50

Anthony

 

 

            He got the text message from Michael at half past four.  Get away as soon as we can. It’s on for 6pm at the club.  Anthony  answered the text, and then stuffed his mobile phone into his back pocket.  The time worked well for him, he thought.  He was working a double shift, and wasn’t due to clock off until eight. If he feigned illness and got away before six o’clock, then there was a good chance the whole thing would be done and dusted by eight.  He would be able to return home on time.  He was hoping he would never have to lie to his wife again after tonight. 

After making several fake dashes to the toilet, Anthony claimed he had a bad stomach, and was promptly sent home.  No one wanted a chef with a dodgy tummy working in the restaurant.  He changed out of his grease stained work clothes, chucked them in the back of his car, and drove off.  He felt a nervous drumbeat throbbing through his body as he drove towards Redchurch.  It made him lick his lips and grasp the steering wheel tight enough to make his knuckles ache.

There was a part of him that felt wound up tight, and full of dread as he headed back to that place.  It was the part of him that felt like the scum of the earth for telling his wife so many lies.  It was the part of him that told him he should do as she asked, stay away from trouble, keep his nose out of it all.  But the other part of him was kicking his arse all the way along, again and again, bang, bang, bang, get a move on, get over there, get it started.  It was a part of him he had left behind a long time ago.  Remnants of the troublemaker he had once been.  He smiled recklessly to himself, as he drove back to the familiar territory.  He saw himself as a young teenager, giddy with his own swagger and balls.  He had been full of himself, with every good reason to be.  Michael had grown up with his eyes fixed upwards, emulating his older brother from the petty crimes, to the fights with boys after school. 

He’d thought he was the bees knees, hadn’t he?  Big and strong and handsome. Not afraid of anything or anyone.  The day he had laid his father out on the kitchen floor had been one of the best days of his life.  Michael had been hovering in the background.  No one was ever going to push them around again.  He hadn’t even been that bothered about going to prison the first time.  It had been on the cards for years.  There are only so many times the police and the courts can warn a young man to behave himself.  Maybe there had been a part of him that had wanted to go.  Another string to add to the bad boy bow.

That was the part of him that Chrissie did not know, or understand, Anthony reflected.  She had a distinct habit of talking over him, or changing the subject whenever a slice of the old him appeared in a conversation.  It’s okay, he sometimes wanted to tell her, I don’t want to go back to being that person, not ever, talking about it won’t change me back to him.  He could never quite get it through to her, that he had stopped being that person when he met Danny.  She had an irrational fear and suspicion of a man she had still not even met, and yet Anthony knew that boy had changed him more than anything, or anyone else had.  That she should be thanking him, not fearing him.

I wanted to help him, Anthony thought, swinging his car around the roundabout and following Barrack road, past the police station and the youth club, that’s when I changed. When I wanted to help him. Didn’t want to get in trouble anymore. Wanted to get him out of trouble. 

It had seemed so simple, at first.  Anthony recalled how he had revelled in his position as the older boy the younger ones could turn to.  He had relished the thought of getting his hands on Lee Howard.  That night in the garden, on Danny’s fourteenth, he had sent the boys inside the house and given it to Howard straight.  He had provided his most menacing stare, his blood-thirstiest grin.  With his friends behind him, he had sent that small eyed, thin lipped bastard packing.  Done.  He had clapped his hands, grinned smugly at his friends, looked forward to telling the boys not to worry.  How wrong he had been.

Anthony could still remember the feeling now.  Having the ground ripped out from under his feet.  The confusion.  The hammering at the door, the police swarming in violently, handcuffing him and dragging him outside in just his tracksuit trousers.  Horror and disbelief swamping his mind.  Seeing Michael and Billy skidding to a stop on their bikes outside, as he was shoved into a police car.  He smoked a bit of dope, but he did not deal.  It wasn’t fair.  He was set up.  He was fucked over.  No time to help Danny, or spend time with Mike, it was just all over. Back to prison.  He hadn’t done anything wrong.

Oh those months had dragged in misery.  He had been overwhelmed by his own sense of helplessness and self-pity.  How could he be back in prison again?  How could this happen?  How could he prove it was all wrong?  How could he get back out there and help Danny?  He couldn’t.  The realisation had led him into the first real depression of his entire life.  He couldn’t do anything.  All he could do was serve the time.  Bide his time.  Hope for the best. Grit his teeth.

Anthony approached the roundabout, narrowed his eyes at the desolate nightclub across the road, and turned left, and then left again.  He pulled into the car park of the Conservative club, overlooking the roundabout.  It was almost directly opposite Howler.  It was surrounded by a chain link fence, beyond which a row of neatly maintained conifer hedging further helped disguise his car.  He killed the engine and sat back, closing his eyes briefly, pressing them together and allowing himself a deep, steadying breath. 

Prison had changed him that time.  He had felt it, and he had known it whenever Michael looked into his eyes.  He was just as vulnerable as they were, and they all knew it.  He had been wrong about Lee Howard.  Anthony reached into the back then, retrieving his cigarettes and his mobile phone from the pockets of his chef whites.  He saw that he had missed a call from Lucy, but tucked the phone between his legs, while he lit himself a cigarette.  He smiled to himself wryly.  He had been trying to give up again, but if there was any time that called for a smoke, surely this was it? Into the dragons den, and all that, he mused, picking the phone back up and bringing up Lucy’s number. Before he called her, he gazed back out of the windscreen, at the glimpse of Howler he had through the bushes.  A sadness settled deep within him then, as he tried to imagine all the nights Danny must have spent there, collecting glasses and washing up.  Just a small boy in the palm of monsters.  He recalled the time Danny had shown up with a cut to his forehead, and fresh blood pumping from his nose and mouth, as usual just brushing it off as if it was nothing.  It was the night they had been getting ready to go to Chaos for the first time. He could still see Danny’s face, beaming with excitement, hopping around impatiently, while Anthony kicked the wall and longed to go and beat the shit out of Lee Howard, while at the same time realising that he had to hold back, he had to be smarter than that.

Danny had rolled his eyes, dismissing it, longing to get going, to get to the club that played his music. Anthony had let them go, watched them from the window, Michael with hands in his pockets, his shoulders hunched anxiously, while Danny bounded on ahead, laughing and shouting.  He’d watched them go, seething in disgust and rage, balling his hands into fists against the window pane.  What could he do?  He had just got back from prison.  He was terrified of getting sent back.  Howard could do it again, couldn’t he? What could he do?

That night, he had sat watching and listening as they dissected the amazing time they had had, and he could tell by their eyes that they had taken something.  He didn’t say anything until morning, and his fears had intensified overnight.  Smoking weed was one thing, but he didn’t want his little brother taking anything else.  He had felt utterly helpless, like a pointless gaping bystander, just hanging back and watching aghast as the lives of the two people he cared about most were put at risk.  In the end he had pulled Danny to one side and warned him never to give that shit to Michael again.  He hadn’t enjoyed it, first the look of fear that leapt into the boys eyes when he grabbed him, and then the instant flash of hurt, followed by anger and distrust. 

Anthony sighed, and looked away from the club. He tried not to picture who might be in there now, and why.  He rubbed his eyes awake, rolled his window down a little, and tapped his ash outside.  And then there was Michael and Lucy, dragging Danny back from the beach, a total wreck, so fucked and out of it he could barely stand.  Anthony recalled his dismay, his frustration, how could this be happening?  He’d thought again, what could he do?  Confront Howard again?  Go to the police?  Talk Danny into telling the police?  He even considered going to the boys mother.  It was only when Danny coughed up the name of his drug dealer, that Anthony started to form a loose plan in his mind. It had spiralled from there. 

He knew the Lawlers.  He could find Jaime and talk to him.  It was a start.  Yeah, he thought now, his finger still hovering over the call button to Lucy, it had been a start, the start of getting us all in even deeper. I should have gone to the fucking police.  I would have…but I was scared of going back to jail… He supposed he felt a lot like Danny did about it these days.  If he could go back and face himself at that age, he would shake himself by the shoulders, tell him to do the right thing.  Get the police involved, the social services, anything. Get Danny away from those men, and get those men locked up.  It didn’t seem like it was possible at the time.

He sighed, shook his head and pressed call.  Lucy answered almost instantly, as if she had been holding the phone right next to her ear.  “Anthony?” She sounded scared, he thought, and he didn’t blame her. “What’s going on?  The other two won’t answer their phones!”

“It’s okay, I just heard from Mike,” he told her gently. “He’s low on credit, so doesn’t want to use any up unless he has to.  Think Danny has his turned off for the moment.  He had a run in with that Haskell woman earlier, and she keeps phoning him.”

“Oh?  Why?  What happened?”

“She’s been involved from the start, didn’t Danny tell you yet?”

“Involved?  With what?  No, he didn’t!” Lucy sounded perilously close to tears, Anthony thought grimly.

“We only found out when I got hold of Jaime Lawler. He works for Howard too. Drug dealing again.  He told us Haskell has been on Howard’s side the whole time, letting him know where we all live and that. Probably posted some of those letters herself, who knows?”

“Bloody hell Anthony!” Lucy cried down the phone. 

“I know, I know.  Look, we’ll have to explain it all properly to you later darling. I’m parked opposite Howler at the moment.”

“What are you all going to do?”

“Hopefully nothing,” he told her honestly. “I’m just sat out here in case they need me.  Hopefully it will just be a chat, Lucy. They’ll just try and sort it all out.”

“But you can’t trust men like that!” she hissed desperately down the phone at him. 

“It’s alright” he tried to tell her.  “We have a plan.  It’s all sorted.  We’ll be okay Lucy, I promise you.”

“You can’t promise me that,” she replied tightly.  “None of you can. This is just like before, you three taking things into your own hands. It will all blow up in your faces if you’re not careful! Why don’t you just tell the police?”

“It’s not that simple Luce. Danny needs to speak to Howard.  He needs to put it behind him, and this will be the way.  He’s not going in alone.  Mike’s going in too, whether they like it or not.  I’m watching Lucy. I’ll call the cops the first sign of trouble I see, I promise.”

“I don’t want him to end up back in jail again.” Her voice was tiny now, cloaked in tears. “Like last time Anthony. What if it happens again?”

“No weapons,” Anthony assured her uselessly. “It won’t be like that. I promise.  It’s different.”

“I hope so,” Lucy told him and hung up the phone.  Anthony closed his eyes briefly, awash with fresh guilt.  Then he scrolled down the contacts on his phone.  He had added the number for the police station just minutes down the road.  In case we need it.  He glanced at the time.  Ten minutes to six.  He wrote a text to Michael and sent it; I’m here. Place looks dead from out here. Your end?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

51

Michael

 

We’re in the alley. Couple of cars parked close. Must be them. We’ll go in dead on 6. Michael hit send, then threw his head back against the head rest in his car, pushing a nervous hand stiffly through his hair.  “How you feeling?” he asked, with his eyes closed.  He heard Danny shifting on the passenger seat, and clearing his throat.

“Like something crawled into my stomach and died there.”

Michael laughed, opened his eyes and looked at him. “Yeah, you look kind of like that too!”

“Shut up.  Look at you.  I saw your hand shaking on the steering wheel on the drive over!”

Michael leaned towards him digging him in the side with an elbow.  Danny shoved him back, punched him in the arm.  There was a smattering of gentle, nervous laughter, and then they both fell silent again.  Michael checked the time on his phone.  Five minutes to go. 

“Feel a bit naked,” Danny croaked next to him.  He coughed, clearing his throat again, and drummed his fingers against the dashboard as he gazed out and up at the building to their left.  “Without a shit load of knives on me, I mean.” He looked at Michael again, a grin on his face, dread in his eyes.  Michael nodded sombrely.

“We’ve got Anthony.”

“I have a feeling I sense some pain heading my way,” Danny said, still grinning. Michael grunted.  He did not even want to think about it.

“You better turn your phone back on,” he said. “Get Anthony’s number up ready.”

Danny pulled out his phone, and Michael watched him pressing the buttons, and trying not to let the shake in his hand show too much.  He didn’t blame him one little bit.  He felt sick to his stomach with fear, and he didn’t have as many reasons as Danny did to be afraid.  But this was where it would all end, wasn’t it?  He had not yet grown tired of repeating this assurance inside his mind. It would all end here tonight, because Danny would talk to Jerry Howard.  Something would happen.  Michael still had no idea if Danny planned to agree to any of the old man’s terms, but he guessed it was better that way.  His job was just to be there. 

“Another four missed calls from Haskell,” Danny remarked beside him. Michael shook his head in disgust.

“Unbelievable. Why doesn’t she just crawl off and die?  I still can’t believe that hard nosed bitch.”

“What about what she said?” Danny looked at him, biting his lower lip.

“I wouldn’t believe a word that woman said, Danny. Not a word.  And even if it is true, if her mums’ fella’ abused her or whatever, why the fuck would that make her do what she did?” He lifted his hands in a gesture of frustration. “Why? I mean, if it’s true, then she should know how it feels, she shouldn’t be helping people like them!”

“She wanted to kill him, she said,” Danny replied, gazing down at the phone that lay in the palm of his hand. “She never had the guts.”

“So what?  Who cares?  Fuck her.  She screwed you over big time, mate, don’t forget that. We wouldn’t even need to be doing this if she hadn’t been helping that fucker in there, would we?”

He watched Danny consider it.  He felt the urge to roll down the window and spit out of it.  Just the sound of that woman’s name on his tongue made him feel queasy and on edge.  He had seen her on the pavement, clinging to Danny, whining and wailing.  What a performance! Michael did not buy a word of it.  “Don’t you go feeling sorry for her,” he warned Danny then, who looked back at him quickly with a frown. “I mean it mate.  I know what you’re like.  You’re already making up excuses for her in your head, aren’t you?”

“No, course not.”

“Yes you are. You’ve got that look in your eye. You feel sorry for her.”

“I do, in a way.”

“You don’t even know if it’s true,” Michael protested, twisting in the driver seat to face him properly. “It’s probably all bullshit about this man abusing her. Just another way for her to stick the knife in! She’s sick, that’s all it is Dan, she is sick. She just wanted a good juicy story, and she got that in the end didn’t she?”

“It would explain it, that’s all,” Danny shrugged, and looked back out of the window, closing his hand over his phone.  “Why she was so obsessed for years.”

“Whatever, just don’t you go feeling sorry for her, and when this is all over, don’t you bloody go anywhere near her. She’s poison.”

“I might not even be around here anyway,” came the distant reply.

“What are you saying?  What does that mean?” Michael asked him sharply.

“Got to think what to do for the best. For everyone.”

“You’re not gonna’ fucking let them chase you away.” Michael patted his arm, forcing him to turn to look at him. “Do you know, between us, Lawler and Haskell we have enough to go to the police? We could get Howard sent down. That’s what we need to focus on when tonight is over, depending on how it goes. We haven’t done anything wrong remember? We haven’t broken any laws.  They fucking have.”

“I know, I know.”

“Well then, don’t let me hear you talk like that. We don’t want scum like them winning Danny. We don’t want scum like them running the place!”

“Michael, it’s six o clock.”

“What?” Michael looked at his own phone.  He felt his stomach fall to his feet. “Oh fuck.”

He looked up, caught a glimpse of the abject misery on his friends face, and then watched him take a huge breath, before reaching for the handle and opening the car door. Michael opened his side, got out and closed the door quietly.  They both looked up at the building.  It had been painted a startling white out the front, with a neon blue sign that flashed on and off in the dark, Howler, but out the back it was the same drabby grey it had been back then. 

Michael came around to stand by Danny. He wanted to say something, but all he could think of was good luck, and that sounded terrible.  So he nudged him instead, and nodded at his phone.  Danny showed him that he had Anthony’s number up. Michael nodded, swallowing the hard lump that had formed in his throat. “Press call as soon as we see anyone,” he whispered, and then wondered why he was whispering, and why the hell he suddenly felt about fourteen years old again.

Danny nodded, placed the phone in his pocket and approached the back door.  There were three dirty steps. He stepped onto one, then reached out and pressed the buzzer to the right side of the door. His eyes flicked nervously back to Michael. Michael waited, one step behind him, not breathing.

He expected the buzzer to return with a voice, or a buzzing noise, but that did not happen.  Instead, they heard several locks being turned, or drawn back. They swapped looks again.  Michael shifted from one foot to the other, feeling the air leak out of his lungs. He told himself to snap out of it.  This was an old man they were dealing with. Lee Howard and Jack Freeman were dead and in the ground. But it was not the old man who answered the door.  It was the wide staring face of the man they now knew to be Nick Groves.

The man was taller than them by a good few inches, built like a wrestler, and with the steps between them, Michael suddenly felt even smaller and younger than he had before.  Nick Groves was dressed in a snappy grey suit, and he greeted them with a sneering smile that stretched out and up towards his small round ears.  His shaven head was huge and round, and reminded Michael of a bowling ball, gleaming upon his wide, square shoulders. “Evening lads,” came the gruff, yet pleasant greeting.  He sounded amused, Michael thought, staring at him.  Like he knew he was in for a fun night.  He held the door open for them, and Danny looked at him once, then made it up the steps, squeezing past Nick Groves into the dark and narrow hallway that was beyond.  Michael followed quickly, not wanting to lose him, afraid that the door would be slammed in his face.

But Nick Groves let him through, and Michael squeezed past the big man’s chest, as Danny had before him. Nick Groves slammed the door behind him, clapped his hands in delight, and when Michael turned to look at him, all he could see was that huge shining head rushing violently towards his, the man’s eyes sparkling with hunger.  Michael did not even have time to remove his hands from his pockets.  The head smashed into his, darkness exploded, and as he went down he fought to say the words, to urge Danny to act, press call Danny! Press call! Call!

48

Lucy

 

 

The morning had gone well, she reflected, grabbing her duffel coat from the staff room, and buttoning it up on her way out to the car park.  She had finally gone to see the head to announce her pregnancy.  Of course, the head had been lovely, really excited for her, and before long everyone knew, and everywhere she went she felt the smiles upon her.  She walked out to the car park, one hand now proudly held under her growing bump.  Lucy was relieved she no longer had to try and disguise it with looser tops than normal, convinced that her fellow teachers just thought she had let herself go a bit. It was all out in the open now.

She breathed a sigh of relief as she walked, and then broke into a huge helpless smile when she spotted Michael’s car.  Both doors opened, and the two young men approached her, smiling warmly.  She held out her arms to them both and laughed in surprise as they both fell into them, snaking their arms around her back. “Oh aren’t I the lucky one?” she laughed. “Two handsome young men coming to meet me at school?  They’ll all be gossiping like crazy in there!”  She had her arm around each of them, Michael’s mass of thick black hair nestled into one shoulder, and Danny’s blonde locks on the other side.  Michael finally pulled away and she wrapped both arms tightly around Danny. “Are you both alright?” she asked then, feeling suddenly that they were not.  Michael averted his eyes to the ground.

“How’s school?” he asked, avoiding the question. “Bet they still remember me and Anthony here!”

“I bet they do,” Lucy agreed, frowning as Danny remained buried in her arms. “So why the visit?” she asked, trying to catch Michael’s eye. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”

Danny breathed in deeply then, as if sucking up the smell of her.  She felt him nuzzle his nose into her neck through her hair, and she giggled as it tickled, but she could also feel the sadness coming from him, and her heart began to race.  She forced him back, holding him around the waist.  “Come on, what is it?  I know you two well enough by now to know something is wrong.”

“You look gorgeous,” Danny told her, smiling broadly.  But the smile did not touch his eyes.

“What’s going on?” she asked again.  “Michael?”

Michael was leaning against his car, ankles crossed, hands in pockets.  He looked at Danny, as if trying to read what the right answer might be. “He just wanted to come and see you, that’s all,” he said with a nervous shrug.  Lucy understood what it was then, and she berated herself for not realising sooner. She looked Danny in the eye, and he held her gaze.

“You’re going to see him aren’t you? The old man?  Today?” Danny nodded in reply to her, keeping his hands where they were, laced at the small of her back. Lucy tried to swallow down the fear that came rushing up from her guts.  She told herself she had known it was coming.  “You’ll be careful?” she asked, shifting slightly to take in Michael just behind.  “You won’t do anything silly?”

“Just going to talk,” Danny told her gently, his smile stretching out to his ears, his hands pulling her closer. “Just going to lay it all on the table and try to find a solution.  I promise, it will all be okay.”

“I’m scared,” she told him, and he nodded.

“Me too, but it will be okay.  I’ve got my sidekicks in tow, see?” He jerked his head at Michael, grinning. “It’s all worked out,” he tried to reassure her.  “We’re meeting in a public place, no funny business. We’ll call the cops the first sign of trouble we get, we promise.”

Lucy tried to say something, but the words got stuck in her throat.  She felt like she was going to cry, so she pulled him close again, burying her face in his chest. Her belly squished between them, and he put his hand down there, rubbing it gently and chuckling into her hair.  “You promise me you’ll be careful,” Lucy said, closing her eyes against him.  “Promise me and the baby.”

“I promise, I promise,” Danny replied, playfully ruffling her hair. “I just came to let you know what’s going on. I didn’t mean to freak you out or anything.”

“I’ll look after him Luce,” said Michael, moving away from the car and stepping forward.  Lucy lifted her head, held back the tears and forced a smile for him.  He looked so anxious, she thought, anxious yet somehow fierce, how was that possible?  She thought back then, seeing him as a teenager again, and it made her smile real.  She had always thought him so handsome, she remembered, that dark tousled hair, those deep brown eyes.  He had driven her best friend Zoe crazy for years, holding her at bay for as long as he could, while he checked out all the other girls first, even though Zoe was by far the prettiest girl in the whole school.  Lucy reached out to him, pressing her palm against his cheekbone.  He’d looked fierce all the way through school, she thought, Michael Anderson, talking back, getting into fights, trouble with the police just like his older brother.  He had swanned around school as if he owned the place, and in many ways he had.  Fierce, she thought again, looking at him, fierce but yet full of hope, that was how he had been back then. The joker.   Always with a ready smile and a careless laugh, no matter how tough life seemed.

“You better look after each other,” she corrected him, and he smiled against her hand, nodding. 

“We’ll call you later,” said Danny, finally unwinding himself from her.  She shivered and crossed her arms over her stomach, as the cold wind whipped her hair back from her face.

“You better do.”

They nodded, looked at each other and headed back towards the car.  There was nothing else to be said, she supposed, watching them.  Of course she realised they were probably not telling her all of it.  That was their way, and she understood, she knew why.  She would get the full story when the time was right, and that was okay.  She supposed she didn’t want to know any more than she did at the moment anyway.  She was at work, and she was already distracted enough with thoughts of the baby. She watched Michael get back behind the wheel.  Danny was half way around the car when he suddenly halted, let out a breath, and then ran back to her.  He caught her in a violent embrace, nearly knocking her from her feet, and then his lips were upon hers urgently, their teeth clashing mid-kiss.  He pulled back, looked like he was about to say something, and then looked away, and went back to the car.

Lucy was left watching the old Escort roar off with both of them inside, grim faced behind the windscreen.  “See you later,” she whispered to the wind, lifting a hand in a pointless wave.

 

 

 

 

49

Danny

 

            So, seeing Lucy had been like a blow to the heart.  Danny felt choked by it, driving away, leaving her there like that.  He could only watch her growing smaller in the wing mirror, her hair blowing back in the wind, and think, he had only just found her again.  He looked at his phone then.  There was a text message from Caroline Haskell, and just seeing her name there on his phone made him want to vomit.  His mouth felt dry and tasteless.  “Back home,” he told Michael, not looking up from his phone.  “She wants to meet in the Inne.”

“Classy,” Michael nodded, tapping the ash from his cigarette out of the half open window.  “What time?”

“Half an hour.”

“Great.  Just enough time to get a pint in.  I think I need one, how about you?”

“Hmm,” Danny replied, unsurely. “Don’t know.”  He went back to looking out of the window, watching the roads and the houses rush by.  He hadn’t been back in this area for eight years, he thought, staring at it all.  A whoosh of memories, good and bad and mundane, were spiralling through his mind as they passed by.  He remembered walking out of school one day.  He remembered why; his English teacher, who had tried to encourage him to join the school newspaper, breaking the news to him that actually he wasn’t allowed to after all.  He had been in trouble with the police, and this would set a bad example to the younger pupils in the school.  Danny found himself smiling out of the window, think I told her to sod off or something like that, then I just walked out, just left.  Had he gone into McDonalds for a milkshake or something, before wandering home, assuming no one would be there? 

The rest of the memory reared its head like a monster that had been hiding behind the sofa.  He wondered whether to speak it, whether to share it with Michael, would that exorcise it?  Howard had appeared out of nowhere, he remembered. He had been in his room, and he hadn’t had time to get the door shut, when he heard the steps pounding up towards him.  Caught.  Trapped.  Huge hands twisted in his hair, pinning him to the bed, an enormous knee pushing into his spine.  Howard laughing, smug that he had him alone, pulling his knife from his pocket and holding it against his cheek and then his neck. You gonna’ stab me in the eye are you?  You gonna’ stab me in the eye Danny? That was the day he had kicked Howard in the balls.

“What are you thinking?” Michael asked, glancing his way.  They had passed McDonalds now, and were heading down Somerley road back towards town.  “Bad memories, eh?”

“Just thinking about the day I kicked Howard in the nuts,” Danny replied, looking at him with a grin.  “Just came back to me, because I remember it was the day I walked out of school, after they said I couldn’t be on the paper?” Michael nodded in reply.  “I went to McDonalds and got a milkshake and went home, thinking I could spend the rest of the day on the sofa, watching MTV or something.”

“And so what happened?”

“He’d spotted me walking home.”

“How’d you manage to get him in the balls?”

Danny saw himself on the bed, turned over, face stinging from a hard slap that told him where he stood, Howard holding him down by the arms, and his legs lying there, right between his.  He had looked down, saw the tight bulge of stone washed denim between Howard’s tree trunk legs, and he had looked back up into the twisted face of a man who was marching like a devil through all of his dreams, and he took his chance. “Just took the chance when it came and gave him a good boot in the balls,” he smiled at Michael.  “Fucking hell, he went down like a sack of shit.  I just fucking ran! I was shitting myself!  I ran and ran, I swore to god he was after me, but he wasn’t.  I ran to the base and hid.  Then I started laughing, I remember that.  I’d kicked him in the balls!”

“Little old you,” Michael said, repeating something Billy had laughed around the campfire that night outside the old caravan they had called the base. “I remember mate.  Must have felt superb.”

“Remember that morning I called for you, really early?” Danny asked suddenly, sitting forward and staring past Michael as they went over the two bridges that led back to the high street. “We rode our bikes down there, down the alleys behind the shops?”

“Oh yeah, we nicked some bread!”

“From the back of the cafe,” Danny remembered.  That was a good memory, he told himself, as they drove down the high street, past the café Jake had eventually got a Saturday job in.  He was glad they turned left at the roundabout, onto Barrack road, instead of continuing on, up towards the club.  Even as they turned off, Danny could see it there.  It had been called Nancy’s once, before Howard bought it outright and changed the name to K.  It had been white and neon blue outside.  It did not look like it had changed much, Danny mused, staring back over his shoulder as it grew smaller in the back window.  He saw a sign advertising live music outside on the pavement.  He shuddered then, thinking of Jerry Howard, with his hands on the place.  And up past the club, if you kept walking, you came to the old record shop he had worked in, for Terry.  Further on, there was a bridge which crossed the railway lines, and more blocks of flats to the right.  That was where Freeman had lived.

They headed down Barrack road, and Danny turned his eyes to the front. “Can you go home and check on Kurt for me?” he asked Michael when they got closer to home.  “Maybe take him out for a little walk for me?”

“Oh mate, I was gagging for a pint,” Michael complained.

“You can still have one.  Just do that for me then come to the pub yeah?”

“Yeah, yeah,” Michael sighed, parking the car around the back of his flat as usual. “You going straight there?”

Danny checked his phone for the time. “Yeah. May as well.  Another nasty little meeting I’m not looking forward to.”

They got out of the car and Michael locked it, and pulled out his key to the door to the flat. “Jaime was a fucking mess,” he reflected, shielding his eyes from the sun with one hand.  Danny sunk his hands in his pockets.

“Yep.  Sad, wasn’t it?”

“Well to be honest, he was always gonna’ end up like that,” shrugged Michael. “When people have got nothing else in their lives, you know?”

“I know, but…” Danny gazed at his feet, struggling to find the words to express his intense disappointment.  “I just thought…I don’t know.  At one point he was just my drug dealer, you know?  I was as scared of him as I was of everyone else.  I didn’t trust him or like him.  But towards the end, it changed. I mean, I know Anthony paid him, but he still put his neck out digging the dirt on Freeman, didn’t he?  If he hadn’t done that Mike…”

“Don’t,” Michael held a hand up and started to walk towards the flat. “Just don’t. Let’s get on with this.”

“Okay.  See you in a bit.”

 

He walked to the pub, feeling his guts shrivelling up inside of him.  It was a horrible sensation.  He felt like he had no energy in his bones, as he forced himself on.  He wondered when he was going to start to feel brave again.  When the urge to fight back would return.  It was hiding today.  He wanted to be under the duvet with Lucy again, curled up in the warm, not having to deal this nightmare.  He looked ahead at the pub, wondering if Haskell was inside.  He could not bring himself to call her Caroline anymore.  He could not bring himself to think of her as a woman, or even as human. The thought of her and him together, limbs tangled, naked skin, her breathing heavily into his ear, before crying out in ecstasy. He was sickened.  All that time she had been throwing him to the wolves.

He paused before pushing open the door.  He searched for the strength to go on.  In the end, it had eluded him for now, but the only thing that made him go inside to face her, was knowing that he had to.  There was no choice in it.  He saw her right away.  It looked like she had only just arrived.  There she was, at the bar, coat still on, but unbuttoned, leaning breezily towards Tony, wallet in hand.  She glanced his way, smiled broadly and waved a hand, before addressing Tony again.  Danny let the door swing shut behind him.  He realised he had no idea how to handle this, or what to say to her.  So he walked past her and sat down in the usual place, in the corner.

She turned to face him, two glasses of wine held out, and tossed her hair back over her shoulders.  He looked her up and down and cursed himself for ever finding her attractive.  He found her loathsome now, and had to stop himself from curling his lip, as she placed the drinks down and pulled up the stool opposite.  She was already frowning at him, picking up that his mood was dark.  “You okay?  You look like you’ve seen a ghost.  And what happened to your head there?” She was trying to peer round him, to get a glimpse of the bruising and grazing he had suffered at the hands of Nick Groves.

“Well you ought to know,” he replied in a low voice, glancing distastefully at the wine before fixing his eyes back on hers.  She tossed her hair again, still smiling, but with a guarded look in her eye.

“Pardon me?”

“I said, you ought to know.”

“I heard you, but what the hell does that mean?” She laughed a little at the end of her sentence, but it was a nervous laugh, and her mouth was twitching.

“I’m surprised you don’t know,” said Danny. “You know, that I know.” He looked at her unflinchingly, and she responded by shaking her head in confusion and picking up her wine glass.

“Danny, you’re talking in riddles! What do you mean?”

“I’d have thought you’d be good at riddles. A person as tricky as you.”

“You’ve lost me!” Caroline sat back a little, uncrossed her legs and tucked one arm around her middle while she sipped from her glass. Danny leaned forward then, the aggression and resentment rolling over him darkly.

“Let’s get straight to the point,” he hissed across the table at her. “And no more bullshit, all right? I know you’re working for Jerry Howard, I know you’ve been with them from the start, helping them to pinpoint me and my friends, so that you could get close to me and get my story!” He sat back again, his eyes flaring at her, his teeth clenched in growing fury.  He watched the colour drain from her face.  For a moment, she just sat there.  She swallowed.  She glanced at the door.  She looked at the floor.  She lifted her glass and drank steadily.  “It’s all out in the open now,” he told her, as she waited. “So don’t even bother to think up excuses or lies.”

Caroline looked away from him, her face a mask of guilt.  She shuffled her stool closer to the table, and rested an elbow upon it, the hand reaching up to ruffle under her hair.  “Can we not do this here?” she whispered to Danny.  He rolled his eyes at her.

“I’m not going to make a scene.  I’m not going to shout or go mental.  I just wanted you to know that I know.  I know what a despicable, lying, cheating, back stabbing, two faced, cold hearted little whore you are.”

Her jaw dropped, revealing her perfect, white little teeth.  She let her hair fall forward, as if to shield herself from the rest of the pub. “I don’t know what you’ve heard…” she began, her eyes moving around shiftily.

“Are you trying to deny it?  Are you going to tell me you haven’t been working for Jerry Howard?”

Her mouth snapped shut, and in that moment then, he knew for sure.  If he had harboured any doubts that she was capable of such vile behaviour, they vanished in that moment.  He smiled grimly. “You can’t can you?” he asked, and she shook her head at him, her lips still pressed tightly together.  “Why?” he shook his head at her and lifted his shoulders up and down.  It was all he really wished to know.  Why.

Caroline Haskell gazed down at the table, and breathed out heavily through her gritted teeth.  “You know why,” she murmured her reply. “I wanted that story.  I wanted my hands on it from the start.  I told you that.”

“When did you first meet Jerry?”

“At his son’s funeral.”

“What?”

She nodded in misery, hair now hanging down both sides of her face.  She gripped the stem of her wine glass in one hand, while she chewed at the polished pink nails on her other hand.  “I hung about.  Wanted to see if I could collar someone to talk to me.  Saw your mum there, and Jerry had a go at her, and she left.  Everyone was drifting away, and he stayed there, and so did I.” She shrugged her shoulders as if this should explain enough.

“What did you talk about?”

“Just…just his son.  How angry he was.  He said he was interested in talking to me, but off the record, until he had his head straight.  So I met up with him a few weeks later.  He called me.”

Danny felt himself withdrawing from her presence, until his back was pressed firmly up against the wall behind him.  “And then what?”

“He told me his side.  He told me you’d taken the most precious thing in his life away from him, and he wanted to make sure you paid. He still wouldn’t let me record anything.  Said he wanted to see what happened at the trial.” Caroline’s head seemed to be sinking lower and lower as her eyes burned into the table. “So I met him again after the trial, and he was happy about the result, but he still wouldn’t talk to me on record.  I knew what he thought alright, and he told me he had loads of information that no one knew, stuff that would make an amazing story.  But I had to wait for it.  He was happy you were in prison.  He said his revenge would begin when you were released.”

“So then what?  What else?  The next eight years, what?”

Caroline shifted awkwardly on her stool, shot a quick look around the pub, then returned to staring down at the table.  “We stayed in touch,” she said softly. “I kept an eye on things for him.”

“Like where my family and friends lived, for instance?”

“Yes,” she nodded once.  “Things like that.”

“Okay,” said Danny, trying to take it all in, trying to fathom the massive betrayal.  “Did you know he bought the club?  Did you know he owned the White Horse and brought Freeman back to manage it for him?”

“Well, not until recently.  That’s his business.  He wanted to keep solid connections around here. Not just with me.  Businesses.  Employees he could trust.”

Danny struggled to swallow the urge to scream at her. “People like Jaime Lawler?” he snarled, as his hands balled into fists upon the table.  She peered at him from behind the hair.

“I think Jerry pulled him back in deliberately.  It took a while, I think. He knew he had links to you, and Michael and Anthony.”

“Spies everywhere,” Danny shook his head in disgust.  He searched his pockets then, patting down his jacket, searching for cigarettes.

“He’s a clever man,” she said, with a sigh. “And a very persuasive one.”

“So his deal with you?” Danny finally found his cigarettes, whipped one out and tossed the pack onto the table.  “What was that then? You keep tabs on us all, and in return he lets you get the story?  See, I’ve been thinking about that, the last few days.  I’ve been thinking about all of it. So clever! Because I wouldn’t have ever agreed to do a story with you, if I hadn’t needed to know where Howard and Freeman were so badly, would I?  And who put that idea into my head, eh?  That I needed to find them, and you had the resources to help me?”

Caroline looked up then, her eyes shining with tears.  She picked up her glass and finished off the wine.  Danny lit his cigarette. “I’m sorry,” she said.

“No, you’re not, don’t give me that bullshit!” he spat back at her. “You’re only sorry you got caught, you bitch.  You helped them target me, and my friends and family! You did that! How can you sleep at night, eh? Knowing innocent people are getting bricks through their windows, and threatening phone calls?  Getting beaten up in the fucking pub? You’re disgusting, Haskell. You are worse than them!  All of this, to get a story?  To get my story? Wasn’t his story enough for you?”

“No! I wanted your side, not just his, I wanted to hear from you!” She stared back at him, wide eyed and open-mouthed.  “I waited eight years to hear your side!”

“You waited eight years to fuck me over you evil cunt!”

“No, no, it wasn’t like that…I genuinely wanted to hear your side, I didn’t want to write a one sided article!”

“So that’s alright is it?” he asked in amazement. “You wanted to present two sides of the same story, write an amazing article, get fucking rich and famous, or whatever, and that makes it alright?  That makes it alright to get involved with drug dealing child abusers, eh?  Does it?  You fucking disgust me!”

“It escalated,” she muttered, and with both elbows on the table, she pressed the palms of her hands flat against her face.  “I didn’t like them Danny.  I wasn’t on their side.  I just used them to get to you.”

“You helped them Caroline,” Danny argued with her, jabbing a finger onto the table in front of her as she dropped her hands and stared at him. “You spied on the people I care about, you put them all in danger, Anthony’s little kids, Michael’s son, Lucy! You put them in danger, you put them in the firing line by getting involved with that man.”

“Wasn’t just me, was it?” she hissed back then, a little fire returning to her eyes, and a flush to her cheeks. She reached out, and snatched up the wine he had left untouched.  “I hardly did a thing! What about Freeman, and Jaime Lawler?”

“Freeman was a low down filthy pervert, who couldn’t resist the thought of managing his own pub, being the big man for once, lording it up over a pub full of students! Not exactly hard to understand why he came back is it?  Crawled off to oblivion for a year after I stabbed him, and then called back to a well paid position, a position of power, which is exactly what men like him crave!” Danny sucked on his cigarette, eyeing her up distainfully. “And as for Jaime.  The guys a fucking heroin addict.  Up to his fucking eyes in their shit.  But you.  You’ve got no excuse Haskell.”

“I didn’t know they would do all those things,” she insisted. “He didn’t put it like that.  Do you think if he’d put it like that, I would have agreed to help him?  He’s clever Danny, you don’t even realise how clever.  He came across like this pained, distressed old man, desperate to find out why his son had to die.  He didn’t say he wanted to terrorise people to get to you! I didn’t know he would do those things!”

“But once you did know,” Danny cocked his head to one side. “What then?  You carried on, didn’t you?  You let it go on.  You knew it was them, you knew they were doing those things.  You let it go on, because you had me in the palm of your hand, spilling my guts, dragging up the past, making me relive it all, just so you could get your dirty little story!”

“No, no,” she was shaking her head at him. “I didn’t know for sure it was them.”

“Shit! Who else would it fucking be?  Admit it Haskell. You knew it was them, and you sat back and waited for your interview, didn’t you?”

“Well, I thought it would all end! The quicker I got the story, I mean, the sooner it would all stop. Once I got the story recorded, then Jerry would see you to put his…his views across.”

“That’s not what he wants to do,” Danny laughed and corrected her. “He’s not just gonna’ have a chat with me tonight!”

“Tonight?”

“Oh don’t pretend you don’t already know.  I’ve arranged to meet him tonight.  He wants all of the money back, the money my mum left me.  He wants me to get out of town, and he wants me to say sorry.”

Caroline frowned at him. “I didn’t know any of that, Danny. He only says what he has to, you know.  It’s not like I’m his best friend!”

“No, just one of his minions, scuttling around, doing the dirty work for him.”

“That’s not fair.”

“That’s fucking mild, Caroline! You’re worse than that!” Danny tapped ash into the ashtray and leaned towards her again.  “You’ve helped a monster, you know that don’t you?  I sat and told you what his fucking son was like.  Did you believe a word I said?  Or did you just sit there laughing at me?  Thinking I was talking shit, and I deserved everything I got?”

“No, of course not, I believed you Danny!” She shifted nearer to him, her arms crossed on the table, her face just inches away from his.  He felt her eyes searching his, searching for some softness, some understanding.  “I believed every word you told me, how could I not?”

“I don’t know,” he shrugged. “I don’t understand how your vicious mind works.”

“Look, I got in over my head, alright?  I mean, you more than anyone should be able to understand that! You know what these people are like!”

“I know what it’s like to be on the receiving end,” he told her. “And when my stepfather tried to rope me back in, by offering me a job, I fucking said no! You should have done the same Caroline.  Who would want to be on the payroll for people like that?” He pushed his face even closer to hers. “You know they are still involved in drug dealing? Jaime works for them.  Like he always used to do.  But like I said before, he and Freeman, I can understand it.  Weak men, with addictions.  Their connections with Lee and his dad go way back.  But you.  You!”

“I just wanted the story,” Caroline’s voice was almost a squeak, so desperate was she to get him to understand. “I couldn’t see past that! I admit, I got obsessed. I told you that before, didn’t I? From the moment I saw you come out of that house, Danny, I wanted to hear it from you!”

“Why?” he demanded, holding her gaze with his. “Tell me why.  There are plenty of evil things that go on every day in this world.  Plenty of other horrible stories you could have followed.  Why this one? Why was it so important that you had to wait eight fucking years, get involved with the scum of the earth, and put innocent people’s lives at risk, just to get me to talk?  I mean, in the end, was it really worth it Caroline, or were you disappointed?  Did I fill you in enough?  Did I provide enough gory details to satisfy you?  You’re like a leech.  You’re a parasite.  I thought that the first time I met you.  Sucking off other people’s misery. Vile.”

“Don’t say that, that’s not true, that’s not fair, you don’t know….” She broke off, her voice breaking as tears spilled from her eyes. Danny laughed at her.  He wanted to slap her.  He wanted to shove her off her stool and kick her arse. 

“It is fucking true,” he insisted. “That’s exactly what you are.  I mean, journalists in general are like that, but you, you took it to another fucking level!  I mean, eight fucking years!” He rocked back away with her, roaring laughter, and stubbed his cigarette out in the ashtray.  Caroline sniffed through her tears, held onto the second glass of wine, and sipped from it.  “You’re a joke,” he told her. “You make me sick.  To think I fucking went with you.  It makes me want to vomit.  All that time, you’re all over me like a rash, when really you were on his side, sneaking around, helping him, helping him torture me! All over again! Thanks a lot! Thanks so much Caroline.”

“I slept with you because I liked you…” she said, shaking back her hair and fixing him with a firmer gaze, her jaw taut with defiance. “Believe that or don’t believe that, but it’s true.  I liked you from the start Danny, from that day, the day they brought you out of the house.”

“Then you’re sick.”

“I’m sick?”

“Yeah, you’re totally fucked.  There’s no hope for you. I pity you.  You may as well do the same as Freeman and fucking string yourself up and let the lights go out.”

She moved back as if she had been slapped.  He watched the tears roll slowly down her bright red cheeks.  “That’s a horrible thing to say.”

“You’re a horrible person Caroline.  I can hardly stand to look at you.  You’re a cold hearted bitch, look at you!” He pushed his face towards hers again, his backside momentarily leaving his seat.  “I can’t believe I was stupid enough to go anywhere near you! It makes me feel sick, thinking about it.  You’re as bad as Jack Freeman, you know?  Sick and perverted.  Taking advantage.  Lying.  Enjoying the power you have over people.”

“It wasn’t like that.”

“Oh I’ve had enough, I’ve fucking had enough of this shit, I don’t know why I’m even still here.” Danny got up from the table, shoved his way angrily around it, and began to stalk quickly out of the pub.  Immediately he heard her leaping up to follow him. 

The cold air met him outside.  He shoved his hands into his pockets and felt her pulling at his elbow.  “Listen to me Danny,”

“What else have you got to say?” He pulled his elbow free, and turned to face her.  She pulled her coat around her, buttoning it up and blinking tears away as she scanned the high street.

“I did like you,” she told him.  “I do like you.  I’m not like them, Danny, I’m not.”

“No, I told you, you’re worse than them. Why did you do it Caroline? Why did you sell your soul to the devil like that?  For an article? For a piece in a shitty newspaper that no one will even care about the week after?”

Caroline sniffed.  Pushed her hands into the pockets of her coats, and let her hair be blown wildly around her shoulders by the cold winds careering up the high street.  “I told you before,” she sighed through her snot and tears. “Me and you have more in common than you think.”

Danny frowned curiously.  He folded his arms and waited. “Yeah, like what?”

“The things you went through.”

He nodded, waiting.

“I went through some things too,” she went on, her eyes now darting restlessly about, meeting his and then tearing away again.  “The same things Danny.  That’s what I meant, when I said that to you.  I meant we had things in common.”

Danny took a step towards her.  He guessed he was supposed to feel sorry for her now.  Take her in his arms and feel her pain.  But he just wanted to laugh out loud at her.  He didn’t know why, but that somehow made it worse. “Go on.”

“My mum.  My dad died when I was six.  My mum remarried when I was eleven.  Alex his name was.  I called him dad.”

Danny laughed.  He could not stop himself.  He rocked back on his heels and laughed at her.  She glared up at him.  He saw the anger flash across her face. “Don’t you fucking laugh, it’s the fucking truth you bastard!”

He stepped closer. Peered down at her tear streaked face. “Is it?”

“Yes.  He abused me.  He did things….” She croaked a sob, buried her face in her hands.  “I’ve never told anyone…never!”

“Why should I even believe you?”

She dropped her hands, aghast. “Why would I lie?”

He pressed his face into hers.  “Because that’s what you do!”

“It’s the fucking truth!” She pulled away, took a step backwards. “It’s the truth.  It’s the truth!  I tried to tell her, but she loved him so much she didn’t believe me.  No one believed me.  I…I wanted to kill him…I thought about it day and night. I tried to think of ways to do it…I did!  You have to believe me! I tried to poison him once.”  She stepped forward then, her face creased, tears sliding down her cheeks.  Her hand came out, grabbed at his coat.  “I put it in his food…It would have killed him, but I chickened out!  I took it and scraped it all in the bin before he could touch it.  I didn’t have the guts…..So it went on.  It went on for years.”

Danny looked down, at her fingers clawing at his clothes.  She appeared wretched.  Desperate.  He felt cold.  He took her hands, and held them in his own. He wanted to be a million miles away from her.  “If that is true….” He spoke carefully and slowly, his eyes burning into hers. “…and I fucking doubt it, the way you lie, but if that is true, you know what?  That makes you even fucking worse.”

“But that’s why your story meant so much to me!” she wailed then, threading her fingers desperately through his and holding tight.  “Don’t you see? That’s why I got so obsessed! That’s why I did the things I did, why I got so in over my head… because I had to see you, I had to speak to you!”

“It makes you worse,” he repeated. “Because if you went through what I went through, then you would understand. You would know how much it means to be able to live a normal fucking life, with no fucking fear, yeah? How would you like me to track down your old man, eh? See if he wants to fuck you up again, eh?  How would you like that back in your life Caroline?”

She flinched. “I didn’t know…I didn’t mean…”

“If you hadn’t helped him, none of this would be happening. He used you.  You let him use you.  And it’s not just my life getting fucked up, see?  My girlfriend, my girlfriend, is fucking pregnant!” He watched the alarm leap into her eyes.  Her mouth fell open again. “Yeah!” he nodded triumphantly. “We’re back together and we’re having a baby.  See I’ve got a chance?  I’ve got a chance of a normal, decent life, with someone who’s good, someone who’s kept my head afloat for years, and because of you, all of that is in jeopardy.”  He shoved her hands away violently, as if they were cancerous.  “You could go to the police with everything you know,” he said, stepping away from her.  “That’s the only thing you could do right now to put any of this right.”

“Danny..” she moved towards him, but he did not give her the chance.  He spun away and started walking fast.  He immediately heard her heels clattering desperately after him.  Felt her clawing at his back, dragging him to a stop. “Stop! Please stop! Listen to me! It’s because I didn’t have the guts! I wanted to kill him, I wanted to be free of him so much, but I never went through with it.” Danny kept walking, hands in pockets. Caroline clung to his coat, hurrying along with him.  He growled impatiently and tried to shake her off. “I admired you!” she wailed then. “You did what I wanted to do! You fought back!”

“Yeah, and every day I wish I hadn’t!” Danny stopped walking again, shook her off and glared at her darkly.  “I was wrong, okay?  I shouldn’t have done it Caroline, I shouldn’t.  I should have gone to the police that night.  I should have shown them what he did to me, and my mum would have backed me up.  He would have gone to jail.”  He nodded at her face. “Yeah. That’s what I should have done.  Now that I’m older I can see that, and you have no fucking idea how much I would like to go back and tell myself to stop, not to do it! Then none of this would be happening, would it?”

“But he would have, he would have continued to….” Caroline stopped, her head hanging, her shoulders drooping.

“We’ll never know will we?” he asked her.  He looked away, and saw Michael was heading down the road towards them.  He sighed and looked back at Caroline, feeling pity for her for the first time.  “We’ll never know what he would have done, because I killed him.  I did the wrong thing Caroline.  I only see it now.  And the only thing I can do is try to make it right with his father.  The only thing you can do is go to the police, with everything you know.” Danny placed his hand briefly on her shoulder, giving it the smallest of squeezes. “You know more than me.  I only know what Jaime’s said.” He shrugged, and turned away from her.  “It’s up to you.”

46

Danny

 

 

            He wanted to lie in bed with her all day.  He found the weekends glorious.  No hurry, no need for intrusive alarm clocks, no need for her to climb groggily out of bed, leaving him all alone.  He would usually wake up first, eyes blinking up at the cream coloured ceiling, as he tried to work out where he was.  Then he would automatically grin to himself.  So much for taking things slowly, he would think.  He had hardly spent a minute at Michael’s flat lately.  He would feel her lying next to him, warm and close, her hair across the pillow, and he would wriggle onto his side to stare at her for a while.  She was getting paranoid about her cheeks getting chubby, but Danny thought the little bit of extra weight suited her.  She was glowing, or so his mother said every time she set eyes on her.  Danny could see what she meant.  There was a warmth that radiated from Lucy, and he remembered if from across the classroom when he had first met her.  He had wanted to reach out and touch it, and use it to pull himself into it.

This morning his eyes tracked down to her neat little stomach, popping out over the waistband of her pyjama trousers.  He watched it for a moment, totally fascinated by the way it moved in and out as she breathed softly in her sleep.  They had the scan photos on the bedside table.  Lucy was going to buy a frame to put them in.  She was twenty weeks pregnant now, Danny remembered.  It had taken a while for the language to seep in.  He had felt like they were all talking in an alien tongue at the hospital on the day of the scan.  Lucy seemed to know exactly what everything meant though.  She had giggled when the midwife spread the clear jelly on her bare stomach, and her hand had reached out for his.  His heart had been hammering wildly inside his chest, and when the picture came up on the screen, he had been totally shocked by the force of his emotions.  He hadn’t expected it to hit him like that.  He was enthralled and bowled over to be back together with Lucy, but the dad thing had still been a huge fear, unknown territory, scary for so many reasons.  But seeing the baby on the screen had been unbelievable.  It had changed everything.

It had a sweet little face, incredibly rounded cheeks and full lips like him.  It’s fists were curled up under its chin, and its legs were crossed over at the ankles, knees firmly pressed together.  “Do you want to know the sex?” the midwife had questioned them.  Danny had been staring in disbelief at the screen, so Lucy had answered for them.

“No thank you.  We want it to be surprise.”

A surprise.  It was that, alright.  What surprised Danny the most was how much he suddenly wanted it.  He hadn’t thought it possible.  A part of him had wanted Lucy back so much, that agreeing to be involved with the baby too had almost been an afterthought.  Okay, he had thought, I’ll see how it goes, I’ll try.  But now he knew he didn’t have to try, he just wanted it. 

Now he lay on his side, with one hand placed carefully upon Lucy’s belly.  She could feel it kicking now, but he had yet to experience one.  She snored on gently beside him, so he kept his hand there, hoping.  He felt a deep sense of belonging and satisfaction, and realised with a jolt that he had never really experienced either, before now.  It was like everything suddenly made sense, he thought, watching his hand on her belly.  It was like everything had somehow fallen into place, that day in the hospital, watching that little baby, their little baby on the screen.  It had made him remember the night of his fourteenth birthday party, before everything had kicked off, before Howard had got rid of Anthony and shown him what he was dealing with.  He and Lucy, cuddling at the kitchen table, her dopey and drunk, snuggling into his chest, while he stroked her hair back.  She had asked about his real dad, where he was, why he wasn’t in contact.  It was another thing he had liked about her.  She wanted to have proper, interesting conversations, and she was not afraid to ask things that other people would do their best to avoid.  They had talked about it, and she had said how rotten it was for a dad to do that, to not be there for him.  She had repeated her own mothers’ view on children, that they were the most precious things in your life, or they should be.  She had said it then, hadn’t she?  How she would find having a child the most precious thing in the world, and then she had lifted her head and looked at him with her make up smudged all over her face, and she had pressed her finger against his cut lip.  I think I’m going to marry you, one day, she had said.  He could still remember how those words had set his heart on fire.  How the warmth from her had seeped into him, and spread through his blood, through his veins, making everything that was scary and unfair, just a grey blur behind him.  Because she was in front of him, she was beside him, and that was all okay.

And then the shit had hit the fan.  Everything had fallen apart around him.  His mother had not had a clue what her new boyfriend was capable of.  Danny had spent more time on the floor than standing, in that house.  He felt the baby move then, just a ripple under his palm, at the same time he saw himself in his mind, lying on the kitchen floor with Lee Howard’s foot crushing down on his chest. He remembered painfully that Lee Howard had two main ways to hold him in place, one was by the neck, and the other was by standing on him.  He felt the ripple again, like a little tidal wave of life under his hand, and he almost pulled away, not wanting to taint the baby with his own grim memories. 

He didn’t want to think about it, he didn’t want those images in his mind, or those trembles of fear on his skin, but he had to.  He had to.  It wasn’t over yet, and he needed it to be over.  He had more reason than ever to make it all go away.  He kept his hand on the baby, while Lucy slept on, and he looked back up at the ceiling, forcing himself to think.

He had made the call, and spoken to Jerry Howard, while his mother snored anxiously against his shoulder.  Not many words had been spoken.  “I want to see you,” he had said. “To sort this all out.”

“You know what I want.  You gonna’ give it to me?”  The man’s voice had been low and nasal, but still brought back searing memories of his son’s gruff tones.

“Give me a time and a place and I’ll be there,” he had replied stiffly.  And so it was arranged.  In three days time he, Anthony and Michael would drive to a location that was yet to be confirmed.  Jerry Howard had said he was a busy man, hard to pin down, and would tell them the place the day before.  Danny didn’t know quite what to make of this, but saw that he didn’t have a choice in the matter.  He had not told Jerry that he would not be alone, he didn’t see the sense in that.  Like Anthony had said more than once, it could all be some kind of trap.  He had kept his mother out of it.  She wanted to know when and where he was meeting Lee’s dad, but Danny told her nothing was sorted yet.

It was a dark heavy thing, he thought, hanging right there over his head.  And there, under his hand, was a different thing altogether, a light and amazing thing, something breathtaking in its beauty and its promise.  He felt joined with Lucy, joined together like a forcefield around the unborn baby.  He promised himself he would do what his own father had failed to do for him.  He would stand by that child, never leave it, no matter what.  He would never ever let anything bad happen to it.

So, this had to be sorted out.  One way or another.  Anthony wanted to know if he had a plan, if he was going to give Howard the money he wanted.  If he was going to give the man any of the things he wanted.  Danny still didn’t know.  He didn’t know what assurances Howard would give him, that if he played it his way, it really would be over.  How was he to know it would just carry on regardless?  That Lucy would be targeted again.  And the baby?

Fear and rage bubbled inside him and he rolled over then, away from Lucy and the baby, reaching out to the bedside table for his phone.  Just as he picked it up to see what time it was, it rang in his hands, making him jump.  Lucy stirred beside him, but then rolled over and went back to sleep. Danny saw that it was Michael, and hopped quickly out of bed in his boxer shorts. “Mike?” he whispered, heading out of the bedroom.

“Yeah, why you whispering?”

“Was in bed.  Lucy’s still asleep,” Danny replied, closing the bedroom door softly behind him and padding into the kitchen to put the kettle on. “She’s flat out mate.  Has to get up so early for work all week, it really takes it out of her. I’m gonna’ let her sleep all day if she needs to.”

There was a snigger from the other end of the phone.  “Get you mate.  How bloody sweet!”

“Shut up.  What do you want?”

“I’ve got news.  Not good news.”

“Oh,” Danny felt his heart sink, and sighed as he rinsed out a mug from the day before and grabbed the milk from the fridge.  “Should I be sat down?” he joked weakly.

“Can you get away for a bit?” Michael asked. “We need to talk, me you and Anthony.  There’s stuff to tell you, and anyway, we need to work out our plan for, you know.”

Danny groaned.  But he knew it was all inevitable, and there was no point in railing against it. “I’ll come over to yours then,” he agreed. “Give me an hour.  Or can you pick me up?”

“Pick you up mate?  I’m already parked outside.”

Danny frowned, went to the kitchen window and peered out.  Michael and Anthony were sat out there in Mike’s rusty old Escort.  They waved up at him obligingly.  He waved back unsurely.  “Bloodyhell Mike.”

Danny got dressed, wrote a note for Lucy and placed it on his pillow for her to find.  He looked at Kurt, still curled into a tight ball at the bottom of their bed, and thought about taking him.  He decided against it at the last moment, striding from the flat without him. “What’s the emergency?” he asked immediately, when he climbed into the back of the car.  Michael started the engine and drove off.  Anthony turned to look at him.  His face was taut with tension and unease.

“I met up with Jaime Lawler the other day,” he told him.

“Oh?”

“Yeah. Took me a while to track him down actually. Seemed like he didn’t want to hear from me. But when I finally got to speak to him, he agreed to meet me.”

Danny looked from Anthony to Michael.  He could see his face in the wing mirror, and he was frowning deeply. “What did you want to meet him for?” he asked Anthony.

“Well, last time I bumped into him, he was still living in Redchurch you know, still hanging around the old haunts.  I got the impression he wasn’t exactly living a straight life yet either.” Anthony grimaced and shrugged. “I wanted to see what he knew…about Freeman, and Howard, you know?”

Danny nodded slowly. “And did he?  Know anything?”

“Oh yeah,” Anthony nodded quickly. “He basically works for the fuckers.”

Danny’s mouth fell open in surprise.  If he had been expecting to hear anything at all, it had not been that. “What?  How?”

“What do you reckon?  Drug dealing, that’s what.  The fella’ didn’t learn his lesson, that’s for sure.” Anthony sighed and shook his hair back from his forehead, as Danny attempted to let it all sink in.  He still remembered the last time he had seen Jaime Lawler, the night he had called him from the phone box.  He had been as scared as the rest of them by then.  He had sworn he was keeping well away from it all.

“But drug dealing for who?”

“This is where it gets even more interesting,” Michael spoke up.

“Yeah,” agreed Anthony. “Okay.  When Lee died, he supposedly left half the club to your mum and half to Freeman, right?” Danny nodded silently.  “Well for whatever reason, Jerry ended up buying the lot.  Owning the whole thing.  Plus, when Freeman said he used his money to buy into the White Horse, he was also lying.  Jerry Howard already owned that place, and employed him to manage it.  In other words, he got Freeman back here, and put him in there.”

Danny touched his forehead.  They were careering back to Belfield Park.  He felt like his brain was being pounded from all sides.  “But why?” he asked again, looking to Anthony for the answers. 

“Not really sure,” he replied. “But I’m guessing several reasons.  To keep him under control, to keep him where he could see him, that kind of thing? Or to get him supplying drugs to the Uni students there? I mean, Freeman would probably have jumped at the chance, right?  His own pub, easy ready money, power? Makes sense.”

“So what about K’s? Howler, whatever it’s called?”

“Same thing.  Well, he puts another meathead in charge of that place. You know that big guy that attacked you the other week?  His name is Nick Groves.  He and Lee were good friends apparently, and so I’m guessing it was pretty easy for Jerry to convince him to come this way and run a club for him.”

They had pulled into the alley behind Michael’s flat.  Without talking, all three of them got out of the car, and headed to the flat, shooting distrustful glances up and down the alley, and over their shoulders as they went.  It was cold in the flat.  Michael dashed about, switching the central heating on, and making cups of tea, while Anthony and Danny lit up cigarettes in the lounge.  Danny sat on the sofa, smoked and tried to absorb it all.  He stared down at the tatty carpet beneath his feet, and felt an eerie chill settling over him, that had nothing to do with the cold flat.  Jerry Howard was starting to seem like some kind of God, he thought, playing with peoples lives, moving them around like pawns in a chess game, setting them up for battle.  It was striking how similar his behaviour was to Lee’s.  That was exactly how he had operated.  Controlling them all.  All the power at his fingertips. 

Michael came in with the tea and the conversation began again. “So,” said Anthony, leaning forward beside Danny, tea in one hand and smoke in the other. “Jaime ends up getting dragged back into it all.  God knows how.  He looks a state, by the way. Looks like he takes more drugs than he sells, you know.  Felt sorry for him really.  He doesn’t know any other way.”

“So Jerry Howard has Freeman in a pub, Groves in the club, all drug dealing or whatever, but why?” Danny looked sideways at Anthony.  He thought he knew the answer, so it seemed like a dumb question, but it needed asking all the same. “Why do all that?  When did he do all that?”

“After Lee died,” shrugged Michael from the armchair.  “Seems like he moved down here. Started pulling strings, moving people about.”

“And you know why,” said Anthony.

Danny nodded grimly. “To prepare for my release.  To get me back for killing his son.  It all makes sense.” He released a mammoth sigh and buried his face in his hands for a moment or two.  “Unbelievable,” he murmured, although it really wasn’t.  Like he had said, it all made perfect sense.  “So he had this whole harassment campaign in motion eight fucking years ago.  Great. What a lovely man.  I am so looking forward to meeting him again!”

“That’s not all,” he heard Anthony mutter next to him.  Danny dropped his hands and stared at him in dismay.

“Fuck me, what else?”

He watched Anthony open his mouth, look at Michael, then close his mouth again, as if he did not know how to say it.  He swallowed instead, cleared his throat, and had another go.  “Haskell,” he said.  Danny sat up straighter.

“What about her?”

“In on it.  From the start too.  Howard must have hooked up with her back then, when the story broke, when she was sniffing around it all.”

Danny felt like he had suddenly forgotten how to breathe. He stared at Anthony, until it seemed like he was choking on nothing.  He got to his feet abruptly, instant rage falling over him.  He felt them watching him.  He wanted to explode.  He wanted to hit something, smash something, kill something.  “You must be fucking joking,” he managed to utter, stalking around the other side of the sofa.  Anthony and Michael swapped anxious looks.

“Told you not to trust her,” said Michael darkly.

“Why?  Why would she?  How?  I don’t fucking get it!” Danny shook his head, tried to calm himself down, but it was almost impossible.  He walked over to the wall and kicked it hard.  It hurt his foot but he wanted to kick it harder.  He felt like an idiot, a fool. He knew they must all be laughing at him, all of them!

“Because she’s a bitch, that’s why!” Michael called out from behind. “She’s a hard-nosed bitch, who was prepared to do anything to get her fucking story, that’s why.  She’s been helping them all along.  Helping them keep tabs on us.”

“That’s how they found it so easy to target us, when you got out,” Anthony explained, facing him.  “The bricks through the window, the letters, everything.  She knew where we all lived.  She knew everything, from being a reporter.”

“But why did she need them?” Danny turned from the wall, red faced and shaking with rage. 

“She’d do anything to get closer to you,” shrugged Anthony sadly. “To get closer to the story.  We all told her to piss off back then, didn’t we?  None of us would speak to her.  I bet Jerry Howard did.  I bet he was really fucking friendly to her.  But he made her wait, didn’t he?  He must have convinced her that the bigger story was worth waiting for.  Waiting eight fucking years for.”

Danny smoked the last of his cigarette and leaned over Anthony to hurl it angrily at the ashtray.  He plunged his hands desperately back through his hair. “Bitch,” was all he could think to say.  “Fucking conniving, cheating, lying, dirty, nasty skanky bitch!”

“It all adds up,” Michael went on.  “The only reason you agreed to do the interview with her, was because of the shit we were all getting.  Remember?  You wanted to know the names and the addresses, to sort it out.  She got you that, at a price.  But her helping you get to them, was the only reason you agreed to tell her your story, right?

Danny nodded silently.  He closed his eyes.  Pulled his hands back down from his hair, and onto his face.  “They were all behind it.  Them harassing me pushed me into doing the interview.  She got what she wanted.  She gave them what they wanted.  Fucking treacherous whore!”

“You have to stay focused though,” Anthony said then, rising from the sofa and walking around it to Danny. “We’re one step ahead now, mate, as long as Jaime Lawler keeps his fucking mouth shut. They don’t know we know all this! They don’t know we have Jaime on side.  You’ve got to stay cool, don’t let it get to you.”

“But for fucks sake!” Danny wailed then, dropping his hands to stare at Anthony in utter misery. “I slept with that nasty bitch! She used me! It’s disgusting, it makes me feel sick! It’s like she’s this parasite, that feeds on other people’s misery!”

“That’s exactly what she is,” Michael piped up.  “I knew it mate.  I knew it the first time I laid eyes on her.  She’s a shark.”

“She sat there and listened to it all,” Danny’s arms hung at his sides.  He felt the anger dripping away steadily now, to be replaced by a dismal sense of bewilderment and sadness. “She fucking sat there and listened, each time, to me talking about Howard, and Freeman, and all the shit they did to me.  She sat and listened to that, she dragged it out of me, and all the time she’s fucking working for the cunts!  How can she do that? How can she help them, after what they did?”

Anthony blew out his breath, his hands on his hips.  “I don’t know mate.  I don’t know.  I’ll never understand it either.  Some people are just evil.  Twisted.  They’ve got no good in their own lives, so they feel no guilt about destroying other peoples. You can’t let it get to you now though.  You have to stay focused.  It’s nearly over.”

“Only if I give him what he wants.”

“And are you going to?” asked Michael, now also getting up from his chair, and crossing the room to stand beside Anthony. Danny looked bereft.

“I have no idea yet.”

“We need to take some action,” said Anthony. “We need to prompt Howard to give us the location, so we can work out what to do.  Have you got his number on you now?”

Danny’s shoulders slumped as he pulled out his phone and passed it to Anthony, who started to scroll through the contacts.  “I’m gonna’ send him a text,” he said.  “Tell him to decide on the place, or it’s all off.  See if that kicks his arse into gear.”

Danny just watched.  He saw Anthony’s face, that familiar serious frown, those dark eyes puzzling over it all, trying to work out what to do. He saw him taking control, like he had done so many times back then, and he gave in for a moment, letting him.  His mind travelled back to the bed he had woken up in just over an hour ago.  It seemed like days ago.  He thought of Lucy, still there, and pictured her curled up on her side, the way he had left her, with Kurt at the end of the bed, and the baby, rippling gently inside her stomach. He swallowed the hard lump that had formed in his throat, and thought he would do anything just to get back to them, just to crawl back under the duvet and curl up with them, and just hide from it all.  Just wait for it all to go away.

Anthony sent the text and pushed the phone into Danny’s chest.  “There,” he said firmly.  “Now let’s see what happens.”

47

Michael

 

            Michael slept well that night.  He woke once, confused by the amount of sleep he had already enjoyed, and realised that he probably had not slept well for weeks now.  How could anyone sleep well when they felt under siege?  When a brick, or something even worse could come through the window at any moment?  He had kept a distance from Zach and Jenny, just in case.  He had completely changed his routine, he had become so fearful of being watched.  If he wanted to see Zach, he arranged with Jenny to meet him in a public place somewhere, like the indoor play centre, or the park, a different place each time.  This way he and Zach had fun, and he didn’t have to worry too much about leading the bad guys to his son, or Jenny.  Jenny.  He and Jenny had shared a few moments lately.  Sometimes when he looked into her open, honest face, he could almost see the life he should have been living all along.  It tugged at his heart constantly.  It was becoming harder and harder to be apart from Zach, and from her. 

Jenny had dumped her boyfriend.  She liked to try to assure Michael that it had nothing to do with him.  That things had not been going too well between them for some time, and she just hadn’t had the guts to end it.  She was single, and she told him she planned to stay that way, and just focus on Zach.  She told him this with a look in her eye that told him something else altogether.  When this shit is all over, when it’s safe again, I’ll do something, I’ll make my move.  Michael found himself daydreaming about them all being together again.  He was older now, more mature.  He didn’t want Zach to grow up without him.  He wanted to be the one who tucked him up in bed at night, and he wanted to be there in the morning when he bounced out of bed, wanting his daddy.  It all seemed so simple, so refreshingly close, just within his reach, if he wanted it.  He had started to view his bachelor pad with increasing distain and unease.  Anthony had been right all along.  He had been living his life in one spot.  Unable to move on.  Clinging to the old days out of some sense of loyalty to Danny, who was unable to move on either in prison.

Michael woke up that morning, nodding to himself as he yawned.  He had slept well, and the wheels were in motion.  Before long, one way or another, it would all be over, wouldn’t it?  He had to believe it, just like they did.  They had talked the night away, they had chased the demons from the shadows, just like in the old days.  It was like brushing the cobwebs down from the ceiling.  Starting anew.  Or it would be, once it was all over, because surely they all deserved it now? 

He swung his legs out of bed, pulled on his jeans and grabbed the nearest t-shirt he could find to yank over his messy hair.  Anthony and Chrissie, he thought, as he yawned again, they would be alright again when this was all done.  Anthony would not have to lie to her any longer.  Maybe she would learn to understand?  Maybe she would be okay with Danny, now he was going to be a dad?  The thought made Michael smile as he dragged some clean socks from his underwear drawer and pulled them on.  Danny, a dad.  It really was quite funny.  He enjoyed teasing him about it, now that he finally seemed up for it.  It was nice.  It was normal.  It was what people did, wasn’t it?  Met nice girls, had kids, lived a decent life.  They would all make a better job of it than their own parents, that was for sure.  Michael made sure to tell Danny this on a daily basis.  “Even I’m a better dad than mine was, even me, so you bloody will be too.  We won’t make the same mistakes.”

As he left the room, and nearly bumped into a blurry eyed Danny, Michael heard his phone already starting to harass him.  He rolled his eyes at Danny, who blundered sleepily into the bathroom, and located his mobile leaping around energetically on the coffee table in the lounge.  Anthony. “Morning bro!”

“Morning, you both up?”

“Yes sir, up sir, ready to go sir!”

“Don’t be a dick Mike. Listen, I’m off to work now, but call me or text me when you get the go ahead okay?  I’ll pull a sicky if I have to. If not, Chrissie already thinks I’m meeting you to watch the football later, okay?  Then I’ll text her and say I’ve had a few drinks and will be home late.”

“You lying, cheating, dastardly…”

“Shut up,” Anthony groaned. “See you later.”

Michael ended the call just as Danny reappeared from the bathroom.  “Sleep well?” he enquired with a knowing grin.  Danny already had his phone in his hand.

“Not that well, no, funnily enough. It feels like before an exam at school, you know?” he rubbed one hand against his stomach and grimaced.  “Feel all weird and knotted up.  I’ve arranged to meet Lucy when she has her break at lunch.  I won’t tell her much.  I just want to…” he shrugged his shoulders at Michael. “You know.”

“You’re gonna’ be alright you twat!” Michael roared at him, coming forward to slap him on the shoulder. “You look like we’re about to send you into the lions den for fucks sake.”

“Well it feels that way.  The club, of all places?” Danny looked with wide eyes around himself, as if still trying to come to terms with it.  “Why there? I get the feeling Jaime Lawler has spilled his guts, you know?  We’re not meant to know Howard has anything to do with that place.”

“Well that’s why we’re going to track the little scroat down now, isn’t it?  He won’t be hard to find. Come on, get ready.  We’ll get breakfast when we’re out.”

“What about Kurt?”

“Better leave him here,” Michael said, glancing at the little dog who, as always, was winding himself in and out of Danny’s legs.  “Think it’s gonna’ be a long day, mate.”

 

They drove silently out of Belfield park, following Barrack road, past Lucy’s flat, and towards Redchurch.  Michael pulled into the McDonalds along Somerley road and ordered them breakfast from the drive through.  They ate in the car in the car park facing the main road.  “I can still remember driving this way, when we first moved here,” Danny said after a long silence.  “Following the removal van.  You remember, those first few days after we moved in, how you and Billy and Jake tried to psyche me out? Riding your bikes around and around outside the house?” He looked at Michael with a tired smile.  Michael swallowed the lump of fries in his mouth and wiped his face with a napkin.

“Course I remember. It may have looked like we were trying to start shit with you, but really I was just so bored, I just wanted to know who you were!”

Danny stifled a giggle, as they both stared back at the road. “And all those mornings,” he went on, “we’d cross that road on our bikes, go onto Somerley estate to get to school.”

“When you actually went to school!” laughed Michael. “Christ, even I had a better attendance record than you.”

“Yeah.” Danny looked down then, his expression troubled. “Well. Life was alright for a while wasn’t it?  Remember all those tricks we played on John Bradley?  I wonder what ever happened to him.”

“Retired, last I heard.  Where shall we start mate?  I’ve called him twice on the number Anthony had, but he’s not picking up.”

Danny nodded grimly. “Start wherever,” he sighed. “Let’s do it.  Shit, I shouldn’t have eaten that, I feel sicker than ever now.” He blew out his breath and pushed his hair back with one hand.  “Come on then.  Let’s take a wander down memory lane, eh?”

“It won’t all be bad,” Michael laughed at him. “You probably needed to do it sooner or later.”

He balled up the rubbish and hurled it onto the back seat, started the engine and screeched the car out of the car park and back onto Somerley road.  They crawled around the old estate first.  Michael had his own knot of dread building in the pit of his belly by now.  He could barely even look at Danny to see how it was all registering on his face.  They drove slowly past Danny’s old house.  The front lawn was littered with kids toys; bikes and scooters and footballs.  Michael glanced up at the top window, recalling how he had climbed up the trellis and in through the window, desperate to see how his friend was.  “Never forget climbing up there to see you,” he shook his head and murmured. “Fucking shit myself, with that gorilla sat downstairs the whole time.” 

“It was brave of you,” Danny returned, staring at the house. “Christ,” he said then, taking another deep and shaky breath.  “The things that went on in that house.” He shuddered, and reached for the pack of cigarettes he had slung onto the dash board.  They drove on, around the roads, circling their old stomping grounds, much the way they had circled it on their bikes as kids.  Michael noted that not much had changed.  It all looked eerily the same.  He felt that if he stared hard enough, he would see himself as a teenager, leaning over the handlebars of his bike, trying to look cool by smoking a cigarette. 

They drove back out onto Somerley road, took a right, and began another slow crawl around the bigger estate.  Jaime Lawler’s family had lived here.  Michael quickly found the house, pointing it out to Danny, and accepting the cigarette he had lit for him.  “I’ll knock,” he said, parking up and opening the door. “See if they still live there.”

 

Five minutes later they were back in the car and driving more purposefully, back into town, Michael chanting the address over and over inside his head.  It was not the same address Jaime had had years ago, but it was close by.  They drove down the high street, took the left onto Barrack road, and then turned right.  Close to the railway lines, there were several blocks of new build flats.  The sort of one and two bedroom dwellings that landlords liked to buy into then rent out to people on benefits.  They parked out the front of one, and got out of the car.  Michael glanced once at Danny, as they paced up to the main door and pressed the buzzer. He looked grey, he thought, grey and sick.  He hoped some of the old fight would make a comeback before this day was done.  The buzzer made a crunching sound and a rasping voice came back at them; “yeah?”

“Jaime, it’s Michael and Danny. Let us up.”

There was a silence before the buzzer crunched again. “You cunts. What you doing here? You’re gonna’ get me killed!”

“You better let us up then,” Michael advised him. “Before we’re seen out here.”

“Fuck.”

It worked though, and they were let in.  They ran silently up to the second floor.  Jaime Lawler had his door open already, and was peering out at them, as they came down the corridor towards him.  Michael could already see what Anthony had meant about him.  He looked at least ten years older than he was.  He was noticeably thinner, and he had been a thin man eight years back.  As they approached, he stepped back into his flat, and they followed him in, immediately greeted by the strong smell of weed.  Michael looked at Danny and made a face.  Danny closed the door behind them and let his breath back out again.

“What do you want, for Christs sake?” Jaime was already complaining, still doing that little dance of his, shifting from one foot to the other, while his hands fiddled with his baseball cap, and his eyes shot about everywhere as if they were too scared to settled on anything for too long.  He crammed the dirty blue hat onto his head and twisted it from one side to the other. “I’m fucking serious, you’ll get me killed! Between you and your brother! Bloody hell!”

“We won’t be long,” Danny spoke up then, leaning against the door as if he was reluctant to come in any further than that. “Good to see you Jaime. It’s been a while.”

Jaime lifted a thin hand and scratched viciously at the back of his head, making the cap bounce back and forth on his forehead. He was frowning deeply as he took Danny in, his eyes running quickly over him, his feet shifting about on the threadbare grey carpet. “Yeah, yeah, it has, yeah, but this isn’t good, you know?  You two here like this! I’ve had enough, I don’t wanna’ know about any of it, you know? That’s why I didn’t answer my phone!”

He looked terrified, Michael thought, watching him.  He leaned against the door frame of what looked like the kitchen, placed his hands in his pockets, and then changed his mind quickly, jerking away from the door frame, adjusting his cap, and gesturing wildly around at his flat.  “You just can’t come here!” he hissed at them. Michael looked around.  The place was a mess.  It made his own flat look like a pleasant family home, he thought.  The smell of marijuana was thick in the air.

“We’re seeing Jerry Howard later,” Michael said, watching the fear leap immediately to life on Jaime’s haggard face.  “At the club.  Did you tell him anything, Jaime?  Did you spill the beans after you saw Anthony?”

Jaime moaned, rolled his eyes and loped away from the kitchen, dragging his feet as he entered the small lounge.  Michael and Danny followed cautiously.  They found Jaime perched on the edge of a battered green sofa, fiddling with the contents of a little tin on his lap.  Michael nodded, and glanced at Danny again, who paused in the doorway, arms folded.  “You guys still smoke?” Jaime asked, not looking up. “I’ll roll us a big fat one.  You’re gonna’ need it today you crazy fucking aresholes.”

“No thanks,” Michael shook his head. “Come on then, are you gonna’ be straight with us? Why did he tell Danny to come to the club tonight?  Why there?”

“How the fucking fuck should I know?” Jaime looked up, his grey eyes raging for a moment. “Why’d you have to come and ask me for, eh?  I want to be left out of it, I just told you that!”

“Does he know you saw Anthony?” Danny asked from the doorway. “That’s all we need to know Jaime.  You really came through for us, you know.  Telling Anthony all that stuff, about the club, and Haskell.  We’re grateful.”

“Yeah, we’re grateful,” Michael agreed, watching Jaime stuff a roach nervously into the end of the joint.  “But what happened then, mate?  You seem nervy as fuck.”

“Yeah, alright, alright!” Jaime shouted at them from the sofa, drumming his feet violently against the floor. Michael narrowed his eyes at him.  Something was different about the guy, he thought.  He had always been shady, always been trouble, but something had changed.  He looked like a nervous wreck, and he looked like he wanted to leap out of the window to get away from them. “Alright, have it your way, have it your way you fuckers! Yeah, he knows I saw Anthony, alright? Don’t ask me how, but he knows, so I’m in trouble, and so are you, and this whole thing is gonna’ blow right up in your fucking stupid faces, and the best thing you idiots can fucking do, is just get out of here and disappear! Right?”

He jammed the joint between his bad teeth and lit the end, inhaling long and deep, as Danny and Michael looked on.  “What’s wrong with you?” Michael questioned, his tone gentler suddenly. “You’re not the same Jaime.  What have they done to you?”

Jaime laughed, hurled himself backwards on the sofa, and stayed there, his thin legs spread wide apart.  His tatty white tracksuit jacket looked like it had seen better days, and the cuffs rode up his forearms every time he moved.  He puffed smoke across the room, then instantly took the spliff back to his lips for another drag. It was then that Michael saw the marks on the inside of his forearm.  “I work for them, didn’t Anthony tell you?  They pay my bills, right?  I don’t wanna’ fall out with them do I?”

“How could you go back to that?” Danny asked, in dismay. “After everything that happened?  You knew about Freeman, you knew it all.  How could you go back to being their errand boy?  Fucking up more lives?  You said you’d stay away Jaime.”

“Easier said than done, Danny boy!” Jaime cackled, his face split by a huge, gap-toothed grin.  Michael moved forward slowly then.

“Or is there another reason?” he asked, grabbing hold of one of Jaime’s wrists and quickly shoving up the sleeve. The bruises and marks went all the way up.  Jaime hissed in rage and leapt up from the sofa, practically flying across the room to get away from Michael.  “Heroin Jaime? I never thought even you would be that dumb.”

“Oh give me a break, give me a break,” Jaime said, his voice whining, as he pulled down his sleeves, wrapped one arm around his ribs and smoked his spliff. Danny looked on in horror.

“Jaime!  You idiot!”

“For how long?” asked Michael.  Jaime shrugged, his eyes dark and defiant.

“I don’t know, few years, on and off,” he grumbled at them. “Oh don’t fucking start right? I’ve tried it all! I’ve been on programmes, I’ve been on methadone, the fucking works right?  I’ve tried it, I’ve tried it, I’ve tried it!”

“So if you piss Howard off, you don’t get your drugs, is that right?” Danny asked from the doorway. “That’s how they got you by the short and curlies, eh? That’s it, isn’t it?”

“You try being me!” Jaime shot back, pointing his finger viciously their way. “It’s fucking impossible!  I need that stuff, right?  I need it.  The pain, right, the pain is fucking unbearable!” He paced about in the small space he had positioned himself in.  Michael looked around, noting how bare the room was.  Just one sofa, a small table, and a large chunky television on a box in the corner. “I’m feeling like shit, right now see?  You have no idea!  I just have to fucking wait!”

“Wait for what?” asked Michael.  He swapped a look with Danny, and knew he was feeling exactly like him.  He wanted to get the hell out of there as quickly as he did. “A delivery?”

“Just go, right?” Jaime stopped pacing and leaned against the wall, putting one grubby trainer back against it to steady himself.  He smoked the spliff, watching them through slitted grey eyes. “You can’t help me.  I’ve done all I can to help you.  You do what the fuck you want now, yeah? You can’t trust me, right?  I work for Howard.  He’s my boss. Just like in the old days, eh?  You remember that Danny boy? Howard was always the boss wasn’t he?  Till you took him out.  But then the old man took over, and he’s ten times fucking worse.  You ought to knife him too!” He tipped his head back then, cackling with unstable laughter. “You should! Go on do it! Go round there tonight with all your knives again, mate! Show the twisted old fucker what you’re made of! Fight back, remember that?  That’s what you said to me last time I saw you kid.  Fight back.  You still fighting back, eh?  ‘Cause if you are you’re a braver man than I’ll ever be.  I’m tellin’ you.  Fuck that shit.”

“I think we better go,” Danny spoke softly from behind.  Michael nodded in agreement.

“You take care of yourself,” he said to Jaime, and he meant it. “You did a hell of a lot to help us Jaime.  You should remember that.  It’s not too late to start again.”

“Nah, nah,” Jaime shook his head violently, and tightened his arm around his middle. “Too late Mike, I like my gear too much, I do! In love with it I fucking am.”

“Thanks Jaime,” Danny came forward then, quickly, as if he knew he wouldn’t if he thought about it twice.  He grabbed Jaime’s hand and shook it firmly, while staring him right in the eye. “Things would have been a lot worse for me, if you hadn’t helped Anthony back then.  I just want you to know that.”

“And things would have been a lot better for you if I hadn’t helped you out that night,” Jaime replied quietly, his eyes still for once, focused on Danny. “But good of you to say it mate.  Good luck.”

Danny nodded, dropped his hand and walked out of the flat.  Michael patted Jaime on the arm. He wanted to say something else, something meaningful, something that might inspire him to start again, to get out from under the bad guys thumbs, but he couldn’t think of anything. There was nothing.  It was all so depressing.  It was worse than he had feared.  The man’s life was a horrible mess.  He turned and walked out of the flat.

44

Lucy

 

 

            She waited for him outside, at his request.  He said his mother was not feeling very well.  He said it in a slightly guarded, amused way, which suggested to Lucy that Kay had a hangover.  So she waited outside in her car, rubbing her hands together and fiddling with the heating, and unable to breathe for the fear bubbling and building inside of her.  She saw him come out of the block with his bag and his dog, and she had to look away, because it hurt too much.  She took deep breaths, sucking up the air and willing it to send calming signals to the rest of her body.

            He opened the door and climbed in beside her, with his bag and his dog on his lap, and an apprehensive look on his face.  The silence waited for one of them to speak.  For one of them to let the other one know everything was okay.  She wanted to let it be him.  They stared into eachothers eyes, until she felt her lips start to tremble and stretch.  She watched the amusement fill his eyes and wanted to hit him.  But it looked like someone had already done that.  “What’s so funny?” Lucy demanded suddenly, feigning anger, wondering if she ought to slap him across the face after all.

            Danny grinned, only it was a half grin, lopsided, and his eyes seemed to burn into hers.  Lucy wanted to grab his face and press her lips onto his.  She was suddenly and overwhelmingly reminded of her schoolgirl days.  Of watching him and wanting him from afar, of being too shy, too awkward to do anything about it.  Of lying on her bed scrawling into her diary, purging herself of the days wants and lusts, how he had brushed against her in the corridor, how their eyes had met twice across the classroom, that kind of thing.  Remembering made her want to hit him even more.

            “You,” he told her finally, pulling across his seat belt.  “Your face.  You look like you don’t know whether to hit me or what.”

            “Thought crossed my mind,” she replied wryly.  “But yet again it looks like someone has beaten me to it.  What happened?”

            “Same old story,” he said with a sigh, still grinning.  “I can tell you all about it if you want.  Lots to tell.”

            Lucy turned the key in the engine and started the car up.  “Well you better tell me then,” she said, not entirely sure how much of it she wanted to hear.  “I’ve got a feeling it’s gonna’ be a long day.”

            “You don’t mind?” he asked then, and she felt his hand on her arm.  She checked her mirrors, but did not pull out.

            “Mind?”

            “Me.  This.  I don’t deserve it really do I?”

            “I’ll let you off,” she smiled. “You’re a man.  You’re not the first to run off when a woman says she’s pregnant, and you won’t be the last I bet.”

            He sighed in relief, took his hand back.  “Okay.  Thanks. I don’t really know where to begin though.”

            “Who did that to you?”

            Danny nodded at her. “Good place to begin.  It was one of the guys who attacked me and Mike and Anthony in the pub?  He was a bit pissed off with me.  He was friends with Lee and Jack, and now they’re both dead.”

            Lucy stared at him open mouthed, before remembering to concentrate on her driving.  Luckily it was only a short drive back to her flat.  She hated driving when she was distracted, and the baby alone was enough of a distraction at the moment.  She had noticed her concentration skills had declined considerably, since the baby seemed to occupy every waking minute within her mind.  “Dead?”

            “Yeah, I only found out yesterday. Jack hung himself.  Did it to himself.  Though some might argue my mum had a bit of a hand in it.”

            Lucy shot him a quick look to register his expression.  He seemed incredibly calm, she thought, as if he had absorbed it all and come to terms with it somehow.  He looked back at the road, frowning through the windscreen. “You better explain,” she murmured, shaking her head, feeling lost with it all. Danny cleared his throat.  He could feel his eyes were on her, taking her in, watching her, but she had to watch the road.

            “She went to see him last week,” he said. “To have a go, or whatever.  To say her piece.  Then she tells him what else she did.  She put he’s a pervert all over the University message board, you know, and emails, phone calls, the lot.  Warning the students about him in the pub. The shit hit the fan and he topped himself.  With a sign saying ‘pervert’ hung around his neck, no less.”

            “Oh my God, Danny.”

            “I know.  I know.”

            “How do you feel about that?  I mean….Jesus Christ!”

            “I feel okay,” he shrugged beside her.  “He chose to do it didn’t he? Obviously he couldn’t live with himself anymore.  Mum only told the truth.  She let those kids know who he was, that’s all.”

            “Is she okay?”

            “She was hammered when I got there last night,” Danny replied with a small chuckle.  “A bit freaked out about it all, but she said she did it for me, she wanted to do something to make it up to me or whatever.  Fuck knows.  What a mess eh?”

            “I don’t even know what to say Danny.  I really don’t.”

            “Well it’s pretty much nearly all over, to be honest.”

            Lucy sucked in her breath. “How is it?”

            “Well I finished the interview with Caroline Haskell,” he paused for a moment, digging into his bag, and then waving a folder at her.  They caught eachothers eye accidentally then, and Lucy felt her stomach drop at the name of the woman.  “It’s all here.  Mum read it this morning.  You can have a look too, you know.  Because it’s pretty much the whole fucking story from beginning to end, you know, in case you wanna’ know…anyway,” he stuffed it back into the bag.  “So I’ve seen Dennis, Lee’s brother…and I’ve seen Freeman, God rest his soul, so now I’ve arranged to see the old man himself.  The puppet master!  The man behind all this loveliness.  I might get some answers, see.”

            “Are you sure you know what you are doing?” Lucy took the next left to her road and pulled up out the front.  “Won’t it be dangerous I mean?  What’re you going to say, or do?” 

            “It’s just the final piece,” he said, lifting and dropping his hands, as if he didn’t quite have the words to explain it.  Lucy turned the engine off.  She wanted to look at him but she was afraid to.  “I know what he wants from me.  I’m not sure if I’m gonna’ give it to him yet, I’ll see how things go.  But don’t worry. I’m taking Anthony and Mike with me, definitely.”

            Lucy could only manage a slight nod, as she stared at the steering wheel, and tugged the keys out of the ignition.  “Well, that’s good,” she said, uselessly.  She moved one hand without thinking, going for her stomach, the way she had grown accustomed to doing lately.  To hold the baby, to soothe it, to feel it there.  She stopped herself and sighed.  “Come on then,” she told him. “Let’s get the kettle on.”

            Danny followed her into the flat, with Kurt still in his arms.  Lucy filled the kettle silently, shooting a look his way, wondering what he was thinking, what he was doing here.  She grabbed two cups, watching him hanging about awkwardly, looking like he wanted to sit down, but was not brave enough to do it.  When the tea was made, she nodded to the lounge, and they went through.  Danny sat down and Kurt curled into a small ball on his knees.  Lucy wanted to laugh then.  “You and that bloody dog!” she said, with a smile, rolling her eyes. He narrowed his suspiciously.

            “What? You sound like my mum.”

            “You’re just surgically attached to each other, that’s all,” she shrugged, crossing one leg over the other, and self-consciously tugging her top down over her swelling belly.  “It’s all right, it’s sweet, it just makes me laugh, that’s all.”

            Danny smiled back, dropping a hand onto the little dog, who grunted and wriggled in appreciation.  “He’s getting so old now.  I’ve got to make the most of him haven’t I?”

            “It’s so sweet the way he remembered you,” Lucy sighed, settling back into the sofa with her tea between her hands.  “Amazing, really.”

            “Best present anyone ever gave me,” Danny looked at her and said. “My mum says I treat him like a baby.”

            Lucy felt her throat go dry.  She looked away from him, back down to the little dog.  “You do.  A bit.”

            A silence stretched out before them again.  Lucy bit at her lip, drank some tea, and had to pretend that it tasted nice, when for some reason it had gone back to tasting wrong.  She felt it gurgling unhappily in her knotted stomach, and wondered if morning sickness could come back when you thought you were past it.  She watched Danny drink his own tea, keeping one hand on Kurt the whole time.  She felt impatient suddenly then.   She didn’t want to hear about Caroline Haskell, or his mother, or Jack Freeman or any of those people.  She just wanted to know what he was doing here.  What did he want?

            “So you’re…” he looked at her briefly, frowned slightly, then glanced back down at Kurt, as if that were safer.  “You’re okay then?”

            “Yes. I’m okay,” she told him.  “I’m still pregnant.”

            “Oh.  Yes.  I know.”

            “Is that why you’re here?  Is that why you wanted to see me?”  Lucy stopped herself, biting her lip again and raising her cup to her mouth to sip more tea.  She told herself not to expect too much, not to hope for too much.  She saw him try to compose himself, but he just ended up looking confused.

            “Yeah,” he said finally, although he didn’t sound very sure to her.  “I mean, yeah, I wanted to see how you were.  And say sorry.”

            “Sorry for what?”

            “You know.  Running off.  Being a bastard.  Hitting the bottle.” He met her eyes again, grimaced sheepishly and shrugged his shoulders. 

            “I didn’t exactly make things easy for you either,” Lucy told him.  “I hurt you a lot, and I didn’t mean to.  Then I go and spring an unwanted pregnancy on you.  I know you said you didn’t want kids…but there you go.  This is where we are.  I’m keeping the baby Danny.  I already love it, if that makes sense.  What you want to do, or not do, is entirely up to you.”  She leaned forward then, unable to tolerate the tea any longer, and placed it on the coffee table.  “I’m not going to put pressure on you, or expect anything of you.  I’m here if you want me, as a friend, as more, whatever.  That’s all I have to say really.”  She folded her arms across her middle, felt the rise of her belly, and flattened her hand against it; hold on baby, hold on, give him a chance.

            Danny exhaled loudly.  “Okay,” he said slowly, hesitantly.  “I’ll be honest too then.  I do want you.” He looked at her then, and she felt her heart beating faster already, her cheeks warming up.  “I never stopped wanting you.  It fucking killed me when you said all that stuff on the beach…I do kind of get it now, I mean, my mum tried to help me understand…and I sort of do, but I just wanted to be with you, you know?  Whatever happened.  I just wanted to give it a go and see what happened with us.  And I guess, what I’m worried about now, among a million other things obviously, is maybe you just want me back now because…of…you know, the baby?”

He was really finding it difficult to look at her now, Lucy could tell.  She sat further forward, so that their knees were side by side, just touching.

            “I just look like a twat, don’t I?” she said with a wry smile.  “But life has a funny way of ripping the ground out from under your feet, have you noticed that?  I stand by the reasons I wanted us to have a break.  I was worried about us.  I’ll probably always worry about us.  But nothing changed how much I love you, and nothing ever will, you know?” He nodded silently beside her.  “I did it because I wanted you to be sure.  I just wanted you to have some time to yourself.”

            “Lucy, I had plenty of time to myself in prison, didn’t you think of that?”

            “No…I mean, yes.  Oh I don’t know Danny,” Lucy groaned, dropping her forehead into one hand and turning her face to look at him.

            “It kept me going in there you know,” he went on. “Thinking of me and you together at last.  Then you were there to meet me, and I just thought, okay here we go.  A decent, normal life.  That’s all I want, you know.”

            “But can you see how that puts so much pressure on us?” she asked him. “Being together as kids, dealing with all that shit, that was one thing.  Then eight years apart.  I mean, I know we saw each other and wrote to each other, but I guess I always kind of thought you would get out, see me for a bit, and then realise what else you could have.  What else is out there.”

            Danny was looking at her in amazement, shaking his head incredulously. “Lucy, is your self-esteem really that low?  Because I always kind of thought you were really confident and together!  Do you really think like that?  Did you really think I’d get bored of you and move on?”

            “I just didn’t want to cling onto you,” she shrugged, desperate to explain. “I didn’t feel I had any claim on you, any right to be with you, just because we were together back then. I just felt you needed time to spread your wings, you know, take your time, instead of jumping straight into a serious relationship.”

            “Okay, okay,” Danny said then, suddenly turning towards her and grasping her hands with his own.  Lucy was shocked, both by his sudden movement, and by the feel of his skin pressing against hers.  She felt her fingers curling into his, responding to the touch, clinging on.  “Can we just take things slowly then?  Can we just sort of pretend we’ve just met or something then?  You know, go on dates and keep it all fun and casual, that sort of thing?”

            Lucy wanted to cry.  She looked down at his hands, over hers and felt fingers lacing through hers, holding on.  “But what about the baby?”

            “The same thing,” he said, nodding. “One step at a time.  Take it slowly.  I can get my head around it, I know I can.  I’ll do anything Lucy, I just want to be with you.”

            “But do you think you’ll ever want it Danny?” she had to ask.  There was nothing she wanted more than to fling her arms around his neck, and pull him close to her, and promise him the world.  But the baby.  The baby was more important than anything they felt.  She felt his hands loosen on hers and dismay filled her heart.

            “I’ll be honest,” he said, glancing down. “It scares the fucking shit out of me Lucy.  All of it does.  I know people say everyone is like that.  Mike says it.  Anthony says it.  But it’s like, how the hell would I know how to be a good dad Luce?  I barely even remember my own dad, that’s how much he thought of me, and as for…” he paused, running his tongue over his bottom lip, his eyes seemingly fixated on her middle.  Lucy did not want him to speak the name either.  The name that seemed to hang like a dark shadow over everything in their lives. 

            “You wouldn’t be like that,” she said, pulling one hand out from his and holding it gently to the side of his face.  She saw his eyes weaken, closing briefly, before jerking open to stare right into hers. She shook her head at him adamantly. “You would never be like him Danny.  You mustn’t think that.”

            “But people say that, don’t they? Like, people who are violent to their kids, it’s because their parents were violent to them?  It carries on, doesn’t it?”

            “It’s different Danny.  It’s not always true, for one thing. There are plenty of people out there who have suffered horrendous childhoods, and then managed to give their own kids perfect ones.  And also, that man wasn’t your parent, he didn’t bring you up.  He only had influence over you for a few years.  Before he came along you were kind and good and sweet, and you still are.  You still are.”

            “I just worry though, I just worry.  What if I can’t cope? What if I don’t like bond with it or whatever?  What if I resent it somehow?  Like he resented me?  What if I…what if I….” He trailed off again, lowering his head.  Lucy couldn’t help herself, she placed her other hand on his shoulder and pulled him close.  His forehead bumped against her collar bone, making her laugh and wince.

            “Just shut up you idiot,” she told him. “Do you think I would want to be with you, if I had any doubts about you like that? You’re gonna’ be the best bloody dad in the world, that’s what I know Danny, even if you don’t! I know it, and everyone else knows it, and you just have to give yourself a chance.”

            “Okay,” he was breathing into her neck.  “Okay then.”

            “You can come to the scan with me if you like.”

            “What?  When?”

            “Next week.  If you want to.  And look,” she grinned, blinking away the tears in her eyes, and pulled up her top to show him her rounded belly.  “Look how fast I’m growing!  I’m getting all fat!” She giggled as his eyes grew wider.

            “Bloodyhell Luce.”

            “I know, I know.  Weird isn’t it?”

            His hand snaked out towards her stomach, hovering above it unsurely, before resting featherlike upon it.  “Mental,” he said quietly. “An actual little person.”

            “Blows your mind really.”

            “How big is it?”

            “About the size of a potato.  It has all its legs and arms and everything.  It’s just a tiny little mini person.”

            “You’ll be an amazing mum,” he sighed. She had her hand on his shoulder, and moved it down to his lower back, rubbing back and forth.

            “Maybe we’ll all be amazing together.”

            He lifted his head, pressed his forehead onto hers, took in lungfuls of air and closed his eyes.  “I hope so Lucy.” He opened his eyes and looked right into hers, and she felt the warmth spreading down between her legs, the longing tingling down her arms, making her shudder.  “I’ll do my best, eh?”

            Lucy didn’t want to talk to him anymore.  What he had said was good enough for her.  It was good enough for now.  She closed her eyes, pressed her lips softly against his, and let him push her gently back down onto sofa, as a thousand sweet memories roared through her mind.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

45

Anthony

 

 

            Anthony was sat in the lounge, flicking through the TV channels, checking the time on his watch, and sporadically picking up his mobile phone to check it for messages.  The kids were in bed, presumably asleep.  He was waiting for his wife to come home from her ironing jobs.  He was waiting for her to take over, and he was waiting to tell her another lie.  He realised he had been doing that a lot lately, and it saddened him beyond belief, that it had all come to this.  It felt like he had two choices.  Tell her the truth, and lose her, risk losing the kids.  Or lie.  He consoled himself with the knowledge that he had not lied constantly.  He hadn’t needed to for a while.  His brother and Danny had done a good job of keeping him in the dark since the attack in the pub that day.  He had realised that they were, of course.  He wasn’t stupid.  He had known something was still going on, and that they were deliberately keeping him out of it.

Anthony drummed his fingers impatiently against the armrest, jerking his other arm up to look at the time again.  Half past seven.  She had said she would be no later than seven.  He had swapped with her at half four, coming in from the restaurant, brushing a kiss across her cheek in the hallway, before she nipped straight out of the door, yelling that dinner was in the oven.  He had fed the kids, let them watch TV while he cleared up, bathed them, read to them and tucked them into bed.  He blew his breath out loudly with frustration.  He was not looking forward to lying to her, especially because he had it all worked out, and somehow that made it feel worse, but he was looking forward to getting out of the house.  He was looking forward to getting stuck in.  Standing still was not in his nature. 

His phone beeped at him then.  A message.  He snatched it up from where it lay beside him on the sofa and looked at the screen.  Jaime. Anthony grimaced, and scratched the back of his head.  They had not been in contact for a few years now, but Anthony still considered him a friend, of sorts.  Not the sort of person he could ever bring home to meet the wife and kids, of course.  Imagine that! Chrissy could still barely disguise her distaste whenever she heard Danny’s name mentioned.  What would she think if he knew he was back in touch with another blast from the past?

Saving you a seat mate!

Anthony grinned and quickly typed back; still waiting for wife! Be there soon as. He heard the door then, her key turning in the lock, and he stuffed the phone into his pocket in a panic that made him feel stupid and childish.  He got to his feet as she walked in, immediately narrowing her eyes his way.  “Kids okay?”

“Yep,” he nodded. “I’ve got to go out!”

“But I’ve just got in!”

“Emergency,” he shrugged, heading for the hallway to grab his coat.  Chrissy let her own coat slip from her shoulders, hanging it up on the hook just as Anthony reached for his.  He glanced at her apologetically. “Workmate,” he explained, “in a right old state.  His missis has left him.”

“Hmm,” Chrissy had folded her arms in a disapproving fashion. But Anthony did not allow her any time to question or admonish him for leaving.  He kissed her cheek and left.  He imagined her seething in the hallway, as he headed down the street, shoving his hands into his pocket, exhaling breath into the cold air.  He had an appointment to keep.

            It felt like going back in time, Anthony realised vaguely, when he reached the old haunt and paid his money on the door.  He stood outside for just a moment, staring around at the street they had waited on so many times that year in the bed-sit.  Leaping about, impatiently queing up to get in.  He felt a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth, recalling how excitable Danny had always been, more than the rest of them, who would have been happy about a night out anywhere.  This place had been special to Danny, he knew.  He’d been overwhelmed at first, unable to really believe there was a club that played all the music he loved, and introduced him to even more.  Anthony remembered seeing it in his eyes, the burning desire for more.  He would leap up and down all night, his hair flying about, his eyes wild with excitement.

            Sighing and shaking his head, absorbing the time that had passed for all of them, Anthony ducked through the doors of Chaos, and took a look around for Jaime Lawler.  The dance floor was empty.  The club had not long opened.  A few groups were scattered here and there, some at the bar, some lounging around the poole table.  Anthony tried to place the name of the song that was playing, and the band. He tapped one foot without thinking, nodding along whatever happened to my rock and roll? But he failed, without even really trying.  He had not had time for music in the last eight years.

            It didn’t take him long to pick Jaime Lawler out, perched on a stool at the bar, though it had been a good two or three years since he had last seen him.  He was tall and thin, hunched over his pint, still dressed the same.  Tracksuit jacket, jeans and a baseball cap crammed down over his forehead. His slate grey eyes peered out suspiciously from under it, taking Anthony in and lifting a lazy hand in a half-hearted wave. “Alright then mate?” he called out. Anthony took up the stool next to him and they shook hands.  He felt Jaime’s grip tighten, and his eyes seemed to pierce through him suddenly, just before he let go and dropped his hand back to cradle his pint.

            “How you doing Jaime?” Anthony asked, nodding to catch the barmaids attention.  “Pint of Carlsberg please love,” he told her.  The girl had short bleached blonde hair and a pierced nose.  She smiled warmly at him, but Anthony was used to that.  If anything, the wedding band on his finger seemed to make the girls even friendlier. 

            “Not so bad, not so bad mate,” Jaime’s response was a tired one.  Anthony paid for his pint and looked him over.  Jaime was a few years older than him.  Anthony had been in the same school year as his younger brother Bradley.  Bradley had gone down the wife and kids route at a young age and stuck with it.  Jaime had gone down the crime and punishment route at an equally young age, the question was, was he still at it?  “Getting old, eh?” Jaime sat with his legs apart, one hand dangling, the other lifting the pint glass to his lips.  He grinned and cocked his head. Anthony nodded and smiled.

            “Looks that way,” he agreed sombrely. “Happens to us all.  Never really believed it would though, did we?”

            Jaime’s eyes moved down to the bar, he leant on it with one elbow and Anthony watched the way his eyes moved about quickly, taking everything in, tracking across the bar, to Anthony’s hand, to his clothes, down to his shoes and back again.  There was still something distinctly shifty about the man, he mused, drinking his beer.  “How’re the wife and kids?” he asked.  Anthony nodded again.

            “Good thanks, really good.  How about you?  Last time I bumped into you, you were still free and single.”

            “Ah that’s the only way I know,” Jaime met his eyes briefly, grinning widely, and Anthony noticed that he had two teeth missing now.  One on the top right, and one just below it.  His other teeth looked grey and in bad shape.  It made him look older, Anthony thought.  “There’s no woman out there would put up with me, and bloody kids, eh?  Not for me thanks.  My bloody nephews and nieces do my head in when I see ‘em.  How’s your brother?”

            “He’s not too bad,” said Anthony. “He’s trying to get back with his ex, the mother of his little boy?  I hope he does.  It would be good for him.”

            “Yeah, yeah, no doubt,” Jaime swivelled on his stool, still grinning, but looking around everywhere, jerking his eyes up every time someone came in, or moved.  He touched the rim of his baseball cap every now and again in an almost subconscious gesture.  “He’s staying out of trouble these days then?”

            “Yeah, pretty much,” Anthony sighed. “But trouble has a way of finding him.  Well, not so much him specifically, but Danny. He’s been staying with Mike.”

            Jaime’s eyes had a life of their own, Anthony thought, almost transfixed now by how quickly they moved around.  They met his, then jerked away, took in two young girls who skipped in arm and arm, back to the bar, down to his nearly finished pint, then down to his trainers. He sort of lifted and dropped his skinny shoulders in a series of uncomfortable shrugs. “Yeah, yeah, so how he is then? That what this is all about?  This little blast from the past eh?” He laughed, but it was more of a cackle, and again Anthony was reminded of someone much older than Jaime was, and suddenly he could see him as a wrinkled old man, hunched and thin, with tobacco stained fingers and a gappy smile. 

            “Yeah, basically,” Anthony said, deciding it was time to cut the small talk and get down to business. “I asked for your help once before, you remember?”

            Jaime nodded, his grey eyes thinning to wary slits. “I remember.”

            “Because of Mike and Danny, because I cared about them.” Anthony drank some beer, and tried to catch Jaime’s eyes and hold them still.  “Here I am, at it again, all these years later.  You didn’t mind me contacting you?  I mean, you were the only person I could think of that still lives round there, that might know anything.”

            “Oh I know things, I know things alright,” Jaime had put his empty glass down on the bar.  He searched inside his jacket and brought out a packet of tobacco, which he set up on the bar to roll a cigarette.  Anthony swallowed nervously.  He watched him, waiting, wanting to urge him on, but not wanting to interrupt him.  His messages to Jaime had gone unanswered at first, and he had wondered if he had the wrong number for him.  A search via Friends Reunited had linked him back up with Bradley, the family man, who had confirmed that the mobile number Anthony had for Jaime was correct.  He had phoned him not long after. 

            “Anything useful?” Anthony urged him after what felt like an age.  Jaime rolled his cigarette into a neat white tube and tucked a roach into one end.  He did all of this without looking at Anthony once. Anthony picked up his pint and drank three mouthfuls, put it down, and scratched his head impatiently.  Jaime put away his tobacco pouch, dragged a lighter from his other inside pocket and lit his roll-up.  Anthony found himself wondering if the man was doing it on purpose, because he had something really juicy, and was dragging the moment out in anticipation for it, or was he just extremely reluctant about sharing what he knew?

            Jaime dragged heavily on his roll-up, his thin lips pursing tightly around the end, the skin around them wrinkling heavily.  He exhaled deeply, let his eyes drift back to meet Anthony, and Anthony had a flashback then, back to that horrible ghastly moment in the pub he had worked in.  When he had sat just like this, face to face, hunched forward to catch Jaime’s hushed tones, to hear what a dirty bastard Jack Freeman really was.  He remembered how his stomach had rolled over, how he had wanted to puke, and run from the pub to find Michael and Danny, to drag them home and keep them safe.  “You know Freeman is dead?” Jaime said finally.  Anthony nodded quickly.  “You know he topped himself in his own bleeding pub?”

            “Yes.”

            “He didn’t actually own that pub, he just managed it.”

            “Hey?” Anthony frowned, felt the urge to shake his head and blink, not understanding.  Jaime reached for the bar, dragged an ashtray forwards and tapped his roll-up against the edge.  “I had my suspicions few years ago to be honest,” Jaime went on. “But what did it matter to me?  Never saw you and Mike round that way for obvious reasons.  Danny boy locked up inside.” Jaime shrugged at him, elbow on bar and cigarette dangling over the edge between his long fingers. “But I found out since you called me, started sniffing around a bit more.  Jerry Howard bought both places, K and The White Horse.”

            “Let me get this straight,” Anthony leaned towards him. “When Lee Howard died, he left half of the club to Freeman, and half to Danny’s mum, or so she says.  So what, did Freeman and Danny’s mum both sell their halves to Jerry?

            Jaime shrugged and nodded at the same time. “Look all I know is, Freeman had his fingers in both pies, but you only ever saw him at the White Horse, lording it up.  A guy called Nick Groves manages K’s, or Howler it’s called now, and has done since Howard died.”

            “So Jerry owns both?” Anthony asked, still not understanding. “What, Lee left his club to his wife and his dad? Why did she and Freeman think he owned half of it?  Oh Christ, this is confusing.”

            “Because Jerry wanted to stay in the background, that’s why, can’t you work it out?” Jaime rolled his eyes under the brim of his cap and tapped his roll up at the ashtray again.  “Come on, you ain’t silly Anthony mate.  Danny’s mum wouldn’t have cared who she sold to, she just wanted shot, and wanted the money.  Done.  Freeman wanted Danny to think he had half and sold it to buy the Horse, because that hides who really owns it all, doesn’t it?  Jerry.  Jerry Howard owns both places, and he had Freeman managing one, and Groves in the other, and let me tell you something else mate, if you think all the dodgy shit and drug dealing died with Howard, you’d be fucking wrong too.”

            Anthony sat back, overwhelmed.  He blinked a few times, looked at his pint dumbly and felt the urge to order a shot of something stronger.  “Bloodyhell.”

            “Yeah, so when old pervy Jack started whinging and whining saying he had fuck all to do with screwing Danny over, he was lying mate.  He was in on it from the start because he fucking had to be.  Because just like Lee owned his bollocks back then, Jerry owned them now.  Well till he topped himself anyway.  Wise fucking move that was.”

            “Who is this Groves fellow?”

            “Oh you’ve met him mate,” Jaime tipped his head back, almost gloating out at Anthony from under his cap.  “You met him in Old Inne, didn’t you?  Big shaven haired bastard.”

            “That guy?” Anthony was appalled.  “Fuck! He said he was a mate of Lee’s.  He attacked Danny again, you know, after Freeman killed himself.”

            “Yeah, and how much do you want to bet it’s been him and Freeman, and fuck knows who else, running around smashing all you people’s windows in, sending hate mail and all that shit?  Watching you all mate, that’s what.” Jaime looked grim for a moment, his eyes shooting around the place again, as he leaned towards Anthony and lowered his voice.  “They been watching you all for years, I reckon.  Waiting for Danny boy to get released.  They knew he’d head back to you lot.  They been keeping tabs on where you all live and work, so they could fire all this shit at you as soon as you took him in.”

            “But why?” Anthony lifted his hands in exasperation and dropped them dismally down into his lap.  “Why for fuck’s sake?  Danny did what he did, he paid for it, it was eight fucking years ago!  I don’t get why they would carry it all on.”

            “It’s obvious,” Jaime shrugged at him, a sneer on his thin lips.  “Lee was Jerry’s precious son.  The other one was a retard right?  The mother died after the funeral.  Jerry was left with no one thanks to Danny.  He wanted him to pay.”

            “But he did pay! He went to jail for eight years!”

            “But he’s still alive,” Jaime reminded him with another thin shrug.  “He’s out, he’s alive, he’s got friends and family who care about him, right? And he’s got money in the bank.  Lee Howard’s money.”

            “That’s what he wants,” Anthony nodded, lips tight, teeth clenched. “He told Freeman and Freeman told Kay.  He wants all the money back, he wants Danny to apologise, and he wants him to leave here and go away.”

            “You reckon he’s gonna’ do any of that?”

            “I don’t know,” Anthony sighed, shaking his head.  “But I know he’s arranged to see him next week.  He phoned him and put it into place.”

            “Well he’s fucking crazy if he goes anywhere near that man,” Jaime shook his head, sucked hard on his roll-up and crushed the butt into the ashtray.  “I’ve heard stories about him mate.  Stuff that would make your toes curl.  You think Lee was evil and twisted?  How the fuck do you think he got that way?”

            “I don’t even want to think about it,” Anthony breathed, rubbing the heel of one hand into his eye.  He dropped his hand then and looked blankly at Jaime. “How do you know all this?  Didn’t they know you gave Danny the coke he took before he killed Howard?”

            “Nah, that never came out,” Jaime touched his cap, crossed his ankles together and leaned back again on his stool, resting his back on the bar behind.  “I kind of got myself roped back into things again, you know.  That way.”

            “You mean dealing?” Anthony lowered his voice to a whisper.  He didn’t know why it surprised him, because it was obvious that people like Jaime Lawler were too far gone to ever change.  But it did, for some reason.  Jaime gave a brief, guarded nod.  “Back that way?” Anthony questioned. “For them?” Another quick nod.  Anthony breathed in and out slowly, and stared around at the club, which was slowly starting to fill up.  A line of customers clustered along the bar, trying to get the single barmaids attention.  The music had gone up a level.  This time he knew the name of the band, Primal Scream, one of his favourites from back then, and a group of highly excitable teenage girls were already bopping about in the middle of the dance floor, screaming out the lyrics as if their lives depended on them; I’m movin’ on up now! Yeah, out of the darkness! My light shines on, my light shines on…

            “It’s all I fucking know, right?” Jaime snapped beside him then. “I got no fucking qualifications or experience.  I got dragged back into it, so what?  Probably worth your while I did, eh?  Kept my nose to the ground for you.”

            “You’re doing a brave thing right now then,” Anthony met his eyes squarely and told him.  He watched the thin man quiver slightly, and his lips worked nervously over his broken teeth.  “Meeting me here.”

            “Well you’re a mate,” the reply came quickly, defensively, but Anthony could see the fear and the doubt working itself up in his eyes.  “Danny was a mate.  And I always felt bad, you know.”

            “About what?”

            “About fucking everything,” the man groaned, rubbing at his eyes with his hand.  “About Freeman putting me onto him when he was just a kid.  Getting him into all sorts of shit.  Knowing what a sadistic bastard his step-dad was.  I was never brave enough to say or do anything, was I?  Just kept my nose out of it, I did, just minded my own fucking business I did.  Turns my stomach now, you know.  And that night…” he paused, shaking his head from side to side, whistling out a slow stream of breath, his grey eyes zooming around the club.  “That fucking night….he called me.   I should have said no, because he made it pretty obvious what he was gonna’ do.”

            “Did he?”

            “Oh yeah.  He took the stuff and said not to tell anyone, and the last thing he said was he was gonna’ fight back, and when I asked how, he said ‘you’ll see’.  He didn’t wanna be in that position anymore, you know, did he?  That evil bastard tracking him down all the time.  I didn’t blame him.” Jaime shrugged, his face shut down now, his eyes small and tired.  “I thought, fuck it, let him fight back if he wants, who was I to stop him?  I left him to it.  Then the next day…”

            “I know,” Anthony stood up then.  He didn’t think he could bear to be in Jaime’s company a moment longer, it was all so depressing.  “But you can’t blame yourself Jaime.  In some ways we all played a part.  The thing is now to sort all this out, so Danny can live a normal life.”

            “You’re gonna’ go with him?”

            “Yeah, me and Mike.”

            “There’s something else you should know.”

            “What?”

            “That reporter bird?” Jaime raised his eyebrows expectantly as Anthony nodded in confusion.  “She’s in on it too.”

            “What?”

            “Yeah.  Jerry’s been using her too. Or she’s been using him, whatever. He let her know how to find you all, how to find Danny to get her story.  She’s part of it Anthony.  I’m not really sure how or why, but she is.  She’s on the payroll.”

            Anthony stood next to the bar in dumb amazement, the information rolling over him in waves of bewilderment.  He covered his mouth with one hand for a moment, trying to take it all in.  “Okay,” he said finally, meeting Jaime’s eye. “Thank you Jaime.  You be careful, yeah?”

            “Always careful,” was the unsure reply.  Anthony nodded and patted him on the shoulder.

            “I better go.”

            “Call me if you need me.”

            “Thanks.  Thanks Jaime.” Anthony hurried out of the club, his mind swimming.  He got out into the sunshine, brushed back his hair and stared up at the buildings around him.  Their own old bed-sit was just around the corner.  Anthony ran his tongue over his dry lips, as he felt shivers spiralling down his spine.  Looking over their shoulders, that was how they had lived there for a year, wasn’t it?  Trying to get on with things, attempting something close to a normal life, but in reality they had all lived with one eye trained over their shoulders.  He had felt like their guardian, in more ways than one.  Shepherding them in and out of the building, watching out for trouble, staring into the shadows. He pulled out his phone and stared at it for a moment, thinking who should he call first, Danny or Michael?