Authors: Cath Staincliffe
Zak
T
he house was gone. Zak stood there for a minute blinking as if his eyesight had just packed in and would start up again any second and hey presto, there’d be the view as it should be, the house and the trees and everything. Not so.
There was a pile of bricks in the centre of the plot and wooden joists and bits of window frames stacked to the side. All the brambles and the saplings had been stripped away and the bigger trees by the perimeter fence had been pruned. There was a big brazier too, blackened, and Zak caught the whiff of burning wood still in the air.
Zak shivered. The weather was bitter, his wrist ached with the cold, a gnawing pain and he wanted to rub it warm but it was still clad in the plaster cast.
He looked again at the house and shook his head. His sleeping bag had been in there, the spare clothes he had. He knew it would have been freezing in the winter but he could have burned stuff, made like an Indian in a tepee. Now he’d nowhere.
He walked to the PDSA, stopped a couple of passers-by with the mam in hospital story and got £1.50.
Bess was mental when she saw him. Wriggling and licking his face. He knew they didn’t have set charges, ’cos it was for poor people who couldn’t pay for a proper vet, but they liked you to make a contribution. He gave the woman his £1.50, said sorry it wasn’t more.
It was growing dark already as they left. Zak weighed up his options: a shop doorway or Midge’s. He rang Midge. ‘Just a night,’ he asked. ‘I’ll find somewhere tomorrow.’
Midge hesitated. Zak waited, hoping.
‘Can’t be any longer,’ Midge said.
‘Course not. Thanks, mate.’
There was a girl living with Midge now, Stacey, and she didn’t take to Zak, wrinkled her nose and went off to the bedroom when he got there. Midge raised his eyebrows and said she was a mardy cow but not to take any notice.
Later Stacey went out, trimmed up like a Christmas tree, all shiny and gaudy. Midge gave Zak a fiver and he went for chips and jumbo sausages and curry sauce (no sauce for Bess).
Midge had to stay in; he’d business to do. People calling round to score.
Zak and Midge had a blow after the chips. Started Zak’s cough off but he liked the blurry feeling that followed, made him dopey and giggly.
One of Midge’s customers brought a couple of big bottles of cider with him and they shared them and watched
Top Gear
and a
Bear Grylls
rerun, surviving in the jungle. Zak got the giggles, then the munchies, but Midge said they had to leave some stuff for Stacey.
Zak slept on the sofa, Bess alongside him on the floor nearby. Midge had turned the lights off but the curtains were sheer and the street light, a fierce blue-white, filled the room with a glow.
In the early hours he heard Stacey come back and clatter around. He smelt toast and bacon and his stomach growled. Bess twitched, raised her head and looked at him. He put his hand on her head for a bit. Then she relaxed again, settled back with a sigh.
Zak had a dream he was with Bear Grylls in the jungle. Bear was picking grubs off the floor and eating them. Zak felt sick and Bear was yelling at him, ‘Eat it or starve, see if I care!’ Then Bear was hitting him, hitting his head and making him feel even more sick. Zak woke up and he was glad he was in Manchester, on Midge’s couch, even if he was dead cold.
In the morning he didn’t see Stacey but Midge made him a fried egg buttie and a coffee. Zak took his pills. Midge asked him what they were but told him there wasn’t much of a call for them. Midge dealt in temazepam and co-codamol as well as weed and E’s. Zak thought he’d keep them anyway, try and sort his chest out for good.
‘Where you gonna go?’ Midge asked him.
Zak shrugged. He hated the hostels and they wouldn’t let him in with Bess, anyway.
‘Maybe another old wreck.’
Midge narrowed his eyes. ‘They’ve boarded up the Narrow Boat,’ he said. Zak imagined the pub, dark, smelling of old fags and beer. Better than nothing.
‘Need somewhere I can get into without too much bother.’
Midge waggled his head. ‘They’ve put grills up.’
They were watching
Jeremy Kyle
, the people screaming at each other, some lard-arse whinging about his girl’s spending habits, and there was a knock at the door. Midge let the lad in and took delivery of an M&S carrier. Paid him. When the boy had gone, Midge told Zak he was one of Carlton’s runners. ‘You know they put a reward out for Danny Macateer?’
Zak felt a shimmer of unease. Did Midge know something? Had Zak let something slip last night? He’d been pretty wrecked – he hadn’t said anything, had he? Something slithered inside him, a worm in his belly.
‘Twenty grand,’ Midge said.
‘You’d have to be mad,’ Zak said. ‘Even if you did know something.’
Midge agreed. ‘Never live to spend the dosh.’
Twenty grand. Zak’s head swum with pictures. A little flat and him and Bess with all their own stuff. Fridge full of food, the heating on, a power shower. Two bedrooms, one for his mam. He thought of Carlton raising the gun, the lad spinning and falling. Bess barking. Imagined himself turning down a road one day, brought up short, two lads with guns in their hands. Zak putting his own hands up as if palms could stop bullets. The jolts as one then another punched through him. A waterfall of fear and pain and Bess barking, barking as his sight went.
Zak shivered. ‘Suicide,’ he agreed. No one would ever give up Carlton, no matter how high the reward.
That afternoon he set out, went by the Narrow Boat but the grills were heavy duty, a professional job. You’d need power tools to break in there. He walked all round for hours but didn’t see any likely spots. He sat with Bess in the launderette to warm up a bit. The smell was good in there, clean and soapy. He was starving by teatime. He did an hour on the supermarket car park and made a few bob. Bought a double cheeseburger and shared it with Bess. He thought about trying town. They were still building stuff round the canals but the trouble was the security in the new places was really tight. Dogs and nightwatchmen and cameras. A condemned building would be better.
He got the bus over to Longsight, got off on Dickie Road by the street market and walked along Stockport Road to Levenshulme. One or two places did seem derelict but when you looked closer you’d see movement inside, or steamed-up windows, and know better.
Zak’s feet were hurting. He’d got a blister on his little toe. It grew dark and began to rain, soft and fine like a net. He bought some Lambrini and tobacco and Mars bars and food for Bess. Then he found a cardboard box left out for the recycling. Off a new dishwasher. Still pretty dry. He took that and went up to Levenshulme train station. Once the platform was empty, he clambered down on to the tracks and underneath the platform where he could rig up a hidey hole. The cardboard flattened out was their bed. He’d have to get a sleeping bag sorted in the morning.
He slept fitfully. After eleven nothing stopped at the station but the trains ran all night; the vibration singing in his bones before he could even hear the engines, then the rattle and crash and roar and the dust as they came racing through. Freight trains. He couldn’t tell what they were carrying, some had old-fashioned trucks but others were long lines of containers, some with signs he thought might be Chinese.
He’d have to find a place to stay. He’d never make it sleeping rough. The knife in his chest was twisting again and he couldn’t stop shivering, his skin was greasy from the trains, he felt like he’d got diesel in his lungs. He cuddled up to Bess, desperate to get warm. She whined and licked his face. Good dog. He closed his eyes and felt the tickle of her fur on his cheek, breathed in her doggy smell and listened to a police siren whooping through the night.
Cheryl
V
inia told Cheryl that she’d heard Carlton and his boys talking about the latest shooting and the chat coming round to Danny. Carlton bragging how that had sent a message plain and clear to the rival gangs.
‘What message?’ Cheryl asked. ‘That they’re stone killers and they don’t care who they hit?’
Vinia cut her eyes at her, pulled her hand away. Cheryl had manicured Vinia’s nails, was now doing the base layer. ‘You want me to tell you or you just gonna keep interrupting all the time?’ Vinia snapped.
‘Don’t have a fit,’ Cheryl said.
Vinia huffed.
‘Just tell me.’
‘He said Danny wasn’t a player but he was a blood relation to some of the Nineteen Crew. Taking him out would show them this was war. No rules all’s fair.’
Cheryl looked at Vinia. ‘By that reckoning, makes you fair game an’ all. Relation of Carlton.’
‘I ain’t agreeing with it,’ Vinia protested, ‘just saying, that’s all.’
Cheryl hated Carlton for what he’d done, probably hated him more because they were all so weak and helpless around him, no one to raise a voice. Except Nana and even she wouldn’t be so stupid as to do it in the man’s hearing. How come Nana was so brave? Had she been born brave or did she get braver as she grew older?
‘You seeing Jeri soon?’ Vinia held her other hand out. Cheryl checked the nails were dry and began applying the next coat. Vinia wanted sunsets on each nail:
real bright, you hear me
.
‘He wants me to go down to Bristol next weekend.’
‘You go, girl.’
Cheryl hummed. ‘I’d have to leave Milo, two nights. Nana’d be wiped out. One’s enough.’
‘She can nap in the day,’ Vinia pointed out. ‘You not interested,’ she joked, ‘move over and make room, honey. I’ll get me some.’
Cheryl was unsure, uneasy about going. Not just on Nana’s account neither. She liked Jeri, she liked him so much, but sometimes she wondered why he bothered with her. She’d gone over to Liverpool one time, when he was working, spent the night in a smart hotel and he’d come to Manchester again, a rare Saturday night off when he’d met Milo and Nana.
Nana had gone into holy-roller mode, quizzing Jeri about his folks and his church and all. He was polite with her but didn’t pretend to be religious and Nana made it clear that he was a great disappointment in that regard. She seemed to think his work as a DJ was akin to some loser on a boom box in a shebeen, even when Cheryl explained that Jeri was playing in proper clubs and on the radio and not some illegal drinking den. ‘Got bookings all over, Nana, Ibiza, Japan even. He pays tax. It’s a really good job.’
When Jeri came to Manchester they stayed at the Hilton on Deansgate. Cheryl knew Jeri wanted to impress her and he did. It was expensive, even for someone like him who was used to hotels. She loved it. The bed big as a boat, the yards of carpeting, the thick white bath towels. They ate in the restaurant there that evening, views looking right out over the city. She felt ignorant and clumsy at first, seeing the formal tableware, the bright expression of their waiter in his fancy apron. But Jeri put her at ease, had the same easy friendly manner with everyone, not stuck up. He told her he’d once been a waiter, knew what it was like to get snobby customers, the sort that liked to make you feel small, like they were better than you. She imagined Carlton there in the restaurant, how it would all be about face and impression, scoring points. Every interaction a power play.
When Jeri talked about his music, his face came alive, bright with excitement. ‘Still can’t believe how lucky I am,’ he said. ‘Started out at school, playing on borrowed decks, got to do a couple of music festivals, promoter caught me, liked what he saw and next thing he’s got me a spot in Monte Carlo. Kid off a shit estate up there spinning tunes and they’re all going for it – fat cats and the yachting brigade – chanting my name!’
‘Yachting?’ Cheryl laughed. ‘But you still live in Bristol?’
‘Love it. Moved house though – like a shot. You come down; I’ll give you the tour.’
She smiled. ‘Rags to riches.’
‘Summat like that,’ he grinned back at her.
They’d gone back to their room and got to know each other real well in that wide bed. Jeri laughed when he came, Cheryl cried when she did. And that was just fine.
She was falling for him deep and that was scary, she didn’t see how it could work, him jetting here and there, a big name on the dance scene, and her stuck in Hulme on benefits with Nana and Milo.
Bristol was a step too far too soon. Going there would show she was committed and surely it wouldn’t be long after that, knowing he had won her, that Jeri would cool and turn, moving on to the next girl who caught his eye.
Cheryl finished painting Vinia’s sunsets and made a cup of tea. The milk had run out so she left Vinia blowing at her nails and went along to Sid’s for some.
It was a foggy night; she could smell yeast on the air from the lager plant up on Princess Road. The fog hung in shreds round the street lights and distorted and muffled the sounds: traffic from the main road, footsteps and the cough of a car engine that wouldn’t start.
Cheryl bought cigs and some Murray Mints for Nana. She was 2p short but Sid let her off.
‘I’ll bring it next time,’ she promised. She knew he sent money home to Pakistan.
‘Don’t be daft,’ he told her, ‘it’s only pennies.’
Sid was there from seven thirty in the morning till eleven at night, seven days a week. Cheryl wondered how he stood it – the boredom – even with his telly tuned to some Urdu station.
Cheryl had just left the shop, opening the packet to have a smoke on the way home, when the shot rang out. Jesus! Deafening. A boom that she felt through the soles of her feet, in her teeth. She ducked, instinctively, and ran back into the shop. ‘Oh, God! Oh, no!’ Her heart thundering in her chest, her muscles spasming with fear.
‘Hey!’ Sid was all concern.
‘They’re shooting!’ she shouted. Dread burning in her blood: guns blazing, someone getting killed.
‘No – listen.’
She did, heard a cracking sound, then a droning whistle.
‘Fireworks,’ he said. ‘The big one was a mortar.’
She felt like weeping.
‘It’s against the law to sell them at this time of year,’ Sid said.
‘It’s against the law to shoot people too,’ she snapped, cross suddenly, fed up with it. ‘That doesn’t stop ’em.’
Sid laughed and Cheryl started too, wiping her face and sniffing, still trembling.
‘Are you okay?’ he asked her.
‘Yeah.’ Just scared. Always scared. This was how it would be, she thought, on forever. Like Sid in his shop, day after day, year in year out. Suffocating. Waiting for the next time, the next crack of gunfire, the next death, and the one after that. A whole life holding her breath.
While Milo listened to
Each Peach Pear Plum
at Storytime, Cheryl looked up the number on the library computer again. Nana was at the hospital seeing one of the doctors there. She didn’t want an audience, thank you very much.
Home again, Cheryl rang the number, her head buzzy and a knot in her belly. When she spoke her voice sounded weird, like it didn’t belong to her. ‘I know who shot Danny Macateer,’ she said, ‘but if they find out I’ve told anyone they’ll kill me.’
She was standing in the front room, at the window, gazing through the net curtains. Nana had the winter ones up, thick, lace effect, a flower design. Cheryl watched a woman walk past carrying shopping, looking worn out.
The man, his name was Joe, told her they would protect her identity.
‘I can’t move away,’ she said, ‘I’ve got family.’
‘That’s fine,’ he said. ‘No one in the area will ever know that you helped us. You will be an anonymous witness; no one will know who you are.’ He thanked her for coming forward, said he understood how difficult that must have been. But how important it was. ‘We will need you to come in and make a full statement,’ he said. He told her where the police station was and said she could choose a time to suit her.
‘This afternoon,’ Cheryl said. She’d go crazy if she had to wait overnight. She had someone coming for nails at one. ‘About three. I’ve got a little boy; I’ll have to bring him with me.’
‘No problem,’ said Joe. ‘Take my mobile number. It’s always on, you can get me wherever I am.’ He read it out. Then, ‘Can I take your name?’
Cheryl felt a chill inside, a giddy feeling, like she might fall over. ‘Do you have to?’ Couldn’t she be anonymous to him, too?
‘I will need it for your evidence but it won’t be shared with anyone else. I guarantee that.’
He waited.
Cheryl looked back into the room: at the mantelpiece with Nana’s fancy gold-coloured clock, her own school photos on the wall, the embroidered mats on the back of the sofa that Milo always pulled off. Within her the fear that if she told him her name there would be no going back. That the room and everything else in her life might be lost.
She pressed her lips tight together, heard her breath shudder. Then the sound of the man’s breath at the other end of the line. She thought of Danny singing his song and the way her legs had weakened when she heard the firework. She thought of Milo. Imagined him not coming home one night. Imagined him growing up without the gangs at his heels. ‘Cheryl,’ she said. ‘Cheryl Williamson.’
Cheryl didn’t know which bus would take her to the police station, or if they even ran on time. So she decided to walk. She guessed it would take about half an hour. She fed Milo early and changed his nappy, got his bag sorted and some juice to take. He had his nap while she did a French manicure and pedicure for a friend of Vinia’s. The girl paid Cheryl and gave her a couple of quid tip, which was cool.
Cheryl was just going to get Milo up when there was a knock at the door. She thought perhaps Vinia’s friend had forgotten something. A man and a woman stood there. In suits. Her first thought was Jehovah’s Witnesses but they weren’t smiling so they couldn’t have been selling anything.
The woman stared at her. ‘Cheryl Williamson?’
They knew her name! Cheryl felt her stomach drop. Were they from the police? Had Joe sent them? Was it a trap?
‘We’re from the Department for Work and Pensions. Can we come in a moment?’ The woman wore dark lipstick, purple, too severe for her face. The man was young and fat with baby blue eyes; he carried a file.
‘I’m just going out,’ Cheryl said.
‘That’ll have to wait,’ the woman told her.
Cheryl let them in; she didn’t know what else to do. Perhaps if they were quick she’d still make her appointment. ‘What’s it all about?’ Cheryl tried to keep the apprehension from her voice. Maybe it would be some scheme they wanted her to go on, access into work or something. But who’d look after Milo? And she’d miss him; he was only a baby really.
‘You claim Income Support,’ the woman said, ‘we have copies of your files here. Your benefit is means tested and you have a duty to report any change in circumstances, including any additional income.’
The man patted the file with one dimpled hand. Cheryl felt her face grow warm.
‘You declare that you have no income from employment but that isn’t true, is it, Miss Williamson? You are running a business from home.’
Running a business! Cheryl nearly laughed but knew that would be a stupid thing to do. ‘No, I’m not,’ she said. ‘What business?’
‘You’re denying it?’ The woman motioned to the man and he opened the file and passed her a piece of paper. She had a fancy pen and wrote something down. ‘A nail salon,’ she said with an edge and made a point of looking over at the trolley in the corner where Cheryl’s polishes and creams, glue and false nails and tools were all kept in plastic containers. See-through containers. ‘Benefit fraud is an extremely serious offence.’
Fraud! How did they know? Had someone shopped her? She felt grubby; they thought she was a scrounger, milking the system, making a mint. It had never been like that, she just tried to help out a bit so they could cover the bills, get things fixed when they broke. Twenty quid here and there. She kept looking down. ‘I’m going to be really late,’ she said. ‘Can I do this tomorrow?’
‘Other work to do?’ the woman said smartly.
‘No, erm, hospital.’ Cheryl felt sick. ‘I’ll have to ring them. Explain.’
‘Hospital?’ The woman frowned. ‘An appointment?’
Cheryl didn’t want her checking up. She stalled for a moment: ‘Just antenatal group. But I’d better let them know.’ The woman couldn’t check whether she was pregnant, could she?
The woman nodded. ‘We could be some time.’
Cheryl rang the number Joe had given her, and he answered quickly. ‘Hi, it’s Cheryl Williamson,’ she said. ‘I was coming in for three but I can’t come now.’
‘Can you tell me why?’ He sounded alert, secretive.
‘They, erm, the benefits people are here.’
‘Cheryl, where are you?’
Didn’t he believe her?
‘I’m at home.’
‘I don’t have your address.’
She hesitated, gave it. The woman was watching her. Had she twigged it wasn’t the hospital? ‘Thanks,’ Cheryl said. ‘I’ll try and make it next time.’
It can’t have been more than five minutes and he arrived. He wasn’t like she’d imagined, he sounded younger on the phone but he was quite old with grey hair and a lot of wrinkles round his eyes. Laugh lines. Cheryl wondered what he had to laugh about, doing a job like that.
The door had woken Milo. Joe introduced himself to her visitors, then suggested Cheryl see to the baby and leave Joe to have a word.
She left the living-room door open a bit and as soon as Milo stopped crying, Cheryl sat on the stairs with him.
The benefits woman was spitting mad. ‘You can’t just tell us to back off,’ she was complaining. ‘Have you any idea what benefit fraud costs the nation every year?’
Joe said something back, too quiet for Cheryl to catch the beginning but she heard the rest. ‘And if you insist on interfering with a witness, I can have you both arrested.’
‘You can’t do that!’ Purple lips was outraged.
‘Oh, yes I can. Though I’d rather not. It does seem rather extreme.’