Chris Cleave - Incendiary

Terence Butcher turned back from the window.

—I hired you to make the tea, he said. That’s all.

—Yes sir I’ll just make the tea from now on. I’ll keep my big trap shut.

—No, he said. Don’t. I don’t have anyone else I can talk to.

—What about your wife sir?

—What about her? he said.

—Can’t you talk to her?

—Wives are different, he said.

—Different how?

—Different like this. The difference is I can talk to you about her but I can’t talk to her about you.

—Why would you? There’s nothing to say about me.

—Yes there is, he said.

—What’s that supposed to mean?

—What do you think it’s supposed to mean? he said.

—I think it means you think too much.

Terence Butcher sat down on the edge of his desk and lit a Marlboro Red. He blew the smoke out and it drifted up towards the air-conditioning holes in the ceiling. His eyes looked up at the disappearing smoke.

—Listen Terence sir I know what you need I used to have a husband myself you know. You need to take your mind off things. Let’s go down the boozer tonight. Me and you. Let’s drink ourselves silly. We won’t go to a coppers’ pub we’ll go somewhere nobody knows who we are so we can make tits of ourselves.

Terence Butcher frowned.

—No, he said. You’ve seen how I get when I’m drunk.

—Yeah and so what? Nothing happened did it.

Terence smiled and shook his head.

—Tessa still wouldn’t like it.

—Yeah sir well is Tessa going to know?

He looked across at the photo of his wife and kids. He stared for the longest time and when he looked back at me he looked old and tired and sick of himself.

We left from Scotland Yard at 8 that evening. We went in the back of a riot van with wire mesh over the windows and a rubber skirt so you couldn’t throw petrol bombs under it. It had a white-noise siren and a tear gas cannon. It was the perfect way to get through London traffic Osama I don’t suppose you’ve had the pleasure. Me and Terence Butcher rattled around in the back like spare parts. We were headed for the Approach Tavern just off Victoria Park. One of the lads from the motor pool was driving and he got us there in 20 minutes flat. It must of been some kind of a record. The outrider was a great help. He rode in front of us in tight leather trousers and his big BMW motorbike was all painted up in yellow and purple squares. He looked like Darth Vader riding a Battenberg cake.

The van stopped before we got to the Approach and we walked the last 100 yards on account of Terence Butcher said if you turn up at the pub in a riot van people do start to ask daft questions about why they bother paying their taxes. I chose the Approach because it was near enough my neck of the woods to get home easily afterwards but far enough away not to be the sort of pub where coppers stumble out covered in blood. Anyway blokes like the Approach on account of they do a perfect pint of Guinness. My husband used to like the place. My husband always thought a pub ought to be busy and loud. You probably think a pub ought to be firebombed and turned into a mosque Osama well that’s the difference between my husband and you. I bet he could of drunk you under the table.

Terence Butcher was wearing civvies but he wasn’t fooling anyone. He had these blue jeans on with a lime-green polo shirt tucked into them and light-brown Timberlands. He wore his mobile clipped to his belt in a little leather pouch the way only coppers do or your dad. I was wearing my brown skirt and white blouse and Clarks shoes. When we got inside the place was pretty quiet. There was half a crowd in there but it was nothing like what a Friday night would of been before the curfew. The barman winked at us and said Good evening officers.

Go on laugh if you want Osama but I’ve seen photos of you and it’s not as if you’re god’s gift to fashion. Baggy white trousers cammo jacket digital watch and a fussy beard. You’re a right state aren’t you? You’re ever so Hoxton.

We chose a table in the corner and I sat down while Terence Butcher went to the bar. He took his time on account of he was getting a Guinness. They pour them in 2 parts you see which is something you’d know Osama if you got out a bit more. While I was waiting for Terence Butcher to get back I sat there and thought about my boy. I was thinking of the way he waved good-bye to me with his nose pressed up against the back window of the Astra. I was looking down at the floor and I suppose I must of been in a world of my own because when Terence Butcher came back with the drinks he had to snap his fingers to get me to look up.

—Cheer up love, he said. It might never happen.

He sat down across the table from me. He sat his Guinness down in front of him and he pushed my drink towards me.

—There you go, he said. Chin chin. Here’s to brighter days.

I smiled then but it was a nervous smile. If that smile had been a kid it would of been one of those kids you see on telly on the kidney machine with the tubes coming out of them. COURAGE OF BRAVE KELLY, 5. Terence Butcher watched me and took a sip of his pint.

—How’s your drink sir?

He sat back in his chair and put his hands down around his pint. He frowned.

—Listen, he said. Don’t ever call me sir again when we’re off duty. If you do then I’ll have you transferred to the British Transport Police. You will spend the next five years telling fat children not to drop crisp packets on the Docklands Light Railway. If you prove to be especially effective in that capacity you will be promoted to the District and Circle Lines. After fifteen to twenty years if you perform well you will be taken off the night shift and you might even be permitted occasionally to see the light of day in such prestigious surface stations as Gunnersbury and Chiswick Park.

I downed my G&T and it exploded in my tummy.

—Doomed to the underworld. Is that what happened to the last girl you had an affair with?

He didn’t answer straight away. He drained his Guinness first. His eyes watched me over the top of his glass while he drank. He put his pint down very careful and wiped the white Guinness foam off his top lip. He lit a ciggie.

—Is that what this is? he said. An affair?

—Not yet. Not properly.

I slid my hands across the table so that the tips of my fingers were touching the tips of his. Terence Butcher looked around to see if anyone was watching. He let his head drop almost to the table then he lifted it up again and looked at me.

—Would you like it to be? he said.

I didn’t answer I just pushed my hands forward so my fingers laced in with his. He didn’t move his hands back but he didn’t fold them round mine like he could of.

—Well? he said.

—Oh god do you have to be such a copper about everything?

—What? he said. What do you mean?

—Everything has to be black and white with you doesn’t it? In your world we’re either having an affair or we aren’t.

—That’s right, he said. I want to know where we stand. Life’s hard enough without making it complicated.

—I do like you Terence Butcher. I get so lonely and I think you’re a good man and I think you understand me.

He grinned.

—Great, he said. We’re having an affair.

I shrugged. He was such a little boy sometimes.

—Alright then. Yes. Oh actually no. Come to think of it no. No it would never work you see. Trust me you don’t want anything to do with me Terence you don’t know what a state I’m in.

He shook his head.

—You’re fine, he said. There’s nothing wrong with you a couple of drinks won’t fix.

I held on tight to my glass and tried to block out my boy’s voice singing COUPLE OF DRINKS! COUPLE OF DRINKS! NOTHING WRONG WITH MUMMY.