by Irvine Welsh
They crowded in towards the platform at the front of the hall, to hear the host, dressed as one of the alien species known as the Borg, welcoming them from the podium. — So enjoy yourselves, he urged, — and remember, resistance is futile!
Kibby was jumpy in the busy crowd, but he felt even more so as something brushed against his buttocks.
It’s somebody’s hand!
He turned round sharply to face a lecherous grin. It belonged to a middle-aged man with fairish hair that was greying at the temples, and who sported a large Zapata moustache. His skin was orangey sunbed-tanned and he wore a T-shirt, which under the lights was as electrically cobalt white as his teeth. It had the words BEAM ME UP stamped on it.
Turning his back again, Brian Kibby caught Ian saying, — It’s no DeForest Kelley after all, it’s Chuck Fanon who played a Klingon crew member in one of the episodes of Deep Space Nine!
Again!
But that touch had now become an undisguised grope. Something in his essence twanged like an elastic band. He should turn round now and punch the guy, or tell him to eff off. But Brian Kibby didn’t hit out, didn’t swear and didn’t make scenes in crowded places. For reasons not known to himself, he was a person who always bore abuse and humiliation in silence. Instead he gave a feeble, — Tsk, and headed out, making for his hotel.
Ian Buchan spun round in time to see Brian Kibby pushing through the crowd, making his defeated egress. He was about to set off in pursuit when he saw that his friend was being followed by that sleazy guy, the one who always hung around the conventions and who was known as a pervert. He hesitated, trying to work out what was going on.
Head down, crossing the bridge with a group of his mates, his collar turned up against the cold, biting wind as he lit a cigarette, Danny Skinner looked ahead, eagerly anticipating the tenements, which would buffet him against the gale’s assault. The posturing clouds, heaving and swirling above, closed in like a rival mob intent on inflicting some damage. Then a swirling pocket of air whipped grit into his eyes. He spat out, — Fuck, as he collided with an oncoming lassie: overweight, sour and tutting. A crisp packet danced in front of him, its camp fluttering motion and gaudy colouring mocking his plight.
The word on a billposter above, stark black against a white background, came into focus as his watering eyes expelled the dirt: CONTACT.
— I’ll be fuckin glad tae get inside the ground, he moaned to McKenzie, as they approached the turnstiles.
— Aye, me n aw, McKenzie nodded, slapping his huge, cold hands together.
Skinner shared a quick look with Gareth, which seemed to conspiratorially ask how a man of Big Rab’s girth could even be expected to get through the turnstiles. He had read somewhere that the British turnstile had gained over a foot in width since the 1950s. The article also said that it still wasn’t enough, as more able-bodied people than ever now had to enter through the disabled gates.
He still wanted a pie.
— Thought you’d packed in the tabs, Skinny? Gary Traynor nodded to his cigarette.
— Doesnae seem much point, he smiled. — I’ve a theory that they’re actually good for ye. I reckon it’s passive smoking that’s the real killer.
From the ramshackle East Stand, or the ‘Scabby’ or ‘Cowshed’ as it was more accurately called by its residents, the visiting South Stand was a kaleidoscope of dimly discernible visages. Traynor wished he’d put in his contact lenses. Spotting Aberdeen faces from this range was impossible. As so often happened a fat cunt stood out, beating a nearby baldy and ginger. A chorus of ‘you fat bastard, you fat bastard’ was greeted with a resplendent curtsy from the obese Aberdeen casual which had the simpletons baying, the psychopaths staring with studied malevolence and the clued-up boys smiling in quiet appreciation.
The wind suddenly changed direction, whipping a spray of rain into the faces of the crowd. A tinny riff of a ringtone intro’d ‘The Boys are Back in Town’ as McKenzie clicked on his mobile and Skinner, though appearing nonchalant, knew it was his cocaine contact and allowed himself that internal ‘yes!’ that followed a psychic stoppage-time winner of this type.
Skinner looked around at his friends, who had been subsumed into a larger mob. A good few faces were out today. He felt ready for some serious action, more so than in a long time. A meet had been arranged after the game, down East London Street, and the firms were to make their way there in small groups.
As the Hibs boys started to leave around ten minutes before the final whistle, the Aberdeen lads mounted a surprise attack. Instead of going over the Bothwell Street bridge, they somehow managed to get round the back of the South Stand where they confronted the remaining Hibs supporters.
The majority of the Hibs mob had all but left the Scabby and were heading for the meet but there were a few stragglers, of which Skinner was one, and they were surprised to see the Aberdeen crew charging through packs of terrified scarfers and replica strips on their way towards them.
Here we go . . .
Skinner felt his pulse rising as the adrenalin shot through him. The police were simply in absentia as the mob of Aberdeen surged forward. It was going off, Skinner thought excitedly, and in almost seventies- and eighties-style numbers. All around him. A proper old-school row, one which they had spent years preparing themselves for, but due to the ritualisation of the violence with the policing and stewarding, seldom actually happened on any scale outside the pages of newspapers. Not only did Skinner stand his ground, he ran straight into the Aberdeen boys, throwing punches.
C’mon then, ya sheepshagging cunts . . .
Sidestepping a bull-like country boy in a black Stone Island jacket, Skinner found himself exchanging fast and enthusiastic blows with a toothy, skull-faced guy with hard weaselly eyes who was clad in a red Paul & Shark. He’d resolved to keep focused and in the proper scrappers stance, but his opponent connected first with a heavy right-hander on his nose which dazed him and stung his eyes with tears, and Skinner was soon flaying around, windmilling like an amateur.
Bastard . . .
Taking a fair cracker in the eye and another on the chin, Skinner staggered back, briefly noting the insipid sodium street lamp burning wanly against the murky twilight sky. It was only then he was aware that he’d actually hit the ground. Realising that his legs had gone, he sensed that it was unlikely he’d be able to get straight up and so curled into the foetal position. But it wouldn’t herald his own demise as someone else was going to get it. Yes, Kibby was going to suffer, because he, Danny Skinner, was now invincible. It was inconceivable madness, but he had the power!
Geez it then, Aberdeen, just fuckin well geez it!
After a few stout boots were sunk in one killjoy shouted, — Fuckin leave it, min, he’s had enough!
Fuck off . . . stupid cunt . . .
The rain of blows began to let up and then ceased, as the police sirens filled the air.
Kibby’s owe some decent sheepshagger a drink, or more likely the Lothian’s finest. Still a fuckin healthy one but . . .
For a while he thought that he’d been stabbed. Some of the blows seemed too sharp and breaching to have been made by fist or boot alone, but he could see no blood as the paramedics lifted him off the pavement. Before they could load his stunned form into the back of the ambulance, two policemen tore him from their protesting grasp, handcuffing him and throwing him into the back of a van, where they removed one cuff, clipping it on to a rail that ran the length of the vehicle. The folly of the Lacoste top, he thought, through a daze of double vision as he sat silently in the meat wagon, the anaesthetic of adrenalin dissipating as he became aware that his head was throbbing and his sides aching. Next to him was his Aberdeen adversary. — Fit, like? the boy asked, looking slightly guiltily at the battered Skinner and offering him a cigarette.
His throbbing, dizzy opponent was happy to accept. — A good show by your chaps, it has to be said, he acknowledged.
— Min, ye took some beating there.
— Ah wel
l, industrial accidents, mate. Anyroads, they breed them tough in Leith, he grinned through his terrible sweet pain.
I hope that for somebody else’s sake they do the same in Featherhall.
Eyeing the boy’s jacket, Skinner commented, — Smart threads. Is that a new range Paul & Shark? he asked, pointing to the man’s chest.
— Aye, got it doon in London, ken? the Aberdonian beamed. Skinner tried to return his smile but his face hurt too much. It wouldn’t last though, he thought cheerfully.
Well, no for me at any rate.
Ian Buchan had been concerned when Brian Kibby had gone back to the hotel early. He pondered as to why Brian had left; maybe he should have gone with him. But leaving with that strange guy, what was all that about? Could it be . . . was Brian gay? Surely not, he’d always professed interest in girls, like that Lucy for example. And that girl at his work he always talked about. But maybe . . . it might have been a case of the lady protesting too much.
Returning to the hotel, Ian was disinclined to go up to the room. Brian was an adult, what he did or didn’t do was his business. Stopping along the riverside gangway, he watched the moonlight glisten on the Tyne, noting the new waterfront theme-bar zone emerging from under glass and chrome.
Brian might just have that guy back!
He sat up at the bar half the night, with some other Trekkies, talking about conventions past. The party carried on in one of the hotel rooms, Ian waking up fully clothed alongside a Trekkie he vaguely knew.
In a room on the floor above him, the dawn was rising, filtering a tepid light in through the curtains. Brian Kibby tried to lift his banging head from the pillow but his body only snarled back a threatening response. In terror, he recalled the events of yesterday. That weird guy touching him up. He’d felt terrible anyway but with the harassment and humiliation, he’d headed back to the hotel, without even telling Ian. And now Ian’s bed was empty, hadn’t been slept in.
The creepy guy had even tried to follow him back, had said disgusting things about them having sex together! He shuddered at the recall of the pervert’s words: ‘I want to burst your arse. I want to make you squeal.’
— LEAVE ME ALONE! Brian Kibby had howled in his face, exploding into tears and running away, as everyone entering and leaving the hall looked round at the moustached pervert, to his shock and shame.
Then Kibby had gone, nerves jangling, back to the hotel, wondering what was happening to him. He’d curled up into a ball under the blankets. Instead of the settling into a comforting dreamland, he just lay there in a stupor, feeling like he’d been in a car crash. His mouth and throat were completely arid, as if he’d swallowed some hot desert sand. He tried to generate saliva but only managed to weld his tongue to the roof of his mouth. Now he was gagging with the rasping dry heat, which seemed to push right down into his throat and chest . . . he reached for the tumbler of water by his bed but he’d forgotten to fill it up. Exhausted and in pain, he was disinclined to be harassed so blatantly by his needs, but a racking cough grappled him, watering his eyes, and he was compelled to stagger to the minibar and get some mineral water, his legs, back and head burning in excruciating agony.
His lips were strangely numb and swollen: as he sipped the water, it ran on to his chest and pyjamas.
The early-morning hours slowly faded away, just as the night had slipped by in a sleepless agony. Kibby’s swollen eyes ached and itched full of sleeplessness’s phantom dirt. He squirmed like a beached porpoise on his sweat-soaked bed.
When he heard a knock coming from outside he clambered up, feeling like a parade of drummers were beating out a tattoo on his legs, back, head and arms. Timidly opening the door, he saw Ian’s face contort in horror.
Far from being charged for his activity in the row after the Aberdeen game, Danny Skinner had taken such a bad battering that the duty sergeant had sent him straight up to casualty, castigating the officers who’d snatched him from the paramedics. They planned to keep him in overnight for observation. On the ward he talked to a reporter from the Sunday Mail who was looking to get information from the wounded. He was a young man, with already thinning hair and terrible pockmarked skin. With his earnest but nervy manner, Skinner felt sorry for him. The reporter sat a tape recorder in front of him and said, — Do you mind? Like he was about to light up a cigarette.
Skinner’s line was that as he was leaving the ground he was set upon by Aberdeen thugs. Fortune had smiled upon him as the only conclusive CCTV footage of his involvement in the conflict showed him lying prostrate and being kicked by different individuals. He talked at length as the reporter listened in grave, but detached, concern.
He was given painkillers that night, which seemed to have absolutely no effect on the terrible aches he suffered from. At one stage he needed to go to the toilet but was too tender to move. He lay still until he eventually fell into an even sleep. When he awoke early in the morning, he skipped out of bed and drained his bladder, contemplating himself in the mirror.
Not a mark on me!
Chagrined by his poor show in the row, he took up the stance and practised shadow-boxing for a bit. Then he got dressed and left the ward, discharging himself, embarrassed at the absence of any marks on his face. — The doctor will need to see you before you leave, said the surprised nurse, looking at the notes, trying to reconcile this Skinner with the one her colleagues admitted yesterday.
She went to find the duty doctor, but when she returned, Skinner had gone.
When he got home that Sunday morning, he heard the phone ring three times, but stop just before his messaging service kicked in. He dialled 1471 hoping that it might be Kay, concerned at his injuries, but his mother’s number came up. She must have read about him in the Mail. He thought about calling her, but his pride stopped him. He reasoned that if she really cared that much, she’d call back.
— C’mon, slowcoach, Ken Radden smiled back at a battered and bruised Brian Kibby who panted and gasped behind the rest of the pack on the West Highland way. — If we don’t make that lodge before dark . . . he said ominously, adding, — . . . you should know that more than most.
Ken had never said that to him before. It was their private guilt-tripping phrase, one they often used in the sly condemnation of others whom they perceived were letting the side down. And worse, ‘slowcoach’, that Hyp Hykers generic term of patronising abuse for someone who wasn’t really up to scratch.
Now Brian Kibby felt guilty for his tired snorts of exasperation when Gerald, always Fat Gerald, held them up. How he was always keen to shout words of superficially friendly badgering encouragement to Gerald when Lucy was in earshot: — C’mon, Ged! You can do it, mate. No far now!
And Lucy, all they had done was exchange pieces of chocolate. This time his was a Yorkie, hers a Bournville dark. Now he could see her ahead, trying to wait for him, but unable to help herself as he fell further behind. He watched her orange backpack, moving out of his reach. A swarthy-faced young Hyp Hyker called Angus Heatherhill, whom Kibby had never talked to, was pulling up alongside her. Heatherhill had an unruly mop of black hair, under which a pair of dark and steely eyes were sometimes visible.
Kibby’s heart grew leaden, becoming another part of his physical burden, and seemed to drop a couple of inches in his chest cavity. Things were going so terribly wrong. He couldn’t understand it. He was waking up every morning feeling so dreadful. And now, the state he was in . . .
And Ian hadn’t called. He had been so strange on the return train journey, when Kibby had woken up badly bruised, having suffered what he had since fearfully postulated was everything from some severe allergic reaction to the bizarre improbability that he’d been sleepwalking and fallen down a flight of stairs. His mother, like Ian, couldn’t believe it; she thought that he’d been beaten up. She wasn’t even going to let him go to the Hyp Hikers!
As he watched Lucy’s back grow smaller, and Heatherhill’s windmilling arms gesticulating to the side of her, Kibby thought of her sharp, frail fe
atures; accentuated under those thin, gold spectacle frames she occasionally wore instead of contact lenses.
He often fantasised about being Lucy’s boyfriend. In these sketches, mundane domestic scenarios produced almost as much satisfaction and not so much guilt as full-on masturbatory set pieces. A particular favourite had Lucy sitting next to him, riding shotgun in the car, his dad’s old Capri, while Joyce and Caroline sat in the back.
Mum would love Lucy while Caroline and her would be real pals, like sisters, but at night it would just be me with Lucy in our own flat and we’d kiss and . . . but that’s enough ay that!
Shaking himself out of his fledgling fantasy, Kibby looked up to the darkening sky.
God, I’m sorry about all my touching myself cause I know it’s wrong. If you could get me a girlfriend I’d treat her nicely and there would be nae need to . . .
Kibby gasped again as he looked ahead and saw the backs of the group receding further on the horizon. But somebody had stopped. He staggered forward on his aching legs. It was Lucy! Her almost translucent face appeared to open up as he advanced unsteadily. A cast of disquiet – or was it pity again – seemed to chisel her brittle smile as Kibby felt his legs going. With every step it seemed as if they were shortening or he was submerging into a swamp. But the sodden earth was rushing up and before it met him the last sight he saw was Lucy’s mouth forming a perfect ‘o’.
He stood at the bus stop, waiting for one of the maroon Lothian vehicles to take him up Leith Walk, full of beans, entertaining the other regulars in the queue with his chat. The Sunday newspapers had mentioned the trouble at Easter Road, now the Monday morning ones were full of it. He’d already made the Daily Record, where he was described as Daniel Skinner, Local Government Officer and an innocent victim of Saturday’s violence.