Catherine O'Flynn - News Where You Are

He went back down the steps to Azad’s Kleen ’n’ Kustom Kars. A young man with an intricately razored haircut was heat shrinking some black-plastic tint onto the rear window of a Seat Ibiza and talking loudly to a man who was reading the paper and giving no indication of listening.

‘She wanted the full valet, right, but you shoulda seen it inside. She had like four hundred Snickers wrappers all over the floors and the seats. Nothing else — no Kit Kat, no Monster Munch, no road atlas — just Snickers everywhere. And she’s like skinny, man. Like a size zero. So I thought to myself, Fine. Whatever. Bulimia . But the thing is I thought they were supposed to hide it. Where was the shame and all that self-hate stuff? She seemed pretty happy with herself to me. She looked at me as if I was something she’d trod on, you know, like: “Yeah? I eat twenty-six Snickers bars a day and I still look hot.” So I just took the keys and said nothing, you know, cos we’re professionals.’

The other man raised his eyebrows and then saw Frank hovering nearby.

Frank approached. ‘Are you Azad?’

The man regarded Frank with some suspicion. ‘Yeah, that’s me. Who wants to know?’

‘My name’s Frank.’

Azad nodded. ‘All right, Frank, can I help you?’

‘I was just wondering if you knew if a man called Michael Church worked in the unit above.’

Azad walked over towards him. ‘Mike? Yeah, there’s a Mike works up there. He ain’t in today, but you can leave a message if you like. I’ll make sure he gets it next time he shows up.’

Frank wasn’t sure if they were talking about the same man. He pulled the photo out of his pocket. ‘Is that the Mike you mean?’

‘Yeah, that’s him. I ain’t seen him for a few weeks, but …’ Something in Frank’s expression prompted him to ask, ‘Is something wrong?’

‘Well … Michael died three weeks ago. I’m just trying to trace any next of kin or close friends.’

Azad closed his eyes for a second and then let a long stream of air out between his teeth. ‘I fucking knew it, man. I knew there was something wrong. I said to the owner of the estate when he come round last week — I said, “Not seen Mike about. Maybe you should try and call him.” I was worried, you know.’

‘You knew him, then?’

‘Yeah, I knew Mike. That’s sad news.’

‘Could I talk to you about him?’

Azad looked over at the kid tinting the window. ‘You be all right if I go get a coffee, Sy?’

‘I’m a professional, Az, this is what I’m telling you.’

Azad shook his head and led Frank over to a couple of plastic chairs outside the sandwich shop.

‘You’re not chasing up debts or anything like that, are you?’

‘No, nothing like that. It’s just that Michael died alone. He was a friend of a friend and I’m just trying to help find out a little about his life.’ He decided to spare Azad the details of Michael’s death.

Azad lit a cigarette and took some time before he spoke. ‘I never used to talk to him at first. He was just another face you’d see around here, you know, like the Jesus people. We’d nod or whatever, but that was it. I know he was working here long before we came and set up below him. I’d see him going in each morning at eight thirty on the dot with his little lunchbox and then again at five going home, and that was all I knew about him.

‘Then one day I was here on my own, Sy was off sick and it meant I could turn off the radio for once. I mean don’t get me wrong, I love music, but Sy doesn’t listen to music — he just likes distorted bass rumbling around the boot of a car. To be honest, it gives me a bit of a migraine by the end of the day — getting old I guess. So I was sorting through invoices or some shit like that in the workshop and I heard this other music coming from upstairs. I didn’t notice too much at first, then I started listening and — I can’t explain it, but it was so beautiful. It was old music, I could tell that, but there was something about it, you know, kind of sad and happy at the same time. I don’t know … it got under my skin.

‘Anyway, in the end I had to know what it was so I walked up the stairs and knocked on the door. Mike opens it, wiping his hands on a rag. He looks at me and you know the first thing he says? He goes: “Is the music too loud?” I thought, Bloody hell, man, how loud is our music normally and he’s asking me if he’s disturbing us! That was the first time I spoke to him.’

Frank nodded. ‘And you got to know him after that?’

‘Yeah — we just got on and I started to go up there most days to eat my lunch. Mike’d have corned-beef sandwiches and I’d have Pot Noodle and he’d play his records and tell me a bit about them. It was weird, really. Sy thought it was well weird — I mean you’d think we wouldn’t have anything in common, but we just got along.’

‘Did he ever mention any family or people outside of work?’

‘A bit. Mike and Burkett worked together for years, but Burkett died some years back. I think really the business was winding down anyway and after he died Mike could have retired, but he felt some duty to Burkett to carry on the business — he didn’t want to let it all fade to nothing. He was very loyal, you know. He thought his mate had worked all his life to build up the business and it was up to him to carry it on. To be honest, I don’t think he had many customers, but he’d still come in every day.

‘He told me something amazing once — apparently back in the day, every Thursday night, he and Burkett would clear the workshop upstairs, push all the machines to the sides and throw covers over them. They’d light some candles, get it all looking nice and then at seven o’clock their wives would come down and they’d do an hour or two of ballroom dancing. Can you believe that? I love that story, man. I like to imagine the men in dickie bows and the women in those big, pink ball gowns they wear on telly with numbers on their backs sweeping up and down the unit. I’d have loved to have seen that.

‘Anyway those days were long gone by the time I set up here. Mike’d just come in every day, work on his own and go home. It went on like that for a few years, then Mike’s wife got ill and he started taking time off to go with her to the hospital and stuff. Then eventually he just left to nurse her full time.’

‘But he came back afterwards? He was still working here till recently?’

‘Yeah — he came back. I never expected him to. I thought if his wife died — well, when , really, it was obvious from what he said that she wasn’t getting any better — I thought he’d call it a day then. But he came back. He was really low, you know. He didn’t say anything, he was all business on the surface, but you could tell. He didn’t have any customers by then. They’d all gone elsewhere when he was off nursing his wife. He just used to come here because it was what he did when she was alive. I think he could pretend she was still at home waiting for him when he was in his workshop. He still made stuff. There’s boxes of little intricate things he made up there, but it was just a hobby, really.’

Azad chewed on a broken nail. ‘I’ve been worried about him these last few weeks. You can ask my wife — she knew all about Mike. I told her how I didn’t think he spoke to anyone else but me, up there in that empty unit all day long and then back to an empty house in the evening. It was hard. My wife was always saying I should invite him over for dinner one evening, cook him something proper but … I dunno, I thought it’d make him awkward, you know — it’d be crossing a line. I knew nothing about him, really. Not where he lived. Not even his surname.’