''Sell me your ring,'' cries Mister Vanilla. ''I'll give you a pearl necklace for your ring.''
The wall is very narrow and the drop very steep. They pass the Minster gardens and then the clerical houses, long, beautiful lawns tended by churchmen, and then, horrifyingly, there are some steps, only a few but enough to send their teeth a-chattering, their bones a-clattering and their bollocks a-splattering.
''A-A-A-A-A-A-A,'' he cries as he judders down to the next level.
''U-U-U-U-U-U-U,'' cries Mister Vanilla as he follows.
Yo-yo just manages to stay ahead, although his legs cannot really reach the pedals. It does not matter. Mister Vanilla's knees are somewhere up near his nose.
As they pass high by the traffic lights at the Gillygate junction, a chocolate Labrador in a purple Ford Focus does a double-take then woofs ''Shave your legs!''
Bollocks, thinks Yo-yo, there's nothing to shave, and they swerve round the bend and into the straight stretch of Lord Mayor's Walk.
Along the ancient wall they go, the boy struggling to get a foothold on the pedals because his legs are too short, the man wobbling dangerously because he is too large. Forty-stone on a tiny child's bike (or a tiny, child's bike), but when they reach Monkbar and enter a narrower section, it's Yo-yo who
os
w be
bl
and comes off the bike, scraping his elbow on the medieval stones.
''Bugger!'' cries Yo-yo as the Penny Farthing skids away and over the wall to land in a rose-bush in a garden below. ''Bugger!''
''Aha!'' cries Mister Vanilla, ''I have you now!'' He discards his bike and advances, moustaches waxed and very erect. He pops a sugared daisy into his mouth, breathes the scent into Yo-yo's face as he kneels down. Yo-yo backs into the Monkbar stones. ''I want your ring,'' says Mister Vanilla. ''I'll give you a belly-button diamond in exchange.'' The small kid's bike tumbles away over the grass. Mister Vanilla stretches out one pudgy finger and touches the ring inside Yo-yo's vest. ''Nice outfit, by the way,'' breathes Mister Vanilla, ''Very sporty, and I know you like sports.'' Yo-yo wrestles and struggles beneath the great weight but it is like a starfish trying to crawl out from under a whale. ''Come along, Yo-yo, I'll treat your ring well,'' breathes Mister Vanilla. ''I'll keep it polished and shiny, buff it up every day, if only you'll let me. You'll love what I'll do to it. You can have a pearl belly-button stud and a very rare pearl tongue-ring in exchange.''
''Everyone wants my jewel,'' says Yo-yo. ''Why should I give it to you?''
''Because of your mother,'' says Mister Vanilla.
''Don't talk of my mother,'' Yo-yo says fiercely. ''She's dead, right? Dead. I killed her. I sliced her up with a chainsaw, cut out her liver and fried it with rice, along with that of her boyfriend, the one-legged window cleaner named Stins. I dissolved his bones in sulphuric acid and buried my mother under the dahlias. They were always her favourite flower.''
''That was peonies,'' says Mister Vanilla. ''I'm so sorry, Yo-yo. I need your ring.''
''You'll have to kill me first,'' says Yo-yo defiantly.
''Maybe it's time,'' says Mister Vanilla. ''Maybe it's time to end all the pain, all the confusion, all the questions that swirl in your mind, the headaches, the eating disorders, the identity crises, the lying awake in the middle of the night, the constant 'who am I' and 'why am I different', the crying, the tears, the endless fear of being discovered. You know they will beat you if they learn what you are,'' Mister Vanilla fixes his eyes on the emerald ring, ''What this does, the power this gives you. They may even kill you. They've killed people for less.''
''Without the ring I am nothing,'' says Yo-yo. ''You may as well kill me.''
''I don't want to kill you,'' says Mister Vanilla.
''Do it,'' says Yo-yo, and closes his eyes. Mister Vanilla shakes himself, reaches out for Yo-yo's throat, fat-sausage fingers bloated and stiffening. Yo-yo smiles contentedly and prepares for surrender to the fat man. At last it is happening. Perhaps it is time for the questions to stop. Come, Mister Vanilla. Do it. Finish it. The time has come. The pain must end. His throat is squeezed. He feels his face purpling. Choked-in air rattles his body. He utters a gargle. He senses Mister Vanilla's peppermint breath in his hair.
''Oi, you!'' comes a shout from Monk Gate. ''What's your game?''
''Taking something that is mine by right,'' says Mister Vanilla. ''Now shove off!''
''You leave him alone!'' shouts the voice. Yo-yo opens his eyes.
King Richard III's black velvet robes flow over his bulging, humped back. His shoulder-length hair is rat-chewed and ragged, his withered arm dried up and blasted. The golden chain clanks on his chest as he limps monstrously from the Monkbar museum, his sword raised.
Mister Vanilla backs away from the boy's fallen body. ''Your Majesty, I am merely collecting a long-standing debt.'' He digs in his waistcoat pocket and gives a winning smile. ''Sugared snowdrop?''
''RUN!'' yells King Richard. Coughing, spluttering and gulping down air, Yo-yo scrambles to his feet and hares away along the wall and down the stairs, hearing Mister Vanilla's cry of exasperation ''Get off, you dead fool!'' as he reaches the bottom. He looks wildly around, is momentarily tempted by The Monkbar Model Shop with its enticing display of Hornby train sets and Airfix planes, is not tempted by Ladbroke's or by the Monk Bar newsagent's racks of Le Monde and Frankfurter Allgemeine or by Meadowcroft's shoe repair and key-cutting shop (est. over 80 years) so runs across the road past some old gravestones and jumps into
Job Centre Plus.
There is a blue sofa with a red back set on a grey carpet in front of a lectern staffed by a shock-headed, blue-blazered official whose purple name-badge reads ''MARK MIZZENMAST. I AM HERE TO HELP.''
''Good morning, sir,'' Mark Mizzenmast oils. ''What cycle are you?''
''What?''
''Cycle,'' says Mister Mizzenmast.
''Errr .... penny farthing,'' Yo-yo replies.
''Ho, a joker.'' Mister Mark Mizzenmast smoothes his blazer. ''You'll never get a job with that attitude,'' he sniffs. ''What's your cycle?''
''40 for colour-fast, cold-rinse and spin,'' says Yo-yo.
''One last time, or I'll call Security.'' Mark Mizzenmast stands up ramrod straight. ''What’s your cycle?''
''OK, OK.'' Yo-yo looks Mark Mizzenmast straight in the eye. ''Once a month I bleed like a gazelle's throat that's been ripped out by a lion, eat cakes and coals and stab my boyfriend in the arse with a red-hot knitting needle. Happy?''
Mark Mizzenmast blows a whistle. ''Security! Security! We got a clown who doesn't take the Job Centre seriously. Batter him! Batter him now! And cancel his claim!''
Yo-yo bolts into the
Selby and York NHS Monkgate Health Centre.
He has got the security guards from the Job Centre on his tail. Not that a rather thick-set woman and a wheezy old geezer worry him but it's still something else to deal with.
''What seems to be the problem, young man?'' says a white-coated nurse with a face like a bulldog chewing a bag of thumb-tacks.
''I have a problem with my ring,'' he gasps.
She slaps his face. ''Don't be disgusting,'' she hisses.
''Yo-yo, my ballcock! I'm coming to get you!''
He can smell the sugared rose-petals.
So he bolts again into St Wilfrid's RC Primary School (Diocese of Middlesbrough).
''Where's your school jumper?'' says an officious schoolteacher with a face like a bulldog chewing a bag of plungers. ''And you don't have a tie. Don't you know PE kit is only for PE lessons? Really, you are the scruffiest young lout I've ever set eyes on. You'll sit here after school for half an hour and write lines 'I must not wear shorts in the shower.' No, I meant corridor. 'I must not wear shorts in the corridor.' No, classroom. 'I must not wear shorts in the classroom.' Oh bollocks. No, not bollocks, titties. Yes. Titties. Big hairy titties. No. No. Not hairy. Just titties. 'I MUST wear shorts in the classroom.'...No. Bollocks. Shit. I meant t
itties.''
''Yoo hoo, my cockling!'' coos Mister Vanilla, fat face at the window.
AHHHHHH! yells Yo-yo.
''I must wear titties in the classroom,'' the schoolteacher says. He opens his jacket to reveal a pendulous pair of plastic breasts. But Yo-yo has gone. ''Bollocks,'' says the teacher. ''Nice shorts.'' He hitches up his comedy boobs and pulls a face like a bulldog chewing a carton of spiders. ''So I said to Enid, if these get any bigger, I'll be able to use them as ear-warmers.''
Yo-yo is back on Monkgate but The Tap and Spile is closed. He pounds on the door. ''Let me in,'' he cries. ''Let me in.''
A grumpy voice calls ''We ain't open yet, you sad, raddled, young alcoholic.''
''I need help,'' cries Yo-yo.
''You're telling me, mate,'' says the grumpy voice. ''It's not even 10 and you're banging on the door after a drink. Pissheads' Anonymous, mate. That's what you need, not a drink''
''Please…..'' begs Yo-yo, ''Please let me in. I might die if you don't.''
''Good God,'' says the grumpy voice in disgust, “To be in such a state at your time of life. How old are you? You don't sound more than eight.''
''I'm thirteen actually,'' says Yo-yo, ''Nearly fourteen, but that's not the point.''
''Good God, thirteen,'' says the grumpy voice. ''I bet your liver's completely fried. You'll be like that there Georgie Best.'' From inside The Tap and Spile, Yo-yo can hear the radio:
Mona McBonkers: He’s only got himself to blame, Jeremy. Alcoholics deserve no sympathy.
Jeremy Vine: But isn’t alcoholism a disease, Mona?
Mona McBonkers: Disease my arse, Jeremy. The research says it’s a self-inflicted self-indulgence. I hope he dies slowly and painfully as his liver rots inside him and then them kiddies in the parks will be safe. 95% of my Daily Wail readers agree with me, so it must be true. The so-called common people know better than any politician how to keep the kiddies safe from these booze-raddled scumbags.
''I'm coming, my prettikins,'' calls Mister Vanilla from the roundabout.
''Let me in!'' Yo-yo bangs on the door again, ''Or I'll bang till you come.''
''Clear off,'' says the grumpy voice, ''Lest you make some unseemly joke about banging till I come. Oh. You already did. Well, bugger off anyway.''
Yo-yo smacks his fist against the door one more time then spins away back towards the graveyard. A plan is forming.
''Hello, cupcake,'' says Mister Vanilla. His great podgy fingers dig into Yo-yo's sweat-vested shoulder. ''We meet again.''
Yo-yo squirms. Mister Vanilla gropes at his buttocks, fat fingers digging through the skimpy, silky shorts. Mister Vanilla chortles. His chins shake. The sickly-sweet scent of peppermint wafts up Yo-yo's nose.
''Get off me!'' shouts Yo-yo. ''I've changed my mind! I don't want to do it now!''
''Give me what I want!'' says Mister Vanilla, grappling Yo-yo through the gravestones and forcing him up against the hedge. A twig scratches Yo-yo's legs.
''Never!''
Yo-yo is forced back into the prickling, stabbing branches. Mister Vanilla is using his body to crush the air from his lungs, to smother his breathing, to squash him like a slug under a steamroller.
''Help me!'' yells Yo-yo to the passers-by waiting to cross at the traffic lights. ''Help me!''
The passers-by tut and pass by.
''Wearing shorts like that,'' mutters a mother, ''Gets all he deserves.''
''What a tart,'' adds her small daughter aged six.
''I'll bet he's a regular slapper,'' says the mother.
''You can tell,'' says the small daughter aged six. ''Riddled with disease.''
''Ho ho ho,'' Mister Vanilla chortles. ''You won't escape now.''
The great weight presses him into the privet. Twigs jab into the flesh of his buttocks and calves. Time is running out. With a huge yell and all of his strength, Yo-yo swings his tartan rucksack up from the grass. It catches Mister Vanilla under the ear and knocks him down flat. Mister Vanilla sees
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