‘Gerrup.’
Andy woke out of a dream of crushed limbs to find he had been sleeping with his leg folded under him. His brother-in-law stood at the bottom of his bed, unshaven, in vest and jeans. A light like sour milk came through the drawn curtain.
‘What’s up?’
‘You are. Gerrup.’
‘OK, OK, keep your hair on, what time is it anyway?’
‘Time you were going. Michelle’s in the kitchen.’
‘Going where?’
‘Any bloody where,’ Pete said, banging out of the room.
Andy pulled himself out of the camp bed and went to the bathroom. His nephew had already gone, the Harley-Davidson duvet spilling out of his bed like entrails.
When he made it to the kitchen they were both there, Pete at the table with a huge plate of fry-up in front of him, Michelle with her back against the sink, smoking.
‘OK, you get a cup of tea and a slice of bread and that’s it. I ent doing no fry-up for you. Then you get packed and out. I’ve had it up to here. You think I want my kids growin’ up with a jailbird?’
‘What’s brought this on, I’ve been out over a month?’
‘Yes, and you’ll be back before we know it. I know what happened, I know you was banged up for the night and bailed. So that’s fuckin’ that. I can’t cope, not with this baby as well.’
‘What baby?’
‘This baby I’m havin’.’
‘I didn’t know you were havin’ a baby.’
‘Well, you do now. Here.’ She handed him a slice of white toast on the end of a knife. ‘Tea’s in the pot. I want you gone in half an hour.’
‘I’m supposed to be your brother.’
‘You should have thought of that.’
‘I’ve paid my way.’
‘Yeah, with dirty money. No thanks.’
‘Where am I supposed to go?’
‘You should have thought of that an’ all.’
‘Look …’
‘No. You look, And. I want me house back and Matt wants his room back and I ent arguing with you.’
She stood, pasty face with the look under her eyes that said she was pregnant. She had spots on her chin and her roots were growing out, dark brown in an earthy furrow across the corn blonde.
He drank his tea. Ate his toast. Pete piled egg yolk, sausages and beans on to his fork and stuffed it sideways into his mouth. A lump of yolk dropped on to his vest.
‘Gerroff,’ Michelle said and threw a cloth in his direction.
Andy looked round. Quite suddenly, he’d had enough. He couldn’t have stayed another night. He got up. ‘Right,’ he said.
He’d little to pack and he left some bits behind. He got it all into the holdall easily enough. Twenty minutes later he was walking out of the door without saying another word to either of them. It was sunny. There were daffodils out round the edges of the blocks of flats and in the front gardens. It was mild. The air had a smell of spring in it.
‘It’s good,’ he said to himself. ‘Good.’
He wondered how the kitchen garden was coming along at the prison.
It felt like coming out all over again, just at first. It was partly the spring, partly that he would never have to crumple up his limbs in the camp bed in Matt’s fetid bedroom again or watch his brother-in-law eating egg. But there was more, a strange feeling that he was renewed, emerging from a tunnel which he had thought was at an end months ago but which had had an extra, sideways section.
He walked to the edge of the town whistling and then he turned on to the road that ran round the Hill. There were some people walking dogs, and a pair of mothers with toddlers, straining up the grassy banks to the top, laughing into the mild wind.
Andy climbed slowly, and when he reached the Wern Stones, he sat down, and leaned against one. He still felt crock from the impact of that van. The sun brushed his face. He looked down over Lafferton. King. That was how they played it when they were kids. King of the Wern Stones.
He’d heard the stories about last year’s murders that had happened on the Hill but he couldn’t connect with any of that; he had been inside and this had been another world.
He stayed there for half an hour, until the sun moved behind some clouds and his back hurt, pressed against the ancient stone. The mothers and toddlers had gone.
Andy got up. He should go. But go where? He supposed he would have to walk into town and try and see his probation officer. Didn’t she have to get him somewhere to sleep? He thought about Lee Carter. He’d a house full of places to sleep.
He went to Dino’s instead. The café was full of morning shoppers and the espresso machine was working overtime. Andy found a table near the counter. From behind it, Alfredo waved, tea towel over his arm, face perspiring. Seconds later, he pushed a cup of tea and two slices of toast across and shouted Andy’s name.
People piled in, and after a while the door just opened for them to see there were no seats, and closed on them again. It was warm and it was noisy. When someone left a newspaper, Andy reached across and grabbed it. He opened it on the soccer page and sipped his tea to make it last.
He was back for a sandwich at half past one, after mooching round the streets, failing to see his probation officer and sitting on a bench for half an hour. This is what it’ll be, he thought, benches, doorways. I’m a dosser. It’s what happens.
He went back to Dino’s at ten past four. The place was quiet at last, just a couple of schoolkids squabbling over nothing and one woman eating her slow way through a toasted scone.
‘OK, Andy, what’s up?’
‘How do you mean?’
‘You been in here three, four times, hanging about – like we used to hang about.’ Fredo pointed to the boys, who picked up their bags, and left, shoving each other on to the pavement. ‘Your Michelle had enough of you?’
‘Yeah, right.’
‘Well?’
‘I said yes, OK?’
‘Right. You wan’ tea, coffee, milk shake, Coke …’
‘Tell you what … what was it we had? Coke float. That’ll remind me.’
‘You want reminding? … You really want a Coke float?’
‘Tea then.’
‘You don’t wanna Coke float, but maybe you want a job?’
Andy took the tea and stood at the counter with it. Alfredo went on wiping down the glass shelves of the pastry stand.
‘You seen me here today? Gone mental. And it’s just me.’
‘Why? Thought you had a million family.’
‘Not so much now and Maria’s had to go home, her sister’s in hospital, she had bad baby trouble.’
‘So there’s a job?’
‘There’s a job.’
‘What doing?’
‘Everything … anything … behind here, in the back.’
‘How long for?’
‘No idea. A week, a month, ten years.’
‘Only trouble is, I’d have to be clean, look respectable.’
‘You’re all right, Andy.’
‘Not after a couple nights on a bench I won’t be.’
Fredo stopped wiping the shelves. ‘She really has thrown you out.’
‘Not that I care. Blood ent always thicker than water.’
‘Sure it is.’ He turned to the sink and put the cloth under the hot tap.
The woman finished her scone and went out.
‘There’s a couple of rooms upstairs. Full of junk, nobody’s lived up there for years … no furniture, kitchen’s in a state. Nothing’s turned on.’
‘You mean it’d go with the job.’
Alfredo looked at him steadily. ‘Not exactly. You could have full pay and sleep on the bench or half pay and have the rooms. I’d get it sorted quick enough, there’s always furniture somewhere.’
‘There is?’
‘No bath. Sink.’
‘That’s OK. You’re forgetting where I’ve been, Fredo.’
‘And no Carter. No trouble.’
‘No.’
There was another pause. Alfredo was silent, still looking at him speculatively. Then, he leaned across the counter and put out his hand. Andy took it.
‘Tonight, you better come home with me.’
‘Thanks, Fredo,’ Andy said. It seemed to be enough.