by Nicky Black
As the applause started, he turned back and clapped furiously, then whooped loudly, his hands cupped around his mouth. He looked at Nicola who sat with her fingers joined under her chin, smiling at the stage, her eyes reflecting the lights like sparklers. He’d never wanted anything more before in his life.
After the show as they stood outside, Lee was a little relieved that Nicola had to run off home so quickly. They’d stood and whispered in low voices about the operation that night. She was scared: he was like a greyhound in the trap. She’d left feeling reassured, but her stomach turned in knots. Now she was gone, Lee could alleviate some of his guilt, hang out with Debbie for a few minutes, and wait for Louise outside the front of the school. But Debbie was distant, giving yes and no answers, refusing to look at him. Lee shuffled his feet awkwardly and was relieved to see Louise bounding towards them, squealing with delight.
‘Wasn’t it amaaaazing?’ she said, her face blazing with excitement.
Debbie hugged her. ‘Oh, Louise, you were so beautiful!’
‘Ah, Mam, don’t cry, please!’
‘I can’t help it,’ she said, wiping her eyes. ‘It was incredible.’
Louise looked at Lee. ‘Did Nicola come? Did she like it?’
‘She loved it, you were brilliant.’
Louise was grabbed by some friends and she yelled at Lee and Debbie as she was dragged away, ‘See you later, parents!’
The silence was clumsy and graceless.
‘So, is she your girlfriend?’ asked Debbie, her hands in her jacket pockets, her eyes looking at something in the distance over his shoulder. He noticed she wore make-up, lipstick and had a new haircut.
‘No. I mean, yes. I don’t really know.’
‘You are so weak,’ she said and walked away.
As Nicola walked towards her house she felt a mixture of dread and excitement. She smiled shyly at familiar faces from the estate. Drunk men with red faces and huge noses carrying cans of cider. Women with squirming kids in buggies, a hunchback old woman taking teeny, tiny steps behind her checkered shopping trolley, dressed for the middle of winter, even though it was the height of summer. She was beginning to experience the life she could have, a life free from Micky and from Valley Park. She liked it. She liked Lee. She thought she loved him. She certainly fancied him like mad.
She heard Michael Jnr’s laughter as she opened her front door and stepped into the hallway. She walked into the living room and was surprised to see Kim getting up off the sofa.
‘She’s just going,’ said Micky.
‘No, stop for a cuppa.’ Nicola smiled at her, but Kim avoided her eyes.
‘I’ve got to get Amy from next door’s.’
‘You okay?’
‘Fine, see you later, Micky. Tara, kids.’
Michael responded with a wave, and Liam squeaked a byeeee to Kim. Nicola tried to ignore the atmosphere.
‘Go and watch telly in your bedroom,’ Micky ordered the children.
‘Why?’ whined Michael.
‘Just do as you’re told. Liam, go with Michael.’
The kids knew not to answer back, and they both shuffled off upstairs.
Nicola sensed trouble. ‘Cup of tea? I’m gasping,’ she said.
‘Sit down.’
‘Micky, I didn’t ask her to come.’
Micky stood up, pulled a gun from under the cushion of the chair and pointed it at her.
‘Sit down.’
She did as she was told.
‘We’re going to play a game,’ he said, sitting on the arm of the chair and placing the gun to her temple. Nicola swallowed, fear pinning her to her seat. ‘There’s one bullet in here, and every time you give me the wrong answer, I’ll pull the trigger. Don’t know where the bullet is, though: could be right at the beginning or at the end. But it’s not half going to make you answer some fucking questions, right?’
‘Micky, please, I didn’t ask her –’
He put his hand over her mouth. ‘I don’t think you’re getting the message. You only talk when I tell you to. Right, let’s start with where you went – today.’ He took his hand off her mouth.
‘I went to see Margy.’
CLICK! Micky pulled the trigger and Nicola jumped, her hands shot down to grab the fabric of the cushion. She gripped, her knuckles white.
‘Wrong answer. Start again.’
‘I went to see someone...’
‘Someone called...’
‘I went to see about a job.’
‘What do you want a job for?’
‘I just thought a job might...’
‘A job might be a bad idea.’
‘Look, what do you want me to say?’
‘Just tell the truth.’
‘I went into town to see about a job.’
CLICK!
Nicola strained her neck back. ‘Micky, stop it, please stop. I’ll tell you anything you want to know. Don’t, please.’
‘It wasn’t town you went, was it?’
‘Jesmond. That’s near town.’
‘But it wasn’t in town. Be careful what you say, think carefully.’
‘I went to see about a job in an office, answering the phones.’
CLICK!
Her lips quivered, but the tears were too terrified to escape.
‘By, you’re lucky. Three down. It’s going to get you soon if you don’t start telling the truth.’
‘It was a school. I went to a school.’
‘Posh school. So you were there for an interview? Carry on, I’m enjoying this. Tell me what time your interview was then.’
‘I... two...’
CLICK!
Nicola held her breath. Her body shook and her hands started to go numb as they clung to the chair’s cushion. Micky tutted and shook his head.
Nicola struggled to drag words out of her mouth, ‘I didn’t have an interview, I just heard they wanted someone, I just called in on the off chance.’
‘That’s a bit of a long shot, isn’t it?’
She nodded.
‘Don’t move, Nicola, I can’t trust myself with this: could go off any minute.’
The tears came and she gasped back air, her body rigid with fear. ‘Why are you doing this, Micky? I didn’t do anything wrong, I promise.’
‘Oh but you did, didn’t you?’
‘Honest, Micky, I didn’t do anything wrong. I just heard about a job.’
He leant into her face. ‘You lied to me.’
‘I thought you wouldn’t let me go.’
‘You didn’t even have the decency to ask.’ Nicola didn’t speak, couldn’t speak. ‘DID YOU?’
She whimpered, ‘No, I’m sorry.’ She gulped, tears dripping down her neck.
‘So did you get it?’
‘What?’
‘The job, you fucking idiot.’
‘It had gone.’
‘Then why did you take so long?’
‘Eh?’
‘Why were you in so long?’
‘Because there was some kind of show on, I had to wait to see the head teacher.’ She sensed he’d got the information he wanted and felt the muscles in her neck loosen. Her eyes shot him a glance. ‘Were you there?’
‘I’m everywhere, sweetheart. Understand?’
She nodded. ‘Yes.’
‘And it’s a fucking good job you weren’t seeing a bloke or you’d be dead by now, d’you understand?’
‘Yes.’
Micky leant back and pointed the gun at the floor, pulling the trigger halfway.
‘No!’ Nicola shouted.
He pulled the trigger fully. CLICK! And again, and again. He yelled with laughter as he stood up, clicking the empty barrel over and over again as he walked out of the room.
Nicola put her arms around her stomach and bent forward, her head on her knees. It was Friday. Tonight he’d be on that boat. Tonight the police would point a gun at him. With any luck they’d shove it in his face. They’d tell him to get on his knees, tell him to sh
ut the fuck up. They’d glide the cuffs on his wrists, read him his rights, throw him into the back of a van with all his scum mates. They’d take his prints, kick him in the kidneys – and that hurt, she knew all too well – then boot him into a cell that stank of someone else’s piss. Let him rot. Let him starve.
Tonight was Friday. And Micky Kelly would be out of her life by midnight.
Micky lay in the bath, his stomach and knees protruding from the crusty, grey water like fleshy islands. The bathroom suite was green – he hated it, hated the black crevices in the grouting, the dripping tap, the fractured, dried-up bar of soap hovering on a plastic dish of scum. Tania did her best with what the Council had given her, but it was a dump and she’d rather spend her money on earrings and underwear than her house. If he complained, he’d get a tirade of how she was sorry she wasn’t Little Miss Frigging Perfect, and if he wanted a wife or a housekeeper, he’d better start making the commitment, better start working closer to home so they could have a proper life together with their kids. He couldn’t even knock it into her. She’d been around the block a few times, and her great, articulated lorries of brothers would break his legs before they saw any man lay a finger on their sister. Not after Norman Myers, the first husband. Had six pins in his shins after his legs were crushed like eggshells in a hit and run. Marlon Brewis, husband number two, found in the middle of the Town Moor with two dislocated shoulders and only one bollock. No. You didn’t beat up on Tania Brewis. She had no loyalty to thugs that weren’t blood relatives.
He sometimes wished Nicola had the same will to defend herself. He wanted her to fight back – self-preservation was the only way he could control himself – knowing he might not win, having too much to lose. If she’d retaliated on that first night, clobbered him with the frying pan, kicked him in the balls or something, she could have nipped it in the bud, but no, she just lay there, even let him help her to her feet, hugged him back, told him everything would be okay. She apologised. Sorry for doing absolutely fuck all wrong. He didn’t beat up Tiger, or the lads or Tania. They wouldn’t let him. They would hurt him back.
Nicola had no one to defend her. She had a lot of front, though: she could argue with the authorities, the police, even him sometimes, but she didn’t hide her softness either, you just had to see her with the kids to know that. She was the only person other than his parents he’d ever known who genuinely cared about what happened to him, who worried about him, wanted him to be safe, frowned in sympathy when he was sick, stroked his head and willed him to be better. They say you hurt the ones you love, but she would never hurt him. Ever. He’d never admit to anyone, even her, that he needed anyone or anything, but he knew he needed Nicola. If she left him, he would go to pieces, because then there’d be no one to care or worry about him. He’d made the mistake of getting used to it, of letting her take care of him. But he’d failed her. Now the only way to make her stay was to frighten her into it. Why else would she? Look at the state of this. He rubbed his hands over his vast stomach.
He missed her. She didn’t smile at him anymore when he walked in the door. She stiffened in his arms. She cried after sex. If only she would be like she used to be and love him every minute of the day, every thread of her dedicated to him, everything she did, done with him in mind. If only she would fight back.
He sat up in the bath, grabbed a nail brush and started scrubbing his head, fiercely scouring away the self-awareness he wished he didn’t have. He saw her, Nicola, on the floor; he watched her crumble, giving up the fight for fear of the pain and humiliation of the bruises. It gave him a whole new level of superiority, the kind he hadn’t had since he was in the ring. But that was about to change, because tonight he was in charge. Tonight there’d be money. And money was everything. Money was change. Money was life.
Tania opened the bathroom door and walked in with a lit joint. It was some of the new Dutch shit – strong as hell, and the best hit she’d had in years. She wore a leopard-skin satin dressing gown, so short as to hardly hide the fuzz of her cunt. Her permed hair straggled in dry, purple-black ribbons around her shoulders, the white roots showing her age more than she’d like to let on. She sat on the edge of the bath and handed the joint to him. He wouldn’t normally, not when he had a big job on, but he was feeling the nerves and this was just what he needed. His first night as the gaffer and he was shitting himself that something would go wrong. At the same time, his heart skipped with exhilaration at the thought of the handshakes and the slaps on the back he’d get once he’d pulled it off. Micky Kelly. Made us all a mint in three hours. Micky’s your man. Micky’s the bollocks. Get Micky a drink, will you? Bring the wife, come to ours for your dinner, Micky.
He took a long drag of the joint and inhaled, holding his breath and closing his eyes as he felt the muscles in his legs float. When he opened his eyes again, he saw Tania’s smiling face. She, too, was anticipating a windfall. She’d got the catalogues open downstairs. Shoes. Knickers. Jewellery. She wanted a Siamese cat, she’d said. Get us one, will you?
He took another drag and pulled her head towards him, blowing the smoke out of his mouth and into hers. He undid the belt of her dressing gown and she shrugged it from her shoulders onto the floor. He took in her thin body, brown from years of sunbeds, her breasts flat, the nipples pointing towards her knees, a line of flesh sinking into her belly button like a deflated balloon. She put one leg into the bath, and his eyes moved from her stomach to between her legs. He sat up, passed her the joint and put his fingers inside her. She threw her head back with a barking laugh and started to move her hips back and forth, her free hand over her breasts. He loved watching her come. She screamed, she yelled, she swore like a whore.
They finished the joint, lying on the unmade bed amongst a pile of washing. Half an hour and he’d have to get himself into town. It was Friday at last, and he was about to become the biggest earner the syndicate had ever seen.
Lee held the tiny radio in his hand and brought it to his mouth: ‘Positions,’ he said.
His earpiece gave him two Rogers and a Good to go, Sarge from DC Thompson who was on the boat with two other plainclothes officers.
Lee checked the time: it was eleven p.m. The fireworks at Tynemouth were over and the doors to the boat were being closed ready for the journey back to Newcastle. Music blared. Some people stood on the deck doing the dance moves to ‘Tragedy’. A couple were necking on one of the benches, his hand up her skirt and hers up the back of his shirt. Lee gave orders quietly and confidently. As soon as any money changes hands, give us the word.
Copy that.
Fifteen armed officers sat in the back of the unmarked van. They were hot and sweaty in their bulletproof gear, most of them fidgeting and trying to keep the adrenalin going in the silence. Two hours they’d sat, waiting for their moment. Lee raised the radio to his mouth and asked if Micky Kelly had shown his face yet.
No sign of him, Sarge, came Thompson’s reply.
Lee slammed his hand on the steering wheel in frustration. Where the fuck was he? Waiting at the other end? Not much point in all this if you can’t get the commander. The real bosses would be at home, or in a bar, waiting for the call to say the business was complete. But this wasn’t about them. This was about Micky Kelly, and Micky Kelly had turned into the Scarlet Pimpernel.
Okay, Sarge, here we go.
‘Stand by,’ said Lee. ‘Remember, secure the doors first, I don’t want any of this stuff going overboard.’ He waited for the code word. It came about ten seconds later.
Riverdance.
The men piled out of the van like clockwork and down a creaking metal ramp onto the deck of the boat. They shouted above the music.
EVERYBODY DOWN! EVERYBODY! GET DOWN, SIR! YES, DOWN!
Half of the officers poured through the doors into the boat, knocking sausage rolls and vol-au-vents from the buffet table onto the floor. Women screamed and men looked dazed, herding together like cattle. The officers knew who they were looking for and headed
straight for some of Tiger’s known associates. A police helicopter overhead made sure there were no opportunities to escape.
Within a couple of minutes, Lee had the all-clear from inside and he headed onto the boat. The inside was bright now and he scoured the place with his eyes. Some officers were turning out the pockets of half a dozen handcuffed men, the rest searched under chairs, under the DJ’s table. Thompson threw an anxious look towards Lee and shook her head slightly as the officers turned out nothing but cigarettes, condoms and loose change from the pockets of the dealers. He gritted his teeth. It’s here somewhere.
‘Cordon the whole place off as a crime scene, nobody goes home till the place has been picked apart,’ he said. ‘Get everyone’s details.’ He indicated the partygoers, huddled in corners or sitting on the floor, their heads between their knees. He saw Mooney sitting with his back against the wall, legs sprawled, his thick curls heavy with sweat and his crutches strewn by his side. Lee got down onto his haunches and put his face next to Mooney’s huge, watery eyes.
‘Where’s Micky Kelly?’ he asked, his voice low and threatening.
‘Fucked if I knaa,’ croaked Mooney, his voice strained, his breath rank, his legs on fire with the pain of being thrown to the floor. Lee stood up and looked around him. He wasn’t there.
He wasn’t fucking there.
FIFTEEN
Micky kept his groans to himself as another blow hit his left ear and sent his face reeling to his right shoulder. He kept it there, the droning in his head becoming louder with each strike. His hands were tied together behind him, his feet tied to the chair legs. He felt his blindfolded eyes closing behind swollen flesh, and his pummelled ribs stifled his breathing. His head rolled forward and hung on his chest like the dying Jesus. He’d given up goading them, telling them he’d have them, have their mothers. An hour of constant pounding at his head and body, and he was in no doubt that something had gone horribly wrong the night before.