by Trevor Hoyle
Some of the lads were there: Crabby, Arthur, Fester and Shortarse. Kenny ignored them and sat in the corner farthest away from the long curving bar with the leatherette trim which took up all of one wall. Janice sipped her half of mild and watched the girls on the small scarred dance-floor, accustomed now to Kenny’s moods and wise in the ways of dealing with them; he would come round sooner or later, and even if he didn’t, anything she might say would only make matters worse.
‘How’s your mam?’ Kenny said after ten minutes of brooding silence.
‘All right. She’s gone away for the weekend.’
‘Oh aye.’ He lifted his pint and the liquid was almost sucked out of the glass. ‘She’s all right, your mam,’ he said, testing her.
‘Yeh,’ Janice said non-commitally.
‘Where’s she gone?’
‘Blackpool.’
‘At this time of year?’
‘She has a friend there.’
‘Oh aye,’ Kenny said.
The group came on and all further conversation was curtailed to shouted observations and monosyllabic remarks. The group went through their limited repertoire of outdated top thirty hits and rock n’ roll standards; Janice wanted to dance but as she knew Kenny wouldn’t, had to be content to sit and listen, tapping her foot and moving her little round bottom on the seat. When he went to the bar to get more drinks Kenny was approached by Fester, who laid a fat square hand on his shoulder.
‘Crabby says Skush got the chop.’
‘Yeh.’ Kenny watched him from beneath heavy eyelids and then shifted his gaze, like somebody ill-at-ease who awkwardly transfers weight from one foot to another. He said, ‘Did Andy tell you?’
‘He told Crabby.’
‘He was stoned. We tried to get him away but the law arrived. There must have been ten of them.’
‘Did he have any stuff on him?’
‘Pockets full of it.’
‘Fuckinell,’ Fester said. ‘Will he grass?’
The word sent a thrill through Kenny. He suddenly felt bigger and tougher and more dangerous, and life expanded within him: after all it was possession of drugs – a criminal offence – and the law was involved. ‘Skush isn’t a nark,’ he said, matching Fester’s word with one of his own.
‘They’re bastards though; they could trick him into telling them your name and Andy’s. You want to get an alibi or get away for a bit.’
‘Yeh,’ Kenny said thoughtfully. He was thrilled at the idea, but at the same time felt a slight unease. And yet he wasn’t afraid, not truly afraid: the real and actual possibility of being picked up by the police was something that happened to other people, like getting cancer, or being run over by a bus. They might get Skush, they might get Andy, but they’d never get him.
‘Hello stranger,’ a girl’s voice said, and it was Eileen from Woolworth’s.
‘What are you doing in a duff place like this?’ Kenny asked.
‘Same as you.’
She still had the blatant, unabashed stare that both discomfited and excited him. A picture flashed instantaneously through his mind of her lying back with her legs open, inviting him to have it away. She would be that kind of girl: straight in, first time, no messing. He remembered a girl (but not her name) who had invited him into her house during the school holidays and they had lain on her mother’s cerise eiderdown and it had taken what seemed like hours to unfasten her bra, finally, at long last, revealing little pink rosebud nipples which he hadn’t known what to do with and could only gaze at in dumbstruck awe. It was the first time he had been overcome by such intense sexual excitement, and Eileen evoked the same response – he couldn’t get his breath properly and was shaken by an almost uncontrollable desire to reach out in the crowded pub and grab her breasts.
‘On your own?’ Eileen said, moving in next to him. (Fester had raised his eyebrows, pursed his lips, and gone.)
‘No, I’ve got a bird with me.’
‘Regular girlfriend eh?’
‘Not really.’ Kenny let his eyelids droop. ‘She hangs around a bit. What can you do?’ They looked into each other’s eyes. ‘How’s Woolies these days?’
‘Same. Irwin’s always on your back. As usual.’
‘That twat. He wants fucking strangling, that cunt.’
‘Yeh. He’s a right cunt,’ Eileen said deliberately, her eyes locked on his. Kenny’s hands were perspiring. Why had he never got to grips with it when he had a chance? He knew she would go like a rattlesnake and here it was staring him in the face and he couldn’t do a thing about it. Apart from kicking Janice into touch.
‘Do you fancy a trip to Luton?’ he said straight out of the blue. Eileen’s mouth curved in a small mocking smile. Kenny lowered his voice as though somebody might be eavesdropping. ‘They’re playing the Dale in a couple of weeks and I’m going down on the coach. Fancy it?’
‘Yeh,’ Eileen said. ‘Why not?’
‘I’ll see you in Woolies,’ Kenny said. ‘I’ll come in one afternoon and fix it up.’
‘Yeh.’ She was still watching him as he turned to go; Kenny was unnerved. He got back to the table with the drinks and when he looked up she was smiling at him over her shoulder.
‘Who’s that?’
‘Who?’
‘That girl.’
‘Who wants to know?’
‘I only asked who she was,’ Janice said plaintively.
‘Somebody I used to work with.’
‘Have you ever taken her out?’
‘What?’ Kenny said. ‘No.’ And then remembering himself, ‘What’s it to you? What if I have? So what?’ He was thrusting his face near hers, wanting to hurt her, to make her cry. He gripped the flesh of her forearm between his bitten fingers and pressed it as hard as he could till all the blood had gone, leaving an area of tiny blue bruise-marks. When she cried out he thumped her on the muscle of the upper arm and kept repeating, ‘Shut up. Shut up.’
Even when they got outside and were walking towards the chip shop on the main road there was too much violent energy in him that had yet to be dissipated. They walked apart, Kenny scuffing his boots on the pavement and Janice desolate and in tears. She loved him and was afraid of him: she couldn’t understand what drove him. Why did he want to hurt her? What was so wrong with the world that he had to inflict pain on other people – like a spiteful, obstinate child that must smash and destroy everything around it?
Inside the fluorescent brightness and greasy warmth of the chip shop they stood in line, not touching, and waited their turn at the high stainless steel counter. The man was scooping sizzling brown fish out of the hot fat. Kenny didn’t even bother to ask Janice what she wanted; she noticed that he couldn’t take his eyes off a boy in front of them in the queue – a young man, rather, in a midnight-blue velvet suit with flared trousers. His hands were white and nicely-kept, with long tapering fingers, and his hair had obviously been washed, trimmed and blow-waved at one of those boutique-type hairdressers, probably in Manchester. At the kerb was a lowslung sports job – a Lotus – and the blonde hair of a girl splayed over the back of the leather seat.
As he was going out with his order Kenny sniggered down his nose and the young man half-turned and went on. Janice was prepared for something to happen but nothing did. She prayed that the car would drive away: the mood Kenny was in, the venom spurting inside him, could lead only to damage, either to property or people.
The car was still there when they came out. Janice tried to stay close to him, clutching his arm, but he shook her off. He stood in the middle of the pavement, his eyes hooded, eating fish and chips, and said in a loud voice: ‘Hey, Jan. What kind of a ponce would buy a shit-heap of a car like this?’
As expected, there was no response. Kenny continued to watch the young man through the windscreen. The blonde girl was saying something to him, and, although they couldn’t hear her, obviously in a low voice.
‘It must be a ponce,’ Kenny said loudly to Janice. ‘A fairy. Look how shiny it is. I b
et he polishes it a lot. Or gets his mummy to do it for him.’
The young man wanted to drive away; the girl was begging him to drive away; but for that reason he couldn’t. Kenny tossed a greasy chip on to the shiny bonnet. Janice shrank away into the shadow. The car door opened and the young man got out.
‘Watch what you’re doing,’ he said.
Kenny stopped eating. His jaw went stiff. ‘Are you talking to me?’ he said.
‘Just watch the car, that’s all.’
‘Or what?’ And when the young man didn’t answer, ‘Or what will you do?’
It was coming, it was coming, Janice could see it happening in front of her eyes. The badness was spilling out of him, it had to be released. If the young man didn’t get in the car now it would be too late. She saw Kenny’s hands with the tattooed knuckles wadding the newspaper into a tight greasy ball: she could almost sense the nervous energy vibrating in his arms: he had to take his spite and hate and frustration out on somebody.
‘I don’t want to argue with you, friend,’ the young man said. He still had one foot inside the car; he was that uncertain; and the girl was pleading with him to drive away.
Kenny said slowly, ‘I’m not your fucking friend.’ He threw the ball of newspaper on to the bonnet and stood with his arms hanging straight down at his sides. For the first time that evening, Janice realised, he was enjoying himself. His fingers were actually twitching with suppressed eagerness. A fist in the face and a boot in the bollocks were his idea of how to end a good night out.
‘Kenny…’ Janice said, but – as she knew he would – Kenny ignored her. And then the small miracle she had hoped for, and given up hope, happened. The young man got into the car and drove off. Kenny ran into the road and kicked at the rear bumper but missed.
All the way home on the bus he was distracted and fretful. She tried to cheer him up. ‘Me mum’s away. I’ve got the key. We’ve got the flat to ourselves. You can stay the night.’
‘Great,’ Kenny said without enthusiasm. He wiped the window with his sleeve and stopped in mid-motion. He looked at her. ‘You’re all electric in the flats, aren’t you?’ he said. Janice nodded. ‘And have they all got meters?’
AWAY
LUTON IS 163 MILES FROM ROCHDALE WHICH MEANS THAT the coach has to leave the town-centre by eleven o’clock at the latest. The day is wet and miserable, with the coach whipping up a funnel of spray in its wake as it heads south down the M6. In the front seats sit the staunch, respectable, middle-aged supporters who follow Rochdale’s ailing progress in the Third Division out of a kind of stoic self-denial: they feel themselves to be martyrs whose redemption will come through sacrifice to a lost cause. In the back sit the rowdies. They see the country as divided into battle-lines – a number of isolated feudal kingdoms constantly at war with one another which send out rival bands of marauders to plunder and pillage and spread alarm amongst the citizenry. They are the spearhead of attack, infiltrating behind enemy lines, with memories of past victories to sustain them and the promise of fresh glories to come. Their scarves flap damply out of the windows and empty beer cans roll about under the seats.
Eileen sits in the corner window seat next to Kenny; the bumpy coach ride is making him randy and once or twice he has clumsily attempted to put his hand on her knee but Eileen has rebuffed him with an ease that is almost patronising. She seems to possess a vast amount of knowledge about life which unsettles Kenny and somehow makes him feel inadequate. Janice he can handle – no problem – and the lads don’t worry him either (with them it’s a matter of bluff and double-bluff, beating them down with a word, a look, a gesture) but with Eileen he gets the impression that she can see right through him and has the uncomfortable feeling that she might even be laughing at him. She has what he considers to be a very sexy mouth: her teeth are large and protrude slightly, making her lips permanently moist and available. Her flat open stare takes everything in, cool, withdrawn and yet watchful, as if the world passing before her eyes contains nothing that would surprise or alarm her. She has it all weighed up, Kenny decides, and he doesn’t know whether he likes it.
‘What about your girlfriend?’
‘Who says she’s my girlfriend?’ Kenny says predictably. He will never admit to anything, especially the truth.
‘You were with her that night.’
‘Yeh. Well…’ he shrugs unconvincingly, ‘…she’s just a bird, that’s all.’ And then adds mysteriously: ‘She was useful to me.’
Eileen turns away from the window to look at him. Spray fans out like steam and the tyres make a sucking noise on the tarmac. ‘How do you mean?’
‘We pulled a job together,’ Kenny says, feeling the need to impress her, show her that he can play the game as well as anybody. At the same time he’s alarmed at his own rashness; if you talk too much you never know where it might lead …
‘You mean you stole something?’
‘Yeh, sort of.’ He has to go on now that he’s gone this far, and tells her the story of the break-in: four meters in one night: clean away without a smell of the law.
Eileen is impressed. He has her full undivided attention.
‘It’s better than working,’ Kenny boasts.
‘How much did you get?’
‘A few dabs.’
‘How much though?’
‘Seventeen quid.’
‘Seventy?’
‘Seventeen.’
‘Out of four meters?’
‘We’d have got more,’ Kenny says quickly, ‘only they’d just been emptied. Still, it was better than nowt.’
‘Didn’t the police ask any questions?’
‘The cops,’ Kenny says as though she’d made a small joke. ‘Yeh, they asked Janice and her mother but her mother was away for the weekend and Janice said the place must have been broken into Sunday afternoon because everything was all right till then.’
‘I thought you said Friday night.’
‘We did the meters on Friday night,’ Kenny says, lowering his voice, ‘but Jan told the police it was Sunday because that’s when the new lodger was due to arrive. What we did was to break in the other three flats – except his – so they’d think it was him. We opened his door with the key and just did the meter. On the others we broke the locks as well.’
Eileen thinks this out and says admiringly, ‘You planned it all.’
‘Yeh, course I did,’ Kenny says, lighting a cigarette and sinking back in the seat.
‘They suspected the lodger instead of you.’
‘Right.’
‘So they got him instead.’
‘No,’ Kenny says. ‘He never showed up. He’s still in Shrewsbury.’
• • •
After the match – which the visiting team lose 2-1 – Kenny and some of the Rochdale supporters go on a tiny rampage through the streets of Luton. It has to be tiny: there are only eight of them, Eileen and another girl included. At one point they are chased by a dozen-or-so Luton supporters and lose their way, and by the time they get back to the ground the car park is deserted: the coach has gone. It is dark and cold, although the rain has stopped.
Kenny, unblooded so far that day, leads the way to the nearest pub and they sit among the early drinkers feeding themselves with crisps, cheese snacks and cold meat pies. One of the lads says, ‘What are we going to do now?’
‘No use moaning,’ Kenny says. ‘We’ve missed it and that’s that.’
‘I’m not moaning; I’m just saying what are we going to do now? We’ve nowhere to kip.’
‘For Christ’s sake stop worrying. You get on my bleeding nerves.’
‘I’m not worrying. I just said—’
‘All right. Forget it.’
‘How are we going to get back?’ Eileen says. She asks the question out of interest, not in the least anxious or perturbed, and Kenny admires her for it.
‘Thumb it.’
‘Tonight?’
‘No, tomorrow.’
‘But what about ton
ight?’
‘We’ll be all right,’ Kenny says, holding her eyes with his own. She meets his look openly, on equal terms, without a trace of archness. He wonders what it is going to be like when his mouth is pressing against her open wet lips, his tongue working away behind her protruding teeth – anticipating the experience with a kind of scared lust.
Fortunately, between the eight of them, there is enough money to buy beer for the evening and by eight-thirty they are all merry and slightly bored. They are in a strange town, among people who speak with an unfamiliar accent, and the possibilities are endless: it is simply a matter of deciding on a course of action which promises the most thrills. Even roaming the streets is exhilarating because every corner brings a new and unexpected landscape; everything is so different from their northern industrial experience that the air itself seems charged with mystery and danger.
They try several pubs, working their way towards the centre of town. Kenny can’t get used to the beer, which seems thick and dark and slightly sweet-tasting: northern beer is lighter with a sharper edge to it. He walks with his arm around Eileen’s waist and hers around his, now and then catching a passing whiff of her smell whose strangeness and unfamiliarity makes him conscious that beneath her clothes is an unknown body, with its dark recesses and secret places.
‘I hope they don’t catch you,’ Eileen says.
‘Who’s that?’
‘The police.’
He gives her a sidelong glance. ‘Do you reckon they will?’
‘I don’t know,’ Eileen says. ‘Anyway, you can always say you were with me.’
This is one of the nicest things anyone has ever said to Kenny. That – and the beer – fills his stomach with a rosy warmth. He hugs her to him as they walk along and then says in a low voice so the others can’t hear, ‘I fancied you a lot when I worked at Woolies.’
‘You never said owt.’
‘We don’t where I come from.’
‘I fancied you,’ Eileen says after a slight pause.
This is Kenny’s cue to slip his hand inside her coat and squeeze her breast. She makes a sound, a moan that is almost inaudible, which thrills Kenny down to his boots. He feels the tug of a gathering erection.