The Killing Jar

by Nicola Monaghan

  ‘It’s just a trip, Kez,’ I heard Mark say. ‘Just a fucking silly little trip.’ His voice echoed through the crack in the ice and I knew it were, and that I’d just have to wait for it to end. I let my head fall onto the table and the ice shattered.

  Just like that I was normal again. ‘Sorry,’ I said to Mark. I could see my hand in front of me, shaking. ‘God, I’m sorry Mark.’

  ‘No need. S’my fault. Shouldn’t of given you shrooms after what yer been through lakely. Stupid-a me.’

  Course he was right. I realised that and went psycho gell again. I bashed the table then stood up, thumping at him. He grabbed my wrists and I was thrown back to Phil, outside his house, sending poisonous words whispering into my ear. It were like all the temper I felt towards Phil transferred to Mark then. It wasn’t fair at all, but what is at the end of the day? Not October, that’s for fucking sure. All sorts of foul language came out my mouth, and things you shouldn’t say to no one ever.

  After a bit I settled, and Mark grabbed me and squeezed hard. I let him push all the breath out of me, tighten like an anaconda so’s I couldn’t say no more shit to him.

  I sat down. I was freezing.

  ‘Yer lips’ve gone blue,’ Mark said and I shrugged. ‘You looked like you was possessed or summat.’

  ‘Your fucking mushrooms, that’s all,’ I said.

  ‘More-n that and we both know it, Kez.’ I wouldn’t look at him. He grabbed my hand across the table. ‘You called me Phil.’

  ‘I called yer lots-a things.’

  ‘Yeh, but I din’t mind the other things ser-much,’ he said. He did well with that one cause it made me smile. ‘Yer know what’s wrong wi-yer, we both do. Yer going ter be messed up for good unless yer do summat about it.’

  ‘Like what?’ I said, raising my voice. What’d happened had happened, I thought. Nowt to be done about it now.

  ‘Like get yer own back,’ he said. Then his favourite word. Revenge. It rolled off his tongue. The way he said it, and his mouth watered, you’d think it were the word for a tasty bit of meat or some nice wine. It were the only word Mark said that made him sound posh.

  ‘Yeah, like how?’ I said. Despite all this stuff I got up to, the way I went on with my life, all I was really back then was a stroppy teenage kid and that’s what I sounded like.

  ‘Like kill the bastard.’ A stroppy teenage kid with mates who said stuff like that and meant it. I went quiet. This was a line you drew, surely. Yeah, me and Mark were kids who crossed lines, but this one? It were too much. I looked up at Mark and saw the set of his eyes. I knew if I gave the okay he’d do it. And the thing was, I wanted to. To stop me-sen doing it, I went inside the tiny caravan bathroom and locked the door.

  Mark could of broke the door down. The lock was this flimsy plastic thing and wouldn’t of held. He didn’t even bang on it though. That was how well he knew me. If he’d of tried to get in, I’d of screamed and shouted and gone more and more against him. Course he left me to it and I stayed in there for hardly no time at all. I looked at my face in the mirror. I was looking skinny. I’d always had cheekbones but now my face looked hollow as a skull. My eyes were sunk and brown all the way round, underneath the lids what they call the whites were hardly white at all. More pink. My lips were still blue like Mark’d said so I looked like some kind of fucked up clown. My hair dripped lank over my shoulders. I looked like a poster of one of them heroin chic models. I looked like my mam. I knew a few drags of one of Mark’s special doobies or a shot of what Uncle Frank’d gave me after I’d got beat up would end it all. I’d feel better, like nowt’d gone off with Phil Tyneside or the baby. But I also knew the effect’d last five minutes. Then I’d need more and more and more till I dropped down dead. Seen it with my mam, the way she was going. I vowed again I’d never do brown, not even one little drag of it.

  I came out my hidey-hole different. Like Morph must of felt the first time he unfurled them shiny blue wings.

  ‘I don’t want ter kill-im,’ I said. I paused. ‘But yer could hurt-im a bit.’

  Mark looked up at me, half smiled. ‘No, Kez me duck, no. You can do it. It’s the only way it’ll do the job, see.’

  ‘How?’

  Mark held summat out to me: a small embossed pill.

  ‘Don’t be fucking stupid, Mark. Yer can’t hurt a bloke wi-just E,’ I said.

  ‘Look at it close,’ he said.

  I took the pill off him. It were about twice as thick as normal. ‘What is it?’ I said.

  ‘Double stacked. Made of stuff called PMA. Not ecstasy at all,’ he said.

  ‘What’ll it do?’

  ‘Give it Mr Tyneside. Then you’ll see.’

  TWELVE

  Mark told me it were bullshit about serving revenge cold. ‘Get it while it’s hot and tasty,’ he said, with that wicked grin he had what made you think he was up to nowt more serious than putting a spider in the teacher’s desk drawer. He had strong opinions about revenge, did Mark. And three rules he lived by. Do it quick, make sure you see it, make sure they know it were all down to you. So long as you followed these rules, the gospel according to definitely-not-Saint Mark, you could cure owt. At least, you’d believe you could if you rated what Mark said, and I did back then. He was the only person there for me what I could rely on. Jon was too young, my mam was too fucked, my mommar long gone and Mrs Ivanovich, who might of watched for me, was far too long dead.

  A few Saturdays on, with my blood still bubbling hard and hot about what Phil’d done to me, I went with Mark to The Garage. We knew Phil went there most weeks cause so did we by then – it were part of the territory we’d negotiated. ‘Two birds, one stone,’ Mark said as we set out, loading up the hidden pockets in his denim jacket with pills and wraps. ‘Business and pleasure.’

  ‘Just mek sure you don’t mix owt up wi-the special pills,’ I said. And Mark twinkled, held up a moneybag full of double stacked, shook it. The pills hit each other, making a sound like plastic against plastic.

  The Garage was heaving, like it always were of a Saturday. Mostly student types like Phil. We’d paid off the bouncers so’s they’d let us alone. We weren’t risking no trouble, not that night. We paid our dues then launched our-sen across the dance floor to where we knew we’d not be filmed by the CCTV. It were crowded, but most people knew who we were and the room split open to let us pass. I saw this gell make eyes at Mark. She had hair straight as owt, shiny, and her skin was shining too. Like Bek from the gell’s home. Someone who’d had the best of everything her whole bloody life. She had a stud in her nose and I could tell by the sparkle in her eyes she was pilled already. Gells like her often looked at Mark. He brought out summat in them. Problies they thought he’d be a nice rough shag. This gell looked that type. The sort who’d had to be daddy’s little princess all her life till she went away so now she plays the dirty little slut with a glint in her eye. I pushed between her and Mark as we walked to our spot. If he noticed me do that, or even noticed the gell at all, then he was bloody good at hiding it cause he didn’t even blink. But then it were my night, and he wouldn’t of spoiled that for owt, least of all for a shag with some posh slapper.

  We’d not been standing there long before some blokes came over trying to score. It were almost always the blokes, the ones who approached us. I hated to think the gells were too pathetic to buy their own pills and I don’t think that’s what it were anyways. I think the lads took over. Summat primeval. They want to go hunting and come back dragging a huge hairy mammoth behind them. It’s funny how these things don’t change that much. The bloke what spoke to us was tall, skinny, wouldn’t of made much of a mammoth hunter. He looked nervous. He turned to Mark with a bit of a grin and said, ‘What yer got?’ Mark half nodded and showed the bloke a handful of bright coloured pills.

  ‘Eight quid a pop,’ he said. The bloke got out a twenty and held up two fingers. Mark gestured he should hand the cash to me. I gave him change and he walked off with two yellow tablets.

 
‘Don’t forget to drink water,’ I called after him and Mark laughed.

  ‘Yer don’t have to mother-em. They’re big boys,’ he said.

  ‘Bad choice-a-words,’ I said, and I looked at the floor. Mark rubbed my back and said sorry. Held his arm against my shoulder and tried to find my eyes with his own till I looked back up at him.

  ‘It’s all going ter get much better soon,’ he promised.

  I looked round the room but I couldn’t see Phil. I was worried he wouldn’t come but we were dead busy and I didn’t have much time to think about it. It were money here, pills there, the odd wrap of coke. It wasn’t really a skag kind of place but some clubbers bought a bit on the way out, summat to bring them down on the way home. They always called it brown, and I heard a couple of them talking once, arguing about what it were made of. They didn’t know it were heroin and I couldn’t believe it. Fancy taking summat if you don’t even know what it is. Mark reckoned half the club types were the same. Didn’t even know that MDMA meant ecstasy ner nowt. Street drugs don’t come in a nice little box with the active ingredients in a list on the back, I know that, but you’d think they’d of showed an interest in finding out. Money and powder and pills changed hands without explanation and they stayed ignorant. Mark’s pockets were emptying fast and mine were filling up. I made him check he’d still got the double-stacked PMA stuff. I would of hated to give it someone by accident. Course he had it, and he told me off for fussing.

  At long last I saw Phil across the room. He came in looking like he was trapped inside a bubble of happiness. Some gell close to his own age was wrapped on his arm and they kept smiling and pecking at each other. I guessed this was his fiancée. I wasn’t sure then how we’d do it. Didn’t know what to do if he wanted pills for the both of them. How was I going to make sure he took the bad ones? She wasn’t exactly going to make my Christmas card list, Phil’s woman, but I didn’t want to do her no harm. She’d done nowt to me.

  Phil made straight for us. You’d think he’d of had a bit more decorum about it, given what’d gone off with him and me, but he was such a tosser he didn’t care how I felt. Just so long as he got his disco biscuits. He spoke to Mark, course, didn’t dare look me in the eye. I wanted to make sure of who was going to take the pills so I interrupted.

  ‘How much you want? And what you prepared to pay?’ I asked him. I felt my jaw stiffen, like I’d done some E even though I hadn’t. Mark’d stopped me taking owt, reckoned it were important I kept straight that night.

  ‘Just a pill. Usual kind of money, eight quid or something,’ Phil said.

  ‘What about yer gellfriend?’

  ‘Julia’s strictly a cigarettes and alcohol type.’

  I snorted. ‘Julia is, is she?’ I said, making fun of his accent. ‘Ten. Special stuff. Show-im Mark.’ Mark took a pill out of the money bag. ‘Look, it’s thicker,’ I said. If Phil’d been owt like me, the sort who worries about what he put in his body and checked it all out, then he might of guessed this was a dodgy pill. But he didn’t. He just nodded. One of them knowing movements. I’m summat special. I know what I’m doing here and I’m getting a good deal. The kind of way people like Phil who’ve never had to worry about owt move in these situations. I wanted to bust out laughing when I saw it but I didn’t. He would of worked it out then. I just gave him my curt Broxta nod and took the poor sap’s money. Couldn’t help but feel glad I was taking his cash and giving him summat to make him sick. Double whammy. Couldn’t help thinking that I’d took pills, all them months ago. Pills what’d killed the tiny little baby growing inside me.

  I sipped my Bacardi and Coke. It were a novelty for me, alcohol. I didn’t usually drink when I was on stuff, so hardly ever. I watched Phil walk off. The way he swung his feet like the big ‘I am’. First I thought what a tosser he was, then another feeling came, summat I wasn’t expecting. I was sorry for him. I looked at his face as he made a fist round the pill and went to get a drink to wash it down with and there was a knot in my tummy, worse than when the baby was there kicking and moving about and making me sick. I made for the dance floor to follow him. Mark grabbed my arm.

  ‘What yer doing?’ he said.

  ‘This in’t right,’ I said, turning to look him in the eyes.

  ‘It’s the right thing for you,’ he told me. I shrugged. ‘It’s up ter you then. It’s your problem,’ he said.

  I shook away from Mark then and caught up with Phil before he got back to his gellfriend.

  ‘What you doing?’ he said as I grabbed his arm, echoing Mark a minute before. ‘Can’t you see Julia’s just over there? She’ll freak.’

  ‘Tell her yer dropped summat. Thought yer were supposed to be clever. Surely you can blag it?’ I said. He didn’t say owt to that, but stood there blinking at me, glancing over his shoulder and back again.

  ‘What d’you want?’ he said.

  ‘To know yer sorry,’ I told him. My jaw tightened even more then and if I hadn’t been sure I would of sworn I’d had some E. My throat contracted and I squeezed my whole face in. With all this effort, there wasn’t no tears.

  ‘For what?’ Phil said, raising his voice and pulling an ugly face. ‘For shagging you? You wanted it as much as I did.’

  ‘I’m a kid. I don’t know owt.’

  ‘You didn’t seem like much of a kid then. Or now. Look at you, dealing in the corner. Not exactly kids’ stuff is it?’ he said. I could of walloped him one – he had this smarmy, I’ve-had-you-don’t-want-you-no-more grin plastered across his face and I just wanted to smash it to pieces.

  ‘I got pregnant. Had ter have an abortion.’

  ‘Well then, you’ll remember next time to take your pills,’ he said with this sarky tone to his voice. And with that Phil turned and brushed me off him, like I was muck on his collar. And I thought, yeah, you’ll get pills, and walked back to Mark.

  ‘Well?’ Mark said, and I knew what he was asking.

  ‘Let’s mek-im really sick,’ I said.

  It wasn’t long before Phil stomped back to us to complain.

  ‘That was a dud,’ he said to Mark. Not to me of course. ‘I’m not up at all.’ I had to work at not smiling.

  ‘Sorry mate. I knew there was a few bad-uns in that batch but there’s no way to tell what’s what,’ Mark said.

  ‘What you going to do about it, then?’ Phil asked him.

  ‘You can have another one, on me,’ he said.

  Phil puffed up then, like a boxer who’d just won a big bout. Mark handed him another dodgy pill and he strutted off.

  ‘Tosser,’ Mark said and he was spot on. I couldn’t believe Phil’s conceit. I mean, he could of saved his-sen a load of trouble if he’d of thought straight instead of being so up his own arse. What sort of drug dealer can you complain to and get a refund or replacement? None I’ve ever met and that’s for sure. Anyone ever gave me owt for free and I’d cotton summat were up. That’s the problem with kids like Phil. Had too much handed to them on a plate. I can almost feel sorry for him when I think about it now. Back then though, I felt summat swell inside me. The whole room pulsed and looked beautiful. My face grinned without me trying. If it wasn’t for the fact I couldn’t get into the music I would of sworn I’d had a pill. It were sweet. It were as hot and tasty as Mark’d said it would be.

  Mark and me made a few more deals but it got quieter. I danced a bit. Then I went for a wander. Mostly I wanted to check out Phil, see how fucked up he was getting. That was when I realised how thick he really was. He was drinking pints of beer. He didn’t look high, just a bit drunk, as he swayed and grabbed his gellfriend’s shoulder to stop from falling.

  Soon after, he was back complaining to Mark about the second pill. His words were slurred and his face red as owt. I thought about how hard his blood would be pumping, cause that’s what PMA does for you and not much else.

  ‘I’m sorry mate. I really don’t know how you could of got two suckers in a row. That’s fucked up,’ Mark said. He let Phil argue for a bit
, so’s it didn’t look totally obvious. After Phil’d ranted for a while Mark said, ‘D’yer fancy doing a speedball, to mek up fer it?’

  A speedball’s only a step away from Mrs Ivanovich and her cyanide, about the stupidest thing you can put inside your body. I could tell by his face Phil didn’t have a clue what it were. Mix up heroin and coke and inject them. Coke speeds up your heart and heroin slows it down. Take them both at once and your pacemaker doesn’t know what’s hit it. It were the same shit what made River Phoenix drop down dead. I knew then Mark was pushing it. I’d told him. I didn’t want to kill the fucker, just make him sick.

  ‘It’s the best rush ever,’ Mark told Phil.

  ‘Course,’ said Phil, blinking again. Just goes to show how bullshit can kill you.

  ‘Come on then,’ said Mark, gesturing towards the toilets. Phil looked like he was going to bottle it for a minute. I doubt he’d realised a speedball was summat you inject for starters. But he wasn’t going to lose face, specially not in front of me.

  ‘You’ll love this better than fucking young pussy,’ Mark said, and the two of them laughed. See, maybes it were cause I knew Mark, or cause I wasn’t so fucked up as Phil, but it were obvious to me Mark was having a dig when he said that. Even more obvious by the way he laughed after that he didn’t find owt funny. There was no lightness to that laugh. It were more like summat out a horror movie.