Kate Tempest - The Bricks that Built the Houses

‘Wanna taste then?’ Joey says. ‘Little taste?’ He hauls a heavy package from the chest, the size of a sleeping toddler. ‘Just to prove it’s the same stuff, know what I mean, taste from the package you’re gonna walk away with, right? Try before you buy, if you’re not fully satisfied blah blah blah.’

Joey smiles and he looks like a stroke victim, the smile grates against his face. Harry stays neutral, waiting for him to say something definite, to direct a clear question at her. Joey drops the package, heavily, on top of the tank, Harry worries that it’s going to break the glass and fall in and kill the fish. Nothing happens. It just sits there between them for a while.

Joey sniffs loudly, wipes his nose with the back of his hand. Shifts around in his seat. The leather squeaks. ‘There it goes again!’

‘Yep,’ Harry agrees.

‘Look, mate. Thing is,’ Joey says, ‘with Pico away, things have changed slightly.’ Harry finishes her cigarette, lets the ash fall on the floor, waits. ‘The price has doubled.’

Harry watches Joey smile at her. She sees it clearly now, at least. He wants to rob her. Cheeky bastard .

‘The gear’s much better quality than Pico’s ever was. It’s had to come down different routes. I’m an honest man, trying to make an honest living.’ He flashes his gravestone teeth, runs his fingers through his greasy hair, wipes his hand on his suit jacket. ‘You’re free to leave here and not take it, sweetheart, by all means, leave right now, I ain’t gonna stop you. It’s just you and me down here.’

Joey looks around, sniffs loudly again, holds a cigarette between his fingers but doesn’t light it. Looks at Harry, closely, leans towards her, shoulders squaring. ‘But you won’t find anything better out there, darlin’, and you know it and all.’ He pauses, serious now, twirling the unlit cigarette between the fingers of his right hand. ‘ This stuff’ — he uses the cigarette to point to the sack of coke on the fish tank — ‘fresh off the boat this morning. No one ain’t laid a fucking finger on that cocaine since Bolivia.’ He waits for that to sink in. Pushes his crotch out a little, shifts his thighs on the leather. ‘The one thing I did hear when I was asking around is that you like to sell to the discerning user, the bigwigs, yeah? Happy to pay premium prices for premium gear? That’s right, ain’t it? In fact, men like them, the more expensive it is, the more they fucking enjoy it. Ain’t that how it goes with the CEOs?’

Joey smiles again, with his lips closed this time. He sticks his little finger in his ear, wiggles it around. Discovers a little kernel of wax, digs for it, reaches it, pulls it out. ‘Excuse me,’ he says, looking at it, wiping it on his suit jacket.

Harry keeps her silence, sips her brandy soda. This is actually the best brandy soda I’ve ever had in my life, I’ll give you that, you creepy fuck .

Joey’s features are thick and cumbersome, his lips are like Cumberland sausages. His face is marked with deep acne scars. He wears crocodile-skin boots, he’s got fat thighs and skinny calves. He’s sweating at his temples, his crotch is pushed out towards Harry, his head is nodding slightly, balanced like a toffee apple on top of his weird, thin neck.

‘What d’you reckon then?’ he’s saying. ‘Coz I’ve been thinking all day about this, sweets, and the only way I can see us moving forward together, as I’ve already said, is by starting afresh. Me and you. Whole new game. Whole new pitch. New rules. New fucking balls, please. You know what I mean? Whole new arrangement.’

Harry watches, sips her drink. She swallows hard. Joey keeps talking.

‘Look,’ he says. ‘Cut to the chase — I’ll continue sourcing you the best coke money can buy, and you’ll pay me for my work. Simple as that. All it is, is it’s double what you paid Pico. Double bubble. Toil and trouble. And that’s non-negotiable.’ He takes a pen from his pocket and writes a figure on a scrap of paper, slides it across the top of the tank, raising his eyebrows as he does it. ‘Welcome to sample if you like, as I mentioned.’

He points to the pile of coke beside the figure. Harry doesn’t pick up the paper, she reaches for another cigarette. Lights it, smokes deeply. She watches Joey, the shark, the coke on the table, notices Leon’s presence against the wall behind the sofa Joey’s sitting on, hidden, breathing with the bass from upstairs. Man’s a fucking joker. Got to give him that .

‘Look, Joey,’ Harry says, calmly, like she’s tired of all this. ‘The price is fixed as far as I’m concerned. If you want to make your sale, we’ll make it now, at the price I’ve been paying since I began dealing with Pico, seven years ago. If you don’t want to make the sale at that price, I’m not interested.’

Joey’s eyes are bulging slightly; there is something, some shift, taking place in his face. He lets out a laugh, and it sounds like a car skidding. It goes on for a long time. Harry grits her teeth against it.

‘I like you!’ Joey says. ‘I like you, Harry. You’re a funny bitch.’ He laughs again. Stops abruptly. ‘OK,’ he says. ‘So here’s how we’re gonna do it, OK?’ His smile spreads like a rash across his face. ‘You’re gonna give me all the money you have on you, and then I’m gonna give you half a key. OK?’ Joey waits, thinks, bites his fingernails for a moment. ‘ Or , what we could do is, you give me that suitcase, and I let you go without breaking all your bones.’ He shrugs, turns a bit of fingernail around in his mouth, spits it out. ‘We could do that if you want, you stupid little cunt.’ Joey looks her up and down. ‘When was the last time you went with a man, Harry?’ he says, his tone dropping deep into the back of his throat. ‘Funny that you work on your own, don’t you think? Being what you are.’

It hits Harry then, like a punch in the face from a passing stranger. This isn’t the guy. This isn’t the guy I’m meant to be meeting. This is some fucking chancer. Could be fucking anyone . Harry sits still and feels her stomach move. Wishes that they hadn’t come. Now there’s only one fucking way left for this weird fucking night to go . She closes her eyes briefly. She can feel a headache coming, a strain in the back of her eyeballs. She should be wearing her glasses, but she can’t get used to her face in them, and the idea of contact lenses freaks her out. Wonder if Becky wears contact lenses .

In the time it takes for these thoughts to go through her mind, for her cigarette to burn down a fraction of a millimetre, for her hand to move an inch closer to the briefcase by her feet, Leon has stepped from the wall, grabbed Joey in a choke-hold and is wrestling him to the floor.

Real-time returns, the echoes of slow-motion roar in Harry’s head. She snaps herself out of it. Sees Joey and Leon fighting on the floor, too close to each other to land a blow. Leon untangles himself, stands and hauls Joey up with him and kicks him hard in the hip, the waist, and punches him four times, fast, in the face and then again in the chest. Joey is dazed, doesn’t know where to fall, his eyes are rolling, the punch to the chest was so hard there’s blood on his shirt. Leon keeps pummelling him. Harry watches, fascinated. Joey’s body drops. He thrashes limply, rolls over, moaning like a distant train. Leon kicks him in the shoulder, in the legs, goes to swing one at his head.

‘Don’t,’ Harry says.

Leon looks back at Harry, who’s still sitting, motionless, on the sofa. ‘What?’ he says. ‘It ain’t worth doing nothing half-hearted.’

Harry sighs, gets up and moves without thinking; she heads to the stash, takes one of the massive packages and squeezes it into her briefcase. She leaves the rest, goes for the money. She stuffs bundles into the waistband of her trousers, the lining of her jacket. She packs money inside her shirt, under her fucking armpits. Joey is moaning on the floor. Face a mess, looking like a pattern in the carpet. Harry watches him, feeling sympathy for him, almost. Joey looks up at her, empty eyes searching for meaning.