In Loco Parentis (20 page)

I don't take the money. “I've got a pass. Look.” I take it out like I've got to prove something. And I start backing away worried that she can see straight through me.

She backs off. As she turns into a dark alley at the side of the road she looks at me and shouts. “You should be locked up, you should.”

I guess our friendship's over.

The crazy bag-lady's got me all confused. It's like I was hypnotised and she's just left and clicked her fingers.

There I am, middle of Stoke Newington with a knife in my boot, all ready to knock on someone's door and puncture their body until their life's leaked out from them. Soon as I see what I'm doing I know it's me who's crazy.

Killing Don's dad was different. Hadn't planned for it to happen, had I?

This time I'm going all cold-blooded.

The hag is right. I need to get out of here.

I cross the road and stand at the stop, waiting for the next bus to take me home.

loyalty is his only vice

Doesn't feel like home any more.

Go in, the sitting room door's open.

In Wolf's makeshift bed there's a woman. The covers stop at the curve of her hips and she doesn't bother to cover up when she sees me, only draws on the spliff and offers it over.

Her breasts, too big and heavy for her slender frame, point south and me, I'm struggling not to stare.

I'm grateful for the smoke, mind. Take it from her and leave the room, pulling the door behind.

I only realise my hands are shaking when I put the end of the roach to my lips. Can't tell if it's the weather or my cold-blood that are causing it.

Wolf grins at me from the kitchen, his good arm covered in bubbles up to the elbow as he does the washing up.

“What the fuck are you doing?” I ask him.

“The washing up.”

I don't bother to tell him that it was a broader question. “Thanks, man,” I say and sit down at the table.

“You meet Steel?” he asks.

“Yep.”

“What do you think?”

“Reckon she'll end up with a curved spine.”

Wolf cracks into a stoned laugh. I'm surprised to hear the laugh coming from my own mouth.

“So where've you been?” he asks.

“It's a long story.”

“I'm hung like a horse.”

I start at the beginning.

regrets

Outside the rain's beating at my window like a percussion instrument.

The phone's ringing and I ignore it. Rings again. I still ignore it.

There's something about Wolf and the way he sucked up the story that has me worried.

He owed me he said, like there was something cryptic to the words. Owed me big time. It wasn't the words that got me, but the look in his eyes, the shiny black of his pupils practically shouting out that he's lost the plot.

Wished I'd kept the whole pathetic tale to myself, shared it with Mike instead. He'd understand.

No way I'm going to sleep.

Owes me big time.

Maybe giving him the address wasn't the wisest thing to do.

Shit.

I get out of my bed and go looking for the stash.

Limbo

John, Craig's dad from last year's class, catches me between the staffroom and the office. He's a cool guy, his long fringe curling over his left eye so he needs to keep flicking his head to see properly.

“Can I have a word?” He's quiet. I know straight away it's bad.

“Course.”

He takes small steps till I'm by the sink next to the toilet.

“Is it true Carpenter hit a kid?”  His American accent bubbles through his words.

I'm right on the spot. Under the heat-lamp. Ready to break down. Don't say anything though.

“Is it?”

“Is it what?” I'm trying to work out an angle. Can't find one. Just stand there trying to pass the answer over by pursing my lips and opening my hands. It doesn't seem to work.

“Did he hit a kid or didn't he?”

I guess if he's asking he knows already. Just needs some kind of confirmation.

Inside my head it's like the floodgates have opened. Pictures of Alistair's warning flash by as if on a flooding river, followed by images of the gigs Craig's dad got me into by putting me on the guest list and of the party he had at his house before the summer break.

He flicks his hair from his eyes. Moves in close. He's usually as laid back as a fallen tree, but not this time.

I nod. Keep nodding. Then whisper. “Yes. Yes it's true.” The words are out. I feel better. By the looks of him, so does he. “Someone in my class.”

“Zlatan?” Course he knew. I guess he's just testing my loyalties and I realise where they lie.

“Yes, Zlatan.”

“Which is why his parents are moving him up to New End.”

Shit. That's out of the blue.

“Are you sure?”

“Spoke with them yesterday. Soon as the paperwork's handled, they're off.”

“But...” I don't get to finish. In walks Mildred.

“Excuse me,” she says. “May I just get to the bin?”

Mildred and her ‘may I's.' Won't let the kids go the toilet unless they ask properly. “Can I go to the toilet, please?” they ask. “I know you
can
go to the toilet, but are you allowed to?” she says. “M...m.....m...” is the prompt. Wonder if she asks Carpenter before she sucks his cock. “May I take you in my mouth, Phil?”

“No worries.” I say. “So like I was saying, Craig will definitely be on the team for the next match.”

Mildred picks up a tissue, carefully removes the gum from her mouth and wraps it in tissue paper before throwing it in the bin.

John and I stand like a pair of lemons watching.

Two minutes to the bell and I start counting the seconds.

Christmas Shopping

Less than two weeks to go until Christmas and I've not bought so much as a Satsuma.

No way I'll get it sorted all in the one lunch
-
break, but the sooner I get up the road the better.

I'm practically jogging up the street, the only things holding me back being my cigarette and the pair of lungs that are calling out in submission.

By the time I get to the newsagent's, my lungs have won.

Stopping a while to catch breath, I take a look at the cards in the window. There are second hand bikes, kittens, cleaner services and a few ladies who might well be offering a little more than a massage.

Breath under control, I head for the museum shop, only I see the MMR plate attached to the black Fiat before I get there, Emma with her nose practically up to the wind-shield.

She can only be doing 20. 25 at the most. The cabbie behind her isn't impressed. Blows off a couple of quick toots and gets to see Emma's v-sign out of her window.

I dive through the first doorway there is.

Happens to be a hairdresser's. Women only and me bald as a plucked bird.

The girl with the scissors is pretty tasty, mind. I go straight over, all bluff.

Now I'm close, I see the tan's out of a bottle, the edges between the tan and the untreated skin an orange line like a border marked on a map.

“Karen in?” I ask, all casual.

“Karen? She's on lunch.”

Thank fuck for small mercies. Chances of there being a Karen working here must be a million to one.

“Never mind, I'll come back later,” I tell her, hoping the relief's not obvious.

“Don't worry yourself, mate,” she says, common as a cabbage white on a vegetable farm. “I'll give her a shout. ‘Scuse me a mo,” she says to the lady in the chair and wanders to the door at the back with the Staff Only sign.

“I wouldn't kick him out of bed.”

It's almost enough to get me to forgive the fake tan.

“She'll be here in a sec, love,” the girl says. “Just finishing off her fag.”

“All right?” she asks.

I might be if I wasn't looking at her.

gold, frankincense and myrrh

I get to the Museum shop and relax. Feel like a genius for the dodge I pulled. Might be I'm in the wrong job and should start doing a spot of private investigation on the side.

There's a clean, soapy smell to this place. A hint of cinnamon. Everything's beautifully presented on glass shelves that must get cleaned at least twice a day.

The guy sitting behind the counter stops writing in his notepad for a moment and looks up to smile. I squeeze my lips together in acknowledgement and he gets back to what he's doing, only I know he's going to be keeping an eye on my every move, like I've got ‘shoplifter' tattooed across my forehead or something. Feel the urge to slip something up my sleeve to spite him, but those days are behind me. Mostly behind me.

There's a great, silver cork screw with a fish head that opens up into a body shape and a tail. Not romantic, perhaps, but unusual and practical.

The set of Pop Art coasters is cool and there are packets of astronaut food as possible novelty items. I pick the one that's labelled ‘Astronaut Ice Cream' to check out the ingredients. Feels like a block of an oasis you stick flowers in when I give it a squeeze.

The door's bell gives a sweet, little ring.

I'm just getting the ingredients list into focus when I feel a pair of fingers over my eyes and the world goes dark.

“Guess who?”

I don't need to. That career as a private investigator looks like it's already out of the window.

Soon as I turn round Emma plants her lips onto mine. Gives me one of those big sucky kisses that makes the biggest noise of all.

“Hey baby,” she says.

Her hair's pulled tight back into a pony-tail. Makes her ears look big and her teeth equine. Could be why she's wearing the enormous African face-mask earrings, to distract the eye. Even so, she smells ready for bed and in her pin-striped suit she looks nice enough to eat.

“Hey.”

“Christmas shopping?” she grins.

“Just browsing.”

The man behind the counter clears his throat loudly. I'm guessing he doesn't like the way we're standing eye-to-eye and hip-to-hip. Screw him. I pull her tight and give her a kiss back. Straight away I want sex.

“You coming round later?” I ask, my hormones taking over both sides of my brain.

“I've got time for a quickie, yeah.” My legs lose some of their strength at the words. “And make sure you bring some of that ice-cream. Might come in handy.”

She turns back to the door and gives me one of her smouldering looks.

“And by the way,” she tells me, “I've already got one of the corkscrews.”

The bell rings again as she leaves and I remember I'm supposed to be buying the present for Jenny.

Taking the Astronaut Ice Cream and the corkscrew to the counter, I feel my heart sink an inch and my throat tighten, so that when the man asks me if there'll be anything else my answer sounds like it's given by a baby frog.

gnashing of teeth

Five o'clock and it was a quickie alright.

It's already pitch black outside, or it would be if it weren't for the glow of orange from the street lamp over by Crippen's house.

There's not a sound to be heard. Like the world outside has disappeared.

Funny that, because the world inside seems to have disappeared, too.

I imagine the bottom of the ocean. The darkness and quiet. Close my eyes and imagine myself there.

When I open my eyes again, I look around and see the mess on the bed, the pinks, whites and browns of the freeze-dried Neapolitan that half an hour earlier had seemed like the food of the gods, the breakfast of champions. I want to get out, put my feet on hard land, but I can't. It's the bed I've made, the saying goes, and now I have to do some lying in it.

I think of the bottom of the ocean again. Imagine myself to be sinking like a stone.

Loneliness covers me like a heavy blanket, suffocates hope and humanity.

On the wall opposite I look at the bumps of plaster under the wallpaper. They morph, shift, until they make the face of Jesus. For this moment, there is life. I concentrate. Will God to enter the room, to bring light into my life.

And it fades. Twists into another shape, the shape of plaster bumps on a wall.

The tears come, my chest heaves up and down and I hold my legs tightly to my chest.

I want it to be the end.

To let it finish.

Want my heart to stop.

It beats on.

Out in the hall, I hear the door open and slam.

“Joe?” The smell of fish and chips and vinegar gets to me before the next words.