Craig Robertson - Random

They drove no more than two minutes to the hill known locally as The Womb on account of the number of kids conceived there. There are few places in suburban Glasgow that are very far from bits of green that could be used by desperate teenagers.

Hutton was marched to the top of the hill at gunpoint, his hands tied behind him. Frankie Grant carried the kettle.

They kicked his legs from him until Hutton was on his knees before them. They cracked the side of his head with the gun barrel and forced his mouth open.

Frankie poured half the kettle of near-boiling water down his throat then covered him in the rest.

Hutton screamed.

He did the same again when Frankie smashed the empty kettle off the side of his face, leaving a red welt that stained him from his cheek to his forehead.

Charlie Grant tore the trousers off him and forced Hutton to bend over, spreading his legs wide.

Davie Stewart went behind him and shoved the barrel of the gun up Hutton’s arse. He forced it roughly into his hole and spiralled it as deep as he could inside him.

Hutton still played the big man. He told them to fuck off. Told them to do it. Told them to go ahead and pull the trigger. So Davie Stewart did.

There was a click and nothing else. The gun had never been loaded in the first place.

That was the point when Hutton began to cry. He sobbed a bit and laughed out of relief. Just before Davie Stewart raped him.

Charlie Grant did the same but Frankie settled for kicking Hutton hard in the balls. Each to their own.

They left Hutton on top of The Womb, bleeding, blistering and greeting his eyes out. He’d thought they were going to kill him and chances are he ended up wishing they had. The message was that were some things worse than death for a Glasgow hard man. There were worse things that Alec Kirkwood could do to you than that.

Everyone who lived and breathed in the inner city knew the value of image and dignity. Lose those and you’d be as well losing your balls. Hutton had tried to be smart with the wrong guy. Anyone else fancy trying that? Thought not.

They would be calling him a mad bastard again. That was fine. They’d be saying he was just a psycho in a good suit and he could live with that. This time it had all been about getting that message across, not about wee Spud’s killer.

As Hutton lay blubbering on the top of that hill, Davie Stewart eventually asked him who had killed Spud Tierney. Through his snot and tears, Hutton said he had no idea. Davie Stewart hadn’t expected to hear much else but kicked him in the head anyway. That was for being stupid. You should have said that in the first place, arsehole.

News of what was done to Hutton was quickly fed to all corners. No point in doing it otherwise.

Had to make you wonder what he might do to the person who had actually killed Tierney. It certainly made me think. Not scared, not of what he might do. Worried that it might get in the way of my plans. A complication I could have definitely done without.

Some people asked how it was known Hutton was leaving the house at the time he did. They wanted to know how Kirky’s men knew to have that kettle boiling.

Some said Hutton was a creature of habit. Others knew that wasn’t true. The smart money said Mrs Hutton made a phone call. Three unanswered rings then hung up. Come on down, the price is right.

Hutton didn’t go to the cops, of course, and didn’t go to a hospital. He went to the flat where the mother of one of his children lived. She took one look at him and closed the door in his face.

He went to Mick Docherty’s and didn’t get a much better reception. Mickey stuck a bundle of cash into Hutton’s pocket and sent him on his way. It was the last anyone heard or saw of him.

Not all my fault. Hutton put himself in that world. I just put him in that situation.

My view on other people’s happiness was not what it was. There was a time when I’d have wanted everyone to be as happy as me. As us.

The day we were married. The day Sarah was born. The first day she went to school. The day she won that poetry prize. I had so much happiness that it burst out of me and there was plenty to share.

Things changed.

Other people’s happiness became something I didn’t consider greatly. It became something I didn’t consider at all. My priorities were my own. She was my only concern. Other people didn’t exist. Other people were noises that fluttered at my ears or drifted past my eyes. They were in the world but not in mine. People were obstacles and stepping stones. They thought they were talking to me and that I was listening. They thought I cared. They thought. I didn’t think about them.

Oh we all live in our own self-centred little worlds but my isolation was more than that. Their selfishness was no match for my obsession. Other people live for themselves but want to be loved by others. I lived only for her and had no need for love.

I wouldn’t say it was callous. More indifference. Maybe that amounted to the same thing but I didn’t care to hurt. I just didn’t care. Other people’s feelings were as irrelevant as they were, somewhere on my horizon, shadows upon shadows. That is how I could do what I had done and what I was about to do.

I picked up the Herald. Glasgow Herald as was. I didn’t like it when things were changed without good reason.

Page 22 is the Gazette page. Why it is called that has never been particularly obvious to me but it didn’t matter. The Gazette page is where they have the obituaries and the BDMs. Births, Deaths and Marriages.

Except in the Herald it is Births, Marriages then Deaths. They probably consider it a more natural order of things but I was always uneasy with the change from the conventional. The Gazette page is where people celebrate themselves in print. It is where they let their friends and neighbours know of their achievements or failures in genetics. Weir

John and Fiona are delighted to announce the safe arrival of their beautiful twin girls,

Victoria Susan Eilidh (5lbs 11 ozs) and Emma

Ann Marcia (5lbs 9 ozs) at 34 weeks on

22nd February 2010. Sisters for Jack. Many thanks to Dr James Hines, Dr Ken French and all staff at the Royal Alexandra Hospital, Paisley, for all their care and attention.

That was not to be it.

I felt for John and Fiona though. They were pain waiting to happen. John and Fiona still thought life was fair. Beautiful twin girls. Victoria and Emma. Lovely. Victoria. Emma. Sisters to Jack. Good weight for premature twins too.

So many bad things could happen to Victoria and Emma. A world of bad possibilities. That was a fact. I almost despised John and Fiona for their ignorance. How could they be so unaware of fate, so naive, so stupid to think otherwise? McGowan

At the Southern General Hospital on 28th February

2010, to Neil and Polly McGowan (nee Rawstone) a son Angus Michael, a little brother for Claire.

Not the one.

Angus, a good name but anachronistic. Parents really had to be more considerate when naming their offspring. We had taken two months to settle on Sarah’s name. Sarah was a princess, wife of Abraham and mother of Isaac. If it was a boy it was to have been David, the beloved one.

Two columns of births. One and a half of marriages. Four and a half columns of deaths. Three of acknowledgements which was really just another three of deaths.

I looked carefully at the last seven and a half columns. Why so many more deaths than births and marriages? The population was dropping but not that quick.

If deaths were more worthy of noting in a national newspaper then that sounded more like guilt to me than honouring those that had gone. Anyway, deaths clearly didn’t suit my purpose. That would have been impractical on so many levels.