Alphabet (29 page)

Maybe.

They head south. The motorway is six lanes of solid metal and it feels like they're doing 80 m.p.h., though he can't see the speedo. The feeling of wanting to escape is gone; now it's a matter of wanting to live. He eats the sandwich, tunes out their talk and peers at the people in other cars, the signs telling everyone where to go, how to navigate the hugeness of the outside world. Wentham soon begins to seem less real, like some other reality you might reach through a manhole or trap door . . . Eventually they peel off into an urban hinterland of ring roads, industrial estates and tatty ethnic restaurants. Finally, they arrive.

Shower. Body search. Property. He grabs his books as they cascade out of the plastic sack. Everything's mixed together, trainers, notepads, Walkman, radio, curtains – Curtains have to go in stored property, they're not allowed in cells here, it's a fire and suicide risk . . . Don't argue, the man says. What about the confiscated shoe box, the typewriter, when it comes?

‘What d'you think?' the officer snaps back at him. ‘It's a metal object! Kill someone if you threw it at them, couldn't it? Or it could be turned into three dozen very sharp little knives . . . I don't give a flying fuck what they did somewhere else! Waste your time applying if you want but there's no
chance. You'd be better off trying to make a new one out of lolly sticks.'

He's back in Victoria's architecture again: brick walls, metal landings and stairs. Distant windows high up at the end of the wing admit a dusty light that filters down, mingling with the ghostly flicker from fluorescent tubes and the scuffed blue-grey of the walls. The officer follows right behind him, close enough to hear his breath. The inmates are locked down but you can tell they're there: the place stinks of old sweat, blocked toilets, unwashed laundry, damp mortar, leftovers, drains. Tough, Simon tells himself, you've been spoiled, haven't you? He won't notice it after a day or so . . . Likewise, the lack of colour. But the crackling of aggression in the air, that electricity that impregnates every space and charges every surface, which makes a man's fists automatically clench, that won't be so easy to ignore. He walks as tall as he can, the bag of gear bumping on his back. The bedroll is under his free arm, the cutlery bowl and mug in his hand.

‘Right, in there, Austen,' the screw says, and he walks in, knowing the door will crash behind him, the key turn in the lock.

It's dirty. And one reason for the stench here is obvious: a lidless bucket stands at the end of the bed, emptied, but not cleaned. He dumps the bedding and bag, climbs on the bed to look out. The window faces east and is already open as far as it can go. There is tarmac as far as the wall, which is topped generously with coiled razor wire. A high fence, also topped with razor wire runs about six feet in front of the wall. Beyond, he can make out a distant urban sprawl: hilly streets of smallish terraced buildings, a pall of smoke drifting in from the left. But it's good to be alone at last. He lets go of the window bars, climbs down and sits on the mattress.

What can you say? Half of them here are two'd up. It's a pit, a dumping ground, worst place he's been so far. Thanks a lot!
He thinks at the walls, which stare back at him, blank, insulting.
Did someone tell you life was fair?
He can almost hear the
exasperated voice of the first person to tell him that: Helen, one of the social workers at Burnside. He told her where to get off, but she was right, of course. Things happen. You're chucked out: not so bad, though, compared to being murdered. Maybe he is a piece of shit or maybe they fucked up big time. So what, he tells himself, you're here now, and you've got to work out how to survive.

He wants to hit the walls. He can imagine going berserk, hitting out until they lock him in some hole of a punishment cell, hitting out again when they finally open up the door.
Plenty go that way. He can imagine it. He can imagine it so well that his nails are cutting grooves into the palms of his hands. But something in him won't let him do it. Instead, he gulps in air, sends it hissing out between his teeth. No: he did get somewhere and they won't wipe him out, he decides. It's not going to be the end of the story. Annie said that often; she always pulled them up when the phrase trotted out: ‘No, there
isn't
an end to the story,' she'd say. ‘There's always something you can do.' And Bernadette gave him the C word, there, under his clothes. The fact is, you've got to admit that women seem to know what you need to live and they want to pass it on: these words are resources, hang on to them. Even Tasmin, just a kid, didn't she write to him that a person rebuilt from the ruins could be stronger than before? It's in the letters somewhere, if he ever gets them back. When. He's going to make sure of it and he's going to stick up for himself. He'll get himself out of this hole, the shortest possible way.

Slowly, Simon wills his fisted hands to uncurl and relax to the point that he can use them. He makes the bed, then lies down and sleeps, dreamless, until the din of unlocking brings him back to where he is, the familiar over-strenuous pounding of his heart in his chest. Think of it as a bad dream, he instructs himself. You'll wake up. But then, you've got to laugh, because to cap it all he's in the supper queue and finds himself three behind someone who looks just like Teverson, and when the man turns to make his way back to the cells, he realises it is
the actual bastard himself, just the same except for a touch of white mixed in with the ginger bristles on his scalp and jaw and some deeper lines around the too-blue eyes.

‘Android, back from the funny farm!' Tev says. ‘How long is it?' It's not long enough, Simon thinks.

‘Weren't you going to be out by now?' he asks.

‘Job I got set up for when I was on parole went pear-shaped.' Simon shrugs, turns away as Tev claps him across the back.

Here, you're either locked in your cell or you're locked out of it. No in between, no messing around. When Association comes, Simon goes to the other side of the showers, where there's an unlocked area smelling of unrinsed cloths and weak disinfectant. He swirls the pail clean in the butler sink, leaves it to drain, pick up later; there's nothing to wash or dry your hands with. But it's done, first things first. Next thing is to put in an application to see Alan. Get him on the phone.

‘Look, don't come near me, don't bother, I'm just passing through,' he tells Teverson who seems to spend most of his life on the landing, with a mop and bucket propped up near by, or else smoking and talking in a low voice to a bunch of hard cases in the cleaning bay. None of the screws ever tell him to work. The story is that he is getting
married
in a few weeks' time, but they won't let him out for it so he is bringing the whole business in, cake, buffet, suits, flowers, the lot. ‘Name of Carmel. Half his age. Sexy or what?' a stunted-looking bloke called Ratty tells Simon. ‘Legs up to here and the rest of it. A mate bought her on a visit to cheer him up and that was that.'
It's impossible to believe. Almost.

‘I didn't agree with it,' Alan tells him, the two of them sitting in a cell that has been converted into a miniature office for the use of visiting professionals. ‘I wasn't the only one either. I made my feelings very clear and I've made a note of it in the file. And now, I really, really don't want you to throw the baby out with the bathwater. I want to help you make sense of this.' Alan
looks exhausted, grey. Simon's sitting straight back in his chair, hands loose on his thighs.

‘Can you get me out of here?' Simon asks.

‘I'll do what I can.'

There's 23-hour lockup on the weekends, also for days every time there's any kind of incident, such as someone has their arse cut open to get a charger of drugs out, or gets stabbed for debts. So there's more and more lockup, more people losing it, imploding, wrecking cells. The alarm bell goes off every other day. The place is like a pressure cooker or a village on the edge of a volcano, except that the volcano is them too, they're all inside of it, driving it up to the boil. Monday, everyone comes out desperate, ready to batter someone with a chair or some batteries in a sock: chicken and egg, hopeless case thereof, and one of the worst places in the civilised world to be.

It's going to be months, not weeks, Alan says. But Simon does get an interview in Education. Education is down in the basement, with no windows at all. As you go in, there's a mural of gaudy tropical fish with a candy-pink octopus lurking in the corner. After that, it's grey again.

‘Quite apart from the pressure of numbers, we don't have anything on site here to offer that you haven't already done,' the pale, blond man down there tells him. So what? He'll do it again, while he's waiting to get out of here. But instead, the bloke there gives him the Open University prospectus to look through. He reads it during the lockdowns. He studies information on the Access Course, and the options thereafter:
Linguistics, Philosophy, History of Art, Languages, Literature, Politics, Media Studies, History, Sociology, Biology, Geography, Psychology, combinations thereof. You get videoed TV course units to watch, books and materials, which might be paid for by a special grant. A tutor writes you reports on your work, within ten days of receiving it. He could eventually be allowed to attend one of the special seminars. Which course is for you? the brochure asks. Any! All! Using the script he used to call Dead Normal, Simon completes the application for the
Access Course; the grant forms too. Education have not done many of these, but the pale man, Martin, can't see why it shouldn't go through.

H is for hope. Don't do too much of it, mind.

The answer comes in just over two weeks: yes. A starter pack will be on its way as soon as the cheque from the charity has arrived and been cleared. ‘Glad to be able to help,' Martin says. ‘We can get you some computer time down here once the stuff arrives.' So he's set up. It'll keep him going while he's in this hell hole, and he can just take it along with him when he goes . . . He shakes Martin's hand in front of the mural and he can feel both the threat of tears and the grin stretched across his face, it almost hurts, but he can't turn it off.

He emerges from the basement to find that things are just getting back to normal on the wing after another incident.
Officers stride about, unlocking doors for lunch. Teverson is back in his usual spot, face like thunder.

‘Look,' he says, barring Simon's path, ‘you've gotta help.'

‘Well, no,' Simon replies, which should have been ‘Fuck off' or ‘You deaf or what?' but it is hard to be fierce while walking on air, dreaming of brand new books and golden spires, the smile still lurking on his face.

‘It'll be worth your while,' Teverson says.

‘I've got everything I need.'

‘I'll swap that bucket of yours for a new one.' Teverson says.
‘There's one in the cupboard, right now. It's yours, just to listen, right?' Just to listen? Nothing will get the smell of other's men's shit out of the bucket he has, so Simon follows Teverson to the cleaner's bay. Teverson picks up the bucket, yellow:
pristine, with matching lid. He demonstrates the fit, hands it over. Then he bars the way out of the cleaning bay.

‘I've been through three best men, already!' he says. ‘Tony got ghosted, the next bloke went on some sodding course, and now Bates has just got himself fourteen days in the cage for threatening a screw. It's next week and I've paid for it all, can't get a cent back. What I'm saying is, how about fifteen quid – actual money? Make sure I'm together, be sweet to everyone
on the day?' He's standing there with the bucket and Teverson has got him by the shoulder and is grinning from ear to ear as if there was nothing at all weird about asking someone he's ripped off, fucked up the arse and insulted to take on such a role . . . it's so awful, it's funny and Simon feels as if his face has fallen off.

‘Eh?' Tev prompts. ‘I don't want some runt with the sleeves folded up, or a fat bastard with the waist undone, see? You're the exact right size for the suit I've got.' Simon laughs out loud; Tev lets go of the shoulder and sticks out his hand to shake. ‘I'll fill in the application.' He has the form in his pocket, ready.
‘You just sign it, OK? I'll pay when it comes through.'

‘No,' Simon says. ‘I don't want your cash.' He gives himself a moment, but the decision is made. ‘I'll do it for the hell of it, but I don't want your cash.'

‘Rock solid, mate,' T tells him. Well, he's not worn a suit before. He's never been to a wedding.

38

‘Very smart. Now come along,' Sykes tells Simon, who has been waiting for some time, standing up so as not to crease the hired suit, grey wool with tiny flecks of blue in it, Italian, apparently. There's a yellow carnation and a bit of fern tucked into his lapel.

‘Where's T?'

‘Pissing around,' Sykes says. ‘He had the DTs this morning and cut himself shaving, so he wants to check in first aid to see if there's some plastic skin . . . wants you to welcome them all.
If he don't hurry up, maybe you can marry her instead.'

For a minute or two, he's the only person here other than Sykes, rattling his keys over by the door. It's a big room with a high ceiling. Compared to normal, an immensity of space. The windows are fifteen feet up and barred, but there's a lot of light and a royal blue carpet. Set obliquely at the front is the registrar's table with some flowers and two chairs to either side of it.
More chairs with Wentham-blue padded seats are set out in two blocks of rows of three with an aisle between. There are flowers on the trestle table at the far end, next to the cake, and he goes up close to have a real look: all different types of them, yellow and white and cream with some powdery green stuff thrown in. Things he doesn't know the name of, but not daffodils, that's for sure.