Twelve Days of Winter (8 page)

Then another set: a different girl this time, with ginger hair and a bone-pale complexion. And another one.

Kirkhill flinched. ‘They. . . They’re not mine. Someone else must have put them on my computer . . . to discredit me! It was—’

‘You’re in the bloody photos! And according to this you’ve got about two and a half gig of assorted kiddie porn on there too!’

Kirkhill stammered, fidgeted, eyes flicking from George to the door and back again. ‘I never . . . it . . . no . . . you see—’

‘You know what they do with paedophiles in Oldcastle nick? Sometimes they get stabbed, sometimes they get the shit kicked out of them, and there was this one bloke got raped with a broom handle. Died a week later: internal bleeding.’

It was like watching a building collapse, one minute James Kirkhill was there, the next there was nothing left but tears and snot and trembling, pale skin.

His hand swirls through the icy water, nothing, nothing, nothing . . . hair. He grabs at it, holding firm. Pull her to safety and everything will be all right. Everything will be—

She comes to him, in his little suntrap, smiling that smile she knows he loves. The one that makes his trousers bulge. Danielle grabs his hands and spins him around. Laughing. ‘I’ve got some news for you.
Great
news.’ She stops twirling and places one of his hands on her belly. ‘Our love has caused a little miracle.’

No, no, no. . .

‘You have to get rid of it! You’re too young, your career. . .’ Sweat sticks his shirt to his back. ‘Think about the championships, the
team
!’

‘James?’ She backs off a couple of steps and stares at him, mouth a thin hard line. ‘We are
keeping
this baby, and
you’re
going to be the father, understand?’ A smile lights her face like a burning building. ‘We’ll be the perfect family. And if not, I’ll tell my mother. And she’ll tell the police.’

—holding her head beneath the water as she struggles and struggles . . . and then she’s gone, hanging lifeless beneath his fingers as that stupid bitch Sarah screams.

He lets Danielle go.

There will always be more where she came from.

Filling telephone boxes with soft-core pornography wasn’t a bad job in the height of summer, but on a freezing Tuesday night in December it was an absolute bastard. Brian reached into his armpit and dragged out the Blu-Tack – the only way to keep the damn stuff warm enough to stick − tore off a blob, pressed it onto the back of a postcard and fixed it above the phone. ‘S
EXY
S
ADIE
, T
HE
N
AUGHTY
L
ADY
’ with a photo of an attractive, big-boobed blonde in thigh-high leather boots, matching basque, and whip. Whoever the girl in the picture was, she was nothing like the old dear who actually answered the accompanying phone number. The
real
Sexy Sadie looked like Brian’s nan.

The phone box was already pretty crowded. There was Mr Aziz’s finest – Sexy Sadie, Busty Becky, and Naughty Nikki – and the usual collection of doms, subs, trannies, tarts and rent boys. Some had photos, others just the promise of personal visits and ‘unique services’. Brian tore them all down, leaving the box clean except for Mr Aziz’s doddery bunch of kinky pensioners, and Dillon Black’s girls.

Brian might be failing geography, but that didn’t mean he was stupid.

Hands jammed deep into his pockets, he nipped across the road, taking his chances with the traffic. The burger joint was busy: hordes of kids eating processed meat and fries, passing around cans of super-strength lager when the staff weren’t looking.

A couple of them nodded hello as he walked in.

Cameron Williams glanced up from his double cheeseburger, mouth hanging open – full of half-chewed mystery meat. ‘Oy, Wanker!’ Doing the hand gesture as well.

Brian ignored him. Cammy was a dick. But he was a
big
dick and answering back would just get Brian’s head kicked in.

So he joined the queue for till number three instead.

He shuffled forwards, staring at the menu like he didn’t already know it off by heart. Cheeseburger with onion rings, fries, and a large Irn-Bru – same as always. And, as it was bloody freezing outside, one of them deep-fried apple pie things as well.

Bob – his mum’s new bloke – slipped him a tenner to get something to eat while they went down the pub. Which was cool. Meant he’d have enough left over for a packet of fags and a couple bottles of extra strong cider. That’d round off the evening nicely.

He ordered his burger, then settled back against the counter to wait. Checking his pockets: still twenty or thirty postcards to go. That would take him all the way down to the railway station, where there was a nice little corner shop that didn’t mind selling booze and fags to thirteen-year-olds. The free market economy in action: that’s what his English teacher, Mr Kirkhill called stuff like this.

Brian knew
all
about the free market economy. He was a seasoned practitioner of its darker arts.

The food arrived and he carried it over to an empty table; it was way too cold outside to eat in some piss-smelling shop doorway. He took a big bite of burger and a shadow fell across the table.

A man’s voice, deep and gravelly: ‘Anybody sittin’ here mate?’

Brian shrugged and kept on eating, head down. Free country, wasn’t it?

The bloke plonked himself on the other side of the table and unwrapped whatever it was he’d ordered.

‘You’re Brian, right? Brian Calder?’

Brian shrugged again, still not looking up. ‘Depends, doesn’t it.’

‘Thought I recognized you. We’re in the same line of work, Brian.’

‘Oh aye?’ Why did the weirdoes always have to sit next to him?

He crammed in an onion ring, and took a peek at the nut-job: thin, pasty-faced, goatee beard, hooded eyes and wide forehead, hair like one of them teddy boys you saw on the Discovery Channel, and a diamond ear stud. Fingertip-length black leather jacket over broad shoulders, a Hawaiian shirt and shark’s tooth necklace. Big Johnny Simpson.

Oh Jesus. . .

Brian’s cheeseburger tried to choke him. He coughed, spluttered, forced it down. ‘Mr Simpson.’ He dragged on a smile. ‘Nice to see you.’ Oh Christ. . . ‘How’s Leslie?’

‘Fuck should I know? I’m only her father.’ Big Johnny took a bite of his not-so-happy meal. ‘Bloody kids: soon as they hit puberty they want nothin’ to do with their old man.’ Chew, chew chew.

‘Right. Right.’ Oh God. . .

Big Johnny polished off the burger, fries, and a large Diet Coke, then settled back in his plastic seat and stared at him. ‘You finished?’

Brian glanced down at his food – virtually untouched, the melted cheese all leathery-looking, the onion rings pale and greasy. ‘Not really hungry.’ Not any more.

‘Good.’ Big Johnny stood, towering over the table. Shite: he was
huge
. ‘Come on, you and me are goin’ to take a little walk.’

Brian’s newly dropped balls tried to claw their way back into his body.

Oh fuck. . .

Half past eight and the city lights made sparkling reflections in the Kings River. Brian had a perfect view of them, because Big Johnny was dangling him – head down – over the water. A truck rumbled by on the bridge above, pigeons cooed on the metal support beams. Brian clenched his arsehole tight shut. Don’t cry. Don’t puke. Don’t beg for Mummy. . . She’d be pissed by now anyway.

It was pitch-black under the Calderwell Bridge, just the red tip of Big Johnny’s cigarette, bobbing up and down as he spoke. ‘You see, Brian, people who screw with me end up in the water. If they’re lucky.’ He gave Brian’s ankles a shake. ‘You feeling lucky?’

‘It wasn’t me!’

‘Eh?’ Johnny puffed on his fag, for a bit. ‘
What
wasn’t you?’

‘Leslie – I didn’t do it!’

There was silence, then the shaking started again in earnest. ‘What about Leslie? What the fuck
didn’t
you do?’

‘Get. . .’ Change fell out of his pockets, splashing into the dark waters over his head. ‘Get her up the stick!’

‘SHE’S FUCKING PREGNANT?’

‘It wasn’t me!’

‘She’s fourteen!’

‘Please, I didn’t do it!’ Brian closed his eyes – this was it, he was going to die.

‘
Bastard
.’ Big Johnny let go.

Brian fell, screamed. THUMP – flat on his back, the footpath slamming the air from his lungs. Mummy. . . He lay there, spread-eagled, gripping the cold, dirty concrete.

Johnny grabbed him by the scruff of the neck and yanked him upright. ‘Who was it?’

‘I don’t know, it—’

Johnny backhanded him one.

‘I don’t know, I don’t!’ The words tasted of old pennies.

‘Then you find out, understand? You find out who’s been . . . 
touching
my little girl and you tell me, or I swear to God: you’re going for a fucking swim next time!’

Brian nodded, tears spilling down his face, top lip wet with snot.

Johnny took a couple of steps away, dragging on his cigarette like he was punishing it. ‘You know what? I need a drink. You need a drink?’ He flicked the dying gasp of his cigarette out into the cold, dark river. ‘Course you do.’

The Docker’s Arms was a shit-hole pub down by the Logansferry harbour: stained wallpaper, cracked and sticky linoleum, vinyl upholstery held together with silver tape. A CD player belted out hits by Jimmy Shand and His Band – accordion music to drink heavily by. The choice was Export or Lager. None of your fancy real ales, pilsners or alcopops here. Big Johnny got them each a pint of Export and a double whisky. The wrinkled old lady behind the bar didn’t seemed to care that Brian was only thirteen.

‘Mairi’s Wedding’ crackled out of the speakers as Big Johnny led the way to a table in the corner. He sat and watched Brian gulp down the whisky. Pulled out a packet of fags and lit one – looked like the old lady didn’t care about the smoking ban either. ‘You did no’ bad there. I’ve known grown men pee themselves when I dangle them.’

Brian managed a sickly smile and reached for his pint.

‘I hear you’ve been selling some stuff.’

Deep drink. Gulp. Nod.

‘Who’re you selling for? Dillon?’

‘Nah.’ Brian shook his head, the whisky burned in his half-empty stomach. ‘I . . . I get some blow off this bloke I know from Blackwall Hill, he gets it from someone in Dundee.’

‘Not any more.’ Big Johnny dug a rolled-up carrier-bag out of his leather jacket and dumped it on the table. ‘Now you work for me.’

Brian opened the bag and peered inside. A couple of ounces of blow and about two dozen silver paper wrappers. ‘I . . . I’ve never sold—’

‘Heroin’s like anything else: you hand it over, they give you the money. No problem. Like sellin’ tins of beans, or washing-up liquid. Only the mark-up’s way better.’

‘But—’

‘You’re no’ looking for another swimmin’ lesson, are you Brian?’

‘No! No, it’s fine, I can do it.’

Big Johnny smiled. ‘Knew you’d see it my way.’ He reached into his other pocket and pulled out a small leather bum-bag. ‘You put the money in here.
All
of the money. You get your commission when I get the cash. If you
ever
help yourself we go back to the bridge, only this time I’m taking a claw hammer with me. Understand?’

Brian nodded.

‘Good. Now finish your drink and get to work.’

The blow was easy enough to get rid of – half the kids in Brian’s class liked a spliff – but the smack was a different matter. It was too hardcore for Brian’s mates. Too
dangerous
. Which was why he was wandering round Kingsmeath’s skanky red light district in the middle of the bloody night. It wasn’t a patch on the upmarket ‘tolerance zone’ over in Logansferry. Here the hoors were unregulated, unprotected, and probably infectious. Milking the punters for all they were worth.

But at least he wasn’t going to get his balls cut off by some pimp. This lot were strictly freelance.

Brian hit pay dirt with the very first girl he tried: a stick-thin figure with hollow cheeks and dark eyes, wearing just enough clothes to stave off hypothermia. She took three wrappers.

Looked like Big Johnny was right – it was a piece of piss after all.

Brian made his way down the street, stopping to chat with the prozzies, blushing when they flirted with him, taking their money.

By quarter to twelve he was down to his last wrapper. Get a shift on and he could just make the Corner Emporium before it shut. Cider, fags, and a packet of rolling papers – been skimming the blow all night, selling people quarter-ounces of hash that weren’t
quite
up to size. Keeping enough for himself to get nice and high. Not stealing from Big Johnny Simpson, stealing from the customers. Not the same thing.

All he had to do was—

A woman in her early twenties with a mascara-streaked face and torn tights pawed at his sleeve. ‘You got any more?’ Her jacket was dirty up one side, hanging open to reveal a pale stomach, short skirt and low-cut top. She’d been pretty once, but it was a while ago. ‘C’mon, I’m dying here. Maggie says you’ve got!’

Brian gave her a smile. ‘It’s your lucky day.’ He held up the wrapper. ‘Last one.’

She licked her lips, fingers stroking her dead-fish belly, eyes shining. ‘How much?’

Brian told her and she swore.

‘You’re kidding – that’s
twice
what Dillon charges! It’s—’

‘Take it or leave it.’

‘But it’s been a shite night. . . I’m good for it!’ Wringing her hands, staring at the sparkling tinfoil. ‘I’ll pay you back.’

‘Sorry, love, it’s the rules. The guy I work for. . .’

She opened her coat wide and pulled up her top, showing off her naked breasts.

‘He . . . er. . .’ Brian blinked. Coughed.

‘Come on, you know how it works.’ She fumbled with his flies, groping her way into his underpants with cold fingers.