by Adrian White
“But why would you do such a thing?” asked Katie.
Bruno shook his head.
“I don’t know. Sometimes I just . . . lose it.”
Well, Katie could understand that.
“But what a thing to say,” she said.
“I know,” said Bruno. “It was unforgivable – and I’m sorry.”
But by the end of the party, Bruno had reverted to type. As people left, the farewells were full of drunken assurances to meet up again through the summer. Katie played along, though she knew it was just so much bullshit. She was too tired for goodbyes. Mike was asleep on the sofa, and Katie wished he’d wake up; he’d pick up on her mood and know how to get rid of the few remaining guests. Everybody was going back to the security of their parents’ house and summer jobs and, perhaps, holiday trips abroad. Mike was returning to Belfast as part of his agreement to work for the firm sponsoring him through college; only Katie and Bruno were staying in Manchester, just as they had at Christmas.
Bruno walked through to the kitchen and grabbed a six-pack of beer from the fridge. Katie was in the hallway, saying goodbye to Eugene, and Bruno pushed past to leave.
“Oh right,” said Katie, “just take the last of the beer, why don’t you?”
Bruno turned at the door.
“What are you saying?” he asked.
“It’s not like you brought anything with you in the first place,” said Katie.
Bruno dropped the cans to the floor. He grabbed Katie by the neck, and pinned her to the wall of the hallway. Katie’s feet were lifted from the ground, and she struggled to take her weight on her toes. She couldn’t breathe because of Bruno’s grip on her throat. He had his other arm drawn back to hit her.
“You sh-shouldn’t,” said Eugene, and tried to block Bruno’s fist.
“Fuck off, Eugene!” said Bruno.
“Bruno!” shouted Mike. He ran through from the other room.
Bruno stared at Katie.
“Let her go,” said Mike. “Put her down.”
Bruno shifted his grip so he held Katie up by her jaw. She could breathe, but she was still unable to reach the floor with her toes. She spoke to Bruno through her clenched teeth.
“Go on, then,” she said. “Fucking do it, why don’t you? Get it over with, you cunt!”
“I fucking will, you bitch!” said Bruno.
“Bruno!” shouted Mike.
Bruno lowered his arm and relaxed his grip on Katie. She slumped against the wall.
“Give me a cigarette,” he said to Eugene.
“I – I don’t have one,” said Eugene. “I don’t smoke.”
“Here,” said Mike and offered a packet to Bruno. “Now calm down, for Christ’s sake.”
Bruno took a cigarette, lit it, and drew heavily on it. He stared down at Katie and she stared back. Everybody stayed as they were, and waited for Bruno to decide what to do. He took three long drags on the cigarette, and threw the butt out the open front door.
“Thanks for the party,” he said, and leant down to pick up the cans of beer.
“Leave the beer,” said Katie.
Bruno shook his head.
“If Mike wasn’t here, you’d be dead,” he said to Katie.
“I know,” said Katie, “you’re a hard man; we all know. But I still want my beer.”
Bruno shrugged and laughed, and then walked out the door.
“Katie!” shouted Mike. “Let him go – it’s not worth it.”
Katie sensed Eugene trembling next to her by the door, and she turned her attention to him.
“It’s okay,” she said to him, “it’s okay.” She led Eugene back into the flat and sat him down. The others in the room mumbled their farewells to Katie and Mike. The party was over now, that was for sure.
“Would you like me to stay?” asked Mike.
“No, I’d like you to make sure Eugene gets home okay.”
“I want to stay,” said Mike. “I could take Eugene home and then come back. I could help you clear up.”
Katie shook her head. They both knew what he was talking about.
“I don’t want you to,” she said. “I want to be on my own.”
When they’d left, she stood in the hallway where Bruno had pinned her to the wall. She’d been scared, but she’d felt something else too and she finally understood her relationship with Bruno. For a brief moment, she had wanted him to touch her. If he’d lowered his arm and touched her, with his fingers and not his fist, or maybe even his lips, she wouldn’t have stopped him – even with Mike there, so close by. She reached up now to her own lips and smiled.
Well now, there’s a thing, she thought.
But nobody would ever know, and she’d never let herself be caught out like that again.
The summer gave them all a chance to cool off. Mike arranged for Katie to work for his American company, or a subsidiary of them, in Manchester.
“Why would I want to work for an investment banker?” she asked.
“Why not – what else are you going to do?” said Mike. “I doubt there’s a case of English law you haven’t read and memorized and anyway, don’t you need the money?”
This last was a consideration – Katie was tired of just existing. Three months was a long time to wait before her next grant cheque, and signing on for the dole seemed like a step back into dependency, back into care.
“But why would they want me?” she asked.
“Because I told them how suitable you are,” said Mike.
“On what grounds? I don’t even know what they do.”
“On the grounds that every workplace is the same.”
“And what would you know about that?” asked Katie. “You’re only just out of nappies.”
Mike smiled.
“Ouch,” he said. “Point taken – that last bit I picked up from my father.”
“And what does he do?” asked Katie.
“He’s a management consultant, so he knows about these things. He reckons that once you start a job, you find out just how easy it is and how useful you really are.”
“Have you ever had a job, Mike?”
“Yes,” he said, “I have, but this isn’t about me. Who knows, you may even like it.”
This was Mike, forcing the issue again; he wouldn’t allow Katie the easy option of staying hidden away at home.
“Katie,” he said, “you’re studying for a law degree. If you do nothing else with your life, that’s already more than most people ever hope to achieve. But what will you do next? I know its several years away, but what’s going to happen once you graduate? You’re not going to sit in a flat in Hulme, staring at a graduation certificate pinned to your wall – or are you? I don’t know – perhaps you want to become some big, flash, corporate lawyer, or maybe help disadvantaged children – I don’t know, and it doesn’t really matter. But you’re going to have to learn to live out there in the world, and this is as good a way as any. Otherwise, what’s the point in trying in the first place?”
Katie smiled.
“Fine speech, Mike,” she said.
“Well . . . ”
Katie knew he was right and she was glad that he cared, but in the end it was the money that made up her mind – that and the fact there were now over two million people on the dole. She was lucky to be given the option of working, and she found that she liked it. She learnt a lot and was a natural, it seemed, when it came to the principles of banking. The company offered to sponsor Katie for the next three years in college. She told Mike when they met up again after the summer.
“It’s in their own interest,” said Mike. “They wouldn’t do it unless they saw something in it for them.”
Katie had enjoyed working, but it was good to be back in college, back to her studies, and good to see her friends again. Even Bruno was still around, though for now he kept his distance from Katie. She knew he attended the gym regularly, because she saw his name signed in at reception, but she never saw him there again. She next saw him
a few weeks into the new term and she was surprised, because it was on campus.
“Did Bruno apply to do another course?” she asked Mike.
“No, he’s working for me now.”
“Working for you – doing what?”
“I’m starting a listings magazine for Manchester,” said Mike.
“A what?” asked Katie.
“A listings magazine – like Time Out in London.”
“But that’s London,” said Katie. “Is there enough happening in Manchester to justify a full magazine?”
“Well, we’re going to have articles and stuff but yes, Manchester has enough going on – more than enough over the next few years. I got the idea from that concert we went to – or you all went to. If Manchester’s producing the best bands in the country then people will want to see them; they won’t want to miss out on what’s happening.”
“But that singer’s dead,” said Katie. “He hanged himself.”
“That was unfortunate,” said Mike, “but there are others on the way. And there are new clubs opening; things are happening, believe me.”
“Yes,” said Katie, “but we never go – it’s just for the tourists. And when we do go there are only about twenty people there. It’s hardly what you’d call a movement.”
“You might not go,” said Mike, “but I do and I tell you, something is definitely happening here. You’re just pissed off because punk is dead, and you can’t cope with the fact that something new might be happening without you. Why do you think all these Londoners want to come to college in Manchester?”
“Okay, okay, I get the point,” said Katie, “but how do you go about setting up a magazine? And what do you mean – Bruno’s working for you?”
“I’m responsible for raising the finance, persuading investors that it’s worth their while.”
“And what does Bruno do – stand beside you to help persuade them?”
“No,” said Mike. “Bruno’s doing two things: he’s making sure the venues notify us with details of what’s on, and he’s working with the writers on their articles for the first edition.”
“The writers?” asked Katie.
“Mostly people in college studying journalism or suchlike.”
“You mean those wasters that you see in the coffee bar all day?”
“Yes, those wasters – you know, Katie, sometimes you’re not very nice. Just because someone doesn’t fit your profile of the conscientious student, doesn’t mean they have nothing to offer.”
“It sounds like a charity project for Bruno.”
“As I said – that’s not very nice. I wouldn’t be doing this if I didn’t think it could make me a lot of money.”
“How – how can it make you money?”
“Selling advertising space, selling the whole magazine if it takes off – though naturally, I haven’t told that to anybody else.”
Mike was a strange mixture – since coming back to college, Katie had noticed how much more politicised he’d become. He was as exercised by the striking steelworkers as he was by events in the North. Yet self-interest was never far away; accumulating money, legally or otherwise, was what that drove him on. The idea for the magazine probably originated as a way to help out Bruno, but Mike couldn’t be involved in something for long without thinking how it could make money. So while he may not have liked the direction society was heading, he was ideally placed to benefit from it.
The magazine was a success, but suffered from a lack of investment. Mike wanted it to work well enough to attract a major buyer; it was a good idea, but it became a drain on his resources. Bruno had done well, but he was bored already and likely to go off the rails at any given time. His drugs intake was phenomenal and it was impossible for him to sustain a regular lifestyle.
Their trips to the casino continued, but they were becoming less welcome wherever they went. This was partly due to their behaviour – there was always someone who had drunk too much or taken too many drugs – and the pit bosses recognized Mike as a consistently big winner, and they didn’t like it. Katie saw that the purpose of their large group was to distract attention away from Mike as the main player, but twice now Mike had been told that they didn’t want to see him again. He was doing nothing illegal, and they weren’t exactly sure how he was managing it, but it was up to the casinos if they wanted him in their club.
Mike bankrolled the visits to the casino but it was on the understanding that if you went along, you had to work for your supper. Based on what Eugene had told Mike in the White Horse, they all sat at various blackjack tables and kept count of the cards passing through the shoe. If a low card was played, that added to the positive count; if a high card was played, that took away from the count. Anything more sophisticated would have been apparent to the casino and impossible for the players to keep track, but it did tell them if there were mostly high cards left in the shoe. Mike stepped into the game when he was given a signal that the cards were in his favour.
As it was, some of Mike’s friends were of more use to him than others – the likes of Eugene saw it as a fascinating mental challenge, while Rory would get carried away with the game and forget to keep count. There were advantages in even this. It was sometimes obvious to the pit bosses that Eugene was keeping track of the cards, but he won so little, it was of no consequence. In fact, more often than not, Eugene lost; but he lost only small amounts of money, while Mike never played with less than a hundred on each bet. And if the others couldn’t give Mike such good information, they at least acted as a distraction and confused the casino into thinking they weren’t with Mike. Best of all, though, were Katie and Bruno; they were accurate counters without appearing to be so. Katie looked stunning and Bruno looked dangerous – it took longer for the casino to pick up on Mike when these two were around.
But there were frustratingly small returns for Mike. It was possible to view each trip to the casino as a bit of fun where he made a little money, but still Mike wanted more. Mike had Eugene make out probability tables he could memorize; colour-coded charts that Mike studied more closely than the Financial Times. He often played with several hands when the shoe was in his favour, but the possibility of really taking the casinos for a serious amount of money was still tantalisingly out of Mike’s reach.
“There are too many variables remaining,” said Eugene. “You require a more accurate count.”
“Yes,” said Katie, “but unfortunately we’re not operating under laboratory conditions.”
Mike tended to agree – anything more sophisticated would be too easy for the casino to spot, and more likely to lead to mistakes.
“The problem is,” said Mike, “I need a large enough bankroll to see me through the bad patches. Even when the count is good, I still sometimes lose.”
“You could flip a coin forever,” said Eugene, “and you would bet on it landing on heads at least once, but it might only ever land on tails.” He spoke as if in awe of this statistical possibility.
“Or,” said Mike, “and this is more likely – it could land on tails until I run out of money, and then land on heads,” said Mike. “I don’t know, I think I make more money on the stock market than I do in the casino.”
Katie thought of pointing out that this was maybe the way it should be, but she knew Mike could never let it go; he was convinced of some golden payday in the future. They started travelling further afield, first to Leeds and then to London, where at least they weren’t so well known. Mike couldn’t cover the cost for them all to go on these trips, so he took Bruno and Katie, who were more use to him; for Katie, the trips held the added attraction of seeing other cities for the first time.
Katie eventually made her peace with Bruno – she had to if she was to spend time with Mike. By the end of their second year, the group had crystallised into a friendship between these three. Katie was never totally at her ease in Bruno’s company, and avoided being alone with him for any length of time, but she knew she was not the easiest of characters hers
elf. Whatever chemistry had brought them all together in the first place – and Katie continued to believe that chemistry was Mike – the dynamic held strong for the three of them.
Bruno continued to stretch Katie’s tolerance to the limit. He turned up at a drinks party to celebrate the end of that year’s exams, and deliberately antagonised Rory with Irish jokes. It was the time of the hunger strikes, and Bruno’s jokes split the room in two; some laughed, while the others felt as though they shouldn’t.
“What’s Bobby Sands’ phone number?” Bruno asked.
Rory looked away and didn’t answer.
“Ate nothing, ate nothing, ate nothing,” said Bruno.
Rory wasn’t strong enough to stand up to Bruno, and besides, Bruno was too high to care. Katie watched and listened from across the room. Bruno saw her looking and smiled, but Katie didn’t smile back.
“What?” asked Bruno, but Katie said nothing.
She already knew that come the following year, Rory and Eugene were likely to drift away – not so much because of Bruno, but the ever-increasing demands of college work. Katie only saw them occasionally around the campus, or less often at the gym; for the most part Rory and Eugene’s wild days were over.
Mike cited the hunger strikes as his reason for choosing to work in Manchester that summer, but Katie thought there was more to it than that. She suspected Mike had a sweetheart back home in Belfast, though if he did, he wasn’t saying. Katie and Mike worked together as traders in the stock broking firm, but Mike’s heart wasn’t in it. Katie, on the other hand, became the star trainee in the company, and it was obvious she had a future there if she wanted it.
Mike taught Katie how to drive – another example of her new found confidence – and she passed her test at the first attempt. Mike bought an old Jaguar for next to nothing – not for him any old student run-around. It cost Mike more in petrol than it had to buy. They often drove out to the hills after work, and called into village pubs for some supper – they appeared to be quite the couple. Katie loved spending the time with Mike, especially working together throughout the summer, but she was worried about where he hoped it was all heading. She suspected he’d stayed in Manchester out of a misplaced jealousy of Bruno, which was crazy, but just as crazy was Katie allowing this to continue.