Die Tryin'

by Stavro Yianni

  ‘Niko,’ the smiling Greek bloke behind the counter said in a cheery, pleasant voice.

  He put out his hand and Nick XR2 took it. ‘How’s it going, John?’ Nick XR2 asked.

  ‘Not bad, re. You?’

  ‘Good, good…’ Nick XR2 cleared his throat and lowered his voice, not wanting John’s workmates beavering away behind them to hear him. ‘You know that thing I was talking to you about earlier…?’

  ‘You want a unit, right?’ John asked, looking them over one by one.

  Tony was eyeing up the middle-aged woman with saggy breasts, who was perched in front of a computer; Charlie was twitching nervously as he grabbed a boiled mint from the dish on the counter. He popped it into his mouth and began chewing straight away, the ensuing series of crunches echoing over and over in the silence. Nick Black went and sat on the edge of a nearby chair, just watching everything tick over.

  ‘That’s right,’ Nick XR2 replied. ‘How much is it?’

  ‘Well, we usually charge one twenty a month for large units, sixty for small ones, but as you’re family, I can get you a fifteen percent discount on whatever you want.’ John winked as he mentioned the fifteen percent.

  Nick XR2 turned his mouth downwards and began nodding. ‘Sounds good.’ He then turned to face the others, giving them a ‘what do you think boys?’ look.

  ‘It’s cool,’ Nick Black replied, short and sharp.

  ‘Tone?’ Nick XR2 asked, looking over at him.

  Tony just carried on staring at the woman at the PC. ‘What?’

  ‘It’s all good with us,’ Charlie said, answering for Tony, chewing his sweet. His head then went into a brief spasm.

  John stared at them, confused and unsure for a second, before professionalism took over. His face melted into a wholesome salesman’s smile, and he slapped the counter with both hands. ‘Good! What were you after, large or small?’

  ‘Just a small one, re.’

  ‘Right. Did you bring two forms of ID like I said?’ Nick XR2 dipped into his pocket, pulled out his passport and driving licence, and handed them over. ‘Nice one. Just gotta photocopy these and I’ll be back.’

  ‘No problem, re.’ John tapped the counter again before turning and heading away.

  Nick XR2 turned back to the others, the holdall still gripped firmly in his hand like it was his Siamese twin. ‘We’ll split the cost five ways, shouldn’t be much more than a tenner a month,’ he said.

  ‘Can your cousin hurry up, this place is giving me the creeps,’ Charlie said, his eyes darting round nervously.

  ‘It’s called an office, Charlie,’ Nick XR2 replied, his voice laced with irony. ‘This is what they’re like—boring, sterile, grey.’

  ‘And quiet,’ Nick Black added.

  ‘I just don’t like it,’ Charlie said. ‘It’s like a…graveyard.’

  ‘Yeah, and we’ve had enough of those for one day,’ Nick Black added dryly.

  ‘All right, all right,’ Nick XR2 said showing them his free palm. ‘He’ll be back in a minute, then we can get out of here.’

  ‘What about Taki?’ Nick Black asked.

  ‘What about him?’ Nick XR2 asked back.

  ‘See how shook up he looked? He was so pale, I thought he was gonna whitey.’

  ‘Don’t worry, I’ll sort out Taki,’ Nick XR2 reassured them. ‘Probably freaked out by what Tony did.’

  ‘Aren’t we all?’ Charlie said.

  Nick sighed, they all turned to look at Tony, who just stood there, staring at the tits on display.

  ‘We better keep an eye on him,’ said Nick XR2.

  ‘Who Tony or Taki?’ Nick Black asked.

  ‘Both,’ Nick XR2 said and rubbed his forehead.

  Nick Black raised his eyebrows. ‘Here comes your cousin.’

  Nick XR2 spun round to see John coming back with a load of papers in one hand, and a set of keys in the other. He stopped by a door on his left and opened it. ‘Come on boys, I’ll show you your unit,’ he said, holding the door open.

  Nick Black got to his feet. ‘Come on, Charlie,’ he said, and Charlie followed him, staring at all the walls around him as if he could see faces in them.

  They went past Tony who was still staring vacantly at the PC woman’s breasts.

  Nick XR2 patted him hard on the shoulder, snapping him out of his daze. ‘Let’s go, Tony,’ he said.

  Tony looked round to set eyes on John for the first time before he followed. They entered a long concrete corridor, lit up by naked fluorescent lights dangling from the ceiling. Lined up along both walls were what looked like garage doors. John led them about halfway down the corridor and put the key he was carrying into a garage door on his left. A loud rasp echoed all around them as he pulled the door upwards, exposing a nice compact space beyond.

  ‘This good for you?’ John asked.

  They all stuck their heads inside and checked it out.

  Nick XR2 began nodding. ‘Perfect. Cheers, re.’

  John then turned to Nick XR2 and lowered his head slightly, making his eyes turn into two circles of shadow like he was a panda bear. His salesman’s smile had vanished. ‘What are you keeping in here, Nick?’ he asked.

  Nick Black could almost taste the serious edge to his voice.

  Nick XR2 shook his head. ‘Nothing. Just some personal items.’

  ‘Re. Listen,’ John said sombrely. ‘It’s not drugs is it?’ he asked and looked round them all as he spoke.

  Nick XR2 let out an offhand chuckle, his grip on the holdall tightening. ‘Come on, re, we’re not into that shit,’ he replied with wide, sincere eyes.

  ‘Look. This is my job,’ John said with a grave frown. ‘If I get caught hiding drugs or anything like that for you lot, I could get the sack.’

  Nick XR2 laughed and gave John a friendly pat on the shoulder. ‘You’re paranoid, re, you know that? I wouldn’t bring shit like that to your doorstep. I wouldn’t even get into anything that in the first place. You’re my cousin for fuck’s sake…’

  Nick Black watched on with baited breath. John’s serious facial expression didn’t change, and Nick Black thought he wasn’t going to swallow Nick XR2’s bullshit. But, Mr Cucumber on ice held on, staring sincerely at his cousin with big, round eyes, his free palm open out in front of him.

  The usual outcome of a standoff involving Nick Theodorou was that Nick won hands down.

  That was exactly what happened.

  John’s stone-face softened like melting wax. He shrugged, and then smiled ruefully. ‘I know you’re my cousin, re. But, I gotta make sure we all know where we’re coming from, you know what I mean?’

  ‘Of course,’ Nick XR2 said and nodded. And then a second later: ‘Drugs. Pfff. Us?’

  ‘I know. I know,’ John said and chuckled, his head bowed. He held up the key. ‘Here you go. I’ll fill all this out. When you’re done, come back to reception to pay. Okay?’

  ‘No problem, John.’ John then walked off, trying his best to lift his head back up to where it was before he got Nick XR2ed.

  When he went through the door and back out to the reception area, Nick Black puffed his cheeks. ‘Thought for a second there he was gonna rumble us,’ he said.

  Nick XR2 turned his mouth downwards as he stared at the key in his hands. ‘Nah, John’s sweet as a nut, don’t worry about him.’

  ‘I don’t know how you fucking do it,’ Nick Black stated, shaking his head. ‘I mean you just managed to make your own cousin feel like a complete a tit for rightly questioning why we want this storage unit. Unbelievable.’

  Nick XR2 smiled. ‘Must be in the genes.’ He then looked up at them all. ‘Right, let’s go.’

  He stepped inside the storage unit and placed the holdall down on the floor; it looked tiny in the big empty space. That wasn’t important. The importance was the security, anonymity, and seclusion. That was all.

  Nick XR2 came back out to the corridor before he rolled the garage door back down and locked it up. ‘That’s that then.’
>
  ‘Who gets the key?’ Charlie asked, and it was a strange question to come from him.

  He’s adamant he doesn’t want any of the jewels, so why does he care who got the key? Nick Black thought to himself.

  ‘I suppose we’ll have to… Scissor, paper, rock it,’ Nick XR2 replied.

  ‘Okay,’ Charlie said.

  ‘You two play, then. I’ll play Charlie,’ Nick Black said.

  He stepped over to where Charlie was and shook his clenched fist on the air three times. He kept his fist clenched while Charlie made the V sign denoting scissors. Rock blunts scissors; Nick Black won. Tony had rock and Nick XR2 paper. Paper covers rock: Nick XR2 won. The two Nicks turned to face each other and shook their fists on the air three times. Nick XR2 opened his palm. Nick Black made the V sign. Scissors cuts paper: Nick Black won.

  Nick XR2 let out a small sigh, and then dropped the key into Nick Black’s hand.

  ‘You win,’ he said.

  Nick Black knew Nick XR2 hated losing at anything, even a silly little game like this. He also knew that Nick XR2 would have really wanted to hold onto the key himself because it was a power buzz, a control buzz. Nick XR2 liked to be in control. Of everything.

  ‘Don’t worry, I won’t lose it,’ Nick Black said, pocketing the key.

  ‘You better not,’ Nick XR2 replied with a dark gleam in his eye.

  ‘Right. Now can we please get out of here?’ Charlie asked, agitated and twitchy.

  ‘Yeah, let’s go,’ Nick XR2 agreed. ‘But listen,’ he then said, looking at them over with wide eyes. ‘We gotta give each other our word that what went down today and what we’ve got stored in there remains between us and us only. Okay? No one touches the bling unless we all know about it. ’

  ‘All right, Nick,’ Charlie said. Nick XR2 looked from him to Nick Black.

  ‘You got my word, Nick,’ Nick Black told him.

  Nick XR2 then looked at Tony. ‘Okay, Tone?’

  Tony’s head snapped round, fresh out of another daze.

  ‘We’re in this shit together,’ Nick XR2 added. ‘No matter what happens, we’re together. Agreed?’ He put out his hand as he spoke. Charlie nodded and put his hand on top of Nick’s. Nick XR2 looked at Nick Black, who smiled wryly and placed his hand on top of Charlie’s.

  ‘Agreed, Tone?’ Nick XR2 then asked, staring up at him.

  ‘Yeah, yeah agreed,’ Tony declared and stared at them one by one as he placed his hand on top of theirs.

  Nick Black stared back at him through squinted eyes, Charlie with big, frantic ones.

  ‘What about Taki?’ Charlie asked, looking at Nick XR2.

  ‘This includes Taki as well,’ Nick XR2 said. ‘I’ll tell him too, okay?’

  Charlie nodded.

  ‘Good,’ Nick XR2 said, and they released their grip on each other.

  ‘What do we do when Marco’s mates come looking for him?’ asked Nick Black.

  Nick XR2 shook his head. ‘He said they didn’t know anything about it,’ he replied.

  ‘How can we be sure?’ Nick Black asked.

  ‘Well, we can’t. We’ll just have to lay low and hope everything stays calm.’

  Nick Black huffed. ‘Great. Paranoia for the next six months…’ he said.

  ‘Rest of our lives,’ Charlie corrected.

  ‘Look. We’ve got no other choice. What’s done is done,’ Nick XR2 reminded them. ‘We just have to hope that we get away with it.’

  ‘We’ll never be the same again.’ Nick Black said, looking at Tony. Tony stared down at the ground.

  ‘Just go home, relax, lay low and try and forget about what went down today,’ Nick XR2 advised.

  ‘Easier said than done,’ Charlie stated.

  ‘Well, fucking try!’ Nick XR2 snapped. ‘Okay?’ He then puffed his cheeks and shook his head. ‘Come on,’ he said. ‘Let’s go.’

  SEVEN

  A couple of days passed. To Charlie, they felt more like a week.

  He couldn’t remember the last time he ate nor slept. It was always the same when the voices got out of control. But, as things had taken a turn for the worse at the cemetery, the chaos in his mind was ramped up even higher than usual.

  He stood in his bedroom, naked, staring at his reflection in the full-length mirror attached to his wardrobe door, the events of the other day going round and round his head like a stuck record. Tony had flipped out, just like Snow White tried to warn him he would. But he didn’t listen to a word she said. Instead, he let the nutcase do whatever he wanted. While he sat outside out of harm’s way like a little pussy, Tony was brutalising Marco with a dead man’s fucking thigh bone.

  Charlie blamed himself. He was supposed to look out for this shit. Look out-look out-lookout-thelookout-I’mthelookout-lookout-

  -I’mthelookout

  He grabbed his hair with both hands and pulled it hard, images of blood and death and laughing demons bombarding his mind, not leaving him alone for even a second. LOOK OUT FOR— he managed to stifle a scream that was bursting to get out, and threw his hands away from his head.

  Shit was bad. Bad, bad, bad. They had robbed from the dead, took a life, and (worse) covered up the evidence. There was no doubt in Charlie’s mind that this shit was gonna rebound on them big time. The other pricks might not be able to see it, but he could, as clear as day. Oh yeah, he could see it coming all right.

  They would be judged on this and duly punished.

  All of them, to a man.

  He stared at his reflection again, perturbed to see his ribs bulging out of his chest, and suddenly an image came back to him from his childhood—a cartoon of a haunted pirate ship, the drunken crew playing music and singing Dead Man’s Chest; one of the percussion instruments a skeleton, its ribcage used as a makeshift xylophone. Xylophone chest. And that’s what he was. Skin wrapped bone. Like a starving African kid on one of those Oxfam adverts.

  He released a heavy sigh, closed his eyes, and rubbed them.

  ‘Looking a bit skinny there, Charlie boy…’ a voice suddenly rasped in his mind.

  Charlie’s eyes snapped open. He caught their reflection in the mirror—big dilated saucers, ringed with licks of dark skin. He knew that voice. Knew it all too well. It was her. The Dark Bitch. The Old Witch. And the old hag couldn’t have picked a worse time to show her withered face.

  ‘You’re going to burn,’ she then said in a cruel voice. ‘I’ve seen it. They told me, Charlie. You’re coming down here with me, my boy. It’s been set in stone.’

  ‘Go away,’ Charlie said to his wide, frightened eyes.

  But it was uttered with the strength of a drowning Chihuahua.

  The Old Witch cackled in return, and the sound was like a crow’s rusty keen. ‘A perfunctory response,’ she said, her voice laced with contempt. ‘I expect better from you by now.’

  ‘Why don’t you leave me alone?’

  ‘Why don’t you take some more!’ she sharply countered. ‘Go on. Take more, and then more. Hurry up the inevitable. Die young, boy. Life’s not worth it. It’s muuuuch better down here in the hospital. No pain. No suffering. Just eternal darkness. Go on, Charlie, give it a try. You’ll like it…

  You’ll never achieve anything in your risible little life anyway. Not as long as I’m here. As long as I’m here, all you’ll do is suffer.’

  ‘Why? Why do you do this to me?’

  ‘You’re my little pet project,’ she said with mild glee. ‘Your suffering is my pleasure; your weakness my strength. You keep me alive and as long as I’m around, you’ll always be nothing. Nothing! You hear me, boy? Nothing!’

  Something in the corner of the mirror caught Charlie’s eye—a figure, forcibly bent over by a huge hunch on her back, her shadowed face just about visible in the shadow; eyes that gleamed with dark and clear intelligence; a top lip lined with wrinkles, deep crags and crevasses, rising into a sickening grin, exposing rotten stumps for teeth.

  Charlie spun round, but was faced with nothing, just his empty
bedroom.

  That crow like cackle reverberated in his mind again. ‘In no time, you’ll waste away like those rows and rows of disease victims we’ve got down here. You should see them, Charlie, lined up like battery chickens, their pathetic souls ebbing away into nothing, pleading for the doctors to stem the pain. It’s a sight to behold…

  Why don’t you join them for a bit of fun, Charlie…’

  Charlie clasped his ears, trying his best to block her out, but the sound was in his head, not outside it.

  ‘We’ve got them all down here, Charlie. Skulking around the wards. Like that pretty little thing from ’28. Found out her husband was unfaithful to her, and did she ever get her revenge… Slit his throat from ear to ear while he slept, and cut off his pride and joy. Made him swallow it to see how much he liked the taste of it.

  Heh-heh-heh.’

  That cackle went off again and Charlie stared at the ceiling, feeling the bile in the pit of his stomach stirring. ‘28? 19-1928?’ he stammered. ‘Exactly how old are you?’

  ‘I’m old, boy.

  Old enough to have been forced into the death chamber along with girls and boys no older than ten. Forced to watch them choke on those poison fumes, tears of blood streaming down their cheeks moments before their eyeballs burst right out of their skulls. I tasted that poison at the back of my throat, and breathed it in deeply till it corrupted every cell in my wretched body.

  Old enough to have been lost in the trenches with the boy soldiers, bombs erupting all around them, shattering their eardrums to bloody pieces. I watched them all fall to the ground, writhing in agony, unable to hear their own screams of pain.

  Old enough to have seen the whores lined up along the banks of the Thames looking for business, Scold’s Bridles strapped to their pretty little faces by corrupt politicians and perverted priests, ready to torture their tongues if they dared stir the secrets of their liaisons, their forced silence keeping esteemed reputations safely intact…