Ordinary Thunderstorms

14

THE LIGHT OVER THE western sector of the Shaftesbury Estate was a milky blue, the early morning sun brightening the brickwork of the topmost storey — the sixth — and beginning its slow creep down the fa£ades of the remaining five, casting sharp geometric shadows as it moved, making the apartment blocks look stark, but at the same time austerely sculptural — exactly the aim and purpose that the architect, Gerald Golupin (1898–1969), had in mind as he had drawn up his visionary design for this complex of social housing units in the 19505, until someone else, to his abiding chagrin, had named it the Shaftesbury Estate (Golupin had proposed something more Bauhausian — MODULAR 9, in reference to its nine apartment blocks and three wide quadrangles — in vain). The Shaft, in certain lights, could still appear severely impressive: hard-edged, volumetrically imposing, a triumphant melding of form and function — as long as you didn’t look too closely.

Mhouse, of course, was thinking none of these thoughts as she plodded up the stairs to her flat — Flat L, on Level 3, Unit 14. She was tired; she had drunk a lot of alcohol and had snorted many lines of cocaine over the last six hours or so as well as performing a variety of sexual acts with two men — what were their names? Still, she had £200 folded flat in the sole of her white PVC boot. It had been one of Margo’s specials. She and Margo showed up at this hotel in Baker Street at midnight where two men were waiting for them in a double bedroom (nice bathroom en suite) — Ramzan and Suleiman, that was it — and so the long night had begun. Ranizan and Suleiman, that was them, yeah, old blokes, but clean — but which one was which?

Luckily, Margo had called her at lunchtime and so she had been able to park Ly-on with her next-door neighbour, Mrs Darling. She was always happy to look after Ly-on (Mhouse gave her a fiver) but it couldn’t be done spontaneously, she needed a few hours notice, at least.

Mhouse rang the bell and, after a two-minute delay, Mrs Darling opened it. She was in her sixties, with a misshapen, lumpy body and a thin head of dyed auburn hair. She had no front teeth.

“Aw, hello, Mhousey, sweet,” she said. “Tired out, eh?”

“Them late shifts is killers, Mrs D.”

“You want to complain — way that factory works you people. Why can’t they pack veg at a proper hour?”

“It’s the early markets, see?”

“Still: it’s a living, I suppose — in these sad times of ours. Here’s the little fella.”

Mhouse crouched and kissed her son’s face — which was still blank and neutral with fatigue, roused from his bed so early.

“Hello, baby,” Mhouse said. “You been a good boy?”

“Not a peep out of him. Slept like a log, little lambkin.”

Mhouse slipped Mrs Darling her fiver.

“Any time, dear,” Mrs Darling said, “such a quiet, well-behaved little chap.” She paused and ruffled Ly-on’s hair, then looked meaningfully at Mhouse. “Haven’t seen you down the Church, recent.”

“I know, I know. I need to go. Maybe tomorrow.”

“God loves you, Mhousey, never forget. He doesn’t loves us all but he loves you and me.”

Mhouse led Ly-on along the walkway to their flat and unlocked the door. Inside she filled the kettle to make a cup of tea, then switched it off. She felt the urge to sleep encroaching on her like onrushing night, a tiredness so acute she could hardly stay on her feet.

Ly-on had turned on the television and was searching the channels looking for a cartoon.

“You want some happy-flakes, baby?” she asked, thinking: please say yes.

“Yeah, Mum.”

“Yeah, Mum, what?”

“Please happy-flakes me.”

Mhouse filled a bowl with sugar-frosted cornflakes, added some milk and a few glugs of rum. Then she crushed a 10 mg Diazepam under the blade of a knife and sprinkled its dust over the flakes. She handed it to Ly-on, who was now curled up in a nest of cushions on the floor in front of the TV. She sat down beside him and watched him eat his happy-flakes. When he’d finished she took the bowl from him and stuck it in the sink with the other dishes. She slipped her,£200 into the stash under the floorboards in the toilet and, when she came out, saw that Ly-on — was now fast asleep. She turned the TV down and settled him more comfortably on the cushions, then went into her room, took two Somnola and smoked a joint — she wanted to be out for twelve hours, minimum.

When she woke it was four o’clock in the afternoon. Ly-on was still sleeping but he’d wet himself.

♦

That night, Mr Quality-He-Delivers knocked on the door at about 8.00.

“Who is it?” Mhouse said, through the letter-box.

“Quality coming,” was the reply.

“Hey, Mr Q, come on in,” she said, unlocking the door. Mr Quality was perhaps the most important man in The Shaft, for all sorts of reasons, none of them particularly violent. No one who dealt with Mr Quality wanted him to be angry with them so he very rarely resorted to main force. He was very tall and thin and Mhouse knew that his real name was Abdul-latif. He stepped into the room, seeming twice as tall as Mhouse, and anyone might have thought he was about to go off running as he was wearing a dark maroon track suit and very new trainers, box-fresh. Only the fact that he had silver rings on all eight fingers and two thumbs made this supposition less than likely.

Mr Quality lounged against the kitchen wall, looking around him, proprietorially — it was his flat, after all. He was always lounging, was Mr Q, Mhouse thought, as if he supposed it made him seem not quite so embarrassingly lofty.

“Hey. Ly-on, man. How it hanging?”

Ly-on looked up from his TV. “Good,” he said. “I fit like new car.”

Mr Quality chuckled. “Sweet-sweet. You keep chillin’, man.”

Mhouse beckoned him away from Ly-on. “Where we at?” she asked.

“Saktellite TV, rent, gas, water, electric…” he pondered. “,£285, I say.” He smiled at her, showing small perfectly white teeth in mottled pink and brown gums. “You dey get problem?”

“No, no,” Mhouse said, thinking thank the good lord for Ramzam and Suleiman. “Everything working. Sometime the light he go out but I know it’s not you fault.”

“The electric he go be difficult. We have many problem. Gas easy, water easy, but electric…” he winced, tellingly. “We done get wahallah. They chase us — ah-ah.”

“Yeah. Bastards.”

She went into the bathroom for her stash, then pretended to rummage in the cardboard box beside her bed and opened and closed the cupboard doors before coming back with his £285. That left her with about £30—and she owed Margo…she’d have to go out again tonight. Still, the good thing about Mr Quality was that he could provide you with anything — anything — as long as you had the money. In Mhouse’s flat the gas, water and electricity had been cut off months ago but Mr Quality had reconnected her within hours. Every now and then Mr Quality paid to have sex with her — or rather, ‘paid’ in the sense that he always offered her money that she always declined.

She handed the,£285 over and Mr Quality paced about the flat, checking it out as if he were a prospective buyer. Mhouse kept it as clean as she could — she had very little furniture, but she had a broom and she always kept the floors swept.

“You have spare room, here,” Mr Quality said, opening a door into the second bedroom. There was a mattress on the floor and a few cardboard boxes with clothes and old toys in them. “I can get you lodger—£20 a week. No worry, clean nice person. Asylum, no speak English.”

“No, I’m fine at the moment. Keeping busy, business is good,” she said, trying to appear casual. “Things are OK, going fine. Yeah, fine.”

“You go let me know.”

“Yeah, sure. Thanks, Mr Q.”

After Mr Quality had gone she gave Ly-on his supper — mashed banana and condensed milk with a slug of rum. She crushed a Somnola into the mix and mashed it further with a fork.

“Mummy’s got to go out to work tonight,” she said as she handed him the bowl.

“Mummy working too hard,” he said, spooning the banana pabulum into his mouth.

“You go to toilet if you need pee-pee,” she said. “Don’t do it in you pants.”

“Mum — don’t saying that.” His eyes were on the screen.

She kissed his forehead and went to change into her working clothes. No point in waiting, she thought, might as well get the cash as soon as possible. She put on a cap-sleeved T — shirt with a red heart across her chest, wriggled into her short skirt, pulled on her zip-up white boots, picked up the umbrella, checked her bag for condoms and fastened the keys on the long chain to her belt. She locked the door on a sleeping Ly-on — she’d be back in a couple of hours or so, she reckoned, no need to alert Mrs Darling, and headed along the walkway to the stairs.

As she was leaving The Shaft, heading out to the Rotherhithe shore and her usual beat, she saw a black taxi-cab pull up, its light off. No one got out while it sat for a minute or two at the kerb. Who’s ordering a black cab at The Shaft? she wondered as she made towards it. Brave fool.

The driver stepped out as she walked past — big bloke, ugly face with a weak, cleft chin. She glanced back to see where he was going and saw him lock his cab and wander into the estate.