Dead Watch

by Steve Liszka

  Wesley bit his tongue and shrugged. ‘Blame the M25.’ He wanted to say that it was more like half an hour ago, but that would just be asking for trouble.

  ‘The M25 didn’t phone me up last night and ask to have the girls without prior notice. That was you, Wesley.’

  ‘What can I say, I miss them. You should try living without your family. It’s not easy.’

  He suddenly felt an overwhelming urge to tell Nina that he missed her too and to ask her to take him back. He didn’t know why. He hadn’t expected to say it, and he wasn’t even sure that was what he wanted. Did he love her? At least part of him felt like it did. Some days, all he could think about was being back there with the three of them, and other times, he kind of enjoyed the solitary nature of his newfound predicament.

  Fighting the urge to say anything, he followed Nina into the house. The place was immaculate as usual. Even when she was working, Nina had always been slightly OCD about the housework, but now that the girls were both in full-time education, her day-time hours seemed to revolve around making the place look like a show home. Perhaps that was why she kicked him out, maybe he was the one thing that was preventing her having her dream house.

  She led him into the living room where Emily was sitting quietly with her Peppa Pig rucksack on her lap, watching an episode of the same animal on TV. When she saw him, she did that shy sideways look that kids did when they were really happy to see someone but didn’t want to show it. Wesley sat next to his little girl, and lifted her and the bag onto his own lap. She was getting heavy; she was nearly six now and was already in year one at school. He hadn’t noticed himself getting older until he had children. Now, the girls acted as a visual indicator of his own mortality.

  ‘I know this one,’ he said, looking at the TV screen. ‘This is where Pedro Pony breaks his leg.’

  He did know it, too. Emily had it on DVD, and he must have seen every episode on it at least fifty times.

  Emily laughed and snuggled into her father. ‘Yeah, and then, Peppa and the others write on his cast.’

  Wesley tickled the girl under the arms, almost making her fall off his lap. ‘Yeah,’ he said, imitating her voice, ‘and then, Peppa tries to fall over and break her leg so she can get a cast too. Silly piggy.’

  He tickled her again, and they both laughed.

  The door of the room flew open, and Olivia waltzed in like she was a model on a catwalk. Now, he felt really old. She was nine going on nineteen and already up to her mother’s shoulder. He hoped that both the girls would follow Nina in the height department. She was tall, at nearly five ten, and a good inch or two bigger than him. When she wore her heels, as she often liked to do, he felt like Tom Cruise, or maybe that should be Dudley Moore, with some gangly supermodel at his side.

  ‘Hi, Dad. How are you?’ Olivia asked.

  ‘I’m fine, thanks, darling,’ he said, feeling strange that it was him answering the questions. She reminded him so much of her mother, it scared him. ‘You look beautiful.’

  ‘Shut up, Dad,’ she said, bringing Nina to Wesley’s mind more than ever.

  ‘That’s told me, hasn’t it, you cheeky monkey.’

  He wondered how long he could keep calling her lame-o things like that without her rolling her eyes and saying “whatever,” or whatever it was that kids said now to uncool old farts like him.

  ‘Right, then, girls,’ he said, getting to his feet. ‘Let’s skedaddle. We want to get back before the traffic starts building up again.’

  Nina followed them to the front door and just as they were saying their goodbyes, Wesley looked past her into the kitchen and, for a moment, thought that he was seeing things.

  ‘Is that Gregg I just saw in the kitchen?’ he asked. ‘What’s he doing here?’

  Gregg was married to Paula, Nina’s best friend since they’d been in little school. They’d been out together on plenty of occasions, and while he could be a bit of a bore, waxing lyrical about his job as a supermarket manager or his adventures on the golf course, Gregg was okay, if slightly dull.

  Nina looked over her shoulder briefly then back to Wesley. For a split second, he thought he detected a slight chink in her armour.

  ‘Oh, yeah,’ she said, like it was obvious. ‘It’s Gregg. He lives here now.’

  Her nonchalance made Wesley think he had misheard her. ‘He what?’

  ‘I thought I told you, he moved in a few weeks ago. Surely the girls must have said something.’

  ‘No,’ he said, ‘I pretty fucking sure the girls didn’t.’

  ‘Wesley!’ she shouted. ‘Watch your language in front of our daughters.’

  He looked again and saw Gregg’s head pop out from behind the free-standing fridge. The man smiled and offered Wesley the smallest of waves. Wesley shook his head and started towards him until Nina stepped into his path.

  ‘And where do you think you’re going?’

  ‘Where do you think I’m going? I’m going to speak to Gregg over there and find out what the hell is going on here.’

  ‘No, you’re not. This is my house. Now leave please.’

  ‘I’ll think you’ll find it’s my house, actually. I’m the one who pays the mortgage.’

  ‘And I’m the one with my name on the deeds right next to yours.’

  Emily tugged at her father’s hand. ‘Come on, Daddy, let’s go.’

  ‘See,’ Nina said, ‘you’re upsetting her.’

  Gregg came out of the kitchen and positioned himself about five yards behind Nina. ‘Come on, Wes, don’t be like this.’

  Wesley gave the car keys to Olivia. ‘Do me a favour, honey, take Emily into the back of the car and wait for me. I’ve got the DVD players set up, and I think Frozen is still in there from last time.’

  ‘Yay,’ Emily said, instantly brightening up as her sister led her towards the vehicle.

  ‘So, tell me, Gregg, what does Paula think about all this?’

  Gregg shrugged. ‘She’s not happy.’

  Wesley laughed. ‘I bet she isn’t. You’ve run off with her best friend, you piece of shit.’

  ‘Don’t talk to him like that,’ Nina said. ‘How dare you.’

  ‘How dare I? How fucking dare you look down your nose at me when you’re living with your best mate’s husband. Jesus, you’ve got a nerve.’

  For once, Nina was temporarily silenced. Wesley seized on it, turning his attention to Gregg.

  ‘And as for you, you’re happy to live here in my house while I’m paying the bills. I thought you had more pride than that.’

  ‘Come on, Wes, don’t be like that. I still have to pay for things my end with Paula and the kids.’

  ‘And so do I, Gregg. But the difference is, I’ve also got to pay for my shitty little flat, and now, it seems I’m paying for you too.’

  ‘So that’s what this is all about, is it?’ Nina had found her voice again. It hadn’t taken long. ‘Money. I should have thought as much. That’s just typical of you, Wesley, it really is.’

  ‘You know what, Nina?’ Wesley said. ‘Why don’t the two of you just fuck off.’

  ‘Hey!’ Gregg shouted. ‘Don’t talk to her like that.’

  ‘Or what? What are you going to do about it, tough guy?’

  Nina laughed. ‘And what are you going to do, Wes? All this riding around on fire engines again suddenly make you think you’re a real man, does it?’

  Before he could answer, she spoke again. ‘I’ll tell you exactly what’s going to happen. Things are going to continue just like they are now. Gregg is going to keep living here, and you’re going to keep paying the bills. If you don’t like it, then forget seeing the girls anymore. Understand?’

  ‘You can’t do that. I’ve got my rights.’

  ‘Can’t I? Do you know how long it will take you to get those rights? Months, years, most likely. I’m their mother, and I get to say if you can see them or not. You start making our lives difficult, and I’ll make yours a whole lot worse, understand? Act like an idiot, an
d the only time you’ll see the girls is at Christmas and birthdays. Is that what you want?’

  ‘You wouldn’t do that. I know you’ve proved yourself to be a pretty disgusting piece of work, but not even you would stoop that low.’

  ‘Wouldn’t I? How about you try me and find out.’

  Wesley stood there looking at the two of them for a long time; Gregg hiding behind her like Wes was a heavyweight boxer. He laughed, then turned and left the house. ‘You’re fucking welcome to each other.’

  When he was almost at the car, Nina shouted to him, ‘You know you never used to swear like that when you worked in fire safety!’

  ‘Go fuck yourselves,’ Wesley said without looking back.

  Jimmy

  ‘Calm down, son. You’re gonna give yourself a hernia.’

  Bob watched with amusement as Jimmy demolished what was left of the two-foot-high brick wall. The couple who owned the house had come into some money and decided to replace their aging conservatory with a flat roof extension, complete with skylights and bi-folding doors. The existing footings were too shallow and not wide enough for building regulations, so Jimmy and Bob were knocking down and starting again. It was a pretty standard job for them.

  Many firefighters had a second job, or fiddle as it’s usually referred to, and many of those jobs were often found in the trades. There were people out there who got sniffy about this, but as most insiders knew only too well, it was those skills they brought with them from the outside world that helped firefighters achieve their goals effectively. The Fire and Rescue service was all about problem solving and improvisation. One person on their own might not have the solution, but between them, a crew could usually muddle through and come up with a decent working plan.

  Tradespeople were usual practical hands-on types, and their specialist knowledge was often the thing that saved the day. If a car had crashed into a building, causing a partial collapse, and you had a builder on your crew, they would have a much better idea than most about how the structural integrity had been affected. An electrician could give a far better assessment on the extent of the damage caused by a fire in fuse box than the average crew member. If you were sent to a serious flooding and you had a plumber on the crew… you can see where this is going.

  Jimmy put down the sledgehammer and took a slurp of his tea. It was almost cold; he should have drunk it ten minutes earlier like Bob had done. The older man had never missed the opportunity to have a cuppa. When he was in charge of Red Watch, the boys knew that all they had to do to avoid him getting them out in the yard drilling was to keep him plied with tea. Since he had taken his retirement and become a full-time builder, he had made sure to keep up this most important of rituals.

  ‘What’s got into you today, boy?’ Bob asked. He still called Jimmy a boy, even though he was in his mid-forties and a good ten years older than both of Bob’s kids. ‘You’re like a dog chasing a bone.’

  ‘There’s no point fucking around, old man,’ Jimmy said. ‘The quicker we get this wall down, the quicker we can make a start on getting those footings done. You did bring the breaker, didn’t you?’

  Bob rolled his eyes. ‘Did I bring the breaker? Of course I brought the sodding breaker. But the fact is, I have no intention of using that breaker until I’ve eaten my lunch. They ain’t going to pay us any more money for doing it quicker.’

  Jimmy threw the cold tea into the pot of lavender next to him, then dug into his holdall for a plastic Tupperware box.

  ‘Don’t tell me,’ Bob said. ‘Soppy Bollocks has got you boys running around the yard again.’

  Indirectly, Bob was one of the many reasons that Wesley had found life so hard since arriving on Red Watch. Everyone loved Bob, and he was as good a Watch manager as you could find. He wasn’t a drill pig like some other people who held his rank, and he couldn’t give a shit about polished shoes and freshly ironed shirts. All that mattered to Bob was that when they got a call, his crew had the ability to deal with the situation effectively and with the minimal of fuss. And you could say what you liked about Red Watch, they might have been lazy sons-of-bitches, but when the shit went down, they knew exactly what they were doing. You could try, but you’d struggle to find a more professional group of firefighters in the service.

  Whenever he got the chance, Bob liked to drop Wesley’s name into the conversation. He enjoyed hearing Jimmy bitching about the man, and romanticising about how much more fun it was when he had been the Watch manager. Bob knew it was petty, but Jimmy’s moans were his only link to the job nowadays.

  ‘Something like that,’ Jimmy said as he opened the foil that enveloped his ham sandwiches.

  The two of them had been working together for nearly twenty years, pretty much the entire time Jimmy had been in the fire service. When he turned up for his first day at Brighton, the two of them had hit it off immediately. Bob quickly took Jimmy under his wing, not that the man needed looking after. He had just come out of the Marines and was as tough a fella as you were likely to meet. But for all his bluster, Jimmy reminded Bob of a little lost kid, and so he made the conscious decision to become his mentor, teaching him everything he knew about the fire service as well as giving him an unofficial apprenticeship in the building trade. More importantly, he also became a father figure to Jimmy.

  In a way, Jimmy’s life had taken a similar path to that of Lenny’s. Perhaps that’s why they found themselves bumping heads so often; they were too alike. Both of them had been brought up in less than ideal situations, and both of them had experienced life outside of the law. But while Lenny’s old man had used him and his brother as punch bags when he got the booze inside of him, Jimmy’s old man had never laid a hand on him. The fucker had never laid eyes on him, either; he had pissed off as soon as he found out that his girlfriend was pregnant. Jimmy was brought up by his mum in a one bedroom flat, halfway up a tower block in East London, and even though the woman had done everything in her power to keep her son in line, it was never going to happen.

  It was easy to understand why Jimmy fell in with the wrong crowd at such a young age. With his old man out of the picture, he needed someone to look up to, and those people just happened to be the older kids who lived in the block. They hung out in the basketball court at the bottom of the tower until late at night and rode around on their BMXs like they were the kings of the estate. Jimmy used to look over the top of his balcony and watch them in awe as they showed off the goods they had stolen from the shopping centre, getting drunk on the cheap booze the older boys were able to buy from the store. His mother did her best to steer him away from them, but there was no stopping Jimmy. He was going to be one of the bad boys too.

  Considering the things he got up to in his teens, it was amazing that the boy escaped without a criminal record. Stealing, fighting, dope dealing and selling anything they could get their hands on, Jimmy and his mates did whatever took their fancy. He knew there was no future in what he was doing, but it was fun, and he felt like he belonged with a group of mates that would always have his back no matter how bad things got. Yeah, right.

  When he was sixteen, they got involved in a little turf war with the boys from the block next to his. Both groups thought they were little Mafioso, trying to sell their dope to the older, better off kids who had to walk through the estate to get to the art school they attended.

  One night, the two gangs had got a bit mouthy with each other on the courts, and the bravado and name calling quickly turned to pushing and shoving, which quickly turned to punching and kicking, which quickly turned to Baashi, the little Somali kid who lived a few doors down from Jimmy, being stabbed in the heart with a kitchen knife. As the two gangs ran away, Jimmy sat there cradling the boy’s head in his lap, crying like a little baby as his friend bled out.

  Two days later, he went down to the Navy recruitment office and signed up for the Marines. He was skinny then, and unfit too. The nearest thing he had done to exercise in the past couple of years was knock a football against t
he wire fence that surrounded the courts.

  A few weeks later, he kissed his crying mother, who was relieved that he was getting away from his friends, but terrified he could end up going to war. Jimmy went straight to the train station to begin his journey to Lympestone, Devon, the place that would be his home for the next eight months.

  He wouldn’t say he loved being a marine. He certainly enjoyed his time as a commando and he was good at it, too, a natural in the field. Jimmy was grateful to the marines for what they had given him; a new life, travel, decent money for the first time, of which he passed most on to his mum, but he never loved the lifestyle like some of the other lads did. Most of them defined themselves as being marines; it was the thing that made them who they were. He just felt like a bloke who had joined up to get away from far worse shit.

  Two years after he joined, the first Iraq War kicked off. His mates were gagging to get out there and prove their worth, but instead of fighting in the desert like some of the marines in 40 Commando, Jimmy found himself on manoeuvres in the freezing cold tundra of Norway. He wasn’t bothered about missing the war. He had no idea what the fuck it was all about anyway, none of the lads did really, they just wanted to get out there and finally put their training into practice. He had joined up to escape a war zone, not find one.

  After eight years, two tours of Northern Ireland, and a spell in both Belize and the Falklands, Jimmy left the marines and not knowing what else to do, he applied for and was accepted into the fire service. The marines had been good to him, but when he finished training school and turned up at Brighton, Jimmy knew he had found his real home.

  ‘So, what’s the numpty got you doing now?’ Bob said. ‘Bridging drills over shark infested custard again?’

  Jimmy laughed as he snapped off one of the sticks of his Kit Kat and shoved the whole thing into his mouth.

  ‘It ain’t just Wes, Bob. Did you ever get the feeling that sometimes you were the only sane person in the job?’