Martina Cole - Close

Trevor had never once questioned another player's tactics or agenda since he had been in the big league. He had never caused a scene of any kind or been the catalyst for anything even resembling trouble. But he was going to cause trouble after this little lot. He was going to cause fucking murders when and if he finally walked away from here. So he smiled and yawned, and he decided that he was going to have to lose gracefully and give them his marker. He had been around long enough to know when he was being shafted and he had been shafted royally by this shower of shite.

He was unable to leave the game, he knew, because these so-called players, who, incidentally, looked like a parody of Dean Martin and the rat pack, had more or less told him that if he went home now they would not be too thrilled. There was no actual spoken threat but then there wouldn't be, would there?

He would lose to them if that was what they wanted; the money was nothing to him, he only ever wanted the game. The game was all that mattered to him and for a few seconds he toyed with the idea of wiping them out completely. Playing them for all they were fucking worth. Fronting it out and wanking them off, but he knew he was playing for his life. Mister fucking Agreeable was going to take his poke one way or another. Only his calm exterior and a big loss would guarantee that he would walk out of this place in one piece.

'What do you want, Trevor? Anything you need you just tell me, OK?' The young man who was serving the drinks was a handsome and, suddenly seriously nervous, little fucker.

Trevor guessed, rightly, that he had only just sussed out the situation and was not happy about being witness to anything that might drag him into the world of violent retribution. He was eighteen, top whack, and he was so naive he probably thought Debbie Harry was a natural blonde. Collar and cuffs.

Trevor grinned and shook his head as if he was happy as a sandboy. The three gooners and the ponce all ordered large drinks and that in itself told Trevor that he was dealing with fucking amateurs. He wanted to scream out at the top of his voice, 'Have me over if you must, but don't fucking rub it in and make it so obvious. Have a bit of respect.'

Trevor was more gutted at the way they seemed to think he was such a cunt that they could just mug him off. He would have had more respect for them if they had just robbed him; an honest robbing would have been preferable to this barrage of insults and foolishness. They were making him feel like a prat. Any real card player worth their salt went off the drink once the real money was on the table for the simple reason you never knew what might be in it. Certain people got lairy when they were being wiped out. The Faces were the worst of them all; they honestly believed that you were scrumping their fucking wallets somehow.

Trevor had made a point of never playing Faces unless they had the proper in. He insisted on a guarantee that they were real players. Which meant, of course, that they were happy to lose their money. Most criminals, especially bank robbers, were not natural losers. It was the nature of that particular beast that they tended to take money, not give it away to some bloke with a smile and a better hand than they had. Some had even been known to come back later in the evening with a shotgun and a chip on their shoulder bigger than Mount fucking Rushmore demanding their money back, convinced they had been short-changed. You couldn't do a lot about that, you certainly didn't remind them that they had been in a proper game with serious gamblers, not playing poker in prison for fucking peanuts, nine times out of ten with people who had no intention of losing to them. Somehow, that conversation never seemed to come up.

No one accepted a drink. A real pro got up during a break and then watched the fucker being poured out. In his world the barman would have the fucking sense to open a new bottle in front of his face; it was accepted, expected and it stopped fights. He was being rolled by a herd of fucking imbeciles. Big imbeciles admittedly, but fucking drongos all the same. The real insult was that these fucking Keystone Cops thought he was buying into this fucking lunacy. Really believed that he had not cottoned on.

In all his years, Trevor had never, ever, been treated like this. Oh, he had seen the chancers and he had observed gooners in his time. When he had first come on the scene he had been offered fortunes to be one. He had refused; he wanted to win fair and square. Gooners were players who were ornaments until the final sting. There was never a gooner of course, in the singular, because a good card man would wipe them out in no time. Gooners worked together so that, like now, when he had knocked out the real players and the pot was a small fucking fortune, they would sit at the table and work together against him. He was expected to believe that they were better players than him, that his luck had gone on the trot faster than an ex-wife with a pools win and an ex-paratrooper for company. He was so insulted that he was determined to make these cunts work for the jackpot. Then he would congratulate them and leave with dignity and a fucking raging hard-on for all their arses. The bar boy winked at him and he wondered if, on top of everything else, they all thought he was a poofter.

'Not long till me party.' Pat Junior's voice was proud and filled with longing for the day to finally arrive.

Billy Boot, Pat's long-time friend and Lance's arch-enemy, was almost as excited as he was at the thought of the party. This was the party to end all parties as far as he was concerned and he was thrilled that Pat was going to be the lucky recipient of such a wondrous event. Everyone within earshot was straining to hear the conversation and all those invited had been bragging about it for ages, with the girls discussing their outfits at every opportunity. Lance kicked a football that had rolled near him back to the boys who were playing with it. He was good at sports and he kicked it with all his considerable strength, knowing that it would slam into one of the younger kids who were waiting patiently for its return.

He was spot on and the ball hit a seven-year-old lad on the side of his head. He was a hardy perennial though, who rubbed his ear furiously, forced away the tears that were filling his eyes and carried on with the game, even though his face was crumpling by the second with pain and cold.

'I bet that hurt him.' Lance was laughing at the boy's predicament.

'Course it hurt him. You meant it to. It's freezing today so that must have really stung.' Lance shrugged as if he had no idea what Billy was talking about before saying loudly, 'You're right, it is cold, ain't it? Hope my old coat is warm enough for you, Bootsie.'

The boys were in the school playground in their usual place by the school gates. The weather was icy cold, and their coats were buttoned up tightly against it. Patrick knew that they were better dressed than any of the others and he accepted that, appreciated it. He also understood why his mother passed their old clothes on to other kids in the school. It was her way of helping people out and it was accepted in their world.

Unlike Lance, he had never felt the urge to point that fact out. Now he could feel the heat of Billy's humiliation as if it was happening to himself.

Lance was sneering at Billy, taunting him as he always did and Billy Boot was not going to put up with much more of it. Lance had never understood when enough was enough; he always had to push everything and everyone to the extreme. He spent his whole life causing upset and hurting people without a thought for their feelings or their circumstances. They had both been to Billy's house and Pat knew that Lance had seen how hard up they were. Billy had six younger brothers and three older sisters and a father who was always in the pub. He battered Billy and his brothers regularly and, without a second's thought, Billy's sisters were also beaten, but generally only on a Friday or Saturday night when he came home from the pub looking for his wife. Even though he knew he wouldn't find his wife, and knowing exactly what she was up to, he would smack his daughters around instead.