That Summer He Died (29 page)

‘Who the hell is—’ James started to ask.

‘Arnie Oldfield,’ Alex said quietly. ‘The car park owner. Been at the cider. Leave the talking to me.’

Arnie finally reached them. ‘’Ello, Alex,’ he said, his voice husky.

‘All right, Arnie?’ Alex looked him up and down, any intimation of distaste masked by his shades. ‘Like the suit. Dressed to kill. Ladies better watch out tonight with a Romeo like you on site, eh?’

Arnie cackled, accepted a cigarette off Alex. He eyed it for a second, saying, ‘Not one of your funny cigarettes this, eh?’

‘Nah, nothing worse than tar and nicotine in that.’

Arnie slipped it into his breast pocket. ‘Save it for later, then.’

‘You do that.’

Arnie turned to face James. ‘Who’s this?’

‘Sorry,’ Alex said, placing a hand on James’s shoulder. ‘Forgetting my manners. This is James. Al L’Anson’s nephew. He’s down for the summer.’

Arnie nodded, digesting the information. ‘You got my money?’ he asked.

Alex produced a sealed envelope from his back pocket and handed it over. ‘All there. What we agreed.’

Arnie ran a long, grubby fingernail along the envelope’s flap and peeped inside. ‘Just checking,’ he said, resealing it and closing his fist around it. ‘Seen them films where it’s all torn newspaper inside. Not stupid, you know.’

‘There’s enough there to stop you fretting about where your next meal’s coming from for a while,’ Alex said.

‘Don’t fret over nothing no more,’ Arnie said, weighing the envelope in his hand. ‘Before Igot this, an’ all.’ His mouth curved into a jagged grin. James looked away; it was like the ‘before’ photo from a scare poster in a cosmetic dentist’s waiting room. ‘You’re not the only one with money-making schemes. Got a few of my own,’ crowed Arnie.

‘Sure you have,’ Alex said, not really listening. He glanced at James and announced, ‘Said we were meeting Plugs and Michaela in a few minutes, didn’t we?’

James didn’t know what Alex was talking about, had only met Plugs once, hadn’t even heard of Michaela. But he nodded anyway, playing along.

‘Better get going then, hadn’t we?’ Alex said.

Arnie’s hand snapped out like a dog’s jaw, latching on to Alex’s wrist. ‘Don’t reckon I’m telling you the truth, do you?’

‘’Course I do, Arnie,’ Alex said, slowly dislodging his fingers. ‘Bet you’ve got more schemes up your sleeve than I’ve had hot dinners.’

Arnie gobbed heavily on the ground between them. A fleck landed on Alex’s boot, clung there like cuckoo spit on a leaf.

‘Taking the piss now.’ His lips curled back over his teeth again and he inserted finger and thumb into his mouth, pinched at one of his teeth, and jiggled it where it lolled loose in the gum. ‘Get these fixed up like a film star, I will. Bright and white and brand new. Soon have plenty of money for that sort of thing.’ He waved the envelope in front of Alex’s face. ‘This is nothing, I’m telling you. Be able to use this to wipe my arse on soon.’

‘Yeah?’ Alex asked. ‘How’s that, then? Decided to sell the car park? Or you doubling the rate you charge for mowing people’s lawns? That it?’

Arnie shook his head. ‘Don’t need to. Not now. What I got’s worth ten times this patch of dirt and the gardening work put together.’ His eyes narrowed. ‘Not telling you, though,’ he added quickly. ‘You’re a sly one.’ He smiled. ‘That’s why I like you. You hate Murphy and them, same as me. But I still ain’t telling you where my money’s coming from.’

Alex started to turn away. ‘Well, Arnie, I gotta get moving now, but I’ll tell you what: you give us a shout when you get your money and you can take me out for a drink. That sound good?’

‘You wait,’ the other man shouted. ‘You’ll see. Who’ll be the crazy one then, eh? I’ll buy you that drink. Just you wait.’

‘Too many nights spent sucking off cider bottles,’ Alex commented quietly as they walked away. He laughed. ‘Fix his teeth? Apart from what I just gave him, he hasn’t got enough to buy a tube of toothpaste.’

They found Dan sitting on the edge of the stage, wedging the remains of a hot dog into his mouth.

A couple of fast-food stalls were already set up over to the right, just outside the marquee. James should have been hungry too, after all he’d thrown up. But the coke had killed his appetite stone dead.

‘All right, dog dick?’ Dan said to James with a wink. He wiped his hand across his mouth, smeared mustard over his unshaven jaw and grinned at Alex too. ‘The ’Raker’s packed out with trendy little hipsters down from London,’ he said. ‘That viral campaign of ours worked a treat. Dad can’t believe his luck. ’Specially the way things have been since Dawes got wasted. Might as well be chucking their money at him. Had to clean the till out twice already. Paranoid he’s gonna get robbed.’

‘Have to get him to have a word with the Council for us then, give us a medal for services to the local economy,’ Alex said. He lowered his shades and peered into Dan’s eyes.

‘Need a little kick-start?’

Dan tapped his pocket. ‘I’m sorted. Just get some food on board then I’m on it.’

Alex replaced his shades and stepped back. ‘Good. Need you keeping it together the next couple of hours.’

Dan rolled on to his side, screwed up his face and farted. ‘Jesus,’ he exclaimed appreciatively, listening to the reverberations echoing off the wooden stage. ‘Fuck the DJs. I’ve got all the tunes we need up my arse. Stick a mic up there and I’ll have ’em dancing till dawn.’

‘Reckon they might feel ripped off, if that’s all they get for their money,’ Alex said.

‘Yeah, yeah,’ Dan said, sliding off the stage to make way for a crew-cut roadie.

*

The first punters started arriving about an hour later. An hour after that and the queue was stretching, three bodies thick, past where Murphy and his crew were stationed.

James had already done two more lines and was still feeling wickedly high. He was standing next to Alex at the gate, watching the freaked-out procession eagerly swapping cash for a lick from a fluorescent stamp on the back of their hand. James’s own hands rested on the till. He wasn’t to move, that’s what Alex had said.

‘You’re my ears and eyes tonight. Half of these piss-heads, I don’t bloody trust. You see any of them trying to rip me off and you tell Dan to sort it out.’

So that was it, James had realised then. Alex was the boss here, James and Dan his watchdogs and enforcers.

From behind came the sound of feedback and drums, and the agonised wail of the first band’s front man. James turned and surveyed the writhing mass of pogo-ing bodies in front of the stage.

It was shaping up nicely. He was impressed. He’d had no idea how many people there’d be here. Or how well Alex would manage things. James grinned, his head now nodding in time with the bass line that had just started thumping out of the trance tent. He’d get in there soon. It was what his body needed. Screw the band. He was already way too wasted for that.

Just watch the money. Watch the money and don’t let Alex down.

Because he really didn’t want to. He liked it, being here, a part of this, with a job to do, a position in the hierarchy. He liked it all: the looks he got from other people, the respect, even the plastic ‘Crew’ pass around his neck.

Dan returned from the beer tent and handed over bottles of Bud.

‘Nice,’ he observed, gazing along the line of new arrivals.

‘Better carry on like this too,’ Alex said, ‘the amount of cash we’ve ploughed into it.’

‘It’ll be fine. Look at them. They’re gonna fucking love it.’

‘Yeah, but just remember that this is business, all right?’ Alex warned. ‘Right up till that queue’s passed through. Fun only comes after we’ve got the gate money tucked away safe and sound. Time for you to take over from James here,’ he told Dan.

‘Why, where you going?’

Alex waved his hand vaguely in the direction of the nearest beer tent. The sunlight was fading now, the electric lights on-stage powering up to take its place. Over to the right, pas the trance tent, the searchlight scanned the sky. Alex chucked a beer bottle into a roll bin.

‘You stick close to me,’ he told James. ‘Keep your eyes peeled for Murphy and the squad.’

They reached the beer tent and slipped inside. Bass bumped from the speakers roped over the bar. James followed in Alex’s slipstream, nodding hellos to the various people he’d met over the preceding weeks, forcing his way past strangers. Somewhere amongst these stunted conversations he lost track of Alex. One minute he was there, his shoulder pressed against James’s, the next James turned to speak to him only to find that Alex had been miraculously transformed into a red-haired girl with a spliff clamped in the crook of her fingers.

‘You got anything for me?’ she asked him.

She was stunning. He almost wished he did have something to give her, and certainly wished that Alex were still here so that he could be associated with him as the deal went down. Instead, James shrugged apologetically, aware that his reply would almost certainly signify the end of their conversation.

‘No,’ he said, then added, ‘sorry.’

‘Well,’ she said, looking around vaguely, already stoned, ‘have a suck on this then.’

He accepted the spliff gratefully, took a couple of hits and handed it back, saying, ‘Cheers.’

She threaded it between her lips, took a toke. Her words came out in a cloud, like smoke-signals: ‘Anyone dealing round here?’

‘Guy called Alex. Wears shades all the time.’

The smoke cleared from her face. ‘Yeah? You give us a shout if you find him?’

‘Sure,’ James said, finding himself smiling as they stared at each other. ‘Where will you be?’

‘Around. You’ll find me. . .’

James finally succeeded in clawing his way over to the bar. He stretched up on tip-toe and scanned the crowd for Alex: no joy. No sign of the redhead either. He sighed. All lucked out.

Boom.

He saw her hovering at the entrance to the tent, t-shirted and tanned, talking to a girl in a tie-dyed top and combat trousers, and another girl with her hair tied up in bunches, working some kitsch Toyko Lolita club look.

Suzie.

Definitely her. Even from this distance and in spite of the backdrop of dusk, there was no doubt. Short black hair, long eyelashes, mahogany eyes. Suddenly he was glad he’d lost Alex, pleased that Dan was stuck at the gate, out of sight.

James raised a hand, waved, then realised the futility of the action from this distance. He was about to push back through the crowd, surrender his coveted position at the bar, when Suzie changed his mind for him by entering the tent.

Her friends hung back. James craned his neck, tracked her movements, unblinking. Once in the crowd, she moved laterally, shifting in and out of his line of sight, edging along to the side of the tent where it was less frantic. Then her progress became swifter. Ultimate docking point: the far right of the bar. James began to elbow his way across for the interception.

She finally spotted him, apparently oblivious to her presence, nudging his way past a group of people, wading through the mass of arms grasping like tentacles for a grip on the bar. He turned as soon as he reached the bar, swept his gaze deliberately across her without recognition. . . only to swing it into reverse and settle it on her with what he hoped was a look of mild surprise.

He projected the pulling paradox: cool but interested. For a second, he thought it was going to backfire and Suzie was going to blank him, but he risked a smile and, thankfully, she returned it, pushed her way past the last few bodies huddled between them, and joined him at the bar. He felt her body pressed up close to his by the pressure of the crowd.

‘You’re sweating like a pig,’ she said.

He wiped his hand across his brow, lowered it and acknowledged the truth of this with a smile. ‘Sumo wrestler in a sauna,’ he said, glancing round the tent.

‘Comes with the territory, I guess.’ He noticed her studying his face. Her smile was gone.

‘What?’ he asked.

Suzie frowned. ‘You OK?’ There was a note of genuine concern in her voice.

‘Sure,’ he said.

Her voice sharpened. ‘Well, you look really wired.’

The antagonism jarred his mood. This wasn’t the way things were meant to be going. He didn’t want her thinking of him like that.

‘No,’ he said with a shake of his head, ‘not at all.’

She smiled sceptically and said, ‘Really.’

He shrugged. ‘I’m clean.’ He indicated the bar with his thumb. ‘Apart from beer.’

‘I’ll take your word for it.’

But it was obvious that she hadn’t. ‘You don’t believe me, do you?’

‘Seen you around with Alex and Dan a lot recently. Like you say, “goes with the territory”.’

‘And you disapprove?’

‘I disapprove.’

James noticed the people behind him starting to get aggravated by his failure to order. ‘You’ll have to tell me about it some time.’

‘Yeah, maybe I will.’

‘Anyway,’ he said, concentrating on projecting some lightness into his voice, ‘back to the beers. Can I get you something?’

‘No, it’s all right. I’m getting a round in.’

‘OK.’

She waved her hand and a barman came straight over and fixed her drinks.

‘You OK with those?’ James asked, as she turned away to face the crowd, three beer bottles gripped in her hands.

‘I’m fine.’ She moved off without another word.

Blown out, he watched her drift into the crowd, then turned and ordered a double shot of vodka and a bottle of beer, downed the vodka at the bar and moved through the crowd with the beer bottle raised to his lips.

‘Where the fuck have you been?’ Alex asked, materialising at his side.

‘Nowhere,’ James said. ‘The bar. Just getting served.’

‘Come on.’ Alex pushed his way out of the aggro-zone. ‘We’ve got work to do.’

He stationed himself in one corner of the tent. James stood at his side, like a sentry, and divided his attention between hawk-eyeing the crowd outside and monitoring Alex’s deals. First came faces James recognised, could match to names: Grancombe people. Tried and tested from the right pocket. Local price. Then later, as word spread from pill-popping tongue to pill-popping tongue, outsiders, strangers. Potential garbage from the left pocket. Rip off. Alex was subtle, a card sharp at work, all smiles, palmings and sleights-of-hand. An illusionist. Everyone’s best friend and no one’s.