Still Midnight

16

Shugie was in the living room, sitting defiantly on the piss-damp settee, casually reading a newspaper from July.

In the kitchen Eddy sat on a stool, Pat crouching on a rickety wooden box with ‘FRAGILE’ stamped on the side. They sat away from each other, each marooned like boats lost on a dead sea. Dumb with tiredness they were both struggling to keep awake. Someone, not Shugie, had put down laminate flooring but a long-ago flood had warped the boards. They were curving up at the sides making the floor choppy and uneven. Under the dirt Pat could see that each board was a photograph of the next, the same knot in the wood repeating like a greasy dinner.

Eddy held a loaf in a waxy wrapper, opened out like a bag of sweeties. He had been eating dry bread all night because that was the only foodstuff Shugie had remembered to buy with the forty quid Eddy had given him in advance. He’d invested the rest of it in superlager.

Pat breathed heavily through his nose as a precursor to speaking but Eddy looked away. ‘Man,’ said Pat regardless. ‘We need to move.’

‘Leave it,’ Eddy warned through his teeth.

‘We need to move him.’

Eddy didn’t answer. He held out the bread wrapper as if it was a solution. Pat shook his head. He couldn’t eat in here. He felt as if particles of Shugie’s piss would be getting in his mouth and into his stomach when he ate. Had to be. That’s what smell was, particles.

He brought his elbows and knees in, shuddered a little, thinking about dead skin. Then he remembered the girl and wondered how she was. But Shugie didn’t have a radio, never mind a telly. They didn’t know if they were in the news or not. If it was in the paper there might be a photo of her. The chances were that she’d been taken to the Victoria Infirmary. Less than a mile away, in a clean bed.

Desperate to relive the warm glow he felt when he first saw her, Pat imagined her lying in a hospital bed with her hair fanned out over the pillow, smelling nice, peachy or flowery, clean, thinking about him perhaps. Pat shook his head softly. No. He had shot her fucking hand off: if she was thinking about him it wasn’t fondly. A girl like that wouldn’t go with someone like him. The father was annoyed that the door was chapped at night. The house was clean and pink, nice. She was from a good family. Even if he hadn’t shot her by accident she’d never go with him. Her father wouldn’t allow it.

He imagined himself walking into the ward with a big bunch of flowers, dressed smart, looking sharp, but her face was horrified when she saw him again. Disappointed with the fantasy he took himself back to the hallway to see her there. Her waist was tiny, the waistband of her denims hanging off her hip bones. He realised suddenly that the bridge of his nose felt hot when he was in the hall. Looking at her waist he could see the black woollen edge of the eyeholes. He had a balaclava on. She didn’t know what he looked like.

Pat sat upright, smiled, almost laughed. She had no idea what he looked like.

Back at the Victoria Infirmary Pat walked into a ward that didn’t exist and smiled at a girl who didn’t remember him. Shy, she looked away but he gave her an impossibly glorious bunch of flowers and she suddenly loved him back.

He had been in the Vicky once, to see someone, he thought, a niece with tonsils or someone. Smiling at the dirty laminate he walked through the lobby, took a lift, sauntered into the ward. He could pretend to visit someone else and just look at her. It would be reckless, stupid.

If he did go, which he wouldn’t, he’d sit far away and just look at her. Then he’d go over and say something nice, you’ve got beautiful eyes or something, something to make her feel good even though she was missing a hand.

Surrounded by swirling particles of Shugie’s urine, Pat’s thoughts went off on their own, to a romantic, wordless conversation between himself and Aleesha at her bedside, to cups of tea in the hospital cafe, shortbread, smiles. He picked her up in a car he didn’t own, went to places he’d never been, places in the country, sunny places.

A girl like that, a girl who smelled of toast and warm, she wouldn’t go with someone like him. Her father would never allow it. She’d only go with him if she wasn’t living with her father, like if he was dead or something.

A rap on the glass above the sink made them both sit up. Malki’s skinny face looked back at them, smiling and Pat grinned back. Malki disappeared and then the door opened. He stood in the doorway, wearing a new white tracksuit with twin blue strips up the leg and a matching cap.

‘Been shoplifting?’ Eddy thought buying clothes was womanly.

Malki didn’t answer but curled his lip at the bin bags piled up by the door. ‘’Kin hell.’ He held the knees of his pristine trackies away from the bags as he sidled by. ‘Been in some dives, man…’

Pat was on his feet, unreasonably happy to see Malki. ‘Thanks for coming.’

Malki held out a thin blue polythene bag. ‘Call me with offers o’ money and I’m there, man.’ He gave the rubbish a sidelong look. ‘Only, eh, the job doesn’t involve touching stuff in here, does it?’

Pat looked into the bag of lager cans. ‘Four’s not enough to keep Shugie in all day.’

Eddy stood up and looked into it. ‘It’ll need to be.’

‘He’ll go out for more. And he’ll be pissed when he goes. He could tell someone.’

Eddy looked at him. ‘So what ye saying, tie him up or something?’

Pat and Malki looked at each other. ‘Hm,’ Malki smirked, played it as if he was thinking really hard. ‘There may be another way…’

But Eddy was in at him. ‘Don’t you take the piss out of me, you junkie fuck.’

Malki fell back. ‘Yous are on steroids.’

‘Eddy, I think Malki means we can just buy Shugie more bev.’ Pat the peacemaker.

‘OK.’

Malki was embarrassed. ‘Anyway, it’s Mr Junkie Fuck to you.’

No one laughed. It was an old joke. Feeling he had the high ground again Eddy handed Malki a gun. ‘Take this and stand outside the door of the bedroom.’

Malki held the gun between his forefinger and thumb, looking at it as if it was a used condom. ‘Eh… Eddy, man, no guns, man.’

‘How are ye going to threaten him if he tries to get away?’

Malki held the gun out to Pat. ‘Is it the old guy from last night?’

Eddy took the gun back. ‘Aye.’

‘Well, he’s not gonnae try to get away though, is he?’

‘Well, we don’t know, do we?’ said Eddy, goading. ‘That’s the raison d’etre for having the guns, isn’t it?’

‘No.’ Malki held firm. ‘No guns, man.’

‘Take the fucking gun.’ Eddy shoved it back at his hand.

Malki dodged him. ‘Man, I’m a lover not a fighter.’

Eddy was furious. ‘What if he tries to get away? What ye gonnae do? Fuck him back into the room?’

‘Keep your money, man.’

Eddy and Pat looked at Malki. He was not going to change his mind. He took a step to leave but Pat blocked his way and looked at Eddy. ‘Come on.’

Eddy was bewildered, unable to understand anyone passing up the opportunity to threaten a man with a gun.

‘We need to phone,’ said Pat reasonably.

Doing his laugh that wasn’t a laugh Eddy turned his back on them, sliding the gun into his trouser pocket.

Pat nodded Malki through to the living room, where he was treated to the sight of Shugie sitting on the edge of the settee looking at the racing pages of meets long past. Shugie looked the junkie boy up and down, huffed at the obvious inadequacies of his replacement. But Malki minded his manners. ‘Right?’

Shugie didn’t answer.

Pat brought him to the bottom of the stairs. ‘Go up and watch the door til we get back, OK?’

‘It’s the old guy, yeah?’

‘Yeah,’ said Pat, keen to get away.

‘Has he eaten anything?’

‘Bit of bread, can of juice.’

Malki whipped a family bag of wine gums out of his trackie pocket. ‘Grub’s up!’

‘Aye, very good.’ Pat smiled, glad Malki was here to lighten the mood, glad he found the place as disgusting as Pat did. ‘Get your arse up there.’

Malki stopped on the second stair and turned back. ‘Same rate as last night?’

Pat nodded. ‘Aye.’

Malki grinned and jogged up five stairs.

A knock at the front door made them both freeze. They looked at each other. In a flurry of silent motion Malki ran to the top of the stairs and Pat bolted through the living room to the kitchen door, stopping when he was flat against it. Eddy followed him, cowering in next to the stack of bin bags.

‘Fuck!’ Pat whispered.

‘Malki?’ hissed Eddy.

Pat nodded and pointed at the ceiling as Shugie looked in through the kitchen door. The knock came again, three formal raps on the front door. Shugie raised his eyebrows.

‘Answer it and get them the fuck away frae here,’ ordered Eddy.

Shugie looked confused. ‘What if it’s someone who wants to come in?’

‘Don’t fuckin’ let them.’

Shugie nodded and shuffled off to the door.

They listened, breathless, as the door creaked open on unaccustomed hinges in the distant hallway. A low rumble addressed a question to Shugie which he answered in the affirmative. The voice, an official voice, told him something. After a pause Shugie said ‘no’.

The door creaked loudly and Eddy and Pat both breathed out, realising too late that the door had not shut but had been opened wider, that steps were coming into the hallway, into the house, towards them.

Eddy opened the kitchen door and they shuffled gracelessly into the garden, crouching down under the kitchen window, praying the Lexus was low enough not to be seen through the window. They held their knees tight to their chests, listening to the long grass hissing spitefully around them, hearing through the broken window as footsteps came all the way into the kitchen. Three sets.

‘And does anyone live here with yourself, Mr Parry?’

Eddy and Pat looked at each other. Polis voice. Shugie had the fucking polis in his kitchen. Pat buried his head in his knees, looking down at the grass flattened below him. He shut his eyes and saw the sunshine die on the girl in the hospital bed, her hair slid across the pillow into ash.

It was a young polis, high voice, just new to it: ‘… regarding an incident at Brian’s Bar on the weekend of the fourth?’

‘Nah, nah.’ Shugie’s rumbling smoker’s voice. ‘I wiz out of it, and ah, I cannae just remember.’

‘Well, Mr Parry,’ said the polis. ‘Judging from the overwhelming and pungent stench of urine in your domicile, it is my firm conclusion that you do indeed have fuck all recollection of that particular incident.’ The second polis was laughing softly, repeating the line: ‘stench of urine’.

‘And so, Mr Parry we will be getting the fuck out of this disgusting abode pronto.’ He stopped for a titter himself. ‘Thanking you, but offers of tea and biscuits will be declined.’

‘And biscuits!’ echoed the giggly second polis.

Shugie said nothing. He stood and took the abuse until a sudden thump came from the kitchen ceiling.

The polis shifted their feet. ‘Is there someone else in this house?’ It was the other one talking. Shugie didn’t answer him.

‘Mr Parry?’

Shugie mumbled, ‘Cheeking my fucking…’

The giggler was suddenly stern. ‘Is there someone else in the fucking house, Parry?’

‘… disrespectful and that, talking about smells and that, whit’s your fucking house like then?’

‘Come on, we’ll just go and see, Paul.’ It was the first polis again, the comedian.

Shugie spoke up. ‘My mate – he’s… sleeping it off.’

‘Right, answer us when we fucking speak tae ye, well.’

‘’S get the fuck out of here before we catch something.’

‘Too fucking right… disgusting.’

They were walking away, Shugie grumbling behind them. Finally the front door slammed shut.

Pat raised his head from his knees and whispered, ‘I can’t… my fucking nerves are shredded here,’ he reasoned. ‘Eddy, I know you’re the contact, but I’m facing the same time as you and I can’t fucking take it.’

Eddy raised a hand, Pat expected him to get angry but he looked frightened too. ‘Let’s go and phone and then we’ll come back and move him.’

‘Where to?’

‘Well, you fucking decide.’ Here was the spite. ‘You fucking come up with somewhere better if you’re so much fucking smarter than me.’

‘Breslin’s.’

Eddy blinked, his bottom lip flapped as he thought of things to say. He licked his lips, disappointed that Pat had come up with somewhere so much better. ‘Let’s phone.’

The roll shop was tiny, little more than a dirty-looking door with a chalkboard outside announcing the availability of tea and full breakfast butties. Pat made Eddy stop here because he knew it sold newspapers too.

He stepped across the pavement, alive with the urgent tenderness of a lover orchestrating a chance encounter. Workmen in dusty jeans stood by the counter. The heavy aroma of spitting fat filled the narrow room with sticky air. Trying to act calm Pat turned to the newspaper stand. She was looking out at him.

A bad photo, grainy head and shoulders, taken by a mobile phone, but it was clear enough for him to see what he wanted. Long black hair parted in the middle, a large nose, hooked like a finger curling come hither. White perfect smile and hooded eyes that spoke only to him. She was injured but not dead. The first paragraph said that they were a respectable family. Shows what they know, thought Pat.

She was making a face in the picture, puffing up her cheek-bones and pouting a little, not tarty, just sweet. Pat reached out to pick up a copy and felt the texture of the rough paper kiss his fingertips, smelled the hot fat as sweet, the daylight glinting on the greasy wall as a sparkle. That she existed made the tawdry present bearable. He folded the paper and tucked it under his arm, smiling, as happy as if it was her arm, and went over to the counter, ordered two egg and bacon rolls and two cans of ginger, handing over the money to the beautifully hungover fat man behind the counter.

He read on as the rolls were made. Her name was Aleesha, she was sixteen, a pupil at Shawlands Academy, loved by all her classmates. Pat knew she would be popular, he’d known it. She had lost several fingers and was in intensive care in the Victoria Infirmary. At that he slowly dropped the paper, his mouth hanging open in amazement. He knew she would be in the Vicky. He just knew that she would be there. It was as if they were connected somehow, as if he had picked the place they would meet again.

He read about the terrible damage to her hand and empathised with her pain, with the awful disfigurement she would have to live with, but deep inside he was pleased that he had shot her, because now she wouldn’t be perfect and a hundred miles above him, because he had caused her photo to be on the front of the paper and he could look at her whenever he wanted.

The rolls arrived and he carried them, fat seeping through the paper bag out to the car. Eddy told him to be careful not to get grease everywhere; it was a hire car and they’d have to pay extra if they got stains on the seats and that. Use the newspaper on your lap, he said.

But Pat folded the paper carefully and tucked it into the pocket on the door, letting the fat get on his jeans instead.

‘What’s it saying?’ Eddy nodded at the paper.

Pat filtered through the story to find the facts. ‘She’s stable,’ he said. ‘In the hospital. Intensive care.’

Eddy stopped chewing and stared at him. ‘Who’s stable?’

‘The girl.’

‘Oh, the one you shot?’

That stung, him saying that so lightly, as if it was a detail. Pat looked out of the window. ‘They’ve clues anyway.’

Eddy took another bite and asked through a mouthful, ‘Can I see?’ He held his hand out to the paper but Pat hesitated. He didn’t want Eddy to touch his paper. He braced himself and handed it over casually.

They finished their rolls in silence, Pat holding a secret vigil over the paper until Eddy handed it back, and licked his fingers before accepting. He folded it nicely so that her face was visible and tucked her into the car door pocket. They drove on, looking for a phone box that didn’t have a camera right nearby. Cameras were all over the city like rats.

Finally Eddy stopped the car in a quiet street, a few spaces away from the phone box in case they were being watched, and they looked around, keeping their eyes up, looking for cameras on the sides of buildings and on street lights. It was a residential area, a quiet street with big trees and bushes in front of the tenements.

‘Right.’ Eddy pulled on the handbrake, and snapped his belt off.

‘No.’ Pat touched his arm with a staying hand. ‘No, I’ll do the phoning.’

Eddy looked at him. ‘Why?’

‘’Cause you’ve been under a lot of pressure…’

Eddy liked that characterisation. He nodded at the windscreen. ‘Well, be threatening. And tell them two million by tonight.’

‘And we’ll call back with a drop place?’ Pat knew that was what they had to do, they’d talked about it enough, but he wanted to make Eddy feel as if he was deciding. ‘Aye, that’s right, that’s… a drop point. We’ll call back later.’ ‘When they’ve got the money?’ Eddy nodded again. ‘When they’ve got the money.’ Pat got out and took the newspaper with him.