by Ruth Jacobs
Reluctantly, she took out her purse and handed over the cash: five immaculately presented piles of twenty-pound notes, each totalling one-hundred pounds, the Queen’s head sideways on the note acting as the clip over the others which were flat with the Queen’s head upright.
As Len tucked the money into an inside pocket of his jacket, Shelley discreetly read the indigo letters across his knuckles. One set of four fingers spelled ‘L-U-C-K’, and the other, ‘F-A-T-E’.
“Laters,” he called out, slamming the front door behind him. The bang startled Shelley and as she flinched, she singed her hair with the flame from her Clipper lighter.
Smoking a cigarette, she paced the dual aspect room from the bay windows at the front to the patio doors at the back. She thought it strange that he hadn’t counted the money in front of her before he left – checking the cash in the presence of the buyer was protocol.
After ten minutes, she tried to convince the board that he might’ve got chatting to his friend. Another ten minutes passed and the board had convinced her that he’d run off with the money.
From her handbag, she took out her mobile and called Len. His phone went straight to voicemail a dozen or so times. So, she called the man responsible for making the introduction – her most unpunctual, skunk-smoking, slow-talking dealer – Ajay.
“He’s a business associate. I don’t know where you’ll find him,” he told Shelley.
“This is your fault. You have to get my money back.”
“This is your beef, not mine. I was doing you a favour, man, init?”
“Losing me five-hundred pounds is not doing me a fucking favour.” Shelley kicked the armchair. Several orange and green morsels fell off and landed on her trainers.
“Don’t be shouting at me now. You need to mellow, Shello, man.”
“I won’t be fucking mellow ’til I’ve got my motherfucking money back.”
Ajay didn’t reply. She looked at her phone. There was no call. He’d hung up.
***
Thirty minutes had passed and still Len hadn’t returned. She told herself another half-hour then she’d have to leave, go to a cashpoint and score in Camden.
Wandering through the house, she looked for money she could take to make up for the cash that had been taken from her. Her ransacking of the place was barely noticeable as every room looked like it had already been burgled.
In an upstairs bedroom, she emptied the contents of a rickety chest of drawers onto the floor. From the heap of dirty clothes, men’s toiletries and scraps of paper, a box of two-hundred cigarettes emerged. At least they were Benson and Hedges. But five-hundred pounds for a box of two-hundred Bensons was hardly a good deal.
Continuing her search, she crawled under the double bed. As she shoved around and hurled the lids from the shoeboxes that lay there, the dust caused her to sneeze. It caught in her throat and she choked. In one of the shoeboxes, she found a pair of Nike trainers. Although they had no value to her, she imagined the thief wouldn’t be happy if they went missing.
When she stood up, she brushed the dust from her jeans and sweatshirt, and shook out her hair. She flung open the wardrobe and flicked through the hangers of clothes. The only item she could find worth taking was a pair of new-looking Levi 501s. Again, of no use to her – they weren’t her size – but at least the crook would miss them.
Having searched the other three bedrooms and found nothing worth taking, she returned to the room with the men’s toiletries and clothes. She was certain it was Len’s room.
The mattress was soiled with a variety of stains. Some were recognisable as blood, and the rest, quite possibly urine, faeces and food. She wrapped the long sleeves of her sweatshirt over her hands. She took a deep breath and held it while raising one side of the double mattress and flipping it over. The mattress banged against the windowsill as it landed upright on the floor, wedged between the sill and the wooden bed frame.
There was nothing to be seen on the slatted bed frame except for more stains and dust. The dust revisited her throat. She gasped for breath. Coughing and spluttering, she staggered around the bed frame towards the mattress by the window.
Trying to resist her gag reflex, she felt around the mattress for gaps. Something hard was inside but she couldn’t find an opening. She took out her keys and stabbed the corner of the mattress near where she imagined the package of drugs or money was hidden. Once she’d made an incision, she used her key to slash along the mattress. She covered her hand with her sleeve and delved into the laceration she’d created.
Her heart sunk as she gazed at the handgun she’d dropped onto the coffee-spattered carpet. Though she knew the thief would miss it, she also knew she couldn’t take it. The gun might have been used for a crime and she couldn’t have it in her possession. At the board meeting, some disputed her rationale, but she knew they’d only change their minds later if she did take it. They kept her hovering over the gun, goading her to put it in her handbag, but she didn’t.
Protecting her hand with her sleeve, she put it back where she’d found it. Then she pushed her body between the mattress and the windowsill, and lifted the bottom of the mattress to slide it back along the slats.
Before she left the room, she pulled the only poster off the wall – a picture of an alien with the sentence, ‘Take me to your dealer’. It wasn’t a sensible place to be asking that.
With the Blu-Tack from the poster in her handbag, and the cigarettes, trainers and jeans tucked under her arm, she went to the front door. The door didn’t open. Frantically, she pulled at it but it wouldn’t budge. It was locked. She rushed through to the back of the house and tried the patio doors. She was locked in.
***
Every window she tried in the downstairs and upstairs of the house was nailed shut. She needed to find another way out, but she was wary of breaking glass in case a neighbour heard and called the police.
Under the stairs, she noticed a small door, which she expected led to a basement but she hoped might also lead to an exit. She couldn’t remember seeing a garage or a lower level to the house when she arrived, but she had been inattentive with her mind focused on scoring.
She tried the small, gold handle but the door was stuck. Using all her strength, she yanked it towards her. Putrid air rushed out to greet her. Despite retching, she climbed down the narrow staircase and entered the dark room. She felt her way to a light switch. A single bulb lit up the damp cellar. It was completely bricked in.
She sprinted back up the creaking stairs and rushed out the cellar door straight across into the pestiferous kitchen. The slimy vinyl caused her to skid and she fell. Pushing herself up from the floor, she felt the stickiness on her hands. While the taps ran, she searched for something to clean them with. Soap or washing up liquid would have been ideal but she couldn’t find anything, not one bottle of detergent. In the absence of a cleaning agent, she rinsed her hands under the hot tap, wincing as the water scorched them.
Having dried her hands on her sweatshirt, she pulled open all the kitchen drawers until she found the cutlery. She took a knife, a fork and a spoon and returned to the front door. She tried with each utensil to use them as a lever to open the door, but the cutlery didn’t work. The gap between the door and the frame was too narrow and too short to get leverage.
Deflated, she tramped through to the patio doors at the rear of the lounge where she tried with the cutlery. First she used the knife but, as that had been misshaped during her attempt at the front door, it didn’t work.
Before she went to get another, she tried with the fork, pushing it in the gap where the two glass-panelled doors met. The fork was too curved to fit right through, although she noticed the doors moved slightly when she jiggled it. There was no point in trying the spoon; the fork was too curved, and she could tell that the handle of the spoon would be too fat.
Back in the kitchen, she rummaged for a long-bladed knife. In a drawer housing an abundant supply of every imaginable kitchen utensil, she fou
nd three. She took her finds into the lounge and laid the blades on the grimy carpet by the back doors.
The first knife she managed to get right through the gap, but it wasn’t strong enough to pull the doors apart. She put another knife farther down, below the lock that held the doors together. That knife also went right through the gap.
For about five minutes, she twisted and pulled on the knives, causing the doors to rattle as they jarred back and forth. The lock was still holding the doors together but the gap between the doors was increasing with each pull. She moved the knives closer to the lock: one just above and the other just below. With all her strength, she pulled with the knives angled in opposing directions. The doors opened inwards. With her handbag over her shoulder, she picked up the swag and walked into the garden.
She looked around for a way out but the garden was fenced in. There were no side exits. Of course, it was a terraced house, she remembered. She stepped up on the low wall that bordered the patio and looked over the fences on either side. All she could see were rows of more fences.
She ran to the rear of the garden to see if there was a way out of the back. There was nothing to stand on that allowed her to see over the fence, unless she climbed a tree. She was not in the mood for tree climbing. The only thing she wanted to do was get out and get her drugs.
Heading back towards the patio, she heard voices from the garden next door. She approached the fence and pulled herself up, clinging to the rough wood with her hands.
“Excuse me, please,” she said, with her head peeping over the fence. “My boyfriend’s locked me in by accident. Would you be able to help me get out, please?”
“Oh, you poor thing,” said a grey-haired lady from next door.
Shelley began to cry.
“Don’t worry, sweetheart. My husband’s gone to get the ladders. We’ll have you out in no time.”
Shelley jumped down and examined her hands for splinters. Within a few seconds, a ladder was being passed over the top of the fence.
“Thank you so much,” Shelley said, reaching up and taking the silver ladder. She opened it and set it on the grass, next to the fence. As she stood on the platform at the top – about six-feet high – she stalled, unsure if she could manage the jump down into the next-door neighbour’s garden.
“Come on, love, it’s okay, I’ll catch you.” The old man from next door opened his arms in front of her.
Shelley threw over the jeans, trainers and cigarettes. She leapt in his direction and he caught her. As he steadied her to stand on the grass, she started crying again.
“You know we hear how he talks to you, sweetheart. You really shouldn’t stand for it.” The lady put her arm over Shelley’s shoulder. “There, there, it’ll be all right,” she said, patting Shelley on the back. “Come on, I’ll take you out.”
Shelley picked up the swag from the grass and followed the lady through her house. The decor reminded her of Aunt Elsie’s and part of her wanted to stop there for a cup of tea.
“Thank you ever so much.” Shelley stood on the doorstep. “You’ve been so kind. I really appreciate it.”
“That’s no bother, sweetheart.” The lady smiled. “Don’t you go back to him now. A lovely girl like you needs to set her standards, you hear me, and higher than him.”
20. Stolen Goods
Fresh works, a boulder of crack and a heap of heroin lay on the coffee table in front of Shelley. The spoon, the glass of water and the bag of citric were lined up neatly. Everything was ready for her solitary party. Jay had come through with the drugs in the end. When she’d told him what had happened to her yesterday, he’d asked for the address in Ladbroke Grove and offered to help her recover the stolen money. He’d been so concerned that when he’d delivered her medicine, he’d come in and made her a cup of tea – the cup of tea she was still drinking.
The five-hundred pounds worth of heroin and crack that Shelley now had in her possession had cost her a thousand pounds. Her savings, supposed to see her through university, were diminishing at an unsustainable rate. Her client list was shrinking, and she was working infrequently. Somehow, she’d pulled it off with the bandages and had been paid the other night. Although Resident Dicks All the Boxes seemed sympathetic about her skin condition, she wasn’t sure he’d be calling her again.
Earlier in the afternoon, Shelley had called Ajay who’d been the one responsible for the introduction to Len, the thieving connection, but Ajay told her he couldn’t get hold of him. She’d called Len countless times herself during the night, but to no avail. She was about to try again – but first, she needed a fix.
Having got her itch on, she sat back on the sofa, scratching at her face and neck. Later, as the effects lessened, she picked up her phone to call him again. This time he answered.
“I’m the girl you locked in your house, fucker. I want my money back.”
“What are you on about?” he replied. “I never locked you in. I came back and you was gone. You nicked the Blu-Tack off my poster. What the fuck did you do that for?”
“You can have it back. And your two-hundred Bensons and your five-o-ones and your Nikes when I get my motherfucking money.”
“It’s all right, love. You can keep ’em.”
“I don’t want your shit. I want my fucking money back.”
“What about what you done to my back doors? It was like sleeping out in the Antarctica in here last night.”
“It’s your own fucking fault.” Shelley leant forward to prepare her next hit on the coffee table. “I want the money or the drugs today. If you don’t sort it, someone’s gonna be paying you a visit – and believe me, they’re gonna fucking get it.”
“There’s no need to do that. I weren’t up to no skulduggery,” he said, softly. “It’s a misunderstanding, that’s all. Just gimme a few days and I’ll come up good.”
“No. Not a few days. Today.”
“I can’t do it that fast. I need a bit of time.”
Shelley could tell the conversation was going nowhere, so she put down the phone. She thought how desperate he must have been for a fix that he’d steal from someone who knew where he lived.
After a few moments, an idea came to her mind. Whether he came through with the money or the drugs, or he didn’t, it didn’t matter any more. She’d thought of a more useful way he could pay her back.
21. Sick Leave
On Sunday, when Shelley’s supply of drugs had dwindled to an unacceptable level, she got back on to Jay. She knew to allow up to a day for his arrival. Even when he said he was down the road, it could take up to twenty-four hours to get to her flat. Fascinatingly, the same journey could also take fifteen or twenty minutes, although that had only happened on a handful of occasions. She imagined how it would be if she ran her business like that. She’d have no clients. But then, there’s no client more desperate than a junky – that she knew too well.
Shelley picked up her ringing mobile. “Sick bitch is back in business,” Nicole told her.
“Do you know what’s going on? Why did the police take her?” Shelley sat upright on the sofa and popped a pinch of heroin into her spoon.
“No. She said she’d been away. I couldn’t let on that we saw her getting arrested.”
“Did she say anything about me?” Shelley sprinkled in the citric.
“She’s been calling you. She asked if you had a new number.”
“You didn’t give it to her, did you?”
“Of course I didn’t. But why don’t you want her to have it? We’re supposed to be acting normal.”
“I know but I can’t bear talking to her, keeping up the nicey-nicey act.” Shelley balanced the phone in the crook of her neck as she added water then cooked the contents of the spoon. “You told her I was on holiday?”
“Yes, everything you said. Are you coming to Final Touch with me this week?”
“Maybe next.” Shelley tried to ignore the dirt under her uneven fingernails. “How was court?” she asked.
“They’re gonna be sentenced... It’s over and I’m not gonna let those cunts in my head again.”
With Marianne back and Nicole finished with court, they could finally move on with their plan for the rapist client. They arranged to meet up later in the week, which gave Shelley time to enjoy her private party a little longer. Inconveniently, it would need to be broken up at some point though; she’d managed to drag herself out the flat on Friday for a visit with her mother, but she hadn’t seen her aunt for over three weeks.
Shelley had her fix, then lay back on the sofa. She flicked through the channels, stopping at the brawling on Jerry Springer. Watching the show, she decided her life could, in fact, be worse.
Her last hit had been too weak. Leaning forward, she dragged the wooden coffee table closer towards the sofa to cook up the next. As the quantities of heroin and crack were dangerously low, to ensure she didn’t run out before Jay arrived, she first measured doses for a twenty-four hour period. Less crack was required than heroin; although the initial high was stronger with more, the hallucinations were also increased.
Cautiously, she selected a good-looking vein on the inside of her elbow. If the weather was pleasant, she’d use her skin condition excuse for wearing long sleeves. Lying to Nicole would be hard, but she didn’t want to keep blowing the veins in her feet and the veins behind her knees required contortionism for which she couldn’t muster the energy.
She wrapped a belt around her arm and waited for the vein to bulge. When it looked ripe, she pulled the orange cap off the syringe and slipped in the needle. Drawing back, she watched her blood unite with the brown liquid in the barrel. The thrill of the needle consumed her. Gently, she pushed in the plunger and felt herself hurtling into the other dimension.
***
The buzzer sounded and Shelley roused. Slowly, she opened her eyes. The flat was bright with sunshine. She raised her partially dead arm from its dangling-off-the-sofa position and swung it up onto the coffee table to reach for her phone. A needle was hanging from the inside of her elbow. She plucked it out.