Stevan Alcock - Blood Relatives

She smiled tightly at me. Stripped of her make-up, her fox-like features seemed harder than I wor used to seeing, and her hair, minus grips, hung girlishly about her face. She had a magazine and a biro in her hand. One of her friggin’ competitions. Mandy’s tranny wor blaring out Abba’s ‘SOS’. Mother tidied her hair behind her ears.

‘You wor late home again this evening,’ she said. ‘Is this a regular thing now?’

‘Dunno, depends on how we’re running.’

‘I’ll keep you some dinner back.’

‘Ta, but no need.’

She pulled at a thread on her sleeve. ‘You’d best go see what he wants. You know what he’s like when he’s riled.’

A beam of light wor still shining from under Mandy’s door. Sis worn’t a morning person, she needed chivvying at every turn, all sullen, her school tie knotted between her breasts, her socks around t’ ankles, brushing her hair at the breakfast table, never wanting to eat owt, so that Mother had taken to slipping bags of crisps into her school bag in an effort to get summat down her. Waste of friggin’ time, if you wor to ask me.

‘Mandy,’ Mother called out. ‘Radio off, lights out, please.’

Hearing no response, she opened t’ door. Mandy wor asleep. I could see her, face-down on t’ bed, still dressed. Her skirt had rucked up around her waist, showing her knickers. One arm wor hanging floppily down t’ side of t’ bed and her hair wor hiding her face.

While Mother sorted out Mand, I headed downstairs. Mitch’s Adam’s apple wor piston-shunting as he glugged the pale-ale dregs down his throat. His small, droopy moustache glistened. He wiped the back of his hand across his mouth.

‘Didn’t you hear me calling?’

‘Along wi’ half of t’ street. I wor kippin’.’

‘You’re missing a bloody good match here.’

I shrugged. He closed in on me. I caught the whiff of ale on his breath.

‘I do believe, lad, you got paid today.’

‘Might have.’

‘Might have? Never mind yer might haves, let’s be having you.’

I took t’ buff wage packet from my jeans pocket and surgically peeled off a mangy tenner, holding it by t’ corner ’til Mitch’s fingers tugged it from me.

‘Ta,’ he said, the note vanishing behind his palm like he wor performing a card trick.

I said, ‘When I started this job you said that half wor going toward my upkeep and that.’

‘It is, my lad, it is. But then, who got you this job?’

‘I know, I know, you did. Only, you said that …’

‘Me! Right! And just one word wi’ Craner and I can take it from you again. You pay me and then I’m cheaper for your mother, then she’s got more for your upkeep. That’s common sense, that’s logic, that’s good housekeeping, geddit?’

‘If you say so, it must be so.’

Behind him, the TV screen wor barrelling again. There wor a long ‘Oooooh’ from t’ crowd. A near miss, which made him turn toward t’screen.

‘Fer Chrissakes!’

He leant over t’ back of t’ set, swearing under his breath, fiddling wi’ t’ horizontal adjustment.

I said to Mitch’s back, ‘They found a dead woman this morning. She’d been done in. A prozzie. It wor in t’ news. Makes you wonder, don’t it?’

Mitch straightened up and backed gingerly away from t’ telly. ‘Does it?’

‘I mean, if I’ve ever sold her a bottle of pop or summat. If t’ next time I walk up to some door in Chapeltown or Halton Moor or wherever someone’ll say, “She won’t be wanting no limeade where she’s gone.” Then I’ll know, won’t I?’

Mitch grunted. ‘Now, you stay, I tell you. Stay!’ Like he wor commanding a dog. A black line slid mockingly down t’ TV screen.

Next morn I wor up wi’ t’ lark. Mitch wor up before t’ friggin’ lark. I watched him through t’ ciggie burn in my bedroom curtain, loading boxes into t’ back of his rusting Austin Cambridge van.

I wor threading boot laces in t’ kitchen when Mother sauntered in and plonked the kettle onto t’ gas ring.

‘Wor that Mitch?’

‘Uh-huh. Just missed him. Just gone off.’

‘Gone off? Off where? He’s supposed to be running me over to your gran’s. Didn’t he say when he’d be back?’

‘Haven’t spoken to him.’

I’d sussed where he wor heading, but it worn’t my place to blather. Eric said that women worn’t meant to know everything, which wor why they wor always trying to. Eric wor a philosopher on all things women. Mother picked at her old nail varnish as she waited for t’ water to boil.

‘Will you be late again tonight?’

She wor fishing again. I leaned over my boots so I wouldn’t have to look her in t’ eye.

‘No, so long as we don’t break down.’

I wanted to keep my options open. Maybe I’d go see t’ Matterhorn Man.

‘Those vans do seem to break down a lot,’ she said. ‘Someone should get them seen to.’

The Corona Soft Drinks depot wor t’ last in a row of gun-metal-grey industrial units up in t’ city’s northern suburbs. As soon as I stepped into t’ depot it lifted my morning bones; the metallic acridity of nails, rivets, corrugated panels, the headiness of t’ exhaust fumes, the saccharine odour of t’ pops – lemonade, limeade, cream soda – and squashes – orange barley, lemon barley, blackcurrant.

Going on twenty vans wor being readied. From Craner’s office came t’ chink of change being checked.

‘Morn, Mr Craner!’

The gaffer didn’t take kindly to me being so chirrupy first thing, which wor why I greeted him thus. Irritate the morose bugger.

Behind me came t’ jangle of nudging bottles on t’ end of a forklift. Coke, Tango orange, Tango lime – empties all being stacked; or full crates – orangeade, dandelion and burdock. Someone else wor dragging a crate along t’ floor – Tango lemon, Tango lime, malt vinegar.

I punched the clock, took our float and sought out our van. The load had still to be sorted and signed off, the engine checked for petrol, water and oil. That wor every van boy’s job.

I lifted up the bonnet and withdrew t’ rapier-dipstick, wiped it, slid it back into its sheath, withdrew it slowly, assessed the oil-line level, wiped it on a rag and then reinserted it. While I wor busying wi’ this I could see Craner in his office, balancing on his swivel office chair, chalking up crew names on t’ wall blackboard behind his desk. Cos he could barely reach the board wi’ his short arms outstretched the names sloped off at one end. I could make out my own initials alongside a capital ‘E’ for Eric.

I wor screwing on t’ radiator cap when from behind me came t’ unmistakable sound of glass splintering on concrete. One of t’ new lads, balancing too many bottles up each arm. He’d learn. If he lasted. The lad’s face puckered up like a butchered pig as dandelion and burdock meandered toward a sludge patch of oil. The crash brought Craner out of his office.

‘You! Yes, you, fatso! Chuck some bloody sawdust over that spill,’ Craner barked, his voice eaten up by its own echo. I grinned at Fatso, who wor just gawping at Craner like a friggin’ idiot. It wor t’ same here as in school: being podgy – especially being nearly friggin’ immobile – you worn’t part of t’ main gang. Craner pushed his glasses further up his nose and seeing me smirking, shouted in his favoured mocking tone, ‘Still here, Mr Thorpe?’

I unhinged the bonnet support strut and let the bonnet crash down. Craner flinched.

‘Good as gone, Mr Craner, good as, just waiting for Eric.’ I nodded toward t’ toilets. ‘He’s just taking a dump.’

I climbed into t’ cab to wait on Eric. In truth, I wor wary of Craner. Craner and Mitch went way back. I gobbed out onto some sawdust by t’ van wheel. It brassed me off, being in Mitch’s grip, but I also knew that Craner owed Mitch for summat. A little back-scratching, a little palm-greasing, and here I wor, my first proper job. Most times Craner wor holed up in his depot fiefdom, so it worn’t as if he could come check up on me. Although wi’ Craner you never knew, Craner seemed to have his spies everywhere.