Leanne Dunn woke with a humming in her head and a dull, persistent ache in her stomach. As she eased herself off the edge of the bed, she felt her cold foot touch the bare floorboard and jerked it back. At once she knew this was a mistake, as it sent the bed shoogling and waves of nausea coursing through her already delicate digestive system. She tried to right herself, placing her body weight on her elbow, and vomited onto the bedspread. The sight of the dark, liquefied bile made her retch again and more malodorous fluid was expressed from her mouth. As she rocked on the bed’s edge, sharp pains pressed into her clenched stomach. She leaned forward, elbows on her knees, and watched as the floor swayed beneath her.
Leanne felt worse than she had felt in a while, but she knew that was coming to an end because Gillon was due to arrive and collect the night’s takings. He always brought a few wraps – and she’d had a good night, scoring a ton-fifty – so she’d be clear of the nagging symptoms of withdrawal soon.
Leanne found the strength to attempt another rise from the bed. At first she placed her hands either side of her, but the give in the mattress threatened to disrupt her already shifting centre of gravity. She brought her hands together and wrung them like lathering soap; her mouth was dry now, she needed water. She looked down at her thin, bruised legs; they were as pale and white as her feet, the only indicators of colour being the blackness between her toes. Gillon would castigate her for that: he didn’t like his girls looking like street trash. She knew she had to wash before he arrived or he’d remind her of the rules with his fists or, worse, withhold the precious wraps.
Leanne found strength enough to plant her feet and stood holding the door handle like an old woman with a walking stick. The expanse of floor between her room and the kitchen seemed an endless savannah – a familiar territory but one beyond her – and no matter how hard she tried to summon the determination to move she couldn’t find it. Her back ached where she stood and the calf muscles beneath her screamed with the pressure of body weight. Leanne’s knees buckled, sending shocks through her thin thighs. She knew she couldn’t support herself any longer; a wave of pressure from an invisible avalanche above suddenly descended and she was floored.
The sound of Leanne’s bony frame landing on the bare boards was a pathetic thud, like shopping spilling from a burst bag. Her eye socket had connected with the floor and the stinging sensation told her that there would be swelling. Gillon wouldn’t like that: black eyes were against the rules. When he belted his girls, he made sure the consequences stayed out of sight. The thin, pain-wracked bag of bones that lay on the bare floor with the swirling balls of dust and the smattering of condom wrappers didn’t resemble a human being. There was no life force on show, no strength or even a dim indicator of breathing. It took some more time for Leanne to summon the courage to attempt a move – which, when it came, transpired to be a shuddering of shoulders as she sobbed into the pale, dirt-wreathed floor of her Lochside flat.
An hour or so after Leanne passed out, she awoke shivering again with a thin tendril of drool tethering her mouth to the floor. The incessant whooshing of her gut seemed to have passed, supplanted with the empty feeling that she carried inside her most days. There was still a persistent thud in the front of her head, but the debilitating cramps had eased enough to at least make crawling along the floor an option. She reached the bathroom door slithering on her belly like war wounded and hauled herself into the shower cubicle, grabbing the handle to release welcome jets of water.
As the shower came to life, Leanne gasped for air. She gulped a few mouthfuls of water as she tried to adjust to the assault on her senses, but it didn’t take her long to feel the soothing effects of the water on her weary body. She was still cold and riddled with aches and pains, but as she curled in the base of the shower cubicle she began to feel like a return to the real world was possible. She let the water pour over her, allowing herself to believe that rejuvenation was taking place, but all the while knowing she needed to face the world outside. When she released herself from the shower, Leanne found there was no towel, so she draped herself in a bathrobe, retrieved from the floor. She was cold and shivery, but there was no place to hide from her responsibilities. Gillon would be arriving soon and she would have little time to herself before the day’s punters started to appear. She ran her fingers through her wet hair and tried to focus on her face in the mirror’s reflection. Her eye had started to yellow after connecting with the boards earlier, but she could cover that with make-up; it would be another day or so before the actual shiner showed and Gillon had anything to complain about.
Leanne’s feet were dragging as she made her way through to the kitchen. The flat was cold and bare. There were chairs in the living room, but they were hard-backed – the remnants of a discarded dining set that Gillon had made her stack into the back of his white van after spotting them at the side of the road. She didn’t want them in the flat, it made the place look like a dentist’s waiting room, but Gillon told her he wasn’t supplying the flat for her to get comfortable in: it was where she worked, it was where she turned tricks.
Leanne felt her body’s functions returning. She poured herself a glass of water and turned on the portable television that sat on the kitchen worktop. The picture was hazy, flecked with snow, but she wasn’t overly interested in the content anyway; it was merely distraction she wanted. She leaned over and reclaimed her packet of ten Club and the blue plastic lighter. As she lit up, she leaned on the side of the sink and watched the news playing. She didn’t know why the news had her attention until she realised that she was staring at a familiar scene – the town of Ayr.
‘Holy . . .’
Leanne moved closer to the television screen and turned up the volume. The newscaster was the same one she had seen a hundred times, but it seemed strange to see her so close to home.
‘Police have confirmed the recovery of a body from Ayr’s tip and that they are dealing with a murder investigation.’
The reporter sounded so formal, not like the people Leanne knew. There were some people she spoke to – punters – who could speak posh, but they tended to keep their mouths shut.
The journalist continued with the report: ‘Police have refused to confirm the victim’s name until family members have formally identified him, but a number of unofficial sources have claimed the victim is a local man, believed to work in the banking industry . . .’
Leanne jumped away from the sink as a loud knock sounded on her front door. She placed her cigarette on the rim of the sink and looked away to the other side of the flat, but felt herself drawn back to the television screen.
‘Leanne . . . open up!’
She heard more knocking on the door.
‘Leanne . . .’
She recognised the voice, but it wasn’t Gillon’s. She had expected Gillon, but this voice was a shock. She made her way to the front door and stood with her hand pressed hard against the jamb.
‘You need to go away, Danny’s coming and he doesn’t like you here . . .’
‘Leanne if you don’t open this bloody door, I’ll knock it down and I’ll go through Danny Gillon next!’
Leanne’s hands were trembling as she removed the chain from the door and turned the key. There was a sudden gust of stale air from the close as Duncan Knox pushed in. The large man was sweating, his hair mussed and his cheeks ruddy and bulging as he stomped past Leanne and made his way into the kitchen.
‘This . . . this . . . you’ve seen it then?’ he was roaring, his voice pitched high and bursting with emotion.
As Leanne entered the kitchen, she saw Knox standing in front of the television screen with his hands pressed tight to his face. She had never seen him that way before; he was always so calm: threatening, but calm. Knox was a large man and he liked to throw his weight around: as Leanne appeared at his side, he reached out and grabbed her, and the dressing gown she was wearing opened up and exposed her scrawny breasts. She shrieked out theatrically as Knox pulled her towards him.
‘Shut up! Haven’t you seen what’s going on?’ He pointed to the television screen, but Leanne’s eyes were pulled towards his face; his jaw jutted forward, exposing broken and cracked teeth that poked up like tombstones. ‘Look, look!’ he roared.
As Leanne turned to look at the screen once more, she retraced her earlier viewing before the knock at the door and pieced the two ends of the report together. It was a murder investigation in their hometown, that much was certain.
‘What’s that got to do with me?’ she said.
Knox pushed her away and stamped his feet towards the other end of the kitchen. ‘What’s it got to do with you – are you kidding?’
‘I don’t . . . understand.’
The man in her kitchen seemed beside himself. He slapped his palm off the side of his face and then ran it over his stubbly chin in one sweeping, nervous gesture that signalled his state of mind like a flare. He kept walking, pacing, as he spoke. ‘Don’t you know who that is?’
‘No . . .’
Knox halted. He brought up his hands and waved them either side of his head as he raised his eyes to face the heavens. ‘It’s James Urquhart.’
The name took a moment to register on Leanne’s memory, but after a few seconds, the realisation of who he was, and what the name meant, sent a spasm of shock through her thin frame. ‘James . . . It’s . . .’
‘Yes. Yes . . .’ Knox’s voice was thundering now. He crossed the floor towards Leanne and grabbed her by the shoulders. He was shaking her to and fro as he bellowed into her face. ‘And you better pretend you never laid eyes on him! Do you hear me? Do you hear me?’
Leanne had no words. Her voice was a part of her that she had lost access to. Her throat was constricted by her own emotion. She was frozen, all over her body; she felt cold.
‘Leanne . . . Do you hear me?’ Knox shook her shoulders, and her head lolled on her neck. ‘You never knew James Urquhart. I mean it: you better keep your hole shut about him! For the first time in your bloody life you better learn to keep that hole in your stupid head shut!’