The Business (44 page)

Young girls were often seen as frightening, intimidating, older men often wanted a woman they could use without any preliminaries. They wanted to rent a hole, no more and no less. If they wanted a big fucking song and dance they could go home and fuck their old ladies. The whole attraction of a prostitute was that the man concerned did not feel under any obligation to make the experience good for all concerned. And thank fuck for that much anyway!

Shove it in, shove it out, shove the money in her direction. That was Imelda Dooley’s mantra. Although she had her regulars, of course, and she was willing to play whatever game they wanted her to.

Imelda was quietly rocking now. She could feel the buzz as it enveloped her. She was smiling, the real smile that only heroin could tempt her to produce. The dope had hit the spot, and she was now so relaxed and laid back that she would not have been surprised if her body had dissolved into the furniture around her. This was the feeling she spent her life trying to re-create. Since her first hit, she had been chasing that same high. Only it rarely saw fit for a return match. Today though, it had overwhelmed her, and she sat there enjoying the intense pleasure it brought with it. She was really enjoying the initial high and, once the euphoria wore off, she would get herself another drink.

As she gazed around her she saw a few of the girls that walked the market with her, and waving to them half-heartedly, she saw them raising their eyes heavenward at her drugged condition. But she didn’t care, she was thrilled to be where she was, saw the dirty old pub as a place of wonderment. As she came down a few minutes later she began to concentrate once more on the earn.

Imelda had wraps all over the place, she was in possession of more wraps than Liz Taylor and Doris Day combined. Except her wraps were very small, easily hidden, and gave the owner of them a feeling of confidence and expectation. She would not be wearing them over an evening dress at any time in the near future.

The knowledge that she had more than enough brown to fulfil her needs gave her a real feeling of calmness, made her feel as if she could take on the world if she wanted to.

Imelda scored repeatedly every day; even though she had more than enough for her daily needs, she liked to know she had an overabundance of brown to hand.

Since the first time she had been detained at Her Majesty’s pleasure, she had learnt the value of methadone and had seen her addiction as a medical condition when she needed to. But methadone was not for her, she hated to be without the real thing. She loved the way she was now, at peace with the world around her.

The pub was getting busy now. It was filling up quickly, the men who were arriving were all out on the gatter, looking for cheap drinks, cheap conversation and even cheaper female company. None of the men around her would ever win any awards for good looks, but then again if they could pull a bird without the aid of paper money and alcohol they would not be of any use to her anyway. She liked the warmth that was enveloping her, liked the camaraderie she encountered. One day a week this place was rocking. Still, she always kept herself to herself, she liked her own company. Unlike a lot of the women she encountered on the bash, she did not feel the need to justify her existence by surrounding herself with women of her ilk. She liked her life as it was, a lot of the women on the pavement were there to subsidise their kids, a man, or a habit. And, in extreme cases, all three.

Imelda saw herself as far superior to them because she only ever worked by herself, for herself. She dressed well and when she ate, which was not always a regular occurrence, she ate well. When she blew the needle it was always with the best gear she could locate. She had read in a book once, while banged up in Holloway, that pure heroin was addictive, but not really that harmful. It was what the fucker was cut with that caused most of the damage. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle had been a skaghead, and he had done all right for himself. Sherlock Holmes was a cokehead in the books, she had read them in nick and had discussed them with her drug counsellor. But she did not see herself as a junkie as such. She did not use jellies, never had and never would. She knew that they were the cause of many an amputation and she liked to be in possession of her arms and legs, they suited her lifestyle.

A drink was placed on the table before her and she looked up expectantly. She was not surprised to see the pub landlord winking at her. He liked her; she knew that was because she was always alone, quiet and respectful, and he liked to get a quick feel when the opportunity arose. That was not often, however, his wife being a heavy-set lass from Lancashire with huge breasts and a stomach that was already determined to stroke her knees sooner rather than later. She kept one eye on her husband and the other eye on the tills, she didn’t trust the barmaids either. But once a week she visited her sister in Islington, and her old man, along with the barmaids, made the most of her absence.

Imelda smiled at him, and picking up the large vodka and tonic he had delivered to her table, she took a large gulp.

‘There’s plenty more where that came from, Mel. You enjoy it, lass.’

‘I intend to, Ronnie.’

He grinned once more, thrilled at the prospect of a bit of strange. She was a nice lass was Imelda, despite all the rumours about her being a murdering bastard.

She was a quiet sort, never caused any trouble for anybody as far as he had seen, and she plied her trade with a dignity that was lacking in the majority of the brasses who frequented his establishment on a Friday evening. She was a bit ragged round the edges, bless her, but then as his old mum always said, you got what you paid for in this life.

As Imelda drank her free drinks, she was pleased at how the evening was panning out. She was not really someone who liked the limelight, she preferred to ply her trade in the anonymity of Shepherd’s Market. But once in a while she liked to be in the warm, liked to be in company, and liked to know that she was still attractive enough to get a few perks. As she relaxed back into her chair she was unaware of the young man who had been observing her since she had arrived.

Kenny was fascinated by her, he had finally tracked his mother down, and he was enjoying seeing her in action. She was something to watch, from her false smile to her carefully painted fingernails, she looked the epitome of an old brass. She had covered her scars with foundation, but they were still evident to anyone who knew what they were looking for. Kenny thought she was definitely a bit weird, he could see that she had no kind of connection to the world around her. He almost felt sorry for her. She was sad really.

He had felt an urge to see her for himself after Jordanna had accidentally come across her because he had known that he would not be able to rest until he had gazed upon her in person. She was exactly how he had envisaged her, and he understood now why Jordanna had been so devastated. For Imelda it had to be like looking in a mirror, a mirror that showed her as she had looked twenty years earlier. Whereas, on Jordanna’s part, it must have been fucking terrifying to see what could happen to you if you weren’t careful. His mother looked like a fucking poor man’s Diana Dors.

Kenny watched her as she looked around her once more, saw her give him the once-over but, unlike his sister, his mother’s ignorance of his closeness, his identity, did not bother him. He was quite happy for the moment to be like David Attenborough, to just observe her in her natural habitat. He was amazed that, even though he recognised her, knew her, he did not remember her at all. Not now that she was in front of him anyway, the woman he remembered was nothing like the Real McCoy. He had a feeling that was probably a good thing. For all concerned. Especially him.

Chapter Nineteen

In the six months since Jordanna had seen her mother, she was a changed girl. Mary saw the difference in her granddaughter and she did not know how to make it better for her. She was like she had been all those years before, when her mother and her lifestyle had interrupted her life; she was distant, frightened, unable to relax for any length of time. She was also brasher, always on her dignity and argumentative.

It was as if her mother’s complete disregard for her as a person, as her own flesh and blood, had made her realise that she had been born without any kind of real thought. She knew now that she had never been wanted by anyone. She knew that her mother had carried her inside her for all that time, and still had never once cared about her. Even her granny’s love had only been incidental, she suspected that she had not relished her birth either.

It was as if her own mother’s lack of recognition as to who she actually was, had destroyed her confidence overnight. She was not the same; she was harder, had lost her softness, her kindness. She was almost like her mother in some respects and she seemed determined not to let anyone get past the guard she had suddenly acquired. Apart from Kenny, she would not let anyone get close to her, it was as if the knowledge that her own mother didn’t want her had convinced her that no one else ever would either.

For Mary it was soul-destroying to watch her granddaughter as, ironically, she turned into the person she hated most. Mary knew that Jordanna remembered what had happened the night Lance had died. She also knew that Jordanna had loved her mother unconditionally as a small child, even though she had been frightened of her, frightened of her lifestyle.

Unfortunately, Jordanna had never understood that heroin addicts didn’t have feelings or emotions like everyone else around them. Junkies thought they did, at first, thought the way they acted was normal, thought they were still normal. But they weren’t. They could never be normal again. It was the introduction to a new way of life, and if they embraced it, they would never be the same ever again. It was an illusion. They were slaves to a craving that nothing or no one could ever compete with.

Jordanna had been too small to understand that her mother had never cared about anyone in her orbit unless that person could be of some kind of use to her. Jordanna had only ever wanted her mother to love her, she had never understood that where Imelda was concerned, loving anyone had never been an option. Even Kenny had only ever been the recipient of his mother’s interest because he was a male. A big, handsome boy, Mel had seen him as something to show off to people. She saw him as an achievement because he wasn’t a girl.

Like a lot of women, Imelda saw the production of masculine children as some kind of trophy. Proof of her womanhood, something to perpetuate her myth of being a good mother. But she had walked away from him without a second’s thought when the need had arisen.

Imelda had always been strange, Mary could admit that to herself now. She had been tipped over the edge by Jordanna’s father, and his treatment of her. She had known for a long time that Imelda had never been right in the head. She had caused so much heartbreak and trouble for so many people, and she had not cared about any of it.

Her daughter was the last person she wanted in her life, and that hurt Jordanna deeply. Seeing poor Jordanna’s distress at her mother’s indifference to her only made Mary dislike her daughter even more. She had walked away from everyone, even her own children, without a backward glance. She was glad that Basil had put the hard word on her, she didn’t want her near the kids. In fact, if she could, she would be quite happy to erase her daughter from their life once and for all. But unfortunately she knew that her daughter would never really be out of her life, not until she was dead and buried and, unlike most junkies, that seemed to be a long time coming.

Imelda had a habit of turning up when you least expected it. Usually when she needed money; when she had come out of the big house and needed a sub. The worst of it was that when she had last seen her daughter, Imelda had not even enquired about how her own children were getting on. It was as if they didn’t even exist to her. She had not asked after them once. Mary had secretly been glad about that at the time, if she was completely honest. It saved her having to deal with her. She had given her a few quid and promptly forgotten about her. She had certainly not mentioned her to the two children that she had produced and then used as weapons against her, her own mother. That was the hardest thing for Mary to come to terms with, that Imelda used her own children to get whatever she wanted, and she used them without any kind of guilt. She knew that her children were all her own mother had left in her life, were all she really cared about, and she had still seen her own babies as nothing more than a bargaining tool.

Mary had turned her back on her sons, and she knew inside that she could be a hard case when she needed to be. But at least she had been given another chance at motherhood; she had Jordanna and Kenny and they were all she cared about now. They were all she needed in her life if she was honest.

Now though, through Jordanna, Imelda had once again infiltrated their lives, and Mary knew that no good would ever come of it. Imelda tainted everything she came into contact with; she was a pariah, a Jonah, and all she could do was wait and see what trouble her daughter was going to bring to her own children’s front door this time. Imelda had already brought them enough heartache, but it seemed that the avalanche of destruction had already begun and Mary did not know how to stop it. She was unable to prevent any of the usual destruction Imelda left in her path, because she didn’t know what to expect from her this time. She had never encountered the kids as grown-ups, and that was something she felt was about to bring its own set of problems. Especially where Kenny was concerned, he seemed fascinated with his mother, he was like all men where women were concerned. Fucking stupid. Kenny thought that he could cope with her and all she would bring with her. He was too young to see that she was always on the look-out for a new mug to manipulate, use, and that he fit the criteria down to the proverbial ground. Kenny was an accident waiting to happen.