Ben Cheetham - The Society of Dirty Hearts

“Don’t talk stupid.”

Mia’s eyes flashed scorn at Julian. “I’m not the fuckin’ stupid one here.” She jumped up and started to walk away, flinging over her shoulder, “If you don’t want me, I’ll just have to find someone else to fuck.”

“Wait, Mia, don’t go.” Julian tried to get up, but whether from the dope or lack of sleep or both, his body felt like lead, his arms straw. The darkness quickly swallowed Mia. He lay thinking about her. He thought about the blood on her palm. She must have had a knife in her pocket — perhaps for self-defence, perhaps for use on herself, perhaps both. He ran his tongue over his lips, tasting her. He massaged the heel of his hand hard into his stomach, trying to push the heaviness away. It was as immovable as a rock. With a low groan, head spinning, he closed his eyes, giving in to the tiredness dogging him. The instant he did so, the dream attacked him with savage force, as vivid as a waking hallucination.

When Julian awoke, the fire had burnt down to glowing embers and he was shivering cold. He sat with his shoulders scrunched forward, his nose running and his mouth full of sticky, bitter saliva. A kind of raw sickness gnawed at his insides. The river drew his eyes. Momentarily, he considered stripping off and washing in it, washing himself free of the guilt. But it wouldn’t work, he knew. It would take more than water to wash away the memory of the dream. He climbed the bank to the car and drove home through the quiet of dawn.

Christine was in the kitchen, drinking coffee. There were dark clouds under her eyes. Sometimes, even with all the pills, the pain prevented her from sleeping properly. “You smell like a fire,” she said, looking at Julian with curiosity and concern as he poured cereal into a bowl and got out the milk. “Where’ve you been all night?”

“With a friend.”

“Which friend?”

“Does it matter? Just a friend,” Julian muttered through a mouthful of cornflakes. He gave his mum a sullen glance. “Anyway, what’s it to you where I was? What I do’s my own business. Isn’t that what you said last night?”

Christine sighed. “Yes, I said something to that effect. And I meant it. But that doesn’t stop me from worrying about you, Julian. Especially when you drag yourself home looking like death warmed over. And especially when you’ve made such a traumatic discovery so recently.”

Julian stopped eating. “Dad’s told you then.”

Christine nodded. She reached out to gently take hold of her son’s wrist. “Don’t worry, we don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to. But if you do want to talk about it or anything else, anything at all, then I’m here. I’ll always be here for you, you know that.”

Julian felt tears tickling at the back of his throat. He swallowed forcefully, knowing that if he let them go everything else would come out with them. He managed a thin smile. “I know.” He withdrew his arm from Christine’s hold. “I’m going to get a shower.”

“Okay, darling.” As Julian turned away, Christine added, “Oh, I almost forgot. Eleanor phoned last night.”

“Eleanor, what did she-” Julian started to say. Then, remembering with a sudden sinking of his heart that he’d arranged to take her out the previous evening, he screwed his eyes up and exclaimed, “Shit!”

“What is it? What’ve you done?” Christine frowned. “You’ve not stood her up, have you?”

“I didn’t mean to, I just forgot.”

“Oh, Julian,” breathed Christine in a gently reproachful tone. “Eleanor’s such a lovely girl. She doesn’t deserve to be just forgotten. If you’re going to mess her about like that, perhaps you’d be better off leaving her alone.”

Julian stared at the floor, biting his lip. His mum was right, he knew. Eleanor would be better off without him and his problems in her life. He also knew he had to see her and, if not explain, at least apologise. Without a word to his mum, he rushed out the front door to his car. When he got to the Hill’s house, like he’d used to do when they were together, he went around back and threw gravel from the path at Eleanor’s bedroom window. Her face appeared at the glass, sleepy-eyed and frowning. She made no move to open it. Please, he mouthed, please, Eleanor. She hesitated a moment longer, then relented — like he’d known she would do. She peered down at him, waiting for his explanation.

“I’m sorry, Ellie,” he said.

“Is that it? Aren’t you even going to try to make an excuse?”

“I could feed you some line of bullshit, if that’s what you want?”

“No, that’s not what I want, Jules. I want to know why you blew me off.”

Julian made no reply.

“Fine,” said Eleanor. She started to close the window.

“Wait, Ellie. Truth is, there was something important I had to do.”

“You mean like getting wasted with Kyle.”

“I didn’t get wasted with Kyle.”

Eleanor made a sceptical humph. “Have you looked in the mirror this morning? Your eyes are totally bloodshot.”

“I didn’t say I didn’t get-” Julian broke off, realising he was saying more than he wanted to.

Eleanor’s frown intensified. “Oh, I see. You got wasted, just not with Kyle. So who was it then?”

Again, Julian said nothing.

Eleanor heaved a sigh. “Go home, Julian,” she said. Then she shut the window and the curtains. Julian threw more gravel at the glass. In the old days, she’d have reappeared, they’d have spoken some more and, finally, he’d have wheedled his way round her. But this time she didn’t reappear. He returned to his car. He didn’t go home, though. He drove to Kyle’s house — or rather, his parents’ house. Kyle’s mum let him in and he went into Kyle’s bedroom and opened the curtains. Kyle squinted over the top of his duvet. “What the fuck you doing here? It’s the middle of the night.”

“It’s seven-thirty.”

“Yeah, like I said, the middle of the fucking night.”

“Your mum told me to tell you to get your arse out of bed and ready for college.”

Kyle dropped his head back on his pillow and groaned, “Bollocks to that.” He pulled a spliff from under his pillow and lit it. “Shake and bake,” he said, passing it to Julian. “So come on, bro, lay it on me. Why are you here disturbing my beauty sleep?”

“I’ve seriously blown it with Eleanor this time.”

“Yeah, I kind of guessed that from your sorry-assed-face. What happened?”

“I stood her up for Mia Bradshaw.”

Kyle jerked his head up, eyes astonished, inquiring. “You what? Are you off your fucking head?”

“It’s not what you think. I wanted to talk to her about, well, about something that happened in the last few days.” Julian hesitated.

“Go on, spit it out.”

“I probably shouldn’t be telling you this, but I guess you’re going to find out soon enough anyway.”

Julian told Kyle about Joanne Butcher. “Hoooly shit,” exclaimed Kyle. “I fucking told you. I told you she was dead, didn’t I? How did it happen, do you think?”

“How would I know?”

An almost ghoulish light in his eyes, Kyle asked, “Had she been, like, mutilated or anything?”

“I didn’t get close enough to see.” Julian knew better than to mention the bite marks.

“Jesus, this is massive.” Kyle glanced around himself. “Where’s my moby? I’ve got to tell everyone about this!”

“You can’t do that. You’ll drop me in it big time.”

Kyle pursed his lips disappointedly. “Can’t I tell just a few people? I mean, what difference would it make? You know what this town’s like. Half the people in it probably know by now anyway.”

“That’s not the point. Look, I’m asking you to keep this to yourself until it comes out in the newspapers. Then you can blabber on about it as much as you want with whoever you want.”