House of Lads

by Roland Lloyd Parry

  I knew what had happened there. One of them wars they go on about. I knew my mum had been a nurse for some goody group. I never knew that was where she’d been.

  I was feeling queasy but I made myself speak.

  “How’d I end up in Liverpool then?” I said it like I still didn’t believe him. But I could tell he’d have a good answer to that.

  “Duh? Your mom and dad took you there. Dangerous in Iraq in the nineties. She married him and took you both home with her.”

  “Don’t tell me. You got all that on paper?”

  He patted the file.

  “Why did he leave then?”

  He sniffed and blinked. “This is where it gets hard, Hami.”

  “Azo.”

  “Whatever. They kicked him out of the UK.”

  I felt sicker. “Why?”

  “Eeh... He was dodgy. Full of hate. Dangerous friends. They don’t like folks who tick those boxes.”

  “His job. On that form. He spoke English?”

  “Right. Clever man, your dad. Too clever. He thought he could play both sides.”

  “Eh?”

  “He wasn’t just helping us. He was part of the axis of evil all along. He was well-trained. Tough. They sent him back there and cut him loose. Lately, he’s been in Syria.”

  I saw myself from outside. Stood up in the air and looked down at me sitting there in that scabby metal box. A right mess I looked.

  “Are you working for Paterson?” I heard myself say.

  “Who?”

  “Let me speak to him.”

  “Who we talking about?”

  “Paterson. British intel. He’s the one running me.”

  “Running you? What are you, a half-marathon?”

  “I’m an asset, you bell-end.”

  He snorted.

  “I don’t look like much,” I said. “But my mum’s well proud of me.”

  He looked lost for a sec. Then he smirked. Then he frowned like he was listening at last. He heaved himself up out of his armchair and walked out, jinking the wire and clanging the metal shut behind him.

  It was locked when I got to it. I grabbed at it, then yanked my hand away. A leccy charge. It nipped my fingertips and whipped up my arm. I yelled and jumped and fell back on my arse.

  I took a piss in the bucket and waited.

  He was gone so long I ended up lying down on the matting again. Wasn’t the comfiest spot, but I dozed off. It was knackering being in my head lately.

  When I opened my eyes again, the feller was still gone. Someone else had joined me. When I lifted my head from the floor, I saw it sitting in the corner by the opening, looking at me. A black Alsatian with yellow eyes.

  I rolled onto my side and pushed myself up sitting. The dog twitched and growled but stayed where it was. I pushed myself backwards away from it, to the far end. I leaned my back against the metal and waited.

  Ten minutes later, the feller clanged in through the door again. He handed me a bottle of water. He stepped back and looked down at me.

  “So I looked up this Paterson,” he said. “No one’s heard of him.”

  “No one who?”

  “You Britskies share everything with us.”

  “So?”

  “So either you’re full of shit, Hami, or our Britsky chums are hiding things from us. Which would be bad.”

  “And it’s not bad snatching one of us off the street and flying him to Shitistan?”

  “Like I said, we share everything.”

  I ground my teeth. So someone on my own side had signed off on this. Paterson always said he worked in the shadows, but this was taking the piss.

  “Your leaders gave you up, Hami. Don’t sweat it. You’re not the first.”

  “Find Paterson. He’ll tell you. I’m doing good work.”

  “Told you, buddy. If your Paterson is real, he’s a ghost and we got an issue. If he’s not, then you’re bullshitting me, and we got an issue. Either way, we can’t help you.”

  “So they’ve handed me over to you. What for? If you don’t even know I work for Paterson, I’m nothing to you. I’ve got nothing else going for me.”

  “Wrong, buddy. You got your poppa.”

  I was never top of the class, but I was quick enough to see something was up here. Was Paterson dodgy? I knew from my training those Yanks were up our arses. Well if we were sharing everything, then Paterson should know where I was. He should be out to bat for me. Not letting them snatch me and bully me about my dad. Unless… oh, no. Unless he knew about my dad an’ all.

  “Tell me more about him,” I said.

  He clicked his tongue. The dog jumped up and padded towards me. I hunched up but didn’t budge. It stopped in front of me, growled and fixed me with its yellow eyes.

  The feller came over and stood behind it.

  “No, buddy,” he said. “You tell me about him.”

  “Eh? I don’t know him.” I was angry now. “What’s wrong with you? You said you know who I am. Then you’ll know I’ve not seen him since I was four. You’re welcome.”

  The feller frowned and said nothing.

  I turned to the dog. “Alright, scrote,” I said to it.

  It barked and lunged. Its two front paws landed on my chest. I was about to gob it but it got its front teeth round my left ear. It held them there, not breaking the skin, just tugging. Hot yok and breath all down the side of my face. If I wriggled it’d bite in.

  The feller knelt down on my right side and talked to my free ear.

  “He doesn’t like people lying.”

  “I fuc… ”

  He yelled over me.

  “Before you bullshit me anymore, Hami, look the doggy in the eyes and think.”

  I did it for a minute. Didn’t help me sort my thoughts out. He went on.

  “Your dad left Syria a week ago. He’d dropped off our grid but we’re pretty sure he’s headed your way. We want to know where to find him.”

  “I’ve never… ”

  He shushed me again. The dog growled.

  “We know about you and Raz, Hami.”

  “So what?”

  “So we know you’re with Raz, and we know Raz knows the same people your dad knows. We know you’re the link between them. Now you’re our link to them too.”

  I just stared at him. He must have been in a hurry, because when I didn’t speak, he took it the wrong way. He thought I was being hard. He grunted at the dog. It tightened its jaw. My head filled with its growling. My ear was burning.

  I must have passed out because when I opened my eyes I was lying on my side on the floor and he was at the far end, stepping out through the opening. The dog followed. Its tail vanished and the door clanged shut.

  I was on my own again. I dozed. The lights stayed on.

  The songs started.

  I don’t know anything about music, me, but I know what I don’t like. Most of all when I’m trying to sleep. All kinds of gash he was playing. Hard smelly crap and techno and stuff off the radio. Rihanna. Shining bright like a diamond. I knew that one at least. Too loud though. My brain was trying to shut down but it couldn’t. The light got brighter. I squeezed my eyes shut but the lids were all back-lit.

  The noise was right inside my head.

  No clue how long it all went on. Next thing I remember I was sitting up against the wall again and the feller was crouching in front of me holding out a donut.

  I stuffed it in my gob and chewed, snorting air in and out through my nose. The dog was sat next to him, watching me. I ran out of strength to chew and just sat there with the donut gumming up my gob. He handed me a paper cup. Foamy white coffee. I held it to my mouth and glugged it down.

  The songs had stopped. My head was ringing. Everything looked slow and far away. The feller’s voice came through.

  “Hey, Hami. Where’s your poppa?”

  “Wish I knew, mate,” I said.

  He went out. The dog stayed. The music came back on. Diamonds in the sky.

  32 />
  “Jeez, you’re a tough one, buddy.”

  He was sitting at my side sipping Pepsi from a bottle.

  “I don’t know nothing.” First words I’d said in a few days. I’d just got my voice back after all that yelling. He’d had a doc look at me and brought in a camp bed so I could have a real lie down.

  “Not knowing nothing, huh. That must be nice. So you really don’t know where your poppa is? Jeez. You almost got me giving up here.”

  “Almost?”

  “Mmyeah.”

  “I’m no use to you.”

  “Wrong, buddy.”

  He reached out and squeezed my shoulder.

  “I gotta tell you. I freaked out when I got that you were telling the truth,” he said. “But then I thought about it, and I said to myself, what the hell. Whether you know your dad or not, you’re still the best guy to lead us to him.”

  “How’s that?”

  “Simple, buddy. We drop you back in Liverpool. He’s on his way there. So you’ll find him. Or more likely, he’ll find you.”

  I laughed, if you could call it that. My lips curled up and my chest poffed in and out. Snapshots of Southport pier flashed through my head. I saw the Iranian ice-cream man outside our old school. Heard the cheesy chimes of his van. Heard the kids singing in the playground. I saw Frank shaking his head and rubbing his eyes when I asked him about my dad. I saw Paterson sitting with a crooked grin as he nosed through my files on his laptop. Heard myself asking him what he knew; heard his snotty drawl in reply. He was shaking his head an’ all. Then I saw Raz, his spongy cheeks full of Monster Munch, nodding as he heard my sob story, his bitter grin like he understood.

  Last I saw the man himself. My dad, grinning as he stood on the pier, gob trailing from his muzzy. My lungs flapped quicker. My dry laugh got harder and rounder and rolled into a scream.

  The Yank wasn’t getting much sense out of me. He left it a day or two before he came back.

  He sat on one of the placky chairs with the dog next to him. I was on my camp bed with my back to the metal wall.

  “So. You’re going back to Liverpool to find your dad. You’re gonna find out what he’s planning. And you’re going to set him and Raz both up for some of your Britsky boys to snatch in the act. Then they’ll be handed over to us.”

  I wheezed. “You daft bastard. How do you know I’ll not just nick off as soon as you cut me loose?”

  “You’re smarter than that, Azo. We snatched you off the street. We could do it again. Or maybe not you. Maybe Maya.”

  “You know where she is?”

  He nodded. “You do good, maybe I’ll tell you.”

  “You reckon I’d screw over my own dad for some bird?”

  “True, that’s a gamble,” he said. “So maybe not just Maya, then. Maybe Ali too.”

  33

  They flew me back. I think. Dropped me off with a bag on my head. I pulled it off and I was at the roundabout by the Spar in Litherland. Just like that. Evening. It had got chilly while I was away. Start of autumn.

  I was aching all over from that workout in the shipping container. I zipped my hoodie up and felt in the pockets. The Nokia was there. Someone had charged it.

  I stood in a doorway next to the chippie. Paterson answered after two rings.

  “Ah. The runaway slave.”

  All chirpy, taking the piss. He paused and I heard him sipping something. I pictured him in his sitting room with one of them massive bulbs of brandy. A record player with Mozart on and some leathery milf unzipping his cords.

  I heard him swallow. “What’s up?” he said.

  “Checking in,” I said.

  “You’ve not called in three weeks.”

  “I’ve not been near a phone all this time. I left the country.”

  He chuckled to himself.

  “I thought you might have skipped, Azo. So where are you? Ibiza?”

  “I’m back in Liverpool. And I’ve got some goodies on Raz. So take your cock out of your ear and listen.”

  “Pop,” he said. “It’s out.”

  “Feller called Beshat. Raz has been stocking up weapons for him. Now he’s coming over here.”

  “Mm.”

  “Yeah, mm. They said he’s my dad.”

  He was quiet for a sec.

  “Who told you this?” he said at last.

  I sank to my arse on the pavement. Thought I was going to start crying but nothing came out. I was all dried up inside. I just shuddered and sniffed.

  “Azo, where are you?” he said. “Stay there.”

  I dozed off against Paterson’s shoulder as we drove. When I came round it was dark. We’d pulled up in a car park somewhere.

  I told him all about the Yank. I wasn’t big enough to play both sides.

  “Do you know about my dad?” I said.

  He sighed and lit me a ciggie. He nodded.

  “How come them Yanks knew about him?” I said. “How come they got hold of me?”

  “I’m sorry, lad. That was out of my hands.”

  “I thought them and us were bezzie mates. I told the feller I was with you. He didn’t give a toss.”

  “We share everything with our US cousins,” Paterson said. “Everything but me.”

  “What makes you so boss?”

  “Do you think anything would stop us spying on the Yanks if we thought we could get away with it?”

  Took me a sec to get my head round that. I’d not been sleeping well.

  “You’re not spying on Yanks. You’re spying on Raz.”

  “I’m spying on lots of people.”

  “Well so am I now. You’re sharing me with the Yanks. Jealous?”

  He smiled and shook his head. “I rather like it,” he said. “It feels naughty.”

  “You ponce.”

  He chuckled and slapped my shoulder.

  “What about this Beshat then?” I said. “Is he my dad?”

  He smiled. “Don’t be scared, lad. Let him come. There’s work to do. Raz is out and about. I made sure he got cut loose so I could keep an eye on him.”

  “You heard from Maya?”

  He nodded. “Smart girl.”

  “Where is she?”

  “On her way home from Syria with Rodney and the lads.”

  “Here?”

  “I’ll let you know when she’s landed.”

  “Where am I going now?”

  “Back to the house.”

  “You blagging me?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Raz there?”

  “Not right now. He’s lying low. The house is empty. We went through it looking for Raz’s little fridge. No sign. You’re going to track it down.”

  He gave me some sleeping pills and a wad of cash and dropped me off back at the roundabout. I still had my key. The Yank had given me back all the stuff from my pockets.

  I walked round to the house and let myself in.

  Raz’s room was locked. I snooped around the rest of the place. No one. Nothing. I climbed up to my attic. Still the same sheets on the bed. Everything as when I’d left. I climbed out the skylight, scrambled down the roof and checked the gutter.

  Maya had left the biscuit tin there. Placky bag with a few pinches of skunk still in. A few Rizlies left and two old crinkly Regals. I skinned up and smoked it.

  Same old view over the roof tops. Dark trees and winking streetlights. Same old Liverpool sounds. Swooshing cars and sirens far off.

  It started to spit with rain. I sucked the last of the spliff and flicked the roach into the back garden. I put the Nokia in the biscuit tin and hid it in the gutter. I crawled back through the skylight and into bed and drifted off to the sound of the falling rain.

  34

  My dad came to me again in my head. He was wearing shorts and socks and a basketball vest, camo-coloured. A rifle over one shoulder. One of them belts of bullets on the other. Those chocolate ice-cream holes for eyes. He talked to me, and it was Frank’s voice that came out, his rough Scouse bark.
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  I tried to put my arms round him. It was like hugging barbed wire. His bullets scratched me. I stood off and looked down at my arms. There were bullets in them, showing through under the skin like splinters and moving around like maggots, burrowing up and down through my flesh.

  I looked up at my dad and asked him if he’d put one of them in Paterson. He reached out and stroked my cheek. Prodded my nose with his fingers, kneading it all out of shape. He opened his mouth again to speak, but I never heard him.

  My eyelids crackled open. It was light. My nose was twitching.

  There was a smell. Smoky. Toasty. Meaty.

  Something was cooking.

  I sat up with a jerk and looked around. Half thought I’d see a cup of tea on the bedside table, but not this time. I listened out for sounds from downstairs. Nothing. Just that smell. Must have been coming out of the vent at the back and in through the skylight. My attic was straight up from the kitchen.

  I pulled my trackie bottoms on and crept down the ladder. Stood on the landing and listened again. Heard the fuzzle of the telly from downstairs.

  I peered down through the banisters. The back-room door was shut but I could hear the telly clearer now. The rattle of a saucepan from the kitchen.

  I crept downstairs.

  I opened the living room door. All like it used to be. The telly was on but no one was watching it. The kitchen door was open. I went on through.

  Some feller.

  He was stood there at the stove with his back to me, stirring something in a pan.

  I felt like I knew him, even from the back. Thick-set with hunched shoulders. Grey anorak, grey hair. A white skull cap on his head.

  A carton of juice on the table. A gun next to it. Glock. One of the chairs was pulled out. A Klashni stood propped against it, the stock resting on the floor.

  My foot creaked in the doorway. He turned his head. Chubby face, he had. White beard.

  I knew him. Where from?

  “Morning mate,” he said. Scouser. “Beans?”

  He took two plates out of a cupboard and laid them on the table. A pair of slices popped out of the toaster. He laid them on the plates and tipped beans on top, scraping the clingy sauce out of the pan. He sat down and pointed me to a chair with his spoon.