by Paul Jones
‘I do. And I’ve also made the mistakes that go with them. It’s not always easy to be able to practise what you preach. I’m human just like the next person.’
‘So where did all this experience come from then?’
Will stalled. ‘It’s a long story, Geoff. Too long to get through in one afternoon. We’ll save that for another day. So you still up for it then?’
Geoff took a thoughtful sip of his coffee, then confirmed his decision.
‘It’s got to be done, Will. There comes a point when someone has to make a stand. These bastards out there have no respect for anything, police can’t do anything, courts hand out pitiful sentences. It’d be easy to just turn the other cheek, run away and hide. But who the hell wants to live like that? I haven’t trained all those years just so some vicious hooligan can start pushing me or any of my friends around.’
Will looked on with a satisfied little smirk.
‘And yes, I know all those years ago you were right about how all this was going to happen. But someone’s got to punish these bastards. If the police can’t protect us, the courts can’t protect us, we have to start protecting ourselves.’
Geoff’s spiel was stopped by his mobile ringing in his tracksuit pocket. He flipped it out and saw that his wife was calling. He answered it.
‘Yes Jan, I’m in Will’s flat, yes I know. I won’t be long. Bye.’ Geoff blew as if he’d been on the phone to her for hours. ‘Promised her we’d go to B and Q and have a look at those bloody bathroom suites. Suppose I better make a move.’ He stood up and placed his mug on the table.
‘Oh by the way, give us your mobile number, I’ve got a new phone now?’ Will told him.
Quickly, they swapped numbers, then, Will saw him to the front door.
‘Listen, Geoff, be careful, mate. Try and hide your identity as best as you can, and watch for weapons.’
Geoff turned at the front door. ‘We will.’
‘Pop over when it’s done. You’ve got my number now. Any trouble give us a ring.’ They shook hands, and Will watched him leave before shutting the door.
Going back inside, Will looked down at the caller display window on his mobile as if, he, too was expecting a call.
*
The three of them, Geoff, Tom, and Charlie all sat in Tom’s navy blue estate parked on Mostyn Broadway, some fifty yards away from the town’s main nightclub. It was Friday night, 10pm.
To cover himself for the evening, Geoff had told his wife Jan that he was having a few drinks with the lads. So even if he was unfortunate enough to get marked up tonight he could always say he got it trying to break up a fight in the pub.
Geoff felt the adrenalin surge through his intestines, and for a split second he wished he was back at home on a regular Friday night with nothing else on his mind to worry about. Normally, by this time he would languishing in front of the TV with a bottle of Stellas, and wondering whether or not he would get a shag with the missus.
Geoff took in a huge breath, the body’s natural preparation to feed the muscles oxygen ready for battle. The last time Geoff had actually got into a physical with anyone was about five years ago in one of the local chip shops. Two, salty-looking chaps had accused him of jumping the queue even though Geoff had ordered his meal long before they arrived. All it took was a left-right combo, an empi (elbow strike) and one more straight right and it was over. There was no time for any adrenal build up, it just kicked off and Geoff sprung into action. However, afterwards driving back home he was shaking like a leaf mainly due to the post-confrontational shock.
This time was much different. Geoff had had nearly a whole week to build himself up for this confrontation. And this type of preparation was probably the most destructive. The fear of confrontation itself, a slow-drip of adrenalin that over a long period of time, is capable of draining you physically as well as mentally.
Geoff sucked in air through his nostrils to try and calm himself down.
Tom’s phone chirped in his jacket pocket and he answered it.
‘Yeah, right, OK, cheers.’ he said, then ended the call.
He turned to Geoff and Charlie. ‘They’re on their way up to the Boulevards, they’re going through town now.’ He raised his brow to warn them. ‘There’s five of them.’
Geoff glanced at his two companions wondering if that last bit of info might pose a problem for them.
Tom sneered and looked straight ahead. ‘Obviously they’re travelling with some back up just in case.’
Geoff felt a stinging urge to give Will a call to come and give them a hand, but stopped himself. Even though Will had graciously offered his services, it just didn’t seem the right thing to do. No. Getting Will to fight their battles for them would look weak. No. If it was going to be done at all, it had to be done by the three of them.
‘What do you think?’ Tom turned to Geoff in the back.
Geoff fought hard against the urge to say sod it, let’s go home, there’s too many of them. But this was the defining moment for all of them. This was make or break time, fight or flight, the hero or the coward scenario.
Then Geoff said without even realising the consequences. ‘If we’re gonna do it, let’s just do it!’
‘Right then.’ Tom gunned the accelerator.
‘Boom, boom.’ Charlie added.
With an added adrenalin top-up, Tom almost screeched the car off and around the roundabout towards the prom. ‘We’ll park down Adelphi Street, and get them before they reach the swimming pool.’
Geoff’s heart thundered in his chest. ‘Hope there aren’t any CCTV cameras about?’
They turned the car down towards the swimming pool, and shot up a dimly lit Adelphi street. Getting themselves ready for the ambush, they all pulled on their beanie hats to try and conceal their identities, and then dived out of the car. Tom raced over to the boot, flung the door open, and grabbed a teak baseball bat.
Geoff gave him a that’s not part of the plan look.
‘There’s five of them isn’t there, we only want three, so this is the deterrent for the other two.’ Tom explained.
Charlie alerted them ‘They’re coming up to the wos it’s name, coach park.’
Tom slammed the door shut and led the way down a short side-street that cut into Mostyn Broadway, where they would intercept them.
Tom and Charlie gazed down the road to check on the gang’s progress.
Geoff breathed in and out slowly, he felt nauseous.
‘Shit, where’s that other tosser?’ Tom snarled. ‘Only two of them are there.’
Geoff leaned over. ‘Where are the ones we need?’
‘The one with the white shirt hanging out, and the tall one waving his arms about.’
Geoff nodded making a mental note.
Tom issued last minute instructions. ‘Wait till they’re almost in line with us and then rush them. Here, Charlie, you have the bat, keep the others away.’
Charlie took it off him. They stayed midway down the side-street out of sight, and waited until the gabble of voices were almost dead ahead, then Tom broke into a run followed by the other two. Startled by their appearance, the five youths stopped dead in their tracks and wondered what the hell was going on. Tom went straight for Lanky arm waver, and Geoff squared up to White Shirt. Tom’s head smashed into Lanky’s face with a squelchy thud. Geoff front kicked White Shirt just above the groin, and fired non-stop left rights at him. Charlie swung the bat towards the other three.
‘Get back! This is business, any of you interfere and you’ll be next.’
Out of pure shock the three lads obeyed, but for how long their conscience would allow before one or all got brave, that was the question.
White Shirt was down on one knee, overpowered by Geoff’s quick-fire left and right shots. He tried in vain to grab at Geoff’s legs, but Geoff began pummelling him with thumping knee strikes to the head.
Lanky was still on his feet trying to grapple wit
h Tom, but Tom banged away at his body, sickening blows that almost made him double-up. Tom quickly switched to swinging left and right hooks to the face. You could hear the slaps a mile away. White shirt was now on his back trying to use his legs to fend off Geoff’s attack.
‘OK, leave off. I’ve had enough,’ he cried.
Geoff booted his legs a couple of times. ‘You ever touch any of my friends again and I’ll come back and finish the job properly. You got that?’ he snarled.
‘OK, OK!’ White Shirt held up his hands in defeat, his nose mashed and bloodied.
Meanwhile, Lanky couldn’t take any more punishment from Tom, and succumbed to one more left hook before dropping to his knees. But Tom didn’t stop there, he remembered how these vicious yobs had apparently tried to kick Phil’s head off. In a fit of pure rage, he kicked and kicked as if he was trying to break through a heavy door. In desperation, Lanky curled up into a protective ball.
Suddenly, his three mates looked like they were about to charge in. ‘Leave him! Leave him, he’s had enough!’
‘Sod you!’ Charlie spat just missing the head of one with his bat to keep them at bay.
‘How do you like it, eh?’ Tom soccer-kicked Lanky up and down his crouched body making him squeal like a little sissy.
Geoff was just about to tell Tom that that was enough when the beating stopped. In disgust, Tom gobbed down at Lanky, and stormed off.
Geoff backed away from White Shirt who was still lying on his back, and Charlie moved away from the three lads, still brandishing his bat should any of them find a set of balls. ‘Tell that other bastard he can run, but he can’t hide. Boom, boom!’ Then off he jogged to catch up to the other two. Behind him the three lads dashed to the aid of their beaten comrades.
Back at the car, all three dived inside, and whipped off their beanie hats. Charlie threw the baseball bat in the back seat with Geoff. Meanwhile, Tom fired up his motor, and reversed back towards the swimming pool ready to shoot off on to the prom. Now they began to relax a little.
‘Jesus Christ!’ Geoff sighed flopping in the back seat trying to steady his quivering body.
Charlie ruffled out his flattened hair. ‘Mission accomplished. Boom boom.’
‘Bastard!’ Tom seethed, still some anger left in him.
‘What?’ Geoff asked.
‘Still missed that other tosser though didn’t we?’
Charlie gazed awkwardly out the window. ‘He’ll be expecting it now as well, won’t he?’
‘Shit, we’ll just have to let him stew for a while,’ Geoff groaned. ‘At least we’ll have the pleasure in knowing he’ll have to be looking over his shoulder from now on. Anticipation of death is worse than death itself and all that.’
Geoff lay back again, and wiped the cold sweat off his brow. His mind replayed every second of every blow he had delivered in the ambush. The fact that he wasn’t repulsed by his actions surprised him.
Thinking back on the whole ambush Geoff didn’t regret anything they had done. After all, those cowards had beaten the hell out of Phil without any provocation. Not a one-on-one fair square-off, but four or five, including those drunken girls, against just one. At least they had afforded the two lads that gladiatorial chance of a fair fight. Geoff was satisfied justice had been served, they got what was coming to them, and so would the remaining thug when they finally got hold of him.
However, the night shift for these three avengers was not over yet. Travelling up Measdu Road, something hit the hood of Tom’s car with a loud clang.
‘What the hell?’ Tom cried pulling opposite the old Bodnant, Annex Clinic.
All of them dived out to investigate. Tom examined his roof and found only a minor scratch.
‘Over there.’ Charlie pointed to a lager bottle lying in the middle of the road.
Obviously someone had thrown it, but from where? On one side of the road was an empty school field, on the other stood the backs of a housing estate facing the main road. Perhaps it was someone from one of the gardens.
They all jogged down to the panel fences lining the back gardens. Tom picked one yard and Geoff and Charlie chose others. Almost on command they all leapt on to the panel fences hoping to catch the culprits hiding on the other side. But it was Tom who struck lucky when he spotted three ten year olds, two boys and a girl, scuttling off like cockroaches.
Tom swung over in hot pursuit. ‘Got em.’
But by the time Geoff and Charlie had caught him up, Tom had all three kids rounded up at the back patio window. Just as it looked as if he was going to give them all a backhander for their cheek, the patio door rumbled open. Someone wearing a red football tee shirt with a football-sized belly to match blocked out the light.
‘Hell’s going on?’ The man’s eyes darted between the three strangers standing on his lawn.
‘One of these little toe-rags just lobbed a bottle at my car!’ Tom explained giving the brats a now-you’re-going-to-get it look.
‘So what that got to do with you chasing them in my garden?’ The man nodded his head arrogantly.
Tom eyed him with disgust. ‘You what?’
‘Get off my property now, or I’ll get all three of you for trespassing.’
Tom grabbed the fat man by the throat with such force that the man tripped back over the patio step. Tom used the momentum to tip him over and pin him on his back, his hand never leaving the man’s flabby throat.
‘No, leave him, leave him.’ the young girl cried.
‘Hey what going on?’ his even fatter wife cried, as she waddled through.
‘Shut up!’ Tom barked at her, then turned back to fat man.
‘Listen, you piece of shit, you’re lucky I’m not suing you for the damage your brats have done to my car.’
The fat man didn’t say anything, he wouldn’t dare, the fear shone clearly in his bolting eyes, and his heavy breathing.
‘I’m sick of scummy parents like you who probably live on benefits and breed like rats. It’s always someone else’s fault with you lazy deadbeats isn’t it?’
Geoff and Charlie swapped uneasy glances.
‘Sort yourselves out,’ Tom growled thrusting his hand against the fat man’s throat. ‘And sort those brats out too. Don’t make me come back and have to do it for you. And don’t think about phoning the police, or I will be visiting you again. Got it?’
The fat man tried to nod through Tom’s tight grip. Tom released him and stood up. He turned and nodded to Geoff and Charlie lets go. Behind them the fat man tried to climb back to his feet with the aid of his children and his cursing wife. He looked like a beach turtle turned upside down.
Back in the car as they drove off, Charlie began to snigger.
‘Certainly didn’t expect all that.’
Geoff glanced out of the rear window. ‘Hope they don’t take down your car registration number.’
‘So what if they do, I’ll sue them for the damage to my car. Good job it’s only my run-around.’ He snarled. ‘Had he apologised and given the kids a good bollocking I would have left it at that. But when he tried to have a go at me, and not his brats for what they had done to my car I thought you ignorant git. So I kicked off.’
‘One more down, another twenty thousand or so to go before we clear up this town. Boom, boom.’
‘Boom bloody boom,’ Geoff concluded, looking forward to a couple of well-earned lagers waiting for him back home.
CHAPTER 5
Will stopped by the Presbyterian church on Gloddaeth Street, and began walking the rest of the way down the street back to his flat, he was knackered. It was the first real jog he’d had since coming out of nick. Boiling hot, he pulled off his beanie hat, heart drumming in his chest, his throat raw from exertion, and his legs wobbling as if they had no bones in them.
It was Saturday morning, the sky was leaden grey, it was cold and uninviting, and it looked like it was going to be one of those dark gloomy days that never seem to wake up.<
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Will took out his phone, and looked for any text messages on the caller display window. This time it wasn’t Stacey he was thinking about, but his mate Geoff. Will wanted to know how everything went last night, and thought he should have heard something by now. As he reached the Tribells chip shop on the corner, he searched for Geoff’s number so he could call him to find out, then paused. Perhaps ten o’clock on a Saturday morning, was too early to ring? Most people usually like to have a lie in. But burning curiosity overpowered any consideration, and he decided he would take the chance. He punched in the number and pressed the phone to his ear and that’s when he saw her.
Stacey was standing in the doorway outside his flat. For a second Will almost forgot about the call and quickly hit the quit button on his mobile. She was wearing a purple fleece jacket that covered the behind of her jeans. Her hair was raven-black, and was cut into an old-fashioned bob. Her eyes, her eyes were of the darkest brown, just as he’d remembered. And whenever she got angry they would glisten like chocolate minstrels. The first time he ever saw her he thought she wasn’t classically pretty, but plain-looking leaning towards attractive, a bit like that young sexy teacher in school all the lads had a crush on.
As Will strolled towards her, he was a bit lost for words, and judging by the look on her face, he couldn’t tell whether she was pleased to see him or not. It was the same type of look she used to give him after they had had an argument. Cold and defensive, as if he had a lot of explaining to do before she even considered speaking to him again.
Will stood at the base of the steps, and uttered the first thing that came into his head. ‘I had almost given up on you.’
Stacey’s expression remained the same. ‘So how have you been?’
‘Great!’ Will replied, climbing the steps towards her. ‘I’ve had a really wonderful three and a half years in prison, thanks.’
Stacey appeared annoyed by his sarcasm.
Will stood before her, and she glared up at him with those delicious brown eyes. ‘Wanna come in?’ he asked, digging into his tracksuit bottoms for the key, and Stacey nodded.