COUSIN BILLY WASN’T happy, and he told me.
“I’m no happy, Alec.”
His voice was nasal Glaswegian, the same accent I’d tried for years to lose. Brought me too much trouble this side of Hadrian’s Wall.
“Everything will be OK. Trust me.”
He gave me the look, eyebrows steepled, tip of the tongue just peeking from beneath his protruding front teeth. “Trust you, Alec? It’s because I listened to you that I’m in this shite in the first place. You told me to stand up to him and all that got me was a death sentence.”
“Don’t worry.” I showed him the Browning pistol. “This time things’ll be different.”
“That’s what I’m no happy aboot.”
“I’m not gonna use it. I’m only gonna show them it so they know we mean business.”
“And what then? What if they dunnae listen to you? Are you gonnae use it then?”
I didn’t have an answer for him. “Just quit worrying, will ya? You’re making me nervous now.”
“So let’s just get the fuck oota here and forget all about them.”
“Here” was in my beat-up Volkswagen Golf, just across the street from the hangout of the man Billy was so terrified of.
“Can’t, Billy. We do that, we’ll never be able to walk these streets again.”
“Won’t be walking anywhere if Gardy kills us.”
I laid the bullshit on thick. “So go to your grave with your honour intact. I’d rather be a dead hero than a living coward.”
“I’m no a coward.”
“Didn’t say you were. Just making a point.”
“I’d rather be a live hero, but.”
“Exactly my point. That’s why I brought my gun.”
Before he could say anything else, I slipped out of the Golf, jamming the Browning into my belt at the back. I hid it under the tail of my sweatshirt, pulled up my hood. Billy didn’t follow. Good lad. He wasn’t there to back me up, just save me if things went tits-up and a quick getaway was in order. Billy scooted over into the driving position, and turned on the ignition. He drove the Golf away and into a parking space next to a Spar shop on the corner. I watched him nose the car round and then reverse into the shadows. The lights went off, but I could still hear the low thrum of the idling engine. Out of sight, but not out of mind. I left Billy there and walked across the street to the pool hall.
Couple of kids in the doorway gave me the thousand-yard stare, eyes like jaundice pouring from manhole covers. High. I pressed between them and they grunted, didn’t want to move, but they’d no option. One of them pressed his forearm to my lower back but that was the extent of his defiance. I gave him the dead eye: the old silent promise. Maybe he’d felt the weight of the gun in my belt ’cause he quickly moved away, towing his drug buddy along with him. I let them go; they meant nothing to me.
First thing I noticed was the smell of pot, heavy in the air like a dampener. Next was the stench of sweat. Something else. Wank juice. Smelled like teenagers. There was a short vestibule, which doubled as an occasional toilet judging by the stains on the walls. Then there was a narrow flight of stairs leading up into darkness. From up there in the rafters came the clack of cues on balls. There was the low rumble of conversation, punctuated by harsher curses and raucous cheers. I felt like my arsehole was doing a Betty Boop pout, but I went up the stairs. Like I told Billy, rather be a dead hero …
If someone came down, maybe that’s as far as I’d get. I went up the last few steps with my hand tucked under my sweatshirt, thumb on the gun’s grip, ready to tug it out and start blasting. But no one came down. Thought, thank fuck for that, and kept going.
Another corridor.
This one was graced with strip-lights. One of them flickered. A bluebottle bounced along the plasterboard ceiling, doing a crazy waltz. I tried to ignore the loud buzz, but it was much the same as the sound inside my head. They blended and grew exponentially, juxtaposing one on top of the other. My mouth felt dry, like Ghandi’s flip-flop. Like Billy’s credit score.
There was some hip-hop shit playing through a speaker. Couldn’t stand the stuff. All these young lads in the pool hall playing at being gangstas. Would’ve made me laugh if they weren’t so serious. Now I wasn’t happy. Maybe Billy had a point. Wasn’t too late to walk away.
Of course it was. I’d made it all the way into the pool hall and it was like in those old westerns my dad used to watch on a Saturday afternoon. If there was a pianist, he’d have stopped playing. The hip-hop jagged on, and that was the only thing that spoiled the effect.
There were kids in the big room, slouching round green baize tables with cues held like torches to ward off the dimness. They were all in the obligatory hoody and baggy trousers. Chains hung from a couple of pockets, beanie caps pulled low like it was winter outside. I ignored them. They were just tag-alongs. I walked across the room, down the centre of the dozen pool tables. I was watched all the way. Mouths hung open. No one spoke, they didn’t have to. Their faces said, What the fuck is he doing here?
I told them.
“This has got fuck all to do with any of ya. I’m here to see Gardy.”
“Dead man walking,” someone said, like prison rap.
Maybe he was right. I was taking a big chance throwing myself into the lion’s open mouth, but hey, sometimes you’ve gotta live dangerously just to get by.
The pool hall was spread over two floors. The boys, they had to hang out down here in the shitty quarters; the men, they all went upstairs into the loft. It was like they were saying that they were above the others, and I’m not talking literally.
This time I didn’t get a free walk up the steps.
I was stopped by two guys. One of them was a hard bastard I knew as Toad. No one called him that to his face, ’cause it was nothing he’d go by. The other I didn’t know. In my head I called him Skank, ’cause that’s the way he smelled, like a whore bitch.
Toad was an ugly man. No one would deny it, not his mother even. He’d a round head, warty texture, flat nose, and wide lips. Get the picture?
“The fuck you doin’ walking in here?” he said with a hand flat on my chest.
“No other way in.”
“Who says you’re goin’ in?”
“Me,” I said, “and Gardy. He’s expecting me.”
“Whatcha carrying?”
I showed him my empty hands.
He snorted at the other man, who began wiping me down.
“You like how that feels?” I asked the skank. “Rubbing yoursel’ all over another man?”
“The fuck’s this?” he asked touching the bulge in the back of my pants.
“I shit mesel on the way in when I knew you’d be here to stop me,” I told him.
He withdrew his hand, looked at Toad for what to do. Toad knew I was packing, but asked anyway.
“You packin’, Alec?”
“’Course I am.”
“Gonna have to have it.”
“Touch it,” I said smiling, “and you’ll get it all right.”
Toad rocked back on his heels. His tongue went from one side of his lips to the other. I half expected his eyes to roll back as he blinked, but they didn’t.
I could hear the silence behind me, as contradictory as that seems. It was as if the hush was a tangible weight pressing down on my shoulders. The gangsta music had faded so even it was indistinguishable from the buzzing in my skull. My peripheral vision retracted, like I was a horse in blinkers. I zoned down on the hand pressing on my chest.
“Take your hand off me, Toad, or I’ll break it.”
“Fuckin” Toad?”
“You heard.”
Toad removed his hand.
But only to coil it into a fist.
He should have hit me then. But he didn’t. He was hard when he got going, but he was a pussy beforehand. No real bottle. He flicked his gaze to the skank standing at my shoulder and I guessed that’s who would kick off first. I smashed the prick in the throat before he got the chance. Point of my elbow bone right in his voice box; fucker couldn’t even scream.
Toad flinched, but not far enough.
My forehead cracked him on the bridge of his nose.
He went back, hands cupping the blood spewing into his palms. I hoofed him in the bollocks.
I said the bastard was hard. He didn’t go down, but that was only a minor setback. I grabbed him by his skull and battered my knee into his chest, then used his head like a bowling ball, fingers inserted in his nostrils to swing him down and round and across the floor.
Don’t know if that was him out of the fight or not, ’cause I immediately went up the stairs and into the room they called the Gods. I’d filled my hand on the way up, the Browning feeling like a clumsy and unfamiliar weight. Shouldn’t have, I used to carry one all the time, but it had been a few years. It was a single action pistol, with thirteen 9mm rounds in the magazine, and I had the hammer cocked back, the safety catch on, ready to go.
There were five of them up there. Four punks and the biggest arsehole of them all. The one in the middle was Raymond Gardner. Or Gardy to friends and foes alike. I showed him the barrel of the Browning so he could see the black hole that was gonna suck him into oblivion.
“Heard you were expecting me, Gardy?”
He had to take a spliff out of his mouth to speak.
“Alec Duncan, me ol’ pal,” he grinned. “How long’s it been? Fuck me, must be three years.”
The Browning never wavered from his skull. Give him his due, he didn’t look bothered. As if having a gun pointed at him was a daily occurrence. Maybe it was these days.
His pals didn’t look as confident, they were antsy, trying to move away without making it obvious. I read Gardy’s face; wasn’t difficult, being the proverbial open book.
“Pity me an’ you can’t be friends again. You see the wankers I have round me nowadays? Not like it was back in the Regiment.”
The Regiment was a whole lifetime away for both of us now. His if I didn’t get my way.
“Things were different back then,” I told him.
“Dunno about that. I’ve still got the same enemies. Micks and ragheads.”
And at least two Scots, I wanted to add. Me and Billy Reid.
“I’m here about my cousin Billy.”
Gardy came round a pool table, putting his head even closer to the barrel of my gun. He sat on the edge of the table, folded his arms like he was fuckin’ Simon Cowell offering scathing criticism. He put on a passable Glaswegian accent. “It’s the difference between Bing Crosby and Walt Disney. Bing sings but Walt disnae.”
“The fuck you on about?” Not that I hadn’t heard that old joke about a million times.
“I’m speaking in metaphors,” Gardy said.
“You’re talking shite,” I corrected.
He smiled, thumbed the spliff back between his teeth. I wanted to remind him that the no smoking ban also applied to toking on a joint, but that would have just made me look like an idiot. Holding an illegal handgun on someone wasn’t viewed favourably by the law either. I let it go.
Gardy was a wiry fucker, always was. In the last three years since I last saw him he’d put on the beef, but it was all round his neck and shoulders. He still looked like an ex-squaddie. Right down to the short hair, the rubber-soled boots. He was still dangerous. The difference was I was clean, but he was wired. The gange wasn’t the only thing he’d taken judging by the twitching round his eyes. I glanced, saw white residue from a couple lines on the pool table rim. Coked up. Speed maybe. I’m not that up on the different substances people snort up their noses these days. Didn’t care for them or the people that peddled them. I had to hang with Billy only because he was blood.
“Billy says he owes you money,” I said.
“Like I said, Bing sings—”
I got it this time. Billy had reneged on paying his supplier.
“You can’t get blood from a stone,” I reminded him.
“It’s all about the ways and means, Alec, me ol’ pal.”
“You wanted him to steal money from our grandmother, you bastard.”
“She’s eighty-two, ain’t she? What does she need with a heap of cash?”
I flicked off the safety. Almost shot the prick there and then.
His friends had made themselves scarce, backing off into the corners, still trying to look like hard-cases, but failing. I wondered if any of them were carrying; if they were they weren’t making a move yet. I kept the gun on Gardy. Like stink on shit as they say.
Gardy studied the end of his spliff. Looked like it had gone out. Told me he was blowing instead of sucking. Bad sign; meant he wasn’t afraid of me or the gun. That’s what comes of coke, makes you feel indestructible, I heard.
“Billy owes you no nothin’. That’s it, Gardy. Leave it at that an’ we stay good ol’ pals.”
Gardy shook his head.
“Can’t be done, me ol’ china.” The fuck had he switched to a cockney accent for? That was Gardy, though. He used to be good fun, would have us all grinning at his Sean Connery or Billy Connolly, his Tommy Cooper or Prince Charles. I used to laugh with him, now I was laughing at him. I saw now that he used the accents and mimicry cause he just wasn’t happy with the skin he was in. Was why he’d reinvented himself from a Special Forces soldier to a drug-peddling smackhead, I supposed. Pathetic bastard.
Then there was me. I was also once an SAS bad-arse. Now look at me. Running around like a common criminal, defending someone who I should’ve smacked round the head a few times for even thinking of burgling my granny’s bungalow. Give Billy his due, he’d come to me before he did it. Made me wonder what would have happened if I hadn’t been in town, though. I was there protecting one deadbeat from another.
Gardy jutted out his chin, lips tight on his teeth as he looked me up and down.
“You’re lookin’ fit, Alec. What are ya doin’ these days?”
“Hod carrying,” I said. “Building site over Yorkshire way.”
“Fuckin’ labouring?”
“Carrying bricks beats carrying shit.”
“Depends on your perspective. See, the shit pays better. Come to work for me, Alec. I’ll let Billy’s debt go.”
“Kiss my arse.”
“Not my style. I’ve kicked plenty in my time.” He laughed. “Kicked yours once, as I recall.”
He had too. Gave me a right leathering. But that was then.
I lowered the Browning.
“Got a deal for you,” I said.
“Shoot,” he said.
Maybe I should have, but I’d a point to prove.
“Ooh, bad choice of word, eh?” he grinned. “What I meant was—”
“I know what you meant. Me an’ you, we get it on. I win, Billy’s debt is clear.”
“What do I get outa the deal?”
I lifted the gun. “You get to stay on living.”
Gardy stuck the spliff back between his lips like it was a cheroot. Said, in his best Clint Eastwood, “You gonna use that gun or whistle Dixie?” He laughed. “Where? When?”
“Right here right now, if you want?”
He shook his head. “Where’s the money in that? I’m a fuckin’ businessman these days, Alec. Don’t fight for nothin’, you know.”
He glanced round his four pals. “Which one of you pricks thinks Alec can take me?”
They all grumbled out uneasy laughter. Like, what the fuck were they gonna say?
“Put a ton on me, lads,” he said. “I win, I take the pot. Four hundred should do it. It’ll cover Billy’s debt.” He squinted up at me. “You want to put up a wedge, Alec?”
“I carry bricks, not cash.”
Somehow I got the impression that Gardy’s pals weren’t too happy about putting up the stake, not when it looked like a sure winner for their leader. But it was an out for them, a way of getting back into his good graces. They counted bills on to the corner of a pool table.
Gardy picked up the stack of twenties and tens. Riffled them under his nose. “I love the smell of cash in the morning.” He mangled the Apocalypse Now quote, but his pals laughed with him. I shook my head. Wondered where we were doing it, so I asked him.
“Where we doing it?”
“Out the back,” he said. “We’ll pick up the others on the way down, get a real purse going.”
I led the way down. Trusting Gardy was like I said earlier, like putting your head in a lion’s mouth, but I got the impression the money and the accolades meant more to him than if he cold-cocked me from behind like a bitch. Toad and the perfumed skank were nowhere to be seen and maybe that was a good thing. Blood spatters on the floor showed which way they’d gone. Into the pisser to clean up. Fuck ’em; I didn’t need any more enemies clamouring round me ’cause Gardy was dangerous enough for any man to contend with.
We went out through the back of the pool hall and down a flight of metal steps. The young gangstas followed us out, brave now that their vaunted leader was among them. They were all talking excitedly, dissing me behind my back. Telling Gardy to fuck me over real good, like they’d been raised in South Central LA instead of here in northern England.
There was a cobbled yard, dustbins, a shell of a car. Recognized it as an old Ford Escort like one my dad had back in the early eighties. Could’ve been the same one for all I knew ’cause someone boosted it from outside our house and we never saw it again. Couldn’t fathom how the car got here because the yard was fully enclosed by a high wall; maybe the car was here before the wall and they just built around it like it was a museum piece in need of protection. Right.
Gardy took off his shirt. Threw a couple of lightning-fast punches, danced like Ali for the crowd. They were all cheering him, money passing back and forward.
I put the Browning down on one of the bins. Took off my sweatshirt and piled it on top. Stood there in my vest like Bruce Willis. Some of the crowd shut the fuck up, ’cause I was a wiry bastard mesel. I shook the kinks out of my hands as I walked forward.
Gardy bounced on the balls of his feet.
I said, “Remember, I win, that’s it.”
“My hand on it,” he said, like I was going to fall for that old trick.
“Your word will do.”
“OK, we’ve a deal.” He turned to the crowd. “No one steps in. No one does nothin’, got it?” He got sounds of assent from them. “If Alec beats me, then that’s everythin’ over with. No one touches Billy Reid.”
I nodded at him. For old time’s sake.
“Rules?” he asked.
“You’ve seen Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid?”
He nodded. “I have.”
“Good,” I said and front-kicked him under the chin. As he picked himself up off his arse, hand massaging his jaw, I said, “You should’ve seen that one coming, Gardy.”
He smiled at me, blood trickling from between his lips like he was a vampire fresh from a virgin’s throat.
“Sneaky bastard,” he laughed. “That’s the way I got you the last time.”
“We’re square now,” I told him. “We start from scratch.”
“OK.” He came at me quick.
He punched me in my chest, then hooked at my head with a left. His knuckles scraped my skull but I was ducking. I sunk a dig into his guts. It was like punching a drum. I folded my arm, slammed him with my elbow, and that had more effect. He arched his back, got a hold on my face with both hands. Dug his thumbs into my eyes.
Could have tried to fight his hands off me, but while I was doing that he’d have demolished me. I rammed forward, hit my forehead against his. Kneed him in the bollocks. I’ve heard about guys on steroids; abuse makes their testicles shrivel. Maybe that was the case with Gardy ’cause he didn’t flinch, just came back at me with a knee of his own. Got me in the solar plexus and nearly knocked the wind clean out of me. But at least his thumbs were out of my eyes.
We rattled round the yard, grunting and swearing, trading punches and kicks, none of them landing too cleanly. The crowd moved with us, baying for blood. All of it mine, of course. One of them spat on me; would’ve broken his nose given the chance but Gardy wasn’t giving me a second. I grappled him and we both rolled across the floor, digging and clawing. We spilled apart. Someone accidentally on purpose stepped on my hand. I swung a kick at him from the floor, caught him on his shins and the prick jumped back. Then it was back to Gardy. We had a hold on each other, his fists twisted in my vest, mine in his mouth and on his belt. We used that prop to struggle back to our feet.
Gardy tried to bite my fingers and I jerked my hand free. We backed away a step. But that was all. Then we were back into it.
I looped a right over the top of him, hit him in the back of the neck. Tried for his mastoid with the edge of my hand, missed but nearly tore his ear off. He backed away, touching his lug-hole like it was a prized possession. “Fuck me,” he said.
I intended to.
I threw a punch at his windpipe.
Gardy stepped quickly to the side and caught my arm. Hand on wrist, hand on elbow. He rolled my arm, locked me tight, then pushed down on the joint. I felt a tendon rupture. Fuck me but it hurt. Gardy kept pressing, trying to give my arm a twoway hinge. I kicked my heel into his shins, and threw myself away. Nearly tore my arm out of its socket, but at least it wasn’t broken.
Gardy didn’t stop to think how I’d got away, just monopolized, coming after me while I was still off balance. He kicked me in the arse with the toe of his boot. Dunno if you’ve ever been kicked there for real, but it’s not the playful admonishment that most people think of. A blast of pain went right up my spine to the crown of my head. Then it went all the way back down again.
Could hardly stand.
Couple of Gardy’s pals were in my way and I grabbed at them to steady mesel. They shrugged me off, swung me round and Gardy planted his fist in my left eye socket.
Jesus! White light, a taste of metal in my mouth, pain like a son of a bitch.
They didn’t know it, but Gardy’s pals had helped me. Put me back on my feet and ready to give back everything I got. I jabbed Gardy in the mouth. Stuck a one in his gut, another in his ribs. He winced with every shot and I followed him. Palm under his chin, heel hooked round his knee in a judo trip.
Gardy wouldn’t be caught so easily; he hooked me under an armpit, swung round, got his hips under me and threw me with a judo hip-toss of his own.
Flat on my back there was no escape from the heel he stamped on my chest.
It was like having the stuffing forced out of every orifice in my body. I must have yelled in agony, ’cause Gardy looked like he was pleased with himself and tried again. This time I was ready for him and I swept his leg over me with both arms. He straddled me, looking down at me with the red-rimmed eyes of a mad bull. I punched him in the balls.
Maybe he wasn’t on steroids after all, or my knee hadn’t been on target last time, because the result here was the absolute opposite. He collapsed down on me, knees folding, and he spewed on the floor over my left shoulder. I got a hot and sticky wash all down my neck, and that kind of galvanized me to get the fucker off me. I grabbed his precious ears, twisting his head with them as if they were handlebars and Gardy went over on to his back. I rolled with him, let go with one hand so I could punch his face to mush. I landed one, two, going for the third when someone grabbed my bicep. Couldn’t help the natural reaction, I glanced up at who it was and got a smack in the teeth for my trouble.
Toad was back.
Bad Toad, bad.
I was going to swarm up, give him some, when I was surprised to hear Gardy shouting, “The fuck you doin’? Didn’t you hear what I said?”
He wasn’t shouting at me.
To be fair Toad hadn’t been there when Gardy set the rules. But he got the message. Cowed, Toad let go of me and I swung back to Gardy, my fist cocked.
He laughed through his split lips. “Fuckin’ hell, Alec, you’ve learned a thing or two since we last fought.”
“Yeah,” I agreed. “How’s about this?”
Forgot about the punch and dropped my elbow instead. Smashed his head into the floor. Three times I got him just like that, and I could see his eyes rolling in his head. Wasn’t finished though, so I bunched my fist, hit him again, seen his lips split under my knuckles. Rearing back again, I got ready, fist angled at his windpipe. Killer blow now that his throat was an open target.
Gardy’s arms were by his sides. Not fighting now.
I pressed the fist on his chest. Not to hold him down but to help mesel up.
Standing over him, I looked around the crowd. They were like rabid things, all panting, their fingers twitching: the pack mentality about to let loose its fury. I coiled my hands, ready to give them as much as they brought.
“Alec won.”
I blinked down at Gardy. While I was distracted he could’ve got me in the bollocks or stamped my knee out of joint. He was just lying there, breathing heavily, wearing a whimsical look on his face as if he’d just had the best shag of his life.
I held out my palm for him, and he took it. I hauled him to his feet. He wouldn’t release my hand and for a second I tensed, waiting for him to try and pull me on to a head-butt.
“Take it easy, me ol’ mucker,” he said, his voice kind of John Lennon mixed with the Gallagher brothers. Don’t know what he was going for this time. “You beat me, fair and square.”
He shook hands with me, then let me go. He patted me on the shoulders for all to see. Friends again.
“We were good once,” he said, touching his swollen ear. “Let’s get back to the old days, huh?”
“Can’t, Gardy. Not when you’re into this shite.”
“All I’ve done is traded one pile of shit for another, Alec.”
“You’re right there.” I stood back, massaging my elbow. I looked at my old sergeant. He’d taught me well, made me the bad-arse I’d turned out. He was the one who’d given me the physical tools to defend my family. Couldn’t help but feel he hadn’t been trying his hardest to break my arm. Once over he’d have done it in a second. He winked at me.
“You won, Alec. A deal’s a deal in my book. Billy’s back in the black.”
I stared at him, mindless of the crowd round us all looking on in dumbfounded silence.
Gardy turned to his mates. “He won. Got it? Now give him the purse.”
“Don’t want the money. Just knowing that Billy’s safe is enough.”
He winked again, leaned in close to my ear. “Take the purse and you can give it to your ol’ pal Gardy when we meet for a drink later.”
Couldn’t help but grin at the sneaky twat. Made himself a heap of cash, paid off Billy’s debt and got himself a whole lot more. And he’d done it in a way that bought me some respect and didn’t dent any of his. I winked back at him. “You’re on. The local, yeah?”
“Got it.”
Maybe I misjudged him. Maybe he wasn’t as far gone to the dark side as I’d assumed.
Nah, he was still a bastard.
I pulled my sweatshirt on. Tucked the Browning into my belt. Picked up the large stack of notes someone had put on the next bin along.
When I looked back, Gardy and the others had all filed back up the stairs. Probably there’d be a celebratory spliff passed around in the Gods when he got back up there. I felt like it would be good to have a pint with my old friend, without the baggage of all the bullshit that life had served us lately.
I didn’t go back through the pool hall. Didn’t want another runin with Toad or the perfumed skank; I was hurting too much. I climbed up on the bonnet of the Ford Escort, boosted mesel over the high wall and into a narrow alley running alongside the hall. Walked out, across the street towards the Spar shop.
Billy’s Golf was still in the shadows. Some get-away driver, I thought, has he fallen asleep?
The engine was purring, but that was it. Couldn’t hear any snoring.
“Billy? Billy.” I shot forward, yanking open the driver’s door. “Oh, shit, Billy!”
He was dead.
Didn’t need to be a doctor to tell. His head was arched back over the headrest. Mouth open, full to the brim of spew. His left arm was splayed out across the gear stick, sleeve rolled up. Rubber tube hanging loosely round his bicep, bloody smear on his arm, among all the other scabby wounds where he’d jabbed needles. There was a hypodermic syringe lying in the foot-well, a burnt spoon and lighter, all the paraphernalia. To think I’d just fought the battle of my life for things to end this way. What good had I done?
I stood there. My little cousin, Billy Reid. Seventeen years old, a junkie for the last four. Dead.
“Billy, you stupid dumb fuck.”
I massaged my elbow. Shook my head. Looked down at the forlorn waste of a young life. Why’d he do that? Obviously he didn’t trust me to make things right. Or he didn’t trust himself. Maybe Gardy wasn’t the only one unhappy with the skin he was in.
Me neither if the truth was told.
Only one consolation I could think of: my granny’s house wouldn’t be burgled by Billy now.
The day was saved.
Who dares wins?
Yeah, right.
Some fucking hero me.