by Phil Earle
Those aren’t the rules. Parents don’t knock off after a shift.
Carers do. Scummers do.
I can’t.
I’m here.
Always have been. Guess I always will.
CHAPTER 2
Have you ever stared at a line of words for so long that they don’t make sense any more?
Well, it was happening to me.
I’d been sat in the scummers’ study for at least half an hour, looking at the piece of paper that Ronnie had put in front of me.
The questions on it weren’t difficult to get my head around or anything.
They were just three easy questions.
The same questions he put in front of me before each of my reviews. All right, he’d dressed up the language as I’d got older, but they were basically the same every year.
‘Listen, Bill. This is your review, don’t forget. It’s all well and good me putting a load of legwork into it, but without knowing what you want, how can I possibly go and get it for you?’
I’d heard it all before, and as a result knew he wasn’t going to let me leave the room without writing something down. That was what he was like. A twat of the highest order.
I read the first question again.
1. What do you feel are your priorities for the coming year?
I raised my eyebrows and sucked on the pen, nothing coming to mind. Well, nothing that would please him anyway. So I opted for taking the mick.
Finally hatching an escape plan that works. Digging a tunnel big enough for both me and the twins won’t be easy, but if I prioritize, a year should be enough time.
I nodded my approval as I read it back. Yep, made sense to me, so I moved on to number two.
2. How can your key worker, carers and social worker help you achieve this goal?
Simple, that one, so I put pen to paper.
Keeping me stocked up with spades would help. And if they could clear away the rubble from the tunnels, that would definitely speed up the process.
Number three hardly tested me either.
3. Where would you like to be in a year’s time?
I scribbled the answer down without thinking.
ANYWHERE BUT HERE.
Satisfied that my work was done, I jammed the lid back on the pen and turned to Ronnie, who was scribbling away at the other desk, open files scattered around him.
‘I’m done,’ I muttered, avoiding eye contact of any kind.
‘And have you written anything?’
‘Oh aye, more than ever.’ Which, strictly speaking, wasn’t a lie.
‘Where are you off to now?’
‘Out.’
‘Where to?’
‘Somewhere.’
‘And when will you be back?’
‘When I’m finished,’ I huffed, although by that point I knew I was out of earshot and through the front door.
Leaving the house is something I do a lot. Sometimes because I’m hacked off, sometimes because I’m up to no good, and sometimes just because it creates work for the scummers.
That’s one of the things about living in a kids’ home. Everything you do creates work for the scum. It is a magnificent way of messing with their heads and adding more to their plates.
If I break a window, there’s an incident report to write. If I whack one of the other scummers, there’s another. But here’s the best thing. If I even leave the house, they have to write it down.
The house has a logbook, you see, and it’s supposed to monitor where each of us is at any time. Where we are, what we’ve eaten and how much, what time we were up, what time we went to sleep. And whenever we leave.
I don’t know if we’re supposed to know about it.
I don’t know if the other lifers even care.
But me?
I love it.
Use it to my advantage every time I can.
On average I must go through the front door at least twenty times a day, not including when I actually need to. Gives me a bit of joy, it does, to see them scampering to the office, biro in hand, every time I step off the front porch.
I always make sure I’m outside for at least ten minutes, though. Some of the older scummers think they’re wise to it, you see. Reckon I’ll be back in seconds, but when I’m not, and they know they’ve got the senior scum in head office checking procedure all the time, they’ve got no option but to log it.
Brilliant, eh? Makes the long repetitive days just fly by.
After wasting half an hour in front of Ronnie’s pointless questions, though, I was in need of some air and tried to chill out in the garden.
Not that there was much chance of that happening. Not with other lifers getting in your face.
Don’t get me wrong, there have been times when I’ve made friends with other kids here. Or alliances at least.
But not for a long time.
I mean, what’s the point?
People move on. Quickly as well. I’ve gone to bed some nights and found rooms empty the next morning. And not just once or twice. It happens all the time.
So now I don’t bother trying to get to know people. And I certainly don’t tell them anything. Except not to mess with me.
Unfortunately, some people don’t get to grips with that quickly enough. So I have to remind them.
Charlie Windass was one of those kids. He’d been with us months, and was only a year younger than me, so he should’ve known better than to get in my face.
‘Hey, Bill,’ he crowed, marching over to where I was sat. ‘I hear you’ve got your review this week.’
I tried to ignore him, but when he kicked the toe of his trainer against mine and repeated the question, I knew it wasn’t an option.
‘Didn’t you hear me?’
‘Yeah, I heard you. I just don’t want to talk to you.’
He tried to look hurt, but he just looked pathetic.
‘Well, that’s not very brotherly of you, is it? I’m only trying to talk to you.’
I bristled at the suggestion of him being family.
‘Listen, mate,’ I growled. ‘I don’t know who sent you over here, or whether you’ve got a death wish or something, but let’s get something straight, shall we? I’m not your brother, right? We may sleep under the same roof, but you aren’t, and never will be, a friend. I don’t want to talk to you. I don’t even want to look at you. So get out of my face, all right?’
I saw a hint of a smile on his face and knew instantly he was after a ruck. Which was fine by me.
‘Jesus, they’re right about you, aren’t they?’ He laughed. ‘Soon as I arrived the others told me you were a loon. And they were right. No wonder you and the other two have been here since you were born.’
And that was it. Game on.
Charlie may have been in care a while, but his skills didn’t match the speed of his mouth. I don’t know if he was expecting a fair fight or something, but he certainly didn’t protect himself, and a swift kick to the nads saw him on the floor.
To his credit, he tried his best to even things up, but his kick at the back of my knee was just lame and left me no option but to make my point more forcefully.
Pinning his arms with my knees and sitting on his waist to disable his legs, I leaned over him, spitting angrily while backhanding him several times a sentence.
‘What the others should have told you, Charlie, is that being a loon makes me the sort of person you should avoid. Not mess with. You get me?’
I pressed my palm against the end of his nose and forced it back towards his eyes. I saw his tears, but he remained silent. So I pressed harder.
I don’t know how much longer he’d have stayed quiet, or how much further I’d have pushed, because I felt two arms grip me by my shoulders, pulling me backwards.
By that point I was too far into the zone to think clearly about what was happenin
g and I lashed out wildly with my fists, happy to fight the whole world. No one was going to take me down in this mood.
Apart from three scummers, that is.
They must have been watching from the window or something, because they were there so quick, two of them taking an arm each, while the Colonel wrapped his arms around my legs and hung on like a rodeo rider.
I bucked and wriggled as they carried me back towards the house, but they were just too strong to break away from, and too far out of range to land a decent throatful of spit on.
By the time we reached the house, I knew the game was up, but I was still too angry to quit. Especially as Charlie Windass was back on his feet, flashing the wanker sign at me as he stumbled after us.
I tried to calm myself with the thought that he’d keep. There was plenty of time to get my revenge. We were lifers, after all.
CHAPTER 3
I struggle with school.
Not with the learning bit. If I chose to go, I’d learn. I’m not thick.
What I can’t get my head around is the idea of a job at the end of it.
I mean, it doesn’t matter if I know where a comma goes, or what the capital of Spain is. Any boss seeing me walk in for an interview is more likely to call security than to offer me a gig. Fact.
I’m not looking for sympathy. I’ve seen it. Time and time again. You don’t live here this long without learning. Unfortunately, what I’ve learned doesn’t give you the tools to earn a tenner an hour.
Take Marie.
Classic example.
Lived here six years, from twelve till they packed her off at eighteen.
Marie was pretty straight. Wasn’t into any particular scene. Wasn’t really a drinker or a smoker. Went to school. Don’t think I ever saw her restrained. Not even as a result of me or one of the other lifers acting out.
Course, as soon as she turned seventeen, they started prepping her for leaving. Getting her own gaff, nice place too.
‘You should see it, Bill,’ she raved. ‘Brand spanking new flat on that development by the old town. Council place, but still tidy.’
Life skills, they called them. Everything she’d need to know to live on her own.
But nothing could prepare her. Not after living here six years.
On the day she turned eighteen, she packed her bags and was off, and at first it all seemed rosy. The flat was fine, she kept in touch with her social worker, seemed to be coping with the life skills rubbish.
Except she couldn’t get a job. At first she set her sights high. Office junior at some company in town. She thought the interview went well, thought she’d answered all the questions, reckoned she was in.
But she wasn’t. They turned her down.
And so did everyone else. Betting shops, Blockbuster, nurseries, pubs. They all saw something that didn’t add up, didn’t appeal.
Before she knew it, she had bills. Loads of them. And the life skills couldn’t pay them. And neither could all the school lessons she’d sat in like some obedient puppy.
So Marie did what any lifer would do. She arsed it up completely.
Started delivering for some guy who lived in her block.
‘I’m not daft,’ she told me. ‘I know what it is I’m carrying. And that’s all it is, a bit of fetch and carry for a mate.’
I didn’t buy into that. Marie was just like me, and I know I couldn’t resist a quick dabble on whatever it was in that bag.
Something got the better of her anyhow. Last time I was round her flat you could barely get in the door for the bills wedged behind it.
‘Don’t be soft, Bill,’ she said to me, when I asked if she’d given in to temptation. ‘Just isn’t my thing. My mum’s maybe, but not mine.’
To be honest, that was the last time I spoke to Marie. The lure of going to her gaff to escape the Colonel lost its appeal. It was in a right state. After a few months she’d flogged the TV, the stereo, all the good stuff. Made my room look like the Ritz.
From what I heard, though, things went downhill pretty quickly.
She started skimming off the packages she was meant to be delivering. Naturally the dealer got wise and wanted paying back.
Not money, you understand, something a bit more intimate, and not just for him. For his boys as well.
I don’t have to spell it out, do I? Last anyone saw of Marie, she was standing by the industrial site round the back of the cinema, all blank eyes and pincushion arms.
Well, bugger that. And bugger school as well if that’s where it gets you.
Mind you, endless days in the home weren’t any better. Especially as Ronnie had all the scummers well briefed on what my day should involve.
Each morning they’d go through the routine of setting up a desk for me in the kitchen, the same work from the day before that I’d refused to look at. The same pencil sat by it, which was always blunt. I meant to ask if that was intentional.
I mean, I’m not a savage. If it’s going to go off, I’ve got my fists; I don’t need a sharpened HB.
I always sit at the desk, just to give them that bit of hope, before swinging on the chair, tapping the pencil on my teeth and trying to get to the kettle to make a brew before they stop me. As soon as they get a bit lairy, I’ll tip the table over, or rip up the book, or snap the pencil. Whatever takes my fancy. Whatever gets the message across that the work thing isn’t going to happen.
The problem with this is that it makes for a pretty dull day. All the others are at school, all nine of them.
The twins included.
I make them go. No messing. Because the difference is we won’t be here much longer. We’ll be rehoused, sorted, and then school will mean something for them. Be important. Bigger picture and all that.
So when the table’s gone over by nine thirty, it means I’ve got another six hours until they get home. That’s a fair wedge of time to fill.
Especially when the Colonel’s locked the door to the TV room.
‘Billy, if you want to watch the box, you earn it, sunshine.’ It was always the same line. The same wind-up. The same restraint. The same arm up my back. Even the tussle became a bit dull after a while.
So I spent the majority of days in my room. Staring at the plastic stars. Wondering what it would take to get them shining again. Either that or dreaming of ways to run rings round the Colonel.
I swear that once the clock hits three, it slows down, goes to double time or something. Like it’s another way of punishing me.
I’m always desperate to get out the door and meet them at the gates, but the Colonel has put that to bed.
‘Sounds like a privilege to me, Bill. Once you’re back at school or engaging with work from home, then we can look at it again. Until then, during school hours, the outside world is off limits.’
Man, I’d like to hurt him.
But instead all I can do is invent new ways to get at him, idling away the minutes until the door bursts open and the twins get home.
They’ll be ten this year, and it kills me that this is all they’ve known. They don’t remember what it is to be home, to not have a daily routine that runs like a military operation.
All they have is me, and that’s what worries me.
The house practically shuddered as the door was flung back on its hinges. The hurricane hit and, as always, I was ready for it as its full force slammed into my chest.
‘Biiiilll,’ Lizzie shouted, and the words rang in my left ear as Louie, true to form, bellowed the same into my right.
‘Now then, troubles.’ I beamed as I gave them the once-over. ‘How was your day?’
‘All right,’ they groaned. ‘Same as always.’
‘Anyone give you any grief?’
‘Not today. Well, only Ronnie for not having my tie on when I came out of school,’ moaned Louie, with a smile. ‘So I told him where to go.’
‘Oi, oi.
You leave that to me. You just keep your head down and do as he tells you, you hear?’
‘I hear you.’
‘Right. Well, get up the stairs, both of you, and get yourselves changed. Then we’ll find ourselves something to do before tea.’
As they slumped upstairs, I noticed Ronnie behind me in the doorway.
‘You really are good with them, you know,’ he said, a smile on his face.
‘What do you expect?’ I replied, as I hung their coats on their pegs. Ten pegs and ten names in black marker pen. Classy, eh?
‘I just wonder how you can be so different with them to everyone else you live with.’ As if it’s a big surprise. ‘It’s like watching a different person.’
‘Because I live with them by choice. I can hardly say that about the rest of you, can I?’
And besides, I thought, you don’t live here. None of you scummers do. We just pay your wages. Biting my lip, I followed them up the stairs. I couldn’t be arsed to get into it again.
‘Are you eating with the rest of us tonight? I thought I might stay and eat before getting off …’ He stopped himself before finishing with the word ‘home’.
But I knew what he was going to say, so I chose to ignore him.
*
The rest of the day passed off the same as most. It’s all about routine for the scummers. Makes their shift end quicker and easier, and gets them to the pub on time.
But it does nothing for me or the twins.
The rest of the lifers can do what they say, but not us. So while the rest of them crowded round the board to see what was for dinner, I was in the larder with the twins, choosing what we were going to cook.
None of the other lifers question it any more, only the new scummers that seem to start work in the house every other week. All the others know the score.
Me and the twins fend for ourselves. Choose what we’re having between us, not mapped out in advance by Ronnie.
‘Make sure you tidy any mess up,’ said the Colonel from the doorway.
I can tell that it still gets to him, no matter how much he tries to hide it, but this is one thing I don’t do to wind him up. It’s about trying to do something normal. Or what I’m guessing normal is.