I looked at Robert lying on the floor of the alleyway as my throat tightened. What had I done? It wasn’t as if I heard Jennifer’s voice from beyond the grave, reprimanding me, but I might as well have. The satisfaction of smacking him with the bat had gone within seconds and was replaced by a growing sense of unease. This wasn’t me. This wasn’t the man that Jennifer knew, or would have wanted me to be. I threw the bat onto the floor where it bounced, narrowly missing Robert’s phone. I wasn’t bothered about fingerprints on the bat as I had gloves on, and everything I was wearing would be incinerated by this time tomorrow, anyway. There wasn’t much time as the taxi could turn up any minute, so I hurried back to the end of the alleyway, stopping short of the entrance to make sure it hadn’t turned up. That wouldn’t be good, being spotted leaving the alleyway by a Canary Car.
There was no sign of a taxi, so I ducked out of the alley and crossed the road, pulling my hood up as I did so. I looked both ways and saw the dog walker I’d noticed earlier about fifty yards closer than he had been when I walked into the alley behind the pub. Silhouetted in the light of a streetlamp, he was watching his dog take a shit on the pavement. For a second, he looked like the priest on the posters for that film about an exorcist that came out years ago, except I couldn’t remember the priest on the posters having a dog, or it shitting while he watched it. The mist meant that I couldn’t get a good look at him, which was a good thing because if I couldn’t see him then he wouldn’t be able to see me, either. I hurried across the road, away from the dog walker, and cut down a narrow alleyway between two houses. I’d been through the alleyway several times over the last few weeks as I’d planned out my route back. When you’re dressed as a runner, you can go anywhere with no one taking a blind bit of notice.
I reached the end of the alley and broke into a slow jog, wanting to put distance between the scene and me but without drawing too much attention to myself. A few months ago, I wouldn’t have been able to run for a bus without wheezing, but my stamina had got a lot better since I’d cut right back on the booze and smokes. I knew the route I would take like the back of my hand, and I figured that I’d be back in The Heartsease with a pint before anyone came close to finding Robert. As I picked up my pace, I wondered if he’d even be found before the morning. I didn’t care. It wasn’t cold enough for him to die of exposure, and I’d shoved him onto his side so he didn’t swallow his tongue. He’d wake up in a while with a banging headache, and crawl back under the stone he came out from. The message had been delivered, that was the main thing.
A few minutes later, I reached one of my favourite places in the whole of Norwich. It was here, on this bench, that I’d kissed Jennifer for the first time. If the graffiti was to be believed, a kiss was one of the milder things that had happened on this bench. I took a few deep breaths, pulling the hip flask from the inside pocket of my running jacket and loosening the lid before taking a large slug from it. As the cheap whisky burned my throat, I started laughing. This turned into a cough, and the next thing I knew I was trying to laugh and cough at the same time. Any unease I had felt earlier was gone. I was bulletproof, and Robert had got what he deserved. The justice that the court had failed to deliver had been delivered. I looked up at the sky, at the faint stars in the blackness, and for the first time since Jennifer had died, I felt a sense of peace. I raised the hip flask again and drained it.
Knowing the minute I walked into the Heartsease I would have to relive the moment with the others, I sat on the bench for a few moments just to get my head together. A few minutes later, I got to my feet and wandered across the park and through the back streets of Thorpe St. Andrew, heading for the alleyway that led to the back of The Heartsease. When I got there, the wheelie bin was in the same place, and getting over the fence was simple.
I was looking forward to seeing my mates, recounting the events of the evening. As I walked into the pub with a grin that almost split my face, the only people inside were the people I wanted to see — Big Joe, Tommy, David. They all looked at me expectantly, and I put both thumbs up in the air like a complete tool. I couldn’t help it. I was too buzzed.
“You look like a man who needs a pint,” Big Joe’s voice came from behind the bar like a foghorn. Hearing this, both Tommy and David turned round to look at Joe. “All right, pints all round then,” Big Joe said, a smile on his face. I sat down between Tommy and David, grinning like a child at Christmas.
“Well?” Tommy said. I paused for a few seconds before replying.
“Boom,” I said before laughing at the pair of them. “Job done.” David reached across and patted me on the shoulder, which was very unusual for him. Apart from the odd handshake, I didn’t think we’d ever actually touched each other.
A few moments later, Big Joe came across to our table carrying a tray with four pints on it. He put one in front of the three of us and, to my surprise, sat down with the fourth in his hand. In all the years I’d known Big Joe, I’d never seen him drink. Tommy and I had even had an argument about it one night. I was sure that Big Joe liked a drink — he was a landlord after all, and had the face and build of a man who liked a pint — but Tommy was sure he was teetotal. Neither of us had got the bottle to just ask Big Joe, but I guess in the end I won that argument.
“So, how did it go then?” Big Joe asked, sliding my phone over the table toward me. “You sort him out?”
“I did,” I replied, taking a large sip from my pint. “He went down like a sack of spuds when I smacked him.”
“Good lad,” Big Joe said. “Nice one.” Tommy and David both nodded in agreement. “You’d better get changed, fella. Your stuff’s out the back, in the cellar. Just go on through, but if you nick anything, I’ll cut your bollocks off.” I got to my feet and walked through the bar, listening to the sound of the three of them laughing. The last thing I heard as I opened the cellar door was Big Joe saying “finally, the boy done good”.
I shivered in the cold of the cellar as I got changed. My original clothes — the ones I’d been wearing earlier for the CCTV camera — were freezing. As I shrugged myself into them and stuffed the running kit into a large yellow bag that Big Joe had got from his mate at the hospital, I thought about Robert lying on the ground of the courtyard behind the pub. Although I’d bottled it not long after hitting him, at least I felt as if justice had been done to a degree. Not the justice I had wanted, or that Robert deserved, but justice of sorts.
Despite the cold, I felt a broad smile creep onto my face as I walked back out of the cellar to join the others.