The Hard Cold Shoulder - L A Sykes

by Near To The Knuckle

  Sandra, your A and E colleague?”

  She frowned distractedly and said, “Sorry? What?”

  “Sandra, from A and E. What can you tell me?”

  “Red haired Sandra? She’s off sick with stress. That’s what they say she’s off with. Stress, eh? I don’t think I’ve met anyone working here without stress, with all what’s going on and this bloody bureaucracy on top, like there’s not enough to do. You’d know, being the police. They’re doing the same to you lot aren’t they? Why, she’s alright isn’t she, I mean you don’t thi-”

  “Doesn’t matter, just wanted a quick word, but the bloody bureaucrats on her ward wouldn’t give me her address.”

  She shook her head and laughed incredulously, “Really? That’s ridiculous. I know she’s in the nurses accommodation block, I just don’t know the number. Sorry I can’t be more helpful, and I’m sorry about the…the other thing.”

  I nodded, “I’ll get it off the computer at the station, no bother. I’ll leave you to get back to your patients.”

  I walked out down the corridor through the bleeding and bouncing A and E rabble with her words running after my eardrums: “Please let me know Theresa’s all right.”

  “Tabitha,” I shouted.

  ***

  Children screaming and parents tutting from the A and E queue snatched my attention. The line had splayed into a circle. In the middle, two security guards wrestled with a drunk. They were unevenly matched, one being over six foot, the other just about five. The figure in between took advantage of the mismatch, leaning into the shorter.

  I walked over to see if I’d know the bloke, thinking it was probably one of the known street drunks left to rot and beg in the high street, thinking I could talk him down before someone got hurt. I was surprised by the drunk’s sharp suit as he shouted, “Get off me you grubby bastards and give me my glasses.”

  I waved my I.D. at the security boys. The taller grimaced, keeping a tight grip on the suit’s wrist and said, “Your lot’s back, eh? Should think so too, should be in’t cells, this bugger. Your lot brought him in, pissed out of his face dancing around in town. They couldn’t be arsed with arresting him, told the staff to let him go when he’s sober and passed fit. Was alright at first, slept like. Since he’s woke up he’s demanding to jump the queue. We weren’t funny with him, we just told him no, and then he goes to slap Danny,” nodding to the smaller guard.

  He managed a smile while struggling to restrain the other sinewy arm and chipped in, “He did and all, good job I can still bob and weave.”

  Taller strained and growled, “Keep still, calm down. Danny, get that wrist lock on proper, don’t bruise his skin, Christsakes, we’ll be sued, sacked or both.”

  The drunk wriggled and turned to the taller guard, “How dare you-”

  I cut his speech off by slapping him across the face with the warrant card. “No, how dare you. How dare you act like this in front of kids. This is a bloody hospital. For everybody, not just you. You’re no more important than anybody else, so either sit down, shut up and wait your turn, or fuck off home. These people work here to help people, you jumped up prick. Treat them with proper respect or sling it.”

  He stopped struggling, breathing heavily.

  “The cavalry, I see. You’re just a glorified version of these clowns. Do yourself a favour and piss off.”

  I laughed and took the wrist from the taller guard. I twisted it hard and shoved it up his back, kicking away his legs. Pushed his face into the floor, knelt down and whispered, “Buck up, buttercup. You’re making a prize fool of yourself.”

  “Get off! You can’t do this. I’ll report you, you vicious little thug. You’re going to break my arm.”

  “Are you going to behave?”

  “Don’t dare talk to me like a child, you-,” I pressed his wrist higher. He yelped.

  “Well, stop acting like one. Now are we finished?”

  “You’re finished! you’re finished, you hear me?”

  “I’m not finished just yet.” I ground my knuckle into his nose. He squealed.

  “Just get off.”

  “Only when I’m satisfied you’re going to be civilized.” He wisely kept his mouth shut and I let go. I dragged him back to his feet, picked up his glasses and delicately slid them onto his shocked face.

  I turned to leave, pushing through the clapping crowd.

  “Never even said thank you for returning his glasses, the rude bugger,” I said to a young woman with two dumbstruck kids clamped to her thighs on my way out.

  I followed the signs to the nurses’ residency block, wondering what had happened to the country to take it to the point where nurses were on yellow pills and going against their vocation to stage a strike because of the decisions of politicians who couldn’t get a majority vote and considered human suffering in economic terms, forgetting about the people with nothing but the rain as a surety.

  I’d been harsh on the nurse, Vanessa, maybe too harsh. I didn’t think I’d been too harsh on the Champagne Charlie and I convinced myself I’d broken even on the karma front.

  The front entrance to the nursing residential block, a squat, grey-bricked huddle of flats, was locked with an electronic keypad, making a discrete break-in impossible. I tried a couple of random codes hoping to get lucky. I pushed all the buzzers, numbered one to forty, and got nothing in the way of a response.

  Karma shone in the form of a pretty brunette who gave me a smile that could sweep the streets. She unclipped the door and said, “Can I help you?”

  I tried a smile and said, “I’m a friend of Sandra’s, love. You know, bright red hair. Just passing by and wanted a quick catch up, like.”

  “Sandra? Oh I know, yes, she’s on the top floor at the end. That Sandra?”

  “That’s the one. Thirty-eight.”

  “Thirty-six, isn’t it? I might be wrong, I’ve only been there once, for a coffee when I first moved here. I’ve not see her in ages, come to think of it. Shift work. Tell her hello from Emma on the ground floor, will you?”

  “Certainly, Emma. Off anywhere nice?”

  “Just into town meeting some friends.”

  “Well, have a good one. And take care, now.”

  “Thanks.” She let herself out and I watched her disappear at the end of the street. I took the stairs; the landings were silent, most of the flats seemed unoccupied with only the odd one on each floor with mats and shoe trays outside their doors. I reached the top floor. Eight doors, four either side. Thirty-six, second on the right.

  I crept across the moss green carpet, listened hard. Nothing. I tapped lightly on the door. No response. I slowly depressed the handle. It was locked. I listened again, took another look around and remembered I wasn’t a copper any more anyway. What was I afraid of? I didn’t need just cause and magistrates permission to jeopardise legal process.

  No more disciplinary board meetings.

  No bollockings.

  Fuck it.

  I stepped back and took it off its hinges with my shoulder, swinging into the flat’s wall with a sharp crack.

  The living room doubled as a bedroom with a small kitchen attached at the top; its door open. It was empty. The bed wasn’t. Its occupant remained static. Either a deep sleeper or worse. I took a deep breath to steady myself from the room shrinking in my mind; I felt the walls pressing against my shoulders.

  I rushed to the still form, head concealed under a thick white duvet. I gripped the covers and prepared for the worst. I peeled them back and piercing screams threw me back in a panicked scramble.

  A naked Indian man sat bolt upright, letting out shrieks in staccato bursts.

  “Shush, whoa, calm down. Calm down,” I shouted.

  He jumped out of bed and reached underneath, pulling out a cricket bat. “Come on, pervert. I’ll take your fucking kneecaps off!” he cried, wild eyed.

  I snatched my warrant card, waving it. “It’s alright, I’m the police. There’s nothing to be alarmed about-” />
  “Nothing to be alarmed about!? I’ve been on call for the last twenty-four hours and the minute I get to sleep the police come kicking my door in! I’ve been a tax paying British citizen for twenty-eight years and I get treated like this? Do you want proof you fascist bastard? I’ll get you proof.” He dropped the bat and started rifling through a drawer under a bedside table.

  I shouted to his back, “No, no, no there’s no need for any of that. I just got the addresses mixed up, that’s all. Just a welfare check on someone doctor, that’s all.”

  “Doctor? I’m a Mister, you rude bastard. Consultant. Can you even spell that? I bet you can’t even say it, you uncultured yob. Go on, say it.”

  “Look, Mister, I’ve got my job to do so I’m going to have to leave now. I apologize for the disturbance, now go back to sleep.”

  “Say it.”

  “What?”

  “Consultant. As in consult, to ask. Ask, instead of knocking bloody doors off hinges when people are trying to sleep. You can’t even say it, can you? Too many syllables hasn’t it?”

  My patience thinned quickly. “Oh fuck off back to bed.”

  “Oh I will, Mr. big policeman, kicking in doors. I’ll go back to sleep when I’ve phoned security.”

  I left him jabbering to himself and fiddling with his phone. I went back into the corridor and saw thirty-eight had the only other floor mat. Dried mud crusted around its edges. I had maybe two minutes before the security boys would show.

  Shouldered into thirty-eight; identical layout except for an untouched bed. The kitchen was as bare as the walls. Under the bed, two black canvas bags with clothes packed tightly, ceramic ornaments wrapped with socks. A half-full strip of syringes in a side pocket with toiletries. Nurse Sandra, possible junkie or major league diabetic. Packed and ready to bolt.

  I came out of the room, wedging the door shut behind me and hoping the dim lights would cover the splintered edges. Shouted from the doorway of thirty-six, “Sir, when was the last time you saw your neighbour?”

  “I’m so tired I don’t know what fucking day it is. The security are coming for you,” he smiled under his bushy moustache.

  “Think. She may be at risk. I was told she’s off sick with stress, I need to know when you last saw her.”

  “Stress? Ha! She’d know what stress is if she had to put up with this kind of harassment! I can’t remember the exact day, a week or so ago, maybe.” He swung his arms up in the air, “She’s probably ran away, and I can’t blame her. Who in their right mind would want to live in this town!?’

  I left him to it and bolted down the stairs. I approached the front door and saw the security boys letting themselves in with a key fob. I had nowhere to hide and contemplated on which one to knock out first. The taller broke into a smile and said, “Oh, it’s you, inspector. We couldn’t recognise you through the glass. We thought you were a burglar or something.”

  I forced a laugh. “No, was just passing through and heard a commotion. I’m glad you two are here. Some naked Indian bloke was running about with a cricket bat. Think he was sleepwalking, talking about having a nightmare about being deported. I managed to wake him up and took him back to his flat. He’s made a mess of a couple of doors though. Must have been a vivid dream, I’ll say that.”

  Danny and the taller man turned to each other and said, “Mr Kadam,” simultaneously.

  “Got to shoot lads. Tuck him in properly.”

  “We will, thanks for before.”

  “Any time, boys.”

  The rain outside carried on the rising wind, lashing my face. I was dizzy: from the cramped spaces and the fact the nurse, Sandra, couldn’t have been on duty the night Tabitha was admitted. Yet she knew enough to inform Tommy Rellis of the details. I wondered how that was possible and my head thumped at the implications and the image of packed bags; ready to disappear. Waves of exhaustion swayed my balance and I welcomed the icy bite of the gale to keep me alert. Things didn’t add up and I needed a rest and some back up, in the form of thirteen bullets.

  Three

  I walked down the canal bank and up over the iron bridge to my flat, trying to burn off the adrenalin the agoraphobic panic had shot into my veins, hoping the serenity of the slow flowing grey canal water would rub off on me; neither the walk nor water made any difference.

  Crossing the deserted road I heard light tapping a distance behind. They sounded more and more like footsteps the longer and harder I listened.

  I kept walking at the same pace for a hundred metres, stopping suddenly and crouching, playing with my boot laces. The footsteps followed suit. Only the humming of the orange lamp post bulb broke the silence. I chanced a look around, seeing nothing and anything in a menagerie of sinister black forms, sculpting random patterns from neon lit shadows.

  The effects of insomnia were worsening by the day, teasing my senses, and I scanned the street until I was sure there was nothing.

  I took the stairs to the third floor of the block I never called home. Kicked my way through a pile of post and flipped on the light. Buzzing television sets from the thin walls of the neighbours scratched at the silence I craved.

  The hallway seemed narrower every time I came back, even though I felt myself growing smaller. I went into the living room, leaving the doors wide open, and slid the windows up, welcoming the wind. I ran a freezing shower and tried to slow down my thoughts and the choking sensation of the cramped bathroom.

  I knew Tommy Rellis was owed no pity, but I felt the torture of the man’s bad decision-making creeping into my fibres; echoes of my own mistakes illuminated in the bare, one bedroom flat with Closed In for unwanted constant company. The consequences of the man’s disgusting, selfish stupidity spiked into the forefront of my mind, ripping up ruminations of both mine and Tommy’s self-induced annihilation: The girl, Tabitha.

  Her name flickered round and round and visions of streams of tears swam through my head and I forced myself to lie on my bed and clamp shut my eyes. Beads of sweat cascaded from my temples and I concentrated on breathing steadily, willing desperately needed sleep to carry me away.

  Flashes of fragmented faces danced and I focused on fading them to black through the shattered lenses of my eyes taking refuge and writhing behind the lids fighting to open. My body locked up and I drifted into the moment where consciousness unravels onto the sweet edge of the realm of the promise of sleep. I floated towards a flush meadow and saw a scattering of red carnations swaying gently. I swept my hand down to feel the petals and the flowers wilted between my fingertips. The white clouds gathered together, darkening and twisting the sky as shadows towered and a ripping gust stole my breath. Thunderous rain peppered the earth, soddening the ground until I felt it fall away. I scrambled back up on a mound of mud, dirt sinking beneath my feet. The ground rumbled and shook and I turned to see a great caliginous hole with limbs clawing at the surface. Copious legions of corpses broke through, various shapes and sizes, naked flesh peeling from their emaciated bodies and faces, pulling each other up, following my path, begging me with their eyes, circling and snatching at my feet and murmuring and squealing. I tried to scramble higher but their bloodied arms reached out and yanked at my legs. Swirling clouds descended and wrapped around my chest and neck, dragging me skyward though the dead hung on, splaying my body, separating the vertebrae in my stretched back.

  I was screaming, my screams uncontrollable, screwing into my skull and ringing my ears and I forced my eyelids to open and gasped for breath. I ran into the living room, leaned out of the window, shivering, sucking in air. I felt a presence emanating from the hall and snapped my head around.

  DCI Tavistock raised his eyebrows and grinned from the doorway.

  Four

  He shook his head slowly, sighed and said, “What’s up with your face? You look like you’ve been in’t woods wit Yorkshire Ripper.”

  He was my gaffer, before the force psychologists told me I wasn’t mentally strong enough anymore. They told me what I was expe
riencing was perfectly normal. They told me one day I’d be more or less back to my old self. Maybe. I told them I could function fine for the job.

  More than fine. Good to go, keen to get back in the station, elbow to elbow with the crew. The Brass wouldn’t take my word for it, and wouldn’t have let Tavistock’s thoughts on the matter shift their decision anyway.

  I tried to compose myself and shrugged. “How are you doing, sir?”

  “Been better, lad, been better, but looking at you puts things into perspective a bit, that’s for certain. Just thought I’d pop in, keep tabs like.” He looked around the living room, scrunched up his face at the veil of dust layering the glass coffee table and the brown faux leather couch, “Hardly the Casino here, lad, is it? Don’t you offer guests a drink?”

  “I don’t have any, sir. I don’t drink, I like to keep my mind sharp,” I said, forcing a smile.

  He stared into my eyes, “How times change, eh? No booze? What is it? Scared you’ll lose control and do something stupid?”

  I took a deep breath and felt my face burn. I kept the forced smile fixed. “No, my mind is fine alright. I just prefer to keep it clear is all.”

  He looked me up and down. “That right, is it? You used to drown yourself in ale. You been eating? I’ve seen more meat on a butcher’s pencil.”

  “Have you come to do a fucking welfare check or what?” I snapped.

  He smirked and held up his hands. “All right, all right. You never used to have a temper on you, you touchy bugger. Laid back Larry they used t’say behind your back. I just wanted to show you that you aren’t on your own, son. So what are you up to then?”

  “Working. Private consultations.”

  “Consultations, eh? Very posh.”

  “Best thing that’s ever happened. The force’s loss. If they won’t employ me, there’s others who will. No paperwork either, suits me fine. Sit down, sir.”

  He continued to stare and said, “Prefer to stand, lad. Is that Ludo?” he asked, pointing to the bookcase. “Jesus, I’ve not played that since I was a nipper. Set it up, I’ll have you a game.”