When I was younger I used to tell everybody this story of Joe and me, the story of the game-changer. The way I told it, though, I made it out that it was my dad that took me aside and told me to batter Joe’s face in with a brick as he slept. That was how I wanted my father to be, to have that kind of will to power. But it wasn’t my dad. It was my grandad. It was old Jock.
The main thing, however, was that the face was Joe’s and the brick was in my hand. He wept all night, blood leaking into his pillow. I was scared, but exhilarated, almost tripping on my own sense of might. We both knew the score from then on in.
7. THE SISTER
The plane journey was a glorious, tortuous blur of knowledge. The audiobooks blasted into his ears through headphones, now supplemented by the Kindle. It was a magnificent liberation. He could enlarge the text, enhancing his focus on individual words without the proximate jumbled distraction crowding them out. He had learned how to modify the typefaces; some fonts were easier to read than others, and this experimentation yielded fruit. In tandem with the actors who read him the text, he had taught himself how to recognise words on a page. Gradually, the searing frustration of failure had been replaced by the buzz of learning. The sneers of teachers, the giggles of classmates, the mordant shame and the violent, incandescent rage, they belonged to another person, in another age.
Yet the name was still on his passport: Francis James Begbie. This, despite him using ‘Jim Francis’ professionally, and his wife mostly referring to him as Jim. It had been an easy development: by minor coincidence, Melanie’s surname was the same as his first name, and she was often referred to as ‘Frankie’ by college friends. Nonetheless, she was flattered when he told her that he wanted to be known as Jim, and when Grace arrived, they would all take the surname Francis. — I don’t want her growing up a Begbie, he’d said emphatically.
But whatever he was called, he hadn’t believed that he would ever come back to Scotland. It simply wasn’t on his agenda, and he vowed that his mother’s funeral would be his last visit. He wasn’t close to his brother and sister, nor his sons, whom he imagined would just do what they would do. What he hadn’t really thought about any of them doing was dying. And his visceral reaction hadn’t surprised him, but what did shock him was how deep it went.
As for friendships, those that existed between unreconstructed men of violence could thrive in camaraderie and even genuine affection for a while, as long as a pecking order was steadfastly adhered to. When it broke down, however, the results were devastating and few relationships could survive them, assuming both parties managed to. But in any case, his old friends lived lives that no longer had any appeal to him.
He’d spoken to June, quickly sensing through her anti-depressant-fuddled and muffled weeping that her principal agenda was to get him to pay the funeral costs, which he readily volunteered to do. She’d told him the bones of the case; that after an anonymous tip-off, Sean had been found bleeding in a flat in Gorgie, having suffered multiple stab wounds. The police reckoned he’d been assaulted there, but nobody else was present and the neighbours heard nothing to indicate a struggle. The flat was rented by a landlord to a well-known drug dealer who was currently serving a prison sentence. There was no evidence of a drug transaction, and as far as everyone knew, the dwelling had been empty a long time prior to Sean moving in.
As the flight dragged on it grew tiring, and the connection from London Heathrow was late. Now he emerges back into Edinburgh, cold and fatigued, wearing a light leather jacket, and wheeling out the mid-sized red case he’d stuffed mainly with T-shirts, socks and underpants. Winds from the North Sea blast him as he exits the airport terminal building. It had been a mistake not to bring more appropriate attire. He pulls out his iPhone, as a message from the phone company pops into his text box, outlining the extortionate rates he will pay while abroad. It is followed by a more welcome one from Melanie:
Love u!!! XXX
He texts back:
Arrived in one peace! Love u!!! XX
He looks in dismay, realising that he spelled piece wrong. Then, to his surprise, when he gets to the taxi rank, he finds he knows the cabbie, instantly recognisable by his distinctive corkscrew hair. And the driver knows him. — Awright, mate? It’s Franco, ay? Sick Boy’s auld mate!
— Terry. Franco, as he will always be known in Edinburgh, pulls a tight smile back. Juice Terry is one of the city’s characters, and it is comforting to see an old face. Last he’d heard Terry was still making stag vids with his old friend Sick Boy, and driving a cab in his spare time.
— Read aw aboot ye. Yir daein well, Terry grins, then his face creases. — Listen. . ah heard aboot yir laddie. Really sorry, mate. Young boy n aw.
— Thanks, but ah’d sortay lost touch wi him.
Terry quickly mulls over the response, trying to work out whether it’s genuine, or stoic bravado. — Ower fir the funeral, aye?
— Aye.
Driving Franco to the requested address in Murrayfield, and a street that is a mishmash of low-rise dwellings, Terry leaves him a card. — If ye ever want a cab, gies a shout, he winks. — Ah dinnae huv the ‘For Hire’ sign on that much, if ye git ma drift.
Franco takes the card and puts it in his inside pocket, exiting the cab, saying goodbye, and watches Terry speed off. Through a descending, eerie morning mist, he looks across at the imposing rugby stadium. Then, wheeling the red case behind him, he walks down the short driveway of the pebble-dashed house where his sister lives wth her husband and their two sons. He knocks on the door and Elspeth opens, hair piled high on her head and held there by an almost implausible range of pins and clips. She immediately embraces him, hugging him tightly, — Aw, Frank. . I’m sorry. . come in, ye must be exhausted. .
— I’m fine, he purrs, patting her back. They break their grip and Elspeth takes him indoors to the welcome heat, offering him a beer, which he rather curtly refuses. — Dinnae touch that stuff.
— Sorry, she says, making a bit of a fuss about the apology, then corrects herself. — Ye still teetotal?
— Nearly seven years.
Elspeth fixes herself a gin and tonic, though it’s still morning. — You look really well, she offers, sitting down beside him.
Frank Begbie can’t say the same about his younger sister. She seems heavier, bloated around the face. — Pilates, he smiles.
— You’re joking!
— Aye, Mel does aw that. I just go to a boxing club four times a week.
Elspeth laughs in a manner that sheds years from her. — Ah couldnae see you doing Pilates, but California, ye never know!
— I suppose stranger things have happened.
As if acknowledging the truth in this, Elspeth states, — So you’re an artist now, aye?
— So some people say.
Her eyes narrow as she raises the glass to her lips. Takes a sip. — Aw aye, I read a piece aboot ye in Scotland on Sunday. All those Hollywood stars, wanting to be pals with you. Elspeth raises an eyebrow. — You ever met George Clooney?
— Aye. Met him once.
— What was he like?
— I liked him, Franco concedes. — And because of that I don’t think it’s good manners to talk about people when they aren’t around.
There is a pomposity in his response that rankles Elspeth. — Since when did you start caring about good manners?