by Marc Horn
He’s still wanted for that robbery. Other officers have been unable to locate him. Arrest enquiries have been completed at various times of day and night, but no one’s ever in. Funny that. Unless an officer reasonably believes a suspect’s in an address, he has no power to kick the door in. Well, that piece of restrictive legislation has never restricted me from entering any premises I want to, but coppers these days worry too much about the repercussions. All you have to do is say you heard movement inside. And if the slag’s not there, you just open the back door and tell the control room he did a runner.
At this point in time, however, such a tale would not do me any favours. I’m supposed to be on special leave. Doesn’t stop me spotting White in the street though.
I can happily wait here all day, sitting on these piss-stained, concrete steps and staring at the graffiti on the walls. I’m a hunter. I’m done with The Poet and now I’m after White. You can take as long as you want, son. I will not be beaten.
Very threatening, the graffiti. ‘I love stabbing pigs’ one lovely lad has scrawled in red ink. I’d have loved to have caught him writing that. He’d never even look at a copper disrespectfully again after I’d finished with him.
Very high on my list of priorities is cheating. Cassandra thinks we’re an item, so fucking another bird is, in her eyes, cheating. Every time I do it, she gets upset. Like I say though, it’s her decision to stick around. Well now I actually want to hurt the bitch. She stole my stuff, tried to fuck with my head. I don’t buy her explanation. It’s a lie. I don’t know what the truth is, but I know the love thing is bullshit. I mean, she probably does love me − she’s a bit of a bunny boiler after all, but that’s not why she did it. There’s a much bigger reason and I reckon it’s linked to this My Universe theory.
I wish I’d brought some kind of solution to clean these walls. Since I’m sitting here, I might as well use my time as effectively as I can. I reach out and scratch at a letter with my thumbnail. Flakes of red paint float to the ground.
‘Dogs will quack and ducks will bark,’ I say and then laugh. Imagine that. That might start happening pretty soon. The more material that enters my head, the more distorted the rest becomes. Fuck, one of these days I’ll peel off Cassandra’s knickers and a dick will fall out!
White doesn’t see me when he leaves his house. Not until he walks a few metres and sees me stand up and smile at him does he acknowledge me. I beckon for him to come over to me. He stops, thinks about running, but just as quickly realises it would be a very stupid thing to do. His head drops and he sucks his teeth and curses me under his breath as he swaggers towards me.
*****
Every copper has a favourite slag. Mine is Big Log. I walk up to him in custody.
‘What you been handling this time, you son of a bitch?’ I ask him, as he stands handcuffed in front of the custody sergeant.
‘Phone cards, they reckon.’
On the counter are hundreds of phone cards, still sealed in transparent slips of plastic. He winks at me. He knows he’ll get off it. They won’t be able to prove the cards were stolen, as no one will know where they came from – if there’s no theft there can be no handling stolen goods.
‘What’s he done?’ he asks me, nodding towards my prisoner who’s staring at his own feet.
‘Robbery. Right in front of me.’
Big Log looks at White. ‘Bad luck, ’bro.’
Big Log reminds me of the black bloke out of The Green Mile, the prisoner with special powers. Big Log is indeed big, but that’s not where he gets his nickname from. He’s called that because every time he gets nicked, he blocks his cell toilet and we have to call out the cleaners.
Also in custody is our most regularly used Chinese interpreter, Miss Chin. I’ve been waiting to see her. I escort White over to her and, after saying hello, I hand her a voice recorder.
‘Have a listen to that, will you, love? Tell me what they’re saying. Just press play.’
Miss Chin listens to the recording. The recorder’s useful for noting down registration numbers, times and street names when I’m off duty. I’m a twenty-four hour copper. Why should I let someone off just because I’m not in uniform? This recording, however, is from my local Chinese. If the little dudes’ chit-chat behind the counter actually makes sense, then I reckon they’re slagging me off.
Miss Chin swallows. Her unflawed, tiny face tightens. ‘You will not like it.’
‘Go on. What’re they saying?’
‘They say that you are crazy... insane... you wear cheap clothes and one final thing...’
I exhale hard. Little bastards. The money I’ve put their way! ‘Well?’
‘They call you... white trash.’ She looks at me ashamedly, as if I might be thinking that these little pricks are representative of how Chinese people operate. I know they’re not. I find the Chinese to be hard working, friendly and harmless.
‘Ah well, seems like I picked the wrong takeaway.’
Miss Chin smiles coyly and nods. I thank her and take the voice recorder.
After booking White in, I’m summoned to the duty inspector’s office. My team aren’t on today, instead it’s Team 1. Their inspector, Will Stewart, hands me the phone. It’s my governor on the line, Inspector Cobbal. He tells me that the case will be handed over and I’m to go home immediately. Cobbal’s one of my biggest fans, but right now I can tell he’s pissed off. As my leader, he’ll probably take some shit because I nicked someone while on special leave. He doesn’t mention this. His message is concise and firm. I’m tempted to tell him that I can’t be expected to turn a blind eye to a wanted robber I see in the street, but that would be disrespectful. He knows me too well.
I don’t leave the station immediately. First, I return to custody and have a quick word with Miss Chin. She’s a little reluctant to agree to my request and undoubtedly feels that I should know better, but she gives me what I need. I should think so. I’ve brought a lot of work her way, especially with illegal DVD sellers.
*****
‘I knew you’d work it out.’
I don’t speak. I don’t know what to say. I can see the back of myself. I’m in police uniform, kneeling on the ground. I’m handcuffed in the rear stack position.
‘They can’t eliminate you like they eliminated me. It’s backfired on them. You’re too smart to get taken out.’
I try to break out of the cuffs. I can’t. They’re rigid, too strong. I’m afraid to speak. I know the words will be too weak.
‘It’s all falling into place now. All because of you.’
I seal my eyes tight, tense my facial muscles, do everything I can to stop a tear escaping. But then my eyes snap open, the ceiling takes form and the tear trickles down my cheek and onto the pillow.
17
I don’t know what to make of dreams. The answers I need probably lie within my subconscious, but it’s an uncomfortable state to be in. Dreams bring out the worst in me. They trigger unrealistic reactions, as they did last night. I don’t believe that my father is communicating with me. He’s dead. All that’s left of him is his skeleton in Eltham Cemetery. Any spiritual connection is wishful thinking, desperation. I’ll wake up, feeling enlightened and emotional, until reality sinks in and I get a grip of myself.
So his words of encouragement mean nothing to me. And even if I was to assess their validity, well, he’s talking bollocks – I’m still a little skull-fucked. I’d expected, even hoped, that Miss Chin would tell me that the recorded words were indecipherable. That would have added some serious weight to my theory – that I can’t create foreign languages; that nonsensical, alien words are spilling out of my overloaded head. As it stands, if I am right, I can speak Chinese. I rake my fingers through my hair. It’s not just that casting doubt. Why would I kill three kids? I mean, through the creation of The Poet? Am I some kind of sick bastard, or what? And why cram his house full of stuff about me? Some self-esteem boost? To reinforce how great I am? I don’t need that. It doesn’t
make sense. And there’s no one I can talk to.
But there’s so much that supports the theory. I’m always seeing people who have striking and unjustifiable similarities – a northern girl will have exactly the same crooked smile as a southern bloke with a totally different set of genes; two people from different countries will have the same nervous twitch; two unrelated blokes will have identical voices, in both pitch and delivery. Noah and Foreskin have the same eyes. Tone and Mr Maple have the same nose. There are many more examples. It’s uncanny and I pick up on it every time. I can predict certain expressions, reactions and behaviour on the basis of what I’ve seen their ‘clones’ do. And I get it right every time. How can it be so? How can these completely disconnected people have the same construction? Perhaps because I no longer have room to create individuality.
And what exactly is the extent of the bitch’s involvement? I suspect that she’s integral to all this. She sticks to me like shit to a shoe, whatever I do. She tries to mug me off about loving me, caring about me, as if she’s my guardian fucking angel. She has my house broken into, has my computer stolen because she thinks it contains evidence that she sent the ‘stop writing journal’ messages. And I’m expected to believe that she did all this to save my job. Fuck off!
I hand a brew to the builder in the bathroom.
‘Cheers, mate.’
‘It’s where I relax,’ I tell him. ‘I just want to come home and stretch out in a fuck-off bath.’ He laughs. ‘My toes poke out of that poncy thing.’
I wander into the lounge, sit down and point the remote at the TV screen. But my arm freezes and my thumb stops dead just before it reaches the power button. Slowly, I return the remote to the arm rest. I look at the builder. He’s busy using a laser device that measures distances. Cassandra. Could it be? I stare out the window at the blue sky.
She’s here to save them all. Not my guardian angel, but theirs. This is my world, my universe. I created it and I control it. Her role is to preserve all the life-forms of my making. I can make them all die; she is here to stop that possibility.
I turn back to the builder and notice that he quickly looks away. He starts to whistle, attempting to appear nonchalant, uninvolved. They’re all fucking involved, every one of them. They are dependent on me and she − that bitch − is their lifeline. Should I beat this out of him? Should I interrogate him? I would get the answers I want, I know it. She can’t have me find the answers. That’s why she wants to put an end to the journal. The answer threatens her very existence. Threatens everyone’s. If I knew what all this was really about, I could end it. The bitch is their whore. They employ her to keep things running smoothly, to keep me naive. And skull-fucked...
Suddenly, I feel exposed and vulnerable. I look at the builder. He’s leaning through the bathroom window, checking the external walls. What the fuck do I do about this? Feasibly, they will do anything to protect themselves. But, how then can I be in any danger? A threat to me is a threat to them. I have to be kept alive. Does that mean that I have never been in danger? Would The Poet not have shot me? Would the bloke on the bus not have stabbed me had I not reacted as fast as I did? If so, then what was the purpose of those two fuckers? What was the point? Why did I need to face that danger? I stand up, place my hands behind my head and walk to the window. Outside, a mother and her daughter are walking along the pavement. They’re laughing, seemingly oblivious to me, focused on other things. This raises so many questions. If I’m right then why did I subject myself to witnessing my father’s brutal murder at the age of five? Why the hell did I design my own life to be so agonisingly painful. Am I masochistic? Do I enjoy extreme levels of personal suffering? Well, I enjoy inflicting pain on other people, people that deserve it. But I can’t consciously say that I relish my own pain.
Time to interrogate the bitch. See where this is going to take me.
*****
‘Usual, please.’ I place a tenner on the counter. The son says something and then his father quickly exits the kitchen and joins him. I notice that there is a new addition to the fish tank sitting in the corner of the takeaway. ‘Nice new fish,’ I say. ‘Nice colour. I like the blue stripe and the purple fin.’
Both of them ignore my praise. They look at me as if I’m an apparition. The father’s lips move as if he’s about to speak, but it seems he can’t find the right words. He studies my eyes, regards me with caution. The door rings behind me, indicating that a new customer is about to enter the shop. Then there are a couple of girly screams and the customers run off. I hear laughter as they pound along the pavement.
‘You put on clothes!’ the father orders me.
I sniff, extend my forefinger to him as I whisper, ‘One second,’ and then show him the note in my other hand. In Chinese it reads, ‘My clothes are too cheap for this classy joint.’
The father swallows, a glint of guilty acknowledgment in his eyes, then he stutters, ‘This business! You scare off customer! I call police!’
Well, in light of recent revolutions, I feel somewhat immune to any dramatic form of punishment. What are they going to do to me? I hold the cards...
I pick up the tenner and show him another note, which reads: ‘I’ll be able to buy a stylish outfit with this, won’t I?’ No answer. And then, in English, I say, ‘I’ll look as good as that fish!’ Then I walk towards the door, my legs bowed so they can watch my balls swing. Outside, I turn left and enter the alleyway adjacent to the takeaway. I pick up my heap of clothes and put them on.
On my way home a police car flies past me, blue lights flashing and sirens blaring. They’re looking for a naked man.
18
Sub of the day is tuna. Friday’s the worst day of the week for buying Subway. My refreshment purchases are determined by three things – cost, nutrition and novelty value. Yes, a twelve inch sub is cheap and nutritious, but I eat tuna all the time at home. When I’m at work, I want something different. Thursday’s BMT sub is probably the tastiest meal, but right now I tuck into a chicken shish kebab, bought from my mate Kostas, who is extremely generous to police.
I’m watching Noah patrol alone. I’ve been told that since I destroyed The Poet, Noah’s been bad-mouthing me. Though he may feel stitching me up to our leaders was the right thing to do, it means he’s now distrusted by the rest of the team. Hence why he is out on foot by himself.
Kebab juice runs down my chin. I wipe it away with the back of my hand and then lick it off. Naive little prick. He comes here thinking he can do things his way. Ignores the advice he’s given and sticks with what he thinks is best. I watch him look along the side roads as he crosses over them, but never once does he look behind or above. As he passes Cinder Terrace, a rowdy estate full of slags, he’s oblivious to potential danger. Luckily for him the yobs are still in bed, so it’s just me in my peaked cap and shades, thirty feet above him, that he fails to spot. He walks with purpose and pride, ready to help wherever it’s needed, and ready to be a hero! Bullshit. He doesn’t know what’s going on around him. I could run up to him and stick a knife in his back and he’d only find out about it in hospital.
Another problem I have with him is I can’t hate him. Though I had a totally different approach to his when I started out, our defiant, rigid attitudes are the same. It shows inner strength. I drop my wrapper on the ground. It joins all the other fast food boxes discarded by the estate dross.
Cassandra has not returned my call. I left her a voicemail last night. I’ve never known her not to reply the same day. Very unusual, this. Though I told her to fuck off last time I saw her, she did suck me off before she left. No way was that her parting gift, no way. She must know that I’m on to her, that I’m unravelling this mystery in which she is a key player.
I toss three eggs at Noah. The first splatters in front of him and pebble-dashes his trousers. As he jumps back, the second hits his arm, followed a fraction of a second later by the third, which detonates on his left cheek. I smirk and quickly change position. When I look down again,
I see him scanning the estate walkways, his fingers splayed in front of his face to protect his eyes from further assault. With his other hand he fumbles with his radio, asking for support. I crouch down behind the wall. No one will assist him. He’s disliked; the weak link; a threat. His frantic radio transmission will lift the entire team. When I hear him start to run, I again move position. As he bounds up the steps, I hear him ridiculously ask for the police chopper. He doesn’t put this request through the control room, he calls them up directly himself, because he knows Control will fob him off. India 99, however, inform him that they’re committed elsewhere. Then he calls up for the dog unit, but as soon as he does this, Control cut in and ask him to deal with a domestic incident in a flat in Cinder Terrace. That’s this estate.
Hesitantly Noah informs Control that he’s virtually on scene. After a few seconds, he starts to jog towards the address. ‘Fuck!’ I whisper. I’m going to do my own legs now, I know it. But for me, saving my own skin is rarely a factor in deciding what I must do. ‘Fuck!’ He’ll know I threw the eggs. They’ll know I threw the eggs. Welcome ammunition for them. Ah well, fuck it. I’m fifty metres behind him when he knocks on the door. A hysterical woman, tears streaming down her face, opens it and then is pulled inside by a muscular bloke with a skinhead. Noah sticks his foot in the door as the skinhead tries to shut it, and succeeds in keeping it open. The door swings inwards and the skinhead grabs Noah’s neck and pulls him inside. When I get there Noah’s on his back with the skinhead on top of him, wringing the life out of him. The woman’s screaming from the kitchen, a phone against her ear. I lean forward, open my arms and then drive both palms towards each other. They connect with the skinhead’s temples and knock him out. See, when you hit someone, their brain shifts in that direction. If it’s hit in both directions it has nowhere to go and freezes. Noah coughs and splutters as I pull the slag off him and dump him to the side.