Deadfolk (4 page)

Well, I reckon I turned about hundred different shades of white and red for the next few seconds. No youngun had addressed us like that since I were one meself. And even then it had been a case of me smacking the cunt in the teeth before he could do it again. But now…Well, they was just younguns. It’d be wrong to smack a youngun in the teeth. I shut the window and went back to the bed.

‘Oh, Blake.’

‘Don’t worry, Sal.’

‘About what?’

‘What they’m sayin’. Fuckin’ liars.’

‘Don’t matter, Blake.’

‘Liars. I ain’t no bottler.’

‘I know.’

‘Ain’t no fuckin’ bottler.’

‘I know.’

‘Ain’t no bastard fuckin’ bottler.’

‘Blake…’

‘Ain’t—’ Sal led my hand under her gown and pressed it into her tit. That always had the effect of calming us down, then geeing us up again in a different way. But it weren’t working this time. I didn’t fancy her. I couldn’t. How could I feel her up when she were still warm and wet from Baz Munton? ‘Don’t matter, Sal,’ I says, getting up again.

‘Come on, Blake. I’ll just pop in the shower.’

‘Ain’t in the mood. And besides, I gotta be at work soon.’

Reckon there ain’t much you needs telling about the Munton clan. Unless you growed up in the woods you’ll have heard all about em. Mangel ain’t ever seen such a family as them besides emselves. There were talk once of erecting a statue of the three boys and their late pa right in the middle of town. I hope they does and all. Give folks summat to lob things at. Cos sure as bollocks there ain’t no one round here touched a real Munton and lived to brag about it down his local. Except meself, course. But that were Mandy Munton, who were a bird. And I don’t brag about that.

Anyhow, I were thinking such thoughts and smoking a fag as I drove townward. Your Capri 2.8i is worth a ton-thirty on a long straight and seven and half seconds up to sixty. On top of that it has power steering and manages twenty-eight mile to the gallon. That’s what your manual says anyhow. Mine weren’t quite like that. Power steering were fucked, fuel injection were shot, and like I says just now, the exhaust were starting to blow. But I still loved her.

I parked her behind the Paul Pry and strolled on in. Half five, it were. Nathan were reading a paper, propping himself up by the elbows on the bartop. He stood up when he seen us. ‘All right, Blakey,’ he says.

‘All right, Nathan the barman. What you doin’ readin’ that for?’

‘What? The paper? Most folks reads it so’s they can stay in touch with local events, Blake. And thass why I reads it an’ all.’

‘Aye, but difference between you an’ most folks is you knows it all already. Feller can’t fart in this town without you gettin’ wind of it, so to speak.’

‘I wouldn’t say that, Blake.’

‘I would. You might as well write the bastard paper.’

He made a sort of growling sound. Not that he were comparing himself to a wild animal. Nathan weren’t by any stretch a physical man. He were simply making it be known that he felt uncomfortable talking openly on such matters.

‘Usual, is it?’ he says.

‘Aye,’ I says, though he’d already half pulled the pint. You had to feel sorry for him in a way. Things must get boring when there’s nothing you don’t know. ‘Woss on special today?’ I says.

‘Pie.’

‘Again?’

‘Aye.’

‘All right, do us pie and chips then.’

‘Be ten minutes.’

I gave him a note and he handed back some coins. It were just enough for some fags and a bottle of milk later on. I pocketed it, wondering why I were always skint even though I spent most of me time working in a bar and not drinking in it. Then I remembered that it were payday and cheered up a bit. I turned the paper round and tried to read it. It were the
Mangel Informer
. I didn’t get very far with it. Every page were filled with what passed for news in Mangel them days. If they only knew, I thought, shaking my head. If they only knew what real news were. How could I give a badger’s arse about someone landing a twenty-pound barbel in the River Clunge when the Muntons was doing their best to ruin us?

Your feller off the street might be able to take in his stride accusations such as I had suffered. Being called a bottler weren’t the worst thing that could happen, they might say. Better than having your bollocks lopped off with a rusty pair of shears anyhow. That’s what your average feller’d say. But he ain’t a doorman, is he? He’s a bricky or a milkman or…works down the slaughtering yard—summat that don’t demand the total respect of his public. For me—head doorman of Hoppers Wine Bar & Bistro—losing your knackers is the easy bit. Least no one can see you ain’t got no knackers.

‘Eh, Nathan.’

‘Aye, Blake?’ he says, shoving a plate in the microwave.

‘You heared things about us?’

‘Well, I reckon not,’ he says, walking up to the bar and smoothing down his tash. As tashes go there weren’t much to smooth down. It were not unlike a centipede taking a nap on his upper lip. A far cry from my own effort, which were wide and thick and filled the gap between nose and lip quite amply. In my opinion if a man can’t grow a proper tash he’s better off shaving. But nobody’s opinion counted for shite with Nathan except his own. ‘No, I reckon not. Only that thing with the Muntons. Baz Munton in particlier.’

Like I says—no one can see you ain’t got no knackers. But every bastard with two ears knows if a doorman’s courage is called into question.

Asking Nathan didn’t prove nothing, mind. Just cos he knew, don’t mean everyone knew.

‘All right, Nathan. Ta.’

I got started on me pie. It were all right. About as all right as you got at the Paul Pry anyhow. But I couldn’t enjoy it. I couldn’t enjoy nothing while that big yellow question mark were hanging over my head. Even the lager tasted flat. Life had lost its flavour. And far as I could see there were only one way to get it back. Show folks that my bottle were intact. Show em that no bastard—not even a fucking Munton—could keep us down.

I polished off the scran and sank another pint. Some of the taste were coming back now. That’s what happens when you makes a decision. Life’s flavour comes back. Only some of it, mind. You don’t get the whole lot until you’ve done what you decided on doing. But that wouldn’t be long in coming. I looked at me watch.

Time for work.

That’s the good thing about decisions. Soon as you makes one you feels better. Never occurs that doing what you’ve decided is another matter entirely, and liable to have you feeling bad all over again when you fucks it up.

‘All right, lads,’ I says, in my fatherly way. It gives em a nice feeling as they goes in, gets em in a good mood so they don’t mind splashing out a bit at the bar. This were just one of the little touches that had made me head doorman of Hoppers Wine Bar & Bistro.

Only it didn’t seem to be working on this occasion. There was five of em, all underage. By rights they ought to have been kissing my boots for letting em in. But no. All I got were sniggers and smirks.

But I couldn’t let it get to us. There was other punters to think about.

‘Lookin’ lovely tonight, ladies,’ I says not five seconds later. And I’ll tell you what—they
was
lovely. This were one of the things I loved about my job. You got to act like the host at a posh party, winking at all the birds and patting em on the arse as they frolics past. And they loved it.

Usually.

‘Get yer filthy hands off us,’ the one says. I’d seen her around ever since she’d sprouted tits and were thus old enough to get into pubs. She were normally the friendly sort, full of winks and licking lips and rubbing herself up against us when the crush were on.

‘All right, doll,’ I says, taking it in my stride, me being a doorman and all. ‘No harm done, eh.’

‘I seen what you done, dirty old bastard.’ This were a different one now. All three of em was facing us, pointing at us with their pushed-up bosoms. ‘You molested her.’

‘Hey,’ I says, still smiley of face and sing-song of voice. ‘Calm down, right? Juss me bein’ friendly, ennit.’

‘Friendly? Blinkin’ over-friendly if you asks me.’ This were the first one again—the one whose arse I’d molested. ‘I’ve a good mind to…’

I stopped. A crowd of punters had formed behind em, laughing and rubbing hands together like it were bonfire night and I were Guy Fawkes. I thought I spotted Legs amongst em, but it were hard to tell. No, couldn’t have been him. Legs would have backed me up. I were starting to feel a mite dizzy, truth be told. All I wanted were for them birds to shut it and move on. Then the crowd would piss off and things’d get back to normal. I were only doing me job after all. I were only meeting and greeting and making punters happy.

‘Call the pigs, Kel. Folks like him needs puttin’ away and castratin’. If
we
don’t do summat about it he’ll go off and molest someone
else
.’

‘Reckon he’s one o’ them preverts, Kim?’ she says, looking at us and squeezing her lower lip between finger and thumb. ‘Here, go inside an’ call the coppers for us, will you?’

‘Call em yerself. You he raped, ennit?’

The crowd were still growing. It weren’t a crowd no more, it were a mob. Seemed half the town were coming down to see old Blakey in his darkest hour. Meanwhile I’m stood there, hands behind back. What else could I do? I were a doorman. My job were to welcome them what’s welcome and send the others on their way. Only no one were interested in coming in. They was all coming out onto the street. They all wanted to watch me and Kel and Kim and the other lass.

‘Go on, Kim. I ain’t feelin’ all right an’ I don’t reckon I’d make it to the phone.’

‘Fuck off. Standin’ up, ain’t you?’

‘
Please
, Kim. Go on.’

‘Woss goin’ on here then?’ It were hard to tell whose voice this were. It came out of the crowd, from amongst the laughs and hoots and catcalls. But in my heart I knew straight off who it were. It were one of them voices that’d been fucking with my head every night of late—winding us up and calling us names and telling us things I’d rather not have heard.

It were Baz Munton.

And suddenly he weren’t in the crowd no more. Suddenly his fat face were looming up behind Kel. Or Kim. I forgets the which. ‘This cunt botherin’ you, ladies?’

‘Hiya, Baz.’

‘Hiya, Baz.’

‘Oh, hiya, Baz.’

‘He molested her,’ says Kim. ‘Gettin’ the pigs onto him, ain’t us.’

‘Oh aye? Touched her up, did he?’

‘Aye, grabbed her arse. Tits an’ all.’

‘Deary me. You ain’t joshin’ us?’

‘I ain’t. Gospel truth, it is.’

Baz shook his head slowly, eyes on mine. ‘So he touched up an innocent child?’ he says. ‘That what you’re sayin’, Kel? Grasped her pure white flesh and turned it to his own mucky ends?’

Kim looked at Kel.

‘Aye,’ says Kel, her face screwed up with the pain of it all. When the tears started rolling, they took half her slap with em, leaving dirty great stripes down her face. ‘He used me.’

You might be thinking I were just standing there like a cunt, taking it all. Well, that’d be about right. But you tell us, what were I supposed to do? I searched the crowd for Legs, but I couldn’t see him no more. Maybe I hadn’t seen him the first time. All them faces looked the same to me. Eyes dark and burning, lips hanging open, gagging for my blood.

But I had to say summat. I were a doorman. ‘Come on, ladies and gents. Show’s over, ennit. Move along now. Come on—’

‘Are you tellin’ us to fuck off?’

‘Hey now, Baz. There’s no need for—’

‘Is you? You is, ain’t you. You molest these innocent birds here, an’ then you tells us to fuck off. Well make us. Make us fuck off, Blakey Boy. Come on.’

He pushed me hard, slamming us into the brick wall. I were still standing, but he’d knocked the wind clean out of us and I tasted blood in my mouth. ‘Leave it, Baz,’ I says, searching inside for the old Blake who used to take shite off no one. I ran the tip of my tongue against me lower lip, feeling where I’d bit it.

He went to take a swing at us, stopping his fist a few inches from my eye. But it were too late. I’d flinched. I’d flinched fairly out me skin. And I knew how that looked to the onlooking horde. He came up close and spoke low, so as only I could hear. ‘I heared things about you. Things you wouldn’t want these good folks to hear. Things you wouldn’t want coppers to hear neither, seein’ as these things I heared makes you a killer. Wife killer an’ all. Reckon to that, eh? Eh?’

His breath smelt of fag butts and old sewerage pipes. But I’d rather smell that than hear what he were saying. I kept quiet and looked sideways.

‘I’m the last cunt you wants on yer back. Know why, Blakey Boy? I’ll tell you why. Because I hates you. I hates you and I’ll see to it that you goes down. An’ go down you will. Maybe tomorrer. Maybe in a few year. We’ll see.’

He patted us on the cheek and moved off. I dunno if he went inside or not. I didn’t notice anyone go in or out after that. I couldn’t look at their eyes. I knew that they’d be looking back at us, see. And I knew what they’d be thinking. After a while I fucked off for a bit. If I can’t see who’s going in and out what’s the good in standing there? I walked round the back, smoking and kicking pebbles about. I knew I were out of order. I were a doorman. What kind of a doorman abandons his door? It weren’t right, but I couldn’t hack it back there. Maybe that were it.

Maybe I weren’t up to being a doorman no more.