Nicola Barker - Behindlings

Arthur positioned his thin fingers over the phone’s mouthpiece and turned to Jo, ‘Excuse me…’

He tapped her on the shoulder.

‘Excuse me.’

She jumped out of her reverie and spun around to look at him. ‘Sorry,’ he smiled, ‘do you happen to know the name of this bar by any chance?’

‘Saks,’ Jo said.

‘Thanks.’

He returned to his conversation, ‘It’s called Saks. It’s very full. We’d be much better off… Well… I… Yes. Well that’s… that’s entirely up to you, but…’

Jo wiped her nose –

Silver Canyon

She found herself looking down at his bag and his hat. The hat. It had a special logo on it. A squidgy bear-like… no koala-like creature. Above it the word Gumble.

He was still talking. ‘No. I… If it’s a standard type I might have some idea, Wesley, but I’m hardly… I can’t…’

Jo froze.

1… 2… 3… 4…

Ten-second delay.

‘Josie. Josie. Hey!’

Jo turned around, still almost oblivious.

Huh?

Anna.

Anna.

Anna Wright, literally ten inches away, fish-eye lensed by her unexpected proximity.

‘Packed or what? ’ she bellowed.

Jo tried to stand up, shocked. No room.

‘Need another?’

Anna pointed at her beer.

Jo inspected her bottle, panicking –

Get away from here

‘No. Hello. That would be… Yes. That would be fantastic.’

‘Back in a minute.’ Anna moved off to the right, pulling a wallet from her pocket. The thin man had… he’d stashed his phone away already. And he was looking at her. He was pointing — What?

‘Oh right, ’ she gabbled, her nose tingling sharply, ‘of course. There you go…’

She passed him his drink back, dabbing her nose — self-consciously — on her sleeve.

‘Thanks.’ He grabbed his coat, ‘Your friend’s just arrived. I should probably…’

Stop… Stop… Stop shaking your head, Jo,

It’s a statement of fact

He stood up, balancing his drink, his coat and his rucksack unevenly in his arms, pushing the stool closer to her with his knee and staggering to a small gap next to the bar.

‘That’s very…’ she said –

Gentlemanly

He was facing away from her but he was still — she observed anxiously — just within spitting distance. She shoved her beer between her knees and smoothed a hand over her short hair. Anna was fighting her way back already. She hailed several people and kissed two cheeks (twice, in the air) on her brief walk over. Seemed to know everybody –

Dry as a bone.

Goddamn her

Jo had no chance — and no room, either — to manoeuvre before Anna’d handed her a second bottle, grabbed the stool and plonked herself down on it. She was drinking red wine. Burgundy.

‘Jesus you’re soaking. ’

Jo looked down at herself, ‘I know. I…’

‘I have had the worst fucking day,’ Anna interrupted, ‘you simply would not believe… ’

She scrabbled around in her pockets and pulled out her cigarettes and a lighter, ‘Smoke?’

‘No. No I…’

‘ Nurse. Of course you bloody don’t. Do you mind?’

‘Not at all. And thanks for…’

Jo raised the second bottle.

Anna lit up. She inhaled, she exhaled.

‘So,’ she smiled, slipping the packet and her lighter back into her pocket, ‘what’s the story?’

‘Pardon?’

Did she know about the hospital?

The trouble?

How could she?

‘With Wesley. What’s the story there? I almost shat my pants when I saw it was you walking along that road tonight. I couldn’t…’

Jo peeked surreptitiously towards the thin man by the bar. Anna was such a foghorn — such a squawker — he must be…

She shifted on her stool. Her coat fell from her lap –

Damn

‘You okay there, Josie?’

She retrieved the coat.

‘No I’m… That’s fine.’

She bundled it up again, trying not to spill her beers. She’d barely touched the first one. She sucked on it to gain time. Drank down about half, inhaled, hiccuped, apologised, then wiped off her mouth with her hand.

But Anna had focus. She had zeal.

‘So what’s the story with Wesley? Eddie said you actually knew those two old men out there this evening. The grumpy one’s called Doc. He’s the leader, apparently. His son Followed, but only very briefly. Drowned in Anglesey a couple of months back. Got caught up in that whole chocolate-wrapper-challenge thing. It was all over the papers.’

‘The Loiter.’

‘Pardon?

‘That’s… That’s what they…’

Anna’s eyes tightened fractionally, ‘So you are involved with them to some degree?’

‘Well, no… I mean…’ Jo nodded (Anna’s powers of deduction were plainly not all they might be), ‘only by sheer coincidence… I wasn’t… I just happened to bump into them earlier.’

Anna was nodding too now, encouraging her.

‘I didn’t really…’

‘And you also know, I presume,’ she interjected, ‘the kind of man you’re dealing with here?’ Jo’s eyes widened, uncertainly. She slowly shook her head. ‘He’s a pig.’

Jo swallowed, with difficulty.

‘Killed his only brother,’ Anna continued, stony-faced, ‘trapped him in an abandoned fridge and then left him there to die. Totally cold-blooded.’

Jo struggled to hide her dismay, ‘But he was only…’

‘Seven. That’s way too old for accidents. He was the kind of child who’d pull the wings off butterflies. Probably broke into churches and stole the collection with his mates. Played on the organ. Pissed in the vestry. That kind of thing.’

Jo wriggled on her seat. She peered over at Arthur, agonisedly — Nothing

Anna sipped on her drink, ‘His father was a seaman. Always away at sea. Mother didn’t clamp down on him nearly hard enough if you ask me…’

Jo inspected her beer bottle. She didn’t want an argument.

‘And obviously — from the Force’s point of view — if people didn’t feel the need to Follow,’ Anna rolled her eyes expressively, ‘then there wouldn’t be…’

She sucked on her cigarette, disapproval oozing from every orifice.

Jo stared back at her, bright with embarrassment.

‘When he arrived on Wednesday,’ she continued, ‘they contacted us straight away…’

‘Sorry?’ Jo butted in.

‘Pardon?’

‘ They contacted the force?’

‘Meaning?’

‘You said they contacted the force?’

‘Yeah,’ Anna nodded, missing the point (on purpose, was it?), ‘but he was clever. He stayed over on the far side — Northwick, Westwick, Salting. No roads. I mean we’re happy to go out on surveillance, but we draw the line at hanging around in the middle of a freezing field all day just to watch some arse-wipe catching a rabbit and taking a shit in a ditch…’

Jo winced, sympathetically.

‘He was spotted on the rubbish dump at one point. Somebody reported him. He was catching seabirds apparently. We thought we might be able to detain him on it for a while, but he got out of there too quick and always went for the unprotected species. He’s a cunning little twat. Survived out of jail for this long, let’s face it.’

‘Apart from…’

‘The first two convictions. Of course. But that’s what made him. The publicity. Eddie says he walks the perimeter every day,’ Anna continued, then she paused, speculatively, ‘although I guess you must know that already if you’ve been…’