Musclebound (26 page)

‘Bleedin’ Greg,’ I said. ‘He’s as bad as the Enemy. “Who, what, when, how much?” Questions, questions. That’s all God Greg and the politzei do. Ask fuckin’ stupid questions.’

‘What enemy?’ Simone said. ‘You haven’t been talking to the police, Eva?’

‘Never talk to politzei,’ I said. ‘Don’t never do that.’

‘Shshsh,’ she said. ‘Keep your voice down. What enemy?’

‘Anna fuckin’ Lee, the Enemy. You saw her in the Cat ‘n’ Cowbell the night you made me count to a hundred in the rain.’

‘Shshsh!’

‘Don’t shshsh me,’ I said. ‘You did. An’ now she wants to know how much and who and where. An’ she’s gave me twenty-four hours to tell her. An’, Simone, I got to go away ‘cos I can’t tell her nothing more than I told you and God Greg. ‘Cos no one believes me. Tha’s why.’

‘I believe you,’ she said. ‘But please talk quiet.’

‘Can I come and stay with you, Simone?’ I wanted to tell her about the Enemy and the way she never ever lets a person alone. But Simone was having a coughing fit.

‘I don’t even know where you live,’ I said. ‘I don’t know where Ma lives any more. An’, Simone, every twatting sod in the universe knows where
I
live. And they keep coming round with hammers an’ shooters an’ shit. An’ questions, Simone, questions. All the time.’

I was so glad to be talking for true, I couldn’t hardly stop myself.

‘I jus’ want a few fights an’ a bit of peace,’ I said, ‘cos that’s true. ‘An’ you. Did’ja know I was lookin’ for you all these years, Simone, and sodding Ma wouldn’t never say where you was. And now, Simone,
now
I can’t even find
her
and she sends round Wozzisname, and now, Simone,
now
, I’m a …’

‘Sssh, Eva, shshsh. Please. You’re upset. Don’t be so upset.’

She knew me so well – I was a bleeding misery and no one else cared.

She got me another rum to cheer me up.

‘Don’t be upset, Eva. Don’t worry,’ she said. ‘I’m here now.’ And that was true too. There she was looking at me with her Eastern-princess eyes and stroking my hand.

‘You really saw me fight last night?’

‘I did, Eva,’ she said. ‘Of course I did. You didn’t think I’d miss that, did you? Are you all right – feeling better?’

‘Yeah. I was good, wasn’t I?’

‘You were wonderful,’ she said.

‘You was proud of me, wasn’t you?’

“Course I was,’ she said. ‘Bursting with it. There now, it’s all OK.’

‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘Cos it was.

‘I’m here,’ she said. ‘We’re together. So don’t get uptight any more. What you told me, about the lottery ticket – Eva, are you listening?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Is that all true? Because I’ve got to tell Greg something, and I’ve got to convince him it’s true or he’ll keep coming after you.’

‘We could go away,’ I said. ‘Why tell him anything, Simone? Why did you go off with him?’

‘’Cos he had a gun.’

‘But you
gave
him the gun. I had it, but you gave it to him.’

‘It was his gun, Eva.’ She sighed. ‘Eva, he’s a big, dangerous man. It doesn’t matter if he’s got a gun or not. Even when you had the gun,
he
was calling the shots. Can’t you see that? Big dangerous men always win.’

‘They fuckin’ don’t,’ I said. ‘You saw what I done last night. Pete an’ Gruff’s big blokes too.’

‘That’s your answer to everything, Eva,’ she said. ‘Kick ’em in the balls.’

‘Too right.’

‘But it doesn’t change anything. They pick themselves up off the floor and they’re still big dangerous men. Only now they’re big, dangerous and angry.’

‘
And
they’ve got blue balls. And they think twice before messing with me next time.’

‘So they think twice,’ Simone said. ‘Congratulations. Usually they don’t think at all.’

‘Why’re you so bitter?’ I said.

I’m not bitter,’ she said. ‘Just tired. I can’t kick big dangerous men in the balls. I don’t want to make them angry. The only thing big men are good for is protecting you from other big men. When big men get angry they hurt you, Eva. I don’t want to be hurt.’

‘No one’s going to hurt you,’ I said. ‘You got me.’

‘Yeah,’ she said. ‘And you go round making big dangerous men angry.’

‘Well, they fuckin’ make
me
angry.’

‘Don’t I know it!’ she said. ‘What am I supposed to do? I wish you hadn’t sold that ticket, Eva.’

‘What ticket?’

‘The lottery ticket. I wish I had so much money I could call the shots and have a bit of power. Then I wouldn’t have to keep on and on
placating
them.’

‘Wha’?’

‘Big dangerous men,’ she said. ‘Doing what they want – being what they want me to be.’

‘Don’t,’ I said.

‘Oh yeah, right,’ she said.

‘You’re a model,’ I said. ‘Aincha got it all?’

‘Eva, there are girls, fourteen, thirteen years old, doing what I’m doing now. You don’t understand. You
can’t
understand. They’re all doing –
being –
what the big blokes want them to be.’

‘So, let them.’

‘Blokes like young flesh. Young skin. You lose your place in the pecking order. Then you’ve got to do more of what the big blokes want – you’ve got to do what you’re told, what the young ones won’t do. So you’ve got to find a big dangerous guy to protect you from the others. You’ve got to, Eva.’

‘I don’t,’ I said. ‘You don’t. You got me.’

She sighed. She said, ‘Or scratch enough money together so you don’t need any of them. I wish you hadn’t told me, Eva.’

‘Wha’?’

‘About the lottery ticket. We nearly had it, Eva, we were
that
close, and missing by an inch is worse than missing by a mile. Are you listening?’

‘Yeah.’

‘You’re going to sleep on me,’ she said. ‘Well I suppose it’s better than shouting.’

‘Not sleepy,’ I said. But she was right. I dunno why. I put my achy head down on my arms for a second – just to ease it – and when I woke up it was much worse.

‘Go home, Eva,’ said the landlord. ‘I’m not running a rest home for drunken wrestlers.’

‘Where’s Simone?’ I said. ‘Where’s my sister?’

‘That’s never your sister,’ he said.

‘Is.’

‘Who’d’ve thought it – sweet kid like that,’ he said. ‘She left half an hour ago. She probably couldn’t stand the snoring.’

‘Wasn’t snoring.’

‘No?’ he said. ‘We’ve got a generator in the basement – it must’ve been that making all the racket.’

He seemed to be in a good mood so I asked him for a glass of water. I dissolved six of the tablets and drank the water. It almost made me throw up.

Then I went home. I didn’t want to go home ‘cos of all the scuzz-bags who could find me there – but the landlord wouldn’t let me stay in the Fir Tree and I didn’t have nowhere else to go. Simone didn’t tell me where she lived – well, she couldn’t, could she? I went to sleep before she could, and she’s too nice to wake me up. She knows I need my rest. She came to see me at the Ladywell Baths last night and she saw all what I’d went through. So she knew.

Thinking about it cheered me up. Till I got home and found that bastard Andy waiting for me. I didn’t even get a chance to take the chain off the gate, so when he came up behind me and grabbed the collar of my jacket I didn’t have nothing to hit him with except the shopping bag. You can’t do much damage with a loaf of bread and half a pound of streaky bacon.

‘Ow!’ he went. ‘You always got to hit people, don’cha? I only want to know where Simone is.’ Which was exactly what I wanted to know too. And it made me see red, white and blue. ‘Cos I’m Simone’s sister so I got a right, but he’s less than nothing and it’s none of his diseased, rotting business.

‘You,’ I said. ‘You want hitting, you do. I’m so fuckin’ sick of you. You’ve took everything I got and now you want my sister too.’

‘You can’t fob me off with a lousy two hundred quid,’ he said. ‘You killed a man. If it wasn’t for Simone I’d’ve gone to the police. I’m not playing silly buggers any more. I’ve got to see Simone. She didn’t come home last night, and her mother ain’t seen her. So she’s got to be here.’

‘Listen to me, fart-face,’ I said, ‘you go back to that greedy old bag you’re humping, and you tell her to squeeze stones ‘cos she’ll get more out of them than she will out of me. I’m dry. You hear me. Dry. Cleaned out. Bled white.’

With every word I took a pace forward. I was so blazing hot I was shaking my bread and bananas in his face. And he was walking backwards.

‘She said there was no reasoning with you,’ he said.

‘Then that’s the one true word she spoke,’ I said. ‘You can flush the rest down the crapper. She’s a poxy, lying, greedy cow and I hope she dies hurting. I hope you do too.’

Suddenly, I knew, if I had a hammer in my hand, I could of hit him too. I could. I was so burning crazy mad I could of hit him just like I hit Wozzisname. They say it’s easier the second time. But if they say that, they never done it themselves. ‘Cos the frightening thing is how easy it was the first time. Just wallop … and down he went. Just wallop, and then nothing. For ever.

But when you’re blazing, when you’re seeing sparks, when your guts is clenched like a hot steel fist – and that fist is beating on your own insides trying to get out – what do you do? For Christ’s sake, someone, tell me that. What the hell do you do? No one’s ever,
ever
been able to tell me that.

I lobbed my shopping bag over the gate into the yard. I went up after it. I wasn’t fit for dainty work like putting keys into padlocks. I went up the gate like I go up the ropes and post in the ring. Take the high ground – go for the flying slam.

I turned and there was dirty Andy, on the pavement – just waiting for me to slam down on him. He looked up at me with his mouth open.

He said, ‘You’re insane. You really are.’ And he swung round and walked away.

He walked away and left me balanced on top of the frigging gate. Ramses, Lineker and Milo was going ape-shit too. Leaping at the gate and the fence barking their fool heads off.

‘
Shut up,’
I bellowed, so loud it hurt my throat. ‘Just shut up, all of you.’

And they did. But it was like there was still barking and snarling going on in me head. Which I.s’pose is what they mean by ‘barking mad’.

‘Just shut the fuck up,’ I screamed. ‘All of you.’ And the dogs stared at me like I was crazy. And Andy looked round at me just once and hurried away up Mandala Street.

So I jumped down off the gate and ran after him. I wanted to boot his sorry arse all the way to Ma’s place. Then I’d boot
her
sorry arse all the way to hell and back.

But by the time I got to the corner of Mandala Street I was out of breath and feeling like I wanted to puke. And I remembered I didn’t know where Ma lived any more.

I looked round the corner and saw Andy, still walking away, and I thought – that’s where you’re going, you dirty troll. You’re off to see the trollop.

So I followed.

And it started to rain. Andy pulled his collar up round his ears and stuck his hands in his pockets. I did the same. That’s what it’s like when you’re following someone – you do what they do. And it sucks. It really does. ‘Specially if the stupid wossock you’re following goes to the wrong place.

I could of told him. I could of said, ‘Andy, you stupid wossock, Ma don’t live here no more. She moved out, bag and baggage, days ago.’ But I didn’t, ‘cos I didn’t want him to know I was following him.

He’d been there before – he knew about the useless lifts and he went straight to the stairs. I didn’t follow because I didn’t want to meet him when he left. Which he would as soon as he found out Ma wasn’t there. I stood in the courtyard in the pouring rain.

Then I thought, supposing Ma didn’t leave the block. Suppose all she did was move from one flat into another in the same block?

So I kept my eyes on the outside walkways to see what floor Andy was on when he came out of the stairwell. But when I saw him again he was on Ma’s walkway, on the fifth floor. Then he disappeared just about where Ma’s door was. And I thought, what if Ma got her neighbour to lie to me? I could see that happening. I could just hear her saying, ‘You know that bleeding daughter of mine? Well, if she ever comes round here looking for me, tell her I moved out. I don’t want to talk to her no more ‘cos she’s always on at me to tell her where her sister is. I can’t be bothered with her ‘cos I’m off to the pub.’ The neighbour woman might do it ‘cos Ma could make her life a misery with all her noise and the walls being paper-thin.

I was thinking about this and what to do about it when Andy came out of the stairwell, walking straight towards me. I only just got behind a rubbish skip in time, but I don’t know how he didn’t see me. It was raining and getting dark, but even so …

He was so close I could see the worry lines between his eyes. His shoulders was hunched and his hands was rammed in his pockets. He was a big guy.

The funny thing was, though, he didn’t look like a boozer. All the times I seen him before, I was too hopping mad to look at him proper. He was just this big, nasty thing between me and the light. Now, when I had a chance to look at him, I was surprised. ‘Cos he looked too clean and classy to go for a scrubber like Ma. Her fellers usually look like they got bad breath. And if you make a mistake and get too close to one of them you find out it ain’t just the way they look.

So I thought, I bet he’s going home to his wife. ‘Cos nine times out often, Ma’s fellers are married, although you wouldn’t think any decent woman would ever marry them. Ma meets blokes who’re out on the razzle, and usually she only meets them the once.

Right, I thought, I’ll find out where the wife and kiddies live. Then if he gives me any more aggravation I’ll be able to hit him with something heavier than a loaf of bread and a bunch of bananas. I’ll tell him if he doesn’t stop coming round to my house I’ll go round to his. So his missus can whack him with one of her saucepans and save me the bother. Which is what any decent missus would do if she found out her hubby was snogging around with Ma.

I thought I might do it anyway. After all, he ruined my life, didn’t he? He was the one who put the knife to Simone’s throat the night he and Wozzisname tried to grab her. If he hadn’t done that, I’d never of panicked and Wozzisname wouldn’t be at the bottom of the Thames with a fire extinguisher between his legs. If he ruined my life it was only fair if I ruined his.