Tony Black - Gutted

I didn’t know how to feel. They were something I never looked at. But, brute that he was, I felt we’d all played a part in earning those trophies — my brother and me, sister too — with beatings and scoldings. My mother earned her share in a million and one more painful ways. I saw her face in my mind: it was a road map of lines and hurt. How could I object to anything she asked of me? I’d been little or no use to the woman, ever. And the way things looked I saw no change on that front. Certainly no good change. Maybe worse was an option, though.

I said, ‘Mam, whatever you want to do is fine by me… whatever makes you happy.’

Her voice trembled. ‘Oh, Gus, if only.’

‘Come on, Mam.’

She started to cry. ‘You must think I’m just a silly old fool.’

‘Mam, you’re nothing of the kind.’

I heard her reaching for tissues to dab her eyes. ‘Well, don’t you mind me, Gus.’

‘Mam, there’s no way I’m gonna stop minding you.’

‘No, seriously. Here’s me bawling away and you have your own problems to deal with… You’re a grown man with a life to lead and I have no right putting my cares on you. I’m sorry, son. Can you ever forgive me?’

I said, ‘Mam, if there’s anything I can-’

She cut me off: ‘I am absolutely fine, it’s just… well, just seeing you in the paper set me back and thinking about the trophies, it made me…’

She struggled for the words.

‘Mam, no need to explain. I know fine. Whatever you do, just take care.’

She said goodbye and hung up.

I put down the phone. There was a book nearby: Knut Hamsun’s Hunger. I fingered the pages. I always carry a book; something my father never understood. His learning came from an altogether different world. Our worlds were always destined to collide. What was God thinking giving a hard man like him a bookish little nyaff like me for a son? I knew that was the question he’d asked himself all his life. On his deathbed he was still asking it, but just sounding it differently. I knew I wasn’t ready to forgive my father for those years. Would I ever be?

I moved to the kitchen table, sat down and lit a Marlboro.

Rasher had sent on the cuttings from the Crawford child killing story. I’d been having difficulty reading them. Normally I have a strong stomach for this kind of thing but for some reason, lately I’d been going soft. Call it age; it certainly wasn’t maturity.

Little Christine Crawford had only been a tot, three years old. There were so many pictures of her splashed over the pages it was impossible not to become attached. I was press, I knew we always chose the cutest shots. The girl they called Chrissy was a sweetheart: blonde hair, blue eyes, the apple of every parent’s eye.

As I tried to read about Chrissy’s death my throat froze.

She had been in the Meadows — one of Edinburgh’s most popular parks — with her mother. Walking, just walking and playing on a bright spring day, when she’d run off behind a tree. Minutes, just seconds perhaps, out of her protector’s sight.

Passers-by described a scream, high-pitched, the kind only a very young child makes. No one saw the moment of death. Thank God. The first on the scene, a male passer-by and the child’s mother, were greeted with a sight of immense bloodletting.

Chrissy hadn’t stood a chance.

The dog’s owner, Thomas Fulton of Sighthill, was traced.

He’d claimed not to know that the dog, an illegal pit bull terrier, had escaped its enclosure.

I shut the folder. Kept a cutting out, one with an address in Sighthill.

My coat was hanging by the door. I knew what Mac and Hod would say about what I planned to do next, but it was something I just had to pursue.

On Gorgie road the bus driver was forced to hit the anchors. A shower of crusties with placards had taken over the road, marching five to ten deep.

Hands went up in the cab, palms slapped on the wheel. ‘Get off the road, y’bloody hippies!’

I had a laugh to myself. Driver was flat-topped, giving off more than a hint of redneck vibe. I said, ‘What is it… ban the bomb?’

He turned, squinted at me. ‘They’re hippies.’

Like that was supposed to explain it all. Never ceased to amaze me, this attitude. Bit of an out-there hairstyle, to some it’s worse than carrying a flaming trident. How did Shipman get away with whacking all those old ladies for so long? Short back and sides. Deffo.

As the bus driver found the high gears again, I caught a glimpse of some posters being tied to the gates, pictures of animal vivisection. Monkeys with huge metal rods stuck in their heads, great sores weeping, blood, guts. Just horrific. My stomach tightened; in the last few days I’d had more than my fair share of blood and guts. I looked away. Thought: Who can look at that?

The second I got off the bus in Sighthill, I was looking for syringes on the ground. In the All Stars trainers there was no way I was risking a puncture. Made a note to get the Docs cleaned up sharpish.

I followed a trail of Tesco trolleys, bashed, rusted and wrecked. Suppose a few trolleys go missing up here — who’s gonna come after them without Delta Force back-up?

The scene was a Mad Max movie: burnt-out cars, boarded-up windows, more trash than the tip, blowing all ways.

In the city, down the East End, Leith, you see poverty, but nothing like this. This was Third World. Sure, we’d spared them the need to build their own shanty town, but only because we’d done it for them. Welcome to high-rise hell.

I grew unnerved by the lack of bodies; a place like this, it’s a sign. But then I saw an old woman, struggling along with an Aldi carrier bag. She was ancient, at least eighty. Looked to be all hard years too. Wondered what she’d done to deserve being dumped out here. Christ, we look after our oldies, eh? As she approached I smiled — put the frighteners on her and she grabbed up her bag, held it to her chest.

‘Good morning,’ I said.

She stood still, eyes wide, trembling. I didn’t know what to say. Chose the easy option: nothing. Left her be. At the end of the road she was still clutching the bag to her chest, staring.

As I turned around, an anorexic Vicky Pollard put her nose in my face. I looked her up and down, thought: When the widest part of your leg is your knee, you’re in trouble.

‘What you fucking after?’ she spat.

‘Come again?’

‘You’re no’ from around here… You looking for business?’ She blew a pink bubble at me, looked like the old Bazooka Joe.

‘No, er, no thanks.’

‘How? You no’ fancy me?’

I tried to walk around her. She jumped in front of me and lifted her tight black sports vest, flashed her tits. ‘How’s that then?’ Her ribs stuck out further than those gnat stings.

I pushed her aside. ‘Put that away, I’m not interested.’

‘A blow then, or a chug for a tenner?’

I didn’t answer. Felt a hail of abuse showered at my back as I walked off. Was beginning to wonder if it had been a good idea coming out here without an AK-47.

I had Moosey’s address from the cutting; it wasn’t too hard to find. There were so many houses boarded up in the street that I could pick out the inhabited ones from a mile off — they had glass in half of their windows. There was a gate to the yard but it was lying in the middle of the lawn, poking through grass about half a foot high, flattened in part by a burst mattress that had recently been flopped down in the middle. I stepped over a car tyre with, what was that, teeth marks? It looked like it had been half chewed by Godzilla. As I banged on the door I heard the likeliest cause, barking and scratching on the other side.

‘Shut it!’ was yelled. A female voice, gruff.