lungs burned like acid, crying all the time, running until I came to the water.

  I fell to my knees and heard the bikes spin off through the estate. They weren't coming for me. Not tonight, not this time. I threw up the bile in my guts and wept silently. My knees were deep in the river mud and it seemed that all the world was nothing but that black water before me, dark and deep and cold and forever.

  Gareth Spark writes dark fiction from and about the moors and rustbelts of the North East where grudges are savoured, shotguns are cheap and people get by in the economic meltdown any way they can. His work has appeared at Near 2 The Knuckle, Out Of The Gutter, and Shotgun Honey.

  By Richard Godwin

  They like the fast food joints. They smell of burning sugar. They talk about cookies and donuts, candy and chocolate bars. There’s blood in the food chain. I’m holding the chain here in these endless hotels. I want to wrap it around their throats and yank. Perhaps I will drag them along miles of broken stones. That way I can see if they have flesh at all.

  All the hotels belong to the same company. There is only one company. The towns are all the same, they may be part of a stage set. I sometimes hear them coughing in the wings, a piece of donut stuck in their throats, all those directors with limousines full of hookers stationed by the terminals at airports, waiting. They’ve paid for it all, they only understand payment. My salary is the questionable reality of the illusory freedom I enjoy. I’m waiting for Frankie. He is much like a dealer, except he talks a different jargon. Beneath the jargon lie the addictions, gnarled and diseased, just like the targets. Their compulsion for annihilation tastes just like burning sugar. Outside my window it looks like icing.