by C. J. Tudor
‘What are you doing here?’
‘Checking up on your welfare.’
‘I find that hard to believe.’
She laughs. My bladder cramps.
‘I saw you had some visitors today.’
‘You met them?’
‘They were leaving just as I arrived. We didn’t have a chance to chat.’
She glances around. ‘It strikes me that they were searching for something. Perhaps the same thing that you were hoping your old friend might stump up a wad of cash for.’
‘They didn’t find what they were looking for.’
‘You’re sure.’
‘Yes.’
‘Why?’
‘Because I don’t have what they’re looking for. Not here.’
She considers this. ‘I have found, in my line of work, that it is beneficial to be in possession of all the facts.’
‘I’ve told you –’
‘You’ve told me FUCK ALL!’
She slams the poker down on the coffee table. Abbie-Eyes flies into the air and lands near my feet. A crack splits her plastic features. Her loose eye spills out of the socket. It stares up at me from the floor. Sweat gathers at the base of my spine.
‘Fortunately,’ Gloria continues, ‘I’ve done a little research of my own. It was interesting.’
She stands, walks over to the log burner, bends down and opens it.
‘Let me take you back twenty-five years. Five schoolfriends. You, Stephen Hurst, Christopher Manning, Marie Gibson and Nick Fletcher. Oh, and your little sister, Annie. Never told me about her.’
She sticks the end of the poker into the burner, wedging it deep inside the logs. The flames crackle louder.
‘One night, when you were out with your friends, she went missing. Disappeared from her own bed. There were searches, appeals. Everyone thought the worst. And then, miraculously, after forty-eight hours, she came back. But she couldn’t, or wouldn’t, say what had happened to her …’
‘I don’t see –’
‘Let me finish. Happy ending, except, two months later, Daddy crashes his car into a tree, killing little Annie and himself and leaving you critically injured. How am I doing so far?’
I stare at the poker. In the fire. Out of the frying pan, I think wildly.
‘Like you said, you’ve done your research,’ I say.
Gloria begins to pace. ‘Oh, I left a bit out – a few weeks after your sister’s return your friend Christopher Manning falls from the school English block. Tragic coincidence, don’t you think?’
‘Life is full of tragic coincidences.’
‘Fast-forward to now, and you return to the village where you grew up. You plan to blackmail your old schoolfriend Stephen Hurst for a large amount of cash. What do you have on him? What is he hiding?’
‘Someone like Hurst has plenty of secrets.’
‘I’m beginning to think you do too, Joe.’
‘Why do you care?’
‘Because I like you.’
‘You have a very odd way of showing it.’
‘Put it another way then – you interest me. Not many people do. For a start, you’re one of the least likely teachers I’ve ever met. You’re a drunk, a gambler. But you have a vocation. You choose to impart knowledge to children. Why is that?’
‘You get a lot of holidays.’
‘I think it’s because of what happened here, twenty-five years ago. I think you’re trying to make amends for something.’
‘Or just trying to make a living.’
‘Flippancy is a flimsy defence mechanism. Trust me, I should know. It’s one of the first things to fall away when people are in fear for their lives.’
‘Is that a threat?’
‘You wish. Actually, what I’m giving you is a lifeline.’
She walks over. I flinch. She bends down and holds something out. A card. Blank, except for a phone number.
She reaches down and slips it into the pocket of my jeans, patting me gently on the crotch.
‘You can reach me on this for the next twenty-four hours if you need my help.’
‘Why?’
‘Because, deep down, I have a soft spot for you.’
‘That’s comforting to hear.’
‘Don’t take it to heart.’
My eyes flick back to the poker. The fire spits.
‘The Fatman is getting impatient.’
‘I told you –’
‘Shut up.’
The sweat is now trickling down between my arse cheeks. My stomach is a tight ball of cramp. I want to be sick, to shit and to piss all at once.
‘He gave you extra time. Now, he wants his money.’
‘He’ll get it. That’s why I’m here.’
‘I know, Joe. And if it were just up to me?’ She gives a dainty shrug. ‘But it looks to him like you ran. That doesn’t inspire faith. The Fatman wants to be sure you understand how serious he is.’
‘I do. Really.’
She takes the poker out of the log burner. The tip glows red. I glance towards the door. But I know I’d be in a headlock before my backside left the armchair.
‘Please –’
‘Like I said, Joe, I have a soft spot for you.’
She walks over and crouches down next to me. She holds up the poker. I can feel the heat.
Gloria smiles. ‘So, I’m going to spare your pretty face.’
I lie on the sofa. I have taken four codeine tablets and finished the bottle of bourbon. My left hand is bound in an old tea towel and resting on a pack of frozen fish fingers. It is now only mildly agonizing. I am not expecting to be playing a violin concerto any time soon.
My skin feels hot and feverish. I drift in and out of consciousness. Not sleep. Just an illusory grey-and-black place peppered with strange visions.
In one, I’m back at the old colliery site. I’m not alone. Chris and Annie stand on the crest of a hill. The sky hangs above them like a bag of mercury, swollen with silvery light and fluid with black rain. The wind rages and tears with invisible claws.
Chris’s head is oddly misshapen, caved in at the back. Blood runs from his nose and eyes. Annie holds his hand. And this Annie, I know, is my Annie. The ugly gash is there on her head, deep and ruinous. As I watch, she opens her mouth and says softly:
I know where the snowmen go, Joe. I know where they go now.
She smiles. And I feel happy, calm, at peace. But then the clouds above them lower and swell, and instead of rain a cascade of shiny black beetles pours down. I watch my friend and my sister fall to the ground, engulfed in the scuttling mass of bodies until all I can see is a swarm of blackness. Devouring them, swallowing them whole.
My phone starts to ring. Saved by the bell, or rather Metallica.
I roll over and pick it up with my good hand. I squint at the screen. Brendan. I press Accept with a shaky finger.
‘You’re alive?’ I croak.
‘Last time I checked. You sound like shit.’
‘Thanks.’
‘You love my honesty.’
‘Don’t forget your pert arse.’
‘Healthy eating, no booze. You should try it.’
‘I’ve been calling you for days,’ I say.
‘Lost my phone charger. What’s so urgent?’
‘I just … wanted to check you were okay.’
‘Aside from missing my favourite pub, dandy. When can I go back?’
I look at my bandaged, burnt hand. ‘Not yet.’
‘Feck.’
‘It might be an idea to move out of the flat for a while as well.’
‘Jesus! Is this to do with your habit of owing money to unpleasant people?’
Guilt stabs my insides. Brendan has been good to me – more than good. He’s let me share his flat, rent free. He has never lectured me on my gambling. Most people would have given up on me. But not Brendan. And now I’m paying him back by putting him in danger.
‘Have you got somewhere to stay tonight?’
&nbs
p; ‘Tonight? Well, there’s my sister. I’m sure her husband will be bloody delighted about that.’
‘It shouldn’t be for long.’
‘I should feckin’ hope not.’ He sighs. ‘You know what my dear old mammy would say?’
‘ “I’m losing my voice,” hopefully?’
‘When does a hare stop running from the fox?’
I groan. ‘When?’
‘When it hears the hunter’s bugle.’
‘Meaning?’
‘Sometimes you need someone bigger – like the police – to sort out your problem.’
‘I am sorting it. Okay?’
‘Like you sorted it before – stealing money from the school safe.’
‘I never took a penny.’
True. But only because Debbie – the secretary with the handbag addiction – got there before me. When I found this out we came to an agreement. I would say nothing if she paid the money back. I would also leave quietly (I was on my final written warning for timekeeping, sloppy work and general shittiness of attitude by that point anyway). Oh, and she would owe me.
‘That was different.’
‘I remember. I was the one who brought you grapes every day in hospital when you couldn’t pay your debts and someone made papier mâche out of your knee.’
‘You visited me twice in hospital and you never brought me grapes.’
‘I sent you texts.’
‘You sent me porn.’
‘Well, who needs feckin’ grapes?’
‘Look, I really will sort this.’
‘Did I mention that I’ll have to share my sister’s spare room with feckin’ hamsters that squeak their wheels all night?’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘Or that she has two young kids who think five o’clock in the morning is a perfectly acceptable time to play trampoline on their uncle’s stomach?’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘ “Sorry” will not help my hernia.’
‘I just need a few more days.’
A deep, deep sigh. ‘Fine. But if you don’t sort it, or if you run into anything you can’t handle –’
‘I’ll call you.’
‘Jesus, no. Call the police, you moron. Or the A Team.’
24
‘So then I said to this pupil that, while I respected her right to express herself by throwing the shoe …’
Simon is drawling on. It says something about my current state of mind that the soporific nature of his voice is vaguely bearable this lunchtime. Or perhaps I have just managed to tune him out to white noise. Irritating but ignorable.
It’s just me, Simon and Beth at lunch today. I am not hungry. Not in the slightest. But I force down some chips in the vague hope they might help my hangover. I also have my second can of full-fat Coke in front of me.
Simon has gone through the obligatory and predictable drinking-on-a-school-night ‘jokes’. I smile politely and just about manage not to punch him in the face. It would hurt my hand, for one thing. I have made a relatively professional-looking bandage out of a cut-up pillowcase and told people that I burnt myself on the oven. Drunken cooking, etcetera. Beth occasionally gives me knowing looks. She doesn’t believe me. I don’t care. Right now, I am more preoccupied by last night. By what Marcus told me. By my encounter with Gloria. By what a mess I am in and how it would be difficult for things to get any worse.
‘Mr Thorne?’
I look up. Harry is standing by the dining table. His face is grim.
‘Could we have a word in my office?’
Difficult but not impossible.
‘Of course.’
I wait for some sort of snide comment from Simon. None is forthcoming. He seems intent upon his lunch. Too intent. I scrape back my chair.
Beth raises her eyebrows. ‘Catch you later.’
‘Yeah.’
I follow Harry along the corridor.
‘Can I ask what this is about?’
‘I’d rather wait until we reach my office.’
His tone is hard, non-committal. I don’t like it. I have a very bad feeling about this. Which, considering my starting point this morning, is impressive.
Harry pushes open the door and steps inside. I follow him. And stop. Dead.
A visitor sits in front of Harry’s desk.
As we enter, he stands and turns.
I’d say my heart sinks, but I’m not sure it could dive much further without a mask and oxygen. In fact, I almost laugh. Really, I should have expected it. I’m a gambler. You’re supposed to think about all possible outcomes before you act – work out your strategy – but I suddenly feel as though I’ve been flapping about like a tasty bit of tuna at a table of sharks.
Harry closes the door and looks between the pair of us. ‘I believe that you two know each other.’
‘We both grew up in Arnhill,’ Stephen Hurst says. ‘Other than that, I wouldn’t say I really “know” Mr Thorne at all.’
‘Well, I was picky about my friends even then,’ I say.
Hurst’s smug expression falters momentarily. Then he spots my bandaged hand. ‘Been picking fights again?’
‘Only with the oven. But if you’re offering?’
‘Mr Thorne, Mr Hurst,’ Harry interrupts curtly. ‘Can we all sit down?’
Hurst lowers himself into his seat. I walk over and reluctantly do the same. It feels a lot like how we used to sit in front of the headmaster twenty-five years ago.
‘So,’ Harry says, and shuffles some papers in front of him. ‘Some things have come to my attention that I think we need to discuss.’
I try to adopt a pleasant tone. ‘Is this regarding Jeremy Hurst and the incident with Marcus Dawson in the toilets yesterday, because –’
‘No.’ Harry cuts me dead. ‘It is not about that.’
‘Oh.’
I’m back-footed. I glance at Hurst. His face has resumed its former self-satisfied expression. I would like to smash it from his jowls. I would like to leap from my chair, grab him around the throat and choke him until his eyes bulge and his tongue turns blue.
Instead I say, ‘Then I suppose you had better enlighten me.’
‘Prior to taking the position with us here at Arnhill you worked at Stockford Academy.’
‘That’s right.’
‘You supplied a reference from your former head – Miss Coombes?’
I can feel sweat starting to dampen my underarms. ‘Yes.’
‘Except that’s not entirely true, is it?’
‘I’m afraid I don’t understand.’
‘Miss Coombes did not supply that reference.’
‘She didn’t?’
‘She denies any knowledge of it.’
‘Well, I think there may have been some miscommunication.’
‘I doubt it. Miss Coombes was quite clear – you left Stockford Academy suddenly, not long after a substantial amount of money went missing from the school safe.’
‘That money was recovered.’
Hurst can’t contain himself any longer. ‘Apparently, you like to play cards, Joe?’
I turn. ‘Why – fancy a game of Liar? And what exactly does any of this have to do with you?’
‘In case you’ve forgotten, I’m on the board of governors. When it is brought to my attention that one of the teachers here is not fit for the job –’
‘Sorry – “brought to your attention”. By whom?’
His lips purse. And then it comes to me. Simon Saunders. He was in the Fox the night I ran into Hurst. He knows him. (Doesn’t everyone in Arnhill?) Why go running to Harry when he could go over his head and tell all to someone on the board of governors? Someone who already hates my guts. Get Hurst on side and maybe store up some favours for himself. Two birds – one poisonous little toad.
‘You should be careful who you listen to,’ I say.
‘You’re not denying it then?’
‘I would say that the version presented here bears only a vague resemblance to the truth. Something which
I would prefer to discuss with my superior in private.’
Hurst’s eyes flash. ‘The truth is that you accepted this position under false pretences and you left your previous position under a cloud. This, on top of the fact that you have some vendetta against my son, no doubt based upon your imagined prior history with me. Your demeanour and performance as a teacher are entirely unsuitable. Oh, and you stink of booze.’
He straightens his tie and sits back triumphantly. Harry stares at me wearily from across the desk.
‘I’m sorry, Mr Thorne. This will go before the board. You are entitled to union representation, but in the light of these revelations –’
‘Accusations. Unproven in the most part.’
‘Still, I have no choice but to temporarily suspend you from teaching duties while we come to a decision about your future with the academy.’
‘I understand.’
I stand, trying to contain the trembling in my body. Partly the hangover, mostly anger. I mustn’t let it show. Mustn’t let Hurst know he has got to me. Always keep the game face on.
‘I’ll just collect my things.’
I walk towards the door. And stop. You also need to let them know you still hold the winning card. I glance at Hurst.
‘Nice tie, by the way.’
The look on his face is all I need.
I don’t return to the canteen. I gather my coat and satchel from the staffroom – which is mercifully empty – and head out of the school. I don’t trust myself to face Simon again. Even though I am already under suspension, an assault charge isn’t something I particularly want to add to my CV.
When I reach reception I pause. Miss Grayson is not in her usual place in her small glass cubicle. Instead, a younger clone – short dark hair, glasses, although no hairy mole – is sitting in her seat, tapping at a computer.
‘Excuse me, where’s Miss Grayson?’
‘She has a cold.’
‘Oh.’
‘Did you need to speak with her?’
‘Well, I’m leaving, and I was hoping to say goodbye. Do you know when she’ll be back?’
‘I’m afraid not.’
‘Right. Thanks for your help.’
I start to turn.
‘Oh, Mr Thorne –’