Ирвин Уэлш - Dead Men's Trousers

It isn’t a bad spot for surveillance: a tapering street, on a turn-off from a highway and close to a narrow intersection, then a slip road onto the freeway. They probably thought they were being smart when they picked it. Harry smirks to himself, wet hand leaving a damp trace on the leather wheel he’s been tightly gripping, although the car is long stationary. Close to downtown, accessible to the freeway .

Assholes .

For a while his only sighting has been the couple from next door. They have a dog, one of those big Jap bastards. Sometimes Melanie’s mom – he remembers her from his high-school days, a looker like her bitch of a daughter – swings by to pick up the mail. Now she’s an older woman, her blonde hair fading to ash-grey, with complementary silver-rimmed specs. Is she still fuckable at a push? Hell, yeah, Harry would spring to giving the old girl a taste of dick. But she’s not his target. Not her, nor the two little grandchildren Melanie and the killer have given her, whom she’s now looking after.

It’s felt like an age but it must have been only a few days, and suddenly, one late afternoon, Melanie is back. The car pulls up and there they are. Her little daughters, the oldest not that much younger than Melanie herself was when he first met her… and there he is… that monster she married.

Harry rubs the bristle on his face, adjusts the rear-view mirror to see anything that might approach from the bend behind him, in the quiet, tree-lined street. To think he looked up to Melanie, thought of her as strong, smart and good. But he was wrong; she’s weak, deluded by a sense of her own self-righteous liberal bullshit, easy prey for that animal. Harry can imagine him, with that weird gravelly voice of his, giving her that jailbird hustle, that born-on-the-wrong-side-of-the tracks BS. But maybe she’s just blind. And if that’s the case, then it’s Harry’s duty to make her see straight.

He watches the old Paddy motherfucker helping their two daughters out of the station wagon, into the home. The way his evil eyes look back, scanning the street. Scum, scum, scum. Oh, Mel, what are you fucking doing? She worked with the killer in that Irish jailhouse – or was it Scotch? – what the fuck was the difference? – where he first conned her. She knew then he was a killer! Did she really expect him to change? Why can’t she see through him?

Those two bums; no sign of Coover, the water and fish probably doing their work on his body right now. Forget him. But the other one, Santiago, found snagged onto the oil platform, though with his pulped face and the gunshot wound still easily detectable. The bullet extracted, bagged and tagged in the evidence room. It could be traced, to a still-missing weapon. But he is no longer on the case (on any case), and nobody else freaking cares.

Then Melanie appears again: wearing a blue hoodie, sneakers and shorts. Is she going for a run? No. She gets into the car. Alone. Harry takes his chance, waits till she drives past, then pulls out and follows, tracking her all the way to the mall. This is good. It’s public; she won’t suspect his motives.

He follows her inside, slipping past her, before stopping and doubling back, so that he accidentally-on-purpose runs right into her. On seeing his approach and widening smile of recognition, she pointedly looks the other way. This is bad. Even after everything that has happened, and with that drunken phone call, he didn’t expect such a blatant snub. He has to say something. — Melanie, he pleads, stepping in front of her, his palms turned outwards, — I need to apologise. I made a terrible mistake.

She stops. Looks at him warily, her arms folded across her chest. — Fine. Now that’s the end of it.

Harry nods slowly. He knows what will fly with her. — I’ve been in rehab for alcohol addiction, and I’m attending meetings regularly. It’s important for me to make amends. Can I buy you a coffee? Please? It would mean a lot to me. His tone’s pleading and emotional. Liberals liked to hear that people are basically good and trying to be better. Why shouldn’t I make the same play on her as that criminal psycho asshole she married?

Melanie flicks her hair back, sighs and gestures wearily to the food court. They head over, finding seats at the Starbucks, close to the counter. As Harry joins the line and orders two skinny lattes, Melanie starts talking on her phone. His ears prick. Is she talking about him? No, it sounds like harmless banalities, dispatched to a friend. Yes, we’re back… The kids are fine… Yes, Jim too. I think it did us both good to get away. Last year was all about reconnecting with family… Sicily was wonderful. The food – I need to hit the gym, big time .

Harry lowers the coffees to the table, slides one across to her as he gets into the seat opposite. Melanie picks up her cup, takes a tentative sip, mumbles some thanks. Her phone sits on the table in front of her. He has to broach this carefully. She’ll still have the recording made of his message from last summer, when he was drunk, stupid and weak. That cunning monster she married would see to that. But Melanie had to know that she’s hitched to a psychotic killer. And Harry will prove it. He will show that Jim Francis murdered those two men.

At first they talk blandly of old college and high-school days, and mutual acquaintances. It’s going smoothly, Harry reckons, straight from the cop’s interpersonal playbook. Establish normality. Build trust . And it seems like it’s working. Hell, Harry even draws a smile out of Melanie, through recounting a tale of one of their buddies. It excites him, as it has always done. It allows him to glimpse possibilities. So he talks about himself a little. How Mom didn’t last long after Dad passed, kind of just gave up. How he inherited that lovely old house up in the woods. It’s a bit isolated, but he doesn’t mind that. But then something goes wrong. The part of him that so desperately still wants her to be with him, in that house, it suddenly emerges, and Harry jumps topic too quickly. Can’t hold back. Can’t stop the cop in him coming out. — You’re in serious trouble, Melanie. He shakes his head in tense gravity. — Jim is not the man you think he is!

Melanie rolls her eyes and picks up her phone, putting it back in her bag. She looks at him evenly, speaking in a slow, deliberate tone. — Keep the fuck away from us. From me, my husband and our children. Her voice rises, to pull nearby patrons into referencing the drama. — You’ve been warned!

Harry draws in a breath, shocked at the depth of her loathing. — I’ve been suspended from the department. I’ve lost everything, but I’m never going to let him hurt you!

— Jim isn’t hurting me, you are! I’m telling you, if you approach me again, I’m making a formal complaint, through an attorney, and giving your department a copy of the tape, and Melanie rises, swinging her bag over her shoulder. — Now stay away from my family!

Harry pouts, his bottom lip involuntarily trembling, but then he turns away, facing two women who have been eavesdropping. — Ladies, he says in a slow, sardonic seethe of acknowledgement, before sipping at the latte. He looks forlornly at the lipstick mark around the rim of the other cup. It seems to belong to a ghost he has been chasing most of his life. Sure enough, by the time he turns back, Melanie has gone, vanished into the throng of shoppers. Harry can scarcely believe that she was ever sitting so close to him.

When Melanie returns home she finds Jim in the kitchen, making a sandwich. It is an elaborate, layered effort, involving lean turkey breast, avocado slices, tomatoes and Swiss cheese. Her husband’s ability to immerse himself so fully in the most mundane of tasks, as well as the most complex, never fails to amaze her. The still intensity he brings to everything. Through the window, she sees the girls playing in the yard with the new puppy, which is out of sight, but Melanie can hear its excited barking. Jim looks at up her, cracking a smile. It slides south as he quickly senses that something is wrong. — What’s up, honey?