Stark Contrasts (An Adam Stark novel Book 1) (2 page)

It drives me mad: partly the laziness, but mostly the attitude that once it’s left their mouth, it becomes someone else’s dirty little problem.

I hate chewing gum at the best of times. Pavements are now thoroughly spattered with the stuff - ugly, immovable, embedded in the tar. Sometimes, it looks as if the pavement's developed some form of allergic reaction, breaking out in grey-white hives. Gobbing the stuff onto a pavement is bad enough but, when gum is spat into a urinal in the gents toilet, it becomes a personal bête noir.

The toilet was in a shopping centre near my workplace - the kind of behemoth of commerce that could be found dotted at intervals across London and countless other British cities. A cultural present from our American cousins, which I for one, would gladly exchange for something more suitable or get my money back. Oversized, soulless, anodyne, identikit, crowded and convenient. I deliberately chose the quieter of the facilities, situated at the far end of the centre. With a standard collection of lavatorial furniture and accoutrements; nothing remarkable about it. Until this particular afternoon that is.

If forced to guess, I'd have put his age at about eighteen; wearing a hoodie and an attitude problem. Both of them cloaks, designed to disguise and, at the same time, mark him out as a very particular kind of guy. Jeans hung off his anorexic arse revealing expensive, designer underwear. Knuckles almost scraped the floor. Shambling up to the urinal alongside me, he started to piss. With entirely predictable, casual contempt, he discharged a lump of indigestible chicle into the bowl in front of him, dousing and chasing it around the upturned colander which prevented it from being flushed into the drain. If he'd been listening, the snap, as he placed his straw on my camel’s back, would have been plainly audible. However, he couldn't hear it on account of some ghastly form of dance music pulsing through and out of his earphones. One boy, so many irritants.

So, you’ve just gobbed your gum into the toilet you little dick (literally). Who the fuck is going to fish it out and put it in the bin? You? No?
Really
? You do surprise me. Oh, of course, you’re leaving that delightful task to the poor, minimum-wage slave, unfortunate enough to be on duty today. After all, that’s what people like that get paid for, right? I mean, if you didn’t give them something to justify them being there, they’d be out of a job, right?

Wrong!

I watched the hooded troglodyte head for the sinks, rather improbably demonstrating a regard for his personal hygiene. Unluckily for him, this gave me the time I needed to intercept him at the door as he tried to leave; stick a wedge under it to stop anyone walking in on us. I'd been carrying this around for a while, waiting for the right moment to use it.

I should probably mention at this point that I'm a big guy - as in huge - and this little shit was no match for me. Still, the gun helped persuade him to comply with my wishes, return to the scene of his crime. He wasn't to know it was an unloaded replica.

I indicated he should switch off his music player and hand it over. When he did so, I dropped it into the nearest toilet bowl. His eyes boiled with fury and frustration.

“What the fuck, man? That cost me a lot of dough!”

I shook my head, ignoring his protestations. Maybe I was doing him a disservice, but it seemed doubtful he acquired the iPod through entirely legitimate means. The over-the-mirror lights providing illumination seemed to flicker slightly, in time with my anger.

“All right, arsehole. Pick up the gum.”

He looked at me, as perplexed as he was fearful.

“Pick it up!”

After a moment's hesitation, he assented, shaking it and holding it with the contempt he deserved.

“Ok, now back in your mouth it goes.”

He was aghast.

“Aw, no way! Come on, man. I’ve pissed on it! What the fuck is your problem?”

“My problem, fuckwad, is arrogant, ignorant pricks like you who think they can act how they please and treat everyone else like shit. Who the fuck did you think was going to go get that gum from the bowl?”

“I don’t know, man. The attendant? It’s their job to clean the fucking toilets, innit?”

I needed to rein in my temper. The satisfaction in this moment wouldn't come from decorating the wall with pea brain soup, and I didn’t need the heat an assault charge would bring. I leant in close, whispered.

“Not today, dickhead. Today, you're going to find out about good manners and consideration for your fellow man or woman. Today, you're going to clean up your own mess.”

I pulled back again.

“Now chew!”

He tried to delay the inevitable. Firstly, through aggression.

“Fuck you, motherfucker! I ain’t chewing no piss-covered gum!”

As the gun went to his temple, he tried reason.

“Come on, man, you’ve made your point. I’ll put it in the bin. You don’t need to make me eat it.”

I fixed him in a stare and shook my head.

“Mouth. Now!”

He popped the gum in his mouth, gagging and snorting, only managing a couple of chews before spitting it out on the floor and dropping to his knees, wailing and sobbing.

“Pick it up and keep chewing, you worthless little bastard!”

Looking up, his tear-filled eyes pleaded with me to stop tormenting him. I was unmoved. He reached out mournfully and picked up the gum again, putting it in his mouth on the third attempt. Once again, snorting, coughing and gagging ensued.

“Now swallow.”

“What?!”

“Swallow it!”

Defiance made a very brief reappearance.

“Fuck you! I chewed it like you said. I am NOT fucking swallowing it!”

I pressed gun barrel to head, cocked the hammer, at the same time grabbing him under his chin with my free hand.

“You
will
swallow it or I will blow your fucking head off.”

He swallowed, sagged to the floor, adopted the foetal position and whimpered pathetically.

The gun went back in its holster. Covering it with my jacket, I stood up, walked across the tiled floor and pulled the wedge from under the door. Almost instantly, a guy came in, stopping when he noticed the hooded baby crying on the floor.

“Is he alright?”

“Yeah, I think he might be a junkie. I offered to help, but sometimes, there’s no getting through to his type.”

The guy looked at me, then back at the boy and shook his head.

“You’re right there, mate. Think I’ll use the toilet at the other end of the centre.”

“Yeah, me too.”

3. Night-time

The deep pulse of the night is pounding in my temples. I pull the darkness in close to me and let it hold me tight. It feels warm and welcoming. It delivers my power. I am at once seen and unseen.

He is near now. I can sense the dread in his veins. The feeling he's trying so hard to suppress. Most of you would not recognise the tells but I can. It circulates with his blood and I can hear him fighting it. It's in his breath, his footsteps, his glance, his shoulders. You would see a confident young man. I see a charade...a victim.

I have selected all of them carefully. They have done wrong - I've seen that. They taunt us, daring us to do something about it; hiding behind rights and excuses. Deny responsibility, blame deflected and renounced. They require chastening and I shall provide. A start was made but I need to finish things off. Complete the circle. Cleanse us of the stain created.

He's wearing the hooded top, shuffling, almost hobbling along in the obligatory manner required of his tribe. The park is deserted, it's late. Any witnesses will likely have four legs and a tail, demonstrate a remarkably similar gait to my boy. In any case, I'm always careful about who sees me. I move with grace and whispers.

I am a shadow, a ghost...a reaper.

He's chewing.

I'm waiting.

He thinks he hears a sound. He does, but without recognition of significance...too late. I am around him, upon him.

No-one sees me. Not even him.

The room is prepared. He cannot struggle now - the anaesthetic has seen to that. It takes me a  while to complete all I want to do. Some of it has grace but a certain amount of brutality cannot be avoided. Should not be avoided.

It's a hard lesson learned but he'll be a poster boy for change. An example to take heed of. A warning of what might befall the transgressors. He'll thank me one day for showing him the error of his ways...you all will.

4. Stark

Detective Inspector Adam Stark walked slowly along the hospital corridor, mind not fully on the job in hand, even if it did sound both bizarre and intriguing. To be fair, he was intrigued, but Sarah remained foremost in his pondering.

Sometimes, life as a cop could be shitty. The job, ironically, took no prisoners. You were in up to your neck or you were out - no compromise, no middle ground. Once you made detective grade, it
was
your life. Sarah: more patient than any of the others, more understanding, more forgiving. But even she had a line - a line he crossed once too often.

Still, you make choices in life. No-one coerced him into being a cop, never mind a detective. If a relationship, normality and all that jazz really topped his list of desires, then he could surely have it. It would probably mean leaving the service, but he could make that choice if he wanted to. The unavoidable truth dawned on him as he mulled. Even though Sarah leaving troubled him, it wouldn't make him choose her. They both knew this to be the incontrovertible truth. He was a cop -  welcome to his only choice.

“Hello, Detective Inspector Stark!”

The voice hauled him away from his meditation, back into the harsh fluorescent and cloying antiseptic of the hospital.

“Hey, John. How goes it, wee man?”

John Constance was an orderly and a regular contact. He revelled in feeding Stark snippets of information gleaned from patients, and highlighting any admissions he thought might pique Stark's interest. Constance meant well; a cheery, amiable sort, perhaps not the sharpest knife in the drawer but harmless enough.

“I'm good, Detective Inspector, just fine an' dandy. Unlike that poor bastard you're going in to see! That is one weird situation right there.”

Eyes twinkling, and yet, Stark sensed an effort being made to suppress disquiet. A false bravado. After many years working in hospitals it was likely Constance had encountered all manner of gruesome sights. Whatever this one involved, it managed to shake a seasoned veteran of trauma. Stark smiled; his own bravado perhaps. Without consciously thinking about it, he held his breath, turned the handle and entered the room.

A young black man lay in the bed, attached to a drip, with his face heavily bandaged. Detective Constable Katz looked toward Stark as he closed the door and nodded the slightest of acknowledgements. Lara Katz was a strikingly attractive young woman. Long, raven-black hair - today tied up tight on the back of her head - a slim, athletic figure and piercing, green eyes. Assigned as Stark's partner about two weeks ago, he was finding it hard to avoid being attracted to her. He got the distinct impression she found keeping things on a strictly professional level with him far less taxing.

“What've we got then, Katz?”

“Dwayne Clements, sir. Aged nineteen, found lying in the street at about three o'clock this morning and brought in here for emergency treatment. Some sick bastard pulled out all his teeth, then sewed up his mouth.”

Stark cocked his head slightly and frowned.

“Jeezo. That's pretty severe. Any indication of motive?”

“Oh, the motive is totally clear, sir. The animal who did it appears to be on some sort of vigilante crusade. He left a note explaining his actions and why we should be thanking him.”

Katz reached down, lightly touched Clements on the wrist, picked up an evidence bag from the bedside table with a note in it, and handed it to Stark.

The note was typed on plain, white paper. No words cut from a newspaper, no sloping handwriting in green ink and, no doubt, once forensics completed their once over, would be entirely clean. The message was clear...but also odd. A tirade out of proportion.

To whom it may concern,

For too long we citizens have put up with the erosion of decency, manners, consideration and all the other things that make living together on this small island more bearable. People like Dwayne here think they can do as they please without consequence. Well, I am here to let Dwayne and his like know that there are consequences - I am their consequence.

As he seems so fond of gum, I thought I'd leave him with his - a reminder that respect and consideration for others is something we all need to get our teeth into. If he won't tell you what happened, ask him to spit it out. He usually has no problem with that.

You may may be feeling sorry for him. Don't! He is a warning, a totem. One day he will thank me for this and so will everyone else.

Yours,

A concerned citizen taking action

Taped to the bottom of the note was a stick of chewing gum

“Wait a minute. Is he saying he pulled out all this boy's teeth because he liked gum? What the fuck, and what's with the cryptic comments about respect and spitting something out?”

“I know, sounds like someone who's seriously disturbed to me, sir. Dwayne's still under sedation, so I've not been able to talk to him yet. Apparently, his teeth were yanked out pretty forcefully and with little finesse, but the doc said the sewing was very neat - possibly professional. He was unconscious when he was found, so he's none the wiser either,” Katz replied with a certain amount of weariness.

“Has he had any visitors?” Stark asked.

“Not while I've been here, but the next visiting time is at six, so maybe a relative will appear then. Do you want me to hang about and wait for them, sir?”