The Crowlands

by T M Creedy

  CHAPTER TWO

  Home is a small one bed flat on the second floor of what once must have been a grand family home. Now it is cramped, cut up into many multiple dwellings so the landlord Mr Benny could make as much money as possible from us hopeless, low wage, low self-esteem, desperate tenants. The rent has to be paid in cash of course, and I never see a receipt, just earn myself a greasy smirk from Mr Benny whenever I hand over my six hundred quid a month. There was a rumour that there is a group of Romanian factory workers living in the dank basement, working different shifts so two people could use one single bed at different times. I have no idea of the set up down there, the cooking facilities or the sanitation arrangements, but I do hear the front door banging at all times of the day and night, and never hear any feet on the stairs so either the single mum in the ground floor flat was on the game and getting through thirty tricks a day, or the rumours about the basement are true.

  My flat is sparse, which is a good thing given the size of it. Just a couch and telly in the living room, a double bed and single wardrobe in the bedroom, galley kitchen and shower room. That's it. It isn't homely. I’ve never bothered with the niceties of creating a cosy home so the walls are still the same magnolia painted woodchip that was there when I moved in four years ago. The carpet is threadbare and none too clean - there is a limit as to what cleaning miracles my second hand Henry Hoover can perform. My bedlinen is still the same faded floral sets my Gran donated to me from her own linen cupboard as a flat warming present. I have three sets of bedlinen, all old fashioned flowery prints, and I use them in rotation. One for the bed, one in the wash and the third I use as a throw for my couch. It covers up the worst of the unidentifiable stains and makes it look like I care enough to make an effort.

  It is onto this flower covered couch that I throw myself when I get in the door. The flat is freezing as usual. It had just one solitary electric wall heater, puzzlingly located directly under the draughty lounge window, which meant any heat it did decide to generate went straight out into the night. I wasn't going to waste money on electricity so I drag my duvet off my bed and roll myself up in that like a big, orange daisy printed sausage. My tin of cheap beans sits on the kitchen worktop waiting to be chucked into a bowl and heated in the microwave, but my laptop on the floor is begging for my attention first.

  I piggybacked my internet service from the tenants upstairs, who either were too thick to put some security on their connection or didn't care that the neighbours were using their service for free. I’m going to just log in, check my emails. I won't go onto any gambling sites at all, won't search for any new virtual casinos that had opened its doors today and was dying to welcome me as a new player with bonus offers of free money. Just a quick look at the weather forecast, a mooch around the news on MSN. Opening up my Gmail account I have a notification from one of the bingo sites I excluded from months ago. The self-exclusion period was up. My account was open and available for play again, would I like to make a deposit? Just click on the link. It would only be ten pounds, I promise myself. Ten pounds would buy me ten games of bingo, and then I would self-exclude again, swear on Gran's life. Click.

  In case you're wondering, my family have washed their hands of me. Mum and Dad first, when I 'borrowed' Mums credit card without telling her. I was going to pay them back, honest, but I had a theory. New players when they first signed up to a gaming site always won a bit on their first day. It was the casino's way of hooking you in, promising bigger wins if you just kept playing, kept spending. So I created a new account using Mum's name and address - and credit card details. Mum soon cottoned on when she checked her bank statement online and saw line after line of payments to a gaming site, via a banking service based in Cyprus. By then I'd gone through seven hundred quid without realising it. I could have sworn I was due for a big win, and I would have paid Mum back and even given them a share of the profits. But it just didn't happen. I lost Mum and Dad a shitload of money which they struggled to pay the interest on, let alone pay off the actual debt. They were in dire financial straits as it was. Dad hasn't held down a job in years. His temper always gets the better of him when he's had a few drinks. He would turn up for work, swaying and weaving, ready to climb up into the cab of his big eighteen-wheeler artic lorry, shouting and swearing and swinging his big meaty fists at the site manager who took his keys off him, and sent him home in disgrace and unemployed yet again. Mum did her best, but she couldn't say no to a drink either, and she went from being a respected doctors’ receptionist, to cleaning offices at night where it didn't matter to the bosses if you were pissed or not. They pay her well below the minimum wage, even though that is illegal, but they know she won't complain. No one else would employ her. Mum still does a bit of cleaning now and again but mostly they manage on their pensions, so the seven hundred quid I ‘invested’ for them represented a big chunk of their monthly outgoings.

  They were shocked when they realised what I had done, and begged me to get help. They even found the details of a Gamblers Anonymous group and registered my name without me knowing. I promised I would go to one weekly meeting, but on the condition that if I didn't like it, I wouldn't have to go to another. I did go. I turned up at the church hall at six one evening, saw the vicar with his dog collar getting ready to lead the group, saw the twitching, fidgeting wasters already seated and waiting for the meeting to begin, and I turned on my heel and left. I don't belong there, in that group. I am strong enough to stop gambling on my own, if I choose to.

  I’ve done some really shitty things to get money, I freely admit that, but the worst shitty thing I did was to steal Gran's necklace. I mean, I know it was wrong and all that, but on the flip side it was meant to be mine when Gran died anyway. It was a three strand natural pearl choker which Grandad had bought her for her twenty-first birthday, and had a platinum and diamond clasp. Gran always said it was to come to me so it wasn't like I didn't have any right to it. I just wanted it early, before Gran actually died. I took it from Gran's jewellery box one day when she was down in her kitchen searching for the shortbread biscuits I loved so much when I was a kid. Shoving it into my bag, I endured the weekly tea and chat with Gran, the necklace burning a hole in my side the whole time. I had a buyer already lined up. He was one of those pawn brokers who poses as an antique buyer, and he promised me five hundred based on the description I gave him. The bastard welshed on that though, and when I took the necklace into his grubby little shop the next day I walked out with just three hundred quid in twenty pound notes. I put two hundred into my bank account and the other hundred I lost on the machines at a William Hill. The two hundred pounds in my account was lost that same night playing Jokers Wild poker online. Like I said before, I never learn.

  Gran forgave me eventually, but was careful not to invite me round to her house anymore, and I know she was disappointed that her precious necklace had been sold. She would have liked it to stay in the family and be handed down from generation to generation. She went to bingo on her own now. She took care to hide her purse whenever I turned up on her doorstep. It hurt me so much, losing my Gran's trust. I figured it was best to stop all contact. I couldn't stand to see the disappointment on her face when she looked at me so I stopped calling, didn't answer my phone when her number came up, and eventually she stopped trying.

  Looking up at the digital clock on the microwave I see it’s gone eleven already. I haven’t had my tea yet. The beans are still sitting on the bench where I left them. I’ve been playing bingo for almost five hours straight, but I won fifty quid so that was enough keep me playing until now, but I didn’t have another win so it’s all gone. The hatred and revulsion of my weakness takes over again and I click on the ‘Close Account’ button, sealing off that account for another six months. At once a feeling of relief and wellbeing floods my body. ‘Good girl.’ I tell myself. ‘No more gambling.’

  My bedroom is too cold and I am already safely cocooned in my warm duvet so I decide to sleep on the couch tonight. The
beans can stay where they are; I’ll have them tomorrow. That means I don’t have to think about tea tomorrow night and I won’t need to get any more cash out so I take my debit card out of my purse and place it on top of the fridge. I won’t take it with me to work tomorrow, and if I don’t have it, I can’t get any money from the bank, and I will walk past all the bookie shops without giving them a thought. Satisfied with my plan, I drift into sleep. I have done well today, I think, not thinking about how many hundreds of pounds I have wasted in the last two days since I got paid.

  Running late for work in the morning, I almost forget about the card on the fridge. I don’t need it. I won’t take it.

  But what if I have to buy something on the way home? What if I get a bit peckish and fancy a pasty during my morning break? Swiping the card, I slide it back into its worn flap inside my purse. I won’t get any cash unless I need it. I’ll pay for my pasty with my card, no cash back. I will not gamble today.

  The hallway is dark and smelly, crammed with other people’s junk, and I edge past the bicycles and baby buggies towards the front door. There is a low whistle behind me and I spin around to see Mr Benny, his fat greasy body lumbering into the hall from the door of Flat One. He is pulling up his trousers over his hairy belly and doing up his belt, like he’s just got dressed in a hurry. Flat One was the single mum – don’t tell me she was fucking him. The ever present lit cigarette glows against his bushy moustache as he grins around it at me.

  ‘Zaaaaarrrrrraaaaaa.’ He drawls, bubbles of spit appearing on his lips.

  ‘It’s Sara.’ I tell him for the hundredth time. He always gets my name wrong. He shrugs, my name is of no importance to him.

  ‘Rent due end of the week, yeah?’ He takes a long drag on his smoke and eyes me up and down. ‘I don’t want no excuses this time, yeah? None of this “Oh I don’t have the money for you Mr Benny” rubbish, yeah? End of the week, OK?’ Blowing his lungful of smoke directly into my face I catch a whiff of his fetid breath and nearly gag.

  ‘I know.’ I say flatly. ‘You‘ll have your money.’ I have no idea where I’m going to get it from this time. I only have about three hundred quid left on my overdraft, and that is supposed to see me through until next payday – food, bills and all.

  ‘You don’t have the money again, we’ll have to do summing about it, yeah?’ Mr Benny goes on. ‘Come to some arrangement, yeah?’ He smiles his oily smile and I get a glimpse of the blackened stumps in his mouth. God no, I would rather be living on the streets than be reduced to sleeping with a fat pig like him.

  ‘You’ll have your money.’ I say again, lurching for the door handle and taking a deep breath of the fresh morning air, freeing myself from his rancid miasma.

  My breath comes in short, panicky gasps as I pound the dirty pavement, heading for the store I work at. Where can I get six hundred quid from in the next three days? There is nobody I can borrow from. My employers didn’t give advances on wages, not that they would advance me that much money anyway. I might have to get one of those payday loans. Wonga or Quik Quid, one of those websites which give you the cash but charge a thousand percent interest, and just have to suck it up. I’m almost in tears when I arrive at the shop with seconds to spare and I keep busy by setting out the displays of cheap nylon tabards and polyester hats. My mind keeps wandering back to the dilemma of the rent. If I won just one jackpot, if I put a hundred quid in the slot machine and played maximum bets, I would definitely win, I know it.

  As soon as it’s lunchtime I sprint to the nearest cash machine and tap my PIN in frantically, requesting fifty quid. A hundred was too much to risk, fifty would be OK. The mechanism in the machine whirrs and stops and I hold my hand out for my cash. But none comes. There is a message on the screen. ‘Insufficient funds – please contact your banking service provider’. Oh no, no, no, no no, no this can’t be happening. In desperation I push my card in again and request a balance.

  -£253.26.

  I’m overdrawn by more than two hundred and fifty quid. My available funds are £46.74.

  Forty-six quid and seventy-four pence.

  FORTY-SIX FUCKING QUID? Two days ago I had twelve hundred in there. How had I gone through over eleven hundred of it already? My scalp prickles in horror and I feel a cold sweat break out on my face. I have forty-six quid left to my name. I owe the landlord six hundred. There was no way on earth I could balance the books.

  I must have spent more than I thought online. I remember maxing out the cash on my card on both days so there was five hundred of it, I must have spent the same again playing the slots on my laptop. There is an impatient huff behind me as the queue for the cash machine grows longer. Shuffling to one side I stare and stare at the print-out in my hand. Forty-six quid.

  For the rest of the day I go from cold to hot to cold again. I am in serious shit this time, no doubt about it, I can’t see a way out of this one. Tentatively I let my mind slip towards Mr Benny’s offer of an ‘arrangement’. Would I be able to do it – just this once? If I closed my eyes and held my breath the whole time, could I do it? My stomach heaves as I remember the smell of him this morning and I clasp my hand over my mouth involuntarily. I’ll leave, I think, I’ll pack up and go. Down the coast somewhere and start again. Start over in a new place. With my forty-six quid.

  By the time I get home it barely registers that I have not gambled today. I tuck my head into my collar and walk as fast as I can, intending to start packing the moment I got in. When I let myself into the hallway there is a moment when the door gets stuck on something lying on the hall floor. The day’s post, for all of the residents, gets shoved in through the front door and the rule is the first one to find it stacks it neatly on the wonky table on the side. There is nothing for me, there never is. This lodging house is so off the radar we don’t even get those threatening reminders about paying our television licences. I can see there are several cards in the post, like birthday cards. They’re all addressed to Master William Ainsworth and I think this is the young son of the woman in Flat One. I’m ashamed of this but I did pick them up and hold them up to the watery light, looking to see if I could see anything through the envelope. I stick my little fingernail into the small gap where the envelope is sealed and rip it, just a tiny bit. By squeezing the card inside the right way I can just about see inside it, and yes, it looks like there is money there. I could just about make out the edge of a paper note. I could just take the card. She would never know it was even delivered, and after a week or so, she would assume it was lost in the post. The post office always tells you not to send money through the post now anyway, it’s too much of a temptation for some of their employees, and money goes missing all of the time. I dither, thinking of how easy it would be. There might be twenty quid in there and that would keep me fed for a few days.

  I’m just about to put the card in my handbag when I’m interrupted by the front door opening again. I think it's one of the Romanians. He looks at me, takes in the piles of cards and then sees the one I’m holding my hand, the back flap ripped just a little bit, and I know he knows what I’m about to do. He frowns but says nothing. He might not know the words in English to call me a lowlife, thieving bitch who takes birthday money from a little boy but that’s what he’s thinking. He’s right though, and I can’t do it. Twenty quid wouldn’t even help me out very much so I put the card down with the rest. He nods warily and walks away towards the back of the house.

  Scooping up the collection of envelopes and takeaway menus I’m patting them into some approximation of tidiness and setting them on the table surface, when something catches my eye. The Metro, the free London newspaper, has come apart and is in scattered sheets across the floor, and face up and slapping me in the face, is a bold print Wanted ad in the Classifieds section.

  Short Term Accommodation Desperately Required

  Help! I’m in-between houses and need four nights

  accommodation in a private rental apartment,

  from Thursday 28th to Mon
day 1st only. Discretion

  an absolute must! Cash paid up front. No questions

  asked if no questions asked. Tel: 07114 816664

  Thursday 28th is tomorrow. It sounds really dodgy, with the advertiser asking for discretion and paying in cash, but this just might be the answer to my prayers. I’m willing to give them my flat for four nights if it means I can pay my rent this month. I’ve no idea how much they’re willing to pay but, let’s face it, I’ll take anything I can get at the moment.

  Before I’m even up the stairs I have my mobile out and I’m tapping in the number from the ad. It’s another London based mobile number but not a prefix I recognise. The line clicks a few times before finally connecting and I hear the reassuring ringing. It rings out with no one picking up. Of course, they would have found somewhere by now, they were probably inundated with offers and have given up answering their phone. I’m just putting my key in my door when my mobile rings in my hand. The number is blocked but I just know it’s the same one I just tried to call.

  ‘Hello?’ My voice is a little breathless from climbing the stairs. There’s a pause and then a woman’s voice replies.

  ‘Hi. Um. I just had a missed call from this number?’ She is speaking quietly, like she is somewhere where there are other people listening in.

  ‘Oh hi. I’m just answering your ad in the Metro. The one for four nights’ accommodation?’