by Martina Cole
He was dragging the ice tray from the fridge and making a compress with a tea towel.
‘You’d better look good tonight. I promised you to Leroy McBane and you’d better be good, girl, you had better be fucking good.’
Tiffany listened to the man she had loved like a father and a brother and a lover all rolled into one, and now the effect of the crack had worn off she was seeing her life and what it had become with stunning clarity.
Her eye was burning with pain and her daughter was still screaming in fright. But she didn’t go to the child. She knew better than to antagonise the man before her when he was like this.
The only consolation she had was that he had called her little flat home. Only now he had finally said the magic word she wasn’t sure she wanted to hear it.
‘It’s broken, Miss Halter.’
‘I guessed that much meself.’
As the nurse set about patching her face up Carole relaxed against the pillow and tried to get comfortable.
Patrick Connor was not an enemy she wanted or needed, but she knew he wouldn’t forgive her for many a long day. She sighed and her whole body shuddered. If Tiffany told him why they had argued she would be in for another hiding, a real one this time.
She closed her eyes once more in distress.
When the nurse had finished Carole made her way to the canteen and ordered a cup of sweet tea. As she sat down to drink it she noticed Karen Black at another table. She watched Karen who was sitting with a large dark-haired woman, possibly her sister, and talking animatedly.
They were obviously up to something.
Another woman joined the table. She was dressed in the distinctive pink overalls of the hospital cleaning squad.
Marie was in this hospital and Carole knew she was witnessing the planning of another attack.
Leaving her tea, she made her way to reception and got Marie’s ward and room number. As she walked up the stairs she felt an overwhelming tiredness assail her but carried on to Marie’s room regardless. She saw the two plainclothes officers and slipped into the day room to keep an eye out for their departure. Whatever she had said about Marie in the past, she was out and she was hurt. Also, Carole might need her old friend’s help at some point now she was in the shit with Patrick and probably with Tiffany as well.
When the coast was clear she walked towards the side room. Her face was screaming and her eyes nearly shut. She should be at home in bed. But that could wait. She was a streetwalker. Pain was something she had learned to suppress many years before.
Trying to smile so as not to frighten the woman in the bed she walked sedately into Marie’s room.
Chapter Seven
Louise tidied up the lounge and as usual cleaned the glass on all her son’s photographs with a soft cloth. Each one was duly polished and gazed at, tears never far from her eyes.
Kevin watched her silently as she performed the ritual. Years ago the sight of her as she was now, looking vulnerable and sad, had broken his heart. Nowadays, it irritated him. Marshall was dead, they had two daughters living. One she tolerated, and that was the only word he could use about her relationship with Lucy, and the other daughter might as well be dead as far as her mother was concerned. In fact sometimes he thought it would have been better for all concerned if Marie had died.
Turning reproachful eyes towards him his wife said sadly, ‘I miss him so much, Kev. I still expect to hear his cheery voice in the morning. See his little face smiling at me. Sometimes it all seems too much to bear.’
She didn’t expect an answer, she had said the same thing twice a day since the boy died.
‘You have a grandson, another boy. Maybe you should have taken him in.’
Kevin walked into the kitchen and his wife followed him angrily.
‘Who the fuck’s rattled your cage?’
She was upset and for a few seconds he was contrite. Then he took a deep breath.
‘No one has rattled my cage, Lou, you just aggravate me at times talking about Marshall. You make him out to be a saint and he wasn’t, love. He wasn’t.’
Louise looked at him as if he was a complete stranger she had encountered in her kitchen. Her eyes were screwed up with hurt.
‘He was the best of the bunch. He could have been anything he wanted. And he wanted the best, for me and for him.’
Her words were uttered with a vehemence that startled her husband. They also annoyed him.
‘He wanted the best for you? Like I didn’t, is that what you’re saying? He would have provided you with whatever you wanted, is that it? I AM JUST THE USELESS PONCE WHO PAYS THE BILLS AND PUTS THE FOOD ON THE TABLE! But Saint bloody Marshall would have given you greater riches and made you proud, is that what this is all about? Is that why you had no time for your two girls, eh? They weren’t going to give you any reflected glory, were they? You make me sick.’
Louise picked up the canister that held the tea bags, and as she lifted it high he cried, ‘Don’t even think about it, Lou. I will slap you till your ears ring if you throw that fucking thing and I take oath on that. I hate this bloody house. Sitting in the front room is like sitting in a mausoleum - that boy’s face everywhere you look. No photos of the girls, though, eh, or your grandchildren. Only him, Saint Marshall. Well, you’d better listen to me and listen good. I am sick of hearing about him.’
‘You was always jealous of him. All of you were. That boy was everything to me and you all knew it. Well, I am keeping his memory alive whether you like it or not. He is with me every moment of the day. I think about him as soon as I open my eyes in the morning . . .’
‘This marriage would be a lot better if you opened your fucking legs every morning.’
Louise started to laugh then, a painful sound in the quiet of the house.
‘Oh, so that’s what this is all about really. Well, mister, you have no chance now. I’ve put up with you pawing me for years. Not any more. You disgust me, at our age and all. We should be winding down now . . .’
He bellowed in her face, ‘We should have our fucking grandchildren round us, we should have a happy family, we should have had a lot of things except you stopped all that as usual. It’s all what you fucking want. Well, I want things as well.’ He stabbed himself in the chest with his thumb. ‘Companionship for a start. Friendship. A bit of fun and me leg over now and again. What about me, Lou, eh? What about me?’
She stared into his anguished face. Inside her head a little voice was telling her to tread warily. Build a few bridges. But her natural antagonism cancelled the voices out.
‘Fuck you, Kev. Fuck you and what you want. I want Marshall back, and that’s all I want. I don’t want any of you, do you hear me? Not you, not Lucy, and especially not Marie or the fucking animals she bred. So now you know, don’t you, eh? Now you fucking well know.’
It had gone too far and they both knew it.
Kevin’s voice was quiet when he next spoke.
‘I know all right, Lou. Now I know.’
He turned and walked from the house, leaving his wife alone in the kitchen in a crashing silence broken only by her sobs.
Marie looked at Carole for long moments before she spoke.
‘I didn’t recognise you for a second.’
Carole tried to grin but failed.
‘I could say the same about you, love!’ She settled herself into a chair by the bed. ‘How you feeling, Marie?’
‘How do you think? What happened to your boat then?’
Marie knew her old pal wanted something or was after some kind of information and she was naturally wary.
Carole sat in the chair looking defeated. It was all in her body language. Her shoulders slumped, her battered face drooped. One half of her wanted to tell Marie about the Blacks and what they were planning, but she suddenly wanted revenge. Revenge against Pat for what he had done. Against Tiffany for what she had said. But she dressed it up in her mind as wanting to help her friend, wanting Marie to know what was happening to her daughter
and grandchild. She was a good person, she was trying to help. In less than eight seconds she had decided to act the concerned friend to both this woman and her daughter. She could tell her the other news about the Blacks if Marie didn’t look like she was going to do anything. Save it for last.
‘Patrick did it. He smashed me one because I slapped Tiffany.’
Marie pulled herself up on to her elbows and said loudly, ‘I beg your pardon?’
‘I slapped your Tiff. Honestly, Marie, that is one fucker of a girl . . .’
Marie interrupted her.
‘What has Patrick got to do with her? How is he involved with her?’
Carole could see the fear in Marie’s eyes and wished now she had not been the bearer of such bad news. But she persevered.
‘He has her on the bash. You know what he’s like.’
Marie slumped back into the bed. Her blackened eyes felt hot with the dryness anger can bring.
Slowly and painfully Carole explained the situation. As Marie listened, the new world that had never felt stable crumbled even further about her ears.
‘And you knew this? You knew this when I came to your flat after my release? You knew and you didn’t tell me . . . is that what you’re saying?’
Carole nodded.
‘My God, Carole, you are one piece of shit! My own mate. What else do you know that you haven’t told me, eh?’
Carole couldn’t look at her.
‘How could I tell you, Marie? You know what he’s like. And her! She is more stubborn than you are. You know how he can be when he wants something, all sweetness and fucking light. She was all over him like a fucking rash. Now he’s being his usual arsehole self and she is having problems. Bad problems.’
‘The rotten bastard! How did he get to her, Carole, how did he find her? What about my Jason, is he dealing crack yet?’
Carole shook her head; she had introduced Patrick back into Tiffany’s life though she wasn’t going to admit that to Marie Carter.
‘Jason is adopted, you know that. Pat isn’t interested in him. Never liked boys, did he? Young girls was always his gig.’
‘My poor little Tiff . . .’
‘Don’t know about the “poor little” bit, Marie. She is a cow. She’s on crack, Tiffany is. Out of her fucking box on it most days. Little Anastasia was everything to her, still is, but we both know once the old Persians kick in that will all go out the window. Fucking drugs, what’s wrong with a good old-fashioned drink?’
Marie listened to her old friend and her mind was screaming at her. She had listened to women in prison talking about daughters in other prisons, about how they were living their mothers’ lives all over again. Even Carole Halter had one daughter who was living her life; she was in prison and had kids in care. Now it was happening to Marie’s Tiff. Her little Tiffany who she’d thought wanted nothing to do with her because she was having a good life. Was living a clean life. Now all Marie’s nightmares were reality and she had to try and do something about them. She pulled herself painfully from the bed.
‘What you doing?’ Carole’s voice was high.
‘What’s it look like?’ Marie said. ‘I’m discharging meself. I need to see her and you had better tell me everything you know, Cal, or I’ll brain you and I mean that, OK?’
Carole nodded.
She knew better than to argue with Marie. Look what had happened when her other friends had argued with her. That fact was never far from Carole’s mind.
She would edit out her own part in Tiffany’s downfall, put all the blame on Patrick. Let him deal with her because one thing she knew, everyone was wary of Marie. Even Karen Black had only dared take her mob-handed, though by the looks of Marie’s face she had done a good job. Let Marie sort out Pat Connor. Let her give him what he needed.
Carole Halter hoped that Marie killed him. Someone was going to do it one day and, unlike Marie, she herself didn’t have the guts.
Fifteen minutes later they were in a taxi and Carole was sweating with fear. Patrick would eat her face and smile while he did it if he found out what she’d done. And what would Tiffany’s reaction be to her mother turning up unannounced on her doorstep?
Lucy was at work. As she sipped coffee during a break, she saw her father storming through the workshop. Being a paper factory it was large and noisy; they made everything from Hoover bags to large industrial rolls of paper. She assumed her father was looking for her and left the glass-walled Portakabin used for breaks with her coffee mug still in her hands.
As she walked towards him she saw him stop and look around as if searching for someone, and suddenly she knew exactly what was going to happen.
She dropped her mug and rushed through the machines to where she knew Karen Black was working. She was too late. She saw her father dragging the woman from the building by her hair. The fear in Lucy’s chest was so great she lost the power to breathe and had to concentrate on expelling air from her lungs.
She felt faint with fright.
What the hell was he doing?
Didn’t he realise the Blacks were a force unto themselves? A family so feared even the police visited them in groups of four? Karen would take her by the throat and throttle her for this.
As she burst out into the cold air she saw Karen Black take a swing at her father, but he blocked it easily. Then, dragging the struggling woman, he threw her unceremoniously on to the ground.
‘You ever touch me or mine again, Black, and I will kill you. Marie won’t be in it when I get through. Do you understand what I’m saying?’
Karen seemed to understand that he was over the edge. She nodded, barely moving her head. Kevin’s eyes were manic, his whole face screwed up with hatred. For the first time in her life she was on the receiving end of violence. Like most bullies she was basically a coward. She picked on the weak, or made sure she had a crowd with her. Now she was alone, as most of her victims had been, and she was terrified.
Kevin kicked her three times in the back and stomach.
‘I should have brought a wrench with me, I understand from my daughter they do a much better job. You tell your brothers to look out because they will be seeing me, OK? They will be seeing me sooner than you think.’
With that he walked away, or ambled would be a better description because he wasn’t even breathing heavily after all his exertions.
Kevin slid his hands into his pockets and strolled out of the car park without a care in the world. He felt his manhood returning. He felt for the first time in years that he was taking control again, of his life and his children’s.
People who had witnessed the attack were standing quietly by the entrance. No one said a word. The shop steward went back to his office. He had no intention of getting involved in all that. Black was an accident waiting to happen and like most of her workmates he had enjoyed seeing her get for once what she had dished out so often.
Karen Black pulled herself painfully to her feet. The fat had cushioned the blows to her body but it would be a long time before she could cope with the blow to her self-esteem. She was humiliated and it showed. A large chunk of her hair had been pulled out and was hanging on the shoulders of the tracksuit she always wore to work. It was a reminder of what had happened to her and as she saw it blowing in the wind she felt the tears begin. In front of everyone she cried, and walked past Lucy without a word.
Pat had gone and Tiffany was giving her daughter a boiled egg when she heard the doorbell. She picked Anastasia up and went to answer it.
Emotionally she was still fragile. It had been a fraught few hours. When she saw her mother on the doorstep it was like a hallucination. This scruffy battered woman was like something from her worst nightmares. For a few moments she thought it was a side effect of the crack. But this woman was real, she was flesh and blood. She was Tiffany’s flesh and blood.
The girl’s eyes bored into Carole Halter’s. The other woman was standing nervously behind Marie.
‘You rotten bitch . . .’
Marie walked into the flat and shut the door quietly behind her. She saw the conflicting emotions on her daughter’s face, resisted the urge to take her too into her arms and embrace her. She saw the shock turn to pain and felt a physical ache in her own heart at the sight. The little girl she had pictured all these years was a woman, a grown woman, with the same fears and the same problems she had encountered herself.
Tiffany stared at her mother and in her head registered the recent bruises, the pain reflected in her shadowed eyes, and the slim supple body that was at odds with the woman she remembered.
How many times had she cried out for her over the years? Cries that were useless because her mother was incarcerated, gone from her when she most needed her. Now Marie was standing as bold as brass in her hallway, bringing the stench of prison and memories of old loneliness with her.
‘Hello, Tiff.’
It was the sound of her mother’s voice that undid her. That deep husky voice she remembered making her laugh and also telling her to get lost. The voice that she’d conjured up at night in the home, wishing her mother would come and get her. The voice she had longed for yet hated all her life.
‘Long time no see, eh?’
Marie felt such a rush of emotion at the sight of her daughter she nearly forgot why she was there. She saw that hair, the soft blonde hair she had loved, the doe eyes and the skinny woman’s body that belied a little girl in disguise.
‘Get out, Mum. You ain’t welcome here.’
Marie laughed gently.
‘I ain’t welcome anywhere, sweetie, but it never stopped me going somewhere if I really wanted to, did it?’
The words were softly spoken but hid a threat and they all knew it. Marie was not going anywhere. Not yet. She was using the fear that had been her only weapon all those years before and the knowledge was painful to her.
She walked through to the kitchen and looked around her. She knew from Carole that the place was usually spotlessly clean. Today it had the grimy look of a drughead’s place. Once drugs took hold it was all you thought about, all you wanted. Your priorities changed. She knew that better than anyone.