Mud Pie

by Emma Lee Bole

  *

  “Frank!” exclaimed Rhoda. She hurried to the door to give him a hug. I was learning that Rhoda was a great one for hugging; she just never did it to me.

  “They let me out,” said Frank. He looked over at me. I felt like I’d been hit with a brick.

  I laid down my rack of lamb. “You will get that damn coat cleaned now, won’t you?”

  He scratched his head. “I don’t know. How can I? Maybe I should just not wear it again.”

  “For Christ’s sake.” I held up my hands, red with slaughtered lamb. “It’s only blood. It’s not Becki. And you ought to throw away that bloody handkerchief while you’re at it.”

  “I only called in to say thank you,” said Frank, startled.

  “We knew they’d got the wrong man,” said Rhoda.

  “I’m still on bail. No, not bail, but I’m not charged. What’s the word? They want to keep track of where I am. Don’t leave the country sort of thing.”

  “And did they treat you all right?”

  “Fine, apart from the tea. Dishwater,” said Frank, “and far too much of it. Every half hour, like a Chinese tea torture.”

  “I’ll make you a proper cup now,” said Rhoda, beginning to bustle.

  “I’d rather have a beer. And I’ll buy Lannie one too, if you can do without her for a bit.”

  “Of course we can!” said Rhoda. “In fact, I’ll do better than that. We’ll give you both a meal, on the house. There’s plenty of spare lasagne. Go on, Lannie, we’re not busy and not likely to be! You need to fill Frank in on all the latest hoo-hah at the club. Take the table by the fire. You can come back and wash up later.” She winked at me.

  “So what’s the latest hoo-hah?” asked Frank as we sat down.

  “Himself and AnneMarie.” I filled him in while Rhoda set our places and brought our lasagne with a flurry of napkins. Brendan was beaming at us as he pulled Frank’s pint. I felt awkward and on display.

  Frank looked sombre at my story. “I knew Niall liked to chat up the lasses. I didn’t know it went any further than that. Do you think AnneMarie was telling the truth about other women?”

  “In at least one case I’m sure she was. Niall was in shock – well, we all were – but it still took him a long time to get around to denying it.”

  “But Niall and Becki,” said Frank thoughtfully. “Do you think they really did?”

  “God knows. I know Becki fancied him. And she was all over him at the party – though AnneMarie didn’t seem to mind back then.” Of course, she had to keep Becki sweet if she wanted to get her supplies. And maybe she blamed Niall rather than Becki. “I suppose she might have been making more of it than there really was, to incriminate Niall. She was crazy enough to say anything.”

  “She’s fragile,” corrected Frank. I disagreed. Crazy seemed to me to fit the bill. Crazy enough to stick with her self-inflicted martyrdom. Crazy enough to think her husband was a killer.

  Maybe I was being unfair. I’d crazy, too, if I were married to Niall – especially if I were a devout Catholic wife with three young kids, who couldn’t contemplate divorce. Maybe she had liked being a martyr at first, but now she was trapped by it. Poor AnneMarie. It had sounded like she’d really thought that Niall might have murdered Becki...

  But then Niall had sounded like he’d really thought KK might have done it. Waving those letters. Nothing about the missing money, I realised: that had disappeared into thin air.

  “Becki even made a play for me once,” said Frank, investigating his lasagne. “God knows why. She certainly picked her time. I’d just started going out with Sue, and she knew it.”

  “What happened?”

  “Well, I turned her down as nicely as I could but she tossed her drink over me and told me I was a fucking poofter. Her words, not mine. I got a bit sharper with her than I should have. I had to walk out in the end. She had a downer on me after that.”

  “She was over-confident,” I said. “She thought she could have anybody.” Or maybe it was purely habit, another addiction.

  “Even Brendan,” said Frank. “He said he’d told you about that.”

  “Yes, he did.” I must have sounded severe, because Frank said gently,

  “Don’t think the worse of him, Lannie. He was going through hell at the time; he had no idea Rhoda was so sick. He thought she was getting ready to leave. That’s why I let Rhoda know about Becki, so that she’d have to tell Brendan she was ill.”

  I stared at him. “What? You shopped Brendan?”

  He pulled a wry face. “Yes. That’s fair enough. I didn’t enjoy it, but it seemed the lesser of two evils.”

  I could identify with that. “But how did you know Rhoda was sick?”

  “I saw her at the doctor’s after I broke my foot. She was crying, so I knew it wasn’t flu. I took her for a coffee and it all came spilling out. But she wouldn’t let me tell Brendan, so I forced her.” Frank sighed. “Becki was breaking them up. I didn’t know what else to do.”

  I wanted to take his hand and reassure him. Instead I just said lamely, “You did right.”

  “Did I? I could have broken them up properly. It was a hell of a risk. But Brendan managed to patch it up. Don’t think too badly of him.”

  “I don’t.” I did of Becki, though. All in a day’s fun for her. I want, I want, grabbing like a greedy child at whatever took her fancy: Frank, Hugh, Brendan. Cackling at Hugh that she’d bewitch him, telling everyone Frank was gay. She was vindictive when she was thwarted. What might she have threatened Brendan with? “Frank?” I said hesitantly. “I think Becki came to the Woolpack, early in November. Alice told me. It sounded as if there was an argument, and Rhoda got upset.”

  “Hardly surprising.”

  I bit my lip. “The children said Becki was screaming.”

  “Aye, well, she had a bit of a temper.”

  “Frank? Could Brendan make sure Becki never worked again?”

  He frowned at me. “I suppose he could have stopped her job at the club if he felt inclined. He’s got the clout. But why would he? Anyway, what was Becki doing at the Woolpack?”

  I shrugged. “Gloating?”

  Frank shook his head. “That’s harsh. She wasn’t that ill-natured.”

  “Maybe she wanted to pick up the threads of the affair again,” I said. “Maybe she went to meet Brendan, and ran into Rhoda.” Becki would have enjoyed the hold she had over Brendan, I thought. Dealers were like that too. They relished the power to withhold, to torment, to draw their struggling catch after them like a fish on a line until they decided to release it for a few hours. I imagined fierce words flying around the kitchen, Becki taunting, Rhoda shouting, a horrified Brendan saying things he didn’t mean and would immediately regret...

  Because Brendan was a kindly man. Nevertheless, a shiver ran down me. I glanced over at him, drying glasses behind the bar, careful and industrious. Rhoda put a hand on his shoulder as she passed him, glanced my way and said something with a smile.

  I looked away again quickly and turned back to Frank. “How did you get wind of Brendan’s affair?”

  “I guessed. It wasn’t hard, from the way he was acting, all furtive and guilty. Becki would fondle him and whisper in his ear, and Brendan would blush like an apple.”

  Poor Brendan. No practice at affairs. Unlike Becki, who had plenty; surely enough to be discreet? But maybe she liked people to notice. Look at me. Look what I can do.

  “KK guessed as well,” I said without thinking, and then wished I hadn’t, because I didn’t want to discuss KK with Frank.

  But Frank was surprised. “Did he? He never said. Mind you, he wouldn’t, he’s a very private man, KK. But he wouldn’t be happy about Brendan and Becki. He’s got strong morals.” I began to blush like an apple myself at the thought of KK’s morals.

  “You’d think Becki could have stuck to single men,” I said to cover my embarrassment. “There was no shortage at the club, after all.”

  Frank shook his head. “It
was almost like she was preparing for rejection, picking people who had a good reason to turn her down. It meant it wasn’t her fault if they didn’t love her. I think she needed reassurance that she was lovable.”

  “Reassurance? Why?”

  “I don’t know. You might have to ask her family that.”

  “I saw you staring at her father in the funeral.”

  “Did I? I was wondering how the good little girl in his speech squared with the real Becki. What he really thought of her.”

  “It sounded like he idolised her.”

  “It sounded like he didn’t know her,” said Frank. “He didn’t approve of her job at the club. Probably didn’t fit his image of what his daughter ought to be.”

  “He certainly ladled it on at the funeral.”

  “Aye. Couldn’t just accept her as she was. Maybe that was Becki’s problem: she couldn’t fill her family’s expectations and be a good little girl, so she veered off wildly the other way like a stolen car, and went smash.”

  I thought about this, about the two sisters at the funeral, beautiful and dutiful beside their father wrapped tight in his dignity. Becki as an angry, unsuccessful Cinderella who never made it to princess, but was murdered at the ball, sacrificed behind the wheelie bins.

  I didn’t know if Frank was right. I didn’t know how she might have felt. I was in no position to judge, having no experience of family expectations. No-one had had any of me, except Karl. He’d expected me to look after him; fight for him; bail him out. Which I had, up to a point. Until I made a point of not doing it. “It’s all speculation. We don’t know any of this for sure,” I said.

  “Never will, now.”

  “No.” We fell into silence as we ate.

  I was remembering Manchester, shopping with Karl. I was seventeen, and we were off to spend my first earnings. Karl only came along so I could buy him new trainers, but I didn’t mind. It felt good to do the brother and sister thing again, after a long interval when he hadn’t wanted to know me. Maybe he hoped people would think I was his girlfriend.

  We snook into the posh shops down King Street together, giggling and whispering and being eyed by security guards, until Karl said loudly,

  “Come on, Lannie, this is all cheap tat. Let’s go somewhere really classy,” and we fell out of Monsoon together, laughing. Went off to Top Shop instead, where I fell in love with a blouse as blue-grey as the sea which I had never yet seen except at Blackpool in the dark, with a beaded fringe around the hem and sleeves. I lingered and fingered but there was no way I could make my money stretch that far.

  So I settled for a T-shirt and was happy until half way down Cross Street Karl said, “Happy Birthday, Lannie.” And he pulled out the beaded blouse from under his jacket. I don’t know how he’d done it. I’d not seen a thing. He held it out to me with a grin as big as the Town Hall.

  “Jesus, Karl, you nicked that!”

  “So?”

  “So I can’t take it!”

  His face froze. “Why the fuck not?”

  “Because you can’t go nicking things!”

  “I can,” said Karl. “I just did. I’m good, aren’t I? Admit it, you never saw me! Anyway, you used to nick stuff too.”

  “Not for years now. Bloody hell, Karl, you’d better take it back!”

  The grin had switched right off. “I can’t. Don’t be an arsehole. You want it or not?” Without waiting for an answer, he dropped it in the bin at the bus stop and stalked off.

  I hesitated, in two minds whether to fish it out again. In the end, I didn’t. By that time, Karl was running down to St Peter’s Square like a kicked whippet. He jumped on a tram and was gone.

  He didn’t talk to me for a month afterwards. I wished I’d taken the blouse. It was a gift, for Christ’s sake. I’d not even thanked him. I’d not lived up to expectations.

  “Lasagne’s good,” said Frank.

  “Is it?” I’d been eating without tasting. I wondered what Karl ate in Strangeways; then made myself bury him again. Like a body in a shallow grave, Karl was always too close to the surface, too easily uncovered: all it took was a word, a scent, and there he was.

  I forced myself to focus on lasagne. “It’s not bad. A touch herby, not enough salt. Do you know, I’ve never eaten a proper meal in the Woolpack before. Especially not sitting on my bed. It’s a nice interlude from cooking.”

  He put his fork down and looked at me. “You’re not still sleeping on these seats?”

  “No, I’m mostly falling off them.”

  “You’re still welcome to stay at Nan’s house.”

  I shook my head. “I wouldn’t feel safe. Anyway, you and Sue need to get on with doing that up and selling it.”

  “Well, that’s but,” said Frank. He cleared his throat and stopped. “How about the Portakabin at the yard? Jake’s gone back to South Africa. We couldn’t persuade him to stay another season.”

  “You amaze me.”

  “I’m amazed he stuck it out this long,” said Frank, “but the Portakabin’s free.”

  “How much is the rent?”

  “I told you, it’s free. I owe you for getting me out of jail.”

  “You would have got out anyway,” I argued. “You were innocent. You knew that, that’s why you were so calm when they arrested you. You didn’t even look surprised.”

  “I was only surprised that it took so long.”

  “Well, Grimshaw had only just got hold of your jacket.”

  “No. I mean it took fifteen years.”

  All the flavour drained out of the lasagne, leaving me with a mouth full of wet flannel. I swallowed.

  “What are you saying, Frank? That you should have been arrested for Dean’s death?”

  “It always felt like it.”

  “But that’s crazy! You couldn’t have stopped it happening! You were behind him when he came off his bike.”

  “True,” said Frank, “but I always felt guilty.” His voice was very quiet, matter-of-fact. He took another gulp of beer, put down his glass and twirled it carefully on the beermat.

  “The thing is,” he said, “it was the day before it happened.”

  “What was?”

  Frank took a deep breath. “I went to the pub with him. To several pubs in Bollington, actually. Quite a crawl. Just the two of us. No particular reason, just chatting about this and that.”

  “And he got drunk?” Now I thought I understood. Dean had still been under the influence the next day.

  “No,” said Frank. “Hang on.” I waited, and after a while he continued, “We were in the Meridian when Dean asked me out of the blue if I’d ever thought what it was like to be gay. Not the sort of conversation we usually had. So I was a bit taken aback and said, no, but I was glad I wasn’t. He asked why, and I made some crack about shirtlifters and don’t turn your back to tie your bootlaces. You know.”

  He didn’t look at me. I said “mm” and waited for the rest.

  “Well, I didn’t know anyone who was gay,” said Frank. “Not then. I don’t know many now, but it was zero then. And Dean asked me, what if he said he was gay? So I said I’d start watching my back, you know, making a bad joke of it because I was scared of where he was heading.”

  “Dean was gay?”

  “That’s what he said next. I said, no, you can’t be. I mean, he’d had a girlfriend. They’d only split up three weeks earlier. And she hadn’t been the first.” Frank looked up in appeal. “He had a Kawasaki 900 and he supported Bradford Bulls. So I said bloody hell, Dean, you can’t be gay.”

  He picked up his glass and put it down again without drinking. “I didn’t want to hear it. Scared shitless in case he was coming on to me. He wasn’t, of course – he just wanted to tell a mate and he thought I’d be the most approachable. Which I wasn’t. I just kept telling him it was impossible, that he’d got himself confused after his break-up, that he’d think differently when he met someone else. In the end he got up and walked out. Next day he rode straight into the cra
sh barriers on the Cat and Fiddle.”

  “He couldn’t have done that on purpose.”

  “Couldn’t he? Just like he couldn’t be gay?” Frank shook his head, then ran his hand through his hair. “I don’t know.” He was silent for a moment. “I let him down.”

  “You don’t know why he crashed.”

  “He was going too fast. He was being reckless. He wasn’t a reckless lad, Dean, not normally. If I couldn’t accept it, who could? He didn’t stand a chance with the rest of his mates. That’s what he must have thought.”

  “Not necessarily.”

  Frank looked tired. “Whatever.” He began to pick at his food again.

  “So you’ve been feeling guilty ever since?”

  “I am guilty,” said Frank.

  “Did you tell Grimshaw all this?”

  “Of course not. He’d have thought I was nuts.”

  “You are nuts,” I said.

  “Going nuts,” said Frank. “It’s irrevocable, that’s the thing. Makes no difference what I do now, I can’t mend it.”

  I said the obvious, soothing thing. “You have to forgive yourself sometime, Frank.”

  “Why?”

  I thought about this, but couldn’t find an answer. “You just have to live with it, then.”

  “That’s what I’ve been doing.”

  “Does Sue know all this?”

  He took another forkful of lasagne, shook his head. “Not the gay bit.”

  “Don’t you think you should tell her?”

  “No. She thinks I’m off my head about Dean as it is.”

  “But you’ve told me.”

  He gave me a sharp look. “Thought you might understand. Because of your brother.”

  “Because I betrayed my brother?”

  “And how does that make you feel?”

  I didn’t need to even think about that one. “Like crap. Guilty. Furious. Sick. Tied up in knots inside.”

  He nodded.

  “But Dean’s fifteen years in the past,” I said.

  “You think you’ll feel any better in fifteen years?”

  “Christ, I hope so. It should be all forgotten by then.” But even as I spoke, I felt the weight of knowledge, a cold, hard, heavy burden laid across my back, that I knew I would carry all my life.

  Frank looked wistful. “The thing is, I don’t want to forget. That would mean losing Dean altogether. I suppose you’ve had plenty of practice at forgetting, though. You’d need to, with a background like yours,” a remark that made me wonder in a sudden panic how much of my background had leaked through from the garbled story I’d poured out to him in Sue’s neat kitchen. It was all a bit of an exhausted blur. I’d not let slip my mother’s drinking, surely? God, I hoped not… Or my lousy pig of a supposed father trying to climb into my bed, or all the other things I was so ashamed of and usually kept hidden, pushed down deep?

  “There’s a load I’d like to forget,” I answered bitterly. “But it lurks round corners and jumps out when I’m not looking.”

  He rested his chin on his hand, studying me. “Maybe you shouldn’t try to shut the past away. The good memories are there too, along with the rough stuff.”

  “Are they?” I didn’t believe him.

  “Caravanning in Wales,” said Frank, “just after me Dad got made redundant. Pootling around rock-pools in a stiff breeze all day, hunting dead crabs and invisible shrimps. Black Rock Sands it was. We bought chips every night, furnace-hot and too much salt. Mum fried eggs to go with them because we couldn’t afford fish. Sand in the bed. Sand everywhere. Went to sleep every night with the radio on low and my head full of shrimps. Woke up every morning listening for the sea. Pure bloody magic.”

  I understood then what he meant. “Camping near Hawkshead,” I said. “It rained all week, but I don’t remember the misery, just ice-creams in the café every lunchtime and endless games of cards. The best holiday I ever had.” It was pretty well the only holiday I’d ever had.

  “When was that?”

  “I was about ten. There was me, Karl, my sister Nicole, and Dave who was Nicole’s father.” Not mine, sadly, but Dave had come round regularly, assuming the mantle of father to us all regardless. “He taught us to play crib for Maltesers. Karl couldn’t add up to 31, so Dave helped him out, and slipped him extra Maltesers while we pretended not to see. We played all week until the tent flooded and we had to pack up and go home. He even got us singing in the car.” I’d felt more like crying.

  “Your mother didn’t go?”

  “No. Dave took us away to give her a break.” Or to give us a break from her. She was drunk when we got back. I remember that. After one look, Dave took us all down the laundrette and we tried to play crib again while our muddy clothes went round. But it was no fun any more, and we had to go home eventually. “He was a good man, was Dave.”

  Quick-speaking, hard-smoking, wiry, canny, rough-fingered and honest; he moved up to Glasgow a year later. He hung on in Manchester as long as he could, until Nicole had left home and was safe. But he couldn’t wait for all of us.

  “It only takes one person,” I said, half to myself. “One person makes or breaks you.” For me, Dave had been the one.

  And who had been the one for Karl? Who had he looked to? Who had been the one he needed? Had it been me?

  “One person,” said Frank quietly, studying his beer, so that I guessed he was thinking about Dean again.

  “But you might be starting your own family soon,” I said. “You’ll be getting married. Moving house, all that. Starting a new life.”

  “Don’t know about getting married,” said Frank.

  Privately, I thought Sue would be down that registry office quicker than a cat in a pantry. Then I was ashamed. So I said, “Sue was very good to me the other day. I never thanked her properly, but she was very kind and helpful.”

  “She is,” said Frank. He pushed his knife and fork together and said nothing more. The meal was over.