Vouloir

by J. D. Chase

  I reward him with a massive grin. I’m about to do the lame ‘I could tell you but then I’d have to kill you’ line and think better of it. My mouth has done enough damage, I’m not risking more.

  ‘Um. We’ll wait for her outside because I know you’re going to be just fine. And if not, I’ll just pick the lock. We’ll get someone to let us in downstairs because that lock is a bitch. I could do it, but it would take too long. The one on the flat door is a piece of piss though,’ I say, and yeah, I’ll admit that the look of shocked admiration on his face feels good.

  I give him a wink and press on before he changes his mind. ‘Right. Laptop and water bottles. I’ll grab the chairs and meet you by the front door, okay?’

  He nods and says, ‘Yeah.’ But I’ve seen men standing before a firing squad looking happier.

  As the door closes behind us, I see him jump at the sound. The poor kid’s nerves are shot and we’re only a foot outside the door.

  He remains silent as we descend the stairs. I’m not sure whether it’s best to praise him, chat about something and nothing or keep my mouth shut so I do the latter.

  We get to the entrance door and I push it open. He freezes. Like turns to stone. His pallor fits too.

  I use the chairs to prop the door open then take the laptop from him. It’s then that I notice that he’s brought down the power lead and adaptor too. With anyone else, I’d mention it and take the piss but, with him, I’m not sure it’s a brain fart. Sadly, I think it’s a genuine misunderstanding on his part. I take one of the chairs and position it so that it’s backed up against the building then place the laptop on the seat. Then I turn to find him standing in the doorway looking utterly terrified.

  ‘It’s no different out here, Kid,’ I say. ‘Except for the fresh air. It’s much cooler than the flat. We’ll sit here, behind the door so we can see anyone coming this way. But, to be honest, in this cul-de-sac, it isn’t likely there’ll be many people around.’

  Perhaps that’s why she chose it. The thought springs into the back of my mind.

  He takes a deep breath and places one foot on the paved area outside the door. Then the other. His movements are so stiff, robotic even. I walk backward to the chairs, just a few feet away, keeping my eyes on his and a smile on my face. Reassurance, that’s what he needs. Just like when I’ve stormed homes and found terrified residents. Quiet confidence and friendliness always worked well, especially when we didn’t share a common language.

  It works now too. He follows me and sits stiffly on the edge of one of the chairs. I sit in the other, putting the laptop on my knees. They’re hardly comfortable, these dining chairs but they’re not intended for chilling on, are they? So we’re both far too upright to be properly comfortable but my intention is to get him onto the grass. I have a blanket in the boot of the car—I keep it there for emergencies (always be prepared and all that shit).

  There’s a breeze blowing that you would barely notice in the scorching heat of the sun but here, in the shade of the building, it’s gorgeous. We sit there in silence for a few minutes and just chill. Well, I chill a little. He’s already frozen.

  When I feel him relax, just a little, I turn to him and say, ‘So you managed to get rid of Veuve for a while. Let’s make the most of it. She’s probably worried about what we’re getting up to, here on our own. Maybe she thinks we’re having a party and inviting lots of ladies. Lots of scantily clad ladies.’

  I give him a wink and he smiles but it doesn’t reach his eyes.

  ‘That reminds me, I’ll have to show you how to hide your browsing history on the laptop.’

  Another one of those blank looks.

  I grin. ‘When you’re using the Internet, unless you clear it or use an incog—secret browser, whoever uses the laptop after you can see what you were looking at.’

  I see comprehension dawn and he nods.

  ‘So next time you’re looking up pictures of ladies with big tits,’ I pause and make a suitable gesture with my hands, ‘I’ll show you how to keep it a secret.’

  He smiles shyly.

  Yup, he’s been searching for such online images. He didn’t know how to surf the web a few days ago and he’s already perving.

  I put my hand up for a high five and he just looks at it. He’s still looking tense so I take the time to explain.

  ‘But why?’ he says, scrunching up his brow.

  ‘Just because,’ I say. ‘It’s a social thing I guess. What friends do.’

  ‘Ah, okay. High five!’ he says, holding his palm up in front of him and looking way more pleased with himself than is socially acceptable.

  I chuckle and slap his hand with as much enthusiasm as it was offered.

  ‘Ouch,’ he says, shaking his hand but his eyes are dancing and he’s looking more relaxed than I think I’ve ever seen him.

  I laugh and while I’m reluctant to spoil the mood, what I said was true: I don’t think Veuve will be able to stay away for too long.

  ‘So what do you want to tell me while we’re not being babysat by you know who?’

  The smile slides off his face and a frown appears. ‘Did you manage to find out anything about Ross yet?’ he says, but I’d told him I needed to know more so he doesn’t look hopeful.

  I shake my head. ‘No, that’s why I need more from you. I need whatever you can tell me. No matter how insignif—unimportant it seems. Anything, even if it’s something you think you shouldn’t tell me for some reason. I know he’s a bad man who is responsible for bad things. But I need to know whatever you know.’

  He nods and begins to talk.

  Within no time, or so it seems, Veuve pulls up in a taxi looking anxious before spotting us sitting outside and then, frankly she’d look less shocked if she’d witnessed an alien aircraft landing.

  I’m sure my face could match hers in the shocked stakes but I’m doing my best to keep it under wraps. The Kid’s still insistent that she shouldn’t know what he’s planning. I’ve drained my water bottle ages ago but I’d give anything for a cold beer. Or six.

  I used to think that I’d seen it all—and that I’d had to go as far as Iraq and Afghanistan to see some of the worst atrocities carried out by mankind in recent years. But the words that spilled from The Kid’s mouth in an increasingly fluent manner as he finally opened up, tell me how wrong I am. It’s inconceivable to me that the events he’s described to me took place right here, in London. The capital city of the United Kingdom, the ‘Land of Hope and Glory’ . . . or so the song says. And yet, I know deep down inside that he’s speaking the truth.

  More than once I’ve wanted to embrace him. To take him into my arms when he became too choked with emotion to speak. Or when endless tears streamed down his pale cheeks and sobs racked his frame. Or, worst of all, when his expression became so twisted with fear or hatred or probably a combination of the two that it underscored the unimaginable horror of his words. Unimaginable to my brain, fact to his.

  I’d found myself fighting back tears and rubbing the back of my hand across my face, mirroring him, each time I lost the battle. For a long stretch, I hadn’t spoken a word. I’d just sat and absorbed the full impact of his words until they pushed past the nausea that churned in the pit of my gut and ignited the fire of revenge. A fire that I vowed would remain aflame until I’d tossed every single culprit responsible for his misery, and that of so many other kids, into the flames of hell. To die a slow death, or something akin to the living death they’d inflicted on so many kids.

  My eyes search Veuve’s face as she walks warily across the paved surface. The road’s probably thirty feet away but she seems to take forever to reach us. I can see she’s struggling. Her impulse will be to run to The Kid. To find out what’s happened—not just because we’re sitting outside on dining chairs, but because he looks like he’s recovering from a particularly virulent dose of salmonella. His skin, even paler than usual, has taken on a clammy sheen which highlights the red-ringed eyes.

  So, with g
reat restraint and the cogs of her brain whirring, she finally approaches us. The look she shoots me leaves me in no doubt that she blames me for whatever unfortunate event has beset The Kid.

  ‘What are you boys doing out here?’ she says cheerfully, her attention firmly on The Kid now.

  My God, her acting is way better than anything churned out by the countless theatre schools across the capital. I file that piece of information away.

  ‘Jones made me come outside,’ he says, looking utterly miserable. ‘He forced me.’

  Yes, technically there’s a grain of truth in there but, the way he says it, it sounds like I dragged him down the stairs.

  Immediately, she turns to me. She’s no longer a sex therapist, she’s a mamma grizzly bear and I’m threatening her young.

  I hold my palms out in front of me to stop her advance while I try to think of something to say to stop her ripping my head off my shoulders.

  I hear a delighted ‘whoop’ and The Kid high fives both of my hands.

  Veuve freezes. As, for just a second, do I.

  We both turn to face him. He’s grinning all over his face, looking every inch a five-year-old. The little shit!

  Veuve looks back at me. We’re thinking the same thing. He just sits there, looking mightily proud of himself.

  I can’t comprehend it. Just moments before, he’d poured his heart out. Narrating a horror story too dark and terrible to be fiction. Yet here he is, grinning like a Cheshire cat who got double helpings of cream.

  ‘So you’re okay out here?’ Her expression is unreadable.

  He nods enthusiastically and I finally relax. So does Veuve. I hear her exhale and can almost feel the tension leaving her body.

  I stand and invite her to take my chair. She hesitates but then nods her thanks and sits down. I sit on the edge of a wide grass verge a few feet away. The sun is on it now, the patch of shade having shrunk in the time we’ve been out here. There’s still plenty of heat in the sun and within moments, I’m missing the shade.

  ‘So,’ she says. ‘How did you end up out here? It looks like you locked yourselves out, except for the fact that you have my dining chairs out here. So unless you were planning on selling them for a quick profit, I assume you intended to come and sit out here.’

  He nods. ‘It was too hot in the flat. Jones wanted to open a window or go out on your balcony again but you have the keys. That reminds me. You said you keep the keys in case there’s a fire so we can get out. What about when you’re not here? How do I get out?’

  Hands flying to her mouth, she cries. ‘Oh my God. Of course. I’m sorry, I guess I’m so used to living alone. I haven’t managed to crack the domestic shit yet, have I?’

  I see her face turn to me, her eyes wide. Yeah, you slipped up there, Veuve. You give the impression that he’s your son but you just pretty much gave the game away. Of course, I don’t know that—not as far as you’re concerned.

  I decide to see whether she’d give the game away in relation to a theory I am working on. I stretch out and pull my black tee-shirt over my head, letting the sun caress my bare skin.

  I register the way her eyes flick over to me, not once but twice in quick succession, although she wrestles with them to stay away. I see the way her fingers pluck at the hem of her skirt in minor agitation and frustration. Then, her eyes are flicking over again. And her jaw is tensing. She’s listening to The Kid as he prattles on about the way we’ve looked at Google Maps and used Street View while actually sitting here.

  But I know she’s not paying him her full attention. She’s too distracted. Suddenly, her brain catches up. ‘But how? You don’t have an Internet connection out here. The Wi-Fi range of the router barely covers the flat.’

  The Kid looks to me in blind panic.

  I smile. ‘Sorry buddy, I should have showed you. Because we’re outside, I used the data connection of my mobile to create a hot spot then I connected the laptop to it. Hey presto! Outdoor Internet access on the laptop.’

  You lying fuck, Jax. But ten out of ten for quick thinking. She looks satisfied. And not just about the Internet connection.

  I’d kept my eyes on The Kid while I was speaking. I’d seen her checking out my ink. I can’t help myself. I sit up and push my shoulders back, pumping up my pecs then I put my hands just behind me, keeping my fingers pointing towards me and brace my arms. Not only does that highlight my pecs, it stretches my biceps and keeps the main ink pointing in her direction.

  I want to high five The Kid when he comments on my tattoos and an animated conversation ensues. She can’t help herself. Her eyes keep being drawn back to my ink when I inform The Kid about the inspiration behind each one and when I had each one done. She’s practically salivating when I turn around and show him the tattoos on my back.

  Typically, he’s most intrigued and impressed with the simplest tattoo of all. My blood group is given on my shoulder . . . for obvious reasons . . . and a complete waste of fucking time, as it turned out. I found out years after having it done, along with many others before me, and no doubt since, that doctors will still type your blood, even if you’re tatted, unless they haven’t got time, then they’ll just top you up with O-neg. I’ve thought about covering it over as it’s a bit naff, as if I’m showing the world I was a Commando—if I wanted to do that, I’d wear my dog tags . . . as if! But it’s a part of my history so I let it stay—most people don’t get it anyway.

  At least I didn’t get a Commando dagger tattoo. Most guys I’ve seen with them are obviously fakes. Too many youngsters get them before they’ve even attempted the entrance tests . . . and then fail. Some think it’s going to get the ladies all hot and bothered . . . it might unless they happen to venture down to the south-west. Then all it’s likely to get them is a slap—the ladies down there are immune to it—they’ve been there, done that too many times.

  ‘I don’t know about anybody else, but I’m gagging for a cold drink,’ I say, when The Kid is suitably satisfied with my explanations.

  Not missing a beat, she stands and says, ‘Well, thank you so much for coming over early. We’ll see you soon, I’ve no doubt.’

  The Kid raises his eyebrows. Even he, with his poor social skills, cannot mistake the dismissal in her tone.

  I offer to help them take the chairs back upstairs but the stubborn creature waves me off and carries both chairs, one by one, inside the building. The Kid grabs the laptop and the power lead as well as the empty bottles. I know she’s going to have to leave one chair there and come back down for it but I let it go. Before she can hustle him inside, The Kid asks her what time she’s at the club tomorrow. I’m working from late afternoon until midnight—I couldn’t keep putting jobs off. I have a healthy savings pot but I’m saving that for my retirement. A man in my line of business retires early.

  ‘Early,’ she says. ‘Most of the afternoon.’

  The Kid looks to me expectantly.

  ‘I’ll be over around one. That okay?’

  She purses her lips but nods and heads inside.

  The Kid walks over to me and says, ‘I don’t know what you meant about the hot spots and the Internet but it sounded good. Did you really do that?’

  I give him a wink. ‘Of course I did.’

  He doesn’t look convinced. I told you he was a bright kid.

  I’M NOT GOING TO say it. Every time I so much as think that everything is going . . . you know what, something happens to make me take it back.

  In the last week, I feel like a burden has been lifted. The Kid and Jones are getting on famously. Jones often comes around when I’m not here and, weather permitting I’ll find them in the garden when I return. Yes, that’s right . . . in the garden, behind the flat, usually surrounded by families and youngsters out to enjoy the settled spell of good weather.

  The day after I found them by the entrance and the world stopped spinning—at least for me, Jones turned up with a couple of deckchairs. He plonked them by the entrance and buzzed up then asked The K
id to go down. He’d also brought a pizza and some sun lotion for The Kid’s pale skin. That was them sorted for a couple of hours. I’d remained upstairs . . . skulking around and feeling very left out until it was time for me to head to the club. I wasn’t meeting Dean until half past two. I’d been invited to join them but I know it’s healthy for The Kid to spend time with another guy, albeit one old enough to be his dad but it’s still a huge step towards social independence.

  The next day, I found them at the side of the building . . . just a couple of hundred feet around the corner from the entrance. The next day, it was the communal garden. Now they hang out there every day. The Kid’s skin is developing a healthy glow and he seems more relaxed—not just when he’s outside but inside the flat too—that bit of exercise and fresh air sure makes a difference.

  I don’t have to go to the club today. It’s Sunday and I’ve given myself the day off, hoping to do something outdoors with The Kid. But, before I could tell him, he’d invited Jones over. They’re out there now, huddled over something despite the heat. I find myself wandering out onto the balcony every so often—purely to check The Kid’s okay. I may have happened to notice that Jones has taken his tee-shirt off . . . but so has every female over the age of thirteen. I’ve never heard so much giggling or seen so much hair flicking. Well they can stay away . . . from The Kid obviously.

  Jones is another matter altogether. They’re welcome to him. Since the night Dean had seen him fucking Avril, one of the club strippers, I’ve not been at Vouloir at the same time as him. I’ve asked Gabe to keep an eye on him—telling the barman about Dean’s warning—to justify my interest. It seems that he’s been in the club now and again and has chatted to lots of members at the bar but he’s kept his dick in his pants.

  At least inside the club.

  I watch now as a blonde comes up and says something to him—totally ignoring The Kid although he’s much closer to her age. I hear her giggling but I don’t catch the conversation. I notice The Kid paying her very close attention, but Jones doesn’t seem interested. It takes a while but she gets the message and moves on. I hear the guys laughing and then The Kid holds his hand up and I hear him shout, ‘High five!’ I don’t think he realises you don’t have to shout it but it’s cute to witness, all the same.