Saturday's Child

First were that I came face to fuckin' face with Rob Stokes.

Second were that me mobile went off.

'Y'alright, you daft cunt?' I said to Stokes. He were standing there in his boxers and a T-shirt with 'Kiss Her Goodbye' written on it in all swirly writing. Aye, mate. Kiss Her The Fuck Goodbye, because Mo owns your arse now.

I answered me mobile. It were Innes. I grinned. 'Innes! The fuck are you?'

'Morning,' he said. The cunt sounded pleased with himself. 'Where are you?’

‘I'm in Heaton.'

'What's the address?' Like the fucker knew where we was. Rossie looked at us, his arms out.

'I hear you got your sister pregnant, Mo,' said Innes.

'What the fuck are we gonna do with him, MO?' said Rossie.

I waved me hand at Rossie, looked at me sister. I sucked me teeth and watched her eyes start to overflow again. 'You talked to Alison.'

'Is it true?'

'When'd you talk to Alison?'

'I'll take that as a yes, then. So what happens when your dad finds out you've been rolling your own?’

‘She's me half-sister.'

'Semantics, mate. She's sixteen, barely fuckin' legal.'

'What's the matter with you? You have a run-in with the law or something?'

And he started whinging on about how some daft fuck knocked him down or summat. I weren't really listening. It all sounded like: Blah blah fuckin' blah.

'Where are you? Tell me where you are.'

Rossie beckoned me over to the window. I followed, pulled back the nets and looked down at the road. There he fuckin' were. In that scabby Micra with me paint job all over it. I felt like waving at him. He were leaned back in his seat, staring out the windscreen and gabbing away in me ear.

I was gonna do the cunt, first chance I got. But there were another cunt what needed doing first. Innes laughed in me ear. Lad were going nuts.

'Fuck are you talking about?' I said.

And he went on about how he had it all figured out, like he knew it were Rossie following him an' all that. Oh aye, he were the big fuckin' private dick. Sorry cunt, more like. And I'd had enough of his fuckin' rambling, so I cut him off, turned round and Stokes were gone from the wardrobe.

I ran downstairs, caught the fucker in the hall messing with the door. Punched him in the back of the head and bent me finger-splint doing it. Pain roared through me hand as Rossie came down and pulled Stokes up the hall. His feet went all over the place and I kicked him in the bollocks on the way to the kitchen. Alison at the top of the stairs, crying again. I went up and grabbed her, pulled her down and into the kitchen. Rossie had grabbed a chair, sat Stokes up in it and leathered the cunt hard in the face. Stokes made a noise like a fuckin' pig and I pulled Alison right in so's she could get a better look.

'See that?' I said. 'That's your boyfriend right there.'

She closed her eyes and shook her head. Looked like it were gonna come flying off her fuckin' shoulders. I grabbed her face and pulled it about until she opened them eyes. 'You look, Alison. That's your fuckin' boyfriend. He did a runner. And you're gonna find out what happens to people who try to fuckin' run from me.'

'You said you wouldn't hurt him,' she said. 'You said you wouldn't do owt to him.'

'I lied.' Said to Rossie, 'Give us your butterfly'

'Mo — '

'Give us your fuckin' knife.'

Rossie handed it over. I flipped the blade out and held it up to Alison. 'You keep them eyes open, Sis, or I'll cut your fuckin' eyelids off.'

FIFTY-FOUR

Can't focus, but my hand finds the door and I force it open, stand on trembling legs and Mo's right in my face. He doesn't back off, just looks at me with dull eyes. As my vision comes back, I can see his nostrils flared, the colour in his sunken cheeks.

Then he butts me sharply just above the nose.

A white flash and someone pulls the ground from under me. I go down hard on my arse, my forehead crackling with pain, my mouth hanging open like the stupid bastard I am. I fumble for the side of the car, try to pull myself up, but my head spins too fast. Dizzy as fuck, I can't quite make it. Mo plants a boot in my stomach and I keel forward onto my hands and knees. Before I know it, my gut clenches hard and I spew on the road. Talk about deja vu.

'I owe you that one, Innes,' he says.

I try to blink through the tears, contain the throbbing in my gut long enough to make out what's going on. Across the street, a fat guy has Alison Tiernan by the wrist. She's in her nightie, barefoot and stumbling, screaming with the cracked voice of someone who's been dragged from her sleep. The fat guy hauls open the passenger door of a white Bedford and pushes her in. She kicks and swears, but once that door slams shut, she contents herself with spitting at the window.

'She had a bag packed,' says Mo.

I cough; it hurts. I spit the bad taste in my mouth at the tarmac.

'Stokes is inside,' he says.

It's difficult to focus, but Mo seems relaxed now he got the head butt out of his system. I pull myself to my feet and slump against the Micra, hold my head back to stem the blood from my nose. 'You found him,' I say.

'He were in there,' he says. 'They're dealing with him right now.'

My mouth doesn't work. It's like I'm drunk again, and it's not a good buzz. Rob can't have been that bloody daft to go over to Alison's and warn her Mo was coming. He's not that thick, surely. For all his faults, I never took the guy to be suicidal.

'He got away. I lost him. He's not in there. You're fuckin' lying.'

Mo draws closer, smiling. His hand snakes up to the back of my neck, grips hard and before I know it, I'm being frogmarched across the road. And this bloke, I've taken him before, I could do it again. But the thing with a head butt is that it messes with your motor functions, throws your balance and perspective out of the window. He lets go as we near the front door, standing to one side. I sway, trying to centre; I look at the ground and focus on his twitching feet.

'Well?' he says.

The house smells damp. The odour's enough to make my gut twitch. 'Well, what?'

The left side of Mo's face ticks into a half-smile. For a moment, I see Morris Tiernan there. 'Go on, Innes. You know you want to.' He places a hand on my shoulder. I want to shake it off, but my head's spinning and I need the support.

'I'll leave you to it,' I say.

'Don't be daft. The party's just started.'

'I think I lost my invitation.'

'You're on the guest list, mate.'

Mo pushes the front door, guides me into the hallway. Too gloomy to see anything, like a house long deserted. I want to turn back, but I don't have the energy. Somewhere out of sight, I can hear the sound of muffled sobs. As I get to the end of the hall, I make out a door, closed. The sobbing gets louder as Mo pushes it open. Then the sound cuts short.

And in the dim morning light, I see Rob Stokes. Tied to a wooden kitchen chair that was white before someone started beating him, his pants round his ankles, his face a battered mess. He's been sick down the front of his T-shirt which is ripped open at the navel. His head is down; it looks like he's staring at the reddish brown stain between his legs. A stiff breeze blows through the open window, billowing nets and wafting the stench of shit and vomit my way. I cover my nose with one hand.

'Reeks, don't he?' says the fat guy. He walks over to Stokes and pats him on the head. Stokes jerks to one side, a low painful sound escaping his lips. 'Not surprising, like. He had an accident.'

'More than one,' says another guy from the shadows. I can see the shine of black leather. He's holding a butterfly knife in his right hand, absently working the blade in and out of the twin handles.