Playing for Keeps (Glasgow Lads Book 2) (28 page)

He closed the blinds to cover the T-shirt, picked up Milk, then opened the door. “Right. Goodbye. Safe travels.”

She flinched at John’s chilly tone. “Please don’t be angry with me. You of all people must understand why I can’t bear another Orange Walk. To see my loving son take part in a hate parade—”

“Mum, stop being dramatic and kiss your cat goodbye.”

She sighed and planted a kiss atop Milk’s head. “Oh, now I’ve gone and put lipstick on him.” Mum rubbed the white fur between the cat’s ears, which only served to spread the crimson stain. “You sure you won’t come with me? Plenty of other men would be happy to carry that banner.”

“I promised Dad I’d march. Besides, I told you, I’ve a plan to fix everything.”

“Yes, but I still don’t know what that plan is, and if it’s like your usual cockamamie schemes, you’ll need my help to keep from making a state of it.”

She was probably right. John considered offering her a deal—his honesty in exchange for her support. But he knew she’d reveal his secret “for his own good.” He had to be her equal in stubbornness.

“I’ll see you Monday.” He shut the door.

Once her footsteps receded down the stairs, John turned back to the window and opened the blinds to examine his project.

The words WE ARE were centered, one atop the other, outlined in black fabric pen. The typeface was bold, readable from a distance, even to the lens of a phone’s mediocre video camera. Ian, the lodge’s Worshipful Master, had assured him in last night’s voice mail that his wife would film the parade from the terrace where John’s family would be sitting.

“It’s going to be glorious,” he told Milk as he set the cat on the bed. Then John uncapped the fabric-paint pen, held the T-shirt tight against the window glass, and began to trace the first letter of the final word.

A word the bigots couldn’t ignore.

= = =

While the fabric-pen paint dried (the paper tucked within the shirt to prevent anyone outside from reading it), John went downstairs to make dinner. With the Walk only fourteen hours away, his own appetite had fled, but his father needed to eat.

Dad was sitting at the table, going over the lodge’s signup roster for the parade. “Looks like we’ll have nearly two hundred fifty walking tomorrow.”

“Is that a lot?” John voice’s echoed in the refrigerator, where he was searching for the last of the red cabbage.

“About the same as last year, which is good. When I was your age, the Ibrox lodge walked over a thousand men. And it
was
all men back then. God knows I didn’t agree with the decision to let women start walking, but if not for the ladies, we wouldn’t have even two hundred this year. So I was wrong.” He paused. “Did you hear that, John? I admitted I was wrong.”

“I heard you.” John checked the saucepan to see how the beef was browning. “As did the secret camera in the ceiling. Now I’ve permanent proof.”

His father chuckled. “Make sure you’re to bed early. Dunno if I’ll be able to sleep. Too excited.”

“How? You’re not even walking this year.”

“For the first time. Which means that for the first time, I’ll get to watch my boy walk down that street wearing the collarette—and carrying the lodge banner, no less.”

“For the
last
time as well, Dad. Remember our agreement.”

“That’s what makes tomorrow special.” He rose to his feet and tottered to the sink, where he laid a hand on John’s shoulder. “I’m not stupid, son. I know times are changing. For people like me, that means holding on to the past, keeping with the traditions of our forefathers. But for people like you—”

“People like me?”

“The young.”

“Oh.” John unbristled. “I thought you meant—never mind.”

“Young people like you feel you must move on, be part of the bigger world. I know you’ll do great things one day, John. Just gonnae no forget where you fae.”

John knew that even if he left Ibrox tomorrow and never set foot south of the Clyde again, he
would
never forget where he came from. These sullen streets and cracked pavements were in his bones. He would climb out one day, but he’d reach back and pull his neighbors up with him. With jobs and decent homes, they’d have no fuel for their hatred save a silly football rivalry.

“I won’t forget, Dad.” John hoped his creeping sense of guilt didn’t come out in his tight smile. “Promise.” He moved away to retrieve the vegetable knife from its wooden block. “We should finish Series Ten of
Strictly Come Dancing
tonight. Unless you’ve moved on without me, that is.”

Dad gave a sad smile. “I’d never leave you behind.”

They ate dinner on their laps in front of the telly, bachelor style, since Mum wasn’t there to scold them for getting bread-roll crumbs on the carpet. He even let Dad defy his diet and have an extra serving of beef stew. As they marveled at Louis Smith’s winning show dance—
fucking hell, those ARMS
—and laughed at judge Bruno’s saucy praise, John let himself take a mental snapshot of this, what could be their last happy night together.

What if he destroyed it all tomorrow? What if his father never forgave him?

Sitting with Milk in his lap, running his thumb over the lipstick stain on the cat’s pure white fur, John knew he was walking the thinnest, shakiest of tightropes. But he had to trust himself, and trust that both Dad and Fergus would understand. He couldn’t let fear or guilt stop him from doing what he must.

Later, after his father had gone to bed, John returned to his room to finish the project. The black fabric-pen outline of the letters and the artwork had fully dried, so he laid the shirt atop his desk and retrieved the paintbrush and three tiny pots of fabric paint. Carefully he filled in the letters with black, then completed the drawing with its two essential, painfully symbolic colors.

He hung the shirt beside the window to dry. It wasn’t a work of art, but its message was clear, and tomorrow everyone would see it. Tomorrow he’d show them all—his father, the lodge, and most importantly his nephew—that one of their own could break free.

Finally, he packed a suitcase, in case Dad didn’t understand.

= = =

Stepping out of the Ibrox subway station, Fergus welcomed the Saturday morning rain. It gave him an excuse to pull up his hood and hunch his shoulders, hiding himself as he made his way toward John’s street. Also, he realized with a smirk, the downpour would thoroughly soak those blasted Orange Walkers.

He passed a group of them on Edmiston Street, three fat old wankers in dark suits and bowler hats, white gloves, and orange sashes. With them was a man Fergus’s age wearing a royal-blue uniform and carrying a small black flute case—a member of one of those “blood and thunder” bands linked to loyalist paramilitary groups, the Protestant counterparts to the IRA. Fergus stepped off the curb to avoid putting his own eye out on their umbrellas, and to avoid giving them the throttling they deserved.

As their footsteps receded, swallowed by the patter of rain on splintered pavement, he let out a breath and unclenched his fists inside the pockets of his hoodie. After today, the worst of the Glasgow “marching season” would be over. Next Saturday—on the “Glorious Twelfth,” as the tyrants called it—the most zealous Protestants would take their triumphalism to Northern Ireland. Scotland would be glad to be rid of them for the weekend.

Fergus hurried on toward John’s house. He planned to bide his time at the newsagent across the street, perhaps buy some crisps or the morning
Herald
while he kept watch. After a few minutes, if the truth failed to reveal itself, he’d knock on John’s door. Call it a surprise visit. Tell him he gave up the concert to help John boost his father’s spirits. If that were the real reason John was avoiding him today, then he’d be thrilled at Fergus’s devotion. And if it weren’t the reason, if John
was
seeing this Ian bloke behind his back, Fergus would know from the panic in his eyes.

As he stepped into the newsagents’ shop and saw the revolting display of junk food, another idea came to him. John had mentioned his dad was a fan of Wotsits, the allegedly cheese-flavored corn puffs. Fergus grabbed a packet of each variety—regular, prawn cocktail, and flaming hot—and took them to the cashier. If nothing else, perhaps he could make good with Mr. Burns.

Just then, the front door opened at the house across the street, the one with the small hedgerow. John’s house.

“Oh, I forgot—” Fergus pointed toward the adjacent rack five feet away. “Something.”

Facing the shelf of sweets, he craned his neck to peer at John’s front door. An late-middle-aged bald man hobbled out, followed by John, who dragged a wheelchair over the threshold and through the wrought-iron gate. His father sat in the wheelchair, though not without considerable argument, and took the umbrella John gave him. John lifted the hood of his dark, tightly belted raincoat. Then they were off, hurrying down the wet pavement.

Fergus grabbed the plastic bag of Wotsits from the cashier, dropped a five-pound note on the counter, then dashed out of the shop.

He followed John and his father at a distance, close enough to keep them in sight, but far enough they couldn’t hear his footsteps over the driving rain. They both wore polished black shoes and dark-blue trousers. Perhaps they were off to a fancy breakfast to cheer Mr. Burns on his anti-anniversary.

Regardless, John was with his father, just as he said he’d be. Not meeting Ian for a romantic tryst. Fergus felt more a fool than ever. He’d given up a day of great music to pursue a paranoid whim. If John ever found out Fergus had stalked him, it could destroy everything they had.

That did it. He resolved to veer off at the next intersection and head home. Liam hadn’t found a taker for the extra tickets, so perhaps Fergus could still catch a bus out to Loch Lomond and join his friends.

The rain began to weaken. In place of its patter, Fergus heard scattered drums and flutes a few streets ahead, warming up to accompany the Orange Walkers. The sound gave him even more incentive to divert his path, to avoid hearing strains of “Derry’s Walls” and “The Billy Boys.”

At the corner, Fergus turned left for the subway station, leaving John and his father hurrying down the busy boulevard. Odd, this didn’t seem the sort of area that would have a posh breakfast restaurant. They weren’t taking the subway, and they’d already passed several bus stops.

And why would John and his father purposely head toward the crowded parade route? How annoying for them to have to navigate all that—

Fergus’s feet stopped. So did his heart.

= = =

It wasn’t hard for John to wear the grim face of the typical Orange Walker. His hands oozed sweat inside his white gloves as he marched through the drizzle, bearing the blue-and-orange banner of the organization he’d come to loathe. His pulse pounded in his temples in time with the big bass Lambeg drums behind him. His intestines felt locked in a tangling, twisting death match at the sound of those flutes, playing songs that glorified his people’s triumph over Fergus’s.

Three more streets.

He’d always thought it odd these parades were so solemn, given that their side had won the Battle of the Boyne they were commemorating. These marchers acted like the war was still on. They seemed to believe that if Protestants weren’t ever-vigilant, the Pope would sweep down these roads any moment, burning condoms and corralling everyone into confessionals, where they’d be forced at scepter-point to pledge allegiance to the Irish Republican Army and Celtic Football Club.

Two more streets.

The crowds on the pavement were thicker here, as was the police presence, blocking off the route to traffic and even pedestrians. The sight of so many witnesses made John feel faint. Full-on mouth breathing, he needed every scrap of digestive discipline not to boak all over the road. In a few minutes, after he’d made his statement, he’d have an excuse to vomit, as the other Orangemen would no doubt punch him in the gut.

Starting with the man to his right—his lodge’s Worshipful Master, Ian Graham, whose jowls shook as he marched along, proudly carrying the Union Jack. To John’s left was Ian’s younger brother Richard, bearing the blue-and-white Scottish Saltire flag in his meaty fists.

One more street.

He thought of Harry. The boy wouldn’t understand today, but he’d look back later and remember when his Uncle John took a stand against bigotry. Perhaps he’d join the growing majority of Scots who were weary of hate and eager for hope.

John thought of Fergus again, and how proud he’d be when he heard, but perhaps also a little angry, especially if this stunt put John in hospital.
You and your grand ideas
, he’d say, before kissing him—gently, on account of the bruises and busted lip. Then John could tell him everything, and the lies would end at last.

A sudden calm swept over him as he approached the terrace where his family sat, where Ian’s wife was capturing the parade on video for posterity. The marchers had been instructed to give a quick look right as they passed the terrace, to show respect for their elders who could no longer walk.

John smiled proudly. In a few moments, he would do more than look.

He shifted the banner to one hand, then loosened his tie, ready to unbutton his jacket and shirt. Ready to reveal all.

“John Burns!” hurled a voice from the pavement to his left.

John’s spine turned to ice. Never had his name been said with such rage.

Oh God. No. No no no no no no no no no.

John forced himself to look, though he knew the voice as well as his own.

There in the mist stood Fergus, eyes blazing with hurt and hate.

John croaked a single agonized, incoherent syllable. Somehow he kept walking, though his feet had gone numb and his head swam with vertigo.
Please, God, let this be a nightmare. I promise when I wake I’ll call off this madness.

Fergus lifted his arm and flipped John off with two fingers. The gesture booted John out of his paralysis. “Wait!” he called to Fergus, then turned and shoved the banner toward Ian. “Take this. I need to talk to him.”

“You need to ignore him, Brother John,” Ian said without breaking pace. “There’s troublemakers in every parade crowd.”