“Where?”
“Well if I fuckin’ knew that I wouldn’t be telling you about how it’s gone missing would I?”
He shrugged his shoulders. “Well, whadda ya’ want me t’ do about it?”
“Tell me which one of your friends is a thief!”
“Woah, dude! Don’t funkin’ throw accusations out like that just coz you can’t find y’ stuff, okay?”
“It was here yesterday when I left and now its not. How the fuck do you explain that?”
“Dude, don’t get shitty with me alright? No one was smoking pot last night, just drinking and shit. Cool?”
“No it’s not cool, cos someone last night took my shit – one of your fuckin’ friends.”
“I oughta smack you in the fuckin’ head for saying that.”
“I don’t give a fuck. I want my weed back.”
“Dude, you better start watching what you say, because I don’t like where you’re pointing that fuckin’ finger of yours. So you got some shit stolen – what do you want me to say?” He crossed his arms and leaned on the door frame.
“Say that someone who wasn’t one of your friends came into the house, went into my room, and left carrying my bag of weed. Say that, because then I’ll know it wasn’t one of your fuckin’ friends!”
He said nothing. One hand rose and rubbed his forehead. “Shit.”
“What?”
“Well, the guys have said that Rucker’s gone back to stealing shit ay, but no one has really said anything about it, or even asked him. So long as he wasn’t stealing from us, it didn’t really matter.” He scratched the back of his head. “I’ll admit there was a couple of times that he was alone, like going for a piss and the door was closed behind him to keep the warm air inside the living room, so I guess it might have been him, dunno, but I’m fuckin’ sure it wasn’t anybody else, eh? No one else would do that, as far as I know them, but apparently Rucker’s been getting accused a lot recently of this shit by other people we know, so I wouldn’t blame y’ for suspecting him.”
“Well, I want him to pay. I want him confronted and to have to pay for this.”
Tinsdale put his hands up in defence. “Hey, he ain’t done nothing to me, it’s not my problem. Do what you want – none of my friends or I will stand in your way. If he did steal it then that’s his problem, not ours and he suffers the consequence, but I won’t fuckin’ set him up alright? Coz, he’s still a friend of mine, and I’m not the one that he stole from. Cool?”
“No it’s not cool!”
“Well, it’s gonna have to be!” Tinsdale was looking like he seriously did not want to be messed with. “He didn’t trespass on my property – he trespassed on yours!”
I was furious that he wasn’t going to answer for his own friends, but I had to concede to the fact that it really wasn’t his problem – it was all mine. So I had to deal with it.
“I’ll tell you what David. I’ll ask my mates if they’re aware of anything and I’ll let you know.”
“Fine.”
Lucas knew more than Tinsdale.
“But that’s only because I’m friends with the people he’s already stolen from. He wouldn’t dare steal from his own friends – Tinsdale and his crew – because he’d probably get his head smacked in. So he only steals from people he’s been introduced to through his friends or just random parties he turns up to.”
“Why don’t his friends do anything? Why are they even friends with someone like that?”
“What are you naïve? Look at Tinsdale – is he the sort that gives a shit what other people think… or even do? Rucker’s a good friend to him, they keep good company, as they say.”
I felt disgusted at the double standards that seemed to go around for different people amongst Tinsdale and his friends.
“Don’t get me wrong, eh David – they all think he deserves getting the shit kicked out of him, but Rucker knows that if he steals directly from his friends then that’s exactly what’s going to happen. ‘Don’t shit in y’ own back yard’ well, he’s been shitting in everyone else’s back yard and he knows now that he can get away with it. So, fuck, if y’ gonna do something then do something. Don’t just talk about it like everyone else does.”
I needed some perspective on this issue that wasn’t tainted by age – or lack of age, or something. I don’t know, just something different I guess. From someone different.
I arrived at mum’s house at about 4:30 but only made it half way down the drive before stopping at the kitchen window where I could see mum sitting at the table that looked out onto the backyard, a glass of whiskey in her hand, poised at her lips. She wasn’t moving and had her eyes closed. What was she doing? Testing herself, again? Her shoulders began to shake, and then the other hand reached up to clutch her forehead, the glass came down and hit the table spilling whiskey over the edges and onto her hand. She yelled a throat scraping yell that wrenched at my insides and then suddenly stood up and flung the glass against the opposite wall. It smashed with little resistance, sending whisky in all directions and leaving a stain dripping onto the floor. She fell to her knees beside the table, crying loudly and horribly. I wanted to turn and run; it hurt so bad, but there seemed to be a deeper impulse that was driving me and I quickly ran around the corner and in through the back door. I knelt down and put my arms around her and had to hold her tight as she relaxed and fell into my grasp, crying and sobbing into my t-shirt. She smelt terrible. Completely soaked in alcohol fumes. An empty bottle of whiskey lay in the corner of the kitchen. The leaflet I had left by the phone lay next to it screwed up into a ball.
“I love you mum.”
She couldn’t really say anything coherent through the tears and sobs, but when she had cried enough, she quietened down and held my arm.
I couldn’t think of saying anything worthwhile, anything that would mean something to her so we just knelt there together for a short while.
She raised her head slightly and said, “You’re going to have to take me to the hospital.”
“OK.”
I tried to move but she didn’t move with me and she was too heavy for me to lift by myself so I just waited until she was ready.
Her hand was the first thing to move. It took me by the shoulder and she released her weight from me so I could help her to her feet.
She leaned against the table for a while and then started looking for the car keys before falling against the cupboards and vomiting as she hit the ground.
I stood there for a while, shocked and then angry. I wanted to leave her, run away and let her die of her own stupidity. But I felt compelled to stay and look at my mother writhing on the ground before me, an all too familiar mess. I decided to get her a glass of water even as the anger continued to ride high in my emotions, knowing that there wasn’t really anything I could do to help. Somehow I knew that she wasn’t so bad that an ambulance needed to be called, so I just sat for a while until she got a grip of herself, took some sips of the water, turned away from the smell of her own vomit and began struggling to get herself to her feet again. She found the car keys this time without falling and handed them to me as she passed the stain on the wall, ignoring it and looking towards the backdoor where she was heading. “You can drop me off and take the car back if you want.”
“Ok.”
When we got to the building I started unbuckling my seat belt, but she said “It’s alright, I don’t need you in there. I’ll ask about that Bridge programme that was on the leaflet you left.”
“Ok.”
“Just drop the car off and lock the doors when you leave.”
“Sure.” I took the house key off the key ring and gave it to her. “Mum?”
“Yeah?”
“I think I’d like to join you. Sometime, if that’s alright.”
“For what?”
“If you go to the Bridge programme.” I looked down at my feet resting on the car pedals. “I’ve been having memory lapses.”
She looked at me
and smiled. “I love you son.”
“Thanks.”
She began to move out of the car.
“Hey Mum.”
“Yeah?”
I paused, not really sure why I was asking. A part of me felt like I was doing it for her, another part for myself because I had finally got to the point where I really felt like I needed it, but also, because it just felt like the right thing to do.
“What is it son?”
“Would you like to come to church with me sometime?”
She looked me in the eyes and smiled. “Yes. Yes, I would.”
I watched her go through the sliding doors into the reception and talk to a nurse, then started up the car and drove off.
I started to see things a lot clearer now. Mum had tested herself to the point where she had to break free, where the struggle to be free was a prison within itself. She got rid of that prison with one simple act of retribution aimed at the whiskey. Hopefully this would be enough for her, enough at least to start her on a path towards recovery from her addiction.
I got back to the house and dropped the car keys on the kitchen table and set about cleaning up the mess that Mum had left. There was whiskey spilled over the floor, under the table and along the bench-top where she must have been so drunk that she had completely missed the glass – it wouldn’t have surprised me if she had tried licking it up. I took the hand-shovel and brush out of the hot-water cupboard and swept up the broken glass, dumping it into the outside rubbish bin. I felt stupid doing it, but I also felt like I needed to do it. I had done so little for Mum. She never blamed me for Dad leaving but I could always tell that a part of her hated me for not helping her through that, for being so caught up in my own problems that I had practically ignored everything that had happened to her. I was the worst kind of son.
I couldn’t help looking at the stain on the wall as I soaked a cloth in a bucket of hot water. It looked suspiciously like the outline of someone’s head. I was still angry and needed to vent that anger: Mum had vented hers – there was no reason why I couldn’t vent mine.
I saw Claire’s eyes piercing through me in the reflection of the rear-view mirror. Her smile was unreserved, without doubt, with utter conviction: “We’re doing it for Jesus!”
I couldn’t believe that she had made Jesus an accomplice in her crime. Like he had personally asked them to go and rip that person’s lawn up.
“Forgiveness is the way of the Christ” I remember someone saying once.
But I couldn’t forgive. What I felt in me wasn’t something that Jesus would ever sanction, but it was something that I wanted. And I wanted it bad.
Fuck Jesus! I’m doing this for myself!
Part X
– On another plate –
“I know someone who knows Rucker. He could possibly keep me informed about his whereabouts.”
“Does this guy hate Rucker too?”
“Nah, David. He just doesn’t give a shit what happens to him. Most people know what Rucker’s like and only those who he steals from are so hateful that they want something bad to happen to him. Other people like us are kinda just waiting for something to happen.”
I assumed that when he said ‘us’ that he wasn’t including me.
“It won’t be a set-up, just an opportunity that I’ll be looking for and let you know when the time is ripe. OK?”
“Sweet.”
“Good, but you’ve gotta take it when it comes alright? Otherwise it’s just a wasted opportunity.”
“No problem.”
Being back at the Laundry Rentals was partially welcome, but only because my hours were mostly part-time and the work didn’t require any thinking, and little answering to stupid bosses. In fact I kinda liked both my bosses there – it’s always nice when you get a second-in-charge who empathises with you.
Unfortunately I only had one thing on my mind now and it was distracting me to the point where work was becoming burdensome.
I received the txt from Lucas at 11:00am: Rucker was heading down Lindesfarne Road and was about to meet a friend in the gardens – the friend wasn’t going to be turning up because he didn’t want to take the chance of getting wet from the expected rainfall. I looked outside: the clouds were practically waiting for the right moment to pour bucket-loads down. I didn’t fancy being out there working for another hour when it happened either – nor did I want the chance of losing this opportunity to get the revenge I had been waiting for. Just as I had resolved to go in and ask the boss if she wanted me to continue working or just come back another day when it wasn’t going to rain, the rain started falling in a gentle wash of wind creating episodes of torrential downpours between calm moments that gave me ample enough time to get at least some work done. But I had settled to ask for the rest of the day off in a roundabout way that at least showed that I was only making a suggestion, and hopefully planting the idea in the boss’s head in the meantime.
She was sitting at her seat surrounded by the assistant manager and an outside employee of the company.
“Umm, sorry to interrupt, but do you want me to carry on working or just go home and come back when there is less chance of the laundry sacks getting wet?”
She folded her arms. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“I just thought that if you wanted me to come back later when its dryer then I could, that’s all.”
“That little bit of rain won’t harm anything. Give me one good reason why you can’t continue working through it.”
I had no idea what to come back with and was silent for a moment. She raised her eyebrows at me either expecting a reply or just expecting me to get back to work. And then to save me any further embarrassment, the sound of hail crashing like thunder on the tin roof of the warehouse broke the silence …and a few faces as well.
The assistant manager looked at the boss. “That sounds like a pretty good reason.”
There was laughter, but the boss just looked at me with a smirk and said “fine, you win. Take the day off”.
I casually walked to my locker saying farewell to the ladies and promising them my return some other day, but as soon as I picked up my keys and my jacket, I ran like a fucker to my car trying to dodge the hail by running alongside trucks and under as many trees as possible, but also because I was in a hurry to get some much needed vengeance.
As I sat inside the car with the hail pelting down on the windows, I sent a txt to Luke asking if Rucker was still in the gardens. His reply said: [ he all yors. It no rain so hrd at grdn ] Good, I thought. Less distraction when my fist is extracting blood from his face.
I started the car up and drove out of the parking lot as the prison across the road moped in silence looking somewhat sad amidst the hail that was gently beating it into submission. I drove quickly – stupid, when I think of it now, but I was in a hurry to satisfy my need for revenge. I vaguely remember a red and blue light flash out of the corner of my eye as I drove at least 80km and rising down Lindesfarne Road but dismissed it as a mixture of bulging blood vessels in my eyes and the sudden appearance of blue in the sky. I took a lot of corners wide which allowed me to keep my overall speed up and the few straights I bolted down probably helped to keep distance between myself and the car that I had no idea was following. The further east I went the less it was raining until finally I got to the garden with a ray of sunshine arching across the car and bathing me in its glow. I got out and ran full tit into the gardens without even thinking where he could be, just heading towards the shelter that most people use when it rains over this way. He was there alright, and hardly even had a chance: He stood up to run but I had my hands around the collar of his scrawny neck before he could get his legs moving in time. My momentum pulled us both in the general direction that I had been running and I used it to thrust him onto the ground. It hit him hard as he tried to say something but I kicked him in the stomach while he was down and grabbed his head, throwing fist after fist into his face. I pulled his head backwards so his fac
e was looking up at the sky and his back was arched awkwardly.
“You fuckin’ sorry now you cunt?”
“Wha… oh, shit man. Dude I’m sorry I’ll pay you”
I didn’t care. I smacked him hard in the nose and blood splattered across his mouth, then I shoved his head back into the ground, stood up and started kicking furiously at his body, even aiming a couple at his head for good measure.
“You bastard! How dare you steal from me.”
“I’m sorry man, I’ll repay ya! I’ll repay ya!”
“Shut up you cunt!” I stomped viciously on his arm. His shoulder buckled and I swooped in for more attacks, pummelling his face with as much energy as I could muster. “You uncaring piece of shit!” Rain kept washing the blood off making me think that I wasn’t doing enough damage. “You could have saved her,” I screamed into his fearful eyes as my fist connected with his cheekbone. “You could have saved her!”
He looked confused through the abrasions that I was dealing to his face so I yelled even louder to make it abundantly clear: “You killed her!”
He tried rolling away as I landed a hard one into his side and began begging me to stop, but his outstretched hands were just getting in the way, so they ended up taking the brunt of the beating instead.
“I didn’t kill no one, I didn’t kill no one! What the fuck you talking ‘bout?”
His pitiful face just made me want to do a better job as each blow knocked more blood out of him, more pain, more payback and more satisfaction out of me. All I could see as I swung and connected each fist against his wet and bloodied face was an animal who didn’t care, who had no desire to care or make amends, but would only plead forgiveness like a weasel trying to get out of what he deserved.
So I kept hitting.
What did a stance against violence mean to me now? Nothing. It had all turned to nothing. Just a chance to make someone else finally know what it felt like to be in need of so much help and to not receive it. In some strange way, demanding that he understand what he had done.
I Am The Local Atheist Page 25