Inside Straight (16 page)

I waited for the shotgun blast that would end me, but it didn't come. Instead I heard the smash of glass and the roar of an engine and the squeal of tyres.

I opened my mouth.

"Oh."

And then I passed out.

It was the beginning of a new world, a new life.

There was darkness, and then there was light, a blue light shining somewhere softly in the distance and growing larger like a slowly approaching planet. The thought jumped into my head that perhaps I'd like to try to move a little, but I could feel that my legs weren't behaving. I blinked with my eyes closed, and then blinked them open. I saw Jacqui as she was escorted from the club. She was limping. There was blood on her leg. I tried to get up. I left a bloody handprint on the floor and then I felt sick and then I was sick, violently so, making raw, animal noises that would have been amusing had they not been accompanied by so much vomit.

"Jesus, someone help Graham, will you?"

I felt hands on me, lifting me. The touch sent a ripple of revulsion through my body. I smelled my own vomit, then I tasted it and I wanted to be sick again. I tried to wave my Samaritans away. "No. Sick."

"Just keep breathing, alright? Let's get you over here, sit you down."

"Don't feel well. Leave me alone."

I wanted my mum. I wanted Jacqui. I wanted a cold flannel and a dark room. I was dirty, ashamed, stinking and wrong. Someone plonked me down on one of the stools that stood around the roulette tables. It wobbled a bit, but there was a hand on my back to keep me from falling. I breathed out through my mouth. I kept tasting sick and wanted to spit, but I couldn't bring myself to do it. A man had to have standards.

"Just lean forward." A woman's voice. She sounded too young to know what she was doing. "That's it. Just keep breathing."

"I don't like it. Tastes bad."

"We'll get you some water, Graham, alright?"

"Where's ...?" I wanted to say "my mum", but I held it in. "Where's Jacqui?"

"She's in the ambulance."

"Is she hurt?" I looked around. The someone who'd helped me up was Tintin. I frowned at him, felt worse, was positive I'd heard a woman's voice. "What happened?"

"She got shot."

"Shot?"

"You don't remember?"

"No."

"It was just a graze. She'll be fine." He looked at my hairline. "You took quite a knock yourself."

"Anyone call the police?"

He nodded and his head appeared to split into two heads until I blinked them back together. My stomach turned.

Tintin frowned at me, either concerned or short-sighted. "I'll get you some water."

"I'm going to be sick."

"I'll get one of the paramedics over. They'll sort you out."

I didn't want Tintin to go, but I also didn't want to say anything to that effect just in case he took it the wrong way. I watched him hop up the stairs and turned my face to the stiff breeze that blew in from outside. It smelled of rain, and somewhere out there I could hear it, too. Someone in yellow came towards me and I couldn't tell if it was a man or a woman until it disappeared for a second and then reappeared as a stocky woman with a bulbous mole like half a Malteser on her top lip. She was right in front of me, something in her hand.

"I'm not well, Doctor."

She shone a light in my left eye, then my right. "You're concussed."

"Is that bad? I don't feel right."

"Sick?"

I nodded, my mouth open – she'd read my mind. But she was too close. She smelled of medicine. I moved away from her and almost went off the stool again.

She grabbed me and hauled me upright. "We should probably take you to hospital."

"I don't want to go to the hospital."

She had both hands on me now, easing me up. "It's okay. Nothing to worry about."

"No, I don't
want
to go to the hospital. I need to stay here. I need to talk to the police. Are the police here? Did someone call them? Someone should've called the police."

I was walking now, the paramedic to my right and slightly behind me so I couldn't see her properly without turning. I tried to find my mobile phone so I could call the police. I brought out the burn phone and it took me three blinks to recognise it. When I did, I almost threw it across the room.

"I need to talk to ..." I couldn't concentrate. "There's someone I need to talk to."

One step, another step, almost floating.

"You shouldn't be talking to anyone right now. What's your name, love?"

"Graham." I watched my feet as I walked. They looked as if they belonged to someone else. I wouldn't have been caught dead with sick on my shoes. Which reminded me. "Am I dying?"

"No."

"But
could
I, though?"

"Maybe, if you don't see a doctor."

"Okay." She was lying, but it was a good kind of lie. It made me smile. I found myself in reception. The light was too bright. "I should probably go to the hospital, then."

And I did. A young doctor with skin like an orange put stitches in my scalp where Jez had brained me, then kept asking me all sorts of questions. "Do you know where you are, Graham?"

"Hospital."

"Which one?"

"I don't know. They didn't tell me."

Which was the wrong answer, if his constipated expression was anything to go by. "Do you remember what happened?"

"I got hit in the head."

"Do you remember who did it?"

"I don't remember his face."

"I see."

"No, he was wearing a ski mask. He threatened me and then—"

"Can you repeat the months of the year to me in reverse order, please?"

I blinked. "What's that?"

"December ..."

"I
know
it, I was just—" I cleared my throat. "December, November, October, September, August, July, June, March, February, January," I opened my hands. "Good?"

He held up a finger in front of me. "I want you to touch my finger, then touch the tip of your nose for me."

I touched his finger. I touched the side of my nose. The constipated expression became tighter. "Is that bad?"

He moved away from me. "Have you been sick at all?"

"I was sick, yes. I don't know how many times. I didn't feel well."

"Okay."

"What's going on?"

"Think we better keep you in, have some tests."

"I can't do tests." I shook my head. "That's not fair. I'm not well."

He nodded at me. "A CT scan. X-rays? Just to make sure you haven't hurt yourself too badly, okay?"

"I didn't hurt myself, someone
else
did it to me."

"Okay, good."

And I found myself ushered to my feet and out of the cubicle, hustled past cold white lights down squeaky floors. I didn't remember much after that. It was cold again, and then it was warmer, and when I opened my eyes I found myself in a darkened room that smelled clean like a fridge. My throat hurt, but I couldn't focus. I blinked a few times and fought a rising panic that said I'd gone blind somehow. When I saw something move in the corner of my eye, the panic stopped. I couldn't get scared now, not while there was someone watching.

"How are you feeling?" Jacqui's voice, quiet but still the loudest thing in the room.

I turned my head. She smiled at me. She was sitting by the bed. She was still wearing the clothes she'd been wearing at work, so I guessed it was the same night. My head hurt, but I wasn't going to tell her that. "I think they think I've got a concussion."

"They'll be keeping you in, then."

"Overnight, yes. I think so. They scanned my head in this machine thing."

Her smile grew wider. She blinked. It looked slower than it probably was. I wondered if I was wearing clothes under the blanket. I hoped I was wearing underpants at least.

"Thanks for stepping in, Graham."

I made a move to wave my left hand, then waved my right instead. I didn't need her seeing the skin. "Hey, no problem. Don't worry about it."

She laughed. "I don't know what happened."

"How are you?"

"I'm alright." She nodded at her leg. "I got hit."

I didn't look. Not because I didn't want to look at her leg, but because I didn't trust myself to handle the sight of blood. "Shot?"

She nodded. "A mere flesh wound."

I nodded, too. My head felt heavy. "That's good. I'm glad you're okay. I was worried."

"Were you?"

I half-closed my eyes. I was getting sleepy, but I didn't want to go to sleep just yet. Someone told me once that if you get hit on the head and you go to sleep afterwards, you die. But then, someone else told me that you shouldn't swallow chewing gum or else it sticks up your insides and you can't go to the toilet anymore. I didn't know if either were true, but I wasn't stupid enough to tempt fate. I opened my eyes, tried to focus on the ceiling. I felt drunk, or how I imagined drunk to feel, since I hadn't actually been that way in about fifteen years. All I remembered about being drunk was being unable to walk or think or speak, and then leaning over a toilet bowl with an open mouth, while I felt as if I was being swallowed up by a world of shadows and stench.

"It's okay." Her voice was soothing. "You can go to sleep if you want. I'll get out of your hair—"

"I didn't think you'd do it." My voice was thick as I addressed the ceiling.

"Do it?"

"I'm sorry." I breathed in through my nose. My sinuses felt swollen. "I didn't think you'd fight back." I smiled. "I suppose you're a better woman than I thought you were. That's nice."

There was quiet in the room. For a second, I thought she'd gone, and then I wondered if she'd ever been there in the first place. The doctor had been right and my head wasn't. There was definitely something knocked loose in there that I couldn't quite put my finger on because it was in my head and in order to do that I'd have to drill a hole or else bust an eardrum or maybe go in through the nose ...

"What was that, Graham?" Jacqui's voice again.

"You're still there." I turned and saw her. She wasn't smiling anymore.

"Yeah, I'm still here. What did you say?"

"When?"

"Before."

"I don't remember."

"About not thinking that I would fight back."

I didn't remember. I told her that. Exactly. "I don't remember. It's my head. The doctor said I was concussed. So did the lady paramedic. So I suppose that's a second opinion. Do you know that if you go to sleep when you're concussed, you die? You don't wake up."

She was shaking her head. "I don't know, Graham ..."

"Do you think that's true? I heard it, but I'm not sure. You hear so many things about stuff like that, it's difficult to know what to believe sometimes."

"I think if the doctor put you in a bed, you should probably try to get some sleep." She moved from the chair, got to her feet. I saw her leg then. Just above the knee, the white bandages almost glowed in the dark. I stared at them. My stomach felt watery. She approached the bed. "Thank you, Graham. For what you did. You didn't have to do it, but I'm glad you did."

I smiled. "You're very welcome."

She patted my hand. "Try to get some rest, alright?"

"Yes."

"Make sure you do everything the doctor tells you."

I closed my eyes. Still smiling. Feeling warm. "Yes, Mum."

She laughed. It was a soft sound. Not like a woman's laughter at all, which I'd always known to be shrieked and grating. This was a lady's laughter. A woman who'd been raised correctly, not dragged up like most of them I had to work with. Someone with a sound education, decorum and manners. A bit of class.

I heard the quiet click of her heels as she walked to the door and imagined her closing it behind her, careful not to disturb me. In my mind, I saw her smile. I saw her white teeth, a tiny light in each eye, and I even saw her blow me a kiss goodbye before the final chink of outside light slimmed into nothing.

She was a good woman. A strong woman. An attractive woman. And I'd saved her life.

Not bad, Graham. Not bad at all.

The next morning, my head was clear, but splitting. A chubby nurse brought me a couple of horse pill painkillers which I tried to wash down my throat with a plastic cup of water. She also brought me some breakfast, which amounted to little more than soggy, pre-cooked toast, a child's bowl of Lidl-brand cornflakes and a cup of juice that might've been introduced to an orange once, but didn't really remember much about it.

Later, a doctor swanned into the room, clearly in a hurry and unable to stay long. He moved my breakfast tray out of the way and, when he thought I wasn't looking, stole a bit of toast. He was young, smelled of aftershave and ink, and proceeded to examine me with all the care and attention expected from a man who routinely handled other people's body parts. By the end of it, I felt violated and raw.