by Nicky Black
The only thing that hadn’t been on Valley Park was Debbie. Debbie was from Jesmond Vale – the posh end. She’d wanted to defy her round-bellied philanderer of a father, and show her tight-arsed mother that girls could have fun if they wanted. It was the 1980s, and freedom was rife. They’d met just days after his sixteenth birthday in Eldon Square Shopping Centre where she was looking for earrings and he was looking for girls. Lee was the handsome one: his perfectly wedged hair and brown Bambi eyes meant he wasn’t short of girlfriends. His mates, Hoots and Dinger, were spotty and skinny with lank mullets to their shoulders. They would have to make do with the ugly mates, but they were happy for anything they could get, let’s face it. Debbie was with her friends, twin daughters of dentists, both with mouths full of metal and shoulder pads out to here. Lee had sat opposite her with his Big Mac. She’d grinned a gappy, imperfect grin at him over the straw of her milkshake and he’d nearly come in his stone-washed denims. It wasn’t long before he was coming inside her on Tynemouth beach and Louise was made.
At sixteen, Lee had walked away from Valley Park, never to return. The news of his impending parenthood had sent his own embittered father into one of his unearthly rages. Bruce Turner’s kid?! Debbie Turner?! Bruce Turner had given Frank a job, a chance, for Christ’s sake. It might just be part-time, but he could sit in a chair and seal boxes. And now his own son had got the man’s daughter up the spout? Did he know who this man was?
Lee knew who he was, the mighty Bruce Turner with his box at Newcastle United and his scrapyards and factories all over the place. Yes, he gave the odd cripple a job to help him get his jowly mug on the local news, but he didn't have a philanthropic bone in his body.
Lee had never returned to Valley Park after that. But it was Frank who had said never. Never wanted him in his house again, never thought he’d amount to anything, never wanted to see him again. His father’s sticks had beat the words across his back.
Finishing his whisky, he looked at the row of taxis outside the hotel bar window. He should do it now. Get it over with.
***
When Nicola arrived at the pub with Margy, her brother, Mark, and his wife were already there. Mark’s wife, Kim, was looking a bit rough. Normally she’d have her make-up on perfect and her hair washed and styled, but tonight her face shone and her blonde hair was brittle and dark at the roots. She’d lost weight since the baby was born. They both looked worn out, but they were still in love, Mark and Kim. It made Nicola feel lonely inside. It made her want the old Micky back. She wanted it to be like it used to be, before he started to blow everything out of all proportion.
She loved the bones of this boy, her little brother. They were extensions of each other. They looked alike, same dark, shiny hair, freckled noses and heavily lashed, green eyes. Of course, his hair was shorn now, the edge of a tattoo of some beast from his back reaching up and round his neck. It was never questioned that they wouldn’t be near each other for the rest of their lives. She’d looked after them both when it became obvious that their mother didn’t care if they went to school or not, if they were loved or not. But, unlike Mark, it had made Nicola tough. He needed her, and she would always protect him.
She watched him now as he sucked on the end of a cigarette like it was his last. He was a nervous wreck. She took in the long scar above his left eyebrow, reaching down to his temple, the mark of the baton of some flat-faced policeman. The police had made his life hell for years, and Nicola felt her blood boil whenever she saw a uniform or a squad car. They’d got their way this time. She wanted to spit on them, the shitheads. Everyone knew Mark wasn’t into drugs anymore. And even if he was, he wasn’t thick enough to keep them up the kitchen drainpipe where the slimy hands of some greasy copper had no doubt put it. Mark was terrified of going to prison, of being cooped up, unable to breathe, and if he ended up inside, she knew the scum would have got just what they wanted. She was frightened too. She knew it would ruin Mark’s fragile life at best, and kill him at worst. She hated every last one of those pigs, and when her husband drank with them and shook their hands she wanted to kick him hard in the balls.
Margy interrupted her thoughts with a nudge in the ribs. ‘It’s the band,’ she said, pointing at four large, hairy men lugging instruments.
Nicola grunted and Margy raised her eyes to the ceiling.
‘Well, go on then! Get the bliddy drinks in!’
***
The taxi dropped Lee at the edge of Valley Park, the driver not wanting to venture anywhere near the Nags Head. ‘Nowt but trouble,’ he growled as Lee handed him a fiver then watched the taxi speed away without the offer of any change.
He walked towards the pub, everything around him frighteningly familiar, yet different, smaller than he remembered, quieter and darker. As he pushed the door to the pub open and walked up to the bar, he recognised the barman, Scotty, now in his fifties and sporting a beer belly the size of a small country. A band was setting up on the stage and people were whooping and cheering the big, bearded blokes in Dubliners T-shirts. He took in the faces around him: Scotty, the old, toothless drunk at the end of the bar, swaying like long grass. That’s when he noticed her. She stood next to him and he glanced sideways at her for a second, feeling himself redden a little. A few seconds later, his head turned as he felt her move next to him, his eyes drawn to her, like an addict is drawn to their drug of choice.
There was no recognition in Scotty's eyes when he asked Lee what he wanted. Lee shook his head.
‘She’s next,’ he said.
He heard her order a pint and three lemonades, throwing her hair back from her shoulders then looking at him. He saw something in her face, a flutter of recognition maybe. Her green eyes blinked at him for a second and he opened his mouth to speak, but she turned back to Scotty to pay for her drinks, then walked back to the table she shared with a big, matronly woman, a puny man with a neck full of tattoos, and a childlike young woman with frizzy blonde hair in a small ponytail.
Nicola set the tray on the table and blew her fringe from her face. As she’d stood at the bar, her arm a few millimetres from that of a man she thought she recognised, she’d felt a flicker in her tummy like she did when her babies first moved. It didn’t show, obviously, she’d made sure of that.
Sitting down, she drank the top inch of lemonade from her glass and glanced at Lee: maybe she knew him from school, or maybe he was off the telly or something. He was dressed well, good jeans, expensive shirt tucked in with the sleeves rolled up, and the shoes shone. She soon realised, though, that she simply recognised one of her own when she saw it, no matter how much their shoes cost. She knew everyone on this estate, knew every face in this pub, but not this one. She watched him light a cigarette, both hands wrapped tightly round his lighter, not behind one hand like the posh people who often had their cigarettes lit for them. The skin was lined, his teeth a little out of kilter, and his nails bitten to the quick; his joints and knuckles had the roughness and scarring of a man who’d worked outdoors and, though he stood up straight, his shoulders were a little hunched like someone who’d stood in the cold many a night. This was a local boy made good. And handsome, too.
‘Jesus, a lass could die of thirst!’ Margy’s hands sat on her wide hips and Nicola, jolted back to reality, quickly reached under the table. She took a bottle of vodka from her bag and poured it into her glass of lemonade under the table, making sure Scotty couldn’t see. She passed the vodka under the table to Margy, who took it with a sincere expression. ‘You are the best friend in the fucking world,’ she said to Nicola, who smiled, the first few sips of vodka warming her already, her spirits rising as she relaxed into her night out, surrounded by the people she couldn’t live without.
The band started ‘Whiskey in the Jar’, and women were on their feet already. Big women with sparkly tops and white, bruised legs; little women with teeth missing.
Nicola felt the brown eyes of the man at the bar on her. She knew he was watching and she liked it.
> ***
Micky pulled his black jacket around him as the night air took on a chill. It was ten o’clock and the club was filling up with people taking advantage of the free entry before ten-thirty. He sniffed often, eyes like a hawk’s, not missing a trick. He looked like a human Titanic, the long dimple in his chin curving aggressively like an exclamation mark.
‘Jeez, look at this lot,’ said Stevie, Micky’s door mate for the night.
Micky braced himself as a group of lads wearing pink Afro wigs approached them. ‘No stags, mate, sorry,’ said Micky to the lad at the head of the group.
‘Ah, well this isn’t a stag night, see,’ the lad replied, ‘it’s a divorce night. My mate Alan here –’
‘Do I need to say it again?’ said Micky, not looking at him, but keeping his eyes on the rest of the group.
Stevie stepped up next to him. An ex-boxer like Micky, Stevie always found himself at the beck and call of the better of the two fighters. Everyone knew Micky could still knock a bloke out with one punch.
‘Let us in, you fucking twat!’ shouted a drunken skinhead from the back.
‘Please?’ said Alan the divorcee to Micky, pleading with his hands, ‘we’re not that drunk. Honest, guv.’
‘Listen, lover boy,’ said Micky, getting close to Alan, ‘you seem like a sensible bloke. Now take your mates up the road to Legends or something, or you’ll not be getting another wife anytime soon, right?’
Alan looked around at his friends.
‘I’ll count to ten,’ said Micky, stepping back.
‘Howay lads, looks shite anyway,’ said Alan. They all hesitated.
‘In my head,’ added Micky.
Alan began rounding everyone up, but as they started moving on, the skinhead turned on his heels and headed back towards Micky. ‘Who do you think you are, eh?’ He stood about three feet away from Micky, pointing at him, spitting out the words. Alan pulled at his friend’s T-shirt, sensing what was to come. ‘Think you’re a fucking hard man? Well, I know people, me, who are fucking harder than you, you fucking lardy-’
Micky’s head rammed into his face, a couple of girls waiting in the queue squealing as blood gushed from the skinhead’s nose and he fell to his knees. Micky took a handkerchief from his top pocket and wiped his forehead while Alan dragged his friend away.
‘There’s CCTV!’ Alan shouted, pointing to the camera up high on the side of the building, ‘I’ll get the police!’
‘Aye, whatever,’ Micky said to himself.
Stevie was handing out bits of paper to the girls in the queue who were clinging to each other. ‘First drink’s on the house, lasses,’ he said as he ushered them inside.
‘As soon as Mooney gets here, I’m off,’ said Micky, composing himself.
‘All right for some,’ said Stevie. It pissed him off that Micky seemed able to pick and choose where and when he worked. They were still equals in his mind, but it was obvious that Micky was being primed by Tiger to move up the syndicate into a more senior position. Still, the boss knew best.
Micky sniffed once more. He couldn’t be arsed with the jealousy and the ‘team dynamics’. He just wanted to make money so his kids didn’t grow up wanting for basics. And Nicola. She’d get a nice house off Valley Park with a dishwasher and a walk-in shower. He would make sure she was better off with him than with anyone else. It was just taking longer than he thought.
Micky was under no illusion. Nicola was out of his league, but she loved him – she’d married him, given birth to his kids. She was ten years his junior, and even better looking now than eleven years ago when they met. Her body was still shapely, slim at the waist but ample around the tits and arse, just how he liked it. Now thirty-seven, Micky had piled on the weight. He had always been stocky and muscular, and he worked out constantly at Tiger’s gym, but the years of steroids and protein enhancers had taken their toll. His hair was gone, his eyes shrunken. He was mammoth, but he liked it that way. It made him threatening, and threatened people did what they were told and didn’t question his opinions and make him feel stupid. Nothing made him more angry than being made to feel stupid.
By the time Mooney got to the club, it was almost ten-thirty.
‘Where the fuck have you been?’ Micky towered over him.
‘Down the Quayside, load of footballers in, sold a mint.’ Mooney was his usual twitchy self. At barely five feet tall, he couldn’t control the ticks that ravaged his pock-marked face. His head was a mop of curly, greying black hair, greasy and uncombed, and his blue eyes bulged like those of a newly hatched chick. There was a smell of dampness about him. He repulsed women and he hated every last one of them for it.
‘Should’ve seen all the s-sluts throwing themselves at them.’ Mooney jogged on the spot, completely hyper.
‘Well, there’s plenty more sluts inside. And here, don’t come out till you’ve taken at least five hundred.’
‘Yes, boss.’ Mooney’s face lit up at being offered a club again, rather than the second-rate pubs and bars that were his usual haunts. He saluted Micky and winked at Stevie as he went in the door, Stevie flaring his nostrils as if he'd smelled something rancid.
‘Right, I’m off,’ said Micky.
‘So I’m on me own, then?’
Micky gave Stevie a look that told him to back off as he hailed down a passing taxi. ‘Tiger’s sending someone over,’ he announced as he slid into the back seat of the cab.
The driver sat upright. ‘All right, Micky lad,’ he said, but Micky couldn’t be doing with pleasantries. He’d been getting more and more itchy to get back to Nicola over the past hour.
‘Valley Park,’ he ordered and, knowing when to stay quiet, the driver pulled off.
Micky called Nicola’s mobile. He called again, and then again. She hated that phone, and he hated that she never took it out with her. That was the whole point of the damn things.
As the taxi crawled through the traffic, he could feel the anger bubbling in his chest. She’d looked stunning earlier. It had taken every inch of control he’d had not to rip her face off so no one else would look at it. She’d be the best looking bird in that pub by far, and if she was pissed, her lard-arse mate would have her up dancing and the blokes would be thinking their luck was in.
The queues of taxis heading around town was dense. He could have walked quicker. He covered his mouth with his hand, breathing deeply to fight off the frustration. He clenched his jaw and dialled her number again. He’d ram that fucking phone down her throat if she didn’t answer this time.
***
Lee soaked up this long-lost haunt from his past. The upholstery was a soft green now, rather than the tan-coloured leather of the 1980s. He could remember sinking his fingers into the cracks of the leather and pulling out the stuffing while his dad moaned about people leaving green crisps in the ashtrays. Frank had brought him here for his first pint on his sixteenth birthday. You didn’t wait until you were eighteen on Valley Park. Sixteen years later he was in the same bar, staring at a woman as she danced to ‘The Irish Rover’. He watched her hips move. She spun around on one foot, propelling herself with the other, her hands above her head. His eyes burned from lack of blinking. She stood out somehow, her skin too clear, her eyes too bright, her smile too white – dare he say it, too good for the place.
The song came to an end and the pub was full of cheers. The band moved on to ‘The Twelfth of Never’ and couples got up to slow dance. Nicola fell into her seat, out of breath, her hair wet at the fringe with sweat. As she pulled at her top to cool herself down, she stole a look at Lee, took in his tall, slim frame, brown eyes, the fair, wavy hair receding slightly at the temples. When their eyes met, he smiled, his face creasing into ripples of skin across his cheeks right up to his ears.
Margy peered suspiciously at Lee over her glass. This could go one way or the other, and she hoped it wasn’t the other. Although she would happily see Nicola free of that dickhead husband of hers, she also knew how much danger something li
ke this could put her in. Just the fact that someone else was looking at her like that could throw Micky into a frenzy, and Margy knew what he was capable of. She looked to Mark, wondering if he’d noticed the silent flirtation, but Mark sat straight and unmoving, his eyes piercing something in the near distance. She followed his gaze to the bar, and nudged Nicola gently. They all stared at the back of his fiery red head. Tyrone Woods.
Nicola put her hand on Mark’s arm but he was up and out of his seat, not noticing Kim’s drink falling to the floor.
It was a few seconds before Tyrone sensed the breath on the back of his neck. He turned, started, and tried to move away, but was hemmed in by men wanting their drinks, their women waiting thirstily at their tables.
‘A word,’ said Mark, his fists tight at his sides.
Tyrone wiped his young, lipless mouth, his eyes darting around the pub. ‘Nar, you’re all right,’ he said tensely in a drawling Derry accent.
‘Still gonna do it?’ Mark said in Tyrone’s ear. ‘Still gonna lie for the filth?’
Tyrone’s tiny blue eyes were normally daggers, a warning to stay the hell away. But the boldness Mark was used to in this boy was gone. Like Mark, he was jumpy and frightened. Tyrone’s eyes shot towards the exit, but Mark put his head in the path of any gaze that wasn’t directed into his own face.
Lee, sitting just a few feet away, noticed the change in atmosphere. The red-haired kid at the bar looked scared out of his wits, and Nicola and her two companions no longer smiled and laughed and drank their vodka. They sat huddled together, watching, finding comfort in each other’s hands.
Nicola watched in alarm as she saw Tyrone’s older brother, Gerry, emerge from the men’s toilets and stride towards his brother and Mark. His long, bandy legs, round shoulders and hawklike face gave him a grizzly, cartoon-like appearance. Gerry Woods was ugly, and he had a reputation for not stopping until his opponent was either unconscious or dead.
