Nicola Barker - Darkmans

He sat in his seat, frowning, thinking, puffing on his cigarette. Every so often he inspected his hands–

Surgeon’s hands?

Eh?!

Fuck off!

When the cigarette was almost done he stubbed it out and grabbed his phone. He switched it on–

174 messages

He quickly turned it off again. He cast the phone aside. He leaned over and picked up Beede’s brown envelope. He opened it. He pulled out the batch of photocopied papers. He stared at them, frowning. He turned to a random page and squinted at the badly reproduced script. His frown deepened. He turned to another page, then another, then another.

Kane closed his eyes, leaned forward and rested his forehead on the steering wheel, then he pulled himself together, tossed the papers on to the passenger seat, started up the engine and performed a careful three-point turn. He drove out of Peta’s smallholding, back on to Barnfield, on to Ox Lane, on to Silver Hill and the Ashford Road. As he drove, a police car, an ambulance and two fire engines overtook him. Then the traffic slowed down. Then it stopped.

Kelly was sitting at a bus-stop on a virtually grid-locked Malcolm Sargent Road, gazing poignantly at her phone.

‘Enjoyin’ the view, Kell?’ a cheery voice enquired from a short distance behind her.

She didn’t even look over.

‘Fuck off,’ she snapped, ‘for the thousandth bloomin’ time, just Fuck. Right. Off .’

‘Well that ain’t a very Christian way to react,’ Garry exclaimed, shocked.

‘Huh? ’

Kelly’s head spun around.

The jovial builder was removing a Missing Dog poster from a nearby lamp-post.

Kelly almost fell from her seat. ‘We was just comin’ ta find ya, Gaz,’ she tried to struggle up (but couldn’t quite manage it), ‘then the damn scooter ran out of juice an’ we got stuck here. Gaffar’s meant ta be pushin’ it to the nearest garage, but I reckon he must’ve done a bunk or somethin’. He’s been gone over an hour…’

‘Everythin’s totally grid-locked,’ Garry explained. ‘I was meant to be headin’ over to Cedar Wood but I couldn’t get through, so I nipped round here instead…’ he shrugged, ‘an’ now look at it — bumper to bloody bumper.’

‘You’ve changed your coat,’ Kelly observed, surprised.

‘Uh…yeah.’

Garry’s cheeks flushed.

‘That sports jacket looks good on ya,’ Kelly mused, ‘I always said you scrubbed up all right…’

‘I just got my dog back, as it happens,’ Garry interrupted, keen to change the subject.

‘Did ya?’

‘Nan’s over the moon,’ he grinned.

‘Aw ,’ Kelly cooed, ‘I always loved your old nanna…’

She paused. ‘I always wished she was my nanna…’ she paused again. ‘Although you can keep the dog, mate. That dog is fuckin’ rank …’

Garry looked hurt.

Kelly quickly turned away. ‘These two arseholes in a car was really givin’ me some gyp earlier,’ she muttered (as if hoping to justify her inexcusable brashness). ‘I tried to turn the other cheek an’ all that, but I ain’t too good at it yet…’ she grimaced. ‘In truth, Gaz, I don’t know if I’m really cut out for all this Christian palaver.’

‘Well I suppose Christians’ve always had a history of persecution, Kell,’ Garry volunteered helpfully.

‘Ya reckon?’

‘Sure. Didn’t you ever see Gladiator ?’

‘Yeah. ’ Kelly nodded, ‘I had the hots for Joaquin Phoenix.’

‘Well Russell Crowe was actually the Christian in that.’

‘Russell Crowe was?’

‘Absolutely.’

Kelly gave this some consideration. ‘So what about you, Gaz?’

‘What about me?’

‘Are you a Christian?’

‘Uh…’ Gaz shrugged, ‘I ain’t much of a church-goer, Kell, but I like to think I’m a Christian man — by nature — if that amounts to anythin’…’ he paused. ‘You know, Love thy neighbour…Do unto others etcetera …’

They stared at each other.

‘If you don’t mind my sayin’,’ Garry confided, ‘you’re lookin’ a little the worse for wear.’

‘Paul died,’ Kelly murmured poignantly, ‘I’ve just been sittin’ here, all on my tod, tryin’a get it straight in my head, like.’

Garry came to sit down next to her. ‘I was real sorry when I found out, Kell,’ he murmured, lacing his hands together and staring off, morosely, into the traffic. ‘I had a lot of time for that boy. I mean Jase an’ Linda could happily go hang ,’ he shrugged, ‘but you an’ Paul, well, that was an entirely different matter…’

‘I weren’t there for him, Gaz,’ Kelly lowered her head, ashamed, ‘none of us were.’

‘ Oi! ’ Garry gently repremanded her. ‘You did what you could, Kell. You had your own shit to deal with, remember?’

Kelly didn’t respond.

He reached out and placed a comforting arm around her shoulders. ‘Paul always took everythin’ so much to heart,’ he murmured. ‘He was such a sensitive little bugger. Not the sharpest knife in the drawer — not by any means — but he weren’t stupid, neither. He just felt things more deeply than your average bloke, an’ the only way he thought he could cope was to blank it all out…’

Kelly nodded. A single tear dropped on to her lap.

They were quiet for a while.

‘So who told ya?’ Kelly finally asked. ‘About Paul, I mean?’

‘One of the nurses rang.’

Kelly frowned. She pulled away slightly. Garry dropped his arm, circumspectly.

‘ Which nurses?’

‘From the hospital in Readin’,’ he elucidated. ‘They were a terrific bunch. Nothin’ was too much trouble for that lot…’

‘So you went up to visit?’ Kelly demanded.

‘Sure. Every few weeks,’ he shrugged. ‘I’ve got an old school pal in Chertsey so it weren’t no big deal.’

Kelly stared up at him, intently. ‘You’re solid gold, you are, Gaz,’ she announced.

Garry looked away, embarrassed. Kelly sniffed and then dabbed at her nose with the back of her hand.

‘Maybe you should come an’ sit in the Dodge for a while,’ Garry suggested. ‘The heatin’ ain’t up to much but it’s cold as a witch’s tit out here.’

‘Nah. I’m fine,’ Kelly insisted, ‘I don’t wanna hold you up.’

‘You ain’t holdin’ me up,’ Garry grinned, exasperated. ‘In case you haven’t noticed, I’m stuck in a 10-mile fuckin’ traffic jam, you silly mare.’

Kelly shot him a sharp look, then immediately relented, and held out her hand. ‘Just like old times, eh?’ she muttered as he pulled her up.

They staggered over to the Dodge together. It took several minutes to manoeuvre her inside.

Once she was settled, Garry turned on the engine and switched the heating up.

Kelly cleared her throat. ‘There’s somethin’ I gotta tell ya,’ she confided, ‘now I’ve turned over a new leaf an’ all that…’

‘Oh yeah?’

Garry was trying to hunt down a spare blanket in the back.

‘Remember that bloody nose I got?’

‘Yup.’

‘Well it weren’t actually blood , as it happens. It was half a tin of tomato soup.’

Garry stopped his search, shocked. ‘Are you serious?’

‘Straight up. I was just a stupid, little skank, Gaz. I only did it to try’n grab your attention. ‘

‘But why, Kell?’ Garry asked, saddened. ‘You already had my attention, so far as I can recall.’

‘I guess I just wanted more of it,’ Kelly shrugged.

Garry slowly sat back down again. ‘Well I truly regret givin’ that kid a sound thrashin’ now,’ he murmured.